«Apud Alatrium Campaniae oppidum». Giovanni Tortelli and the Abbey Under Pope Nicholas V, in Walls...

"APUD ALATRIUM) CAMPANIAE OPPIDUM": GIOVANNI TORTELLI AND THE ABBEY

UNDER POPE NICHOLAS V 1

ANTONIO MANFREDI*

I. Alatri and the biography of Giovanni Tortelli

The abbey of S. Sebastiano has been marked by a number of historically important people. The most ancient of these - Liberius, Servandus, Benedict of Nursia - have attraeteci the attention of historians, while other figures have passed almost unnoticed . Chief among these is Giovanni Tortelli, a fine scholar of grammar and of Greek, to whom Pope Nicholas V (1447-55), the humanist and theologist Tommaso Parentucelli da Sarzana (1397-1455), entrusted his new papal library, the original nucleus of the Vatican Library. H eretofore, studies of Tortelli have barely glimpsed the abbey's role in his life. However, the presence of the humanist at S. Sebastiano is of primary importance far our understanding of the radical changes of the fifteenth century revealed by the archaeological study of the building. At the same time, it adds an unsuspected new dimension to the biography of the humanist.

Giovanni Tortelli was born in Arezzo in the early years of the fifteenth century, and died by 1466 somewhere near Rame, while still a member of the Curia 2• A subtle scholar, his knowledge of Greek was particularly profound; his studies in ltaly under Vittorino da Feltre were followed by several years in Constantinople ( 1435-38). His fairly long life,

* Translated by Elizabeth Fentress. ( 1) I am grateful to Elizabeth Fentress for her invitation to take part in this project and for her translation

ofmy text. I will never fo rget the profound impression that the abbey made on me as I crossed its threshold on a beautiful J anuary day. I was welcomed by the whole team, with whom it has been a pleasure to collaborate - together we have experienced a serene and productive collaboration which is very rare among scholars of such different disciplines: in particular I am grateful to Peg Laird , Caroline Goodson, and Stephanie Leone for the rich exchange ofideas and information begun in a chance meeting in the Vatican Library. The translation into English of the Latin texts was greatly enhanced by the collaboration of Ann Kuttner, and thanks are due to Maria Elana Bertoldi, Paolo Cherubini, Mariangela Regoliosi, and Lerry Spiteri for reading this text .

(2) The two principal modern biographers ofTortelli are Girolamo M ancini, " Giovanni Tortelli cooperatore di Niccolò V nel fondare la Biblioteca Vaticana", Archivio storico italiano, 78, no. 2 (1920), pp. 161-282; M ariangela R egoliosi, "Nuove ricerche intorno a Giovanni Tortelli , I. Il V aticano lat. 3908", Italia medioevale e umanistica, 9 ( 1966), pp. 123-89 ; and Mariangela R egoliosi, "Nuove ricerche intorno a Giovanni Tortelli , 2. La vita di Giovanni T ortelli '', Italia medioevale e umanistica, 12 ( 1969), pp. 129-96.

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ANTONIO MANFREDI

played out between his studies and his ecclesiastical obligations, culminated in seven years of intense collaboration with his contemporary Nicholas V. Affinity, friendship, and a shared history had already linked Tortelli to the pope, who was almost exactly the same age. Both had lived in Florence, although at different times, and both had studied in Bologna between 1420 and 1430, Parentucelli studying art and theology, Tortelli dialectics and philosophy. Tortelli's theological studies began at the end of the l 430s, under Gaspare Sighicelli, a master well known to Parentucelli, who later as pope was to -elect him bishop oflmola 3 . Tortelli was not only a grammarian and a priest but also completed a degree in theology, studying both the pagan classics and the early church fathers. Likewise, Parentucelli was an expert scholar of the classics, particularly the patristics, and maintained dose contact with two other Florentine humanists, Niccolò Niccoli and Ambrogio Traversari. Parallel, too, were the careers of Parentucelli and Tortelli inside the Curia of Eugenius IV ( 1434-4 7), where they were both protegés of two pre-eminent cardinals, Niccolò Albergati 4

and Giuliano Cesarini 5 . Both benefited from their double formation in humanism and theology, which culminated in their participation at the Council of Ferrara-Florence, called in 1438 to resolve the schism that then, as now, divides the Eastern and Western churches. It was probably at that time that their friendship became closer. In 1447 Parentucelli was elected to the throne of Peter and took the name Nicholas V, and this first humanist pope soon nominated Tortelli as cubicularius and apostolic subdeacon.

Nicholas V launched an intense dialogue between humanists and the Curia, supporting the new culture with important proj ects . His reign was as brief as it was productive, celebrated for its doctrine, its commitment to the revival of the city of Rome, and the undertaking, only partially completed, to create a new papal library. Tortelli was an intimate collaborator in this last enterprise, as were scholars like Bessarion, Niccolò Perotti, Lorenzo Valla, Giovanni Aurispa, Poggio Bracciolini, Carlo Marsuppini, Giorgio Trapezunzio, Teodoro Gaza, Francesco Griffolini, Jean Jouffroy, Giannozzo Manetti. Thus at the death of the pope in 1455, a series of inventories show that over 1200 manuscripts assembled by Nicholas V formed the foundation of the collections of the Vatican Library 6 . Tortelli was

(3) Regoliosi , 1969, pp. 130-38; Sigicelli joined the Dominican order in 1433, studied and taught at Bologna with Parentucelli, and was elected Bishop by Nicholas V in 1450; Hierarchia catholica medii aevi, sive Summorum pontificum, S.R.E. cardinalium, ecclesiarum antistitum series ab anno 1198 usque ad annum [ 1605} perducta e documentis tabularii praesertim Vaticani collecta, digesta, 6 vols_ , ed. by Konrad Eubel et al. (Mi.inster: sumptibus et typis librariae Regensbergianae, 1913, repr. 1960-), 2 : 1431 -1503, p. 167 ; Thomas Kaeppeli, Scriptores ordinis praedicatorum medii aevi, 4 vols. (Rome: Ad S. Sabinae, 1975), 2, pp. 12-1 3.

(4) Parentucelli was for years the secretary of Albergati, bishop ofBologna, with whom he participated at the councils of Base! and Ferrara-Florence, while he continued his studies of philology and theology and his researches on ancient manuscripts, particularly patristics. This was first brought to light by Remigio Sabbadini, Le scoperte dei codici latini e greci ne' secoli XIV e XV, 2 vols. (Florence: Sansoni, 1967), I , pp. 90-91 , 11 5-1 6.

(5) Tortelli, after a period in Florence, probably in the circle ofother Arretine humanists, obtained in 1435 a papa! " safe conduct" for Constantinople (ASV, Reg. Vat. 373, fols. CLXXIII: see Regoliosi , 1966, p. 139). Cesarini recalled him to Italy.

