Pontano’s Virtues: Aristotelian Moral and Political Thought in the Renaissance 9781474281850, 9781474281881, 9781474281836

Table of contents :
Cover
Half-title
Title
Copyright
Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments
Note on the Text
Introduction
Part One: The Great Pontano
1. The Storms of Life
2. The Haven of Philosophy
Part Two: Rewriting Moral Philosophy
3. Learned Authority
4. Latin Philosophy
Part Three: Virtue, Inside Out
5. The Rule of Reason
6. Beyond the Veil
Conclusion
Appendix 1: Chronology of Pontano’s Works
Appendix 2: Chronology of Pontano’s Life and Political Events
Appendix 3: Moral Virtues in Aristotle and Pontano
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

Pontano’s Virtues

Bloomsbury Studies in the Aristotelian Tradition General Editor: Marco Sgarbi, Università Ca’ Foscari, Italy Editorial Board: Klaus Corcilius (University of California, Berkeley, USA); Daniel Garber (Princeton University, USA); Oliver Leaman (University of Kentucky, USA); Anna Marmodoro (University of Oxford, UK); Craig Martin (Oakland University, USA); Carlo Natali (Università Ca’ Foscari, Italy); Riccardo Pozzo (Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Rome, Italy); Renée Raphael (University of California, Irvine, USA); Victor M. Salas (Sacred Heart Major Seminary, USA); Leen Spruit (Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands) Aristotle’s influence throughout the history of philosophical thought has been immense and in recent years the study of Aristotelian philosophy has enjoyed a revival. However, Aristotelianism remains an incredibly polysemous concept, encapsulating many, often conflicting, definitions. Bloomsbury Studies in the Aristotelian Tradition responds to this need to define Aristotelianism and give rise to a clear characterisation. Investigating the influence and reception of Aristotle’s thought from classical antiquity to contemporary philosophy from a wide range of perspectives, this series aims to reconstruct how philosophers have become acquainted with the tradition. The books in this series go beyond simply ascertaining that there are Aristotelian doctrines within the works of various thinkers in the history of philosophy, but seek to understand how they have received and elaborated Aristotle’s thought, developing concepts into ideas that have become independent of him. Bloomsbury Studies in the Aristotelian Tradition promotes new approaches to Aristotelian philosophy and its history. Giving special attention to the use of interdisciplinary methods and insights, books in this series will appeal to scholars working in the fields of philosophy, history and cultural studies. Available titles: Elijah Del Medigo and Paduan Aristotelianism, Michael Engel

Pontano’s Virtues Aristotelian Moral and Political Thought in the Renaissance Matthias Roick

BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2017 Paperback edition first published 2018 Copyright © Matthias Roick, 2017 Matthias Roick has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p. vi constitute an extension of this copyright page. Cover image © The Art Archive/Alamy Stock Photo All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Roick, Matthias, author. Title: Pontano’s virtues : Aristotelian moral and political thought in the Renaissance / Matthias Roick. Description: New York : Bloomsbury Academic, 2017. | Series: Bloomsbury studies in the Aristotelian tradition ; 1 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016039913| ISBN 9781474281850 (hb) | ISBN 9781474281836 (epdf) Subjects: LCSH: Pontano, Giovanni Gioviano, 1429-1503. | Aristotle. | Philosophy, Renaissance. | Virtues. Classification: LCC B785.P8434 R65 2017 | DDC 170.92--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016039913 ISBN: HB: 978-1-4742-8185-0 PB: 978-1-3500-8217-5 ePDF: 978-1-4742-8183-6 ePub: 978-1-4742-8186-7 Series: Bloomsbury Studies in the Aristotelian Tradition Typeset by Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd. To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.

Contents Preface and Acknowledgments Note on the Text Introduction

vi

viii 1

Part One The Great Pontano

15

1

The Storms of Life

19

2

The Haven of Philosophy

45

Part Two

Rewriting Moral Philosophy

71

3

Learned Authority

73

4

Latin Philosophy

97

Part Three

Virtue, Inside Out

121

5

The Rule of Reason

123

6

Beyond the Veil

157

Conclusion

179

Appendix 1: Chronology of Pontano’s Works Appendix 2: Chronology of Pontano’s Life and Political Events Appendix 3: Moral Virtues in Aristotle and Pontano Notes Bibliography Index

183 184 186

188 291 311

Preface and Acknowledgments The subject of this study is the moral and political thought of Giovanni Pontano. It is based on the treatises and tracts Pontano wrote, to which scant attention has been paid until now, as well as on his ad hoc political writings and his better known dialogues and poems. It moves between different fields of inquiry including philosophy, history, and literature, trying to represent Pontano’s thought not only in its doctrinal aspects, but in a more comprehensive and contextualized perspective. Its main contention is that Pontano rewrites Aristotelian moral and political thought in a humanist key, and that his thought, centered on the notion of virtue, is far from being a “strained Aristotelianism.” By contrast, Pontano’s theory of virtue imposes itself as a powerful guiding knowledge to human action in the Renaissance, inherent in a variety of thoughts, attitudes, and practices of the time. In my view, this aspect has been underestimated, and I hope that the present study will introduce readers to Pontano’s moral and political thought as well as to Aristotelian virtue ethics and its role in early modern culture. This book has come a long way, and many people have contributed to its shape. Eckhardt Keßler introduced me to the philosophy of the Renaissance and aroused my interest in humanist moral and political thought when I was still a student. He also turned my attention to Giovanni Pontano and his work. In later years, Martin van Gelderen has helped me to find my way through the intricacies of methodological discussions and through the strange labyrinth of academe. The critical comments of Anthony Molho have taught me a lot, not least the importance of historiography. Moreover, the acquaintance with Riccardo Fubini and his works on Italian humanism have deeply influenced my work. I am also obliged to Thomas Kaufmann who has supported and encouraged my work. Peter Stacey has read and commented on an early version of Part Two, giving me valuable advice and moral support. With Bianca de Divitiis, I discussed the first chapter of the book and learnt much about Pontano’s activities as a patron of arts. Susan Karr has read a large part of the manuscript with the greatest attention and interest, helping me to improve my writing and my argumentative skills. Her comments have been of decisive importance for me. Among the libraries I visited, I would like to express my warmest thanks to the members of staff of the rare books and manuscript section of the

Preface and Acknowledgments

vii

Biblioteca Nazionale in Naples for their generosity and uncomplicated manner. Furthermore, I thank the I Tatti Library in Harvard’s Centre for Renaissance Studies in Florence. Often, it was the best of all possible libraries for me. Another great library, the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel, supported me with a two-week summer course and with a six-month scholarship during the preparation of this book. Furthermore, the book would not have been possible without the financial support of the German Academic Exchange Service and the European University Institute. Many have helped me during the years, but I certainly owe a great debt of gratitude to Niki Koniordos. Of course, I have benefited a great deal from discussions with colleagues and friends. I should like to especially thank Lodi Nauta for his advice and encouragement; Jill Kraye for helpful conversations and commenting on particular chapters; Marco Sgarbi for his great help in publishing the book. Special thanks also to Matteo Soranzo and Shulamit Furstenberg-Levi for sharing their knowledge on Pontano with me, and for helpful discussions and criticisms. Over the past years, I have presented parts of my book in a variety of places. I should like to thank Serena Ferente, Florence Bistagne, Julia Haig Gaisser, Luke Roman, Valérie Cordonier, Marc Deramaix, Danilo Facca, Valentina Lepri, Grazyna Urban-Godziek, Christina Strunck, Tommaso de Robertis, Albert Schirrmeister, and many more for comments and suggestions. I owe a special debt to the group of scholars in Naples, who have shared their sovereign knowledge on Pontano and the Kingdom of Naples with me: Giuseppe Germano, Antonietta Iacono, Francesco Senatore, Guido M. Cappelli, Giancarlo Abbamonte, Fulvio delle Donne, Vera Tufano, Gianluca del Noce, Ferdinando Cascone, and Francesco Storti. Finally I would like to thank Serena, Daniel, and Sara, with love. Heartfelt thanks also to my parents, Monika and Andreas Roick, to my brother Markus and to my Italian family, Pietro Fosco and Tina Fondacaro. Matthias Roick Göttingen, Wolfenbüttel and Caltagirone, June 2016

Note on the Text Abbreviations for Aristotle’s ethical works are as follows: EE EN MM

Ethica Eudemia Ethica Nicomachea Magna Moralia

Aristotle’s works are cited by book, chapter and Bekker page, and column and line numbers. English translations from the Nicomachean Ethics are cited from Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, tr. and ed. Roger Crisp (rev. ed., Cambridge, 2014). Latin translations are cited from Aristotle, Ethica et Politica Aristotelis cum commentario Averrois, tr. Leonardo Bruni (Lyon, 1538), if not otherwise indicated. Pontano’s works are cited from modern editions if available (see bibliography for details). Works not available in modern editions are cited from Giovanni Pontano, Opera omnia soluta oratione composita, 3 vols (Venice, 1518–19). A digital copy of this edition is available on CAMENA – Corpus Automatum Multiplex Electorum Neolatinitatis Auctorum, http://www.uni-mannheim.de/ mateo/itali/autoren/pontano_itali.html#p3, accessed June 1, 2016.

Introduction

Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503) was a man of many talents. “Loved by the muses, esteemed by worthy men, honoured by the kings of the Lord”—this is how he lavishly praises himself on his epitaph.1 He was right about the muses. The variety and richness of his poetical works, reaching from lullabies to religious hymns, has left him an eminent place in the history of neo-Latin literature; the famous Venetian printer Aldo Manuzio spoke of him as aetate nostra Vergilius alter (a second Virgil of our time).2 He may have been right about the esteem of worthy men, too. One marvels, at least, at the number of moral writings and other philosophical works Pontano produced throughout his lifetime. As a nineteenth-century biographer somewhat resignedly remarked, Pontano’s writings are “almost innumerable.”3 Pontano was the author of the most famous mirror-for-princes of the Quattrocento; he wrote treatises on political subjects like obedience, fortitude, and magnanimity, but also on inhuman behavior. His ethical works range from a discussion of the virtues concerned with the right use of money, among them liberality and magnificence, to the treatment of more general themes like prudence and fortune, as well as a treatise on pleasant conversation. These works apart, Pontano also wrote a work of grammar, wrote a history of the Neapolitan war (1459–65), and pursued extensive astrological studies. Moreover, honored or not, Pontano did not confine himself to the realm of literature, as his reference to “the kings of the Lord” indicates, but was also a significant presence in the political landscape of Aragonese Naples. He was deeply involved in the kingdom’s affairs, and very close to the protagonists of peninsular politics from the Peace of Lodi in 1454 to the invasion of Charles VIII in 1495. Diplomat, politician, philosopher, historian, astrologer, and poet—in the language of his own astrological works, Pontano was a “mercurial” character.4 He has often been admired for his versatility, and his contemporaries praised him fulsomely.5 In later times, however, Pontano lost his appeal. Some of his writings continued to exert the fascination they once had; others sank into oblivion. As

2

Pontano’s Virtues

a poet and Latinist, he has enjoyed an enduring success.6 This is also true for his dialogues, in which he vividly describes the discussions of the Neapolitan academy or reflects on contemporary life in satirical form. Yet, whereas his “artistic” works and dialogues have been celebrated as lively, original, and witty, his philosophical writings have faded into the background. We are assured that Pontano was neither a “great thinker” nor “a philosopher” and that his treatises “are only interesting for their illustrative anecdotes.”7 The present study returns to Pontano’s role as a thinker and philosopher, and it argues that his oeuvre is an important contribution to the Aristotelian moral and political thought of the Renaissance. Moreover, it contends that the notion of virtue is at the center of Pontano’s philosophical works, and that it had a decisive influence on his life as a political actor and as a humanist. Consequently, it is not concerned with his philosophical works in an exclusive sense, but with the many ways in which his thought was entangled with the different aspects of his “mercurial” existence. Therefore, the title “Pontano’s Virtues” alludes to his philosophical treatment of virtue ethics as well as to other aspects of his life. There is nothing surprising in the insistence that Pontano was an Aristotelian, of course. Francesco Elías de Tejada has rightly observed that Pontano links his thought directly to that of the Stagirite, that he follows Aristotle in all of his works, and that he builds his arguments on an Aristotelian basis, though not in the systematic and encyclopedic manner of scholastic authors such as Thomas Aquinas or Alonso de Madrigal.8 He even advances the opinion that Pontano repeated his Aristotelianism “with obstinacy.”9 More recently, Francesco Tateo has described Pontano’s treatises as “an encyclopedic project that aims at amplifying, exemplifying and giving a detailed account of Aristotelian ethics.”10 Neither will it come as a surprise that Pontano’s moral and political thought relies on the notion of virtue, given that virtue ethics was the dominant approach in Western ethics until the eighteenth century. It is important to note, however, that the assertion that Pontano’s works are Aristotelian and virtue-centered has tended to foreclose on any discussion of what these terms might possibly imply. Therefore, little has been said about the exact character of Pontano’s Aristotelianism, and few attempts have been made to examine just what is involved in regarding virtue as a crucial phenomenon, not only in the philosophical life of the Renaissance, but also in the social and political life of the period. Once we begin to take these points seriously, however, exploring the facets of Pontano’s moral and political thought—filled as it is with commonplace ideas and observations—may turn out to be a more fruitful enterprise than has been suggested. For philosophers, Pontano’s treatises provide a sophisticated version

Introduction

3

of virtue ethics, and it would be a mistake to reduce the rich historical texture of his Aristotelianism and virtue ethics by fastening on some abstract features and general remarks. Although it might seem paradoxical, only by putting Pontano’s works into historical context will it be possible to find new points of contact to initiate philosophical discussion. Similarly, historians should not dismiss Pontano’s philosophical treatises offhandedly. For the examination of Pontano’s thought might contribute to a better understanding of the—longemarginalized—role of virtue ethics in late medieval and early modern societies.11 Certainly, Pontano’s treatises do not represent the average knowledge or selfconsciousness of his contemporaries in moral matters. And yet, they offer us insight into deeply ingrained cultural patterns and the sociocultural discourses that provided Pontano and his contemporaries with a way to conceptualize and evaluate social and political life. As these remarks suggest, the renewed claim that Pontano was an Aristotelian and a virtue ethicist requires a revision of the prevailing scholarship. We need to rethink what it means to place Pontano in the Aristotelian tradition, and we need to address the question of how the notion of virtue might contribute to a better understanding of early modern ethics and politics. Both issues involve a larger debate over the way in which we perceive of humanist moral and political thought. Both in scholarship and in the wider public sphere, there is a pronounced tendency to see Pontano and his contemporaries mainly as “preMachiavellians.”12 Therefore, they seem to belong to those shady figures that lead their afterlife in a kind of limbo between the “not any longer” of medieval thought and the “not yet” of modern thought. There is no need to insist on the error of prolepsis to see that a description of this kind severely curtails the possibilities for interpretation.13 We are compelled to adopt a vantage point from which Machiavelli appears as the high priest of political “realism,” freed from the requirements of an abstract morality, while the humanists become the acolytes of a misguided political “idealism,” still following these requirements and hence ever “limping after practice,” as in Friedrich Meinecke’s old verdict.14 Among others, Amedeo Quondam has forcefully argued against the view that the separation of ethics and politics, ascribed to Machiavelli, constitutes the single most important feature of early modern political thought.15 For while the rapidly changing outlook of fifteenth-century Italy poses new challenges to conventional political practices and models, there is no attempt to come to terms with these challenges by sidelining moral considerations. As Guido M. Cappelli writes in the introduction to Pontano’s De principe, “the necessity of a new politics corresponded to the necessity of a new ethics.”16 However, the new

4

Pontano’s Virtues

ethics and politics is not born, like Minerva, from the head of a single thinker, nor is it characterized by a sense of radical conceptual innovativeness. In the case of Giovanni Pontano, at least, it is more a matter of reconfiguring more traditional forms of ethics and politics in a continuous interplay with political practices and ideological exigencies.

Pontano and the Aristotelian tradition Pontano’s reconfiguration, or his rewriting, of moral and political thought depends largely on Aristotle’s philosophy, first and foremost on the Ethics. There is nothing remarkable in this statement. Even though there is a long-standing scholarly tradition that describes the humanists’ philosophical outlook and their main interests largely in terms of a “Platonic revival,” a “rhetorical philosophy,” or the “pursuit of eloquence,” the times of disregard and neglect of Renaissance Aristotelianism—or, as Charles Schmitt put it, “Renaissance Aristotelianisms”—is a thing of the past.17 As David Lines remarks, it would be highly misleading to think that “Renaissance humanists generally ignored or were dismissive of Aristotle’s writings, and of his Ethics in particular.”18 In fact, Aristotelianism remained the predominant philosophical tradition even long after the fifteenth century, although it was not always “the most original, the most innovative, or even the most important.”19 Pontano is not a “pure” Aristotelian, however (whatever such a term might signify), and his treatises are not easily reducible to a specific genre. Among the many forms of Aristotelian works in the Renaissance—Lines mentions translations, compendia and handbooks, paraphrases and textbooks, as well as dialogues and commentaries20—Pontano seems to represent an eclectic amalgam, containing elements of almost all of these forms. Pontano himself describes his peculiar blend as a combination of three different approaches to moral philosophy. As he writes in De immanitate, one of his last prose works, he has adopted an intense interest in moral action and prudential reasoning from Cicero. Yet, he does not share Cicero’s dislike for theoretical questions. Therefore, he takes over the theoretical underpinnings of his moral philosophy from Aristotle, who is concerned mainly with the principles of moral action. With Seneca, he adds a third influence to his list. For Seneca does not so much describe or investigate moral action as exhort his readers to a good life and deter them from the vices. Hence, Cicero represents the prudential and practical side of Pontano’s writings; Aristotle stands for their cognitive and theoretical moment; Seneca’s presence indicates their exhortative and volitional aspects.21

Introduction

5

As harmonious as Pontano’s self-description is, it seriously understates the role of Aristotle in his moral and political thought. Aristotle’s Ethics serves as a constant point of reference and inspiration for Pontano. Most of the treatises Pontano wrote elaborate on single chapters or sections of the Ethics, paraphrasing them, adding to them, refining them. Therefore, the Aristotelian influence on Pontano’s works reaches far beyond theory; it supplies him with his material and a basis upon which he develops his thoughts. His treatises represent a sophisticated and self-conscious affirmation of Aristotelian ethics. Still, Pontano is not always a faithful interpreter of Aristotle. He appropriates the Stagirite’s thought, covering, as it were, the tracks of his rewriting. For sixteenth-century Aristotelians such as Bernardo Segni, Pontano thus rendered his own efforts vain, as he did not translate, but imitate Aristotle, weakening his own authority and diminishing the usefulness for his readers.22 Obviously, Pontano had a very different take on his writings. As we will see, attention to style and philosophical precision did not exclude one another, and his imitation—and even emulation— of Aristotle aimed at heightening his own authority. For modern scholarship, Pontano’s reliance on Aristotelian philosophy has posed problems of a different kind. From the beginning, Neapolitan humanism had suffered “bad press,” conceding a merely ornamental function to the humanists at court. As Jacob Burckhardt saw it, serious philosophical thought could not develop in an ambiance so prone to ostentation.23 The negative remarks on Pontano’s “strained” Aristotelianism might still echo this unfavorable judgment. Above all, they bespeak a general tendency to contrast the “concrete,” “philological,” and “historical” inquiries of the humanists with the “thought cathedrals” of the scholastics, as Eugenio Garin put it in one of his seminal studies.24 Scholars of Neapolitan humanism subscribed to Garin’s formula from early on, but opposed his view on the humanists in the kingdom, successfully arguing for a more differentiated picture of Neapolitan humanism, with Pontano as its key figure.25 Already in 1954, Sergio Lupi, one of the editors of De sermone, emphasized that Pontano’s philosophical works were related to “a life that had many forms and was concrete, lived with sentiment, passion and reason” and could not be “reduced to the abstractions of metaphysical thought.”26 Likewise, Tateo insisted that Pontano’s writing can “be traced back to the liveliness of his human experience and the development of his personality.”27 Mario Santoro, too, saw Pontano’s moral treatises as expressions of a “realistic interpretation of human existence” concerned with the “different layers” of human experience.28

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Pontano’s Virtues

It is clear that from within this paradigm the impact of Aristotle on Pontano’s thought is, at best, ambiguous. For the most part, it has been seen as proof of Pontano’s conventionality or as a threat to his originality as a philosopher or thinker. Thus Lupi recognizes the strong Aristotelian influence on Pontano’s works, but hastens to add that Pontano’s use of Aristotle is nothing more than the confirmation of the laws and principles he had discovered all by himself. “What mattered were … his [Pontano’s] ideals … and all the problems of human nature, not Aristotle.”29 What counts is Pontano’s spirit, as it were, and not Aristotle’s letter. It would be misleading to take Lupi’s assertion as an expression of Pontano scholarship in general. It seems justified to say, however, that Pontano’s adherence to Peripatetic doctrine does not fit well with the paradigm of his thought as “lively,” “concrete,” and opposed to scholasticism. The present study attempts to go beyond the dualism between the “conventional” Aristotelian and “original” humanist parts of Pontano’s thought. By setting his arguments into different contexts, it will be evident that Pontano’s Aristotelianism is an integral part of his philosophy. The example of the Aristotelian doctrine of the mean (mediocritas) might serve as an illustration. First of all, the concept of mediocritas had been heavily criticized and dismissed in the ethical works of Lorenzo Valla (c. 1405/7–57). By reintroducing it in his works, Pontano returns to a more conservative and intellectualist stance than some of his humanist predecessors. Therefore, his use of mediocritas is not simply a reiteration, but a conscious reaction to recent developments in the field of ethics. Secondly, Pontano changes the conceptual structure of mediocritas, embedding it into the context of his astrological thought. (In modern terms, he defines it as a doctrine of equilibrium, not as a doctrine of moderation.) As will be argued, this redefinition is part of a more general tendency to put a stronger emphasis on the material and corporeal aspects of human nature. Within this perspective, Pontano’s use of mediocritas does not so much affirm his unoriginality as it reveals important information about his intellectual stance and the character of his theory of virtue. Another problem with older conceptions of Pontano’s Aristotelianism is that scholars have sometimes interpreted those passages as “modern” that were explicitly linked to Aristotle. De Tejada, for example, holds that Pontano’s contention in De fortuna that “the happiness in this life is not complete without external goods” is entirely original.30 However, a more careful examination reveals that this affirmation is a direct quote from Magna Moralia.31 Likewise, Pontano’s argument that recreation is part of human nature is not so much inspired by the Neapolitan sun, as de Tejada seems to assume, as it is informed

Introduction

7

by a close reading of the Ethics.32 The point of this discussion is not that de Tejada and others have overlooked one or more references to Aristotle. The point is rather that the “innovative” moments in Pontano’s treatises do not necessarily prefigure modern thought, but result from a reconfiguration of Aristotelian thought. Using terminology that Michael Freeden developed for the study of political ideologies, Pontano manoeuvers the concepts of Aristotle’s moral thought into “distinctive configurations” and “specific conceptual patterns.”33 It is within these configurations and patterns that single concepts—which are themselves clearly borrowed from Aristotle and other classical authors—gain a specific “momentum” or “spin,” creating the potential to actually guide a person’s moral and political conduct. Pontano’s Aristotelian virtue ethics is conventional, but at the same time has its own “physiognomy.”

Pontano and virtue ethics The renewed discussion of Pontano’s place in the Aristotelian tradition is closely connected to the question of virtue. At first, the choice to rethink Pontano’s life and works under the notion of virtue might seem odd. As Bernard Williams has written, “virtue” has become largely unintelligible in our everyday language, to the point of acquiring “comic or otherwise undesirable associations.”34 Consequently, the constitutive role of virtue in early modern society has been severely underestimated and trivialized, despite its appearance in a surprising number of contexts in the culture of the time. And while for most philosophers virtue ethics seems to have established itself very firmly, historians still have the tendency to see it as unable to provide any form of practical guidance. Robert Black, for one, has described humanist treatises in terms of “moral platitudes and banalities,” falling back on a venerable tradition that dismisses humanist moral and political thought as “abstract,” “idealistic,” and “dysfunctional.”35 Only of late have historians begun to acknowledge the role of virtue and “the obvious importance of this intensely moral context of everyday life in the Renaissance.”36 Regarding humanist political thought, James Hankins has recently argued that the theme of virtue was so central that “we are justified in describing humanist thinking on politics as a kind of ‘virtue politics’.”37 In the light of these considerations, the notion of virtue holds the potential to rethink Pontano’s moral and political thought as well as humanist moral and political thought in general. There are two main reasons for this. First, it bridges the gap between “theory” and “practice.” In Pontano, as in other authors, virtue

8

Pontano’s Virtues

ethics is more than a set of philosophical doctrines; it is also a cluster of different thoughts, attitudes, and practices. As Jeremy Bentley has shown, Pontano and his fellow humanists were not scholars in the ivory tower, but scribes, secretaries, counselors, diplomats, courtiers, and educators.38 In Bentley’s own words, he provides his readers with “the less romantic but more accurate truth of things”: that for the greater part of their lives, humanists like Pontano tended “to various legal, political, and administrative chores in the kingdom of Naples.”39 Analyzing the diplomatic correspondence and political memoranda, Bentley takes a “Machiavellian” view on the Neapolitan humanists’ activities, arguing that they “exhibited an increasing willingness to take, if not an immoral or amoral, at least a hard-headed approach toward political problems.”40 In his view, humanists like Pontano “recognized the impossibility of conducting Neapolitan diplomacy according to the standards of an absolute, abstract morality” and “carried out their diplomatic duties according to the prevailing standards of the real political world.”41 As Bentley concludes, “Niccolò Machiavelli held no monopoly on political realism.”42 Bentley’s interpretation is convincing with regard to the Neapolitan humanists’ ad hoc writings and seems plausible when applied to fifteenth-century diplomacy in general. In her review of Bentley’s book, Alison Brown has rightly commented that “not that many readers of fifteenth-century diplomacy … would believe that Machiavelli held a monopoly on political realism.”43 Indeed, the diplomatic correspondence of the time holds great interest for anyone interested in tracing a profile of humanist moral and political thought.44 The question is whether we should read the humanists’ activities as an anticipation of Machiavelli, separating the “theory” of the treatises from the “practice” of ad hoc writings and political correspondence. The present study does not opt for this approach; instead of searching for signs of a nascent Machiavellian concept of politics, it rather looks at the possibilities and capacities of the “old” and traditional forms of moral and political thought. Thus the discussion of virtue always contains a normative element, leaving ample space for ideological argument, that is, the legitimization or delegitimization of certain kinds of conduct by describing them in terms of virtue and vice—not only for kings and princes, but also for other political actors like Pontano.45 The point about “theory” and “practice” dovetails with a second point about the relation of “ethics” to “politics.” Without doubt, Pontano is most famous for his De principe, subject of influential interpretations by Quentin Skinner and Maurizio Viroli.46 Another important political work is De oboedientia. Both De principe and De oboedientia belong to Pontano’s early works, and it is here that

Introduction

9

he has attracted most attention by historians of political thought such as Claudio Finzi, Guido Cappelli, and Peter Stacey.47 From the point of view of Aristotelian virtue theory, however, the distinction between what is “moral” and what is “political” is not always as clear-cut as modern studies suggest. In Aristotle, ethics forms part of politics; nevertheless, the Nicomachean Ethics does not say much about the relation of ethics to politics.48 Consequently, there are many ways to inquire into the role of virtue in the context of politics. In what follows, emphasis is placed on two specific aspects of Pontano’s political thought: his employment of Aristotelian virtue ethics in the context of his political career (in Chapters 1 and 2) and the creation of the image of the virtuous ruler (in Chapter 6).

A “transversal” Renaissance In general, the “transversal” approach based on the notion of virtue has the advantage that it allows us to discuss a wider range of topics and themes, reflecting the breadth and diversity of Renaissance moral and political thought. In geometry, a transversal line passes through different lines in the same plane; likewise, in history a transversal inquiry does not stick to one field of study, but crosses the (often present-minded) boundaries between fields. This seems necessary since “the breadth of what counted as moral philosophy was far greater, and not differentiated from politics” at least up to the seventeenth century.49 In order to understand the moral and political thought, there is still a lot of work to do, and most of it will take place on a synchronic, and not a diachronic level. As Jill Kraye and Risto Saarinen have argued, philosophers such as Alastair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor have based their far-reaching theoretical assumptions on the early modern history of ethics “on a quite small body of textual evidence.” In contrast, Kraye and Saarinen have emphasized the “rich variety of approaches to moral thinking and ethical theories” that characterizes early modernity. For them, “the moral thought of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries still remains to a great extent unexplored.”50 Consequently, we are “not yet in a position to formulate or evaluate abstract claims concerning the deeper meaning of the transition from the medieval to the early modern period” until we “read and analyse the extant texts in all their diversity and variety.”51 Relying on a “transversal” approach seems to have certain liabilities, however. First, it lacks, as it were, a “global” perspective on Renaissance moral and

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Pontano’s Virtues

political thought. Rather than defining a new narrative, it primarily proposes to rethink the boundaries of the ethical and the political in the Renaissance. At first sight, the disappearance of “grand theses” is not promising, of course. As Anthony Molho has quipped, “fragmentation and erudition, not the search for an age’s spirit, define current studies on the Renaissance.”52 Still, the emphasis on virtue and on the Aristotelian tradition tries to elude long-lasting scholarly disagreements on the status of Renaissance humanism that have often resulted in false or misleading dichotomies: philosophical vs. non-philosophical writings, pagan vs. Christian beliefs, monarchical vs. republican stances. Second, it must be clear that a “transversal” approach cannot treat all topics and themes it touches upon in full. One example is poetry. In a recent study, Matteo Soranzo has demonstrated how closely Pontano’s poetical works are intertwined with questions of identity and, very similar to the first part of this book, with his political self-fashioning.53 Another example is the Accademia Pontaniana. Pontano’s moral and political thought certainly reconnects to the development of the humanist movement during the fifteenth century, as Part Two argues. Nevertheless, there is much more to the Accademia than vertical (or intergenerational) links. The horizontal links (that is, contacts between contemporaries) are equally important. In a new study, Shulamit FurstenbergLevi investigates both of these dimensions, taking the Accademia Pontaniana as a model of a humanist network.54 Still another example is astrology. In Pontano (and many others) astrology plays an important role in virtue theory, describing the corporeal traits of character and the role of fortune, as Part Three contends. Still, it would be misleading to reduce his treatment of astrology to one aspect alone. The De rebus coelestibus, Pontano’s astrological masterpiece, is neither limited to moral questions, nor is it purely Aristotelian in outlook, referring to many authorities, among them Ptolemy and Julius Firmicus Maternus.55 Finally, the “transversal” approach always bears the danger of returning to what Quentin Skinner has rightfully denounced as the “myth of coherence.” Different from other studies on Pontano, the parts of the book do not follow a chronological order, but complement each other. The single chapters normally zoom in on specific episodes or specific works, but the overall emphasis of the book lies on the later part of Pontano’s life and the treatises he wrote after 1495, most importantly De prudentia, De fortuna, De magnanimitate, and De sermone. This goes against the grain of a lot of scholarship, which sees Pontano’s most important contributions mainly in his earlier works such as De principe and De oboedientia. From the point of view of the present study, however, the Aristotelian features of his moral and political thought can be seen to have a

Introduction

11

certain continuity through the years, even though they are employed in different contexts throughout Pontano’s career, as will emerge from the study that follows.

The argument The three parts of the book map Pontano’s moral and political thought, concentrating on three different themes: Pontano’s role as a political actor, his place in the humanist movement, and his ethics of virtue. Part One, “The Great Pontano,” focuses on Pontano’s political career and is based on a short autobiographical sketch in De prudentia (1498/1500), celebrating him for his diplomatic successes and his moral integrity. As is the case with other autobiographies, Pontano’s sketch is not a reliable guide to events, but an interesting case of self-presentation. Hence, his remarks are not simply an objective account of past endeavors, but the culmination of his efforts to shape his role as political actor. Still, it would be misconceived to view the autobiographical sketch as the instance of a merely “idealistic” description of Pontano’s life; rather, it reveals the ideological force of virtue theory on different levels. Chapter 1 turns to the complex political and diplomatic questions connected to Pontano’s career in the 1480s and early 1490s when he becomes first secretary to the king. The diplomatic sources of the time, first and foremost the correspondence of the Florentine ambassadors at Naples, allow us to reconstruct some of the circumstances under which Pontano became first secretary and how he shaped his role that was far from well defined, even on an institutional level. As Sabrina Marcotti, one of the editors of the Correspondence, has pointed out, the figure of Pontano would merit a study on its own.56 In relation to Pontano’s autobiographical sketch, it is interesting to see that he employed a number of moral precepts in order to establish himself as the central figure of the Aragonese administration. In the words of Daniela Frigo, referring to the discussions of diplomacy in early modern authors, Pontano’s political activities cannot be described in terms of a specific sector of statecraft. Rather, we need to focus on the moral profile and duties that were connected with his office as diplomat and secretary.57 Furthermore, Pontano did not see himself as a subservient figure. In his famous letters to King Ferrante he shows himself self-assured to the point of audacity, an attitude reflected not only in his sketch, but also in the—allegedly “idealistic”—Aristotelian portrait of the magnanimous man. Chapter 2 takes its cue from the second part of the autobiographical sketch, concerned with his retirement that coincided with the French conquest of

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Pontano’s Virtues

Naples. It concentrates mainly on De prudentia I, discussing human happiness in rough parallel with the topics treated in Ethics I. For Pontano, as for Aristotle, virtue is the highest good, and Pontano elaborates quite extensively on the various dimensions of this statement. He also defends virtue against pleasure as the highest good, reacting to the provocative thesis of Lorenzo Valla’s De voluptate. Finally, Pontano reasons about the relationship between the active life as politician vis-à-vis the contemplative life as a scholar. He does so under concrete premises: throughout his treatment of the greatest good, central to any Aristotelian theory of virtue, he shows his efforts to come to terms with his own life and to compose himself as an individual possessing a virtuous character.58 Part Two, “Rewriting Moral Philosophy,” is concerned with Pontano’s place in the humanist movement and tries to determine his intellectual outlook and his style of philosophical inquiry. It involves two main aspects of discussions on Renaissance humanism: the debate over its philosophical or non-philosophical character and the question of how to define it. This is not the place for an excursus on Renaissance historiography; therefore suffice it to say that the question in Pontano’s time is not that of defining “humanism” in general, but that of discriminating between different strands and outlooks within the humanist movement. Of course, the encounter with classical antiquity continued to drive the humanists’ intellectual endeavors and constituted the center of gravitation of their thought. Notwithstanding, the destabilizing power of antiquity triggered different kinds of reactions and developed in various directions. In this sense, the humanists of Pontano’s generation do not have a sole defining characteristic in common—a set of subjects, or a shared philosophical ground, a pagan outlook, or a republican stance. Still, they constitute a distinct body of persons that interact with each other. It is possible to imagine the humanists connected by family resemblances such as those depicted in Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations. In this way, the single humanists constitute a gallery of intellectual portraits, just like the real ones in Giovio’s villa on Lake Como. All of them have different faces, and yet resemble each other in one or more aspects. Following these suggestions, Part Two analyzes Pontano’s role as a humanist intellectual from two different angles. Chapter 3 turns to the humanists in the generation preceding Pontano and examines their differing reactions to the political and social changes on the Italian peninsula. While Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita) and Bartolomeo Facio opt for a “conservative” outlook, a more “progressive” attitude is epitomized in the figure of Lorenzo Valla. Pontano’s works constitute a complicated reaction to these developments. For although the discussion on the outlook of the humanist movement is methodological

Introduction

13

in character, it is also ethically and politically charged, involving questions of authority and hierarchy. Chapter 4 deals with Pontano’s attempt to develop humanist moral and political thought in terms of a new Latin philosophy. In a conscious reaction to the more radical strains of humanism, Pontano takes Aristotle as his authority. With reference to Francesco Petrarca’s thoughts on language and reason, as well as Leonardo Bruni’s retranslations of the Ethics and Politics, he works on an “eloquent” version of Aristotle that combines rhetorical style and philosophical precision. Nonetheless, he insists on the discreteness of Greek and contemporary culture, complementing Aristotle’s ethics with specific elements of Roman moral philosophy. Part Three, “Virtue, Inside Out,” analyzes the main tenets of Pontano’s treatment of virtue. The main argument is that Pontano’s ethics is not an assortment of obvious moralisms, but inquires very carefully into the complications and difficulties that are an inherent part of the theory of virtue. Chapter 5 addresses the material side of human nature and the phenomenon of fortune. It begins with a short discussion of Lorenzo Valla’s critique of Aristotelian moral philosophy and then focuses on Pontano’s theory of action, in which he reproposes the typical features of Aristotelian moral psychology such as the tripartite soul and the notion of virtue as a habit and a mean. It continues with Pontano’s treatise De fortuna, reconnecting it to the debate over fortuna in the humanist movement and underlining the special role of the treatise. Pontano does not only rewrite the Physics, but also the Aristotelian Liber de bona fortuna, a compilation of the chapters on fortune in the Magna Moralia and the Eudemian Ethics. Chapter 6 returns to political discourse. Here, the point is not only to be virtuous, but also to appear virtuous. It starts with a short account of Poggio Bracciolini’s De infelicitate principum, in which the Florentine humanist almost negates the possibility of virtuous rule, and continues with an analysis of how the humanists at the Aragonese court react to this negative view. They employ the idea of education and of virtue in order to construct the image of a wise ruler. However, the history of Aragonese rule over Naples shows how the ideological use of virtue ethics has its limits. While Alfonso I is awarded the epithet “magnanimous,” his son Ferrante and his grandson Alfonso II pass to history rather as representing the dark side of Renaissance statecraft.

Part One

The Great Pontano The story of Giovanni Pontano’s life is a story of success. By the time of his death in 1503, he had achieved an admirable reputation among his friends and supporters, and indeed across the Italian peninsula as a whole. In the following decades, it became customary to refer to the deceased as the “great Pontano.” Already in 1502, Aldo Manuzio wrote to Pontano: “Indeed, I had heard from many that you were a great man. But (as they say about Isaeus) you were found to be greater both in your poetry and your prose works.”1 Still in 1558, when Peter Perna published a book by the Apulian humanist Antonio de Ferrariis in Basle, he thought it appropriate to mention that the author had lived “in the days of the great Pontano.”2 Pontano would encounter less enthusiastic responses in later times. Nonetheless, from the pages of his biographers arose a picture that celebrated him as “poet and prime minister” who combined his secretarial duties with a varied literary production. In the high-sounding words of Ferdinando Gabotto, a nineteenth-century editor of Pontano’s letters, he was “one of these distinguished men who were able to renew the happy marriage between practical and intellectual life, between art, literature, and poetry, and the experience and administration of public affairs in the beautiful days of the Renaissance.”3 Of course, Gabotto’s idyllic vision was exaggerated. The “beautiful days of the Renaissance” in which Pontano lived were not without violence, war, and intrigue. His father was killed in factional strifes in his hometown Cerreto when Pontano was a young boy.4 Almost all the family property was lost to the “licentiousness of the enemies.”5 Besides, the Pontano family had been afflicted by violence in earlier generations.6 With a marked taste for Senecan tragedy, Pontano reported gruesome stories about cannibalism he had heard from his grandmother, involving toasted livers and the drinking of the enemy’s blood. One of his great-grandmothers had been burnt to death by her own brothers— leaders of the enemy faction—together with two of her children.7 This brutality

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Pontano’s Virtues

stood in stark contrast to the charming scenery of Umbria from which Pontano drew inspiration for his poems. In these poems, Umbria appears not as a scene from Dante’s Inferno, but as “cultivator of the Muses” and as “revered homeland” of the Latin elegiac poet Propertius.8 If, then, the “beautiful days of the Renaissance” had their darker side, it was also the case that the “happy marriage” of letters and politics was not as blissful as Gabotto supposed. Pontano, although celebrated as a poet and writer, did not have an easy life at court, even when he became first secretary to the king in 1486. Far from being favored for his philosophical knowledge and literary skills, his talents seem to have been turned against him. Outside Naples, Pontano’s appointment as first secretary did not meet with sympathy. For one, Ludovico Sforza complained that Pontano was a philosopher who knew nothing about politics, a judgment shared by the Florentine ambassador Bernardo Dovizi da Bibbiena.9 Pontano responded to these allegations with indignation. Indeed, he did so in his typical self-confident and ironic manner: “To a man of letters like me, whom the duke of Bari [i.e., Ludovico Sforza] calls a philosopher, it is sufficient and must be sufficient … to have held the affairs of Italy in his hands for two or three times.”10 Pontano saw himself as an elder statesman whose authority and experience could not be called into question, least of all by Ludovico Sforza.11 This high self-esteem was not the result of a rash outburst of the sometimesunpredictable Pontano, nor was it confined to a specific episode in his career. Rather, it derived from a strategy open to the uomo licterato, or literary man. While the princes and nobles in Italy and elsewhere surrounded themselves with a “rich scatter of refracted self-images” in material objects,12 Pontano surrounded himself with literary self-images in his writings.13 In almost all of his writings there are traces of his life; sometimes as hints, sometimes as explicit comments and remarks on his contemporaries, on himself, and on the times he lived in. Pontano obviously wanted to ensure that his name would live on and that he would go down to posterity as the “great Pontano.” In a famous passage of his astrological poem “Urania” he wrote, “Fame herself [will be] present at my funeral, in golden dress,/with her great mouth and with her great voice …/she will make my name known to great applause,/and she will carry my reputation down through the centuries.”14 “Greatness,” “success,” and a “lasting fame with posterity”—for modern readers it is easy to forget that these terms are not self-serving but inseparably linked to the notions of virtue and the good life. For Pontano and his contemporaries, the desire for greatness and glory, along with the chance of success, all go together with the pursuit of virtue; and Pontano had a long way to go to become the “great

The Great Pontano

17

Pontano.” This is especially true for his political career under the Aragonese. Not being an uninvolved observer of political life, but one of its actors, he had to carefully craft his public role, and what we might now call the “standards of morality” played no little part in it. The deep fascination with the role Pontano chose to play is noticeable even in modern studies. Carol Kidwell goes as far as to assert that he was “the only man who was reputed to be honest in fifteenthcentury politics.”15 This is certainly a misinterpretation. Pontano could hardly have succeeded on the political stage for as long as he did had his personal strategy been restricted to a profession of honesty and moral goodness. This first part of the book attempts to elucidate how Pontano constructed, experienced, and understood his role as a politician. Its point of departure is one of the most conspicuous examples of his moral and political self-presentation: an autobiographical sketch in the treatise De prudentia (On Prudence). Pontano wrote this sketch around 1501, when he was over seventy years old, looking back at his political career and describing his retirement. As he put it, he had finally arrived in the haven of philosophy after the storms of life. He had given up the active life in favor of a life of contemplation. These two different lives raised different issues. On the one hand, Pontano’s remarks on the active phase of his career led to the question of how his autobiographical sketch related to his actual life as a political actor. Pontano’s autobiography contains important hints about how he employed the precepts of moral philosophy in his political life to construct his moral integrity and to enhance his own reputation. On the other hand, the description of his retirement raised the more general questions of the highest good, of the role of pleasure in the good life, and of the relationship between the active and the contemplative life.

1

The Storms of Life

Giovanni Pontano’s political activity took place mainly in the second half of the fifteenth century, a time after the “glory days” of civic humanism had passed but when Italy was not yet torn by foreign invasions. As Melissa Meriam Bullard has remarked, the period in question has often been viewed as “a period of relative stability,” especially when “viewed in retrospect across the chasm of the sixteenthcentury crisis of Italy,” with the result that “the gravity and danger of pre-invasion Italian conflicts appeared diminished.”1 Pontano’s political career, however, bears witness to the storms that raged over the peninsula during these years. In order to understand his moral and political thought, then, it is important to discuss his career in some detail and to set it into the context of Aragonese Naples. Pontano himself discusses his career in an autobiographical sketch in De prudentia, one of his latest works, written around 1501. In retrospect, he gives an account of his advancement at court: As you know, having left my homeland because of the civil strifes which had ruined our household due to the ruthlessness of our opponents, I made my way to King Alfonso, at the time in Tuscany because of a war against Florence; and on his return to Naples, I went with him. There, I dedicated myself to the study of letters, and I did so very successfully. Scarcely older than twenty-four, I had acquired a fame that made me excel even among the elders and those who had spent the greater part of their lives with these studies. After Alfonso’s death, his son Ferrante called for me, and so I followed him for some years under the greatest labors and toils, as he was involved in a complicated war. Then I served Alfonso, his son, on the orders of his father. My relationship with father and son was of such a kind that I exposed myself to serious danger for both of them. But although I dealt with these kinds of things for an extended period of time, I still wrote more than a few works.2

Pontano’s sketch reads like a short introduction to his life and the political scenery of late fifteenth-century Italy. He joins the Aragonese court in 1447 and spends his early years in Naples under Alfonso the Magnanimous, who had conquered

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Pontano’s Virtues

the Kingdom of Naples only in 1442. Surrounded by famous humanists such as Lorenzo Valla and Antonio Beccadelli, known as Panormita, the king was involved in a huge cultural and political project of self-aggrandizement. The limits of such a self-aggrandizement became clear, however, when Alfonso died in 1458 and left the Kingdom of Naples to his son Ferrante, while his Catalan possessions went to his brother John II. Ferrante’s succession was far from undisputed and led to a serious conflict with the baronage of the realm, resulting in the First Barons’ War (1459–65) against John II of Anjou, who tried to recover his rights to the Neapolitan throne. I will return to Alfonso’s strategy of self-representation and its difficulties and ultimate failure during Ferrante’s and the younger Alfonso’s realm in Chapter 6. For now suffice it to say that Pontano became a stout follower of the Aragonese in the 1450s and 1460s. He faithfully served Ferrante during the First Barons’ War, and then served his son, the younger Alfonso. The present chapter is mainly concerned with the dramatic events of the 1480s and early 1490s, the decisive phase of Pontano’s political career. His autobiographical sketch continues: Things became really difficult when I had to settle the war that had broken out between Ferrante and Pope Innocence VIII, and then flared up again. Never had Ferrante been in such dire straits, never had he been closer to his own ruin! In the war of Ferrara, brought on by the Venetians with utmost asperity, it was due to my conduct that a peace settlement was reached in the heat of war; and it was my efforts and counsels that brought peace and tranquillity to the whole of Italy. From then onwards, I occupied the first place in public affairs of Ferrante and Alfonso, in times of both war and peace. For long years, I played a leading role in their deliberations, in their consultations and in the decisions they took, and I did so with integrity and faith. As a result no one has ever complained about my style of government, neither then, nor in the present. Rather, people condemn the times they live in and accuse fortune; many do so openly, and in secret everyone does. For the arrival of Charles VIII, king of France, who occupied the Kingdom of Naples for no more than a year, led to my dismissal from all royal offices I held in the kingdom.3

Pontano obviously alludes to the War of Ferrara (1482–84) and the conflict between Ferrante I, king of Naples, and Pope Innocence VIII (1486–92). He ends with the French conquest in 1495. Remarkably, in his sketch he reverses the chronological order of events, making his career culminate in the post of prime minister after the war of Ferrara. This was not very accurate. His rise to the highest office did not begin with the peace of Bagnolo (August 1484), as he would have the readers of his sketch believe, but with the Second Barons’ War

The Storms of Life

21

(1485–86). Designed to topple the Aragonese from power and involving Pope Innocence VIII, this conspiracy caused the greatest upheaval in the realm since the inception of Ferrante’s rule in the 1460s. Although the barons ultimately failed, they considerably weakened the king’s position inside and outside the realm. As we will see, the peace of August 1486 did not put an end to the conflict, but led to a prolonged struggle between Ferrante and Innocence which ended only in 1492. This quarrel mainly related to the breach of the peace treaty, but it also issued from a profound disagreement about their mutual relationship. With this conflict, king and pope put the Italian system to an acid test which eventually corroded the Aragonese position and opened the way to the French invasion of 1495. For Pontano, the clash between Ferrante and Innocence turned out to be the chance of a lifetime. The king’s former top leadership had been swept away by the conspiracy, its aftermath being marked by expropriations, imprisonments, and executions. Pontano was supposed to fill the huge gap left by his decapitated predecessor Antonello Petrucci. This was not an easy task. As the Florentine ambassador Bernardo Ruccellai reported, the chancellery was in disorder after Petrucci’s execution. In the beginning, the king had to take matters into his own hands. Only a few people, among them Pontano, were allowed to assist him.4 Only slowly was Pontano able to step out from under the shadow of his predecessor. In order to understand how he did so, it is necessary to look in some detail at the Second Barons’ War and the peace negotiations that followed it. Only in this context does it become clear how Pontano fashioned his role as politician and arrived at a rather self-reliant and independent stance, a long distance from the “docile attitude to authority” that some have ascribed to the humanists.5 The present chapter tries to understand how Pontano constructed, experienced, and understood his role as a politician within this context. As will be shown, he fashions this role primarily during the prolonged conflict with the papacy. Pontano negotiates not only peace, but also his standing at court. In fact, both the political questions of the realm and his moral and political thought are closely connected to the construction of a surprisingly autonomous stance as counselor and politician.

Fear and loathing in Naples As a diplomat, Giovanni Pontano was implicated in some of the most serious episodes that preceded the French descent. In his autobiographical sketch in De prudentia he claimed an important role in resolving the conflicts that arose

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during the 1480s and early 1490s. The war of Ferrara (1482–84) between Ercole I d’Este, duke of Ferrara, and Pope Sixtus IV and his Venetian allies was the first of these conflicts. Ferrante, Ercole’s father-in-law, took Ferrara’s side and sent his son Alfonso for military support. Pontano, therefore, experienced the war as secretary to Alfonso, participating in the complicated negotiations which led to the peace of Bagnolo. The situation was highly complicated, with many personal interests at stake. As Ludovico Sforza, who tried to hold the reins of the peace negotiations, confided to the Venetian envoys, he found himself in “a strange labyrinth.”6 In fact, peace negotiations became bogged down and neared an impasse at the beginning of August 1484, shortly before the conclusion of the treaty, signed on August 7. Pontano’s role in resolving this impasse is not very clear. In retrospect, Pontano told the Florentine ambassador Piero Nasi that “if [he] had not concluded the peace of Bagnolo soon, in the course of eight days the Venetians would have taken all coastal regions in the gulf because the prince of Taranto [Pirro del Balzo] had sent an envoy to Venice in order to offer all these lands to this signory, for the acquisition of Lecce in return.”7 Therefore, the leading role Pontano claimed for himself in the autobiographical sketch— and in his conversation with Nasi—cannot be confirmed, but remains possible. Pontano may have given a decisive impulse toward a solution when he urgently requested Duke Alfonso and his father Ferrante to give up their blockade.

New brooms The main conflict was yet to come, however. After almost two years of campaigning in central and northern Italy, Duke Alfonso returned from the war on October 20, 1484. The duke returned to Naples with a number of things on his mind. In his chronicle, Notar Giacomo reports that Alfonso entered the city with blades on his battle horse, preceded by four men with besoms.8 These symbolic acts indicated a stricter, if not hostile, approach to the baronage of the realm, as later historians did not fail to point out.9 There could be no mistake about this new orientation. As Alfonso wrote to Lorenzo de’ Medici only a few days later, he decided to “order the things of the realm” (assectare le cose del Reame).10 Alfonso’s diarist dutifully noted that the following day [4 November] he rode to Castelnovo to see the king with whom he held counsel the whole day long, thinking over and discussing many things. He spent much time with his Majesty, who gave him full power and authority to revise and order the whole realm according to his ideas, putting all his trust in the admirable ingenuity of his Lordship.11

The Storms of Life

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The administration and the nobility saw the duke’s activism in a much less favorable light. For them, Alfonso’s “reforms” were an ill-disguised attempt to diminish their powers and seize their money. The last wars against Florence in the aftermath of the Pazzi conspiracy (1478–79), against the Turks at Otranto (1480), and the Ferrarese war (1482–84) had required great expenditures. In the past, such pecuniary problems had often resulted in actions against highranking officials. In his treatise on liberality, published in 1498, Pontano gives a good example of this kind of behavior. He describes how Alfonso I, the “Magnanimous,” ruler over a realm of Mediterranean dimensions with fabulous riches, had managed to become bankrupt in the 1450s. He makes no secret of how the king reacted to this bankruptcy: “Moved by his indignation and anger, he deprived the officials of the royal treasury of all their possessions, under the pretence of fining them.”12 Apparently, the younger Alfonso planned to follow in the footsteps of his ancestor. The sixteenth-century historian Camillo Porzio highlights this in a passage in which he makes the duke reproach his father. In the eyes of Alfonso, King Ferrante had let himself be deceived by his servants as a result of his goodness and his bad government. While they had become rich, he had remained poor. Now, with all dangers impending on the state, he should take advantage of his stolen property and punish the culprits.13 As Porzio explained, Alfonso’s main targets were Ferrante’s most important collaborators: his first secretary Antonello Petrucci and his minister of finances, Francesco Coppola. Both ministers came from humble beginnings and had made their fortune at the court of Ferrante. They were nuove genti, and their success made them vulnerable to the duke’s accusations, even if Petrucci attempted to prove the opposite.14 Modern historians largely confirm Porzio’s picture.15 Alfonso’s aggressive behavior destabilized the Aragonese bureaucracy to a considerable extent. The atmosphere in Naples deteriorated, leaving more and more space for a climate of suspicion and fear. This was also true for the baronage in the provinces of the realm. Alfonso had openly declared that he wanted to trim the power of the barons, a political strategy shared, but not openly affirmed by the king.16 On his return from North Italy, rumor had it that he wanted every castle in a thirty-mile radius around Naples for himself.17 Similarly, new taxes did little to contribute to a better standing of the monarchy among the barons.18 Furthermore, there had already been cases of expropriation.19 Lanfredini described the atmosphere that resulted from this threatening behavior in a dispatch of July 23, 1485: “[A]ll the barons have become very suspicious and gloomy, and everyone of them makes provisions, hiring men, endowing

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themselves with ammunition and fortifying their castles.”20 Eventually, at the time Lanfredini wrote these lines, the barons had already decided to rebel against the king.21 Although there were many signs of the rebellion, at first Ferrante reacted dismissively to warnings and let things go—an error Pontano would accuse the king of in 1491.22

Rebellion This negligent behavior changed when Ferrante learned of the involvement of the pope in the barons’ plans. On August 16, 1485, a letter from Ferrante’s ambassador, Aniello Arcamone, arrived at Naples. The letter, written two days earlier, contained important information about the barons’ conspiracy and the participation of the pope in it.23 The king and his son were dismayed (molto sbighottiti), as they had been in negotiations with the princes of Altamura and Salerno. These negotiations had led them to hope for an early end to the rebellion. With the new information from Rome, they realized that these talks had been nothing more than delaying tactics—sono tutte tristitie e inghanni, as Lanfredini wrote.24 As Porzio wrote maliciously in his History, the “habits of the subjects follow those of their rulers”—the subjects of Ferrante, simulatore e dissimulatore peritissimo, were imbued with their master’s strategies to such a degree that their own teacher could not see through them.25 On a strategic level, the involvement of the pope aggravated the crisis considerably. Since the times of the Normans when Roger II (1095–1154) had been invested with royal authority over Southern Italy by the papacy, the kingdom had been held to be a fief of the Church. In this way, “a relationship between neighbouring powers fraught with conflict and misunderstanding” had been created, “for while the papacy claimed from it full rights of temporal suzerainty, to the rulers of the kingdom it implied no more than a spiritual vassalage.”26 These differing attitudes resulted, as Riccardo Fubini has described it, in an oscillating rhythm of alliances and hostilities between Rome and Naples, alternating from pope to pope, or in one and the same pope according to the circumstances.27 Innocence VIII certainly counted among the hostile popes. From the beginning, Ferrante had not been on good terms with him.28 Equally, the circle of courtiers and counselors around Innocence were ill-disposed toward the Aragonese rulers, as Ferrante and Alfonso were well aware. “They know that the government in Rome is filled with people hostile to them and of a bad character,” wrote Lanfredini.29 Nor had father and son done anything to

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improve their relationship with Innocence. From the beginning the Aragonese had tried to strengthen their position and to reduce the influence of Innocence to a minimum. On his first visit to the newly elected pope in October 1484, Alfonso had demanded the incorporation of the papal enclaves in the kingdom: Pontecorvo and Benevento, as well as of Terracina. This was only the prelude to further irritations. Thus, the king used Innocence’s call for a holy war as a reason to be exonerated from the annual payments the pope received from him as his feudal lord. On the day of Saints Peter and Paul, June 29, he sent the traditional white palfrey to Innocence, but not the substantial sum of money he was held to pay according to the pope. Consequently, Innocence rejected the palfrey.30 This discordant note would create huge problems for Ferrante and his son. The pope’s support of the rebels took the conflict to an Italian level. Already in July, the famous condottiere Roberto Sanseverino had been ousted from his position by Ludovico Sforza.31 In the present situation, he became a great threat to the kingdom, not only due to his unpredictable character, but also because he would freely accept any new condotta, including one for the pope and the barons. Tensions rose further when in mid-August Roberto’s emissary firmly denied that there were any plans to invade the kingdom.32 As a matter of fact, only a day later, the news of a planned invasion reached Naples, together with a sketch of the future partition of the realm between the pope, Ludovico Sforza, and Roberto himself.33 The very existence of the Kingdom of Naples was at stake. Given this situation, King Ferrante chose to follow a double strategy. On the one hand, he tried to bring about reconciliation between himself and the barons; on the other, he intensified his diplomatic efforts in Rome. In the first months, Pontano was involved in the first task, serving as an emissary between the king and the barons in his function as secretary to the duke of Calabria. At first, these negotiations seemed to yield positive results, but the longer they carried on, the clearer it became that they mainly served the barons’ delaying tactics. As Angliberto del Balzo, one of the conspirators, confessed two years later, the barons had reunited against the king and in obedience to the pope, deceiving the king in the peace negotiations.34 The king learned of this deception through an informant among the barons, just a day after Pontano had returned from Apulia.35 Pontano parted for Abruzzo with Duke Alfonso at the end of September. Regarding the situation in Rome, all attempts to change Pope Innocence failed. The king’s ambassador in Rome, Aniello Arcamone, soon suggested for the need to prepare for war, as the pope seemed decided to carry on with the war.36 In mid-October, his condottiere Roberto Sanseverino parted for Rome, preparing for an invasion of the kingdom.

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On November 20, the rebels finally declared war on the king.37 Just as on the diplomatic stage, so too in the military field Ferrante sought to divide the action. He himself took care of the military actions within the realm. He hoped to defeat the rebels, who lacked men, money, and a clear political leadership.38 Regarding the campaign outside the kingdom, Ferrante depended strongly on the support of his league with Florence and Milan in order to keep the pope and his troops in check. With the help of Lorenzo de’ Medici, the Aragonese had succeeded in enlisting Virginio Orsini.39 The duke of Calabria, and with him Pontano, directed his men toward Rome. In December, they had reached the broader environs of the city.

A complicated peace With the Second Barons’ War in full swing, the peace negotiations turned out to be among the greatest challenges Pontano had to face during his political career. As he writes in his autobiographical sketch, Ferrante’s reign came close to ruin in 1485/86.40 As in the case of the treaty of Bagnolo, however, Pontano’s role in the peace negotiations is not as clear as his own remarks suggest. He was not involved from the beginning, neither when first attempts at peace were made in January 1486, nor when peace talks became serious in May and June, after months of indecisive military action. Several initiatives were under way. For one, Roberto Sanseverino had started his own initiatives rather early on.41 Roberto essentially promoted a separate peace, which would deprive the pope of his military power; it would also help him to earn with a peace by changing sides.42 Yet, the king insisted on continuing the military pressure on the pope, convinced that a future peace depended largely on this pressure, and his allies shared his view.43 Furthermore, Ludovico Sforza was radically opposed to this variant, seeing Sanseverino as a deadly enemy who had attempted to overthrow his government.44 Given such resistance, this initiative was marginalized and in the end came to nothing.

Two strings to the bow The initiative of Cardinal Ascanio Sforza, brother of Ludovico and a skilled diplomat, was much more important. Sforza had been officially entrusted as mediator in the coming peace negotiations by King Ferrante.45 Reticent in the beginning of the conflict, Ascanio had made a powerful comeback in the

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consistory on March 6, 1486. Attacking the French cardinal Jean Balue, he had presented an alternative to the aggressive plans of the circle around Giuliano della Rovere and spoken against a further expansion of the conflict.46 The tension among the cardinals opting for peace and those intent on continuing the war became obvious in a tumultuous consistory in the beginning of June.47 The divide among the cardinals as well as the military advances of the duke of Calabria was favorable for the king. As his speaker, Ascanio hoped to draw personal advantage from this situation. Yet, Cardinal Sforza held no monopoly on the negotiations. From the end of April, his brother Ludovico supported peace talks involving the famous condottiere Gian Giacomo Trivulzio.48 In contrast to his rival Ascanio, Trivulzio was held in high esteem by the pope, and to the advantage of Ludovico, he was adamant in his intentions to exclude Sanseverino from any future designs.49 At first the activities of the two Milanese negotiators ran parallel. Ascanio was not informed of Trivulzio’s activities, and was quite annoyed when he found out that he was not the only representative of Milan in talks with the pope. Although the king now had two strings to his bow, the nomination of several negotiators caused a certain amount of confusion. Pontano entered the stage only on June 23, when Giovanni Albino, another diplomat in the service of the Aragonese, returned from Rome with a letter that invited Ferrante to send him Antonio d’Alessandro and Giovanni Pontano as representatives of the king and the duke of Calabria, respectively. The letter held out the prospect of a conclusion within the next three days. But there were also other directives from Rome. A letter from the pope’s vice-chancellor invited the king to concentrate on Ascanio’s line and to ignore all other negotiations. The position of Ludovico in Milan was not at all clear.50 This chaotic situation played into the hands of Pontano. For reasons of organization, the king decided to entrust the duke of Calabria with further negotiations. As secretary to the duke, Pontano would convey the royal commission and help to cut down the number of parallel peace talks. This was a shift away from the old elites in the kingdom. Pontano was a “new” man, informed of the intentions of the king. It was his task to mediate between the different factions and to restart and coordinate the negotiations.51 Moreover, his appointment implied a change of strategy: Pontano was much more pro-papal in his political outlook than other court members. He was also well connected with the Guelph party, and on good terms with Gian Giacomo Trivulzio.52 For Ascanio Sforza, Pontano’s arrival meant the exclusion from a large part of the ongoing negotiations, even if it was he who signed the final treaty for Milan, much to the anger of Trivulzio.

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In the beginning, Pontano’s participation in the peace talks was to no avail. The Florentine ambassador to Naples, Giovanni Lanfredini, reported on July 2 that the negotiations had cooled down. Pontano was said to return to Naples soon.53 Still, on July 12 he had not yet returned.54 The day after, Giovanni Albino arrived at Naples, reporting that the peace negotiations “had vanished into thin air.”55 As a matter of fact, on July 25 none of the fundamental issues had yet been resolved. Obviously, the pope saw himself in a less hopeless position than his opponents. Therefore, the king urged the duke of Calabria to intensify his endeavors in order to reach a more satisfying conclusion; a good war would bring a good peace.56

Pontano in action Nevertheless, a “good” war needed to be backed by diplomatic action, and this was Pontano’s task. In his dialogue Asinus,57 he lets his friend Jacopo Sannazaro describe the laborious weeks between the end of July and the conclusion of the peace treaty on August 9. Often we felt sorry for the old man, hastening from Rome to Alfonso’s camp, then again from the camp to Innocence in Rome, weak in body, in the hot midday sun, amid crowds of bandits that rendered the roads insecure. As his escort, we often lamented full of grief that his life would be over in less than a few hours.58

The joy was greater when the peace had been concluded, and Pontano celebrated it as a diplomatic masterpiece and personal success. The “Gabriele Altilio” of the Asinus thinks that Pontano has done brilliantly because, in the peace that he made, to his great credit and the greater tranquillity of the peoples, he not only restored the royal fortunes, which were in a desperate plight, but he even stabilised them.59

In Pontano’s eyes, he had concluded the peace on his conditions (quibus voluit conditionibus).60 The treaty itself suggested a different picture. As summarized by Carol Kidwell, “Ferrante would pay the tribute; the barons would recognise the Church and pope as their ultimate overlords and would therefore pay feudal dues to Rome, which would be offset against the king’s assessment; the pope would distribute the bishoprics and benefices in the kingdom; Aquila would be free to choose between allegiance to the pope or to the king.”61 This sounded more like a defeat than a victory. Apparently, Pontano had concluded the peace rather on the terms of the College of Cardinals than on the king’s.

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Years later, Pontano explained the discrepancies between his own satisfaction with the conclusion and the actual treaty to Piero Nasi, Florentine ambassador to Naples in the early 1490s. The peace of 1486 had turned out to be a curse to Pontano, leading to a prolonged conflict for which he was made responsible, at least in part. In 1491, a new and more stable peace with Rome was at hand, and he pressed for a quick solution—for the love of his lords (per amore di costoro, che mi sono signori), but even more for love of himself (per amore mio), as the situation of the kingdom concerned him directly.62 But, as he assured Nasi, the failure had not been his: All the promises I made were promises I could hold and that would have been observed. But as soon as I had left Rome … the cardinal of San Pietro in Vincula [i.e., Giuliano della Rovere, the future Pope Julius II] made his return from Genova, and the chapters of the peace were turned upside down and manipulated. It is true that I promised the payment of the tribute to the pope, but the pope himself told me that he had no intention to be paid, and he said: “I’m sure the king and I will reach an agreement”; and Ascanio [Sforza] and other cardinals made fun of me, telling me I should not worry about this promise and that no payments would take place etc.63

Pontano’s contention that the chapters of the peace treaty had been manipulated made part of the Aragonese line of argument, defending Ferrante’s comportment after the conclusion of the treaty.64 For the conflict between the king, the pope, and the barons of the realm had not yet ended. Already on August 13, Ferrante’s first secretary Antonello Petrucci and Francesco Coppola, another protagonist of the king’s policies, were arrested together with their families on the wedding of Coppola’s son with a granddaughter of Ferrante.65 This arrest caused a major stir in Italy, not least because of the way in which it took place. The detention and death of the condottiere Giacomo Piccinino in the 1460s had brought Ferrante notoriety for cruelty and underhandedness.66 His proceedings against the barons contributed to the further establishment of this notoriety. After a trial against Coppola, Petrucci, and the secretary’s two sons, they were publicly decapitated.67 These events were only the prelude to further persecutions of the nobility. Moreover, in the summer of 1487, another series of arrests took place.68 On the order of Ferrante, the trial proceedings against the barons were printed and distributed throughout Italy and Europe.69 Pontano, too, was involved in justifying the arrests. In the name of Ferrante, he informed Giovanni Albino, emissary with Virginio Orsini, why they had taken place. His letter began with the remark that the king had done everything in his power to placate the minds of his subjects (pacare gli animi di ciascuno).

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This was also true for the barons. The confiscation of their castles had served no other end than to calm the situation and reassure them (de acquietare & assecurare li animi loro). During their stay in Naples, the king had treated them like his children and not as his subjects (presto come figlioli, che como subditi). Thus, it was all the more distressing for him that their “perverted nature” and their “old-established errors” (perverse nature & inveterate defecti) had prevailed. Therefore the king was forced to change strategy. Having first given them sweet and tasty food, he was now forced to give them medicaments and remedies (medicine & remedii de ammalati), even if their illnesses were incurable because the barons had once again conspired against him. In so doing they were likely to bring war to the whole of Italy and expose the peninsula to the threat of a Turkish invasion. In this situation, the monarch had no other choice but to protect the public good. It was for this reason that he ordered the detention of the barons.70

Reprise The pope did not sympathize with the language employed by Pontano. As their former ally, the pope felt responsible for the barons and responded with a short note. He declared himself astonished about the detention of the barons and admonished the king to be prudent, forbidding him to proceed until further notice. Such a serious and grave event, he insisted, required careful consideration.71 The king answered two days later refusing any advice of the pope in these matters. The letter also contained heavy attacks on the clergy in Rome, pointing out their partial responsibility for everything that had happened. For the same reason, the king rejected the pope’s reproach that he had not been informed about the detentions. This could have been hardly possible given that many prelates at the papal court were involved in the new intrigues against him, conscious of the barons’ moves and that of their accomplices.72 Both sides insisted on their point of view. The conflict culminated in the excommunication of Ferrante on June 29, 1489, and his deposition on September 11 of the same year. The conflict dragged on, but only in the beginning of the 1490s did it become a liability to Ferrante’s policies and that of the League. Superficially, the problem was money. Ferrante’s expenditures for the military were exceedingly high. He behaved like someone on the brink of war, and one of the main reasons for this state of affairs was his pained relationship with the papacy. Pontano’s position was rather clear. Ferrante had to come to terms with Innocence, otherwise he ran the danger that Innocence would be succeeded by a pope even more hostile to Naples, or that Ferrante would die without leaving

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things ordered for his own successors, a great danger for his heirs and for the peace of Italy.73 But money was not the only problem. The conflict between Ferrante and Innocence concerned a more fundamental problem: the relationship between the kingdom and the papacy. Ferrante’s refusal to pay the tribute or to accept any interference with his handling of the barons indicated a policy designed to eliminate the pope’s influence in the realm once and for all. From his point of view, this made perfect sense. Without an external authority like the pope to which his barons or a foreign invader could appeal, his royal rule would be more secure than ever. For the pope, on the other hand, an independent Neapolitan king was more like a nightmare, a constant danger on the southern borders of the papal states over which no means of control could be exerted. When Ferrante demanded “nothing” from the pope except to be left alone, as Pontano put it, he actually demanded a lot more than the pope could afford to give. This ideological struggle boiled down to a few critical questions. Innocence insisted on two points. Firstly, he demanded the release of the barons still in prison; secondly, he wanted Ferrante to pay the tribute. Ferrante would not hear of it. A release of the barons was not acceptable to him. “Rather,” added Pontano, “he [the king] was wrong when he did not behead all of them, with the cardinals of San Pietro in Vincula, Balue and Sant’Angelo as eye-witnesses.”74 This remark made Nasi, the Florentine ambassador, prick up his ears. The further fate of the arrested barons had been unknown, but Nasi had been informed by a “gentleman with good contacts to the court” that they were alive (as Pontano’s formulation also suggested), incarcerated between Salerno, Gaeta, Ischia, and another unknown place in Calabria.75 In fact, Ferrante and his successors released most of the captives in the course of the next years. As Elisabetta Scarton has argued, the king’s image as a cruel and calculating ruler that quietly disposes of his opponents needs revision.76 Regarding the tribute, the king did not feel obliged to pay it in money. Rather, he considered it a debt to be paid in kind when and if he came to the pope’s help with his military forces or in defense of the Church; or in support of the campaigns of the pope, as during the war against Florence, when Ferrante had taken up arms as commander of the papal armies. These were the cases in which Ferrante had to pay tribute to the Church, as formulated in the papal bull of Sixtus IV of 1472.77 Consequently, the king continued to send only the white palfrey to Rome, without paying the tribute in money.78 The situation intensified when the city of Ascoli started a rebellion. Under these circumstances, Pontano was sent to Rome to negotiate peace. He left

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on November 1, 1491, to the annoyance of the Florentines, who had not been informed of this step.79 Pontano was accompanied by Luigi di Casalnuovo, the duke’s secretary and Pontano’s son-in-law, as well as by Gian Giacomo Trivulzio, at the time under the service of King Ferrante.80 As it turned out, the pope had explicitly requested Pontano’s presence in Rome.81 In De sermone, Pontano narrates the story that some cardinals warned Innocence of king Ferrante and his insidious character. Purportedly, Innocence answered them: “But Giovanni Pontano, with whom we negotiate the peace, will in no way deceive us. For honesty and trust will not abandon him, who has himself never abandoned honesty and trust.”82 Ferrante and Alfonso did not share Innocence’s predilection. As the duke made clear only a few days after Pontano’s departure, he did not believe in the possibility of diplomatic success on the part of his old teacher.83 The king was also skeptical. More than this, he became suspicious and lamented the little information he received from Rome.84 Milan gave further reason for concern. Ludovico Sforza complained to the king that Pontano worked against him in Rome.85 The most difficult question was still that of the tribute, and Ludovico had apparently succeeded in making the pope insist on his position.86 Notwithstanding, Pontano continued negotiations. In an alarming letter to Giovanna d’Aragona, Ferrante’s wife, he warned her that further hesitations would not help the Aragonese cause. He alluded to letters from France and Milan indicating an anti-Aragonese coalition. Should the envoy of the king return with new doubts and consultations, this would only play into the hands of the adversaries, who were settled in their position.87 In another letter of the same date, addressed to the duke of Calabria, Pontano argued along the same lines. He defended the chapters of the treaty as a great achievement: “The whole world was against you, and still you got your will.” Again, Pontano hinted at an antiAragonese coalition and asked his lords not to interfere with his negotiations any longer, coming up with ever-new questions of detail. “In the name of your devil, be magnanimous: a poor man like Giovanni Pontano does not fear Europe, while you fear not to get enough…. With your writings from Naples, with your precautions worthy of shady lawyers, you have put shame on me.”88 Obviously, Pontano had had enough of the interferences from Naples: “Don’t you think that I will fight over your replies any longer.”89 The king sent back his envoy Luigi di Casalnuovo on January 15, with “a resolution that would soon lead to the conclusion of the peace, if his holiness, the pope would judge on the basis of what is good for him.”90 On January 19 Pontano and Luigi presented the king’s resolution to the pope, who insisted on

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the inclusion of some further stipulations. Pontano transmitted these stipulations as fast as possible to Naples, where they were discussed by the duke of Calabria, the jurists of the Sacro Consiglio, and the most important counselors. After having affirmed that the stipulations did not bear any importance in themselves, Pontano’s letter was sent to the king, who was staying in Apulia. It was then returned to Innocence in Rome. The pope accepted the fourteen chapters of the treaty and the peace was finally concluded on January 27, 1492.

I, Pontano As the preceding section shows, the role of Pontano within Neapolitan and Italian politics was that of the political negotiator, not that of a protagonist. In the case of the peace of Bagnolo, Ludovico il Moro had been credited as its promoter, together with Robert Sanseverino. In the peace of 1486, Ascanio Sforza and Gian Giacomo Trivulzio were the main protagonists, and in 1492, Lorenzo de’ Medici starred in the role of pacifier. Yet Pontano’s claim to have been the decisive factor and responsible for all these peace negotiations implied that he seemed to think of himself as more than a simple subordinate. In fact, as Giuliana Vitale has noted, even though Pontano described himself mostly in traditional terms as “segretario” and “ministro,” he was well aware of the “creative and original role of his work.”91 The new role of the office was the result of a major change that had taken place under Ferrante. The secretary was no longer limited to “bureaucratic” activities of the old “regis litterarum magister”—that is, the dispatch of letters and privileges—but took on greater responsibilities on a diplomatic and political level.92 In Pontano’s time, the new role of the first secretary had still to be defined and circumscribed, and this left room for experimentation as well as conflict.

Personal politics The question is how Pontano dealt with this situation and how he attempted to shape his role as a political actor, taking advantage of the ambiguity and the possibilities that his office presented him with. He did so in several ways. First of all, for Pontano, politics was something personal, something that depended on the character of its actors.93 In one of his long conversations with Piero Nasi, the Florentine ambassador, he described the nature of the king to be “hesitant.” “For this reason”, he explained to Nasi, “he needs a lot of time to take a decision, and once the decision is taken, he is slow in implementing it and pays little

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attention to anything else than the present situation.” But Pontano did not limit himself to this observation, but also compared the king’s character with his own. “He [Pontano] told me that this nature was very different from his own, ‘for although I have a high receptivity, I need time to decide, but once I have taken my decision, I implement it at once, thinking a lot about the future.’”94 This distinguished Pontano from the duke of Calabria, “quick in his deliberations and implementing them overhastily.”95 Obviously, Pontano saw himself as a counterbalance to the king’s hesitant character. As he argued during the conversation with Nasi, the king’s hesitance had nearly cost him his realm three times. The first time was during the First Barons’ War, when he did not come to an agreement with the prince of Taranto, the leading figure of the revolt. The second and third time have already been mentioned: during the negotiations for the peace of Bagnolo, Ferrante risked a Venetian invasion in Apulia with the help of the prince of Altamura and later in the Second Barons’ War, he doubted the readiness of the barons to go to war.96 From Pontano’s point of view, the same problem of hesitance also applied to the 1491/92 situation. Ferrante needed peace with the pope, yet was still hesitant about signing an agreement. Pontano’s letters from Rome during 1491/92 expressed his conviction that the king would throw away the opportunity for peace because of his hesitant nature. This is why he warned other members of the royal family not to undermine his endeavors with ever-new doubts and consultations, tormenting him with questions of detail and dangerously delaying the negotiations. In doing so, Pontano tried to avoid the impression of disobedience. “I do not want, and I must not want, anything else than the king wants,” he wrote to the queen consort. Still, he insisted on his point of view and enrolled the whole royal family for his cause, not forgetting to apologize for his letters.97 In a similar vein, he wrote to Alfonso, the duke of Calabria, “I think I have annoyed the king, your father, for the things I have written, beyond my office but according to my nature and my habits.”98 Nevertheless, he repeated these things to the duke and to his brother Federico. Different from the letter to the queen, the letter to the duke, with whom Pontano was more familiar, did not end with an apology, but with a defiant remark: “If you don’t like what I write, that’s just how it is (tal si sia di Voi). This is what Giovanni Pontano has to do (così specta fare ad Joan Pontano).”99 Although Pontano recognized the political authority of the king unconditionally, he did not accept the idea of simply carrying out his tasks. Indeed, as a stout follower of the Aragonese kings, he did not fail to criticize his lords in the strongest terms and to interfere with their policies. He actively

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worked for the good of the king, even if this meant working against the king’s actual designs. “Everyday, I am trying to improve your situation, in all ways possible, and it seems that your Majesty wants to lead me astray.”100 Another striking example of this behavior is described in a letter of Vincenzo Granata to Giles of Viterbo about a meeting of the Venetian ambassador at the time when Alfonso had become king of Naples. In a meeting with the Venetian ambassador, Granata reports, the king chooses to entreat him to help the kingdom. He tells Pontano to be patient and to remain silent. His secretary, however, cannot control himself and starts to threaten the ambassador, convinced that this will aid his lord.101 The role Pontano claimed for himself went beyond that of a counselor. Pontano’s work did not restrict him to give counsel; it allowed him to shape the policies of the realm. He knew that this was a transgression difficult to justify in front of the king. Being a wise ruler with a lot of experience [he wrote to Ferrante] it is nothing else than presumption, or, more exactly, audacity that I want to call some facts to your mind, to give you counsel and to draw your attention to things that you are used to handing well for yourself. And although this is true, nor is it wrong that it is nearly impossible to take away from someone those things that are given to us by habit and nature. I will not be able to change my nature and to remind my Lords that which seems good for them to me.102

Consciously, Pontano exceeded his powers. In this way, he created a sphere of political action for himself, not according to the old conception of the office as secretary to the king, but according to his own personality. In other words, Pontano did not act solely as secretary to the king, he also acted as Giovanni Pontano. From this perspective, the formula with which he used to sign the king’s documents seems to indicate more than a technicality. Rex mihi mandavit Joannes Pontanus: The king sent me, Giovanni Pontano.

A letter to the king A letter of May 7, 1490, to Ferrante is especially revealing of the way Pontano fashioned himself in the ambience of the court. This letter is an announcement of Pontano’s intention to resign. It begins with a personal remark: “Sacred Majesty, this is my birthday, and on such a day, according to the old custom, one gets up in the morning to thank God, then the rest of the day is devoted to pleasure.”103 This is only the prelude to the sarcastic argument that follows. Pontano uses a medical metaphor, not dissimilar to the one employed in the

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king’s justification for the arrest of the barons and common in the contemporary language of politics. Although kings normally do not exercise the profession of a medic, Pontano writes, the king has given him some (presupposedly bitter) pills to swallow, even without starting the treatment with (sweet) syrup. Given that the king has taken the trouble of playing medic, Pontano takes the medicine with pleasure, in the interest of health. But his health, he continues, necessitates that he desist in his efforts and renounce his office as secretary.104 As it turns out, Pontano had tried to retire already the year before, but the Castellan had refused to convey his announcement. This time, the pills of the king allow him to speak in liberty and to tell him directly of his resignation.105 Of what did the bitter pills consist? Pontano’s income had been taxed to the sum of twenty ducats. The old secretary was furious about this new taxation. As he calculated for the king, this sum corresponded to an income of 500 ducats a month, given that the tax rate was actually 4 percent. As a good accountant, Pontano did not fail to include a list for the past months, showing that for every single month from January to April, his real income had been far below this sum. This is not a question of detail, but of power. Pontano proved that he knew his mathematics, while the people who really should know it, did not. There is little consideration in the actions of the latter, even a certain maliciousness and hence, according to Pontano, the king failed to act wisely when he listened to them. As Pontano insisted, Ferrante should have asked him directly instead of relying on incompetent people. What is at stake here is a certain dependence of the king on his courtiers and officials. Essentially, Pontano is admonishing the king for being easily influenced by some and forgetting his valuable officials. But Pontano did not give in. He reminded the king that the Republic of Venice paid 12,000 ducats a year to the chancellery, and that Ferrante himself had designated a sum of 7,000 ducats a year when reforming his chancellery. In comparison, Pontano not only received a relatively low salary, but also had to pay his scribes by himself. Indignation reached its climax when Pontano compared his situation with that of his predecessor Antonello Petrucci: In the time of M. Antonello every year captaincies were given to the clerks, magistracies, posts of notary public, benefices, and he robbed the people and the first person robbed was king Ferrante. In the times of the wretched and unfortunate Pontano, offices are not given in the chancellery, and neither the people nor the king are robbed, and I have to pay tribute from my own sweat to the tax collector.106

In other words, Petrucci had been remunerated well for his ill conduct, while Pontano was punished for his right conduct. The conclusion of this paradox was

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not explicitly drawn by Pontano, but obvious all the same. To a certain extent, Ferrante had been responsible for the errors of his former secretary-turnedrebel, not having reacted to the excessive modes of the chancellery. But the old secretary gave also another thrust to this argument. If the barons had not known how to use their liberties and had accumulated riches, the “wretched” Pontano had at least the satisfaction that he did not owe anything to the king and his family. Your Majesty himself has made all his ministers and has given to all of them. Your majesty has not made me, because I made myself by myself. Also, Your Majesty cut me down in past times and valued me as though I were an ignorant and incompetent fool. Nor have you given me to myself, but I have certainly given to Your Majesty and to your son, and you know it, and if you do not wish to know it, it is not, nevertheless, that I do not speak the truth. The fiefs, the castles, the provisions, the revenues, the gifts which my services could have expected (not, however, that I expected them myself), are these, that from my sweat I should have to pay the tax collector twenty ducats a month….107

The tensions between king and secretary were tangible in this passage. Yet similar to other occasions, Pontano did not retreat, but defended himself from Ferrante’s condescension, probably instigated by his courtiers. He ended his letter with the announcement of his retirement. I was not born owing tribute to anyone. I have certainly been a servant of great princes, and through their grace, and not through my merit; as I have served them well, I have called this to their minds, and sometimes they have followed my advice. I don’t think that I, in this last tournament of life, should be a tax payer, and neither should you believe this, wise, powerful, and old as you are, nor your children, nor your grandchildren; this is a matter of justice, not of forced argument. I have no doubts about going to stay on my farm, secure, without arms and without guard.108

In order to underline his autonomous stance, Pontano falls back on an alternative to his public life, namely, that in the place of his official duties, a tranquil and secluded life among his books and on his farm awaits him. The philosophical idea of the contemplative life as the best form of life becomes a powerful argument in the struggles of daily politics and amid the intrigues at court. Unlike Ferrante, Pontano had a card up his sleeve: his status as philosopher and poet. The king has no access to this kind of life. From the perspective Pontano presents in his letter, the king is not better off than his secretary. On the contrary, his supreme political power does not even enable him to live a better life than his subject. Pontano’s pointed remark on a life without arms and guards makes

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it clear that he retains Ferrante to be less happy than himself, taking up motives from the literature on the infelicitas principum of which Poggio and others had drawn a drastic picture. Moreover, Pontano’s remark was also contrary to a topos of the mirror-of-princes tradition. Thus, his teacher Panormita had depicted Alfonso I as a ruler who was so just and wise that he did not need any guards.109

Pontano the magnanimous As this letter shows, Pontano knew how to use his status as philosopher to his own advantage when it came to winning recognition for himself and defending his position at court against other competitors. Accordingly, his autobiography depicts him as a self-made man, whose success was due to his virtuousness and not to anyone else. Pontano’s autobiographical sketch follows this argumentative strategy, making him appear as an independent figure in all instances, not as a servant of the Aragonese whose political career depended on their grace. In no place of his sketch does Pontano mention Alfonso I’s famous liberality or show gratitude toward him. He does not present himself to Ferrante, but is invited (arcesserer). Similarly, he serves the younger Alfonso on the order of his father (iubente patre). He does not recommend himself to Alfonso, but is recommended by the king. Pontano never appears as a petitioner in his description, dependent on the grace of his lords. On the contrary, his lords need him. He risks danger for them, showing courage. He concludes peace in the most difficult situations and counsels them in all-important questions, showing prudence. Pontano, as he fashions himself, bears a number of traits that recall the Aristotelian figure of the magnanimous man. This magnanimous figure is thought to remember the benefits that he has conferred, but not those he has received; he does not take petty risks; he is bound to be open in his likes and dislikes and to speak and act straightforwardly; he is haughty toward those who are influential and successful.110 It has long been debated whether the Aristotelian portrait of the magnanimous man refers to an active life which aims at honor, or a contemplative life which aims at wisdom.111 In his autobiography, Pontano successfully combines both possibilities. Insofar as the theoretical life is an absolute end to man, it opens up room for him to move in his active life as a politician. Vice versa, he needs the active life in order to prove his magnanimity in the exercise of all virtues and to obtain to a life of contemplation as the fruit of his active life, on the basis of his actions in the past. This entanglement becomes abundantly clear in Pontano’s treatment of poverty and the use he makes of his own “poverty” in his self-fashioning.

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De magnanimitate gives an illuminating example of this use. In an anecdote, Pontano tells his readers that when he [king Ferrante] had put me in charge of certain important projects which were under discussion and when I saw that his son was very annoyed, I was not afraid to say that I would not refuse the burden … nor would I be deterred, either by his son’s scornful spirit or by his father’s indulgence of his son, for I would have against both … a very great patron. When the king asked me, in surprise, to tell him who, I said “poverty …” it will protect me against your accusations and will absolve me as a free man in court.112

Carol Kidwell dates this episode to the time when Pontano worked as Duke Alfonso’s teacher in the 1460s.113 It is much more probable, however, that it refers to the 1480s, after the Second Barons’ War. The language chosen seems to allude to the processes against the barons in 1487. As a matter of fact, when Pontano defended his peace treaty of January 1492, he took up much the same language, explicitly referring to the barons and ministers of the king deemed guilty: Aniello Arcamone, Antonello Petrucci, Francesco Coppola, Giovanni Pou, and Diomede Carafa (the last was not involved in the process, but as counselor of the king was obviously not very highly esteemed by Pontano). Not anyone of these great masters has done what I have done, all by myself and abandoned by everyone; you know how I’ve done and it is up to you to judge. Beg your pardon, however: One hundred times you’ve been sold; any of the aforementioned has enriched at your expense, while you have remained poor. I wait for the day in which I will be put on trial to see if I have done well. I have nothing to lose, but each of these gentlemen was worth one hundred thousand ducats, if not more. I will account for my actions before the judges with my head held high, and without lawyer.114

Of course, the “poverty” in which Pontano depicted himself did not refer to a total lack of means. After all, he was one of the few humanists who could afford to build a family chapel; he owned a palace in one of the best parts of Naples and held two country estates. Therefore, he considerably understated his case when he wrote that “it is not like I lacked my daily bread, nor have I ever lacked it, nor will it lack” in the same letter.115 Still, he refers to himself as poor and wretched (povero) more than once in his letters.116 Obviously, Pontano’s presumed “poverty” did not refer to his economic situation per se. It rather referred to his self-perception as someone who exercised modesty and restraint in his office. He consciously adopted arguments that had circulated from the beginning of the 1480s onward and had been directed against

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his predecessor. Indeed, the insistence on his moral integrity and on the fact that he had not enriched in his office at the expense of the king was one of his most powerful arguments when it came to enforcing his position and carrying through his policies. On the one hand, this “moderation” saved Pontano from the fate of Petrucci and others. Pontano alluded to this fate when he sarcastically recommended to the king to look for another secretary, who would not only pay him taxes, but also relinquish his life and his belongings.117 On the other, this “moderation” enabled him to further elaborate on his independence and, according to the figure of the magnanimous, on his moral superiority. Pontano employs the same strategy in his last dialogue Aegidius, written c. 1501. Here, as in the letters, he contrasts his own modesty with the greed of his predecessors. As he has one of the interlocutors say, those who have held the position of magister epistolarum, or secretary, as it is now called, in our times, have all taken advantage of their office and have enriched enormously except Gioviano…. He always said, “I don’t want to suffer poverty, but I refuse to be sumptuous.” In this way, he did not only rule greed and the appetite for money, but even kings in their government.118

The moral lesson employed—rational rule over the non-rational, appetitive part of the soul—implies political power, and according to Pontano a very far-reaching political power on the highest levels of administration. Not by coincidence, this remark is followed by another example of Pontano’s moderation, once again employing the idea of contemplation and otium as an alternative to the active life of politics, transforming it into a means of an autonomous attitude. The example recalls the time when Louis XII had taken hold of Naples in the beginning of the sixteenth century. As Pontano lets his interlocutor tell the story, he refused a lucrative offer on the part of the French administration. He rejects the proposal: “You would not make me richer, but more busy, while I, with the help of god, do not suffer any want.”119 A later anecdote carries this self-fashioning to extremes. As one of Pontano’s servants supposedly related, the old Pontano, author of a treatise on banquets, rarely had more than a bit of fruit for dinner; instead of a horse, he rode a mule with only one man as escort; his clothes were not made of silk, but of wool; in addition, they were rather worn out.120 The reader might decide whether the anecdote is a sign of freedom from ambition or an instance of senile miserliness. It is a fact, however, that Pontano’s utterances and habits in his political life have their place in his moral and political treatises, and vice versa. His letters, testimony to his hard-headedness, make use of the same kind of arguments as seemingly abstract and theoretical discussions such as De magnanimitate.

