Chapter V: General Disintegration of Belief (4)

[421A] Mich. Cannesius, _Vita Pauli II._, in Murat. iii. ii. col. 993. Towards even Nero, son of Domitius Ahenobarbus, the author will not be impolite, on account of his connection with the Pope. He only says of him, ‘De quo verum Scriptores multa ac diversa commemorant.’ The family of Plato in Milan went still farther, and nattered itself on its descent from the great Athenian. Filelfo in a wedding speech, and in an encomium on the jurist Teodoro Plato, ventured to make this assertion; and a Giovanantonio Plato put the inscription on a portrait in relief carved by him in 1478 (in the court of the Pal. Magenta at Milan): ‘Platonem suum, a quo originem et ingenium refert.’

[422] See on this point, Nangiporto, in Murat. iii. ii. col. 1094; Infessura, in Eccard, _Scriptores_, ii. col. 1951; Matarazzo, in the _Arch. Stor._ xvi. ii. p. 180. Nangiporto, however, admits that it was no longer possible to decide whether the corpse was male or female.

[423] As early as Julius II. excavations were made in the hope of finding statues. Vasari, xi. p. 302, _V. di Gio. da Udine_. Comp. Gregorovius, viii. 186.

[424] The letter was first attributed to Castiglione, _Lettere di Negozi del Conte Bald. Castiglione_, Padua, 1736 and 1769, but proved to be from the hand of Raphael by Daniele Francesconi in 1799. It is printed from a Munich MS. in Passavant, _Leben Raphael’s_, iii. p. 44. Comp. Gruyer _Raphael et l’Antiquité_, 1864, i. 435-457.

[425] _Lettere Pittoriche_, ii. 1, Tolomei to Landi, 14 Nov., 1542.

[426] He tried ‘curis animique doloribus quacunque ratione aditum intercludere;’ music and lively conversation charmed him, and he hoped by their means to live longer. _Leonis X. Vita Anonyma_, in Roscoe, ed. Bossi, xii. p. 169.

[427] This point is referred to in the _Satires_ of Ariosto. See the first (‘Perc’ ho molto,’ &c.), and the fourth ‘Poiche, Annibale’).

[428] Ranke, _Päpste_, i. 408 sqq. ‘_Lettere dei Principi_, p. 107. Letter of Negri, September 1, 1522 ... ‘tutti questi cortigiani esausti da Papa Leone e falliti.’ They avenged themselves after the death of Leo by satirical verses and inscriptions.

[429] _Pii II. Commentarii_, p. 251 in the 5th book. Comp. Sannazaro’s elegy, ‘Ad Ruinas Cumarum urbis vetustissimæ’ (_Opera_, fol. 236 sqq.).

[430] Polifilo (i.e. Franciscus Columna) ‘Hypnerotomachia, ubi humana omnia non nisi somnum esse docet atque obiter plurima scita sane quam digna commemorat,’ Venice, Aldus Manutius, 1499. Comp. on this remarkable book and others, A. Didot, _Alde Manuce_, Paris, 1875, pp. 132-142; and Gruyer, _Raphael et l’Antiquité_, i. pp. 191 sqq.; J. Burckhardt, _Geschichte der Renaissance in Italien_, pp. 43 sqq., and the work of A. Ilg, Vienna, 1872.

[431] While all the Fathers of the Church and all the pilgrims speak only of a cave. The poets, too, do without the palace. Comp. Sannazaro, _De Partu Virginis_, l. ii.

[432] Chiefly from Vespasiano Fiorentine, in the first vol. of the _Spicileg. Romanum_, by Mai, from which edition the quotations in this book are made. New edition by Bartoli, Florence, 1859. The author was a Florentine bookseller and copying agent, about and after the middle of the fifteenth century.

[433] Comp. Petr. _Epist. Fam._ ed. Fracass. l. xviii. 2, xxiv. 12, var. 25, with the notes of Fracassetti in the Italian translation, vol. iv. 92-101, v. 196 sqq., where the fragment of a translation of Homer before the time of Pilato is also given.

[434] Forgeries, by which the passion for antiquity was turned to the profit or amusement of rogues, are well known to have been not uncommon. See the articles in the literary histories on Annius of Viterbo.

[435] Vespas. Fiorent. p. 31. ‘Tommaso da Serezana usava dire, che dua cosa farebbe, se egli potesse mai spendere, ch’era in libri e murare. E l’una e l’altra fece nel suo pontificato.’ With respect to his translation, see Æen. Sylvius, _De Europa_, cap. 58, p. 459, and Papencordt, _Ges. der Stadt Rom._ p. 502. See esp. Voigt, op. cit. book v.

[436] Vespas. Fior. pp. 48 and 658, 665. Comp. J. Manetti, _Vita Nicolai V._, in Murat. iii. ii. col. 925 sqq. On the question whether and how Calixtus III. partly dispersed the library again, see Vespas. Fiorent. p. 284, with Mai’s note.

[437] Vespas. Fior. pp. 617 sqq.

[438] Vespas. Fior. pp. 457 sqq.

[439] Vespas. Fiorent, p. 193. Comp. Marin Sanudo, in Murat. xxii. col. 1185 sqq.

[440] How the matter was provisionally treated is related in Malipiero, _Ann. Veneti, Arch. Stor._ vii. ii. pp. 653, 655.

[441] Vespas. Fior. pp. 124 sqq., and ‘Inventario della Libreria Urbinata compilata nel Secolo XV. da Federigo Veterano, bibliotecario di Federigo I. da Montefeltro Duca d’Urbino,’ given by C. Guasti in tbe _Giornale Storico degli Archivi Toscani_, vi. (1862), 127-147 and vii. (1863) 46-55, 130-154. For contemporary opinions on the library, see Favre, _Mélanges d’Hist. Lit._ i. 127, note 6. The following is the substance of Dr. Geiger’s remarks on the subject of the old authors:--

For the Medicean Library comp. _Delle condicioni e delle vicende della libreria medicea privata dal 1494 al 1508 ricerche di Enea Piccolomini_, Arch. stor. ital., 265 sqq., 3 serie, vol. xix. pp. 101-129,254-281, xx. 51-94, xxi. 102-112, 282-296. Dr. Geiger does not undertake an estimate of the relative values of the various rare and almost unknown works contained in the library, nor is he able to state where they are now to be found. He remarks that information as to Greece is much fuller than as to Italy, which is a characteristic mark of the time. The catalogue contains editions of the Bible, of single books of it, with text and annotations, also Greek and Roman works in their then most complete forms, together with some Hebrew books--_tractatus quidam rabbinorum hebr._--with much modern work, chiefly in Latin, and with not a little in Italian.

Dr. Geiger doubts the absolute accuracy of Vespasiano Fiorentino’s catalogue of the library at Urbino. See the German edition, i. 313, 314. [S.G.C.M.]

[442] Perhaps at the capture of Urbino by the troops of Cæsar Borgia. The existence of the manuscript has been doubted; but I cannot believe that Vespasiano would have spoken of the gnomic extracts from Menander, which do not amount to more than a couple of hundred verses, as ‘tutte le opere,’ nor have mentioned them in the list of comprehensive manuscripts, even though he had before him only our present Pindar and Sophocles. It is not inconceivable that this Menander may some day come to light.