(6) Antonio Manfredi, "The Vatican Library of Pope Nicholas V: The Project ofa Universal Library in the Age of Humanism", Library History, 14 ( 1998), pp. 104-1 O; and Antonio Manfredi, "Note preliminari sulla sezione greca nella Vaticana di Niccolò V", in Niccolo V nel sesto centenario della nascita. Atti del convegno internazio -

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GIOVANNI TORTELLI AND THE ABBEY

named one of the papal secretaries, in charge of relations with the other humanists and the creation of the new collections 7 . Here Tortelli put all of his notable capacities as a humanist to use seeking to expand the collection according to the guidelines determined by the pope. Many traces of his work survive, particularly the creati on of the section of the library devoted to Greek texts, which was the most innovative section of the collection and probably the one which received the most intense care from its librarian 8 . Tortelli was concerned with not only the classica! world but also with early Christianity, an interest that matured during his study of patristic texts, particularly those of Tertullian and Saint Augustine. His recently revealed readings and annota tions on De civitate Dei demonstrate these pursuits 9 • Under the aegis of the pope, then, we find the interaction of classica! and Christian studies, the creation of new translations of Greek texts as yet unpublished in the West, and the preparation of new, correct editions of Latin texts. Giovanni Tortelli served as reference point far the humanists involved in these new endeavours, even in their argum ents with each other 10

.

Tortelli's major work, the Orthographia, was certainly among the books of the new library. This vast study of ancient Greek and Latin was among the firs t of its kind, with a grammatica! foundation and contents that were both antiquarian and erudite; and it was destined to become highly influential in the following century 11

. The dedication of the work to the pope, who had involved the author in the great cultural initiatives of his pontificate, naturally followed. In fact, the Orthographia is a faithful mirror ofNicholas's wide-ranging attention to antiquity, which is amply demonstrated by the recent edition of the entry

nale di studi, Sarzana, 8-10 ottobre 1988, ed. by Franco Bonatti and Antonio Manfredi, Studi e testi, 397 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2000), pp. 49-70.

(7) R egoliosi, 1969, pp. 172-75. (8) Tortelli's role as librarian is testified by two explicit and credible witnesses : Filelfo, in a letter of 1465

(R egoliosi, 1969, p. 173), and Vespasiano da Bisticci, L e vite ( n.d.), ed. by Aulo Greco (Florence: Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento, 1970-76), 2, p . 61: " E ssendo !iteratissimo et uomo diligentissimo lo misse sopra la libreria ch' egli aveva ordinata" (" As he was a most !iterate and diligent man, [Nicholas] placed him in charge ofthe library he had ordered" ) . More evidence is contained in a letter to Pietro Odo da Montopoli (who, as we will see, was one of Tortelli's most faithful friends) published in Maria T eresa Graziosi Acquaro, " Petri Odi M ontopolitani carmina nunc primum e libris manuscriptis edita", H umanistica L ovaniensia, 19 (1970), pp. 7-11 3 (p. 31) : " qui ( Nicolaus V) cum te illi bibliothecae praefecisset, quam admirabilissimam parabat" ("When Nicholas V had completed with you tha t most admirable library which he was preparing" ). An officiai document is lacking, but perhaps this was unnecessary in the Curia of that period. Before the reorganiza tion of Sixtus IV, the role of librarian was always entrusted to papa! secreta ries. On the documents of the Vatican during this period , see Antonio M anfredi, " Il convivium scien tiarum di Antonio de Thomeis tra gli inventari della V aticana di Sisto IV", in Libri, lettori e biblioteche dell' I talia medievale ( sec. IX-XV) . Fonti, testi, utilizzazione del libro, ed. by Giuseppe Lombardi and Donatella Nebbiai dalla Guarda (Rome : ICCU, 2000), pp. 507-17 (pp. 507-8).

(9) M anfredi, 1998. ( l O) For the rela tionship between the pope and the humanists, the bibliography is vast : see most recently

N iccolo V nel sesto centenario della nascita. Atti del convegno internazionale di studi, Sarz ana, 8-10 ottobre 1988, ed. by Franco Bona tti and Antonio M a nfredi, Studi e testi, 397 (Va tican City: Biblioteca Apostolica V aticana, 2000).

( 11 ) The complete title of the work is Commentariorum grammaticorum de ortlwgraphia dictionum e Graecis tracta tarum libri.

I 1s1

ANTONIO MANFREDI

on "Rhoma", a scholarly itinerary that built on the work of Flavio Biondo, refocussing it and checking the evidence at first hand 12

. In tune with the new humanist habit, the learned grammarian had archaeological interests and was directly involved with the archaeology of Rame and its monuments during these years 13

• It is in this atmosphere that we must examine Tortelli's experience in Alatri.

Of course, some hint of Tortelli's relationship to the city of Alatri was already known to modem scholars: it emerges clearly from the incipit with which he opens the dedication of the Orthographia 14

:

Coeperam olim, beatissime pater Nicolae quinte summe pontifex, commentaria quaedam grammatica condere quibus omnem litterariam antiquitatem et orthographiae rationem cum aportunis historiis pro poetarum declaratiane connectere conabar, profuturus sane pro mea virili studiosis linguae latinae. Interim ab aliis studiis negociisque familiaribus interceptus, illa prorsus relinquere atque longa tempore abiicere visus sum; sed nuper, cum apud Alatrium, Campaniae oppidum, ex aeris romani molestia secessissem, ea absolvere quorundam amicorum ragatu conatus sum, sic quoque ad calcem vix usque perduxi ... atque ... tuae sanctitati, aqua velutfante omnia mea bonafluxerunt, dedicare constitui ... ut in tua illa bibliotheca quam omnium quaefuerunt paestantissimam comparas quo pacto collocare possis.

(Blessed father Nicholas V, highest pontiff, I once began to compose a grammatica! commentary, in which I kept trying to interrelate all ofliterary antiquity and the rules of orthography with appropriate narratives apt to the discussion of poets, convinced that by so doing I would please, according to my forces, the scholars of the Latin language. Meanwhile, interrupted by other studies and by family matters I thus seem to ha ve left off this project and abandoned it fora long time. But recently, retiring to Alatri, a town of Campania, to escape the dangers of the Roman air, I ha ve sought to resolve my project at the request of some of my friends, and so too in effect I ha ve almost finished it ... and I ha ve decided to dedicate it to your holiness, the water from which like a wellspring all of my possessions ha ve flowed , so that you can place it, as agreed, in that library of yours that you are preparing, surpassing of all those that h_ave ever been.)

