The first edition of this work, which came out in 1759 (a year after Bodoni’s arrival at the press) is a relatively short 208-page examination of the Tibetan language, but the second edition, to which the first is attached at the end, reaches 820 pages, and is a lengthy discourse on Manichaeism, the evils of divine emanation, the origin of the Buddha, Japanese and Indian divinities, and of course, the power and glory of the Catholic faith.52 It is based on reports sent back to Rome from Lhasa by the Capuchin missionaries, Francisco Orazio della Penna di Billi and Cassiano di Macerata, and is still in circulation today. Throughout the work, Father Giorgi wastes no time in flaunting the superiority of the Catholic Church over the teachings of the Buddha; nor does he hesitate to make some astonishing, far-reaching cross-cultural linguistic comparisons, thus displaying to advantage his immense erudition, if less than logical judgment.
It comes as no surprise that Bodoni was chosen to work on this book, having studied with Father Giorgi and profited from his help while working on the Arabo-Coptic pontifical. The Alphabetum Tibetanum was a brute to typeset, containing as it did many foreign languages interspersed with the Latin narrative, as well as text diagrams and six fascinating engraved plates by Alexius Giardoni of subjects such as prayer wheels, the crucified Indra, and the Bhudda’s toenails. Once again, Bodoni provided some ill-suited head- and tail-pieces.53
It is hard to assess how many more books Bodoni worked on during his years at the Propaganda press. We know about the Pontificiale and the Alphabetum Tibetanum because they are mentioned by his biographers and scrupulously scrutinized by Sergio Samek Ludovici,54 but it is impossible to ascertain what other publications he typeset and decorated. It is, however, easy to speculate that his fellow compositors became resentful about seeing his name on publications while they remained anonymous, and this resentment could have caused Ruggieri to stop singling him out. Whatever the case, Bodoni’s subsequent work at the press is unacknowledged. We know he’s there, but he’s a shadow figure.55
YOUNG GIAMBATTISTA was far from dull, and this begs the question: What was he up to in his spare time in a city that was rife with variety and known for its sexual license?
De Lama states that in his hours of leisure Bodoni cut decorations and flowery capitals, and cut tiny characters, which were highly admired in Rome. Is this believable? Certainly, to some extent. But Bodoni was an attractive young man at the height of his sexual powers, living in Rome at a vibrant moment in the city’s history, and it is hard to believe that he spent all his time whittling away when all Rome was on offer.56
Outside the building lay the Piazza di Spagna, from which the Spanish Steps, like a backdrop for an opera, climbed towards the church of the Trinità dei Monti. The piazza and its immediate surroundings were the favored home of expatriates, including those who had dealings with Cardinal Spinelli and the Propaganda Fide press. Among them was archaeologist, librarian, art historian, and pederast J.J. Winckelmann, who lived in the Palazzo Zuccari, at the top of the Steps, from where he could survey the whole city. His view, however, did nothing to mitigate his complaints about lack of sleep because of the frightful noise of shouting, shooting, and fireworks that often lasted until daybreak.
The Piazza di Spagna was indeed the noisy meeting place of Rome. Working at the Propaganda Fide, Bodoni was aware of its powerful draw during the day, but what about his nighttime activities? After a day’s work, all he had to do was to walk out the door of the press to find himself confronted with . . . Life! Gorgeous Roman women! Pretty girls and their mothers! Foreigners! Elegant shepherds and shepherdesses! Homosexuals! Castrati! Transvestites! Harlequins! Actors! (but no actresses—the Church, which turned a blind eye to adultery and courtesans, was firm about outlawing actresses). And pretty young boys dressed as girls, who spoke with flutelike voices and, with some anatomical adjustments, acquired “plump, round hips, buttocks, and necks.”57 It became extremely difficult to tell the boys from the girls as they strutted about the Piazza di Spagna but, as Giacomo Casanova, who was in Rome at the same time as Bodoni, knew only too well, the challenge was so enticing.