[The catalogue of the library at Urbino (see foregoing note), which dates back to the fifteenth century, is not perfectly in accordance with Vespasiano’s report, and with the remarks of Dr. Burckhardt upon it. As an official document, it deserves greater credit than Vespasiano’s description, which, like most of his descriptions, cannot be acquitted of a certain inaccuracy in detail and tendency to over-colouring. In this catalogue no mention is made of the manuscript of Menander. Mai’s doubt as to its existence is therefore justified. Instead of ‘all the works of Pindar,’ we here find: ‘Pindaris Olimpia et Pithia.’ The catalogue makes no distinction between ancient and modern books, contains the works of Dante (among others, _Comœdiæ Thusco Carmine_), and Boccaccio, in a very imperfect form; those of Petrarch, however, in all completeness. It may be added that this catalogue mentions many humanistic writings which have hitherto remained unknown and unprinted, that it contains collections of the privileges of the princes of Montefeltro, and carefully enumerates the dedications offered by translators or original writers to Federigo of Urbino.--L. G.]

[443] For what follows and in part for what has gone before, see W. Wattenbach, _Das Schriftwesen im Mittelalter_, 2nd. ed. Leipzig, 1875, pp. 392 sqq., 405 sqq., 505. Comp. also the poem, _De Officio Scribæ_, of Phil. Beroaldus, who, however, is rather speaking of the public scrivener.]

[444] When Piero de’ Medici, at the death of Matthias Corvinus, the book-loving King of Hungary, declared that the ‘scrittori’ must now lower their charges, since they would otherwise find no further employment (Scil. except in Italy), he can only have meant the Greek copyists, as the caligraphists, to whom one might be tempted to refer his words, continued to be numerous throughout all Italy. Fabroni, _Laurent. Magn._ Adnot. 156 Comp. Adnot. 154.]

[445] Gaye, _Carteggio_, i. p. 164. A letter of the year 1455 under Calixtus III. The famous miniature Bible of Urbino is written by a Frenchman, a workman of Vespasiano’s. See D’Agincourt, _La Peinture_, tab. 78. On German copyists in Italy, see further G. Campori, _Artisti Italiani e Stranieri negli Stati Estensi_, Modena, 1855, p. 277, and _Giornale di Erudizione Artistica_, vol. ii. pp. 360 sqq. Wattenbach, _Schriftwesen_, 411, note 5. For German printers, see below.]

[446] Vespas. Fior. p. 335.]

[447] Ambr. Trav. _Epist._ i. p. 63. The Pope was equally serviceable to the libraries of Urbino and Pesaro (that of Aless. Sforza, p. 38). Comp. Arch. Stor. ital. xxi. 103-106. The Bible and Commentaries on it; the Fathers of the Church; Aristotle, with his commentators, including Averroes and Avicenna; Moses Maimonides; Latin translations of Greek philosophers; the Latin prose writers; of the poets only Virgil, Statius, Ovid, and Lucan are mentioned.]

[448] Vespas. Fior. p. 129.]

[449] ‘Artes--Quis Labor est fessis demptus ab Articulis’ in a poem by Robertus Ursus about 1470, _Rerum Ital. Script, ex Codd. Fiorent._ tom, ii. col. 693. He rejoices rather too hastily over the rapid spread of classical literature which was hoped for. Comp. Libri, _Hist. des Sciences Mathématiques_, ii. 278 sqq. (See also the eulogy of Lor. Valla, _Hist. Zeitschr._ xxxii. 62.) For the printers at Rome (the first were Germans: Hahn, Pannartz, Schweinheim), see Gaspar. Veron. _Vita Pauli II._ in Murat. iii. ii. col. 1046; and Laire, _Spec. Hist. Typographiæ Romanae, xv. sec._ Romæ, 1778; Gregorovius, vii. 525-33. For the first Privilegium in Venice, see Marin Sanudo, in Muratori, xxii. col. 1189.]

[450] Something of the sort had already existed in the age of manuscripts. See Vespas. Fior. p. 656, on the _Cronaco del Mondo_ of Zembino of Pistoia.]

[451] Fabroni, _Laurent. Magn._ Adnot. 212. It happened in the case of the libel. _De Exilio_.]

[452] Even in Petrarch the consciousness of this superiority of Italians over Greeks is often to be noticed: _Epp. Fam._ lib. i. ep. 3; _Epp. Sen._ lib. xii. ep. 2; he praises the Greeks reluctantly: _Carmina_, lib. iii. 30 (ed. Rossetti, vol. ii. p. 342). A century later, Æneas Sylvius writes (Comm. to Panormita, ‘De Dictis et Factis Alfonsi,’ Append.): ‘Alfonsus tanto est Socrate major quanto gravior Romanus homo quam Græcus putatur.’ In accordance with this feeling the study of Greek was thought little of. From a document made use of below, written about 1460, it appears that Porcellio and Tomaso Seneca tried to resist the rising influence of Greek. Similarly, Paolo Cortese (1490) was averse to Greek, lest the hitherto exclusive authority of Latin should be impaired, _De Hominibus Doctis_, p. 20. For Greek studies in Italy, see esp. the learned work of Favre, _Mélanges d’Hist. Liter._ i. _passim_.]

[453] See above p. 187, and comp. C. Voigt, _Wiederbelebung_, 323 sqq.]

[454] The dying out of these Greeks is mentioned by Pierius Valerian, _De Infelicitate Literat._ in speaking of Lascaris. And Paulus Jovius, at the end of his _Elogia Literaria_, says of the Germans, ‘Quum literæ non latinæ modo cum pudore nostro, sed græcæ et hebraicæ in eorum terras fatali commigratione transierint’ (about 1450). Similarly, sixty years before (1482), Joh. Argyropulos had exclaimed, when he heard young Reuchlin translate Thucydides in his lecture-room at Rome, ‘Græcia nostra exilio transvolavit Alpes.’ Geiger, _Reuchlin_ (Lpzg. 1871), pp. 26 sqq. Burchhardt, 273. A remarkable passage is to be found in Jov. Pontanus, _Antonius_, opp. iv. p. 203: ‘In Græcia magis nunc Turcaicum discas quam Græcum. Quicquid enim doctorum habent Græcæ disciplinæ, in Italia nobiscum victitat.]

[455] Ranke, _Päpste_, i. 486 sqq. Comp. the end of this part of our work.]

[456] Tommaso Gar, _Relazioni della Corte di Roma_, i. pp. 338, 379.]

[457] George of Trebizond, teacher of rhetoric at Venice, with a salary of 150 ducats a year (see Malipiero, _Arch. Stor._ vii. ii. p. 653). For the Greek chair at Perugia, see _Arch. Stor._ xvi. ii. p. 19 of the Introduction. In the case of Rimini, there is some doubt whether Greek was taught or not. Comp. _Anecd. Litt._ ii. p. 300. At Bologna, the centre of juristic studies, Aurispa had but little success. Details on the subject in Malagola.]

[458] Exhaustive information on the subject in the admirable work of A. F. Didot, _Alde Manuce et l’Héllenisme à Venise_, Paris, 1875.]

[459] For what follows see A. de Gubernatis, _Matériaux pour servir à l’Histoire des Études Orientales en Italie_, Paris, Florence, &c., 1876. Additions by Soave in the _Bolletino Italiano degli Studi Orientali_, i. 178 sqq. More precise details below.]

[460] See below.]

[461] See _Commentario della Vita di Messer Gianozzo Manetti, scritto da Vespasiano Bisticci_, Torino, 1862, esp. pp. 11, 44, 91 sqq.]

[462] Vesp. Fior. p. 320. A. Trav. _Epist._ lib. xi. 16.]

