Pontifical Academy of Arcadia

The Accademia degli Arcadi or Accademia dell'Arcadia, "Academy of Arcadia" or "Academy of the Arcadians", is an Italian literary academy founded in Rome in 1690. The full Italian official name was Pontificia Accademia degli Arcadi.

Established in honor of Queen Christina of Sweden by members of her Roman intellectual circle, the academy sought to reform Italian poetry by opposing the ornamental excesses of Marinist verse in the Baroque period with a return to classical simplicity, drawing inspiration from Greco-Roman pastoral literature. Each member assumed a pastoral pseudonym, and unlike most learned societies of the period, the academy admitted women.

Shortly after its founding, the academy grew to number over 1,300 members and established colonies across Italy. Its most celebrated member was the librettist and lyric poet Pietro Metastasio, widely regarded as the highest exponent of the Arcadian movement. Goethe was admitted in 1786, and George Frideric Handel was a frequent attendant during his years in Italy.

The academy survives to the present day, and membership is considered prestigious. In 1925, it was renamed the Arcadia Accademia Letteraria Italiana(Arcadia Italian Literary Academy) and continues to operate as a historical institute promoting literary criticism.

History

Foundation

The beginnings of the Accademia degli Arcadi date to February 1656, when a literary circle formed under the patronage of Queen Christina of Sweden, who had abdicated the Swedish crown in 1654, converted to Catholicism, and taken up her residence in Rome, where she spent much of the rest of her life.