In 1906, the Nobel Prize awarded to Giosuè Carducci sparked an unprecedented wave of enthusiasm in the city of Bologna. Riding that wave of enthusiasm, Giovanni Pascoli and other intellectuals succeeded in establishing the new Class of Moral Sciences, which would be officially inaugurated only in 1907. Between 1910 and 1930, all the most prominent humanists from the University of Bologna, along with many of the most renowned jurists, joined this new Class, fostering dynamic “interdisciplinary collaborations.”
The Academy counts among its founders Giuseppe Brini, a renowned leader in Roman law studies, along with other legal historians such as Emilio Costa and Silvio Perozzi, who were able to build fruitful interactions with scholars of Roman civilization and Latin literature.
During the Fascist period, following the resignation of President Giuseppe Brini in protest against the regime, the Academy further strengthened its commitment to the study of Roman civilization, also through the contributions of the linguist Alfredo Trombetti. After the devastation of World War II and the dire effects of the racial laws, the Academy of Sciences resumed its activities, shifting its focus to disciplines that had previously been overlooked but later gained great scientific and cultural significance, such as history, philosophy, anthropology, statistics, economics, and the emerging fields of law.
In more recent times, the Class of Moral Sciences has promoted several areas of excellence, among which stands out the Lectura Dantis Bononiensis organized by the distinguished Dante scholar Emilio Pasquini, who led the initiative from 2009 to 2021, the anniversary year of Dante’s death. This reading cycle, recognized internationally for the exceptional quality of its speakers, culminated in the three-volume collection Lectura Dantis Bononiensis, dedicated to the three canticles of the Divine Comedy.
The other activities of the Class of Moral Sciences have reached the highest levels of excellence across all its fields, thanks to the contributions of many distinguished academics—ranging from linguistics to archaeology, from ancient and modern history to political and social sciences, as well as the most advanced perspectives in law, economics, philosophy, and anthropology. The richness of these contributions emerges in the numerous meetings held annually, which are documented in an equally extensive range of publications, particularly in its Annales.
