Although it is common among reviewers to present the structure and content of the book first, and keep their readers in suspense of the actual verdict until the end of the review, I wish to break with that convention here. I would like to herald this history of Latin literature in Tyrol as a milestone in classical philology in terms of its design, the valuable insights it generates and the wealth of texts that are discussed. These volumes will not only prove indispensable for future studies of the intellectual history of central Europe, they will also bring about a change of paradigms in the way Latin literature is approached in general.

Researchers of Neo-Latin literature face various kinds of obstacles: on an institutional level, the field does not enjoy sufficient support from universities, and suffers from the ignorance in some academic circles where the notion prevails that only what has been thoroughly researched is of interest, and that only what is judged to be of interest should be researched. Within the field itself, problems include the overwhelming quantity of surviving Latin literature dating from the modern period to the nineteenth century, an abundance that is aggravated by a dearth of dictionaries, literary histories and up-to-date text editions for these specific periods. The contributors to the T(yrolis) L(atina) have responded to these problems by making a deliberate selection on a geographical and historical basis. Instead of focusing on nation states, which have been subject to stronger historical changes and only started to emerge in the course of the nineteenth century, they have limited their studies to Tyrol, which has been politically and culturally coherent as a territory from the thirteenth century, and comprises today's North, East and South Tyrol plus Trentino. The study covers the Middle Ages to the present. Within this frame, the dissolution of the Jesuit order in 1773 emerges as the most important event to distinguish between literary periods.

For readers from the English-speaking parts of the world, the most urgent question is perhaps why they should devote their attention to a publication dealing specifically with Tyrolian latinitas. There are several answers to this question. One of them lies in Tyrol's geographical and cultural importance as a gateway between Italy and Germany, especially considering Innsbruck's temporary status as an imperial residence, and the way intellectual and spiritual life flourished throughout the region as a result of its university, the involvement of the Jesuit order, and Brixen and Trento's status as bishoprics. The best argument in favour of engaging with this topic, however, is the impressive amount of material unearthed in the study: the approximately 7,000 Latin texts, written by 2,000 authors known by name and 1,400 anonymous authors, more than vindicate the choice. The impressive quantity of texts allows this publication to close crucial gaps in current research. Entitling the study a literary history of Latin literature IN Tyrol means that only texts written in Tyrol with content explicitly related to the region were included (e.g. dedicatory writings for a sovereign). However, this criterion leads to the problem of how to deal with texts by writers who published their works on an international level, as most Jesuit professors and itinerant teachers did.Footnote ¹ It is not possible to resolve this issue to full satisfaction. The decision made by the editors and research supervisor T. to classify their magnum opus as a literary history also calls for a short explanation: because few text editions are available, each author provides short text samples and summaries of the works in question, thereby creating a kind of search tool. All Latin quotations are translated into German. The editors also made the pragmatic and innovative decision to use a broad definition of the term ‘literature’. Alongside works of the highest formal perfection, there are samples of functional writing – such as students’ notes, congratulatory speeches, dissertations and publications dealing with language teaching or the natural sciences – as long as there was clear evidence of creative endeavour. Only inscriptions and official documents were excluded. Manuscripts which have not yet been edited receive equal attention to texts that are already available in print. This guarantees a representative overview of the extant material.

The volumes are organised into seven subsections. Volume 1: (1) from the beginnings of Tyrolian latinitas up to the reign of Meinhard II and the creation of Tyrol as an independent territory c. 1285; (2) from 1285 until the death of Emperor Maximilian I in 1519; (3) the sixteenth century until the death of Archduke Ferdinand II of Tyrol in 1595; (4) the seventeenth century until the Tyrolian line of the House of Habsburg became extinct in 1665 and the university was founded in 1669; Volume 2: (1) from the founding of the university to the dissolution of the Jesuit order in 1773; (2) from the expulsion of the Jesuit order to the revolution in 1848; (3) from the revolution in 1848 until today. The work also features an extensive appendix, which includes a bibliography of more than 100 pages, as well as an index nominum, geographicus and rerum for each of the volumes. Notes in the margins make it easier to navigate the text. Each of the subsections begins with a lucid introductory portrait of the respective period. The survey of each of the periods is then organised into individual chapters according to genre. Thankfully, generic classification is not based on an overly rigid system, but on the available source material. As a result, the ‘pedagogical’ eighteenth century features an entire chapter devoted to ‘Language Teaching, Poetics, Philology’ (TL 2, pp. 797–806), a genre that is not dealt with in similar detail elsewhere in the book.

Let me outline some of the results to be found among the many valuable chapters of this publication. First, it is especially noteworthy that both quantity and quality of the production of Latin literature peaked in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and that more literature from the nineteenth century has survived than from the sixteenth century. These observations not only mean that we ought to jettison the idea that the production of Latin literature was decaying from the Age of Enlightenment onwards, they also call for a change of focus in classical philology when it comes to the topics, the chronology and the geography selected for studies. Latin Jesuit drama, for instance, prospered once more before an end was put to its production in Austria in 1764, up to which point it enjoyed unceasing popularity with its audience.

