Volume 2 / Book 5 — CHAPTER LXX (continued 2)

Also found with the works of Hippocrates and Galen in various editions and in the 1497 edition of Rasis.

MSS are also numerous, but catalogues usually do not state whether William of Moerbeke or Peter of Abano is the translator. It is ascribed to the former, however, in

BN 7337, pp. 78-84, Liber hyppocratis de prognosticationibus egritudinum secundum motum lune traductus a domino fratre Guglielmo de Morbercha archiepiscopo Corintino ordinis predicatorum.

Vienna 5498, 15th century, fols. 53-59, our treatise precedes that of Peter on the motion of the eighth sphere.

Vienna 5275, 16th century, fol. 195, Pseudo-Hippocrates, Fragmentum libri de medicorum astrologia a Petro de Abano in latinum sermonem traducti.

Sloane 780, 15th century, fols. 55v-58v, “De iudiciis a lune observatione formandis de sanitate vita et morte infirmiorum,” is the Peter of Abano version, opening, “Cum legerem libros hypocratis medicorum optimi inveni hunc parvum sed magne utilitatis librum....”

Sloane 636, 15th century, fols. 98v-102v, has the Incipit of William of Moerbeke’s translation (Quetif and Echard, 1719, I, 390), “Sapientissimus ypocras omnium medicorum peritissimus ait, Inscius medicus est qui astronomiam ignorat....” This is also the Incipit of Digby 29, 15th century, fols. 167-72.

The recently revised catalogue of the Royal MSS notes that a third version, which apparently is neither by William of Moerbeke nor Peter, is found in

Royal 12-C-XVIII, 14th century, fols. 33v-36r, which opens, “Dixit ypocras qui fuit medicus et magister optimus et medicus non est qui astronomiam ignorat”;

Sloane 3171, fols. 104v-116, which opens, “Dixit ypocras medicorum optimus cuiusmodi medicus est qui astrononiam ignorat”;

Sloane 3282, fols. 89v-90, which opens, “Dixit ypocras qui fuit medicus et magister optimus cuiusmodi medicus est qui non astronomiam nossit”;

Cotton Appendix VI, fols. 5r-8r, which opens, “Dixit ypocras qui fuit medicus et magister optimus cuiusmodi medicus est qui astronomiam ignorat.”

Digby 28, early 14th century, fols. 81v-85, which opens, “Dixit Ypo. non est medicus qui astronomiam non novit,” is perhaps the same version; at any rate Coxe says that it differs from Digby 29, William of Moerbeke’s translation.

Geomancy.

Geomantia, in Latin according to Mazzuchelli, Venice, 1549 and 1586. I have not seen either.

Geomantia di Pietro d’Abano nuovamente tradotta di Latino in volgare per il Tricasso Mantuano, Venice, 1542.

Novamente dall’ eccell. M. S. Musio da Capoa ricorsa, 2 pts., Vinegia, 1546-1550. Another edition, Venice, 1550.

Comincia la Geomantia di P. d’Abano tradotta di Lattina lingua, Venice, 1556.

CLM 392, 15th century, fol. 69-.

CLM 489, 16th century, fols. 222-33, “Desideravi verum et certum Iudicium dare secundum gloriosam et venerabilem scientiam Geomantiae ... / ... Explicit liber Petri de Abano. P.”

Sandaniele del Friuli 240, 15th century, “Incipit modum iudicandi questiones geomantie sive modum magistri Petri. Considerantibus (?) verum et certum ... / ... veluti nocturna. Explicit liber Geomantiae. Deo gratias Amen.”

Prophecies.

Questa sie la profetia composta per el reverendissimo negromante piero dabano ... Bologna, 1495.

Vatican 5356, fol. 28, Variae prophetiae Magistri Petri Patavini de Abano.

Heptameron, or Elements of magic.

Kiesewetter, Der Occultismus des Alterthums, mentions a Latin edition, Venice, 1496, which I have neither seen nor found mentioned elsewhere.

It was printed together with the Occult Philosophy of Henry Cornelius Agrippa in Latin at Paris, 1565, and in 1600 and 1655 in English translation.

Also in J. Scheible, Kleiner Wunder-Schauplatz, Theil 10, 1855.

