Pietas cristiana e felicità pubblica. Pauperismo e pensiero assistenziale in due Ducati padani nel secolo dei Lumi (Christian pietas and public happiness. Pauperism and chartitable thought in two Po duchies in the age of Enlightenment)

A millennial evolution of collective mentality towards poverty comes to an ideal landing point in the Age of Enlightenment. The original ethical connotations of social medicine and of the requirements for the spiritual salvation of the rich have been progressively nuanced, and the poor is plunges into a troubled fragment of the social body, falling into diverse categories of marginality and deviance. Broadening the scope of analysis to the reformist ferments that, in different cultural circles, permeate the eighteenth century debate on poor relief, the essay focuses on the peculiar reality of two neighbouring duchies of the Po Valley, highlighting significant differences. While in the capital of the Duchy of Modena – based on the ground already cleared by Ludovico Antonio Muratori in the first half of the 18th century – a renewed organic reflection leads up to the strong reformist policy of Ludovico Ricci, in the neighbouring Parma the lively reformist interlude of the French minister Du Tillot comes to end, and this crisis may explain why only a few unpublished memoirs circulate, while there are no significant printed works on the urgent issue of poor relief.