Between 1763 and 1764 the kingdom of Naples was hit by a very serious famine, which historiography has read substantially as a clash between "old" urban powers and "new" state powers. The essays collected here propose a multi-voiced reading of the phenomenon, observed from different institutional, geographical and documentary points of view, in order to give substance to a multifocal and integrated investigation that restores its complexity.
Keywords: 18th century, famine, consuls and merchants, the Bourbon courts