In French as Les Oeuvres Magiques de Henri-Corneille Agrippa, par Pierre d’Aban (Heptameron ou les élémens magiques de Pierre Aban, Philosophe, Disciple de Henri-Corneille Agrippa), Liège, 1788.

Sloane 3850, 17th century, fols. 13v-23.

CLM 24936, 17th century, pp. 94-131, Petri de Abano doctoris urbis Pataviae Magia.

Vienna 11294, 17th century, fols. 41r-74v.

BN 17870, 18th century.

Elucidarium necromanticum.

Vatican, Regina Sueviae 2014, according to Mazzuchelli (1741) p. liii, who, like Naudé, lists this as a separate treatise different from the Heptameron.

Annulorum experimenta.

BN 7337, 15th century, pp. 131-8, “Peritissimi artium ac medicine doctoris in omnibusque scientiis excellentissimi magistri Petri de abbano annulorum experimenta feliciter incipiunt. Primo et principaliter in hac arte considerandum est quod 28 sunt mansiones lune.” This seems to be the work described by Naudé as “Liber experimentorum mirabilium de annulis secundum 28 mansiones Lunae.”

Circulus philosophicus.

CLM 17711, 17th century, fols. 284-307, is perhaps identical with one of the three preceding works.

APPENDIX III

PETER OF ABANO, ABRAHAM ABEN EZRA, AND HENRY BATE

French translation from the Hebrew.

The French translation from the Hebrew of astrological treatises by Abraham Aben Ezra is preserved in BN, fonds de Sorbonne, 1825. I have not seen the MS but infer from the description in HL XXI, 500-3 that it includes only five of Abraham’s treatises, The Beginning of Wisdom, Nativities, Revolutions, Elections, and Interrogations. At the close of The Beginning of Wisdom we are told that it was written down by Obers de Montdidier from the dictation of Hagins the Jew in the house of Sire Henri Bate at Malines and finished December 22, 1273.

Peter of Abano’s Latin version.

One MS of Peter of Abano’s version, BN supplem. lat. 151, is partially described in HL 21, 501. Others which I have examined are BN 7336, BN 7438, Canon. Misc. 190. I have seen various other MSS noted in catalogues and elsewhere, but such notices seldom seem to give a full and accurate list of the treatises. They were printed in 1507 by Peter Liechtenstein as noted in Appendix II. All copies which I have seen contain at the close of the first treatise, the Liber Introductorius or Beginning of Wisdom, the passage, of which HL 21, 501 has already quoted the Latin, stating that when Peter of Abano the Paduan found this work “in Gallic idiom, through the unskilfulness of the translator from the Hebrew defective in many ways, corrupt, and sometimes poorly arranged and failing to make sense, as far as he could he brought it back in the Latin tongue to Abraham’s original meaning.” The date is then given as 1293. Peter is also usually named as the translator at the beginning or end of the other treatises.

Additional treatises in Peter’s version.

In the Latin versions of Abraham’s astrological treatises besides the five named by the Histoire Littéraire are found the Liber rationum,[2885] the Liber luminarium et de cognitione diei cretici,[2886] and Tractatus particulares, which are really three treatises, namely: (1) “Incipit alius tractatus particulare. Incipit tractatus de partibus horarum in interrogationibus”;[2887] (2) “Tractatus in tredecim manieribus planetarum”;[2888] and (3) “Tractatus de significationibus planetarum in duodecim domibus Abrahe.”[2889] The De consuetudinibus in judiciis astrorum et est centiloquium Bethen, which occurs in the midst of Abraham’s treatises in the MSS, is probably not by him and is placed last in the 1507 edition. The Tractatus particulares are not included by Steinschneider in his list of Abraham’s astrological writings.[2890]

A Latin translation by Henry Bate.

While in general the Latin translation of Abraham’s astrological treatises is ascribed to Peter, in all the editions and manuscripts that I have seen,[2891] one of them, entitled De mundo vel seculo and dealing with conjunctions and revolutions, is ascribed to Henry Bate, the same under whose patronage the French translations were made.[2892] It would therefore seem that Peter found Henry Bate’s own Latin translation of 1281 more satisfactory than the French translation made at Bate’s house in 1273,[2893] and did not attempt to revise it. In some manuscripts Bate is also credited with a Latin translation of The Beginning of Wisdom or Liber introductorius, made in 1292.[2894]

Other writings of Henry Bate.

