Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/67

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Europe at tJie Ope?ii)ig of the Sixteenth Century 29 Vol. I, p. 544, and below, p. 30), upon which previous writers had relied. This discussion, "Zur Kritik neuerer Geschichtschreiber," forms an appendix to the narrative. Histoire de France, edited by Lavisse. Vol. V, Part I, pp. 1-132, for the Italian wars ; the remainder of the volume deals with France at the opening of the sixteenth century. VlLLARl, The Life and Times of Niccolb Machiavelli, translated from the Italian. Also, by the same writer, The Life and Times of Girolamo Savonarola. New, cheaper editions, in one volume each. The best biographies of these distinguished Florentines. Gregorovius, Lucretia Borgia. From the German, 1903. Describes the life in Rome under Alexander VI. Schirrmacher, Geschichte von Spanien, Vol. VII (1492-1516), 1902. This work belongs to a great series called Geschichte der europdischen Staaten, edited originally by the distinguished historian Heeren. The first volume of the collection appeared in 1829, and the end is not yet. Hefele, Cardinal Xi?nines u?id die kirchlichen Zustande Spaniens am ende des i$ten und Anfang des i6ten Jahrhunderts, 2d ed., 1851. Delaborde, V expedition de Charles VILI en Italie, Paris, 1888, 4to. Finely illustrated and scholarly. Ranke likens the sources of modern history to a vast museum, The sources, where we see about us genuine specimens and mere imitations, the beautiful and the repulsive, the striking and the inconspicuous, all col- lected from many nations and belonging to various periods and yet lying beside one another, without order or explanation ("Zur Kritik neuerer Geschichtschreiber," Vorrede). It seems at first sight hopeless and vain to give a very brief account of the multitudinous sources for the history of western Europe, since the opening of the sixteenth cen- tury. Yet those of first-rate importance which have a general bearing and may be looked for in our few large American libraries are by no means innumerable. In any case it will be possible to give the advanced student, in this and the succeeding bibliographies, some little idea of the great classes of material — state papers, memoirs, corre- spondence, diaries, reports — upon which the historian must rely. Marino Sanuto, Diarii, 58 vols., 4to, 1879-1903. This is the most detailed and voluminous history of a period ever written, so far as is known, by a contemporary. Sanuto (1466-1536) was a Venetian, and after preparing a history of Charles VIII's invasion, he began in 1496 keeping a detailed journal of events as they happened. This he continued for thirty-eight years. The author includes many state papers,