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Taken out of their historical context, Pontano’s treatises seem to betray an almost pungent sense of an empty morality consisting in bon mots and grave, but ineffective sentences. Machiavelli had an easy job denouncing this kind of morality in The Prince. Yet, as soon as these passages are read together with Pontano’s letters and set into the context of his political projects and efforts, these pieces of a seemingly abstract morality gain a different weight. The true character of this morality is different: Although it is based on the virtues and on moral principles, Pontano’s moral thought is not restricted to being a “doctrine,” a theoretical construct. Rather, he employs philosophical principles in the routine of everyday political life.

The “French incident” Notwithstanding, Pontano’s political activities are ambiguous in character. Pontano was not as successful as he has his readers believe. He might have held the affairs of Italy in his hands two or three times, but much of his political career depended on factors outside of his reach. Fortuna played a greater role in his life, as he himself would acknowledge. On a smaller scale, he could downplay this role, as in the case of his autobiography. By manipulating the chronological order, he made his post as first secretary depend on his own efforts, and not on the chaotic circumstances of the Second Barons’ War. Likewise, he turned personal defeats into triumphs, climbing the ladder of success despite the mixed results he produced as a diplomat and politician. On a greater scale, however, he had little influence on the course of events. The event that marked the end of Pontano’s political career, the French invasion of 1495, was the best example. Meticulously, Pontano set his strategy of selfrepresentation into effect, interlacing his works with personal recollections and constructing a sophisticated philosophical basis of this self-representation in De prudentia. His circle of friends was also involved in this process, when they celebrated the “great Pontano” in their letters, poems, and dedications. Without a doubt, their most impressive contribution to Pontano’s fame consisted in the publication of his works, propagated by his close friend and disciple Pietro Summonte and financed from many different sources in the beginning of the sixteenth century. The designation of the academy as Accademia Pontaniana was a further sign of the reverence Pontano’s former friends and disciples had shown for him and continued to show. All the more significant is the fact that it was the famous Florentine historian Francesco Guicciardini (1483–1540), temporally and ideologically distant from

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Pontano and his circle, who “sullied” this immaculate record in an incriminating episode in his History of Italy. As Guicciardini reports, before Charles VIII left Naples on May 20, 1495, after having spent three months in his newly won capital, he received solemnly in the cathedral, with the greatest pomp and glory … the insignia and honours of kingship and the accustomed oaths made to new kings, Giovanni Pontano praying in the name of the people of Naples, whose reputation, most brilliant for the excellence of his learning, of his management of civil affairs and of his morality, was in no small way marked by this action, because, having long been secretary to the Aragonese kings and in the greatest authority with them, also teacher of literature and master of Alfonso, it appears that, either to observe the proper role of ambassador or to curry more favour with the French, he spread himself too much in the censure of those kings by whom he had been so greatly exalted, so difficult is it sometimes to observe in one’s self that moderation and those precepts with which he, full of so much erudition, writing of the moral virtues and making himself, through the universality of his mind in every sort of learning, a marvel to everyone, had instructed all men.121

Guicciardini wielded a sharp pen, and his episode is among the few pieces of biographical information which have not been brought into circulation by Pontano and his circle. Undoubtedly, it brought fame to Pontano, albeit not of the kind he had hoped for. The Florentine historian’s anecdote heavily laid upon later judgments on Pontano’s political role, reverberating throughout the centuries. For example, Isaac d’Israeli, father of the later prime minister Benjamin Disraeli, used Guicciardini’s story in his Miscellanies of Literature, published in 1840, in order to present Pontano as “a monstrous example of the subservience to power.”122 In short, if there ever had been someone who had earned the denomination of a “hired pen”, of a rhetorician without any moral and political convictions outside of his works, it was Pontano. As blatant a case of bad conduct as that reported in Guicciardini’s story endangers the whole construct of the “great Pontano” and, in effect, diminishes his moral integrity. As a consequence modern interpreters such as Carol Kidwell try to explain Guicciardini’s report with a speech Pontano gave on the arrival of the French king, classifying it as a mere formality or an attempt to prevent further violence.123 Further, she argues that in his position of prime minister or secretary Pontano was “only a servant.”124 The documents mentioned above draw a different picture. Of course, Pontano was in the service of the Aragonese kings, but he never felt “only a servant.” Among others, Maria Luisa Doglio has emphasized the exceptional

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nature of Pontano’s “political theory” in which he insists on the leading role of the intellectual as well as on a certain autonomy and independence as a political actor.125 The most important testimonies of this attitude have been presented in this chapter. It can be found in Pontano’s letters, but also in the diplomatic correspondence of the Florentine ambassador. These sources contain information which the autobiographical sketch in De prudentia withholds. As a negotiator of peace, Pontano depended on a serious of external factors, which he himself would have described as fortuna. His peace negotiations were not as triumphant as he wanted his readers to believe, but had a deeply ambiguous and precarious character. This was not his “fault,” but a result of the ever-increasing pressures and strains on the Italian system. Despite these pressures, Pontano steered successfully through the storms of life. From the perspective developed in this chapter, Pontano’s “French incident” was not a moral shipwreck that rendered his endeavors worthless. Rather, it put his political stance into the limelight. Throughout his career, Pontano insisted on his own point of view. He put forward his opinions vehemently, if not obstinately. “Io non mi lasserò del mio recto camino,” he once wrote to Ferrante, “I will not stray from my right path.”126 Given this background, it seems probable that he censured the kings he had served. For years, he had admonished them and indicated their errors. For him, the French invasion was predominantly the result of an unsuccessful policy he had opposed. His critique was not primarily inspired by his rhetorical training or his wish to flatter the new king, as Guicciardini suggested. Rather, it sprang from the better insight that the events had proven him right and that his lords had been deaf to his advice. His speech to the king of France was not an example of Pontano’s subservience to power, but of his unbending self-assuredness.

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The French descent into Italy deprived the Aragonese of their power and ousted Pontano from his office. However, while his former masters made their return to power for a few more years, Pontano remained in retirement, a fact that did not seem to dismay him too much. In the second part of his autobiographical sketch in De prudentia, he describes the experience in rather positive terms: As a matter of fact, this event [that is the French conquest of Naples] gave me the opportunity to enjoy some rest, to take pleasure in my present leisure time and to benefit from my reflections, and I thank the Lord in Heaven for it. For, as you know, I had tried to resign from my office under Ferrante three times, and he had not wanted to hear of it; but then, by divine beneficence, a hostile force brought me leisure and led to my retirement. As I have said, at the present I enjoy the fruits of my former life; in no way, however, have I taken advantage of my position and become rich from my official duties. Instead, I engage in intellectual activity and cultivate my mind in such a way that I have landed in a very safe and quiet harbour after the heaviest storms.1

As Pontano puts it, he has finally found some peace and rest in a life he describes as “heavenly” (coelitus) to his friends. Provided with good health and enough money to carry on, he concentrates his efforts in the exercise of his mind. Sometimes he takes a trip to his country estate in Antignano and prunes the trees in his garden.2 The peace and quiet of his situation leads him to liken it to that of a ship that has arrived to harbor. Finally, at the age of seventy, he is safe from the tempests and storms of the active life. It may have been that Pontano really appreciated his life in contemplation, but it may equally have been that he did not. Certainly, he was not the first to evoke this seafaring metaphor in order to digest his forced retirement. For one, Cicero uses the metaphor of the haven of philosophy in book V of the Tusculan Disputations. “[A]s my own inclination and desire led me, from my earliest youth upward, to seek her [that is philosophy’s] protection, so, under my present misfortunes, I have had recourse to the same port from whence I set out, after

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having been tossed by a violent tempest,” he writes. Then he praises philosophy as the guide of life, as discoverer of virtue and the expeller of vices.3 In order to function as a guide, however, it is necessary to know the supreme good. In De finibus, “Piso” uses the metaphor of the harbor to explain the philosophy of the Peripatetics to his friends: “Ignorance of the supreme good, is necessarily equivalent to ignorance of how to plan one’s life. And this may take one so far off course that one loses sight of any haven to provide shelter.”4 In contrast to Cicero, Pontano does not conceive of his situation as one of misfortune. Rather, he considers himself lucky that a foreign invasion has finally brought him the peace and tranquillity of a contemplative life. From Pontano’s perspective, the loss of his office has affected him only contingently. Pontano might adopt this position to conceal his dissatisfaction, but it also underscores his break with the negotium of political life. In any case, Pontano’s metaphor of the secure harbor implies much more than the well-earned leisure time of an elder statesman who has been pensioned-off due to a change of government. In the framework of Peripatetic philosophy—Pontano’s most important point of reference among the philosophical sects of antiquity—the metaphor of the harbor stands for the final end (finis) of all human action which consists in the attainment of the highest good (summum bonum). The autobiographical sketch in De prudentia not only outlines Pontano’s life, it also fulfils an important argumentative function; it appears in a chapter on the “perfect life.” This is less presumption on part of Pontano than good Peripatetic philosophy. In the Ethics, Aristotle famously declares that the object of practical philosophy is “not knowledge, but action” (non cognitio, sed actio),5 and that “it is not in order to acquire knowledge that we are considering what virtue is, but to become good people—otherwise, there would be no point in it,” a sentence with which Jean Buridan opens his fourteenth-century commentary on the Ethics.6 Pontano paraphrases the remark in Charon.7 As a consequence, the person who reflects on moral philosophy cannot be bracketed, but becomes part of the philosophical argument: “[T]he truth in practical issues is judged from the facts of our life, these being what really matter.”8 In the context of the Ethics, autobiographical writing is not a rhetorical ornament or a historical description, but rather an integral part of the philosophical argument.9 Pontano is well aware of this fact, and it forces him to find a balance between his past political life and his present state of contemplation. This balance involves rather fundamental questions, as the good or “perfect” life depends on one’s concept of the highest good. What does the highest good consist in? Which life leads to it? These are the philosophical questions that surround Pontano’s

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autobiographical sketch in De prudentia I and force him to rethink the role of the active and contemplative lives in the attainment of happiness.

A tale of two brothers For Pontano as for every Aristotelian, all ends in life refer to one final end for the sake of which every single action and every single work is undertaken. Everyone sets course for this final end, “just like sailors setting their course for the haven.”10 The same argument is made about goods: among all goods, one good is better than the other, but “the good [we are talking of] is the best and most excellent … and everyone who attains this good will have reached his final destination or end, not different from those who come from the high seas and land into the haven.”11 The question remains: what is the final end, the highest good? In the Ethics, Aristotle confirms that “most people … agree about what it is called, since both the masses and sophisticated people call it happiness, understanding being happy as equivalent to living well and acting well.”12 Pontano, too, asserts that the final end of human life is living well.13 But this general precept needs to be explained.

Bruni and the Isagogicon Of course Pontano was not the first to occupy himself with the highest good. A whole philosophical tradition derived from the discussion of the highest good. Not only classical and scholastic authors, but also other humanists had dealt with this question before him. One of the most famous and influential works concerned with the question of the highest good is Leonardi Bruni’s concise Isagogicon Moralis Disciplinae (“Introduction to Moral Philosophy”).14 In the Isagogicon, Bruni enlists three principal opinions (sententiae) stemming from antiquity that propose different solutions to the problem. For Eudoxus, Aristippus, and Epicurus the highest good consists in pleasure (voluptas), whereas Aristotle, Theophrastus, and the Peripatetics are convinced that the activity proper to man is the “practice of virtue” (usus virtutis); though they also concede importance to the goods of fortune. In contrast, Zeno and the Stoics define happiness as moral worth (honestum) and think virtue alone to be sufficient for a happy life, given that the notion of honestum comprises that which is good, laudable, and virtuous. This Stoic conception of the highest good is not only the most demanding, but also the most difficult to attain. As Bruni’s

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interlocutor comments, “I rather doubt it’s true, but it is certainly a stout and manly creed.” 15 Bruni does not take the side of any of these schools. Although distinct in their respective outlooks, he does not think that the three ideas of the final end outlined are as distant from each other as they profess to be. “[A]lthough they may battle over words, they are nevertheless very close to each other.”16 Stoics and Peripatetics share their predilection for virtue, although they are divided in their opinions about material goods. Also the Epicureans have an important point to make: “[H]appiness is impossible without pleasure. Pleasure is in fact so involved and connected with it that the two cannot be separated.”17 From all these similarities, Bruni concludes that reconciliation is possible, with the notion of virtue at its center: “virtue is the mistress and effectrix of the happy life.”18

Dubious happiness Pontano’s own discussion of happiness reflects Bruni’s point of view rather faithfully. For him, virtue also plays a central role in the attainment of the highest good. In the prologue to De prudentia, the emphasis on the virtuous life becomes obvious in Pontano’s severe criticism of an episode in Herodot’s History. As Herodotus tells the story, Croesus, the richest and most powerful king on earth, asks Solon whom he deems the happiest among men. Against the king’s expectations, Solon first answers him Tellus, the Athenian, then Cleobis and Biton. He names these two brothers because they were born in Argos, a noble and well-ordered city, they were rich and had a prospering household, they were well endowed with bodily strength and gained prizes at the games, and finally, on the request of their mother, whom Cleobis and Biton had greatly honored, the gods bestowed on them the highest blessing mortal man can attain: death.19 Originally, Solon’s story had been interpreted as an expression of the opinion of the immortal gods on death. In this understanding it was retold by Cicero in the Tusculan Disputations.20 When read in a Christian key, episodes like that of Cleobis and Biton seem to point toward the superior status of the afterlife as praemium for the labors and toils of the present life. Poggio Bracciolini puts forward such an interpretation in his De humanae conditionis miseria.21 Pontano probably has this or a similar reading in mind when he rejects the story of the two brothers.22 There is a variety of aspects to the story he judges worthy of critique. First of all, he criticizes the idea that happiness can be attained simply by being born into a certain social and political context and/or

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with certain abilities and prospects. What if Cleobis and Biton had never won a prize? What if they had been born in Umbria or in the Sabine hills, with no Isthmic or Olympic games? What if they hadn’t been endowed with all their fortune, their strong bodies, and their helpful souls? Could they also have been happy in a city with no possibility for its citizens to hold an office?23 A second objection regards the premature death of the brothers. Far from praising Cleobis and Biton as happy, Pontano bluntly asks whether this early death has not diminished their happiness, given that both die in the prime of their lives. Death in itself is neither a happy event, nor does it make part of human happiness. As Pontano puts it in the epilogue to book I, “no one thinks that a dead man can be happy, for happiness belongs to the living…. Death puts an end to human happiness; when someone dies, he stops being a human at once.”24 What would have happened to Cleobis and Biton had they lived longer? Here, Pontano’s argument takes a turn difficult to reconcile with Solon’s original tale. In Solon’s version, the two brothers are granted the “greatest gift” of death because they had drawn their mother, an Argive priestess, in a chariot to a solemn sacrifice, standing in for the cattle that had not arrived in time. In Solon’s story, the Argives saw this laborious deed as an act of piety, and they celebrated the two brothers and praised their mother for having such sons. Pontano, however, practically skips over this part of the story. As a result, the death of the two brothers gets a different spin. No more connected to their heroic deed, the death of the two brothers seems an almost cowardly completion of their material happiness, conserving it by putting an end to their lives. Throughout the course of his treatise, Pontano opposes such a view of happiness connected to the idea of a freedom from labor and toil on the one hand, and one of affluence on the other.25 It is only with this in mind that Pontano’s next questions make sense: What if they had bumped into a stone and hurt their toe; would that have diminished their happiness? What if they had been surprised by a rainstorm on their way? Would it have diminished their happiness if they had seen and heard things they would not have liked to perceive at all? This is just to say that man should get rid of the human condition and assume one that belongs to the gods, that he should never feel any pain or sorrow, that he should never feel joy or put on a smile, that he never should become angry or have compassion, indifferent to the ups and downs of human life as well as to the role of nature and its works. And in the end, human happiness will be spoilt by mosquitoes, flies, and fleas.26

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It is possible to read this passage as a critique of the Stoic doctrine and an abstract notion of morality, as Mario Santoro has done.27 This reading is plausible especially if one concentrates on the role of the passions. Famously, the Stoics advocated the eradication of all passions from life.28 But the story of Cleobis and Biton suggests a slightly different thrust to the argument. It is equally possible to read it as a critique directed against a wrong idea of happiness in human life, a happiness which never lacks anything, which never desires anything, and which is simply there without our being involved in it. It is clear that this kind of happiness is lost with every single disturbance. It can be spoilt even by flies, mosquitoes, and fleas; this is hardly a Stoic position. For Pontano, the forgetfulness of the human condition seems to consist mainly in our pretensions to leading an absolutely undisturbed life like the immortal Gods. In a certain sense, one might even say that Pontano makes a genuine Stoic point in his argument: if happiness is lost with the sting of a mosquito, the cause of this loss is man who fails to exercise his reason properly and has no understanding of nature. For Pontano, the story of Cleobis and Biton is more of an example of this failure to understand human happiness than for human happiness in itself. In Poggio, the early death of the brothers is closely connected with the idea of death as a relief from earthly aches and pains. As happens often in the miseria hominis literature, these aches and pains are ascribed to the cruelty and hostility of nature, rather an evil stepmother than a mother, as in the satirical portray of the “Stoic” Cato in Lorenzo Valla’s dialogue De voluptate, whose speech Charles Trinkaus has described as a case for Stoicism that “no Stoic could recognise.”29 Obviously, Pontano sees the death of Cleobis and Biton in a different light. For him, it is an illicit escape from the troubles of life. This “short-cut,” although granted by the gods, is not dissimilar from suicide. Poggio in fact mentions the cases of friends who have preferred to put an end to their lives instead of bearing the illnesses they were afflicted with any longer.30 In contrast, Pontano, in his De rebus coelistibus, exalts his former teacher Guido Vannucci, who had been suffering from Malaria for twenty-four years.31 In De fortitudine, he dedicates a whole chapter to people who have borne their diseases with equanimity.32 Hence, Pontano holds a position that comes rather close to that normally ascribed to Stoicism. Indeed, in De prudentia, he dedicated an entire chapter to elaborate on one of the most “Stoic” moments in the Ethics in which Aristotle affirms that “no man who is truly happy can become miserable.”33 Thus, Pontano’s polemical force is not directed against the abstract ideal of the Stoic sage and his imperturbability. Rather, it is directed against an idea of a perfect happiness which would exclude any complications or any disturbances

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a priori, preferring to bring a “perfect” life prematurely to a close in order to avert any possible disturbance. As Pontano perceives Solon’s story, it leaves out the whole range of human experiences—the ups and downs of human life—and therefore does not take into account the human condition. There are challenges one has to deal with, problems have to be mastered, successes to be enjoyed; sometimes one has to get annoyed or angry. The premature death of the two brothers symbolizes a kind of anaesthetic view of the world, a kind of numb happiness, which does not consist in living through the wide spectrum of human experiences, but in simply switching them off or escaping them. The happiness Pontano has in mind is not based on the absence of pain, therefore. Neither is it based on a pretense of affluence. In order to show the absurdity of these definitions, he employs his talents as a moralist and satirist. Someone who thinks that everything should be available everywhere will never be happy. Not taking into account the nature of the place he is living in, he will always find some fault with it. From this point of view, even the part of Arabia that the Romans call “happy” (the south of the Arabian Peninsula was named Arabia eudaemon) becomes “unhappy,” despite its abundance of natural resources. And Britain, even worse! A very cold place; for no small part of the year one must live in vaulted chambers with stoves and wait for the shipment of wine from Italy and France; those who don’t drink alcohol will never be happy in such a place.34 But do not lose heart, Pontano concludes, “much less do the Britons depend on wine for their happiness than the Italians on the oh so recommendable water of the Nile.”35 Having reached this climax of absurdity, Pontano exclaims indignantly: For heaven’s sake! For me, the happy man has to be just, moderate, brave, and has to have a good knowledge of the nature of things. And yet, it is arduous to administer justice; it is very difficult to practice moderation in pleasure, innate in us; it is extremely dangerous to fight in battles, which are a matter of life and death, of honour and glory. And you know as well as me what it means to stay awake all night, you know the weariness of the body and the exhaustion of the mind, the going round in circles of those who occupy themselves with philosophy. In all these matters, it is of no importance whether I possess a silk dress or a porcelain cup, or not. Believe me, happiness has its place first and foremost in the soul and the soul’s constitution.36

A good constitution This exclamation is based on firm Aristotelian grounds. In the Ethics, human happiness is closely connected to the proper function of man. This proper

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function cannot consist in the life of nutrition and growth, shared also by plants. Neither does it consist in sentient life, shared by horses and cattle. What remains is “a practical life of the rational part,” or, as Pontano puts it, “rational action.”37 For Pontano, reason is a kind of norm of what is right; it chooses what is good and judges what is morally right. In general, moral virtues and actions are always good and right. Therefore, they are also laudable and just, given that praise is the companion to the moral good, as are justice and equality to the right.38 More specifically, every virtue has its own task and office: temperance is concerned with the restraint of our appetites and desires; fortitude with dangers, toil, and the regulation of our fears; prudence takes measure, weighs things, and controls everything pertaining to action.39 The good life, then, depends on an activity of the soul in accordance with reason.40 Yet, this life is not accessible to just anyone. “The good life,” Pontano writes, “is not open to anyone, but only to someone with a good constitution.”41 The expression bene constitutus was carefully chosen. It has different connotations, and all these connotations fit together to form a comprehensive picture of human happiness. As a medical term, bene constitutus refers to the Greek “eukrasia,” the normal condition (health) as balance between the bodily fluids and external environment. Pontano was well aware of this meaning. In the dialogue Aegidius, he discusses the term “krasis” from which “eukrasia” derives. There, he rejects the translation complexio for “krasis.” Among the alternatives which he provided for the term one finds mistura ac constitutio corporis, the “mixture and constitution of the body.”42 He based this translation on an analogy between respublica and body—“[F]or just like the constitution of a commonwealth consists of laws, morals, statutes and decrees, thus the constitution of the body consists in its humours and their mixtures and harmony.”43 Nevertheless, bene constitutus does not exclusively refer to the physical makeup of a person. It can also relate to the possession and administration of external goods. Thus, when Cicero speaks of the “best men” (optimates) in Pro Sestio, he describes them not only as “honest and in their senses,” but also as “well off in their domestic circumstances” (bene de rebus domesticis constituti).44 A third sphere to which the term bene constitutus can refer is that of character. In De amicitia, for instance, Cicero defines the “rightly ordered mind” (animus bene constitutus) as a mind that is pleased at what is good and grieves at the reverse.45 In his description of the homo bene constitutus, Pontano encompasses all these aspects. He elaborates on the different facets of this constitution, drawing a detailed picture of the well-constituted man. This picture is more an idealized portrait than a faithful depiction. Just as Cicero’s portrait of the consummate

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orator is “a picture of such a one as perhaps never existed,”46 Pontano’s portrait of the well-constituted man is not that of a real person. It rather serves as a clear illustration of the different aspects of his good constitution.47 Before discussing the goods the well-constituted man should be provided with, Pontano discusses two important prerequisites that do not allow for exceptions. First of all, it is one of the prime characteristics of the homo bene constitutus not to live a solitary life, but to be well integrated in society. Pontano wanted him to be “a lover of civil society (societas civilis), living in the community of men and under their laws.”48 This is not an option, but an indispensable presupposition. In the most fundamental sense, virtue is a social notion. It cannot be exercised in solitude. This is not only the case on a “material” level; that is, the exercise of justice, the social virtues, and the virtues concerning money all depended on another person with whom to be just, funny, or liberal. It is also the case on a more theoretical level, insofar as virtue had a strong social component; “reason” (ratio) is inextricably intertwined with the notions of “right” (rectum) and the “moral good” (honestum). For Pontano moral goodness (honestas) and justice (iustitia)—the latter derived from the concept of rectum—held the first place in the dealings of human society. Therefore, anyone equipped for happiness will strive for the justice and moral good which constitute the bonds of human society.49 The solivagus, wandering about in loneliness, cannot fulfil this condition.50 In addition to his social integration, there is a second indispensable characteristic to the homo bene institutus. “In the second place,” Pontano writes, “I do not want him to be a child, nor in years, nor in character.”51 Similar to animals, children are held to lack a fully developed rationality, and this makes them liable to be ruled by their passions. Furthermore, they are too inexperienced and weak for public life.52 Having stated these two fundamental requirements, Pontano continues his description of the well-constituted man with the goods of the body. The body should have all members and energies at its disposal. Legendary strength, like that of Milo of Croton, a famous wrestler, was not necessary. Alluding to one of the fantastic tales that surrounded Milo, Pontano quips that a good constitution does not include the capability to lift a bull. Still, the well-constituted man should have the strength to carry a shield and a spear, if necessary, in order to fulfil his civic duties.53 Personal beauty is of importance, too. For according to Pontano, there is something about ugliness that is ridiculous and contemptible; hence, it does not fit the happy man, admired and highly esteemed by everyone. Happiness is combined with authority, dignity, and reverence. Pontano elaborates on this

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theme in De magnanimitate. Like the ideal of the happy man, the magnanimous person also needs to be tall and handsome. In this context Pontano focuses on Charles VIII among examples from antiquity.54 A further element of a good constitution is the possession of external goods. First of all, the well-constituted man comes from the nobility and has a good ancestry. Since Ferrante was the illegitimate son of Alfonso the Magnanimous, the question of legitimate birth was an issue of some importance in Naples. One of Pontano’s preferred examples is Romulus, the founder of Rome. Although poets and historians ascribe divine ancestry to him, on the basis that Mars was his father, there was another side to his origins. Thus, some Sabines reproached him for an incestuous relationship: an unknown father, and a wolf bitch as foster-mother.55 In De fortuna, Pontano dismisses this position. From the point of view of nature, the accusations of incest and adultery play no role. Romulus had been born from the coition of a male and a female; everything else did not depend on the law of nature, but on human laws.56 Money and riches are the next requirement for the truly happy man. For Pontano, they are the “material” with which virtue and a virtuous behavior can be realized. Following the idea of the mean, he underlines that money should be available in sufficient quantities to the virtuous man, not in abundance or extravagant quantities. As it seems, this was an important point for Pontano, as he used an additional chapter to explain what he meant by “sufficient” (satis). Sufficient food at a banquet, for example, does not presuppose that everything should be eaten to the last morsel, but that there will be leftovers.57 Notwithstanding his insistence on mediocrity, Pontano has recipes for the use of great sums of money, too. His treatises on magnificence and splendor provide guidelines for keeping an eye to mediocrity amid superabundance. The last point on external goods regards one’s wife and children. A man with a good constitution should be married and a father. Also in this case, superabundance is not necessary. Jokingly, Pontano adduces the example of Hercules and assures his readers that no one needs a hundred children in order to be happy. In sum, a good constitution has several aspects. As regards the body, it enables the well-constituted man to fulfil his tasks and to obey the orders given by the soul; it also includes a sufficient quantity of external goods able to provide the necessary materials whenever required by use, moral goodness, and right reason.58 The emphasis is on use and activity. All the specifications put forward by Pontano do not constitute anything valid in itself. The happiness they adduce depends on the uses made of them. If they were not employed as “material” for good actions, they are worthless. As a matter of fact, Pontano himself does

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not dispose of all characteristics he describes. In this sense, his autobiographical sketch constitutes a “real life” example not opposed to the ideal portrait given, but supplementary to it. The story of Cleobis and Biton, instead, smacks of wrong idealism and constitutes an early counterpoint to Pontano’s own life story. Contrary to the two brothers, Pontano has not been born in a well-ordered city, but amid civil strife and murder. Different also from Cleobis and Biton, he has not been born wealthy, but has been left without means. And, as already alluded to, Umbria has no Olympic or Isthmic games. Although Pontano comes from the lesser nobility, his career has been that of a homo novus who has made his fortune all by himself. He is a man of good constitution on his own account, not like the two brothers. For someone like him, an early death would have been disastrous. It has taken Pontano long years to reach the position he is in. Only in old age is he able to enjoy the fruits of his former life, as he makes clear in his autobiographical sketch. Like the story of Cleobis and Biton, Pontano’s own story is one that concerns the perfect life. Nonetheless, the tale of the two brothers and that of Pontano are diametrically opposed as if written in different keys.

The shadow of virtue Pontano’s discussion shows a preponderance of Peripatetic and Stoic elements. As in Aristotle’s Ethics, the highest good is clearly conceived of as the exercise of virtue, although external goods also play their role. Moreover, Pontano emphasizes the role of honestas, moral goodness. “[S]o great was the power of honestum that our ancestors, more than laudable men, spoke of a ‘honest’ face, when they wanted to praise a woman for her beauty …”59 Therefore, “honest” actions are “beautiful” actions; in fact, Cicero translates the Greek kalon with honestum, and virtuous action is beautiful in itself. As expected, and in accordance with traditional Renaissance moral philosophy, Pontano’s treatment of the highest good concentrates on the moral good and virtue.

Valla on pleasure However, there is a third candidate for the highest good: pleasure. Disregarded by most writers, the “pleasure principle” had a powerful proponent in Lorenzo Valla, one of the most controversial humanists of the Quattrocento. In his dialogue “On Pleasure” (De voluptate), published first in 1431, then in 1433 in a changed version

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under the title “On the True Good” (De vero bono),60 he lays out an intriguing case for the “Epicurean” position. Beginning with a “Stoic” speech by “Catone Sacco,” the dialogue consists of three parts. Sacco’s relatively short speech is followed by a long “Epicurean” intervention by Maffeo Vegio in which he promotes pleasure as the principle of human action.61 Then, the dialogue concludes with a “Christian” discussion of the highest good led by Antonio da Rho. The middle part of the dialogue became the most famous of the three. In his speech, “Maffeo” is unwaveringly committed to destabilizing the conventional assumptions of Stoicism and Aristotelianism by exalting the role of pleasure in moral theory. According to him, “pleasure will not be (as is prated by the Stoics, the most abusive of men) a whore among chaste wives but rather a mistress among her servants.”62 “Maffeo” makes the question for the highest good even more pointed than Bruni and reduces it to two possible solutions, Stoic honestum and Epicurean pleasure. Moreover, he equates pleasure with the expedient (utile) and honestum with the rightful (rectum), and is committed to the view that these two solutions contrast sharply with each other. His advocacy of pleasure entails the exposure of the notion of honestas as an “empty and futile word that accomplishes nothing,”63 as well as the promotion of pleasure as the highest good. “Maffeo” emphasizes that this promotion of pleasure does not automatically lead to a rejection of the notion of virtue. It rather claims that the underlying motive of all virtuous action is pleasure. I shall never actually deny that virtues and vices exist, and that … trust, kindness, and other such qualities … are the restraints and locked doors against crimes. But to attribute the goal and end of the rightful and the honorable to these qualities does not seem to me a sound interpretation.64

In order to corroborate his position, “Maffeo” moves on to explore the role of pleasure in virtuous actions. His analysis of the four cardinal virtues highlights his view that virtue does not offer any rewards and that “no one does anything for the sake of it, or ought to.”65 However, there is one serious objection to this argument in more traditional accounts of virtue theory: glory is virtue’s reward. “But fame,” you say, is a companion of virtue, and for that reason honestas borrowed its name from honor, that is, “fame.” You are right. It is evident that honor does not derive from honestas but honestas from honor and glory, so that, per se, that honestas we have been talking about should amount to nothing—as it certainly does…. For this reason our ancestors decided that the temple of Virtue and that of Honor should be joined together, so that in the former, duty should

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be located, and in the latter, the goal of duty; in the former, toil, and in the latter, the aim of toil; so that the temple of Virtue should be despised unless it gained us the temple of Honor.66

“Maffeo” eagerly endorses the argument that virtue’s reward is glory. Far from being a recognition, however, he sees it as an unintended confirmation of his own position. Different from the Stoics, glory is not a “side effect” of virtue, but its very goal. Virtue in itself is nothing if not conceived of with regard to this goal. Accordingly, “Maffeo” deconstructs the Stoic position and describes the virtues in terms of the expedient and the pleasurable: Why are we glad to be considered good, just, active? Surely so as to obtain authority and trust. In what way? By having others say this of us: “He is brave and vigorous; let us make him our leader in war. He is careful, hardworking and honest in administrative affairs; how can we do better than assign the administration of the state to him? He is full of good ideas and eloquence; let us elect him to our body to be both a support and an ornament for us.” It is with this aim in mind, I say, that people desirous for glory will take pains.67

A virtuous person acts virtuously not for the sake of virtue itself, but for the sake of improving his reputation and his stand. Hence, “Maffeo” regards virtuous behavior as advantageous and pleasurable. On the one hand, this daring assertion breaks up the traditional ethical framework and allows for a greater flexibility in judging what is virtuous and right. Famous examples for this subversive component include “Maffeo’s” comments on virginity. On the other hand, the insistence on pleasure as the principle of human action underscores the role of glory in human action and requires a careful reordering of its values. Thus the greater goods, which are the greater personal advantages, are preferred to the lesser ones, or the lesser losses to the greater ones. It is difficult to specify, however, which are the greater, which the lesser goods, especially since they change according to circumstances, location, the person concerned, and other matters of the same kind. Nevertheless I shall say something to clarify the matter. The principal good is to avoid what is evil—dangers, anxieties, hardships; the next is to be loved, which is the source of every pleasure.68

Although this last sentence indicates a series of problems of the “hedonistic” approach to human action, “Maffeo” could conclude that “the civic life or the life of honor … cannot be distinguished from each other.” In his hedonistic perspective, the civic life is a species of the pleasurable life.69

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Accordingly, the contemplative life remains as the last reserve for the Stoics and their conception of the highest good as honestum, as “Maffeo” jokingly remarks.70 In the next part of his argument, he sets out to prove that the contemplative life is also a species of the pleasurable life. His principal opponent in this section is Aristotle as a champion of the contemplative life, and “Maffeo” attacks him on different levels. First of all, he questions the neat Aristotelian distinction between sensual and mental pleasure: Aristotle … establishes two pleasures—one in the senses, the other in the mind, or soul. But I do not understand how, when there is only the one and the same name, we can create from it two different things—all the more so because all pleasure is felt not so much by the body as by the soul, which governs the body.71

Mental pleasure is never purely “mental;” it is “almost corporeal” and “dependent on what we see or hear or perceive by one of the other senses.”72 Accordingly, contemplation is not entirely different from sensual perception. In order to connect contemplation and sensual perception, “Maffeo” refers to a passage in Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations in which Pythagoras compares the different kinds of life to the different kinds of people at the Olympic Games. Some of these people compete for glory and the honor of a crown, just as some choose the active life of honor. Others are led there by the gain of buying and selling, like those who choose a life of profit. A third category of people come “merely as spectators through curiosity, to observe what was done, and to see in what manner things were carried on there.”73 As “Maffeo” concludes, Pythagoras compares philosophical contemplation with the observation of the Olympic Games. Taking him rather literally, the former exploits this analogy in order to level out the difference between contemplation as a purely mental activity and observation as sensual perception. “At any rate, your pleasure in contemplating the sky and the stars is no greater than mine when I gaze at a lovely face.”74 This remark dovetails perfectly with “Maffeo’s” critique of the Aristotelian distinction between sensual and mental pleasure. In a next step, Valla begins to argue against the self-sufficiency of contemplation and has “Maffeo” ask somewhat indignantly, “Please tell me, who would dedicate himself to the study of science and letters attracted by the sweetness of contemplation?” Valla then goes on to describe the hardships and frustrations connected to these studies, culminating in the following résumé: “In short, contemplation (contemplatio) is as laborious as the exercise (actio) of the virtues.”75 Accordingly, the motivation to dedicate oneself to a life of contemplation is not the draw of contemplation itself, but of our appetite for glory. Not by

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coincidence, Valla omits Pythagoras’s remark that the aim of those dedicated to a life of contemplation is “neither applause nor profit” in his otherwise accurate rendering of the Ciceronian passage.76 Typical for Valla, he uses this insight to expose the utilitarian motives underlying the moral goodness of which his contemporaries had grown so fond. This time, the target of his polemics is Aristotle. “You didn’t want to seem as someone who craves for glory, but as someone who loves his studies, and still, you didn’t love your studies for their own sake, but rather for the sake of glory.”77

Pontano’s pleasure Pontano is not untouched by Valla’s arguments. The role of pleasure, the exaltation of the senses, and the strong eroticism in his poetry are worthy of a further single study in their own right.78 And although Pontano firmly rejects the idea of pleasure as the highest good, he tries to rethink its role within the traditional framework of Aristotelian thought in his moral works. After all, the notion of pleasure is not unknown to Aristotelians. Its basic tenets are the disapproval of the life of pleasure as understood by the masses and the distinction between a “bad” sensual pleasure and a “good” pleasure of the mind. In De voluptate, the Epicurean interlocutor challenges both principles. Pontano reacts to this challenge by reconfiguring Aristotelian doctrine in such a way as to remain loyal to these principles and still converge with some of Valla’s points. For Aristotle, it was “the masses and the most vulgar” who believed that happiness is pleasure. Although he conceded that this belief was not completely unreasonable, he used harsh words regarding a life of pleasure and enjoyment: “The masses appear quite slavish by rationally choosing a life fit only for cattle; but they are worthy of consideration because many of those in power feel the same as Sardanapallus.”79 This servile life of pleasure could have nothing to do with true happiness. Therefore, cultured men preferred the political or contemplative life. It is not surprising that moralists in the Renaissance, like their predecessors, stressed this point for their readers. Pontano was no exception. Like Aristotle, he rejected the idea that a life of pleasure would bring happiness. After treating the “good life” (quid sit bene vivere) in De prudentia, he dedicated a chapter to the question of the “blissful life” (de beate vivendo).80 As far as the blissful life is concerned, the idea of this life has been brought up by people with an admiration for the life of the rich and powerful. But while those in power and wealth rather live a life in affluence than a good life, they

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Pontano’s Virtues rather abuse than use the abundance of things they dispose of. In their hands, this abundance does not bear fruits, but rather leads to their perdition and the loss of their riches because they are more attracted by the senses than led by reason.81

Pontano further explains this disorientation in terms of an imbalance between the sentient, “animal” part of the soul overpowering its rational, “human” part which should normally guide our lives.82 This is the “bovine existence” that Aristotle had encountered among wide sections of the population, even among the elite. Still, pleasure does not necessarily have to be sensual. Following Aristotle, Pontano distinguishes two kinds of pleasures: one connected to the senses, the other to the mind. In his treatise “On fortitude” (De fortitudine), he writes, as man consists of body and soul, thus pleasure is twofold. One is a lackey to the senses, a kind of itching and enticement; the other is a companion and partner to all our actions in which our mind (animus) rules, and springs from splendid and honest labor.83

This is a more conservative stance than that of Valla’s Epicurean interlocutor who explicitly questions this duplicity. Pontano’s reinstatement of the two pleasures has a precise aim. In De voluptate, Valla reproaches the Stoics for their claim that humans should strive for difficulties, and not for pleasure.84 This is just the position Pontano takes in De fortitudine, as well as in other works. Hence, he has to rely on the distinction between sensual and mental pleasure in order to maintain his theory of action. Fortitude plays an important part in this theory insofar as it is directed against all kinds of obstacles and difficulties. Sensual pleasure cannot provide a sufficient motivation for this task, as it tends to distract the mind from these obstacles and difficulties, favoring more comfortable solutions. Accordingly, Pontano compares the sensual pleasures to the Sirens’ song: first pleasant, but disastrous in the outcome. As is clear from Pontano’s argument, the Aristotelian framework does not simply disapprove of pleasure. It rejects sensual pleasure, whereas it allows for mental pleasure. When Aristotle compares his own ideas on happiness with common opinions, he asserts that the life of the virtuous person is in itself pleasant. “For experiencing pleasure is an aspect of the soul, and each person finds pleasure in that of which he is said to be fond … a lover of justice finds it in the sphere of justice and in general a person with virtue finds pleasure in what accords with virtue.”85 In this context, the notion of kalon-honestum comes into

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play. After explaining that most pleasures conflict because they are not pleasures by nature, Aristotle confirms that “lovers of beauty (kalon) find pleasure in things that are pleasant by nature, and virtuous actions are of this kind … their life does not need to have pleasure attached to it as a sort of accessory, but contains pleasure in itself.”86 As a consequence, pleasure and pain are important indices of moral progress. The crux of the matter lies in the fact that “it is because of pleasure that we do bad actions, and pain that we abstain from noble ones.”87 Pontano alludes to the first part of this sentence when he compares sensual pleasure to the Sirens’ song, leading to moral shipwreck. The second part regards fortitude. In order not to shrink from fine action, one has to endure pain and to overcome one’s fears. Therefore, fortitude implies the presence of pain, and this presence excludes the immediate sensation of pleasure. However, it does not exclude its mental counterpart. Aristotle himself concedes that “the end that courage aims at would seem to be pleasant, but to be obscured by what else is happening. This happens, for instance, in gymnastic competitions.”88 The attainment of a pleasurable good can be connected to hardships and pain, to things we would normally shun, as the example of boxing contests shows. “[t]he end for boxers—their reason for doing what they do, namely, the crown and the honors—is pleasant, but, since they are flesh and blood, being hit is distressing and painful, as is all the hard exercise they do.”89 Pontano chooses a similar example, closer to his own experiences: See, for example, the extreme hardships a tournament involves for its participants. In tournaments, heavy weapons have to be employed; under the sun, the rider has to spur his horse into the dust of the arena; in the meantime, during the running, he has to couch his lance, strike his opponent and bear the heaviest blows, risking his life. While all these things are happening, no pleasure is felt. Yet, how much of it arises from the congratulations, when the crier announces the winner under the applause of the spectators and the crowd conducts him home, adorned with the prizes of his victory!90

Pontano’s position in this passage is Aristotelian in its outlook. At the same time, however, it is not as distant from Valla’s position as it might first seem.91 Valla had mainly attacked the idea that human beings tackle hardships, difficulties, and dangers for the sake of the moral good (honestas); from his point of view, the notion of honestas had no meaning at all. Following his strategy of deconstructing the Stoic honestas, Valla argued that it derived from the notions of honor and glory, and not vice versa, throwing his weight behind Epicurus who had connected honestum to public opinion.92

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Pontano’s strong emphasis on public favor as congratulations, applauses, and prizes comes close to this “Epicurean” point of view. Although Pontano would have never agreed with Valla’s more radical assertions, such as the nonexistence of honestum, his connection of honor and glory with pleasure reflects Valla’s reinterpretation of glory as a species of pleasure, and not of honestum. It has to be remembered that Valla denies neither the existence of virtues like fortitude, nor their goodness. Yet, he substitutes honestum with voluptas as final aim of the virtues. Human beings endure hardship not for the sake of hardship or the moral good, but for the sake of pleasure. This shift induces significant changes to the whole system of coordinates in which the theory of virtue is embedded. Pontano is by no means willing to accept this shift in all its consequences, but it surely reverberates in his own works. His stress on the role of pleasure is one indication of his accommodation to Valla. Remaining on firm Peripatetic grounds, he manoeuvers the Aristotelian precepts into a configuration that makes them converge with, rather than contradict, Valla’s claims. There can be no doubt that Pontano insisted on the honestum as the highest good, and from this point of view pleasure cannot develop the exclusive motivational force it gained in Valla. Yet, Pontano significantly augments the concomitant role of pleasure by staging it as the ultimate promise of honor and glory.

Virtue, pleasure, and recollection Not by coincidence, Pontano took up his discussion of pleasure in De prudentia. Referring to De fortitudine, he affirms the distinction of pleasure into two kinds and pointedly describes them as a companion to vice and to virtue, respectively. He lavishly praises the latter: [F]rom what thing can greater or fuller or more desirable or more natural pleasure be gained than from just, generous, brave and magnanimous actions? For what gives more delight than having acted dutifully? than to have treated men beneficently? than to have fulfilled one’s religious obligations? And certainly this sort of pleasure is not contaminated by grief, cannot be taken away by any force, no blast of fortune can drive it on the rocks, it is ours and will remain with us as long as memory itself endures and the recollection of good deeds.93

Obviously, this praise of honest pleasure can be related to Pontano’s autobiographical sketch. Not only does it return to the metaphor of the sea voyage and hint at the moral shipwreck of those who allow themselves to be

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seduced by the Sirens’ song of sensual pleasure. It also lends weight to the function this sketch has within the economy of the first book, being nothing less than the memory of a well-ordered, virtuous life, a recollection (recordatio) of one’s past. Recollection also plays a certain role in Valla’s work. In a passage on the tranquillity of the mind (tranquillitas mentis), he concedes to his Stoic adversaries that tranquillity is seriously disturbed by vices and the memory of past misdeeds. Sulla, for example, had great difficulties sleeping because he was plagued by the memory of the corpses of the citizens he had killed.94 But in general—and also in the case of the contemplative life—he tried to shift its ultimate motivation away from the idea of honestum toward pleasure. Of course, Pontano does not make the same moves as Valla. On the contrary, he forcefully insists on the distinction between sensual and mental pleasure, and instead of attacking the authority of Aristotle, he bases his examination on it. Still, his thoughts match Valla’s at a certain point. Evidence of this comes into view when Pontano puts forward examples of the honest pleasure which results from labor and toil. Different from De fortitudine, these examples are not taken from the active life, but from a life of contemplation. Still, they are not inspired by the tranquillity of mind which Valla had attacked, but rather reflect Valla’s remarks on the arduousness of the contemplative life. Pontano was a master at describing the toils of intellectual life, as his first example shows: The boy is taken to the grammarian, groaning and weeping, … taken away from play … he often feels the rod of the teacher and of the disciplinarian and the most severe reproofs, he is forced to stay up late at night, to get up early in the morning, to bend over his book and almost all the time, night and day, now exercise his mind, now his memory and afterwards his voice, when he is forced to recite what the teacher assigns him, between abuse and whippings.95

Who is the unfortunate boy? It is Virgil, reveals Pontano, the greatest of all Roman poets. However, his hardships are worthwhile, as they are rewarded with glory. For what could be more pleasant than having Augustus, the senate, and the Roman people rise from their seats in reverence while reciting in public?96 Two further examples make the same point, although in a less drastic manner. Aristotle rightly praised himself for having attained a knowledge which far exceeded that of his Greek and Egyptian predecessors: Plato was venerated in Greece, Sicily, and Italy alike; kings looked up at him; the people admired him.97 Interestingly, Pontano’s Aristotle acted in exactly the way that Valla’s Aristotle had not, and had consequently been condemned. Also in the case of Plato, the

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emphasis on a response from the people is all the more striking as Pontano uses the same words (reges … suspexerunt) in his own epitaph. But despite all this praise, pleasure is not the aim of one’s action; rather it is a side effect. Pontano does not substitute the moral good with pleasure. Far from such a radical proposal, he tries to delineate the outlines of a more traditional theory based on the Peripatetic and Stoic idea that true happiness consists in the exercise of the virtues. All that is morally good brings joy with it. For as we see our shadow follow our body when we walk under the sun, although it is not the shadow that constitutes our body, but it is rather constituted by the body under the sun. Likewise, pleasure follows those actions which constitute virtue, and it never deviates from the good life. Still, one lives well and acts according to right reason not for the sake of pleasure, but for its own sake.98

Although Pontano emphasizes the role of pleasure, in the end he remains in the Aristotelian framework. Pleasure is the mere shadow of virtue.

Action and contemplation Among the three possible final ends of life, Pontano chooses Aristotelian virtue as his personal favorite. The question remains, however: which is the perfect virtue, or in other words, which happiness is the perfect happiness? As Pontano puts it, there are two possibilities. “Inquiring into the perfect life and the best virtue, we come across two kinds of happiness. One depends on a life wholly dedicated to action, the other on a life of contemplation.”99 This distinction between active and contemplative life is presented in relation to a hierarchical order of the virtues. On the lowest level of this hierarchy are the “virtues” of the body. The body in itself is an instrument for the soul, and as such, imperfectissimum, as Aquinas puts it; not acting on its own account, but only insofar as moved by something else. In this sense, the soul can be described as the perfection of the body.100 Again, the virtues of the soul are divided into classes, depending on the differentiation of the soul into an irrational and rational part. The moral virtues reside in that part of the soul that is irrational, but capable of obeying reason. The intellectual virtues, instead, reside in the most noble, that is, the rational part of the soul.101 Accordingly, the best and perfect virtue has to be identified among the intellectual virtues. Pontano turns to a discussion of these virtues in De prudentia III, based on the Aristotelian treatment in Ethics VI.

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In his discussion, Aristotle distinguishes two parts of the rational soul, and Pontano follows suit: The contemplative faculty has to be divided into two parts. For it deals with the cognition of things that are certain, natural and immutable, not subject to any kind of variation, and from this kind of cognition, science originates; or it deals with the cognition of things that are doubtful, and because of the uncertainty and variability of these things, deliberation has to take place, which is also called calculation.102

According to Aristotelian doctrine, the respective virtues of these parts are wisdom (sapientia) and prudence (prudentia). Prudence is closely connected to action, wisdom to contemplation. As such, they are the guiding virtues of the active and the contemplative life, respectively. Pontano participated in both ways of life. On the one hand, the overarching theme of his treatise is the virtue of prudence, which presides over the active, political life; a life, moreover, Pontano had successfully led in the past. Yet, his present life is a life of contemplation in the “harbour of philosophy.” Therefore, he does not opt for prudence or wisdom; neither does he strictly separate the active from the contemplative life. Instead, he roots prudence and wisdom, as well as action and contemplation, in human nature in a way that makes them depend on each other. “Both action and contemplation lie in the nature of human beings, and have to rely on each other’s help.”103 Active life and contemplative life are not mutually exclusive, but can be mixed in different proportions. In order to illustrate this point, Pontano refers to the medical language of humors. Just as the melancholic type does not indicate the absence of all other humors except black bile, but only its preponderance, so a life of contemplation does not exclude a life of action and vice versa.104

Thrice the perfect life Accordingly, Pontano avoids a “simple” answer to a question as complex as that of the perfect life. He gives the palm of victory neither to contemplation nor to action, but tries to represent these ways of life as different, but inextricably intertwined, aspects of one and the same life. Pontano bases this argumentative strategy by breaking down the concept of “perfection” into its different meanings. Aristotle gives three basic meanings of what is “perfect” or “complete” in Metaphysics 5 (Delta), in which he defines the key terms of his philosophy. Pontano, who owned a copy the Metaphysics in Greek,105 employs each of these meanings and makes them correspond to one definition of a perfect life.

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In its first meaning, “perfection” refers to “that outside which it is not possible to find any, even one, of its parts.”106 Pontano applies this meaning to the nature of man. Given that this nature comprises both an active and contemplative side, the perfect life will have to take into account both of these aspects. “That seems to be perfect that is self-consistent and has all of its parts,” he writes. “Therefore, happiness is attained both through an active and a contemplative life, given that both lie in man’s nature.”107 Perfection can be reached only by the exercise of practical and theoretical activities, and Pontano’s autobiographical sketch corresponds to this demand. Despite the dangers he exposes himself to for King Ferrante and his son, he finds the time to write philosophical works. Not by coincidence, his remark is placed between the description of Pontano’s early success on the cultural stage and his later one on the political; the disposition in itself reflects the tension between theory and practice, contemplation and action. Pontano’s twofold engagement was already praised by his contemporaries. Antonio Galateo’s words in a letter on Pontano’s death are often quoted in this context: [T]his is what I admire most in Pontano. A man exceedingly busy in the greatest affairs, in the business of the Kingdom, and no stranger to rural occupations, he pursued his literary studies so diligently that a man completely at leisure and with the least involvement in public or private business could not do more.108

Based on this letter and other utterances by contemporaries, Mario Santoro has identified Pontano’s successful combination of political and literary activities with the “secret of his exceptional personality, the code to the extraordinary cultural function he held in Aragonese Naples.”109 This observation still holds true. As might be added in the present context, it is an interpretation Pontano himself gives his readers. In fact, moral and intellectual virtues are well balanced in Pontano’s sketch. He proves his braveness when he accompanies his king in a war that lasts for years and puts himself in danger; thanks to his moderation, he does not abuse his position in order to get rich; his prudence allows him to find solutions in the most complicated and difficult situations; and his knowledge and learning are reflected in his works. Accordingly, Pontano’s self-presentation comprises of both the theoretical and practical aspects of life, faithfully mirroring the first Aristotelian definition of perfect happiness. The second definition of perfection is “that which in respect of excellence and goodness cannot be excelled in its kind.”110 This is the definition of perfection which is applied to the question of happiness in the tenth book of the Ethics.

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Famously, Aristotle argues that perfect happiness is a kind of contemplative activity. If happiness is activity in accordance with virtue, it is reasonable to expect that it is in accordance with the highest virtue, and this will be the virtue of the best part of us. Whether this is the intellect or something else we think naturally rules and guides us, and has insight into matters noble and divine … it is the activity of this part … that will be perfect happiness. We have already said that this is a contemplative activity.111

Pontano follows this argument and allots supremacy to contemplation.112 As he argues, the contemplative life is less liable to be disturbed. In its exercise, it needs to rely on things outside itself to a far lesser extent. Furthermore, the joy connected to the mind, which Pontano circumscribes with the term fruitio, is more complete and stable than the one connected to the active life, always in danger of being obscured and spoiled by events outside the control of the actor.113 With these arguments, Pontano moves strictly within the Aristotelian framework.114 Still, he does not approve of an unconditioned appraisal of contemplative happiness. While action does not deviate from human nature, contemplation seems beyond human attainment and appears to exceed the limits of the human condition.115 This is similar to Aristotle’s position in the Ethics, to whom “such a life is superior to one that is simply human.”116 But Pontano’s conclusions differ notably from those of his model. Aristotle argues “someone lives thus … in so far as there is some divine element within him” and suggests that “we ought not to listen to those who exhort us because we are human, to think of human things, or because we are mortal, to think of mortal things. We ought rather to take on immortality as much as possible.” 117 Pontano, instead, restrains speculation by reconnecting it to the sphere of human practice. Human beings are not divine, but human, and as such they will associate with other human beings and look for company; they will engage in conversation with others. Thus, even a man living a life of contemplation will not keep his thoughts all to himself but discuss them with others. This is exactly what Pontano is doing with his treatise; it is an act of communication by someone deeply involved in a life of contemplation and thought.118 Therefore, a totally reclusive life far from human society is less divine than it is savage because it leaves one’s family, friends, and fatherland in the lurch. Anyone leading a life in contemplation has a right to dedicate himself to his studies. Still, he will fulfill his duties and meet his commitments as vir bonus and homo civilis.119 Pontano connects this restriction of the contemplative life with a specific situation. Many people, he writes, retire to their country estates, tired of the labors of the city and the toils of public life.120 This life corresponds to a third

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kind of perfection. “The things which have attained their end, this being good, are called complete; for things are complete in virtue of having attained their end.”121 In this sense, perfect happiness consists in a perfection of a life which has attained its ultimate end and has landed in the harbor.122 An echo of this last definition can be found throughout the Ethics whenever Aristotle insists on the “fullness” of happiness in the sense of a full life (vita perfecta). “One swallow does not make a summer; neither does one day,” as the famous saying goes.123

The fruits of life Pontano interprets this additional qualification of happiness in his own way. For him, perfect happiness consists in a successful autumn of one’s life. In this autumn, one would enjoy the fruits of one’s long life, full of labor and toil. As is obvious, the contemplative life plays a prominent role in this outline. Yet, its relevance is not so much based on its excellence among all other human activities, but rather as the yield of these “lesser” activities. As Pontano writes, the “fruit” of the active life consists in leisure, tranquillity and seclusion, enabling those who have reached this point to concentrate on the exercise of the mind.124 In this third kind of perfect happiness, the entanglement between “practical” life and “theoretical” approach can be grasped. They are not mutually exclusive, but strongly interdependent. The last part of Pontano’s autobiographical sketch makes use of the ideas expressed on the happy life. Action and contemplation are linked with each other and become part of one single design which integrates all three kinds of perfection into one life story: Pontano’s. The contemplative life Pontano leads when writing De prudentia is the perfect life according to the most noble virtue. Yet, it is only seemingly autonomous insofar as its meaning derives from Pontano’s past life. His past labors, as well as the recollection and recall (recordatio) of past deeds, justify his present leisure. Moreover, this past life of action is not self-contained, but requires its conclusion and perfection in leisure and contemplation. Hence, Pontano’s autobiography is a self-conscious act of recollection. As such, it holds an important place in his philosophical reflection on the theme of happiness, embedding this reflection into the context of the philosopher’s life. As Pontano himself puts it, it is the very act of recollection of his past life, the recordatio, which arouses his enthusiasm for the study of wisdom.125 Further, it is this recordatio that dictates the conditions of Pontano’s writings and constitutes their philosophical potential. Yet, this power of recollection can only unfold as long as it recollects a good (and therefore happy) life. In order to serve as

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“material” for philosophical reflection, one’s past deeds have to turn out as something perfect (per-fectum), and not as deeds that should be rather undone (in-fectum).126 The link between autobiography and philosophy becomes clear even in the narrative frame of De prudentia. It takes place in a little funeral chapel (fanulum) built by Pontano in the 1490s.127 As he does not fail to point out, the chapel was built at his own expense (nostris e sumptibus). Here, the idea of one’s age as collecting the “fruits” of life becomes manifest on a material level. The construction of the chapel is in itself a virtuous act of magnificence—which Pontano defined as fructus pecuniae.128 His chapel represents a space of contemplation, aimed at spiritual pleasures, fitting for someone who has retired from public life in order to exercise the powers of his mind. This symbolism holds even for the location of the chapel. In Pontano’s words, it has been constructed in the noblest part of town, simultaneously the space of political power and seclusion from the profane life (the etymology of the word “profane” derives from pro and fanum). This place is also highly adapted for the activities of the noblest part of the soul, contemplation. Likewise, the time in which the conversation takes place follows a similar pattern. Pontano has retired from his offices and is free from all political activities, while his listeners are momentarily free from their official duties.129 When Pontano wrote De prudentia in 1501, he had reached a balance between action and contemplation that seemed imperturbable. Still, the storms of life, from which he had supposedly found shelter in the harbor of philosophy, swept through Italy, and they were more violent than ever. In the last months of his life, they finally reached Pontano. As he wrote in his last work, De sermone, “I’m seventy-three now, but without any leisure; for the storms over Italy do not allow me to enjoy the leisure which nature has conceded to old age.”130 Italy, as Pontano had known it, did not exist any longer. While he was still alive, the Italian peninsula transformed into a theater of war in which foreign troops fought for supremacy. “In the course of life we encounter many reverses and all kinds of vicissitudes,” Aristotle had written in the Ethics, “and in old age even the most prosperous of men may be involved in great misfortunes, as we are told about Priam in the Trojan poems.”131 Pontano reacted to this Priam situation with a laugh. “I do not invite you to cry with me, but to laugh with me,” he wrote to the dedicatee of De sermone, “for I do not turn away from my grief in order to make you and others cry, but in order to let you know that even in the greatest hardships there is consolation.”132

Part Two

Rewriting Moral Philosophy Giovanni Pontano was not only a diplomat and politician. He was also one of the most important humanists of the second half of the fifteenth century. From the middle of the 1450s onward, he began to gain a reputation as a scholar and teacher. Bartolomeo Facio laudes Pontano for his literary talent in his De viris illustribus, completed before his death in November 1457. Upon being appointed a fixed salary in 1460, Pontano was already referred to as vir clarissimus, under the academic name of Gioviano.1 This early fame even seems to have led to an appointment as professor of oratory in Perugia in 1465, although he was prevented from accepting it due to a veto from Pope Paul II, who preferred to ascribe this task to a familiaris. Nonetheless, Pontano did engage in some independent schooling activities. As is clear from Facio, Pontano had opened a “school” in Naples. The character of this school becomes evident from a remark of Caracciolo that it was around this time, the end of the 1450s, that Pontano began to enjoy a large clientele and to become popular among the nobles at Naples, who “flocked together” to listen to Pontano expounding the ancient poets and historians.2 As a matter of fact, a student’s notes of some of Pontano’s lectures on Virgil and Valerius Maximus have been preserved in a manuscript in the Biblioteca Angelica in Rome.3 Also his first work De aspiratione, a grammatical treatise on the use of the letter “h,” seems to have been destined to school use.4 Most prestigiously, though, Pontano became a tutor to the royal family. He taught John of Navarra, King Alfonso’s nephew, until his departure for Spain. Later on he acted as teacher for Alfonso, duke of Calabria, son of King Ferrante and future ruler over Naples. After Antonio Beccadelli’s death in 1471, Pontano became the renowned leader of the Neapolitan academy. His intellectual position grew stronger in time, and even the political hardships of the 1490s did not seriously damage his image. Just as on the political stage, so too in the intellectual realm, Pontano exalted his role and celebrated himself as an educator and philosopher, carefully constructing a picture of himself as the undisputed leader of the academy and

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as an authority in the field of the humanities. In his treatises, he faced one of the great challenges of the humanists: that of rewriting moral philosophy. The humanists’ standing did not depend on their immense and detailed knowledge of the ancient past alone, but also on their ability to revive this past for their contemporaries. In this context, the attempt to rewrite moral philosophy served as a touchstone of their capacity to inscribe their own languages, ancient Greek and Latin, into the practices and norms of everyday life as well as scholarly discourse. In their writings on moral philosophy, the humanists made their knowledge of the past react with the demands of a relentless present. Sometimes, these reactions were harsh and threatened to dissolve traditional ideas. Aliquid potius novi dicendum, “rather something new should be said,” was the typically spirited phrase with which Lorenzo Valla opened his inaugural lecture for the academic year 1455/56.5 At different times, the reaction between past and present was rather purifying and led to a sort of refinement. Thus rewriting moral philosophy could mean starting from scratch, thinking anew, making a difference, but equally to rethink, to write again, to propose once more. It could have a “revolutionary” as well as a “conservative” side to it. The humanist movement had different faces, and it steadily evolved, depending less on personal choices than on changing circumstances. Pontano completed his studies in the late 1440s and early 1450s. Around this time, the conflicted relationship among the Italian states tended more and more toward the precarious balance of the peace of Lodi; the religious crisis of the fifteenth century slowly subsided; and “humanism as a literary program became standard in elite Italian education.”6 The humanists’ sweeping success created new possibilities for them, augmenting their chances of employment, gaining them new privileges and adding weight to their authority. However, their authority did not depend on their learning only; a great deal also hinged on the humanists’ capability to turn their erudition into a display of moral and political authority. It was not possible to simply base this authority on a superior learning, as has been suggested by accounts opposing an “innovative” humanist thought to an “outdated” scholastic thought.7 The question of how to accomplish this task was much more complicated and led to severe infighting, sparking conflicts among the humanists. In fact, the humanist generation preceding Pontano was characterized by a series of controversies that derived from their differing attempts to constitute and to wield authority. The tensions connected to this process of learning can be traced in Pontano’s works and informed his intellectual outlook. Still, his treatises made an effort to overcome these tensions. In them, he proposed a Latin philosophy.

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At first glance, humanist controversies seemed to arise from professional rivalries, personal misgivings, and a marked inclination toward verbal abuse. “Of all men who ever formed a class,” Jacob Burckhardt wrote with unsurpassed indignation in the Civilization, “[the humanists] had the least sense of their common interests… From literary discussion they passed with astonishing suddenness to the fiercest and most groundless vituperation. Not satisfied with refuting, they sought to annihilate an opponent.”1 Indeed, social realities heavily influenced on the humanists’ teachings. As Christopher Celenza has noted, the intellectual world of the humanists was “more public, and more openly agonistic” than ours.2 The pressure of competition was high, and one of the most effective ways of drawing attention to oneself was to score off other competitors in public.3 Sometimes, disputes could even turn into outbursts of real violence.4 On closer scrutiny, however, the controversies revealed much more than the humanists’ all-too-human concerns. Their quarrels highlighted not only their “unbridled subjectivity” and moral failures, as Burckhardt and others have suggested.5 As Marc Laureys, Roswitha Simons, and Arnold Becker write, “conflict and rivalries in the world of Renaissance humanism cannot always be explained by quirky character traits of the individual antagonists or the personal motives and interests which drove them into a confrontation; polemical writings are also quite often subtly connected with various strands of public discourse in contemporary society.”6 Humanist polemics also shed a glaring light on the intellectual tensions within the humanist movement—tensions that resulted from the growing necessity to accommodate to an altered political, religious, and social ambiance. What was at stake in the humanists’ disputes was their intellectual outlook and style of inquiry. Accordingly, these disputes were not as limited and local in character as their immediate causes suggested, but had serious repercussions on the further development of the humanist movement. In Pontano’s case, the scene for his endeavors as an intellectual was set by two controversies involving his teacher and patron Antonio Beccadelli (1396–

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1471), usually referred to as Panormita, the man from Palermo. Both incidents reveal the difficulties and obstacles humanists had to struggle with while trying to establish their authority. The first controversy took place in the early 1430s, when Panormita made part of the Milanese court and was attacked for his risqué poetry by the Franciscan friar and humanist Antonio da Rho. The second revolved around the controversial figure of Lorenzo Valla (1406–57). Panormita and Valla had been bound by ties of enmity since their days at the Milanese court.7 Since then, they had continued to cross swords, even after they had joined the court of Alfonso the Magnanimous. In the middle of the 1440s, their argument reached a climax when the Ligurian humanist Bartolomeo Facio, a protégé of Panormita, attacked Valla for his conduct as well as his daring philosophical works. In what follows, both controversies are analyzed in terms of the intellectual outlooks they involved and produced, together with their influence on Pontano’s own intellectual development and his writings.

The lost laughter Antonio Beccadelli, commonly known as Panormita, had his literary breakthrough with the daring Hermaphroditus.8 The Hermaphroditus was a collection of erotic poems modelled on the writings of classical authors such as Catullus, Tibullus, Propertius, and Martial—authors who would become important also for Pontano’s self-fashioning as a poet.9 Published in late 1425, the Hermaphroditus met with a wide, yet ambivalent, response. Beccadelli’s literary skills were praised, while the licentious content of his work was criticized, if not outright condemned.10 In fact, the work, dedicated to Cosimo de’ Medici, did not result in a sustained patronage at first. Nevertheless, Beccadelli had made a name for himself. In 1429, he became the aulic poet of Filippo Maria Visconti, and in 1432 he was made poet laureate by the Emperor Sigismund.11 Despite appearances, however, Beccadelli’s standing at the Visconti court was constantly undermined by his opponents. Continuing power struggles led to the loss of his illustrious position as aulic poet. In the end, Panormita left the Visconti court and in 1435, entered the service of Alfonso the Magnanimous.12

The controversy with Antonio da Rho Among Panormita’s most fervent critics in Milan was the Franciscan theologian Antonio da Rho. Da Rho was far from being hostile to the humanist movement

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as such. Rather, his querelle with Panormita derived mainly from his own humanistic interests. Indeed, it was on account of these interests that he had failed his candidacy for the chair of theology at Milan in 1426/27. As da Rho put it in a later work, he was passed over because the archdeacon and canons held the opinion that “a theologian should not pass on knowledge about the literature and sayings of the pagans.”13 Upset by the decision of his confreres, da Rho began to work on the Apology in which he vigorously defended his interest in pagan authors. Crucial to his argument is a particular emphasis on poetry. In his Apology he asks, What dare I say about the poets?… when I cite or repeat them, I obviously aggravate the wound my adversaries have inflicted. These people, although they do not know the poets and as absolute rustics and brutes cannot understand them, nevertheless,… they bite and rend with censorious words anyone who handles them as if to know them were a crime.14

Far from fighting a losing battle, da Rho attacks his opponents with the selfassertiveness of the learned humanist. In his view, their negative assessment of the pagan poets is not based on their piety, but on their ignorance. “Incompetents” and “pedants” (ineptissimi atque litteratores) that they are, they should stick to their preferred authors like Augustine, Jerome, Basil the Great, and others. Even from these authors, he suggests, “they [would] clearly perceive that to have once studied the poets is in no way a sacrilege, but… to know them is very worthwhile.”15 Yet, Antonio has to make concessions, too. In order to defend his interest in the poets of antiquity, he distinguishes between two kinds of poetry. His rebuttal continues, I valued little Virgil’s lascivious and obscene verse… while I yet admired his talent. Nevertheless, those severe and serious things that he sang without equal, I pursued, embraced, and reverently kissed with love, zeal, and faith.16

Da Rho belittles the playful and youthful poetry of Virgil as morally dubious, though skillful, whereas Virgil’s later, “serious” works receive his unconditional praise. He applies the same scheme to Ovid, whom he reads “not in the women’s quarters… as my skirt-chasing adversaries do, but in a throng of distinguished colleagues.”17 Poetry is only valid and authoritative if stripped off its supposedly morally subversive traits. Accordingly, not all poets pass da Rho’s scrutiny and find his approval. He expresses serious doubts about the Roman satirist Juvenal “who is better at elaborating than at censuring obscene Roman customs.” Among the other

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poets excluded from his reading list are Catullus, Tibullus, Propertius, and “the obscene Martial.” These are exactly the poets Beccadelli had fallen back upon in the Hermaphroditus. Not surprisingly, then, da Rho also rejects “a certain Panormita, whose genius will not be condemned but his life someday will be unless he writes serious verse subsequent to his filthy ones (as Virgil did).”18 This is not an unusual judgment. It closely resembles the opinion expressed in a letter by Poggio Bracciolini, which Beccadelli gladly accepted and used as an introduction to his work.19 In this letter, Poggio is astonished at the “manner so charming and well put together” in which Beccadelli describes “topics so immodest and so ridiculous” and admonishes him to turn his mind “to more serious matters” in the future.20 Both da Rho and Poggio acknowledge Beccadelli’s talent, but are uncomfortable with the erotic content of his poetry. Consequently, they advise him to occupy himself with more serious matters. Da Rho’s little remark on Panormita had no consequences as long as Panormita was far from Milan. As soon as Beccadelli moved to Pavia, however, it became a bone of contention between them. From the summer of 1429, anonymous defamatory poetry came into circulation. Some poems attacked Panormita, others da Rho. These diatribes culminated in an anonymous invective against Panormita, stemming from 1429/30 and most probably written by da Rho himself, who developed it later into the much longer Philippic against Antonio Panormita (1432). Beccadelli, for his part, attacked da Rho in a letter that circulated from 1431 onward.21 With all his authority as an aulic poet, he dismisses the defamatory verses directed against him as “raucous, lame, clumsy, and childish,” disqualifying da Rho, the supposed author, as a “verse writer” (versificator) and “syllable counter” (syllabicator), who is by no means capable of writing poetry. In other words, the author of the poems against Panormita lacks the very talent that he displays in the Hermaphroditus. Moreover, Beccadelli defends the erotic content of his poetry: “[T]he poetic art licenses us to indulge in jokes and witticisms, ‘for,’ as Catullus elegantly says, ‘it is fitting that the poet himself be chaste and pious; his little poems require nothing of the kind.’”22 In the footsteps of Catullus, Beccadelli attempts to separate personal character and poetry.23 All the same, he does not escape the logic of da Rho’s argument. Just as da Rho himself had been forced to make concessions to the moral rigidity and stern piety of his fraternity exponents, Panormita is forced to play da Rho’s game. He explains his Hermaphroditus within the biographical scheme of playful youth

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and sober maturity that his opponent had invoked. Moreover, he affirms that his earlier attitudes have changed. [T]his little work was composed in my tender years, when one jokes and sins with greater license… my age, my character, and my studies are quite different… my present age instantly recoils form all lewdness and pleasure and demands severe habits and a severe manner of speaking.24

Only four years after the publication of his scandalous work, Panormita is no longer the daring poet of his youth. Being an officially employed servant to the Duchy of Milan, he promises to mend his ways. “I would like to purge that sin— if what all poets practice is really sin—by a certain severe and grave style of oration (severo ac gravi quodam orationis stilo),” he writes in his letter, adding that “this can perhaps be done while bringing the highest, eternal praise and glory to our best and greatest of princes.”25 While Panormita can deride da Rho’s talent as a poet, he cannot avoid the moral presuppositions of his colleague’s argument. Adapting himself to the circumstances, he has to turn to more serious matters and fashion himself as a respectable and austere personality. This was an important turning point in Panormita’s career. In the ambience of the court, the separation of literary talent and moral integrity cannot be maintained, as the legitimacy of the ruler is based on his virtuous character as well as the authority of his officials. As a consequence, Panormita has to carefully mitigate, if not openly deny, the more subversive moments in his writings. He has to perform a difficult balancing act between ingenium and mores. On the one hand, he has a humorous and ingenious character, able to entertain and to transgress the limits placed upon him; on the other hand, there is the necessity to display serious-mindedness and solemnity, and this is only possible by confirming these limits and by conforming to them. So grave and severe did Panormita become that he criticized da Rho for his translation of Suetonius’ Lives. According to the reformed scandal poet, Suetonius’ history is full of “adulteries, illicit sexual acts, incest, and many other such things, so that if there is some rose therein, it [cannot] be picked without a thorn.” As Panormita points out, the duke had requested that da Rho translate a much less obscene writer, Lucan, and understandably so. A valuable author like Lucan would have been suited to “read, approve, and imitate [the duke’s] ancestors’ industry, ingenuity, and strength.”26 With these remarks, Panormita not only turns the tables on da Rho, he also formulates the main objectives of his later biography of King Alfonso of Aragon. Written in the 1450s, his Words and Deeds of King Alfonso would finally accomplish the severe and grave style of oration which Poggio and

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da Rho had demanded from him. Alfonso would substitute Filippo Maria as the “best and greatest of princes,” depicting him as a king without flaws, or, applying Panormita’s own words, as a rose without thorns.

Lucian: Risus et seria When Pontano met Panormita for the first time, the man from Palermo had become one of the most important figures at court. Although Panormita was made secretary to the king only in 1455, he took up important offices from rather early on. In 1437 and 1438 he already figured as one of the presidents of the Sommaria, a kind of monitoring body for the royal revenues and expenses, and as locumtenens for the protonotary, head of the royal secretarial staff.27 Furthermore, he had become Alfonso’s teacher in history and moral philosophy, regis historiarum moralisque philosophiae magister,28 and was one of the main protagonists of the literary séances which Alfonso usually held in Naples, reading and explaining authors such as Livius and Seneca to him. He was not only on good terms with the king, but also well connected among the officials at court. After Lorenzo Valla, his great rival, had left for a position in Rome, Panormita’s role as a promoter of letters in Naples was undisputed.29 The young Pontano much appealed to Panormita, who not only approved of his character and talent, but first and foremost of his playful and very promising poetry (Pontani indole et moribus maximeque nugis et versiculis, in quibus quantus futurus esset ostendebat, delectaretur).30 Much like Panormita’s own early poetry, Pontano’s nugae show elegance and wit, important merits in a society like that of Renaissance Italy. Entertainment was welcome, and so were men with a talent for pleasant conversation. Despite his heavy official attire, Beccadelli had not lost this talent during the years. In one of his poems, Pontano flatters him as “the father of all wit” (pater omnium leporum): “One of your friends invites you/ To come to him tomorrow and bring/With you all the humour you can,/And all the jokes which you have at home.”31 Pontano admired his teacher and patron. After Panormita’s death in 1471, Pontano dedicated the dialogue Antonius to his teacher’s remembrance. His last work, De sermone (1502), still celebrates Panormita for having revived poetry in its ancient splendor. Both works depict Panormita as a Socratic figure, more inclined to ask questions than to give answers, laughing at the discussants rather than proving what has been said, thus entertaining his audience while leaving them without any certainties about the matters discussed.32 In De sermone, Pontano gives an example of this “Socratic irony” (Socraticae dissimulationes).

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Asked for his opinion on some ancient maxim, Panormita feigns a gap in his memory and sends his interlocutors to Pontano—ite ad Jovianum. In this way the old Panormita, “a man of first rank at King Alfonso’s court,” concealed his knowledge of things he had often lectured on.33 “Go to Gioviano”—with these words the old Panormita passed on his legacy to his younger colleague.34 As might be clear by now, it was not an easy legacy to inherit. It was characterized by a tension between laughter and seriousness, between the pleasure of transgression and the arduous work of toeing the line. Pontano’s first dialogue, Charon, reflects this tension rather closely, giving it a new and exciting literary form: Charon is a descent to the underworld, a tour de force situated on the banks of the river Styx. It consists in a series of satirical conversations modelled after Lucian’s Dialogues of the Dead. Appreciated as one of the finest pieces of humanist dialogue by modern philologists, it was successful also in its own time; it circulated in manuscript and was printed in Naples in 1491.35 It was also among those works of Pontano which seem to have had a continuing influence—with Charon, Pontano turned out to be a worthy successor to Panormita.36 One of the secrets of the dialogue’s success lay in the congenial interpretation and employment of its literary model. Luciani risus et seria omnia (All of Lucian’s laughter and serious writing)—this is how Giovanni Aurispa announced the return of the first complete manuscript of Lucian to Italian soil in 1423.37 Indeed, Lucian had been a genuine discovery of the humanists; no continuous text of him had been available to medieval authors. Only in 1397–1400, when Manuel Chrysoloras, an eminent Byzantine scholar, began to teach Greek at Florence, were some of his writings reintroduced to the Western tradition.38 Therefore, the study of Lucian was at the heart of the humanists’ first programmatic encounter with Greek culture.39 Besides the Greek original, a number of Latin translations were also produced. Among the translators were Aurispa, Guarino, Lapo da Castiglionchio, Rinuccio da Castiglione, and Poggio Bracciolini.40 As Aurispa’s short description of Lucian’s works as risus et seria shows, the humanists’ interest in this author had two sides to it. The success of his works depended on their ambiguous position between seriousness and laughter, moral edification and entertainment. On the one hand, the dialogues were seen as serious works of moral philosophy. This was not so much due to the fact that “earlier humanists read the newly accessible Latin Lucian as if his parodies were serious descriptions of the Hellenistic schools of philosophy.”41 Rather, it had to do with the moral messages omnipresent in his works. Stripped of their humorous and iconoclastic connotations, they could be readily embedded in the context of a “serious” humanist education, much like Roman comedy.42

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On the other hand, if the dialogues were not reduced to seria, they provided the humanists with new literary possibilities. Leon Battista Alberti’s Momus was a case in point. Inspired in many ways by Lucian’s dialogues,43 Alberti stated in the proem: if we shall ever be granted someone who equips his readers to enjoy a better life, instructing them with weighty sayings and varied and choice material, while at the same time charming them with laughter, pleasing them with jokes, and diverting them with pleasure—a thing which among Latin authors has not hitherto happened often enough—then I think this author should certainly not be ranked with common, ordinary writers.44

Like Alberti’s own work, Pontano’s Charon came rather close to this ideal. The young Umbrian humanist exploited the possibilities of the Lucianic dialogue with more mastery than anyone else.45 Trying to distinguish himself as an outstanding author, Pontano followed Alberti’s model of using “an original and surprising literary genre to treat known and common ideas.” Unlike most of his predecessors, he did not simply extract the serious parts from Lucian; he also took his laughter seriously.46 Therefore, Charon beautifully captures the intensified conflict between laughter and seriousness. In its ambivalence, the issues of prior humanist debate crystallize and sparkle in a new light. The dialogue’s protagonist—Charon, ferryman of the dead—is torn between a kind of philosophical apprenticeship and the coarse humor of his less refined literary ancestors. As Carol Kidwell has noted, one might easily see the oblique selfportrait of the humanist as a young man in Charon, following the models of his elder colleagues, the underworld judges Minos and Aeacus, trying to get his bearings in a new and strange world.47 In loosely connected scenes, he meets people of all kinds, among them the cynics Diogenes and Crates, tyrants, priests, philosophers, and prostitutes. Thus, Pontano creates a comedy that viewed contemporary society from a Lucianic perspective and makes his readers laugh. Charon procured him the literary fame for which he had striven.

Important matters Notwithstanding, Pontano’s preference for satire and sarcasm was not to the taste of everyone. Half a century after its first publication, the biting humor of Charon was heavily criticized. To Paolo Giovio, Pontano seemed “unjustifiably harsh” (supra aequum mordax) in his judgments, censuring everyone with “biting frankness” (acerba scribendi libertate).48 And when Erasmus tried to defend his Moriae encomium in a letter to the theologian Martin van Dorp with a reference

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to Charon,49 an incensed Dorp did not hesitate to put Pontano together with Poggio Bracciolini, “a most damnable and obscene writer fit only to be put on the fire.” Angrily he asked Erasmus “what… these worthless fellows [had] done except to write filthy books?”50 Charon is more than a filthy book, however. It does not consist merely of satirical attacks, although the brilliance of Pontano’s style engraves these attacks in the memory of his readers. The risus will not stand without the seria; it constitutes the “seasoning” of more serious and important subjects, as Alberti put it in the Momus.51 Indeed, the doctrinal underpinning of Charon is provided by its Ciceronian main theme, the “study and knowledge of the best things” (rerum optimarum cognitio atque scientia).52 Put into Aeacus’s mouth in the very beginning of the dialogue, this formula cites the Ciceronian definition of philosophy and anticipates the more conservative parts of the dialogue.53 This is quite alien to Lucian’s dialogues. Lucian had not accepted any philosophical authority in his works in which a marked philosophical skepticism prevailed. One clear sign of this change of perspective is Pontano’s treatment of the Cynics, who in Lucian’s works had personified this skepticism.54 Pontano shows no sympathy for the Cynics’ subversive approach to philosophy. Rather, he derides their attitude. Diogenes’s contempt for all forms of convention and his rustic manners, which Pontano describes in detail, have led to a situation in which even during his lifetime he is already called a dog, a “dogfish” living in the Styx.55 He has forgotten how to walk upright and only knows how to swim, feeding himself on raw fish. This characterization closely follows the story of Cola Pesce, a legendary figure famous in South Italy.56 Furthermore, Crates, another famous cynic, is criticized. According to Diogenes Laertius, Diogenes had persuaded him to discard all his estate and his flocks, and to throw his money into the sea.57 Consequently, Pontano depicts him as an inhabitant of the Styx, on an everlasting search for his gold, ignoring the final ends of human life. For according to Aristotelian philosophy, money is not a good in itself, but can be put to good and bad uses. This makes Crates’s deed essentially an act of stupidity. As a philosopher, he would have been especially capable of putting his money to a good use, and if his own money had become a burden for him, he could have given it to others, instead of throwing it into the sea.58 On the doctrinal level, then, his dialogue shows a much more orthodox outlook than Lucian or others of Lucian’s humanist heirs like Poggio and Alberti. The tendency toward more conservative modes of argumentation is built into the dialogue—a tendency gladly accepted by later interpreters. Thus, Giovan Francesco Torresani (c. 1498–1557/58), the editor of the Aldine

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edition of Pontano’s works (1518–19), characterizes Pontano’s dialogues as grave disputations on “most important matters” (res gravissimae) and plays down Lucian’s influence.59 At the time Torresani wrote, Lucian was no longer the hero of a literary revolution that humanists such as Alberti or Pontano had made him. Once more he had become the blasphemous and polemical writer he had been depicted as in early Christendom, “inveighing against the good and mocking the authority (dignitas) of everyone.”60 For Torresani, Lucian’s laughter could no longer be taken seriously since it represented a defective form of humor, scurrility—against Pontano’s own views.61 Quietly passing over the dialogue’s satirical traits, he saved Pontano from this scurrility only by concentrating on the more serious matters in his works. Charon’s laughter subsided, and seriousness prevailed.

The grammarians rehearse the uprising The new seriousness of the sixteenth century did not only concern Charon’s laughter. In more general terms, it related to any kind of irreverent behavior and to any questioning of the authorities. One of the roots of this tendency can be traced back to a humanist controversy that took place in Naples only a few years before Pontano entered the scene. The dispute in question revolved around the figure of Lorenzo Valla. Valla has been acknowledged by both contemporaries and historians as one of the most controversial figures of the humanist movement. “[I]f there can be anything that all scholars would agree upon concerning this most brilliant and complex of humanists, it is most certainly his tendency to hold positions which are oppositional or contrarious,” writes W. Scott Blanchard.62 Valla’s fame was based on his behavior as well as on his both ingenious and provocative works, like his already mentioned dialogue On Pleasure.