This Henry Bate was called by Pico della Mirandola “a disciple of Albertus Magnus.”[2895] In 1274 at Malines and in fulfilment of a promise made to William of Moerbeke, the noted translator of the Dominican Order and at that time papal chaplain and penitentiary, when they were together in Lyons, Bate composed a treatise on the astrolabe.[2896] Later Bate also wrote an account of his own horoscope and destiny.[2897] It gives the year of his birth as 1244. He was a canon, doctor of theology, and university professor; and seems to have spent his life mainly at Malines, Liège, and Paris. He also wrote on errors in the Alfonsine astronomical tables.[2898] Another unpublished work of his is entitled Speculum divinorum et quorundam naturalium.[2899]

Other works by Abraham.

There were also Latin versions of other astronomical and astrological works by Abraham than those translated by Bate or Peter.[2900] One cannot, however, be sure that “Abraham Judaeus” always refers to Abraham Avenezra, as there was a translator or translators of the thirteenth century by that name. Simon Cordo of Genoa was assisted in his Latin translation of the medical works of Serapion by an Abraham Judaeus of Tortosa;[2901] and Alfonso X of Castile employed a Jew named Abraham in astronomical translation from Arabic into Spanish.[2902] An Abraham Iudeus of Barcelona translated Haly on Elections from Arabic into Latin,[2903] and was perhaps the same as Abraham Bar Chasdai, a rabbi of Barcelona who translated the supposititious Aristotelian work De pomo from Arabic into Hebrew, after which Manfred, the illegitimate son of Emperor Frederick II, translated it or had it translated from Hebrew into Latin.

APPENDIX IV

WAS PETER CALLED TO TREVISO IN 1314?

It was stated by Bonifazio in his History of Treviso,[2904] and repeated by Mazzuchelli[2905] and Tiraboschi,[2906] that on August 7, 1314, the Trevisans, wishing to establish a university, brought Peter to their city, where he taught and practiced medicine for a year. Colle[2907] agreed that he received a call but doubted if he accepted it because his will, drawn up in 1315, makes it appear that he is still in the employ of Padua. But it is not quite certain that he even received a call, if we judge from the extant original documents,[2908] a decree issued by the government of Treviso on August 9, 1314, and letters of the 15th and 16th of that month. The decree indeed aims at the institution of professorial chairs in the two laws and medicine (phisica) at Treviso, namely, Ordinary Lecturers in Civil and Canon Law, and Extraordinary Lecturers in Civil Law and Medicine. Under each of these four heads it lists three names, and that of “Master Peter of Abano” heads those in medicine. But the decree further states that “the doctors named below” are to be balloted upon, and apparently by lot,[2909] and thus arranged in order of first, second, and third choice. The position is then to be offered to the first one chosen; if he refuses, to the second; and so on. It is also stated that the incumbents “are to lecture and teach through three years continuously after their arrival,” not for one year. The normal salary is set at four hundred petty pounds annually, although the Council of Three Hundred are left some liberty in increasing or diminishing this amount. Moreover, we have a letter of August sixteenth notifying Peter of Suzara of his final appointment after he had indicated that he would accept the election. Similar letters were sent to five others of the twelve men named in the decree, and the name of Peter of Abano is not found among the five, the professor named in medicine being Henzelerius or Hengelerius. Either therefore Peter of Abano had not been elected or had refused to accept the appointment.

APPENDIX V

PETER’S SALARY AT PADUA

Amount exaggerated.

The amount of salary offered at Treviso was worth mentioning because the statement has been made over and over again that Peter in his will of 1315 bequeathed to the town government of Padua fifteen hundred lire or pounds that were due him for his past three months’ salary. From this it was inferred that his annual stipend was either six thousand pounds, or four thousand if reckoned on the basis of an academic year of eight months. This seemed to show that he was the highest paid professor of his own, not to mention our, age. On turning, however, to the will as printed by Verci[2910] we discover that the fifteen hundred pounds represent three years of back pay, and that Peter further bequeaths to the commune of Padua five hundred pounds of small denarii due on his salary, presumably for the current year.[2911]

Why was it so far in arrears?

