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, professor of the belles lettres, and chancellor of the republic of Florence, was born in 1464, He was a very accomplished scholar in the Greek and Latin languages. Varchi, in one of his lectures, pronounces him the most eloquent man of his time. He died in 1521, in consequence of a fall from his horse. In 1518, he published a Latin translation of Dioscorides “De Materia Medica,” with a commentary. About the end of it he mentions a treatise, “De mensuris, ponderibus, et coloribus,” which he had prepared for publication, but which has not yet appeared. Mazzuchelli speaks largely of him in his “Italian Writers;” and more copious notice is taken of him by the canon Baudini, in his. “Collectio Vetcrum Monumentorum.” The translation of Dioscorides, which he dedicated to pope Leo X. procured him so much reputation, that he was called the Dioscorides of Florence.

He now endeavoured to console himself by cultivating his poetical talent, an employment which had been long interrupted, and resumed his poem on the chase, for which he had collected a great many notes and observations in the East and in France. In 1546, the inhabitants of Reggio chosd‘ him public professor of Greek and Latm, with a handsome allowance, and the rights of citizenship. In this office he continued about three years, after which the grand duke, Cosmo I. invited him to be professor of the belles lettres at Pisa. After filling this chair for seventeen years, he exchanged it for that of moral and political science, and lectured on Aristotle’s two celebrated treatises on these subjects. Such was his attachment to that university, and to the grand duke, that during the war of Sienna, when Cosmo was obliged to suspend payment of the professors’ salaries, Angelio pawned his furniture and books, that he might be enabled to remain at his post, while his brethren fled. And when the Siennese army, commanded by Peter’ Strozzi, approached Pisa, which had no troops for its defence, our professor put arms into the hands of the students of the university, trained and disciplined them, and with their assistance defended the city until the grand dukewas able to send them assistance. in 1575, the cardinal Ferdinand de Medicis, who was afterwards grand duke, took Angelio to Rome with him, settled a large pension on him, and by other princely marks of favour, induced him to reside there, and encouraged him to complete a poem, which he had begun thirty years before, on the conquest of Syria and Palestine by the Christians. Angelio caused all his poems to be reprinted at Rome in 1585, and dedicated to this cardinal, who rewarded him by a present of two thousand florins of gold. When he became grand duke, Angelio followed him to Florence, and there at Jength published his “Syrias.” He was now enriched by other pensions, and was enabled to pass his declining years, mostly at Pisa, in opulence and ease. He died Feb. 29, 1596, in his seventy-ninth year, and was interred in the Campo Santo, with great pomp; and a funeral oration was read in the academy of Florence, and, what was still a higher honour, as he was not a member, in that of Delia Crusca.