The solemn incipit indicates the times and places of the creation of the text, scanned by three temporal markers (olim; interim; sed nuper, cum), which coincide with the three welldocumented phases of Tortelli's life: his early studies between Man tua, Florence, and Con-

(12) Giovanni Tortelli, Roma antica, ed. by Luisa Capoduro, RR inedita, 20 (Rome: Roma hel Rinascimento, 1999).

( 13 ) For a useful summary of all the architectural projects promoted by Nicholas V, see Girolamo Mancini, Vita di Leon Battista Alberti (Florence: G. C. Sansoni, 1882), pp. 340-43. For a recent discussion of another humanist involved in Nicholas's archeologica! projects, see Tino Foffano, "Il De rebus antiquis memorabilibus basilicae Sancti Petri Rome di Maffeo Vegio e i primordi dell'archeologia cristiana" , in Il sacro nel Rinascimento. Atti del XII convegno internazionale, Chianciano-Pienza, 17-20 luglio 2000, ed . by Luisa Secchi Tarugi (Florence: Franco Cesati, 2003 ), pp. 719-29.

( 14) The editi on of the dedica tory letter is in Silvia Rizzo, "Per una tipologia delle tradizioni manoscritte di classici latini in età umanistica", in Formative Stages of Classica[ Traditions: Latin Texts from Antiquity to the Renaissance, ed . by Oronzo Pecere and Michael D. Reeve (Spoleto: Centro Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo, 1995), pp. 37 1-407 (pp. 402-07); further bibliography and a brief introduction can be found in Jean-Louis Charlet and Martine Furno, l ndex des lemmes du De Orthographia de Giovanni Tortelli (Aix-en-Provence: Publications de l'U niversité de Provence, 1994). On the publication history, see Maria Donata Rinaldi, "Fortuna e diffusione del " De orthographia" di Giovanni Tortelli'', Italia medioevale e umanistica, 16 (1973), pp. 227-61 .

1ss I


stantinople, when the idea of the work was conceived; the busy period of the Council ofFerrara and studies for his doctorate in theology, when the work was necessarily left aside; and the completion of the Orthographia and its dedication to Parentucelli, following the latter's election to the papacy. Much scholarly attention has been devoted to the chronology of the work's publication, which probably occurred towards the end of 1451 15

. In his dedication, however, Tortelli seems particularly anxious to clarify the contexts in which he finally decided to complete a text that he described as "opus magnum, varium et diffusum". One of these was certainly the papal library, the centre of his work for the pope. Studies currently underway on the Vatican Library during the age ofNicholas V, and on Tortelli 's contribution to its creation, show how important both the library and the learned pontiff were for the writing of the Orthographia 16

. Y et the dedication more clearly accentuates Alatri, where Tortelli completed the book and decided on the dedication to the pontiff: "apud Alatrium, Campaniae oppidum [ ... J ea absolvere [ ... J conatus sum [ ... J atque [ ... J tuae sanctitati [ ... J dedicare constitui". Tortelli himself underscored the importance of the location in a marginal note to the incipit contained in a Vatican copy of the Orthographia 17

. H ere, to the right of the first folio , the author repeated the name of the oppidum Campaniae 18

, as if emphasizing the role that the city played in the final elaboration of the manuscript and his own life at that period. However, scholars have misunderstood Tortelli 's special relationship with Alatri and his association with S. Sebastiano. Archival investigations undertaken in conjunction with the archaeological study of the abbey of S. Sebastiano now allow us to understand far more clearly the importance of Alatri and the abbey in the biography of the humanist 19

•

Tortelli at Alatri between 1449 and 1452

The dedication of the Orthographia explicitly links Tortelli to the town of Alatri, a relationship that has not gone unnoticed although it tends to be relegateci to footnotes. It is

(15) Luisa Capoduro, "L'edizione romana del " De Orthographia" di Giovanni Tortelli (H ain 15563) e Adamo da Moltaldo", in Scrittura, biblioteche e stampa a R oma nel Q.uattrocento. Atti del II seminario, 6-8 maggio 1982, ed . by Massimo Miglio, Paola Farenga, and Anna M odigliani (V atican City: Scuola Vaticana di Paleografia, Diplomatica e Archivistica, 1983 ), pp. 37-56 (p. 40); Rizzo, 1995, p. 402, n. 120.

(16) Manfredi, 200 1, pp. 265-98. (17) BAV, Vat. lat. 1478. The bibliography on the codex is vast: it was first described by Bartolomeo

Nogara, Codices Vaticani Latini, 9 vols., ed. by Marco Vattasso (Rome: typis polyglottis Vaticanis, 1902-), 3 : Codices 1461-2059, ed. by Bartolomeo Nogara (1968), p . 11 , then by Rinaldi , 1973, p. 254, n. 26. Mercati was the first to claim that it was an autograph: Giovanni Mercati, Scritti di Isidoro, il cardinale Ruteno, e codici a lui appartenuti che si conservano nella Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana , Studi e testi, 46 (Rome : Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1926), p. 154, n. 1. He was followed more recently by the following authors: Virginia Brown and Craig Kallendorf, "Two Humanist Annotators of Virgil. Coluccio Salutati and Giovanni Tortelli", in Supplementum Festivum. Studies in honor of Paul Oskar Kristeller, ed. by J ames Hankins, J ohn Monfasani, and Frederick Purnell (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1987), pp. 92 -1 24; Rizzo, 1995, pp . 401-02; Charlet and Furno, 1994, p. 11 ; and Gemma Donati, Pietro Odo da Montopoli e la biblioteca di Niccolò V con osserva zioni sul De Orthographia di Giovanni Tortelli, RR inedita, 20 (Rome: Roma nel Rinascimento, 2000), ad indices.

(18) A reproduction at a reduced size ofthe incipit and notula can be found in R egoliosi, 1969, pi. 13, I. ( 19) Manfredi, 200 1, pp. 265-98.

I 1s9

ANTONIO MANFREDI

thus worthwhile to review briefly what we already know about Tortelli and this Campanian town. Besides the dedication itself, three sets of sources detail this relationship. The first is already known: the set of letters from his friends collected in the manuscript Vat. Lat. 3908 20

. The second group of sources has not been used outside the local historiography of the area and until now had not found a place in the biography of the humanist. These are found in the Archivio di Stato at Frosinone 2 1

. The third group of sources, which includes a bull (litterae gratiosae) of Nicholas V, is preserved in the Archivio Segreto Vaticano. All of these documents belong to the third phase of Tortelli's career, between the end of the l 440s and the beginning of the l 450s.