This puts an entirely different aspect upon the matter. It not only shows that Peter’s stipend was scarcely a tithe of what had been supposed, although a good salary for the times, as a comparison with that offered at Treviso and with the amounts of the other legacies made by Peter in his will indicates. It also raises the question, why was the payment of Peter’s salary some four years in arrears? And why does Peter make a distinction between five hundred pounds for which he holds papers (Bulletas) from the town officials and the fifteen hundred pounds due him for the previous three years and for which he apparently has nothing to show. Is there some question as to his claim for salary for those three years or even as to his having been in the Commune’s employ? Probably the simplest explanation is that after failing to receive his salary for these years Peter took the precaution to get a definite statement concerning it for the fourth. This might also serve to explain why Treviso had hopes of getting him away from Padua in 1314, and why he stayed on in 1315. The years just preceding 1315 seem to have been a troublous time for the city of Padua, which incurred a heavy sentence from the emperor Henry VII, and had wars with Vicenza and Can Grande, not to mention civil strife such as that of April, 1314, when another Peter—Judex de Altichino—was slain with his sons in the public square by the people, their goods confiscated, and the family banished to the fourth generation.[2912]

There seems to be no quarrel between Peter and the Commune of Padua, for he goes on in his will to entrust himself, his children, and his property to its tutelage and defense, besides leaving the Commune the two thousand pounds in question. Also as Peter makes his will in Padua, where most of his legatees live, where he still has his residence, and where he intends to be buried, it appears that in May, 1315, he still is in the employ of that city and has been for years past. So he has not yet gone to Treviso or elsewhere. Nor is his bequeathing the two thousand pounds arrears to the city a sure indication that he does not intend to teach there any more, either because he expects to die soon, or to accept a position in another university, or to cease teaching entirely because of old age. These arrears are an asset and he has to dispose of them somehow in making his will; he evidently has continued to teach when one and two years’ pay was owing him, and he may continue to do so now when three or four years’ salary is in arrears. However, it must be said that he shows no hope of ever recovering these arrears, nor is there any evidence that he ever did.

APPENDIX VI

WHEN DID PETER DIE?

The date of Peter’s death may be placed between May 25, 1315, when he made his will, and November 19, 1318, when the record of a legal transaction in which his sons were concerned appears to speak of him as dead.[2913] It has usually been assumed that he died in 1315 or 1316 and these dates are given in epitaphs,[2914] which, however, were composed long afterwards and cannot be accepted as sure proof. Peter’s making his will has been taken as a sign that he was at death’s door and died almost immediately afterward, but this inference does not seem necessarily to follow either from the will proper or from the accompanying confession of faith which he made on the day preceding. Arnald of Villanova, it will be recalled, made his will in 1305 but lived on until 1311. Peter concludes his confession of faith by affirming that such has been his belief in the past, is now, “and will be to the very end of his life.”[2915] Unless we assume that this last clause is added simply as a matter of form or as a safeguard against the possibility of the Inquisition’s making the charge that immediately after his confession Peter became a heretic or relapsed into his previous heresy—unless we make such an assumption, which may be entirely unwarranted—the natural conclusion is that Peter did not expect to die immediately.

The language of the will itself points in the same direction. Peter, “a provident and discreet man,” contemplating the unstable condition of human nature and noting that “those things which have the appearance of lasting for a long time” nevertheless “tend visibly toward their end,” has decided to meet such perils half-way and happily anticipate the last day of life by a will made when in full possession of his senses and intellectual faculties.[2916] No mention is made of his being in ill health, unlike another will of the same period quoted in the same volume of Verci, in which the testator speaks of himself as “of sound mind, although afflicted body, not wishing to depart this world intestate.”[2917]

Other indications that Peter not only did not die immediately after making his will, but continued to teach and write, are the fairly strong evidence and probability that the pope to whom his treatise on poisons is addressed is John XXII, who was not elected until August 7, 1316; and the dubious assertion in a fifteenth century manuscript that Peter was acting dean of Montpellier at that time. We might also add that a prefatory note in the 1555 edition of the De venenis states that he lived to be almost an octogenarian.