[463] Platina, _Vita Sixti IV._ p. 332.]

[464] Benedictus Faleus, _De Origine Hebraicarum Græcarum Latinarumque Literarum_, Naples, 1520.]

[465] For Dante, see Wegele, _Dante_, 2nd ed. p. 268, and Lasinio, _Dante e le Lingue semitiche_ in the _Rivista Orientale_ (Flor. 1867-8). On Poggio, _Opera_, p. 297; Lion. Bruni, _Epist._ lib. ix. 12, comp. Gregorovius, vii. 555, and Shepherd-Tonelli, _Vita di Poggio_, i. 65. The letter of Poggio to Niccoli, in which he treats of Hebrew, has been lately published in French and Latin under the title, _Les Bains de Bade par Pogge_, by Antony Méray, Paris, 1876. Poggio desired to know on what principles Jerome translated the Bible, while Bruni maintained that, now that Jerome’s translation was in existence, distrust was shown to it by learning Hebrew. For Manetti as a collector of Hebrew MSS. see Steinschneider, in the work quoted below. In the library at Urbino there were in all sixty-one Hebrew manuscripts. Among them a Bible ‘opus mirabile et integrum, cum glossis mirabiliter scriptus in modo avium, arborum et animalium in maximo volumine, ut vix a tribus hominibus feratur.’ These, as appears from Assemanni’s list, are now mostly in the Vatican. On the first printing in Hebrew, see Steinschneider and Cassel, _Jud. Typographic in Esch. u. Gruber, Realencyclop._ sect. ii. bd. 28, p. 34, and _Catal. Bodl._ by Steinschneider, 1852-60, pp. 2821-2866. It is characteristic that of the two first printers one belonged to Mantua, the other to Reggio in Calabria, so that the printing of Hebrew books began almost contemporaneously at the two extremities of Italy. In Mantua the printer was a Jewish physician, who was helped by his wife. It may be mentioned as a curiosity that in the _Hypnerotomachia_ of Polifilo, written 1467, printed 1499, fol. 68 _a_, there is a short passage in Hebrew; otherwise no Hebrew occurs in the Aldine editions before 1501. The Hebrew scholars in Italy are given by De Gubernatis (p. 80), but authorities are not quoted for them singly. (Marco Lippomanno is omitted; comp. Steinschneider in the book given below.) Paolo de Canale is mentioned as a learned Hebraist by Pier. Valerian. _De Infel. Literat._ ed. Mencken, p. 296; in 1488 Professor in Bologna, _Mag. Vicentius_; comp. _Costituzione, discipline e riforme dell’antico studio Bolognese. Memoria del Prof. Luciano Scarabelli_, Piacenza, 1876; in 1514 Professor in Rome, Agarius Guidacerius, acc. to Gregorovius, viii. 292, and the passages there quoted. On Guid. see Steinschneider, _Bibliogr. Handbuch_, Leipzig, 1859, pp. 56, 157-161.]

[466] The literary activity of the Jews in Italy is too great and of too wide an influence to be passed over altogether in silence. The following paragraphs, which, not to overload the text, I have relegated to the notes, are wholly the substance of communications made me by Dr. M. Steinschneider, of Berlin, to whom I [Dr. Ludwig Geiger] here take the opportunity of expressing my thanks for his constant and friendly help. He has given exhaustive evidence on the subject in his profound and instructive treatise, ‘Letteratura Italiana dei Giudei,’ in the review _Il Buonarotti_, vols. vi. viii. xi. xii.; Rome, 1871-77 (also printed separately); to which, once for all, I refer the reader.

There were many Jews living in Rome at the time of the Second Temple. They had so thoroughly adopted the language and civilisation prevailing in Italy, that even on their tombs they used not Hebrew, but Latin and Greek inscriptions (communicated by Garucci, see Steinschneider, _Hebr. Bibliogr._ vi. p. 102, 1863). In Lower Italy, especially, Greek learning survived during the Middle Ages among the inhabitants generally, and particularly among the Jews, of whom some are said to have taught at the University of Salerno, and to have rivalled the Christians in literary productiveness (comp. Steinschneider, ‘Donnolo,’ in Virchow’s _Archiv_, bd. 39, 40). This supremacy of Greek culture lasted till the Saracens conquered Lower Italy. But before this conquest the Jews of Middle Italy had been striving to equal or surpass their bretheren of the South. Jewish learning centred in Rome, and from there spread, as early as the sixteenth century, to Cordova, Kairowan, and South Germany. By means of these emigrants, Italian Judaism became the teacher of the whole race. Through its works, especially through the work _Aruch_ of Nathan ben Jechiel (1101), a great dictionary to the Talmud, the Midraschim, and the Thargum, ‘which, though not informed by a genuine scientific spirit, offers so rich a store of matter and rests on such early authorities, that its treasures have even now not been wholly exhausted,’ it exercised indirectly a great influence (Abraham Geiger, _Das Judenthum und seine Geschichte_, Breslau, bd. ii. 1865, p. 170; and the same author’s _Nachgelassene Schriften_, bd. ii. Berlin, 1875, pp. 129 and 154). A little later, in the thirteenth century, the Jewish literature in Italy brought Jews and Christians into contact, and received through Frederick II., and still more perhaps through his son Manfred, a kind of official sanction. Of this contact we have evidence in the fact that an Italian, Niccolò di Giovinazzo, studied with a Jew, Moses ben Salomo, the Latin translation of the famous work of Maimonides, _More Nebuchim_; of this sanction, in the fact that the Emperor, who was distinguished for his freethinking as much as for his fondness for Oriental studies, probably was the cause of this Latin translation being made, and summoned the famous Anatoli from Provence into Italy, to translate works of Averroes into Hebrew (comp. Steinschneider, _Hebr. Bibliogr._ xv. 86, and Renan, _L’Averroes et l’Averroisme_, third edition, Paris, 1866, p. 290). These measures prove the acquaintance of early Jews with Latin, which rendered intercourse possible between them and Christians--an intercourse which bore sometimes a friendly and sometimes a polemical character. Still more than Anatoli, Hillel b. Samuel, in the latter half of the thirteenth century, devoted himself to Latin literature; he studied in Spain, returned to Italy, and here made many translations from Latin into Hebrew; among them of writings of Hippocrates in a Latin version. (This was printed 1647 by Gaiotius, and passed for his own.) In this translation he introduced a few Italian words by way of explanation, and thus perhaps, or by his whole literary procedure, laid himself open to the reproach of despising Jewish doctrines.