, a man of great learning, whq raised himself from a low condition by his merit, his parents being so far from able to support him in his studies, that they themselves stood in need of charity, was born at Rome in 1540. He made a quick and most surprising progress in his studies; for when he was but ten years old, he could make verses upon any subject proposed to him; and these so excellent, though pronounced extempore, that it was commonly thought they exceeded those of the most studied preparation. A proof of this was at the table of the cardinal of Pisa, when he gave an entertainment one day to several other cardinals. Alexander Farnese, taking a nosegay, gave it to this youth, desiring him to present it to him of the company whom he thought most likely to be pope: he presented it to the cardinal of Medicis, and made an eulogium upon him in verse. This cardinal, who was pope some years afterwards, under the name of Pius IV. imagined it all a contrivance, and that the poem had been artfully prepared before-hand, by way of ridicule upon him. He therefore appeared hurt at it, but the company protested that it was an extempore performance, and requested him to make a trial of the boy: he did so, and was convinced of his extraordinary talents. According to Strada, as the cardinal of Medicis was thinking upon a subject for this purpose, the clock in the hall struck; which was the occasion of his proposing a clock for the subject of his verses. The duke de Ferrara coming to Rome, to congratulate Marcellus II. upon his being raised to the pontificate, was so charmed with the genius of Antoniano, that he carried hi:n to Ferrara, where he provided able masters to instruct him in all the sciences. From thence he was sent for by Pius IV. who recollecting the adventure of the nosegay, made inquiry for the young poet; and having found him, invited him to Rome, and gave hinvan honourable post in his palace, and some time after made him professor of the belles lettres in the college at Rome. Antoniano filled this place with so much reputation, that on the day when he began to explain the oration pro Marco Marcello, he had a crowd of auditors, and among these no less than twenty-five cardinals. He was afterwards chosen rector of the college; and after the death of Pius IV. being seized with a spirit of devotion, he joined himself to Philip Neri, and accepted the office of secretary to the sacred college, offered him by Pius V. which he executed for many years with the reputation of an honest and able man. He refused a bishopric which Gregory XIV. wculd have given him, but he accepted the office of secretary to the briefs, offered him by Clement VIII. who made him his chamberlain, and afterwards a cardinal. It is reported, that cardinal Alexander de Montalto, who had behaved a Hitle too haughtily to Antoniano, said, when he saw him promoted to the purple, that for the future he would not despise a man of the cassoc and little band, however low and despicable he might appear; since it might happen that he whom he had despised, might not only become his equal, but even his superior. His intense application is said to have hastened his death, Aug. 15, 1603. His printed works are, 1. “Dele 1 Educazione Cristiana de Figliuoli libri tre,” Verona, 1584, 4to, reprinted at Cremona and Naples. This work on education he wrote at the request of cardinal Borromeo. 2. “Orationes tredecim,” Rome, 1610, 4to, with a life of the author by Joseph Castalio. 3. Various discourses, letters, pieces of poetry, both Latin and Italian, in the collections.

, brother of the preceding, was born in 1703, at Arnheim, and died in 1763. He was professor of the belles lettres, first at Utrecht, then at Goude, and at Delft, and lastly at Amsterdam. His first work was a dissertation “De MilHario aureo,” Utrecht, 17_'S, 4to, reprinted in 1769 by. Oelrichs in his “Thesaurus Dissert, selectissimarum.” In 1735, he published a Variorum edition of the Disticha Catonis, of which an improved reprint was made at Amsterdam in 1754, with two dissertations by Withof, on the author and text of the Distichs. There are also by him sortie academical orations, “Pro Latina eruditorum lingua,” Goude, 1737, 4to; “De Gneca Latini sermonis origine,” Delft, 1741, 4to; “De Mercuric,” Amst. 1746, 4to; and he left manuscript remarks and corrections on the Pseudo-Hegesippus in the hands of his nephew, the subject of the next article.

, surnamed Panormita, from his native country, Palermo, in Latin Panormus, vvas born 'there in 1394, and at the age of six was sent to the university of Bologna, to study law, after which he was taken into the court of the duke of MiIan, Philip-Maria-Visconti. He vvas afterwards professor of the belles-lettres at Pavia, but without leaving the court, in which he enjoyed a revenue of eight hundred crowns of gold. The emperor Sigismond, when on a tour in Lombardy in 1432, honoured him with the poetic crown at Parma. Beccadelli then went to the court of Naples, where he passed the remainder of his life, always accompanying Alphonso, the king, in his expeditions and travels, who loaded him with favours, gave him a beautiful country house, enrolled him among the Neapolitan nobility, intrusted him with political commissions of great importance, and sent him as ambassador to Geneva, Venice, to the emperor Frederic III. and to some other princes. And after the death of Alphonso, he was not less a favourite with king Ferdinand, who made him his secretary, and admitted him of his council. He died at Naples, in 1471. While in the service of Alphonso, he wrote his history “De dictis et factis Alphonsi regis, lib. IV.” Pisa, 1485, 4to, and often reprinted. He was rewarded by his sovereign with a thousand crowns of gold for this performance. His five books of letters, orations, poems, tragedies, &c. were published at Venice, 1553, 4to, under the title “Epistolarum lib. V. Orationes II. Carmina praeterea quasdam, &c.” But the most extraordinary of his productions was his “Hermaphroditus,” which long remained in obscurity. This is a collection divided into two books of small poems, grossly indecent, and yet dedicated to Cosmo de Medicis, who is not said to have resented the insult. What renders this production the more extraordinary, is, that it was written when the author was advanced in life, and at a time when his character seemed to derive dignity from the honourable employments he held, and his reputation in the learned world. Of this work, written with great purity of Latin style, some copies got abroad, and ^excited the just indignation of the age. Filelfo and Laurentius Valla attacked it in their writings; the clergy preached against it, and caused it to be burnt; and the author was burnt in effigy at Ferrara and Milan. Valla even goes so far as to wish that he had been burnt in person. Even Poggio, not the most chaste of Italian writers, reproached his friend with having gone too far. Beccadelli defended himself by the example of the ancients, and Guarino of Verona quotes the example of St. Jerome, but sense and decency went against them, and these poems were confined to the Laurentian library strictly, as Mr, Koscoe says, but surely a more certain method might have been devised to consign them to perpetual oblivion. A copy, however, was by some means preserved, and printed at Paris in 1791, when the revolution had brought on a general dissolution of morals and public decency. “The editor,” says Ginguene, “no doubt thought that our morals were so confirmed as to have nothing to fear, and the book is now in every shop.”