APPENDIX VII

WAS THE DE VENENIS ADDRESSED TO POPE JOHN XXII (1316-1334)?

Survey of the editions and MSS

In some nine printed editions which I have examined the pope addressed is denoted simply by the letter “N”; and most of the MSS do not specify the pope by name, or if they do, it is not so stated in the catalogues. Giacosa[2918] says that the treatise is dedicated in some MSS to Pope Honorius IV, but he does not specify them, and I do not know of any such. Where the pope is named, he is either John without enumeration,[2919] or John XXII.[2920] It is perhaps worth noting that there never was any John XX, and that John XXI is sometimes called John XX, and John XXII is called John XXI, but that the converse is impossible. In view of this uncertainty in the enumeration, it would also not be surprising to find either John XXI or XXII named without enumeration. Scardeone[2921] in the sixteenth century asserted that the De venenis was dedicated to John XXII, although this conflicts with his statement that Peter died in 1315. Mazzuchelli[2922] spoke of an Italian translation in which the pope is called Giacomo. There never was a pope so styled, but both Honorius IV and John XXII (called John XXI by Mazzuchelli owing to the error above noted) bore the name Giacomo before they assumed their pontifical designations. Another cogent reason for dismissing John XXI (1276-1277) from consideration is that Peter at the age of twenty-six or twenty-seven would neither have adopted the authoritative tone that he employs in the De venenis in addressing a pope who had himself, as Petrus Hispanus, been a medical writer of note, nor have failed to advert to that pope’s own medical works.

Inference from a citation of Avenzoar.

In the De venenis[2923] Peter cites the Latin translation of a treatise by Avenzoar (ʿAbd al Malik ibn Zuhr ibn ʿAbd al Malik, Abu Marwan) concerning the power of a powdered emerald as an antidote against poison. In the printed editions Avenzoar’s work is referred to as that translated for Pope Boniface.[2924] If we could only rely upon this as Peter’s original wording, it would mean that he was himself addressing some pope later than Boniface VIII (1294-1303), and so would support the other evidence that the De venenis was addressed to John XXII. But in at least one manuscript of the De venenis the work of Avenzoar is said to have been translated “for the Roman people.”[2925] Moreover, the Latin translation of Avenzoar in question is extant and in the printed version[2926] we read at the close that it was translated at Venice, August 21, 1281, from Hebrew into Latin by a master of medicine from Padua[2927] with the aid of a Jew named Jacob. The work would thus seem to have been translated long before Boniface became pope. In a Paris manuscript,[2928] however, the translator gives his name as John of Capua, a baptized Jew, of whom we know as a translator of other works from Hebrew into Latin,[2929] and addresses his present translation to the archbishop of Braga in Portugal,[2930] whom Hartwig believed to be Martin de Oliviera who held that office from 1292 to 1313. Now this John of Capua also translated the work on Diets of Maimonides, at the suggestion of William of Brescia who was Pope Boniface VIII’s physician, and Hartwig believes that he met the archbishop of Braga at Rome. But more than this, in a Vienna manuscript the translation of Avenzoar is addressed to Pope Boniface VIII himself.[2931] Apparently therefore there is justification for Peter of Abano’s speaking of the work as translated for Boniface VIII. And whether it was or not, in any case it was translated at too late a date for Peter to have cited it in his De venenis, had that treatise been addressed to Pope John XXI who died in 1277. So if we admit that the De venenis was addressed to a Pope John, it must have been addressed to John XXII who became pope on August 7, 1316.

Popes and poisons.

Returning for a moment to Boniface VIII, it may be remarked that he was presumably the pope who, as Peter himself states in the Conciliator, had protected him from certain persecutors. That there was nothing strange in addressing a work on poisons to a pope of that time is shown by the fact that Ermengard Blasius (or Blasii)[2932] of Montpellier, physician of Philip the Fair of France, translated the work of Moses Maimonides on poisons for Clement V, the predecessor of John XXII, in 1307.[2933] But there is no evidence so far as I know to indicate that Peter of Abano addressed his work on poisons to Clement V, although chronologically it is possible.

APPENDIX VIII

PETER AND THE INQUISITION

His own statement in the Conciliator.