But the Jews went further than this. At the end of the thirteenth and in the fourteenth centuries, they drew so near to Christian science and to the representatives of the culture of the Renaissance, that one of them, Giuda Romano, in a series of hitherto unprinted writings, laboured zealously at the scholastic philosophy, and in one treatise used Italian words to explain Hebrew expressions. He is one of the first to do so (Steinschneider, _Giuda Romano_, Rome, 1870). Another, Giuda’s cousin Manoello, a friend of Dante, wrote in imitation of him a sort of Divine Comedy in Hebrew, in which he extols Dante, whose death he also bewailed in an Italian sonnet (Abraham Geiger, _Jüd. Zeitsch._ v. 286-331, Breslau, 1867). A third, Mose Riete, born towards the end of the century, wrote works in Italian (a specimen in the Catalogue of Hebrew MSS., Leyden, 1858). In the fifteenth century we can clearly recognise the influence of the Renaissance in Messer Leon, a Jewish writer, who, in his _Rhetoric_, uses Quintilian and Cicero, as well as Jewish authorities. One of the most famous Jewish writers in Italy in the fifteenth century was Eliah del Medigo, a philosopher who taught publicly as a Jew in Padua and Florence, and was once chosen by the Venetian Senate as arbitrator in a philosophical dispute (Abr. Geiger, _Nachgelassene Schriften_, Berlin, 1876, bd. iii. 3). Eliah del Medigo was the teacher of Pico della Mirandola; besides him, Jochanan Alemanno (comp. Steinschneider, _Polem. u. Apolog. Lit._ Lpzg. 1877, anh. 7, § 25). The list of learned Jews in Italy may be closed by Kalonymos ben David and Abraham de Balmes (d. 1523), to whom the greater part of the translations of Averroes from Hebrew into Latin is due, which were still publicly read at Padua in the seventeenth century. To this scholar may be added the Jewish Aldus, Gerson Soncino, who not only made his press the centre of Jewish printing, but, by publishing Greek works, trespassed on the ground of the great Aldus himself (Steinschneider, _Gerson Soncino und Aldus Manutius_, Berlin, 1858).

[467] Pierius Valerian. _De Infelic. Lit._ ed. Mencken, 301, speaking of Mongajo. Gubernatis, p. 184, identifies him with Andrea Alpago, of Bellemo, said to have also studied Arabian literature, and to have travelled in the East. On Arabic studies generally, Gubernatis, pp. 173 sqq. For a translation made 1341 from Arabic into Italian, comp. Narducci, _Intorno ad una tradizione italiana di una composizione astronomica di Alfonso X. rè di Castiglia_, Roma 1865. On Ramusio, see Sansovino, _Venezia_, fol. 250.

[468] Gubernatis, p. 188. The first book contains Christian prayers in Arabic; the first Italian translations of the Koran appeared in 1547. In 1499 we meet with a few not very successful Arabic types in the work of Polifilo, b. 7 _a_. For the beginnings of Egyptian studies, see Gregorovius, viii. p. 304.

[469] Especially in the important letter of the year 1485 to Ermolao Barbaro, in _Ang. Politian. Epistolæ_, l. ix. Comp. Jo. Pici, _Oratio de Hominis Dignitate_. For this discourse, see the end of part iv.; on Pico himself more will be given in part vi. chap. 4.

[470] Their estimate of themselves is indicated by Poggio (_De Avaritia_, fol. 2), according to whom only such persons could say that they had lived (_se vixisse_) who had written learned and eloquent books in Latin or translated Greek into Latin.

[471] Esp. Libri, _Histoires des Sciences Mathém._ ii. 159 sqq., 258 sqq.

[472] _Purgatorio_, xviii. contains striking instances. Mary hastens over the mountains, Cæsar to Spain; Mary is poor and Fabricius disinterested. We may here remark on the chronological introduction of the Sibyls into the profane history of antiquity as attempted by Uberti in his _Dittamondo_ (i. cap. 14, 15), about 1360.

[473] The first German translation of the _Decameron_, by H. Steinhovel, was printed in 1472, and soon became popular. The translations of the whole _Decameron_ were almost everywhere preceded by those of the story of Griselda, written in Latin by Petrarch.

[474] These Latin writings of Boccaccio have been admirably discussed recently by Schück, _Zur Characteristik des ital. Hum. im 14 und 15 Jahrh._ Breslau, 1865; and in an article in Fleckeisen and Masius, _Jahrbücher fur Phil. und Pädag._ bd. xx. (1874).

[475] ‘Poeta,’ even in Dante (_Vita Nuova_, p. 47), means only the writer of Latin verses, while for Italian the expressions ‘Rimatore, Dicitore per rima,’ are used. It is true that the names and ideas became mixed in course of time.

[476] Petrarch, too, at the height of his fame complained in moments of melancholy that his evil star decreed him to pass his last years among scoundrels (_extremi fures_). In the imaginary letter to Livy, _Epp. Fam._ ed. Fracass. lib. xxiv. ep. 8. That Petrarch defended poetry, and how, is well known (comp. Geiger, _Petr._ 113-117). Besides the enemies who beset him in common with Boccaccio, he had to face the doctors (comp. _Invectivæ in Medicum Objurgantem_, lib. i. and ii.).

[477] Boccaccio, in a later letter to Jacobus Pizinga (_Opere Volgari_, vol. xvi.), confines himself more strictly to poetry properly so called. And yet he only recognises as poetry that which treated of antiquity, and ignores the Troubadours.

[478] Petr. _Epp. Senil._ lib. i. ep. 5.

[479] Boccaccio (_Vita di Dante_, p. 50): ‘La quale (laurea) non scienza accresce ma è dell’acquistata certissimo testimonio e ornamento.’

[480] _Paradiso_, xxv. 1 sqq. Boccaccio, _Vita di Dante_, p. 50. ‘Sopra le fonti di San Giovanni si era disporto di coronare.’ Comp. _Paradiso_, i. 25.

[481] See Boccaccio’s letter to him in the _Opere Volgari_, vol. xvi. p. 36: ‘Si præstet Deus, concedente senatu Romuleo.’ ...

[482] Matt. Villani, v. 26. There was a solemn procession on horseback round the city, when the followers of the Emperor, his ‘baroni,’ accompanied the poet. Boccaccio, l. c. Petrarch: _Invectivæ contra Med. Præf._ See also _Epp. Fam. Volgarizzate da Fracassetti_, iii. 128. For the speech of Zanobi at the coronation, Friedjung, l. c. 308 sqq. Fazio degli Uberti was also crowned, but it is not known where or by whom.

[483] Jac. Volaterran. in Murat. xxiii. col. 185.

[484] Vespas. Fiorent. pp. 575, 589. _Vita Jan. Manetti_, in Murat. xx. col. 543. The celebrity of Lionardo Aretino was in his lifetime so great that people came from all parts merely to see him; a Spaniard fell on his knees before him.--Vesp. p. 568. For the monument of Guarino, the magistrate of Ferrara allowed, in 1461, the then considerable sum of 100 ducats. On the coronation of poets in Italy there is a good summary of notices in Favre, _Mélanges d’Hist. Lit._ (1856) i. 65 sqq.

[485] Comp. Libri, _Histoire des Sciences Mathém._ ii. p. 92 sqq. Bologna, as is well known, was older. Pisa flourished in the fourteenth century, fell through the wars with Florence, and was afterwards restored by Lorenzo Magnifico, ‘ad solatium veteris amissæ libertatis,’ as Giovio says, _Vita Leonis X._ l. i. The university of Florence (comp. Gaye, _Carteggio_, i. p. 461 to 560 _passim_; _Matteo Villani_, i. 8; vii. 90), which existed as early as 1321, with compulsory attendance for the natives of the city, was founded afresh after the Black Death in 1848, and endowed with an income of 2,500 gold florins, fell again into decay, and was refounded in 1357. The chair for the explanation of Dante, established in 1373 at the request of many citizens, was afterwards commonly united with the professorship of philology and rhetoric, as when Filelfo held it.

[486] This should be noticed in the lists of professors, as in that of the University of Pavia in 1400 (Corio, _Storia di Milano_, fol. 290), where (among others) no less than twenty jurists appear.

[487] Marin Sanudo, in Murat. xxii. col. 990.

[488] Fabroni, _Laurent. Magn._ Adnot. 52, in the year 1491.