There are no references to Alatri from the time when Tortelli, together with the whole of the Curia, was far from Rame and Lazio : indeed, the papal court of Eugenius IV did not return to Rame until 1443, and Tortelli himself did not establish residence there until he had completed his doctorate in theology at Bologna, in the beginning of 1446. On his return he entered the service of the Portuguese cardinal Antonio Martins de Chaves, who kept a residence in Rame and another at Tivoli 22

, according to the custom of Roman prelates who protected themselves from the city's summer climate with retreats to healthier places in the Roman suburbs or neighbouring towns 23

.

A few months after the election of Nicholas V, in the first half of 1448, we find Tortelli already inserted into the entourage of the new pope. It is around this time that Alatri may have appeared in Tortelli's life. Between September 1448 and January 1449 he disappeared from the papal palace, his established residence. His friends were to discover later that he had left Rame to recover from an attack of the plague: his friend Lorenzo Valla wrote in a letter of 2 October 1448, "they say you live in a pleasant natural spot - and a

(20 ) This is the vast and well-known collection of a great part of Tortelli's correspondence, particularly from the period of his collaboration with Nicholas V: Regoliosi, 1966, pp. 122-89. This group of letters is currently being restored at the Vatican laboratory, which is being accompanied by a meticulous codicologica! and palaeographical description. We hope to see its results published in the near future.

(21 ) See below, pp. 1 76-78. (22 ) R egoliosi, 1969, pp. 138-71. This is his second period of study, identified by Tortelli himself as a

second phase in his career as a scholar. On his stay in Tivoli, in particular during the summer and autumn of 1446, see Regoliosi, 1969, p. 170. On his stay with Antonio Martins de Chaves, see also Lamentii Valle, Epistole, ed. by Ottavio Besomi and Mariangela Regoliosi, Thesaurus Mundi, 24 (Padua: Antenore, 1984), pp. 302-03.

(23) Secretaries, learned men, and teachers also aspired to a residence in villa, depending on their means. They were inspired by classica! models and humanist ideals. An interesting invitation to Tortelli from Gaspare da Verona sheds more light on how these summer retreats were used. vVriting in the autumn of 1451 , from his villa in the Castelli Romani, Gaspare describes the vita in villa according to the classica! ideal of the company of learned men, good books, and simple food, in a style with clear Horatian echoes - indeed Horace is explicitly cited in the letter. We do not know ifTortelli accepted, but it is significant in this context that the invitation was not simply to pass a few days in the country, but also to propose that Tortelli be introduced to another humanist whose work combined study and architecture, Leon Battista Alberti. We can find a trace of this in the letter to Tortelli from Gaspare da Verona: Giuseppe Zippel, "Un umanista in villa", in Storia e cul tura del Rinascimento italiano, ed. by Gianni Zippel (Padua: Antenore, 1979), pp. 280-87. R egarding Alberti , Tortelli , and the villa, see the contribution of Leone, below, pp. 210-13.

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most healthy one" 24. Mariangela Regoliosi proposed that this could ha ve been Tortelli's

first stay in Alatri. He prolonged his tranquil retreat until the following J anuary 25. How

ever we have no direct evidence that he was indeed at Alatri, and the next phase certainly shows him moving north rather than south 26

. In 1449, after spending six months in Rome, we find Tortelli accompanying the pope and his court on a trip to centra! ltaly. At Spoleto, Tortelli was named cubicularius 27 and perhaps also entrusted with the library 28

; and thence the papal entourage returned to Rome.

In the first half of 1450, Tortelli remained in Rome while the pope celebrateci the principal rites of the Jubilee year 29

. On 2 March Tortelli was sworn in as apostolic subdeacon 30

• In the second half of 1450, another wave of the plague hit the city, exacerbated by the large number of pilgrims. The pope escaped to Umbria and the Marche, while Tortelli accompanied cardinal camerarius Ludovico Trevisan to Florence and Milan, returning to Rome in December. We can see that both the pope and the members of the Curia were accustomed to pass the first few months of the year in Rome and to leave the city for the summer months, without, however, leaving the Patrimonium sancti Petri, the papal state.

While there is no trace of Tortelli in Alatri in 1450, at least three of his correspondents document his presence there in 1451 31

• The first is Giorgio Correr, who, in a letter, dated 5 March, writes: "Y ou reminded me of happier times when you wrote in your other letter about Alatri that you had heard from people of that city that I had once stayed there" 32

.

Correr himself had been part of the Curia, at the end of Eugenius IV's papacy, but he had fallen into disgrace at the beginning ofNicholas's reign. His text responds to a hitherto undiscovered letter from Tortelli, and indicates that Correr had once spent some time in Alatri and madefriends there. Correr is also responsible fora second text, dated 27 October: ''I heard that you had gone to Campania, I believe to care for your health" 33

. Another reference to a trip in Campania comes from a letter from another friend, Iacopo Perleoni, also written in the autumn of 1451 34

. The region indicateci in these two letters corresponds to the province of southern Lazio, called maritima et campania which was under the contro! of a governor

(24) Valle, 1984, p. 344: "Aiunt te loca et amena et saluberrima incolere". (25 ) Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 11-12. (26 ) In fact, in the edition ofValle's letters (Valle, 1984, pp. 321-22, 344-45), on letter 44 the editors com

ment that there is no further mention of Alatri. No other evidence has emerged to support this hypothesis. (2 7) This honor was conferred on 31 May 1449: Valle, 1984, p . 326. It is possible that this nomination

coincided with that of the papa! librarian: ASV, Reg. Vat. 435, fol. 356r, gives only a brief notice of the event. (28 ) Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 178-79; Valle, 1984, p. 326. (29 ) For the extensive bibliography on Nicholas V 's Jubilee, see Massimo Miglio, "Il giubileo di Niccolò

V", in La storia dei giubilei, ed. by Marcello Fagiolo and Maria Luisa Madonna (Prato: BNL, 1998), who published the previous bibliography.

(30) ASV, Reg. Vat. 435, fol. 5lv; Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 178-79. (3 1) Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 181-82. (32) Gregorio Correr, Opere, 2 vols ., ed. by Aldo Onorato (Messina: Sicania, 1991 ), 2, p. 488. Laetiora mihi

tempora in memoriam revocasti, cum in altera epistola scribis de Alatro, quodque a civilibus illis audiveris me aliquando illic degisse.

(33) Correr, 1991, 2, p. 491: Audivi te in Campaniam isse, credo valetudinis tuendae grafia. (34) Regoliosi, 1966, p. 141.

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ANTONIO MANFREDI

named by the pope. It corresponded in part to the modem Ciociaria and also included the Pontine marshes and the hilly areato the east precisely where Alatri is found 35

.