Hassle in the castle Initially, Valla’s irreverence had been to great advantage both for himself and his patron Alfonso of Aragon, whom he had been serving since 1435. With his attacks on the Roman Church and its secular powers, most famously in his writing on the donation of Constantine, Valla had dominated the earlier years of Neapolitan humanism. However, his importance rapidly diminished when Alfonso reached an agreement with the pope and established himself as King of Naples in 1442. After this point, other talents were required. Panormita became

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the leading figure at court and gave Neapolitan humanism a new direction. He did so together with his close friend Bartolomeo Facio, a Genoese humanist who had joined the court in 1444, and succeeded Valla as official historiographer in 1448.63 Under Panormita’s and Facio’s aegis, the humanists at court were much less concerned with polemics than with the construction of the “myth of the magnanimous king” and the intellectual legitimization of Alfonso’s rule over Naples.64 As Riccardo Fubini has put it, the king “no longer had use for militant polemicists, but for celebratory writers and apologists.”65 Vulnerable as Valla became due to this change of policy, he came under attack from different quarters. Thus, he was summoned before the court of the inquisition at Naples in 1444.66 Accused of heresy, Valla ran the risk of serious consequences. Only King Alfonso’s personal intervention prevented worse ills and led to the acquittal of the charges. In spite of this, the king’s court was not exactly a stronghold of Valla’s followers. His rather pugnacious character had made him enemies throughout his career, and Panormita counted prominently among them. Bitter rivals that they were, the king’s famous reading hour set the scene for their struggles over favor and authority. Valla seems to have been at an advantage, having made Panormita cut a poor figure in front of the king and his courtiers, as he gleefully reported in a letter to Pier Candido Decembrio from 1442/43.67 Panormita would not stand for this intrusion of his ground. When Valla wrote a history of Ferdinand I of Aragon (1380–1416), Alfonso’s father, he sensed an opportunity to teach him a lesson and put him in his place.68 A close friend of Panormita’s, Facio got hold of the preliminary draft of the History that Valla had left to Alfonso for correction and amendments concerning his father’s life. Maintaining that Valla had posited a finished version in the royal library, he considered himself entitled to fetch it.69 Then he sifted through the book in search for errors of all kinds, eventually collecting a huge number of mistakes— over five hundred, as he gloatingly informed Panormita. Five hundred errors seemed to be enough to strike down Valla’s critique and his ambitions to become court historian, a position in which Facio was intensely interested.70 A selection of the mistakes was brought forward during one of the reading sessions with the king. Valla, taken by surprise, reacted tempestuously and called Facio the tiniest of dwarves, a mental midget (minutorum minutissimus).71 The offended Facio used this opportunity to write a series of invectives against Valla. Although substantial parts of these are occupied by philological arguments, the main thrust of Facio’s attacks is directed against Valla’s character. In the eyes of Facio, Valla is imprudent and presumptuous, holding in esteem only himself,

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and despising and disregarding all others.72 Moreover, this presumptuousness leads Valla to immoderate behavior resulting in recklessness, arrogance, and impudence. Facio ascribes these vices to his opponent by referring to the idea of propriety (aptum): Valla’s comments are not legitimate criticisms, but inappropriate breaches of etiquette. Valla interrupts the explications of others most unfittingly, without respect or consideration for persons, place, or time (nullo respectu, nulla ratione persone, loci et temporis habita). For according to Facio, when a learned man like Panormita holds a lecture on grave and important matters (de seriis et maximis rebus) anything other than silence is improper.73 Clearly, Facio’s accusations are based on certain assumptions regarding discussions in the ambience of the court, as well as intellectual discourse in general. First of all, Facio reconnects Panormita’s authority as a teacher to the authority of the king. Having an official appointment as magister moralis, Facio begins with the assumption that Panormita holds the first rank among the humanists at court. Accordingly, Valla has to subordinate to his rival and to recognize his superior position. From this perspective, Valla’s domination of the king’s reading circle has to appear as an unlawful act of usurpation. For Facio, his interruptions and criticisms are not tokens of his intelligence, but rather proofs of his insolent character. Therefore, one’s authority as a scholar is closely intertwined with one’s standing at court. A free exchange of ideas can take place only along the lines of a preordained hierarchy. Accordingly, Facio’s ideas of intellectual discourse presuppose a rather static and monologist model. He draws a clear-cut distinction between an obedient disciple, on the one hand, and a commanding teacher of a literally unquestioned authority, on the other. Consequently, he requests Valla to be silent and to keep his tongue in check (silere disce et lingue tue frenum adhibe)—albeit with little hope that Valla will follow his admonitions given his innate arrogance (certe hic nunquam mihi concedes propter innatam arrogantiam tuam).74 Taking Valla’s criticisms of Panormita as his starting point, Facio denounces his opponent’s irreverence against others, too, presenting his readers with a climax of authorities Valla has tried to discredit in his works. Among the “victims” included in Facio’s list are eminent contemporary figures like Bruni and Guarino, but also a whole list of classical authors. According to Facio, Valla does not respect Priscianus as a grammarian, tries to show the errors of Cicero as a rhetorician, dismisses Aristotle in matters of dialectic, accuses Livius of ignorance, and attacks Boethius on the question of predestination; his critique of Bartolus nearly cost him his life in Pavia. Valla even dares to correct venerable

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Church fathers like Augustine and Jerome on religious issues. “Hence,” Facio concludes, “you do not spare the living, nor the dead, and you do this for the sole purpose of receiving praise from your vituperation of others.”75 Contrary to Valla’s boast, Facio concludes his attack with a last blow: all learned men despise his writings—writings that had even made him appear in front of the inquisition. These were massive accusations, and Valla reacted in a similarly massive manner with his voluminous Antidotum in Facium (Remedy to Facio). Consisting mainly of detailed discussions of grammatical and stylistic problems, the Antidotum refuses the allegation of philological incompetence and provides evidence for that of his opponents. With relish and at great length, Valla goes on about Panormita’s blunders in front of the king and his clumsy moves to make them good. Furthermore, he carefully depicts his colleagues’ misbehavior that has eventually culminated in the misappropriation and public denigration of his History. From his narration, a totally different representation of the facts results. Far from being the victims of his supposed insolence, Facio and Panormita are the offenders. It is they who have arrogated a superior position at court, not him. In order to prove this, Valla has to dismantle Facio’s attempt to reconnect Panormita’s authority as a scholar to the authority of the king. As he points out, the person of the king has great authority (magna dignitas) when he carries out his royal duties (cum fungitur regio munere), but not as a student of literature (cum litteras discit). Contrary to Facio, for whom the king disposes of the “highest wisdom” (summa sapientia) and “extraordinary insight” (singulare iudicium), Valla emphasizes that the king himself has openly admitted that he has a scarce knowledge of letters (non satis doctum esse). What is the importance of being the king’s teacher, then? In Valla’s argument, it amounts to nothing: the mere title of magister moralis will not save Panormita from his attacks, as it does not imply any authority in terms of scholarly capability. The latter is not evidenced by one’s standing at court, but rather by one’s intellectual faculties. Valla also contradicts Facio’s assertion that the disciple has to stay silent. In order to do so, he quotes a line from Horace, “amid all this you must read and question the wise.”76 Taking this advice literally, he insists on the necessity and the right of the disciple to regularly put questions to the teacher to the end of learning properly. This view coincides with the practice at the king’s reading circle. Valla is not the only one to interrupt the reader. Questions come from the king himself as well as from his courtiers. Furthermore, the questioners seem to enjoy and encourage discussions between the scholars present.77 Hence, a student is perfectly entitled to ask questions; he can even remain unsatisfied with the answer given and propose it to others.78

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Although Valla’s model of intellectual exchange is more competitive than Facio is, it does not question the close relationship between learned authority and social standing. Valla knows perfectly well the extent to which he depends on the favor of the king and his court. Consequently, he does not fail to point out the full praise he has received during the reading hours in order to boost his own position. Yet, he emphasizes that this praise does not depend on his social status as a courtier or his political role, but on his merits as a scholar. Unable to meet him on the grounds of philological discussion, he sustains, Facio and Panormita have tried to defeat him with calumnies, insults, and character assassination.79 Accordingly, Valla refuses to treat Panormita and Facio as peers. He does not see them as men of letters, but as deadly enemies attempting to annihilate him. “With these, I compete for praise and glory in the wrestling school, so to speak. With you, however, I fight for my life and my liberty, as if in a battle.”80 This statement is typical of Valla’s attitude. “I am a soldier” (miles sum), he had written once; on another occasion he had imagined himself in the frontline of the fight for truth (pro veritate in acie).81 But despite the fact that Valla explicitly links this imagery with an engagement for the Christian faith and the respublica Christiana, for religion and for the Church, his attitude resolutely failed to meet with friendly responses. Facio was not the last to criticize the polemical ways in which Valla handled the philosophical, rhetorical, and theological traditions of his time. In the footsteps of Facio, future generations would see Valla’s aggressive way of thinking not as a sincere attempt to establish truth, but as a sign of his quarrelsome nature and insolent character.82

“More respectfully, grammarians” Pontano bears witness to this development when he keeps to an image of Valla as a contentious and polemical figure. Of course, he had not been involved directly in the polemics between Facio, Panormita, and Valla, since he joined Alfonso’s court two years after they took place. Valla had already left for Rome when the young humanist made his way to Naples. Hence, Pontano’s arrival fell at a time when the cultural life of the court was dominated by Panormita and Facio.83 In these circumstances, Pontano became a disciple of the two of them, siding with them and taking on their intellectual outlook. Still, the challenge Valla had posed to the humanist movement reverberated throughout Pontano’s work. As will be seen, he almost represented an éminence grise for Pontano’s moral thought. Only in his last works Pontano calls the devil by his name. In De fortuna, Pontano rejects Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s critical remarks on judicial astrology,

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likening him to the Skeptics and to Valla.84 In De sermone, he politely refers to him as “a very learned man” (maxime studiosus)—in a chapter on those who are disputatious (de contentiosis).85 At the same time, he claims that Valla has written his works not so much in order to teach or to contend for truth, but rather in order to disparage ancient writers such as Cicero, Aristotle, and Virgil.86 This line of argument follows Facio and Panormita. In a chapter on irony and dissimulation, Pontano even pits his former teacher once more against Valla, praising Panormita for having concealed his knowledge in a Socratic manner while censuring Valla’s inclination toward ostentation. In a direct allusion to the literary séances with King Alfonso, Pontano maintains that the philological diligence shown by Valla depended more on his tendency to display his learning than on his talent.87 The direct mention of Valla in De sermone and De fortuna was a postlude to a much more extended dispute Pontano led in his younger years. Unlike Facio’s and Panormita’s controversy with Valla, this dispute was not based on personal invective. Drawing on their attacks, Pontano rather takes the view that Valla was a notorious carper and fault-finder and develops it into a more general dismissal of a type of intellectual. What comes under attack in his early works was not an individual person, but the figure of the grammarian. Since antiquity, grammarians had been ridiculed for their self-opinionated and contentious manners. The literary motif of the battle of the grammarians is already present in Lucian,88 and Pontano revives it successfully in Charon. When Mercury, envoy of the gods, encounters the three grammar teachers Pedanus, Theanus, and Menicellus in the beyond, he has his hands full keeping them from starting a brawl. “More respectfully, grammarians!” he has to admonish Theanus and Pedanus, who squabble over a number of grammatical, lexicographical, and morphological questions. “You must dispute with words, not fists.”89 The grammarians’ punch-up is not only a comical interplay. Their rustic manners rather betray their low status and paltry character. Indeed, schoolmen were often denigrated for their elementary teachings, especially the doctores puerorum, who taught their pupils to read and write in Latin.90 Facio, for instance, deprecates Valla’s History as a text that does not come from “an eloquent man” (ab eloquenti homine), but “directly from the elementary school” (e media pedagogorum scola).91 Pontano remembers his first three teachers as less distinguished by their literary skills than by their weight of punch, wrestling power, and their shrill voices.92 In this view, grammar was an “irksome school object” and a “puerile pursuit unsuitable for an adult,” as Keith Percival has put it.93 This is not to say that humanists had no interest in grammar at all. Pontano himself wrote a grammatical treatise, De aspiratione, in which he treated a thorny

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problem in the field of orthography—the correct use of h.94 His meticulous discussion of metrics in Actius equally counts among the grammatical subjects. Therefore, the humanists’ denigration of the figure of the grammarian was less based on a dismissal of grammar as it served as a means to demarcate their social standing. They had to show that they were different from simple elementary teachers, but also from school-level glossators like Menicellus and his colleagues, who read and explained the Latin prose classics and poets with their pupils— much like Panormita and Valla did in King Alfonso’s reading circle. In order to confirm his learned authority, Pontano’s Charon exposes the uselessness and vanity of the grammarians’ pedantic knowledge of wrong or improvable details. Pedanus, for example, has been informed by Virgil himself about the exact number of vessels of wine Acestes gave to the departing Aeneas, while Hipparchus, a famous mathematician of the second century BCE, has enlightened him about the exact life time of Acestes: “one hundred and twentyfour years, eleven months, twenty-nine days, three hours, two moments and half an instant.”95 With Pedanus’ remarks, Pontano offers an exaggerated, yet not overly distorting, picture of the grammar courses in schools. After all, reading ancient texts entailed providing students with a large amount of factual information about names and locations, assembling and collating lexical and factual material.96 It also meant drawing the students’ attention to grammatical constructions and the vocabulary employed.97 Pontano caricatures this method, but he does not dismiss it. His own annotations to Plautus are a good example of this reading technique, even if written in a more advanced stage of scholarship which saw the budding humanist work autonomously on the text. He provides the plays with exegetical notes, remarks on its grammatical, linguistic, and stylistic peculiarities, references to other parts of Plautus’ work and to other authors like Virgil, Sallustius, Terence, as well as with notabilia of all kinds.98 Pontano employs this method not only as a scholar, but also as a teacher.99 His approach to grammar does not constitute a break with traditional methods. It rather continues and refines these methods by means of an increasingly sophisticated philology. Nevertheless, the humanists discerned themselves not only on the basis of the claim that their technical skills were superior to those of the grammarians. As becomes clear in Pontano’s dialogue Antonius, dedicated to the memory of Panormita, they also claim a higher status as “rhetoricians.” Not by coincidence, the dialogue begins with a satirical prayer against rabies, addressed to San Vito, patron saint of Polignano a Mare, a town in Puglia.100 Later in the dialogue, the motif of the rabid dog reappears when one of the interlocutors, Compater

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or Pietro Golino,101 reports that Panormita used to describe grammarians as “whelps (for that was the word he used) fighting over any bones and bits and crumbs that happen to fall under the table.”102 Of course, the derogatory comparison between grammarians and dogs had its origin in the invective. Already Petrarca had compared his “victims” to dogs whose relentless barking had aroused a sleeping lion.103 Actually, Pontano makes fun of this tradition, when he lets Suppazio, a member of the academy, narrate that he was attacked so ferociously by a grammarian that he had the impression of fighting with a bear or a lion, rather than with a human being. As David Marsh has shown, this passage is clearly linked with Valla’s invectives against Poggio, Panormita, and Facio, as is the reason for the brawl: the question which arouses the grammarian is whether it is more correct to say frictio or fricatio.104 Moreover, the reference to “bears and lions” had its place in the Stoic vocabulary used by Panormita in De dictis et factis. When criticized for his leniency and mildness, Alfonso responds that those who had uttered such a critique seemed to expect to be ruled by lions and bears.105 But Compater goes even further than to compare grammarians with animals. Using the words of Panormita, he also quips that the grammarians are counted among the unsound of mind (furentes), alluding to Roman law,106 and that his wet nurse in Palermo muttered a prayer against rabies whenever she encountered a grammarian.107 Panormita even invented a fantasy name for the mental illness with which the grammarians were afflicted: labyrinthoplexia.108

Literary authorities What is the point of these attacks? It is not the grammatical method, but the inappropriate use grammarians make of it. Their comments are not simply erroneous; they are unsuitable since they impinge upon the rights of the rhetoricians. Just as Panormita and Facio censure Valla for his impertinence, Pontano reprimands the grammarians for their presumption and temerity. In the words of “Andrea Contrario,” another interlocutor of the dialogue, it is difficult to escape the grammarians’ fault-finding and—once again—their “rabid jabbering.” They fretfully complain about poems and letters, while their own writings lack any elegance and refinement—“if you should cast an eye on their own writings, you would see nothing flatter, nothing more graceless, nothing more yawn-making, since grammar is all they have to offer.”109 This remark faithfully reflects a comment Panormita makes on Valla in one of his letters: “[Valla] knows so many things without understanding, and he grabs only for the letters and syllables, without discerning that grave thoughts and

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weighty words must be used.”110 Grammatical correctness is one thing, fluency and elegance in composition another. Paolo Cortesi applies this scheme to Valla when he writes that “Valla tried to express the power of individual words as well as the ways they came together, but he was unable to hand these on correctly for the purposes of structuring discourse.”111 Altough Cortesi acknowledges that Valla contributed much to correct the flawed Latin of his time and to make youths keener in their apprehension, he also maintains that there is “a different basis for composition, which Valla either omitted or did not know. For ornate, sweet and uncorrupted Latin style requires a certain periodic composition which creates audible harmony.”112 As Cortesi puts it, then, Valla, more grammarian than rhetorician, insists on the fine points of Latin language while he is unable to develop a grave style of oration. Pontano builds the same argument into his criticism of the grammarians’ caste. In his dialogue, the grammarians’ pettifoggery even assumes a threatening aspect. As “Andrea Contrario” observes, the grammarians try to “invade” the field of rhetoric, attacking Cicero and advancing against him with a preference for Quintilian—a clear allusion to Valla, who wrote a comparison of Cicero and Quintilian, in which he gave preference to Quintilian.113 Pontano’s “Contrario” does his best to defend Cicero against such allegations. In two lengthy passages, he compares Cicero’s and Quintilian’s definitions of the end of rhetoric and status.114 By doing so, he re-establishes the primacy of Cicero, saving him from the “rabid bites” of contemporary grammarians like Valla.115 In a similar manner, “Elisio Calenzio” defends Virgil from the attacks of the grammarians.116 He laments the extent to which Virgil and Homer are unduly criticized by the grammarians, who find all kinds of errors in them and denigrate their writings. He finishes his speech with a reference to Panormita, who depicted the critics of Virgil as “shameless,” “criminal,” and “detestable,” daring “to force Jupiter out of his kingdom, since they were trying to push and topple the prince of Roman poetry from his throne.”117 Far from challenging Virgil’s authority, “Elisio” defends him from unlawful attempts to overthrow him. Virgil and Homer are the kings of Roman and Greek poetry, respectively.118 Their sayings and inventions have “the standing, force, and authority of law;” each of them has to be “venerated, celebrated as fathers of their country with honors public and private, and paid homage by all men everywhere;” and all those who think otherwise “should be numbered with rebels and enemies.”119 As is clear from these lines, Pontano intertwines literary eminence with political authority. He does so on a personal and political level, building his own authority as a scholar as well as the cultural policies of the Aragonese on the

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figure of Virgil. As Liliana Monti Sabia has shown, Pontano exalts the poet from Mantua in his critical and poetical works, transforming him more and more into a Neapolitan poet and installing himself as his alter ego.120 Not without success; as has been said, Aldo Manuzio praised Pontano as aetate nostra Virgilius alter.121 On a political level, Virgil served as a powerful symbol for the link between the new humanist culture of the kingdom and its Latin past. The Aragonese conquest had led to a revival of interest in the classical past of the kingdom.122 Latin antiquity was set against older elements of south Italian culture, for example the “Grecizing fellows” (graecissantes) and “Italo-Greeks” (italo-graeci).123 In a curious scene in Antonius, a court usher makes his appearance, proclaiming an edict in which the king himself prohibits further verbal abuse against Pontano from their side, so that he will “discourse as a Latin man about Latin matters.” 124 This is a good joke, but it has serious implications. Just as Facio and Panormita invoke the king as guarantor of their intellectual merits, Pontano has recourse to royal authority in order to silence his adversaries.

The yes-sayer and the no-sayer The changed attitude toward authority also led to distinct styles of philosophical inquiry. The dispute between Facio, Panormita, and Valla not only concerned the character and comportment intellectuals should have, it also regarded two different ways to write philosophy. For Valla, philosophy is a quest for truth, and the critique of authorities is possible and necessary. For his opponents, however, philosophical discussions do not have to be aggressive and critical against the tradition; they should rather rely on the authority of this tradition. According to this view, it is not the task of the philosopher to critically revise his predecessors, as Valla does, but to reformulate their positions and to reconfirm them. The difference between these two styles of philosophical inquiry becomes overtly clear in one of the episodes of the dispute between Facio and Valla: their quarrel about Facio’s dialogue, De vitae felicitate, written between July and December 1445.125 Facio’s dialogue constitutes a conscious ideological counterpoint to Valla’s dialogue, De voluptate.126 Valla’s work had been discussed controversially from the beginning, yet criticisms grew stronger during the 1440s. The “Epicurean” interlocutor’s provocative definition of voluptas as the highest good and his attacks on its Stoic definition as honestum were seen as potentially scandalous and heretical. Accordingly, they figured prominently in the accusations of the inquisition. Nine out of twenty-six questions were concerned

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with this topic, more than any other single issue Valla had confronted.127 As a consequence, Valla’s arguments, although intellectually sound, were considerably weakened on an authoritative level. Facio uses the situation to his advantage. In a manner diametrically opposed to Valla’s, he produces a dialogue that was much less challenging than his adversary’s, substituting his rival’s disrespectful astuteness with pious conformism. Valla had styled his treatment as an attack on the venerable Stoic tradition, until then regarded as coming closest to Christian doctrine, and in praise of Epicureanism, the most despised ancient doctrine among his contemporaries. In contrast, Facio emphasizes the compatibility of his work with the tradition. Fashioning himself as a humble thinker full of respect for the ancients, he declares that his work derives less from his own talent and learnedness (ingenio vel doctrina, quae sentio in me quam sit exigua) than it is brought about by divine help (potius divina ope). As Facio assures his readers, he has “confirmed his opinion from the statements of the wisest men and in the tradition of those who are divinely inspired.”128 This reliance on the tradition and on religious orthodoxy led to a rather conventional treatment of the topic, comprised in two parts. In the first book, the two interlocutors, Giovanni Lamola and Guarino Veronese, go through a long list of possible candidates for a happy life on earth—wealthy men, princes and kings, powerful citizens, courtiers, soldiers, priests, humanists. While Lamola puts forward his proposals, Guarino’s role consists in their respective confutation. Consequently, book one ends with the conclusion that the answer to the question of the nature of happiness, its place, and its pursuit has to be discussed further. In the second book, Panormita joins the discussion and goes through the opinions of the philosophers and theologians, and this time Guarino can conclude that “the summum bonum is God and the fruition and knowledge of him.”129 With this conclusion, Facio returns to a much more traditional concept of the summum bonum than Valla’s. In Valla’s dialogue, pleasure had played a central part. The “Epicurean” interlocutor, Maffeo Vegio, had praised pleasure as the principle of all human action, as the ultimate criterion for goodness. By doing so, he had refused to distinguish between a good pleasure of the soul and a bad pleasure of the body.130 “Antonio da Rho,” the Christian interlocutor of Valla’s dialogue, does not accept this position. Still, when defining the beatitude of the next life, “Antonio” blurs the distinction between earthly voluptas and heavenly fruitio. As Riccardo Fubini has argued, he assimilates the Augustinian concepts of uti and frui, thus extending his hedonistic and utilitarian notion of voluptas from the profane to the sacred.131

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Facio is less subtle in his argument. His appreciation of fruitio as the highest good is complemented by the derogation of voluptas, pleasure. “Nothing is more detrimental and pestiferous than pleasure,” “Panormita” quotes the Pythagorean Archytas of Tarent,132 and vehemently argues against the view held by the “Epicurean” interlocutor in Valla’s dialogue that virtue aims at pleasure, be it bodily or spiritual.133 Moreover, the direct opposition to Valla becomes evident in his reaffirmation of the notion of honestum (in Panormita’s words, decus) as the highest value and ultimate aim of the active life, not without underlining its inadequacy within a Christian context.134 In so doing, “Panormita” wrecks the efforts Valla’s “Epicurean” interlocutor—in the first version of the dialogue, he himself—had made to deconstruct ancient examples of virtuous behavior and to unmask them as ultimately based on pleasure. Whereas Valla had presented his readers with a Christian-Epicurean vision that changed central tenets of traditional moral and religious thought, “Panormita” willingly reaffirms these tenets and returns to the Stoic-Christian formulation of human happiness. Valla was clever enough not to attack Facio’s dialogue on a doctrinal level. Instead, he concentrated on some of its stylistic aspects. “As has come to my attention,” an offended Facio wrote in the end of his second invective against Valla, “you criticize that I didn't shape my interlocutors in a way that they would contradict each other more often, and first and foremost that the figure of Lamola yielded too easily to the assertions of Guarino.”135 As a matter of fact, the “Lamola” of Facio’s dialogue is a notorious yes-sayer, corresponding to Facio’s aim to present his readers with a clear and unmistakeable argument. Different from Valla’s colorful play with a variety of masques, Facio keeps his theoretical vision in black and white. The price for his clarity is a serious literary impasse, however, as the authoritative stance of “Guarino” and the affirmative attitude of “Lamola” seriously undermine the dialogic structure of the work. Facio responded to Valla’s critique by referring to Lamola’s character. Following Horace,136 he insists that the author had to take into account the character of the figure he employed in his text (eius mores spectandi sunt). Given that Lamola was by nature compliant and not pertinacious (Lamolam natura facilem et non pertinacem esse), it would have been against the rules of decorum, that is sensitivity to the context, to make him more aggressive than he was.137 As Facio adds, it would have been likewise against the rules of decorum had he introduced Valla as Guarino’s interlocutor. For Facio, Valla is a no-sayer, who would have continued to contradict Guarino. In addition, Facio points out that it would have been against the status (praeter dignitatem) of both interlocutors

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if Lamola, like himself a disciple of Guarino, would have contradicted his own master, distinguished by his age, his studies, and his long experience.138 For Valla, instead, nothing could be more against the rules of decorum than a discussant unwilling to discuss. “Don’t you know what the nature of dispute is?” he mocks Facio in the Antidotum. “It is the same as in a fight: either you do not go into battle or you fight with all your might.”139 Moreover, he remarks, the argument of a dialogue is not chosen according to the person who expresses it, but vice versa. Therefore, he criticizes Facio’s choice of teacher and disciple as his discussants as deeply misguided and disparages his opponent’s style of philosophical argument. The participants of Facio’s dialogue, he quips, do not discuss “by reasoning, as it is custom, but with far-fetched authorities, not with arguments, but with worthless testimonies, not with proofs, but with examples.”140 With his critique of Facio’s monologist dialogue, Valla places himself firmly into a tradition of humanist thought that favors the disputatio as the highest form of learning. The first lines of his On the Donation of Constantine (1440) are emblematic for his forcefulness: Many, many books have issued from my pen in almost every area of learning, and in these I have disagreed with some great authors of long established reputation. Inasmuch as there are those who feel ill treated and accuse me of recklessness and impiety, what must we imagine they are going to do now? How much will they rant against me? And if they have the chance, how eagerly and swiftly will they carry me off to punishment? I am one who writes not only against the dead, but against the living as well…141

So self-assured is Valla in 1440 that he celebrates his rashness and challenged tradition in all of its aspects. And indeed, much of the innovative force of the earlier humanist movement depended on its ability to polemicize with more traditional strands of learning. Facio’s dialogue marks a distinct rejection of this attitude. The discussion between “Lamola” and “Guarino” takes place on rather different grounds than that propagated by Valla. More similar to a learned conversation than to a dispute, it is not designed to portray a lively and open discussion. Rather, the doctrinal limits of the dialogue are set and are to be acknowledged, not questioned. Thus, at one point of the dialogue, “Lamola” not only agrees with “Guarino,” but also explains why he gives in so easily to the arguments of his teacher. I do not dare to contest your opinion, and especially not the part in which you mention pleasure, for I don’t want you to think that I belong to Epicurus’ school, whose opinion and sect I have always disapproved and disdained.142

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This is a clear sideswipe at Valla that dismisses his defense of pleasure as well as his whole way of arguing. Revealingly, “Guarino” answers, You act quite rightly and according to your habits, for you never oppose the truth stubbornly. When you realize that your case cannot be reasonably argued, you give in, you don’t make use of your weapons in favour of your adversary, and you don’t sustain attacks on truth led with too much zeal.143

The conversation between “Guarino” and “Lamola” did not test the limits of morality. It was not an inquiry or exploration, but a reaffirmation and clarification of things already known. Facio’s dialogue was emblematic of a new intellectual outlook regarding the structure and direction of the discussion of moral issues. It clearly indicated a shift from a more open dialogical form of discourse to a more closed monologist form of writing. This shift dovetailed with a changed perspective on the respective roles of tradition and innovation in the further development of humanist thought. Valla had stood for a more radical and disruptive approach, comparatively open and on more egalitarian terms with the ancient tradition. He epitomized the figure of the humanist intellectual by bringing the polemical force of the humanist movement to its peak. Beccadelli and Facio, instead, represented a more conservative outlook, advocating comparatively closed and hierarchic traditions, hostile to extensive innovation, evoking the ancient writers as an authoritative elite to serve as a bulwark against such innovation.144 As such, they encapsulated a change of the intellectual climate, eschewing the more ambiguous and radical tendencies of humanist thought in order to create a new educational and philosophical mainstream, which is less aggressive in tone and more compliant with state and religion.

4

Latin Philosophy

Pontano’s intellectual outlook was molded by a series of different intellectual strands which had developed over preceding generations of humanists. On the one hand, his treatises reacted to the need for a grave and serious philosophy capable of being employed on a political level. On the other, he responded to the formation of a humanist writing in which disputative modes of inquiry receded in importance. These developments were closely intertwined, and both implied a shift toward more conservative and authoritative modes of reasoning. Panormita and Facio had been the standard-bearers of this shift, making important contributions to the genre of history writing and creating the ideological basis for the close relationship between politics and culture that would characterize Neapolitan humanism until the downfall of the Aragonese in 1495. Pontano continues Facio’s and Panormita’s work in many aspects. His mirror-for-princes De principe depends strongly on Panormita’s De dictis et factis, whereas his history of the Neapolitan war clearly takes up Facio’s Libri rerum gestarum Alfonsi regis. Still, he does not simply resume and transmit the ideological patterns connected to his predecessors’ outlook, but transforms them in significant ways. The most important element of this transformation is his interest in the moral treatise, a genre that neither Panormita nor Facio had treated and would become Pontano’s major achievement. Already in De principe, written c. 1468, Pontano holds out the prospect of future works to come. “And if I perceive that this work does not displease you,” he writes to the young Alfonso, Duke of Calabria, “other treatises which I think you will find useful will soon follow.”1 Pontano kept his promise, although his later works did not necessarily follow the trajectory of his early studies. De principe adhered to an established literary tradition, the mirror-for-princes genre, with a well-defined objective, serving educational as well as laudatory purposes. However, the kind of moral treatise Pontano developed over later years was wider in scope and had different aims. As has been said in the introduction, Pontano described his own writing style as

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a combination of three different approaches to moral philosophy, dependent on the works of Cicero, Seneca, and Aristotle.2 Aristotle was the most important of these authors, as the Ethics was Pontano’s main point of reference. However, the success of Pontano’s project to rewrite Aristotelian moral and political thought depended on several factors. First of all, it hinged on a new perception of Aristotle not as the awkward philosopher of the scholastics, but as an eloquent scholar. A second constituent of Pontano’s Latin philosophy was his keen awareness of contemporary culture and his ability to rewrite Aristotle’s works is the key of present discussions and exigencies. A third important feature was a redefinition of the practice of ethical inquiry: the places of philosophy changed, and Aristotle was taken out of the universities and introduced into new circles such as the Neapolitan academy. The following chapter analyzes how each of these factors informed the constitution and structure of Pontano’s writings.

Aristotle becomes eloquent Pontano’s rewriting of Aristotelian thought was a major undertaking. Earlier humanists had made “the philosopher” the figurehead of those intellectual currents and institutional settings they starkly opposed, and the first among these critics had been Francesco Petrarca. In his invective against four Aristotelian friends, entitled De sui ipisus et multorum ignorantia (On His Ignorance and That of Many Others), written between 1367 and 1371, Petrarca formulates the main outlines of the polemics against Aristotelianism. As James Hankins has put it, De ignorantia “was to become the standard humanist critique of scholastic philosophy.”3

Against the Aristotelians A central part of Petrarca’s critique regards the scholastics’ contempt of eloquence. As Petrarca puts it, his scholastic “friends” despise eloquence, a feature they share with all “modern philosophers.” Far from pursuing an ideal of eloquence, they reject it. Instead, they use a technical language which had to remain incomprehensible outside their circles: “the only things they honour in a philosopher are babyish and puzzled babbling.” Against the jargon-ridden language of these modern philosophers, Petrarca argues that Aristotle himself was a “sweet and pleasant writer,” whose eloquence had been “given a scaly hide” in its medieval translations. And while Aristotle “strove to unite eloquence

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and philosophy,” his modern followers “think eloquence an impediment and a disgrace to philosophy.”4 Therefore, they deny the union of eloquence and philosophy on the basis of a strict distinction between rhetoric and philosophy. “Much eloquence, little wisdom,” Petrarca’s friends quote a widely known saying. In much the same way, they judge Petrarca’s written style to be “elegant and exquisite,” and still “devoid of knowledge.”5 By doing so, they insist that the rhetorician’s aim to persuade with his speech can be achieved also by ignorant men. Petrarca, in contrast, stands firm about the close relationship between eloquence and philosophy. For him, morality and speech are intimately connected to each other. Already in the 1330s and 1340s, he argued that both philosophy and eloquence were necessary for moral reform and could not be neglected: “Our speech is not a small indicator of our mind, nor is our mind a small controller of our speech. Each depends upon the other but while one remains in one’s breast, the other emerges into the open.”6 It is Petrarca’s insistence on the close relationship and interdependence of thought and language which points the way ahead and which becomes the basis for the explicit linkage between moral reform and the rewriting of moral philosophy. Petrarca’s criticisms were taken up and radicalized by Lorenzo Valla. In his Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie (Reploughing of Dialectic and Philosophy), which circulated from 1439 onward, Valla heavily attacks Aristotelianism both on an institutional and doctrinal level. In the proem to the Repastinatio, he evokes the eminent figure of Pythagoras as an exemplar of open-mindedness and a quest for truth that was uninhibited by doctrine and authoritative reasoning— both characteristics of Aristotelian thought. With Pythagoras as his model, Valla fashions himself as a soldier and revolutionary fighting against the tyrannical rule of the Aristotelians in the realm of philosophy.7 In his view, the Aristotelians have expanded the authority of their master to all schools. Like Numitor, grandfather of Romulus and Remus, who unlawfully dethroned his brother Amulius, they too are usurpers in the field of philosophy. Their presumption and arrogance have reduced the philosophical community to a state of slavery in which the Aristotelians have taken the law in their hands, similar to private citizens who arrogate themselves the right to promulgate laws as if they were officials (qui cum privati sint, quasi magistratus quidam leges condunt).8 In later versions, Valla renounced the explicit language of politics and moved to safer ground, referring mainly to the “cultural” program of the humanists. In the Retractatio (Revision) of c. 1450, he omitted any allusions to “ursurpers” and “slaves.” With an attitude much less aggressive than the one

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professed in the 1439 version, he rather attacks the Aristotelians’ ignorance of other philosophers and of the language in which Aristotle wrote: But other Latins consider other philosophers unwise, welcoming Aristotle alone as both “wise” and “wisest.” Why not, since he is the only philosopher they know—if in fact knowing is habitually reading him not in his own language but in one that is foreign, not to say inauthentic, not only because most translations of Aristotle’s works are bad but also because much that is said well in Greek is not said well in Latin? This has led even distinguished thinkers into many mistakes of the greatest importance.9

Furthermore, Valla criticizes the scarce knowledge of Latin which characterized the scholastic teachings of Aristotle.10 All considered, Valla asserts, Aristotle has been overestimated by his followers. He does not possess the great mind that the Aristotelians accord to him.11

Leonardi Bruni: Retranslating Aristotle Notwithstanding this critique, not all humanists opposed Aristotle’s teachings with the same vehemence as Valla. From rather early on, Leonardo Bruni (1369–1444) applied the humanists’ pursuit of eloquence to the Stagirite. Whereas Petrarca and Valla treated the figure of Aristotle rather dismissively, unleashing their critical energies on the Aristotelians, Bruni brings Aristotle back into the focus of humanist moral and political thought. In 1416–17, he retranslated Aristotle’s Ethics, taking it out of the hands of the scholastics and making it available in a new version. His version constitutes “a direct challenge to the scholastic culture of the time”: Different from other humanist translations, Bruni’s earlier works included, the Ethics was not a long lost or forgotten writing of antiquity, but a wellknown and well-established text used in the universities.12 Bruni’s preface to his translation of the Ethics underlines the polemical intent and controversial nature of the work. First of all, his argument is based on the assumption that Aristotle was an elegant writer and had set great store by eloquence. Like Petrarca, who had already noted the “scaly hide” of the Latin Aristotle, Bruni insists on the “fact” that Aristotle “was devoted to eloquence, and that he combined wisdom with the orator’s art,” demonstrated by his books which were “written very lucidly and with the greatest attention to eloquence.”13 The principal witnesses for this assertion were Cicero and, in the case of Bruni, the Greek original of Aristotle’s text.14 Bruni’s praise of Aristotle goes hand in hand with a harsh critique of the scholastic translator. As he affirms in the opening lines of his preface, the reason for translating Aristotle into Latin was the way in which the Ethics had been

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previously translated, a way that made it seem a work “rather by barbarians than by Latins.”15 According to Bruni, his predecessor knew neither Greek nor Latin well.16 This disqualified him as a translator, for, as Bruni writes in De interpretatione recta, “the whole essence of translation is to transfer correctly what is written in one language into another language. But no one can do this correctly who has not a wide and extensive knowledge of both languages.”17 This is not the case with the old translator, who shows an ignorance of the “good letters” (bonae litterae). “He is, so to speak, a mongrel, half Greek and half Latin; deficient in both languages, competent in neither.”18 In order to prove his point, Bruni tackles some of the problems he has identified in the old version. Thus, the interpres vetus constantly misunderstands the Greek original (greca multis in locis male accepit), and renders it in a Latin that is “puerile and unlearned” (pueriliter et indocte)—Petrarca’s “babyish and puzzled babbling.” Especially annoying to Bruni is the frequent use of transliterations of Greek words which have a perfectly sound counterpart in Latin. As a sideswipe at the translator’s belonging to one of the mendicant orders, he quips that his predecessor “in ignorance of the best and most approved Latinity, goes about like a beggar in the midst of wealth.”19 Bruni also rebuts the argument that these transliterations are necessary because of the alleged “poverty of the Latin language” (latine lingue inopia) as opposed to the wealth of ancient Greek.20 For Bruni, there are many examples for successful and inspired translations from Greek to Latin. He refers to the comedies of Plautus and Terence, who have adapted Menander’s plays, or Cicero’s adaptations of Aristotle’s thought in his dialogues. Furthermore, he demonstrates the opulence of Latin language by taking issues with the old translator’s inability to cope with the names for certain virtues and vices. Thus, he gives not only one, but several translations of the Greek “eutrapelia,” which Grosseteste had simply transcribed: “urbanitas,” “festivitas,” “comitas,” “iocunditas.”21 Accordingly, Bruni’s critique of his predecessor is devastating. Far from being “pure and free of any fault,” the translation lacks the minimum requirements of any well-written text: Latinity and perspicuity. Moreover, the translator’s ignorance does not only influence the correctness and pureness of language, it also affects the style of the original text. In De interpretatione recta, Bruni claims that a good translator “must possess a sound ear so that his translation does not disturb and destroy the fullness and rhythmical qualities of the original.”22 Yet, Grosseteste’s translation shows nothing of the eloquence of the original, as Bruni complains in his preface: “What shall I say of his mutations of the style, than which nothing could be more confused and perverse?”23

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The problem Bruni indicates is not only a stylistic one. What is at stake is the philosophical understanding of Aristotle. In the Vita Aristotelis (1429), Bruni reports that “among certain learned men—men, however, who do not know Greek—I have come across some scepticism when I commend Aristotle’s eloquence. In fact, accustomed as they are to pore over the socalled translations of this philosopher, they think that he is knotty and unclear and writes awkwardly.”24 The obscurity of the Latin translation hindered an adequate understanding of the text. With Bruni’s version of the Ethics, this situation changed. As he writes in the preface to his translation of the Politics (1439), “liberally educated persons, who previously had been repelled by the absurdity and barbarity of the old translation, thereafter acquired a high regard for these books, with the result that knowledge of their contents has become widespread.”25

Pontano: Toward Latin philosophy These premises guided Pontano’s rewriting of Aristotle. As Petrarca’s and Valla’s polemics show, the scholastics had appropriated and transformed Aristotle’s works in a way that made it difficult for the humanists to commend these works to their audiences. The solution to both problems lay in detaching Aristotle from his traditional university setting. He had to become more eloquent and urbane in order to restore his moral authority on a new level. His philosophy had to be rewritten in humanist Latin, a task Bruni had undertaken in his translations of the Ethics and Politics. Following the lead of Petrarca’s De ignorantia, Pontano’s treatise De oboedientia (On Obedience), written in the late 1460s or early 1470s, opens with an attack against the “modern philosophers,” or, in the words of Pontano, “those who philosophize these days.” In the proem to book I, Pontano claims that … [these philosophers] and their whole manner of speaking … have to be completely dismissed, their dull and much too sober sectarian discussions, hardly delightful for an audience, which they alone or only those similar to them read, so that they do not so much want to teach but to quarrel, and that they are less interested in studying philosophy, as they expound obscure und outlandish things, than in trampling on it and ousting it from its position.26

This passage features many of the points Petrarca and Valla had raised: not only their attack on the scholastics’ language, but also on their style of discussion, their sectarianism, and their preoccupation with natural philosophy.

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At the time of De oboedientia, these points of critique had already become commonplaces in an ongoing and relatively generic debate. It is no surprise, then, that Pontano ascribes this commonplace to the dedicatee of the work, Roberto Sanseverino: I’m certainly moved first and foremost by a saying of yours in which you expressed the opinion that neither philosophy should be without words like an infant, nor should eloquence be without the wealth and the weight of the things themselves, which are discovered and taught by philosophy.27

Obviously, the main point of Roberto’s saying is the scholastics’ lack of eloquence— being “without words like an infant” refers once more to Petrarca’s “babyish and puzzled babbling.” Furthermore, the saying insists on the Petrarcan contention that language and reason cannot be separated. The words of philosophy have to have the weight of reality. As Pontano adds, eloquence is “absolutely required when it comes to the discussion of virtues and the suppression of the affects,” given the intricate link of reason and language (ratio and oratio) which differentiates the nature of humans from that of other animals.28 This link will remain one of the main tenets of Pontano’s philosophical writings. Forty years later, he explains it along very similar lines in De sermone, describing it in terms of a relationship between reason as a guiding knowledge (ratio ipsa dux est ac magistra) and language as its assistant (oratio ministra). Speech is the translator of thought (mentis est interpres) and a kind of instrument of reason (rationisque ipsius instrumentum quasi quoddam).29 As Pontano maintains, “if counsel, advice, and consideration consist of discussions, but discussions consist of words, then speech in itself is an instrument and provides reason, as it were, with its material.”30 Consequently, “those who express their thoughts suitably (apposite) are rightly praised, while those who express themselves poorly and ungainly (male atque incomposite) necessarily have to be rebuked.”31 As in Petrarca, eloquence is not secondary to reason, but closely intertwined with it. Speech is not detached from reason; rather, it is its “spokesman,” expressing and explaining thoughts in the public arena. Therefore, the recovery of Aristotle is a recovery of the lost link between reason and language, philosophy and eloquence. Here, Bruni is the most important point of reference for Pontano—for all of his career. Although Pontano chastizes Bruni for his wrong use of the letter h in De aspiratione, his treatment of moral philosophy is strongly informed by the same objectives Bruni had set in his translations.32 In De magnanimitate, he praises Bruni for his attempt to restore the splendor of Roman eloquence, despite disagreements over single issues.33 A

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passage in Pontano’s early dialogue Charon is in fact a rather faithful rendition of Bruni’s line of argument. For Charon himself appears as one of those learned men skeptical of Aristotle. He voices doubts about Aristotle’s teaching, judging it “too obscure and circumspect” (nimis obscurus et cautus), especially regarding delicate questions such as the immortality of the soul. In Charon’s opinion, the Stagirite is such a “clever and subtle writer” (scriptor tam argutus et subtilis) that he is “not easy to understand.”34 Even when Mercury tells him the anecdote of “a rhetorician” (rhetor) who mocks an outlandish philosophical interpretation of Aristotle,35 Charon insists that the darkness (obscuritas) of Aristotle’s writings might excuse philosophers and theologians.36 Unfortunately, Mercury does not agree. Much like Bruni, he objects to Charon’s thesis that Aristotle himself is an obscure author. Instead, he blames Aristotle’s scholastic interpreters for having created this obscurity in the first place: It’s not all a question of obscurity; but, as it seems to me, the cause of this thing is twofold: first, that today’s philosophers are ignorant of literature, of which Aristotle was in fact an important author; second, that his dialectic has been corrupted first by Germans and Gauls, then also by our own people, and they are now making a hash of it, too.37

In Pontano’s last dialogue, Aegidius (c. 1501), these caustic remarks give way to a more conciliatory view. Named after the Augustinian friar Giles of Viterbo (1472–1532),38 in later years general of the order, the dialogue celebrates the triumph of humanist studies. The humanities had made giant leaps in the beginning of the sixteenth century. Different from Bruni’s times, ancient Greek had become a more familiar language. As “Romano Tamira” (c. 1465–after 1519) says,39 one can see “the Greek works of Aristotle and Plato in the hands of our philosophers, and their old translations are dismissed or are out of favour.”40 As he further points out, this revolution has also reached those circles against whom Bruni had launched his most virulent polemics, the mendicant orders. “And not to mention other things, hasn’t our Giles dedicated himself to the study of the Greek language, and with him a great part of the Augustinian Hermits? There are also a lot of people from other religious orders and schools inspired by the same delight and assiduity.”41 The Aegidius not only celebrates the success of humanist studies, however. It also gives space to religion, a topic that so far had played only a minor role in Pontano’s works. Pontano seems to have had an intense exchange with Giles of Viterbo that also included a critical assessment of Pontano’s works.42 The dialogue reflects parts of this exchange when it declares that it is time for the “Christian

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muses” and for the reconciliation of Aristotelian philosophy and Ciceronian eloquence. Pontano’s vehicle to transport these ideas is a dream vision of the late Gabriele Altilio (1440–1501), Bishop of Policastro and dedicated friend of Pontano.43 As “Francesco Pucci” recounts,44 Altilio has appeared to a monk from Montecassino in a dream. The apparition of Altilio admonishes the remaining members of the academy that they are to bear fruit after a youth spent in playful allurements and should turn to the important virtues of pietas and religio. Indeed, Altilio imparts the knowledge to Pontano that the Muses command him and his colleagues to venerate Christ and to direct their talent, oratio or speech, toward the redemptor.45 The key to this humanistic piety lies in the reunification of eloquence and natural philosophy, as well as eloquence and theology. According to “Pucci,” these fields had been separated after the fall of the Roman Empire, causing a kind of translatio studii toward barbaric countries like Spain, France, and even Germany.46 Yet, there is hope for a renewed union of eloquence with the studies of the natural and divine. One of the protagonists of this renewal is Pontano, as “Pucci” emphasizes: “[A]nd not at all is it your fault, Jovianus, that our knowledge of moral doctrine and our acquaintance with astrology haven’t been illuminated by Latin language.”47 In second place, as another landmark of this learnedness stand the new translations of the works of Plato, Aristotle, and others: “And neither there was nor there is a lack of people who have translated a lot from Greek to Latin with dignity and adornments.”48 With these developments, the “reformation” of philosophy in the light of a revival of eloquence is on its way. As Pontano tells his pupils, Although I am old and weighed down with age, I am yet possessed of the hope that before I leave you, I may see our Latin philosophy expounding its topics with a more refined style and elegance, and that abandoning this contentious manner of debating it may adopt a more tranquil form of speech and discussion, using its own proper and purely Roman vocabulary.49

It is obvious that Pontano sees himself as a trendsetter and the initiator of a Latin philosophy following the principles Bruni had formulated and set into practice in his translations. Nonetheless, much work remains to be done. According to “Giles,” philosophers still have to struggle with the consequences of bad philosophical translations, as their rendering of words, moods, and figures of speech prevents their readers from using a proper Latin terminology.50 In other words, in Latin Aristotle still does not appear as the elegant and well-versed writer that he obviously had been in Greek. In the last part of the dialogue, “Giles” discusses

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different translations of the Greek diathesis. He proposes words like affectio, propensio, appositio, and accomodatio. He even coins a new word, habilitas, in order to render the Greek term as exactly as possible. In contrast, the old translators—“shiftless men” as Pontano calls them—have not come up with any of these translations because “they did not want to elaborate on the problem, for they thought it to be enough of an excuse that there were a lot of Greek words which couldn’t be expressed properly in Latin.”51 In their own view, the humanists did not accept such excuses, but put themselves to work, applying their knowledge of Latin to the Greek thought of Aristotle. Bruni had been the first to render Aristotle into “good” Latin, and Pontano followed his path with his treatises. Their initiative was taken up and followed by others, even churchmen like Giles. This work was not without reward: by integrating one of the traditional key figures of scholastic philosophy into the framework of humanist thought, Aristotle would gain a better standing. Furthermore, those rewriting his moral thought would equally see their reputation enhanced.

This is not Athens By the beginning of the fifteenth century, Aristotle had finally become eloquent. In the proem to De prudentia, written around the same time as Aegidius, Pontano does not hesitate to call him “the most eloquent among the philosophers” (philosophorum omnium disertissimus). As Petrarca had argued, this eloquence was not separated from knowledge, but closely connected to it. Accordingly, Pontano presents his readers with the impressive picture of the old Aristotle, admired for his fame and his doctrines, philosophizing in the columned hall of the Lyceum and receiving guests who have come from all over Greece in order to hear his lectures.52 If Valla sets out his Retractatio with the revered figure of Pythagoras as the archetype of the philosopher in order to demolish the authority of Aristotle, Pontano does the reverse. He emphasizes Aristotle’s undisputed leadership in the philosophical realm and establishes his own authority on that of the Stagirite. To this end, Pontano chooses a strategy that allows him to praise Aristotle and to underscore his own standing at the same time. Deploying the same modesty Facio had displayed in his dialogue De felicitate, his approach is to emphasize the distance between Aristotle and himself, rather than to highlight their closeness: But we, Tristano Caracciolo and Francesco Poderico, do not have our parents in Athens, and there is no Academy for us anywhere in Campania, and we ourselves, really, have no great supply of understanding or wit; yet we are old

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men and we do, certainly, philosophize with a few men, now in the portico of our house, now in this little chapel and ambulatory; and had reverence permitted, we should willingly have called it a Lyceum, but the memory of that great man nevertheless deters us from doing that—still, even if the chapel is by no means sited and dedicated in the premises of the Academy, it is nevertheless sited and dedicated at our expense in a very famous part of this city.53

Although the Latin sentence is quite convoluted, Pontano’s point is clear: Naples is not Athens, his chapel is not the Lyceum, and he is not Aristotle. Pontano therefore renounces the idea of an imaginary return to Athens in favor of contemporary Naples. His attitude contrasts with that of Cicero, who famously named his two gymnasia at Tusculum after the two great philosophical sects in Athens, Lyceum and Academia.54 What veils itself as modesty, however, is a self-confident statement of independence. Pontano’s philosophy, and Latin philosophy in general, does not seek to be like its model, Greek philosophy, but to transform it into something that is its own. One is reminded of Angelo Poliziano’s famous statement to Paolo Cortesi, regarding the latter’s imitation of Cicero: “I am not Cicero. Still, I think I express myself.”55 Likewise, Pontano distinguishes himself both from Aristotle and, indirectly, from Cicero. Even though he refers to his works as Aristotelaea, Aristotelian writings,56 Pontano is amply aware of the gap that separates him from the Greek philosopher. “It’s a long way from Greece to Latium,” Bruni had written in a letter to Niccoli early in the century,57 and Pontano takes him at his word. In fact, Pontano is even more radical than Bruni, who had been convinced of the potential for translation and invested most of his intellectual energies in it. Pontano is much more skeptical about this possibility. His response on being questioned as to what he thought of Valla’s translation of Herodotus by two courtiers in the early 1460s is somewhat prosaic: You know what I think about this whole translation business. I’d rather like to see everyone doing their own than bringing in things from outside. For my part, I think that if Cicero were still alive he could hardly bear it if someone translated his Orator into Greek; and Demosthenes would be rather angry if someone rendered the works he wrote in Attic into another language.58

As a matter of fact, Pontano did not translate any Greek works into Latin. The only exception was his translation of Ps.-Ptolemy’s Centiloquium.59 Also in this case, however, he did not limit himself to render the short Ptolemaic aphorisms into Latin, but rather dedicated himself to their detailed commentary. Indeed, the title of the work is Commentationes.60

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The project Pontano pursues in his treatises is not that of translation, then, but of rewriting.61 This rewriting requires a thorough adaptation and adjustment of the place and time in which the original writer had lived. Hence, Pontano shifts the attention of his readers away from Aristotle, placing himself at the center of his philosophical writings. Based on the conventional claim to appropriateness (aptum), he builds his philosophy around his personality, reflecting on himself and his role in the world. In the old translation of the Ethics, such an adjustment had hardly occurred. Even on the linguistic level, there was no trace of such an effort. Grosseteste had kept to the sentence structure of the Greek original and translated it word by word, without making concessions to the stylistic features of classical Latin. In contrast, Bruni’s translation already implied an adaptation to time and place. He rendered the Aristotelian original not ad litteram but ad sensum, intervening in a variety of ways with the syntax and semantics of the Greek text. Different from his predecessor, he showed a greater flexibility in the translation of single words, allowing for variations in meaning that Grosseteste had tried at all costs to avoid.62

The importance of being elegant Pontano was to go still a step further than Bruni. When he turns to the genre of the philosophical treatise, Pontano disposes of the Aristotelian original. Instead of closely following the flow of the text, he creates his own, inscribing contemporary cultural patterns into the Aristotelian writings and vice versa. A good example for this technique appears in Pontano’s discussion of virtues and vices concerning the social life in De sermone. This is not new terrain; the virtues of truthfulness, amiability, and conversation are a prominent issue in Bruni’s prologue to his translation of the Ethics. As has been mentioned previously, Bruni severely criticizes Grosseteste’s use of Greek barbarisms. As examples, he gives terms such as “eutrapelia” (ready wit, pleasantry) or “bomolochia” (rustic behavior) instead of sound Latin words like “urbanitas” or “scurrilitas.” The awkwardness of the scholastic translation created difficulties for the commentators on the Ethics. It was one of their tasks to supply their readers with further information and explanations whenever they came across a transliterated Greek term. But a word like “eutrapelia” created problems even for experienced readers such as Thomas Aquinas or Giles of Rome. They explained the term mainly by means of an etymological analysis, translating it as “well-turned.”63 This might have helped their readers to understand that the “eutrapelus” was ready of wit and repartee, but it still left them with a rather abstract concept. Not

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by coincidence, of all passages in the Ethics those on the social virtues probably remained among the most difficult to understand for scholastic translators and commentators. The virtues these passages treated were deeply embedded in a historical and cultural context that had remained rather alien to scholastic culture. Grosseteste’s inability to translate the term “eutrapelia” was not simply due to a lack of words or a bad knowledge of Latin; it was rather an entire cultural context which was absent and created the inopia verborum that the humanists attacked with such insistence. For Bruni and Pontano, the situation was different. Familiar with Roman culture through authors like Cicero, Terence, and Plautus, Bruni seems to have had far fewer difficulties in identifying the “eutrapelia” of the Aristotelian text with the Latin “comitas.” More than that, he had a whole range of terms at his disposal with which he can translate the Greek word. In addition, Bruni was well acquainted with the practice of joking, frequenting the mundane coteries of his humanist friends. He knows perfectly well that one witty remark or play on words can earn him more respect among his colleagues then ten neatly formulated definitions. Bruni’s Oratio Heliogabali ad meretrices (1408) shows that he was quite capable of being salacious and to walk the thin line between wittiness and bawdiness.64 This was to say nothing of Pontano. As has been argued above, as a diplomat and courtier he was well aware of the importance of entertainment. Humor and wit played a significant role in the display and representation of power at court, but also among the humanists. After all, Pontano attracted Panormita’s interest with witty poems. Likewise, Cosimo de’ Medici based his prediction of Pontano’s brilliant future on nothing more than a serious of jokes the young humanist made at the expense of the Venetians when he visited Florence at the beginning of the 1450s. Thus, Pontano could read the Aristotelian passages on the social virtues with the eyes of an expert. As a result, Pontano’s De sermone elaborates at length on the art of pleasant conversation. In six books, it offers a theory of wit and a panorama of Renaissance humor that goes far beyond the Aristotelian text.65 This is exactly the purpose of Pontano’s treatises: to amplify Aristotle’s short remarks, to inscribe them into the patterns of Renaissance culture, and to integrate them within the framework of this culture. Aristotle’s writing style lent itself perfectly to this process of adaptation. As Paul Botley has noted, “the eloquence [Bruni] found in Aristotle must have had its basis in brevity,” a “terseness” which sometimes gave his writings an “epigrammatic force.” Confronted with this brevity and terseness, already Bruni “often had to disentangle and expand the philosopher’s elliptical turns of phrase.”66 In his treatises, Pontano continued this work and brought it

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to a new level. Where Aristotle had offered rough sketches and drawings, Bruni had created an acceptable still life of his moral philosophy. Pontano, however, realizes enormous canvases filled with vivid detail. He paints the Aristotelian Ethics in the colors of Latin philosophy. This activity has two sides to it. On the one hand, Pontano takes the same liberties as a Renaissance painter, depicting figures that are not mentioned in Aristotle. Sometimes the Aristotelian doctrines are almost crowded out of the picture by the profusion of examples, anecdotes, and historical pieces.67 In this sense, his rewriting of moral philosophy follows a rhetorical trajectory, aiming at moral persuasion and arguing by example.68 On the other hand, this rhetorical side of Pontano’s treatises should not obscure the degree to which they are based on the grammatical ideals of correctness and perspicuity. In the Rhetorica ad Herennium, three qualities characterize an appropriate and finished style: elegantia, compositio, and dignitas. “Elegance” is defined as the quality which makes “each and every topic seem to be expressed with purity and perspicuity” (elegantia est quae facit ut locus unus quisque pure et aperte dici videatur). Its subheadings are correct Latinity (Latinitas) and clarity (explanatio).69 In this sense, elegance cannot be equated with rhetorical eloquence, but rather with grammatical precision. As David Marsh has convincingly argued, a work like Valla’s Elegantiae covers “a sort of middle ground between grammar and eloquence,” between mere grammatical exactitude and a refined Latin, referring to semantic and formal distinctions.70 Leonardo Bruni’s critique of the “barbarous” translator of the Ethics was based on similar arguments. With his Greek transliterations, Grosseteste had ignored the ideal of Latinity; his translation ad verbum destroyed the clarity of the Aristotelian original. Accordingly, Bruni’s ad sensum method tried to compensate for those faults not only on a stylistic, but also on a semantic level. He refined the vocabulary employed and reworked the sentence structure according to the rules of Latinity and clarity. Where Grosseteste had put the barbarism eutrapelus in order to describe the witty person, Bruni used a range of words such as comis, iucundus, and facetus.71 Pontano follows Bruni in fanning out the Aristotelian text. Faceti and comes are those speaking for the delight and entertainment of the audience, but Pontano also knows festivi, lepidi, and salsi. The last three terms serve him as the starting point for his philosophical inquiry.72 The festivus, lepidus, and salsus are not simply different nominations for the eutrapelos, but refer to distinct types of witty persons. Although they belong to the same genus, they are different species. All three types are concerned with the same subject matter (speech and words) and shared the same objective (delight and pleasure). In order to explain

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their differences, Pontano resorts to an analogy with taste. As there are different kinds of “flavor” (sapor)—some sweet, some salty—there are different kinds of witticisms; and while the agreeable (lepidus) kind of humor is only sweet, its acute version is also sharp (salsus).73 The third type of witty person, the “merry” or “festive” man (festivus), is explained in the context of the festivities held in honor of the gods. They manifest such a variety in their speech that they give a unique flavor to it (sermones maxime condiat).74 Accordingly, the Latin colors of Pontano’s treatment of the Greek eutrapelos and the cultural practice of eutrapelia are not only a matter of rhetorical variation, they also have their origin in the rather sober observation that it seems necessary to show in which aspects [the festivus, lepidus and salsus] are different from one another. This inquiry is neither improper, nor is it useless. For there is nothing which should be shunned more in discussion and reasoning than a confusion and uncertainty stemming from the words employed, and nothing should be more sought for than distinction and choice (distinctio et selectio) in words and things.75

As is evident from this passage, Pontano’s philosophical method is ultimately based on the notion of elegans distinctio, on the work of semantic discrimination and correctness. In order to argue correctly, one has to distinguish between different meanings and to choose the right word. Despite his attacks on the grammarians and his exaltation of the rhetoricians, Pontano heavily draws on the glossography of the genre de differentiis vocabulorum—a grammatical tradition Valla had brought to a new stage in his Elegantiae.76 In other words, Pontano bases his attempt to create a Latin philosophy mainly on Valla’s method of semantic and formal distinctions. In the end, he is much more interested in the trifles of the grammarians than he openly admits. Lodi Nauta sees Pontano even as “an important witness to the ultimate victory of Vallian method.”77 Almost paradoxically, then, Pontano is one of the true heirs to Valla’s project— despite his polemics and his differing philosophical style. On a philological level, he rewrites Aristotelian philosophy according to the notions of elegantia and consuetudo, combined with an openness for neologisms.78

Rewriting the Ethics Pontano’s aim is not the subversion of the traditional philosophical vocabulary, as in Valla’s case.79 Rather, he employs the semantic distinctions he makes in a careful reformulation of philosophical thought. The fine points of Latin language are implicit in his compositions. One of the first chapters of De sermone offers a

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good example how Pontano succeeds in transforming grammatical and semantic discussions into a fluent and stylistically convincing rewriting of the Ethics. Aristotle had opened his chapter on pleasant conversation with the following sentence: “Since one part of life is relaxation (anápausis) and one aspect of this is entertaining conversation (en tautê diagôgês meta paidias), it is considered that here too there is a kind of social conduct that is in good taste.”80 Apart from the sentence structure, Grosseteste’s and Bruni’s translations of the sentence differ in two points. One minor point concerns the translation of anápausis. While Grosseteste renders it with requies, Bruni chooses cessatio as best suited.81 More importantly, both differ in their translation of paidiê, “play” or “pasttime.” Grosseteste opts for ludus, translating it “in hac conversatione cum ludo.” Bruni, instead, settles on iocunditas and renders the expression with “cum iocunditate temporis transmissio.”82 In the polemical preface to his translation, Bruni openly rejects the translation with ludus. With reference to the Aristotelian definition of the witty person—“those who exercise their humour with good taste are called witty”83—he argues that ludentes is the wrong translation of paizontes. As he maintains, the verb ludere refers rather to pastimes like a game of dice, while iocari means playing with words.84 The distinction between ludus and iocus was to become standard knowledge for future generations. In the fourth book of the Elegantiae, Valla asserts Bruni’s distinction, although he does not abstain from mentioning a series of exceptions to the rule.85 Pontano blends these discussions into the first sentences of his chapter on recreation: Because the life of all men … is full of hard and tiresome work, they need some rest (cessatio) after their labors in which they can restore their minds and have a joke (iocus) among their troubles. For it is natural for us to be enticed by the prospect of some intermission (requies) and enjoyment (voluptas).86

Then he goes on with the remark that all kings and well-ordered societies, first among them the Romans, had established different kinds of entertainments and spectacles (ludi) for their relaxation.87 He also puts forward his observation that even workers tell each other jokes (ioca) in order to enjoy themselves (oblectandi gratia) and alleviate their toils with song.88 Hence, Pontano makes use of the entire range of Bruni’s translations for eutrapelia. He even includes one term taken from the old translator (requies). Furthermore, he reintroduces the word ludus that Bruni had dismissed, albeit in a semantically correct way.89 Pontano’s works are full of similar examples of this kind of implicit semantic distinction. In the second book of De sermone, he discusses the conversational

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virtues regarding truth. Where Aristotle had shortly discussed the two vices of boasting and understatement as well as the virtue of sincerity, Pontano subdivides his book into seventeen chapters, all concerned with variations and different species of sincerity.90 Similarly, the fourth book of De prudentia, based on the Aristotelian consideration of four subspecies of prudence, consists of fourteen chapters, all treating different modes of prudent behavior.91 The list could continue (see Appendix 3). A work like De magnanimitate elaborates on the chapters on magnanimity in the Ethics,92 De fortitudine I expounds those on courage,93 just as De liberalitate and De magnificentia reflect back on the first chapters of Ethics IV.94 Still, this is not a return to Aristotle, but a recovery in terms of contemporary culture. Pontano’s rewriting of Aristotelian philosophy is based on the fact that Naples is not Athens. His audience is interested in a moral analysis of the present by means of the past. In this context, language is not an abstract, timeless entity, but subject to changes. Therefore, the humanists’ insistence on good Latin does not lay claim to formal, stylistic improvements only. More than that, it implies substantial semantic redefinitions. Usage (consuetudo) becomes the leading principle of the analysis of language and reality, of verba and res.95

The places of philosophy Pontano’s Latin philosophy does not merely alter the vocabulary and the theoretical structure of contemporary ethics; it also changes the places in which philosophy was pursued. Some of these places, such as the underworld setting in Charon, are fictional; others, like the royal library or Pontano’s chapel in Naples, are real. To a certain extent, this change of places indicates a modification of philosophical practices, too.96 As Pontano insisted, he was not another Aristotle, and Naples was not another Athens. Indeed, he took on modes of ethical inquiry that were mainly Roman in origin. Also as a social practice, then, Pontano’s philosophy was a Latin philosophy.

On the banks of the Styx Pontano’s Charon is one of the most powerful examples of his reappraisal of the Roman concept of moral philosophy. At first glance, Greek elements seem to prevail; after all, Pontano models his work on Lucian, not on a Roman writer. Thus the underworld judges, Minos and Aeacus, are of Greek origin, and the

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banks of the river Styx recall scenery derived from Greek mythology. Still, as has been said, the dialogue begins with a Ciceronian saying typical for the role of philosophy in the Roman context. The opening passages refer almost verbatim to the introduction of De officiis III, where Cicero reports Scipio’s saying that “he was never less at leisure than when he was at leisure … indicating that in leisure he was wont to think of business … so that he was never idle.”97 Likewise, Minos starts the conversation in Charon with the remark that “those who hold office … should never be idle in their free times.” Far from inactivity, “in spare time one ought to think about the business of the state,” as Minos’ colleague Aeacus puts it, “when the mind has been released somewhat from cares, it should be kept active, because then it has by far the clearest perception of truth.”98 The banks of the river Styx are the best possible place for this exercise. In general, the setting of the underworld had always been one highly conducive to discussions of moral philosophy, “a perennial topos for moralists,” as David Marsh has written.99 As such, the mirror image of the underworld has a strongly protreptic character, aimed at the moral conversion of the reader. For in the afterlife, the real hierarchy of values becomes clear. It is no longer distorted by the deceptions of the material world. People are forced to take off their masks and reveal their true selves. As Lucian shows in his underworld dialogues, this revelation can be highly entertaining. In Dialogues of the Dead, Diogenes invites his colleague Menippus, still roaming the lands of the living, to come and visit him in the underworld. Here, you can have your laugh out in security … it is the best of sport to see millionaires, governors, despots, now mean and insignificant; you can only tell them by their lamentations, and the spiritless despondency which is the legacy of better days.100

Laughter appears as a powerful—and, given the circumstances, the ultimate— tool of moral indignation, expressing relief as well as affirming one’s own position. Lucian’s ferryman is little inspired by philosophical thoughts. With a minimum amount of sophistication and a good dose of pragmatism, he gives instructions to Hermes, explaining that the dead “must leave all this nonsense behind them on shore, and come aboard in their skins. As it is, there will be no room to spare.”101 Accordingly the shadows cannot take their worldly goods with them. Charmoleos of Megara, called the irresistible, has to leave all of his physical beauty behind. Lampichus, tyrant of Gela, is stripped of his wealth as well as his pomp and pride; he is not permitted to keep his diadem and robes, nor is he allowed to bring along his “cruelty, folly, insolence, and hatred.”102

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In a more serious vein, Pontano’s Charon starts off with a rather grave philosophical sentence: What kind of life can mortals have among so many and such manifold constraints, since hope so constantly frustrates and deludes them? I consider this to be their absolutely greatest error, that they count hope among the goddesses—Hope, that handmaid of human fortune, changeable, inconstant, deceptive, and the greatest seductress of everyone, good an wicked alike!103

Charon reports of an old tyrant who, similar to Lucian’s Lampichus, “barely made it here to the shore, naked, weeping, limping, walking like an old man with doddering footsteps, and bringing with him hardly even a ring from so many ill-gotten riches,” possibly an allusion to the late Pope Callixtus III.104 Given his profession, it is not surprising that Charon judges the human condition to be a miserable one, being based mainly on the hope of obtaining material goods, which deludes and mocks the mortals. Minos and Aeacus think highly of their colleague’s speech: “We rejoice, ferryman, that you have grown wise. By Erebus! You philosophize admirably!”105 they congratulate him. Charon answers, Why shouldn’t I philosophize, since for so many years I have heard the discussions of the most learned men as they wander unburied on the other bank? I am delighted by their disputations, and when I have time, I even become a pupil and take great pleasure and rich profit from their words.106

Still, Charon remains puzzled by the improbity and cruelty humans show during their life. His underworld perspective allows him to see through their masks, but not to understand their motivations. Suspended in a place between life and death, he has no real knowledge of the world of the living. The once-human Minos suggests that the answer to this puzzle lies in the moral psychology of human beings. As he explains in neat Peripatetic terminology, recalling the day Aristotle was called into judgment and the speech that he gave, the wickedness of human beings derives from their passionate character, from the violent and disorderly desires which upset reason. The moral failure of human beings is analyzed in terms of an upheaval of their irrational, disorderly forces which gain the upper hand over reason and order.107 This is emblematically shown in the killings of Pythagoras, Socrates, and Jesus—all bearers of truth— caused, in Minos’ eyes, by “the race of mortals … blind and overcome by its own lusts and driven to madness.”108 Only the Manes, no more hindered by their bodies, recognize the moral authority of those they have killed and finally follow them, “pure and completely cleansed of the pollution of the body.”109

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With this scenery, Pontano creates a powerful image of philosophy as a meditation on death. His fiction corresponds to a philosophical exercise that Cicero describes in the Tusculan Disputations: [T]he whole life of a philosopher is … a meditation on death. For what else is it that we do, when we call off our minds from pleasure, that is to say, from our attention to the body, from the managing our domestic estate, which is a sort of handmaid and servant of the body, or from duties of a public nature, or from all other business whatever? What else is it, I say, that we do, but invite the soul to reflect on itself? oblige it to converse with itself, and, as far as possible, break off its acquaintance with the body? Now, to separate the soul from the body, is to learn to die, and nothing else whatever.110

For Cicero, the key to philosophical knowledge lies in the separation of the soul from the body and all worldly goods. In Lucian’s and Pontano’s fictional dialogues, this separation has already taken place. Charon, the ferryman, automatically sees the life of each individual sub specie mortis. In living reality, however, things are more complicated. The separation of the soul from the body does not take place automatically, but rather indicates a process and a philosophical exercise.111 It is important to note that this exercise does not primarily concern the afterlife: the meditation on death is most relevant to one’s worldly affairs. It is directed against an unreflective life that does not bother with self-knowledge, too satisfied with convention, and too busy to pose the question of the good life. As Julia Annas has noted, with reference to moral philosophy in antiquity, “it is assumed that people of average intellect with a modicum of leisure will at some point reflect on their lives and ask whether they are as they should be, or whether they could be improved.”112

From court to academy For the humanists, the most important point of reference for this reflection is literature. In most cases, their emphasis on formal training and philological skills dovetails with a focus on the philosophical aspects of their studies. Philosophy and literature are closely intertwined and occur in different places and various institutional settings. In the Neapolitan case, the first important place of philosophy was the royal library. In the literary séances that took place there, humanists such as Panormita read and explained the works of ancient writers, mostly historians and poets. Within this institutional framework, the humanists acted as teachers to the king. As has been said, they followed different models in doing so, but their fundamental aim was the same. Their explanation of classical

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writings imparted moral and political knowledge to the king and the members of the court. These reading sessions and the discussions that ensued were perfect examples of leisure time well spent, a short and regular break of daily routine that was passed in the mirror world of ancient literature and philosophy. During Ferrante’s reign, the reading hours no longer took place. Two different philosophical practices substituted them. Firstly, the relationship between the royal family and the men of letters became more intimate and personalized. Pontano’s relationship with Duke Alfonso was the clearest example of this shift. First the teacher, then the secretary and confidant of the duke, it might be something of an exaggeration to describe Pontano as Alfonso’s spiritual guide; nonetheless he was sufficiently intimate with the duke so as to use frank and even offensive language in some of his letters.113 Within this institutional framework, philosophy was deprofessionalized. Similar to the situation at the beginning of the Roman Empire, philosophy was no longer external to daily life and political life, but became increasingly intertwined with them. Counsels of prudence and detailed recommendations began to substitute general models of good conduct.114 In this way, the private rooms of kings and princes turned into places of philosophy, although the philosopher’s specifically philosophical function became increasingly blurred during the process.115 A second consequence of the end of the literary séances in the royal library was the foundation of the Neapolitan academy, first under Panormita’s, then Pontano’s guidance. The first meetings of the academy took place outdoors, under the Arcades, close to Panormita’s home.116 Different from the king’s reading hours in the library, these meetings seem to have been open to passers-by. As Shulamit Furstenberg-Levi argues, this stage of the Neapolitan academy was characterized by “a lack of structures and rules, and an openness both of the architecture and the mentality.”117 This openness was also reflected in the composition of the academy. Its members comprised of different social classes: city nobles like Tristano Caracciolo, barons such as the Acquaviva brothers, and newcomers from the “bourgeousie,” like Jacopo Sannazaro.118 These members were bound together by a sense of friendship (amicitia), a term that should not be underestimated: friendship was a complex phenomenon that presupposed an affinity of mind (animorum coniunctio) as well as a bond of affection, patronage, and hospitality (necessitudo, clientela, hospitalitas).119 In the case of the Neapolitan academy it was closely connected with the Aragonese administration, that is, the “middle class” whose status fell between that of nobles, courtiers, and the populace. Pontano, for one, had been a client and pupil of Panormita in his younger years. Indeed, the older humanist had been his entry point to the Neapolitan networks of patronage.120

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During later years, the academy moved to Pontano’s house on Via dei Tribunali.121 This change of location reflected a change in the structure and organization of the academy. It symbolized the increasing importance of Pontano as the head of the academy. Under his direction, different types of membership were constituted. The members of the academy could be comrades (sodales) as well as pupils (alumni) or listeners (auditor).122 The dialogic structure of the gatherings that took place close to Panormita’s house changed more and more into a monologic structure concentrated on the figure of Pontano as master and undisputed leader.

“Know Thyself ” Pontano based his authority on a supreme self-scrutiny that corresponded to his sophisticated self-presentation as a politician and intellectual. The guiding principle of this self-scrutiny was the aphorism “Know Thyself,” originally engraved in the vestibule of the temple of Apollo at Delphi.123 Pontano included it in his epitaph: “Thou knowest now who I am, or more properly who I was./ For thee, stranger, I who am in darkness cannot know thee,/But I entreat thee to know thyself. Farewell.”124 Pontano was quite fond of the Delphic saying. Apart from his epitaph, he also put it among the inscriptions of his chapel: “In all stations of life, it is most important to know thyself.”125 This precept was not the expression of an existential predicament, but a guide to the practical life. This relationship between inner experience and the experience of the world, inextricably intertwined in the self, becomes more obvious in De magnanimitate. Here, the magnanimous man is depicted as a master of self-examination, “as if the saying ‘know thyself ’ had been handed down especially for [him].” The magnanimus, Pontano argues, must first of all take measure of himself. He must carefully weigh his own capabilities in order to judge whether he is in fact able to accomplish a certain task. For if he turns out to be an unjust judge of himself and does not manage to set himself feasible goals, he will fail in a ridiculous and miserable manner—just like Phaethon driving the sun chariot.126 Therefore, the knowledge of the self consists mainly of introspection, an examination of what needs to be done and whether it can be done. Accordingly, it implies a temporary withdrawal from the active life, a moment of reflection. On the other hand, this practice aims at concrete action. It explores one’s capabilities as well as one’s personal limits, being an important instrument that guides one’s decisions. In short, it is crucial to examine the question of the self in order to know what is suitable and fitting for oneself. The answer to this question is the key to right action as well as to the good life. As such, it stands at the center of ethical inquiry.

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No one took this exhortation more seriously than Pontano himself. As noted previously, his tempietto symbolized his well-earned retirement; it represented one of the fruits of his active life.127 More than a simple building, it was an expression of Pontano’s self. Accordingly, it was the ideal place to announce the principles of his made-to-measure philosophy. As Pontano explains to his friends in De prudentia, When you listen to me, you will not listen to a philosopher, nor to a man wellversed in Plato’s Lyceum or in Peripatetic promenading; instead, you listen to someone who discusses the philosophical doctrines of the ancient Greeks and Romans; I am more of an admirer than someone who has devoted himself exclusively to these matters for all of his life. For you know the kind of affairs in which I have been engaged, and the nature of the leisure in which I used to study and examine them. Let me pursue, then, with you free from extravagance and with moderation, less pointedly and thoughtful (argute examinateque) than openly and experienced (aperte atque experienter). Discussing human action, we will proceed in this way, since I want to gain knowledge about action itself as well as its principles rather through its appearance and countenance (magis a fronte, oreque), than by looking into and rummaging through it (introspicere ac rimari). For this does not correspond to our discussion, nor to time, nor to my mode of thinking.128

In other words, Pontano bases his philosophy on the fact that he is not a philosopher. At least he is not a “professional” philosopher who has spent his whole life teaching and studying philosophy. Pontano knows himself well; he is modest enough to recognize the insufficiency of his learning. Well aware of the fact that his activities as diplomat and politician had not allowed him to study philosophy in depth, he freely admits that his knowledge has remained on the surface. Correspondingly, his method does not consist of a rigorous and thorough examination of philosophical doctrines; rather it is an open discussion of moral philosophy rooted in the experience of a man who had spent all his life in important business. Pontano’s self-assessment allows him to calibrate his style of philosophical inquiry to his person. However, this calibration has a disquieting side effect. The more Pontano brings his own person into focus, the more he loses sight of other styles of philosophical inquiry. His alleged modesty results in the establishment of a new philosophical style, to the detriment of others. The “open” discussion that suits Pontano is the opposite of the “closed” discussions of the scholastics. It turns against the idea of philosophy made by philosophers for philosophers, rejecting all technicalities and emphasizing the importance of experience.

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Furthermore, Pontano’s self-affirmation offsets Valla’s philosophical method. Obviously, Pontano’s idea of a philosophy that does not “rummage through” action and its principles is a far cry from Valla’s concept that philosophy should be put to the plough, as the term repastinatio suggests. While the latter implies an element of aggression and even destructiveness, Pontano’s own proposal not to go into “depth” and to remain on the “surface” of things completely changes the usual polarity between depth and surface. Going into depth is presented as something negative and undesirable, whereas staying on the surface becomes something positive. Accordingly, the person of the philosopher changed, and so did the times and places of philosophy. Pontano’s chapel was the proof of Pontano’s experience and success. It represented a closed space and retreat, but one that communicated with the outside. The selfhood in question was not an autonomous and individualistic space; it made part of an open public space. Pontano’s decision to put the Delphic saying on the walls of his chapel symbolized this relationship very well; it separated and combined the internal and external dimensions of experience, exhorting and inviting not only Pontano, but also those who walked past and looked upon it to know themselves.

Part Three

Virtue, Inside Out Giovanni Pontano was not a professional philosopher, as he himself willingly admitted in the prologue to De prudentia. Still, philosophy played a central role in his life. As the first two parts of the book tried to show, the idea of a good and virtuous life guided his political practice and intellectual endeavors. This is not to suggest that Pontano followed his own moral and political precepts down to the last detail, nor that his treatises can be taken at face value. The path to virtue was a rather tortuous one. Notions such as “good” and “virtue” were highly contested and had no fixed contours. Still, these notions shaped political, social, and intellectual practices, while they were themselves strongly affected by these same practices. In Part One, these practices include the developing art of diplomacy as well as the challenge of shaping one’s role as secretary to the king; other practices involve building a country estate or a chapel as place of refuge, or the dedication to the contemplative life in one’s old age. All these practices are ethically “charged,” as are the intellectual practices explored in Part Two, for Pontano and his contemporaries connect questions of how to interpret texts and how to weigh literary authorities to questions of character and philosophical style. Pontano, too, is well aware of the importance of practice, albeit in a different sense. He connects practical philosophy mainly to action. As has been said, the orientation toward action, and not theory, is a genuine Aristotelian point. In Pontano’s case, however, his intellectual outlook and philosophical style reinforces this tendency to look at moral and political conduct “head-on,” leaving aside unnecessary theoretical discussions and “squabbles” about minor details. Virtue is, as it were, in plain view. Pontano therefore decides to remain on the “surface” of things, mapping the moral and political landscape of fifteenth-century Italy with great precision and detail. All the same, his moral and political thought is more than a portrait of contemporary culture. Pontano’s

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disclaimer that he is not a philosopher should not be understood as excluding any kind of theoretical work. His treatises are not simple repetitions of precepts regarding virtuous conduct, but discuss the notion of virtue and the many issues connected to it: the good life, the problem of how to develop habits, the question of the mean, and the role of prudence. In its outline, Pontano’s virtue theory is straightforward, and the general precept that underlies his moral and political thought is as clear as it is obvious: virtue has to be sought in the rule of reason. The question how the rule of reason has to be implemented is less straightforward, however, and Pontano acknowledges the complex reality within which moral actors operate. He is well aware that moral decisions and moral actions do not take place in a vacuum and attempts to account for the intricacies of moral behavior. The body and the irrational part of the soul contrast reason on an individual level, and so does fortune, by distorting the outcomes of rational action. Likewise, the virtuousness of the ruler is not a self-evident fact, but has to be represented and constructed, striking a difficult balance between his being virtuous and his appearing to be virtuous. In short, the rule of reason cannot be assumed, rather it requires implementation into different contexts. Pontano did not need to invent a new philosophy in order to tackle these questions. In accordance with his program to rewrite moral philosophy, he was able to call on a vast body of literature, most importantly on Aristotle’s Ethics. His writings represent a sophisticated reformulation of virtue ethics in the Aristotelian tradition. At the same time, Pontano’s moral and political thought vigorously rejects the more radical propositions of humanist authors like Lorenzo Valla and Poggio Bracciolini. In the Retractatio, Valla had attacked the very foundations of Aristotelian moral philosophy, whereas Poggio had assailed the paradigm of the good and wise ruler in De infelicitate. In order to understand Pontano’s works as a reaction to their provocative theses, a brief summary of these authors is provided in the beginning of the following chapters.

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Like any figure elaborating on the theory of virtues in an Aristotelian framework, Pontano holds that an inquiry into the good life is aided by an investigation into human nature. The moral virtues are not supernatural gifts of God, but can be acquired through natural means.1 Consequently, to understand virtue means to understand the natural constitution of human beings. As modern virtue theorists like Philippa Foot, Rosalind Hursthouse, and Julia Annas have argued, classical naturalist accounts of virtue are not formulated in terms of physics, but rather in biological and ethological terms.2 Indeed, for Pontano and his contemporaries, the explanation of what virtue is consists mainly in a moral psychology based on Aristotle’s account of the soul and the Aristotelian tradition, but also on the theory of bodily humors and their mixtures. Since these mixtures are linked to the movement of the stars, the concept of virtue is also related to astrological theories. Accordingly, Pontano’s inquiry into the principles of virtue draws on knowledge of different fields and merge metaphysical, astrological, and ethical notions into a strong moral psychology. This psychology does not abolish the rule of reason, but it illustrates the complex structures into which this rule had to be implemented. Whereas the exhortative side of moral philosophy calls for a rhetoric of subjugation, its psychological side warrants a more conciliatory settlement. As Margaret Atkins and Thomas Williams have pointed out in the context of Aquinas’s theory of virtue, the parts of the soul are not only ordered hierarchically, but also inclusively. The rational part of the soul is the noblest part of human nature. Still, it does not supersede the other parts: “the aim of rational activity is the good of the person as a whole integrated system that includes a variety of inclinations; it is not the good of reason itself.”3 The rule of reason is not despotic, but political. A similar argument concerns the external factors of human action. Virtue cannot simply conquer fortune; it has to come to terms with it. Following the rule of reason, it also has to accept the rule of fortune.

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A virgin in the brothel One of the greatest critics of the rule-of-reason model was Lorenza Valla. His claim that pleasure was the highest good had turned substantial attention toward the sensual, irrational aspects of human life. Indeed, his dialogue De voluptate remained notorious primarily for the Epicurean interlocutor’s celebration of sensual pleasures, not the Christian interlocutor’s praise of heavenly pleasures. Still, Valla objected to the rule of reason in a much more sophisticated manner. His reform of Aristotelian dialectic in the different versions of the Dialectical Disputations—from the Repastinatio (first circulated in 1439) to the Retractatio (begun in 1448 and unfinished due to Valla’s death)—also led to a reform of Aristotelian psychology and ethics.4 According to his radical simplification of the categories, Valla defines the soul as a substance with three distinct qualities: memory (memoria), reason (ratio), and will (voluntas).5 As Lodi Nauta observes, each of these qualities performs a specific action: memory comprehends and retains, reason examines and judges, will desires or rejects.6 As a result of this conception, Valla completely dismisses the idea of a hierarchically ordered soul and abandons the traditional taxonomy of living beings. For Valla, plants, for example, have no soul at all, but a certain freshness and vigor (viriditas) as life force.7 In contrast, every living being that has a soul is gifted with all three of its qualities. Therefore, beasts are gifted with reason. Human beings are not different from other animals by virtue of participating in reason. Rather, it is simply the case that their reason shines brighter than that of other animals: “Just as earthly fires down here are very like heavenly fires up there, the same goes for the souls of animals and our souls, for like the lights of candles theirs are snuffed out, and ours live on forever like the stars.”8 Valla’s new psychology also gives rise to a new theory of virtue. In De voluptate, Valla already introduces major modifications to Aristotelian moral thought. Most importantly, of course, the Epicurean speaker of books I and II defines pleasure as the highest good.9 In addition, “Antonio da Rho,” the Christian speaker in book III, abandons the Aristotelian classification of virtues. Instead of opposing two vices to each virtue, “Antonio” contrasts only one vice with one virtue. Thus, courage is not a virtue between the vices of cowardice and rashness. Rather, the virtue of courage is opposed to the vice of rashness, as the virtue of caution is opposed to the vice of cowardice.10 The Aristotelian definition of virtue as a mean between two extremes is similarly rejected. For “Antonio,” the middle course is not necessarily good, nor are extremes necessarily bad.11

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In the Dialectical Disputations, Valla radicalizes the propositions of De voluptate. Based on his psychology, he proposes a new organization of the four cardinal virtues. With the exception of prudence, he makes them all reside in the will, describing them not as “habits,” as Aristotelians would have it, but rather as “passions” (affectus). In a certain sense, these passions are under the rule of reason: if they follow reason, they are virtues; if not, they are vices. However, with the will as most important factor of virtuous action, a shift from knowledge to volition takes place. Virtuous behavior does not show in knowing what is good, but in willing it.12 Within this scheme, the intellect loses his supremacy over the will. As Valla writes apologetically, “those who make the intellect master and ruler of the will are wrong.”13 The different parts of the soul fulfill different functions, but they are not hierarchically ordered. The intellect does not rule over the other parts of the soul, but depends on them, as they depend on the intellect. In Valla’s model of the soul no single part rules over the others. Valla’s emphasis on the will has several important consequences. First of all, it excludes prudence from the cardinal virtues. For Valla, prudence no longer counts as a virtue at all, since it resides in the intellect, not in the will.14 Following a passage from De officiis,15 Valla argues that prudence has to be accompanied by justice in order to be good. He then describes prudence without justice as malice (malitia).16 In like manner, he argues that Roman law affirms that a word like “guile” (dolus) could be “good” or “bad,” depending on the circumstances and its use.17 As a result, prudence falls out of the picture. Another consequence of Valla’s emphasis on the will concerns the acquisition and the loss of virtue. As Valla’s definition of virtue as a passion implies, virtue is not an action, nor is it a habit.18 What matters was not the act in itself (say, giving money), nor the disposition that prompts the act (for example, liberality), but the intention with which the act is performed (that is, to do something good by giving money). In Valla’s ethics, the realm of virtue is much less calm and predictable than in other theories. In contrast to Aristotelian virtue, the virtue of the Dialectical Disputations is not something that can be learned or acquired step by step. As Valla argues, habits belong to the intellect. Prudence, the arts, and all kinds of learning are habits, and as such “they are learned slowly over time, and they are forced out of habit with the same difficulty, as if driven from house and home.”19 Virtue is not; it “swiftly comes and swiftly goes, not only ordinary virtue but also the greatest—and vice likewise.”20 Valla illustrates his point with various examples. Concerning the acquisition of virtue, he recalls the figure of Polemon, who turned from a dissolute drunkard into a moderate philosopher in only one night, and of the thief on the cross

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who repented.21 In both cases, the acquisition of virtue does not relate to any particular action, nor to a slow process of habituation. In one single act of will both Polemon and the thief change their attitude. Conversely, Valla ridicules those who stick to the Aristotelian definition of virtue as habit. First and foremost, he takes aim at Boethius. As a good Aristotelian, Boethius argues that the performance of one single act of justice will not render a person just. Vice versa, someone who commits adultery on a single occasion will not be regarded as an adulterer.22 Valla confutes this argument with two examples of his own: Why did he not add that if a virgin were to spend one day in a whorehouse she would not cease being a virgin unless she kept up the prostitution? Or that a person who carried out a slaughter would not be a murderer, even if a hundred people died in one day, unless from then on he kept perpetrating slaughter, nor could he be accused of slaughter?23

As Valla maintains, virtue and vice are caused by a single act (ex uno actu).24 Being subject to the will, they are apprehended without degrees (sine gradibus) and by a certain impulse (impetu quodam). As it were, the will has the power to set a new reference point for our actions. We can achieve virtue by simply “changing our mind.” Thus, with shades of Dickens’s Ebenezer Scrooge, a miser might turn into a generous person overnight. Of course, Valla bases his concept of virtue on the Christian idea of conversion. Indeed, some of Valla’s more radical positions derive from his attempt to create a Christian ethics that is closer to the teachings of the New Testament than to those of Aristotle. Thus, he rejects the idea of virtue as a mean (mediocritas) not only by dialectal reasoning, but also by means of a quotation from the Book of Revelation: “You see how I have put vice in the mean, where God also put it, saying. ‘Would that you were hot or cold, but because you are lukewarm I will start to vomit you out of my mouth.’”25 For Valla, Aristotelian virtues are mediocre virtues, while he wants the virtues to be outstanding and extreme. To him, very pale Germans and very black Ethiopians are more appealing than swarthy Egyptians and dark Medes.26 All the discussions on deficiency and excess are a sham: “The way you cover up with words is also just trickery. The whole thing is measured by understanding and good will, not the bigness, smallness or middlingness of the object involved.”27 Valla’s ethics radically changes the premises of virtuous behavior. It is much more particularistic than its Aristotelian counterpart, less intent on moderation than on excellence. In this sense, the moral philosophy proposed by Valla explains some of his character traits and offers the more profound reasons for his disagreements with his contemporaries. His whole approach challenges the moral culture of his time and changes the coordinates of moral and political

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conduct. With Valla’s ethics, this conduct becomes less controllable and stable. What was seen as a process of education and character development by his contemporaries dissolves into a series of ever-new decisions that put one’s moral and political credentials at risk. Living a good life grows more difficult in Valla’s moral thought. Everyone’s integrity becomes more vulnerable, not only in everyday life, but even more in political life. From this perspective, the virgin in the brothel is not only a symbol for dissoluteness, but for the fragile character of virtue.

The three bodies Pontano’s moral philosophy took an altogether different turn than Valla’s. Whereas Valla loves shock effects, Pontano tends to avoid extremes. Pontano shows few signs of intellectual rebellion, although it seems slightly misleading to see his philosophy as mainly inspired by the idea of harmony.28 In his treatises, he clearly strives toward a traditional formulation of Aristotelian psychology and ethics, implicitly rejecting Valla’s ideas on moral philosophy. Nevertheless, Pontano’s own moral philosophy has its own characteristic contours and edges to it. Along these lines, Book VII of De rebus coelestibus, dedicated to Pietro Bembo, opens with the figure of Geryon, king of Erytheia. As Pontano explains, the poets describe Geryon as having three bodies (tricorpor).29 In this way, Pontano maintains, they hint at the three kinds of soul inherent in human beings, alluding to traditional accounts of the soul as tripartite. For Pontano, too, the tripartite model of the soul is one of the tenets of his moral thought. He recounts it throughout his works, albeit with slight modifications. The version in De rebus coelestibus VII starts with the first kind of soul that is characteristic for plants. It is “vegetative,” insofar as it is concerned mainly with nutrition and the power of growth. The second kind of soul is the “sensitive” soul. It derives its name from sense perception.30 Contrary to the vegetative soul, it is able to move the body. According to Pontano, sense perception is never a neutral observation, but always accompanied by a natural estimation. This estimation results in the desire to strive for the beneficial and to flee from what is detrimental.31 By nature, both the vegetative and sensitive soul are servile and submit to the authority of the third kind of soul, the rational soul. While the rational soul assumes the command, the other two kinds of souls act as servants. The sensitive soul is its “attendant” (ministra). It searches out the necessary information,

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prepares it, and presents it to the rational soul.32 The rational soul then considers this information, weighs it carefully, separates it into different parts, examines these parts, and gives a judgment.33 Human action proceeds from this last part of the soul. Some actions rely mainly on the body and its parts, others on the work of the senses.34 In this and other accounts, Pontano exalts the rule of reason. As he puts it, the rational part of the soul is as far removed from the vegetative and sensitive parts as it is close to the divine essence.35 In De prudentia, he describes reason as the most noble part of human nature having a touch of divinity.36 This predominance of reason prompts a strong hierarchical ordering of the soul. Living beings are placed on an ascending scale according to their psychological makeup: first plants, then beasts, and finally, human beings. The scheme starts with the lower parts of the soul and culminates in its highest part, reason. Correspondingly, Pontano characterizes the relationship between the rational and irrational parts of the soul in the political vocabulary of rule and obedience, supreme power, and servitude. In Charon, for instance, the violent and disorderly desires are said to upset reason as if in a rebellion.37 In a similar vein, De obedientia opens with the categorical statement that all old and new philosophy, and all divine and human law labors on and strives for one thing: that the motions of the soul obey reason in order to prevent them from moving around too freely, here and there, as if they were unguarded.38

Indeed, obedience becomes a central tenet of Pontano’s theory of virtue, as it defines the habit of obeying all precepts that have their origin in reason.39 Still, there is another side to Pontano’s moral psychology. The myth of Geryon’s three bodies is more than an allegory for the different parts of the soul. The argument in De rebus coelistibus is not only that the three bodies symbolize the tripartite nature of the soul. It also claims that there are three kinds of body, and that each of them corresponds to a kind of soul. This conception complicates the picture, as it introduces different patterns of moral work on the body and the soul. In this picture, the rule of reason is the beginning, not the end, of all wisdom. It is not a mantra to be repeated over and over again, as is sometimes suggested. Rather, Pontano’s moral philosophy elaborates on the ways in which the rule of reason has to be implemented in human nature.

