Polydore Vergil

Polydor Virgil, also Polidoro Virgili ( Italian), Polydore Vergil (English), Polydorus Vergilius or Virgilius (* 1470, † April 18, 1555 in Urbino), was an Italian humanist, who was a half-century in England.

Life

The second son of a pharmacist Giorgio Virgili grew up near Urbino. He later received a humanistic studies in Padua, probably in Bologna. The ordination he received approximately 1496th Virgil had contact with the ducal court of Urbino, with its famous Renaissance library, because the tutor of the young Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, Lodovico Odassio, supported him in his first years in the profession. Virgil showed his gratitude by dedicating his work De rerum inventoribus Odassio, which was printed in 1499 in Venice. The year before, was Virgil's first book De Proverbiis ( About proverbs, later, greatly expanded edition called De adagiis ) was printed in the same city. From a young age, there was thus Virgil his two subsequent main activities: as a churchman and author of humanistic works.

In 1502 he was sent to England to act in the office of the sub-collector and collect the taxes which had to be paid to the Curia in Rome. In this office, he was the main collector (since 1489 ) Adriano Castellesi which, although little weilend in England, Bishop of Hereford was and was made ​​a cardinal in 1503. This bustling Cardinal practiced under Pope Alexander VI. great influence at the Curia and also enjoyed high reputation at the English royal court.

Polydor Virgil lived, apart from a few trips to Italy, some 50 years in England and did not return until the age of 83 years finally back to his hometown of Urbino. Between 1503 and 1513 Virgil received a number of benefices, which secured him a stable livelihood and despite the onset of the Reformation enabled a certain influence in the English Church. Most important among them the office of Archdeacon of Wells in the West of England Diocese of Bath and Wells were from 1508 ( Castellesi was now in this bishopric enthroned ) and a prebend at the cathedral of St. Paul 's in London. If he was not just staying in Wells on cathedral chapter, Virgil lived near St. Paul's Churchyard, London. Since 1508 member of Doctors' Commons, a posh London Dining Club for the intellectual elite, he enjoyed there, the society is more important prelate and scholar.

His career in the church - as a priest, as representative of the papal curia in England and as a church politician in this country - as well as a scholar was aligned very European for that time. He was acquainted with important humanist and churchmen or friends such as Thomas More, John Fisher, Erasmus of Rotterdam, Richard Fox, the Venetian historian Marcantonio Sabellico and the humanist Filippo Beroaldo from Bologna. He also enjoyed good connections to the English court to the Dukes of Urbino and the Curia in Rome. Virgil's books have been printed in numerous European countries and translated from Latin into eight different languages.

It was probably the patronage of the increasingly controversial Cardinal Castellesi and the enmity of the powerful Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York, and later Lord Chancellor, which ultimately contributed to the fact that Virgil's career stagnated in the hierarchy of the Church. Castellesi, church diplomat at the international level and one of the most colorful personalities of his time, was after the death of Alexander VI. (1503 ) to expand its power base in Rome under the later popes no further. As the star of the Cardinal in the second decade of the 16th century, gradually declined, even Virgil's position in London was weaker. 1515 Virgil was imprisoned for eight months in the Tower of London after letters to Castellesi caught with incriminating statements and Wolsey had been given to. Virgil came to violent protests, including by Leo X., free again, but had the office of the sub-collector in the same year leave. But not enough. As Castellesi of involvement in the murder plot against Leo X. was in 1517 accused of and escape from Rome seized, as Virgil was no protector at the Curia. He drew the consequences from the fierce political wrangling and held thereafter by the international church diplomacy away. Even three decades, he remained in his church office and in the Convocation ( the English Church Parliament) active, but devoted himself mainly to his literary interests. With his excellent knowledge of Latin and as a keen observer of the development of his particular in the field of religion very troubled time, Virgil helped that the worldview and erudition of the developed in Italy humanism of the Renaissance in England and other European countries were included.

