Centenary of the Treccani Encyclopaedia
A delegation from the "United States of the World" took part in the centenary events of the Treccani Encyclopaedia in the presence of Italian President Sergio Mattarella.
To celebrate the centenary of the Institute of the Italian Encyclopaedia founded by Giovanni Treccani in 1925, a list of 100 words was drawn up to mark this century of activity and to respond to the desire to point out an overall coherent path of a century of salient concepts-words/events. The identification of a single word and event for each of these last 100 years was entrusted to an arbitrary selection, guided by a committee of historians and linguists, whose work led to the association of each year with a characterising or significant historical fact that could be referable to a particular semantic field, either by direct reference or by deduction.
A selection influenced by the historical criterion, which has its roots in the very origin of the Italian Encyclopaedia of Sciences, Letters and Arts that, in the preface to volume I, says:
"History, in truth, suggests the method of treatment that befits an encyclopaedia: history with its sovereign conciliatory power of the most contrasting demands of the spirit and the most diverse aspects of truth. Every concept or institution, every religion or doctrine, every myth or theory, every people or lineage exists and lives in its history, with its origin and development. And in history, all dogmatism breaks down, and the soul is humbled together and exalts itself by opening up to the vision of the great horizons in which every fact has its causes and every truth its value; whereby man strips himself of all vain pride and selfish presumption, learning to recognise with religious respect the infinite power that is within him and that even transcends him. The method, therefore, of the Enciclopedia Italiana is the broadest historical method, as much in each individual article as in the overall system. Thanks to this method, the editors have endeavoured to gather around them, assigning to each their part, writers of the most varied mentalities, to collaborate in a complete and organic, objective and calm exposition of the sum of the knowledge that is the result of all scientific research and constitutes the essential elements of culture".
In general, the aim of the initiative is to represent, through the selection of words, the central role that Treccani has played in the development of our country's culture. Emphasising the Encyclopaedia's ability to record changes in society with its entries and, at the same time, to connect them with the great dynamics that have affected the world from 1925 to the present day.
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