Il cibo e gli Emiri (notizia sulla B.IN.G. ritrovata in Qatar)

The Bibliothèque Internationale de Gastronomie of Lugano (B.IN.G.), formerly owned by the financier Orazio Bagnasco, had effectively vanished from record after his death in 1999. Extensive research conducted within the AtLiTeG Project has now revealed that the collection survives intact and is housed within the gastronomic holdings of the Library of the Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) in Doha, which acquired it in 2014 through the patronage of Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad Al-Thani. This acquisition represents a major milestone for the study of Italian culinary history, culture, and language. The collection restores to scholars an extraordinary resource, remarkable both for its size – over 4,000 early volumes, manuscripts and printed books, in twelve different languages – and for its chronological range, spanning from the Middle Ages to the late 19th century. It also provides crucial material for the lexicographic reconstruction of Italian food terminology in the medieval and early modern periods. The article traces the process through which the world’s largest private library of early gastronomic texts was identified in Qatar, examines the scope of the collection and the (partial) catalogue published by Bagnasco in 1994, and situates the rediscovery within a broader historical context that seeks to illuminate the circumstances and climate in which the B.IN.G. was assembled. In conclusion, particular attention is devoted to two Italo-Romance manuscripts belonging to the “Twelve companions” tradition, formerly preserved at the B.IN.G. and now rediscovered at the MIA.