"Aux escholles d'outre-monts"

Based on academic and notary documents published and unpublished and on multiple indirect sources (biographies, correspondences, etc.), this book lists several hundred French, Franche-Comté and Savoyard students who attended Italian universities from 1480 to 1599. It provides, for each character, a record of his studies in Italy, completed, if possible, by an overview of his previous training and a biographical note. A detailed introduction to the organization of university studies in 15th and 16th century Italy, the way in which universities operate and the procedures for obtaining diplomas makes it easier to understand the leaflets. This work offers new materials to the history of universities, the history of families (rectifications and complements made to genealogies by exploited Italian sources), social history (social background of students, correlation between studies and career, strategies of some families relying on studies in Italy to favor their ascent or to establish their power); but also to religious, political and cultural history (just mention the names of St. Francis de Sales, Pomponne de Bellièvre, Michel de L'Hospital or François Tissard). Many of these students have also contributed to spreading beyond the Alps not only the humanism and the sciences learned in the Peninsula, but also the Italian language and culture.