Second, the multi-mediality of Latin literature across a large span of time has never before been so copiously attested: a genethliacon for Joseph II gives a literary depiction of country house decorations to an audience who can see these on location while listening to a literary reworking of what they are looking at (TL 2, p. 622); a book on meditation pairs texts on the right-hand page with copper plates with matching content on the left-hand page, a format which is akin to the modern double page spread (TL 2, pp. 652ff.); a drama from Innsbruck from the year 1757 describes the stage design in footnotes below the text, and also explicitly addresses it in the script itself in an anti-illusionist manner (TL 2, p. 668). These examples demonstrate Neo-Latin writers’ freedom playfully to combine even the most disparate genres. This freedom manifests itself not only in the simultaneous activation of auditory and visual channels, but also in Neo-Latin authors’ emancipation from generic constraints of all kinds. A wonderful example of this is afforded in the discussion of the Iocus serius theatralis by Balde, a work which has no continuous storyline, and instead connects individual scenes via association. This work suggests that it was freedom from generic constraints that allowed baroque Jesuit dramas such as the Tyrolis pacifica from 1646 (author unknown) to fuse its form almost completely with that of the stile nuovo opera performed at Italian courts (TL 1, pp. 458–64).

Another finding that clearly emerges is that the use of Latin as the language of literature and science should on no account be equated with the idea that Neo-Latin writers were only concerned with the past. Eighteenth-century writers had both classics and works by contemporary Neo-Latin writers on their bookshelves,Footnote ² and they reacted to current events in their works. The editors deserve credit for drawing attention to the short epic poem by the gifted writer Giulio Turati (1706–1764), which has only survived as a manuscript. This poem about the earthquake of Hall in 1741 not only incorporates Virgilian motifs, it also holds a place within the subgenre of earthquake literature (TL 2, pp. 655–8).

Drawing a strict line between vernacular languages and Latin during the early and later modern period is consistent with artificial academic conventions, but not with the status these literatures held in life. The absurd legend surrounding Anderl von Rinn demonstrates the practice of switching not just between genres but also between languages: without any supporting evidence, Hall's city doctor Guarinonius invented an anti-Semitic story about the young child Anderl being ritually murdered by Jews. He finished a first German version of the story between 1620 and 1623, but it did not register with the public at all. However, as early as 1621 Jesuit priests reused the same material in a Latin drama, under the ‘advice’ of the inventor of the legend. At the end of the drama, the audience is informed of Guarinonius’ forthcoming publication in German. The Jesuit drama itself immediately gave rise to a cult around the martyr Anderl, to which Guarinonius in turn makes a reference in his Histories, which were finally published in 1651. The ritual veneration of Anderl von Rinn was not forbidden until 1994 by the bishop at the time, whose decision led to angry protests from some worshippers of Anderl (cf. TL 1, pp. 441–5). This case, therefore, gives evidence of a Latin drama's lasting influence on popular mentality for more than 300 years, and demonstrates the permeability of literary genres.

The way the broad definition of literature (as mentioned above) is realised in the study's thematic selection proved enlightening to the reviewer. K. and Kompatscher, for example, allow the reader a glimpse into Jesuit students’ notebooks, in which they describe their rhetorical competitions (TL 1, pp. 476–9). Notes by first-graders are analysed in terms of the didactic methods used in Latin lessons, which appear to have aptly combined theory with learning by heart. What was not previously widely known about Jesuit education is how much value was placed on the ability actively to produce poetry, as is indicated clearly both by the great number of school books dealing with the matter, and by the contents of the lessons themselves (TL 2, pp. 797–806).

Two further results from the volumes clearly allow us to expand research perspectives in Neo-Latin studies. First, Tilg detects a radical departure from religious subjects for the Jesuit drama of the eighteenth century (the last play of this kind was performed in 1724), and instead observes a trend towards subjects related to classical antiquity. The Christian God no longer appears on stage. Tilg sees possible explanations for this change in the spread of middle-class values and the resulting importance of the dyad of state and family (reflected in the republican hero's embodiment of the modern and selfless monarch), and in the transposing of religious subjects to the genre of meditative drama. The institutionalisation of history teaching, which led to a renewed interest in antiquity, contributed to this change as well. It would also be possible, however, to interpret the latent republicanism of these late dramas as emblematic of the increasing distance between Jesuit schools and an absolutist central state that was growing ever more powerful (TL 2, pp. 660–700). This question can ultimately only be solved by comparing theatre schedules of this particular period.

Second, different contributions expose the eighteenth-century's obsession not only with creating knowledge, but also with passing it on efficiently and as quickly as possible. This is demonstrated by the Hexaglotton written by the brilliant philologist and Jesuit priest Ignatius Weitenauer, whose compendium promised to help its user acquire passive comprehension of six different languages in the course of only a few hours (TL 2, pp. 802–5). The Capuchin monk Iuvenalis Annaniensis, on the other hand, attempted to teach his readers how to find every topic within every field by using a model consisting of inter-rotating circles (Artis Magnae sciendi brevissima Synopsis) (TL 2, p. 859). This clearly points to the modern age's desire to chart the territories of the mind.

The volumes can also be judged in terms of the perspectives they open beyond philological circles for the field of intellectual history in general. After studying the volumes, one cannot but reach the conclusion that the reception of antiquity proceeded in very different ways in Catholic countries and in countries with a Protestant cultural history. This could be a starting point for a history of Catholic Enlightenment in central Europe. A beginning was made with Tyrol, and other culturally coherent territories with a Latin cultural history could be studied according to a similar pattern. A long-term goal could be to compile a history of Europa Latina. The fact that the government put an end to Neo-Latin literature in Tyrol just as it had reached the height of its success also brings up the question of how the Latin language and Latin culture is treated today on the political level. Another possible new area of research could be to assess the impact the dissolution of the Jesuit order, and with it the end of the last global education plan based on the Ratio Studiorum, had on the creation and teaching of knowledge in the countries affected by this event. This leads us to another question: how did the Latin language condition access and dissemination of knowledge prior to this event? The accessibility of knowledge is, after all, an unsolved issue today, a fact that highlights how up-to-date and singularly important these volumes are.