[489] Allegretto, _Diari Sanesi_, in Murat. xiii. col. 824.

[490] Filelfo, when called to the newly founded University of Pisa, demanded at least 500 gold florins. Comp. Fabroni, _Laur. Magn._ ii. 75 sqq. The negotiations were broken off, not only on account of the high salary asked for.

[491] Comp. Vespasian. Fiorent. pp. 271, 572, 582, 625. _Vita. Jan. Manetti_, in Murat. xx. col. 531 sqq.

[492] Vespas. Fiorent. p. 1460. Prendilacqua (a pupil of Vitt.), _Intorno alla Vita di V. da F._, first ed. by Natale dalle Laste, 1774, translated by Giuseppe Brambilla, Como, 1871. C. Rosmini, _Idea dell’ottimo Precettore nella Vita e Disciplina di Vittorino da Feltre e de’ suoi Discepoli_, Bassano, 1801. Later works by Racheli (Milan, 1832), and Venoit (Paris, 1853).

[493] Vespas. Fior. p. 646, of which, however, C. Rosmini, _Vita e Disciplina di Guarino Veronese e de’ suoi Discepoli_, Brescia, 1856 (3 vols.), says that it is (ii. 56), ‘formicolante di errori di fatto.’

[494] For these and for Guarino generally, see Facius, _De Vir. Illustribus_, p. 17 sqq.; and Cortesius, _De Hom. Doctis_, p. 13. Both agree that the scholars of the following generation prided themselves on having been pupils of Guarino; but while Fazio praises his works, Cortese thinks that he would have cared better for his fame if he had written nothing. Guarino and Vittorino were friends and helped one another in their studies. Their contemporaries were fond of comparing them, and in this comparison Guarino commonly held the first place (Sabellico, _Dial. de Lingu. Lat. Reparata_, in Rosmini, ii. 112). Guarino’s attitude with regard to the ‘Ermafrodito’ is remarkable; see Rosmini, ii. 46 sqq. In both these teachers an unusual moderation in food and drink was observed; they never drank undiluted wine: in both the principles of education were alike; they neither used corporal punishment; the hardest penalty which Vittorino inflicted was to make the boy kneel and lie upon the ground in the presence of his fellow-pupils.

[495] To the Archduke Sigismond, _Epist._ 105, p. 600, and to King Ladislaus Postumus, p. 695; the latter as _Tractatus de Liberorum Educatione_ (1450).

[496] P. 625. On Niccoli, see further a speech of Poggio, _Opera_, ed. 1513, fol. 102 sqq.; and a life by Manetti in his book, _De Illustribus Longaevis_.

[497] The following words of Vespasiano are untranslatable: ‘A vederlo in tavola cosi antico come era, era una gentilezza.’

[498] _Ibid._ p. 495.

[499] According to Vespas. p. 271, learned men were in the habit of meeting here for discussion.

[500] Of Niccoli it may be further remarked that, like Vittorino, he wrote nothing, being convinced that he could not treat of anything in as perfect a form as he desired; that his senses were so delicately poised that he ‘neque rudentem asinum, neque secantem serram, neque muscipulam vagientem sentire audireve poterat.’ But the less favourable sides of Niccoli’s character must not be forgotten. He robbed his brother of his sweetheart Benvenuta, roused the indignation of Lionardo Aretino by this act, and was embittered by the girl against many of his friends. He took ill the refusal to lend him books, and had a violent quarrel with Guarino on this account. He was not free from a petty jealousy, under the influence of which he tried to drive Chrysoloras, Poggio, and Filelfo away from Florence.

[501] See his _Vita_, by Naldus Naldi, in Murat. xx. col. 532 sqq. See further Vespasiano Bisticci, _Commentario della Vita di Messer Giannozzo Manetti_, first published by P. Fanfani in _Collezione di Opere inedite o rare_, vol. ii. Torino, 1862. This ‘Commentario’ must be distinguished from the short ‘Vita’ of Manetti by the same author, in which frequent reference is made to the former. Vespasiano was on intimate terms with Giannozzo Manetti, and in the biography tried to draw an ideal picture of a statesman for the degenerate Florence. Vesp. is Naldi’s authority. Comp. also the fragment in Galetti, _Phil. Vill. Liber Flor._ 1847, pp. 129-138. Half a century after his death Manetti was nearly forgotten. Comp. Paolo Cortese, p. 21.

[502] The title of the work, in Latin and Italian, is given in Bisticci, _Commentario_, pp. 109, 112.

[503] What was known of Plato before can only have been fragmentary. A strange discussion on the antagonism of Plato and Aristotle took place at Ferrara in 1438, between Ugo of Siena and the Greeks who came to the Council. Comp. Æneas Sylvius, _De Europa_, cap. 52 (_Opera_, p. 450).

[504] In Niccolò Valori, _Life of Lorenzo the Magnificent_. Comp. Vespas. Fiorent. p. 426. The first supporters of Argyropulos were the Acciajuoli. _Ib._ 192: Cardinal Bessarion and his parallels between Plato and Aristotle. _Ib._ 223: Cusanus as Platonist. _Ib._ 308: The Catalonian Narciso and his disputes with Argyropulos. _Ib._ 571: Single Dialogues of Plato, translated by Lionardo Aretino. _Ib._ 298: The rising influence of Neoplatonism. On Marsilio Ficino, see Reumont, _Lorenzo de’ Medici_, ii. 27 sqq.

[505] Varchi, _Stor. Fior._ p. 321. An admirable sketch of character.

[506] The lives of Guarino and Vittorino by Rosmini mentioned above (p. 213, note 1; and 215, note 1), as well as the life of Poggio by Shepherd, especially in the enlarged Italian translation of Tonelli (2 vols. Florence, 1825); the Correspondence of Poggio, edited by the same writer (2 vols. Flor. 1832); and the letters of Poggio in Mai’s _Spicilegium_, tom. x. Rome, 1844, pp. 221-272, all contain much on this subject.

[507] _Epist. 39_; _Opera_, p. 526, to Mariano Socino.

[508] We must not be misled by the fact that along with all this complaints were frequently heard of the inadequacy of princely patronage and of the indifference of many princes to their fame. See e.g. Bapt. Mantan, Eclog. v. as early as the fifteenth century; and Ambrogio Traversari, _De Infelicitate Principum_. It was impossible to satisfy all.

[509] For the literary and scientific patronage of the popes down to the end of the fifteenth century, see Gregorovius, vols. vii. and viii. For Pius II., see Voigt, _En. Silvio als Papst Pius II._ bd. iii. (Berlin, 1863), pp. 406-440.

[510] Lil. Greg. Gyraldus, _De Poetis Nostri Temporis_, speaking of the _Sphaerulus_ of Camerino. The worthy man did not finish it in time, and his work lay for forty years in his desk. For the scanty payments made by Sixtus IV., comp. Pierio Valer. _De Infelic. Lit._ on Theodoras Gaza. He received for a translation and commentary of a work of Aristotle fifty gold florins, ‘ab eo a quo se totum inauratum iri speraverat.’ On the deliberate exclusion of the humanists from the cardinalate by the popes before Leo, comp. Lor. Grana’s funeral oration on Cardinal Egidio, _Anecdot. Litt._ iv. p. 307.

[511] The best are to be found in the _Deliciae Poetarum Italorum_, and in the Appendices to the various editions of Roscoe, _Leo X._ Several poets and writers, like Alcyonius, _De Exilio_, ed. Menken, p. 10, say frankly that they praise Leo in order themselves to become immortal.

