Note 355 — CHAP. IX.

The following analysis of Gianozzo’s oration will be sufficient to prove, that the foregoing censure is by no means too severe.—He began his address by informing his auditors, that if the immortal Muses (“immortales Musæ divinæquo Camœnæ”) could have deemed it compatible with their dignity to make an oration, either in the Latin or the Greek language, or to weep in public, they would not have delegated to another the task of paying the last honours to Leonardo; but since this exhibition of their grief was contrary to the usual habits of the Nine, the administrators of the Tuscan government had determined that the virtues of the deceased should be celebrated by one of his colleagues. He then with due modesty declared, that their choice having been directed to himself, not on account of his talents, but in consequence of his filling one of the principal offices of the state, he had prepared himself for the occasion, not to his own satisfaction, but as well as the brevity of the time allowed him for the purpose would permit.—The orator then proceeded to give a sketch of the life of Leonardo. When he arrived at that period of it in which the deceased became one of the public functionaries of the state, he detailed at some length the history of the Florentine republic during the time of Leonardo’s possession of civic and military offices. In the course of his minute detail of Leonardo’s literary labours, he contrived to introduce brief notices of a considerable number of Greek and Latin writers, and enlarged particularly upon the merits of Livy and Cicero, to each of whom he represented Leonardo as superior, since he not only translated Greek authors into Latin, after the example of the latter, but also wrote histories, in emulation of the former, thus uniting the excellencies of both. After this, preparing to perform the ceremony of coronation, he proved by historical evidence, that the custom of crowning emperors and poets was very ancient. Descanting on the various kinds of military crowns, he informed his auditors, that by the frequent perusal of ancient writers, he had ascertained, that of these tokens of honour there were eight different species, namely, the Corona Obsidionalis, Civica, Muralis, Castrensis, Navalis, Ovalis, quasi Triumphalis, and Triumphalis. The description of the materials of which these crowns were severally made, the occasions on which they were bestowed, the enumeration of divers eminent commanders whose brows they had adorned, led the errant orator into a further digression, from which he did not return before he had detailed at great length the reasons why poets should be crowned with laurel, in preference to ivy, palm, olive, or any other species of evergreen. This dissertation on crowns occupies the space of five quarto pages, closely printed in a small type. Having exhausted this topic, Gianozzo proceeded to prove, that Leonardo was a poet. This led him to enumerate most of the Greek and Latin poets, and to explain the derivation of the term poeta. In treating on this subject, he announces the marvellous discovery, that he who wishes to be a poet, must write excellent poems! “Itaque si quis poeta esse cuperet quædam egregia poemata scribat oportet.” Having endeavoured by sundry truly original arguments to vindicate Leonardo’s claim to the poetic wreath, he closed his harangue by the performance of the prescribed ceremony.

The following list of such of the voluminous works of Leonardo Aretino as have been committed to the press, is extracted from the enumeration of his writings, subjoined to his life by Laurentius Mehus.

1. Historiarum Florentini Populi, Lib. xii. Per Sixtum Brunonem Argent. 1610. fol. Ejusdem traductio Italica a Donato Acciajolo Venetiis, 1473, Florentiæ, 1492. Venetiis, 1560. Ibidem a Sansovino, 1561.

2. Leonardi Arretini de Temporibus suis Libri duo. Venetiis, 1475 and 1485. Lugduni apud Gryphium, 1539. Argentorati per Sixtum Brunonem, 1610. It was reprinted by Muratori, in the 19th vol. of his Rer. Italic. Script.

3. De bello Italico adversus Gothos gesto Libri quatuor. This work is founded upon the Greek history of Procopius. It has been edited in the following places: Fulginii per Emilianum Fulginatum, 1470. Venetiis per Nicolaum Jenson, 1471. Basileæ, 1531. Parisiis, 1534. It was also printed together with Zosimus, Basileæ, 1576, and with Agathias and Jornandes, Lugd. 1594. Bellovisiis, 1607.

4. De Bello Punico Libri tres. Brixiæ, 1498. Paris, apud Ascensium, 1512. Augustæ Vindel. 1537.

5. Commentarium Rerum Græcarum was edited by Gryphius, Lug. 1539. Lipsiæ a Joach. Camerario, 1546. Argentorati, 1610, per Sixtum Brunonem. It was also reprinted by Gronovius in the 6th volume of his Thes. Antiq. Græc.

