Denis L. Drysdall, Andrea Alciato, the Humanist and the Teacher Notes on a Reading of his Early Works

Denis L. Drysdall, Andrea Alciato, the Humanist and the Teacher Notes on a Reading of his Early Works, Genève, Droz, 2022

 

ISBN : 978-2-600-06372-2, 208 pages, 62,25 euros.

Denis L. Drysdall, Andrea Alciato, the Humanist and the Teacher Notes on a Reading of his Early Works, Genève, Droz, 2022, coll. Travaux d'humanisme et de Renaissance, ISBN : 978-2-600-06372-2, 208 pages, 62,25 euros.

The attention given to Alciato in recent years has been concerned mostly with his “Emblemata”. This term, used originally as the title of a compilation of epigrams describing personal devices, became very soon the name of a new genre of poem and illustration widely used in architectural and artistic ornamentation. In his lifetime however Alciato was better known in Italy and France as a jurist and philologist who, equipped with an extraordinary knowledge of classical literature, questioned the interpretations of his predecessors, the commentators and glossators. At the same time he was famous as a teacher who attracted great numbers of students by the clarity and concision of his delivery. This book, which offers a view of his personnality, his method, and his place as a teacher of the law between mos italicus and mos gallicus, is based on a reading of works not always accessible to specialists of the emblems.

Présentation sur le site de l’éditeur 

SOMMAIRE

CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter One: The Budding Humanist. In Bifum

Chapter Two: History of Lombardy

The “Antiquitates mediolanenses”

Inscriptions and Symbolism

Inscriptions in later works

The Rerum patriae libri IV

Chapter Three: Philology: the Method

The Annotationes and the Opusculum (1515)

The Praetermissa (1518)

The Annotationes in Tacitum

Chapter Four: Philology: the Method Applied

The Dispunctiones (1518)

The Paradoxa

De eo quod interest

Declamatio

Chapter Five: The Teacher at Avignon

De stipulationum divisionibus

De verborum obligationibus, 1519

Chapter Six: Religion and Philosophy. Contra vitam monasticam

Chapter Seven: Philology: a Theory of Language

The Commentaria

De verborum significatione libri quatuor

Book 1

“Proprietas”

“Proprietas” in law

“Proprietas” and the “plebiscitum municipale”

“Proprietas” and the avoidance of inequities

Book 2

“Improprietas”

“Usus”

“Extensio” as a means of interpretation

Book 3

Book 4

The dedication to Archbishop de Tournon

Chapter Eight: The Teacher at Bourges

Ad rescripta principum commentarii. “Letter to the Reader”

Chapter Nine: Philology: “Obiter dicta”. Parergon iuris

Chapter Ten: The Poet

Emblemata

“Philargyrus”

Conclusions

Works Cited

Index