[512] Paul. Jov. _Elogia_ speaking of Guido Posthumus.

[513] Pierio Valeriano in his _Simia_.

[514] See the elegy of Joh. Aurelius Mutius in the _Deliciae Poetarum Italorum_.

[515] The well-known story of the purple velvet purse filled with packets of gold of various sizes, in which Leo used to thrust his hand blindly, is in Giraldi _Hecatommithi_, vi. nov. 8. On the other hand, the Latin ‘improvisatori,’ when their verses were too faulty, were whipped. Lil. Greg. Gyraldus, _De Poetis Nostri Temp. Opp._ ii. 398 (Basil, 1580).

[516] Roscoe, _Leone X._ ed. Bossi. iv. 181.

[517] Vespas. Fior. p. 68 sqq. For the translations from Greek made by Alfonso’s orders, see p. 93; _Vita Jan. Manetti_, in Murat. xx. col. 541 sqq., 450 sqq., 495. Panormita, _Dicta et Facta Alfonsi_, with the notes by Æneas Sylvius, ed. by Jacob Spiegel, Basel, 1538.

[518] Even Alfonso was not able to please everybody--Poggio, for example. See Shepherd-Tonelli, _Poggio_ ii. 108 sqq. and Poggio’s letter to Facius in _Fac. de Vir. Ill._ ed. Mehus, p. 88, where he writes of Alfonso: ‘Ad ostentationem quædam facit quibus videatur doctis viris favere;’ and Poggio’s letter in Mai, _Spicil._ tom. x. p. 241.

[519] Ovid. _Amores_, iii. 11, vs. ii.; Jovian. Pontan. _De Principe_.

[520] _Giorn. Napolet._ in Murat. xxi. col. 1127.

[521] Vespas. Fior. pp. 3, 119 sqq. ‘Volle aver piena notizia d’ogni cosa, cosi sacra come gentile.’

[522] The last Visconti divided his interest between Livy, the French chivalrous romances, Dante, and Petrarch. The humanists who presented themselves to him with the promise ‘to make him famous,’ were generally sent away after a few days. Comp. _Decembrio_, in Murat. xx. col. 1114.

[523] Paul. Jov. _Vita Alfonsi Ducis_.

[524] On Collenuccio at the court of Giovanni Sforza of Pesaro (son of Alessandro, p. 28), who finally, in 1508, put him to death, see p. 135, note 4. At the time of the last Ordelaffi at Forli, the place was occupied by Codrus Urceus (1477-80); death-bed complaint of C. U. _Opp._ Ven. 1506, fol. liv.; for his stay in Forli, _Sermo_, vi. Comp. Carlo Malagola, _Della Vita di C. U._ Bologna, 1877, Ap. iv. Among the instructed despots, we may mention Galeotto Manfreddi of Faenza, murdered in 1488 by his wife, and some of the Bentivoglio family at Bologna.

[525] _Anecdota Literar._ ii. pp. 305 sqq., 405. Basinius of Parma ridicules Porcellio and Tommaso Seneca; they are needy parasites, and must play the soldier in their old age, while he himself was enjoying an ‘ager’ and a ‘villa.’

[526] For details respecting these graves, see Keyssler, _Neueste Reisen_, s. 924.

[527] _Pii II. Comment._ l. ii. p. 92. By history he means all that has to do with antiquity. Cortesius also praises him highly, p. 34 sqq.

[528] Fabroni, _Costnus_, Adnot. 118. Vespasian. Fior. _passim_. An important passage respecting the demands made by the Florentines on their secretaries (‘quod honor apud Florentinos magnus habetur,’ says B. Facius, speaking of Poggio’s appointment to the secretaryship, _De Vir. Ill._ p. 17), is to be found in Æneas Sylvius, _De Europâ_, cap. 54 (_Opera_, p. 454).

[529] See Voigt, _En. Silvio als Papst Pius II._ bd. iii. 488 sqq., for the often-discussed and often-misunderstood change which Pius II. made with respect to the Abbreviators.

[530] Comp. the statement of Jacob Spiegel (1521) given in the reports of the Vienna Academy, lxxviii. 333.

[531] _Anecdota Lit._ i. p. 119 sqq. A plea (‘Actio ad Cardinales Deputatos’) of Jacobus Volaterranus in the name of the Secretaries, no doubt of the time of Sixtus IV. (Voigt, l. c. 552, note). The humanistic claims of the ‘advocati consistoriales’ rested on their oratory, as that of the Secretaries on their correspondence.

[532] The Imperial chancery under Frederick III. was best known to Æneas Sylvius. Comp. _Epp._ 23 and 105; _Opera_, pp. 516 and 607.

[533] The letters of Bembo and Sadoleto have been often printed; those of the former, e.g. in the _Opera_, Basel, 1556, vol. ii., where the letters written in the name of Leo X. are distinguished from private letters; those of the latter most fully, 5 vols. Rome, 1760. Some additions to both have been given by Carlo Malagola in the review _Il Baretti_, Turin, 1875. Bembo’s _Asolani_ will be spoken of below; Sadoleto’s significance for Latin style has been judged as follows by a contemporary, Petrus Alcyonius, _De Exilio_, ed. Menken, p. 119: ‘Solus autem nostrorum temporum aut certe cum paucis animadvertit elocutionem emendatam et latinam esse fundamentum oratoris; ad eamque obtinendam necesse esse latinam linguam expurgare quam inquinarunt nonnulli exquisitarum literarum omnino rudes et nullius judicii homines, qui partim a circumpadanis municipiis, partim ex transalpinis provinciis, in hanc urbem confluxerunt. Emendavit igitur ‘eruditissimus hic vir corruptam et vitiosam linguæ latinæ consuetudinem, pura ac integra loquendi ratione.’

[534] Corio, _Storia di Milano_, fol. 449, for the letter of Isabella of Aragon to her father, Alfonso of Naples; fols. 451, 464, two letters of the Moor to Charles VIII. Compare the story in the _Lettere Pittoriche_, iii. 86 (Sebastiano del Piombo to Aretino), how Clement VII., during the sack of Rome, called his learned men round him, and made each of them separately write a letter to Charles V.

[535] For the correspondence of the period in general, see Voigt, _Wiederbelebung_, 414-427.

[536] Bembo thought it necessary to excuse himself for writing in Italian: ‘Ad Sempronium,’ _Bembi Opera_, Bas. 1556, vol. iii. 156 sqq.

[537] On the collection of the letters of Aretino, see above, pp. 164 sqq., and the note. Collections of Latin letters had been printed even in the fifteenth century.

[538] Comp. the speeches in the _Opera_ of Philelphus, Sabellicus, Beroaldus, &c.; and the writings and lives of Giann. Manetti, Æneas Sylvius, and others.

[539] B. F. _De Viris Illustribus_, ed. Mehus, p. 7. Manetti, as Vesp. Bisticci, _Commentario_, p. 51, states, delivered many speeches in Italian, and then afterwards wrote them out in Latin. The scholars of the fifteenth century, e.g. Paolo Cortese, judge the achievements of the past solely from the point of view of ‘Eloquentia.’

[540] _Diario Ferrarese_, in Murat. xxiv. col. 198, 205.

[541] _Pii II. Comment._ l. i. p. 10.

[542] The success of the fortunate orator was great, and the humiliation of the speaker who broke down before distinguished audiences no less great. Examples of the latter in Petrus Crinitus, _De Honestâ Disciplinâ_, v. cap. 3. Comp. Vespas. Fior. pp. 319, 430.

