La India y el Renacimiento florentino: las cartas de Filippo Sassetti

Abstract

Here we present the translation of two of the letters that Filippo Sassetti, the Florentine merchant and humanist of the 16th-century, sent from India to Italy with abundant and insightful observations about the religious beliefs, customs, languages, nature and social life of the subcontinent. This document ―little known and so far unpublished in Spanish (and apparently in other languages too)― is a valuable testimony of the complex process of Europe’s reception and interpretative representation of the ancient Indian culture. In this respect, Sassetti’s hermeneutic endeavours, to a large extent dependent on Florentine Renaissance humanism’s ideals, stand out. They help us understand the Indian Other beyond the stereotypes in vogue then (and now), as well as the difficulties to achieve that.