Principles of change Pontano’s emphasis on the bodily aspects of human psychology suggests some strong modifications to the model of the supremacy of reason. First of all, it

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prompts him to adopt important physical and metaphysical notions in his moral thought. Aristotelian hylomorphism is one of his main explanatory tools, applicable to many different fields.40 Thus, Pontano explains the influence of the stars on the sublunar world in terms of form and matter. Likewise, he describes the act of human procreation in these terms, with the male as formative and the female as material principle.41 He employs them even in his account of the creation.42 In doing so, he follows a well-established tradition that is also prominent in accounts of the relationship between body and soul. Thomas Aquinas, for one, describes this relationship in terms of the distinction between form and matter in the Summa Theologiae: [T]here are two ways in which something is said to be natural to a man; one is according to the nature of genus, the other according to his individual nature. And, since each thing derives its species from its form, and its individuation from matter, and, again, since man’s form is his rational soul, while his matter is his body, whatever belongs to him in respect of his rational soul, is natural to him in respect of his nature of genus; while whatever belongs to him in respect of the particular temperament of his body, is natural to him in respect of his individual nature.43

Pontano relies on this distinction, too. In the case of moral philosophy, it helps him to develop a theory of virtue that encompasses different ways to enact the rule of reason in the realms of the body. Within the framework of this theory, the rule of reason is not automatically assumed, but has to be established in a long and difficult process. Virtue is involved in this process on at least three different levels, approximately corresponding to King Geryon’s three bodies. Firstly, it is not innate but has to be acquired, analogous to physical skills. Just as a child gradually gains control over his or her body and learns to walk by constant training, virtue results from the steady exercise of action. Reason has to inform the body and its parts in order to coordinate its movements. Secondly, virtue is concerned with the appetitive part of the soul, regulating the bodily passions. Thirdly, the human mind is not immaterial. As Pontano maintains, there is a material side to its operations, a kind of rational body. Therefore, the virtues have to take into account one’s character and to “cultivate” the natural skills inherent in it. Formation, regulation, and cultivation—in their basic outline, Pontano grounds all three processes on the Aristotelian account of how things come to be and change, describing the generation of the virtues in terms of form, matter, and privation. In his Physics, Aristotle delineates how something comes to be by means of these three principles. In his example, an “uncultured man” (ho

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amousos anthrôpos) becomes a “cultivated man” (ho mousikos anthrôpos).44 First of all, the underlying principle that remains constant throughout change is matter, or “man.”45 The attribute the man receives, “cultivated,” is the second principle, form. The third principle, privation, refers to the attribute “uncultured” and does so in two senses. As Aquinas elucidates in his commentary on the Physics, in the case of the “uncultured man” it refers to the matter “man” as not yet having the form “cultivated.” In the case of the “cultivated man,” however, it denotes the disappearance of the old form—“uncultured”—in favor of the new one—“cultivated.”46 Pontano also draws on a second aspect of Aristotle’s account of change. Coming-into-being consists not only in the formation of matter, but also in the actualization of some potentiality. The sculptor gives form to the marble block and transforms it into a statue; he realizes one of the many forms that are potential in the marble. In the case of living things, however, matters are more complicated. Here, form is not static, but rather a dynamic property. The form of the acorn is not so much its shape, but rather its end—it exists in order to grow into an oak tree. In Aristotelian terminology, the acorn is potentially an oak tree, and the process of growing into an oak tree is the actualization of this potential.

Formation In his account of human moral psychology, Pontano employs the traditional Aristotelian notions of matter, form, privation, potentiality, and actuality to great effect. Using these terms, he captures different moments of the development of human nature and the processes connected to it. A striking example is his use of the term “privation”—the state of not possessing an attribute or being deprived of it.47 In Pontano’s hands, this metaphysical notion turns into an anthropological description of the human condition in its initial phase. As he remarks in De prudentia I, humans are born without any means to sustain themselves.48 Newborn babies and small children are totally dependent on their parents. While young animals are relatively quick to learn how to survive without their parents, it takes years for human children to acquire the skills necessary for a life on their own. In contrast with the instinctive behavior of animals, humans gain their autonomy only slowly and with much labor and toil.49 Nothing comes easily to them; everything has to be acquired by hard training. A paradigmatic case is language. Notwithstanding that human beings are the only animals gifted with speech, it takes them a long time to become proficient in their language.50

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In Pontano’s description, then, “privation” is not an abstract principle, but man’s constant companion. Pontano comes up with a number of expressions such as inopia, penuria, and indigentia in order to translate Aristotle’s sterêsis, reconnecting it to a range of human experiences. The natural indigence of human beings, a recurrent theme in the miseria hominis literature, becomes the basis for Pontano’s outline of human action. Together with the distinction between matter and form, it helps him to explain the development of human beings. For the initial indigence of man does not betray a simple incompetence or inability. Human beings are not to remain in their state of privation. Rather, man’s privation triggers his desires, setting him in motion and making him realize the potentials inherent in his or her nature. Thus, newborn babies cannot walk, but learn to do so as time goes by. Pontano describes this learning process in some detail. First, little children cannot stand up straight and walk. Their limbs are too weak, and so they start moving around by crawling on all fours. Next, they pull themselves upright and use a support, slowly moving their feet. Later, they hold on to their wet-nurse and make their first steps under her guidance, enticed by her compliments. Then, they grow stronger and learn how to move without any support. In the end, they jump and run as they like.51 This process of learning to walk can be explained quite accurately in the terms of coming-into-being and the actualization of a natural potential. One of the powers that constitute the “form” of human beings is the power to walk upright.52 In this case, form is not a static property like the shape of a marble statue, but a set of powers that constitute human nature. Potentially, a newborn baby also has the power to walk; but it cannot do so in its state of “privation.” Yet, the necessary “matter,” the material support, is there—its feet. In order to actually walk upright, it has to activate this potentiality by exercising them. It learns how to walk by trying to walk: first strengthening its limbs, then crawling on all fours, then using a support. The ability to walk develops out of a continuous exercise, it slowly “takes shape,” as the child learns to use its feet. The same applies to other parts of the body. As Pontano puts it, all these parts fulfill different functions. While feet serve to hold up the rest of the body and to walk, the hands serve to work and to take things. These functions are there, even if a child does not know how to use its hands and feet properly in the beginning of his or her life. The parts of the body are not simply there; they serve a certain purpose and perform certain actions. It is for this reason that Pontano describes actions as their form-givers, informatrices. Action gives a “form” to the single parts of the body by establishing their patterns of behavior.53

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Similar to the body, the mind is also subject to a process of formation. After giving the example of a child learning to walk, Pontano continued his argument by asserting that for the same reason, the mind is gradually brought to perfection. For in the beginning it is frail and rather weak. Before its power is confirmed and everything that sense, observation, attentiveness and experience have brought together abides, it relies on conjectures, examples, and the admonitions, teachings, and judgements of others. Afterwards it results as trained by a lot of sustained action, expert through the exercise of many different things, considered by thought and investigation, and circumspect by consulting itself as well as reason, estimating both general and particular aspects.54

Not only do children have to learn how to walk, they also have to learn how to use their minds, as Pontano underlines throughout his works. Initially, they display ignorance and inexperience and need to be educated in schools, he argues in De prudentia.55 By constant training, they develop their mental abilities to the point that they reach the highest levels of cognition and knowledge, he maintains in De rebus coelestibus.56 Pontano’s account of the acquisition of virtues relies on much the same terminology. According to the two sides of human nature, human action is based on two principles: reason and appetite. “[A]s we are born and raised for action and also partake of reason, so we are impelled to action under the guidance of nature, while right reason, constant in itself, moderates our actions.”57 Obviously, this is a rather traditional statement, based on Aristotelian principles of action.58 As Pontano stresses, the virtues do not come into play automatically.59 The virtues are engendered in human beings neither by nor contrary to nature; rather they have to be acquired by action, exercise, and habituation, as Aristotle states in the Ethics.60 In other words, human beings have the potential to become virtuous. Just as a father will provide his son with weapons and armory when he goes to the military, and as the diplomat will supply his son with money and letters of recommendation when he goes on his first mission, thus nature provides us with the necessary faculties to acquire virtue.61 The young soldier and the budding diplomat have to prove their worth by using their weapons and their money and letters, respectively, and man has to acquire virtue by using the instruments nature has given him.62 Action informs our habits. As the child learns how to walk by trying to walk, man becomes virtuous by acting virtuously. In the child’s case, the underlying “matter”—that is, the instruments—of this process is his or her feet. In the case of the virtues, the “matter” differs from virtue to virtue, although some virtues share the same matter. Liberality and magnificence, for example, are both concerned

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with the right use of money.63 It is the frequent exercise of actions that gives “form” to this “matter.” Actions are the form-givers of virtue, as long as they are guided and moderated by reason. The just man becomes just by acting justly, just as diplomat develops his skills by negotiating. Likewise, the habit of the magnanimous man will be called magnanimity, that of the brave man will be called bravery, and so forth.64

Regulation This description of the acquisition of virtue is based on a sophisticated analogy of the elementary skill of the “first” body: walking. Yet, the most important instruments of the body are not the body parts, but the bodily desires, or passions, of the “second” body. Instead of rejecting the passions, Pontano includes them in his account of human action and virtue. Moral action under the guidance of reason does not necessitate their suppression or eradication, as Stoic philosophy demands, but their regulation and inclusion within the economy of human nature, just as the Peripatetics insist. This insight characterizes Pontano’s entire corpus. Even in the rather stern pages of his treatise on obedience, he acknowledges the importance of the passions. Sensual pleasure, for example, is a necessary element of human life. A life without pleasure would resemble that of the hermits, who live on water and herbs only, and have no sexual experiences— an almost indecent outlook for Pontano. After all, one could enjoy the play of the lyre and song, the smell of flowers, the sight of a beautiful painting, or a pleasant conversation without necessarily falling into vice.65 However, the passions do not only enrich and deepen human experience. They also have a precise function within the framework of human action. Moving and affecting us, they impel us to action. In De fortitudine, Pontano remarks that “these natural movements and impulses, from which the passions arise or rather which are the passions, elicit us to action.” Therefore, no one will deny that they are given to man by nature neither by chance nor in vain.66 The same point is made in the much later De prudentia. “We are moved by being affected, and affect is nothing but motion,” Pontano affirms. Whenever our senses, appetites, or our mind bring something before us that seems useful, pleasant, or good, first our desire is aroused, then we move to action and satisfy our desire.67 Hence, passions are the driving forces of human action: Not only has nature endowed us with instruments indispensable and apt for action, and with a divine mind that judges and inquires into everything, she has also implanted in us the affects by which we are moved and impelled towards everything that seems useful, honourable, enjoyable and good.68

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Accordingly, human action is constituted by three factors: the body and its parts are the instruments of action; the mind regulates and controls the action; the passions set mind and body in motion. This motion is based on two basic reactions to the world: the pursuit of what seems favorable and the avoidance of what seems detrimental. Scholastic accounts like Thomas Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae subsume these reactions under the heading of the “concupiscible” appetite. Besides the concupiscible appetite, such commentaries also refer to an “irascible” appetite dealing with objects that are difficult to attain or to avoid. According to the Summa, the irascible passions “add something to those of the concupiscible faculty; … hope adds to desire a certain effort, and a certain rising of the spirits,” while “fear adds to aversion … a certain lowness of spirits.”69 Pontano follows the outlines of this model. In De prudentia, he introduces the concupiscible appetite as concerned with things good and pleasurable, whereas he describes the irascible appetite as concerned with all kinds of obstacles, difficulties, and dangers.70 Yet, Pontano also changes Aquinas’s account in a significant way. Instead of treating the concupiscible and irascible appetites as two classes of passions, he tends to distinguish between the “direction” of the passion (toward the desired object or away from an undesirable object) and its intensity. As [the passions] are some kind of motion, it is quite clear that they are sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker, and at other times hold on to a middle course that lies between what is too little and what is too much. For we are moved and affected with more or less intensity, or in a mediate way, that is to an adequate degree. Therefore, it is necessary that reason assesses the passions and applies a certain measure to them.71

Reason uses the passions, but has to restrain it within its limits or compel it further than it would go on its own.72 De rebus coelistibus describes the concupiscible and irascible aspects of passion in physiological terms. In Pontano, as in any other classical astrological theory, the planets control the humors of the body and the relative proportions in which they are present. They move the humors, and these movements cause images (visiones) that affect the soul and impel it to action.73 Within this scheme, the planet Venus causes desire. It represents the female, material aspects of generation. Matter strives for form, and Pontano translates the “metaphysical” striving into the biological instinct of self-preservation.74 This instinct prompts a perception of one’s ambiance in terms of good and bad, as the union between matter and form depends on the attainment of what is useful and agreeable and the avoidance of everything useless and unpleasant.75 In contrast, Mars

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regulates the blood temperature. Ominous, flaming, and burning, the red planet is normally regarded as a harmful influence. Its heat does not have the healthy effect of warming, but burns and dries out.76 Still, Mars has its place in the physiology of the soul. Just as anger consists in an excitement caused by the heating of blood, Mars naturally presides over the irascible aspects of the human soul, controlling the intensity of the passions. Virtue has to regulate this twofold structure of passions. For if the passions that impel us to act are too vehement, they will ruin the action, just as heavy rainfalls or extensive heat will destroy the harvest, he explains in De prudentia. If they are too restrained, they are not useful and lead to nothing. Only when the passions exist in their right measure will the actions that result from them become virtuous.77 Pontano describes this right measure in the language of politics. He imagines virtue in all its majesty and authority, sitting on higher ground, defending itself against its enemies. These enemies are two in number. One is violent, arrogant and insolent and does not acquiesce in the power of virtue; the other fears this power and is deterred by its stern and solemn appearance.78 Hence, virtue sits on the curule chair, the seat of consuls, praetors, and aediles. At its right, there is excess, which it first persuades to renounce his claim to power, then convicts of treason and bans. At her left, there is deficiency, which she first entices, then cuts off its retreat.79 Throughout his works, Pontano keeps to the threefold scheme of middle, defect, and excess, and corroborates it on a linguistic level by giving a name to the nameless virtues and vices in Aristotle’s Ethics.80 Moreover, he follows this model even when a twofold structure seems more appropriate, as in the case of beneficentia. Instead of simply opposing this virtue to maleficentia, as the outlines of Valla’s ethics suggest, Pontano situates beneficentia between the vices of being little disposed toward doing good (inofficiositas) and wreaking damage to others (officientia).81 In the case of magnificentia, he explicitly affirms that it is possible to define this virtue as a mean, although it refers to the concept of greatness.82 Just as Pontano’s account of formation reinstates the Peripatetic definition of virtue as a habitus, so his explication of the regulation of the passions reinstalls the notion of the mean.83 In both cases, the rational principle informs the underlying matter—that is, the parts of the body, the mind, and the natural disposition—toward virtuous behavior as well as the passions, their cravings, and illicit titillations. As Pontano put it in De fortitudine, only “petty philosophers” (a clear allusion to Valla) will deny the importance of the mean.84 Only in his poetics, Pontano admits of a different conception. In his dialogue Actius, “Iacopo

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Sannazaro” defines poetry as “speaking in a manner suited to elicit wonder” and adds that “only what is excellent elicits wonder to a high degree.”85 “Sannazaro,” therefore, reconsiders the Aristotelian concept of the mean, and as a matter of fact, it is only the authority of Aristotle that prevents him from dismissing the concept as regards poetry.86 It has long been recognized by scholars, first of all by Francesco Tateo, that the discussion of admiration in Actius shows striking parallels with Pontano’s theory of magnificence.87 Returning to virtue’s conflict with the passions, it is worth noting that this conflict is not merely an internal phenomenon. After all, the desires of the soul depend on the temptations of the external world: [T]he enemy is also outside of us, as well as the very causes of our fight. For it is banquets, Bacchanalian revels, brothels, cook-shops, eating-houses, offices, honours, rewards, money that are outside of us; striving for them, we are moved and direct our actions towards them.88

In our internal struggles with our passions and natural appetites, we acquire a certain disposition toward these external objects. It is this second nature, our habitus, which determines whether we are good or bad. We have no inherent faculty or passion that would make us good or evil by nature.89 For Pontano, virtue is not spontaneous or momentary, but the result of a long and complicated process of formation and regulation.

Cultivation A third aspect of this process is the cultivation of the mind—not the divine part of the human mind that possesses the rational principle, but its material part, the “third” body. As regards this “third” body, the development of virtue is not only a process of habituation; it is also a process of controlled growth and maturation. Age is a key factor in the acquisition of virtue, not least because of the paramount importance of experience. As Aristotle argues in the Ethics, taking prudence as an example, although the young develop ability in geometry and mathematics and become wise in such matters, they are not thought to develop prudence. The reason for this is that prudence also involves knowledge of particular facts, which become known from experience; and a young man is not experienced, because experience takes some time to acquire.90

For Aristotle, older people have “an insight from their experience which enables them to see correctly” to such an extent that one should not pay “less attention to [their] unproved assertions and opinions than to demonstrations of fact.”91

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Pontano paraphrases these passages in De prudentia, making the same point as Aristotle. Still, he introduces an analogy between the ages of human life and the stages of a plant’s growth that is not present in the Aristotelian context. [T]he praise of prudence belongs to the old, most proficient among men … [W]hat is the ripeness of fruits in trees, in old men, most experienced of all, is prudence and the full and most excellent realisation of human action. For childhood is like being in bloom; in our youth, we are crude and tart, with no experience in life and bad-tempered in our emotions.92

Prudence is acquired only over the years, by experience. Whereas it begins to blossom in the young, it does not yet come to maturity.93 However, growth and maturation are not independent of human activities or outside human control. We have the possibility to influence and cultivate our natural inclinations. Pontano compares this cultivation with agriculture. The farmer takes care of the crops by weeding and controlling their growth, arranging everything in order to make the field produce a lot of fruit, trimming it when necessary. In the same way experience, reason, and observation trim and correct the natural components of the human mind and make them bear fruits in the field of human actions and negotiations.94 Thus, a natural tendency like slow-wittedness (tarditas) can turn into hesitant thoughtfulness (cunctatio), quickness (celeritas) into a keen sense to act in the right moment (maturitas).95 For Pontano, character (ingenium) is constituted by a set of talents. Accordingly, he describes ingenium as an excellence in understanding and an aptitude for different arts, offices, and actions. Unlike intellect (mens), individual character is not divine in its origins, but has its proper place in the connection (compages) between body and mind, deriving from the humoral constitution of the body.96 In the process of character formation, heat plays a decisive role: “Those have the greatest talent, who have a greater and livelier heat in their heart and blood.”97 Pontano points out the variety of human nature and ascribes it to the mixtures of the elements. These mixtures are almost infinite in number, and so are the different kinds of character; in the end, every human has a different character. Consequently, the prudent man will take into consideration his own character and that of the others when it comes to action.98 In order to illustrate his point, Pontano evokes some well-known exempla such as Caesar, famous for his celeritas, and Fabius Maximus, the cunctator. He also refers to a series of contemporary political actors, reminding us of his great political experience. Among these actors, King Ferrante holds a prominent place, taciturn and with a propensity for simulation and dissimulation. On the contrary,

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his son Alfonso is described as open and simple. Lorenzo de’ Medici is depicted as secretive (latebrosus). Not surprisingly, Ludovico Sforza is characterized as ambitious and craving for power. But commanders like Federico da Montefeltro and popes like Sixtus IV, Innocent VIII, and Alexander VI are also mentioned.99 Thus, for Pontano, character and talent expressed the individual nature of human beings, their particular propensities, and inclinations. This individual nature constitutes the “matter” which reason can cultivate, but not ignore or pass over.100 On the physiological level, one of the main factors in the constitution of character is black bile. Based on the idea of the human body as a microcosm, Pontano likens black bile to the element earth: “Among the humours that our body contains, or that rather constitute our body, black bile is most similar to earth.”101 Black bile is at once multifarious and elusive in character. Prevalently dry, it has its origin in very hot blood. As such, it grows cold rapidly but remains inflammable, holding its heat for a long time. In this sense, it is comparable to a flint stone that sends out sparks when hit with a piece of iron, or to gunpowder that explodes.102 The effect of black bile on the organism and character is various, depending on the mixture of the other humors and most importantly on the quality of the blood. In this sense, black bile is comparable to wine, an analogy that goes back to Aristotle’s Problemata: the same wine will provoke different reactions in different people; some feel happy and begin to laugh, others feel sad and start to cry, some fall into silence, and still others talk too much under the influence of alcohol.103 In his analogy between black bile and earth, Pontano expresses this diversity in yet another way, comparing it to the different fruits resulting from different seeds. And as earth produces everything through heat and takes the place of a nursery (seminarium), also black bile, when heated, functions, as it were, as a nursery in which the seeds of thought and imagination begin to germinate; later on, these germs bear abundant fruit in the character of man, like a field that produces crops.104

Just as the diversity of herbs and trees depends on the diversity of seeds and the soil in which these seeds grow, the characters of human beings derive from their respective temperaments and mixtures of black bile. Pontano emphasizes the infinite possibilities which result from this “combinatorial” analysis,105 and he underscores the important role played by the atrabilious humor: its ignition prompts us to become excellent scientists, artists, and sages, but also

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ignoramuses, fools, and madmen.106 Some melancholic people tend almost exclusively toward honors and power, like Alexander and Caesar; others have a poetical or philosophical vein, like Homer, Virgil, Aristotle, and Ptolemy; still others excel in the plastic arts, such as Apelles, Lysippus, Praxiteles, and Giotto.107

Will and choice Pontano’s classification of the cardinal virtues reflects his moral psychology. The moral virtues of temperance and fortitude are concerned with the regulation of the passions, residing in the concupiscible and irascible parts of the soul, respectively. The intellectual virtue of prudence, instead, has its seat in the rational part of the soul. Finally, justice belongs to will, that is, the intellective appetite. This neat picture is distorted by Pontano’s preference for prudence and fortitude; temperance and justice play only a minor role, although they are discussed in the context of De obedientia. One possible explanation of this imbalance has its origin in Pontano’s peculiar conceptions of the appetitive and rational part of the soul. For one, temperance is less important than fortitude because it is connected to the concupiscible part. As such, it only indicates the direction of the passion’s movement. Yet, the decisive feature of the passions is their intensity, and this intensity is regulated mainly by fortitude. Within this perspective, temperate behavior follows principally from the right degree of the passionate impulse (impetus). Again, this right degree depends on fortitude. It is fortitude that makes one’s actions assertive and forceful in the face of vice, delimiting excessive behavior and uplifting otherwise deficient modes of operation. In regard to justice and the will, Pontano puts substantial emphasis on the intellective nature of the rational principle. Reason is predominantly a matter of intellect and understanding, not of volition. In fact, the determining factor of virtuous action is choice (electio), that is, Aristotle’s “deliberate appetition of things.”108 Pontano hardly discusses the will, save in the most general terms. In De prudentia, he describes will in rather dismissive terms in order to promote choice, stressing the deliberative aspect and downgrading the volitional one: Choice, however, … is not that kind of will that wanders off, boundless, reckless, not bound by any rules, without any restraints. Rather, it is the kind of will that governs itself and understands in which things the one who chooses can excel, what is appropriate for man, what the circumstances, the respective customs of the city, and reason itself require. Thus, it will be mindful not only of what is right and good, but also of time and place as well as one’s means, standing, and fortune.109

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Choice is different from the notion of will (voluntas) that implies a wish or a sense of longing. One can long to be immortal, but cannot choose to be so; choice is concerned with acts that lie in our power. It refers necessarily to the possibilities and powers of the person that chooses.110 Pontano illustrates this point with an example taken from Greek mythology: The unlearned laugh about the story of the giants which is told in school. But even if this story is invented, one still laughs about those who try to undertake things beyond their powers and their talent and tackle something that no one should dare to do.111

Thus, just as reason has to take a number of different factors into account, choice depends on knowledge and information.112 Someone who has no knowledge or is badly informed will always run the risk of being misled and of thinking of the worst things as the best.113 It is hardly surprising that prudence takes a central role within this scheme. As book IV of De prudentia shows, this virtue directs the whole range of formative, regulative, and cultivating activities that lead to the establishment of the other virtues, mediating between the rational and the material principle of human nature. It is also concerned with the cognitive side of action, collecting, processing and adapting information to the respective circumstances and their alteration. Sometimes, prudence is compelled to give in to the passions of the body in order to fulfill its role, as one of the examples that make up De prudentia V shows. It is the story of Antiochus, son of Seleucus, taken from Plutarch’s Life of Demetrius. Antiochus falls in love with Stratonice, his father’s wife. Although he tries to fight his passion, he fails to subjugate it to reason and consequently decides to starve himself to death under the pretense of being ill. Erasistratus, the court physician, soon discovers the true reason for Antiochus’s malady. In order to resolve the problem, he resorts to a stratagem. He tells the king that his son was in love with his (Erasistratus’s) wife. Seleucus then asks Erasistratus to give his wife to his son. Confronted with his physician’s refusal and reply that the king would do no such thing, Seleucus asserts that he is willing to part with Stratonice. Only then does Erasistratus reveal the truth to the king, who holds his promise and unites his son and wife in marriage. As the example of Antiochus’s love for Stratonice shows, prudence is not only the directive virtue that implements the rule of reason. Obviously, the passion of the prince is so strong that it is impossible to control it rationally. Hence, the reaction of the physician Erasistratus is that of surrender. If the passion cannot

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be subdued, it has to be fulfilled, not in order to cease, but in order to change it from an unnatural and “immoral” state of the soul to a natural and morally acceptable state. The only possible solution, then, is the otherwise indecent proposal of a marriage between Antiochus and Stratonice. In this situation, virtue does not imply the rule of reason, but rather circumvents it. While this is clearly an extreme case, the anecdote shows the power of the material side of human nature. Sometimes, three bodies are more than reason can cope with. Man acquires virtue in a long and difficult process of character formation. He has to work on his body, regulate his passions, and cultivate his natural propensities. In some cases, the rule of reason even implies compliance with the blinding forces of passion. After all, human action does not stem from reason alone. Based on a balanced interplay between reason and sensual appetite, it is never entirely rational, but remains bound up with the irrational impulses. Pontano, as well as other virtue theorists, is perfectly aware that complete rational control over the self is impossible.

In the name of fortune What applies to the internal aspects of human psychology also applies to the external aspects of human action. Here, the rule of reason is put into question by the irrational forces of fortune. Although a well-known and widely diffused saying seems to suggest otherwise, the wise man does not rule the stars.114 Even if reason is properly applied, man cannot perform his actions autonomously, since they depend on a number of factors outside his control. Virtue cannot eliminate all of these factors. Rather, it has to come to terms with them. Human action is not based on reason alone; it also has to reckon with fortune.115 Accordingly, fortune holds a special place in Pontano’s moral and political thought. His treatise De fortuna offers a close examination of the hugely varying conditions and circumstances of human action and character, an inquiry into the irrational, fortuitous, and unforeseeable aspects of reality.116 The rule of fortune extends over any kind of human action concerned with worldly affairs, as fortune controls the whole realm of the goods of fortune or external advantages.117 As a result, it plays a major role in the acquisition and operation of the virtues whose exercise constitutes the happy life. “Those without fame, lacking the goods [of fortune], dismayed and living in squalor—how could you call such people happy?” Pontano asks his readers.118 For him, as for Aristotelians in general, it is impossible to lead a successful and fulfilled life without the goods

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of fortune.119 Accordingly, the importance of the goods of fortune for the active life is emphasized throughout the treatise.120 While Pontano’s tract treats these topics in depth, it is anything but wellrounded. The theme of fortune involves a number of controversial issues and heterogeneous traditions such as Aristotelianism, Middle-Platonic philosophy, Christian doctrine, and astrology. As a result, Pontano does not provide his readers with an entirely coherent theory of fortune. His treatment cannot be reduced to a kind of fatalism, as Francesco Vettori insinuated in a letter to Niccolò Machiavelli,121 nor to the kind of astrological determinism that has been suggested by modern interpreters.122 He reacts with different approaches to different problems. One of the most powerful and influential treatments of fortune is Aristotle’s. In Physics II, dedicated to a discussion of the causes, he defines fortune as a “causation which incidentally inheres in deliberately purposeful action.”123 A typical example is the farmer who digs his field and finds treasure. When the farmer set out to dig, it is not his purpose to find the treasure, but to prepare his field for crops. His finding the treasure is accidental; it is an unintended consequence of the farmer’s original intentions, a side effect.124 As the number of accidental causes is infinite, Aristotle maintains that fortune is inscrutable.125 No one is able to foresee all possible side effects of his or her actions, not only because of the infinite number of accidental causes, but also because of their irrational nature. According to Aristotle, fortune is not subject to the rule of reason, as “reason (logos) applies to what is always true or true for the most part, whereas fortune belongs to a third type of event.”126 Fortune produces effects that are neither necessary nor normal. It does not have any kind of stability. In itself neutral, we perceive fortune either as “good fortune” (eutychia) or as “ill fortune” (dystychia), dependent on its beneficial or detrimental effects.127

From Petrarca to Poggio Aristotle’s account of fortune in the Physics became one of the main points of reference for any philosophical discussion of the subject. Of course, Aristotle was not the only figure to have dealt with fortune; Boethius, for example, was another hugely influential figure. In general, the Roman tradition was full of poets, moralists, and historians who had reflected on the power of fortune. The humanists were well acquainted with this body of literature. Still, they did not ignore or easily dismiss the Aristotelian definition of fortune in the Physics.

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Petrarca, for one, was certainly familiar with the discussion of fortune. In a letter to the Florentine physician Tommaso del Garbo, he refers explicitly to the example of the treasure, commonly used to illustrate the concept of accidental cause. Yet, Petrarca employs the example for a quite different purpose. I know that the one who buried the treasure was a householder, that the one who found it was an architect or a peasant, that what he found was gold and silver, or something like that, that what he found it with was a plow or a mattock, that what he worked the implement with was his hands, arms, oxen, plow-handle, or something of the sort … amidst these things I look for fortune, about which we are speaking, and I find nothing beyond this bare name.128

Petrarca has no interest in an explanation of fortune; on the contrary, he wants to demonstrate its illusory nature in an Augustinian vein. Still, his critique is not new; in a certain sense, it even enters within the Aristotelian tradition. In the Physics, Aristotle willingly acknowledges that “some people … say that nothing happens by fortune, but that everything which we ascribe to fortune or chance has some definite cause.”129 This is exactly Petrarca’s point; among all the definite causes—the householder burying the treasure, the plough, the hand that works the plough—the mysterious force of fortune seems to disappear. Still, Aristotle’s teachings differ from Petrarca’s. Strictly speaking, Aristotle admits, fortune is not the cause of anything. Yet, in another sense, things do occur by fortune.130 Accidental causes cannot be pinpointed in the way that per se causes can. Accordingly, Petrarca is right when he reconstructs the causal chains that lead to the finding of the treasure. Still, the Aristotelian definition of fortune does not locate fortune in one of the causal chains, but in their random coincidence.131 The nature of fortune is not illusory, but fleeting. Therefore, Petrarca’s conclusion that fortune is “a bare name,” or a “bare and empty” name,132 a trap of everyday language, is more pious than philosophically sound. Coluccio Salutati (1331–1406) takes up Petrarca’s discussion. As he writes in his treatise On Fate and Fortune (De fato et fortuna, 1396): Some deny, which I cannot enough wonder at, that fortune is more than a mere name. And still, common language has it that many things come from the hands of case and fortune; and everyone thinks that it has power far beyond the average in the affairs of mortals; and not only ignorant men and the common people affirm this, but also judicious men, even though some among them, who have occupied themselves with writing on the highest things, say that fortune comes down to nothing—which adds to the doubt.133

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Given his doubts, Salutati sets out to study the problem of fortune from different angles. While he dismisses the astrologers’ discussions on fortune, he decides to survey the opinions of moral philosophers as well as natural philosophers.134 The most radical opposition to Petrarca’s rejection of fortune comes from Poggio Bracciolini, however. In his dialogue De varietate fortune (On the Vicissitudes of Fortune) he excels the power of fortune; at the same time, he is acutely aware that religion and reason suggest otherwise. “Poggio” does not mention Petrarca by name, but alludes to him when he refers to people to whom fortune is nothing but “an empty name,” a construct of man’s foolishness.135 He himself has difficulties accepting this view. Together with his friend Antonio Loschi, he contemplates the ruins of ancient Rome and muses about the rise and fall of the Roman empire. Surrounded by the relics of its glorious past, it is hard to imagine that fortune is but a name. Accordingly, “Poggio” begins the discussion with an acknowledgment of fortune’s power. I have heard and read a lot of fortune and its power in the writings of historians, poets, orators, and philosophers; and much more, she is celebrated in the daily conversations of men, who subject nearly everything in human life to her jurisdiction. For emperors, kings, princes, the noble and not noble, even the unlearned crowd think of fortune as something which stands above them and rules over their actions, as if she managed their lives; they greatly desire good fortune, they curse ill fortune, and when something favourable happens, they praise her, while they reproach her injustice when something adverse occurs.136

As “Poggio” continues, fortune is held to be in charge of riches, public honors, political power, and the well-being of one’s children. Like Salutati he takes the “daily conversations” on fortune seriously. At the same time he emphasizes that not only the common people, but also the learned and wise support this view.137 Thus Virgil describes fortune as omnipotent; Sallustius affirms that she rules over everything; Livius says that she is powerful in all matters, but especially in warfare.138 All these authorities bespeak the power of fortune. Far from being but a name, fortune effectively rules human affairs. “Poggio” asks “Antonio Loschi” to shed some light on the matter. “Loschi,” however, doubts whether he will be able to tackle the question. As he explains to “Poggio,” one of the difficulties of the problem of fortune is the lack of definitions. “Both learned and unlearned assert that fortune exists, but hardly anyone has ever tried to define it.”139 One of the few exceptions is Aristotle. Consequently, “Loschi” limits himself mainly to an exposition of the Aristotelian doctrine of fortune in the Physics. Fortune is an accidental cause; these causes are infinite, therefore fortune is highly uncertain; fortune is neither intentional

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nor deliberate.140 Besides the Physics, “Loschi” also refers to Thomas Aquinas’s commentary in which the treasure example figures prominently: if a farmer tilling his field finds treasure, it is good fortune; if he finds a poisonous snake and gets bitten, it is ill fortune.141 In the end, “Loschi” reports in passing that Aquinas connects both kinds of fortune to the celestial bodies; even if fortune is unintended, it derives from a disposition which inclines us toward it.142 “Poggio” is dissatisfied with “Loschi’s” Aristotelian explanation of fortune. In his opinion, fortune represents a much stronger concept. It requires a more powerful definition than that provided by Aristotle. The picture he draws of fortune is quite different from the one in the Physics. It is not accidental or unintended, but firm and stable. Unlike an accident, it does not cling to something else and follow it, but rather leads and commands the others like a mistress.143 Alexander the Great, an example Salutati also discusses, had a run of good luck for no less than thirteen years. As “Poggio” argues, he would have laughed at his teacher Aristotle, had he told him that his fortune was “unexpected” or “unintended.” When Alexander attacked first Greece, then Asia, he relied heavily on his good fortune; if luck smiled upon him, it was not an unintended consequence of his conquest, but a possibility he had considered in advance. Likewise, Caesar built his hopes on good fortune and included it in his plans. So does the merchant who sails his ship to another port in order to sell his grain at a higher prize, finding a favorable wind.144 I maintain that fortune favoured him … and the others I have mentioned, albeit not an Aristotelian one. For they all of them pursued aims that were neither unexpected nor unintended, and they did so after long and careful consideration. Accordingly, neither the fortune Alexander put his trust in, nor the one Caesar followed …, nor the one in which the merchant put his hopes appears to be the fortune Aristotle and Thomas describe. Rather it has to be considered as a greater, divine power of a higher order that keeps turning round our human affairs and imparts a spin to them, offering nothing stable and secure to us.145

“Poggio’s” concept of fortune is indeed different from the one proposed in the Physics, not least because he tacitly shifts the grounds of the discussion. “Poggio” is not so much interested in a precise definition as he is in the precepts informing us how to cope with fortune.146 This shift is not lost on “Loschi.” As he objects to “Poggio,” Aristotle’s enquiry in the Physics concerns mainly the causes, with fortune among them. Therefore, he is interested in the theoretical structure of fortune as a cause, not in the question how to avoid fortune or how to take precautions against it.147

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Taking the side of Aristotle, “Loschi” presses “Poggio” not to restrict himself to the moral aspects of fortune, but to take its physical and metaphysical sides into consideration as well. Thus he proposes to complement the Aristotelian interpretation with a theological one, defining fortune as God’s will.148 This definition seems to be quite compatible with “Poggio’s” idea of fortune as a divine power. Yet, “Poggio” defends his method and remains on moral grounds. Even when “Loschi” puts forward the difficult problem of fortune’s fundamentally unjust character, he avoids any metaphysical or theological debates. Instead, he goes over to the historical discussion of fortune.

Pontano: Roman tradition and religion Pontano is less inhibited than his predecessors. In De fortuna, he takes on the challenge of a philosophical investigation of fortune that comprises both its theoretical and practical aspects. Firmly standing in the Roman tradition, he sees fortune as a powerful cause, far from being an empty name.149 In acknowledging fortune’s power, he uses terms familiar from the preceding discussions: The name of fortune is so widely diffused among all people that even learned men agree that both doctors of medicine, in whose hands the well-being and life of the ailing lie, and military commanders, from whose leadership an army’s victory and the safety of the state depends, need to be lucky.150

Strategy and medicine are not the only areas of human life dependent on fortune. As Pontano acknowledges in the course of his treatise, the power of fortune extends to many other disciplines, too. A token of fortune’s power can be found in pagan religion. As Pontano remarks, the ancient Romans worshipped Fortuna as a powerful goddess, dedicating temples to her and ordaining priests in her service.151 However, the cult of Fortuna does not betray any theoretical understanding of fortune. The nature of the phenomenon remains undisclosed to the followers of the goddess. As Pontano argues, the very name of fortune bespeaks its inscrutable nature. Because in “ruder ages” man did not know which kind of power fortune represented (quae vis esset ea) and because fortune delivered her goods according to neither rhyme nor reason, they named her after the verb “ferre.” “Ferre” can both mean “to bear something” (also “fortitudo” derives from “ferre”) and “to bring something.” Accordingly, the ancient Romans’ attitude toward fortune was characterized by a mix of hope for material wealth and success on the one hand, and Stoic patience and a will to bear the whims of a

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capricious power that did not follow any rational patterns and essentially lacked justice, on the other.152 In the end, the discussion of fortune is based on a kind of paradox. Almost everyone recognizes the existence of fortune, learned and unlearned, but only few have made attempts to inquire into its nature. Despite its potent and pervasive presence in the world of human action, fortune eludes one’s grasp and understanding. Pontano tries to remedy this situation with his treatise—even though he gets heavily criticized by Giles of Viterbo. For Giles, Pontano’s stance is unbecoming; he argues that fortune is not a matter worthy of discussion and that man should rather commit himself to God’s care (cura Dei) than waste his time with thoughts about fortune.153 Nevertheless, Pontano insists on the usefulness of his inquiry and the importance to bring the things that nature has hidden into the open and impress upon our fellowmen, if not upon the whole of mankind, how to consider that which is ascribed to fortune, and the spirit with which to embrace, and if necessary, to bear it.154

In his treatise, Pontano has to tackle two different issues that are difficult to reconcile. One problem concerns the theological implications of an inquiry into fortune. The other relates to the increasing need, clearly outlined by Poggio, to redefine fortune not in physical, but rather in ethical terms. These two problems have a common root. For different from most of the Roman pantheon, fortune did not disappear from popular belief during late antiquity and the Middle Ages.155 As Iiro Kajanto has suggested, “the persistence of this intrinsically unChristian idea in society and culture permeated by the unquestioned doctrines of Christianity … [was] an intriguing problem.”156 While underscoring the Christian emphasis on the transitoriness of temporal things, the idea of a “fickle and malicious Fortune could account for all the uncertainties of life and for its mystifying amorality, the success of evil men and the misfortunes of good people, better than the Christian belief in the world as governed by a all-powerful and benevolent god.”157 Accordingly, a theory of fortune like Pontano’s has to find a solution for the apparent discrepancy between Christian doctrine and the phenomenon called fortune; secondly it has to develop a theory how to deal with the phenomenon in practical terms. Pontano does his best to find an answer to these fundamental questions. He is quite aware that the idea of fortune holds a considerable subversive potential with respect to traditional theological conceptions. On the one hand, he commits himself to the “pagan” view that fortune is a powerful cause, maintained by great

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philosophers and “people and nations” (populi gentesque), joining the powerful alliance of the learned and unlearned men (docti pariter indoctique) who believe in the existence of fortune.158 On the other hand, he is keenly aware that there are “very pious men most dedicated to the divine majesty,” who “call power and will of God himself what others are accustomed to call fortune.”159 This is an allusion to the Augustinian position that subsumes fortune and fate under divine providence.160 Petrarca, for one, adopts this position in his letter to Tommaso del Garbo, although he knows that this will put him at odds with both popular opinion and learned judgments. As he writes to Tommaso, “If perchance [my judgment] is neither ordinary nor philosophical enough, I think it is a pious judgement, and that is enough for me.”161 Yet, this pious judgment has to confront a rather serious problem. If fortune and fate are nothing more than God’s will, the God in question is a highly unjust one, helping the undeserving and punishing the deserving. The only solution to this problem is, as Pontano writes, to leave reason and cause in the hands of God and to submit to his unfathomable will.162 In order to explain this position, Pontano invokes an analogy from the sphere of politics. Like God, good kings act on behalf of secret counsels and without explanation. Fortune refers to nothing else than God’s arcana imperii, then, and Pontano agrees: “So far am I from opposing their doctrine (for I am a Christian) that I hold the opinion that I should ascribe all I own to the supreme will and decision of the highest being.”163

Fortune, fate, and astrology This is Pontano’s concession to Christian orthodoxy. In more general terms, however, he moves between a “weak” position that subsumes fortune and fate under divine providence, prominent in Augustine and taken up in Petrarca, and a “strong” position that establishes fortune as a powerful and—at least to a certain extent—independent force. Thus, Salutati refrains from denying the existence of fortune offhandedly, and Poggio highlights the role of fortune in human action. For a better understanding of the problems involved in the discussion, Pontano makes two moves. First, he discusses the relationship between fortune, fate, and astrology in some detail, mainly referring to the Platonic tradition and to Boethius. Second, he redefines fortune by bringing into play an Aristotelian treatise, the Liber de bona fortuna. Regarding Pontano’s discussion of providence, fate, and fortune, already Petrarca hints at the idea of fortune as “some handmaiden of Providence and executrix of divine will.”164 Pontano finds this idea fascinating. In Calcidius’s

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commentary on the Timaeus,165 he came across a source that would help him to construct a theory that distinguished between different levels of responsibility: [Plato] did not think that all things result from providence, as the nature of regulated things is not uniform. Therefore, he held that some things should be ascribed to providence, some to fate. Moreover, he attributed some things to our will and our decisions, others to the vicissitudes of fortune, and a great many things to chance, which happen without reason and unexpectedly. Thus, the factors that come to Plato’s mind are five in number: providence, fate, human will, and further fortune and chance.166

These five factors have different spheres of influence. Providence rules over divine and intelligible things, while fate rules over the natural and corporeal things. Things belonging to our free will are the result of our initiative, while things outside the scope of our influence belong either to the realm of fortune or of case, depending on whether they have their starting-point in our arrangement of matters or not.167 Following Calcidius, Pontano creates a metaphysical hierarchy that closely resembles the hierarchy at court and simultaneously allows space for God’s will, free human action, and fortune.168 Here providence ranks highest, followed by fate. In order to explain their relation, Pontano weaves excerpts from Boethius into his paraphrase of Calcidius’s commentary. Boethius describes providence as the divine mind in its simplicity, embracing all things, however different, while fate carries out its ordinances and distributes them one by one according to their motion, place, form, and time.169 As Boethius writes in the Consolation, “[P]rovidence is the fixed and simple form of destined events, fate their shifting series in order of time, as by the disposal of the Divine simplicity they are to take place.”170 For both Calcidius and Boethius, providence is prior to fate.171 Again in the words of Boethius, quoted by Pontano: “All things which are under fate are subjected also to providence, on which fate itself is dependent; whereas certain things which are set under providence are above the chain of fate.”172 In Pontano’s thought, divine providence is like a king with absolute power, assisted by his ministers and servants. Despite the absolute power of the monarch, however, not all responsibility lies with the king. In itself, God’s will is uniform, never varies, and never wavers. Like Boethius, Pontano sets it above all things and out of time. In the divine will, all things are present; they don’t have any past or future. Only when fate disposes these things in a temporal and spatial order do they begin to vary, and it is here that the divine will is no longer directly involved: “what varies and acts in different ways, does not proceed from God, but from the variety of things that are moved and shaped, and again move and shape.”173

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God’s will avails itself of mediators, first among them fate. Following Plato and Calcidius, Pontano makes the stars the carriers of fate. For the Platonic demiurge chooses souls in equal number to the stars and mounts them in appropriate chariots. Providence shows them the nature of the universe and teaches them the “laws of unalterable decree.” These laws themselves are fate.174 The stars follow these rules; they enact fate. Still, as movers (motores), they influence the sub-lunar world, and it is there that they create variety. In order to explain this variety, Pontano recurs to the example of fire. It is characteristic for fire to heat, he writes, and this characteristic is in accordance with the stars as motores. The stars, again, act in accordance with the prescriptions of providence. Still, the uniform characteristic of heating varies in its outcomes.175 Heat has many different effects: some stones turn to calcium when they burn; oak wood turns to coal and ashes when set on fire; lead is liquefied; dirt congeals; and so on. While God is the first cause for these effects, he is not responsible for all of them. God is the architect, the universal law and cause of the universe; the effects depend on particular causes and are due to individual “craftsmen.”176 In other words, God is not necessarily responsible for the tiniest of details. Hurting feet, a wolf ’s assault on a flock of sheep, an infertile heifer, or sterile she-ass clearly do not fall within the remit of those phenomenon for which God was responsible.177 In book III, which reacts to the criticisms of Giles of Viterbo, Pontano tries to corroborate his position with lengthy excerpts from authorities like Thomas Aquinas. In the Summa contra gentiles, Thomas dedicates a whole chapter to the question “how a person is favoured by fortune and how man is assisted by higher causes.” He gives the famous example of a servant who is sent to a certain place and encounters one of his fellow servants there. For the servant, who does not know that the other servant has been ordered to the same place, their encounter is entirely unintended and a coincidence. For their master, however, it is a planned event. Thus, Aquinas argues that since man is ordered in regard to his body under the celestial bodies, in regard to his intellect under the angels, and in regard to his will under God—it is quite possible for something apart from man’s intention to happen, which is, however, in accord with the ordering of the celestial bodies, or with the control of the angels, or even of God.178

Pontano is especially interested in the “ordering of the celestial bodies,” that is, the influence of the stars. Aquinas’s authority allows him to defend astrology. As Pontano argues, the celestial bodies influence on our character and dispose

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us to certain kinds of behavior, proving his point with a number of horoscope samples.179 Nonetheless, he endorses the view, in line with Ptolemy, that astral influence is not always a necessity: “Applying prudence, something foreseen and known in advance can be totally averted, or significantly abated.”180 Fortuitous events can be “cultivated,” as Pontano maintains quoting Ptolemy: “A sagacious mind works together with the operation of the heavens, as a skilful farmer, by cultivation, works together with nature.”181 As Francesco Tateo underlines, Pontano translates the Greek verb “sunergein” rightly with the Latin “conferre,” “to work together,” and not with “dominari,” or “to rule.”182 Reason does not rule the stars, therefore, but cooperates with them. To a certain extent, however, Pontano also is convinced that we can overcome the influence of the stars, when we stick to reason, curb our appetite, and do not allow our will to run wild.183 After all, our will is free, as Pontano forcefully argues both in De fortuna and in Aegidius.184 In his discussion of fate, fortune, and astrology, then, Pontano tries to understand the place fortune holds in the cosmos. He also tries to teach his readers how to comport in the context of the complicated hierarchies and influences that make up the sublunar world. His cosmological model allows for a considerable space for human action, against a too-restrictive notion of fate. As Ornella Pompeo Faracovi has argued, this is a general feature of Aristotelian and Ptolemaic astrology during Pontano’s time, employed also in the defense of astrology against Giovanni Pico della Mirandola.185 Astrology is important for ethics because it shows the boundaries within which man moves and allows him to make choices.186

The Liber de bona fortuna Pontano’s analysis in De fortuna tries not to reduce fortune to a secondary phenomenon. He does so in terms of astrology, but his argument has a specific twist to it. Central parts of his treatise propose a concept of fortune as “irrational nature,” as a natural or divine impulse. In the literature, this concept has prompted different reactions. Some read it as an important variant on ancient and medieval theories of fortune, novel in its approach and specific to the Renaissance.187 Others see it as a “curious return to scholastic discussions,”188 and still others find Pontano’s argument simply unconvincing.189 As has passed almost without notice,190 however, his concept of fortune as a natural or divine impulse has an Aristotelian origin, namely the Liber de bona fortuna, a compilation of Latin translations of the chapters on good fortune in Magna

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Moralia and the Eudemian Ethics.191 Inconspicuous as this little work might seem, the Liber leads straight into the heart of De fortuna, as it allows Pontano to develop the kind of discussion Poggio demands in De varietate fortune: shifting away from a “physical” treatment of fortune, toward a “moral” understanding. By defining fortune not as an accidental cause, but as a natural or divine impulse, the Liber provides Pontano with a powerful explanatory tool for his own version of fortune theory. Pontano is not the first to employ the Liber de bona fortuna. It enjoyed a wide diffusion and great appreciation among scholastic thinkers, among them Thomas Aquinas—in fact, Thomas might be called the “inventor” of the Liber.192 Other scholastic thinkers involved in discussions of the Liber were Giles of Rome, Henry of Ghent, and Duns Scotus.193 Humanists were equally well acquainted with the work. Petrarca, for one, affirms in his letter to Tommaso del Garbo that “Aristotle’s little book On Good Fortune is not unknown to me,” even before he quotes Cicero.194 Likewise, Coluccio Salutati dedicates some critical pages of De fato et fortuna to the Liber.195 However, the most direct influence on Pontano probably was his teacher George of Trebizond.196 Notwithstanding the popularity of the Liber, Pontano far surpasses his predecessors in using and integrating it into his thought. De fortuna does not simply mention, quote, or discuss the Liber, it also derives a good part of his arguments from it. Accordingly, De fortuna is certainly among the best examples of how Pontano rewrites and rearranges Aristotelian philosophy. On a linguistic level, his use of the Liber—a text that modern interpreters retain to be “practically unintelligible”197—aims at a less technical rendering and improves on its style, rendering it more easily accessible for those trained in classical Latin. He even develops passages of the Liber into a novella. A short dialogue illustrating fortune as the unreasoning impulse toward good things—“Why do you act like this?” “I don’t know, but it seems right”—turns into the story of Eutychus Sabinus, who one day at lunch tells his wife on a whim that he will leave for Rome.198 On a philosophical level, Pontano uses the Liber for central parts of his treatise, establishing it as an authoritative Peripatetic source. As most of the scribes who had copied the work, he was certainly aware of the fact that the Liber assembled two previously separate texts.199 Still, he does not distinguish between the two parts, but uses the Liber throughout his treatise as a unified text. Pontano’s treatise and the Liber share the same Aristotelian convictions on the importance of the goods of fortune for a happy life. The first part of the Liber (Magna Moralia 2.8 1206 b 30–1207 b 19) starts with the statement that “without external advantages life cannot be happy; and they are in fortune’s control.”200

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This cannot serve as a definition of fortune, however. Therefore the Liber and Pontano go through a list of possible candidates for what fortune is, but exclude all of them.201 As turns out, fortune is neither nature, nor intelligence, nor God. For contrary to nature, fortune produces “without order,” that is fortuitously, a feature which also excludes intelligence and rationality, which “exhibit an orderly sequence and invariability.” Likewise, fortune cannot be a kind of divine care (cura Dei); it does not befit God to distribute the goods of fortune without discrimination, as it would make him a bad judge.202 In De fortuna, this aporetic discussion is followed by chapters on fortune as an accidental cause as well as on the role of fate and Platonic doctrine (as discussed above). Pontano only returns to the argument of the Liber when he discusses which men are actually called fortunate (bene fortunatus in the Latin translation). As he writes, fortunate men are mainly those “to whose benefit fortune has redounded a long time and who it seems to favour in a steadfast and stable manner.”203 Moreover, these men achieve some good beyond their calculation. While the Liber is very concise, Pontano is quite elaborate in underlining that they achieve the good not because of their demonstrated abilities or achievements. Neither prudence, nor careful thought, nor long experience leads to their benefit.204 Based on these observations, both the Liber and Pontano return to the notion of fortune as nature, given that it is absolutely impossible that fortune can be defined as intelligence, as reason, or as divine benevolence.205 However fortune is “nature without reason.”206 “For the fortunate man is he who apart from reason has an impulse to good things and obtains these, and this comes from nature,” the Liber argues, as does Pontano.207 As the impulse is irrational, the fortunate man cannot give an account of their actions.208 In the later passages of book II, Pontano discusses also the second part of the Liber (Eudemian Ethics 8.2, 1246b 37–1248b 11). Aristotle’s argument is notoriously difficult to understand, but Pontano follows it in its main parts. Again, much emphasis lies on the fact that fortune does not depend on prudence or reason. On what does it depend then? Why are men fortunate? There are two aspects to this argument. The first one reformulates the idea that fortune is a kind of nature. Thus both Aristotle and Pontano describe fortune as something that is natural to some, as it is natural to some to be blue-eyed or black-eyed at birth.209 In the case of those who are fortunate, the same thing happens as in a game of dice: good fortune does not depend on their industry or prudence, but on nature. Therefore, the emphasis is less on gaining control and more on giving up control, as Pontano explains. Fortune requires a certain degree of passivity in

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order to work. As soon as the bene fortunatus does no longer follow his natural impulse and starts to reflect on his course of action, he will be out of luck.210 Accordingly, his actions do not derive from any considerations. In fortunate men, what is called “choice” consists rather in a “promptness” to follow the natural impulse without further thought.211 Both Aristotle and Pontano underline this condition of being other-directed when they compare the fortunate man to a “worse-built vessel” that sails better, “not owing to itself but because it has a good steersman.”212 The comparison between bene fortunatus and a vessel leads to the second aspect of the argument, because it reintroduces an idea that so far has been dismissed: the fortunate men are loved by God, having a deity as steersman. Accordingly, Aristotle distinguishes between two kinds of good fortune: one divine, owing to which the fortunate man’s success is thought to be due to the aid of God, and this is the man successful in accordance with his impulse, while the other is he who succeeds against his impulse. Both are irrational. The former kind is more continuous fortune, the latter is not continuous.213

Therefore, the Liber reconnects the “unreasoning impulse” of fortune—that the first part describes in terms of nature—to divine inspiration. As has been said, different from “normal” people who perform their actions as a result of their purposive choice, thus depending on deliberation and reasoning, “inspired” persons rely on their instinct, disengaging reason. As Anthony Kenny has noted, “this type of divine element in humans belongs on the appetitive, not the intellectual, side of the soul,” contrary to the divine element in Nicomachean Ethics X.214 This important observation goes to the heart of the theological and philosophical discussions on the respective places of intellect and will, in which the Liber de bona fortuna was employed at the close of the thirteenth century.215 Pontano, instead, is very cautious concerning this argument. He prefers to rely on the authority of Thomas Aquinas, although the commentary he paraphrases is actually written by Giles of Rome.216 Furthermore, he shifts Aristotle’s comparison of the fortunate man with melancholic men and seers to book I of his treatise, in a chapter entitled “Sybils, soothsayers and poets.”217 As these arguments show, Pontano follows the Liber de bona fortuna in important parts of his treatise. He rewrites the Liber in an extended version, incorporating the Platonic and Christian discussion on providence and fate as well as the Aristotelian treatment in the Physics into its framework. Therefore, De fortuna makes the Liber available for a wide readership, substituting the difficult Latin of the original with Pontano’s elegant diction. However, Pontano

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does not attempt to present a synthesis or selection of the contrasting arguments of the two parts of the Liber. Roughly, book I of his treatise closely resembles the Magna Moralia part of the Liber, whereas book II takes up the argument of the Eudemian Ethics part. (Only book III does not enter the scheme, as it was written afterwards, responding to some of the criticisms it had received and elaborating on the astrological implications of fortune.) This conformity to the original text did not contribute to the clarity of the discussion. In contrast, it led to repetitions and contradictions.

The politics of fortune Nonetheless, Pontano succeeded in giving a strong thrust to his argument. In short, if persons want to act successfully, they have to count on fortune, not to exclude it from their plans. Human action does not depend solely on reason, but also on a kind of instinct, an irrational appetite. Too strong an emphasis on reason can even disturb the propitious course of events. In De fortuna, Pontano relates an anecdote about the way in which the Greek émigré scholar Theodor Gaza defended king Ferrante against some men who had criticized the king’s seemingly inconsiderate and imprudent behavior. “Please, good men,” [Theodor] said, “cease blaming the king, because everything prospers for him beyond expectation, though he governs with these habits and in this way, managing himself and his affairs. Or is it your mind to impede the natural flow of things by deliberating and acting at the appropriate moment? But the king, who is fortunate and happy, may not proceed in any other way than the one he has followed up to the present for fear that when he changes his path and his methods he may also change his fortune with his new methods, something that you by no means desire.” Theodore Gaza [comments Pontano] being a very learned man realised that they, who were ignorant of the nature of good fortune, were acting with their counsels and well-matured thoughts in such a way as to turn away the winds of prosperity from the king’s affairs….218

The Aristotelian text offers Pontano the possibility to emphasize the power of fortune and, at the same time, to give advice how to handle fortune. After all, Pontano wrote his treatise during a period in which fortune had become an important factor of political life, and one which was in fact deeply ambiguous in character. This new role for fortune is perhaps most clearly visible in an exchange of letters between King Ferrante and Bona Sforza in the summer of 1478. In the aftermath of the Pazzi conspiracy, the former allies found themselves on different sides of the conflict, with Milan supporting Florence and

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Lorenzo de’ Medici, while the King of Naples opted for an alliance with the pope. In their letter, the Milanese accused Ferrante of having instigated civil discord in Genova in order to weaken their position. In this context the author of the letter, presumably the Milanese chancellor Cicco Simonetta, not only reproaches Ferrante’s disloyalty, he also criticizes his policies on the grounds that they lack a clear understanding of the role of fortune. “Little do you know about fortune, for which it is characteristic never to remain in the same place. Therefore, if we are not mistaken, after a short time, she turns somewhere else.”219 In other words, Cicco predicted that fortune would turn against Ferrante. According to the Milanese letter, Ferrante had committed a grave political error in underrating the changeable character of fortune and miscalculating the consequences of his actions. Ferrante’s answer, probably written by Pontano, adopts equally strong language. It inveighs against Simonetta and accuses him of being not at all mindful of his fortune and of himself (oblitus fortunae ac sui ipsius). Furthermore, it answers the accusation of the king’s lack of wisdom directly. Regarding our alleged ignorance of fortune’s unsteadiness and deceitful art, we are not sure if we should ascribe your utterances to you or to the imprudence and ignorance of your scribe [i.e. Simonetta]. For no one of our standing, no one in our time has a better understanding and knowledge of fortune’s character than us: We have been in conflict with fortune for a very long time now, and yet, we have never pushed our luck like those who have won over your judgement. Instead, we have always borne patiently and with equanimity whatever fortune had in store for us. Doubtless, if you knew the pitfalls of fortune by experience as we do, either you would have stopped before, or you would stop ruling according to the judgement of others, and imprudent ones to boot, while you have your own [judgement] at your disposal.220

This statement turns the tables on the Milanese, claiming that it is not Ferrante who pushes his luck without any political responsibility, but Bona’s counselors, most prominently among them Simonetta. Bona herself is heavily criticized for her dependence on these counselors. Ironically, Simonetta’s predictions about a change in Ferrante’s fortune proved well founded. When the Milanese chancellor was decapitated in October 1480, his death marked the beginning of the de facto rule of Ludovico Sforza over the duchy. What seemed to be a great success of Neapolitan policies ultimately turned out to be a fatal error. The decision against Bona Sforza and Cicco Simonetta, too friendly toward Florence and France, and the option for Ludovico would seal the fate of the Aragonese dynasty of Naples.

6

Beyond the Veil

It is one thing to become virtuous and to act virtuously in accordance with the irrational and fortuitous aspects of human nature and life. As Pontano knew, it is another thing to show virtue. In classical moral philosophy, virtue is visible for everyone to see. A saying of Panormita reflects this view. As Pontano narrates in De principe, Antonio Panormita was once sitting, worn out from reading, in the hallway of his Plinian villa … When the question of virtue arose among those gathered there, Antonio stated that its light was extremely bright. The overseer of the estate, who was passing by, remarked: “I don’t know how brightly that virtue you speak of shines, Antonio; but what I definitely know is that, even though I’ve wanted to contemplate virtue for a long time I’ve never managed to see it.” To which Antonio replied, smiling, “… tell me, please, what do you think the brightest object in the world is?” “The sun,” he said. “And yet the blind do not see the sun,” Antonio responded, “because their eyes are unseeing. Virtue is therefore much brighter, for even the blind see it very clearly.”1

Virtue in this view is self-evident, and virtuous behavior does not need to be staged. Panormita’s view, as presented in the Prince, was not Pontano’s last word on the matter. As he wrote almost thirty years later in a letter of invitation to a future lady of the queen’s employ, By nature, the works of virtue and a commendable deportment are held in great esteem by everyone, first of all by princes … the virtues should not be concealed from view, but have to be brought to light, in a place where they can be displayed continuously and will be recognized with praise as witness and prize of one’s doing well….2

Here virtue is something public, something that has to be performed. It gains at least some of its worth from its display. Virtuous behavior has to be communicated to, and confirmed by, others. Even the Latin word habitus does

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not only have the technical meaning of disposition, but also the literal meaning of the outward appearance of a person, his or her posture and dress.3 If done rightly, the display of virtue is not merely an act of ostentation, but a virtuous act in itself. From this perspective, all virtues are social virtues which depend on a certain degree of recognition and approval. Their successful performance does not only depend on the person performing them, but also on the conventional standards of conduct, on the spectators and their applause. Not by coincidence, magnanimity, the “crown of virtues,” strives for honor, the “greatest and most beautiful among the external goods.”4 The path to virtue might be steep and stony, but it does not lead through a wasteland. Rather, it meanders through the claims and expectations of society. Society sets the framework for the task of becoming virtuous. This task was especially important in the sphere of politics. Political actors depend on recognition and approval, and virtuous conduct is one of the keys to gaining them. Humanist thinkers were keenly aware of the role of virtue in political life, and the lack of traditional forms of the justification of political power led them to reconsider the Roman ideology of virtus.5 As an alternative to dynastic and juridical claims, virtuous behavior could serve as legitimation of political power. Still, this kind of vindication requires an effective and impressive outside appearance. Not only does the prince have to be virtuous, he also has to appear to be a virtuous person.6 The representation of virtue is indeed one of the great challenges of Quattrocento politics. Thus, Quentin Skinner has noted that “a much-expanded interest in the more ritualistic aspects of princely government” can be found in Pontano’s Prince.7 Guido Cappelli, too, has observed that Pontano writes in a social and political context in which “right of blood, war and physical coercion in themselves do no longer suffice to legitimise and maintain power,” but need to be complemented by a careful shaping of one’s “public image.”8 Cappelli cites Alfonso the Magnanimous saying that “one rules by opinion.”9 Concerning Pontano’s thought, the new interest in the outward appearance of virtue has two different, yet interconnected, aspects. On the one hand, he reacts to the more radical propositions of humanists like Poggio Bracciolini, who dissociate political power and virtue. On the other hand, it takes up Panormita’s and Facio’s successful establishment of King Alfonso as a humanist model of virtuous kingship. Yet, in the end Pontano’s attempt to continue the work of his predecessors and to lend the same splendor to Alfonso’s heirs fails. The political disquiet that characterizes the reigns of Ferrante and Alfonso

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makes it increasingly difficult to legitimize their behavior in terms of a virtuous comportment. Overstretching the limits of plausibility, the “veil” of virtue tears and reveals the flaws of Aragonese policies.

Monstrous regiments Long before the fall of the Aragonese, Poggio Bracciolini’s De infelicitate principum (On the Miserable Life of Princes) tore the veil of virtue. Poggio’s dialogue, written c. 1440, is one of the most powerful attacks on the idea of the virtuous ruler, laying open the contradictions and tensions that characterized Renaissance politics. Just as Valla challenges the Aristotelian foundations of moral philosophy, Poggio calls into question the moral foundations of political thought. In the foreword, he argues that almost all men and women admire the great princes and remain struck with amazement. It is as if they would look up to them from some lower place and see them on a highrising pedestal, or so it seems. They gape at their imposing outward appearances and think that the splendid attires they see correspond to what is on the inside. Only few princes, however, are interested in virtue and the good life, and even fewer seek them. They deem themselves to have prudence and wisdom enough and to spare, if only they attain what the public frenzy usually holds to be admirable and brilliant.10

Within this perspective, political life is marked by a fundamental disharmony between outside appearances and interior aspects. The splendor of kings and princes is not the true splendor of virtue, but the false grandeur of the goods of fortune. For Poggio, a life in happiness is not based on the dominion of fortune (fortune arbitrium), but depends on the assistance of virtue (virtutis presidium). Happiness is not a matter of external goods or goods of fortune, rather it pertains to the goods of the soul. Poggio is of the opinion that recognizing this fundamental insight has made many excellent men throw away their fortunes and spend their free time studying philosophy in order to become happy. If happiness is to be found in any place, it is in the house of men of outstanding learning and wisdom, who spent their time competing for virtue, far away from passionate desires, not striving for the goods of others. According to Poggio, the dedicatee of the dialogue, Tommaso di Sarzana, later Pope Nicholas V, is one of these learned men. Not only did he study philosophy and the optimae artes, but also theology. Just like Poggio, he is on the side of virtue and will be the book’s defender.

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The importance of letters is one of the recurrent motifs of Poggio’s dialogue. Early in the discussion, “Niccolò Niccoli,” the dialogue’s main interlocutor, attacks popes and princes for their scanty interest in learning and wisdom. In order to give an example, he describes Poggio’s successful search for books in libraries in Europe and shows himself disappointed that this search did not bear fruit with kings and popes. Instead of financing and continuing the rediscovery of ancient works, they waste their time and money in wars, pleasures, and other futile pursuits: [W]hen it comes to the search for the literary monuments of the past masters, the wisdom and learning of which leads to a life in bliss and truth, they become numb and fall asleep, for most of them live the life of sheep. Under the sway of their insane passions and various ambitions, they remain quiet when it comes to wisdom, the virtues, or the art of living a good life. Accordingly, they should neither be called princes nor blissful, but rather monsters.11

“Niccolò” insists on this point. He is amused by “Carlo Marsuppini’s” counterargument that a lot of rulers have been judged happy by their contemporaries, and by those who came later. Instead, he insists that they are idle, ignorant, and unlearned, incapable of controlling themselves, avaricious, arrogant, hot-tempered, cruel, and wanton. Enemies of peace and quiet, they indulge in wars. As “Niccolò” complains, “Today in Italy we are not permitted to let our weapons rest because of the greed that some rulers have for the goods of others.”12 Although the dialogue is supposed to set in 1434, this sentence applied well to the situation of 1440: while Poggio was writing his dialogue, Alfonso undertook his conquest of Naples. “Niccolò” connects the uncontrolled desires and ambitions of the princes directly to their ignorance of letters. For the sake of all learned and righteous men, I wished that princes would do something about their wisdom and follow its precepts. But as they do not care about wisdom, they cannot possibly become acquainted with the virtues, nor to put them to use as a reinforcement for their lives. Virtue flees from ignorance and resides in reason and wisdom.13

Princes are monsters because they have no philosophical and literary knowledge, nor do they even strive for it. Learned men are not welcome guests at court: “Very few exceptions made, the study of letters has never flourished among kings and princes, nor have they cared for men of letters and wisdom, nor held them in high esteem.”14 Kings and princes even reject wise men at court since they despise virtue. For the powerful, virtue is dangerous and alarming. Like those who have sore

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eyes, they shun the splendor of virtue and try to subdue it. Therefore, the study of philosophy could flourish only in the days of Greek and Roman liberty. “The studies of letters aspire to and reach after the liberty of speech and life. They flee from servitude and shrink back from it.”15 The examples of unfortunate literary men are many, reaching from Callisthenes, killed by Alexander the Great, to Plato, Zeno, Seneca, and Lucan.16 Among more recent examples, “Niccolò” lists famous poets and scholars such as Dante, Petrarca, and Boccaccio.17 As he concludes, very rarely you will find a philosopher or orator or someone wise and learned in letters who has been enriched by kings and promoted to a higher rank, or has been summoned as counsellor to the king, or as preceptor in matters of the good life, or as moral teacher, if not for ostentation.18

Among all this ignorance and ostentation, “Niccolò” sees no place for good and happy princes. When “Cosimo” confronts him with a list of emperors who have been deemed virtuous and happy, he compares these princes with the phoenix who hasn’t been spotted for centuries. “If there has ever been virtue [in them], it has been in few.” So rarely does a virtuous ruler appear that he has to be considered a monstrosity, like a child with the head of an ox or a cat.19 Both good and bad rulers are monsters, albeit in different senses, and neither are happy. On the one hand, the vices and the passions of the bad rulers prevent them from leading a blissful life. On the other hand, good rulers are worn down by the labor and toil of their manifold responsibilities.20 For “Niccolò,” happiness resides far away from the palaces. In response to “Cosimo’s” ironical question as to whether we have to imagine happiness like Astrea who has gone to heaven, he retells the story of Gyges and Apollo. Gyges, the king of Lydia, asks Apollo whom he deems the happiest among men. Against Gyges’s expectations, Apollo does not name any wealthy, powerful, or famous public figure, but a certain Aglaus, a simple peasant from Arcadia.21 Continuing this line of argument, Poggio turns to Lucian’s dialogue, Menippus, and translates the seer Tiresias’s answer to the question where the best life might be found. As Tiresias responds to Menippus, it resides in those who do not hold an office, apud privatos viros. Accordingly, “Niccolò” judges that if happiness resides somewhere, it lodges in some private quarter, far away from the heights of kings and the peaks of those who rule. What makes life happy are the virtues. Shut out from the palaces, they are forced to flee from them whenever they happen to set foot on their thresholds by chance or by error, thoroughly frightened by the customs, servants, and wiles that dwell there with

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them. In private houses, instead, virtue stays willingly because it is here that the love for wisdom and learning flourishes….22

Parallel to the argument about the absence of philosophy and culture from the kings’ court, “Niccolò” lays great emphasis on the vainglorious and empty character of princely rule. As the political power of kings and other rulers is normally destitute of virtue, it is based on the vicissitudes of fortune, on the passions and on material wealth. Yet, these “materials” do not lead to a blissful life. On the contrary, they are highly apt to lead political rulers astray. The exterior aspects of this kind of political power are always splendid and impressive. Yet, the interiors of political power are empty, meaningless, and hollow, just like in the case of the colossal statues from antiquity. Thus, “Niccolò” quotes a passage from Gallus, in which Lucian describes royalty as similar to those colossal statues, the work of Phidias, Myron or Praxiteles: they too look extremely well from outside: ‘tis Poseidon with his trident, Zeus with his thunderbolt, all ivory and gold: but take a peep inside, and what have we? One tangle of bars, bolts, nails, planks, wedges, with pitch and mortar and everything that is unsightly; not to mention a possible colony of rats or mice.23

For Poggio and his interlocutor “Niccolò,” the outward magnificence and splendor of kingship do not correspond to inner splendor, the splendor of virtue. It may have a political meaning, but it does not have moral meaning. The representation of power is not necessarily built on virtuous behavior. As “Niccolò” fervently advocates, virtue and politics do not fit together. Political power is a corrosive force that either corrupts one’s character, or slowly wears it down. Despite appearances, princes are not happy, but lead a miserable life immersed in vice, labor, and toil.

The king’s new clothes The position of “Niccolò” was rather radical. Repeatedly, his interlocutors criticize him for his stern and hypercritical account. “Cosimo de’ Medici,” for example, finds fault with his propensity toward detraction and chiding.24 “Niccolò” promptly reacts to this criticism. For him, praise is deceitful, as most people have worse characters than one is able to imagine. The world is full of hypocrites who prefer to appear good rather than to actually be so; their vices are concealed by a veil of integrity. Therefore, “Niccoli” rejects praise as something that is dangerous and comes close to a lie.25 Indeed, he condemns the flattery of court historians like Valerius Maximus.26

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Historians at court Panormita and Facio were just that: court historians. Consequently, their political and cultural program followed a more traditional line of argument, as it had been defended by “Cosimo de’ Medici” and “Carlo Marsuppini” in De infelicitate. In their historical works—Panormita’s De dictis et factis and Facio’s Res gestae of King Alfonso—they successfully created an image of Alfonso in which the former conqueror appeared as a virtuous and even heroic ruler, whose moral excellence meant that he was fully entitled to reign over the kingdom of Naples. Since Alfonso’s claims to the throne were heavily contested, virtue played an important role. He had taken the realm by force in a protracted war with his rival claimant, René d’Anjou, acting against the will of major players in Italy, not least Florence and the papacy. It had been “the only major intrusion of foreign power into Italy between the Angevins in the 1260s and the crisis that opened in 1494.”27 In Peter Stacey’s words, Alfonso’s victory was a “forced entry into the political society of Renaissance Italy” and necessitated an “ideological response” to the crisis of political legitimation which resulted.28 Given the shaky juridical and dynastic foundations of the new king’s rule, the task of formulating such an ideological response fell mainly to the humanists at court. As Giacomo Ferraù has remarked, the cultural policies of the king were clearly aimed at the elaboration of an ideology which would promote his cause in the kingdom and on the peninsula as a whole.29 Obviously, Panormita’s and Facio’s justification of Alfonso’s rule required a basis that contrasted Poggio’s discussion in De infelicitate in almost all of its aspects. “Niccolò” was the pessimistic and sardonic spokesman of an antipolitics in which virtuous rule was nearly impossible. Panormita and Facio instead based their works on the very idea of the virtuous ruler. Politics was not divorced from virtue, but depended on it. More striking still, it was in fact virtue that legitimated politics. Accordingly, a book like Panormita’s De dictis and factis took the form of an extended narration of the king’s virtues and aimed to demonstrate Alfonso’s moral superiority. Already in the first anecdote, Alfonso’s virtuous conduct legitimizes his political actions and lends authority to his decisions. The short section describes how King Alfonso became involved with the affairs of the Neapolitan kingdom. In 1420, Queen Johanna II of Naples is threatened by the joined forces of Muzio Attendolo Sforza, father of Francesco, the future ruler of Milan, and Charles, duke of Provence. Looking for support, she turns for help to Alfonso, king of Aragon. Yet, Alfonso’s counselors advise their king against the enterprise. In their

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opinion, it would turn out to be “hard and extremely uncertain in its outcome.” Alfonso’s purported answer reveals much of the ideology underpinning the later myth of the “magnanimous”: As I have heard, Hercules used to help those in dire straits even without their request. And we should hesitate to rush to the aid of a queen, a woman, a distressed? I admit the coming war to be hard and difficult but all the brighter is our future. Without hardship and danger, no one has covered himself with glory until now.30

In Panormita’s account, Alfonso’s advisers are much more cautious about Johanna’s request. They weigh the advantages and disadvantages and doubt whether the oncoming war is feasible. Virtue does not play any role for them, and the prospect of a difficult and long-enduring conflict deters them. Alfonso, instead, does not ponder the consequences of an involvement in the conflict. He is interested in virtue and glory alone. Brave as he is (the chapter is labeled fortiter), the arduousness of the task inspires rather than hinders him.31 Thus it is virtue, and not greed, avarice, nor any other passion, that leads Alfonso into the war for Naples. Similar to a prelude, the first anecdote of De dictis and factis celebrates the king’s virtuous behavior, a motif that will recur through the whole work. The king proves his moral worth in all possible situations and in all possible ways. Thus, he orders his soldiers not to sack the city of Naples after having conquered it. Despite the obstinate resistance of the Neapolitans and the death of his brother Peter during battle, he saves the citizens from the plunder and greed of his troops, personally controlling the streets of Naples.32 This episode ingeniously allows Panormita to depict the king’s moderate behavior. As Alfonso controls his passions and makes them obey reason, he controls his soldiers and forces them to obey his superior command, a lesson he also imparts on his own son in later years. As he writes to the young Ferrante on one of his first military campaigns, “they might love you or fear you, but see to it by all means that they obey you. In no other way you will gain honour.”33 The king is not only brave, moderate, clement, and magnificent; wisdom also figures prominently among the virtues Panormita ascribes to his patron. Many passages in De dictis et factis tell of the king’s interest in classical learning and his inclination toward philosophy, and it is at this point that Poggio and Panormita met. Both men are convinced of the importance of humanist studies and contend that the study of letters contributes decisively to character formation. The fundamental difference lies in their use of this argument. Poggio, in the guise of Niccolò Niccoli, denies that kings have an interest in letters, arguing that due to the vices political power necessarily engenders, the role of king is

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basically incompatible with the cult of letters. In contrast, Panormita emphasizes Alfonso’s familiarity with the new literary culture in order to strengthen his position. Being a learned man and even a philosopher, King Alfonso’s virtues are far from being mere acts of ostentation. Rather, they have a secure basis in his insight and wisdom. Panormita does his best to shape the king’s image as a sage. In the prologue to book I, he refers to Xenophon’s Memorabilia as his model, affirming that Alfonso is without a doubt the wisest and strongest (sapientissimus et fortissimus) among all living kings. This is a significant move. When Poggio dedicated his translation of another “historical” work of Xenophon to Alfonso—the Cyropaedia—he was well aware that this work was not designed as a historical description of the king’s life, but as a mirror-for-princes, depicting the portrait of the “best prince,” a prince, though, which had never really existed, as he writes to Bartolomeo Facio.34 As Riccardo Fubini argues, Poggio is very clear in formulating his idea that “the image of princely virtues is utopian and thereby also of doubtful pedagogical value, except insofar as it points out the discrepancy between what should be and what actually is.”35 Panormita did his best to blur the difference. His point of reference are the Memorabilia, and thus he suggests to his readers that they are looking at a biographical account. Still, his portrait of the king as the “best prince” bears a much stronger resemblance to the mirror-for-princes mode, in which the king’s interest in humanist studies holds a strategic place. As has been noted previously, this view holds that the power of philosophy and of philosophical education enable us to see through the veil of the senses, guiding us toward a real knowledge of things. Translated into political terms, this knowledge guarantees that Alfonso is not a tyrant or an unjust ruler. He is not led by the greed for material values, and this makes him a legitimate ruler on a moral scale. He can thus be seen as an “objectively” good king whose aims are honorable. His wisdom renders his rule acceptable to everyone and makes him superior to all other contenders to the throne. Consequently, Panormita’s De dictis et factis creates the image of a Stoic “philosopher king,” a ruler dedicated to the letters, a wise man who has attained wisdom and accomplishes the best things. As Panormita lets his readers know, the king regards it unworthy of a nobleman to be an uneducated person and makes fun of those who think otherwise. “When he heard that some Spanish king used to say that it wasn’t fitting for a nobleman to be learned in letters, he is said to have exclaimed that these were not the words of a king, but of an ox.” Enea Silvio Piccolomini, who wrote a commentary to the De dictis et factis, allegedly

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heard him citing from a French translation of St. Augustine’s City of God, that “an uneducated king is nothing more than a crowned ass.”36 And when somebody asks the king whether it were possible to be poor amid so many riches, the king answers: “Of course, if somebody sells his wisdom.” According to Panormita, the remark clearly shows that Alfonso appreciates knowledge (cognitio rerum) more than kingdoms and riches.37 Panormita goes even further in his praise of Alfonso’s wisdom, writing that the king surpasses professional philosophers. For what should be strange about the fact that professional philosophers dedicated to one of the schools occasionally produce wise and learned men? However, if one comes across a king or a prince who is involved with government in times of war and peace, surrounded by flatterers and those who draw him into pleasure and entertainment instead of study and learning, and if this king or prince nevertheless shows a constant and firm character, not abhorring the good arts, then this is something really admirable and praiseworthy.38 Panormita turns Alfonso into one of Poggio’s good monsters. Panormita’s anecdotes not only present the king as a philosopher, they also depict him as a Maecenas of the humanists, thus cleverly connecting his wisdom to his liberality. In this way, Alfonso incarnates the very ideals Poggio denies to those holding political power. Alfonso, Panormita narrates, appoints nearly all those men whom he has heard to excel in the art of war or to be famous literary figures to his court. He honors them lavishly and gives them the most splendid presents. For their learnedness and their wit he loves Bartolomeo Facio, George of Trebizond, Leonardo Bruni (who did not join Alfonso’s court for reasons of illness and age, as Panormita puts it), and Poggio Bracciolini.39 Alfonso also takes care of the rising generation of scholars. He supports boys with a talent for philosophy, rhetoric, and theology financially; in his commentaries, Piccolomini purports the story of Alfonso’s joy when he receives letters from two boys he had sent to study in Paris.40

Pontano’s prince, the barons, and a statue Given Beccadelli’s propagandistic efforts, which made his De dictis et factis one of the most successful books of the fifteenth century, Pontano had ample material at his disposal when composing his own mirror-for-princes for Duke Alfonso in the 1460s. Indeed, De principe contains all the tenets of the humanist ideology of education. In order to fulfill the expectations of his father and of everyone else, Pontano writes, it is enough that the duke will not be “neglectful of himself ” (sibi

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deesse). In other words, he has the natural talent and gift necessary to become a virtuous ruler, but he has to develop this potential in the right way, something that will happen “if you will obey those who give you sensible instructions and honourable advice.”41 This needs to happen from rather early on; the foundations of wisdom and virtue have to be laid in youth, as Pontano affirms in much the same words as Vergerio in De ingenuis moribus, one of the great treatises on humanist education.42 As he is also quick to point out, “someone of that age cannot actually be wise on account of his immaturity and lack of knowledge.” The youth, therefore, depends on the authority of his teachers: [T]he first priority is that the child gets into the habit of respecting old men. The second is that he willingly listens to their words. The third is that he strives to make himself as similar to them as possible, not only in words but also in deeds.43

Accordingly, the young Alfonso is surrounded by an entourage of high-ranking men to whom he can turn for advice and instruction. Contrary to Poggio’s accusations, the Aragonese promoted literary men to important offices and engaged them as moral teachers. Pontano himself was the best example of the success of humanist studies and the new place of these studies within politics. For the humanists, an education in the liberal arts became the high road to the temple of virtue and success, with the humanist intellectual as its indispensable high priest and mediator between letters and politics. Neapolitan humanism exemplifies this trend with an almost symbiotic relationship between politics and culture. Following Panormita, Pontano recalls Alfonso the Magnanimous as a ruler who lived this relationship in an exemplary manner: “Your grandfather never set out on a campaign without books,” he informs his disciple, reminiscent of a passage in De dictis et factis.44 Moreover, he concludes his own praise of the use of classical authors with an anecdote from the same work, relating a purported saying of Alfonso regarding Ovid: After a lengthy discussion of Ovid’s merits, Alfonso, moved by the greatness of his fame, said: “I would gladly give up this region, which is no small or insignificant part of the kingdom of Naples, if this poet had been alive in my day; I value him, even dead, more than the lordship of all Abruzzo.”45

As this famous episode is supposed to show, the king prefers a great poet (and sage, given the conception of poetry as a part of moral philosophy) to the command of a region of strategic importance.

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While praising humanist studies, Pontano attacks anyone not as easily inclined toward these studies as King Alfonso; “assent should not be given to those people who decry learned pursuits.” For Pontano, as for Poggio, the dismissal of literary studies means relinquishing any possibility of a sound judgment, of a good life, and of just rule. In Ciceronian terms, he asks his pupil rhetorically: What is more necessary, by Christ, than knowing a great deal both about those things based on a knowledge of nature and of recondite matters, and about those founded on the memory of the past and the example set by famous men? Unless they think that it is not necessary to know whether something is fair or foul, good or bad, to be sought after or avoided…?46

Like Panormita, Pontano shares Poggio’s view of philosophy and literary education as the foundation of virtue. Yet, he also reverses the ideological thrust of the Florentine’s works. As in Panormita’s case, the picture that Poggio paints in the most somber colors is turned into the splendid image of the two Alfonsos, grandfather and grandson, as a philosopher king and an educated prince. In Panormita’s and Pontano’s mirror-for-princes, the two Neapolitan rulers shine in the brightest colors, not indulging in pleasures and entertainment, but rather reading and learning even on their military campaigns and supporting scholars with sumptuous financial rewards. This picture provided future generations of courtiers with an invaluable ideological portrait of their lords. The argument of the magnificent but empty appearance of princes and rulers, put forward by Poggio and formulated by him in Lucianic terms, is thus reversed. Reintroducing virtue and learning into the realm of politics, Pontano also disseminates the ideal of humanist education to the baronage of the realm. From relatively early on, he has important links with the high-ranking members of the aristocracy outside Naples. Thus, his treatise On Obedience is dedicated to Roberto Sanseverino, among the most influential of the realm’s barons.47 While the praise of Roberto’s humanist education serves mainly as an intellectual annexation and “domestication” of one of the most powerful political forces of the realm, later writings of Pontano divert the ideological thrust of humanist education in a different direction. In his treatise On Magnanimity (1499), Pontano addresses Andrea Mattia Acquaviva, head of the powerful Acquaviva family. He praises Andrea Mattia’s father, Giulio Antonio, for the careful education he has bestowed on his sons. The Acquaviva, Pontano writes, had been a family of warriors, trained solely in the art of war. This changes with Giulio Antonio, who hoped to accomplish praise not only for his military expertise, but also for his literary skills. Prevented from pursuing this aim himself, he provides his

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sons with the best possible humanist education. The sequence of generations is telling. While his ancestors were not at all concerned with a liberal education, Giulio Antonio grasps its fundamental importance, putting it into practice not for himself, but for his sons. Having received this education, Pontano sustains, the latter will enter the battle instilled with a magnanimity derived from the examples of famous commanders and military leaders.48 Pontano’s prologue marks a significant shift of attention, no longer centering on the Aragonese monarchy, but on the baronage. It was written after the defeat of 1495, and although the Aragonese had returned to power, little was left of their former authority. In this difficult and temporary situation, the barons again became the real political players. Despite the “betrayal” of his former patrons, however, Pontano remained the educator of Duke Alfonso for generations to come. Giovan Francesco Torresani, for one, indulges in praising Pontano’s role as Duke Alfonso’s tutor in his introduction to the Aldine Opera Omnia published in Venice in 1519–20.49 He tells his readers that, when building a summer palace at Poggioreale in 1487–88, Alfonso put a bust of Pontano there, being convinced that nothing could grace his household more than the image of his old teacher. In order to underline the central position of Pontano and the value of his education and learning for Alfonso, Torresani imagines him—rex ille sapientissimus—leading his royal and princely visitors around, showing them “his weapons, horses, jewels, ingots and gold coins, his elegant furnishings and many other things,” only in the end confronting them with “the most beautiful and precious portrait” of Pontano, almost as if it was a shrine or domestic altar.50 Hence, the magnificent outward appearance of Poggioreale is preserved. In its interiors, there is no “colony of rats and mice,” no “tangle of bars, bolts, nails, planks, wedges,” as in Lucian’s statues. Everything inside is well ordered, based on the authority of Pontano, the teacher and tutor of the duke.

All fall down Despite these appraisals, the reigns of Ferrante and the Alfonso II ended in disaster. In a way, both had to pay the price for the first Alfonso’s magnanimous policies. How disastrous these policies had been became clear when Alfonso died on June 27, 1458, and Ferrante was to succeed him. At this point it became obvious that the political imbalances in the kingdom had only been suspended and painted over. Consequently, Ferrante saw himself confronted with a hostile

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pope who refused to crown him and with revolting barons who saw their chance to change the power relations of the kingdom to their advantage. Jean d’Anjou, the son of Alfonso’s arch enemy, was called into the realm, putting Ferrante in extreme difficulties.

The First Barons’ War Already the last years of Alfonso’s realm had not been as bright as the king’s biographers would have liked. On the one hand, Alfonso Borja was elected pope under the name of Calixtus III. Against all expectations, Calixtus, formerly a close collaborator of Alfonso, turned out to be a strong opponent of the Aragonese in Naples. On the other hand, a number of natural calamities struck the kingdom. As if to condense the political tensions, in 1456 the kingdom was stricken by disquieting natural phenomena. In June, Halley’s comet appeared in the skies over Italy, presaging more political perturbations, and in December, the kingdom was struck by a terrible earthquake, which claimed tens of thousands of lives. In the words of Alan Ryder, the political crisis with the papacy and the natural calamities in the realm transformed the last years of Alfonso’s reign into “a darkening scene.”51 Pontano depicted the discomforting atmosphere of these days between natural portents and political irrationality in Charon. Accurately, Mercury informs his colleagues in the underworld about the latest catastrophic news from the world above. He reports that the cold North wind has devastated vines, olive trees, and citrus trees,52 a clear allusion to a “frost of unprecedented severity” that killed “thousands of trees” in April 1456.53 Nor does Mercury leave out the more serious portents. As he tells his fellow gods, “Italy, from which I am coming just now, has been shaken by great earthquakes, and many towns lie flattened on the ground in ruins.”54 Indeed, Southern Italy was struck by an earthquake of major magnitude in the night between December 5 and 6, 1456.55 Furthermore, the appearance of a comet has “struck the hearts and minds of all with fears of future ills.”56 Lastly, the metaphorical expression of a “darkening scene” becomes rather concrete as Mercury relates that “for several days, the sun has not sent forth its rays and the whole sky has looked dark.”57 The darkening of the sun does not refer to a solar eclipse, however. In contemporary natural philosophy, it was taken to be one of the consequences of an earthquake. Matteo d’Aquila (c. 1410–75), for one, describes the darkening of the sun as a direct consequence of the earthquake in his treatise On the Comet and the Earthquake, written shortly after the December earthquake.58

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Both the earthquake and the comet are important indicators of the political psychology of the time. It is interesting to note, for example, that Matteo begins his treatise with the profound feeling of fear the earthquake has caused in him.59 In De fortitudine, Pontano, paraphrasing a passage in the Ethics, argues that it is inhuman not to fear natural disasters like floods and earthquakes.60 In his treatise De maiestate (1492), Giuniano Maio (1430–93) narrates that Alfonso the Magnanimous reacted exactly like this. Attending mass, he remains calm when the earthquake strikes, even though the priest flees from the altar. For Maio, this is a “not only an admirable, but also a rare and great sign of natural constancy.”61 The episode is also illustrated in one of the manuscript copies of the work.62 The divergence between Pontano’s and Maio’s opinion sheds some light on their different conceptions of the image of the ruler and of political practice. Pontano (and Matteo d’Aquila) seem to share a more cautious attitude toward the possibilities and the limitations of human action. Maio, by contrast, concentrates on the “superhuman” qualities of the king. Remaining within the realm of normal human possibilities, both Pontano and Matteo try to come to terms with the fears of natural phenomena. These fears encapsulate much wider issues, as is clearest in the appearance of the comet reported by Charon. Of course, explanations for this appearance existed in the fifteenth century. Natural philosophers like Matteo affirmed that comets can cause unusual natural phenomena like winds, drought, and earthquakes, following the theories in Aristotle’s Meteorology and Seneca’s Naturales Quaestiones.63 Still, they were also convinced that the comet not only influences natural phenomena, but also foreshadows frightful political changes: wars, civil discords, bloodshed, changes in leadership, and even the murder of princes. Accordingly, the best way to understand the threatening quality of comets was not through natural philosophy, but through judicial astrology, with reference to works like Ps.Ptolemy’s Centiloquium, which Pontano translated and commented on in the mid-1470s. The very last of the one hundred short aphorisms contained in the work dealt with the effects produced by the appearance of comets, most notably, the death of a king.64 The comet of 1456, then, could not escape the notice of astrologers. In his own commentary on the Centiloquium, George of Trebizond, who had himself spent some time in Naples and had been a teacher of Pontano,65 let his readers know “that while I’m writing these lines, a comet has appeared over Rome, on the first of June, between the fifth and sixth hour of the night, in the eastern angle.”66 At the time, however, George did not jump to any conclusion, suggesting that the influence of the comet should be better applied to the whole region

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concerned and not to one single king or kingdom.67 Many years later, Pontano would be much more explicit. In his own commentary on the Centiloquium, he connects the comet to the death of Alfonso in June 1458 and the war that ensued: When I was a young man, a famous comet shone for many days in the east, in the regions of Cancer and Leo, of such length that his tail occupied more than two signs of the zodiac. It was followed by the death of king Alfonso, which drew Emilia, Sabina, Campania and the whole Neapolitan kingdom in a long and heavy war.68

Pontano wrote with the benefit of hindsight. At the time of Ferrante’s ascension to the throne, his position had seemed secure and his succession guaranteed.69 However, this impression turned out to be mistaken. There could be no doubt that the death of the Aragonese ruler, who had been one of the major political figures in the Mediterranean for over forty years, would lead to a critical moment and give rise to the “occasion to verify the political and economic equilibria.”70 Indeed, the pope and the barons of the realm did everything in their power to contest the new king. These events left their imprint on Pontano’s earlier works and heavily influenced their political trajectory. Writings such as Charon, De principe, and De obedientia legitimized the Aragonese rule over Naples and delegitimized its opponents. In the end, the war presaged by the natural calamities in Charon was the work of men. As Pontano’s “Mercury” criticizes, people try to secure their houses against a natural disaster, which occurs only once in a hundred years, while they do not secure themselves against the dangers and evils caused by their passions in almost every instant. Similarly, they accuse nature of having killed twenty thousand in one night, while the wars engineered by them cost the same amount of lives in a single hour, and many more every year.71 Pontano’s denunciation is not an act of unconditioned pacifism. It is a direct attack on those members of Italian society that had caused the war of succession in the first place: the pope and the barons. This becomes clear from his description of the bellicose attitude of the clergy, with which Mercury, the rerum occultissimarum interpres, begins his interpretation of the natural calamities which have afflicted the kingdom. Minos: Mercury: Minos: Mercury:

What is the meaning of these portents? They signify pestilence and war. War? By whom? The priests.

