Poggio Bracciolini and the re(dis)covery of antiquity : textual and material traditions : proceedings of the symposium held at Bryn Mawr College on April 8-9, 2016

This collection draws strength from its cross-disciplinarity, featuring contributions by scholars who investigate Bracciolini's contribution to many fields of knowledge in the Western tradition, spanning across politics and historiography, material and print culture, philology and manuscript studies, calligraphy and palaeography. The essays touch upon intertwined aspects of early Renaissance in its recovery of the classical tradition where the concept of humanitas extends to the manuscript itself. “This distinguished collection of essays adds a wealth of scholarly detail to our understanding of the myriad-minded Renaissance humanist Poggio Bracciolini. And, in doing so, it also managed to capture much of the range and flavour of this extraordinary figure: his learning, his passionate interest in antiquity, his civic pride, and his brilliance in calligraphic design, as well as his ceaseless self-promotion , his enmities, his taste for obscenity, and his penchant for moralizing. Poggio's startling energy and the energy of the whole period course through these pages" (Stephen Greenblatt) The careers of the Curial secretaries Poggio Bracciolini (1380-1459) and Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) reveal many parallels. In 1437-1438 the Este court of Ferrara, where Eugenius IV convoked a church council, provided a focal point for their friendship. It was to the Ferrarese canon Francesco Marescalchi that Poggio dedicated Book 1 of his Latin epistles (1436), and Alberti his Hundred Apologues (1437). Both men were inspired to critiques of contemporary society by the Greek satirist Lucian, and both indulged in composing brief witticisms that expose human vice: Poggio in his Facetiae (Jests) and Alberti in his Apologi (Fables) and Vita (Autobiography). From Lucian, they also learned to dramatize human foibles on the imagined stage of the theatrum mundi, or theater of the world: Poggio in his dialogues, and Alberti in both the Intercenales and Momus. Despite such literary affinities, their approach to ethical questions differed, especially concerning the validity of allegory, which Poggio rejected but Alberti embraced. As a tribute to his colleague, Alberti dedicated Book 4 of his Intercenales to Poggio; he prefaced the work with an ironic Aesopic fable that asserts the superiority of recondite scientific research over commonplace humanistic studies. Eventually, Alberti's status as an outsider in Florence was reflected in the deterioration in his relations with Poggio. The rift was widened in 1441, when Alberti organized the Italian poetic competition called the Certame Coronario that was held in the Florence cathedral on October 22. Poggio was a member of the jury that, to Alberti's chagrin, refused to declare a winner Thanks to his part in the rediscovery of Lucretius in the Renaissance Poggio Bracciolini has been much in academic news recently. But he was always there as a part of the histories of that moment, in all its twists and turns, as an example of what it was to be a Renaissance humanist in the earlier part of the XVth century. He was born in 1380 and educated first in Arezzo. But he soon moved to Florence to become a notary and from his intellectual contacts there a little after 1403 he became a member of the entourage of Pope Benedict IX to remain all his life a member of the Papal court. But, in true humanist fashion, he was busy always with his writings, taking on a range of general subjects, nobility, the vicissitudes of Fortune and many others. Also, again in true humanist fashion, he was often involved in dispute with other scholars, most notably Lorenzo Valla. Yet, amidst all this activity, he had time to travel throughout Europe, scouring libraries to uncover, as with Lucretius, long neglected texts. But perhaps his most notable achievement was the design of a new script, moving away from the less legible texts of medieval copyists to provide one, far easier to read, that was to become the model in Italy for the first printed books - as it is a model still for publishers. Few scholars of that moment can claim to have had so profound and persistent an influence on the spread of culture in Europe and beyond Frontespizio 4 Pagina copyright 5 Sommario 6 Introduction 8 Roberta Ricci 8 Ann Mullaney, Massimo Zaggia 14 Florence 1438: The Encomium of the Florentina Libertas Sent by Poggio Bracciolini to Duke Filippo Maria Visconti 14 Outi Merisalo 38 The Historiae Florentini populi by Poggio Bracciolini. Genesis and Fortune of an Alternative History of Florence 38 David Rundle 54 Poggio Bracciolini’s International Reputation and the Significance of Bryn Mawr, ms. 48 54 Stefano U. Baldassarri 84 Poggio Bracciolini and Coluccio Salutati: The Epitaph and the 1405-1406 Letters 84 David Marsh 102 Poggio and Alberti Revisited 102 Roberta Ricci 116 Shifting Times, Converging Futures: Technologies of Writing Beyond Poggio Bracciolini 116 Philippa Sissis 132 Script as Image: Visual Acuity in the Script of Poggio Bracciolini* 132 Paul Shaw 162 Poggio Bracciolini, an Inscription in Terranuova, and the Monument to Carlo Marsuppini: A Theory 162 David Cast 176 Poge the Florentyn: A Sketch of the Life of Poggio Bracciolini 176 Julia Haig Gaisser 186 Poggio and Other Book Hunters 186 Eric L. Pumroy 202 Poggio Bracciolini, Phyllis Goodhart Gordan and the Formation of the Goodhart Collection of Fifteenth Century Books at Bryn Mawr College 202 List of contributors 212 List of figures 216 "This collection draws strength from its cross-disciplinarity, featuring contributions by scholars who investigate Bracciolini's contribution to many fields of knowledge in the Western tradition, spanning across politics and historiography, material and print culture, philology and manuscript studies, calligraphy and paleography. The essays touch upon intertwined aspects of early Renaissance in its recovery of the classical tradition where the concept of humanitas extends to the manuscript itself. 'This distinguished collection of essays adds a wealth of scholarly detail to our understanding of the myriad-minded Renaissance humanist Poggio Bracciolini. And, in doing so, it also manages to capture much of the range and flavor of this extraordinary figure: his learning, his passionate interest in antiquity, his civic pride, and his brilliance in calligraphic design, as well as his ceaseless self-promotion, his enmities, his taste for obscenity, and his penchant for moralizing. Poggio's startling energy and the energy of the whole period course through these pages.' (Stephen Greenblatt)."-- Provided by publisher