Library

Vittorio Presbyter The only information about him is what he himself wrote down in the volumes of the Fund: he was originally from Vogogna and was a lawyer.
Among the Library's collection, 123 works belonging to the lawyer have been identified so far. Vittorio Presbyter.
From the first investigations carried out among the material of the Newspaper Library, it can be assumed that many of the most important nineteenth-century publications can be traced back to Presbitero.

Arrival and history of the fund

No documents have yet been found indicating the date and manner of arrival of the Presbitero Collection, one of the least known and studied collections in the Museum. The presence of inventory numbers from the first series on some of the works, cancelled due to the disappearance of the reference register, suggests that they arrived at the Library between the late 1930s and the mid-1940s. Works attributed to the Presbitero Collection bear the owner's signature on the title page.
Most of the works belonged to Vittorio The presbytery identified so far deals with the history of the Risorgimento Italian and are very often contemporary with the events narrated. Italian and French philosophical and political works of the eighteenth century.

Vittorio Parmentola (Oulx 1903 – Turin 1985), a republican, was among the founders of the Italian Mazzinian Association and editor of the periodical Il pensiero mazziniano. He authored historical essays on Mazzinian thought. Between 1973 and 1981, he was Director of the Museum and devoted himself particularly to the Library and Historical Archives.
In the Newspaper Library the following have been traced back to Parmentola so far:
Nouvelles de divers endroits, Bern (RI.286) (RI.C.29, INV. PER.154)
The Livorno indicator: journal of science, literature and arts, Livorno, 1829-1830, contains a manuscript index of the articles of the director Francesco Domenico Guerrazzi).

Arrival and history of the fund

The donation of the complete collection of the Livorno Indicator dates back to 1973.

Fund topics

History of Mazzinianism and of the Risorgimento Italian

Consistency of the bottom

668 works donated by have been identified so far Vittorio Parmentola.

Terenzio Grandi (Valenza Po 1884 – Turin 1981), a Mazzinian since adolescence, had many interests, particularly in politics, ethically understood as a lay apostolate of duty. He was a publicist and historian, editor and correspondent for newspapers and periodicals. A member of the Republican Party from the early twentieth century, he founded and edited Il pensiero mazziniano. Together with his wife Ernesta, he was among the founders of the Italian Mazzinian Association, of which he was a tireless promoter.
In 1992 the Museum promoted the publication of Terenzio Grandi's correspondence with Arcangelo Ghisleri entitled The Intransigent and the Idealist (1904-1938).
In 1980 Lorenza Grandi donated the Archive and a significant portion of the volumes from her father's library to the Museum (approximately 500 works by Terenzio Grandi are preserved at the Giuseppe Grosso Library of the Province of Turin).
The Terenzio Grandi book collection contains the entire works of Giuseppe Mazzini, a large part of the historiography on Mazzinianism from the first half of the last century, volumes on Risorgimento Italian, on the history of the origins of the Republican Party and the 19th-century Republicans, in particular the actor Giulio Modena, whose archive Grandi collected.
Of particular importance in the pamphlet collection are documents on the history of the art of printing, and collections (defined by Grandi as “Essays”) of loose issues of Italian and foreign newspapers, divided by genre (for example, the clandestine press of the Resistance).

Renzo Rizzi began his business as a bookseller in 1948 in the antiquarian section of the publisher Ulrico Hoepli. In 1954, he opened the Renzo Rizzi antiquarian bookshop at Via Manzoni 17 in Milan.

