I am currently a postdoctoral fellow (SNSF Ambizione: 201935) at the University of Zurich, affiliated with the SGLP and, since 2024, based at RoSe. I also teach Medieval literature and philology at the Università della Svizzera italiana (Lugano), and as a member of SISMEL I serve on the editorial staff of Micrologus. My research, marked by a strongly interdisciplinary approach, centers on exploring the intricate interplay between medieval science, particularly optics, and the coeval literature and imagery. My interests also include investigating mendicant culture during the Middle Ages, and delving into the interaction between images and texts, with a special emphasis on ‘visual thinking’ and mnemonic devices within medieval manuscripts and sermons.

Before joining UZH, I was a postdoctoral assistant at the Istituto di studi italiani (USI), where I also contributed to educational planning and the organization of symposia for the Scuola dottorale confederale in Civiltà italiana. From 2019 to 2023, I collaborated on the PRIN project LiLeSC (Books and Readers in Florence from the 13th to the 15th Century: the Library of Santa Croce, Roma Tre), focusing on unpublished works by Servasanto da Faenza. Previously, I was part of the In codice ratio team at Università Roma Tre (2018–19) and held a Balzan Prize Fellowship at USI (2017), under the direction of Piero Boitani. I earned my Ph.D. at USI (2016) with a dissertation on Bartolomeo da Bologna’s late 13th-century treatise on physical and spiritual light; my critical and commented edition of Bartolomeo's De luce was published in 2021 (SISMEL–Micrologus Library).

Thanks to the generous support of the Swiss National Science Foundation (Ambizione grant, PZ00P1_201935), in September 2022 I started at UZH a four-year project on the ‘hybrid’ uses of optics in the XIII century. In a few words, I focus on how optics, today a branch of physics with well-defined boundaries, began to be employed outside its scientific context (e.g. in preaching, poetry, etc.), percolated through distant spaces and environments and profoundly influenced the imagery of a wide and varied audience in western Medieval society.  

The complete list can be found in  ZORA . See below for a selection of recent contributions.

Monographs:

• Il “De luce” di Bartolomeo da Bologna. Studio e edizione, Firenze, SISMEL (Micrologus Library 104), 2021.

Journal Articles:

• Through the Lens of Faith: Preaching Optics in Dante’s Tuscany, in Recherches de théologie et philosophie médiévales, 92/1 (2025), 163–190;
• Il Dialogus e la Summula Monaldina del francescano Servasanto da Faenza (XIII sec.). Due scritti ritrovati, in Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia, 76/2 (2022), 429–443;
• Where Does the Last Drop Make the Cup Run Over? Roger Bacon vs John Peckham, and Bartolomeo da Bologna, on the Properties of Water and the Capacity of Vessels, in Studi medievali, 62/2 (2021), 641–665.

Chapters in Edited Books and Conference Proceedings:

• 2024, Visual perception in Dante’s Commedia according to the early commentaries (1320–1400), in Dante’s visions crossing sights on natural philosophy: theory of vision, and medicine in the Divine Comedy and beyond, eds. C. Panti & M. Piccolino, London, Routledge, 126–148 [Open access].
• 2024, “Quanta est via a Bononia usque Florentiam tanta est a Florentia usque Bononiam”. Fatti di cronaca, notizie locali e cenni autobiografici nella Summa de poenitentia di Servasanto da Faenza, in La linea Bologna-Firenze. Cultura letteraria, saperi e scambi culturali nell’Italia del Due e Trecento, eds. J. Bartuschat & S. Ferrilli, Ravenna, Longo, pp. 183–201 [Open access].
• 2023, Through the Mirror. (Super-)natural Properties of Reflecting Surfaces in 13th-Century Scientific and Theological Thought, in Per cognitionem visualem. The Visualization of Cognitive and Natural Processes in the Middle Ages: Acts of the XXV Annual Colloquium of the SIEPM, Porto, 14–15 and 21–22 June 2021, ed. J. Higuera Rubio, Turnhout, Brepols, 327–349 [Open access].
• 2022, Bartolomeo da Bologna e Dante. Incontri mancati e possibili convergenze, in Dante e Bologna. Istituzioni, convergenze e saperi, ed. A. Antonelli, F. Meier, Ravenna, Giorgio Pozzi, 2022, 215-230.
• 2022, Insegnare per figure: le rappresentazioni diagrammatico-simboliche nell’opera di Roberto Grossatesta, in La cultura dei Vittorini e la letteratura medievale, ed. C. Bologna, C. Zacchetti, Pisa, Edizioni della Normale, 2022, 229-248.
• No One Will Spend Eternity Behind Christ's Back, in L’éloquence du visage entre Orient et Occident, ed. O. Voskoboynikov. Firenze, SISMEL (Micrologus Library 110), 155-189.

• Collegium Romanicum;
• SIEPM (Société Internationale pour l'Étude de la Philosophie Médiévale);
• SISMEL (Società Internazionale per lo Studio del Medioevo Latino);
• SISPM (Società Italiana per lo Studio del Pensiero Medievale).