[543] _Pii II. Comment._ l. iv. p. 205. There were some Romans, too, who awaited him at Viterbo. ‘Singuli per se verba facere, ne alius alio melior videretur, cum essent eloquentiâ ferme pares.’ The fact that the Bishop of Arezzo was not allowed to speak in the name of the general embassy of the Italian states to the newly chosen Alexander VI., is seriously placed by Guicciardini (at the beginning of book i.) among the causes which helped to produce the disaster of 1494.

[544] Told by Marin Sanudo, in Murat. xxii. col. 1160.

[545] _Pii II. Comment._ l. ii. p. 107. Comp. p. 87. Another oratorical princess, Madonna Battista Montefeltro, married to a Malatesta, harangued Sigismund and Martin. Comp. _Arch. Stor._ iv. i. p. 442, note.

[546] _De Expeditione in Turcas_, in Murat. xxiii. col. 68. ‘Nihil enim Pii concionantis majestate sublimius.’ Not to speak of the naïve pleasure with which Pius describes his own triumphs, see Campanus, _Vita Pii II._, in Murat. iii. ii. _passim_. At a later period these speeches were judged less admiringly. Comp. Voigt, _Enea Silvio_, ii. 275 sqq.

[547] Charles V., when unable on one occasion to follow the flourishes of a Latin orator at Genoa, replied in the ear of Giovio: ‘Ah, my tutor Adrian was right, when he told me I should be chastened for my childish idleness in learning Latin.’ Paul. Jov. _Vita Hadriani VI._ Princes replied to these speeches through their official orators; Frederick III. through Enea Silvio, in answer to Giannozzo Manetti. Vesp. Bist. _Comment._ p. 64.

[548] Lil. Greg. Gyraldus, _De poetis Nostri Temp._ speaking of Collenuccio. Filelfo, a married layman, delivered an introductory speech in the Cathedral at Como for the Bishop Scarampi, in 1460. Rosmini, _Filelfo_, ii. 122, iii. 147.

[549] Fabroni, _Cosmus_, Adnot. 52.

[550] Which, nevertheless, gave some offence to Jac. Volaterranus (in Murat. xxiii. col. 171) at the service in memory of Platina.

[551] _Anecdota Lit._ i. p. 299, in Fedra’s funeral oration on Lod. Podacataro, whom Guarino commonly employed on these occasions. Guarino himself delivered over fifty speeches at festivals and funerals, which are enumerated in Rosmini, _Guarino_, ii. 139-146. Burckhardt, 332. Dr. Geiger here remarks that Venice also had its professional orators. Comp. G. Voigt, ii. 425.

[552] Many of these opening lectures have been preserved in the works of Sabellicus, Beroaldus Major, Codrus Urceus, &c. In the works of the latter there are also some poems which he recited ‘in principio studii.’

[553] The fame of Pomponazzo’s delivery is preserved in Paul. Jov. _Elogia Vir. Doct._ p. 134. In general, it seems that the speeches, the form of which was required to be perfect, were learnt by heart. In the case of Giannozzo Manetti we know positively that it was so on one occasion (_Commentario_, 39). See, however, the account p. 64, with the concluding statement that Manetti spoke better _impromptu_ than Aretino with preparation. We are told of Codrus Urceus, whose memory was weak, that he read his orations (_Vita_, at the end of his works. Ven. 1506, fol. lxx.). The following passage will illustrate the exaggerated value set on oratory: ‘Ausim affirmare perfectum oratorem (si quisquam modo sit perfectus orator) ita facile posse nitorem, lætitiam, lumina et umbras rebus dare quas oratione exponendas suscipit, ut pictorem suis coloribus et pigmentis facere videmus.’ (Petr. Alcyonius, _De Exilio_, ed. Menken, p. 136.)

[554] Vespas. Fior. p. 103. Comp. p. 598, where he describes how Giannozzo Manetti came to him in the camp.

[555] _Archiv. Stor._ xv. pp. 113, 121. Canestrini’s Introduction, p. 32 sqq. Reports of two such speeches to soldiers; the first, by Alamanni, is wonderfully fine and worthy of the occasion (1528).

[556] On this point see Faustinus Terdoceus, in his satire _De Triumpho Stultitiae_, lib. ii.

[557] Both of these extraordinary cases occur in Sabellicus, _Opera_, fol. 61-82. _De Origine et Auctu Religionis_, delivered at Verona from the pulpit before the barefoot friars; and _De Sacerdotii Laudibus_, delivered at Venice.

[558] Jac. Volaterrani. _Diar. Roman._ in Murat. xxiii. _passim_. In col. 173 a remarkable sermon before the court, though in the absence of Sixtus IV., is mentioned. Pater Paolo Toscanella thundered against the Pope, his family, and the cardinals. When Sixtus heard of it, he smiled.

[559] Fil. Villani, _Vitae_, ed. Galetti, p. 30.

[560] See above, p. 237, note 3.

[561] Georg. Trapezunt, _Rhetorica_, the first complete system of instruction. Æn. Sylvius, _Artis Rhetoricae Praecepta_, in the _Opera_, p. 992. treats purposely only of the construction of sentences and the position of words. It is characteristic as an instance of the routine which was followed. He names several other theoretical writers who are some of them no longer known. Comp. C. Voigt, ii. 262 sqq.

[562] His life in Murat. xx. is full of the triumphs of his eloquence. Comp. Vespas. Fior. 592 sqq., and _Commentario_, p. 30. On us these speeches make no great impression, e.g. that at the coronation of Frederick III. in Freher-Struve, _Script. Rer. Germ._ iii. 4-19. Of Manetti’s oration at the burial of Lion. Aretino, Shepherd-Tonelli says (_Poggio_, ii. 67 sqq.): ‘L’orazione ch’ei compose, è ben la cosa la più meschina che potesse udirsi, piena di puerilità volgare nello stile, irrelevante negli argomenti e d’una prolissità insopportabile.’

[563] _Annales Placentini_, in Murat. xx. col. 918.

[564] _E.g._ Manetti. Comp. Vesp. _Commentario_, p. 30; so, too, Savonarola Comp. Perrens, _Vie de Savonarole_, i. p. 163. The shorthand writers, however, could not always follow him, or, indeed, any rapid ‘Improvisatori.’ Savonarola preached in Italian. See Pasq. Villari: _Vita di Savonarola_.

[565] It was by no means one of the best (_Opuscula Beroaldi_, Basel, 1509, fol. xviii.-xxi). The most remarkable thing in it is the flourish at the end: ‘Esto tibi ipsi archetypon et exemplar, teipsum imitare,’ etc.

[566] Letters and speeches of this kind were written by Alberto di Ripalta; comp. the _Annales Placentini_, written by his father Antonius and continued by himself, in Murat. xx. col. 914 sqq., where the pedant gives an instructive account of his own literary career.

[567] _Pauli Jovii Dialogus de Viris Litteris Illustribus_, in Tiraboschi, tom. vii. parte iv. Yet he says some ten years later, at the close of the _Elogia Litteraria_: ‘Tenemus adhuc (after the leadership in philology had passed to the Germans) sincerae et constantis eloquentiae munitam arcem,’ etc. The whole passage, given in German in Gregorovius, viii. 217 sqq. is important, as showing the view taken of Germany by an Italian, and is again quoted below in this connection.