Arrival and history of the fund

On June 24, 1957, the bookseller Renzo Rizzi wrote to the director of the Museum, Professor Luigi Bulferetti, to inform him that one of his clients, living 50 kilometers from Milan, wanted to sell the Risorgimentale Library established by her husband, who had recently passed away. The collection consists of 1.580 works from the Risorgimento in 2.340 volumes, approximately 500 works from the Great War in 755 volumes, 7.539 loose pamphlets from the Risorgimento period, 1.465 loose pamphlets from the Great War, 843 rare pamphlets bound in 49 volumes. After a series of negotiations and the necessary checks to exclude works already owned by the Library, the Museum will purchase 1.450 monographic works and 7.382 pamphlets, thus renouncing the material on the Great War.
The purchase of the Rizzi Fund was completed on 16 December 1957.
The most frequently represented topics are the history of the French Revolution, the Italian Revolutionary Triennium, and the Napoleonic period, with particular emphasis on Italian affairs. Of particular note are the two miscellanies RIZZI.535 and RIZZI.679 (the latter called the Republican Catechism), which collect, among other things, pamphlets and loose sheets published in Venice and the Ionian Islands between 1797 and 1799, some of which are truly unique pieces. History of the Risorgimento Italian with works of a general nature and others on specific political battles and events, biographies and autobiographies, history of other European nations contemporary to the Risorgimento Italian.

Narciso Nada (Turin 1925 – 2004) was a professor of History of Risorgimento at the University of Turin from 1950 to 1990 with the exception of a period between 1962 and 1969 in which he held the same position in Genoa.
He collaborated with various Piedmontese cultural institutions, including the Museum, where he directed the Friends of the Museum Association and served on its Board of Directors for several years. Professor Nada's work, thanks also to his experience in library science, is a constant in the Library's history: his collaboration was fundamental to the growth and reorganization of the collections, especially between the 1960s and 1980s. Professor Nada's work exemplifies the close collaboration—before him, since the Museum's permanent opening in 1908, and after him, up to the present—of the provision of expertise to the Museum, the Library, and the Historical Archives by the professors of History. Risorgimento of the University of Turin.

Fund topics

Risorgimento Italian and 19th-century European history with many works belonging to Italian and foreign Risorgimento historiography published in the second half of the 20th century. The collection of pamphlets is also very important due to the rarity of some documents.

La Gazzetta del Popolo, a political newspaper founded in Turin on June 16, 1848, by Giovan Battista Botero, Felice Govean, and Alessandro Borella, was the most widely read and popular newspaper in Piedmont until the early 20th century. It closed on December 31, 1983.
In 1932, the “Historical Archive of the Gazzetta del Popolo” was established at the headquarters in Corso Valdocco with the aim of collecting documents and memorabilia that testify to the history of the newspaper (it is therefore not the editorial archive) and of the men who worked for it from 1848 onwards. In 1940, the year in which the Archive took the name “Historical Exhibition of the Gazzetta del Popolo”, the collection occupied 14 rooms of the newspaper building.

Arrival and history of the fund

The donation from SET (Turin Publishing Company) dates back to 1953. The memorabilia and documents from the “Historical Exhibition of the Gazzetta del Popolo” were physically delivered to the Museum on March 15, 1956, contained in 48 crates, each weighing 100 kg, accompanied by a general and summary list of their contents.
These included archival documents, books, pamphlets, periodicals, photographs, posters, proclamations, edicts, and memorabilia which, in the decades following their arrival, were divided between the Library, Historical Archives, and the Museum's Iconographic Cabinet.
Most of the books and periodicals were catalogued starting in the 1970s; the pamphlets and books with more markedly fascist themes were instead filed in the early 2000s.

Fund topics

History of Italy from the Risorgimento to the fall of Fascism; works on fascist politics, doctrine, and propaganda; classics of Italian and French literature and philosophy; collections of laws; encyclopedias and dictionaries.

Consistency of the bottom

To date, 3.157 volumes and pamphlets from the “Historical Exhibition of the Gazzetta del Popolo” have been identified.

Irene di Robilant (ca. 1895-19..?) essayist, was the author of Vita americana (United States of North America), preface by Giuseppe Prezzolini, Turin, Bocca, 1929, animator of the Italy-America Society of New York and friend of Benedetto Croce.