Further confirmation of Tortelli's whereabouts comes from a contemporary address on a letter from the Bolognese Agostino Scanella, one of Tortelli's most assiduous correspondents and a friend of Perleoni as well 36

. Tortelli is addressed by his two titles, cubicularius and subdiaconus, which indicates a da te after 1450, and the address is in Italian rather than Latin: "ad Alatro in Campagna ho (sic) do ve si trova" 37

. The uncertainty surrounding Tortelli's whereabouts is confirmed by Scanella who excuses himself for his silence by the fact that he did not know where to find him: "Y ou might be in regions that are very remote from us and that ha ve more the character of wilderness than, as people say, than of lzwnanitas" 38

.

This final letter nicely sums up what must have been the general impression of Tortelli's summer residence in Bolognese humanistic circles: a place as physically distant as it was in their imaginations. We should, however, note that Tortelli was not the only member of the Curia to set foot in Alatri during those years. Besides Correr, we find a letter written from Alatri in 1451 by a correspondent of Poggio Bracciolini, the young German cleric J ohannes Roth, later bishop of Breslau, who spenta year in Alatri with a patron 39

.

During 1451 Tortelli seems to have divided his time between activities in Rome and at least two trips to Alatri, one in the first half of the year and one in the second. Correr 's letter does not clarify the motive for the first visit - there was no plague during that year -although the second stay was perhaps dictated by a desire to escape the summer heat. In the next year a visit is indicateci by a letter from Correr to Tortelli, dated 28 August 1452, in which he notes that he had received Tortelli's letter written from Alatri twenty days before 40

.

(35) On the history and geography of this province, and especially of the town of Ala tri, see Angelo Sacchetti Sassetti, Storia di Alatri, 2nd ed. (Ala tri: F. Tofani, 1967), pp. 93-1 51.

(36) R egoliosi, 1966, p. 124; Aldo Onorato, " Filippo Fabbri e Giovanni Tortelli : lettere dal manoscri tto Vat. lat. 3908' ', in Filologia umanistica. Per Gianvito Resta, 3 vols., ed. by Vincenzo Fera and Giacomo Ferrali (Paclua : Antenore, 1997), 2, pp. 1359-1 405 (pp. 1374-75, n. 57).

(37) The address is preserved on the verso of the originai letter (BA V, Vat. lat. 3908, fol. 40''). The address is in another hancl, clearly from the chancellery, and was probably a forwarding address written on the letter when it arrived a t the Vatican, perhaps by someone who had only the vaguest idea where Alatri was and whether Tortelli was actually there.

(38) BAV, Vat. lat. 3908, fol. 40". : "in his esses locis constitutus quae a nobis remotissima sunt et quae in se potiusf eritatem habent, ut aiunt, quam hu.manitatem".

(39) Agostino Sottili, " La formazione umanistica di J ohannes Roth, vescovo principe di Breslavia" , in Italia e Boemia nella cornice del Rinascimento europeo, ed. by Sante Graciotti (Florence: L. S. Olschki, 1999), pp. 211-26 (p. 217); and Agostino Sottili, " Der Bericht des Johannes Roth ii ber die K aiserkroenung von Friedrich III", in Deutsche Handwerker, Kunstler und Gelehrte im Rom der Renaissance. Akten des interdis;::iplinaren Symposions vom 27. und 28. Mai 1999 im Deutschen Historischen Institut in Rom, ed. by Stephan Fiissel and Klaus A. Voge! (Wiesbaden: H arrassowitz Verlag, 2001), pp. 46-100 (p. 49).

( 40) Correr, 199 1, p. 503: "Epistolam tuam accepi ex Alatro scriptam VIII augusti", with an inaccurate comment in n. 2, where it is stated that " il Tortelli già da alcuni anni si recava ad Alatri, il più delle volte in cerca di riposo, ma dal 12 aprile del 1452 presumibilmente con maggiore assiduità per curare gli interessi della commenda del monastero delle clarisse di S. Sebastiano" . In fact, the commenda of S. Sebastiano dates from 1453. However, in 1452 Tortelli received a new benefice, the parish of S. Maria di Capolona, a small town north of Arezzo on the roacl to Poppi.

162 I


Apart from the personal reasons cited in these letters, Tortelli had official business to conduct in Campania. This emerges from local historical sources that had been insufficiently explored until now. This new infarmation confirms our conclusions drawn from Tortelli's correspondence; between 1450 and 1452 he had acquired the habit of spending long periods at Alatri. Perhaps the trips were first motivated by a concern far his health, or a desire to retreat far the summer from the Roman heat. However, the visits seem to have become more frequent and began to take on a public character. ·

Alatri during this period was hardly the scene of major events. The return of the popes to Rame had brought no immediate changes and the southern borders of the Papal States were protected by Nicholas V's excellent relationships with the kingdom of Naples and King Alphonse of Aragon. Yet we do hear of conflicts within the Ciociaria itself, regarding the principal economie activity of the region, pastoralism. Alatri, in the mountains, older and more prestigious, was engaged in a dispute with Frosinone, in the valley to the south, aver grazing rights. The governar of the province, Bartolomeo Bolognini, instituted a first arbitration, on 4 February 1450, without however resolving the conflict. The city of Alatri appealed to the pope, who on 4 February 1452 ordered that the status quo as determined by Bolognini be maintained until a special delegate coùld ptonounce judgment. From this act 4 1 we learn that the papal delegate was to be Giovanni Tortelli of Arezzo, in the role of judge and arbiter. It is not improbable that Tortelli stayed on after the arbi tration to see that the judgement was respected and to enjoy the good summer clima te: the letter from Correr shows that he was still there in August.

A new document shows how Tortelli was gradually consolidating his presence in the city. An inscription from 1453, now in the staircase of the Palazzo Comunale, the Museo di Alatri, records that one Laurentinus Tortellius held the role of podestà: LAURENTINVS

TORTELLIVS DE ARRETIO POT(ESTAS) 1453 42. Above the inscription is a coat of arms surmounted by a helmet, indicating that it belonged to someone who was not a cleric. (pl. 78) The shield, with a border, is divided by a Greek cross, decorated with faur crescents at the ends of the arms. In the centre lies an eight-pointed star, while the faur quarters are each filled by a lion's head in profile, paired two by two. The helmet is decorated with the bust of a woman, in profile, holding another crescent - evidently the most important emblem of the arms.

It is easy to identify Lorentino Tortelli since Giovanni Tortelli had at least three younger brothers, Filippo, also a cleric, Lorentino, and Rinaldo 43

. Lorentino was thus the

(41 ) The act dates to 11 June 1452 and is notarized by Vittorio di Maestro Nardo di Alatri: the registers are now in ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius magistri Nardi, 1445-1515, buste 1-3.