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173

Then war will be made by those under the greatest obligation to be advocates of peace? They seek peace with their words, but war with their deeds. What is their reason for waging war? Desire to increase their kingdom. Then avarice is the cause of these evils? Exactly. The degree of avarice that exists in this type of man is almost indescribable.72

These scathing remarks are aimed chiefly at Pope Calixtus. In Pontano’s History of the Neapolitan War, too, the first Borja pope appears as a schemer, trying to destabilize Ferrante and to instigate the nobility of the realm to rebel against him.73 The pope died shortly after his rival, King Alfonso, on August 6, 1458, which put an end to his plans. Nevertheless the damage was done. As Pontano writes in his History, his intrigues had already fermented a huge and ruinous war, the reason of which had to be sought in Calixtus’s unreliable, stubborn, elusive, and ambitious character.74 Although one-sided, Pontano’s portrait was not entirely inaccurate. Indeed, it seems that Calixtus had become extremely ambitious under the influence of his relatives and his counselors. This ambition regarded less the pope’s own person than the members of his family, most notoriously his nephews. While he bestowed the cardinalate on Luis Juan and Rodrigo Borja, he made Pedro Luis Borja the prefect of Rome.75 As the Milanese ambassador Antonio da Pistoia wrote, the pope made himself ridiculous with his decisions.76 Indeed, Calixtus seems to have known no limits under the counsel of his relatives. First he imagined Pedro Luis as emperor in a recaptured Constantinople, then as the governor of Naples.77 Besides the pope, the barons were the greatest opponents to Ferrante’s rule. When the young king ascended to the throne, the barons seem to have been preoccupied for two reasons. As Francesco Sforza wrote to Antonio da Trezzo as early as November 29, 1458, they lamented that Ferrante did not show the liberality they professed and that he closed himself within a circle of Catalan counselors, despite his promises to “live like an Italian and to turn to Italians for advice.”78 Largely ignoring these political motives, Pontano ascribed the war first and foremost to the bad character of the barons. As Francesco Senatore has shown, in so doing he was following a line of argument well established among Aragonese writers, first among them Panormita. According to Panormita, the barons revolted because of their inborn capriciousness (mutabilitas) and desire for subversion (novitatum aviditas). In other words, there were no valid motives for their uprising. Their behavior could be described only in terms of madness (insania).79

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Likewise, in the History Pontano censures Giovanni Antonio Orsini, prince of Taranto and leader of the rebellion, for his vacillation and his unsettled character. According to Pontano, Giovanni Antonio had a taste for sedition, robbery, and discord. He is described as variable and unstable in character and not trustworthy in his friendships; with him, it was not so much respect for morality and religion that counted so much as his efforts to get his grip on the things he had set his mind on; himself rather miserly, he desired the goods of others more than anything else, and as he was fearful in times of war, he was not be trusted in times of peace; and only with difficulty had he born the long and quiet time of peace under Alfonso.80

Put succinctly, he was “a real craftsman when it came to instigating war” (producendi belli egregius artifex).81 In contrast, Ferrante is depicted as a truly magnanimous man, who keeps a clear head in adversity. Continuing the Alfonsine ideology of Panormita’s and Facio’s works, in the De principe Pontano writes to the younger Alfonso, Your father King Ferrante did not show the slightest flicker of emotion when, at the beginning of his reign, he was told about the defection of many nobles, common people and even whole provinces to Jean d’Anjou; still less did he show he was distraught. Not once did he refer to the traitors with an unkind word.82

Ferrante is not overwhelmed by anger, so much as moved to compassion: When the rebellion of a certain noble … was announced, Ferrante was affected to the extent of saying that he grieved because such a man from so great a family had made himself unworthy of his forebears.83

In the long run, this strategy did not work out. Indeed, the reign of Ferrante had a very different character to that of his father. Ferrante was not Alfonso; he had neither the financial resources nor the political weight of his father. A different ideological framework was necessary. Panormita was too immersed in the old Alfonsine days to accomplish this task. Indeed, he never finished his panegyrical portrait of the young Ferrante.84 His style did not fit the new times, and it was rather Pontano’s De bello Neapolitano that reflected the ideological foundations of Ferrante’s realm. Pontano remained true to Panormita’s “moralistic” approach to politics, but he changed its direction. Different from his teacher, Pontano is much less concerned with the exaltation of Ferrante’s virtues than with the criticism of the vices of Ferrante’s opponents in De bello Neapolitano. Whereas Panormita celebrates Alfonso as a wise ruler, Pontano chastises the pope and the barons as

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rebels driven by their passions and their greed. He transfers the vocabulary that Poggio had employed in order to describe the unjust ruler to the baronage of the kingdom, diverting its polemical power and giving it a different thrust. It is not the king’s behavior, but that of the pope and the barons which is delegitimized. Only after 1495, Pontano will add negative judgments on Ferrante.85

A farewell to magnanimity In this way Pontano contributed to the new king’s attempts to strengthen his central power and to weaken that of his adversaries inside and outside the realm. Unfortunately, these attempts led to an endemic conflict even after Ferrante’s victory over the barons and Jean d’Anjou in 1465. The king was not as magnanimous as writers like Pontano would have their readers believe. Ferrante continued to mistrust the barons, and with few exceptions, he never entered into friendly terms with them. As Pontano remarks in De magnanimitate, written almost forty years after the end of the war, Ferrante cultivated his hate from the days of childhood through to his old age. Consequently, he ordered many things unworthy of his dignity as a king, even against totally innocent people.86

The Second Barons’ War was a direct consequence of Ferrante’s difficult character and the mutual distrust between him and the barons. The tensions underlying the conflict of 1485–86 were much the same as those in 1459–65. In the end, they led to the fall of the Aragonese in 1495. In the course of these events, the virtuous picture of the Aragonese dynasty broke into pieces and slipped into a perceived state of degradation. Whereas the first Alfonso’s fame as the “magnanimous” ruler of Naples lasted through the centuries, his successors gained notoriety rather than glory. Episodes like the arrest of Giacomo Piccinino in the 1460s (unmentioned by Pontano in his history of the Neapolitan war) eroded the picture of Ferrante as a virtuous ruler, and during the Second Barons’ War, this crumbled. Although Ferrante had promised not to punish and disown the barons in the peace treaty of 1486, it was obvious that he had changed his political strategy. He no longer appeared as a clement and magnanimous ruler, but as sovereign seeking punishment. Nevertheless, the writings that the chancery produced under Pontano’s direction still clung to the Alfonsine motif of magnanimity: “Nothing was further from our mind than to seek revenge, which was always alien to the rulers of our family, and first and foremost to me,” the king writes to his emissary Giovanni Albino in summer

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1487.87 Ten years later, the last Aragonese king, Federico, would still emphasize the righteousness of the measures taken: For rulers, to whom the kingdom and the regiment of the people is given by divine mystery, there is nothing more fitting than to be liberal, clement and merciful. In this way they imitate the divine operations. Yet, the ruler has to take actions against some subjects, when these subjects misbehave excessively or display too great a fault.88

While the earlier propaganda was directed at the promotion of clemency and mercy, the last years of the Aragonese realm were characterized by a form of propaganda which justified punishment and the suspension of forgiveness. One of the sonnets Giovanni Antonio Petrucci, a son of Antonello Petrucci and one of the barons sentenced to death, had written during his imprisonment complains about this very change: Where has all the great favour gone? And where has our familiarity gone, where did the amiability flee? Where are the praises that seemed to come straight from his heart, with love? Oh, king Ferrante, how promptly Have you turned them into ferocity, Against me, innocent and free of error….89

As Petrucci’s words implied, Ferrante’s severe and unforgiving attitude revealed a darker and more tyrannical side of the king. The ferocity (fierecza) with which the king had come down on his former ministers had nothing to do with virtue, but was rather a form of vice. Pontano himself mentions Ferrante’s dark side in De immanitate when he describes the joy and pleasure the king drew from his prominent prisoners, “in the same way children do with little birds locked in a cage,” bursting out in loud laughter among his friends.90 Likewise, Ferrante also showed little mercy for those who poached his hunting grounds, severely punishing them by cutting their hands off or staking them.91 Not by coincidence, Ferrante’s hunting habits held a prominent place in a papal bull of October 14, 1485, that accused him of being a tyrant and justified the barons’ uprising.92 One of the favors granted by the newly crowned King Alfonso II in January 1494 was particularly welcome: Alfonso ordered to release the hunting grounds of his father to the population. Everyone was free to acquire and cultivate these lands and hunt there without having to fear draconic punishments. The new king kept only a small part of the former grounds for

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himself.93 As the Milanese ambassador Antonio Stanga wrote, “with words and deeds, the king has chosen to do the right thing, that is to caress lands, people, and single persons by showing himself favourable to them.”94 Although Alfonso II tried to rebuild his reputation, the resistance against him grew from day to day. Like his father, the new king continued to exert financial pressure on the baronage and did not abstain from new arrests.95 The kingdom fell into a state of dissatisfaction, disturbance, and agitation.96 As some historians claim, Alfonso understood that the populace detested him and recognized that “all this misfortune and trouble had been caused by his sins,” hence his decision to hand the crown over to his son and become a monk.97 Cowardice or prudence, the king’s abdication and spectacular flight to Sicily epitomized the collapse of the Aragonese dynasty. No splendor of virtue was left. Alfonso’s exit from the political stage led to a final change in strategy. In order to support the young Ferrandino, Alfonso’s son and successor, Aragonese supporters like Pontano switched from praise to blame. In De prudentia, Pontano tells an anecdote that helps explain some aspects of this shift. On his deathbed, the unpopular Alexander Jannaeus, king of Judea, counseled his wife to take his body and leave it to those he had harmed during his lifetime. If his subjects are at liberty to abuse his dead body, Jannaeus argues, the rule of his wife and her political authority will remain unquestioned.98 The virtue of the new ruler was based on the demonstration of the vices of the old one. In a similar manner, Ferrandino and his counselors sacrificed the memory of Ferrante and Alfonso. Thus, Pontano explained the French invasion of 1494–95 not only in astrological terms, but also in relation to the misdeeds of Ferrandino’s predecessors. Just as the First Barons’ War had been announced by Halley’s comet and the greed and avarice of the pope and the barons, so Charles VIII’s descent into Italy had its roots not only in the fatality of the stars, but also in the errors of Ferrante and Alfonso. As Pontano writes to Ferrandino on the eve of the French conquest, Invasions from far away and without any previous offenses have their origin in the celestial movements, and their designs show in comets and the great conjunction of stars, like in the case of the present invasion against your father and yourself, although your grandfather first, then your father have had their part in all this, with their greedy and violent movements.99

Indeed, when Ferrandino gave his last speech to the Neapolitans before Charles’s entry into the city, he bewailed the “bitter rule” (acerbi governi) of his predecessors.100 What had begun with the “magnanimous” rule of the first Alfonso ended with the “cruel” governments of Ferrante and Alfonso II.

Conclusion

When the army of King Charles VIII of France set out to conquer the kingdom of Naples and swept through the Italian peninsula, it was Pontano who handed over the keys of Castle Capuano in February 1495, signaling the end of the Aragonese rule over Naples and the beginning of the Italian wars.1 Yet, there is more to the story than defeat. Pontano stands for a cultural movement that had its origins in Italy and conquered Europe in the sixteenth century, profoundly shaping the moral and political outlook of the continent: Renaissance humanism. Pontano’s political career might have ended with the French descent, but his career as a thinker and writer did not. During the sixteenth century, his Opera Omnia were published in Naples (1505–12), Venice (1518–19), Florence (1520), and Basle (1538–40 and 1566), bespeaking his success as a writer in the first sixty years or so after his death. One must be careful, however, to distinguish between Pontano’s impact on his contemporaries and on early modern moral and political thought, on the one hand, and the importance of his works for our understanding of humanist moral and political thought, on the other. Both dimensions do not necessarily match. Regarding Pontano’s impact on early modern moral and political thought, it has already been said in the introduction that Pontano was most successful as a poet and literary scholar. His impact as a philosopher was certainly much more limited, although it would be worthwhile to inquire into single episodes of the reception of his works. Following the 1512 edition of De prudentia in Straßburg, for example, the Erfurt humanist Konrad Muth (1470–1526), better known as Mutianus Rufus, includes a short satirical dialogue on Pontano in a letter to his friend Johannes Jäger.2 In 1519, Jacob Spiegel, a humanist from Sélestat, publishes a commented edition of De immanitate dedicated to Johann Lucas, a high-ranking financial officer under Maximilian and his successor Charles V.3 And not only Pontano’s treatises contribute to the diffusion of his moral thought; in 1545, an anonymous author translates a poem from Pontano’s De amore conjugali, “Ad uxorem de liberis educandis,” and publishes it under

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the title Jungfraw Zucht, “Education for Maidens,” in Wittenberg, the epicenter of Lutheran reformation.4 These episodes need further research, but they show how fragmented the reception of Pontano’s works could be. The question remains, therefore, whether it will be possible to find other environments in which the reception is less fragmented, for example at the universities or in the schools. Some of the evidence points against this. As has been mentioned in the introduction, Pontano was criticized by later Aristotelians such as Bernardo Segni. In general, Pontano’s idiosyncratic blend of Aristotelian moral and political thought runs against more philological approaches to the Ethics.5 Still, the early and relatively short-lived success of Pontano’s treatises may also point toward a different interpretation. It is possible that Pontano’s Latin philosophy was congenial with early modern treatments of Aristotle’s Ethics and therefore rapidly assimilated by the moral culture of the time. The humanists, first among them Leonardo Bruni, presented a “new” and eloquent Aristotle who appealed to the educated not only at the universities, but also in courts, noble houses, and in merchant cities. Pontano continued Bruni’s language work, and he spelled it out in terms of Renaissance culture and society. Concerning the role of Pontano’s treatises in our understanding of humanist moral and political thought, their analysis certainly contributes toward gauging more accurately the nature and scope of the influence of the humanist movement in early modern Europe. As has been argued, Pontano’s thought reconnects to the thought of humanists such as Petrarca, Bruni, and Valla and transforms their arguments. Recognizing Pontano’s manifold interactions with the humanists of his and of preceding generations draws a more differentiated and richer picture of the Italian humanist movement in the fifteenth century. It adds to the relatively small—and often not representative—selection of well-known sources, first and foremost the Florentine “civic humanists” and Machiavelli. Scholars have tried to link Pontano with Machiavelli, of course, mostly regarding his treatment of prudence and fortune.6 While it is perfectly reasonable to look for these links, the present book has tried a different route. It describes Pontano’s treatises from different angles and analyzes its entanglements with different kinds of theoretical and practical contexts. The first part maintains that Pontano was neither a hired pen nor simply a monarchist in his political activities and writings. Furthermore, his discussion of the active and contemplative life reveals a rather sophisticated model of the role of the intellectual in public life. In a similar way, the second part contends that he was neither a rhetorical philosopher nor a philosophically interested rhetorician. Instead, Pontano was concerned with the careful rewriting

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of traditional philosophical works in the framework of a new Latin philosophy, a task that obviously involved a great amount of philological sensitivity, but also of philosophical understanding, as the third part of the book argues. In this part, it also becomes clear that Pontano’s philosophy is not a completely new formulation of moral philosophy, but a powerful attempt to rethink moral philosophy within the boundaries of the Aristotelian paradigm. With this understanding, it makes little sense to distinguish the “new” and “modern” elements in his writings from the “old” and “medieval” ones. The close reading of his texts and their contextualization are necessary to bring into view the ways in which Pontano’s moral and political thought interacted with various fields of experience and with different practices. Such an approach is not without difficulties. As Mark Jurdjevic has remarked, an inquiry that relies too heavily on local context “does not permit of sustained comparative analysis, essential in any analysis of panoramic context.”7 All the same, if historical research is supposed to be “more than merely one’s appearance in the mirror” of the past,8 then the historical and philosophical understanding of Pontano’s treatises depends on a detailed account of a past thinker’s writings, a topography that embeds his thought in the intellectual landscape of his time. In the case of the “great” authors, there are surely other ways to set free and draw on their intellectual energies, to open up a play of possibilities, experiments, and reactions that goes beyond an accurate historiographic analysis. In the case of “minor” authors like Pontano, however, historical analysis is not “a fussy, minor therapy,” as Nancy Struever has called it.9 It is the key to an understanding of their works. Struever, for example, distinguishes between an “inventive Renaissance ethics” that is concerned with “proper moral work” and “the simple iteration of moralism.”10 As has been shown, Pontano’s Aristotelianism fits neither of these descriptions. No iteration is simple in the history of moral and political thought. As the notion of conventionality, like the notion of a “simple iteration,” dissolves under closer scrutiny, it makes way for a more differentiated understanding of the patterns and configurations that inform a past thinker’s thought. In Pontano’s case, setting his works into context means gaining insight into early modern Aristotelianism, not by turning to an innovative thinker, but by looking to an account that is representative of the Aristotelian culture of the time. Accordingly, the study of Pontano’s Aristotelianism is a step toward a history of ethics that pays more attention to the rich and lively discussions within the Aristotelian paradigm instead of concentrating on its dismissal. These remarks also apply to the treatment of virtue ethics in early modernity. Unfortunately, the avenues that have been opened up by the developments in modern virtue

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theory have rarely been explored by historians. Vice versa, philosophers have seldom realized the opportunities that studies on the history of ethics offer to them and have been interested mostly in ancient virtue ethics, first and foremost in Aristotle’s teachings. The study of Pontano’s moral and political thought entails a change of perspective, however. It does not dismiss Pontano as merely one more virtue ethicist, but analyzes the texture of his thought as well as its reformulation and transformation of the Aristotelian tradition. Reading Pontano is a bit like entering this tradition, not through the mighty portal of the Ethics or its commentaries, but through a side entrance. It gives a different insight into the huge building of “classical” virtue theory and sheds light on Aristotelian moral and political thought in the Renaissance.

App e ndix 1

Chronology of Pontano’s Works 1449

Pruritus

1457

Parthenopaeus sive Amores

1458

De laudibus divinis (first version)

1469

Charon

1469/71

Naeniae

1471

Antonius (first version)

1475

De rebus coelestibus (first version)

1477/79

Commentationes

1481

Editio princeps of De aspiratione

1493/94

Treatises on the social virtues (De liberalitate, De magnificentia)

1495/1499

Actius

1500–1

De laudibus divinis (later version)

1488–92

Asinus

1490s

Baiae

1491

Editio princeps of Charon and Antonius

1494

De rebus coelestibus XII

1495

De rebus coelestibus (radical rewriting)

c. 1498/1500

De prudentia

c. 1499

De magnanimitate De fortuna I, II

1501

Aegidius De fortuna III De immanitate

1501–2

De sermone

1505–12

Edition of Opera omnia in Naples, edited by Pietro Summonte

1518–19

Edition of Opera Omnia in Venice, edited by Gian Francesco Torresani

App e ndix 2

Chronology of Pontano’s Life and Political Events 1429

Pontano is born in Cerreto di Spoleto

1430s

Father is killed in a factional strife Pontano’s family moves to Perugia

1442

King Alfonso conquers the kingdom of Naples

1447

Pontano presents himself at the Tuscan camp of King Alfonso I

1448

Pontano enters Naples

1450s

Pontano becomes a scribe and teacher

1454

Peace of Lodi

1458

King Alfonso I †

1458–64

First Barons’ War against Jean d’Anjou

1470s

Pontano becomes secretary to Duke Alfonso and his wife

1471

Pontano becomes head of the Neapolitan Academy

1476

December 26: Galeazzo Maria Sforza assassinated

1478

Pazzi conspiracy in Florence Duke Alfonso marches into Tuscany

1480–81

Siege of Otranto

1482–84

War of Ferrara

1484

August 7: Peace of Bagnolo

1485–86

Second Barons’ War

1486

August 11: Pontano negotiates peace in Rome

1487

Pontano becomes first secretary to King Ferrante

1492

January 28: Pontano negotiates a second peace in Rome

1494

King Ferrante †

1495

King Alfonso II abdicates and dies in Messina King Ferrandino flees from Naples, then regains it King Charles VIII of France enters Naples Pontano retires

Appendix 2

1496

King Ferrandino †

1499

Louis XII of France seizes Milan

1500

Treaty of Grenada to divide the kingdom of Naples

1501

French viceroy takes over administration in Naples

1503

King Louis XII is forced to retreat from Naples Pontano †

185

App e ndix 3

Moral Virtues in Aristotle and Pontano Aristotle

Pontano

Courage

andreia

fortitudo

Cowardice

deilia

timiditas

Recklessness

thrasutês

audacia

EN 1115a4-1117b22

De fortitudine I

Moderation

sôphrosunê

“Insensibility”

anaisthêsia

Licentiousness

akolasia EN 1117b23-1119b18

De oboedientia I

Liberality

eleutheriotês

liberalitas

Illiberality

aneleutheria

avaritia

Prodigality

asôzia

prodigalitas

EN 4.1 1119b23-1122a17

De liberalitate beneficentia inofficiositas — De beneficentia

Magnificence

megaloprepeia

magnificentia

Parsimony

mikroprepeia

modicitas

Crassness

banausia

ventositas

EN 4.2 1122a18-1123a33

De magnificentia splendor sordities luxus De splendore conviventia inconviventia comessabilitas De conviventia

Appendix 3

187

Greatness of soul

megalopsuchia

Smallness of soul

mikropsuchia

pusillanimitas

Vanity

chaunotês

tumor

EN 4.3 1123a34-1125a35

De magnanimitate I

—

—

ambientia

Ambition

philotimia

ambitio

Lack of ambition

aphilotimia

abiectio

EN 4.4 1125b1-1125b25

De magnanimitate II

Gentleness

praotês*

“Unirascibility”

aorgêsia*

Irascibility

orgilotês*

magnanimitas

EN 4.5 1125b26-1126b10 “Friendliness”

—

comitas

Flattery

areskeia

adulatores, captatores, lascivi

Quarrelsomeness

duskolia

contentiosi

EN 4.6 1126b11-1127a12

De sermone I, II

“Truthfulness”

—

veracitas

Self-deprecation

eirôneia

simulatio

Boastfulness

alazoneia

ostentatio

EN 4.7 1127a13-1127b32

De sermone I, II

“Wittiness”

eutrapelia*

urbanitas

Boorishness

agroikia

rusticitas, trivialitas

Buffoonery

bômolochia

scurrilitas

EN 4.8 1127b33-1128b9

De sermone I, 3–5

Sense of shame

aidôs EN 4.9 1128b10-35

Justice

dukeiosunê

iustitia

EN 5 1129a3-1138b14

De obedientia I

Notes Introduction 1

2 3 4

5

6

7

Pontano’s epitaph can be found in the funeral chapel in Naples, built in the early 1490s: “tumulatus est in sacello ab se sepulchri causa extructo … ubi Elogium ab se compositum in marmorea tabula spectatur … Sum etenim Iovianus Pontanus,/ Quem amaverunt bonae Musae,/Suspexerunt viri probi,/Honestaverunt reges Domini./Scis iam qui sim, vel qui potius fuerim./Ego vero te, hospes in tenebris/ noscere nequeo./Sed te ipsum ut noscas, rogo. Vale.” (Paolo Giovio, Elogia virorum literis illustrium (Basle, 1577), 61.) Giovio took the text from a close friend and disciple of Pontano, Girolamo Borgia, who had included it in his unpublished De bellis italicis. On Borgia and his work, see Elena Valeri, Italia dilacerata: Girolamo Borgia nella cultura storica del Rinascimento (Milano, 2007). Later on, writers fell back upon Pontano’s epitaph. See for example Samuel Johnson, The Rambler (London, 1953), 62. For a further analysis of the last lines, see below, 118. In a letter to Giacopo Sannazaro, Venice, October 20, 1502, printed in Jacopo Sannazaro, Jacobi sive Actii Synceri Sannazarii Poemata (Bassani, 1782), lvi. Nicola Morelli di Gregorio, Biografia de’ re di Napoli (Naples, 1825), 278. On the influence of Mercury and the talents connected to this influence, see Giovanni Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” in Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita (Venice, 1519), iii, 214r and 26v. Giles of Viterbo, for one, celebrates Pontano in one of his letters: “Quisquis is fuerit, qui cum de re litteraria sermo fiat, sive sideralis disciplinae, sive vitae aut morum, sive oratoriae sive poesis studiis sit, sermonem protinus a te incipit … Philosophum te philosophi faciunt, vatem vates, mathematici mathematicum, ancipiti undecumque certamine, quae in te clarissimarum atrium claritate praestet.” Erasmo Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano a principi ed amici (Naples, 1907), 76. Francesco Arnaldi, “Introduzione,” in Liliana Monti Sabia, ed., Poesie Latine di Giovanni Pontano, 2 vols (Torino, 1977), ii, 517, treats him as “the great signore of neo-Latin poetry” and underlines the outstanding and unique character of his poems. Carol Kidwell, Pontano. Poet and Prime Minister (London, 1991), 304 and 09. Kidwell follows a well-established line of research in Italy. As Vittorio Rossi, Il Quattrocento (Milan, 1938), 494, puts it, Pontano was first and foremost an artist, and it was useless to praise him for anything else than his artistic endeavors.

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9 10 11

12

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15 16 17 18

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Likewise, Giuseppe Saitta, Il pensiero italiano nell’umanesimo e nel rinascimento (2nd ed., Florence, 1961), 647, remarks that the “real Pontano” shows more in his poetical works than in his philosophical writings. His remarks dovetail with the description of Neapolitan humanism as characterized by its poetical outlook, opposed to the erudite and critical humanist works in Florence, Rome, Venice, and Milan in Antonio Altamura, “Orientamenti Bibliografici Sull’Umanesimo Nel Sud-Italia,” Italica, 24/4 (December) (1947), 328. On the different dismissals of Pontano as a philosopher, see also Victoria Kahn, “Giovanni Pontano’s Rhetoric of Prudence,” Philosophy and Rhetoric, 16/1 (1983), 31 n. 3. Francisco Elías De Tejada, Nápoles hispánico. La etapa aragonesa (1442–1503) (Madrid, 1958), i, 66. On Tejada and his work, see the concise remarks in David Abulafia, “The Diffusion of the Italian Renaissance: Southern Italy and Beyond,” in Jonathan Woolfson, ed., Palgrave Advances in Renaissance Historiography (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, New York, 2005), 34. De Tejada, Nápoles hispánico, i, 80. Giovanni Pontano, La fortuna. Testo latino a fronte, tr. Francesco Tateo, ed. Francesco Tateo (Naples, 2012), 43. On the marginalization of morality due to the rise of the social sciences during the nineteenth century, and on the attempts to re-introduce ethics as a kind of evaluative “horizon of meaning” guiding one’s decisions and actions, see Andreas Reckwitz, “Die Ethik des Guten und die Soziologie,” in Jutta Allmendinger, ed., Gute Gesellschaft? Zur Konstruktion sozialer Ordnungen. Verhandlungen des 30. Kongresses der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Soziologie in Köln 2000, 2 vols (Opladen, 2001). For a case in point, see Davide Canfora, Prima di Machiavelli. Politica e cultura in età umanistica (Rome, 2005). See also the review (and passionate reply) in Guido M. Cappelli, “‘Contradicciones, paradojas, ambigüedades’. De un libro reciente y de la autonomia teorica del humanismo politico,” Humanismo y Modernidad, 20 (2008), 133–59. On the error of prolepsis, see Quentin Skinner, “Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas,” in Visions of Politics, 3 vols (Cambridge, 2002), i, 62–63. Friedrich Meinecke, Die Idee der Staatsräson in der neueren Geschichte (2nd ed., München, 1960), 45. Translation in Friedrich Meinecke, Machiavellism. The Doctrine of Raison d‘État and Its Place in Modern History, tr. Douglas Scott (New Brunswick, London, 1998). Amedeo Quondam, Forma del vivere. L’etica del gentiluomo e i moralisti italiani (Bologna, 2010), 11–13. Giovanni Pontano, De principe, ed. Guido M. Cappelli (Roma, 2003), xxxiii–xxxiv. Charles Schmitt, Aristotle and the Renaissance (Cambridge, MA, 1983), 10–33. David Lines, “Aristotle’s Ethics in the Renaissance,” in Jon Miller, ed., The Reception of Aristotle’s Ethics (Cambridge, 2012), 173.

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19 Charles B. Schmitt, “Aristotle’s Ethics in the Sixteenth Century: Some Preliminary Considerations,” in W. Ruegg and D. Wuttke, eds., Ethik im Humanismus (Boppars, 1979), 87–89. Luca Bianchi, “Continuity and Change in the Aristotelian Tradition,” in James Hankins, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge, 2007), 49. 20 Lines, “Aristotle’s Ethics in the Renaissance,” 177–86. 21 Giovanni Pontano, De immanitate liber, ed. Liliana Monti Sabia (Naples, 1970), 1–2. Quo autem scribendi consilium omne meum manifestius tibi pateat, sic habeto: de moribus apud Latinos scripsisse Ciceronem, qui id solum mihi secutus videtur, ut actiones quae et quales esse debeant ostenderet, summa cum eloquentia, cuius ipse facile habendus est et magister et princeps. Coeterum definiendis virtutibus, explicandis earum principiis inumbrandisque illarum imaginibus, nihil eum prorsus curae aut studii impendisse, ut practicas, hoc est actiuas, tantum res uisus sit uelle edocere ac complecti…. Apud Graecos uero theoreticam hanc institutionem ita executum esse Aristotelem, uti actiua ab disciplina omnino recesserit, etsi in illo edocendi genere maxime diligens ac consumatus apparet…. Post Ciceronem e nostris Senecam multa quidem maximeque uitae hominum utilia et commoda edisertasse, coeterum oratorio magis more exhortari ad uirtutem honestasque ad actiones legentem … multa tamen admirabiliter loqui, cohortarique acerrime ad bene uiuendum auditores, deterrereque a uiciis, ut libri eius, ut praecepta ab eo tradita, ut denique quae ab illo in medium afferruntur exempla, stimuli sint quasi quidam ad honeste agendum ciuilesque ac domesticos mores actionesque uitae sic administrandas ut, beate simul ac tranquille vitam hanc ducentes, felicitate quidem ipsa uel fruamur adepti, uel consequendam ad eam quam proxime accedamus. 22 Bernardo Segni, L’Ethica d‘Aristotile tradotta in lingua vulgare fiorentina et comentata per Bernardo Segni (Venice, 1551), 8r.: “Pontano … trattò dei costumi non traducendo, ma imitando quelle … Il qual modo quanto egli è più agevole ad esser fatto et forse a chi lo legge di più piacere, tanto lo giudico io meno d’autorità per chi lo compone, et men d’utilità a chi lo legge.” Quoted in David Lines, “Rethinking Renaissance Aristotelianism: Bernardo Segni’s Ethica, the Florentine Academy, and the Vernacular in Sixteenth-Century Italy,” Renaissance Quarterly, 66/3 (2013), 836. 23 In his famous essay “Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy,” Jacob Burckhardt asserts that “the better and nobler features of the Italian despotisms” were absent in the Aragonese rulers of Naples, and continues that “all that they possessed of the art and culture of their time served the purposes of luxury and display.” Jacob Burckhardt, Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien. Ein Versuch (Frankfurt a.M., 1989), 45. On Eberhard Gothein, Die Culturentwicklung Süd-Italiens

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32 33 34 35

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in Einzel-Darstellungen (Breslau, 1886), a kind of complementary study to Burckhardt’s Civilization, see Matthias Roick, “From Lost Laughter to Latin Philosophy: On the Beginnings of Neapolitan Humanism,” California Italian Studies, 3/1 (2012), 2–4. Eugenio Garin, L’umanesimo italiano. Filosofia e vita civile nel Rinascimento (Bari, 1952), 11. Francesco Tateo, L’umanesimo meridionale (Bari, 1972). Mario Santoro, “La cultura umanistica,” in Storia di Napoli (Naples, 1974), IV, 2. Mario Santoro, “Humanism in Naples,” in Albert Rabil, ed., Renaissance Humanism. Foundations, Forms, and Legacy. Humanism in Italy, 3 vols (Philadelphia, 1988), i. Sergio Lupi, “Il ‘De sermone’ di Giovanni Pontano,” Filologia romanza, 2 (1955), 367. Francesco Tateo, “Le virtù sociali e l‘immanità nella trattatistica pontaniana,” Rinascimento, ns 5 (1965), 119–20 and 154. Mario Santoro, “Fortuna e Prudenza nella ‘Lezione’ del Pontano,” in Fortuna, ragione e prudenza nella civiltà letteraria del Cinquecento (Naples, 1978), 68. Lupi, “Il ‘De sermone’ di Giovanni Pontano,” 371–72. De Tejada, Nápoles hispánico, i, 76. A similar argument in Giovanni Gentile, In onore di Giovanni Pontano (Naples, 1926). MM 2.8.1206b31. The Latin version of the relative passage reads “sine enim exterioribus bonis (quorum fortuna est domina) non contingat felicem esse” in the Liber de bona fortuna. In Pontano’s humanist Latin, it reads “felicitatem civilem absque bonis externis perfectam non esse.” For more information, see the chapter, “In the Name of Fortune.” De Tejada, Nápoles hispánico, i, 72. On the Aristotelian concept of anapausis, see EN 4.14.1127b33. Michael Freeden, Ideologies and Political Theory—A Conceptual Approach (Oxford, 1998), 4. Bernard Williams, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy (Abingdon, 2006), 9. Robert Black, “Humanism,” in Christopher Allmand, ed., The New Cambridge Medieval History, 7 vols (Cambridge, 1998), vii, 92. For a classical example of this attitude, see Augustin Renaudet, “Humanisme, Histoire et Politique au Quattrocento,” in Humanisme et Renaissance (Genève, 1958). The perceived lack of theoretical consistency has often been translated into a lack of moral and political integrity. See, for example, James Hankins, “Humanism and the Origins of Modern Political Thought,” in Jill Kraye, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Humanism (Cambridge, 2003), 121–22, and Manlio Pastore Stocchi, “Il pensiero politico degli umanisti,” in Alberigo Giuseppe and D’Addio Mario, eds., Umanesimo e Rinascimento, ed. Luigi Firpo, 6 vols (Torino, 1987), iii, 4. David A. Lines, “From Schools to Courts: Renaissance Ethics in Context,” in David A. Lines and Sabrina Ebbersmeyer, eds., Rethinking Virtue, Reforming Society. New Directions in Renaissance Ethics, c. 1350–1650 (Turnhout, 2013), 57–58.

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37 James Hankins, “The Virtue Politics of the Italian Humanists,” paper presented at Beyond Reception: Renaissance Humanism and the Transformation of Classical Antiquity, Berlin, Humboldt University, March 23–24, 2015, www.academia. edu/11644124/The_Virtue_Politics_of_the_Italian_Humanists, accessed October 26, 2015. 38 Jeremy Bentley, Politics and Culture in Renaissance Naples (Princeton, 1987). 39 Ibid., 147. 40 Ibid., 140. 41 Ibid., 182. 42 Ibid., 194. 43 Alison Brown, “Review of: Politics and Culture in Renaissance Naples,” The Journal of Modern History, 62/3 (1990), 632. 44 For a recent example, demonstrating in full the potential of this kind of analysis, see Francesco Storti, “El buon marinero.” Psicologia politica e ideologia monarchica al tempo di Ferdinando I d‘Aragona re di Napoli (Rome, 2014). 45 Quentin Skinner, “Moral Principles and Social Change,” in Visions of Politics, 3 vols (Cambridge, 2002). 46 Quentin Skinner, “Political Philosophy,” in Charles B. Schmitt, Quentin Skinner, and Eckhard Keßler, eds., The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge, 1988), 424. Maurizio Viroli, From Politics to Reason of State. The Acquisition and Transformation of the Language of Politics 1250–1600 (Cambridge, 1992), 111–12. Both Skinner and Viroli set De principe in a diachronic perspective and underline that Pontano holds a key position in adopting the political language developed by the “civic humanists” of the first half of the Quattrocento to the signories. 47 Claudio Finzi, Re, Baroni, Popolo: La politica di Giovanni Pontano (Rimini, 2004), carefully describes Pontano’s political oeuvre in the light of humanist authors such as Leonardo Bruni and Machiavelli. Guido Cappelli, “‘Corpus est res publica’. La struttura della comunità secondo l‘umanesimo politico,” in Lorenzo Geri, ed., Principi prima del Principe (Rome, 2012), sees Pontano as one of the main protagonists of the humanists’ greater political project, while Peter Stacey, Roman Monarchy and the Renaissance Prince (Cambridge, 2007), analyzes the Senecan character of Neapolitan political thought with an emphasis on the humanist generation before Pontano. 48 For a discussion of this problem, see Dorothea Frede, “The Political Character of Aristotle’s Ethics,” in Marguerite Deslauriers and Pierre Destrée, eds., The Cambride Companion to Aristotle’s Politics (Cambridge, 2013). 49 Aaron Garrett, “Seventeenth-Century Moral Philosophy: Self-Help, SelfKnowledge, and the Devil’s Mountain,” in Roger Crisp, ed., The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics (Oxford, 2013), 231. 50 Jill Kraye and Risto Saarinen, eds., Moral Philosophy on the Threshold of Modernity (Dordrecht, 2005), 1.

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51 Ibid., 2. 52 Anthony Molho, “The Italian Renaissance, Made in the USA,” in Anthony Molho and Gordon S. Wood, eds., Imagined Histories. American Historians Interprete the Past (Princeton, 1998), 289. 53 Matteo Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Quattrocento Naples (Farnham, 2014). 54 Shulamit Furstenberg-Levi, The Accademia Pontaniana: A Model of a Humanist Network (Leiden, 2016). 55 For Pontano’s sources and his astrological thought, see Michele Rinaldi, Sic itur ad astra. Giovanni Pontano e la sua opera astrologica nel quadro della tradizione monoscritta della Mathesis di Giulio Firmico Materno (Naples, 2002). See also Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Quattrocento Naples, passim. 56 Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini a Napoli, vi: Piero Nasi (10 aprile 1491–22 novembre 1491), Antonio della Valle (23 novembre 1491–25 gennaio 1492) e Niccolò Michelozzi (26 gennaio 1492-giugno 1492), ed. Sabrina Marcotti (Salerno, 2004) xli–xlii. 57 Daniela Frigo, “Prudence and Experience: Ambassadors and Political Culture in Early Modern Italy,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, 38/1 (2008), 16. 58 In this sense, Pontano’s philosophy has much in common with Cicero’s reflections in his letters, as analyzed in Robert Hariman, Political Style. The Artistry of Power (Chicago and London, 1995), 95–140.

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2 3

Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano a principi ed amici, 78: “Ante quidem magnum te virum esse a multis audiveram, sed (ut de Isaeo scribitur) maior inventus es et carmine et prosa oratione.” Manuzio alludes to Pliny the Younger, Epistles. Book II, ed. Christopher Whitton (Cambridge 2013), 46, 2.3.1 “Magna Isaeum fama praecesserat, maior inventus est.” Isaeus was a celebrated rhetorician and sophist from Syria. The letter was originally published in Statius, Sylvarum libri quinque. Thebaidos libri duodecim. Achilleidos duo (Venice, 1502), aiv. On the problems connected to Manuzio’s 1505 edition of some of Pontano’s works, see Liliana Monti Sabia, “Una schermaglia editoriale tra Napoli e Venezia agli albori del secolo XVI,” Vichiana, 6 (1969), 319–36, now in Liliana Monti Sabia and Salvatore Monti, Studi su Giovanni Pontano, ed. Giuseppe Germano, 2 vols (Messina, 2010), i, 195–214. Antonio de Ferrariis (Galateo), De situ elementorum (Basle, 1558). Ferdinando Gabotto, Lettere inedite di Joviano Pontano in nome de’ reali di Napoli (Bologna, 1893), 3: “Per la storia politica, della letteratura e della lingua stessa italiana hanno importanza non piccola gli epistolari di quegli uomini insigni che ne’ bei giorni del Rinascimento seppero rinnovare l‘antico felice connubio tra la

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Notes vita pratica e la vita intellettuale, tra l‘arte, la letteratura, la poesia, e l‘esperienza, l‘amministrazione de’ publici affari.” Tristano Caracciolo, “Ioannis Ioviani Pontani vitae brevis pars,” in Liliana Monti Sabia, ed., Un profilo moderno e due Vitae antiche di Giovanni Pontano (Naples, 1998), §4. See also Paolo Giovio, Elogia virorum literis illustrium (Basle, 1577), 60: “Iovianus Pontanus vir ad omne genus eloquentiae natus, Cereto Umbriae oppido metu profugiens, quod ibi pater a factiosis civibus esset interfectus, Neapolim plane iuvenis, et inops contendit.” The Vita of Fabio Pontano gives a different version: “Patrem infans, ut ipsemet testatur, amisit sive morbo absumptum sive, ut alii volunt, a latronibus, cum Neapoli Verretum rediret occisum.” (Wolfgang Speyer, “Die vollständige ‘Vita Ioannis Ioviani Pontani Auctore Fabio Pontano’ im Codex Spoletinus 163,” Rinascimento, 6 (1966), 243.) Fabio refers to Tumuli 2.20, which he quotes in an abridged version (ibid.). The word “ipsemet” refers to the premature death of Giacomo when Pontano was a child, not to the cause of his death; Pontano himself never mentions the fact that his father was killed in factional strives. Giacomo’s illness and his murder in the course of a robbery are conjectures. Giovanni Pontano, “De prudentia,” in Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita, 2 vols (Venice, 1518–19), i, 166r. For the origins of the Pontano family, see Thomas Woelki, Lodovico Pontano (ca. 1409–1439). Eine Juristenkarriere an Universität, Fürstenhof, Kurie und Konzil (Leiden, 2011), 3–12. Pontano, De immanitate liber, 26–27. It is difficult to determine the extent to which these events were fictional. The observation that “startling instances of cannibalism, triggered by the lust for revenge, were now and then reported by chroniclers, as in the Perugian countryside” in Lauro Martines, Strong Words. Writing and Social Strain in the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore, 2001), 186, suggests that the story about cannibalism might not have been a wholly literary invention. Giovanni Pontano, “Parthenopeus,” in Carmina: ecloghe, elegie, liriche, ed. Johannes Oeschger (Bari, 1948), 87, 1.18.25. Translation in Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Quattrocento Naples, 33. For an analysis of the role of Umbria in Pontano’s poetic identity, see ibid., 31–36. Marcello Simonetta, Rinascimento segreto. Il mondo del Segretario da Petrarca a Machiavelli (Milano, 2004), 228–30. In one of his dispatches, Iacopo Trotti reports the Milanese reaction to Pontano’s election as first secretary to Ercole d‘Este on June 12, 1487: “se ha adviso che’l Pontano è male apto al officio de secreteria, perché’l va cum certi suoi termini de philosophia et astrologia che non son al officio suo covenienti, et che la ellectione de lui facta molto se biasema” (ibid., 228). After a meeting with the newly crowned King Alfonso, the duke of Calabria, and Pontano, Bibbiena wrote to Piero de’ Medici on February 15, 1494: “qua non ho trovato quelli spiriti divini che mi pensavo. Solo ci è il Pontano, che per mia fé è buon phylosopho e basta” (G.L. Moncallero, Epistolario di Bernardo Dovizi da Bibbiena (Florence, 1955), 43 ).

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10 Pontano to King Ferrante. Naples, April 26, 1492: “Ad un homo licterato, come ad me, che el Duca de Baro me chiama filosopho, basta et deve bastare, senza altri premii, che doe et tre volte ho tenute le cose de Italia in expeditione et effecto delle operatione et agitatione mie.” Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 40. For a further discussion of this letter, see 35–39. 11 Pontano had an awkward relationship with Ludovico throughout his life. The duke of Bari appears more than once in his writings and is always treated with contempt. In Pontano’s eyes, the duke’s destabilizing politics were directly opposed to his own attempts to secure the peace of Italy, and he held him directly responsible for the downfall of the Aragonese. Girolamo Borgia describes Pontano’s reaction to the French descent in the following terms: “Pontanus noster, qui … pacis concordiae compositionis auctor esse non destitit, ingemiscens ait: ‘Utinam, Alfonse, cum Ludovico Sfortia societatem aut nunquam iniisses aut nunquam diremisses, aut saltem, quod tutius futurum erat, Ferrandi patris consilio paruisses, qui ipsi potius Ludovico Isabellam filiam nuptui tradendam saepe suasisset!’” Quoted in Mauro de Nichilo, I viri illustres del Cod. Vat. lat. 3920 (Roma, 1997). In his works, Pontano portrays Ludovico with great bitterness. In Pontano, “De prudentia,” 197r-v, he describes him as a ruthless character consumed with ambition. In Pontano, La fortuna. Testo latino a fronte, 160 and 202, he appears as a coward fleeing from the French like a thief in the night after having lost his father’s realm. 12 Lauro Martines, Power and Imagination. City-States in Renaissance Italy (Baltimore, 1988), 230. 13 This did not exclude other forms of self-representation. On the Pontano chapel and Pontano as a patron of arts, see Bianca de Divitiis, “Giovanni Pontano and His Idea of Patronage,” in Caroline Elam and Maria Beltramini, eds., Some degree of happiness. Studi di storia dell’architettura in onore di Howard Burns (Pisa, 2010) and Bianca de Divitiis, “PONTANVS FECIT: Inscriptions and Artistic Authorship in the Pontano Chapel,” California Italian Studies, 3/1 (2012), 1–36. On his portraits, see Joana Barreto, “Il diritto all’immagine nella Napoli aragonese: i ritratti di Pontano e Sannazaro,” ibid. On the busts of Pontano, see Francesco Caglioti, “Adriano di Giovanni de’ Maestri, detto Adriano Fiorentino, Giovanni Gioviano Pontano,” in Paola Barocchi, ed., Il Giardino di San Marco. Maestri e compagni del giovane Michelangelo (Cinisello Balsamo, 1992). On his portrait medal, see Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Quattrocento Naples, 89. 14 Giovanni Pontano, “Urania,” in Carmina, ed. Benedetto Soldati, 2 vols, i, 5. 923–26: “Fama ipsa assistens tumulo cum vestibus aureis,/ore ingens ac voce ingens, ingentibus alis/per populos late ingenti mea nomina plausu/vulgabit, titulosque feret per saecula nostros.” Translation in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 311. 15 Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 231.

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Chapter 1 1 2

Melissa Meriam Bullard, “The Language of Diplomacy in the Renaissance,” in Bernard Toscani, ed., Lorenzo de’ Medici. New Perspectives (New York, 1993), 263. Pontano, “De prudentia,” 166r: [U]t scitis, adolescentulus patria cedens propter civiles dissensiones, magna rei domesticae iactura facta, ob adversariorum impotentiam, ad Alphonsum me Regem in Hetruriam contuli, adversus Florentinos bellum gerentem, & cum illo haud multo post Neapolim. In qua literis ita dedi operam, ut annos natus vix quattuor & viginti etiam inter senes, eosque qui in literis consenuerant, iudicarer excellere. Alphonso inde mortuo, cum a Ferdinando eius filio arcesserer, gravi bello implicitum, eum plures annos gravissimis cum laboribus, atque erumnis maximis sum secutus. Inde Alphonsum etiam filium iubente patre. Quibus cum ita vixi, ut eorum causa pericula etiam non mediocria adierim. Inter quae tamen diutius versatus non pauca etiam scripsi.

3

Ibid.: Quodque vel cum primis fuit difficile, attritis, ac pene ad internitionem perductis Ferdinandi rebus, bis inter illum, et Innocentium octavum Pontificem maximum exortum & conflatum bellum composui. Ferrariensi vero in bello, quod accerrime illatum a Venetis fuerat eum me gessi, ut mea potissimum opera, meisque consiliis in ipso belli ardore secuta pax fuerit, cum Italiae totius quiete, & otio. Ex eoque in rerum administrationibus & Ferdinandi, & Alphonsi, ita domi militiaeque me ipsum gessi, ut primum locum in deliberandis, & consultandis rebus, capiendisque consiliis permultos annos tenuerim, ea cum integritate, & fide, ut meis de administrationibus, neque tunc sit questus, neque hodie queratur ullus. Quin palam multi, clam omnes & damnant tempora, & fortunam accusant, quod Caroli Octavi Gallorum Regis adventus, qui regnum hoc Neapolitanum occupavit, quamvis annum vix illud tenuerit, ab regiis me, ac regni administrandis rebus omnino distraxerit.

4

Bernardo Ruccellai to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, November 23, 1486: Ne si vede per ancora piglare forma di governo che sia per condurre molte cose, che è questo uno secondo disordine, perché el Secretario faceva lui tante faccende, e per una lunga auctorità che si aveva preso, l‘aveva in modo ridotte a sé solo, che non c‘è chi, volendo e sforzandosi quanto e può, abbi tale praticha che le possa condurre; e di quì viene che ‘l Re, lui in persona parte per non si fidare, e parte per non trovare chi sia apto, aptende lui al forte delle cose; ma non le può condurre…. El Pontano e lo Abbate Ruggio sono più appresso al Re che altri, e quali hai pratichi e sai quello che valgono in cose di stati.

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13

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Ernesto Pontieri, La politica mediceo-fiorentina nella congiura dei baroni napoletani contro Ferrante d‘Aragona 1485–92. Documenti inediti (Naples, 1977), 226–27. Pontieri dates the letter November 3. According to Melissa Meriam Bullard in Lorenzo de’ Medici, Lettere, 16 vols (Florence, 1977–), x, 9, it is November 23. Anthony Grafton and Lisa Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities: Education and the Liberal Arts in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-century Europe (Cambridge, MA, 1986). On the peace negotiations, see Roberto Cessi, “La pace di Bagnolo dell’agosto 1484,” Annali triestini di diritto, economia e politica, serie II, 3 (1941), 277–356. Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 6, 1491. [Pontano speaking] “se io non facevo presto la pace a Bagnuolo, in octo giorni Vinitiani pigliavano tucte le terre delle marine in sul golfo, perché il principe di Altamura haveva mandato uno cancelliere a Vinetia ad offerirle tucte a quella signoria, ma voleva si obligassi ad acquistare per lui Leccio.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini a Napoli, vi: Piero Nasi (aprile 10–novembre 22, 1491), Antonio della Valle (novembre 23, 1491–gennaio 25, 1492) e Niccolò Michelozzi (gennaio 26,–giugno 1492), ed. Sabrina Marcotti (Salerno, 2004) 134–35. Notar Giacomo, Cronaca di Napoli, ed. P. Garzilli (Naples, 1845), 153–54. Giuseppe Galasso, Storia d‘Italia, xv/1: Il Regno di Napoli. Il Mezzogiorno angioino e aragonese (1266–1494) (Turin, 1992) 698. Erasmo Percopo, Vita di Giovanni Pontano, ed. Michele Manfredi (Naples, 1938), 44. Ernesto Pontieri, Il Comune dell’Aquila nel declino del Medioevo (L’Aquila, 1978), 130. Giovanni Pietro Leostello, Effemeridi delle cose fatte per il Duca di Calabria (1484– 1491), ed. Gaetano Filangieri (Naples, 1883), 46: Die sequenti bona hora caualco in Castelnouo al Signor Re cum quo per totum diem moram traxit ragionando et transcurrendo molte cose. Et de continuo se trouaua apresso dicta Maesta da la quale li fu data plena potesta et autorita de tucto lo reame et che reuedesse tucto et assectasse quello come meglio li paresse: che confidaua in lo mirabile ingegno de sua I.S. Giovanni Pontano, “De liberalitate,” in I libri delle virtù sociali, ed. Francesco Tateo (Roma, 1999), 66: “dolore iraque permotus, regii census ministros plerosque multae nomine pene bonis omnibus spoliaverit.” According to Mario Del Treppo, “L’anima, l‘oro e il boia. Fisiologia di una crescita: Napoli nel Quattrocento,” Archivio storico per le Province Napoletane, 105 (1987), 13 and 17, the exemplum refers to Guillem March Cervelló. Camillo Porzio, Opere (Florence, 1855), 69–70: Il Duca di Calavria, riguardando la debolezza delle forze sue, poco bastevoli a tanto peso sostenere, si rammaricava col padre, rimproverandogli che per soverchia bontà e mal governo i suoi ministri l‘aveano ingannato, fatti sè ricchi, e lui povero; e che almeno allora, che si ritrovava in tanto pericolo dello stato, si dovesse servire de’ furti loro, e come fraudatori punirgli.

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14 Ibid., 77–78: “[Il segretario disse che] … i principi nuovi, come era in quel regno Sua Maestà, tutti procurano di porre nuove genti ne’ loro stati, i quali conoscano l‘obligo della loro fortuna da essi soli derivare.” 15 Elisabetta Scarton, “La congiura dei baroni del 1485–87 e la sorte dei ribelli,” in Francesco Senatore and Francesco Storti, eds., Poteri, relazioni, guerra nel regno di Ferrante d’Aragona (Naples, 2011), 248–49. Del Treppo, “L’anima, l‘oro e il boia. Fisiologia di una crescita: Napoli nel Quattrocento,” 14. 16 See Giovanni Lanfredini’s report on the newly introduced taxes in the already quoted letter to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, May 26/28, 1485:Non riuscendo la impositione nuova, cresceno impositioni per altra via et in modo che ‘l disegnato riescha et che ciaschuno chini el capo, i quali modi danno molte triste conditioni a duca di Calabria, perché lui e l‘auctore, ma s‘intende dipende da re, il quale sa molto bene simulare et vedesi e rispectino et sempre dà del buono, benché manchi l‘effecto. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini a Napoli, ii: Giovanni Lanfredini (maggio 1485–ottobre 1486), ed. Elisabetta Scarton (Salerno, 2002) 156. 17 Giacomo, Cronaca di Napoli, 153. See Giuseppe Paladino, “Per la storia della Congiura dei Baroni. Documenti inediti dell’Archivio Estense, 1485–87,” Archivio Storico per le Province Napoletane, 44–48 (1920–26), 358. See also the instruction of Lorenzo de’ Medici to Giovanni Albino, Octobre 29, 1485: “Appresso, quando S.S. disse mangiando con lo S. Roberto a Bagniolo, che voleva reformare quello Regno, & voleva fosse del demanio 30. miglia intorno Napoli, dove li sopradetti [Francesco Coppola and Antonello Petrucci] tengono loro stati.” Giovanni Albino, “Lettere, istruzioni ed altre memorie de’ re aragonesi,” in Raccolta dei più rinomati scrittori dell’Istoria generale del Regno di Napoli (Naples, 1769), v, 94. For particular motives of the single barons, see the letter of Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 22, 1485. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 245–47. 18 On the widespread dissatisfaction with the new taxes, see Paladino, “Per la storia,” 354–55. See also the instruction of Lorenzo de’ Medici to Giovanni Albino (October 10, 1485): “[Et] quando quelle gabelle fossero supportate con fastidio (el che molto se grida), la S.S. ricorde al S. Re le tolga, & tenere sui popoli ali soliti pagamenti, come sempre s‘è costumato: che nulla cosa tanto aliena l‘anima dei subditi, quanto le nove impositioni & pagamenti.” Albino, “Lettere”, 95. Albino himself ascribed the introduction of the tax to Coppola and Petrucci: “[Et] suadente Antonello Petrocia & Francisco Copula quaestore, novum vectigal, futuri belli semen, populi sunt pendere coacti.” Albino, “De bello intestino,” in Raccolta dei più rinomati scrittori dell’Istoria generale del Regno di Napoli (Naples, 1769), v, 36–72, 37. 19 The arrest of the sons of Orso Orsini and of Pietro Lalle Camponeschi had been two cases in point.

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20 Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, July 23, 1485: “[T]utti questi baroni sono molto insospettiti e aombrati, e ognuno di loro si finta e provede alle cose sue, di gente, di monizioni et fortifichare quello bixogna.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 208. 21 A first great meeting of the conspirators had taken place during the wedding between Traiano Caracciolo and the daughter of the count of Capaccio, Guglielmo Sanseverino, in May 1485. Porzio, Opere, 91. 22 Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 4, 1491: “[N]el facto de’ baroni: la maestà del re intendeva da messer Antonello tenevano simili practiche per sospecto del duca, et non per fare contro a sua maestà. Onde lei: ‘hoggi fareno et domane direno’, et indugiò tanto che questo regno fu perduto, se i baroni erono punto huomini da bene.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 135. 23 Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 16, 1485: “Mostrommi una lettera da Roma, del magnifico domino Anello, fatta a dì XIIII la nocte, che è venuta volando, la quale conclude molte parti: prima la coniuratione de’ baroni cum participatione del papa per dare questo regno alla chiesa.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 232. On the 14 August Lanfredini had already been informed of a letter from Rome in which Arcamone had reported that “some people advised the pope to undertake the enterprise of the kingdom (era stato alchuni che consigliavano il papa a pigliare l‘anpresa di questo regnio).” Ibid., 229. 24 Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 16, 1485: “per la quale lettera sono molto sbighottiti, dove hieri hebbono lettere da don Francesco e da frate Francesco molto buone, et speravano ogni cosa posasse bene et venissino qui, che hora conoscono sono tutte tristitie e inghanni.” Ibid., 233. 25 “[S]avissima reputo e verissima la sentenza che c‘insegna, li costumi de’ soggetti andar sempre dietro all’usanze de’ dominatori. Perocchè Ferdinando, simulatore e dissimulatore peritissimo, aveva in modo pregni gli animi de’ sudditi e de’ ministri delle sue stesse arti, ch’egli, lor maestro, molte fiate non se ne potè guardare.” Porzio, Opere, 42. 26 Alan Ryder, The Kingdom of Naples Under Alfonso the Magnanimous (Oxford, 1976), 3. 27 Riccardo Fubini, Italia quattrocentesca. Politica e diplomazia nell’età di Lorenzo il Magnifico (Milano, 1994), 204–6. 28 As the Franciscan monk Francesco d’Aragona confided to Lanfredini, he judged the pope hostile to the king. Lanfredini agreed on this judgment; after all, he added, the enmity between Catalans and Genovese was a well-known fact. Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, July 10, 1485: “[G]iudichò el papa nimicho del re, et questo se li può credere, perché la inimicitia di Chatelani cum Genovesi ha conformità.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 197. 29 Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 20, 1485: “Sanno el ghoverno di Roma essere in persone nimiche et di mala natura.” The reference here is to Obietto Fieschi and Lorenzo Giustini. Ibid., 240.

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30 Ludwig von Pastor, The History of the Popes from the Close of the Middle Ages, 40 vols (London, 1899–1952), v, 249–51. See also Giovanni Albino’s version of Alfonso’s stay at Rome, following closely the Aragonese propaganda in Albino, “De bello intestino”, 36: Innocentium genere Ligurem, qui eo anno Pont. Max. creatus, ut ne quid admirationis mente conciperet, adire pernecessarium duxit, & omni studio ac obsequio ad compondendam perpetui foederis societatem, quod maxime paternis literis esset admonitus, studuit allicere. Etenim Alphonsus Rex moriens Ferdinando filio praecepit, uti Romanos Pontifices summa semper veneratione prosequeretur, quod ad Regni conservationem praecipue spectare censebat. Ubi Romam venit, eo apparatu ac comitate exceptus est, ut beneficia, quae olim Pontifex ab Alphonso & Ferdinando Rege accepisset, memoria tenere facillime judicaretur.

31 32 33

34

35

36

Albino says nothing about Alfonso’s demands. See the letter from Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, July 31, 1485. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 211. Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 15, 1485. Ibid., 230. Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 16, 1485: “Et per quanto mostra quella lettera le cose sono molto innanzi et debbe el signor Ruberto venire a Siena … et passare in questo regno il quale, col favore de’ baroni, ristituischono alla chiesa et al signor Ludovico danno la parte fu di Sforzo et così el signor Ruberto ne debbe havere uno altro straccio.” Ibid., 233. “Processo informativo per la congiura de’ baroni del regno,” in Stanislao d’Aloe, ed., La congiura de’ baroni del regno di Napoli (Naples, 1859), 220–21: “Dicti baroni … si erano uniti insieme contra lo signore Re ala obedientia del Papa,” “ingannavano lo signore Re in lo tractamento dela pace.” On 28 August, Lanfredini had reported that the king had talked to “uno di questi baroni, quale non nominò” (Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 263). As Paladino has suggested (Paladino, “Per la storia,” 121.), it is not improbable that Angliberto del Balzo was the anonymous informant who leaked details of the conspiracy to the king. During the process, Angliberto insisted that he had taken part in the conspiracy only to gain information for the king. He also confirmed that he sent a messenger to Ferrante. On September 11, 1485, the Florentine ambassador Guido Antonio Vespucci expressed the following opinion to the Dieci di Balia: “Le Vostre Signorie possono presupporre per vero che Nostro Signore habbi una gran voglia di dare una bastonata al re, et di già habbia applicato l‘animo che sia possibile ad acquistare quel Reame per la Chiesa; et da questo proposito non sia per rimuoversi con parole.” Quoted in Marco Pellegrini, Ascanio Maria Sforza: la parabola politica di un cardinale-principe del Rinascimento, 2 vols (Rome, 2002), 179.

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37 Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, November 19, 1485: “Hoggi è tornato el re [da Nola] che, per quello si divulgha, le tante pratiche hanno sortito pocho fructo. Et dicesi per le piazze e’ baroni alzeranno le bandiere della chiesa domani.” Giovanni Lanfredini to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, November 20, 1485: “[C]ome hiersera vi scripsi, questi baroni hanno levate le bandiere della chiesa.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 408–9. 38 Giovanni Lanfredini to the Dieci di Balia. Naples, December 14, 1485: “[E]l re è inghagliardito et sperane la disfactione di questi baroni adversi, perché non hanno gente, né danari, né ghoverno et sono abandonati.” Ibid., 441. 39 In October, Pontano had been sent to him on a diplomatic mission, but fell ill. Ibid., 369. 40 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 166r: “pene ad internitionem perductis Ferdinandi rebus.” 41 On the mission of one Frate Francesco, see Roberto Palmarocchi, La politica italiana di Lorenzo de’ Medici. Firenze nella guerra contro Innocenzo VIII (Florence, 1933), 157–59. See also ibid., 142, and Medici, Lettere, ix, 293, n. 5. See also A. Zanelli, “Roberto Sanseverino e le trattative di pace tra Innocenzo VIII ed il re di Napoli,” Archivio della Società Romana di Storia Patria, 19/1–2 (1896), 177. 42 Palmarocchi, La politica italiana, 177. 43 Giovanni Lanfredini to Dieci di Balia. Naples, June 13, 1486. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 580. See also Lorenzo de’Medici’s counsel in a letter to Jacopo Guicciardini, May 26, 1486, “di non allentare le provisioni della guerra, ma le prosequirei gaglardamente.” Medici, Lettere, ix, 310. 44 See Medici, Lettere, ix, 323, n. 5. 45 Giovanni Lanfredini to Dieci di Balia. Naples, June 10, 1486. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 580. See also the attachment to this letter, Compromesso di Ferrante d’Aragona indirizzato a Innocenzo VIII col tramite del cardinale Ascanio Maria Sforza, dated June 9, 1486, ibid. Palmarocchi, La politica italiana. 181–82. 46 Pellegrini, Ascanio Maria Sforza, 198–200. Della Rovere had convinced the pope to call for the Duke of Lorena. 47 Stefano Infessura, Diario della città di Roma, ed. Oreste Tomassini (Rome, 1890), 201–3. Pellegrini, Ascanio Maria Sforza, 199. 48 See Medici, Lettere, ix, 277, n. 18, referring to a dispatch from Piero Capponi to the Dieci, April 28, 1486, and Palmarocchi, La politica italiana, 176–77. 49 Pellegrini, Ascanio Maria Sforza, 206. 50 Giovanni Lanfredini to Dieci di Balia. Naples, June 23, 1486. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 592. 51 Giovanni Lanfredini to Dieci di Balia. Naples, June 27, 1486. Ibid., 597. 52 Pellegrini, Ascanio Maria Sforza, 207. 53 Giovanni Lanfredini to Dieci di Balia. Naples, July 2, 1486. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, ii, 592. 54 Giovanni Lanfredini to the Signoria. Naples, July 12, 1486. Ibid., 615.

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55 Giovanni Lanfredini to the Dieci di Balia. Naples, July 14, 1486. Ibid., 618. See also Giovanni Lanfredini to the Dieci di Balia. Naples, July 17, 1486: “Di pace non si parla, che io senta.” Ibid., 625. 56 Giovanni Lanfredini to the Dieci di Balia. Naples, July 23/26, 1486. Ibid., 627–28. 57 On the first draft of Asinus, see Guido Martellotti, “Il primo abbozzo dell’ ‘Asinus’ di G. Pontano,” Annali della Scuola Superiore di Pisa, 36 (1967), 1–29. 58 Giovanni Pontano, “Asinus”, in I dialoghi (Florence, 1943), 298: “Miserati saepe sumus senem languenti corpore, mediis diebus, ardentissimo sole, per frequentissimos latrones, quibus itinera circumsessa erant, nunc ex urbe ad Alphonsum in castra, nunc e castris ad Innocentium Romam properare, ut qui illum sequebamur, de senis vita actum iam in singulas prope horas nobiscum ipsi dolentes quereremur.” For a similar situation, see also Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, May 19, 1491: “[D]ecto Pontano, ch’è pure vecchio et patisce di sotto, si stracchò molto…. Et non obstante havessi scripto et decto di non andare [dal re], per sentirsi straccho … il re mandò per decto Pontano.” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 72. 59 Pontano, “Asinus,” 295: “Iudicabam actum cum Ioviano felicissime, quod, pace parta, regias res prope afflictas, magna sua cum gloria, maiore populorum tranquillitate, non restituisset modo, verum etiam stabilisset,” tr Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 194. 60 Pontano, “Asinus,” 298. 61 Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 191. Percopo, Vita di Giovanni Pontano, 46–47, describes the treaty as favorable to Ferrante, but does not give any reasons apart from Pontano’s own affirmations. 62 Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, July 7, 1491. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 113. 63 These utterances are reported in a letter from Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, July 7, 1491: [Q]uello promissi lo potevo fare, et sarebbesi observato. Ma partito mi fu’ da Roma … venne Sancto Piero in Vincula da Genova, et imbruogliorono et perverterono tucti i capitoli. È vero che promissi i censi, ma il papa medesimo mi decte intentione che non si pagherebbono, et dixe: ‘Io ne sarò bene d‘accordo colla maestà del re’; et Ascanio et più cardinali se ne facevono beffe, et mi dixono che io non curassi il prometterli, che non se ne pagherebbe mai niente etc. Ibid. 64 See Scarton, “La congiura,” 260. The reference is to instruction cii in Luigi Volpicella, ed., Regis Ferdinandi primi instructionum liber (10 maggio 1486–10 maggio 1488) (Naples, 1916), 172. 65 Ibid. 238–39.

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66 Scarton, “La congiura,” 281. Serena Ferente, La sfortuna di Jacopo Piccinino. Storia dei bracceschi in Italia (1423–1465) (Florence, 2005), 139–55. 67 Scarton, “La congiura,” 243 and 50. 68 According to the Effemeridi, on July 4 the king had ordered the arrest of Girolamo Sanseverino, the prince of Bisignano, Pirro del Balzo, prince of Altamura, Giovanni Caracciolo, duke of Melfi, Barnaba Sanseverino, the count of Lauria, his son Bernardo, and Angliberto del Balzo, count of Ugento. Leostello, Effemeridi. “Die iiij. Julij … Eo die a quattro ore di nocte o circa lo S. Re fece pigliare lo Principe de Bisignano et lo principe de altamura et lo Duca de melfi et Conte dell avria cum filio eius et lo conte de ducento et fuit dies Jouis.” See also the letter of King Ferrante to Giovanni Albino, signed by Pontano. Naples, July 4, 1487: “Continuando le machinatione del Principe de Altamura, & di Bisignano, del Duca de Melfe, del Conte de Lauria, & Conte de Ugento, per provedere che tale machinatione non passassero avante, & che non sequesse nova perturbatione in lo Reame, havimo questa sera fatto detinere li preditti.” Albino, “Lettere,” 120. Already in April, Pier Bernardino Gaetani, count of Morcone, and Francesco Spinelli had been detained, while Carlo di Sanseverino, count of Mileto had been taken prisoner on 9 July. 69 The prints ran under the title Copia processus coniure nonnullorum titulatorum et baronum regni contra regem Ferdinandum de Aragonia. Anno MCCCCLXXXVI and were printed in Naples by Francesco del Tuppo in two editions, one in June, the other in December 1488. A modern edition is available in the appendix to Camillo Porzio, La congiura de’ baroni del Regno di Napoli contra il re Ferdinando I., ed. Stanislao d’ Aloe (Naples, 1859). 70 Ferrante (Giovanni Pontano) to Giovanni Albino. Naples, July 6, 1487. Albino, “Lettere,” 120–23. 71 Innocence VIII to Ferrante. Rome, July 18, 1487. Ibid., 133. 72 Ferrante to Giovanni Albino. Capua, July 20, 1487. Ibid., 134–35. 73 Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, May 19, 1491: Risposemi epso Pontano: ‘Imbasciatore, io l’ho decto alla maestà del re più volte, et dico ogni giorno, che in queste sue controversie col papa bisogna ci pigli partito…. Epsa sta in sulla spesa, come intendete, et morendo questo papa ha più presto da temere non ne succeda uno altro che sia di peggiore volontà et faccili peggio non fa il presente, che da havere speranza di meglio; et oltre a questo, sua maestà ha da considerare, se lei mancassi, ché ogni homo è mortale, in che essere lascia il duca suo figluolo, con questa brigha alle spalle et sanza investitura. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 70–71. For a more detailed discussion of the different scenarios after the death of the pope or the king, see also Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, May 25, 1491. Ibid., 76. Also in this

204

74

75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82

83 84 85 86 87 88

Notes context Pontano expressed his opinion “che la morte di questo papa o della maestà del re, trovando le cose a questo modo, porterebbe secho qualche grande incendio di guerra in Italia.” Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, June 9, 1491: “Il papa vorrebe rilasciassi i baroni, et la maestà del re non llo vuole fare; anzi, fece male il primo dì a non fare levare la testa a tucti et chiamare in testimonio il cardinale di Sancto Piero in Vincula, Balù et Sancto Agnolo, come harebbono anchora facto i signori vostri.” Ibid., 88. The three cardinals named by Pontano—Giuliano della Rovere, Jean Balue, and Giovanni Michiel—were held to have been involved in the conspiracy. They were among the prelates alluded to in earlier letters of Ferrante written in response to the pope. Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, June 9, 1491. Ibid., 89. Scarton, “La congiura,” 269–81. Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, June 9, 1491. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 88–89. Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, June 30, 1491. Ibid., 105. See the letters from Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici on Novembre 3–5, 1491, ibid., 243–47. Ibid., 248. Ibid., 246 and 51. Giovanni Pontano, De sermone libri sex, ed. S. Lupi and A. Risicato (Lucani, 1954), 58: “commonefacientibus quibusdam eum cardinalibus cavendum esse, ne a Ferdinando, quod esset, ut ipsi volebant, parum firma fide, compositis post rebus, frustra haberetur: ‘At, inquit, neutique falsos nos habuerit Iovianus Pontanus quicum de concordia agitur; neque enim veritas destituet ac fides, qui ipse nunquam veritatem deseruit aut fidem.’” Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 250. Ibid., 265. Ibid., 263. Ibid., 265. Giovanni Pontano to Giovanna d‘Aragona. Rome, January 1, 1492. Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 36. Giovanni Pontano to the duke of Calabria. Rome, January 1, 1492: “In nome del Vostro diabolo habbiate l’animo grande: un poverhuomo, ch’è Joanni Pontano non ha paura d’Europa e Voi havete paura di non retrahere dall’accordo del papa più assai di quello, che mo non vedete nè pensate. Con lo Vostro scrivere da Napoli, con le Vostre cautele de’ procuratorelli mi havete havuto ad mortificare.” Ibid., 37. In general, Pontano had a difficult relationship with the jurists in the Sacro Regio Consiglio. It would be worthwhile to study this relationship in more detail, as Pontano developed a strong aversion to the experts of law and saw his own authority endangered by them. Revealing in this context is his letter to Ferrante from Rome, written at the end of June 1492. Ibid., 45–46.

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89 90

Giovanni Pontano to the duke of Calabria. Rome, January 1, 1492. Ibid., 37. Antonio della Valle to the Otto di Pratica. Naples, January 15, 1492. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 280. See also Antonio della Valle to the Otto di Pratica. Naples, January 21, 1492: “Costoro qui dicono epso Luigi havere portata la resolutione della maestà del re tanto conforme alla mente colla quale venne della santità del papa, che sperano in breve questa practica habbi ad havere quello exito che loro et ogni altro studioso della pace et quiete di Italia debba desiderare.” Ibid., 283. 91 Giuliana Vitale, “Sul segretario regio al servizio degli Aragonesi di Napoli”, Studi Storici, 49/2 (2008), 296. 92 Ibid. 293–94 and passim. For a more general assessment of the changing role of the secretary during the fifteenth century, see Simonetta, Rinascimento segreto. 93 On the notion of character, see 137–139. 94 Piero Nasi to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, August 4, 1491. Corrispondenza degli ambasciatori fiorentini, vi, 134. 95 Ibid., 135. 96 Ibid., 134–35. 97 Pontano to Giovanna d’Aragona. Rome, Januray 1, 1492. Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 36. 98 Pontano to Alfonso d’Aragona. Rome, January 1, 1492: “Credo essere venuto in fastidio al Signor re Vostro Padre per lo scrivere, che li ho facto, fuori del mio officio, imperò ben conveniente alla natura et costumi mei.” ibid. 99 Ibid., 37. 100 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Rome, June 30, 1492: “Cerco bene et fantastico ogni dì di megliorare li facti Vostri, et par che Vostra Maestà me ne voglia disviare.” Ibid., 46. 101 Quoted in Francesco Colangelo, Vita di Gioviano Pontano (Naples, 1826), 122: Magnanimus Princeps … Alfonsus Aragonius, Neapolitani Regni Rex Secundus … convento a se quadam die Veneto Oratore dignissimo, ut ab eo, eiusque Respublica ad commiserationem conversis tanti periculi auxilia exposceret; iussoque prius Pontano suo segretario, alioqui viro eruditissimo, ut patienter adesset, nec in verbum prorumperet aliquod: ille per impatientiam, dum demissi Regis fortunae auxiliare se credit, in minatoria verba contra Oratorem prosiluit, ut non modo Regis afflicti sententiam non coadiuvarit, sed in longe alienum et contrarium finem res et consilium Regis evaderet. 102 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, April 26, 1492: Essendo Voi prencipe savio et tanto experto, non è altro che presumptione, o, per parlar più pronto, temerità la mia volerve ricordare, et in li fatti Vostri, quali Voi sete soliti ben misurare, darve conseglio o vero sollecitarvi. Et per benchè invero sia così, non è però falso che quello, quale per habito et natura

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Notes è dato, ad alcuno volerglilo tollere sia quasi impossibile. Io non potria mutar natura de ricordare alli Signori mei quello mi pare sia loro bene.

Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 39. 103 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, May 7, 1490: “Sacra Maestà, Io nacqui nel dì d‘hoggi, et in tal dì, secondo antica consuetudine, se soliva la matina ringraziare Dio, e lo resto del dì attendere al piacere.” Ibid., 32 (tr. Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 214–15.) 104 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, May 7, 1490: Vostra Maestà hoggi, senza precedenza de’ sciroppi, me ha dato medicina in pillole per essere Quella prudente, per benchè non sia officio di principi fare esercitio di medicina. Ho prese le pillole molto volentieri, existimando che un tal Prencipe, pigliando officio di medico verso un suo fedelissimo servo et affectionatissimo ministro, non possa essere senza consideratissimo misterio. E con questa opinione ho preso le pillole a fine della mia sanitate, la quale resulta dalla desistenza e renunziatione di questo offitio di segretario. Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 32. 105 Ibid.: “Vostra Maestà con queste pillole me ha dato facultate de parlarli liberamente, et domandarli licenza di tal officio.” 106 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, May 7, 1490: “A tiempo di messer Antonello ogni anno se davano capitanie alli scrivani, iudicati e mastrodatti e benificii, et arrobbavasi li popoli, e lo primo rubbato era re Fernando. A tempo di questo tristo e sventurato Pontano non se danno in cancelleria offitii, nè se rubbano popoli nè re, e bisogname esser tributario del sudor mio al fisco.” Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 33 (tr. Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 215.) 107 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, May 7, 1490: Vostra Maestà ha fatti Essa tutti li suoi ministri, et a tutti ha dato, me non ha fatto Essa, perchè me son fatto io, da me medesimo. Anche Vostra Maestà me abbattette in li tempo passato, e fece conto di me, come s‘io fossi un menchionaccio ignorante et inesperto. Nè a me ha dato, ma io ho ben dato ad Esso et al figliuolo, e Voi lo conoscete, e se non lo volete cognoscere, non è però ch’io non dica il vero. Li feudi, li castelli, le provisioni, le rendite, le donationi, che aspettavano i miei servitii (non però che li spettassi io), son questi, che del sudore mio sia tributario al fisco de venti docati al mese. Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 215 (tr. in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 215.) 108 Pontano to Ferrante d’Aragona. Naples, May 7, 1490: [I]o non nacqui tributario ad alcuno. Son ben stato servidore de’ grandi prencipi e per loro gratia, e non per mio merito; così come ho a loro ben

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servito, così l‘ho etiam ben ricordati, qualche volta sono acquetati alli miei consigli. Non delibero, nè crediate Voi, che sete savio, possente e vecchio, ch’io in quest’ultima jostra del vivere habbia ad essere tributario, nè lo credono Vostri figlioli, nè nepoti, e con giustizia, non dico con forza. Io non dubito andare a starme alla mia masseria, sicuro senz’armi e senza guardia.

109

110 111 112

Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 33–34 (tr in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 215. I have added to and changed the translation, understanding the penultimate sentence in a sense contrary to Kidwell’s interpretation.) As Peter Stacey, “Imperial Rome and the Legitimation of Political Authority in Renaissance Naples,” PhD thesis, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, 2000, 141–42, argues, the ruler’s ability to forgo an armed guard or entourage becomes a theme of the literature on princely rule from Seneca onward. The motif recurs in Panormita’s De dictis et factis 2.43: “Alfonsum nonnunquam absque comitantium pompa incedentem vidimus. Cumque et ab hoc a plerisque argueretur suadereturque ut more aliorum principum et ipse armatorum manu stipatus graderetur, exhorruisse consilium visus est, atque dixisse se quidem minime solum, ut isti crederent, sed innocentia associatum vadere, neque esse quod benivolentia civium fretus, quippiam extimescat.” For the portrait of the magnanimous man, see EN 4.3.1124b6-18. For an overview of the discussion, see W.F.R. Hardie, “Magnanimity in Aristotle’s Ethics”, Phronesis, 23 (1978), 63–79. Giovanni Pontano, De magnanimitate, ed. Francesco Tateo (Florence, 1969), 9: Cum igitur gravibus quibusdam me, quae tunc agitabantur, rebus praeposuisset idque ego ferri a filio permoleste animadverterem, nec recusare honus ulla id ratione valerem, dicere haud sum veritus honus illud me, quanquam male libenter, fidenti tamen animo suscepturum, nec deterriturum aut filii contumeliosum animum aut suam patris ipsius in filium indulgentiam; habiturum enim me adversus utrumque quanquam acerrimos accusatores, maximum tamen patronum. Quem rex admiratus scire cum e me pertenderet: “Paupertatem—tum inquam—o Rex; ea me adversus accusationes et tuebitur vestras et liberum absolutumque in iudicio sistet.”

(tr. in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 93–94.) 113 Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 93. 114 Giovanni Pontano to King Ferrante. Naples, April 26, 1492: Nullo di loro gran maestri ha fatto quel che forse ho facto io, solo et abandonato, et come io l‘ho fatto, Voi lo sapete et remettome al Vostro iuditio. Perdonateme, imperò, cento volte sete stato venduto et ali bisogni Vostri ciascun delli predecti se trovarono ricchi et Voi povero. Aspecto un dì che me sia facto el processo del ben fare, et non ho che perdere, et ciascuno di loro havea robba de centomilia

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Notes docati manco. Et aspecto di rispondere alli processatori egregiamente et senza advocato.Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 42.

115 Ibid., 41. 116 For example, “Io so’ un povero hominello” (ibid., 35.); “A me è stata già tolta ogni reputatione, che ad un povero pare mio se potesse togliere” (ibid., 42.); “Quanto ad me, povero et fidel ministro” (ibid.) 117 Pontano to King Ferrante. Naples, May 7, 1490: “un altro faccia quest’officio, che lo farà più riccamente de me, e potrà dare al fisco più de 20 docati al mese, et, a capo di tempo, ce darà la roba sua tutta e la vita.” Ibid., 32. 118 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 277: “Tempestate hac nostra qui apud reges regulosque magistri fuere epistolarum, utque hodie dicuntur secretarii, summum in modum locupletati sunt omnes, praeter Iovianum hunc … illud in ore semper habens: ‘Egere nolo, opulentus esse recuso.’ Qua ratione non modo cupiditati imperavit pecuniarumque appetitioni, verum ipsis etiam regibus in republica moderanda.” 119 Ibid.: “Cum … capto regno Neapolitano, Ludovici Galliarum regis praefectus magistratum ei offerret, quo e reditu eius senectutem opulentiorem duceret: ‘At, inquit, non opulentiorem eam feceris, verum occupatiorem, quando diis iuvantibus nullius honestae rei indigeo.’” 120 Calisto Fido tells this anecdote in his short biography of Pontano. “Parsimoniam frugalitatemque ita servavit, quod, sicuti a quodam nostrate eius statore puerove cubiculario saepius iam adolescens audivi, rarissime quidem praeter aliquot poma cenitaret. Ambitione nulla utebatur, sed mulula obequitans uno tanto comite contentus erat. Vestibus non sericeis sed laneis illisque attritis induebatur.” Liliana Monti Sabia, Un profilo moderno e due Vitae antiche, 76. 121 Francesco Guicciardini, Storia d’Italia (Torino, 1971), 169: Partì adunque il re da Napoli il vigesimo dì di maggio; ma perché prima non aveva assunto con le cerimonie consuete il titolo e le insegne reali, pochi dì innanzi si partisse ricevé solennemente nella chiesa catedrale, con grandissima pompa e celebrità secondo il costume de’ re napoletani, le insegne reali, e gli onori e i giuramenti consueti prestarsi a’ nuovi re; orando in nome del popolo di Napoli Giovanni Ioviano Pontano. Alle laudi del quale, molto chiarissime per eccellenza di dottrina e di azioni civili e di costumi, détte quest’atto non piccola nota; perché essendo stato lungamente segretario de’ re aragonesi e appresso a loro in grandissima autorità, precettore ancora nelle lettere e maestro d’Alfonso, parve che, o per servare le parti proprie degli oratori o per farsi più grato a’ franzesi, si distendesse troppo nella vituperazione di quegli re, da’ quali era sì grandemente stato esaltato: tanto è qualche volta difficile osservare in se stesso quella moderazione e quegli precetti co’ quali egli, ripieno di tanta erudizione, scrivendo delle virtù morali, e facendosi, per l’universalità dello ingegno suo in ogni specie di dottrina, maraviglioso a ciascuno, aveva ammaestrato tutti gli uomini.

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122 123 124 125 126

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Guicciardini was familiar with Bernardo Rucellai’s De bello italico and well aware of the discussions on the writing of history between Rucellai and Pontano. See Valentina Lepri, Layered Wisdom. Early Modern Collections of Political Precepts (Padua, 2015), 63. Isaac D’Israeli, Miscellanies of Literature (London, 1840), 437. Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 13. Ibid., 12. Maria Luisa Doglio, “Le ‘Istituzioni’ di Mario Equicola: dall’ Institutio Principis alla formazione del segretario,” 516. Percopo, “Lettere di Giovanni Pontano,” S. 46.

Chapter 2 1

Pontano, “De prudentia,” 166r-v: Quae profecto res quieti, & otio huic meo, mentique perfruendae causam attulit. Estque deo optimo maximo gratias ex hoc ut agam. Nam, quod vos ipsi scitis, ter sub Ferdinando cedere negotiis cum tentassem, quod mihi ab illo nullo modo fuit concessum, hostilis vis divino quodam beneficio mihi otium peperit, publicisque ab negotiis cessationem. In qua, ut dixi, fruor ante acta vita, nihilo tamen administrationibus ex ipsis locupletior factus, mentem autem ipsam sic exercens, & colens, ut e procellis illis maxime turbidis, in portum quietissimum pariter ac securissimum sim delatus.

2

3

4

5 6

Ibid., 165v: “In tranquillissimo enim otio constitutus coelitum mihi ipse videor sortitus vitam. Nam septuagenarius iam, valido corpore, bonis externis, quantum satis est, modestiae praesertim meae suffultus, animum solum exerceo, eumque continenter, praeterquam cum, nec tamen quotidie, villam inviso, & hortos, gladioque expurgo arbusculas.” Cic., Tusc. 5.2.5: “Cuius in sinum cum a primis temporibus aetatis nostra voluntas studiumque nos compulisset, his gravissimis casibus in eundem portum, ex quo eramus egressi, magna iactati tempestate confugimus. O vitae philosophia dux, o virtutis indagatrix expultrixque vitiorum!” Cic., Fin. 5.15: “Summum autem bonum si ignoretur, vivendi rationem ignorari necesse est, ex quo tantus error consequitur, ut quem in portum se recipiant scire non possint.” For a different use of this metaphor, see August, De beata vita, 1–3. EN 1.1.1095a5. EN 2.2.1103b26-28: “non enim ut sciamus quid sit virtus, nam sic nulla eius foret utilitas, sed ut boni simus perscrutamur.” Jean Buridan, Quaestiones Ioannis Buridani super decem libros Ethicorum Aristotelis ad Nicomachum (Paris, 1513), iira. Quoted in Eckhard Keßler, Sabrina Ebbersmeyer, and Martin Schmeisser,

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8 9

10

11

12

13 14

15 16 17 18 19 20

Notes eds., Ethik des Nützlichen. Texte zur Moralphilosophie im italienischen Humanismus (Munich, 2007), 36. Charon, 112: “Non ex bonorum cognitione humana existit felicitas, verum ex eorum possessione et usu.” For Victoria Kahn, this is one of the “most eloquent passages of the Dialogi.” Kahn, “Giovanni Pontano’s Rhetoric of Prudence,” 31. EN 10.9.1179a18-20: “veritas in rebus ex operibus et vita discernitur. Nam in hiis est principale.” (tr. Bruni) On this point, see Eckhard Keßler, “Autobiographie als philosophisches Argument? Ein Aspekt des Philosophierens bei Cicero und die gegenwärtige Praxis der Philosophie,” in Eginhard Hora and Eckhard Keßler, eds., Studia humanitatis. Ernesto Grassi zum 70. Geburtstag (Munich, 1973), 182. Pontano, “De prudentia,” 149v: “[F]ines & ipsi omnes ad unum eumque summum, ac praestantissimum referuntur finem, propter quem omnino omnia suscipiantur & officia, & opera, ad quem quidem ipsum suum quique dirigant cursum, perinde, ut in portum qui navigant.” Ibid., 1.4, “Unumquenque finem bonum aliquod esse,” 150r: “Inter ipsa autem bona, quod idem dictum est de finibus, est aliud alio melius, ac praestantius, illud vero & optimum et praestantissimum … quod adeptus qui fuerit, non aliter, quam qui in portum ex alto delatus est, finem sit postremum assecutus.” EN 1.4.1095a17-20: “Nomine quidem omnes fere consenciunt. Felicitatem enim vulgus simul eruditique appellant. Sed et bene vivere et bene agere pro eodem accipiunt ac felicem esse.” (tr. Bruni) Pontano, “De prudentia,” 150r: “Videntur autem homines id maxime & cupere, & quaerere, ut bene ipsi vivant.” Leonardo Bruni, “Isagogicon Moralis Disciplinae,” in Opere letterarie e politiche, ed. Paolo Viti (Torino, 1996). The translations are from Leonardo Bruni, The Humanism of Leonardo Bruni. Selected Texts, tr. Gordon Griffiths, James Hankins, and David Thompson (Binghamton, 1987). On its date, see Hans Baron, “The Date of Leonardo Bruni’s Isagogicon Moralis Disciplinae and the Recovery of the Eudemian Ethics,” Yearbook of Italian Studies, 1 (1971), 64–74. Pontano owned a manuscript copy of the text: Mauro de Nichilo, “Una miscellanea umanistica del Pontano. Il cod. Cuomo 1.6.45 della Biblioteca della Società di Storia Patria di Napoli,” Rinascimento Meridionale, 2 (2011), 6 (n. 1). Bruni, “Isagogicon Moralis Disciplinae,” 212. Ibid., 214: “etsi verbis pugnent, re tamen et effectu proxime.” Ibid., 216: “Felicitas enim absque voluptate esse non potest. Adeo enim implicata est illi et annexa voluptas, ut separari nequeat.” Ibid.: “virtutes enim beate vite dominas effectricesque consentio.” Pontano, “De prudentia,” 147v. See Her. Hist. 1.31. Pontano knew Valla’s Latin translation of the History, as is clear from one of his letters. On this letter, see 107. Cic., Tusc. 1.47.