The relations of Peter of Abano with the church and the Inquisition and the question whether he was accused, tried, or condemned for heresy, magic, or astrology, are matters which have seldom been either carefully investigated or correctly stated, although allusions are often made to these points as if they were definitely settled. We shall inquire here what real evidence there is. In the Conciliator, written in 1303, occurs a germane statement by Peter himself at the close of a chapter in which he has discussed the determination of periods in history and the rise of new prophets and religions by the courses of the stars, and the connection of seven angelic intelligences with the seven planets. After this somewhat bold indulgence in astrology Peter concludes, “So much then has been said as can be comprehended by reason concerning this according to the skill of the world’s scholars, in no way derogating from divine wisdom in what has been written but rather confirming it in all points since it alone is truth and life. In this matter, however, some mischief-makers, unwilling or rather unable to hear, for a long time have freely vexed me, from whose hands at last the said Truth has laudably snatched me and mine, with the intervention too of an apostolic mandate.”[2934] Before 1303, therefore, Peter’s astrology had aroused considerable opposition, perhaps at Paris, which however was checked at least for the time being by papal protection, and to which Peter does not so far as I know allude again in his subsequent works.

His professions of orthodoxy.

In many passages of his works, however, Peter recognizes that the Peripatetic philosophy and Christian dogma do not agree, and, while stating the philosophical position, gives his adhesion to the orthodox Faith.[2935] In the preface to the Conciliator he states that the work is divided into three parts in honor of the Trinity. In the Addition to Mesuë he argues that trust in God is of avail in the art of medicine. Pious phralses such as Si deo placet and Deo gratias occur with fair frequency in his works. Finally, in his will of 1315, or rather in a statement made the day before the will was drawn up, he makes profession of firm faith in the Trinity, Creed, and articles of faith, and declares that he believes “in all respects just as Holy Mother Church believes and teaches,” and that he has always so believed and will until his last breath. “And if it should be found that he has ever said anything contrary to the Faith, he said it not because he believed it, but probably for purposes of disputation.”[2936]

Does his will show fear of the Inquisition?

There is perhaps no sufficient reason for doubting the sincerity and spontaneity of these professions of faith, but the question arises whether Peter did not make this confession of faith in order to demonstrate that he was no heretic and so secure the validity of the will which he made on the day following. This would be a prudent step on his part if he had any fear of future action by the Inquisition, since the property of a heretic who was condemned to life imprisonment or to the stake was subject to confiscation. Moreover, the number of judgments of confiscation against deceased persons was “relatively high.”[2937] We now turn to the will itself to inquire if there is anything in it to suggest fear of the Inquisition on Peter’s part. The most, if not the only, extraordinary feature of the will is the attitude shown by Peter toward his sons. We have seen that three survived him and were concerned in legal transactions in 1318 and 1321. There is, however, only one or at most two mentions[2938] of them in the will. After a list of legacies for various purposes and to various persons, including his nephews and grandnieces, and the bequest of two thousand pounds of back salary to the Commune of Padua, the will continues, “Also he has commended himself, his sons, and his property to the Commune and men of the city of Padua as if it were the tutelage and infallible defense of their own sons and property.” Then he names the executors of his will (suos fideicommissarios) and as his heirs Jacobum qu. domini Marsilii de Carrara de Padua and Conradum qu. domini Bonzanelli da Viguntia, whom he describes as “trustworthy men and of eminent virtue and repute.” Jacobus became captain-general of Padua in 1318.

Gloria’s inference.