Roman women, whatever their age or station in life, took care to present “bella figura.” That is, they paid close attention to their appearance, but in a far more natural manner than French women, whose opulent, panniered fashions the Roman upper classes admired and emulated to a certain degree, while the lower classes usually wore traditional costumes. Roman women adored unguents but eschewed rouge and perfume, having “an unconquerable revulsion for odors, maintaining that the use of perfume is pernicious in this climate, and makes them faint.”58 The naturalness of Roman women, their air of comfortably inhabiting their bodies, made the rest of Europe suspicious and uncomfortable. Roman matrons frequently had lovers, an arrangement condoned by their husbands, who often married them for money or prestige. However, the chastity of young, unmarried women was zealously guarded by their mothers, and it took the charm, skill, and determination of a Casanova to make a conquest.59
While Cardinal Spinelli and Abbé Ruggieri may have averted Bodoni’s gaze from Roman women, they certainly made sure that he met cardinals, gentlemen, and scholars, and that he moved in ever higher social, ecclesiastical, and scholarly circles.60 One of the most influential ecclesiastics he met was a fellow Piemontese, Father Paolo Maria Paciaudi, Cardinal Spinelli’s librarian. This meeting with Father Paciaudi was the most important encounter of Bodoni’s life.
Born in Turin in 1710, Paciaudi was a fashionable preacher, whose stirring sermons were intended to induce the aristocratic congregations of churches such as Sant’ Andrea della Valle into a life of virtue. He was also a highly respected scholar, archaeologist, and librarian. A Theatine monk, he practiced the principles of that order in his efforts to reform Catholic morality, and he waged an ecclesiastical hot war on the teachings of Martin Luther. Paciaudi had a particular interest in the work of the Polyglot Press at the Propaganda Fide because the Theatines were the first order to found papal missions overseas. He kept his eye on Bodoni’s progress and was amazed, like everyone else, by the young man’s skill. He would remember this skill long after leaving Rome for Parma in 1761.
Another distinguished scholar/archaeologist with whom Bodoni would have come into contact through Father Paciaudi and Cardinal Spinelli was J.J. Winckelmann. Often referred to as the father of art history, Winckelmann worked as Cardinal Albani’s librarian and as scriptor and prefect of antiquities at the Vatican. He was known for his particularly beautiful Greek script and his insistence on the use of the clearest possible Greek type for the printing of books. He felt that standards of printing in that language had slipped since the days of Robert Estienne (1503-1559), whose publications in Greek were renowned for their elegance and clarity. Bodoni paid attention to this insistence on clarity and beauty, and took it especially to heart when cutting and printing his own Greek type, said to be his favorite type of all.
The man with whom Bodoni spent most time was, of course, Abbé Costantino Ruggieri. They worked closely together, and Ruggieri witnessed Bodoni’s competence quickly outstripping that of his colleagues in the studio. Ruggieri’s admiration for Bodoni blossomed into love. Passerini recounts what happened: “So this learned man fell in love with him, and started to feel so much regard for him that he desired his company on his daily walk, all the more so because it seemed to him that the gloom with which he was often assailed was in large part eased by Bodoni’s lively and witty company.”61 Early each morning, Bodoni set out from the Palazzo Valentini for Ruggieri’s apartment in nearby Piazza SS. XII Apostoli, and together they walked the streets of Rome until Ruggieri was ready to go to work.
Abbé Ruggieri’s world was shattered when Cardinal Spinelli died suddenly on 12 April 1763.62 Bodoni, too, was grief-stricken by the death of that warm and generous man who had done so much for art and archaeology, for the modernization and expansion of the Propaganda Fide press, and for Bodoni himself. Indeed, the cardinal’s death saddened the whole city. His body was transported in a cavalcade from the Palazzi Valentini to the church of SS. XII Apostoli. There he lay in state, and after his funeral he was buried below the