, a lawyer, philosopher, orator, and poet, of Ferrara, was born in 1610. After having pursued his studies with great success, and taken his law degrees, in the university of his native city, he was chosen professor of the belles lettres, then first secretary, and in that quality was sent to compliment pope Innocent X. on his election to the papal chair. He lived in considerable favour with that pope, as well as with Alexander VII. and Clement IX. his successors, and the dukes of Mantua, Charles I. and II. who conferred upon him the title of Count. His poetical talents were principally devoted to the drama and one of his plays “Gli Sforzi del Desiderio,” represented at Ferrara in 1652, was so successful, that the archduke Ferdinand Charles, struck with its popularity, no sooner returned home than he sent for the author and some architects from Ferrara, to build two theatres for similar representations. Berni was married seven times, and had, as might be expected, a numerous family, of whom nine sons and daughters survived him. He died Oct. 13, 1673. Eleven of his dramas, formerly published separately, were printed in one volume, at Ferrara, 1666, 12mo. He published also a miscellany of discourses, problems, &c. entitled “Accademia,” Ferrara, 2 vols. 4to, without date, and reprinted in 1658. Many of his lyric poems are in the collections.

, a canon of the church of Ferrara, and a poet and orator of considerable distinction, was born at Ferrara in 1479, and, as generally supposed, was the natural son of a person who was an apostolic notary. He studied under Peter Pomponazzo, but devoting himself to a military life, served under the emperor Maximilian. He afterwards engaged in the service. of Julius II. and was employed in several important negociations. Returning to Ferrara, he obtained the particular favour of the family of Este, and was chosen to accompany the cardinal Ippolito on his journeyMiuo Hungary. About the year 1520, he was appointed professor of the belles lettres in the university of Ferrara, which situation he filled with great credit until his death in 1541. He was interred in the library of the Jacobins, to which he bequeathed his books, and on which are two inscriptions to his memory, one signifying that “by continual study, he had learned to despise earthly things, and not to be insensible of his own ignorance,” (ignorantiam suam non ignorare.) His works were published at Basil in 1541, one vol. folio, or according to Moreri, in 1544, and contain sixteen books of epistles, and philosophical, political, and critical dissertations on various subjects, and he also wrote some Latin poetry, which the critics of his time prefer to his prose, the latter being heavy, unequal, and affected; his poetry was published with the poems of John Baptista Pigna and Louis Ariosto, at Venice, 1553, 8vo. He appears to have corresponded with Erasmus, whom, like many others, he blamed for his undecided character in the questions which arose out of the reformation.

, doctor of physic, and professor of the belles lettres in the university of Caen, was born in 1502, and acquired great reputation by his skill in the Greek, Latin, and oriental languages. He lived to 103 years of age, and, it is said, without any failure of powers in either body or mind, died of a pleurisy in 1605, but others have reduced his age to 75. He has left, “A Lexicon, Greek and Latin,” better digested, as some think, than that of Henry Stephens: Stephens ranging the Greek words according to their roots, Constantin in alphabetical order. The first edition, of little value, appeared in 1562, but the best is the secon4, Geneva, 1592, 2 vols. folio. Those of Geneva, 1607, and Leyden, 1637, are only the preceding with new title-pages. His editions, with annotations, of the works of Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Celsus, and Quintus Serenus, gained him much credit. They were published between the years 1554 and 1566, as was also his “Nomenclator insignium Scriptorum, quorum libri extant, vel manuscripti vel impressi,” 8vo.

