From a family archive to the Spanish Congress of Deputies: in a brief ceremony, the donation to Spain by Italian financier Claudio Cornini of an 'important documentary fund' belonging to a distinguished 19th century Spanish politician and diplomat, Francisco Martínez de la Rosa, was completed today. This was announced in a statement by the Cervantes Institute, which acted as mediator in this donation.
The documents in question belonged to the Cornini family, descendants of Martínez de la Rosa, who held, among other posts, those of President of the Council of Ministers (1834-1835), President of the Congress and Spanish Ambassador to Rome, and was also a poet, writer and playwright. Among the papers delivered, the Cervantes Institute explains, are some of 'important artistic value'.
The ceremony was attended by the president of the Spanish Congress of Deputies, Francina Armengol, who emphasised that, with this donation, Martínez de la Rosa's legacy 'comes home'. For his part, the president of the Cervantes Institute, Luís García Montero, pointed out that this 19th-century politician was "one of Spain's exemplary exiles" and "an ethical example".
"This legacy is undoubtedly a symbol of the close cultural relations existing between Spain and Italy," argued the Italian ambassador to Spain, Giuseppe Buccino Grimaldi. "These documents were kept by my family as a small treasure," recounted Cornini, "a treasure made up of cartouches, coats of arms, notarial deeds, patents of nobility, literary texts".
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