Arrival and history of the fund

The Robilant Fund consists of various donations received by the Museum starting in 1948; in 1952, Countess Irene di Robilant donated to the Museum the books and memorabilia that belonged to Father General Mario Nicolis di Robilant.
The Countess also provided in her will that all historical works preserved in the family library in Malgrà Castle be donated to the Museum Library. Marilù di Robilant, executor of her sister Irene's will, sent approximately 500 volumes to the Museum in 1972. These included works that had belonged to her great-grandfather, General Enrico Morozzo della Rocca.

Fund topics

Works, including French and English editions, on the history of Italy and the House of Savoy in the 19th century. Many volumes are in fine bindings with inserts from the family libraries they belong to (Morozzo della Rocca and Nicolis di Robilant).
The presence of the label with signature on the back cover allows the attribution to the Robilant-Morozzo della Rocca family library of three works belonging to Carlo Alberto of Savoy-Carignano, almost certainly the only ones in the Library attributable to the royal family:
LA Muratori, Annals of Italy from the beginning of the common era until the year 1749, Milan, from the Società tipografica de' classici italiani contrada del Cappuccio, 1818-1821 (with 19th century green morocco binding and dry-decorated plates with gold squares which have the monogram of Carlo Alberto (stamped in gold)
HG Mirabeau, De la monarchie prussienne, sous Frédéric le Grand, A Londres, Louis Laurent Edme Lejay, 1788 (with 19th century leather binding and gold decorated edges, they have on the front cover the ex libris of Carlo Alberto)
E. Condillac, Cours d'étude pour l'instruction du Prince de Parme, aujourd'hui SAR l'infant d. Ferdinand duc de Parme, Plaisance, Guastalle etc., Parma, 1782 (with leather binding from the 18th century, on the boards, spine and lips gold friezes, on the spine dowels with gold tit. and partition have on the front pastedown the ex libris of Carlo Alberto)

Consistency of the bottom

229 works donated by Irene di Robilant have been identified so far.

Cesare Alfieri di Sostegno (Turin 1799 – Florence 1869) initially undertook a diplomatic career which he interrupted in 1827 when he became first equerry of Carlo AlbertoAfter several years dedicated to studying social sciences, the King appointed him to several positions, including that of Magistrate for Educational Reform in 1844. Thanks to this position, he was able to reorganize the education system of the Kingdom of Sardinia, putting into practice his knowledge of the progress made in the field of teaching in Europe. In 1847, he was appointed Minister of Public Education, the first in the Kingdom of Sardinia.
He was an authoritative advisor to the king Carlo Alberto and a fervent supporter of the granting of the Statute, the draft of which he helped draft. After the armistice, Salasco served as Prime Minister for two months. A Senator, he was President of the Senate from 1855 to 1860.
The Cesare Alfieri Collection is made up of 1.284 monographs.

Arrival and history of the fund

The Cesare Alfieri Fund was donated to the Museum by the Marchioness Margherita Visconti Venosta, custodian of the Lascaris Risorgimento legacy Cavour Alfieri, in 1972, at the request of Professor Narciso Nada.
Before being donated to the Museum, the volumes of the Cesare Alfieri Collection were stored at the Castle of San Martino Alfieri. The works represent only a portion of what was the Alfieri Library towards the end of the 19th century: some of the volumes were donated to the Cesare Alfieri Institute of Political Science in Florence, and others were subsequently donated to the Alfieri Foundation in Asti.
The curator and reorganizer of the Alfieri Library at the Museum was Professor Narciso Nada, founder of the Association of Friends of the National Museum of Risorgimento Italian who in those years was president and later advisor to the Museum itself.

Fund topics

Works relating to the men and events of the Risorgimento Italian; of the leading French politicians, historians, and writers of the time, demonstrating the profound influence that French culture had on the ruling class of the Subalpine region; religious literature, with numerous works on the history of Christianity and the Catholic Church; and pedagogical works relating to the problems of education and childcare, in which Cesare Alfieri had a keen interest.
The collection of works by the major exponents of nineteenth-century European liberalism is particularly large: Guizot, Cousin, Tocqueville, Michelet, Madame de Stael, Sismondi and others.
The greatest value of the Alfieri Fund is certainly its European character which documents the links that existed between Italy in that period Risorgimento and Europe, the history of liberal and national movements and the revival of ideals of freedom in the history of a significant part of the continent during the nineteenth century.

