Books at the Stake: a Case of Book Censorship in Verona in 1494. Frà Domenico de Carpanis and the Controversy over the Immaculate Conception

Abstract

On May 28, 1494 the Venetian Senate ordered the destruction by fire of all copies of a printed pamphlet containing a defamatory 'frotula' against the Dominican Order written by the Neapolitan friar Domenico de Carpanis, who was previously a Dominican himself but later joined the Franciscan Order. De Carpanis was also author of the Sermoni della concezione della Beata Vergine Maria, written against the so called 'maculists', those who - like the Dominican Vincenzo Bandello - refused the thesis of the 'Immaculate Conception' of Mary. The analysis of this vernacular sermon provides details about De Carpani's biography and also clues regarding the place and date of printing of his Aristotelian text De nutrienda memoria, that was believed to be a Neapolitan edition of 1476 and instead could only have been printed in Veneto (Verona or Venice) and not before 1489.