UniTo is an important Italian University, open to international research and training. Here, the Department of Historical Studies– awarded by MUR as “Department of Excellence” (2023-2027) – promotes an interdisciplinary approach to learning and research. Teaching and research explore a wide range of areas of historical studies, from archaeology to the history of religions, with a global reach covering the ancient Middle East, the Mediterranean area, the origins of Europe, the Americas, Asia and Africa. The Department is involved within the WP9 -TAURUS of the ITSERR project.
RESEARCH GROUPS
Discover the opportunities connected to your TNA stay at Università di Torino, within the Department of Historical Studies where to find high specialized libraries and expertise. Here the ITSERR WP9-TAURUS team is developing a software toolkit for 3D visualisation which brings a high improvement in the fruition of historical heritage artefacts and materials.
The dataset of the team has been created by combining the use of portable light-scanners (stereo and microscanners) on the collection of cuneiform tablets with religious content from the Eastern Collections of the Royal Museums of Turin, one of the most complete and ancient of Italy. Moreover, the team, by post-processing the high-resolution images, reveal for the first time some surprising details to discover new aspects of the life of the objects – about their production, storage, and their own authors.
COLLECTIONS AND LIBRARIES
Within the librarian heritage of UniTo there are important book collections, whose content are described as follows:
“Giovanni Tabacco” Library
The “G. Tabacco” Library is the main library of the Department of Historical Studies, dedicated to the Professor of Medieval History of University of Turin, Giovanni Tabacco. It holds about 150.000 monographies and 250 journals, also online. In 2014 the library inherited the so called SAAST, the library dedicated to anthropological, archaeological and territorial Sciences with more than 40.000 volumes e 189 journals. Finally, the library holds also the private library of the famous Professor of Greek and Roman Archaeology and History of Art Giorgio Gullini (1923-2004), with 1500 documents: books, journals and brochures.
Library of Religious Sciences “Erik Peterson”
The Library of Religious Sciences “Erik Peterson” was in its origins the personal library of the important German scholar who studied on evangelical theology, acquired by the University of Turin on October 23, 1961. It is composed by 6.550 volumes and a filing cabinet with about 600.000 manuscript files together with personal letters. The library comprehends also an archive.
Paul Kahle Fonds
Paul Kahle Fonds is a library and an archive dedicated to the famous German orientalist P. Kahle. It comprehends a collection of Arab, Persian and Turkish manuscripts dated between the 15th and the 20th centuries.
The Antonio Attisani Founds, composed by a collection of publication on the performative arts and the Tibet culture.
Eastern Library “Oscar Botto”
The library is named after the important scholar Oscar Botto who collected an important library dedicated to Sanskrit literature, Buddhist doctrine and literature, and to juridical history of ancient India. It houses 40.600 volumes (monographies and journal together with didactic resources). It collects several disciplines about India, Sout Asian East and China and Japan. Moreover, it has inherited also other libraries of importance, such the Fondo Jean Boisselier, on the art of Sout Asian East and Khmer, Thai culture and the Fondo Siegfried Lienhard, of high linguistic interest, dedicate with a collection of Sanskrit and Prakriti texts with grammars and dictionaries on the Indian languages. Finally, the Fondo Anne Marie Esnoul, is dedicated to the art of the Northern India.
Digital Library
The Digital Library houses more than 31.196 ancient and historical items digitalized from 57 collections. The library hoses also rare booklet of the 16th century on topics such as Law or Religion (as prays for weddings or religious feasts).
Credits: SBA of UniTo
DATABASES
Being a TNA fellow at UniTO will give you the access as user to several databases, through the discovery EUREKA for the ones dedicated to research area. While the multidisciplinary database are on Web of Science and Scopus.
NATIONAL MUSEUMS AND LIBRARIES
Turin is a real cultural hub, with very important libraries and museums to discover! Please note that the following Institutions are not included within our network of facilities connected to the access of ITSERR TNA, but we want to highlight their presence as we consider they could represent a further resource on the territory within the domain of Religious Studies for your needs of research.
Royal Library
The librarian heritage of the Royal Library is composed by over 200.000 volumes, ancient papers, engravings and illuminated manuscripts; it is the result of the enrichment of the collection established in 1831 by Charles Albert of Savoy-Carignano.
Art Library
Established in the early 1930s to offer support to bibliographic research on the collections of the Museums of Turin, the Art Library – which belongs to Fondazione Torino Musei – is specialized in ancient, modern, and contemporary art history, art criticism, museology, archaeology, ethnography, and numismatics.
Egyptian Museum
The Egyptian Museum is the oldest Egyptian museum in the world, second in terms of importance only to that of Cairo, housing relics covering an extensive period of time, from the Paleolithic to the Coptic, and offering a broad and fascinating vision of ancient Egypt, its art and its culture.
Royal Museums
Within the several collections of the Royal Museums there is the Archaeological Gallery, whose ten halls house relics until the Roman age, with the famous gallery of the Emperors. One of them houses the collection dedicated to the Ancient Near East, specifically to the Assyrian relics (included within the collections in 1847), with the richest Italian collection of cuneiform texts and cylinder seals which is actually part of the research of ITSERR WP9-TAURUS team.