6. Isagogicon moralis disciplinæ ad Galeotum Ricasolanum. This work also bears the title of Dialogus de moribus ad Galeottum, &c. and under the title of Aristoteles de moribus ad Eudemum Latine Leonardo Arretino interprete, it was printed, Lovanii, 1475. Paris, juxta de la Mare, 1512. Ibidem, 1516, per Ascensium.

7. Ad Petrum Histrium dialogorum Libri. Basileæ, 1536, per Henricum Petri, &c. Paris, 1642.

8. De studiis et litteris ad illustrem Dominam Baptistam de Malatestis. Argentinæ, 1512. It was also published by Gabriel Naudæus in 1642, and it composes part of a book entitled Hugonis Grotii et aliorum dissertationes de studiis bene instituendis, Amstelæd. 1645. It was also printed by Thomas Crenius in his Meth. Stud. tom. i. Num. x. Rotterod. 1692.

9. Laudatio Cl. V. Johannis Strozæ Equitis Florentini, was published by Baluzzi in the third volume of his Miscellanies.

10. Imperatoris Heliogabali Oratio protreptica, sive adhortatoria ad Meretrices, published by Aldus Manutius in his Historiæ Augustæ Scriptores Minores, Venetiis, 1519.

11. Oratio in Hypocritas was printed in the Fasciculus of Ortuinus Gratius Coloniæ, 1535. Lugd. 1679. Londini, 1691. It was again published in the year 1699, from a copy in the possession of Antonio Magliabecchi.

12. La Vita di Dante e i costumi e studj di Messer Francesco Petrarca. The life of Petrarca was edited by Philippus Tomasinus in his Petraca Redivivus, printed at Padua, 1650. It was again printed, together with the life of Dante, an. 1671.

13. Magni Basilii Liber per Leonardum Arretinum de Græco in Latinum translatus—Brixiæ, 1485, per Boninum de Boninis—Bononiæ, 1497. Argentorati, 1507. Paris, 1508. Romæ, 1594.

14. Marci Antonii Vita.

15. Vita Pyrrhi Epirotarum Regis.

16. Vita Pauli Emilii.

17. Tiberii et Caii Gracchorum Vitæ.

18. Q. Sertorii Vita.

19. Catonis Uticensis Vita.

20. Vita Demosthenis. The seven foregoing pieces of biography, translated by Leonardo, from the Greek of Plutarch, were printed, Basileæ apud Isingrinium, 1542.

21. Leonardi Arretini Apologia Socratis. Bononiæ, 1502.

22. Aristotelis Ethicorum Libri decem secundum traductionem Leonardi Arretini. Paris, 1504 & 1510, per Henricum Stephanum, & 1516, per Ascensium.

23. Aristotelis Politicorum, Libri viii. per Leonardum Arretinum in Latinum traducti. Venetiis, 1504, 1505, 1511, 1517. Basil. 1538.

24. Oeconomicorum Aristotelis libri duo, a Leonardo Arretino in Latinum conversi. Basileæ, 1538.

25. Oratio Æschinis in Ctesiphontem a Leonardo Arretino in Latinum conversa. Basileæ a Cratandro, 1528, 1540.

26. Oratio Demosthenis contra Aeschinem a Leonardo Arretino in Latinum e Græco traducta. Basileæ a Cratandro, 1528, 1540.

27. De crudeli amoris exitu Guisguardi et Sigismundæ Tancredi Salernitanorum Principis filiæ. Turon, 1467. This version of Bocaccio’s well known tale is also printed in the works of Pius II.

28. Epistolarum Libri viii. ann. 1472, fol. ab Antonio Moreto et Hieronymo Alexandrino. A second edition was printed, ann. 1495—a third, Augustæ, 1521, apud Knoblochium—a fourth, Basileæ, 1535, apud Henricum Petri—a fifth, Basileæ, 1724, apud Albertum Fabricium—a sixth, Florentiæ, 1741, edente Meho.

29. Canzone Morale di Messer Lionardo. This poem is printed in the third volume of Crescimbeni’s Italian poetry.

The inspection of the foregoing catalogue will evince the diligence with which Leonardo Aretino prosecuted his studies. The numerous editions through which many of his works have passed afford a sufficient indication of the esteem in which they were held by the learned men of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.