Carabinieri return a letter to Ludovico Ariosto to the State Archives in Massa

Carabinieri for the Protection of Cultural Heritage in Venice have returned to theState Archives in Massa a letter written by Duke Alfonso I d’Este addressed to Ludovico Ariosto. The missive had been stolen from the Massa archives. The military, coordinated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office at the Court of Verona, with the help of officials from the General Directorate of Archives and related peripheral offices of the Ministry of Culture, in July intercepted the property in a private negotiation and then proceeded to seize it as an inalienable “cultural asset.”

It is a letter sent on February 13, 1524, by the duke to Ludovico Ariosto, who was the Commissioner General in Garfagnana at the time. The letter deals with theadministration of justice in that hostile and difficult-to-manage territory, a land of brigands in the service of local squires. The ducal reply takes up his commissioner’s remarks and shows his intention to want to react to provocations while comforting Ariosto by expanding his powers of action and confirming his full confidence.

As many as 117 letters from Alfonso I d’Este to Ludovico Ariosto are preserved in the Garfagnana Archives, which were poured into the State Archives in Massa at the end of the 19th century. The investigations carried out ascertained the authenticity of the manuscript and its belonging to the Massa State Archives, confirmed by the presence of the numbering present on the aforementioned letters given by Giovanni Sforza, the first director of the Massa State Archives (1887 -1903).

Image: Titian, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto, detail (c. 1515; Minneapolis, Minneapolis Institute of Art)

Carabinieri return a letter to Ludovico Ariosto to the State Archives in Massa

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