(42 ) It is not mentioned by Giuseppe Sperduti, " Vecchio e nuovo palazzo del comune ad Alatri", in Palazzi municipali del Laz io, ed. by Renato Lefevre (Rame: Lunario Romano, 1985), pp. 497-515. In the last cen tury the inscription was recorded in the Liceo-Ginnasio of Ala tri; see the Addendum to Lidio Gasperini, " Aletrium I. I documenti epigrafici'', Q,uaderni dell'I stituto di Storia ed Arte del Lazio M eridionale, Centro di Alatri, s. 2, 1 (1965) .

( 43) Far Tortelli's family, Mancini, 1920, p. 162. His friends' letters suggest that he was not particularly dose to his family.

I 163

ANTONIO MANFREDI

Fig. 78 - Stemma ofLorentino Tor telli, Museo Comunale, Alatri. (EF)

third in line. The perfect correspondence between his name and chronology with that of the podestà of 1453 makes the identification very probable. W e know very little about him, except that he did not follow an ecclesiastical career but m arried and had at least one child, who received the name of Lorentino's father, Bartolomeo 44

.

The magistrature of the podestà, instituted in Alatri around 1230-40, was the supreme, though not absolute, power in the commune. Chosen by a council of townsmen from four candidates, the official had to be approved by the pope. Papal approval of Lorentino's election would have been guaranteed, since his brother was the pope's cubicularius. The podestà lived in the Palazzo Comunale and served a term of six months, renewable up to a maximum of four years. His duties were described in minute detail by the statutes, which were still active in the fifteenth century 45

.

In this period, the position of podestà had become almost a profession. The role was held fora limited period, to avoid any risk that one might appropriate undue power in the city. They were often called in from outside the town, and then would run for election in another town when their mandates expired.

(44) Mancini, 1920, n. 1. ( 45) Mariano D ' Alatri and Carlo Carosi, Gli statuti medioevali del comune di Alatri (Ala tri: Istituto di Storia ed

Arte del Lazio Meridionale, Centro di Alatri, 1976), pp. 71-74 ; and Sperduti, 1985, p. 500.

164 I

GIOVANNI TORTELLI AND TRE ABBEY

lt is hardly surprising that Lorentino Tortelli should have served as podestà in the town frequented by his brother in both private and public roles. Nonetheless, this new information gives usa clearer view of Tortelli's family, so far known only through a few documents in Arezzo. The inscription also reveals that Lorentino boasted a coat of arms, perhaps acquired through the good offices of his brother, the cleric. In fact, no coat of arms for the Tortelli family is known, and the inscription provides, perhaps, a singular piece of evidence. Tortelli's name, however, has not been found in the lists of the magistrates known so far, which, however, only begin in the middle of the sixteenth century 46

. He is equally unknown in the works of local historians, although his name is found in the notarial register of Vittorio di Mastro Nardo: an act drawn up on 25 October 1452 names Lorentino as podestà 47

, suggesting that he had filled the post prior to the date of the inscription mentioned above. In that very same year, 1453, Giovanni was named commendatory abbot of S. Sebastiano, as we learn from the most significant document linking Tortelli directly to the abbey. This document has remained unpublished and largely misunderstood both by Tortelli 's biographers and the historians of the abbey. In arder to understand it, however, we need to examine the way in which the Clarissan occupation of the abbey carne to an end.

II. The abbey in the first half of the fifteenth century: from the suppression of the Clarissas to the cornm.enda

Previous chapters have demonstrated the important role that the abbey of S. Sebastiano plays in the history of ltalian monasticism. Founded by Liberius in the first quarter of the sixth century, it was transferred in 1233 to the followers of Saint Clare. S. Sebastiano, with its very early foundation date and strong papal and ecclesiastica! support, was particularly important in the early peri od of the newly-established Clarissan arder 48

• After its initial flowering, however, a more difficult period followed, contemporary with the crisis experienced by all the monastic orders in the late medieval period. This was due not only to changes in the spirituality of the times but also to declining material circumstances caused by recurring epidemics of the plague and the resulting economie crises. The plague was particularly damaging to those institutions based on a communal way of life. After the papacy returned to I taly in the early fifteenth century, the popes and the religious orders tried to deal with the difficult situations that had arisen in many monasteries. The socalled Observantiae were supported in some cases, while in others the administration of some

(46) Sacchetti Sassetti, 1967, pp. 415-32. ( 4 7) ASF, Notarile di Alatri , Victorius Magistri Nardi , 2, fol. 36". ( 48) On the importance of this foundation, see in genera! Gregorio Penco, "Vita monastica e società nel

Quattrocento italiano", in Riforma della chiesa, cultura e spiritualità nel Q_uattrocento veneto . Atti del convegno per il VI centenario della nascità di Ludovico Barbo ( 1382-1443), Padova, Venezia, Treviso, 19-24 settembre 1982), ed. by G. B. Francesco Trolese (Cesena: Badia di Santa Maria del Monte, 1984), pp. 3-41; and the chapters above by Bruzelius/Goodson and Romano.

I 16s

ANTONIO MANFREDI

houses was transferred to new orders 'f9 • For those communities with the greatest difficulties, the new institution of the commenda was set up, which involved the assignation of the monastic benefices and properties to secular clerics who were dispensed from monastic obligations. Eugenius IV, who had himself come from a monastic community, played a large part in establishing this system. His work was continued by Nicholas V , who, though a priest himself, was dose to one of the most important religious reformers of the fifteenth century, the Carthusian Albergati 50

• As Gregorio Penco writes, in the fifteenth century the great parabola of medieval monasticism was over: various communities had dis,appeared forever, others became easy prey for commenda, while others struggled with the difficulties of their isolation and the lack of any regular controls. This was particularly the case with the female monasteries, even though it is not always easy to know with any certainty wha t their conditions were, because of their reduced contact with lay society and the lack of documentation which has come down to us 5 1

•

We may suppose such a situation at S. Sebastiano, on which the transfer of the papacy to Avignon must have weighed particularly heavily. Without the presence and protection of the Curia, clearly an important factor in the thirteenth-century life of the monastery, the community was certainly weakened : it was not mentioned in any known papal document of the fourteenth century.

The conditions of the female monastery at Alatri seem to ha ve reached a crisis point by the 1440s: few vocations, a community much reduced in size, a weak observance of the rule, and probably difficult economie conditions. We learn this from a source that, although partial and probably self-serving, must be considered fairly reliable: the records of a case brought against the nuns of S. Sebastiano, then only three in number, after the disappearance of the fourth in dubious circumstances. They were charged with conduct that had given rise to severe doubts as to their chastity. This critical situation had drawn the attention of the bishop and the chapter of the Cathedral of Alatri, attention that we can hardly suppose was disinterested when we consider the properties at stake.