From these passages Gloria concludes that Peter entrusts his body, his children, and his property to the Commune of Padua in order to save them from the Inquisition,—his body from being burned after his death, his property from being confiscated; and that he names “two rich and powerful citizens” as his heirs in order to enlist their aid and with the secret understanding that they shall later transmit the residue of his property, after his other legacies are paid, to his children. It should, however, be realized that the confiscation of the property of a heretic was absolute. “Forfeiture occurred ipso facto as soon as the crime of heresy was committed, the heretic could convey no legal title and any assignments which he might have made were void, no matter through how many hands the property might have passed.”[2939] Whether, therefore, Peter’s sons received their inheritance directly or indirectly, it could be taken from them, if he were condemned as a heretic either before or after his death. On the other hand, there is this to be said in favor of Gloria’s interpretation of the will. If Peter’s property were confiscated as that of a heretic, it would naturally be confiscated by the Commune of Padua, the same secular power to whom he would be handed over for execution in case he were condemned to the stake. By making a generous legacy to the city, by appealing to it for protection of himself and children, and by naming leading citizens as his heirs, Peter may have hoped to enlist public opinion on his side, to prevent any Paduan from accusing him of heresy to the Inquisition or supporting such a charge, or, in case the Inquisition does condemn him and the city government of Padua does confiscate his property, to induce the Commune at least to provide for his children. And certainly the sentence in which Peter entrusts himself, his children, and his goods to the infallible defense of the Commune of Padua does not sound as if he meant to disinherit his sons in favor of other heirs.

Did Peter’s sons inherit his property?

The next question is: what evidence is there to show that the sons ever received their father’s property, if this was his intention? Gloria holds that Peter’s sons are called his heirs in documents recording legal transactions of 1318 and 1321, that consequently he meant them to be his real heirs when he drew up his will in 1315, and that the nominal heirs, true to their trust, have duly turned over the estate after the funeral expenses and other legacies have been met. If this last assumption is true and if Peter’s sons are in 1318 openly called his heirs, whereas in 1315 he did not dare to call them his heirs, it would appear probable either that there has been in the interval a trial for heresy and that Peter has been acquitted, or that there has been no trial and is not likely to be one. But I am not so sure that the documents mentioned describe Peter’s sons as his heirs.[2940]

If so, how?

If, however, they are openly called his heirs in 1318, or if, whether called his heirs or not, they are in possession of his property after his death, there are other possible explanations of this than that the heirs named in his will of 1315 have voluntarily turned over the estate to them. Either the will may have been set aside for other reasons—it will be noted that at its close Peter states, “if it is not valid by the law of testaments, let it have force and hold by the law of codicils or any other law by which it may the better and more efficaciously have force and hold good.”[2941] Or the will may have been annulled by the sons, angry at being disinherited, having themselves informed against their father as a heretic. For note the one exception to the law that the confiscation of the property of a heretic is absolute even at the expense of his innocent widow and children. “Frederick II and Innocent IV both decreed that children could inherit their father’s property, if they denounced him for heresy.”[2942] But this sensational possibility[2943] seems to be excluded by another bit of evidence which Gloria did not note but which supports his interpretation of the will. In 1325 Marsilius de Carrara, nephew of the Jacobus named as one of Peter of Abano’s heirs and almost as prominent as his uncle in the town politics, was knocked off his horse and trodden under foot in a street fight in Padua, and was in danger of his life, but was helped to his feet by “Benvenutus of Abano, son of master Peter, and others of his men.”[2944] Thus whatever disposition was made of Peter’s property, his nominal heirs and his sons seem to have remained on good terms.

Burning of Peter’s bones for heresy.

If Peter’s children were provided for, there is evidence that the men of Padua were not equally successful in protecting his corpse from the Inquisition. Thomas of Strasburg, Prior-General of the Augustinian Friars from 1345 to 1357, in his Commentary on the Sentences[2945] calls Peter a heretic, although he admits that he was a most capable physician. Thomas affirms that Peter denied the miracles by which Christ and the saints raised the dead, arguing that men who were afflicted by a certain disease often fell into a trance for three complete revolutions of the sky. And when asked if Lazarus was not in the tomb four days, he would say that it was only for three full days since the first and fourth days were incomplete. Thomas does not affirm that Peter ventured to deny the resurrection of Christ Himself, but concludes his allusion to Peter by saying, “But in this his iniquity he was deceived and received the reward of his error. For I was present when in the city of Padua his bones were burned for these and his other errors.” The inference which has been drawn from this brief statement is that at some time after Peter’s death his bones were disinterred and burned. This much may perhaps be accepted as the fact, since Thomas asserts he was an eye-witness, but such gossipy reminiscence as this by medieval monks and friars, especially when heretics or saints are the theme, is notoriously unreliable, as Salimbene and the astounding yarns in Thomas of Cantimpré’s work on bees show in the thirteenth century. At any rate Thomas of Strasburg gives no hint that the “other errors” of Peter of Abano were connected with magic or astrology. Indeed Thomas displays a considerable faith in astrology himself in other passages of this work we have cited.[2946] He asserts that the sky itself has a real action on inferior objects except for free will. Upon it the stars cannot act directly but they may affect it indirectly owing to the radical union in us of sense appetite and intellectual appetite.