Works

Anglica historia

The up to now most famous product Virgil's literary work is his Anglica historia ( originated 1506-1514, printed 1534), the first humanist, source-critical representation of English history with an account of the events leading to the death of Henry VII in 1509 ( in later editions to 1538 ). The then English King Henry VII, impressed by Virgil scholarship and his early literary successes, commissioned him to write the work. With it, the Italians great merits acquired by the English historiography and influenced writers such as Francis Bacon and William Shakespeare. Many of his contemporaries in England but he was attacked because of his destructive myths dealing with the history of the country, particularly with the legend of King Arthur, but also because Virgil was altgläubig after the break with Rome in 1534 under Henry VIII. In the Anglica historia particularly his portrayal of Henry VII is highly appreciated. Virgil's account of the reign of Henry VIII applies due to its malicious characterization of Wolsey but also its emphasis on foreign policy operations ( to distract attention from his silence over many internal political developments ) as a little one-sided.

De Rerum inventoribus

Virgil's second major work is a treatise on the inventor of all things: De Rerum inventoribus, published in 1499 first as a three-volume work in Venice, complemented by five more volumes and printed in Basel in 1521 in John Froben. With this work, Virgil founded the new interest of modernity to the figure of the inventor. In contrast to today narrowly defined notion of the inventor Virgil took the concept of the invention is very far, because he interpreted it as a creative act of cultural self-assertion of man. Ultimately, all ( cultural) history since the creation of a series of inventions in the sense of first steps and origins. Thus, the first three volumes of the work include such innovations as alphabets, laws and forms of government, fruit growing, obelisks and warm baths, arranged by subject.

While Virgil dealt in the first volumes mostly with the inventors of the ancient world, he devoted himself in the five subsequent volumes the beginning (ie, inventions ) of Christian institutions. With his perceptive analysis of the institutions of the Christian Church ( Priesthood, confession, sacrifice, various rites, etc.), as they existed in his time, and their beginnings in Jewish and Roman customs and institutions or as papal renewals, entered Virgil territory and contributed significantly to historization the process of becoming the medieval church. Overall, it can be De Rerum inventoribus be seen as a prototypical cultural history. During the first decades of the Reformation Virgil always remained faithful to the Roman Church; but with his critical remarks about the origins and thus the legitimacy of the institutions drew Virgil 's attention to the censors on his book. It was recorded in the mid-16th century in the Index of prohibited books; later editions had expurgiert in Catholic countries (ie " clean " ) are.

In numerous libraries with historical collection of books editions of one or more works are to be found Virgil; alone in the Munich State Library, there are 61 copies of De Rerum inventoribus in 41 editions. Even in Virgil's time this work has been translated into five languages ​​and reprinted 40 times; it was a Renaissance bestseller.

Other works

• The edition of the 8th edition of Niccolò Pirotti huge Martial comment, cornucopiae, Venice 1496
• Inventoribus 1525 Printed in dominicam precem commentariolum (Commentary on the Our Father ), first with De Rerum in Basel,
• Calamitate an edition of Gildas ' De, Excidio et conquestu Britanniae, the first critical edition of one of the older English historiography work, printed in 1525
• At the suggestion of Erasmus translated Virgil a short work, the church father John Chrysostom attributed Regis et monachi comparatio ( printed Paris 1530)
• De prodigiis et sortibus libri III ( 1526 and 1527 written, but only 1531 printed ); Virgil devoted this dialogue Francesco Maria della Rovere, Duke of Urbino.
• Three dialogues, printed 1545 in Basel: De patientia et eius fructu libri II, De vita perfecta liber I and De veritate et mendacio liber I. The first dialogue, over- the patience was Guidobaldo II, Duke of Urbino, was dedicated.
• His last dialogue De Iureiurando et periurio liber I, John, dedicated to the 1st Duke of Northumberland, was printed along with the previous four dialogues in 1553 in Basel.