Cracking down on illicit images in 17th-century Rome. No U.S. copies.

[Art]. S.mi D. N. D. Urbani divina providentia Papae VIII. Constitutio circa formam & habitum sacrarum Imaginum, Urbanus Papa VIII. Ad futuram rei memoria. Sacrosancta Tridentina Synodus optimè agnoscens non leve scandalum afferre posse… Romae, Ex Typographia Rev. Camerae Apostolicae MDCXLII [1642]. [42.3 x 28.5 cm], [1] f. letterpress broadside with woodcuts of Saints Peter & Paul, the arms of Urban VIII, and with a woodcut initial. Folds, minor toning.
 
 
Rare (no U.S. copies) 1642 broadside, issued in Rome under Urban VIII, stressing the Council of Trent’s ban on irregular image practice in the Eternal City. Combating the accretion of unorthodox art required the constant vigilance of Couther-Reformation authorities. 
 
The decree was issued on 15 March 1642, and on 26 June 1642 the broadside was ordered to be “published and affixed to the doors of the Basilica of the Prince of the Apostles [St. Peter’s], and around the Campo de’ Fiori, and in other usual and customary places of the City” (“affixae, & publicatae fuerunt ad valuas Basilicae Principis Apostolorum, & in acie Campi Florae, ac alijs locis solitis, & consuetis Urbis”).
 
The Latin order forbids anyone “to sculpt, paint, or to have sculpted or painted illicit images, or otherwise to have them made in any way, or to retain illicit images previously sculpted, or painted, or otherwise made in any way, or to expose them to public view, or to dress them with a different habit and form than has been customary in the Catholic and Apostolic Church from ancient times.”  These prohibitions applied equally to all ecclesiastical ranks and to all institutions (e.g., cathedrals, universities, monasteries, colleges, all orders, including Cistercian, Jesuits, military orders, the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, nuns, etc.).
 
 
OCLC, OPAC/SBN/ICCU and KVK locate examples of this broadside at the Biblioteca de la Universidad de Granada, Eötvös Loránd University, National Library of Scotland and Biblioteca del Monte (Perugia).
 
*IT\ICCU\UM1E\022011.