THE COMPLETE LETTERS OF OTTAVIO PANTAGATO (1494-1567)

Description

Ottavio Pantagato is one of the most unique European humanists of the 16th century. Although he was considered the Socrates of his time, as he did not publish any work and was always ready to put his knowledge at the service of anyone, his memory has been lost over time and it has been a difficult task to find his autograph documents that accredit him as the central figure of the Rome of the Cinquecento. The epistolary of Ottavio Pantagato, largely unpublished, aims to highlight the figure of this Servite monk. The present edition contains 144 letters by or to the humanist, with brief commentary notes, and preceded by an introduction that presents the figure in the Europe of his time. It is not a biography stricto sensu, but a portrait of an era, of a way of researching the past and of an Epigraphy that is beginning to emerge as a science. With names such as Fulvio Orsini, Piero Vettori, Antonio Agustín, Onofrio Panvinio or Paolo Manuzio among the correspondents, with more than 100 quotations from classical authors, with numerous transcriptions of Latin (and some Greek) inscriptions recently excavated in Rome, the letters amply demonstrate Ottavio Pantagato’s vast culture.