Accademia della Crusca: Italian Language History and Resources

From http://italian.about.com/library/weekly/aa071900a.htm?nl=1

Accademia della Crusca, or The Academy of the Chaff, was founded in Florence in 1582 to maintain the purity of the language. Still in existence today, Accademia della Crusca was the first such institution in Europe and the first to produce a modern national language.

For those interested in Italian linguistics, the history of the Italian language, and philological studies, there is the historical archive which consists of early diaries, literary manuscript texts, and correspondences from early Academy members. La Crusca per Voi is a semiannual periodical dedicated to schools and lovers of the Italian Language and published by the members of Accademia della Crusca. The biblioteca virtuale at the Academy consists of language texts, dictionaries and lexicons and works devoted to the study of the Italian and to linguistics in general.

Read more about the Accademia at http://italian.about.com/library/weekly/aa071900a.htm?nl=1 and visit the website of the Accademia at http://www.accademiadellacrusca.it/index_eng.php