[568] A special class is formed by the semi-satirical dialogues, which Collenuccio, and still more Pontano, copied from Lucian. Their example stimulated Erasmus and Hutten. For the treatises properly so-called parts of the ethical writings of Plutarch may have served as models.

[569] See below, part iv. chap. 5.

[570] Comp. the epigram of Sannazaro:

‘Dum patriam laudat, damnat dum Poggius hostem,
Nec malus est civis, nec bonus historicus.’

[571] Benedictus: _Caroli VIII. Hist._ in Eccard, Scriptt. vi. col. 1577.

[572] Petrus Crinitus deplores this contempt, _De honesta disciplina_, l. xviii. cap. 9. The humanists here resemble the writers in the decline of antiquity, who also severed themselves from their own age. Comp. Burckhardt, _Die Zeit Constantin’s des Grossen_. See for the other side several declarations of Poggio in Voigt, _Wiederbelebung_, p. 443 sqq.

[573] Lorenzo Valla, in the preface to the _Historia Ferdinandi Regis Arag._; in opposition to him, Giacomo Zeno in the _Vita Caroli Zeni_, Murat. xix. p. 204. See, too, Guarino, in Rosmini, ii. 62 sqq., 177 sqq.

[574] In the letter to Pizinga, _Opere Volgari_, vol. xvi. p. 38. With Raph. Volaterranus, l. xxi. the intellectual world begins in the fourteenth century. He is the same writer whose early books contain so many notices--excellent for his time--of the history of all countries.

[575] Here, too, Petrarch cleared the way. See especially his critical investigation of the Austrian Charter, claiming to descend from Cæsar. _Epp. Sen._ xvi. 1.

[576] Like that of Giannozzo Manetti in the presence of Nicholas V., of the whole Papal court, and of a great concourse of strangers from all parts. Comp. Vespas. Fior. p. 591, and more fully in the _Commentario_, pp. 37-40.

[577] In fact, it was already said that Homer alone contained the whole of the arts and sciences--that he was an encyclopædia. Comp. _Codri Urcei Opera_, Sermo xiii. at the end. It is true that we met with a similar opinion in several ancient writers. The words of C. U. (Sermo xiii., habitus in laudem liberalium artium; _Opera_, ed. Ven. 1506, fol. xxxviii. _b_) are as follows: ‘Eia ergo bono animo esto; ego graecas litteras tibi exponam; et praecipue divinum Homerum, a quo ceu fonte perenni, ut scribit Naso, vatum Pieriis ora rigantur aquis. Ab Homero grammaticum dicere poteris, ab Homero rhetoricam, ab Homero medicinam, ab Homero astrologiam, ab Homero fabulas, ab Homero historias, ab Homero mores, ab Homero philosophorum dogmata, ab Homero artem militarem, ab Homero coquinariam, ab Homero architecturam, ab Homero regendarum urbium modum percipies; et in summa, quidquid boni quidquid honesti animus hominis discendi cupidus optare potest, in Homero facile poteris invenire.’ To the same effect ‘Sermo’ vii. and viii. _Opera_, fol. xxvi. sqq., which treat of Homer only.

[578] A cardinal under Paul II. had his cooks instructed in the Ethics of Aristotle. Comp. Gaspar. Veron. _Vita Pauli II._ in Muratori, iii. ii. col. 1034.

[579] For the study of Aristotle in general, a speech of Hermolaus Barbarus is specially instructive.

[580] Bursellis, _Ann. Bonon._ in Murat. xxiii. col. 898.

[581] Vasari, xi. pp. 189, 257. _Vite di Sodoma e di Garofalo._ It is not surprising that the profligate women at Rome took the most harmonious ancient names--Julia, Lucretia, Cassandra, Portia, Virginia, Penthesilea, under which they appear in Aretino. It was, perhaps, then that the Jews took the names of the great Semitic enemies of the Romans--Hannibal, Hamilcar, Hasdrubal, which even now they commonly bear in Rome. [This last assertion cannot be maintained. Neither Zunz, _Namen der Juden_, Leipzig, 1837, reprinted in Zunz _Gesammelte Schriften_, Berlin, 1876, nor Steinschneider in his collection in _Il Buonarotti_, ser. ii. vol. vi. 1871, pp. 196-199, speaks of any Jew of that period who bore these names, and even now, according to the enquiries of Prince Buoncompagni from Signer Tagliacapo, in charge of the Jewish archives in Rome, there are only a few who are named Asdrubale, and none Amilcare or Annibale. L. G.] Burckhardt, 352. A careful choice of names is recommended by L. B. Alberti, _Della familia_, opp. ii. p. 171. Maffeo Vegio (_De educatione liberorum._ lib. i. c. x.) warns his readers against the use of _nomina indecora barbara aut nova, aut quae gentilium deorum sunt_. Names like ‘Nero’ disgrace the bearer; while others such as Cicero, Brutus, Naso, Maro, can be used _qualiter per se parum venusta propter tamen eximiam illorum virtutem_.

[582]

‘Quasi che ‘l nome i buon giudici inganni,
E che quel meglio t’ abbia a far poeta,
Che non farà lo studio di molt’ anni!’

So jests Ariosto, to whom fortune had certainly given a harmonious name, in the _Seventh Satire_, vs. 64.

[583] Or after those of Bojardo, which are in part the same as his.

[584] The soldiers of the French army in 1512 were ‘omnibus diris ad inferos devocati!’ The honest canon, Tizio, who, in all seriousness, pronounced a curse from Macrobius against foreign troops, will be spoken of further on.

[585] _De infelicitate principum_, in Poggii _Opera_, fol. 152: ‘Cujus (Dantis) exstat poema praeclarum, neque, si literis Latinis constaret, ullâ ex parte poetis superioribus (the ancients) postponendum.’ According to Boccaccio, _Vita di Dante_, p. 74, ‘Many wise men’ even then discussed the question why Dante had not written in Latin. Cortesius (_De hominibus doctis_, p. 7) complains: ‘Utinam tam bene cogitationes suas Latinus litteris mandare potuisset, quam bene patrium sermonem illustravit!’ He makes the same complaint in speaking of Petrarch and Boccaccio.

[586] His work _De vulgari eloquio_ was for long almost unknown, and, valuable as it is to us, could never have exercised the influence of the _Divina Commedia_.

[587] To know how far this fanaticism went, we have only to refer to Lil. Greg. Gyraldus, _De poetis nostri temporis_, _passim_. Vespasiano Bisticci is one of the few Latin writers of that time who openly confessed that they knew little of Latin (_Commentario della vita di G. Manetti_, p. 2), but he knew enough to introduce Latin sentences here and there in his writings, and to read Latin letters (_ibid._ 96, 165). In reference to this exclusive regard for Latin, the following passage may be quoted from Petr. Alcyonius, _De exilio_, ed. Menken, p. 213. He says that if Cicero could rise up and behold Rome, ‘Omnium maxime illum credo perturbarent ineptiae quorumdam qui, amisso studio veteris linguae quae eadem hujus urbis et universae Italiae propria erat, dies noctesque incumbunt in linguam Geticam aut Dacicam discendam eandemque omni ratione ampliendam, cum Goti, Visigothi et Vandali (qui erant olim Getae et Daci) eam in Italos invexerant, ut artes et linguam et nomen Romanum delerent.’

[588] There were regular stylistic exercises, as in the _Orationes_ of the elder Beroaldus, where there are two tales of Boccaccio, and even a ‘Canzone’ of Petrarch translated into Latin.