maining space (half of 453 and the reverse side) two notes were made—the first about the mandate of 30th June, to send the sentence and recantation to all Inquisitors, etc., and the permit to Galileo to go to Siena; the second note reports that Firenzuola issued the order to Galileo on 2nd July. The rest of the documents which the Vatican MS. now contains must have been added as they came in, or when there were several to be added. The paging was, of course, continuously carried out.
The last document but one of the collection is a short historical summary of the process. Berti says that this must have been drawn up at least a year after its conclusion,[1] but Pieralisi[2] has pointed out that he should have said, at least a century. The origin of it is plain: when the inquiry of Fra Paolo Antonio Ambr*** of 8th June, 1734, came in as to the erection of a monument in Santa Croce, this résumé was drawn up to put the cardinals, who might not know much about it, in possession of the chief facts of Galileo's trial. In the Vatican MS. the sheet of paper containing the résumé is stitched to the letter of Fra. Ambr*** and the decision of the cardinals written on the fourth page. If any doubts remain that this summary was written in 1734, they will disappear on comparing it with the extracts, published by Gherardi, of the protocol of the sitting of 16th June of that year. In this we find, within parentheses, the most important part of the summary, followed by the decision of the cardinals, in almost verbatim translation from Italian into Latin. The date and purpose of the summary are therefore made clear.
