Ramon d’Alòs-Moner i de Dou (1885-1939) was a Catalan scholar affiliated with the Institute for Catalan Studies (IEC) who played an important role in the institutionalization of Catalan culture. From 1911 to 1913, he lived in Rome, an experience that marked him academically and personally. Whilst there, he was able to gather a great deal of information about Ramon Llull, as well as gain in-depth knowledge of Italian culture, in particular, the literature of Dante Alighieri. His interest in the Florentine poet led him to organize the commemoration of the 600th anniversary of Dante’s death in Barcelona, in 1921, which allowed him to raise awareness of Catalan Dantean work abroad, especially in Italy. D’Alòs-Moner also helped found, in 1920, the Società Nazionale Italiana Dante Alighieri de Barcelona (Dante Alighieri Italian National Society of Barcelona), which assembled an invaluable collection of editions of Dante’s works and Dantean writings. (These documents may have ended up in his library when these societies were dismantled at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War.) His scholarly relations with Italian academics – e.g. the Italian Dantean Society, the Dantist Michele Barbi, the editor of the journal Studi Danteschi or the Catalanophile Alfredo Giannini – earned him the recognition of several Italian societies and institutions. The most important was the award, in 1929, of the Croce di Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Corona. D’Alòs-Moner’s legacy is today spread amongst three conservation centres: the Pompeu Fabra University Library (Alòs-Moner collection), the Institute of Catalan Studies (IEC) Archive (Ramon d’Alòs-Moner i de Dou collection) and the Biblioteca de Catalunya (Alòs-Moner family collection).

A selection of the most valuable copies – often due to their rarity in Catalonia at the time – from the Ramon d’Alòs-Moner collection can be seen below. Of special note are the translations to distant languages (see, for example, the Danish, Japanese, Romanian or Greek editions), the illustrated editions and the specialized bibliography on Dante. We have contextualized each of the Catalan editions and highlighted the most important aspects.