, one of the revivers of literature, and an able grammarian, took his name from the village of Barzizza, near Bergamo, where he was born in 1370. It is thought that he studied at Bergamo, and kept a private school there. He afterwards became professor of the belles lettres at Pavia, Venice, Padua, and Milan. He was in this last mentioned city in 1418, when pope Martin V. passed through in his return from the council of Constance. Barzizza was on this occasion appointed to pay him the compliments of the city, and the two universities of Pavia and Padua having sent orators to the pope, he was also' employed in preparing their intended speeches. He was during the rest of his life patronized by the duke Philip-Maria-Visconti, and enjoyed the esteem due to his learning and talents until his death at Milan about the end of 1430.

, a professor of the belles lettres, was born at Rotterdam in 1658, and died at Amsterdam in 1724. In the evening of Nov. 13, there suddenly arose so thick a mist, that he lost his way, and fell into a canal. He was soon taken out; but the coldness of the water, and the fright from the fall, brought on so strong an oppression upon the breast, that he died in eight days after. There are of Ims, 1. “Latin Poems.” 2. “Flemish Poems.” 3. “A Flemish and Latin Dictionary.” 4. “Notes upon C. Nepos and Terence.” 5. “An edition of Phaedrus,” for the prince of Nassau, 4to, in imitation of the Delphin editions. 6. A fine edition of “Janus Broukhusius’s Poems.”

, a learned Frenchman, and noted commentator upon the classics, was born in 1516 at Montrevil in Picardy. Applying himself with indefatigable industry to polite literature, he made an extraordinary progress, especially in the critical knowledge of the classic authors. After some time he was taken into the retinue of cardinal Francis de Tournon, whom he attended into Italy, where he continued several years. On his return to Paris, he was made king’s professor of the belles lettres, which he had taught before at Amiens. He published commentaries upon Piautus, Lucretius, Cicero, and Horace; he translated, into Latin, Aristotle’s morals and politics, and several pieces of Demosthenes and Æschines. He died in 1572, of grief, for the loss of his friend Peter Ramus, who perished in the massacre of the protestants on the infamous vespers of St. Bartholomew. Lambin was not without apprehensions of suffering the same fate, notwithstanding he was otherwise a good catholic. He was married to a gentlewoman of the Ursin family, by whom he had a son, who survived him, and published some of his posthumous works.

, an Italian scholar, philosopher, and poet, was born at Florence in 1424. After having pursued his elementary studies at Volterra, he was constrained, in obedience to his father, to apply to jurisprudence; but by the favour of Cosmo and Peter de Medici, which he had the happiness to obtain, he was enabled to devote his time to philosophy and polite literature. He became particularly partial to the Platonic philosophy, and was one of the principal ornaments of the academy which Cosmo de Medici had founded. In 1457, he was appointed professor of the belles lettres at Florence, and considerably enlarged the reputation of that seminary. About the same time he was chosen by Peter de Medici to instruct his two sons, Julius, and the afterwards celebrated Lorenzo. Between Landinus and Lorenzo a reciprocal attachment took place; and such was the opinion that the master entertained of the judgment of his pupil, that he is said frequently to have submitted his works to his perusal and correction. Landinus became, in his old age, secretary to the seignory of Florence; but in his sixty-third year, he was relieved from the laborious part of this office, and allowed to retain his title and emoluments. He then retired to a residence at Prato Vecchio, from which his ancestors sprung. There he employed the remainder of his days in study, and died in 1504. He left several Latin poems, some of which have been printed, and some remain in manuscript. His notes on Virgil, Horace, and Dante, are much esteemed. He translated into Italian Pliny’s “-Natural History,” and published some learned dissertations both in Latin and Italian. It is said that he was rewarded for his critical labours on Dante by the donation of a villa, on the hill of Casentino, in the vicinity of Florence, which he enjoyed under the. sanction of a public decree. His edition of Horace was published in 1482. His philosophical opinions appear in his “Disputatipnes Cfuaaldulenses,” a work of which Mr. Roscoe has given an ample account. It was first published without a date; but, according to De Bure, in 1480, folio, and reprinted at Strasburgh in 1508. Landinus’s fame, however, rests chiefly on the advances he made in classical criticism.