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21 Poggio Bracciolini, “De humanae conditionis miseria,” in Opera Omnia (Basle, 1538), 111. 22 A manuscript miscellany owned by Pontano contains a letter “De humane vite miseriis ac de animi immortalitate,” beginning with a “dictum Solonis” and a “Sermo Sancti Bernardi di humana miseria.” Nichilo, “Una miscellanea umanistica del Pontano,” 7 (n. 5) and 9–10 (n. 11). 23 Ibid., 1, prologue. 24 Ibid., 1, epilogue, 168r: “Nemo enim felicem putat eum, qui sit mortuus, quippe cum sit viventium felicitas … mors quidem ipsa felicitatis est humanae terminus, desinitque statim homo esse, ubi quis fuerit vita functus.” 25 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 154v: “[V]itam admirati sunt illorum, qui agerent in potentatibus, abundarentque copia generis omnis rerum, dum affluenter ipsi vivunt magis quam bene” (On this passage, see also below.) Later in the chapter, ibid., 155r: “Quod si beate vivere est, curis, molestiis, laboribusque vacantem esse hominem, & inertia, desidia, lasciviaque languescere abutentem & corporis & fortunae, & animi bonis, tollitur ut vivere secundum rationem ac virtutem sit ipsum bene vivere.” See also ibid., 157r: “Nam beatitudo fere prae se tantum fert & molestiarum carentiam, & rerum omnium affluentiam, cum maxima etiam voluptate.” 26 Ibid., 148r: “Quod quid est aliud, quam velle hominem, humanam abiicere conditionem, & quae deorum sit, illam induere? quod dolere nunquam debeat, nunquam tristari, minime etiam laetari, atque explicare frontem, non irasci, non miserari, non denique moveri ad humanos casus, naturaeque ipsius ministeria, & opera. Denique muscae, culices, pulicesque felicitatem contaminabunt humanam.” 27 Santoro, “Fortuna e Prudenza nella ‘Lezione’ del Pontano,” 38. 28 On the different positions of Stoics and Peripatetics on the role of the passions, see 133. 29 Charles Trinkaus, In Our Image and Likeness. Humanity and Divinity in Italian Humanist Thought, 2 vols (London, 1970), 107. 30 Bracciolini, “De humanae conditionis miseria,” 111. 31 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” iii, 227v. 32 Giovanni Pontano, “De fortitudine,” in Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita (Venice, 1518), i, 79v–81r. 33 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 161v-62v. See EN 1.10.1100b34. 34 Ibid., 148r: “Nemo erit unquam in Britania foelix, quod sit regio maxime frigida, oporteatque non exigua anni parte calidariis agere sub fornicibus, expectareque ex italia, galliaque vini vecturam ac comportationem. O felicitatem maxime deficientem, ad quam perficiendam vini solius desit usus, quo quidem quota hominum pars globum hunc terrarum inhabitantium utitur? ut qui abstemii sunt, felices esse nullo modo queant.” Translation in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 289–90. 35 Ibid.: “Adsit modo animus, adsit inquam animus, multo quidem minus Britanis deerit ad felicitatem vinum, quam Italicis aqua Nilotica tantopere commendata.”

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36 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 148v: Dii boni, felicem esse volumus iustum, temperantem, fortem, scientem, rerum naturae peritum. Atqui maxime laboriosum est, administrare iustitiam, summopere difficile temperare voluptatem, quae nobis est a natura insita, supremum in modum periculosum versari in praeliis, in quibus de vita agitur, deque honore, & gloria. Quae vero sint vigilae, ieiunia, corporis languores, defatigationes animi, ac versationes eorum, qui cognoscendae rerum naturae dant operam, & ipsi scitis, neque nos etiam ignoramus. Comparatur igitur felicitas per difficultates, labores, pericula, maximeque inquietas actiones, vigilias, inediam, perpetuasque illas animi cogitationes, ac solicitudines. Nihil itaque his omnibus actum fuerit, si aut vestis nobis serica, aut Porcellanicum desit poculum. In animo, mihi credite, felicitas maxima e parte collocata est, in animique ipsius constitutione. 37 Ibid., 153r: “Ut igitur vegetantis proprium munus est vivere, sentientis vero sentire, sic eius quae ratione utitur, agere cum ratione.” See EN 1.7.1097b33-1098a3. See also ibid., 152v. 38 Ibid., 153r: “Cumque rationis proprium munus, atque officium sit, honestatem complecti, sitque ratio ipsa norma quasi quaedam recti, ea denique selectrix boni, & iudex honesti, erunt hae ipsae morales virtutes, atque actiones, tum honestae, & rectae tum ad bonum contendent.” On the role of reason, see also ibid., 152v-53r. 39 Ibid., 153v. 40 EN 1.7.1098a8. 41 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 153v: “bene vivere sit non cuiusque hominis, sed eius tantum, qui est bene ipse quidem constitutus.” 42 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 283. 43 Ibid. 44 Cic., Sest. 97: “esto igitur ut ii sint, quam tu ‘nationem’ appellasti, qui et integri sunt et sani et bene de rebus domesticis constituti.” (tr. C.D. Yonge) 45 Cic., Amic. 47: “hoc proprium est animi bene constituti, et laetari bonis rebus et dolere contrariis.” Cicero also speaks of a “bene constitutum corpus” in Tusc. 2.6.17. 46 Cic., Orat. 2.7: “Atque ego in summo oratore fingendo talem informabo qualis fortasse nemo fuit. Non enim quaero quis fuerit, sed quid sit illud, quo nihil esse possit praestantius, quod in perpetuitate dicendi non saepe atque haud scio an numquam, in aliqua autem parte eluceat aliquando, idem apud alios densius, apud alios fortasse rarius.” (tr. C.D. Yonge) 47 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 157v: “Volumus enim quod Cicero in inquirendo, ac describendo oratore facit, perficere felicem, qualis fortasse fuerit nusquam inventus, qui tamen esse, & qualis debeat, aperte ut intellegatis.”

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48 Ibid.: “primo quidem amatorem illum constituimus civilis societatis, viventemque in hominum coetu, sub legibusque communibus.” 49 Ibid., 160r: “Quid quod civili in consuetudine, & vita tum honestas, tum iustitia primum obtinent locum? … Quocirca qui ad felicitatem instituitur, & honesti, & iusti erit cum primis studiosus, quae duo & vincula sunt societatis humanae, & per ea actiones ipsae commendantur.” On the conncetion between “honestum” and “honos,” supreme value of the political life, see Pontano, De magnanimitate, 2–3. 50 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 157v: “Neque enim bene constitutus vir existimandus est aut solivagus, aut sui tantum studiosus, atque amator, vivensque in solitudine.” 51 Ibid.: “Secundo autem loco puerum esse eum nolumus, neque annis, neque moribus.” See EN 1.3.1095a2; 6–7. 52 Pontano returns to this topic ibid., 160v-61r. For a further discussion of the development of rationality and of character, see 136–137. 53 Ibid., 158v-59r. On the goods of the body, see also ibid., 160r. Pontano’s chapters often overlap and repropose topics already dealt with. This suggests that at least the first book of De prudentia lacks the finishing touches which would have been necessary for a more straightforward discussion. 54 Pontano, De magnanimitate, 10. See also Carlo de Frede, “‘Più simile a mostro che a uomo.’ La bruttezza e l‘incultura di Carlo VIII nella rappresentazione degli italiani del Rinascimento,” Bibliothèque d‘Humanisme et Renaissance, 44 (1982), 545–85. 55 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 158v. 56 Pontano, De fortuna, 106/08. Pontano’s discussion strongly echoes some of the arguments concerning adultery and virginity in Lorenzo Valla, De vero falsoque bono, ed. Maristella de Panizza Lorch (Bari, 1970), 36–38. 57 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 159v-60r. 58 Ibid., 159r: “Itaque ut vires corporis eiusmodi esse volumus, quae bene, & valide sibi constent, ad obeunda animi imperia, corporisque ipsius munera, sic et divitiarum, externorumque bonorum copiam talem, ac tantam, quae abunde etiam suggerat necessaria, quoties usus, honestasque postulaverit, et recte agendi ratio.” 59 Ibid., 159v: “Videte obsecro quanta vis sit honesti, quod maiores illi nostri laudatissimi viri cum laudare insigni aliquam specie mulierem vellent, honesta eam facie esse dicerent.” See Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 25, 1.20.1, where he refers to Ter. Eun. 4.4.15: “rerum parens natura feminis multis dedit faciem, ut inquit Terentius, honestam ac liberalem.”—“Nature, the mother of all things, gave many women a face, as Terence says, ‘beautiful and generous.’” Here and in what follows, the translations are from Lorenzo Valla, On Pleasure, tr. A. Kent Hieatt and Maristella de Panizza Lorch (New York, 1977). 60 Valla’s dialogue went through several modifications. Later, its title changed to De vero bono. For an account, see Maristella de Panizza Lorch’s remarks in her introduction to Valla, On Pleasure. See also Eckhardt Keßler’s introduction to

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63 64

65 66

Notes Lorenzo Valla, Von der Lust oder Vom wahren Guten, tr. Peter Michael Schenkel (München, 2004). For further discussion, see Riccardo Fubini, “Indagine sul ‘De voluptate’ di Lorenzo Valla. Il soggiorno a Pavia e le circonstanze della composizione,” in Umanesimo e secolarizzazione dal Petrarca al Valla (Rome, 1990). On Maffeo Vegio, see Fabio della Schiava, “Alcune vicende di un sodalizio umanistico pavese: Lorenzo Valla e Maffeo Vegio,” in Luca Carlo Rossi, ed., Le strade di Ercole. Itinerari umanistici e altri percorsi. Seminario internazionale per i centenari di Coluccio Salutati e Lorenzo Valla (Bergamo, 25–26 ottobre 2007) (Florence, 2010). On the beginnings of Renaissance epicureanism, see Martin C. Davies, “Cosma Raimondi’s Defence of Epicurus,” Rinascimento, ns 27 (1987), 123–39. For an overview, see Jill Kraye, “Moral Philosophy,” in Charles Schmitt, Quentin Skinner, and Eckhard Keßler, eds., The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge, 1988), 374–86. Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 34–35 (1.34.1): “Habetis veram brevemque de virtutibus diffinitionem. Inter quas non ita erit voluptas, ut contumeliosissimum hominum genus stoici garriunt, tanquam meretrix inter bonas matronas, sed tanquam domina inter ancillas.” Ibid., 62 (2.15.2): “Ex quo plane constat honestatem vocabulum quoddam esse inane et futile.” Ibid., 62 (2.15.1): “Ego vero nunquam negaverim esse et virtutes et scelera et hec ipsa que illi retulerunt esse scelerum claustra, fidem, benignitatem et que sunt id genus. Sed non bene mihi interpretantur ad finem honestatis illa referentes.” Ibid., 52 (2.8.1): “Quod quia nullum reddere honestas potest, non est quod aliquid honestatis gratia vel faciat aliquis vel facere debeat.” Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 53–54 (2.8.6-7): “At ea comes est honestatis ideoque honestas ab honore, hoc est a gloria, nomen traxit.” Bene admones. Apparet non honorem ab honestate sed honestatem ab honore et gloria proficisci, ut illa per se nihil sit, ut certe nihil est…. Eoque nostri maiores edem Virtutis atque edem Honoris coniunctas esse voluerunt ita ut in illa officium in hac finis esset, in illa labor in hac finis laboris, illa per se respuenda nisi hanc adipisceretur.

67 Ibid., 60 (2.13.1): Cur enim pro bonis, pro iustis, pro industriis haberi gaudemus? Nempe ut auctoritatem nobis comparemus et fidem. Quo pacto? Ut de nobis alii sic loquantur: est fortis, est strenuus, preficiamus hunc in nostris bellis ducem. Est in rebus administrandis diligens, industrius, integer: cui alii sic commodius mandemus rem publicam nostram administrandam? Consilio pollet et eloquentia: in nostrum ordinem cooptemus, ut nobis sit presidio pariter et ornamento.

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68 Ibid., 62–63 (2.15.5-6): “Ita maiora bona, que sunt maiores utilitates, minoribus aut minora damna maioribus anteponuntur. Que autem maiora bona et que minora sunt difficile est pronuntiare, presertim quod mutantur tempore, loco, persona et ceteris huiusmodi. Sed tamen ita dicam ut res intelligatur: primum quidem est ut malo careas, periculis, solicitudinibus, laboribus; sequens ut ameris, qui est fons omnium voluptatum.” 69 Ibid., 76 (2.28.4). 70 Ibid., 75 (2.28.1). 71 Ibid., 76 (2.28.5): “Verum Aristoteles duas et ipse voluptates facit, unam in sensibus et quandam aliam in mente. At ipse non intelligo, cum unum atque idem nomen sit, quo pacto possimus rem facere diversam. Atque eo quidem magis quod omnis voluptas non tam corpore sentitur quam animo qui corpus moderator.” But see also the utterances of Antonio da Rho, the “Christian” interlocutor, in 3.10.1: “Nam ea (i.e. voluptas) duplex est: altera nunc in terris, altera postea in celis … altera mater est vitiorum, altera virtutum.” (Valla, On Pleasure, 266.) During the process of inquisition in 1444, Valla had to clarify his position on the role of voluptas. On this point, see questions 1–9 in Gianni Zippel, “La ‘Defensio quaestionum in philosophia’ di Lorenzo Valla, e un noto processo dell’Inquisizione napoletana,” Bollettino dell’istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo e archivio muratoriano, 69 (1957), 82. 72 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 76 (2.28.5): “Quid enim fere versamus in mente non quasi corporeum, hoc est secundum ea que vidimus, audivimus, aliquo sensu percepimus?” 73 Cic., Tusc. 5.3.9; De volupate 3.18.6. 74 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 77 (2.28.8): “Quanquam non est maior voluptas tua celum ac sidera inspectantis quam mea decoram faciem intuentis.” 75 Ibid., 79 (2.28.15-16): “Quis huic, queso, scientie literarum operam daret pellectus dulcedine contemplationis?… Atque breviter complectar: ut virtutum actio ita et contemplatio laboriosa est.” 76 Cic., Tusc. 5.3.9: “qui nec plausum nec lucrum quaererent.” 77 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 79 (2.28.17): “Glorie cupidus videri nolebas, studiorum amator videri volebas, cum tamen studi non propter se sed propter gloriam precipue amares.” 78 See, for example, the discussion of the Hendecasyllabi in Karl Enenkel, “Meditative Frames as Reader’s Guidance,” in Karl Enenkel and Walter Melion, eds., Meditatio— Refashioning the Self. Theory and Practice in Late Medieval and Early Modern Intellectual Culture (Leiden, 2011), 36–40, especially 39, “Elegiac love is turned into sensual and explicit erotics; the suffering of unfulfilled love is turned into physical pleasure.” It should also be recalled that Pontano’s teacher Antonio Beccadelli, the Panormita, was the Epicurean interlocutor in Valla’s first version of the dialogue. On this point, see 93.

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79 EN 1.5.1095b19-22: “Vulgus igitur omnino servile videtur vitam pecorum diligendo. Sustentatur autem ob id quod plerique in potentatibus constituti instar Sardanapelli vitam agunt.” 80 I translate beatus with “blissful” and felix with “happy,” based on a distinction made by Pontano himself. For Pontano, beatitudo refers mainly to an absence of pain and an affluence of pleasurable things. Therefore, he prefers felix to beatus, although he concedes that some philosophers prefer to speak of a “blissful life” (vita beata) than a “happy life” (vita felix). Pontano, “De prudentia,” 157v. For a discussion on this terminology, see Valla, Elegantiae, 4.114: Beatus, qui rebus omnibus ad vitae usum ornatumque spectantibus abundat. Ideoque locupletes sane omnes beatos vocamus: ut apud Juvenal [Sat. 1]. Vetulae vefica beatae. Et Cic. Sint florentes, sint beati. Et alibi: Crotoniatae quondam cum florerent omnibus copiis, & in Italia cum inprimis beati numerarentur. Unde apud inferos in Elysiis campis beati vocantur, & a nobis qui apud superos vivunt; ut pene idem sint felices & beati, felicitas & beatitudo. Felices inquam omnium bonorum compotes. Sunt & aliae res pro sua quaeque natura beatae felicesque, veluti de voce apud Quint. Ornata erit pronunciatio, cui suffragatur vox facilis, clara, pura, secans aera, auribus sedens. Beata dixit pro eo quod est plena & perfecta. Et alibi: Nam vocis, quantum in nullo cognovi, felicitas. Lorenzo Valla, Elegantiarum Latinae Linguae Libri Sex (Lyon, 1544), 311. 81 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 154v: Quod vero ad beate vivendum attinet, rei huius opinio ac mentio introducta est ab iis, qui posthabita, despectaque ratione, vitam admirati sunt illorum, qui agerent in potentatibus, abundarentque copia generis omnis rerum, dum affluenter ipsi vivunt magis quam bene, abutunturque potius quam utuntur rerum ipsarum copia, eamque non tam ad frugem convertunt, quam in suam ipsorum, ac rerum simul perditionem, ut magis ipsi trahantur a sensu, quam ducantur a ratione. 82 On this point, see also 133–136. 83 Pontano, “De fortitudine,” 49v-50r: “Namque ut homo ex animo existit et corpore, sic duplex est voluptas. Atque altera quidem sensuum ministra & quasi titillatrix quaedam & illecebra, altera vero actionum earum tum comes, tum socia, in quibus animus imperat, eaque a claris atque honestis laboribus ducit ortum.” 84 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 22, 1.16.3: “Illi magno ore decantant appetendas difficultates quod certe natura negat. Nos ipsius nature iura retinentes dicimus appetendas oblectationes.” 85 EN 1.8.1099a8-11. 86 EN 1.8.1099a13-16: “Cuique autem voluptati est id cuius amator dicitur … iusta amatori iustorum et omnino ea que secundum virtutem talium amatori … Probitatis vero amatoribus iocunda sunt natura iocunda; huiusmodi autem sunt actus secundum virtutem qui talibus viris eciam per seipsos iocundi

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sunt; neque eorum vita indiget voluptate quasi adiuncta sed in seipsa habet voluptatem.” EN 2.3.1104b8-11. For the adaptation of this passage, see Pontano, “De prudentia,” 175r. EN 3.9.1117a35-1117b3: “Attamen finis in fortitudinem dulcis esse videtur sed a rebus circumstantibus obscurari quod et in gymnicis certaminibus evenit.” EN 3.9.1117b3-5: “Nam pugilibus finis ipse dulcis est cuius gratia corone honoresque existunt. Plagis vero percuti si modo illi e carne sunt dolorosa sane atque molesta et omnino laboriosa res est.” (tr. Bruni) Pontano, “De fortitudine,” 50r: In equestribus ludis quae concursores patiantur, videre licet quam sint gravia. Est enim decernendum sub gravissimis armis, sub sole, in pulvere sensim immittendus equus, hasta in ipso interim cursu dirigenda, percutiendus adversarius ictusque gravissimi excipiendi, etiam cum vitae periculo. Haec dum geruntur, voluptas nulla sentitur, quae tamen quanta exsistit, ubi gratulantium voces, cum spectantis populi plausu victorem praeco pronuntiat ornatumque victoriae praemiis domum turba reducit?

91 The similarity between these authors is partly obscured by their differing styles of inquiry. For a comparison of Valla’s polemical style and Pontano’s conservative outlook, see Chapter 3, section “The Yes-Sayer and the No-Sayer.” 92 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 53–54, 2.8.6-7: “Apparet non honorem ab honestate sed honestatem ab honore et gloria proficisci, ut illa per se nihil sit, ut certe nihil est. Eleganter igitur Epicurus id honestum putavit quod esset populari fama gloriosum.” (The reference is to Cic., Fin. 2.48.) 93 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 155v: Qua enim e re aut maior capietur voluptas, aut plenior, aut optabilior, aut naturae congruentior, quam e iustis, liberalibus, fortibus, magnanimisque actionibus? Quid enim iucundius, quam pie egisse? quam in homines benefice? in Deos religiose? Atque hanc quidem ipsam voluptatem nulli dolores corrumpere, nulla vis eripere, nullae fortunae procella impellere in scopulum potest, nostra est, permanebitque nobiscum, quandiu memoria ipsa, recteque factorum recordatio permanebit. 94 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 82, 2.29.2-3: “Que vitia vitanda sunt quod mentem quiescere non sinunt, que molestia quedam est quam mens substinet gestarum rerum recordatione. Qualis fuit L. Sylle, cuius mens atque animus semper inter cadavera trucidatorum civium versabatur, adeo ut somnum capere non posset.” 95 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 155v: Deducitur ad Grammaticum ingemiscens ac plorans puer, eripitur illi ludus, qui eius aetatis est proprius, sentit saepius doctoris atque correctoris ferulam,

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Notes obiurgationesque gravissimas, cogitur vigilare ad multam noctem, matutino tempore expergisci, in librum incumbere, & omni fere vigiliae, ac diei tempore, nunc ingenium exercere, nunc memoriam, post & vocem, dum recitare quae a doctore accepit cogitur inter increpationes & scuticam. (tr. in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 30.)

96

97

98

Pontano, “De prudentia,” 155v–156r: “Haec omnia perpessus est Virgilius … Sed quaenam quaeso maior, quae inquam maior, solidior, exquisitior, optatior atque omni e parte perfectior voluptas, quam cum princeps orbis terarum, Augustus, senatus item ac populus Romanus gentium dominus assurexit in publico recianti.” Ibid., 156r: “Quae Aristotelem comitabatur voluptas … [se] ipsum reputantem ac merito etiam gloriantem, sua pervestigatione, suis vigiliis ad ea pervenisse, quae Graecorum aut Aegytiorum nullus esset antea consecutus? Quae illius magistrum Platonem, quem Graecia, Sicilia, Italia supra hominem venerata est, quem reges propter ingenii excellentiam suspexerunt, admirati sunt populi.” Ibid., 157r-v: Honesta autem omnia iucunditatem afferunt. Itaque quemadmodum videmus sub sole umbram naturaliter corpus sequi, cum umbra tamen ipsa non constituat corpus, sed ea potius de corpore constituatur sub sole. Sic voluptas sequitur eas, quae virtutem constituunt actiones, Quippe quae nunquam discedat a bene vivendo, non tamen ut bene vivere, ac secundum rectam rationem agere, susceptum sit propter voluptatem, sed propter seipsum.

99

Ibid., 162v: “Quibus perscrutandis (sc. vita perfecta et virtus maxima & optima) offeret se se duplex fortasse genus felicitatis, alterum vitae eius, quae tota versatur in agendis rebus … alterum vitae, quae maxime quidem contemplatur, in eoque versatur tota.” 100 EN 1.13.1102a15-17. See ibid., 152v: “anima sit corporis ipsius humani perfectio, imperetque ipsa corpori (perfectioris enim imperium est).” 101 EN 1.15.1102a32-1103a6. For a more detailed analyis of the ordering of the soul, the role of moral virtues and their connection with the passions, see 133–136. 102 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 184r: Atque haec quidem contemplandi vis … dupliciter est etiam partienda. Animi enim vis haec aut in cognoscendis iis vertitur, quae certa quidem ipsa sunt naturaque constituta, neque mutationem recipiunt, nec alio atque alio sese habere modo possunt, quorum e cognitione manat scientia; aut in iis, quae dubia ipsa sunt ac propter incertitudinem permutationemque consultatio in illis locum habet, quaeque alio nomine est etiam ratiocinatio. See EN 6.1.1139a6-15.

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103 Ibid., 162v: “Homini enim utrunque a natura est insitum, ut et agat, & mente perspiciat, atque ita quidem insitum, ut alterum alterius auxilio indigeat.” 104 Ibid., 164v: “Vos vero optimi viri meam hanc dissertionem sic omnem accipite, ut cum de qualitatibus corporeae constitutionis habetur sermo, biliosum, aut pituitosum aliquem dicimus, non quod non aliis quoque constitutus sit ex humoribus, verum quod vel bili vel pituita abundet amplius, sic vitam contemplantem, atque indagatricem non adeo perscrutandis cognitu dignis rebus deditam ut nihil omnino agat.” 105 In the list of books that Pontano’s daughter Eugenia donated in 1505, published in Silvia Sbordone, Saggio di bibliografia delle opere e della vita di G. Pontano (Naples, 1982), 42–43, appears a volume “Metaphisica Aristotilis, in greco, ad stampa” See also Mauro de Nichilo, “Per la biblioteca del Pontano,” in Claudia Corfiati and Mauro de Nichilo, eds., Le Biblioteche nel Regno fra Tre e Cinquecento (Lecce, 2009), 156. Aldo Manuzio published the editio princeps of the Greek Aristotle in Venice between 1495 and 1498. 106 Aristotle, Metaph. 5.16.1021b13. 107 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 164r: “Videtur autem perfectum id esse, quod undique sibi constat, impletque omnes numeros. Atqui ratione hac, felicitas utraque e vita agente, & contemplante comparata, quod homo sit ad utrunque a natura genitus” Girolamo Balbi, Opera poetica, oratoria, ac politico-moralia, ed. Joseph Retzer, 2 vols (Vienna, 1792), ii, 391, uses an identical formulation: “Id autem perfectum esse scimus, quod ubique sibi constat impletque omnes numeros.” 108 Antonio de Ferrariis (Galateo), Epistole, ed. Antonio Altamura (Lecce, 1959), 119: “Hoc est quod in Pontano maxime admiror. Homo in magnis rebus, in Regum negotiis occupatissimus, nec a re rustica alienus, tam diligenter litterarum studia prosecutus est, ut non plus agere potuisset homo ociosus, et in negotiis aut publicis aut domesticis minime impeditus.” (tr. Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 301.) See also Santoro, “Fortuna e Prudenza nella ‘Lezione’ del Pontano,” 27. 109 Santoro, “Fortuna e Prudenza nella ‘Lezione’ del Pontano,” 28. Another very interesting source quoted ibid., 23, is the dedicatory letter of De magnanimitate, written by Pietro Summonte to Angelo Colocci, in Giovanni Pontano, Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita, 3 vols (Venice, 1518–19), i, 226v : “Sed tu haec legens Coloti cave, qua par est viri admiratione ita obstupescas, ut quem olim Romae Ferdinandi Regis legatum, apud Innocentium octavum Pontificem Maximum de summa regni Neapolitani ita occupatum, agendisque rebus tam peritum, atque agilem videris, eundem hunc fortasse non credas, cui tantum ad rerum cognitionem, ac scientiae studia vacaverit.” 110 Aristotle, Metaph. 5.16.1021b14-15. 111 EN 10.7.1177a12-18.

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112 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 164v: “Sed fortasse perfectum ipsum alia ratione quaerendum est in hac ipsa perfectae vitae quaestione, ac virtutis etiam perfectae, dicendumque virtutem contemplandi esse per se praestantiorem quam agendi.” 113 Ibid.: minus perturbari queat, & cum paucioribus indigeat, & mentis illa delectatio, vel perfunctio potius an magis fruitio (ut Christiani loquuntur Theologi, quod verbum & grammaticum est, & recte deductum, a verbo enim fruor, teste etiam Prisciano, deducuntur indifferenter fructurus, & fruiturus, unde fruitio) integrior ipsa sit, firmiusque sibi constet, neque quae in vita contingunt activa obnubilationes serenitatem tantam obscurare, ac foedare habeant. The term “fruitio,” which Pontano emphasizes in this passage, plays an important part in the polemics surrounding Lorenzo Valla’s De voluptate. 114 Aristotle also stresses the self-sufficiency of the contemplative activity and affirms that philosophical wisdom is the most pleasant of all virtuous activities. See EN 10.7.1177a23-29. 115 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 164v: Etenim inter homines bene agere non est ab homine ipso, humanaque a natura discedere. At mente, indagationeque rerum maximarum cognitionem complecti, et earum causas, naturas, ac rationes habere comprehensas, mundumque ipsum cogitationibus subiecisse, ac perquisitionibus suis omnem, quae summa quidem sapientia est, hoc profecto supra hominis videtur esse conditionem, acceditque ad divinitatem, quando hac ipsa via coelitibus maxime similes efficimur. 116 EN 10.7.1177b26-27. 117 EN 10.7.1177b31-32. 118 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 164v: “[I]nter homines versatur, & oratione erga illos utitur, & cogitationes aliis etiam aperit, & ostendit suas, & docet & monet, & hac via benefacit etiam quam plurimis, & ignorantiam, ruditatemque ex aliorum pectoribus excutit, tum disserendo, tum etiam scribendo, ac transmittendo ad posteros inventa, & comentationes suas aeternitate dignas.” 119 Ibid., 165r: “[H]ic ipse contemplator sequetur in illo ipso vivendi genere etiam munera atque officia boni viri.” More specifically, Pontano writes that those retired “non ita quidem abiecisse, ut a se ipsis omnino discesserint, ac bonitatem, probitatem, patriaeque charitatem sic exuerint, ut consilia, responsa, sermonem denique suum adeuntibus denegent, seque ab illorum conspectu subducant.” Pontano himself gives an example for this attitude in his last writing, a letter to Louis XII of France of May 1503. At the time of the letter, the French rulers of Naples are in dire straits due to the military advance of the Spanish, and so is Naples. In the name of Naples Eletti, Pontano intervenes on behalf of the starving

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121 122 123 124

125

126

127 128

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Neapolitans, illustrating their desperate situation to the king and protesting against the abuses of his administrators. Liliana Monti Sabia, “L’estremo autografo: una lettera a Luigi XII di Francia,” in Studi su Giovanni Pontano, ed. Giuseppe Germano, 2 vols (Messina, 2010), i, originally published in Liliana Monti Sabia, “L’estremo autografo di Giovanni Pontano,” Italia medioevale e umanistica, 23 (1980). Pontano, “De prudentia,” 165r: “Scimus non paucos defessos rebus urbanis, senectute iam aggravante, relicta urbe se se in agrum contulisse, illicque vitam egisse tranquilliorem, laboribusque ac civili vita iam defunctis viris dignam.” Aristotle, Metaph. 5.16.1021b24-25. Pontano, “De prudentia,” 165v: “[P]erfectum, de quo nunc agimus, accipiendum forte iccirco est, quia sit ad finem iam perventum (finis enim perfectio est).” EN 1.7.1098a18. Pontano, “De prudentia,” 165r: “[A]ctionum plurimarum fructus est cessatio a laboribus, requiesque in colendis tantum mentis agitationibus, & praeteritarum actionum perfunctione, & praesentium perscrutationum ocio ac voluptate, & fruitione.” See EN 10.7.1177b5. Ibid., 166r: “Ipsiusque ante actae vitae recordatione magis magisque incendor, tum ad res cognitu dignas, quaeque sapientiam constituunt, maiori quodam studio perquirendas, tum ad suavissimos illos fructus, qui inde proveniunt perfruendos.” Ibid., 167r: “Poenitudo … infectum cupiat, quod est iam factum, contra felicitas, quae est cum voluptatis verae, ac sincerae perfunctione, quo nam modo infectum cupiat, quod quidem et sit, & esse utique intelligatur tum optimum, et pulcherrimum, tum etiam iucundissimum?” On Pontano’s introduction to De prudentia, see 106–107. Pontano, “De magnificentia,” in I libri delle virtù sociali, ed. Francesco Tateo (Roma, 1999), 164: “Magnificentiam pecuniae fructum esse qui dicunt, Gabriel Altili, recte mea sententia atque ex ipsa rei cognitione et dicunt et sentiunt; quod publica monumenta imprimisque portus manufacti iactaeque in mare moles et augusta deorum immortalium templa declarant, aliaque item aedificia, quibus hominum utilitati, nec minus etiam saluti prospectum videtur.” Pontano, “De prudentia,” 147r: philosophamurque … ac nunc domestica in porticu, nunc fanulo in hoc, deambulationeque, quod si per religionem liceret, libenter id quidem fecissemus … in celeberrima tamen urbis huius parte, nostris est sumptibus positum, ac dedicatum. Quo in loco liberum me penitus regiis ab administrationibus, atque omnino vacuum, et ipsi quoque publicis (ut video) muneribus vacui, convenire, ni fallor, voluistis, postulaturi de felicitate quidem alter, alter vero de prudentia.

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130 Pontano, De sermone, 1: “Annum agimus, Iacobe Mantuanue, tertium ac septuagesimum et eum quidem nequaquam ociosum aut desidem, quando ocio illo frui, quod suapte natura concessum est senectuti, per Italiae turbationes non licet.” 131 EN 1.9.1100a5-9. 132 Pontano, De sermone, 2: “neque enim te ad complorationem invitamus sed ad risum atque festivitatem, neque nos ipsos a dolore avertimus, quo te ipsum reliquosque invitemus ad lacrimas.”

Part Two 1 2 3 4 5

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Percopo, Vita di Giovanni Pontano, 22. Both Facio’s and Caracciolo’s texts are quoted at length in ibid., 15. Antonietta Iacono, Uno studente alla scuola del Pontano a Napoli: Le ‘Recollecte’ del ms. 1368 (T.5.5) della Biblioteca Angelica di Roma (Naples, 2005). Giuseppe Germano, Il ‘De aspiratione’ di Giovanni Pontano e la cultura del suo tempo (Naples, 2005), 41–47. Lorenzo Valla, “Oratio clarissimi viri Laurentii Valle habita in principio [sui] studii die XVIII octobris MCCCCLV,” in Silvia Rizzo, ed., Orazione per l‘inaugurazione dell’anno accademico 1455–1456. Atti di un seminario di filologia umanistica (Rome, 1994), 192. For a similar attitude, see the poem that introduces Valla’s Repastinatio Dialectice et Philosophiae in its first redaction and not included in later redactions. Lorenzo Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, ed. Gianni Zippel, 2 vols (Padua, 1982), ii, 357: “Antiqua edocti, quid tum si discere nolint/ Haec nova? ‘Vis utres, o nove Bacchus, novos?’” (“Having learned the old [method], why then do not they wish to learn/The new one? ‘O new Bacchus, do you desire skins that are new?’” Translation in W. Scott Blanchard, “The Negative Dialectic of Lorenzo Valla: A Study in the Pathology of Opposition,” Renaissance Studies, 14/2 (2000), 175. The passage is also quoted in Riccardo Fubini, “La ‘Dialectica’ di Lorenzo Valla. Saggio di interpretazione,” in L’umanesimo italiano e i suoi storici: origini rinascimentali, critica moderna (Milano, 2001), 184. Christopher S. Celenza, “Petrarch, Latin, and Italian Renaissance Latinity,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, 35/3 (2005), 522. The sharpest (though in some parts overstated) criticism of this opposition has been formulated in Grafton and Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities. Recently, it has been renewed by Gerrit Walther in the introduction to Thomas Maissen and Gerrit Walther, eds., Funktionen des Humanismus. Studien zum Nutzen des Neuen in der humanistischen Kultur (Göttingen, 2006). Despite these criticisms, the strong opposition between the “new” humanism and the “old” scholasticism still captivates scholars. Thus, in a recent article Michele Cataudella

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analyzes the controversy between Lorenzo Valla and Bartolomeo Facio in the light of this antithesis, asserting that “la visione del Valla, la sua esperienza più valida e solida del nuovo latino, contro il latino scolastico di Facio sostenuto da modelli di seconda mano e certamente ancora da una suggestione dal mondo medievale.” Michele Cataudella, “L’Antidotum in Facium di Lorenzo Valla,” in Marco Santoro, ed., Valla e Napoli. Il dibattito filologico in età umanistica (Pisa, 2007), 54.

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Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (London, 1990), 177. Celenza, “Petrarch, Latin, and Italian Renaissance Latinity,” 521–22. As Grafton and Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities, 63, remark, “eminent humanists with reputations for particular ways of approaching their teaching texts found up-and-coming students only too eager to tell them that everything they did was wrong.” Thus, in Giovanni Pontano, “Charon,” in Julia Haig Gaisser, ed., Dialogues (Cambridge, MA, 2012), i, 94, the grammarian Menicellus sends messages to Pontano and Panormita from the underworld, criticizing Panormita’s use of the diminutive “epistolutia,” present in the preface of his letters, and Pontano’s derivation of the word “curso.” A brawl in the Momus between its protagonist and a crowd of philosophers induced Francesco Filelfo to ask Alberti whether the figure of Momus might represent him, as he had made a similar experience. Leon Battista Alberti, Momus, tr. Sarah Knight, ed. Virginia Brown (Cambridge, London, 2003), 37. A similar episode was retold in the Dies geniales of the Neapolitan jurist Alexander de Alexandris, close to Pontano and his circle, 1.23, “Disceptatio Francisci Philelphi cum Grammatico, an Cicero aliquando ludum aperuerit?” Alexander de Alexandris, Genialium Dierum Libri Sex (Paris, 1539), 17v. Actually, the case is quite similar to that described below: the incensed Filelfo called his adversary indoctissimus omnium indoctorum, just as Valla would name Facio minutissimus minutorum. Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, 179. Marc Laureys and Roswitha Simons, eds., The Art of Arguing in the World of Renaissance Humanism (Leuven, 2013), 2. Having first met at Rome in the late 1920s, Valla had been a client and friend of Panormita until they had a falling out in 1432, in Valla’s words due to the perfidia of Panormita and became bitter enemies. See Lorenzo Valla, Epistole, ed. Ottavio Besomi and Mariangela Regoliosi (Padua, 1984), 121. On Beccadelli’s biography, see Remigio Sabbadini and Luciano Barozzi, Studi sul Panormita e sul Valla (Florence, 1891), and Gianvito Resta, “Beccadelli, Antonio,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1970), vii, 407–13. See also the

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10

11 12 13

14 15 16

17 18

19 20

21 22 23

Notes excellent introduction in Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), The Hermaphrodite, tr. Holt Parker, ed. Holt Parker (Cambridge, MA, 2010), vii–xlv. On Pontano’s use of these poets, especially Propertius, see the discussions in Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Quattrocento Naples, 31–35, 61 and passim. On Pontano and Catullus, see Thomas Baier, ed., Pontano und Catull (Tübingen, 2003), and for a more general treatment Julia Haig Gaisser, Catullus and His Renaissance Readers (Oxford, 1993). According to Lorenzo Valla, “Antidotum in Pogium I,” in Opera Omnia (Basle, 1540), 364, the Hermaphroditus was burnt publicly in Bologna, Ferrara, and Milan and condemned by famous preachers: “[C]ur non autorem librumque ad ignem vocatis? imitantes Berardinum et Robertum, qui opus Antonii Panormitae in concione Mediolani, Bononiae, ac Ferrariae concremarunt.” Holt Parker identifies the preachers with Bernardino da Siena (1380–1444) and Alberto da Sarteano (1385–1450). See Beccadelli, The Hermaphrodite, xxxiii, n. 41. Valla seems to confound Alberto with the much younger Roberto da Lecce (c. 1425–95). Sabbadini and Barozzi, Studi sul Panormita e sul Valla, 40–46. Ibid., 46–47. “[H]aud licere theologum litterarum harum verborumque gentilium notitiam tradere.” I quote this passage from the Rhetorical Imitations from David Rutherford, Early Renaissance Invective and the Controversies of Antonio da Rho (Tempe, 2005), 24. Antonio da Rho, “Apologia,” in Rutherford, ed., Early Renaissance Invective215. Ibid. Ibid.: “Lasciuos itaque obscenosque uersus Vergilii (quid adulescentes, aiunt, non decet?), ingenium tamen admiratus, paruifeci. Quae tamen seuera et seria illum aequante nemine cecinit, amore, studio, fide prosecutes, complexus, exosculatus sum.” Ibid., 217. Ibid.: “[D]enique nobis contemporaneum, Panormitam Antonium quempiam, cuius—nisi seria post foedissima (sic enim Vergilius fecit) scripserit—non ingenium sed uita aliquando damnabitur.” Rutherford, Early Renaissance Invective, 27. Poggio Bracciolini to Antonio Beccadelli. Rome, April 3 [1426]. “Delectatus sum, mehercle, varietate rerum et elegantia versuum, simulque admiratus sum res adeo impudicas, adeo ineptas, tam venuste, tam composite a te dici… Pro caritate tamen qua omnes debitores sumus omnibus, unum est quod te monere et debeo et volo, ut scilicet deinde graviora quaedam mediteris.” In Beccadelli, The Hermaphrodite, 56/58. Rutherford, Early Renaissance Invective, 28–31. Ibid., 251. On this point, see Eugene O’Connor, “Panormita’s Reply to His Critics. The Hermaphroditus and the Literary Defense,” Renaissance Quarterly, 50/4 (1997), 985–1010.

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24 Antonio Panormita to Antonio da Rho. [1431/32]: “[A]lias aetas atque alii mores mihi sunt et studia prorsus diversa… haec mea aetas ab omnia lascivia atque voluptate prorsus abhorret et severos mores et severum dicendi genus expostulat.” Rutherford, Early Renaissance Invective, 250. 25 Rutherford, Early Renaissance Invective, 253. 26 Ibid., 252: “[T]u Suetonium Tranquillum traducere maluisti, ubi adulteria, stupra, incestus, et alia huiusmodi plerumque leguntur, ut si qua insit rosa, sine urtica tum legi non queat.” 27 Ryder, The Kingdom of Naples Under Alfonso the Magnanimous, 195 and 219. On Beccadelli’s career under the Aragonese kings, see Vincenzo Laurenza, “Il Panormita a Napoli,” Atti dell’Accademia Pontaniana, 42 (1912), 1–92. See also Mario Santoro, “Il Panormita ‘aragonese’,” Esperienze letterarie, 9 (1984), 3–24. 28 Caracciolo, “Ioannis Ioviani Pontani vitae brevis pars,” 45. 29 Under the newly elected pope Nicholas V. (1447–55), Valla obtained an office as apostolic scribe, patronized by such influential figures like Nicholas of Cusa and Cardinal Bessarion. Only under Nicholas’s successor, Calixtus III (1455–58), did he finally become papal secretary (Riccardo Fubini, “Profilo breve di Lorenzo Valla,” in L’Umanesimo italiano e i suoi storici (Milano, 2001), 131 ). He died in 1457. For his role in the ambience of Neapolitan humanism and his influence on Pontano’s work as well as his quarrel with Panormita, see below. 30 Caracciolo, “Ioannis Ioviani Pontani vitae brevis pars,” 45. Caracciolo also tells the story of how the young Pontano, accompanying Panormita on a diplomatic mission in 1452, impressed Cosimo de’ Medici with his jokes. Furthermore, Pontano had himself emulated Beccadelli’s poems in a book entitled Pruritus (“Lust”). On this book, see the remarks in Walther Ludwig, “Catullus renatus—Anfänge und frühe Entwicklung des catullischen Stils in der neulateinischen Dichtung,” in Litterae Neolatinae. Schriften zur neulateinischen Literatur (Munich, 1989), 172–77. 31 Pontano, “Parthenopeus,” 94, 1.27.3-6: “unus te rogat e tuis amicis/cras ad se venias ferasque tecum/quantumcumque potes facetiarum/et quicquid fuerit domi iocorum.” 32 Pontano, “Antonius,” 122: “[I]psum Antonium, quanquam multa dicit, plura tamen sciscitari quam docere solitum, nec tam probare quae dicantur quam Socratico quodam more irridere disserentes; auditores vero ipsos magis voluptatis cuiusdam eprum quae a se dicantur plenos domum dimittere quam certos rerum earum quae in quaestione versentur.” 33 Pontano, De sermone, 197: “Antonius Panhormita, qui obliteratam nedum languescentem in Italia poeticam restituit in antiquam pene formam, cum a studiosis persaepe hominibus de perveteri dubitataque sive poetae aliqua sive oratoris interrogaretur sententia, quadam etiam cum frontis hilaritudine ac si memoriae diffideret, ‘ite, respondebat, ad Iovianum’; adeo etiam senex et primarius vir in Alfonsi regis aula, quod saepenumero docuisset, scire se dissimulabat.”

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34 When Panormita dedicated his Epistole gallicae (written during his stay in Lombardy, that is in Gallia cisalpina) to Francesco Arcella, he explicitly mentioned Pontano: “Nam cum sim ego in tua inclyta civitate Neapolitana peregrinus, non potui tibi vitae meae promptiores testes proferre quam epistolas meas; in quibus non tantum ingenii vim aut doctrinae lumen, si quod modo inest, sed animi ac probitatis specimen intueri licet… Nugas lege, et si tibi quoque videbitur, Johanni Pontano, poetae et viro suavissimo, legendas imparti.” Quoted in Gianvito Resta, L’epistolario del Panormita. Studi per una edizione critica (Messina, 1954), 31. For the incunable, see Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), Epistolae familiares (Naples, 1475). 35 Giovanni Pontano, Dialogi qui Charon et Antonius inscribuntur (Naples, 1491). Among the mss., see esp. W.108 in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin, going back to the fifteenth century and bearing the coat of arms of Alfonso Duke of Calabria, containing De principe, De oboedientia, De fortitudine, Charon, Antonius, Commentationes, and De aspiratione. Paul Oskar Kristeller, Iter italicum: accedunt alia itinera; a finding list of uncatalogued or incompletely catalogued humanistic manuscripts of the Renaissance in Italian and other libraries, 10 vols (Leiden, 1965–97), iii, 197a. 36 Juan de Valdés, Diálogo de Mercurio y Carón, ed. J.V. Ricapito (Madrid, 1993), 71, affirms that he follows the models of Lucian, Pontano, and Erasmus. The ms. 6 of the Gräflich Ortenburg’sche Bibliothek in Tambach (über Coburg) may be a German translation. See Kristeller, Iter Italicum, iii, 713b. The mention of Pontano in François Rabelais, Gargantua, ed. Ruth Calder (Geneva, 1970), 122, as “poete seculier” also refers to Charon. Furthermore, the dialogue is among the translations into Italian made during the eighteenth century, as the ms. Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli, XV G 40 shows. 37 Letter to Ambrogio Traversari. August 27, 1424. Giovanni Aurispa, Carteggio (Roma, 1931), 13. Quoted in David Marsh, Lucian and the Latins. Humor and Humanism in the Early Renaissance (Ann Arbor, 1998), 9. 38 Chrysoloras eventually read Lucian with his pupils and commented on at least five of his works. See Ernesto Berti, “Alla scuola di Manuele Crisolora: Lettura e commento di Luciano,” Rinascimento, 27 (1987), 4. As Berti reports, the Vat. Urb. gr. 121 contains Charon, Calumniae non temere credendum, Piscator, Icaromenippus, and Timon which are heavily annoted. Another piece, Iuppiter tragoedus, is not complete and bears no annotations. This manuscript is a copy of Crysolora’s own copy of Lucian (now Vat. gr. 87). 39 Lucian’s Greek seemed to be a good pedagogical choice for beginners. See Hemeryck Pascale, “Les traductions latines du Charon de Lucien au quinzième siècle,” Mélanges de l‘Ecole française de Rome. Moyen-Age, Temps modernes, 84/1 (1972), 130. Although there are no direct testimonies, it is probable that Pontano also first studied Greek with texts of Lucian. In the course of the first half of the

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43

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45 46 47 48

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fifteenth century these texts had become more and more available. See Marsh, Lucian and the Latins, 13. Marsh, Lucian and the Latins, 38. Of these translations, at least Guarino’s was an exercise in Greek. At least, Guarino declared it to be so, when he described his translation of Slander as a “first attempt”: “Calumniam Luciani (latinam feci), breve sane opusculum, in quo prima posui tirocinia,” he wrote to Bartolomeo di Montepulciano in 1416. Guarino Veronese, Epistolario di Guarino Veronese, ed. Remigio Sabbadini, 3 vols (Florence, 1915–19), i, 104. Among the earliest translations were Charon and Timon, rendered into Latin by an anonymous disciple. Ernesto Berti, “Uno scriba greco-latino: il codice Vat. Urb. gr. 121 e la prima versione del Caronte di Luciano,” Rivista di Filologia e di Istruzione Classica, 113 (1985), 416–33. Brian P. Copenhaver, “Translation, Terminology and Style in Philosophical Discourse,” in Charles B. Schmitt, Quentin Skinner, and Eckhard Keßler, eds., The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge, 1988), 81. See the example of the ms. in Padua, Biblioteca del Seminario, MS 165 (Kristeller, Iter Italicum, 2:9), put forward in Marsh, Lucian and the Latins, 3. In this ms. were collected: Basil, On Reading Pagan Literature (trans. Bruni); Isocrates, To Nicocles (trans. Giustiniani); Lucian, Dialogue of the Dead, 25 (trans. Aurispa); Isocrates, Nicocles (trans. Castiglionchio); Vergerio, On liberal Education; Xenophon, On the tyrant (trans. Bruni); Plutarch, On the Education of Children (trans. Guarino Veronese); Bruni, Isagogicon. Guarino’s foreword to his translation of Slander exemplified this tendency, when he reconnected slander to the fundamental issue of ignorance as the cause of many evils afflicting mankind, describing the darkness by which man is surrounded, and consequently ending up with Greek tragedy, quoted in Emilio Mattioli, Luciano e l‘Umanesimo (Naples, 1980), 46. See Marsh, Lucian and the Latins. See also David Marsh, “Alberti’s Momus: Sources and Contexts,” in Rhoda Schnur, ed., Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Hafniensis: Proceedings of the Eighth International Congress pf Neo-Latin Studies (Binghamton, 1994). Alberti, Momus, 4: “[N]am si dabitur quispiam olim qui cum legentes ad frugem vitae melioris instruat atque instituat dictorum gravitate rerumque dignitate varia et eleganti, idemque una risu illectet, iocis delectet, voluptate detineat, quod apud Latinos qui adhuc fecerint nondum satis exstitere, hunc profecto inter plebeios minime censendum est.” See Francesco Tateo, Tradizione e realtà nell’Umanesimo italiano (Bari, 1967), 228–29. Alberti, Momus, 4: “Proximus huic erit is qui cognitas et communes fortassis res novo quodam et insperato scribendi genere tractarit.” Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 65. Giovio, Elogia virorum literis illustrium, 60.

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49 Erasmus to Maarten van Dorp, [end of May] 1515. No. 337 in Desiderius Erasmus, Collected works of Erasmus, iii: The correspondence of Erasmus: letters 298 to 445, 1514 to 1516, eds. R.A.B. Mynors and F.S. Thomson (Toronto, 1976), 122. 50 Dorp to Erasmus. Louvain, August 27, 1515. No. 347. Ibid., 156. 51 Alberti, Momus, 6: “Quod si senseris nostra hac scribendi comitate et festivitate maximarum rerum severitatem quasi condimento aliquo redditam esse lepidiorem et suaviorem, leges, ni fallor, maiore cum voluptate.” 52 Pontano, “Charon,” 2. 53 Marcus Tullius Cicero, De oratore Book III, ed. Mankin David (2011), 66, 3.16.60: “cum nomine appellarentur uno, quod omnis rerum optimarum cognitio atque in eis exercitatio philosophia nominaretur.” 54 A miscellany owned by Pontano contains Diogenes’s Epistolae, translated by Francesco Griffolini. See Nichilo, “Una miscellanea umanistica del Pontano,” 11 (n. 20). Furthermore, Roberto da Sanseverino, dedicatee of Pontano’s De oboedientia, owned a magnificent copy of the letters, written between 1467 and 1468, now Geneva, Bibliothèque de Genève, Comites Latentes 269, www.e-codices.unifr.ch/it/ list/one/bge/cl0269, accessed December 13, 2015. 55 As Gaisser remarks in Pontano, “Charon,” 355 n. 45, the word piscicanis (“dogfish”) is an apparent coinage by Pontano. However, the pun intended most probably refers to the volgare term pescecane. Cristoforo Landino, for example, uses pescecane as translation for “canicula” in his volgarizzamento of Plin., HN 32.48.137, in Pliny, Historia naturale di C. Plinio secondo di latino in volgare tradotta per Christophoro Landino ([Venice], 1534), dcxcvi. This is an interesting example, then, of how Pontano works on different language levels and puts the volgare to effective use in his Latin works. 56 Pontano, “Charon,” 72/74. Pontano retells the legend of Cola Pesce in Pontano, “Urania,” 130–33, 4.468-581. See W. Hübner, “Eridanus und Cola Piscis unter den Sternbildern in Pontanos Urania,” Humanistica Lovaniensia. Journal of Neo-Latin Studies (1979), 139–66. 57 Diog. Laert. 6.4. 58 Pontano, “Charon,” 76/78. 59 On Torresani, the brother-in-law of Aldus Manutius, who continued his work after his death, see Annaclara Cataldi Palau, Gian Francesco d‘Asola e la tipografia aldina. La vita, le edizioni, la biblioteca dell’Asolano (Genua, 1998). 60 “Adde tot dialogos, & de rebus gravissimis disputationes in quibus cognoscendis maiorem fortasse utilitatem capere possumus, quam cum Lucianum bonos omnes insectantem & dignitati cuiusque generis hominum illudentem legimus ubi multum scurrilitatis, urbanitatis parum deprehendimus, quod veteres item in Aristophane annotarunt, quem propterea etiam multo inferiorem Menandro statuere visi sunt” (Pontano, Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita, i, *iii). It is possible that

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Torresani followed the lead of the Apulian humanist Antonio de Ferrariis, or Galateo (c. 1444–1517), a disciple of Pontano and frequent visitor of his academy in Naples. In a letter to the physician and humanist Niccolò Leoniceno, Galateo calls Lucian “a despiser of gods and men alike,” clear-sighted and intelligent, yet with a natural tendency for aspersion: “Lucianus, seu ille contemptor Divumque hominumque, acutissimi ingenii, sed ad maledicendum nati, quem hominum, quem Deorum non laceravit? Christianam religionem sprevit, philosophos omnes foedavit, ac vendidit” (Ferrariis, Epistole, n. xxvii). In his letter, Galateo elaborates on a passage in Lactantius, who had denounced Lucian as an irreligious mocker “who spared not men nor gods” (“qui diis et hominibus non pepercit”) in Institutiones I, de falsa religione, cap. IX. PL 6, col. 159. (Nevertheless, the Greek Church fathers used him also as a source for the philosophy of the cynics, representing the ascetic dimension of paganism. See Michèle Clément, Le Cynisme a la Renaissance d‘Erasme à Montaigne (Genève, 2005), 21–23.) In Pontano, De sermone, 14, scurrilitas is treated, however, without ever mentioning Lucian. On the contrary, Pontano ranks Lucian alongside Boccaccio, Plautus, and Ovid as an affable man (comis vir). Lucian also appears in a list of exemplary figures who wrote poems, dialogues, and stories capable of distracting their listeners from more serious thoughts (“a curis cogitationibusque gravioribus”)—together with Poggio (Ibid., 189–90). W. Scott Blanchard, “The Negative Dialectic of Lorenzo Valla: a study in the Pathology of Opposition,” 149. On Facio in general, see Jeremy Bentley, Politics and Culture in Renaissance Naples (Princeton, 1987), 100–8, Paolo Viti, “Facio, Bartolomeo,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1994), xlvi, and Gabriella Albanese, ed., Studi su Bartolomeo Facio (Pisa, 2000). On his work as historiographer, see Giacomo Ferraù, “Il ‘De rebus ab Alphonso primo gestis’ di Bartolomeo Facio,” Studi umanistici, 1 (1990), 69–113, Sondra dall’ Oco, “La ‘laudatio regis’ nel ‘De rebus gestis ab Alphonso primo’ di Bartolomeo Facio,” Rinascimento, 35 (1995), 243–51;, “Bartolomeo Facio e la tecnica dell” “excursus” nella biografia di Alfonso d’Aragona’, Archivio storico italiano, 154 (1996), 207–51, and Gabriella Albanese et al., “Storiografia come ufficialità alla corte di Alfonso il Magnanimo: i Rerum gestarum Alfonsi Regis libri X di Bartolomeo Facio,” in La Corona d‘Aragona ai tempi di Alfonso il Magnanimo (Naples, 2000), 2. Unfortunately, I did not have the possibility to see the biography by Marco Biagioni, Bartolomeo Facio. Umanista spezzino (1400–1457) (La Spezia, 2011). Giacomo Ferraù, Il tessitore di Antequera. Storiografia umanistica meridionale (Rome, 2001), 67. Riccardo Fubini, “Lorenzo Valla tra il concilio di Basilea e quello di Firenze, e il processo dell’Inquisizione,” in L’umanesimo italiano e i suoi storici. Origini rinascimentali—critica moderna (Milan, 2001), 161.

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66 For the questions involved and the chronology of the process, see Mario Fois S.J., Il pensiero cristiano di Lorenzo Valla nel quadro storico-culturale del suo ambiente (Rome, 1969), 359–82. See also Fubini, “Lorenzo Valla tra il concilio di Basilea e quello di Firenze, e il processo dell’Inquisizione.” Paola Casciano, “Lorenzo Valla e Napoli: un precedente del processo inquisitoriale del 1444,” in Marco Santoro, ed., Valla e Napoli. Il dibattito filologico in età umanistica. Atti del convegno internazionale Ravello, Villa Rufolo, 22–23 settembre 2005 (Pisa, 2007). 67 Valla to Pier Candido Decembrio. Regno di Napoli, 1442/43: “Mihi crede, Candide, non iactantie causa dicam, sed testimonii: feci ut et apud regem et apud ceteros Panormita indoctissimus esse videatur.” Valla, Epistole, 239. The editors date the letter 1442–43. 68 For a modern edition, see Lorenzo Valla, Gesta Ferdinandi regis Aragonie, ed. Ottaviano Besomi (Padua, 1973). 69 See Facio’s account in the Fourth Invective in Bartolomeo Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, ed. Ennio I. Rao (Naples, 1978). A kind of epilogue, this fourth book was written after Valla had successfully claimed to have his History handed back in order to finish it and had publicly moved serious accusations against his opponents. 70 As Facio sustains, Valla had presented his History to the king “quasi gustationem…, ut, si regi placeret opus, tu is esses cui rerum a se gestarum celebratio mandaretur, invidia quadam permotus quod sciebas id negotii mihi datum esse,” ibid., 122. In order to prove this, he put forward the deposition of the book in the royal library and its elaborated outward appearance. But what struck Facio most was the fact that its proem and its final sentence both held forth the prospect of a history of King Alfonso: “Verba enim tua hec sunt: ‘Finis historiarum regis Ferdinandi. Sequuntur historie regis Alfonsi,’” ibid., 123. 71 Lorenzo Valla, Antidotum in Facium, ed. M. Regoliosi (Padua, 1981), 16. The reconstruction of events depends largely on their presentation in Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, and Valla, Antidotum in Facium. For a thorough description and dating of the events, see Mariangela Regoliosi’s excellent introduction to the Antidotum. 72 Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 89: “de te uno quam optime existimans, ceteros omnes contemnis ac negligis.” 73 Ibid., 90: “[T]u doctissimum hominem de seriis ac maximis rebus legentem interrupes? Nescis, imperite, nescis adstantis officium esse per silentium audire?” 74 Ibid.: “Aut discere certe vis, aut docere: si discere, silendum est, si docere, ridiculus es, qui eum docere velis, qui regem doceat.” 75 Pontano, “Charon,” 76: “Denique nec vivo nec mortuo cuique parcis, scilicet in id studens, ut tibi ex aliena vituperatione laudem vendices.” Pontano plays with this formulation in Charon, when the ferryman of the dead remarks on Diogenes: “This fellow, both alive and dead, holds everyone in contempt” (“homo hic et vivus et mortuus contemptui omnes habet”).

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76 Horace, Epistles Book 1, ed. Roland Mayer (Cambridge, 1994), 82, 1.18.96: “Inter cuncta leges et percontabere doctos.” 77 See Valla, Antidotum in Facium, 305–13. Various episodes Valla relates in the Antidotum give the impression that the king’s reading hours were much more dynamic in character than Facio’s account suggests. The courtiers even expected that Valla would object to Panormita’s explanations. 78 Ibid., 309–10. 79 Ibid., 327: “In quo calumniam accusatorum meorum cerni licet, qui aliorum exemplo tanquam id non ausorum, me ab hoc munere etiam cum convicio deterrent.” 80 Ibid., 326: “Certabo itaque cum illis tanquam in palestra de laude et gloria, vobiscum vero tanquam in acie de vita et libertate.” 81 See, for example, the quotes on the front page of Fois S.J., Il pensiero cristiano di Lorenzo Valla nel quadro storico-culturale del suo ambiente: “miles sum et pro religione, pro ecclesia… in acie sto” (Lorenzo Valla, De professione religiosorum, ed. Mariarosa Cortesi (Padua, 1986), 54 ), “pro republica Christiana pugnare est, contra quoscumque pro veritate in acie stare” (Lorenzo Valla, Dialectical Disputations, tr. and ed. Brian P. Copenhaver and Lodi Nauta, 2 vols (Cambridge, MA, 2012), ii, 426). 82 By 1503, the representation of Valla as a polemical and controversial figure had become a kind of commonplace in the literature. Already in 1490, the young Paolo Cortesi celebrates Valla as an “immensely learned writer” and “one of the most diligent researchers of Roman history and the Latin language,” nonetheless insisting that Valla was “violent and slanderous” in character, an “irksome and irritable” fellow: “Horum aetatibus adiunctus est Laurentius Valla, scriptor egregie doctus, cuius ingenii acumine constare inter omnes audio Italiam esse recreatam, sed erat acer et maledicus et toto genere paulo asperior, diligentissimus tamen Romanarum rerum atque verborum investigator. Molestus erat et stomachosus: nihil admodum alienum laudabat, sua vero cum diligentia tum acri quodam iudicio expendebat.” Paolo Cortesi, De hominibus doctis, ed. Giacomo Ferraù (Palermo, 1979), 142. On this point, see also Giacomo Ferraù, Pontano critico (Messina, 1983), 81. 83 Nevertheless, Valla continued to exert some influence at court. An eminent figure like Antonello Petrucci, who would shape Neapolitan policies for decades to come, had been a disciple of Valla. So had Marino Tomacelli, a close friend of Pontano and future ambassador to the republic of Florence. A clear sign of Valla’s continuing influence at court is the splendid volume of his collected works which King Ferrante commissioned for his library. See Zippel’s remarks in Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, xliii–xlv and cx. See also Tammaro de Marinis, La biblioteca napoletana dei re d‘Aragona, 4 vols (Milano, 1947–52), i, 60. While in other parts of Italy his role was reduced to that of the author of the Elegantiae in

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order to downplay the explosive nature of his philosophical writings, this volume even contained the last version of the Dialectical Disputations, otherwise unknown. See Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, xv f. For Valla’s publication history, see Riccardo Fubini, “Pubblicità e controllo del libro nella cultura del Rinascimento: censura palese e condizionamenti coperti dell’opera letteraria dal tempo del Petrarca a quello di Valla,” in Patrick Gilli, ed., Humanisme et église en Italie et en France méridionale (XVe siècle—milieu du XVIe siècle) (Rome, 2004). 84 Pontano, De fortuna, 290: Quid enim aut invidum magis aut maledicum, quam tot seculorum tradita, tot excellentium hominum velle inventa labefacere, et quae disciplinarum est omnium antiquissima, in eam rabido ferri morsu rictibusque oblatrantissimis? Videlicet Picus noster (voco eum nostrum, quia magna mecum benevolentia coniunctus fuit, quodque doctissimum quenque maxime mihi familiarem atque amicum statuo) tractus ipse quidem exemplo est aut Pyrronis, qui physicam et moralem omnem doctrinam evertere conatus est olim, aut Laurentii Vallensis, qui nuper vel decem praedicamentorum seriem, ne Dialecticam dicam omnem, ut subverteret, quid non tentavit?

85 86 87 88 89 90

91 92 93

On Pontano’s attacks on Pico, see Benedetto Soldati, La poesia astrologica nel 400, ed. Cesare Vasoli (Florence, 1986), 230, n. 1. For a critical examination and evaluation of Valla’s association with the burgeoning interests in ancient skepticism in the fifteenth century, see Lodi Nauta, “Lorenzo Valla and Quattrocento Scepticism,” Vivarium, 44/2–3 (2006), 375–95. Pontano, De sermone, 30. Ibid., 29–30. Ibid., 196. See, for example, Lucian, “The Purist Purized [Soloecista],” trans. H.W. Fowler and F.G. Fowler, in The Works of Lucian of Samosota, 4 vols (Oxford, 1905), iv. Pontano, “Charon,” 92: “Reverentius, grammatici! verbis enim non manibus contendendum vobis est.” For a detailed discussion of the elementary school curriculum, see Robert Black, Humanism and Education in Medieval and Renaissance Italy. Tradition and Innovation in Latin Schools from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Century (Cambridge, 2001), 34–63. Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 121–22. Tum. 2.17, Giovanni Pontano, Carmina: ecloghe, elegie, liriche, ed. Johannes Oeschger (Bari, 1948), 229. W. Keith Percival, “Grammar and Rhetoric in the Renaissance,” in James J. Murphy, ed., Renaissance Eloquence: Studies in the Theory and Practice of Renaissance Rhetoric (Berkeley, 1983), 308. Now in W. Keith Percival, Studies in Renaissance Grammar (Aldershote, Burlington, 2004).

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For a discussion of Pontano’s De aspiratione and a partial edition and translation, see Germano, Il ‘De aspiratione’ di Giovanni Pontano e la cultura del suo tempo. The innovative character of humanist grammars is controversial. Most radically, Robert Black has argued that secondary grammars written by famous humanists like Guarino Veronese and Niccolò Perotti are “essentially indistinguishable from those of their Trecento predecessors.” Black, Humanism and Education in Medieval and Renaissance Italy. Tradition and Innovation in Latin Schools from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Century, 124 and 71–72. Pontano, “Charon, 86.” In the sixteenth century, the grammarian’s quarrel in Charon continued to attract the interest of humanists like Gilbert Cousin de Nozeray (1506–67) and Adrian van Barlaand (1488–1542), a Dutch historian, both of whom commented on this passage, as María José Vega remarks in his introduction to Giovanni Pontano, Dialogo de Caron (Salamanca, 2003), 18. Grafton and Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities, 17. On the humanists’ dissatisfaction with medieval vocabularies and the lack of vocabularies suited to their needs, see, for example, Giuseppe Germano’s short remarks in Jacopo Curlo, Epitoma Donati in Terentium, ed. Giuseppe Germano (Naples, 1987), lii–lvii. Rita Cappelletto, La ‘lectura Plauti’ del Pontano (Urbino, 1988), 55. On Pontano’s activities as teacher, see Iacono, Uno studente. The lecture notes of one of Pontano’s students show him practicing the technique of poetarum enarratio, explaining and interpreting archaisms, poetic conceits, geographical and mythological names—“in short any words which did not lend themselves to straightforward literal interpretation.” On the poetarum narratio as part of the school courses in grammar, see Percival, “Grammar and Rhetoric in the Renaissance,” 306, now in Percival, Studies in Renaissance Grammar. Pontano, “Antonius,” 126. As a matter of fact, San Vito was often depicted with a dog at his feet and was said to protect the believers from the bite of rabid dogs, a trait ascribed exclusively to this saint. On Petrus Compater, academic name of Pietro Golino (c. 1431–1501), see Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 58–59. Pontano, “Antonius,” 148: “Comp. An oblitus es Antonii catellorum (hoc enim verbo utebatur) eos persimiles dicentis qui de ossibus deque frustillis ac miculis, si quae forte sub mensam decidant, rixentur.” See, however, the comment by Andrea Contrario at the end of his attacks on the grammarians: “I think Antonio erred not a little in comparing them to whelps and not calling them dogs, in fact rabid dogs.” Ibid., 160. Francesco Petrarca, Invectives, tr. David Marsh (Cambridge, MA, 2003), 3. David Marsh, “Grammar, Method, and Polemic in Lorenzo Valla’s ‘Elegantiae,’” Rinascimento, 19 n.s. (1979), 113. Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), Dels fets e dits del gran rey Alfonso (Barcelona, 1990), 180 (2.49): “Qui nimis lenem et mansuetum principem quereretur,

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Notes expectandum iis esse dicebat, ut ursi ac leones quandoque regnarent.” Peter Stacey, Roman Monarchy and the Renaissance Prince (Cambridge, 2007), 194, has traced the origin of this saying in Sen., Clem. 1.26.3. Pontano, “Antonius,” 160: “[N]arrare enim solebat grammaticorum rationem nullam esse praetoribus, quipped qui furentium in numero haberentur.” According to Roman law, a man being of unsound mind (demens or furiosus) was legally incompetent and had to be put under the direction of a curator. Thus, a furiosus was placed under the cura of his or her agnatus by the law of the Twelve Tables. When there was no legal provision for the appointment of a curator, the praetor named one. See Inst. Iust. 3.19.8. Ibid.: “Referebat enim Sybillam, nutricem suam quotiens grammatico cuidam qui per id tempus Panhormi docebat, obviam fieret, carmine usam quo Siculi adversum canes rabidas uterentur.” Ibid. Ibid., 148: “ab rabiosa garrulitate tuti nihil esse, sive versiculum edideris sive epistolam scripseris; quorum ipsorum scriptis oculum si admoris, nihil inertius, nihil inconcinnius, nihil oscitatius videas, quippe cum nihil supra grammaticum habeant.” For iners as a stylistic judgment see Hor., Ars P. 445: “vir bonus et prudens versus reprehendet inertis,” “an honest and sensible man will censure lifeless lines.” “[Valla] tam multa insipienter sapit, et litteras tantum, [et] syllabas scribentium aucupatur, gravitatem sententiarum aut verborum pondera nihil omnino perspiciens.” Quoted in Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 31. Cortesi, De hominibus doctis, 144: “Conabatur Valla vim verborum exprimere et quasi vias (sed eas non rectas) tradebat ad structuram orationis.” Translation in Martin L. McLaughlin, Literary Imitation in the Italian Renaissance. The Theory and Practice of Literary Imitation in Italy from Dante to Bembo (Oxford, 1995), 145. Cortesi, De hominibus doctis, 144: “[I]n quo tamen et inquinatam dicendi consuetudinem emendavit et multum acuit iuventutem. Sed est certe alia scribendi ratio quae a Valla aut praetermissa est aut ignorata. Florens enim ille et suavis et incorruptus Latinus sermo postulat sane conglutinationem et comprehensionem quandam verborum, quibus conficitur ipsa concinnitas ad sonum” tr. in Marsh, “Grammar, Method, and Polemic in Lorenzo Valla’s ‘Elegantiae,” 103. Pontano, “Antonius,” 148: “Invasere rhetorum materiam, quorum etiam agros depopulate, quod videant acutiora quaedam, ut ipsi putant, a Quintiliano tradi, in Ciceronem sublatis signis agmineque instructo procedunt.” On Valla’s comparison, see Stefano Pagliaroli, “Una proposta per il giovane Valla: Quintiliani Tulliique examen,” Studi medievali e umanistici, 4 (2006), 9–67. (I thank Lodi Nauta for pointing out this article to me.) Examining the ms. H I 5, Real Biblioteca del Monasterio di San Lorenzo de El Escorial, Madrid, Pagliaroli argues convincingly

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that Valla wrote a preludium to such a comparison before 1429 under the title examen. The preludium is addressed to one “Antonius,” and the evidence points toward Panormita. In fact, Panormita mentions Valla’s preludium in a letter to Carlo Marsuppini, written probably in 1428, edited in ibid., 28–29. In the present context, it is worthy to note that in his letter Panormita underlines the preludium’s character as a “literary exercise” that does not put into question Cicero’s authority. He says of Valla: “Praestantiam vero nostri Ciceronis cognitam habet illamque et observat et colit ac pro virile sua sequi magnopere studet,” ibid., 29. The Examen itself, however, shows an acute awareness of its provocative content, using a host of bellicose metaphors. For the end of rhetoric, see Pontano, “Antonius,” 148–60. For the question of status, see ibid., 162–72. The defense of Cicero is put into the mouth of Andrea Contrario, who had firsthand knowledge of the Roman ambiance in the late 1440s and early 1450s, when these questions had been part of a dispute between the Greek scholars George of Trebizond, on the one hand, and Theodore Gaza and Lorenzo Valla, on the other. (Both Trebizond and Gaza frequented the Neapolitan ambience in the 1450s.) See Ferraù, Pontano critico, 89 and John Monfasani, George of Trebizond: A Biography and a Study of His Rhetoric and Logic (Leiden, 1976), 81–83. On some of the arguments put forward by Pontano, see Florence Bistagne, “Modèles et contre-modèles de l’humanisme napolitain: Giovanni Pontano à la recherche d’une langue,” Cahiers d’études italiennes, 15 (2012), 99–110. For the development of the discussion in Venice, see Virginia Cox, “Rhetoric and Humanism in Quattrocento Venice,” Renaissance Quarterly, 56/3 (2003), 652–94. Interestingly, Valla had argued in a similar manner for Quintilian. “Quintiliani iniuriam tolerare non potui,” he wrote in his invective against Poggio. Quoted in Ferraù, Pontano critico, 38. Poggio, on the other hand, had lamented in a letter that in his lectures in Rome, Valla “cum Virgilium et Ciceronis ad Herennium libros legeret, utrumque acriter quotidie reprehendebat; alterum ut parum consideratum poetam ac politum, alteram ut in arte et dicendi praeceptis aberrantem.” Quoted in ibid., 41. For biographical information on Elisius, see Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 58 and Simona Foà, “Gallucci, Luigi,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1998), li. Pontano, “Antonius,” 226: “Hoc loco rei indignitate commotum exclamare Antonium memini improbos, facinoros, detestabiles eos dicentem Iovemque ausos regnis detrudere, quippe qui Romanae poeticae principem et quasi deum quendam suo e regno, suo e solio pellere ac deturbare conarentur.” Ibid.: “Censebat igitur duos hos in duabus nobilissimis linguis Graeca Romanaque summum iure principatum tenere, et alterum Graecae, alterum Romanae poeticae regem esse.”

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119 Ibid.: “horum dicta inventaque locum, vim, auctoritatemque legum habere; hos venerandis, hos patres patriae publicis privatisque honoribus prosequendos, his ubique atque ab omnibus assurgendum. Qui contra sentirent rebellium atque hostium in numero habendos esse.” It is not entirely sure whether Valla is the main target of Calenzio’s defense of Virgil. Pontano himself accused Valla of preferring an ancient Latin translation of Homer’s Ilias, the Ilias Latina or Homerus Latinus, to Virgil, circulating in some manuscripts under the spurious name of “Pindarus Thebanus.” Pontano, De sermone, 29. As a matter of fact, Valla translated books 1–16 of the Ilias. In his invectives, Facio accuses him of plagiarism of the Homerus Latinus (Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 93). In his rebuttal, Valla refers to this version as “translationem Homeri ad verbum eamque barbaram,” which makes it hard to believe that he preferred this translation to Virgil (Valla, Antidotum in Facium, 374). Still, in Valla, Dialectical Disputations, ii, 242, he uses an example for a syllogism which reads “Homerus est summus poetarum, hic est summus poetarum, ergo est Homerus.” Furthermore, in the Novum Testamentum adnotationes Valla states that “aiunt quidam docti plus inesse maiestatis in illa Homeri simplicitate quam gratiae in illa Vergilii festivitate, ubi ille graecos principes populosque, hic italos enumerat,” as discussed and quoted in Ferraù, Pontano critico, 41. In Pontano, “Antonius,” 220. Compater (Pietro Golino) will report “what Antonio once had to say… about the catalogue of the leaders who followed Aeneas or Turnus on campaign.” 120 Liliana Monti Sabia, “Virgilio nella poesia del Pontano,” in Atti del convegno virgiliano di Brindisi nel bimillenario della morte. Brindisi 15–18 ottobre 1981 (Naples, 1983), 51. 121 See Manuzio’s letter to Jacopo Sannazaro, Venice, October 20, 1502, in Giorgio Interiano, La vita, et sito de Zychi, chiamati Ciarcassi, Historia notabile (Venice, 1502), aiv. 122 On the geographical and archeological interests of Neapolitan humanists, see Francesco Tateo, “Virgilio nell’umanesimo meridionale,” in Atti del convegno virgiliano di Brindisi nel bimillenario della morte. Brindisi 15–18 ottobre 1981 (Naples, 1983), 240–42. 123 Pontano, “Antonius,” 134. 124 Ibid. 125 Paul Oskar Kristeller, “The Humanist Bartolomeo Facio and His Unknown Correspondence,” in Studies in Renaissance Thought and Letters (Rome, 1985), ii. 126 Valla, Antidotum in Facium, xxxii. Fois S.J., Il pensiero cristiano di Lorenzo Valla nel quadro storico-culturale del suo ambiente, 176–77. Riccardo Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione da Petrarca a Valla (Roma, 1990), 385. 127 Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 385. 128 Bartolomeo Facio, “De humanae vitae felicitate,” in Felino Maria Sandeo, ed., De regibus Siciliae et Apuliae (Hanover, 1611), 107: “Ego tamen totam opinionem

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meam ex hominum sapientissimorum sententiis et divinitus inspiratorum traditione confirmavi.” Translation in Trinkaus, In Our Image and Likeness, i, 200. Facio, “De humanae vitae felicitate,” 142: “Beata vita… tota est posita in Dei fruitione. Frui autem Deo nihil aliud esse existimo, nisi Deum contemplari atque cognoscere.” Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 37–38, 1.42.5. On this point, see Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 362. See also Maristella de Panizza Lorch, “‘Voluptas, molle quodam et non invidiosum nomen’: Lorenzo Valla’s Defence of ‘voluptas’ in the Preface to his ‘De voluptate,’” in Edward P. Mahoney, ed., Philosophy and Humanism. Renaissance Essays in Honor of P.O. Kristeller (Leiden, 1976). Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 370. Petrarca, Invectives, 150: “Nullam capitaliorem pestem quam voluptatem corporis hominibus dicebat a natura datam, cuius voluptatis avidae libidines temere et ecfrenate ad potiendum incitarentur.” The quote refers to Cic., Sen. 12.39. Facio, “De humanae vitae felicitate,” 132: “Hic quispiam forte dixerit: Tu de corporis voluptate tantummodo intelligis, non animi. Ego vero de utraque loquor.” Ibid., 133: “[N]um Fabium, Marcellum, Marium, Syllam, Caesarem, Augustum, qui res tam amplas, tamque magnificas gerebant, voluptatem respexisse? Aliud profecto, aliud, inquam, praestantius atque excellentius sibi animo proponebant, decus videlicet, famam ac gloriam, licet & ipsi veri summique boni perfectam cognitionem non tenuerint, & meo iudicio etiam erraverint.” Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 108: “Reprehendis, ut audio, quod collocutores non fecerim sepius repugnantes et precipue quod Lamola facilis sit in assentiendo iis que Guarinus asserit.” Hor., Ars P. 119–22. Facio, Invective in Laurentium Vallam, 108–9. Ibid. Valla, Antidotum in Facium, 189–90: “quid magis decoro contrariumquam eam personam facere disputantem que disputare aut nesciat aut nolit… Nescis que sit natura disputationis? Eadem profecto que pugne: aut non descendendum in certamen aut acriter decertandum.” Ibid., 194: “eius stilus eiusmodi est ut siquos audias disputantes, non rationibus, ut moris est, sed longe accersitis auctoritatibus, non argumentis, sed nugatoriis testimoniis, non epicherematis, sed exemplis.” Lorenzo Valla, On the Donation of Constantine, tr. Glen Warren Bowersock (Cambridge, MA, 2008), 1. Facio, “De humanae vitae felicitate,” 61: “Non audeo multum refragari opinioni tue, praecipue hac in parte ubi de voluptate fit mentio, ne tu me ex Epicuri scola unum putes, cuius ego opinionem et sectam semper improbavi atque despexi.” See also Trinkaus, In Our Image and Likeness, 1:403, n. 12. Trinkaus quotes from Urb. lat. 227, 125v.

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143 Facio, “De humanae vitae felicitate,” 62: “Perbenigne et more tuo facis qui nunquam contra veritatem pertinaciter contendis. Ubi enim agnoscis susceptam a te questionem racion[e] defendi non posse das manus, atque arma adversario remittis, nec nimis acriter impugnare veritatem sustines.” 144 I have borrowed the vocabulary from Mark Bevir, “On Tradition,”, Humanitas, 13 (2000), 28–53. Applied to the present discussion, it seems rather illuminating to me.

Chapter 4 1

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Pontano, De principe: “Quod ego hac epistola feci, quem si librum appellare malueris, non repugnabo auctoritati tuae, quemque si sensero tibi non displicere (nam ut laudari postulem nimis impudenter ingenio suo blandientis esset) brevi sequentur alii quos futuros arbitror non inutiles.” Translation in Giovanni Pontano, “The Prince,” in tr. Nicholas Webb, Jill Kraye, ed., Cambridge Translations of Renaissance Philosophical Texts, 2 vols (Cambridge, 1997), 2, 85. Pontano, De immanitate liber, 1–2. See also above. James Hankins, “Humanism, Scholasticism, and Renaissance Philosophy,” in James Hankins, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge, 2007), 39. Petrarca, Invectives, 233. Ibid., 243. Petr. Fam. 1.9.2, Francesco Petrarca, Le familiari, ed. Vittorio Rossi, 4 vols (Florence, 1933–42), i, 45: “Nec enim parvus aut index animi sermo est aut sermonis moderator est animus. Alter pendet ex altero; ceterum ille latet in pectore, hic exit in publicum.” On this letter to Thomas of Messina, see Ronald Witt, In the Footsteps of the Ancients: The Origins of Humanism from Lovato to Bruni (Leiden, 2000), 240–42. Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, 359–60. It is important to note that the work, best known under the name Dialectical Disputations, went through three different redactions. As Fubini, “La ‘Dialectica di Lorenzo Valla. Saggio di interpretazione,” 184 n.1. clarifies, the first redaction stems from c. 1439 and circulated under the name of Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie. A second version (written after 1444) was entitled Reconcinnatio. The edition in Lorenzo Valla, Opera (Basle, 1540), 645–761, follows this redaction. A third and definitive redaction (c. 1450), was entitled Retractatio totius dialecticae cum fundamentis universae philosophiae. I cite the Repastinatio from the second volume of Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie and the Retractatio from Valla, Dialectical Disputations. Concerning their basic premises, Valla’s line of argument remains unchanged through the three versions. As Lodi Nauta, In Defence of Common Sense (Cambridge, MA, 2009), 130, sums up Zippel’s observations, the later

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versions contain evidence for a more thorough reading of Aristotelian texts and, in the case of the third version, of a better knowledge of Greek terminology. Valla, Repastinatio Dialectice et Philosophie, 360–61. Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 6: At ceteri Latini ceteros philosophos pro asophis habent, unum Aristotelem pro sopho atque sophotato amplectentes. Quid ni, cum eum solum cognitum habeant? Si modo cognoscere est non in propria, sed in aliena lingua lectitare, ne dicam in non sincera: non solum quia plerique eius libri corrupte translati sunt, sed etiam multa belle dicuntur grece, que non belle dicuntur latine. Que res in plurimos maximosque errores egregia quoque ingenia induxit.

10 Ibid.: “Adde huc ignorationem nostrae [linguae].” 11 Ibid.: “Neque vero mihi videtur tanti ingenii Aristoteles, ut quasi Achilles Herculesve inter heroes, aut Luna inter sidera—nedum Sol—sit existimandus.” 12 James Hankins, “The Ethics Controversy,” in Humanism and Platonism in the Italian Renaissance, 2 vols (Roma, 2003), i, 193. As Paul Botley remarks, Bruni was not the first to re-translate Aristotelian works. But Roberto Rossi’s translation of the Posterior Analytics was neither groundbreaking nor did it have a wide circulation. Paul Botley, Latin Translation in the Renaissance. The Theory and Practice of Leonardo Bruni, Gianozzo Manetti and Desiderius Erasmus (Cambridge, 2004). 13 Leonardo Bruni, “Premissio quedam ad evidentiam nove translationis Ethicorum Aristotelis,” in Paolo Viti, ed., Sulla perfetta traduzione (Naples, 2004), 255: “Atque studiosum eloquentie fuisse Aristotelem et dicendi artem cum sapientia coniunxisse et Cicero ipse in multis locis testatur, et libri eius summo cum eloquentie studio luculentissime scripti declarant” (tr. Botley). Also in his Life of Aristotle, Bruni elaborates on Cicero’s presentation of Aristotle as an excellent writer and rhetorician. 14 Bruni refers to Cicero’s praise not only in his Life of Aristotle (see footnote above), but also in his Life of Cicero, where he alludes to Ac. 2.119, in which Aristotle’s eloquence is compared to a “stream of gold (flumen aureum).” Bruni, “Vita Ciceronis,” 480. Regarding Bruni’s knowledge of the Greek original, Paul Botley argues against the view that his praise of Aristotle depended solely on a misunderstanding of Cicero. (As is well known, Cicero had actually referred to Aristotle’s earlier works, which had already been lost by the time Bruni wrote.) As Botley maintains, Bruni’s insistence on Aristotle’s eloquence was rather connected to changing Latin perceptions of Aristotle. Botley, Latin Translation in the Renaissance, 45. 15 Bruni, “Premissio Ethicorum,” 255: “ut barbari magis quam latini effecti viderentur.” Translation in Bruni, Selected Texts, 213–17. Bruni’s critique on the medieval translations goes back to his Dialogus I where Niccolì attacks the

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Peripatetici. Bruni, “Dialogi ad Petrum Paulum Histrum,” 97. In De interpretatione recta, Bruni explains his critique at length and defends himself from attacks on his new translation and his preface. 16 Bruni, “Premissio Ethicorum,” 255: “Constat enim illius traductionis auctorem … neque grecas neque latinas litteras satis scivisse.” 17 Bruni, “De interpretatione recta,” 152: Dico igitur omnem interpretationis vim in eo consistere, ut, quod in altera lingua scriptum sit, id in alteram recte traducatur. Recte autem id facere nemo potest, qui non multam ac magnam habeat utriusque lingue peritiam. Nec is quidem satis. Multi enim ad intelligendum idonei, ad explicandum tamen non idonei sunt. Quemadmodum de pictura multi recte iudicant, qui ipsi pingere non valent.

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Translation in Bruni, Selected Texts, 218. Bruni, “Premissio Ethicorum,” 255: “Ita semigrecus quidem et semilatinus fit, in utraque deficiens lingua, in neutra integer.” Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 257. Bruni, “De interpretatione recta,” 158: “Et insuper ut habeat aures earumque iudicium, ne illa, que rotunde ac numerose dicta sunt, dissipet ipse quidem atque perturbet.” Translation in Bruni, Selected Texts, 220. Bruni, “Premissio Ethicorum,” 255: “Quid dicam de transformacione orationis qua nichil est turbacius, nichil perversius?” Translation in Bruni, Selected Texts, 213. “Expertus sum apud quosdam doctos viros graecarum tamen litterarum ignaros fidem non fieri assertione mea dum Aristotelis eloquentiam commendo. Quippe adulterinas huius philosophiae translationes lectitare soliti intricatum quendam et obscurum et inconcinnum arbitrantur.” Quoted in Botley, Latin Translation in the Renaissance, 43. Bruni, “Premissio Politicorum,” 281: “Homines enim ingenue eruditi, quos primo veteris interpretationis ineptitudo ac barbaries a legendo repellebat, ita postmodum eos libros complexi sunt, ut in maximam lucem illarum rerum cognitio sit perducta.” Translation in Hankins, “Translation Practice in the Renaissance: The Case of Leonardo Bruni,” in Humanism and Platonism in the Italian Renaissance, 2 vols (Roma, 2003), i, 177–92. Pontano, “De obedientia,” in Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita (Venice, 1518), i, 1r, prologue: Etenim considerabam eos qui nunc philosophantur, genus hoc dicendi (quanquam pervetus ipsum quidem & philosophorum proprium) omnino

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improbare: aridas quasdam nimisque ieiunas, ac parum iucundas auditoribus dissertiones sectantis: quas aut ipsi soli legant, aut pauci admodum eorum similes: ut mihi quidem videantur non tam docere velle quam litigare: nec ita studere, ut obscuras, atque abditas res aperiant: quam inculcare atque deiicere de gradu velle suo philosophiam. 27 Ibid.: “illa certe cumprimis me movit sententia, qua iudicasti nec philosophiam infantem esse debere, nec eloquentiam sine rerum ubertate, & pondere: quarum esset philosophia inventrix & magistra.” 28 Ibid., 1r-v: Quod si qua in re utilis ac necessaria esset eloquentia, ut certe est in rebus plurimis, tunc eam maxime requiri debere: cum de virtute ageretur, comprimendisque affectibus: quando quidem hoc opus hic labor esset: ut poeta inquit. Et vero si duobus his, ratione atque oratione, a brutis maxime differimus, seiungendae & si nunquam alias, tunc multo minus videntur esse, cum animi informantur. 29 Pontano, De sermone, 3. 30 Ibid., 3–4:“siquidem consultationes, consilia, ratiocinationes ipsae denique dissertionibus constant, dissertiones vero verbis, sic eadem ipsa oratio instrumentum quoque rationi et quasi materiam sumministrat, in qua versetur.” 31 Ibid., 4: “Nam si laudantur recte qui loquuntur dicuntque apposite quod sentiunt, improbentur necesse est qui male atque incomposite.” 32 Germano, Il ‘De aspiratione’ di Giovanni Pontano, 295–304. Despite his critique, Pontano remains faithful to his respectful attitude, as opposed to Valla’s disrespectfulness that “spares neither the living nor the dead.” See De Asp. 2.1.14: Atque haec quidem Leonardus, contra quem si et ego rationes meas attulerim, nemini videri debet memoriae eius iniuriam a me fieri, ad quod me non voluntas, sed susceptae materiae necessitas traxit: nam, ut famae eius detrahere velim non est verecundiae meae. An qui viventium nemini unquam detraxi, detraham Leonardo qui ante quidem mortuus est quam ego ad grammaticum fuerim deductus? Ibid., 297 A more detailed discussion of Ponatno’s criticisms in Bistagne, “Modèles et contre-modèles de l’humanisme napolitain: Giovanni Pontano à la recherche d’une langue.” 33 Pontano, De magnanimitate, 100: Leonardus Aretinus, vir maxime studiosus, quique Romanam eloquentiam suis temporibus a sorde primus atque illuvie vendicare in splendorem conatus est, defectum ipsum, qui est Graece aphilotimia remissionem transtulit, et qui sit ita affectus, remissum. Nos vero … sequemur hac in

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Notes parte et minore hac in virtute rationem eam quam maiores nostri, Romanae et linguae et philosophiae patres, in maiore sunt secuti.