In 1441 Eugenius IV, while in Florence presiding over the Council for the union between the Roman See and the Greek Church, named Bartolomeo, abbot of Casamari, as his delegate in the nuns ' case. The judgment was rendered against the nuns, and the monastery was suppressed. The monastery's property was assigned to the cathedral chapter, for the purpose of the maintenance of the canons, whose number had reached a notable eighteen. On the other hand, the abbot explicitly declared that the monastery was subject to

( 49) Two clear examples are the passage of the monastery of S. Marco at Florence, from the Silvestrine Benedictines to the Domenicans of the O sservanza: Tito S. Centi, L a chiesa e il convento di San J\!larco a Firenze (Florence: Cassa cli Risparmio di Firenze, 1989-90), and the passage ofthe Benedictine monas tery ofS. Maria in Capitolio at Rome, better known as S. Maria in Ara Coeli, to the Franciscans of the O sservanza: rnost recently, M arco Arosio, "Bartolomeo da Colle ( 1421 - 1484), predicatore d ell'Osservanza francescana e dantista minore" , in Gli ordini mendicanti in Val d' Elsa. Convegno di studio, Colle Val d'Elsa, Poggibonsi, San Gimignano , 6-8giugno1996 (Castelfiorentino: Società storica della V aldelsa, 1999), pp. 74-189 (p. 95 ) .

(50) See n. 4 above. (51 ) Penco, 1984, p. 4, passim.

166 I


the Holy See. The papal act of suppression was entered in the documents of the canonical trial against the nuns. The documentation is conserved in the capitular archives of Alatri 52

. The narratio, the account of the trial, also examines the accusations of immoral behavior on the part of the nuns. This gives us a window into the critical conditions of life in the monastery:

extra muros civitatis Alatrinae quodam sub vocabulo Sancti Sebastiani 53 ordinis sancte Clarae extat monasterium quatuor dumtaxat lzabens moniales, quarum una, carnis sectando illecebras, ab illo vaga recessit et de incontinentia aliarum trium apud bonos et graves tantus rumor extitit, quod tempore precedenti mulier laudabilis famae, ut inibi suam pudicitiam Domino consecret, intrare verisimiliter non curabit.

(There is the monastery of S. Sebastiano of the arder of Saint Clare outsicle the walls of the city of Alatri. There are there four nuns, one of whom, giving way to the lecheries of her flesh, has left the monastery as a vagaboncl . There isso much gossip among good ancl sober citizens regarding the incontinence of the other three nuns, that, as a consequence, when a woman renowned for her reputation, apparently did not wish to enter [the monastery] upon thinking the vow of chastity that dedicated her to the Lord. )

Clearly the community was morally impoverished and fragile to the point that it discouraged new vocations - although we should note that one of the nuns must have been very young in 1440 since she was still living at the beginning of the sixteenth century 54

.

There is nothing to corroborate the conditions of monastic observance at S. Sebastiano, as described in the trial acts; however, there emerges a total mistrust of the nuns on the part of the local community. This is based on the two significant facts relateci in the narratio. In the arenga the pope clearly states his intention of improving the conditions of the chapter at Alatri by refarming one religious institution at the expense of another. Among the trial acts exists a document in which two representatives of the cathedral canons take possession of the abbey's property. In the dispositio, or judgment, the pope explicitly declares the suppression of the convent and orders the transfer of the three remaining nuns to a modest house in Alatri that was the property of the ora tory of S. Nicola, which farmed part of the abbey's patrimony. A figure of twenty florins a year was fixed far their maintenance, to be paid by the chapter from the proceeds earned by the abbey's rents . There was no provision far a revival of the convent. It was destined to disappear with the death of the nuns.

Since Scaccia-Scarafani's 1918 treatment of the historical documents concerning the abbey, scholars of the history of the Benedictine and Franciscan orders have treated the year 1442 as the end of S. Sebastiano's monastic life . However, a list of commendatory abbots, recorded by the same Scaccia-Scarafani, clearly contradicts the contents of the documentation of Eugenius IV that suppressed the monastery. The commendatory abbots fallow one another until Pope Innocent X transferred the estate to the church of S. Agnese

(52) ACapA, Cass. Sec . XV, Seg. n. 4; (Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1918, pp. 247-51 ) . The text was recorclecl by . the notary Antonio cli Sisto Leonarcli, who acceptecl the valiclity of the papa! letters shown by the abbot ancl

transcribecl by him. , (53 ) The title ' A1onasterium Sancii Sebastiani extra muros civitatis Alatrinae' is that usecl throughout the fifteenth

century to indicate the monastery . (54) See n. 52 above.

I 161

ANTONIO MANFREDI

in Agone, Rame 55. This was a sign of the monastic institution's autonomy, in spi te of its

assignation in commenda . Thus shortly after its apparently definitive suppression, the whole process seems to have been reversed 56

. Scaccia-Scarafoni noticed the contradiction and remarked that "it is certainly difficult to explain how this property, which by virtue of a recent bulla of Eugenius IV should have remained part of the incarne of the church of Alatri, passed instead to a commendatory abbot" 57

•

The explanation for this serious incongruence comes from a document unknown to Scaccia-Scarafoni. This was promulgateci by Nicholas V who was as concerned with the reform of the monastic orders as his predecessor and as Supreme Pontiff was ready to intervene directly in their affairs 58

. His act for S. Sebastiano, dated 11 April 1453 59, is entirely

different from the previous bull: this papal document, published in the Appendix, is complex, and it is thus worthy offurther detailed presentation.

Written in the form of the litterae gratiosae ad perpetuam rei memoriam, it has the solemn officia! tane reserved for the nomination of high prela tes or significant papal decisions. It is evident from the very beginning of the document that the object of the papal intervention was to provide for the maintenance of the monastery, particularly its buildings, left in a perilous sta te by the previous administrations . The juridical situation is examined in detail in the narratio (including Nuper siquidem). The suppression and the devolution ofthe property had raised more than one problem . Although Nicholas V had originally confirmed Eugenius's judgment - probably during the first years of his pontificate - a series of appeals had ensued, based above all on the very low incarne given to the nuns compared to the real incarne from the estate, which the trial of 1443 had clearly underestimated. The investigation resulted in the annulment of Eugenius IV's dispositions without, however, returning to the status quo ante. Instead , another authority was introduced, a commenda tory abbot pro tempore, who was charged with improving the administration of the monastery's property and undertaking the restoration of the ruined buildings. These two obligations are insisted

(55) See most recently the syn thesis of the abbey's history by U mberto Caperna, " La Badia di S. Sebastia no culla del monachesimo prebenedettino" , in T ra le abbazie del Lazio, ed. by R enato Lefevre (Rame: Fratelli Palombi, 1987 ), pp . 93-110 (pp. 108-10); and pp. 227-29 below.