, the younger, son of the preceding, was born in 1547. His father paid the utmost attention to his education; and so extraordinary was the progress of the youth in learning, that he was enabled to give the world “A collection of elegant phrases in the Tuscan and Latin languages,” when he was only eleven years of age. Other juvenile works at different periods marked his advances in classical literature, and he soon became his lather’s assistant in his labours. When very young, he conducted the printing-business at Venice while his father was engaged at Rome. In 1572 he married a lady of the Giunti family, so well known in the annals of typography; and on the death of his father in 1574, all the concerns of the Aldine press devolved upon him. He was, however, less calculated for the business of a printer than for the profession of an author. ' In 1577 he was appointed professor of the belles lettres in the school of the Venetian chancery, in which young men designed for public employments were educated. This office he held till 1585, when he was made professor of rhetoric at Bologna. In the same year he published the “Life of Cosmo de Medici,” which was so well received, that he was almost immediately invited to undertake the professorship of polite literature at Pisa, which he accepted, although he received an invitation at the same time to a professorship at Rome, which had been lately held by Muratus. During his stay at Pisa he received the degree of doctor of laws, and was admitted a member of the Florentine academy, on which occasion he delivered an eloquent oration “On the nature of Poetry.” He now paid a visit to Lucca in order to obtain materials for a “History of Castruccio Castracani,” which he afterwards published, and which is much applauded by Thuanus. The Roman professorship being reserved for him, he removed thither in 1588, and intending to spend his life there, he caused his whole library to be brought to Rome from Venice, at a very great expence. He was in high favour with Sixtus V. who gave him an apartment in the Vatican, and a table at the public expence. He was also patronized in various ways by Clement VIII. He died in the fifty-firstyear of his age, in October 1597. He left no posterity, and with him ended the glory of the Aldine press. His library, consisting of 8.0,000 volumes, collected by himself and his predecessors, was sold to pay his debts. He was author of many performances besides those already mentioned, but the most celebrated of his works were his “Commentaries on all the Works of Cicero,” in ten volumes. His “Familiar Letters,” published in 1592, were highly esteemed; but M. Renouard confesses, that were it not from his inheriting the Aldine offices, it might not have been remembered he bad ever been a printer; yet, though difference of taste gave his studies a different bent, his numerous writings, notwithstanding they were inferior to his father’s and grandfather’s, sufficiently prove his industry and learning, and justify, to a certain point, the commendations bestowed on him by many to whom his merits were known.

, an eminent Italian poet, was born at Bologna in 1665, and was educated at the Jesuits’ school, and at the university of his native city, after which he devqted himself to the study of classical literature, and having obtained the post of one of the secretaries to the senate of B*ologna, was enabled to follow his studies without much interruption. After publishing a serious poem, entitled “Gli Ocche di Gesu,” The Eyes of Jesus, he produced a tragedy called “La Morte di Nerone,” which with several of liis other pieces was acted with great^ applause. In 1707 he was appointed professor of the belles lettres in the university of Bologna, and soon after was made private secretary to Aldrovandi, who had been nominated delegate to pope Clement XI. At Rome, where he contracted an intimacy with many men of high literary reputation, he published a whimsical dialogue, “Del Volo,” On Flying, in which he endeavoured to prove that men and heavy bodies might be supported in the air, and also wrote several discourses in verse concerning the art of poetry. When he accompanied Aldrovandi, who was appointed the pope’s legate at the courts of France and Spain, he wrote at Paris his opinions “On” ancient and modern Tragedy,“in the form of dialogues; and on his return to Rome, he published his tragedies in three volumes, and was reckoned to have conferred a great benefit on Italian literature, although his style is often too turgid and florid for a model. He also began a poem” On the Arrival of Charlemagne in Italy, and his Accession to the Western Empire,“which he never finished. He died in 1727, at the age of sixty-two, leaving the character of a man of amiable manners and social qualities. His principal works,” Versi et Prose," were printed at Bologna in 1729, 7 vols. 8vo.