34 Pontano, “Charon,” 34. 35 As Erika Rummel has pointed out, Lucian as a classical source “has left its imprint on the humanist-scholastic debate” with his figure of “the contentious, quibbling philosopher,” recurrent for example in Alberti’s Intercoenales. Erika Rummel, The Humanist-Scholastic Debate in the Renaissance & Reformation (Cambridge, MA, 1995), 24–26. 36 Pontano, “Charon,” 36: “obscuritas utrunque fortasse et philosophum excusaverit et theologum.” 37 Ibid.: “Nequaquam in obscuritate omnia; verum, ut mihi videtur, duplex rei huius est causa: altera, quod qui nunc philosophantur ignorant bonas litteras, quarum Aristoteles gravis etiam auctor fuit; altera, quod dialectica corrupta fuerit a Germanis primum et Gallis, deinde et a nostris, in eaque maximam nunc quoque ruinam faciunt.” 38 On Giles, see John W. O’Malley, Giles of Viterbo on Church and Reform. A Study in Renaissance Thought (Leiden, 1968). Gennaro Savarese, Un frate neoplatonico e il Rinascimento a Roma. Studi su Egidio da Viterbo (Rome, 2012); Maria Chiabò, Rocco Ronzani, and Angelo Maria Vitale, eds., Egidio da Viterbo cardinale agostiniano tra Roma e l‘Europa del Rinascimento: atti del convegno, Viterbo, 22–23 settembre 2012; Roma, 26–28 settembre 2012 (Rome, 2014). 39 On Tamira, see Lucia Gualdo Rosa and Patricia Osmond, “Piero Tamira,” in Repertorium Pomponianum. www.repertoriumpomponianum.it/pomponiani/ tamira_piero.htm, accessed November 29, 2015. Tamira served as a link to the Roman academy and Pomponio Leto. As Pontano says, he was a pupil of Pomponio, “cuius auditor fuisti et cultor,” Pontano, “Aegidius,” 260. 40 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 260: “Magna et me quoque spes tenet brevi fore quod dicis, cum Graecos videam tum Aristotelis tum Platonis libros versari in philosophorum nostrorum minibus antiquasque illorum interpretations aut passim abiici aut parum omnino placere.” 41 Ibid.: “[U]tque alios taceam, nonne Aegidius noster magna cum consectatione eremitarum suorum totus Graecis est litteris deditus?” 42 On Giles’s critique of Pontano’s De fortuna, see 147. In general, see Francesco Tateo, Egidio da Viterbo, fra sant’Agostino e Giovanni Pontano (il Dialogo Aegidius) (Rome, 2001). 43 On Altilio, see Fausto Nicolini, “Altilio, Gabriele,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1960), ii. Altilio is also the dedicatee of De magnificentia. He was the teacher of Ferrandino, son of Duke Alfonso. As Pontano, he accompanied Alfonso during the war of Ferrara. During the Second Barons’ War, he was at the side of Ferrandino. After the death of Ferrante, Altilio also become secretary to Ferrandino.

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44 On Francesco Pucci, a pupil of Angelo Poliziano, see Claudia Corfiati, “Un corrispondente fiorentino da Napoli: Francesco Pucci,” in Claudia Corfiati and Mauro de Nichilo, eds., Angelo Poliziano e dintorni. Percorsi di ricerca (Bari, 2009). On the uneasy relationship between Pontano and Poliziano, see in the same volume Mauro de Nichilo, “Poliziano e Pontano: una polemica a distanza,” in ibid. 45 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 256: “Quocirca haec illius ex ore vobis affero:… post lusus iuvenilesque delicias, fruges afferre vos oportere, easque divinis hominum ingeniis coelestibusque donis convenientes. Declarare item Musas quas vos appellatis, eas pietatem esse ac religionem, Christum ipsum denique; hunc igitur colere vos iubere; in eius honorem Musas vestras, id est orationem, tanta cum excellentia vobis concessam convertere.” 46 Ibid., 259–60. As David Marsh remarks, Pucci’s speech is patterned on that of Bruni’s Niccoli. David Marsh, The Quattrocento Dialogue. Classical Tradition and Humanist Innovation (Cambridge, MA, 1980), 115. 47 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 259: “Tamen et spes est brevi futurum ut eloquentia cum doctrina tum naturali tum divina in gratiam redeat, cum minime per te steterit, Ioviane, quominus moralis cognitio Latinis fuerit litteris illustrata sideraliumque rerum notitia, quam pluribus etiam voluminibus ita complexus es, ut siderum effectiones cum physicis etiam causis coniunxeris.” 48 Ibid., 259–60: “Nec defuere etiam aut desunt qui e Graeco multa in Latinum sermonem transtulerint maxima etiam cum dignitate atque ornatu.” 49 Ibid., 280: “Itaque quanquam senem me annisque gravatum, spes tamen cepit fore ut, antequam a vobis emigrem, Latinam videam philosophiam et cultu maiore verborum et elegantia res suas explicantem utque, relicta litigatrice hac disputandi ratione, quietiorem ipsa formam accipiat et dicendi et sermocinandi ac verbis item suis utendi propriis maximeque Romanis.” Translation in Marsh, The Quattrocento Dialogue. Classical Tradition and Humanist Innovation, 107. 50 Pontano, “Aegidius,” 280: [A]egerrime ferret vitium hoc inter philosophantes inolevisse nostrorum temporum coepisseque illud iam nostris a maioribus, nemo ut nunc audeat Latino more ac pervetusto illo quidem maximeque probabili de naturae rebus deque virtutibus disserere; fluxisse autem inde vitium ipsum, quod superiorum temporum philosophi, secuti eorum qui Aristotelicos libros satis quidem ignoranter transtulere et verba et modos ac dicendi figuras, multa quae Latine ac proprie dici possunt aut neglexerunt accommodatis explicare verbis, aut scire quonam pacto recte dicerentur, id minime curavere. 51 Ibid., 282: “Sed noluerunt desidiosi viri, ne dicam loquendi ignari, in hoc laborare, quando satis habuere posse sese excusare quod multa essent Graece quae Latine dici parum possent commode, ac si hoc ipsum non multo melius a nobis quam a Graecis et dicatur et deducatur.”

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52 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 147r: “In Lycio deambulabat philosophans senex ille philosophorum omnium disertissimus, audiendumque ad eum universa etiam Graecia confluebat, nominis eius admiratione commota, ac disciplinae.” In the apograph Vienna, Österreiche Nationalbibliothek, ms. Pal. Vind. 3413, 305v, using a slightly different punctuation and capitalization, the sentence underlines even more strongly the role of Aristotle as “the philosopher”: “In Lycio deambulabat Philosophans, senex ille philosophorum omnium dissertissimus: Audiendumque ad eum universa etiam Grecia confluebat, nominis eius admiratione commota ac discipline.” Pontano seems to elaborate on Bruni, “Vita Aristotelis,” 508/10: “Alexandro deinde in Asiam cum exercitu profecto ipse Athenas rediit ac sui copiam in Lyceo exhibere incepit… Docebat vero plerumque inambulans auditorum turba circumfusus [my italics].” In an editorial note, printed in Pontano, Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita, i, 225v. Pietro Summonte remarks that Pontano errs in ascribing the “Lyceum” to Plato; he does not refer to the introductory sentence, however, but to a sentence on the next page, 147v, in which Pontano says not to be “versatum in Lycio Platonis, Peripateticisque in deambulationibus.” The same error appears in the apograph ms. Pal. Vind. 3413, 305v. 53 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 147r. In the footnote to his translation of this passage, James Hankins writes that “the expression of ideas is uncharacteristically obscure” and that “the passage is possibly corrupt” (James Hankins, “Humanist Academies and the ‘Platonic Academy of Florence’,” in Marianne Pade, ed., On Renaissance Academies. Proceedings of the international conference “From the Roman Academy to the Danish Academy in Rome. Dall’Accademia Romana all’Accademia di Danimarca a Roma.” The Danish Academy in Rome, 11–13 October 2006 (Rome, 2011), 37). If it is corrupt, this does not result from the apograph Vienna, Österreiche Nationalbibliothek, ms. Pal. Vind. 3413, 305r, written by Summonte, with interventions by Pontano (the punctuation follows the original): Nobis vero Tristane Caraciole tuque Francisce Puderice haud quaquam parentes sunt Athene; neque ulla utique Campania in terra est Academia: ipsique haud magna sane cum mentis atque ingenii re. Senes tamen sumus, philosophamurque, & quidem cum paucis, ac nunc domestica in porticu, nunc fanulo in hoc, deambulationeque: quod si per religionem liceret, libenter id quidem fecissemus, ne Lycium tamen appellaremus, tanti viri memoria nos deterruit: quodque et si nequaquam in Academia, in celeberrima tamen urbis huius parte, nostris est sumptibus positum ac dedicatum. I read “id” not as referring to “deambulatio” (which in this case seems to refer to a “promenade”), but as a cataphora referring to the fact that Pontano does not name his chapel “Lyceum.” (I thank Bernhard Schirg for his advice regarding this passage.) For the dedicatees, Tristano Caracciolo and Francesco Puderico, see Mario Santoro, Tristano Caracciolo e la cultura napoletana della Rinascenza

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55

56 57

58

59

60 61 62

63

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(Naples, 1957), Antonietta Iacono, “Autobiografia, storia e politica nella trattatistica di Tristano Caracciolo,” Reti Medievali Rivista, 13/2 (2012) and Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 59, respectively. As Margaret Graver remarks in her comment on Tusc. 3.7 in Marcus Tullius Cicero, Cicero on the Emotions. Tusculan Disputations 3 and 4, tr. Margaret Graver (Chicago, 2002), 79, the Academy was “[o]ne of the two exercise-grounds or promenades (ambulationes, Tusc. 4.7) at Cicero’s villa at Tusculum; the other was called the Lyceum (On Divination 1.8).” Eugenio Garin, ed., Prosatori latini del Quattrocento (Milan, 1952), 902: “Quid tum? non enim sum Cicero; me tamen, ut opinor, exprimo.” On the exchange between Poliziano and Cortesi, and on the Renaissance concept of imitation in general, see McLaughlin, Literary Imitation in the Italian Renaissane. See, for example, Pontano, De magnanimitate, 2: “Tu vero, antequam legere Aristotelaea haec incipias, ita quidem statuas.” Bruni wrote to Niccoli in 1407: “Ex Graecia enim in Latium longa est via.” Quoted in Hanna-Barbara Gerl, Philosophie und Philologie. Leonardo Brunis Übertragung der Nikomachischen Ethik in ihren philosophischen Prämissen (Munich, 1981), 162. Pontano to Pietro Salvatore Valla and Giovanni Ferrer. Naples, January 1, 1460: “De hac autem tota conversione, quod meum sit iudicium, novistis. Mallem enim unumquemque sua, quam aliena ad nos afferre. Equidem et Ciceronem existimo, si viveret, gravato id animo esse laturum, si quis Oratorem suum graece loqui faceret, et Demosthenem stomachaturum, si quae ipse attice scripsisset, alia quispiam lingua eloqui vellet.” Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 26. See also Michele Fuiano, “Insegnamento e cultura a Napoli nel Rinascimento, 1: I Ludi literari,” Atti dell’Accademia Pontaniana, ns 18 (1969), 206. On Valla’s translation and its afterlife, see Stefano Pagliaroli, L’Erodoto del Valla (Messina, 2006). On the Centiloquium (The Hundred Aphorisms), in Greek Karpos, and its role in Renaissance astrology, see Ornella Pompeo Faracovi, “The Return to Ptolemy,” in Brendan Dooley, ed., A Companion to Astrology in the Renaissance (Leiden, 2014), 91–93. Giovanni Pontano, “Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei,” in Opera omnia soluta oratione composita (Venice, 1518–19), iii. On the concept of rewriting, see Francesco Tateo, Riscrittura come interpretazione. Dagli umanisti a Leopardi (Rome, 2001). The most detailed comparison between Grosseteste’s and Bruni’s translation methods is Gerl, Philosophie und Philologie. More succinctly, Hankins, “Translation Practice in the Renaissance: The Case of Leonardo Bruni.” Thomas Aquinas, Sententia Libri Ethicorum, 2 vols (Rome, 1969), ii, 258 (lib. 4, lect. 16): “[I]lli qui moderate se habent in ludis vocantur eutrapeli, quasi bene vertentes, quia scilicet ea quae dicuntur vel fiunt convenienter in risum convertunt.” Giles of Rome, De regimine principum (Rome, 1607), 55, lib. 1, pars 2, cap. 3: “Eutrapelia … sive bona versio est … sit eutrapelus & bene se vertens.”

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64 Bruni, “Oratio Heliogabali ad meretrices.” On the Oratio and Bruni’s “nugae curialium,” see James Hankins, “The Latin Poetry of Leonardo Bruni,” in Humanism and Platonism in the Italian Renaissance, 2 vols (Rome, 2003), i, 148–63. See also David Marsh, “Mamma Roma, City of Women: Leonardo Bruni’s Oration to the Prostitutes,” in Rhoda Schnur, ed., Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Abulensis. Proceedings of the Tenth International Congress of Neo-Latin Studies, Avila, 4–9 August 1997 (Tempe, 2000). 65 Pontano, De sermone. For a classical study of the work, see Georg Luck, “Vir facetus. A Renaissance Ideal,” Studies in Philology, 55 (1958), 107–21. In general, De sermone has attracted some interest among Renaissance scholars. See, for example, Florence Bistagne, “Le ‘De Sermone’ de Giovanni Pontano est-il un traité de savoir vivre?” Silva: Estudios de humanismo y tradición clásica, 6 (2007). On the influence of De sermone on Castiglione’s Cortigiano, see Henri Weber, “Deux théoriciens de la facétie: Pontano et Castiglione,” Reforme Humansime Renaissance, 4 (1978). 66 Botley, Latin Translation in the Renaissance, 49. 67 For the adding of figures in biblical paintings, see the discussion of Paolo Veronese’s The Feast in the House of Levi in John Jeffries Martin, Myths of Renaissance Individualism (New York, 2004), 1–3. For the profusion of physical and secular detail that surrounded the sacred subject of the painting, see the discussion of Carlo Crivelli’s The Annunciation with St Emidius in Lisa Jardine, Wordly Goods. A New History of the Renaissance (London, 1996), 6–10. 68 On the value of examples, see Sen. Ep. 95.65–6; 72–3. Pontano affirms this stance in Pontano, De magnanimitate, 88: “Tantum autem abest ut a philosophi propterea officio recessisse videri debeamus, ut nullum philosophandi genus honestius, laudabilius, utilius iudicemus, quam illorum ipsorum dicta factaque aut tentata in medium afferre, qui virtutes ipsas actionibus docuere atque exemplis magisquam argumentorum explicationibus quaerendas esse.” 69 Rhet. Herr. 4.12.17 (tr. Caplan). 70 See Marsh, “Grammar, Method, and Polemic in Lorenzo Valla’s ‘Elegantiae’,” 100. See also Mirko Tavoni, Latino, grammatica, volgare (Padua, 1984), 141–50. Carmen Codoñer Merino, “Elegantia y gramática,” in Mariangela Regoliosi, ed., Lorenzo Valla e la riforma della lingua e della logica, 2 vols (Florence, 2010), i. On the employment of “elegantio” by Niccolò Perotti, see Giancarlo Abbamonte, Diligentissimi uocabulorum perscrutatores. Lessicografia ed esegesi dei testi classici nell’Umanesimo romano di XV secolo (Pisa, 2012), 107–15. 71 See Gerl, Philosophie und Philologie, 197. Eutrapelia—comitas; eutrapelos—comis; eutrapeli appellantur—ita nuncupantur, quasi comitatem habeant; eutrapelos— iucundos; eutrapelos—facetos; in talibus conversacionibus eutrapeli—quae huiusmodi oblectamenta possunt afferre. 72 Pontano, De sermone, 9: “Itaque, qui verba facerent serendis in sermonibus cum audientium oblectatione ac dicendi lepore, facetos eos dixere et comes, ad haec et festivos et lepidos nec minus libenter salsos.”

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73 Ibid., 11: “Lepidis itaque suavitas tantum inest dictis, salsi etiam acumen, quando salsus sapor est ipse quidem acutior.” 74 Ibid., 12. 75 Ibid., 10: “Quocirca ostendendum videtur, in quo ab alio alius iudicetur differre; neque indigna sane neque inutilis inquisitio, cum sit omnino nihil tam fugiendum in disserendo ratiocinandoque quam ne confusio incertitudoque exoriatur e verbis aliqua, neque aliud magis sequendum quam ut distinctio adhibeatur selectioque et verborum et rerum.” 76 Wolfram Ax, “Lorenzo Valla (1407–1457), ‘Elegantiarum linguae Latinae libri sex’ (1449),” in Wolfram Ax, ed., Von Eleganz und Barbarei. Lateinische Grammatik und Stilistik in Renaissance und Barock (Wiesbaden, 2001), 35. 77 Lodi Nauta, “Philology as Philosophy: Giovanni Pontano on Language, Meaning, and Grammar,” Journal of the History of Ideas, 72/4 (2011), 482. 78 According to Abbamonte, Diligentissimi uocabulorum perscrutatores. Lessicografia ed esegesi dei testi classici nell’Umanesimo romano di XV secolo. Valla’s work in the Elegantiae stands at the beginning of a whole lexicographical tradition. On Valla’s method, see ibid., 29–60. 79 On this subversion, see 124–127. See also Mariangela Regoliosi, “Il rinnovamento del lessico filosofico in Lorenzo Valla,” in J. Hamesse and M. Fattori, eds., Lexiques et glossaires philosophiques de la Renaissance (Louvain-La-Neuve, 2003), 97–99. 80 EN 4.8.1127b33-1128a2. 81 On the concept of “anápausis,” see also EN 10.6.1176b33-35: “Iocari vero ut studeas secundum Anatharsis sentenciam recte se habet. Nam cessacio quedam iocus videtur, cum quod fieri nequeat ut quis continuo laboret cessacione indiget.” 82 The full sentences are as follows. (1) Grosseteste: “Existente autem requie in vita et in hac conversatione cum ludo, videtur et hic esse collocutio quaedam consona et qualia oportet dicere et ut, similiter autem et audire.” (2) Bruni: “Cum autem sit in vita cessacio quedam a negociis et in ea cum iocunditate temporis transmissio videtur hic quoque esse conversacio quedam conveniens et qualia et quomodo dicere audireque oportet.” 83 EN 4.8.1128a9-10: “Moderate autem ludentes eutrapeli appellantur, puta bene vertentes.” 84 Bruni, “Premissio Ethicorum,” 257: “[Q]uod ille ‘in ludo’ inquit, magis equidem ‘in ioco’ dicendum reor; nam ‘ludere’ pila et alea magis dicitur, ‘iocari’ autem verbis. In ioco igitur laudabilem illam mediocritatem, quam Graeci ‘eutrapeliam’ vocant, nostri tum ‘urbanitatem’ tum ‘festivitatem’ tum ‘comitatem’ tum ‘iocunditatem’ dixere. Et qui ita se habet, ‘urbanus’, ‘festivus’, ‘comis’, ‘iocundus’ est.” 85 Valla, Elegantiarum Latinae Linguae Libri Sex, 247, 4.16: “Iocus & ludus quid significent, tum ex Cicero de Oratore, tum ex Quintiliano de Ridiculis colligi potest: ut sit iocus in verbo, ludus in facto. Sed utrunque tamen patitur exceptionem.”

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86 Pontano, De sermone, 7: “[Q]uod hominum vita tum corporis tum animi laborum plena est ac molestarium, iccirco post labores cessatio quaeritur, in qua recreetur animus, atque inter molestias iocus.” 87 In a similar vain, Pontano writes in “De magnificentia,” 168, that the “entertainments, hunts and other kinds of spectacles procure pleasure for the citizens as well as a mitigation of the daily labours and chores” (“ludi venationesque ac coetera spectaculorum genera civium voluptatem atque animorum relaxationem a negociis ac laboribus quaerunt”). 88 Pontano, De sermone, 7–8. 89 As Ernst A. Schmidt, “Catullisch, catullischer als Catull,” in Thomas Baier, ed., Pontano und Catull (Tübingen, 2003), 214–15, shows, Pontano’s poetry employs certain Catullian key words more often than Catullus himself. Interestingly, among them are “iocus,” “iocari,” “iocosus” (16 times in Pontano’s Hendecasyllabi, 6 times in Catullus’ Carmina) and “ludus,” “ludere” (9 times in Pontano, 4 times in Catullus). Here is an area, then, where Pontano’s poetry seems to influence on his formulation of philosophical notions. 90 EN 4.7.1127a13-1127b32. Pontano, De sermone, 51–82. 91 EN 6.9-11.1142a32-1143a24. De prud. 4.2-18. Pontano, “De prudentia,” 198r-207r. 92 EN 4.3-4.1123a34-1125b25. 93 EN 3.6-9.1115a6-1117b22. For a detailed analysis of the Aristotelian influences on De Fortitudine, see Raffaele Rinaldi, “Sopravvivenza e utilizzazione di fonti classiche nel De fortitudine di Giovanni Pontano,” PhD thesis, Università degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples, 2004. 94 EN 4.1-2.1119b22-1123a33. 95 As David Marsh has argued, it was in Valla’s works that this emphasis on usage was developed. In his response to Poggio in the Apologus, Valla refers to the important sixth chapter of Quintilian’s first book of the Institutiones. From his discussion, usage arises as a central criterion in the analysis of human conventions in language and behavior. Marsh, “Grammar, Method, and Polemic in Lorenzo Valla’s ‘Elegantiae’,” 104–10. See also F.H. Colson, “The Grammatical Chapters in Quintilian 1.4-8,” Classical Quarterly, 8/1 (1914), 33–47. 96 It was mainly Michel Foucault who focused his attention on the practices of ethical inquiry. As he argues in Michel Foucault, The Care of the Self (New York, 1986), 45, moral precepts did not simply circulate among a number of different doctrines, they also “took the form of an attitude and a mode of behavior; [they] became instilled in ways of living; [they] evolved into procedures, practices, and formulas that people reflected on, developed, perfected and taught.” With these words, Foucault refers to the care of the self, the precept according to which one must give attention to oneself. Although he is mainly interested in the practice of this precept in the first centuries CE, some of his insights might be applied to the Renaissance humanists, insofar as they revived a certain number of the practices and techniques described by Foucault.

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Cic., Off. 3.1.1: “P. Scipionem … dicere solitum scripsit Cato… numquam se minus otiosum esse, quam cum otiosus … quae declarat illum et in otio de negotiis cogitare … ut neque cessaret umquam et interdum conloquio alterius non egeret.” Pontano, “Charon,” 2: Min. Qui magistratum, Aeace, gerunt, iis nunquam sine negocio ocium esse debet. Aeac. Prudenter atque e re dictum a te est, Minos; nam et in ocio cogitare oportet de negocio et ubi liberior aliquanto factus est curis animus, quia tum longe maxime quid verum sit cernit, exercendus hic est, a sene praesertim, cui non ut ineunti aetati pila et trochulus, sed rerum optimarum cognitio aeque scientia curae esse debeat.

99 Marsh, Lucian and the Latins, 43–44. 100 Dialogues of the Dead 1, in Lucian, “Dialogues of the Dead,” tr. H.W. Fowler and F.G. Fowler, in The Works of Lucian of Samosota, 4 vols (Oxford, 1905), i, 1:107. 101 Dialogues of the Dead 10, in ibid., 1:119. See also the closing scene of Poggio’s dialogue De avaritia (1428), inspired by Dialogues of the Dead 1.3:“Nemo cum moritur auferet secum quicquam, sed nudus atque inops ad inferos transibit.” Quoted in Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 169 and Marsh, Lucian and the Latins, 38. 102 Dialogues of the Dead 10, in Lucian, “Dialogues of the Dead,” 1:120. 103 Pontano, “Charon,” 6: “Itaque quae vita esse potest mortalibus inter tot ac tam varias necessitudines? quos spes tam assidue frustretur ac ludat eorumque vel maximus hunc errorem esse duco, quod inter deas spem numerant, quae humanae fortunae ancilla est, varia, inconstans, fallax peliacissimaque et bonorum et malorum omnium.” 104 Ibid.: “Quod modo tyrannus declaravit, qui, dum regnum animo concipit, spe sua lusus, vix tandem ad ripam huc pervenit, nudus, plorabundus, claudus, senili gressu, fallentibus vestigiis, ex tot tantisque male partis divitiis vix annulum secum ferens.” 105 Ibid.: “Doctiorem te factum, portitor, gaudemus; et, per Erebum, egregie philosopharis!” 106 Ibid., 6/8: “Quid ni philosopher? qui tot annos doctissimos homines, qui trans ripam inhumati errant, disserentes audiam? Eorum ego disputationibus mirifice delector, et, ubi vacat, etiam auditor fio magnamque ex eorum dictis voluptatem huberemque fructum capio.” 107 For a closer examination of this passage and its role in Pontano’s thought, see 128. 108 Pontano, “Charon,” 16: “Caeca igitur mortalitas suisque victa libidinibus atque in furorem acta quem occidit nosse nec potuit nec voluit, nec, siqui bene illum norant, tutari potuere, quippe qui admodum essent pauci: rara est enim omnis bonitas.”

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109 Ibid.: “At Manes, quod corporibus non impedirentur, cognoverunt illum, et, qui corporis contagione mundi atque expurgati omnino erant, secuti etiam sunt.” 110 Cic., Tusc. 1.30.74-75: Tota enim philosophorum vita … commentatio mortis est. Nam quid aliud agimus, cum a voluptate, id est a corpore, cum a re familiari, quae est ministra et famula corporis, cum a re publica, cum a negotio omni se vocamus animum, quid, inquam, tum agimus nisi animum ad se ipsum advocamus, secum esse cogimus maximeque a corpore abducimus? Secernere autem a corpore animum, nec quicquam aliud, est mori discere. 111 On the meditation on death as the “ultimate form of [the] premediation of evils,” see lecture twenty-four (second hour) in Michel Foucault, The Hermeneutics of the Subject. Lectures at the Collège de France, 1981–1982 (New York, 2005), 477–80. 112 Julia Annas, The Morality of Happiness (New York, 1995), 27. 113 See Chapter 1, Section “I, Pontano.” 114 On these points, see Foucault, The Hermeneutics of the Subject, 143–44. 115 See ibid., 143. 116 Shulamit Furstenberg-Levi, “The Fifteenth Century Accademia Pontaniana—An Analysis of Its Institutional Elements,” History of Universities, 21/1 (2006), 37. 117 Ibid., 38. 118 Ibid., 55. 119 See the corresponding entry in Nicodemo Tranchedini, Vocabulario italiano-latino, edizione del primo lessico dal volgare. Secolo xv, ed. Federico Pelle (Florence, 2001). 120 Jeremy Bentley has argued that “Neapolitan patronage … developed along much simpler lines than that in most of the other Italian states” and depended solely on the figure of the king (Bentley, Politics and Culture in Renaissance Naples, 48). Pontano’s case suggests otherwise. For although Pontano writes in his autobiographical sketch that he presented himself to King Alfonso—which is not improbable—it was among the king’s officials that he found the patronage he had been looking for. Beccadelli spread the voice of Pontano’s talents and eventually found accommodation for him in the household of Giulio Forte, treasurer to the king, and a Sicilian like Beccadelli, from Messina. When Pontano first came to Naples in 1448 and fell seriously ill with a fever most probably contracted in the marshes of the Maremma during Alfonso’s retreat from Tuscany, it was Forte who took care of the young man and gave him a home. (On this episode, see De liberalitate 21 in Giovanni Pontano, I libri delle virtù sociali, ed. Francesco Tateo (Roma, 1999), 94.) There was a very practical side to this liberality. The search for young talents who could serve as scribes and invigorate the administration was one of the tasks of the more high-ranking secretaries, even more so as the scribes in their offices worked under their responsibility. Also Antonello Petrucci, who preceded Pontano as chancellor, initially depended on the goodwill of one of King

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Alfonso’s officials. Coming from a rather humble background, Petrucci’s literary talents were recognized by a notary from Aversa, Giovanni Ammirato, who obviously had contact with the Neapolitan court, as he passed on his promising boarder to “his friend and guest” Joan Olzina, secretary of King Alfonso. (Porzio, Opere, 12.) Olzina could be seen as a typical example of the way patronage worked among the officials of Alfonso. His first contact with Italian humanism went back to 1432, when Guiniforte Barzizza, secretary to Filippo Maria Visconti, had visited Barcelona. After his arrival in Italy, during Alfonso’s campaigns for the conquest for the kingdom, these contacts intensified. For patronage during Ferrante’s realm, the figure of Diomede Carafa is of great importance. For his palace, see Bianca de Divitiis, “Building in Local ‘All’antica’ Style: The Palace of Diomede Carafa in Naples,” Art History, 31/4 (2008), 505–22. Furstenberg-Levi, “The Fifteenth Century Accademia Pontaniana—An Analysis of Its Institutional Elements,” 38. Ibid., 55–56. Pausanias, Description of Greece 10.24.1. “Iam scis qui sim, vel qui potius fuerim; ego vero te, hospes, noscere in tenebris nequeo, sed te ipsum ut noscas rogo.” Translation in Samuel Johnson, The Rambler (London, 1953), 62. For more information on Pontano’s epitaph, see the introduction. Riccardo Filangieri, “Il Tempietto di Giovanni Pontano in Napoli,” Atti dell’Accademia Pontaniana, 56 (1926): “in omni vitae genere primum est seipsum noscere.” Translation in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 217. Pontano, De magnanimitate, 24, 1.18.2-5: Iure igitur deterrere ab incoepto Phaetonta filium pater studet apud Nasonem, inquiens: “Magna petis Phaethon et quae nec viribus istis/Munera conveniant.” Itaque quale incoeptum eius fuerit et quam iniquus ipse virium suarum existimator exitus docuit non ridiculus modo, verum etiam maxime miserabilis. Oportet igitur magnanimum aequum cumprimis esse sui ipsius viriumque ac facultatum suarum aestimatorem dimensoremque minime vanum expetitionum suarum ac rerum earum, ad quas intendit consilio, opera atque actionibus suis omnibus. Persuadere autem sibi supra vires supraque ingenium et attentare ea, ad quae non sit accessus, hominis est inconsiderati parumque omnino confirmatae mentis, quae in homine quidem magni animi maxime sedata esse debet minimique immoderata aut lubrica suique ipsius ignara. Nam si privatim cuiquam magisquam universim cunctis praeceptum illud traditum est “Nosce te ipsum,” praecipue videri potest magnanimo traditum.

127 See in Chapter 2, Section “Action and Contemplation,” p. 64.

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128 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 147v: Itaque me ipsum audientes, non philosophum audietis, neque versatum in Lycio Platonis, peripateticisque in deambulationibus hominem, sed disserentem de veterum maxime graecorum ac nostrorum disciplinis, ut qui earum magis fuerim admirator, quam ut in illis solis aut ipse incubuerim omnino, aut adultus consenuerim. Scitis enim quibus ipse in negociis versatus sim, quodque ocium fuerit perdiscendis atque indagandis illis meum. Agemus igitur vobiscum verecunde & parce: nec tam argute examinateque, quam aperte atque experienter. De humanis enim disserentes actionibus, ita quidem agemus, ut qui actiones ipsas, earumque principia, magis a fronte, oreque ab ipso nota esse velimus, quam ut ea cupiamus introspicere ac rimari, quae huius minime quidem sunt aut disputationis aut temporis, nostrique neutique ingenii.

Chapter 5 1

This was not a new development in virtue ethics. On the extent to which natural virtues found recognition in Christian thought as early as by the end of the twelfth century, see Istvan P. Bejczy, “The Problem of Natural Virtue,” in Istvan P. Bejczy and Richard G. Newhauser, eds., Virtue Ethics in the Middle Ages. Commentaries on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, 1200–1500 (Leiden, Boston, 2007). 2 Julia Annas, “Virtue Ethics: What Kind of Naturalism?,” in Stephen M. Gardiner, ed., Virtue Ethics, Old and New (Ithaca and London, 2005), 13. 3 Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Questions on the Virtues, tr. E.M. Atkins (Cambridge, 2005), xiii–xiv. 4 On the different versions of the Dialectical Disputations and the discussions surrounding them, see 238 n. 7. 5 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 118, 1.9.22-25. 6 Nauta, In Defence of Common Sense, 134. 7 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 104/06, 1.9.1: “Cum omnium opiniones confutat Aristoteles ut ineptas, ipse omnium pene sensit ineptissime vel ob hoc, quod animam dat arboribus et herbis.” “Vivunt dico non per animam, sed per viriditatem…. Denique et si vivere arbores et plante et herbe dicende sunt, profecto anima ‘vivere’ non sunt dicende.” 8 Ibid., 116, 1.9.19: “Sicut hi terreni ignes simillimi sunt illis celestibus, ita brutorum anime nostris, quia ille ut lumina candelarum extinguuntur, nostre ut sidera perpetuo vigent.” 9 See Chapter 2, Section “The Shadow of Virtue.” 10 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 97, 3.4.11: “Cum pugnas aut fortis es aut temerarius, cum non pugnas aut cautus aut ignavus.” Valla, On Pleasure, 241.

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11 Valla, De vero falsoque bono, 98–100, 3.4.17-24. Valla, On Pleasure, 243–47. 12 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 132, 1.10.5: “Quapropter non scientia iuris virtus erit sed iusticia, neque cognitio divinarum rerum et humanarum, quod sibi philosophia vindicat, sed ex preceptis sapientie vivere; neque scire bonum laus est sed velle, nec nescire malum sed nolle, neque rursus vitium nescire bonum aut scire malum, sed id nolle, hoc velle.” 13 Ibid., 132, 1.10.7: “Nec animus, que proprie est voluntas, male affectus, sed etiam corpus male affectum perturbat ingenium: nam dolor capitis, lassitudo membrorum, hebrietas, sopor officiunt intellectui. Et iccirco errant, qui intellectum voluntatis dominum imperatoremque constituunt.” Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, 75. 14 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 134, 1.10.9: “Nam prudentia, quae in intellectu est, virtus non erit.” 15 Cic., Off. 2.9.34: “prudentia sine iustitia nihil valet ad faciendam fidem. Quo enim quis versutior et callidior, hoc invisior et suspectior detracta opinione probitatis … sine iustitia nihil valebit prudentia.” 16 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 134, 1.10.9. 17 Ibid., 134, 1.10.12: “Quam licet vocemus solertiam, per se nec bona nec mala: ut dolus, qui cum alibi tum in iure civili dicitur bonus et malus; ut etiam in medicina pharmacum seu venenum malum et bonum.” In Dig. 4.3.1.3, Ulpian differs dolus malus from dolus bonus in reference to older usages: “Non fuit autem contentus praetor dolum dicere, sed adiecit malum, quoniam veteres dolum etiam bonum dicebant et pro sollertia hoc nomen accipiebant, maxime si adversus hostem latronemve quis machinetur.” 18 Ibid., 136, 1.10.16: “in voluntate virtutem potius quam vel in actione … vel in habitu.” 19 Ibid.: “[P]rudentia doctrineque et artes ex habitu constant, que ut lente diuque percipiuntur ita difficile ex habitu, quasi e domo et possessione pelluntur.” Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, 77. 20 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 136, 1.10.16: “Virtus, que affectu constat, celeriter admittitur celeriterque amittitur, quemadmodum et vitium, nec mediocris tantum sed etiam maxima.” 21 Retractatio 1.10.17. Valla, Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie, 77. The story of Polemon is told in Val. Max. Dict. 6.9.ext 1, that of the thief in Luke 23:43. 22 Boethius, “In Categorias Aristotelis,” in Jacques Paul Migne, ed., Patrologiae cursus completus (Paris, 1847), lxiv, 241D–42C. In the passage criticized by Valla, Boethius discusses “quality.” He distinguishes between a stable and unstable qualities: “habitus firma est dispositivo, affectio infirmus est habitus.” Examples for habitus are “artes,” “disciplinae” and—different from Valla—the virtues: “Virtus enim nisi difficile mutabilis non est, neque enim quod semel juste judicat justus est, neque qui semel adulterium facit, est adulter, sed cum ista voluntas cogitatioque permanserit.”

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23 Valla, Dialectical Disputations, 138, 1.10.18: “Cur non addebat, siqua virgo fuerit unum diem in lupanari, eam non desinere virginem esse si non perseveraverit in prostando? an qui cedem fecit non erit homicida, vel si centum uno die homines occiderit, si non perseveraverit deinceps in cede perpetranda, nec cedis accusari poterit?” 24 Ibid., 138, 1.10.20: “ex uno actu summum vitium et ex uno acto summam posse esse virtutem.” Thomas Aquinas explicitly denies this proposition in ST 2.1.51.3, “Utrum per unum actum possit generari habitus”: “habitus virtutis non potest causari per unum actum, sed per multos.” 25 Ibid., 142, 1.10.27: “Vides ut in medio posui vitium, ut etiam Deus posuit, inquiens: utinam frigidus aut calidus esses, sed quia tepidus es, incipiam te evomere de ore meo.” The reference is to Rev. 3.15-16. 26 Ibid., 142, 1.10.28: “Mihi certe videntur pulchriores Germani qui sunt candidissimi et Ethiopes qui sunt nigerrimi, quam Egyptii qui sunt fusci et Indi qui sunt atri, quasi ex utrisque mixti.” 27 Ibid., 146, 1.10.32: “Calumnie sunt, et involucra ista verborum. Totum hoc intellectu perpenditur ac bona voluntate; non rei magnitudine, parvitate, mediocritate.” 28 Lupi, “Il ‘De sermone’ di Giovanni Pontano,” 370, argues that “Pontano possedette in misura eccellente un equilibrio dello spirito che è anzitutto, goethianamente, universalità di interessi.” Ibid., 373, he maintains: “E questa è la classicità, la vera humanitas del Pontano e del suo sodalizio: armonia di pensiero e di azione.” 29 See Verg. Aen. 6.289. 30 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 209r: “a sentiendo nomen duxit.” 31 Ibid.: “[S]ic afficitur, ut corpus ipsum moveat, impellatque ad ea exterius quaerenda, quae profutura sentiat, contraque ad ea fugienda, quae videantur nocitura.” 32 Ibid., 209v: “Quoniam autem rationalis animae imperium est proprium, vegetantis autem ac sentientis servitium, ut Sallustiano utar verbo, ita quidem sentiens vis subservit ratione utenti, ut eius tanquam ministra atque exploratrix exquirat. Praeparet, repraesentetque illi omnia, quae viderit, audierit, olfecerit, gustaverit, quoque etiam modo tetigerit.” 33 Ibid.: “Quibus repraesentatis & tanquam oculis eius id est intellegenti vi expositis sic omnia considerat atque perpendit, eadem illa tanquam in trutina expendendo secernat, secernendo singillatim inspiciat, demum iudicet, sicque inspiciendo ac iudicando in illa illabitur & penetret, ut postmodum eorum omnium rationem & causas appositissime reddat.” 34 Ibid.: “Ab hac autem ipsa anima hominum proficiscuntur actiones, quarum aliae membrorum corporis ministerio aut solum aut maxime indigent, aliae aut parum, aut fortasse nihil praeterquam quid anima sensuum sumministratione operaque illorum utitur.”

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35 Ibid., 209r: “Hoc autem ipsum rationalis animae genus, quantum a vegetante atque a sentiente recedit anima, tantum superiori illi naturae, aut potius, ut nunc loquuntur, essentiae quae divina dicitur, se se adiungit atque inhaerescit.” 36 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 182r: “Inest & teria quaedam, eaque maxime generosa, & nobilis pars, quaeque divinitate non careat sua.” 37 Pontano, “Charon,” 14/16: “Cupiditates igitur appetitionesque vehementes atque incompositas, nullis adhibitis frenis, solere partem illam quae rationis esset audiens ita deiicere de statu suo, ut nullum ea ad medium illud retinendum adiumentum afferre posset: hinc ortum ducere vitia seditionesque cieri et bella coeteraque oriri mortalium mala.” 38 Pontano, “De obedientia,” 2r: “Omnis vetus novaque philosophia et omnis divina atque humana lex in hoc uno maxime laborat & tota nititur, ut motus animi rationi pareant, ne veluti incustoditi & passim vagantes liberius exsultent.” 39 Ibid., 4v: “Obedientia est habitus parendi preceptis omnibus, quae a ratione proficiscantur.” 40 On Pontano’s use of analogy, see Charles Trinkaus, “The Astrological Cosmos and Rhetorical Culture of Giovanni Gioviano Pontano,” Renaissance Quarterly, 38/3 (1985), 446–72. 41 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 95r. 42 In Pontano, “Aegidius,” 268–70. 43 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, xxiii: 1a2ae 55–67. Virtue, ed. W.D. Hughes (Cambridge, 2006) 152, 2.1.63.1: [O]portet considerare quod aliquid dicitur alicui homini naturale dupliciter, uno modo, ex natura speciei; alio modo, ex natura individui. Et quia unumquodque habet speciem secundum suam formam, individuatur vero secundum materiam; forma vero hominis est anima rationalis, materia vero corpus, id quod convenit homini secundum animam rationalem, est ei naturale secundum rationem speciei; id vero quod est ei naturale secundum determinatam corporis complexionem, est ei naturale secundum naturam individui. 44 The example is discussed in Physics 1.7.190b16-191a22. 45 In the Physics, Aristotle does not use the term “matter” (hulê), but “substrate” (hupokeimenon). Nevertheless, in Metaph. 8.1.1042a32-34, he defines matter as something that underlies all opposite processes of change and uses matter and substrate as synonyms (Ibid. 8.2.1042b9) 46 Thomas Aquinas, In octo libros Physicorum Aristotelis, ed. P.M. Maggiolo (Rome, 1954), 58, 1.13.4: [M]ateria nunquam est sine privatione: quia quando habet unam formam, est cum privatione alterius formae. Et ideo dum est in fieri aliquid quod fit (ut homo musicus), in subiecto quando nondum habet formam, est privatio

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Notes ipsius musicae; et ideo principium per accidens hominis musici in fieri est non musicum; hoc enim accidit homini dum fit musicus. Sed quando iam advenit ei haec forma, adiungitur ei privatio alterius formae; et sic privatio formae oppositae est principium per accidens in essendo. Patet ergo secundum intentionem Aristotelis quod privatio … [est] ipsa carentia formae vel contrarium formae, quod subiecto accidit.

47 Aristotle discusses the different meanings of sterêsis in Metaph. 5.22.1022b221023a7, summarized in ibid., 9.1.1046a31-35. 48 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 151r: “Nasci igitur hominem cum summa rerum omnium inopia, quis est qui neget? addam & illud, maxima etiam cum ignoratione.” 49 Ibid.: Animalia fere omnia, ubi alia progredi, alia aut volare, aut natare, aut repere apta sunt, victum ipsa sibi per se comparant. Solus homo postquam & pedibus & manibus, et lingua, qua excellit, commode utitur, vivere tamen nec ipse adhuc per se, aut a se solus potest, neque conservandi sui munus aut obire, aut tutari, neque quas ad res natus est, nisi multos post annos eas attingere. Itaque diutius a parentibus alitur, victitatque annos complures aliena & opera, & cura, discitque laboriose eloqui, cum animalia caetera sponte voces suas, suaque signa, nullo docente, proferant. 50 Ibid.: “Nanque solus cum sit ad eloquendum natus, septimo vix anno eloqui quae sentit exacte potest.” 51 Ibid., 193v-94r. 52 In Pontano, “De laudibus divinis,” in Carmina: ecloghe, elegie, liriche, ed. Johannes Oeschger (Bari, 1948), 263, 1.72: “De mundi creatione ad Antonium Panhormitam,” Pontano characterizes man as “erectus vir.” 53 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 151r-v. 54 Ibid., 194r: Eadem ratione mens pausillatim ipsa perficitur, principio enim debilis plurimumque imbecilla, ante quam eius confirmata sit vis maneantque in robore, quae in illam sensus, observationes, animadversiones, ususque congesserunt … nititur coniecturis, exemplis, aliorum monitis, institutis, iudiciis; post diu multumque agendo exercitata, exercendo plurima diversaque experta, ac cogitando vestigandoque commenta, secumque eadem ipsa cum ratione versans dimetiensque & in universum & per partes circunspecta, efficitur. 55 De prud. 2.1, “Virtutes morales neque inesse a natura, neque esse contra naturam.” Ibid., 171v. 56 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 219v: “Quid quod animus ipse qui pueris tantopere rudis atque etiam ignarus est, paulatim progressimque ita instituitur,

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58

59

60

61 62

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ut e summa ignoratione atque inscitia ad summam tandem rerum perveniat cognitionem atque scientiam.” Pontano, “De prudentia,” 171r: “[U]t ad agendum nati atque educti sumus, rationis etiam participes, sic natura hac duce trahimur actiones ad ipsas, ratione quidem recta sibi undique constante moderandas.” See EN 6.2.1139a16-19. In this passage, Aristotle names three things that control action (i.e., praxis in the sense of purposive action), sensation, intellect, and appetition. Of these, sensation is excluded as a principle (archê) of action, as it belongs also to animals. Pontano takes up this passage in ibid., 183v: “Omnino tria sunt, quae hominis naturam ac vim potissimum declarant, sensus, mens, appetitus. Quota autem sensus vis sit atque authoritas agendis atque administrandis rebus, docent pecudes reliquumque belluarum genus, quarum nuallae prorsus exsistunt actiones…. A mente igitur appetituque agendi vis impulsusque omnis proficiscitur.” Ibid., 171r: “Virtutes morales neque inesse a natura neque esse contra naturam”: “Ne autem propter haec ipsa naturae principia … quispiam fortasse censeat, virtutes esse homini a natura insitas.” See EN 2.1.1103a24-26: “Neque natura neque praeter naturam insunt nobis virtutes, sed sumus nos ad illas quidem recipiendas natura apti perficimurque per consuetudinem.” (trans. Bruni). Pontano, “De prudentia,” 173v. Ibid.: Multum profecto apparatius instructiusque munivit nos natura comparandis virtutibus…. Caeterum ut neque in armis filio traditis, sed in optimo armorum usu pugnae eventus ostenditur, neque in pecunia lucrum exsistit, sed in filii solertia, qui utiliter prudenterque utetur illa. Sic neque in iis opibus viribusque, quibus natura nos instruxit armavitque verum in actionibus ipsis, et in usu exercitationeque agendi virtus cognoscetur nostra.

63 Ibid., 151v: “Singulis enim virtutibus sua attributa est materia, tametsi nonnumquam eadem ipsa materia aliis quoque subiicit actionibus atque virtutibus. Siquidem magnificentia & liberalitas in pecunia versantur eroganda, sed illa tantum dando, haec vero magnifice potius aedificando, qua de re post fortasse uberius.” 64 Ibid., 174r: “[C]onsuetudo assidua, frequensque exercitatio humanarum actionum a recta ratione administrata, temperata, directa, ut puta iusti hominis exercitatio, frequensque & temperata actio vocabitur iure suo iusti hominis habitus, hoc est iustitia, ut pictoris pictura, negotiatoris negotiatio, magnanimique viri habitus, magnanimitas, fortis vero fortitudo, liberalis quoque liberalitas.” 65 Pontano, “De obedientia,” 6v/8r: Nam qui eam [i.e. voluptatem] sic abiecerit, ut quasi radicitus evulserit, is mihi naturae hominis videtur oblitus, aut humana esse conditione maior, ut

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Notes qui aqua & herbis in solitudine vitam ducunt, rerum veneris omnino inscii, quales fuisse Anachoritas plurimos, & ipsum illum Ioannem Baptistam memoriae proditum est. Verum cum voluptatis commune quidem nomen sit, et voluptas ipsa nec semper, nec ubique sit turpis, non omnes corporis sensuumque voluptates intemperantes nos efficient, ut dum lyra delinimur laboremque solamur cantu, aut naribus admovemus flosculos, seu in Iocti aliquas, Gentilisve picturas egregias conversi, in spectandis illis oculos pascimus, et tamquam ipsi reficimur. Quis autem quamvis durus & acer voluptatis contemptor non moveatur, ubi in aliquem facetum & urbanum hominem inciderit?

66 Pontano, “De fortitudine,” 51r: “Cum igitur haec se sic habeant natique ad agendum simus, & ut agamus, naturales illi motus atque impulsus nos excitent, e quibus aut passiones exsistunt, aut iidem ipsi magis sunt passiones, quis non videat eas nec temere, nec frustra esse homini a natura tributas?” 67 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 172r: Quoties enim vel sensus appetitusve vel mens ipsa sub specie utilis iucundive, aut boni, quid simul & utile & iucundum est, aliquid nobis offert, tum moventur illi primo ad cupiendum, inde nos ipsi ad agendum ea, per quae cupiditati satisfiat nostrae. Motus autem hi vel iidem ipsi sunt affectus, vel ab ipsa affectione suscitantur. Etenim afficiendo movemur, nec affectus ipse nisi commotio quaedam est. 68 Ibid., 171v: “Non instrumenta enim ad agendum modo idonea pernecessariaque nobis contulit, mentemque insuper divinam, iudicem quidem atque indagatricem omnium, verum ingenuit in nobis ipsis affectus quidem illos, quibus & moveamur & impellamur ad ea cuncta, quae utilia, honesta, iucunda, bonaque videantur.” 69 ST 2.1.25.1. 70 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 182v: [A]ppetitioni etiam ei, quae sensus sequitur moveturque ad utilia ac iucunda, adiuncta est commotio etiam illa, quae nos hortatur, trahit, impellit, ad ea aut adipiscenda, quae difficiliora sunt comparatu, aut repellenda superandaque, quae vitae, dignitati, commodis impendiisque minitentur nostris. Itaque appetitio illa, quae sensum sequitur duplici etiam modo est consideranda, ut altera sive appetitio ea vocetur, sive appetitus, versetur iis in animae commotionibus, quibus boni ac iucundi tantum studium est propositum, altera in iis superandis repellendisque aut adipiscendis, quibus labores, difficultates, periculaque sunt proposita. 71 Hos autem ipsos satis constat, quoniam motus quidam ipsi sunt, nunc vehementiores esse, contra nunc remissiores, mediocritatem etiam quandoque

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retinere, et quoddam quasi medium inter parum et nimium. Movemur enim ipsi, afficimurque plus minusve, aut etiam mediocriter, quantum scilicet satis est. Quocirca metiri illos ratione oportet, modumque adhibere ac mensuram. Quocirca metiri illos ratione oportet, modumque adhibere ac mensuram. Giovanni Pontano, De prudentia (Florentiae, 1508), 172v. 72 Pontano’s language in this paragraph might echo some elements of impetus theory. On this theory and its treatment by Coluccio Salutati, see Ronald Witt, “Salutati and Contemporary Physics,” Journal of the History of Ideas, 38/4 (1977), 667–72. Salutati describes virtue also as a kind of moderation: “[S]ince this impetus (i.e. the influence of a passion) is weaker (remissior) or stronger (vehementior) than right reason can permit, the habitus of virtue is necessary.” See ibid., 672. The reference is to Coluccio Salutati, Epistolario, ed. Francesco Novati, 4 vols (Rome, 1891–1911), 3:564. 73 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 209v: “Quocirca cum erraticae stellae humoribus e quibus homo constat, praesint, hique ab illis moveantur, motus autem visiones exuscitent, haeque animam afficiant, anima vero visionibus ipsis excita eo tandem propendeat atque applicet, quo assiduo quasi quodam vento agitata impellitur.” 74 Ibid., 164v; ibid. 210r: Appetitionem autem eique animae parti, quae concupiscibilis vocatur a philosophis nostri temporis, Veneris stella praesidet, ea in aptanda suggerendaque ad generationem materia Lunae, ut diximus [ibid.], socia est atque adiutrix. Cuius quidem materiae ut proprium est formam appetere, sic etiam sua ac propria utriusque est conservandi sui appetitio, postquam in unum coivere, qua e coitione constitutum est animal, quod quia sentit, ut appetat quoque necesse est. 75 Ibid., 210r-v: “Conservatur autem formae ipsius materiaeque connexio atque societas, ut eorum adeptione, quae utilia et iucunda futura sunt, sic inutilium ac tristium evitatione & fuga.” 76 For this and other descriptions of Mars, see ibid., 163r-64v. 77 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 172v: “Hae enim ipsae commotiones ad agendum nos impellunt, quae si fuerint ferventiores, ad iniqua, violenta flagitiosaque nos rapient, violentior enim ignis atque aestuantior inflammat magis exuritque quam calefacit, & pluviae intemperantiores demergunt sata messemque ac fragues corrumpunt. Eadem commotiones ubi pusillae ipsae fuerint, remissae, languidae, et actiones quoque nostrae languentes, infirmae, inutiles, vanae, saepenumero etiam ridiculae.” 78 Ibid., 177v: “Habent enim virtutes fere singulae, immo pene omnes, duos adversum se constitutos, & quidem inter se quoque dissentientes adversarios, alterum qui ut violentus quidam atque superbus & contumax imperio nolit eius acquiescere, aut audire praescribentem, alterum qui imperium reformidet, deterreaturque illiud ab aspectu atque augusta facie.”

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79 Ibid.: Qua e constitutione ac locorum positu effectum est ut virtutem dixerint in mediocritate, hoc est medio inter utrunque vitium spatio consistere ibique sibi delegisse curulem quasi quandam sedem praetoriumque suggestum, in quo residens ipsa a dextra, excessum, ut impotentem ac contumacem sibique praesidentem, si revocare ad imperium possit, hortatur verbis, admonetque oratione. Sin minus, male parentem illum superbeque atque impotenter agentem repellit atque insectatur perduellemque tandem iudicat interdicitque aqua & igni. A sinistra vero, quae pars in nobis imbecilla est, defectum, languentem quidem eum maximeque diffidentem, quem etiam blande ad se vocans ac nihilo minus conspectum eius verentem vertentemque subinde terga retrahere ad se omni arte contendit, quod ubi impetrare parum potest, latitare illum, & tanquam in specum confugientem belluam, degere illic ignobiliter permittit. 80 See, for example, the discussion of the nameless virtue regarding ambition in Pontano, De magnanimitate, 101, where the mean is labelled as ambientia, while excess and defect are named ambitio and abiectio. For a recent discussion of the doctrine of the mean and the nameless virtues in the Ethics, see Paula Gottlieb, The Virtues of Aristotle’s Ethics (Cambridge, 2009), 19–51. Gottlieb argues that the Aristotelian doctrine of the mean is a doctrine of equilibrium, not of moderation, and that it offers a sophisticated view of the particulars of the situation. Furthermore, she advocates the importance of the nameless virtues in the framework of Aristotle’s ethic of virtue, offering interesting points of comparison with Pontano’s treatment, especially with the notion of delectus discussed among other places in a chapter 1.23, “De delectu, qui et qualis sit,” in De sermone, 33–35. 81 On this point, see Francesco Tateo, “Giovanni Pontano e la nuova frontiera della prosa latina: l‘alternativa al volgare,” in Francesco Tateo, ed., Sul latino degli umanisti (Bari, 2006), 66–69. 82 Pontano, “De magnificentia,” 174: “placet hac in parte et hoc potissimum loco quaerere, quonam pacto, si magnum eum esse et in magnis versari sumptibus oportet, mediocritatem secuturus ac retenturus sit, cum acuti quidam, magis quam docti homines, nimis etiam superciliose contendant, medocritatem ac sumptuum magnitudinem nullo modo posse simul consistere.” 83 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 174v. See EN 2.6.1107a1-2. 84 Pontano, “De fortitudine,” 51v-52r: Ex quo fit ut nec rerum, nec mensurae ratione habita, nunc exsuperante animo, nunc rursus deficiente, proprium virtutis munus implere nequeamus. Nec vero audiendi sunt qui adversus haec disserere coeperunt, minuti philosophi, aut potius nullo modo philosophi, qui mihi illud sane velle suadere videntur, ut de hominum actionibus tollatur mensura, ea videlicet, sine qua ne artifices quidem consumatum facere aliquid valeant.

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85 Pontano, “Actius,” in I dialoghi (Florence, 1943), 146. 86 Ibid.: “Quod nisi tanta moveret Aristotelis me maiestas, vel ausim abdicare a mediocritate poetam, quae tamen in hoc ipso alio quodam modo et requirenda est et laudanda.” 87 Francesco Tateo, “La poetica di Giovanni Pontano,” Filologia romanza, 6 (1959), 361. For Aristotle, magnificence in an achievement is “excellence on a grand scale” and “excites one’s admiration” (EN 4.2.1122b17). This is why Pontano allows ornament to be abundant in the case of a magnificent building. Pontano, “De magnificentia,” 9: “Et in ornatu quidem, cum hic maxime opus commendet, modum excessisse etiam laudabile est, cum videamus naturam ipsam ornatui ac pulchritudini mirum in modum studuisse.” 88 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 174v: “Nam cum adversum libidinem, intemperatasque sensuum cupiditates, illecebrosasque titillationes pugnamus, quae quidem nobis insunt, etsi nobiscum ipsi pugnamus, hostis tamen extrinsecus est constitutus, causaeque ipsae pugnandi. Sunt enim convivia, comessationes, fornices, popinae, ganeae, magistratus, honores, pretium, pecunia, quae quidem externa sunt omnia, pro quibus adipiscendis et movemur ad ea, & actiones ipsas nostras eo dirigimus.” 89 Ibid.: “Neque vis … neque affectio homini insita bonum vel malum hominem, turpem vel honestum constituunt aut declarant, verum habitus ipse e bonis honestisque aut turpibus malisque ex actionibus comparatus.” 90 EN 6.8.1142a12-16: “ iuvenes quidem et geometre et mathematici fiunt et sapientes in huiusmodi. At prudentes fieri non videntur. Causa huius est quod in singularibus est prudencia que per experimentum nobis innotescunt. Iuvenis autem non est expertus. Longitudo enim temporis experienciam facit.” 91 EN 6.11.1143b11-14: “Itaque non minus inherendum est expertis et senioribus vel prudentium opinionibus atque sentenciis sine demonstracione quam demonstracionibus ipsis. Veluti enim oculum per experientiam habentes principia discernunt.” Pontano paraphrases this passage in Pontano, “De prudentia,” 195v, where he introduces an emphasis on the active and contemplative life: “non dubitavit Aristoteles dicere, oculum esse prudentiae experientiam, nec minus inhaerendum esse eorum, qui in actionibus cum laude consenuerint, probatis sententiis dictisque, quam illorum demonstrationibus, qui procul ab actionibus vixere civilibusque negotiis, remoti a rerum usu.” 92 Ibid., 195v-96r: ut a natura sapiens est nemo … sic nullus etiam natura ab ipsa prudens, quando is habitus exercitatione comparatur rerumque humanarum usu. Quo fit ut prudentiae laus omnis in senibus constat quam maxime exercitatis…. Quaeque fructuum in arboribus est maturitas, ea in senibus quam exercitatissimis prudentia est agendique absoluta maximeque spectata perfectio. Nam pueritiae flores quasi quidam sunt, et in adolescentia cruda et acerba omnia cuius usus sunt nulli, & affectiones ipsae male temperatae.

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Notes See EN 1.3.1095a6-10 for the source of Pontano’s observation that the young tend to follow their feelings.

93

Ibid., 196r: “Itaque adolescentia docta quidem esse potest ac multarum etiam literarum gnara…. At prudentia solum usu, qui in illis est nullus, & annis, qui in iuvenibus quidem florent, minime vero maturescunt.” Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 228v, goes further with this analogy by allotting the four different ages of human life to the quadrants of the zodiac. 94 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 196r: “Cultus enim, ut in colendis segetibus expurgat solum, & hinc ad ubertatem concinnat agrum, illinc luxuriem compescit, sic in dirigendis actionibus susceptisque negotiis, usus, ratio, observatio id praestant, ut quae a natura inesse videantur, ea et compescant & corrigant & componant, & ad maturitatem fructumque perducant.” 95 See ibid., 200r-v, “De cunctatione & celeritate” and ibid., 206v-07r, “De maturitate,” respectively. 96 Ibid., 205r: “Ingenio autem mens hoc interest, quod mens divina res est, coelitusque delapsa. Ingenium vero exsistit ex ipsa corporis animaeque compage & constitutione atque ex humorum e quibus constamus temperatura.” 97 Ibid.: “Ii enim plurimum ingenio valent, quorum in corde ac sanguine maior inest atque agilior calor.” 98 Ibid., 205r-v: “Propter diversitatem igitur concretionis corporeae, quae commistio infinita quidem est, nec omnino comprehensibilis [on this point, see Pontano, ‘De rebus coelestibus’, 227v], eveniunt tam multae varietates, applicationesque ingeniorum, multiplices ipsae adeo, ut quot homines, tot etiam sint ingenia. Quo fit ut in utenda etiam prudentia, ingenium quisque sequatur suum.” 99 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 205v. 100 In the diplomatic correspondence of the time, it was a widespread custom to judge people by their character or personality. For a short example, see Bernardo Rucellai’s description of Innocence VIII in a letter to Lorenzo de’ Medici. Naples, October 26, 1486: “El papa pare di buona natura, e non più acuta che si bisogni, e così dicono che era in minoribus ne essere dipoi mutato. Tardo al piglare partiti che importino, ma assai fermo ne’ propositi suoi.” Pontieri, La politica mediceo-fiorentina nella congiura dei baroni napoletani contro Ferrante d‘Aragona 1485–92. Documenti inediti, 224. The ingenium or ingegno plays a significant role in Machiavelli’s thought. See, for example, Markus Fischer, “Machiavelli’s Political Psychology,” The Review of Politics, 59/4 (1997), 802. Unfortunately, Fischer’s article traces Machiavelli’s psychology back to medieval medical theory, whereas he does not take into consideration the moral psychology developed by humanists like Pontano. In a similar vein, Cary Nederman has suggested that Machiavelli relies heavily on the psychological premises of his “predecessors,” Aristotle and the

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Christian moralists. Just as Fischer, he skips those moralists closest to Machiavelli, among them Pontano. Cary Nederman, “Machiavelli and Moral Character: Principality, Republic and the Psychology of Virtù,” History of Political Thought, 21/3 (2000), 349–64. 101 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 230r-v: “Ex humoribus autem qui nostro continentur corpore, immo qui corpus nostrum constituunt, nigrum fel, quaeque rectius atra bilis dicitur, terrae est quam simillima.” 102 For the comparison with flint stone, see ibid., 159v: Hic autem humor supremum quidem in modum quanquam est aridus, humor tamen est, quique e sanguinis calore ferventiore gignatur atque ab eo manet, quo fit, ut facile etiam tametsi refrixit, post recalescat servetque diutius calorem, de quo genitus est…. Ac mihi quidem lapis is, qui silex dicitur, atrae bilis persimilis videtur, qui ferro percussus, aut lapide alio attritus ignem conceptum evomit. The comparison with gun powder is made ibid., 203r: “Esse item tam spirituosam quam profecto est, palam ostendit pulvus ille intra aenea tormenta bombardasque incensus, qui huic humori maxime similis est etiam colore nedum siccitate.” 103 Ibid., 159v-60r: humor hic variat pro natura fermentationis caeterorumque humorum commixtione…. Quod in ebriis facile aparet, cum idem vinum alios ad risum excitet, ad lacrimas vero alios, hunc ipsum tristitia, at gaudio illum alium afficiat, quosdam silendi studium, non nullos loquendi importunitas ut capiat, facit…. Licet enim idem sit vinum, non eadem tamen est ebriorum omnium concretio humorumque e quibus constant mixtura. The analogy between the melancholic disposition and wine goes back to Aristotle, [Pr.] 30.1. In a later chapter, Pontano takes up a specific point of Aristotle’s discussion, namely the fact that wine makes man inclined for love, while the melancholic are usually lustful. In his treatment of the combined effects of Saturn and Venus, ibid., 203r, he explains that as in the case of wine, the heat of black bile foams the blood and makes the melancholic lustful. This is evidenced with one of Pontano’s analogies: while the virile member lies flat during cold, heat leads to its erection. 104 Ibid., 230v: “Atque ut e terra omnia per calorem prodeunt ipsaque seminarii cuiusdam vicem gerit, sic nigra e bile, ubi concaluit, tanquam seminario e quodam pullulant tum simulacrorum, tum cogitationum germina, quae deinde in hominum ingeniis in agro quasi quodam fruges ac fructus quam uberrimos proferunt.” On the analogy between horticulture and culture in Italian Renaissance humanism, see Maryanne Cline Horowitz, Seeds of Virtue and Knowledge (Princeton, 1997), 114–18.

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105 Another beautiful example of the role of combination is presented in Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 228v and 31r-v. Here, Pontano compares the infinite possibilities to mix the different humours (vis commixtionum) with the diversity which letters and words create in language. On this comparison, see Anthony Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmos. The Worlds and Works of a Renaissance Astrologer (Cambridge, MA, 1999), 6. 106 Pontano, “De rebus coelestibus,” 230v: Unusquisque igitur sana quidem mente praeditus, qui terrae naturam consideravit, mirari desinet, cur tam multa his in libris ac tam saepe a nobis de nigra dicantur bile, quippe quae perinde dicantur atque de fomite uberrimo tum eorum quae ad sapientiam rerumque cognitionem atque ad artium spectent excellentiam, tum illorum etiam quae contrario modo ad ignorantiam, inspicientiam [I read insipientiam], furoremve pertineant. 107 Ibid., 230v and 29r. (There is an error in the numbering of the pages.) 108 EN 3.3, 1113a10: “electio utique erit consulta affectacio eorum que in nobis sunt.” 109 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 175v: “Est autem electio, quod satis nunc sit, voluntas non illa quidem pervagata, infinita, maxime audax, nullis obstricta regulis, aut frenis repressa, verum quae sese ipsam moderetur intellegatque quid elector ipse praestare possit, quid etiam sit hominis, quid tempora etiam ferant, quid mores urbis, quid ratio ipsa non recti solum atque honesti memor, verum etiam loci, temporis, facultatum, ordinis, fortunae.” 110 Ibid. The discussion on the insatiability of the will refers to EN 3.2.1111b19-30. The wish for immortality is discussed ibid., 22–23. That choice is concerned with acts that lie in our own power is mentioned ibid., 30. 111 Ibid., 176r: “Gigantibus cantantur in scholis, affectasse illos coelum invasisseque etiam superos. Atqui ficta ea sunt, irridendis illis, qui supra vires, supraque ingenium suum agenda suscipiunt, attentantque quae minime sunt audenda.” 112 Ibid.: “Itaque ut ad agendum ipsi nascimur, itemque ad intelligendum sciendumque, sic scientia atque cognitio tum rei susceptae, ac nostrum simul, tum facultatum, temporum, locorumque comitari debet vel potius antecedere electionem, nunquaquam ab actione recedere.” 113 Ibid.: “[I]gnorantes plerunque decepti errant, dum pro optimis deterrima, pro honestis turpia, pro modestis improba, ignorata, incompertaque pro cognitis habenat atque compertis.” 114 As Alan Ryder relates, King “Alfonso adopted the device of an open book inscribed with the motto ‘Vir sapiens dominabitur astris.’” Alan Ryder, Alfonso the Magnanimous. King of Aragon, Naples and Sicily, 1396–1458 (Oxford, 1990), 318. The obverse of the famous medal commissioned to Pisanello by Alfonso displayed the same legend. Stacey, “Imperial Rome and the Legitimation of Political Authority in Renaissance Naples,” 201 n. 131.

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115 In what follows, the English word “fortune” translates the Latin term “fortuna,” if not indicated otherwise. Therfore, it refers to chance happenings of fortunate or adverse advents, or luck, rather than to to a person’s condition or standing. 116 Santoro, “Fortuna e Prudenza nella ‘Lezione’ del Pontano,” 34. 117 Pontano explicitly applies fortune to the whole range of civic life and the arts in Pontano, De fortuna, 224: Nec vero genus universum hominum, in civitate qui versantur civilibusque negotiis ac muneribus, adde & facultatibus & disciplinis, ut in administratione publica, in militari, in navali re, ut in medicina (nam & fortunatum medicum esse oportere, omnes quidem consentiunt) non etiam sub fortuna laborant. Quando artes ipsae etsi praeceptis constant rationeque atque observatione, tamen fortunae quoque in iis in ipsis locus relictus est suus. 118 Ibid., 154: “[I]nglorii qui sint, huiusmodique bonis vacui, abiecti ipsi, ac sordescentes, quonam modo felices eos vocaveris?” 119 Ibid., 80: “Cumque bonorum tria sint genera atque alia quidem animi, corporis vero alia, quae tertia sunt, externaque vocuntur, fortunae quoque sunt iure quasi suo attributa. Quo fit, ut adipiscendam ad felicitatem, quod summum civile atque humanum existimatur bonum, vel magnopere fortuna ipsa iudicetur conferre” 120 See, for example, chapter 1.25, “Quantum bona fortuna conferat ad felicitatem,” ibid., 152–56. See also chapter 2.6-7, in which Pontano argues that external goods are necessary for a successful active life (“Felicitatem civilem absque bonis externis perfectam non esse”), whereas they add little to the contemplative life (“Bona externa parum conferre ad felicitatem contemplatricem”), ibid., 206/08. 121 A letter from Francesco Vettori to Niccolò Machiavelli, written in the winter of 1514, is the most famous reference to Giovanni Pontano’s treatise on fortune. Unfortunately, Vettori’s letter does not bring out the sophistication of Pontano’s treatise. Instead he used it to underline his own fatalistic stance. In the past few days [he wrote to his Machiavelli] I have read the book of Pontano, De fortuna, recently published, which he himself sent to the great Gonzalo. In this book he clearly shows that neither talent, nor foresight, nor fortitude, nor the other virtues avail at all when Fortune is absent. We see proof of this every day in Rome. For we know that some lowborn men, unlettered, without talent, are nevertheless in positions of the highest authority. Vettori urged Machiavelli to accept his fate: “You especially, who are not ignorant of evils and have endured much worse, ought to do so. God will bring an end to these things, too.” (Francesco Vettori to Niccolò Machiavelli. Rome, December 15, 1514. Niccolò Machiavelli, Machiavelli and His Friends. Their Personal Correspondence, tr. and ed. James B. Atkinson and David Sices (DeKalb, 1996), 302–3.) Vettori’s reference to Pontano was an excuse as well as an apology for his

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122

123 124

125 126 127 128

129 130 131 132 133

Notes inability to promote Machiavelli. His letter in fact concerned a memorandum Machiavelli had written for Giulio de’ Medici, aimed at relaunching his career, that had been interrupted by the fall of the republic in 1512. For a further discussion, see John M. Najemy, Between Friends: Discourses of Power and Desire in the Machiavelli-Vettori Letters of 1513–1515 (Princeton, 1993), 308–10. Cornel Zwierlein, Discorso und Lex Dei. Die Entstehung neuer Denkrahmen im 16. Jahrhundert und die Wahrnehmung der französischen Religionskriege in Italien und Deutschland (Göttingen, 2006), 47, ascribes a position to Pontano that comes close to astrological determinism. Anthony Parel, The Machiavellian Cosmos (New Haven, 1992), expresses a similar opinion. Aristotle, Ph. 2.5.197a5-7. Aristotle, Metaph. 5.30.1025a16-19. Allusions to this example are also in the Rhetorics and in the Nicomachean Ethics. See Valérie Cordonier, “Sauver le Dieu du philosophe. Albert le Grand, Thomas d’Aquin, Guillaume de Moerbeke et l’invention du ‘Liber de bona fortuna’ comme alternative autorisée à l‘interpretation averroïste de la théorie aristotélicienne de la providence divine,” in Luca Bianchi, ed., Christian Readings of Aristotle from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance (Turnhout, 2011), 88, n. 67. I thank Valérie Cordonier and Tommaso de Robertis for pointing out these passages to me. Aristotle, Ph. 2.5.196b28-29. Ibid., 2.5.197a18-21. Ibid., 2.5.197a26-30. Petrarca to Tommaso del Garbo, November 9, 1367, in Francesco Petrarca, “De rebus senilibus,” in Opera (Basle, 1581), 837–38, 8.3: “[E]um qui thesaurum abdidit patrem familias fuisse scio, eum qui architectum, vel agricolam quod reperit aurum vel argentum, vel tale aliquid quod reperit, vomerem seu ligonem, quo illum ageret manus, brachia, boves, stivam, & quae sunt generis huiusce…. Haec inter quaero fortunam, de qua sermo est, nihil invenio praeter nudum nomen.” Translation in Francesco Petrarca, Letters of Old Age, tr. Aldo S. Bernardo, Saul Levin, and Reta A. Bernardo, 2 vols (Baltimore and London, 1994), i, 287. Aristotle, Ph. 2.4.196a1-3. See also ibid., 2.5.197a10-11. Ibid., 2.5.197a11-12. Ibid., 2.5.197a21-22. Petrarca, Le familiari, iv, 137, 22.13.7: “credere me scilicet et semper credidisse dicentibus nil omnino aliud quam nudum et inan e nomen esse Fortunam.” Coluccio Salutati, De fato et fortuna, ed. Concetta Bianca (Florence, 1985), 129: Negant aliqui (quod satis admirari non possum) aliquid esse fortunam preter nomen, cum tamen communis omnium hominum sermo sit multa de casus et fortune quodammodo manibus provenire; non mediocremque volunt omnes

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ipsam habere in rebus mortalium potestatem; nec solum homines ignari et vulgus hoc asserunt, sed prudentes, licet horum etiam quidam, qui scribentes circa maxima dederunt operam, dicant ipsam esse nichil, quo fit hec dubitatio maior. (I thank Bernhard Schirg for his advice on this passage). Concetta Bianca refers the remark on “quidam, qui scribentes circa maxima dederunt operam” to Aristotle, Ph. 2.5.197a14. It could also refer to Augustine, Lactance, or Jerome, all mentioned by Petrarca. On Salutati’s critique, see also Walter Rüegg, “Entstehung, Quellen und Ziel von Salutatis ‘De fato et fortuna’,” Rinascimento, 5/2 (1954), 143–45. 134 Salutati, De fato et fortuna, 129: “Verum quid ipsam velint tam astrologi quam artis, imo delirationis, geomantice studiosi precedentibus duobus capitulis visum est. Videamus ergo quid morales in hac re sentiant quidve naturales.” 135 Poggio Bracciolini, De varietate fortunae, ed. Outi Merisalo (Helsinki, 1993), 101. 136 Ibid., 100: “Hic,” ego inquam, multa Antoni et audiui et legi de hac fortuna eiusque potestate ab historicis, poetis, oratoribus, philosophis scripta, multo plura sermone hominum celebrantur, omnia fere humana ditioni fortunae subicientium, Nam imperatores, reges, principes, nobiles, ignobiles, uulgus ipsum, ita de fortuna sentiunt, ut eam supra se stare, et actus suos regere arbitrentur, ueluti uitae nostrae actricem, quam secundam exoptant, aduersam execrantur, et cum quid prosperum accidit, fortunam laudant, cum quid aduersi, illius statim iniquitatem accusant. 137 Ibid., 101: “[N]eque huic opinioni uulgo tantum creditur, sed doctissimorum quoque ac sapientissimorum uirorum uoces ac sententiae astipulantur.” 138 Virg. Aen. 8.334; Sall. Cat. 8.1; Liv. 9.17.3. These are standard references, quoted throughout the literature. Pontano, for instance, quotes the Virgilian saying in the beginning of book III (Pontano, De fortuna, 288). 139 Bracciolini, De varietate fortunae, 101: “Nam omnes docti atque indocti pariter affirmant esse fortunam, quid uero ea sit, perpauci tradunt.” 140 Ibid.: “Nam cum in Phisicis de causis rerum dissereret fortunam causam accidentem dixit iis rebus quas agendas susceperis. Has causas infinitas esse uult et incertam esse fortunam, idque fortuna fieri, quod nobis agentibus preter propositum euenat preterque cogitatum.” 141 Ibid. As Merisalo remarks in her critical edition, Poggio studied Aristotle in 1420, during his stay in London and used Aquinas’s commentaries. Poggio’s manuscript of Aquinas’s commentary on the Physics is conserved in the National Library in Florence, BN CS J.V.42. See ibid., 191. See also Riccardo Fubini and Stefano Caroti, Poggio Bracciolini nel VI centenario della nascita. Codici e documenti fiorentini (Florence, 1980), 22–23.

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142 Bracciolini, De varietate fortunae, 101. 143 Ibid., 102: “non accidens quippiam aut preter intentionem, sed firmum quid ac stabile diuque in multis rebus ante premeditatum videtur, neque ut accidens herere et sequi alterum, sed ueluti ducem dominamque et ducere alia et eis praeesse.” 144 Ibid., 102–3. 145 Ibid., 103: Huic profecto … ut superioribus dicemus fauisse fortunam, sed non Aristotelicam, cum omnes certo consilio suscepto, nihil insperato, nihil preter intentionem sint consecuti, itaque neque qua fidebat Alexander, neque quam sequebatur Caesar … neque quam sperabat mercator, apparet eam esse fortunam, quam describunt Aristoteles et Thomas noster. Sed existimatur esse maior atque ordinatior quaedam diuina uis uoluens uersansque res humanas pro libidine, nihil a se firmum, nihil tutum prebens. 146 Actually, Pontano seems to have drawn heavily on this part of Poggio’s dialogue. Poggio holds the position that the moral philosopher does not need a great skill in defining the subject of his speech, but has to give practical advice: “Si ad aedificandam domum subsidium petiero, non tu mihi satisfacies si narres quid ea sit … sed si ligna, calcem, lapides subministres.” Hence, Poggio prefers Cicero’s De officiis to Aristotle’s Ethics: “Alter uirtutum tradit diffinitiones, quid eae sint, quasque in partes diuidantur perquirens. Alter uirtutes ipsas in aciem atque in campum deducit … dat precepta quid quaeque uirtus permittat, quid prohibeat quatenus quid liceat, quid deceat, quod sit officium boni uiri.” (Ibid., 520–23). Also Seneca belongs to this kind of writer: “Hunc imitatus Seneca non est prosecutus diffinitionum fortunae subtilitates, at imbuit nos optimis praeceptis ad eius impetus tum euitandos, tum ferendos.” This triad of authors is quite the same as it will be in Pontano’s De immanitate. Aristotle is characterized as a theoretician, Cicero as the practitioner, and Seneca as the propagandist of virtue. Different from Pontano, Poggio has a strong preference for Cicero and Seneca. Still, Antonio Loschi’s conciliatory position comes very close to Pontano’s ideas: “Et Aristoteles, inquit Antonius, et Tullius Senecaque ac caeteri uiri sapientissimi uaria doctrina erudientes hominum uitam, optime de nobis meriti sunt.” Ibid., 105–6. 147 Ibid., 105: “[I]n Phisicis autem de rerum causis quereret, fortunam uero inter causas collocaret; de ea euitanda aut precauenda, nullus fuit disserendi locus.” 148 Ibid., 104: “[S]i tibi Aristoteles non placet, addamus aliam [diffinitionem] haud repugnantem theologis nostris, dicamusque nihil aliud fortunam esse, quam divinae nutum voluntatis … ita disponentis cuncta quae fiunt, ut quae prodire a fortuna extimantur, summi Dei dispositio efficiat certa ratione, quae praesit humanis rebus.” 149 Pontano, De fortuna, 80: “Est igitur fortuna nec vanum quidem, nec arcessitum nomen, quin maxima quaedam potius potentissimaque et vis et causa.”

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150 Ibid.: “Fortunae nomen apud omnes gentes divulgatum est adeo, ut docti etiam viri consentiant et medicos, in quorum manu salus posita est vitaque aegrotantium, et imperatores, e quorum ductu victoria expectatur exercitus reique incolumitas publicae, fortunatos esse oportere.” 151 Ibid.: Quo fit, ut adipiscendam ad felicitatem, quod summum civile atque humanum existimatur bonum, vel magnopere fortuna ipsa iudicetur conferre, ac si non & templa illi a priscis posita fuerint, & sacerdotes decreti, & ad sortes eius consulendas futuris de rebus iisdemque dubiis atque asperis undique a principibus viris summa etiam frequentia sit trepidationeque concursum. For the cult of Fortuna, see Pliny, Hist. Nat. 2.5.22. Pontano might have known this text on the basis of Poggio’s De varietate fortunae, as Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 286–87, remarks. See Bracciolini, De varietate fortunae, 100–1. Besides Poggio, also Salutati quotes the passage ad litteram in, De fato et fortuna, 186. 152 Pontano, De fortuna, 80: “Atque haec quidem rudioribus illis seculis de fortuna erat hominum opinio, qui quod ignorarent, quae vis esset ea, quodque tum bona, tum mala plurima repente obiicerentur, praeterque expectationem, atque agendi propositum ac rationem, magisque omnino contingerent, quam ordine ac lege proficiscerentur sua, aut electioni consentirent susceptisque actionibus, a ferendo ei nomen indidere.” For still another explanation of “ferre,” see ibid., 242. 153 Ibid., 282/84: “Is cum in nostratia haec incidisset de fortuna, non potuit non commendare studium nostrum raritatemque laboris; praeoptasset tamen, uti cogitationes has nostras in potiora convertissemus … esse enim quodammodo christiano indignum homine de fortuna rationem habere aliquam, cum res mortalium divinae magis curae permittendae essent, quam de fortuna inquirendum aut casibus.” 154 Ibid., 284: Accepimus & boni & docti viri sermonem, quo profecto par fuit animo, & pro nostra etiam pietate in Deum atque observantia, repensaturi in posterum iacturam hanc temporis, si iactura dicenda est, naturae obstrusas res in apertum velle proferre commonefacereque nostrates homines, ne humanum dicam genus, qua ratione quae fortunae adscribuntur, consideranda sint, & quo etiam accipienda animo, & ubi opus fuerit, perferenda. 155 On the role of fortune in these times, see Howard R. Patch, “The Tradition of the Goddess Fortuna in Medieval Philosophy and Literature,” Smith College Studies in Modern Language, 3/4 (1922), 179–235. See also Alfred Doren, “Fortuna im Mittelalter und in der Renaissance,” Vorträge der Bibliothek Warburg, 2 (1922), 71–144.

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156 Iiro Kajanto, “Fortuna in the Works of Poggio Braccioloni,” Arctos (Acta Philologica Fennica), 20 (1986), 26. 157 Ibid. 158 Pontano, De fortuna, 88/90: “[C]ausam tamen aliquam esse fortunam & bonorum, & malorum plurimorum, ac valentissimam quidem causam vel maximi etiam philosophi tradunt. Nam & esse eam populi gentesque, & docti pariter indoctique consentiunt.” 159 Ibid.: “[E]tsi plentiores quidam viri ac maxime divinae maiestatis studiosi, quam alii fortunam, ipsi Dei nutum voluntatemque esse eam dicunt.” Translation in Riccardo Fubini, Humanism and Secularization. From Petrarch to Valla, tr. Martha King (Durham, 2003), 131. 160 Aug. civ. Dei 5.1: “Prorsus diuina prouidentia regna constituuntur humana. Quae si propterea quisquam fato tribuit, quia ipsam Dei uoluntatem uel potestatem fati nomine appellat, sententiam teneat, linguam corrigat.” 161 Petrarca, “De rebus senilibus,” 838, 8.3: “Ad summam ergo, sermo mihi vulgaris, ut intelligar, de re ipsa, hoc iuditium meum est, si fortasse non sat vulgare, non sat philosophicum, pium puto, idque mihi sat est.” Translation in Petrarca, Letters of Old Age, 288. 162 Pontano, De fortuna, 90: “Ac ne iniustum eum aut inconsideratum statuant, dum sceleratis offerentem secunda, probis vero ac continentibus aspera adversaque referentem intellegunt, rationem Deo ipsi, & causam rei eius permittendam censent. Cuius constituta decretaque sint hominibus incomperta, nec fas sit nobis legem, ac metam Deo praescribere, nec occultam eius scitari velle sententiam.” 163 Ibid.: “Quorum opinioni tantum abest, ut repugnemus (Christiani enim sumus) uti nostra omnia ad supremi illius numinis voluntatem constitutionemque referenda censeamus, & quicquid vel decretum ab illo, vel permissum, aut concessum videatur, illud & iustum, & rectum, ac maxime etiam sanctum, & habendum, & iudicandum.” Also in other parts of the treatise Pontano underlines that he does not talk as a philosopher only, but also as a Cristian. See, for example, chapter 2.15, “Animadvertendum esse, Deum primam esse causam”: “nec ut philosophiae solum studiosi, verum etiam ut christiani.” Ibid., 212. 164 Petrarca, “De rebus senilibus,” 838, 8.3: “[P]rovidentia ministra, & divinarum voluntatum executrix quaedam.” Petrarca, Letters of Old Age, 288. 165 For the role of Timaeus in the Renaissance, see James Hankins, “The Study of the ‘Timaeus’ in Early Renaissance Italy,” in Anthony Grafton and Nancy Siraisi, eds., Natural Particulars. Nature and the Disciplines in Renaissance Europe (Cambridge, MA, 1999). 166 Pontano, De fortuna, 128: Putat enim [Plato] nequaquam e providentia proficisci omnia, quippe cum rerum earum quae quidem dispensantur minime sit uniformis, eademque natura. Quocirca quaedam tantum ad providentiam referenda, ad fatum

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quaedam esse, censet. Quid ultra? Ad hominum ipsorum voluntates atque arbitrium nonnulla, alia ad fortunae inconstantiam, pleraque ad casum, quae quidem ipsa seiuncta a ratione pro libidine accidant. Quinque ita sunt numero quae Platoni in mentem veniant, providentia, fatum, hominis ipsius voluntas, ac tum fortuna, tum casus.

167 168

169

170

171 172

173

174 175

This passage paraphrases parts of Calcidius, Commentary, chapter 145 (Jan den Boeft, Calcidius on Fate (Leiden, 1970), 13.) Pontano, De fortuna, 128–32. See Calcidius, Commentary, § 145 (Boeft, Calcidius on Fate, 13.) On Pontano’s hierarchical ordering of the stars and planets and his political vocabulary, see Trinkaus, “The Astrological Cosmos and Rhetorical Culture of Giovanni Gioviano Pontano.” Pontano, De fortuna, 130: “[A]d fatum, cuius ipsius munus sit atque officium singula quidem diggerere, eaque pro motu, loco, forma, tempore distribuere, providentiae vero suum sit ac proprium, cuncta quamvis diversa, quamvis alia atque alia pariter tamen complecti.” See Boethius, Cons. Phil. 4.p6.13. Ibid.: “Sapienter itaque Severinus Boethius, atque apposite, gerendarum rerum formam immobilem ac simplicem, divinam ait esse providentiam, fatum vero eorum, quae divina simplicitas gerenda disposuit, mobilem nexum esse, ordinemque temporalem.” See Boethius, Cons. Phil. 4.p6.10. Calcidius, Comm. § 146, Boeft, Calcidius on Fate, 18. Pontano, De fortuna, 130: “[I]ndeque illud exsistere ut, fato quae subsint, ea quoque omnia providentiae sint subiecta, cui et ipsum etiam subserviat fatum; quaedam tamen, quae providentiae iurisditioni tantum ascripta sint, ea fati seriem magistratusque eius cancellos egressa esse.” See Boeth. Cons. Phil. 4.p6.14. See also Pontano’s discussion of miracles in De fortuna, 224–28. Ibid., 214: “Quod vero variat diversoque agitur modo, id minime a deo proficiscitur, verum a diversitate rerum ipsarum, quae et moveantur et informentur, quae ve secundo loco et ipsae quoque moveant et informent.” Plato, Tim. 41d-e. Calcidius comm., §147, Boeft, Calcidius on Fate, 18. For Pontano’s formulation, see Pontano, De fortuna, 132. Pontano, De fortuna, 214/16: Etenim, crassiore ut agamus Minerva, ignis proprium est calfacere; hoc autem igni tribuitur motore ab eo, qui coelum agitat, ipsi autem motori, de dei id voluntate ac lege et permissum est et attributum. Itaque calor ipse variat, neque unus in iis est, quae ab eo concalescunt, omnibus, manat igitur exsistitque diversus, ac varius e calefactione effectus, pro natura rei eius, quae concalescit.

176 Ibid., 216: [Q]ua ratione et via deus ipse, ut princeps atque uniformis causa, omni culpa vacuus est. Quid enim ad deum diversitas haec, quod idem ipse ignis lapidem

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Notes in calcem excoquat, in carbonem quercum ac cinerem? liquefaciat plumbum, cogat lutum atque opstringat in tegulam?…. Siquidem deus et princeps ipse est et architectus, et universalis tum lex, tum causa, effectus tamen cuiusque particularibus quidem causis propriisque sunt artificibus dedicati.

