La gran casa dei poveri. Architettura e azione assistenziale dell'Albergo dei poveri di Genova nella letteratura odeporica e nelle descrizioni dei viaggiatori (secoli XVII-XIX)

When, in 1656, the city of Genoa decided to provide itself with a new reclusion as a shelter for beggars, a home for the “malmaritate” and a con servatory of virtue, there were no similar institutions elsewhere on the Italian peninsula. The new Albergo built by Emanuele Brignole looked back to the experience of the Italian Beggars’ Hospitals of the mid-16th century, without neglecting the examples provided by contemporary institutions founded in Catholic countries (Paris, Madrid) and Protestant ones (Amsterdam, London). The result was the creation of an institution that was taken as an example by other Italian states throughout the 18th century: informers, diplo mats, travellers mentioned in their reports the grandeur of the building and the organisation of the institution, praising its efficiency and manufacturing potential. This paper aims to examine two main themes that emerge from the analysis of this type of historical sources: the functioning of the Genoese welfare system and the architectural layout of the “Albergo dei poveri” in Genoa. The testimonies of travellers - also, and above all, foreigners - and the odeporic guides, illustrated by interesting engravings, devote much attention to the history of the construction and foundation of the Genoese Albergo. The first descriptions began to circulate very early, when the artefact was not yet completed: right from the start, in fact, the great building site that domi nated the heights of a densely built-up city became an essential element of the skyline and urban identity, thanks also to its monumentality, always accen tuated by the descriptions and the iconography itself, both of local produc tion and of ‘foreign’ production, especially French