, in Flemish Vander Putten, and in French Dupuy, was born at Venlo, in Guelderland, Nov. 4, 1574. His Christian name was Henry. He studied the classics at Dort, philosophy at Cologne, and law at Louvain, under the celebrated Lipsius, with whom he formed a lasting friendship. He afterwards, in pursuit of knowledge, visited the chief academies of Italy, and heard the lectures of the most learned professors. He remained some months at Milan, and at Padua, where John Michael Pinelli gave him an apartment in his house. In 1601 he accepted the professorship of rhetoric at Milan, and nearly about the same time, was nominated historiographer to the king of Spain. Two years afterwards he was honoured with the diploma of a Roman citizen, and the degree of doctor of laws. These flattering marks of distinction made him resolve to settle in Italy; and in 1604 he married Mary Magdalen Catherine Turria, of a considerable family at Milan, a very advantageous alliance. But notwithstanding his resolution, he could not resist the offer made to him in 1606 to succeed the now deceased Lipsius, as professor of the belles lettres at Louvain. This office he filled for forty years, although neither with the same success or the same reputation as his predecessor. Puteanus was a man of vast reading, but of little judgment. He was well acquainted with the manners and customs of the ancients, but had little of the spirit of criticism or philosophy, and was incapable of undertaking any work of great extent. Every year he published some small volumes, and such was his desire to increase their number that he even printed a volume of the attestations he used to give to his scholars.

, whose family name was Schalter, one of the best Latin poets of his time, was born in the electorate of Brandenburg in 1508; and, at fifteen, sent to Wittemberg, where he was privately instructed by Melancthon, in whose house he lived. He had a great ambitioft: to excel and an enthusiastic regard for what was excellent, especially in Latin poetry and although the specimens ht^ studied made him somewhat diffident of his powers, he ventured to submit to the public, in his twenty-second year, a poem, entitled “Res Gestse Csesarum Germanorum,” which spread his reputation all over Germany, and made all the princes, who had any regard for polite literature, his friends and patrons. Afterwards he travelled into Italy, where he contracted an acquaintance with Bembus and other learned men; and, on his return visited Erasmus at Friburg, when that great man was in the last stage of life. In 1536, he married Melancthon’s eldest daughter, at Wittemberg, to whom he was engaged before his journey into Italy. She was only fourteen, but very handsome, and understood Latin well and Sabinus always lived happily with her but he had several altercations with Melancthon, because he wanted to raise himself to civil employments; and did not relish the humility of Melancthon, who confined himself to literary pursuits, and would be at no trouble to advance his children. This misunderstanding occasioned Sabinus to remove into Prussia in 1543, with his wife, who afterwards died at Konigsberg in 1547. He settled, for some little time, at Francfort upon the Oder, and was made professor of the belles lettres by the appointment of the elector of Brandenburg; and was afterwards promoted to be rector of the new university of Konigsberg, which was opened in 1544. His eloquence and learning brought him to the knowledge of Charles V. who ennobled him, and he was also employed on some embassies, particularly by the elector of Brandenburg into Italy, where he seems to have contracted an illness, of which he died in 1560, the same year in which Melancthon died. His Latin poems were published at Leipsic in 1558 and 1597, the latter with additions and letters. He published some other works, less known, which are enumerated by Niceron.

