This collection of print materials, many of them rare and ephemeral, was assembled over many decades by Guido Mazzoni, an Italian Senator, Dante scholar, professor, and bibliophile. The approximately 49,648 pieces span the years 1572 through 1946, with the bulk dating from the mid-18th to the early 20th centuries. Topics range widely and include Italian politics, particularly the rise of Socialism and Fascism; Italian humanities, especially poetry, theater, and opera; Dante studies; patriotic writings, including some by Mussolini and others in his regime; and the history and context of both World Wars. Popular literary and cultural serials abound, many with writings by noted authors, including women writers. Given Mazzoni's background in academics, his friendships with publishers, and his residence in Padova and Firenze, many of the authors are Jewish. Many of the pieces were sent to Mazzoni from former students or colleagues and are inscribed to him. Mazzoni collected many rare pieces from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries; broadsides from Napoleonic, Medicean, and Borbonic Italian regions are numerous. Formats represented in the collection include: pamphlets, offprints, clippings, full-issue newspapers (many from the Piedmont), libretti, scores, manuscript items, small cards, periodicals, small volumes, political broadsides, epithalamia (pieces produced on the occasion of a wedding), and one handmade photo album. There are many illustrated publications, fine engravings, woodcuts, and items with map inserts. About 80 percent of the material is in the Italian language: other common languages include Latin, French, English, German. There are also some publications in Greek, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, and Eastern European languages. The largest and most developed subject areas, with thousands of pamphlets in each series, relate to Italian history from the inception of population on the Italian peninsula through the early 1940s, with emphasis on the 18th and 19th centuries; Italian language and literature from its earliest manifestations through the 1930s; Italian and European politics, ranging from the Etruscans to the rise of Fascism in the 1930s; and biographical works on Italian notables. Smaller but rich subject collections relate to Italian education; social life and customs in Italy; archaeology; music, especially opera and popular music; art history; and religious history. The literary, political, and scientific individuals represented by the collection are too numerous to mention in this introduction, but more detailed information can be found under the section for each subject area listed in this guide. As Guido Mazzoni was the protegé of Giosué Carducci, that poet is most well-represented; also, as Mazzoni was one of the leading Dante scholars in Italy of his time, materials on Dante Alighieri and his works number in the thousands.

The Guido Mazzoni Pamphlet Collection spans the years 1572 through 1946, with approximately 46,825 pieces in the collection. The bulk of the material, chiefly in the Italian language, dates from the mid-eighteenth to the early twentieth centuries. Formats represented include: pamphlets, libretti, clippings, newspapers, scores, manuscript items, small cards, periodicals, small volumes, broadsides (some very large), epithalamia (pieces produced on the occasion of a wedding), and one photo album. There are many illustrated publications, fine engravings, woodcuts, and items with maps enclosed.

About 80 percent of the materials is in the Italian language, though other languages are represented, most notably Latin, French, English, German, Greek, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, and Eastern European languages.

This guide offers access to brief descriptive records for each item. Hundreds of pamphlets, particularly the epithalamia, were described more fully in the library's online catalog and can be found by using the subject keywords "provenance" and "mazzoni guido." A full set of more than 30 volumes held by the library offers photocopied images of Mazzoni's handwritten catalog slips for subject and name access to the pamphlets.

Guido Mazzoni assembled his library in several ways. He purchased many items from rare book dealers and other book sellers in Italy, particularly in Padua, Florence, and Bologna. His colleagues and former students sent him thousands of offprints, extracts, and small volumes of their work, most of them inscribed to Mazzoni. He accumulated materials from his work in the Italian Senate, most notably in areas of education, politics, and the humanities. He also acquired either by purchase or by inheritance entire libraries of academic colleagues, some of whom became his relatives by marriage. Some of these names include Giuseppe Chiarini, his father-in-law, and Raffaello Fornaciari.

The importance of the Mazzoni Pamphlet Collection primarily lies in its contribution to the fields of European and Italian studies. It is a broad but selective bibliography - put into material form, as it were - of nineteenth-century European culture and its transition into the twentieth century. The intellectual arrangement assigned to the pamphlets by library staff places them into thirty-one subject areas.

The largest and most developed subject areas, each represented by thousands of pamphlets, are: Italian history from the inception of population on the Italian peninsula through the 1940s, with emphasis on the 18th and 19th centuries; Italian language and literature from their earliest manifestations through the 1930s; Italian and European politics, ranging from the Etruscan period to the 1930s; and biographical works on Italian notables. Smaller but rich subject collections include Italian education; social life and customs in Italy; archaeology; music, especially popular music and opera; art history; and religious history. Many individual items, particularly literary publications, are ephemeral, rare, and difficult to locate in the United States and even in Italy.

The literary, political, and scientific individuals represented in the collection are too numerous for this introduction, but more detailed information can be found under the section for each subject area listed below. Suffice it to say that virtually every important poet, dramatist, writer, historian, and political figure of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is represented, and, perhaps more importantly, many minor authors and political figures of those eras whose works are now difficult to find. In addition, prominent scientific individuals of the nineteenth century and early twentieth centuries are represented in the collection. As Guido Mazzoni was the protegé of Giosué Carducci, that poet is most well-represented; also, as Mazzoni was one of the leading Dante scholars in Italy of his time, materials relating to every topic in Dante studies number in the thousands.

The U.S. Army European Command's Historical Division was charged with performing analyses and studies of military engagements and other events during World War II. Collection contains U.S. Army intelligence documents assembled from 1945-1954 by the European Command's Historical Division, which was charged with gathering information on the capabilities and strategies of the German and Soviet armies during and after World War II. The information centers on specific events and campaigns during World War II, and was gathered chiefly from German military officials and staff during trials and interrogations. Many of the documents have English translations. Formats include copies of transcriptions of interviews or interrogations, reports, and correspondence. Records are arranged by a number code assigned by United States Army Historical Division personnel. A published guide to the documents is included in the first box of the collection, as well as a list of the documents held by the library, which represent a partial set of the original U.S. Army files.

Collection contains a partial file of U.S. Army intelligence documents assembled from 1945-1954 by the European Command's Historical Division, which was charged with gathering information on the capabilities and strategies of the German and Soviet armies during and after World War II. The information centers on specific events and campaigns during World War II, and was gathered chiefly from German military officials and staff during trials and interrogations. Many of the documents have English translations. Formats include copies of transcriptions of interviews or interrogations, reports, and correspondence. Records are arranged by a number code assigned by United States Army Historical Division personnel. Also included in the first box is the Historical Division's Guide to Foreign Military Studies, 1945-1954, Catalog and Index (Headquarters, U.S. Army, Europe, 1954), which can be consulted for an introduction to the entire file of U.S. Army's documents, with lists of each series and indices of topics, authors, and military units. Appended to this is a list of the library's holdings.