Tra 'mondo storico' e 'mondo storiografico'

Starting from the distinction between history and historiography, this essay intends to illustrate the impact of historiographical interpretations on the historical understanding of the Renaissance period, which was included in a sort of genealogy modeled on the most significant works and the most salient episodes of the Early Modern Age. This is due to the fact that the Renaissance has become the cornerstone of the autobiography of the moderns, from D’Alembert’s Preliminary Discourse to the Encyclopedia to Burckhardt. Finally, this essays intends to advance a new interpretation of the Renaissance separating the historical from the historiographical world, though admitting the moral and civic importance of the historiographical research on the Renaissance.