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I thought this article was going to be about representation of women in Italian art. It turns out to be about the history of abortion and its suppression.
The article seriously needs an introduction or summary, it barely gives a hint about what the article is about, and few paragraphs in the beginning doesn't seem to make the reader any wiser to the topic.
Pregnancy and abortion is mentioned in the first two sentences. From there the article wanders a bit, but I would say it's a pretty strong introduction. Unless I misunderstood the point of the article
This "early modern Italy" is early 1600.
The early modern period is generally held to start roughly in ~1400-1500 and end roughly in ~1750-1800.

I understand that there is a lot of debate on the specific starting and ending dates, but I thought that pretty much everyone would identify ~1600 to be smack right in the middle of it?

Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t Italy a bunch of duchies up until the 19th century?
Mostly right. There were the Papal States and the Kingdoms of Sicily, Naples and Sardinia and Corsica during this period too, but they were often under foreign control. Also there were things like the Republic of Venice spreading throughout the Mediterranean.

It wasn't unified until around 1870 though.