Imprimatur (book)

Imprimatur is the title of an Italian novel, written by Rita Monaldi and Francesco Sorti. The book was published in 2002 in Italy, after which it was published in various other countries. The novel became a large success, in Europe alone over 250,000 copies were sold.

Plot Summary

The story is set in a Roman inn in the year 1683. Ten guests of varying origin are staying: a French guitar player, a Tuscan doctor, a Venetian glass artist, an English refugee, a Napolitan Astrologer posing as an artist and an enigmatic Jansenist. Everyone is carrying his own secrets with him. When the old French nobleman De Mourai dies one morning, the inn is placed under quarantine because the authorities believe the plague has broken loose. One guest, the mysterious abbot Atto Melani, suspects the Frenchman has been poisoned. Together with the young servant, who is telling the story, he starts to investigate.
Together Abbot Melani and the servant discover a network of ancient tunnels, once used by Christians to avoid Roman prosecution. They also discover that other guest of the inn are also using the tunnels for their own mysterious reasons.
While this story unfolds, the whole Christian population is anxiously awaiting the outcome of the Turkish siege of Vienna. If Christian reinforcements arrive too late, Vienna will fall and Europe will be at the mercy of the unfaithful. The Christian coalition is assembled by pope Innocent XI.

Background

Although the story itself is fiction, many of the persona and events are not. The book is based on years of research by Monaldi and Sorti, who dug up lots of information about the siege of Vienna, the plague and Atto Melani. Beside this they also found lots of information about astrology, recipes, medicine, clothing, music and theology. Much of this information was copied into Imprimatur directly from 17th-century manuscripts.
The book shows a slight resemblance to The Name of the Rose from the Italian author Umberto Eco. Both novels feature a detective duo, where a worldly investigator guides an inexperienced companion, who is also the storyteller. Also the abundance of facts about a variety of subjects - from astrology to medicine - was a trademark in Eco's work.

The Imprimatur Affaire

Shortly after its publication Imprimatur caused a lot of turmoil,^[1] because the authors novelized something that could damage the reputation of the Catholic Church, the pope and the Vatican. Monaldi and Sorti novelized that Pope Innocent XI had, through his own family bank (the Odescalchis in Como), lent money to the Protestant house of Orange. Partly due to this financial support the Dutch sovereign William III could overthrow the English sovereign James II and seize the English crown. Subsequently, William ousted the English sovereign to France and abolished Catholicism as official religion. This Glorious Revolution was a triumph for Protestantism. Pope Innocent was motivated by political reasons only: he wanted to prevent Great Britain and France to form an alliance that could threaten the Vatican supremacy.

But this theory lack of historical evidence.^{[citation needed]} In fact, on the one hand, it does not consider the bad relationship between Papal State and France, and on the other hand, it underestimates the good relationship between France and James II. As Roman Catholic Pope, Innocent XI was concerned to defend the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome against the Louis XIV Gallicanism. Innocent XI financial support to William of Orange was solely attempting to avoid any schismatic aspiration of Louis XIV and the rejection of Ultramontanism in England by James II.

After the first edition was sold out, a new edition appeared rather late; advertisements and additional promotion of the book were kept to a minimum.

References