, an Italian biographer, was born at Bergamo in 1721, and at the age of twenty had so distinguished himself as to be elected a member of the academy of Transforrnati at Milan, and on his return to Bergamo, was appointed professor of the belles lettres. In 1742, he published his “Opinion concerning the country of Bernardo and of Torquato Tasso,” a tract in which he vindicated, to the district of Bergamo, the honour of being the native country of these poets, which had been denied by Seghezzi, the author of a very elegant life of Bernardo; but Seghezzi now candidly confessed that his opponent was right, and that he should treat the subject differently, were he again to write on it. In the succeeding years, Serassi published editions of several of the best Italian writers, with their lives, particularly Maffei, Molza, Politian, Capelia, Dante, Petrarch, &c. The most distinguished of his biographical productions, however, was his life of Tasso, 17b5, 2 vols. 4to, on which he had been employed during twenty years. Mr. Black, in his life of that eminent poet, has availed himself of Serassi' s work, but not without discovering its delects. Serassi also published a life of “Jacopo Mazzoni, patrician of Cessena,” 3. personage little known, but whose history he has rendered interesting. Serassi was employed in some offices under the papal government, and in the college of Propaganda. he died Feb. 19, 1791, at Rome, in the seventieth year of his age. A monument was erected to his memory in the church of St. Maria, in Via lata, where he-was interred; and the city of Bergamo ordered a medal to be struck to his honour, with the inscription “Propagatori pcitriae laudis.”

Trapezuntius appears to have met with some reverse after this controversy, for in 1549 he was again at Venice, supplicating the aid of the State, and was in consequence appointed professor of the belles-lettres. While in this office he wrote his Art of Rhetoric, dedicated to the Venetians, which appeared under the title of “Rhetorica Trapezuntina,” but was not printed until 1470, at Venice, in folio, and then only the first book. In 1464 and 1465, he took a voyage to Crete, and another to Constantinople. On his return, being informed that one of his scholars was now pope, under the name of Paul II. he went to Rome, in hopes of being well received; but all he received was an order to be imprisoned in the castle of St. Angelo, where he remained for four months, and was afterwards under confinement in his house. The most probable cause of this treatment was his having returned to Rome without leave; but this is merely conjecture; the pope, however, at length condescended to forgive him, and he remained at Rome much respected. In his latter years his faculties began to decay, and before his death, which took place in 1484, in the ninetieth year of his age, all traces of memory and understanding were gone.

, in German Von Watte, one of the most learned men of his nation or time, was born at St. Gal, Nov. 29, 1484, of which city his father, Joachim Von Watte, was a senator. After some education at home he was sent to Vienna to pursue the higher studies, but for some time entered more into the gaieties of the place, and was distinguished particularly for his quarrels and his duels, until by the sensible and affectionate remonstrances of a merchant of that city, to whose care his father had confided him, he was induced to devote his whole time and attention to books, and never relapsed into his former follies. When he had acquired a competent share of learning he wished to relieve his father from any farther expence, and with that honourable view taught a school at Villach, in Carinthia; but finding this place too remote from literary society, he returned to Vienna, and in a short time was chosen professor of the belles lettres, and acquitted himself with such credit, and gained such reputation by some poetry which he published, that the emperor Maximilian I. honoured him with the laurel crown at Lintz in 1514. After some hesitation between law and physic, both of which he had studied, he determined in favour of the latter, as a profession, and took his doctor’s degree at Vienna in 1518. He appears to have practised in that city, and afterwards at St. Gal, until the controversies arose respecting the reformation. After examining the arguments of the contending parties, he embraced the cause of the reformers; and besides many writings in favour of their principles, befriended them in his rank of senator, to which he had been raised. In 1526 he was farther promoted to the dignity of consul of St. Gal, the duties of which he performed so much to the satisfaction of his constituents that he was re-elected to the same office seven times. He died April 6, 1551, in his sixty-sixth year. He bequeathed his books to the senate of St. Gal, which were ordered to be placed in the public library of the city, with an inscription, honourable both to his character and talents. The latter were very extensive, for he was well versed and wrote well on mathematics, geography, philosophy, and medicine. He was also a good Latin poet, and, above all, a sound divine and an able controversial writer. Joseph Scaliger places him among the most learned men of Germany. He was intimate with our illustrious prelate, archbishop Cranmer, but preceded him in some of the doctrines of the reformation. About 1536 he wrote a book entitled “Aphorismorum libri sex de consideratione Eucharistiae,” &c. which was levelled at the popish doctrine of the corporal presence, and thinking it a proper work for the archbishop to patronize, presented it to him; but Cranmer had not yet considered the question in that view, and therefore informed Vadian that his book had not made a convert of him, and that he was hurt with the idea of being thought the patron of such unscriptural opinions. Vadian therefore pursued the subject at home, and wrote two more volumes on it. The only medical work he published was his “Consilium contra Pestem, Basil, 1546, 4to. Those by which he is best known in the learned world, are, 1. A collection of remarks on various Latin authors, in his” Epistola responsoria ad Rudulphi Agricolas epistolam,“ibid. 1515, 4to. 2. His edition of” Pomponius Mela,“first printed at Vienna in 1518, fol. and often reprinted. 3.” Scholia qoaedam in C. Plinii de Nat. Hist, librum secundum,“Basil, 153 1, fol. 4.” Chronologia Ablmtum Monasterii St.Galli“”De obscuris verborum significationibus epistola;“” Farrago antiquitatum Alamannicarum,“&c. and some other treatises, which are inserted in Goldnst’s” Alamanniae Scnptores."

