Old Members’ Trust Graduate Conference and Academic Travel Fund report – Antonio Pattori (2023, History)

In March 2025, I attended and spoke at the Renaissance Society of America 2025 annual conference in Boston, Massachusetts (USA).

I would firstly like to thank the Trustees of the Old Members’ Trust Graduate Conference and Academic Travel Fund for their generosity, which allowed me to cover accommodation costs in Boston. This is one of the most important conferences for historians of the Early Modern world, with more than 2,000 participants each year.

I presented at the conference, discussing the role of popular politics in Italian Renaissance Conspiracies through the lens of Rome’s “Talking Statues”. These were notorious statues where dissenting individuals pinned their anonymous criticisms of papal government in the form of rhymes, a genre of text which takes the name of “pasquinades”, after one of the infamous statues, named “Pasquino”. These were fundamental in spreading conspiratorial material against individuals and governments.

The paper was well received, and the other panellists and I have formed an informal research group on this topic to further our collaboration. The remainder of the conference was spent listening to the many other various papers and round table discussions, and meeting with colleagues to discuss ideas, common academic interests, and possible further collaboration projects.

I am incredibly grateful to the Trustees of the Old Members’ Trust Graduate Conference and Academic Travel Fund for helping to make this conference trip to Boston possible.

Published: 18 April 2025

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