Lelio Pecci’s travel journal for his mission to Emperor Charles V in Flanders offers modern readers a layman’s description of a large section of Europe (from northern Italy to France, Flanders, Germany, and Austria), as well as a priviledged view into the mind of a learned man from a small, but cultured city in Italy. This article briefly contextualizes Pecci’s journal in the political situation of Siena in mid-century, presents current biographical information on Lelio Pecci, and discusses some of the most salient aspects of the travel journal. It then provides readers with an appendix containing an annotated transcription of the journal based on its only extant manuscript copy.

1. Quaderni d'italianistica

Original publication: Brizio, Elena. "'The Country is Large, and Beautiful and Happy.' Lelio Pecci’s Travel Journal of his 1549 Mission to Flanders." Quaderni d'italianistica 31 (2): 2011. 51-89. DOI: 10.33137/q.i..v31i2.14988. This material has been re-published in an unmodified form on the Canadian HSS Commons with the permission of Iter Canada / Quaderni d'italianistica. Copyright © the author(s). Their work is distributed by Quaderni d'italianistica under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. For details, see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/.