Communities

The contribution aims to analyze the various groups which formed, during the first centuries of the modern era, in the Central and Western World, communities of professors and students found within universities with ever increasingly strict hierarchies. Colleges of doctors, university students (grouped into nationes or colleges) and governing bodies are discussed in the first instance to understand the distinctive traits of these communities of higher learning which were in constant dialogue with the local political powers to negotiate their independence which was also being steadily eroded by the States. The social and cultural background of university professors and students undergoes a huge evolution at the beginning of the modern age when it became fashionable for the nobility to attend university and as a consequence the number of graduates increased. At the same time, under the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, the geographical area where professors and students came from decreased and the intake was increasingly from the local area. RAPPORTO CON I GESUITI Also to be addressed is the variety of intellectual groups (students academies, groups animated by professors, scientific societies, intellectual circles, academies encouraged within colleges) that allowed, like universities, for a lively cultural debate made up of exchanges, writings, experience sharing and enabled a close and strong relationship of the members of a ‘Republic of Letters’ which existed without geographical confines and was expanding quickly in the 16th century.