DHI Next Generation
From Spring School to PhD student and lecturer: Julia's journey into the history of medieval Italy
Video podcast, ca. 7 min.

Our grant holder Julia Andree shares the spark that ignited her passion for Italian medieval history and the role our institute plays in this.

Three years ago she took part in our Spring School "Schlaglichter der italienischen Geschichte im Mittelalter" as a student. In 2026, she was a lecturer herself, standing in front of the group. What happened in between? Two grants with us and co-organising a conference. 
Our study programme not only offers fascinating insights into archives and source-based research, but can also mark the start of a valuable personal network.

For her PhD, Julia Andree is researching the San Gimignano Council records, which she discovered through our medieval studies Spring School. A PhD thesis on an Italian topic – but what about the language? No need to worry, says Julia: the language barrier is smaller than you might think.

Between the Lines – the DHI Rome Book Podcast
Video podcast, ca. 7 min.

Four questions – four answers. In this podcast series, we present books by researchers currently working at our Institute. We begin with Lars Döpking's doctoral thesis Fiskalische Herrschaft. Steuern, Staat und Politik in Italien seit 1945 – a topic of fundamental interest to us all, as taxes affect us all.
If you would like to find out more about which sources provide insights into the tax state and why the history of Italian democracy is, at the same time, the history of its taxes, then listen in.

Lars Döpking, Fiskalische Herrschaft. Steuern, Staat und Politik in Italien seit 1945, Hamburg: Hamburger Edition HIS 2023, ISBN 978-3-86854-371-1.

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode seven, ca. 22 min.

Welcome to "Römische Horizonte - Orizzonti romani", a video podcast series about new music for everyone who’s interested and curious about music. German-Italian soundscapes are presented in collaboration with the Ensemble Horizonte of Detmold.

Contemporary music compositions are always individual and show great stylistic variety. Each piece is, so to speak, its own cosmos in which the listener becomes immersed.
The podcast opens up access to each piece before it is performed by the ensemble, and explains the peculiarities of the playing and compositional style, as well as the context in which the piece was created.

Episode seven
Composer: Giselher Klebe
Title of the piece: Bagatellen (1960)

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode five, ca. 23 min.

Episode five
Composer: Salvatore Sciarrino
Title of the piece: Muro D'Orizzonte (1997)

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode four, ca. 21 min.

Episode four
Composer: Giacinto Scelsi
Title of the piece: Arc en ciel (1973).

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode three, ca. 19 min.

Episode three
Composer: Luigi Dallapiccola
Title of the piece: Piccola musica notturna (1961).

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode two, ca. 21 min.

Episode two
Composer: Salvatore Sciarrino
Title of the piece: Fauno che fischia a un merlo (1980).

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, first episode, 22:39 min.

Episode one
Composer: Jörg-Peter Mittmann
Title of the piece: Lamento (Musica con Monteverdi per sette strumentisti) (2008).

Lecture
Filippo Forlani
Schiavi e Concili. I canoni conciliari sulla schiavitù dall'antichità al Lateranense IV
with an introduction by Andreas Rehberg.

Italy's Amnesia over War Guilt. The "Evil Germans" Alibi

Video podcast in English with Filippo Focardi, Full Professor of Contemporary History at the University of Padua, and distinguished scholar of the memory of the Second World War in Italian society. Introduction by Lutz Klinkhammer, ca. 57 min.
As part of the series The Ends of War. Internationale Perspektiven auf den Zweiten Weltkrieg − conceived by the Max Weber Foundation − German Humanities Institutes Abroad.

The Second World War in the Italian perception is connected to two different dates of the end of war, two caesuras which donꞌt correspond to the German memory or that of other countries in Europe and in the World.
Italy ended its war with the entrance of Resistance fighters in the heart of the industrial capitals in Northern Italy on 25 April 1945; but if we look at a state level – we can underline that the hostilities against the Allied powers, the UK and the USA, ended with the Italian surrender in World War II already in September 1943 − earlier than the other allies of the Third Reich. 

This complicated political situation and ambivalent perception has had and has still a very strong influence not only on public memory in Italy, but on the development of the character of Italian democracy since 1946 as well.

Römische Horizonte – Orizzonti romani
Video podcast, episode six, ca. 25 min.

Episode six
Composer: Valerio Sannicandro
Title of the piece: Stills (2016)

MedAtlantic. Perspectives on the Past
Genuese Merchant Networks
Documentary film, 20 min.
Based on a research project on the Genoese Merchant Networks in Africa and across the Atlantic Ocean, as part of the international project of the Max Weber Foundation Knowledge Unbound. The period from ca. 1450–1530 is investigated through archival studies. And with it, the trade of enslaved persons, which already began in the Atlantic region in the first decades of the 16th century, comes into view. The film journey through the Mediterranean region and the Atlantic presents new perspectives and assessments on this research topic.

The Global Papacy of Pius XII: Catholicism in a Divided World, 1945–1958
Project presentation of the International Research Group
Principal Investigator: Dr. Simon Unger-Alvi

16–18 May 2022
The Return of Looted Artefacts since 1945. Post-Fascist and Post-Colonial Restitution in Comparative Perspective

International conference of the Max Weber Stiftung, organised by the German Historical Institute in Rome,
at the Goethe-Institut Rome (Via Savoia, 15).
Programme (PDF, 1 Mb)

5 February 2020
Ferdinand Gregorovius, ein Preuße im Kirchenstaat. Die digitale Briefedition

Event in cooperation with TELOTA Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, with a reading by Friedhelm Ptok.

Berlin, Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Einsteinsaal (Jägerstraße 22–23)

A video recording of the event is available on L.I.S.A. Wissenschaftsportal der Gerda Henkel Stiftung.

Further information (PDF, 394 KB)

PODCAST: Play externally or download

17 May 2017
Musica e pace. Nuove ricerche sull'Età moderna

Concert on the occasion of the one-day workshop, which was organised within the framework of the international joint project "'Dass Gerechtigkeit und Friede sich küssen'. Repräsentationen des Friedens im vormodernen Europa".

Iustitia et pax osculatae sunt. "Friedensmusik". Musica e pace dal Quattro
al Settecento

Ensemble Chordis
Christine Streubühr – Vocals
Andrea Damiani – Lute and Chitarrone
Sabine Cassola, Stefania Grillo, Valentina Nicolai – Viole da gamba

Programme (PDF, 3 MB)
Conference report (PDF, 0,6 MB)

25 February 2016
Prof. em. Dr. Bruce M.S. Campbell (Queen's University Belfast)

The Environmental Origins of the Black Death.

Evening lecture in the context of the international conference "The Crisis of the 14th Century. 'Teleconnections' between Environmental and Societal Change?"
German Historical Institute in Rome