Consistency of the bottom

1.284 monographs

Camillo Grandini (Milan 1909-1967) was a partisan of Giustizia e Libertà. In 1944, he was deported to Mauthausen with several prominent Milanese intellectuals, including the architect Lodovico Barbiano di Belgiojoso, who became his close friend from then on.
Grandini was a great history enthusiast and, in particular, of the French Revolution and the Risorgimento Italian. He built a personal library of 4.500-5.000 books, many of them with precious bindings.

Tommaso Villa (Canale d'Alba 1832 – Turin 1915) was a politician and lawyer. A member of Parliament (1865-1909) and senator (from 1909), he was Minister of the Interior (1879) and Minister of Justice and Religious Affairs (1879-1881).
At the death of Vittorio Emanuele He was among the most important supporters of the creation of a museum of national history from which, thanks to his influence and tireless work, the National Museum of Risorgimento Italian.
He was President of the Executive Committee for the Italian General Exhibition in Turin in 1884 and President of the Italian Commission for the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1900.
The Museum's historical archives preserve the papers of the Tommaso Villa Fund, purchased in 1993.
The Fund is made up of the volumes of Parliamentary Acts from 1848 to 1884 (missing are the 6 volumes of Bills, Reports, Documents and the 12 volumes of Discussions of the Chamber of Deputies of the VIII Legislature, Session II 1863-1865) and the Parliamentary Speeches of the Count Camillo di Cavour collected and published by order of the Chamber of Deputies, Turin, for the Botta heirs, 1863-1872, volumes 1-11.

Alessandro Galante Garrone (Vercelli 1909 – Turin 2003), a leading figure in the Resistance movement fought in the ranks of the Action Party, was a magistrate for thirty years, while simultaneously dedicating himself to historical studies. From 1966 to 1979 he was a professor of History of the Risorgimento at the University of Turin.
The AGG Section is composed of 941 monographic works.

Arrival and history of the fund

The Alessandro Garrone Fund was formed during the 1980s following donations made in various years; however, it is not his private library, which is kept at the Istoreto – Piedmontese Institute for the History of the Resistance and Contemporary Society.Giorgio August'

Fund topics

History of the Risorgimento Italian; history of European political movements of the 18th-20th centuries.

Consistency of the bottom

941 monographic works

Giovanni Marianetti (Pisa 1924 – Turin 2006) was a passionate bibliophile with broad interests and extensive expertise; he formed "his own collections through research conducted during the ritual breaks afforded by intense managerial activity."

Arrival and history of the fund

The Risorgimento Collection of Giovanni Marianetti was purchased by the CRT Foundation in 2007 and given on loan for use to the National Museum of Risorgimento Italian.
The collection, built up over many years of acquisitions and research, consists of works relating to every field of nineteenth-century culture and history: works by the major Italian and foreign thinkers and politicians of the 19th century; a notable presence of nineteenth- and twentieth-century historiography on the Risorgimento Italian; letters, memoirs, and biographies; local publishing (especially Piedmontese and Tuscan), school books, and children's books; travel guides.
For some highly successful and widely printed works, the presence of the various editions that followed over time is important, as with Massimo d'Azeglio's I miei ricordi.

The Garibaldi Bibliography of the Collection was started by Stefano Canzio (1898-1976), professor, historian, director of the Museum of Risorgimento from Milan and direct descendant of Giuseppe Garibaldi: his grandfather Stefano (Genoa, 1837-1909) was part of the Thousand and married Teresita, third-born daughter of the General and Anita.
The collection was continued and significantly expanded by his son Decio Canzio (Milan, 1930-2013), general manager of Sergio Bonelli Editore for over thirty years and a screenwriter. It is a specialized collection of approximately 1.200 monographic works by and about Giuseppe Garibaldi.