The origins of the legal protection of heritage. legislation on the safeguard of monuments and artworks issued in 15th- to 18th-century europe.
LAWLOVE proposes an analysis of the laws on the protection of artworks and monuments that were issued in the European countries between early 1400s and late 1700s. The objective is to develop a comparative analysis of legislation through both a juridical and an art historical perspective, to understand the systems established in early-modern and modern Europe to administer, protect, supervise, conserve, maintain, classify and record what was thought of as “heritage” in various states.
Research will be carried out on original records related to legislation, including documents preserved in archives and institutes in Europe, and will involve an interdisciplinary approach to Art History, Cultural History, History of Restoration and Conservation, Legal History, Comparative Law, History of Heritage Legislation, and History of Administration.
Research objectives will include an understanding of: the conceptual core of legislation; the systems of administration/supervision prescribed by law; the legal instruments provided to implement the law.
Research results will include: a translation of the corpus of legislation into English; a study of the development of a consistent concept of “heritage”; a study of the practices established to administer, restore, safeguard, catalogue the heritage in 15th- to 18th-century Europe.
LAWLOVE will establish a new state-of-the-art and found a first history of legislation on the protection of the artefacts in Europe, which at the moment is completely lacking, dealing also with questions related to the EU policy-making on the preservation of the heritage.
A specific training-through-research will help the fellow to acquire: new research competencies; methodologies and expertise in new interdisciplinary areas; transferable skills; skills in project/financial management; writing/lecturing/communication skills. The fellow will refine her maturity and independence as academic, increasing her competitiveness for future career opportunities.