looking east
The Specola of the Eastern Worlds

An active memory of one's own past and a clear sense of one's own identity, open to the world, are the two necessary conditions for an individual, a city, or a nation to have an adequate awareness of itself and possibilities for development. With the inauguration of a permanent route that connects the sixteenth-century city, in which Matteo Ricci was born, to his historical experience narrated at every stage, Macerata takes a significant step in building its own memory and a stronger identity. It thus recognises that particular vocation which, over the last four centuries, has linked it in a singular way to the East, through the personalities of Matteo Ricci, Cassiano Beligatti, Antelmo Severini and Giuseppe Tucci: to these and to other Orientalists of the Marche region is dedicated an itinerary within the Specola of the Mozzi Borgetti Library.

Following in the footsteps of our great spirits, let us open ourselves to a path of knowledge and friendship with anyone who «bears upon himself the supreme Heaven and presses his sandals upon the august Earth» (Matteo Ricci).