, an Italian physician and professor of the belles lettres at Venice, was born at Picenza, and was a contemporary of Laurentius Valla. He was well skilled in the Latin and Greek tongues, and wrote a considerable number of books both in physic and literature. One of his books in the former has a title, which gives us no less an opinion of his honesty than of his skill in his profession: it is “De tuenda sanitate per victum;” but it is doubtful whether he practised physic. He wrote “Commentaries on some books of Cicero, Horace’s Art of Poetry, Juvenal, &c.” and “A Comment upon the second book of Pliny’s Natural History,” printed at Venice 1502, in 4to: which, however, must be certainly very scarce, since father Hardouin tells us that he could not meet with it. He was also the compiler of a work entitled “De expetendis et fugiendis rebus,” Venice, 1501, 2 vols. fol. a kind of philosophical and literary Cyclopædia, in which the articles are generally short, but many of them curious. Valla exasperated the duke of Milan so much by his too impetuous zeal for the Trivulcian faction, that the prince procured him to be committed to prison even at Venice. He suffered great hardships in that confinement, but was at last released. He died suddenly, as he was going from his lodgings, in order to read a lecture upon the immortality of the soul, about the close of the fifteenth century.

, a learned physician of Denmark, was born May 13, 1588, at Arhusen, a city of Jutland, where his father was a burgomaster of an ancient family. He began his studies in his native place; but was sent, when very young, to the college of Lunenburg; and thence to Emmeric, in the duchy of Cleves. Having spent four years at these places, he was removed to Marpurg in 1605; and two years after to Strasburg, where he applied himself to physic, to which profession he had now given the preference, and going to Basil studied some time with advantage under Platerus and others. In 1608, he went to Italy, and during a residence of some months at Padua, his uncommon parts and learning procured him singular honours. He visited other cities of Italy, and passed thence into France, remaining three months at Sienna, and four at Montpelier; after which his design was, to make along abode at Paris; but the assassination of Henry IV. in 1610, about two months after his arrival, obliging him as well as other strangers to retire from that city, he went to Holland, and thence to Denmark. He had not yet visited the university of Copenhagen, so that his first care was to repair thither, and to be admitted a member of it. ‘He was earnestly entreated to continue there; but his passion for travelling was not yet satiated, and he resolved to see England first. The chemical experiments that were then carrying on at Marpurg made a great noise; and he went thither in 1611, with a view of perfecting himself in a science of great importance to a physician. Thence he journeyed to Basil, where he took the degree of doctor in physic; and from Basil to London, in which city he resided a year and a half. His friends grew now impatient to have him at home, where he arrived in 1613: and was scarcely settled, when he was made professor of the belles-lettres in the university of Copenhagen. In 1615, he was translated to the chair of the Greek professor; and, in 1624-, to the professorship of physic, in the room of Caspar Bartholin, which he held to his death. These occupations did not hinder him from practising in his profession, and from being the fashionable physician. ’The king and, court of Denmark always employed him; and Christian IV. as a recompence for his services, conferred on him the canonry of Lunden. He died Aug. 31, 1654, aged sixty-six.