The account of Michael Savonarola.

A century later Michael Savonarola supplements with further detail the general impression of trouble between Peter and at least a certain party in the church which we obtained from Abano’s own statement and from Thomas of Strasburg, and suggests that Peter’s inclination toward magic, or at least reputation for magic, led the Dominican inquisitor to denounce him as a heretic at Paris and try to bring him to prison and the flames. “But he was held in so great veneration by royal majesty and the entire university that means were not supplied the inquisitor to take him.” Savonarola goes on to say that, when Peter learned of this, he induced the king and university to call a council of doctors of Holy Scripture, whom he convinced by forty-five arguments that not he but the Dominicans were heretics. “And after sentence had been so given,” continues Savonarola, “if the story is to be believed, it was brought about that the Dominicans were driven from Paris as heretics and exiles and were unable to reside there for thirty-two years.”[2947] But of course we do not believe any such story, which is mentioned nowhere else, and therefore Savonarola’s entire account has to be suspiciously regarded as “a story.”

Savonarola proceeds to say, however, that then the case was appealed to Rome and that by intervention of the pope peace was at last made between Peter and the Dominicans; and that in his testament, “which is held in great veneration by many Paduans,” Peter left his body to be interred among the Dominicans as a sign to God and the world how he had kept the peace with them. As a matter of fact, however, it is in the church of St. Anthony the Confessor belonging to the Friars Minor or Franciscans of Padua that Peter’s will directs he shall be buried, while two Franciscans and no Dominicans are listed among the witnesses to his confession of faith. Again therefore we find Savonarola’s account unreliable. He concludes, “But the Dominican Inquisitor, full of venom and breaking the truce to which he had sworn—an action the more detestable in a clergyman, in the silence of the night opened the sepulcher, burned the body, and gave the ashes to the wind. O unspeakable crime!”

Scardeone’s account.

As we recede further from Peter of Abano’s own time to Scardeone in the sixteenth century, more specific details concerning his life accumulate. Scardeone perverts Savonarola’s statement that Peter’s astrological predictions won him a reputation as a magician and that this got him into trouble with the Dominicans at Paris, into the assertion that Peter’s devotion to mathematical disciplines at Paris caused him on his return to Padua to be suspected of magic. He adds that a rival physician, Peter of Reggio, jealous of Abano’s science and fame, reported him to the Inquisition as a heretic and necromancer. That the Inquisition twice instituted proceedings against him: in 1306, when three illustrious men, whom Scardeone mentions by name,[2948] were his patrons and, since nothing was proved against him at the trial, he was freed from this calumny; and again in 1315, when he died during the trial—Scardeone, however, says nothing to suggest that this was due to application of torture—and was buried in the church of St. Anthony. The Inquisition, however, went on to condemn him upon the basis of his writings, but meanwhile either his friends or his housekeeper Marietta had removed and hidden his body, which the inquisitors had to be content to burn in effigy. “This,” coolly continues Scardeone, “is why Thomas of Strasburg wrote that he saw the bones of Peter of Abano burned in the square of Padua.” Thus Scardeone not merely makes new assertions based upon no one knows what, but contradicts statements of Savonarola who was nearer to the events and Thomas of Strasburg who claims to be an eye-witness. It is on Scardeone’s account, nevertheless, that most modern allusions to Peter of Abano and his fate are based.

Naudé’s statement.

It is hardly worth while to pursue the matter further in later writers except perhaps to note an inscription upon a statue of Peter of Abano in Padua which Naudé mentions in 1625.[2949] “Petrus Aponus of Padua, most learned in philosophy and medicine, and on that account winner of the name of Conciliator; in astrology indeed so skilled that he incurred suspicion of magic, and, falsely accused of heresy, was acquitted.” Thus only one trial is mentioned and that resulting in an acquittal.