177 Ibid., 92: “Igitur ut summa quoque dementia est deo velle praescribere, sic minime consentaneum, vel potius maxime est indecens, ascribere ei vel pedis offensiunculam inter deambulandum, vel lupi in gregem insultum, aut buculae infoecunditatem sterilitatemve asellae, quae inanis cuiusdam sunt infelicisque superstitionis.” 178 Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, 4 vols (Rome, 1918–30), iii, 279, chapter 92, “Quomodo dicitur aliquis bene fortunatus, et quomodo adiuvetur homo ex superioribus causis”: “Cum igitur homo sit ordinatus secundum corpus sub corporibus caelestibus; secundum intellectum vero sub Angelis; secundum voluntatem autem sub Deo: potest contingere aliquid praeter intentionem hominis quod tamen est secundum ordinem caelestium corporum, vel dispositionem Angelorum, vel etiam Dei.” Pontano, De fortuna, 308, paraphrases: “hominem ipsum, quia e corpore quidem constet, coelestibus esse corporibus addictum, quia vero intellectu sit praeditus, angelis, quia autem voluntate utatur, deo, posse itaque quippiam accidere, quod praeter suum hominis sit ipsius propositum atque intentionem, idque pro coelestium tamen corporum affectione proque angelorum constitutione, aut summi etiam dei.” 179 Pontano, De fortuna, 314–26. 180 Ibid., 316: “Provisum vero atque ante cognitum poterit, adhibita prudentia, aut prohiberi ex toto, aut non exigua saltem parte imminui.” 181 Ibid., 304. Pontano refers to the eighth of Ps-Ptolemy’s Hundred Statements. In Pontano, “Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei,” 7v and 10v, he translates, “Sapiens anima confert coelesti operationi, quemadmodum optimus agricola arando expurgandoque confert naturae.” See also the fifth statement, “Potest qui sciens est, multos stellarum effectus avertere, quando naturam earum noverit, ac se ipsum ante illorum eventum praeparare” (“a skilful person, acquainted with the nature of the stars, is enabled to avert many of their effects, and to prepare himself for those effects before they arrive”). 182 Pontano, De fortuna, 304. For the second version of the saying, Tateo refers to Thomas Aquinas, “De sortibus,” in Opera Omnia (Rome, 1976), xliii, 234, “Tholomeus dicit in Centilogio quod ‘sapiens domiantur astris’.” 183 Pontano, De fortuna, 322: “Hoc ipsum aliaque flagitia palam faciunt hominem, si intra rationis gyrum cohibere se et appetitui frenum adhibere voluerit minimeque voluntatem efferri sinet, stellarum configurationes inditasque a coelo propensiones virtute superaturum.” 184 Ibid., 304. Pontano returns to this argument in a famous passage in Pontano, “Aegidius,” 273–79. The passage was republished independently as “Dialogus Joannis Pontani, in quo doctissime disputatur, quatenus credendum sit

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187

188 189

190 191

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astrologiae” in George of Trebizond, Claudii Ptolemaei centum Aphorismos Commentarius (Cologne, 1564). For an early statement, see also Pontano, “Charon,” 56. Ornella Pompeo Faracovi, “In difesa dell’astrologia: risposte a Pico in Bellanti e Pontano,” in Marco Bertozzi, ed., Nello specchio del cielo. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola e le Disputationes contro l‘astrologia divinatoria. Atti del convegno di studi, Mirandola, 16 aprile 2004, Ferrara, 17 aprile 2004 (Florence, 2008), 52–53. For an intersting analysis of the Ptolemiac approach to astrology, see Paul Colilli, Agamben and the Signature of Astrology. Spheres of Potentiality (Lanham, 2015), 140–43. Doren, “Fortuna im Mittelalter und in der Renaissance,” 127–28. Francesco Tateo, Astrologia e moralità (Bari, 1960), 141–49, esp. 46. Don Cameron Allen, “Renaissance Remedies for Fortune: Marlowe and the ‘Fortunati’,” Studies in Philology, 38/2 (1941), 191–92. Patch, “The Tradition of the Goddess Fortuna in Medieval Philosophy and Literature,” 218. Carol Kidwell, for one, remarks that “after all his emphasis on reason and rational behaviour as the key to happiness, Pontano’s irrational conclusion is surprising.” Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 293. For Francesco Tateo’s remarks on the Liber, see Pontano, De fortuna, 35. Valérie Cordonier is currently editing the Liber from the Aristoteles Latinus series. I thank her for her help in understanding the Liber and its origins, and for providing me with a first version of her edition, in part published in Valérie Cordonier, “Réussir sans raison(s). Autour du texte et des gloses du Liber De bona fortuna Aristotilis dans le manuscrit de Melk 796 (1308),” in Andreas Speer and David Wirmer, eds., 1308: eine Topographie historischer Gleichzeitigkeit (Berlin, 2010), 760–70. I will quote from this edition, indicating the lines of the Liber and the corresponding Bekker pages. So far an edition of the Latin text of the relevant parts from the Eudemian Ethics has been available in Henry Jackson, “Eudemian Ethics ‘Theta’ i, ii (H xiii, xiv). 1246a26-1248b 7,” Journal of Philology, 32/64 (1913), 170–200. Moreover, a partial edition (1248a8-1248b11), based on Vat. lat. 2083, dated 1274, is published in T.H. Deman, “Le Liber de bona fortuna dans la Théologie de S. Thomas d’Aquin,” Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et Théologiques, 17 (1928), 39–40. As Cordonier, “Sauver le Dieu du philosophe,” convincingly argues, Aquinas uses the Liber de bona fortuna first and foremost as a weapon against the antiprovidentialist bend of parts of the Aristotelian commentary tradition. In doing so, he does not only use the arguments made in the Liber, but “invents” the Liber in the first place: although he is well aware that he has two chapters from two different Arsitotelian works in front of him, he begins to cite them as a single work from the early 1270s onward, giving it the title under which it will be introduced into the manuscript tradition.

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193 On some of the debates connected to the Liber, see Valérie Cordonier, “Une lecture critique de la théologie d’Aristote: le Quodlibet VI, 10 d‘Henri de Gand comme réponse à Gilles de Rome,” in Valérie Cordonier and Tiziana Suárez-Nani, eds., L’aristotélisme exposé: aspects du débat philosophique entre Henri de Gand et Gilles de Rome (Fribourg, 2014). As Anthony Kenny has noted, 150 mss. of the Liber survive, compared to 55 of the MM and none of the EE. Anthony Kenny, Aristotle on the Perfect Life (Oxford, 1992), 56. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Chrysostomus Javelli still comments on this little work. See Charles H. Lohr, “Renaissance Latin Aristotle Commentaries: Authors G-K,” Renaissance Quarterly, 30/4 (1977), 733. 194 Petrarca, “De rebus senilibus,” 836, 8.3: “Non mihi qui de bona fortuna inscribitur Aristotelis libellus ignotus est, nec Ciceronis illud oblitus sum.” Petrarca, Letters of Old Age, 285. 195 Salutati, De fato et fortuna, 131–33. On Salutati’s arguments, see Charles Trinkaus, “Coluccio Salutati’s Critique of Astrology in the Context of His Natural Philosophy,” Speculum, 64/1 (1989), 64–67. 196 George refers to the Liber in his commentary on Ps-Ptolemy’s Hundred Statements. In the commentary on statement eighteen, he remarks, “Hoc ipsum natura factum ait Aristoteles, quia fortuna natura est, secundum eundem in magnis moralibus, & in eudemiis.” Trebizond, Claudii Ptolemaei centum Aphorismos Commentarius, C3r. 197 See appendix 6, “St. Thomas’ use of the Liber de bona fortuna,” in Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, xxiv: 1a2ae 68–70. The Gifts of the Spirit, ed. Edward D. O’Connor (Cambridge, 2006) 142. The difficulties derive mainly from Moerbeke’s translation. See Dieter Harlfinger, “Die Überlieferungsgeschichte der Eudemischen Ethik,” in Dieter Harlfinger, ed., Untersuchungen zur Eudemischen Ethik (Berlin, 1971), 29. 198 Liber 1.49-51 = MM 2.8.1207b1-3: “Et si quis interroget sic habentem, ‘propter quid hoc placet tibi operari’, ‘Nescio’, inquit, sed placet mihi’, simile paciens hiis qui a deo aguntur.” Pontano, De fortuna, 262: “Ac prioris quidem generis exemplum est Eutychus Sabinus, qui pransus cum esset conversus ad uxorem ‘nescio quid— inquit—boni mihi praesagit animus’, itaque e vestigio ‘iturus Romam sum, cras ad te rediturus.’” Once again, I thank Valérie Cordonier, who has pointed out this passage to me during our reading of De fortuna. 199 In many manuscripts, the twofold origin of the Liber de bona fortuna is clearly stated. See George Lacombe, Aristoteles Latinus, 2 vols (Rome, 1939), 1:72. For Pontano, see above for George of Trebizonds remark in his commentary on PsPtolemy’s Hundred Statements. 200 Liber 1.2-5 = MM 2.8.1206b32-37. For the translations of the passages, I adopt the translation in Aristotle,The Works of Aristotle, ix, ii: Magna Moralia. Ethica Eudemia. De virtutibus et vitiis, ed. W.D. Ross (Oxford, 1915). The Latin version reads: “Putant enim multi felicem uitam eam, que bona fortuna esse aut non sine

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bona fortuna, et recte forte. Sine enim exterioribus bonis, quorum fortuna est domina, non contingit felicem esse. Determinandum igitur de bona fortuna, et simpliciter bene fortunatus quis est et quibus et circa quid.” 201 See Pontano, De fortuna, 82–88. The titles of chapters 2–5 are “Fortunam non esse Deum,” “Fortunam non esse naturam,” “Fortunam non esse intellectum,” “Fortunam non esse rationem.” This sequence is introduced by the remark: “recte Aristoteles hanc ipsam fortunam nec Deum esse, nec naturam putavit, minime vero intellectum, aut rationem.” 202 Liber 1.12-21 = MM 2.8.1026b38-1027a8: [i] Neque enim utique dicet quis fortunam quod est natura. Natura enim semper cuius est causa, huius ut in pluribus aut similiter factiua est, fortuna autem numquam, sed inordinate et ut accidit. Propter quod fortuna in talibus. [ii] Neque utique intellectum quendam aut racionem rectam. Et enim non minus est ordinatum et quod semper similiter, fortuna autem non. Propter quod et ubi plurimus intellectus & racio, ibi minima fortuna, ubi autem plurima fortuna, ibi minimus intellectus. [iii] Sed forte quidem bona fortuna est ut cura quedam dei. Aut hoc utique uidebitur. Deum enim dignificamus dominum existentem talium ut dignis distribuat et bona et mala. Fortuna autem et que a fortuna ut uere uelut utique contingit fiunt. Si autem deo tale attribuimus, prauum ipsum iudicem faciemus uel non iustum. 203 Pontano, De fortuna, 166: “Ex his igitur eos proprie magis atque usitatius fortunatos dicimus, quibus fortuna ipsa diutius arriserit apparueritque fovendis eis firmior ac stabilior.” 204 Liber 1.37-39 = MM 2.8.1207a27-29: “Et enim cui preter cogitacionem suam acciderit aliquod bonum operari, bene fortunatum aimus.” Ibid: “[Q]uorum etiam merita vix aliqua antecedunt, quae dignos iis beneficiis illos faciant, non assiduae prudentesque cogitationes atque consilia, non ingenii validae vires solertiaque permagna et rara, non maioribus denique in rebus diuturnior exercitatio ac rerum plurimarum usus.” 205 Ibid., 174. 206 Liber 1.45-46 = MM 2.8.1207a35-36: “Est igitur bona fortuna sine racione natura.” Ibid., 172: “Etenim licet disputatum sit fortunam a natura prorsus esse aliam, non defuere tamen qui assererent … fortunam … irrationalem quandam esse naturam.” 207 Liber 1.46-47 = MM 2.8.1207a36-37: “Bene fortunatus est enim sine racione habens impetum ad bona, et hec adipiscens, hoc autem est nature.” Ibid.: “Impetum itaque esse eam censent, quod sit absque ratione feraturque suopte tantum agitatu atque impulsu.” 208 Liber 1.49-51 = MM 2.8.1207b1-3: “Et si quis interroget sic habentem, ‘propter quid hoc placet tibi operari,’ ‘Nescio,’ inquit, ‘sed placet michi.’” Ibid.: “Itaque ab impetu ipso raptum aliquem si interroges, quo se proripiat, respondebit aut ‘nihil opinor,’ ut violentus et parum audiens.” See also above.

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209 Ibid., 230: “Atque hi quidem ab ipso statim initio quales futuri sint apparent, quaeque inter eos ipsos aliosque qui secus a natura instituti sunt, intercessura differentia sit ac varietas; perinde ut qui aut caesiis nascuntur oculis aut nigellis.” Liber 11–14 = EE 8.2.1247a9-14: “Nunc quidem enim sic putant ut, natura quibudam existentibus, natura autem quales quosdam facit, et confestim a natiuitate differunt, quemadmodum hii quidem glauci, hii autem nigrorum oculorum eo quod tale secundum esse tale oportet et habere, sic et bene fortunati et infortunati.” 210 Ibid.: “[S]aepenumero eos ipsos, quos fortunatos dicimus, fuisse desertos ab consueta fortunae aspiratione, dum relicto naturalis illius impetus cursu, ad rationem declinant, rationisque sese praeceptis accommodant.” Liber 2.111-114 = EE 8.2.1248a31-34: “et consiliari non expedit ipsis: habent enim principium tale quod melius intellectu et consilio. Qui autem racionem, hoc autem non habent neque divinos instinctus, hoc non possunt.” 211 Ibid.: “Vocamus autem electionem promptitudinem illam sequendi statim illud ipsum, quod impetus repente excitatus oblatum animo obiecerit, nulla prorsus consultatione adhibita, aut pensitatione.” Tateo argues that Pontano distinguishes between “electio,” a simple choice free of any ethical consideration, and “delectus” as moral choice. In De prudentia, however, “electio” is the direct translation of Aristotle’s “deliberate appetition of things.” See above. 212 Liber 2.23-29 = EE 8.2.1247a23-29: Circa naucleriam enim non maxime industrii bene fortunati, sed quemadmodum in taxillorum casu hic quidem nichil, alius autem iacit ex eo quod naturam habet bene fortunatam, aut eo quod ametur, ut aiunt, a deo, et extrinsecum aliquid sit dirigens (ut puta nauis male regibilis melius frequenter nauigat, sed non propter se ipsam, sed quia habet gubernatorem bonum), sed sic quod bene fortunatum daimonem habet gubernatorem. Ibid., 246/48. 213 Liber 2.123-127 = EE 8.2.1248b 3-7: "Manifestum itaque quoniam due sunt species bone fortune, hec quidem diuina (propter quod et uidentur bene fortunati propter deum dirigere). Iste autem est qui secundum impetum directiuus, alius autem qui preter impetum; sine racione autem ambo. Et hec quidem continua bona fortuna magis, hec autem non continua.“ 214 Kenny, Aristotle on the Perfect Life, 73. 215 Cordonier, “Sauver le Dieu du philosophe”; Cordonier, “Une lecture critique.” See also Deman, “Le Liber de bona fortuna dans la Théologie de S. Thomas d’Aquin.” Cornelio Fabro, “Le Liber de bona fortuna chez saint Thomas,” Revue thomiste, 88 (1988), 556–72. Daniel Westberg, “Did Aquinas Change His Mind about the Will?,” Thomist; a Speculative Quareterly Review, 58/1 (1994), 41–60. 216 This error goes back to the Aristotle, Opera Aristotelis de naturali philosophia (Venice, 1482), in which the comment is ascribed to Thomas, not to Giles. 217 Liber 2.119-123 = EE 8.2.1248a39-1248b3: “Propter quod melancolici et recte diuinantes (uidetur enim principium, amissa racione, ualere magis)

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et quemadmodum ceci memorantur magis amissis que hiis qui ad uisibilia, uirtuosius esse quod memoratur.” Pontano, De fortuna, 182, “Similitudo de Sybillis, vaticinantibusque ac de poetis.” 218 Ibid., 250: Theodorus Gaza vir & vita & moribus non minus probatus quam eruditione rerum plurimarum clarus atque scientia, cum audiret obiurgentes quosdam, magis quam incusantes Ferdinandum Regem Neapolitanorum, quod parum consulte, nec omnino prudenter res suas administraret. ‘Amabo—inquit—viri boni desinite Regem incusare, cui moribus his hocque gubernandi genere seque resque suas moderanti omnia e sententia fluerent. An ne id agere est in animo, quo cursum rerum eius suapte natura fluentium, consultando, matureque agendo impediatis? quin gradiatur Rex & fortunatus & felix non alia magis quam qua hactenus incessit via, ne dum iter mutat ac mores, fortunam quoque ipsi nullo modo cupitis, novis artibus mutet.’ Intellegebat igitur vir doctissimus, id illos tandem agere, dum quid fortuna esset ignorant, uti consiliis cogiationibusque bene concoctis aurarum secundos flatus Regiis ab rebus averterent. Tr. in Kidwell, Poet and Prime Minister, 293. 219 Bona and her son to Ferrante. Milan, July 11, 1478: “Neque satis fortunam cognoscis cuius proprium est in eodem vestigio nunquam stare. Itaque, nisi fallimur, non multo post sese aliorsum convertet.” Quoted in Giulio C. Zimolo, “Le relazioni tra Milano e Napoli e la politica italiana in due lettere del 1478,” Archivio storico lombardo, 64 (1937), 421. 220 Ferrante to the dukes of Milan. Naples, August 15, 1478: Quod scribitis ignorare nos fortunae instabilitatem eiusque artem ludicram, cui ascribamus nescimus, vobis ne an imprudentiae ignorantiaeque Dictatoris vestri: nemo enim est vel conditionis vel aetatis nostrae, qui fortunae ipsius magis calleat mores nedum sciat quam nos ipsi, qui cum ea longissimo tempore conflictaverimus, atque ideo non eam lacessimus, ut ii faciunt qui vestrum arbitrium vinctum habent, sed ferimus patimurque eodem animo semper qualencumque se nobis praebeat. Nec dubitamus, si fortunae ipsius aeque tela experti essetis ac nos sumus, aut desiissetis ante aut nunc desineretis, aliorum et quidem imprudentium arbitrio regi, qui vestro possetis. Ibid., 432.

Chapter 6 1

Pontano, De principe, 50: “Sedebat aliquando Antonius Panhormita de lectione fessus in vestibulo Pliniani sui … Cumque inter eos qui aderant esset de virtute quaestio dixissetque Antonius splendidissimum eius lumen esse, praeteriens villicus: “Nescio quam—inquit—virtus ista quam dicis splendeat, Antoni,

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sed certe scio me, diutius illius contemplandae desiderio captum, intueri eam nunquam potuisse.” Ad quae, surridens Antonio: “… sed dic, quaeso, quid putes esse in orbe splendidissimum?” “Solem” inquit ille. “Atqui solem caeci non vident; non vident—respondit—quod ii sint oculis capti: multo ergo splendidior est virtus quam etiam caeci apertissime videant”.” Translation in Pontano, “The Prince,” 77. 2 King Ferrante to Donna Tode Sentillas. Naples, October 5, 1491: “Le opere virtuose, et li portamenti laudabili, naturalmente sonno in prezo presso ciascuno, et principalmente presso li principi … non deveno le virtute stare in ascoste, ma ponerse in luce et in loco dove se possano mostrare continuamente et farse cognoscere con testificatione de laude et premio del ben fare.” Francesco Trinchera, Codice Aragonese o sia lettere regie, ordinamenti ed altri atti governativi de’ sovrani aragonesi in Napoli riguardanti l‘amministrazione interna del reame e le relazioni all’estero, 3 vols (Naples, 1866–74), 2.1, 7. 3 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 174r. 4 See, for example, the first chapter, “Honorem et maximum et pulcherrimum esse bonorum externorum omnium,” in Pontano, De magnanimitate, 3–4. 5 On this ideology and its revival and its employment in the formation of the Renaissance prince up to Machiavelli, see Stacey, Roman Monarchy and the Renaissance Prince. 6 As Claudio Finzi remarks, the next logical step was Machiavelli’s dissociation of virtue and its appearance. What counted, was appearance, not virtue. Finzi, Re, Baroni, Popolo: La politica di Giovanni Pontano, 24. 7 For Skinner’s discussion of De principe, see primarily Skinner, “Political Philosophy,” 424–25. Now in Skinner, Visions of Politics, i, 135–36. 8 Pontano, De principe, xxxiii. 9 Ibid.: “se rige por openión.” On the problem of image, see also Francesco Storti, “El buon marinero.” Psicologia politica e ideologia monarchica al tempo di Ferdinando I d‘Aragona re di Napoli (Rome, 2014), 23–38. 10 Poggio Bracciolini, De infelicitate principum, ed. Davide Canfora (Roma, 1998), 6: Et enim omnes ferme mortales, veluti ex loco inferiori suspicientes, hos ex altissima, ut videntur, basi suspensos rerum dominos admirantur atque obtorpescunt, inhiantesque ad exteriorem principum pompam atque ornatus quales oculis cernuntur, tales interius esse putant. Virtutem vero et bene vivendi disciplinam pauci appetunt, pauciores querunt, satis superque satis sibi sapientie ac prudentie inesse, vel potius superesse, ducentes, dummodo assequantur que preclara ac speciosa vulgo publica insania fecit. 11 Ibid., 11–12: “In pervestigandis vero excellentium virorum monimentis, quorum sapientia et doctrina ad vitam beatam et veram felicitatem perducimur, obtorpescunt atque obdormiunt, vitam plerique more pecorum agentes. Insanis cupiditatibus et variis ambitionibus acti, mirum de virtutibus aut sapientia aut

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aliqua bene vivendi arte silentium agunt, ut non principum aut felicium, sed portentorum sint nomine appellandi.” 12 Ibid., 14–15: Quomodo enim viro doctissimo licet dicere, eos esse felices, quos ne homines quidem quandoque audeat appellare, ignavos, imperitos, indoctos, impotentes, avaros, superbos, iracundos, crudeles, libidinosos, adulatorum et stultitie servos, qui ambitione nescio qua effrenata, tanquam ad pestem mortalium nati, bellis semper indulgent, pacis atque otii hostes? Non licuit Italie nostris temporibus ab armis quiescere propter nonnullorum principum aliena rapiendi cupiditatem. 13 Ibid., 30: “Vellem doctorum ac bonorum virorum gratia, ut sapentie darent operam principes illiusque preceptis obtemperarent. Sed, cum his nulla sapientie cura sit, nec virtutes quidem cognoscere aut earum usu ad vite subsidium uti possunt. Fugit ignorantiam virtus et rationi sapientieque inheret.” 14 Ibid., 38: “Nam neque litterarum studia apud reges et dominos, nisi admodum paucos, unquam viguerunt, neque ab eis doctrina ac sapientia prediti aut culti aut magni habiti.” 15 Ibid.: “Loquendi enim vivendique libertatem litterarum studia expetunt et sequuntur, servitutem fugiunt atque abhorrent.” 16 Ibid., 39. 17 Ibid., 40–41. 18 Ibid., 41–42: “[R]arissime reperietis vel philosophum vel oratorem vel quempiam litteris et sapientia preditum aut ditatum a regibus aut opibus ac dignitate auctum vel ad prestanda consilia vel ad preciepiendam vite disciplinam vel ad componendos mores fuisse accersitum. Quedam ab his ad iactantiam quandam oblata vel data accepimus.” 19 Ibid., 39: “Paucorum, si qua ea fuit, virtus…. Sed tamen, si qui paulo tolerabiliores aut etiam, ut vultis, boni extiterint, id ita perraro contingit, ut portenti loco haberi possit. Nam sepius monstra hominum terra quam bonos principes produxit. Natus est nuper infans bovis capite, alter vero cati.” 20 Ibid., 54–55. 21 Ibid., 57. 22 Ibid., 58: Si quo igitur in loco habitat, inter privatos diversorium habet, procul a regum culmine et fastigio imperandi. Virtutes enim effectrices sunt vite felicis, que, a principum domiciliis excluse, si quando casu aut errore limen ingrediuntur, e vestigio aufugere coguntur, perterrite moribus, ministris, artibus, quibus apud eos vivitur. Cum privatis vero, cum in eis vigeant studia sapientie et doctrine, cum litterarum otio occupentur … libenter versantur et felices reddunt suos cultores.

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23 The Cock 24 in Lucian, Works, 8 vols (Cambridge, MA, 1913–61), iii, 121. Poggio’s Latin version reads: “Mei vero miserebar, qui essem similis magnis illis colossis, quos Phidias aut Miron sculpserat. Hi enim Iovem aut Neptunum ex auro vel ebore sculpunt, fulmen aut tridentem in manibus tenentes. At si quis intraspexerit, videbit informe corpus, vectibus ferreis, clavis, cuneis et luto piceo compactum, in quibus mures et mustele diversorium habent.” (Bracciolini, De infelicitate principum, 68.) 24 Bracciolini, De infelicitate principum, 12: “‘Facillime’, inquit, ‘Nicolae, qui mos tuus est, laberis ad detrahendum. Equidem minime mirror, si quando es in privatis dicatior, cum in ipsos principes tam facile inveharis. Et tamen nullius iniuria aut in te contumelia facit, ut tam sis promptus aut copiosus in eorum obiurgationem.’” 25 Ibid., 12–13: “Tanta enim inter homines versatur improborum copia, ita sceleribus omnia inficiuntur, ita hypocrite superabundant, qui videri quam esse boni malunt, ita quilibet sua vitia aliquo honesti velamento tegit, ut periculosum sit et mendacio proximum quempiam laudare.” 26 Ibid., 18: “Sed scriptorum nonnullorum assentatio, qui adulationis premia a princibus expectabant, ex parvula scintilla virtutis maximum incendium excitarunt, ampliantes ea verbis que tenuia rebus erant.” 27 John M. Najemy, “Introduction: Italy and the Renaissance,” in John M. Najemy, ed., Italy in the Age of the Renaissance, 1300–1550, ed. John A. Davis (Oxford, 2004), 4. 28 Stacey, “Imperial Rome and the Legitimation of Political Authority in Renaissance Naples,” 1. 29 Ferraù, Il tessitore di Antequera. Storiografia umanistica meridionale, x. 30 Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), Dels fets e dits del gran rey Alfonso, 78 (1.1): “Tum rex, accepimus, inquit Herculem etiam non rogatum laborantibus subvenire consuesse: ‘Nos reginae, nos feminae, nos prope afflictae, nos demum tantopere roganti, si diis placet, opem ferre dubitabimus? Grave quidem bellum suscepturos nos esse confiteor, verum eo praeclarius futurum. Quo sine labore et periculo nemo adhuc gloriam consecutus est.’” 31 Ibid., 78: “Orabant equidem suppliciter Ioannae Neapolitanorum reginae oratores Alfonsum, ut destitutae miseraeque reginae auxilium ferret. His refragabantur pene omnes regis consiliarii durum et perquam anceps fore bellum dictitantes apud genus hominum armis exercitatum, industria atque opibus pollens potensque, et praesertim apud mulierem ingenio mobili et inconstanti.” 32 Ibid., 148 (1.21): Urbem Neapolitanam pertinacissime obduratam pugnando denique cum cepisset, Deus immortalis! Quam humaniter, quam liberaliter quam mansuete sese gessit, omnium primum milites a caede, ac direptione coercuit, et praeter primos impetus, quos continere facile non fuit, postea cives omnes a militum furore, et avaritia tutos incolumesque servavit. Ipsemet stricto ense,

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perequitans civitatem prospiciensque ne quis alteri vim, aut contumeliam afferret. Dein his, quamquam victis, liberorum iura concessit, inimicorum omnium etiam Petri iocundissimi fratris caedis oblitus. 33 ACA Reg. 2940. 176r, July 14, 1452, in the king’s own hand: “dizen me que tu gente faze mucho mal, nole des rienda que quando querras; no los poderas mandar o del mal o del bien el principio es fundador; o te amen o te teman, mas faze que en todas maneras seas obedescidoque en otra manera no averas onor.” Quoted in Ryder, The Kingdom of Naples Under Alfonso the Magnanimous, 285. 34 Letter to Bartolomeo Facio. November 23, 1447: “Ea vero Xenophontis historia non usquequaque vera est: non enim historiam Cyri conscribere voluit, sed optimum principem, qualis nunquam fuit, effingere.” Poggio Bracciolini, Lettere, ed. Helene Harth, 3 vols (Florence, 1984–1987), 3:39 and 54. 35 Fubini, Umanesimo e secolarizzazione, 262. Translation in Fubini, Humanism and Secularization, 255, n. 139. 36 Beccadelli, Dels fets e dits del gran rey Alfonso, 86 (1.6): “Cum audisset quendam ex Hispaniae regibus solitum dicere, non decere generosum & nobilem virum esse literatum, exclamasse ferunt, vocem hanc non regis, sed bovis esse.” Aeneas Sylvius’s comment reads like this: “Cum Alphonsum ego ex Bajis Puteolos usque sequerer, essetque illi ad me sermo de litteris. Ait se legisse librum Augustini de civitate Dei ex Latino sermone in Gallicam linguam translatum, in cujus proœmio scriptum esset, Regem illiteratum nihil aliud nisi asinum coronatum esse. Atque ita sibi videri affirmavit.” Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), De dictis et factis Alphonsi regis (Basel, 1538), 28. 37 Beccadelli, Dels fets e dits del gran rey Alfonso, 192 (3.pr): “Nam cum quidam ab eo sciscitaretur, quomodo in tot divitiis pauper effici posset. Effici posse respondit, si sapientia venditaretur. Quo ex dicto utique planum fecit pluris se rerum cognitionem quam regna aut divitias aestimare.” 38 Ibid., 74 (1.pr): Nam philosophi, quique doctrinam aliquam profitentur, studiis tantummodo suis intenti aliena omnia contemnentes, haud mirum videri debet, si singulis aetatibus plures & dicti & sapientes evadunt. Reges vero ac terrarum principes rempublicam domi militiaeque gerentes, plerumque assentatoribus circumsessos, atque iis qui ad voluptatum potius exercitia admoveant quam doctrinae, firmos & constantes si invenias, neque a studiis bonarum artium abhorrentes, non tu hos supra modum admiraberis & in coelum usque laudibus vehes? 39 Ibid., 188 (2.67): Doctrina vero et ingenio insignes amplexus est, praecipue Bartholomeum Faccium suavis et priscae eloquentiae virum, a quo quidem et res a se gestas

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Notes perscribi cupide appetivit, maxime eius libri suavitate allocutus, quem de vitae felicitate regi ipsi antea dicaverat. Georgium Trapezuntium graecis et latinis litteris virum eruditissimum inter familiares, quos cum admiratione diligebat, admisit, dato negocio ut Aristotelis de naturali historia libros omnis e graeco in latinum traduceret, quoniam illi qui prius a nescio quo traducti extabant, propter asperitatem barbariemque orationis haud satis probabantur. Leonardam vero Aretinum, virum aetatis suae disertissimum, quo minus apud se habuerit, non voluntas sed invalitudo illius atque aetas ingravescens impedimento fuit. At epistolae quae ultro citroque extant et extabunt diu mutui et amoris et officii documenta praestabunt. Poggium Florentinum, virum illustrem ob Chiropediam suo nomine e graeco conversam, non solum benivolentia amplexus est, sed honorabilibus et opulentissimis donis ornavit.

40 Ibid., 188 (2.62): “Pueros, quos ad studia litterarum aptos ac prope natos intueretur, verum paupertate et inopia ad gloriam aspirare non posse, ut quisque vel ad hanc, vel ad illam disciplinam idoneus videbatur, partim rhetoribus, partim philosophis erudiendos commendabat, fovebatque sumptum illis affatim ministrans.” See also ibid., 182. 41 Pontano, De principe, 4: “Non deeris autem tibi si recta praecipientibus, si honesta monentibus obtemperaveris.” Ryder, The Kingdom of Naples Under Alfonso the Magnanimous, 88. 42 Pontano, De principe, 24: “iacienda sunt fundamenta ab adolescentia” See Pier Paolo Vergerio, “De ingenuis moribus et liberalibus studiis adolescentiae”, in Craig Kallendorf, ed., Humanist educational treatises (Cambridge, MA, 2002), 2: “Iacienda sunt igitur in hac aetate fundamenta bene vivendi et conformandus ad virtutem animus.” 43 Pontano, De principe, 24: “Primum enim est ut colere sapientes assuescat; secundum ut illorum dictis aures libenter adhibeat; tertium ut eorum se quam maxime similem esse velit, quorum non modo facta, sed etiam dicta imitari contendat. Ex quibus principiis usus, deinde progressionibus, ad quam contendit sapientiam victor consequetur.” Vergerio, “De ingenuis moribus,” 4. 44 Pontano, De principe, 28: “Avus nunquam sine libris in expeditionem profectus, tentorium in quo asservabantur iuxta se poni iubebat cumque nullas Fabiorum, Marcellorum, Scipionum, Alexandrorum, Caesarum haberet imagines alias quas intueretur, libros inspiciebat, quibus gesta ab illis continerentur.” On the king’s readings of Caesar, see De dictis et factis 2.13. 45 Ibid., 34: “Ego—inquit—huic regioni quae non parva regni Neapolitani nec contemnenda pars est, libenter cesserim si temporibus meis datum esset hunc poetam ut haberent, quem mortuum pluris ipse faciam quam omnis Aprutii dominatum.”

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46 Ibid., 28: Neque illis assentiendum est qui litteras accusant, qui si propterea comtemnendas ducunt quod discendae non sint tanquam non necessariae, nescio quid sit quod ipsi discendum putent. Quid est enim, per Christum, tam necessarium quam multa scire atque ea tum in cognitione naturae et rerum occultarum, tum in memoria rerum praeteritarum et clarorum virorum exemplis posita? Nisi si quid honestum quid turpe, quid bonum quid malum, quid expetendum contra quid fugiendum. Cappelli connects this passage to Cic., Off. 1.153. 47 On Sanseverino (who is not the Roberto Sanseverino of chapter 1), see Carlo de Frede, “Roberto Sanseverino principe di Salerno (per la storia della feudalità meridionale nel secolo XV),” Rassegna storica salernitana, 12 (1951), Raffaele Colapietra, I Sanseverino di Salerno. Mito e realtà del barone ribelle (Salerno, 1985); and, “I Sanseverino come paradigma critico della storiografia napoletana,” Rassegna storica salernitana, ns 6/3.2 (1986), 7–46. 48 Pontano, De magnanimitate, 1–2: Atque illi quidem ad Josiam usque avum atque ad Julium Antonium patrem tuum, delectati bellicis tantum studiis, in eo ipso genere laudum excellentiaeque claruerunt. Pater vero tuus, cum ipse quidem minime assequi posset quod maxime utique cupiebat, ut militaribus ornamentis, laudes eas adiungeret, quae e literarum comparantur studiis atque cognitione, illud tamen summa cura, singulari etiam diligentia praestitit et opera, quo tuque fratresque item tui, quandiu aetas cuiusque tulit, optimis sub praceptoribus instituti, ita erudiremini ut, cum aetas ipsa firmior iam magisque robusta ad tubam vocasset ac gladium, ipsis e ludis literarum atque historiarum de lectionibus, animi magnitudinem cumque ea pariter maximorum vobiscum ducum atque imperatorum exempla in aciem afferretis. 49 Divitiis, “Giovanni Pontano and his idea of patronage,” 120. On Torresani and his introduction, see 81–82. 50 Pontano, Opera Omnia soluta oratione composita, 1: *ii r: “Nec dubitabat Rex ille sapientissimus regibus omnibus & principibus ad se venientibus postquam arma, equos, gemmas, aurum rude & signatum, lautamque supellectilem & complura alia ostendisset, unde pacis ornamenta & belli subsidia peti possent, illam ipsam imaginem ad extremum spectandam proponere ut rem omnium pulcherrimam & pretiosissimam.” See Caglioti, “Adriano di Giovanni de’ Maestri, detto Adriano Fiorentino, Giovanni Gioviano Pontano,” 114. The anecdote was also used by Philipp Melanchthon, who published Pontano’s Meteora in 1524. As Walther Ludwig, “‘Pontani amatores’: Joachim Camerarius und Eobanus Hessus in Nürnberg,” in

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51 52 53 54 55 56

57

58

59

60

Notes Thomas Baier, ed., Pontano und Catull (Tübingen, 2001), 11–12, n. 4, remarks, the editors of Melanchthon’s letters were unable to decide whether the “King Alfonso” of Melanchthon’s anecdote was Alfonso I or Alfonso II. It is curious that Ludwig himself expresses the opinion that it refers to neither. Even more puzzling, he also affirms that a parallel to Melanchthon’s account was unknown, although he quotes the letter of dedication in the same footnote. For a picture of the bust, see James David Draper, Olga Raggio, and James Parker, “Recent Acquisitions: A Selection 1990–1991,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, New Series, 49/2 (1991), 26. Ryder, Alfonso the Magnanimous, 393. Pontano, “Charon,” 30: “Quinam venti diebus his vobis flavere? Nam in terris magnam vitibus, maiorem oleis citriisque boreas vastitatem intulit.” Ryder, Alfonso the Magnanimous, 418. Pontano, “Charon,” 50: “Principio Italia, unde ipse nunc venio, magnis quassata est terrarum motibus permultaque oppida prostrata solo iacent.” On the earthquake and its manifold repercussions on the culture of the time, see Bruno Figliuolo, Il terremoto del 1456, 2 vols (Altavilla Silentina, 1988). Pontano, “Charon,” 52: “Exortus est cometes, qui, cum gravissima bella tum regnorum portendere eversiones soleat, omnium mentes atque animos concussit etiam futurorum metu malorum.” Ibid., 58/60: “Tertium quoque portentum nimis graviter eos vexat: complures enim dies sol radios nullos misit aerque omnis coeruleus visus est, quae res hominum animos ad superstitionem vertit.” As this passage shows, Pontano was well acquainted with a kind of natural philosophy that some have ascribed to the arrogant followers of an arabian-flavored Aristotelianism allegedly opposed by the humanist culture of the time. Matteo dell’ Aquila, Tractatus de cometa atque terraemotu (Cod. Vat. Barb. Lat. 268), ed. Bruno Figliuolo (Salerno, 1990), 65: “Nono in loco ponamus quod ipse vidi mane sequente hunc motum terr[a]e: solem fere obscurum et quasi caliginosum et, prope ipsum, nubes oblongas ruptas et obscuras, qu[a]e terrestrem vaporem indicant iam quasi de carcere terr[a]e per motum ipsius effugientem.” For further information on Matteo, see Bruno Figliuolo, La cultura a Napoli nel secondo Quattrocento. Ritratti di protagonisti (Udine, 1997), 37–86. Aquila, Tractatus, 65: “Sepe metum, post illum tremebundum ed periculo plenum motum terr[a]e quem iis diebus, velut diis terr[a]e c[a]elique turbatis, passi sumus, mecum ipse colligebam; quod oculis vidi quodve, tremulus adhuc, expertus sum, et que in dies accipio, miranda quidem, sed fideliter relata inter memoratuque digna, posteris relinqui egregium iudicavi.” Pontano, “De fortitudine,” 55v: Videamus … quae terribilia dicuntur, quae bifariam partitur Aristoteles. Alia enim vult, quae omnino captum hominis exsuperent, quippe quibus nec vires

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nostrae pares sint, nec ullus humanae prudentiae rationique vel tolerandis illis, vel pervincendis locus relinquatur … ea quidem metuere sani potius quam imbecilli est animi … Paucis ante annis cum tera movisset, quot oppida urbesque non quassavit modo, verum etiam funditus evertit? ut qui reliqui sunt, nihil ea nocte meminerint miserabilius. Cecidere ea strage in Hirpinis, Sannio, Lucania, eaque Campaniae parte, quae cis Lyrim est, ad quatuor & viginti hominum millia. Dicat nunc aliquis Teraemotum nullo esse pacto formidandum. Contendat etiam hic suum fortitudini locum esse. Haec igitur, aliaque huiusmodi fortes, ingnavique iusta metuent. The reference is to EN 3.7.1115b25-26. 61 See Giuniano Maio, De maiestate, ed. Franco Gaeta (Bologna, 1956), 78–79: “non manco ammirabile che rara et grande signo de naturale constanza.” On Maio and his relationship with Pontano and Sannazaro, see Soranzo, Poetry and Identity, 77–84. 62 See Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, ms. ital. 1711, available ark:/12148/ btv1b8438678d, 19r. 63 On Aristotle’s discussion of earthquakes, Malcolm Wilson, Structure and Method in Aristotle’s Meteorologica. A More Disorderly Nature (Cambridge, 2013), 217–35. Pontano elaborates on this treatment in the chapter “De terraemotu” in Giovanni Pontano, “Meteororum Liber,” in Mauro De Nichilo, ed., I poemi astrologici di Giovanni Pontano. Storia del testo. Con un saggio di edizione critica del “Meteorum liber” (Bari, 1975), 119–23. On Seneca’s discussion, see G.D. Williams, “GrecoRoman Seismology and Seneca on Earthquakes in ‘Natural Questions’ 6,” Journal of Roman Studies, 96/1 (2006), 124–46. 64 In Pontano’s translation in “Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei,” 90r, the aphorism reads: Cometae quorum intercapedo est undem signorum a Sole, si apparuerint in cardinibus, regni alicuius rex, aut ex principibus regni aliquis morietur. Sin in loco succedente, bene se habebunt quae thesauri eius sunt, suum tamen gubernatorem mutabit. Quod si in loco declinante, morbi ac repentinae mortes erunt. At si ab occasu moventur ad ortum, externus hostis regiones incursabit, sin non moventur, provincialis hostis erit. 65 Pontano, “De magnificentia,” 204: “Georgius Trapezuntius, rerum vetustarum vir abunde studiosus, audientibus nobis, adolescentes cum essemus, non semel retulit.” Pontano, “Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei,” 90r. 66 George of Trebizond, Claudii Ptolemaei centum Aphorismos Commentarius, K4v: “ut dum haec scriberem, cometa stella Rhomae apparuit, primo quidem circa Kalendas Iunias, inter quintam & sextam noctis horam in orientali angulo.” 67 Ibid., K6r: “Quare melius est, ut ego arbitror, ad situm totius simpliciter captum, quam ad singulares regnorum vel regum figuras referre. Illud apprime notandum,

286

68

69

70 71

Notes saepiusque repetendum, significationes cometarum praeter opinionem, ac insolentes esse, ut sicut raro apparent, sic inconsueta significare videantur.” Pontano, “Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei,” 91v: “Nobis adolescentibus insignis etiam cometes ad orientem in Cancri Leonisque reginibus multis diebus fulsit, tantae longitudinis ut amplius quam duo coeli signa comae suae tractu occuparet. Eum secuta est Alphonsi regis mors quae Aemiliam, Sabinam, Campaniam, universumque regnum Neapolitanum & longo & gravi bello implicavit.” “Lo novo re ha havuto quasi universale obedientia da tutto lo regno,” as P. Villarasa wrote to Bartolomeo da Recanati only one day after Alfonso’s death. Quoted in Francesco Senatore, “Le ultime parole di Alfonso il Magnanimo,” in G. Rosseti and G. Vitolo, eds., Medioevo Mezzogiorno Mediterraneo. Studi in onore di Mario Del Treppo (Naples, 2000), 270. Ibid. Pontano, “Charon,” 50: Quod singulis vix seculis semel accidit, in eo avertendo magnopere occupati sunt omnes; quae vero pericula ac mala singulis pene momentis suae ipsorum nefariae cupiditates afferunt, ad ea volentes laetique feruntur. Nocte una post aliquot etiam secula quod ad viginti hominum millia sub tectis oppressa sunt, omnes hoc horrent incusantque, ac damnant naturam, quae vix scio quamobrem amplius illos ferat. At bella, quae unius horae momento et fere quotannis multa hominum millia exhauriunt, interdum regna tota populosissimasque extinguunt nationes, qua non arte quaerunt?

72 Ibid., 78: Min. Quid autem portenta sibi ista volunt?—Merc. Pestem significant et bellum.—Min. Bellumne? a quibus?—Merc. A sacerdotibus.—Min. Ab iis igitur inferetur bellum quos maxime deceret pacis auctores esse?—Merc. Verbis pacem, coeterum rebus bellum petunt.—Min. Inferendi belli quaenam causa?—Merc. Ampliandi regni cupiditas.—Min. Horum igitur malorum causa est avaritia?—Merc. Ea ipsa; quae in hoc hominum genere quanta sit dici vix potest. 73 Giovanni Pontano, “De bello Neapolitano [Extracts],” in Liliana Monti Sabia, ed., Pontano e la storia: dal De bello neapolitano all’Actius (Rome, 1995), 84: “Callistus Pontifex Maximus … perversa consilia et perfidiae plena adversus Ferdinandum agitare coepit clamque cum primoribus civitatum ac regulis agree de rebellione, divulgatis etiam epistolis, quibus Ferdinandum supposititium Alfonsi filium diceret, denique aqua et igni interdiceret, qui huius imperata facerent et in officio ac fide permanerent.” The papal bull in question was issued on July 14, 1458. It renewed the pope’s claim to Naples as a feud. In his private talks, on the other hand, he spread the rumor of Ferrante’s illegitimate birth. See Emilio Nunziante, “I primi anni di Ferdinando d’Aragona e l‘invasione di Giovanni d’Angiò,” Archivio

Notes

74

75 76 77

78

79

80

287

Storico per le Province Napoletane, 17/3 (1892), 739–40. On the speculations about Ferrante’s mother, see Ernesto Pontieri, Per la storia del regno di Ferrante I d’Aragona re di Napoli (2nd ed., Naples, 1969), 19–24. Pontieri also discusses Pontano’s point of view in De bello neapolitano. Pontano, “De bello Neapolitano,” 84: “Quod ni Callisti consilia mors interrupisset, ingens maximeque calamitosum conflatum iri bellum apparebat, quippe qui esset fluxa fide, pervicaci ingenio, variis consiliis, praecipiti ambitione.” Ryder, Alfonso the Magnanimous, 410. “A questo modo el papa ha facto richi la più parte di soi, per forma che tutto el palazzo ride.” Quoted in Emilio Nunziante, “I primi anni,” 17/3 (1892), 736. See the letter from da Trezzo to the duke of Milan, Venosa, February 14, 1458: “Credo che per la via di Roma la S.V. sia avisata come el papa ha creato mess. Borges suo nepote imperatore di Constantinopoli, del che el Re ne ha avuto aviso certo e se ne è riso.” See also the letter from Nicodemo da Pontremoli to the Duke of Milan, Florence, July 4, 1458, in which it is reported that the pope wants to name governor of Naples “el suo Cesare novello, M. Borges.” Both letters are quoted in Nunziante, “I primi anni,” 17/3 (1892), 736. See also the reaction of Francesco Sforza in a letter to da Trezzo, Milan, July 7, 1458, in which the duke informed da Trezzo that his ambassador Giovanni Chaimi would go to Rome and confirm his alliance with Ferrante and make the pope rethink his case: “et li pensieri sinistri et varij—Pontano’s consiliis variis—chel ha facto de darli molestia de tuorli quello reame per la chiesia, el che extimamo però uno sogno, elli suspenderà et tenerà la briglia in mano.” Ibid., 746. Francesco Sforza to Antonio da Trezzo. Milan, Spetember 29, 1458. Antonio da Trezzo to Francesco Sforza. Sulmona, October 17, 1458: “vivere come un italiano et cum italiani consigliarse.” Quoted in ibid., 17/3, 746. See also Senatore, “Le ultime parole di Alfonso il Magnanimo,” 254. Francesco Senatore, “De bello Neapolitano (Pontano e la guerra di Napoli),” in Mario del Treppo, ed., Condottieri e uomini d‘arme nell’Italia del Rinascimento (Naples, 2001), 295. On the “papal” account of the war, heavily influenced by the Aragonese, but still following its own line, see Claudia Corfi ati and Margherita Sciancalepore, “Per un ritratto del congiurato nella Napoli Aragonese: scritture di parte,” in Maria Chiabò, et al., eds., Congiure e conflitti. L’affermazione della signoria pontificia su Roma nel Rinascimento: politica, economia e cultura (Rome, 2014), 256–65. Corfiati analyzes Paracleto Malvezzi’s (1408–87) Tarentina, directed against the prince of Taranto, written between December 1463 and August 1464. Pontano, “De bello Neapolitano,” 85: Erat enim Ioannes Antonius vario et inconstanti ingenio ac parum firma amicitia; apud quem etiam sancti honestique non tantus respectus quantum studium quantaque erat cura assequendi eius quod animo destinasset, atque

288

Notes ut sui ipse parcissimus, sic contra alieni quam appentitissimus erat, utque in bello abunde timidus, sic in pace parum fodens suis aut amicorum opibus, quem longa et maxime quieta Alfonsi pax male habuerat.

81 Ibid. 82 Pontano, De principe, 18: “Ferdinandus pater in initio regni, cum multorum simul procerum ac popolorum, nonnumquam etiam integrarum provinciarum, ad Ioannem Andegaviensem defectiones nuntiarentur, nunquam mutavit vultum ne dum ut animo consternaretur, in ipsos defectores nullo unquam contumelioso dicto usus.” See also Claudia Corfiati, “Il Principe di Taranto tra storia e leggenda,” in Matarrese Tina and Cristina Montagnani, eds., Il Principe e la storia. Atti del convegno (Scandiano, 18–20 settembre 2003) (Novara, 2005). 83 Pontano, De principe, 18: “Nuntiata rebellione magni cuisdam viri, quem honoris causa non nomino (tametsi famae suae minime ipse pepercerit), hactenus commotus est, ut diceret dolere se quod talis talis vir et e tanta familia ortus seque maioribusque suis indignum fecisset.” 84 Antonio Beccadelli (Panormita), Liber rerum gestarum Ferdinandi regis, ed. Gianvito Resta (Palermo, 1968). 85 On the late additions and on the dating of De bello Neapolitano in general, see Senatore, “Pontano e la guerra di Napoli,” 298. See also the discussion in Monti Sabia, Pontano e la storia, 43–53 and 59–69. 86 Pontano, De magnanimitate, 40: “Ferdinandus Neapolitanorum rex a puero conceptum odium servavit ad senectutem. Itaque indigne multa praeterque regiam dignitatem etiam in innocentissimos homines patravit.” 87 King Ferrante (Giovanni Pontano) to Giovanni Albino. Naples, July 6, 1487: “Nulla cosa era da nui più lontana nè più fora de cogitatione, che cercar vendetta, che fu sempre aliena dalì Principi de nostra casa, & da nui principalmente.” In Albino, “Lettere,” 122. 88 Federico in a letter of 1497: “Alli boni perfetti et curiosi principi alli quali per Divino misterio sono dati li Regni et Regimenti delli Populi nulla cosa e piu propria quanto che usare liberalita clementia et misericordia con la quale imitano le divine operazioni et si pur si ave da procedere contra alcuno suddito per eccidente culpa et mancamento de quello.” Quoted in Porzio, La congiura, 207. 89 Sonecti composti per Missere Iohanne Antonio de Petruciis Conte di Policastro, “Al Signore Re”: “Dove e volato tanto gran favore/Et dove e ita la domestichecza/Dove e fuggita la piacevolecza/Dove li lodi che dalo suo core/Parevan che venissero et con amore/O Re Ferrante con quanta prestecza/Li hai voltati in una gran fierecza/ Contro de me innocente de omne errore.” Ibid., 226. 90 Pontano, De immanitate liber, 21–22: “ Ferdinandus rex Neapolitanorum praeclaros etiam viros conclusos carcere etiam bene atque abunde pascebat,

Notes

289

eandem ex iis uoluptatem capiens quam pueri e conclusis in cauea auiculis, qua de re saepenumero sibi ipsi inter intimos suos diu multumque gratulatus subblanditusque, in risum tandem ac cachinnos profundebatur.” On the number and the fate of the barons held captive, see also Scarton, “La congiura”. 91 Pontano, De immanitate liber, 29: “Ferdinandus Neapolitanorum rex qui ceruum aprumue occidissent, furtimue palamue, alios remo addixit, alios manibus mutilauit, alios suspendio afficit: agros quoque serendos interdixit dominis, legendasque aut glandes aut poma, quae seruari quidem uolebat in escam feris ad uenationis suae usum; secus qui fecisset, in eum non aliter saeuitum quam si perduellionis esset reus.” 92 Sigismundo dei Conti, Le storie de’ suoi tempi: dal 1475 al 1510, 2 vols (Roma, 1883), 223: Pro venandi quoque maiori commoditate, ne quisquam loca sylvestria et nemorosa, quantumcumque sua, aut sibi locata, pro quibus censum solvit, ad culturam reducat, neve in sylvis ipsis ligna incidat, sed gravi poena prohibere, et apros extra suam venationem interficientibus manus abscindi facere: sicque aprorum eorumdem numerum in Regno ipso adeo ut frugibus intolerabilia damna inferant, ultra modum multiplicare, et frugum dominos metu poenae abscissionis manuum ad tolerandum damna huiusmodi compellere. 93 As Stanga reports, Alfonso had liberated “li populi et le persone private de tante servitude et ordinato che ciascuno possi a suo piacere intrare in possessione de li terreni suoi et coltivarli et … caciare a piacere loro, havendose reservato solum certi pochi loci persuo piacere.” Quoted in Giuseppe Galasso, Il Regno di Napoli. Il Mezzogiorno spagnolo (1494–1622) (Torino, 2005), 37–38. 94 Antonio Stanga to the duke of Milan. Naples, January 30, 1494: “cum parole et cum facti va caminando per la via drita, cioè accarezando cum grate dimostracione le terre, li populi et le particolari personi.” Quoted in ibid., 37. 95 Ibid. 96 Ibid., 40–41. 97 Galasso quotes Sanudo who affirms that Alfonso recognizes that “tutto questo infortunio et mal procedeva da li soi peccati.” Ibid., 58–59, 62–63. See also the episode of the dream vision of the court physician, told by Guicciardini and Girolamo Borgia, quoted in Mauro de Nichilo, “Girolamo Borgia, Guicciardini, Machiavelli-Nifo e la caduta degli Aragonesi,” in Vincenzo Fera and Giacomo Ferraù, eds., Filologia Umanistica. Per Gianvito Resta, 3 vols (Padova, 1997), i, 534–37. 98 Pontano, “De prudentia,” 209v: “Alexander Hierosolymorum Rex.” See Flav. Jos. Hist. 13.15.5. 99 Pontano to Ferrandino. Naples, February 9, 1495: “Le invasioni longinque, et senza precedente iniurie … preveneno da movimenti celesti, come designano per comete e per grande coniuctione di stelle, quale è questa invasione al Vostro Padre ed ad

290

Notes

Voi facta, per ben che Vostro Avo prima, e poi Vostro Padre se l‘habbiano procurate per li avari et violenti loro portamenti.” Percopo, Lettere di Giovanni Pontano, 56. 100 Carlo De Frede, La crisi del Regno di Napoli nella riflessione politica di Machiavelli e Guicciardini (Naples, 2006), 298.

Conclusion 1 2 3 4 5

6

7 8 9

10

Giacomo, Cronaca di Napoli, 187. See also Percopo, Vita di Giovani Pontano, 88–89. The letter is published in Conradus Mutianus Rufus, Der Briefwechsel des Mutianus, ed. Carl Krause (Kassel, 1885), 383–84. Giovanni Pontano, De immanitate, ed. Jacob Spiegel (Augsburg, 1519). Giovanni Pontano, Jungfraw Zucht des Hochberümpten Poeten Johan. Pontani (Wittenberg, 1547). On this topic, see David A. Lines, “Ethics as Philology: A Developing Approach to Aristotle’s ‘Nicomachean Ethics’ in Florentine Humanism,” in Marianne Pade, ed., Renaissance Readings of the Corpus Aristotelicum (Copenhagen, 2001). Carlo Ginzburg, “Pontano, Machiavelli and Prudence: Some Further Reflections,” in Dioga Ramada Curto et al., eds., From Florence to the Mediterranean and Beyond. Essays in Honour of Anthony Molho (Florence, 2009). Tommaso de Robertis, “Pontano e Machiavelli su fortuna, virtù e prudenza. Il XXV capitolo del Principe,” in Ercole Erculei and Giorgio Grimaldi, eds., Riflessioni storicofilosofiche sul Principe di Machiavelli (Rome, 2015). On this point, see Mark Jurdjevic, “Hedgehogs and Foxes: The Present and Future of Italian Renaissance Intellectual History,” Past and Present, 195 (2007), 261. Stefan Collini, “General Introduction,” in Stefan Collini, Richard Whatmore, and Brian Young, eds., History, Religion and Culture (Cambridge, 2000), 15. Nancy S. Struever, Theory as Practice: Ethical Inquiry in the Renaissance (Chicago, 1992), x. The phrase is coined against Quentin Skinner’s historicist approach to the history of political thought. Ibid., xi. As she acknowledges, she derives this distinction from the works of Bernard Williams, affirming that “Williams’s philosophy is more useful than Skinner’s philology.”

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Index Accademia Pontaniana 10, 41 Acquaviva, Giulio Antonio 168–9 acting in the right moment (maturitas) 137 Alberti, Leon Battista 80–2 Momus 80–1 Albino, Giovanni 27, 28, 29, 175 Alessandro, Antonio d’ (diplomat) 27 Alexander VI, pope (1492–1503) 138 Alexander Jannaeus, King of Judea 177 Alexander the Great 139, 145, 161 Alfonso II, Duke of Calabria (1458–94), King of Naples (1494–5) 13, 32, 50, 158, 174 attempt to reorder the realm 22–5 in autobiographical sketch 19–20 camp near Rome 28 character 138 as king of Naples 176–7 and Pontano 34–5, 38–9, 71, 97, 117, 166–9 Alfonso V of Aragon, I of Naples (1442– 58) (the Magnanimous) 13, 38, 54, 74, 77, 87–8, 174–5, 177 bankruptcy 23 and Beccadelli 78–9 death 19–20, 169, 172 in De dictis et factis 163–6 in De maiestate 171 in De principe 167–9 during earthquake 171 and John of Navarra 71 leniency 89 literary séances 78, 87–8 and Poggio 160, 165 and Pontano 19–20 ruling by opinion 158 and Valla 82–3 and virtuous kingship 158 Altilio, Gabriele (Bishop of Policastro) 105 amiability (virtue) 108 Anjou, Jean de 20, 170, 174–5, 184 Anjou, René de 163

Annas, Julia 116, 123 Apelles 139 appetite, concupiscible 134, 139 appetite, irascible 134–5, 139 appetite, irrational 155 Aquaviva, Andrea Mattia 168 Aquila, Matteo di 170–1 On the Comet and the Earthquake 170 Aquinas, Thomas 2, 64, 108, 123, 130, 145, 152, 154 Summa contra gentiles 150 Summa theologiae 129, 134 Arabia foelix 51 Aragona, Giovanna di, Queen of Naples 32 Arcamone, Aniello 24, 25, 39 arcana imperii 148 Aristippus 47 aristotelaea 107 Aristotelian doctrine 6, 59, 65, 110 Aristotelian ethics 2, 4, 5 Aristotelian framework 60, 64, 67, 123 Aristotelianism 2–6, 56, 98–9, 111, 113, 142, 181. See also Peripatetics Aristotelian moral philosophy. See moral philosophy, Aristotelian Aristotelian philosophy 5, 81, 105, 152 Aristotelian psychology and ethics 124, 127 Aristotelians 5, 59, 98–100, 125, 141, 180 Aristotelian theory of virtue. See virtue theory, Aristotelian Aristotelian thought 7, 59, 98, 99 Aristotelian tradition 3, 4, 7, 10, 122, 123, 143, 182 Aristotelian virtue ethics 7, 9 Aristotle account of change 129–30, 135–9, 142–6, 152–4, 171, 181, 182 in Aegidius 104–6 in Bruni 100–2 in Charon 103–4, 115 in De prudentia 106–8 in De sermone 112–13

312

Index

eloquence 106 ethics and politics 9 Eudemian Ethics 13, 152 Greek thought 106 happiness 46–7, 50 knowledge and action 46 Latin perceptions of 239 n.14 Liber de bona fortuna 13, 148, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155 Magna Moralia 6, 13, 152, 155 Metaphysics 65 Meteorology 171 Nicomachean Ethics (see Ethics, Nicomachean) obscurity 104 perfection 65–8 in Petrarca 98, 100 Physics 13, 100, 129–30, 142–3 pleasure 59–61 Politics 13, 102 in Pontano 4–7, 13, 63, 98, 107–8, 113 Problemata 138 recovery 103 and Renaissance humanists 4 on the soul 65, 115, 123 terseness 109–10 at universities 100, 102 in Valla 58–9, 84, 87, 126 virtue 12 Ascoli 31 Athens 106, 107, 113 Atkins, Margaret 123 Augustine (St.) 75, 85, 148 Civitas Dei (City of God) 166 Aurispa, Giovanni 79 Autobiography, philosophy as 46, 69 avarice 164, 173, 177 Balue, Jean (Cardinal) 27, 31 Balzo, Angliberto del 25 Balzo, Pirro del 22 Banquets 40, 54, 136 Bartolus de Saxoferrato 84 Basle 15, 179 beatus and felix 216 n.80 Beccadelli, Antonio (Panormita) and Alfonso V 20, 38, 74, 158 and Antonio da Rho 74–8 in Antonius 88–9, 90–1 at Aragones court 78–9, 83

on barons 173 conservative outlook 12, 97 as court historian 163–6 De dictis et factis Alphonsi regis (The Words and Deeds of King Alfonso) 77, 89, 97 in De felicitate 92–4 in De principe 157 in De sermone 78–9 Epistole gallicae 226 n.34 Hermaphroditus (Hermaphrodite) 74, 76 as magister moralis 78, 84, 161 at Milanese court 74, 77 and the Neapolitan academy 82–3, 86 and Pontano 109, 167–8, 174 and Valla 83, 85–6, 89 and the Visconti 74, 78 Becker, Arnold 73 Bembo, Pietro 127 bene constitutus 52–3 bene fortunatus. See fortunate Bentley, Jeremy 8 Biblioteca Angelica 71 Biton. See Cleobis and Biton Black, Robert 7 black bile 65, 138 Blanchard, W. Scott 82 Boccaccio, Giovanni 161 body 122, 132,141 and astrology 150 constitution 52, 54 dead body 177 first and second 133 goods of the body 53 humors 134 as microcosm 138 and mind 137 moral work on 128 in motion 127, 134 parts 128, 131, 135 pleasure 58, 92 pollution 115 shadow 64 and soul 60, 116 temperament 129 third 136 weakness 28 weariness 51 Boethius 84, 126, 142, 148–9 De Consolatione (Consolation) 149

Index book, books 4, 37, 63, 81, 83, 102, 160, 167 Borgia, Girolamo 188 n.1 Borja, Alfonso. See Calixtus III Borja, Luis Juan 173 Borja, Pedro Luis 173 Borja, Rodrigo 173 Botley, Paul 109 boxing contests 61 Bracciolini. See Poggio Bracciolini Britain 51 Brown, Alison 8 Bruni, Leonardo 56, 112, 166, 180 critique of scholastic translation 100–10 De interpretatione recta 101 Isagogicon Moralis Disciplinae 47–8 Oratio Heliogabali ad meretrices 109 perception of Aristotle 100, 239 n.14 retranslations of Ethics and Politics 13, 100–10 in Valla 84 Vita Aristotelis 102 Vita Ciceronis 239 n.14 Bullard, Melissa Meriam 19 Burckhardt, Jacob 5, 73 Buridan, Jean 46 Caesar, Gaius Julius 137, 139, 145 Calcidius 148–50 Calixtus III (Alonso Borja), pope (1455–8) 115, 170, 173 cannibalism 15, 194 n.7 Cappelli, Guido M. 3, 9, 158 Caracciolo, Tristano 71, 106, 117 Carafa, Diomede 39 cardinal virtues 139 Casalnuovo, Luigi di 32 Castiglionchio, Lapo da 79 Castiglione, Rinuccio da 79 Catullus 74, 76 Celenza, Christopher 73 character 137–8 Charles V 179 Charles VIII, King of France 1, 20, 42, 54, 177, 179, 184 child, children 15, 30, 37, 53–4, 76, 129–32, 137, 144, 167, 175–6 Christian Belief/Doctrine 10, 86, 92, 93, 126, 142, 147, 148, 154 choice (electio) 139. See also delectus Chrysoloras, Manuel 79, 226 n.38

313

Church, Roman (79, 226 n.38) 24, 28, 31, 82, 86 Cicero 46, 109, 114, 152, 168 and Aristotle 100–1 De amicitia (On Friendship) 52 defence in Antonius 90 De finibus (On Final Ends) 46 definition of philosophy 81 De officiis (On Duties) 114, 125 eloquence 105 honestum 55 meditation on death 116 in Pontano 4, 98 Pro Sestio 52 Tusculanae disputationes (Tusculan Disputations) 45, 48, 58–9, 116 in Tusculum 107 in Valla 84, 87 Cicero, Ps.Rhetorica ad Herennium 110 Cleobis and Biton 48–9, 50, 55 College of Cardinals 28 comet 170–2, 177 condottiere 25, 27, 29 consolation 69 Constantine 82 contemplation 67 contemplation and action 58, 68–9 Contrario, Andrea 89–90, 235 n.114 Coppola, Francesco 23, 29, 39 Cortesi, Paolo 90, 107 counsel, counselor Alexander Jannaeus, king of Judea 177 around Alfonso V 163 around Bona Sforza 156 around Calixtus III 173 around Innocence VIII 24 and instinct 155 of Lorenzo de’ Medici 201 n.43 in Naples 33 in Poggio Bracciolini 161 Pontano’s stance 20–1, 35, 38–9 and prudence 117 secret 148 and speech 103 courage (fortitudo) 1, 38, 52, 60–2, 124, 139, 146 court historians 162–6 courtiers 8, 24, 36–7, 83, 85–6, 92, 107, 109, 117, 168, 231 n.77

314 court physician 140 court usher 91 cult of Fortuna 146 curule chair 135 Cynics 80–1 Dante 161 Decembrio, Pier Candido 83 delectus 260 n.80 diathesis 106 dice 153 Diogenes 80–1, 114 Epistole 228 n.55 diplomacy 8, 11, 121 diplomat 132–3. See also Pontano, as diplomat divine inspiration 154 divine providence 148–50, 154 Doglio, Maria Luisa 42 Dorp, Martin van 80–1 Dovizi, Bernardo (il Bibbiena) (Florentine Ambassador) 16 Duns Scotus 152 education 72, 79, 95, 127, 165–9, 180 elegance (elegantia) 110 eloquence 4, 57, 98–103, 105–6, 109–10 Epicureanism 92 Epicureans 48, 56, 59, 60, 62, 91, 92, 93, 124 Epicurus 47, 61, 94 Erasmus 80–1 Ercole I d’Este, duke of Ferrara 22 ethics 6. See also Aristotelian ethics; politics; virtue ethics and astrology 151 Christian 126 ethics and politics 3–4, 7–9 history 9, 181–2 as‚ horizon of meaning 189 n.11 in Pontano 13, 113 in the Renaissance 181 in Valla 125–7 Ethics, Nicomachean 7 and autobiographical writing 46 Bruni’s retranslation 13, 100–2, 108 contemplation 67 cultivation 136 and De prudentia 12, 64 divine element 154

Index early modern treatments 180 ethics and politics 9 exercise 132 highest good 47, 55 human happiness 51, 66 as Latin philosophy 110 nameless virtues 135 natural disasters 171 object of practical philosophy 46 perfect life 68–9 philological approach 180 in Pontano 4–5, 98, 122 rewriting 111–13 side entrance 182 social virtues 109 Stoic moment 50 Eudoxus 47 eutrapelia (virtue) 101, 108–9 experience 137, 153 Facio, Bartolomeo 74, 87, 89, 97, 106 and Beccadelli 12, 74, 158, 174 controversy with Valla 83–6, 91–5 as court historian 163–6 De viris illustribus 71 De vitae felicitate 91, 106 Libri rerum gestarum Alfonsi regis (History of King Alfonso) 97, 163 Federico, King of Naples (1496–1501) 34, 176 Ferdinand I of Aragon (1380–1416) 83 Ferrandino, King of Naples (1495–6) 177 Ferrante, King of Naples (1458–94) and Alfonso V 164 in autobiographical sketch 19–20, 45 as benefortunatus 155 character 137 conflict with Milan 156 cruelty 176–7 in De immanitate 175–6 in De principe 174 and duke Alfonso 23–4 errors 177 illegitimate birth 54 and Inncocence VIII 21 Nachleben 13 notoriety 29 peace negotiations 29–33 and Pontano 11, 22, 33–9, 43, 66 reign 117, 158, 169–70

Index Second Baron’s War 24–8 succession 20, 172–3 War of Ferrara 22 Ferrariis, Antonio de (Galateo) 15, 66, 229 n.60 Ferraù, Giacomo 163 ferre 146 Finzi, Claudio 9 fire 150 First Barons' War (Neapolitan War) 1, 20, 34, 92, 170, 175, 177 Florence 19, 23, 26, 31, 79, 109, 155, 156, 163, 179 Foot, Philippa 123 fortitude. See courage fortunate (bene fortunatus) 153–4 fortune (fortuna) 13, 41, 43, 146 France 2, 32, 51, 105, 156 Freeden, Michael 7 friendship 117 Frigo, Daniela 11 Fubini, Riccardo 24, 83, 92, 165 Furstenberg-Levi, Shulamit 10, 117 Gabotto, Ferdinando 15, 16 Galateo, Antonio. See Ferrariis, Antonio de Garbo, Tommaso del 143, 148, 152 Garin, Eugenio 5 Gaza, Theodor 155 Genova 29, 156 George of Trebizond 152, 166, 171 Giacomo, Notar 22 Giles of Rome 108, 152, 154 Giles of Viterbo 35, 104–6, 147, 150 Giotto 139 Giovio, Paulo 80 glossography 111 Golino, Pietro (Compater) 88–9 grammarians 82, 86–90, 111 Granata, Vincenzo 35 Grosseteste, Robert 101, 108–10, 112 guelphs 27 Guicciardini, Francesco 41–3 Storia d’Italia (History of Italy) 42 habit, habituation (habitus) 77, 95, 122, 128, 133, 155, 167 and action 132 nature and habit 34–5 as outward appearance 158

315

in Pontano 34–5, 40, 135–6 of subjects 24 Valla’s critique 125–6 virtue as habit 13, 132 Halley's Comet 170–2, 177 hands 131 Hankins, James 7, 98 happiness (foelicitas) 12, 54, 91, 112 action and contemplation 64, 66 in Aristotle 59–60, 67 attainment 47 as contemplation 67 and exercise of virtues 64 and external goods 6 in Facio 91–3 and fruitio 92–3 and good constitution 51–5 as honestum 47 perfect 68 in Poggio Bracciolini 159, 161 in Pontano 48–51, 62 in Valla 56–9 Henry of Ghent 152 hermits 133 Herodotus 48, 107 History 48 Homer 90, 139 honestum 47, 53, 55, 56, 58, 60–3, 91, 93 honor 1, 38, 42, 48, 51, 90, 98, 111, 133, 136, 139, 144, 158, 164 and civic life 57–8 and glory 61–2 and honestas 56–8 and magnanimity 158 temple 57 hope 115 Horace 85, 93 human action 119, 128 external factors 123, 141 final end 46 and fortune 147–8 free 149, 151 ‘‘hedonistic’’ approach 57, 92 limitations 171 not from reason alone 141, 155 Pontano’s outline 131–4 and prudence 137 humanism 12–13, 72. See also Renaissance humanism ‘‘civic’’ 19, 180

316 Neapolitan 5, 82–3, 97, 167 humanist invective 76, 89 humanist movement 10–13, 72–4, 82, 86, 94–5, 180 controversies within 73 innovative force 94 tradition and innovation 95 humanists 92, 142, 152 and Alfonso V 166 at Aragonese court 5, 8, 13, 83–4, 163 and Aristotle 98–106, 180 authority 72, 74 Burckhardt 73 conflicts 72 different strands 12, 97 docile attitude 21 and education 116, 167 and grammar 87–8 and Greek culture 79 humor and wit 109 idealist stance 3 insistence on good Latin 113 and literature 80, 82, 116 philosophical outlook 4 radical propositions 158 and Renaissance Aristotelianism 4 humoral constitution 137 humor and wit 109 Hursthouse, Rosalind 123 ignorance 54, 75, 84, 98, 100–1, 132, 156, 160–1, 227 n.42 imagination 138 impetus 139, 259 n.72 Innocence VIII, pope 20–1, 24–34, 138, 170, 172 instinct 130, 134, 154–5. See also impetus Israeli, Isaac d’ 42 Miscellanies of Literature 42 Jäger, Johannes 179 Jerome 75, 85 Johanna II, Queen of Naples 163–4 John II of Anjou. See Anjou, Jean de John II of Aragon 20 John of Navarra 71 jokes, joking 109 Julius II, pope (1503–13). See Rovere, Giuliano della Jurdjevic, Mark 181

Index justice 37, 51–3, 60, 125–6, 139, 147 Juvenal 75 Kajanto, Iiro 147 Kenny, Anthony 154 Kidwell, Carol 17, 28, 39, 42, 80 Kingdom of Naples 8, 20, 25, 163, 167, 179, 184, 185 Kraye, Jill 9 labor and toil, laborious 19, 28, 48–50, 52, 57–8, 63, 67–8, 112, 130, 161–2 Lamola, Giovanni 92–4 Lanfredini, Giovanni 23–4, 28 language and morality 98 language and reason 103 Latinity 110 Latin language, supposed poverty of 101 laughter 79–80, 82, 114, 176 Laureys, Marc 73 leisure 66, 114, 116 liberality (liberalitas) 23, 38, 125, 132, 166, 173 life, civic 57, 67 life, contemplative 67 life, pleasurable 57, 59 life, solitary 53, 67 Lines, David A. 4 Livius 78, 84, 144 Louis XII, King of France 40, 185 Lucas, Johann 179 Lucian 78–82, 87, 113–16, 161–2, 168–9 Dialogues of the Dead 79, 114 Gallus (The Cock) 162 Menippus 161 Lupi, Sergio 5, 6 Lysippus 139 Machiavelli, Niccolo 3, 8, 142, 180 The Prince 41 MacIntyre, Alastair 9 Madrigal, Alonso de 2 Magnanimous Man 11, 38, 118, 133, 135, 174 magnificence (magnificentia) 54, 69, 132, 136, 162 Maio, Giuniano 171 De maiestate 171 Manuzio, Aldo 1, 15, 91 Marcotti, Sabrina 11

Index Maria, Filippo 74, 78 Mars (planet) 135 Marsh, David 89, 110, 114 Martial 74, 76 Maternus, Julius Firmicus 10 Maximilian 179 Maximus, Valerius 71, 162 mean (mediocritas) 6, 13, 54, 122–4, 126, 135–6, 260 n.80 Medici, Cosimo de’ 74, 109, 162, 163 Medici, Lorenzo de' 22, 26, 33, 138, 156 meditation on death 116 Meinecke, Friedrich 3 Milan 26, 27, 32, 74, 75, 76, 77, 155, 163 mirror-for-princes 1, 38, 97, 165, 166, 168 Molho, Anthony 6, 10 money 1, 23, 25–6, 30–1, 40, 45, 53–4, 81, 132–3, 136, 160 Montefeltro, Federico da 138 moral action 4, 122, 133 moral authority 102, 115 moral considerations 3 moral conversion 114 moral culture 126, 180 moral doctrine 105 moral edification 79 moral excellence 163 moral failure 73, 115 moral good 52–5, 58, 61–2, 64 moral indignation 114 moral integrity 16–17, 40, 42, 77 moral persuasion 109–10 moral philosophy 17, 55, 78, 103, 116, 129, 157 Aristotelian 13, 110, 122, 159 breadth 9 different approaches 4, 98 exhortative side 123 Lucian 79 and person 46 and poetry 167 in Pontano 4, 119, 127, 128, 181 Renaissance 55 rewriting 72, 99, 110, 122 Roman 13, 113 in underworld 114 in Valla 126–7 moral and political authority 72 moral and political conduct 7 moral and political self-presentation 17

317

moral and political thought Aristotelian 2, 10, 98, 124, 180, 182 early modern 179 humanist 3, 7, 8, 13, 100, 179–80 iteration 181 Pontano 2, 4–5, 7, 10, 11, 19, 21, 121–2, 141, 181–2 in the Renaissance 9, 182 moral and politics 9 moral principles 41 moral progress 61 moral psychology 13, 115, 123, 128, 130, 139, 262 n.100 moral reform 99 moral and religious thought 93 moral rigidity 76 moral shipwreck 43, 61–2 moral superiority 40, 163 moral teacher (magister moralis) 78, 84, 161 moral theory 56 moral thought 7, 9, 41, 86, 106, 124, 127, 129, 179. See also moral and political thought moral work 128, 181 moral worth 164. See also honestum muses 1, 16, 105 nameless virtues 135, 260 n.80 Naples 23–5, 30, 33, 168, 171 Alfonso’s conquest 164 ambassadors 11, 29 Aragonese rule 13 and Athens 107, 113 best part 39 desparate situation 220 n.119 Duke Alfonso’s return 22 French conquest 12, 45 Governor 173 Inquisition 83 Pontano’s school 71 Nasi, Piero (Florentine Ambassador) 22, 29, 31, 33, 34 Nauta, Lodi 111, 124 Neapolitan Academy 2, 71, 89, 98, 105–7, 116–18. See also Accademia Pontania Neapolitan Humanism 5, 82, 83, 97, 167 Neapolitan War. See First Baron’s War neologisms 111

318

Index

Nicholas V, pope (1447–55) 159. See also Sarzana, Tommaso di Nile water 51 Orsini, Giovanni Antonio 174 Orsini, Virginio 26, 29 ostentation 5, 87, 158, 161, 165 Ovid 75, 167 Panormita. See Beccadelli, Antonio papacy 21, 24, 30, 31, 163, 170 passions Alfonso V 164 compliance with 140–1 eradication from life 50 Ferrante 174 intensity 139 in physiological terms 134–5 in princes 159–62 rebellion 115, 175 regulation 133–6 rule 53 and virtue 129 virtues as 125 and wickedness 115, 172 Paul II, pope (1464–71) 71 Pazzi conspiracy 23, 155, 184 Peace of Bagnolo 20, 22, 33, 34 Peace of Lodi 1, 72 Percival, Keith 87 perfect life 46, 55, 64–8 Peripatetics 6, 46–8, 55, 62, 64, 115, 119, 133, 135, 152. See also Aristotelianism Perna, Peter 15 Petrarca, Francesco 13, 89, 148, 152, 161, 180 De sui ipisus et multorum ignorantia (On His Own Ignorance and that of Many Others) 98, 102 eloquence and knowledge 102–3, 106 on fortuna 143–4, 148, 152 polemics against Aristotelianism 98–102 and Pontano 102–3 Petrucci, Antonello 21, 23, 29, 36, 39, 40, 176 Petrucci, Giovanni Antonio 176 philosophy, deprofessionalization 117

Piccinino, Giacomo 29, 175 Piccolomini, Enea Silvio 165–6 Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni 86, 151 piscicanis (pescecane) 228 n.55 Pistoia, Antonio da 173 Plato 63, 104, 105, 119, 149, 150, 161 Timaeus 149 Platonic tradition 142–3, 153–4 pleasure (voluptas) 12, 17, 69, 77, 79, 80, 110, 115, 160, 176 in Cicero 116 distinction between mental and sensual 58–60, 63, 92–3 and entertainment 167–8 in Facio 94–5 and happiness 48 as highest good 47, 124 honest 62 and leisure 35–6, 45 mental 63 moderation 51 in Pontano 59–62 and recollection 62 sensual 63, 133 shadow of virtue 64 in Valla 55–9, 92–3 Plutarch 140 Life of Demetrius 140 poets 154 Poggio. See Poggio Bracciolini Poggio Bracciolini, Gian Francesco 79, 81, 89, 122, 175 on Beccadelli 76–7 De humanae conditionis miseria 48, 50 De infelicitate principum (On the Miserable Life of Princes) 13, 38, 122, 159, 163 De varietate fortune (On the Vicissitudes of Fortune) 144–8, 152 on fortuna 144–8 on politics and virtue 158–68 Poggioreale 169 politics and active life 40 anti-politics 163 and culture 97 daily 37 ethics and politics 3–4, 8–9

Index of fortune 155–6 and honesty 17 and humanist studies 167 Italian, peninsular 1, 33 language of 36, 99, 135 and letters 16 Machiavellian concept 8 moralistic approach 174 Neapolitan 33 personal concept 33 quattrocento 158 Renaissance 159 sphere of 148, 158 and virtue 162–3, 168 virtue politics 7 political power 37, 40, 69, 144, 158, 162, 164, 166 political theory 43 political thought 3, 7, 9, 159. See also moral and political thought Poliziano, Angelo 107, 243 n.44, 245 n.55 Pompeo Faracovi, Ornella 151 Pontano, Fabio Vita Ioannis Ioviani Pontani 194 n.4 Pontano, Giovanni Gioviano (1426–1503) 29, 32 Actius 88, 135–6, 183 Aegidius 40, 52, 104, 106, 151, 183 annotations to Plautus 88 Antonius 78, 88, 91, 183 as Aristotelian 2–3, 13, 47, 65, 106–7, 108, 110, 129–30, 135, 153–4 and the Aristotelian tradition 4–7, 123 Asinus 28, 183 and astrology 10, 134, 151 autobiographical sketch 19–21 autonomous stance 37 and Beccadelli (Panormita) 78, 87, 117, 174 chapel (see Pontano, chapel) Charon 46, 79, 80, 81, 87, 88, 104, 113, 114, 128, 170, 171, 172, 183 Commentationes in centum sententiis Ptolemaei 107, 183 at court 21, 27, 35–9 De amore conjugali (Jungfraw Zucht) 179, 180 De aspiratione 71, 87, 103, 183 De bello Neapolitano 173–4

319 De fortitudine 50, 60, 62, 63, 113, 133, 135, 171, 186, 3 De fortuna 6, 10, 13, 54, 86, 87, 141, 146, 151–5, 183 De immanitate 4, 176,179, 183 De liberalitate 113, 183, 186 De magnanimitate (On Magnanimity) 10, 39, 40, 54, 103, 113, 118, 168, 175, 183, 186 De magnificentia 113, 183, 186 De oboedientia 8, 10, 102, 103, 168, 186 De principe 3, 8, 10, 97, 157–8, 166, 172, 174 De prudentia 10–12, 17, 19, 21, 41, 43, 45–8, 50, 59, 62, 64, 68–9, 106, 113, 119, 121, 128, 130, 132–5, 137, 139–40, 177, 179, 183 De rebus coelestibus 10, 50, 127, 128, 132, 134, 183 De sermone 5, 10, 32, 69, 78, 87, 103, 108, 109, 111–12, 183, 187 as diplomat 22, 25, 28, 31 early life 15 educator 169 family 15–16 and George of Trebizond 152 harshness 80 head of the academy 118 hylomorphism 129 and King Ferrante 34–8, 175 Latin philosophy 105 and Louis XII 40 and Ludovico Sforza 16, 195 n.11 as magnanimous man 38–9 mercurial character 1–2 as minor author 181 Opera Omnia 169, 17 as philosopher 119, 121 as politician 21–2, 33, 35, 37 portrait 169 poverty 39–40 privation 130 pro-papal stance 27 reception 179–80 retirement 45 and Roberto Sanseverino 103 school in Naples 71 as secretary 11, 16, 21, 33 self-representation 41

320 social virtues 109 speech against Aragonese 42 and Stoicism 50 on translation 107 tripartite soul 127–8 Urania 16 and Valla 59, 86–7, 111, 127 and Virgil 90–1 and virtue ethics 7–9 virtuousness 33, 66 works 1–2 Porzio, Camillo 23–4 La congiura dei baroni (History) 24 Pou, Giovanni 39 practical philosophy 46, 121 Praxiteles 139, 162 pre-Machiavellism 3 private 66, 90, 99, 161–2, 289 n.93 Propertius 16, 74, 76 prudence (prudentia) 122, 159, 177 acquisition 137 central role 140 and counsel 117 cultivation 136, 151 and experience 136–7 and fortuna 153, 180 in Pontano 38, 66, 139 seat 139 subspecies 113 task 52 in Valla 125 and wisdom 65 Ptolemy 10, 139, 151 Ptolemy (Ps.-) 107, 171 Centiloquium (The Hundred Aphorisms) 107, 171–2 Pythagoras 58, 59, 99, 106, 115 quattrocento 1, 55, 158 quickness (celeritas) 137 Quintilian 90 Quondam, Amedeo 3 reading circle 85–6, 88, 116–17 reading hour 83 recollection 62–3, 68 recreation 112 religion 86, 95, 104, 144, 146, 174 Renaissance 2, 4, 7, 9, 10, 15, 16, 59, 151, 182

Index Renaissance Aristotelianism 4 Renaissance humanism 10, 12, 73, 179 Renaissance Italy 78, 163 Rho, Antonio da 56, 74–8, 92, 124 Apology 75 Philippic against Antonio Panormita 76 Roman Empire 105, 117, 144 Rome 24–34, 54, 71, 78, 86, 152, 171, 173 Rovere, Giuliano della 27, 29 Ruccellai, Bernardo (Florentine Ambassador) 21 Rufus, Mutianus (Konrad Muth) 179 Saarinen, Risto 9 Salutati, Coluccio 143–5, 148 De fato et fortuna (On Fate and Fortune) 143, 152 Sannazaro, Jacopo 28, 117 Sanseverino, Roberto 25, 26, 27, 33, 103, 168 Santoro, Mario 5, 50, 66 Sarzana, Tommaso di 159 Scarton, Elisabetta 31 Schmitt, Charles 4 Second Barons' War 20, 21, 26, 34, 39, 41, 175 Segni, Bernardo 5, 180 self-scrutiny 118 Senatore, Francesco 173 Seneca 4, 78, 98, 161 Naturales Quaestiones 171 Sforza, Bona 155, 156 Sforza, Cardinal Ascanio 26, 27, 29, 33 Sforza, Francesco 163, 173 Sforza, Ludovico (il Moro) 16, 22, 25, 26, 32–3, 138, 156 Sforza, Muzio Attendolo 163 Sigismund III, Holy Roman Emperor 74 Simonetta, Cicco 156 Simons, Roswitha 73 Sixtus IV, pope (1471–84) 22, 138 Skinner, Quentin 8, 10, 158 slow-wittedeness (tarditas) 137 Socrates, Socratic 78, 87, 115 Socratic irony 78, 87 soldier 132 soul (types of) animal (sentient) 60, 127 appetitive 40, 129, 139 human (rational) 60

Index irrational 64.122.128 rational 64, 65, 123, 127–9, 139 tripartite 13, 128 vegetative 127 Spiegel, Jacob 179 Stacey, Peter 6, 9, 163 Stoics, Stoicism 47–8, 50, 55, 56–8, 60–1, 63–4, 89, 91–3, 133, 146, 165 Struever, Nancy 181 Suetonius 77 talent (ingenium) 137 Tateo, Francesco 2, 5, 136, 151 Taylor, Charles 9 teacher and disciple, relationship between 94 Tejada, Francesco Elias de 2, 6–7 temperance 139 Theophrastus 47 theory and practice 7 thoughtfulness (cunctatio) 137 Tibullus 74, 76 Torresani, Giovan Francesco 81–2, 169, 183 tournaments 61 tradition and innovation 95 tranquillity of the mind 63, 68 transversal approach 9–10 Treaty of Bagnolo 26 Trezzo, Antonio da 173 Trinkaus, Charles 50 Trivulzio, Gian Giacomo 27, 32–3 truthfulness (virtue) 108, 113 Umbria 16, 49, 55 usage (consuetudo) 113 Valla, Lorenzo (c. 1405/7–57) 60–3, 72, 74, 78, 88–90, 92–5, 99, 100, 102, 107 acquisition of virtue 125 Antidotum in Facium 85, 94 critique of Aristotelian Moral Philosophy 13 De falso credita et ementita Constantini donatione (On the Donation of Contantine) 94 De voluptate (On Pleasure) 12, 50, 55, 59, 60, 82, 91, 124, 125 Dialectical Disputations 124–5 (see also Valla, Repastinatio, Retractatio)

321

Elegantiae (Valla) 110–12 Gesta Ferdinandis regis Aragoniae (History of King Ferdinand) 83, 85, 87 on Ilias and Virgil 236 n.119 moral psychology 124 Novum testamentum adnotationes 236 n.119 as papal secrectary 225 n.29 philosophical method 120 Quintiliani Tulliique examen 234 n.113 Repastinatio dialectice et philosophie (Reploughing of Dialectic and Philosophy) 99, 120, 124, 238 n.7 Retractatio (Revision) 99, 106, 122, 124, 238 n.7 virtue theory 125–7 Vannucci, Guido 50 Vegio, Maffeo 56, 92 Venice 22, 36, 169, 179 Venus (planet) 135 Vergerio, Pier Paolo De ingenuis moribus 167 Veronese, Guarino 79, 84, 92, 93, 94 vice 8, 62, 124–6, 139, 162, 176 Virgil 1, 63, 71, 75, 76, 87, 88, 90, 91, 139, 144 Viroli, Maurizio 8 virtue vi, 9, 12–13, 48, 121–2, 167, 176, 181–2 acquisition 125–6, 132, 141 and action 133 and age 136–7 Alfonso I 164 Aristotelian 125 (see also cardinal virtues; mean (mediocritas); nameless virtues) assistance (presidium) 159 and astrology 10 best virtue 64 and cultivation 129, 136 description in political terms 135 and education 168 and formation 129 and fortune 123 and glory 62 and greatness 16 and growth 137 and happiness 67–8 and honor 56–7

322

Index

ideological force 11 and ignorance 160 impulse 139 in kings 160 legitimization and delegitimization 8 and liberty 160–1 material for virtuous behavior 54, 132 mistress of happy life 48 and moral philosophy 123 naturalist accounts 123 and office 52 and perfect life 68 and philosophy 46 and pleasure 55, 60, 62, 64, 93 and politics 158, 162, 163, 177 practice (usus) 47 in princes 160–1 public display 157–8 pursuit of 16 and reason 141 and recollection 62–4 and regulation 129, 133–6 Roman ideology of 158 as second nature 136 social notion 53 and society 158 and splendor 159, 161, 177 temple of 56–7, 167 throne 135 Valla on 124–7 and vice 8, 62, 125 visibility 157 virtue ethics vi, 2–3, 7–9, 11, 13, 122, 181–2

virtue theory 9–11, 182 Aquinas 123 Aristotelian 9, 12, 123–6 guiding knowledge vi ideological force 11 Pontano 6, 122, 128–9 role of astrology 10 traditional accounts 56 Valla’s reinterpretation 62, 124 virtuous behavior 54, 57, 93, 125–6, 135, 158–60, 162, 164 Visconti, Filippo Maria 74 Vitale, Giuliana 33 Viterbo, Egidio da. See Giles of Viterbo walking 131–4 War of Ferrara (1482–4) 20, 22 wealth, wealthy 23, 37, 48, 54–5, 59–60, 100–1, 103, 114–15, 144, 146, 161–2 will 139–40 Williams, Bernard 7 Williams, Thomas 123 wine 138 wisdom 38, 65, 68, 85, 99, 100, 128, 156, 159, 164–7 Xenophon 165 Cyropaedia (The Education of Cyrus) 165 Memorabilia 165 Zeno 47, 161