Girolamo Aleandro

Jerome Aleandro, Girolamo Aleandro also, ( born February 13, 1480 Motta di Livenza in the diocese of Treviso, † February 1, 1542 in Rome ) was an Italian humanist and cardinal.

Life

Aleandro was the son of a doctor from a noble family and studied medicine, but then at the University of Padua theology and ancient languages ​​. Since 1499 he was in Venice teachers of the ancient and oriental languages. There he was a key member in the circle of scholars around the humanist printer Aldus Manutius book. 1501 he was appointed Pope Alexander VI. to Rome and entrusted him with diplomatic tasks. In his travels, he became known among others, Erasmus of Rotterdam and familiar. In 1508 he went as a teacher of ancient languages ​​at the University of Paris; there he introduced the systematic study of the Greek language. In his time as a teacher of philology in Venice and Paris, he was active as a publisher of ancient Greek authors and wrote a Greek grammar. Groundbreaking was his " Lexicon Graeco - latinum ," which appeared in Paris in 1512. After a short stay in Orléans (possibly to avoid the plague ) he was in 1513 elected rector of the University of Paris. That same year, he turned back to politics. , He entered the service of the Registrar of Louis XII, was Chancellor of the Prince-Bishop of Liège, and finally 1517 (1519? ) In Rome, head of the Vatican Library.

In September 1520, Pope Leo X sent him as nuncio to the court of Charles V, in order to mobilize Emperor and the Empire against the Reformation. At the Diet of Worms, he played a decisive role. In a famous speech on Ash Wednesday 1521, he demanded to impose immediately the night on Martin Luther. However, this requirement he could not prevail: Luther was summoned. The draft of the Edict of Worms came from his pen ( which led to a break with Erasmus). He then also resulted in the adoption of this document.

1524 Aleandro Archbishop of Brindisi and Nuncio to Francis I in France. Together with this, he fell at the Battle of Pavia ( 1525) in captivity. Later he was several times on a diplomatic mission on behalf of the Holy See on the road, mainly with the task to prevent a peaceful settlement of the religious parties in the German Reich. However, the Religious Peace of Nuremberg ( 1532), he could not prevent. 1538 by Pope Paul III Aleandro. elevated to cardinal. His titular church was San Crisogono. Four years later, he died in Rome.

For the history of the Reformation (and the beginning of the Counter-Reformation ) are his letters as well as his diaries revealing documents.