The Hospital and Church of the Schiavoni / Illyrian Confraternity in Early Modern Rome

Slavic people from South-Eastern Europe immigrated to Italy throughout the Early Modern period and organized themselves into confraternities based on common origin and language. This article analyses the role of the images and architecture of the “national” church and hospital of the Schiavoni or Illyrian community in Rome in the fashioning and management of their confraternity, which played a pivotal role in the self-definition of the Schiavoni in Italy and also served as an expression of papal foreign policy in the Balkans.