About the lecture
This lecture aims to reflect on a number of key issues that have emerged from the many studies conducted in recent decades focusing on female prophecy in the early modern period across various geographical and religious contexts. Particularly during times of political, social and religious crisis – e.g. the Italian Wars, the Thirty Years’ War, the English Civil War, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries – various parts of Europe saw the emergence of female prophets and visionaries, around whom communities of men and women from diverse backgrounds and levels of education gathered. Their words and the physical signs of their experiences gave rise to theological, philosophical and political debates that transcended denominational boundaries. The established authorities and the various Christian denominations of the time often opposed, censored and silenced these women and their supporters. Drawing on a number of case studies, mainly from the 17th century, the focus will be on the ‘voices’ – that is, the verbal and non-verbal languages – employed by the women prophets and their opponents, with a view to highlighting their common characteristics as well as their specific features in different contexts, the elements of continuity and discontinuity, and the forms of their communication and the transmission of their memory.
This Evening Lecture is part of the international conference ‘The voice of prophecy: Women, men and political theology in early modern reformations’, organized by Eleonora Cappuccilli, at the Norwegian Institute in Rome (15-16 October 2026). This conference is funded by the European Union, MSCA Global fellowship, and the Norwegian Institute in Rome.
About the speaker
Adelisa Malena is Associate Professor of Early Modern History at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. Her main research interests include women’s and gender studies, cultural history, and religious history. She has worked extensively on the Roman Inquisition, Catholic spiritual direction, and female mysticism in the seventeenth century. Among her many publications, she is the author of L’eresia dei perfetti. Inquisizione romana ed esperienze mistiche nel Seicento italiano (Rome, 2003). She is currently working on trans-confessional relationships and networks between Italy and Germany in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Interested in attending?
Please register, preferably the day before the lecture: https://nettskjema.no/a/eveninglecture