Terra Infecta: Disease and the Italian Landscape reframes Italy's most celebrated urban and rural landscapes not as monuments to beauty, but as territories shaped by sanitation politics, medical mythology, and the violent erasure of communities from Venice's wetlands to ancient Matera.
About This Book
Italy's landscapes have long been shorthand for civilisation and grandeur — yet behind that image lies a history of disease anxieties, spurious medical narratives, and state-sanctioned destruction. Andrea Bagnato's Terra Infecta traces how the modern sanitation project physically remade Italy: draining wetlands, demolishing neighbourhoods in Naples, and displacing the inhabitants of Matera. Drawing on architectural records, medical history, and the author's own travels, Bagnato argues that the north–south inequalities defining contemporary Italy are rooted in political constructions of uncleanliness rather than objective conditions. This is urban history at its most consequential — running from Italian unification through to the aftershocks of Covid-19, and attentive throughout to the communities who bore the cost of grand hygienic ambitions.
Key Features
- 304 pages of narrative history drawing on architectural records, medical archives, and first-hand travel writing
- Written by Andrea Bagnato
- Case studies include Venice's wetland drainage, the demolition and replanning of Naples, and the displacement of Matera's inhabitants
- Published by Mack, ISBN 9781917651240
What You'll Discover
- How sanitation discourse functioned as a political instrument, used to justify the destruction of working communities under the guise of public health reform
- The architectural and landscape consequences of Italy's sanitation campaigns — from wetland drainage around Venice to wholesale urban replanning in Naples
- How north–south inequality in Italy was constructed and legitimised through medical narratives that had more to do with politics than lived conditions
- Traces of collective resistance and forgotten histories of self-organisation among communities targeted by these grand hygienic schemes
About the Author
Andrea Bagnato is the author of Terra Infecta, a work that draws on architectural records, medical history, and extensive first-hand travel across Italy. His research spans Italian unification to the present day, connecting urban transformation to the politics of disease and inequality.
Specifications
- Format: Hardcover
- Pages: 304
- Dimensions: 125 x 180 mm
- Language: English
- ISBN: 9781917651240
- Publisher: Mack
- Publication Date: [Details available upon request]
Perfect For: Architects, urban historians, and design researchers interested in the politics of public space, the history of sanitation infrastructure, and the contested landscapes of modern Italy.