(56) Scaccia-Scarafoni , 19 18, p. 2 and 32-33. (5 7) Ibid: , pp . 2 and 34-36. (58) An interesting parallel for the suppression of a community in favour of a cathedral chapter, on

Nicholas V 's initia tive, is found in the diocese of his birth , then known as Luni, with a See and cathedral already transferred to Sarzana. The pope suppressed the Benedictine monastery of S. Croce del Corvo, near La Spezia , and assigned its conspicuous property to the diocesan chapter. The enforcement of the pope's will was much delayed because of a long dispute between the canons and the monks : see Niccolo V, 2000, pp. 43 1 n. 72, 506, 5 11 , 564, 565 n. 80, 566, 567, 568 n. 93, 569 n. 95, 57 1 n. 101, 573 n. 106, 584, 591 , 634, 636.

(59) The document was unknown to Scaccia-Scarafoni , 1916, a nd it does not appear in recent Benedictine sources, such as M onasticon Italiae (Cesena : Badia di Santa M aria del Monte, 198 1), 1 : R oma e Lazio (eccettuate l'arcidiocesi di Gaeta e l'abbazia nullius di M ontecassino ), ed. by Filippo Caraffa, p . 11 7, which ends its history in 1442. H owever, it is known in Franciscan sources but has never been fully transcribed: B ullariumfranciscanum, continens constitutiones epistolas diplomata romanorum Pontificum ... ad tres ordines S. P. N . Francisci spectantia, ed . by U lrico H iintermann, José M a Pou y M arti, and Cesare Cenci (Ad Claras Aquas (Quaracchi), Florence: Ex typographia collegii S. Bonaventurae, 1929), pp . 822-23 .

16s I


upon in the litterae of the institution of the commenda. The commendatory abbot was also obligated to subtract from the rents a more adequate income for the nuns, whose residence at S. Nicola in Alatri remained unchanged. lndeed, the document specified that on the death of the last ofthe nuns, their house would return to the patrimony ofthe abbey 60

.

Thus, the narratio presents very important information regarding the history of the monastery, in which the previous situation is described, corresponding perfectly with the earlier documentation that was surely researched before drawing up the new disposition: the proprietors' poor administration of the estate risked the total collapse of the edificia et structure (main building and subsidiary structures), a situation confirmed by experts appointed by the pope himself. This, then, is the principal scope of the new and unexpected papal intervention, a scope that emerges in the arenga itself:

Pastoralis offitii debitum, quo sumus universis orbis ecclesiis et monasteriis obligati, assidue nos compellit ut circa statum ipsorum prospere dirigendum paternis et solicitis studiis intendamus, consulendo eorum reparationibus et oportunitatibus providendo, nec non illa tali bus personis committendo per quas feliciter regi ac in suis edifztiis et structuris reparari et etiam conservari valeant.

(The duty of the pastoral office by which we are constrained on behalf of all the churches and monasteries assid uously oblige usto watch over their circumstances, which should be arranged favourably with fatherly and solicitous care, by advising them about their repairs and providing for their needs, and not least by entrusting them to such persons by whom they may be able to be ruled happily, and have their buildings and structures repaired and also maintained.)

The motive does not seem to have been to restore or reform the monastic rule, but to assign the management of the property, and specifically the renovation of its ruined buildings, to one who could be trusted with the task. This concept was repeated clearly at the beginning of the dispositio :

Nos attendentes quod nisi per nos dieta monasterio salubriter provideatur,forsitan ipsum monasterium in talem deveniret ruinam, quod nisi magnis cum sumptibus reparari et conservari non posset, propterea volentes de remedio oportuno providere ... motu proprio non ad alicuius no bis super hoc oblate petitionis instantiam, sed de nostra mera liberalitate ac delineratione auctoritate apostolica et ex certa scientia ...

(Observing that, unless through us there should be healthy provision for the said monastery, the monastery itself might well degenerate into such ruined state that it could neither be repaired nor maintained without enormous costs, and wishing therefore to see to a timely remedy ... by our own will and not at the urging of any petition brought before us regarding this matter but by our own liberality, in virtue of our apostolic authority, and after being fully informed ... )

Thus, the papal document's intent - to restore the building in order to conserve the property - necessitated reversing the prior bull which annexed the property to the canons who had administered it poorly. The direct administration of the property, however, could not return ipso facto to the nuns. Rather, it nominated a commenda tory abbot who was

(60) Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1916, p. 41.

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ANTONIO MANFREDI

bound to restare the buildings and to manage the property so as to furnish an appropriate sum for the nuns. Nicholas V thus accepted the judicial verdict to solve the crisis of the monastery, but changed the administrative decision regarding the property itself, which he clearly considered to be of much value. The person selected for this administration was, of course, Giovanni Tortelli, the first commendatory abbot.

The papal intervention ad personam, as is normal in the case of a commenda, in this case takes on a singular aspect. Although it is usual to specify that the abbey's property would revert to the cathedral chapter on the death of the commendatory abbot, it is far less common that the monastery should have been reinsta ted after its suppression, as the diocesan authority of the bishop and canons surpassed that of an abbot or abbess, whether ordained or commenda tory. While it remains for historians of Nicholas V's chancellery to evaluate this act in the context of its whole history, we must observe that the pope's intervention was decidedly contrary to the interests of the diocesan chapter and favourable to Tortelli . In the document, Tortelli's role is evident: he had already demonstrated his affection and care for the holy monastery, so its restoration was entrusted to him.

Dilecto fi lio magistro lo/zanni Tortellio de Aretio artium et sacre tlzeologie magistro nec non subdiacono et cu biculario nostro qui, prout no bis constat, ad dictum monasterium non modicam devotionem gerit .

(To our dea r son master Johannes Tortellius of Arezzo, master of Arts and of sacred theology, who is a lso our subdeacon and cubicularius, and who has recently shown us that he bears not a small devotion regarding the said monastery. )

Since the chapter of Alatri had failed to maintain the property, the pope named the most trusted and faithful Tortelli, who was familiar with the situation in the town and who, according to the bull, had already demonstrated his interest for the abbey. lndeed, it is very likely that Tortelli himself was the pope's expert witness to the structure's dilapidateci state, and possibly the architect of the new document. The pope's principal administrative collaborator, his first secretary Pietro da Noceto, also signed the text.

The commenda was entrusted to Tortelli, and was joined to his other benefices, which were relatively limited 6 1

: the archpresbytery of the Pieve di S. Maria of Arezzo, which he had probably held since 1439 ; the parish of S. Bartolomeo al Corso degli Adimari in Florence ( 1448) 62

; and the parish of S. Maria di Capolona ( 1452), the church of his birthplace 63 . The modesty ofthis list accords well with the portrait ofTortelli as depicted by the biographer Vespasiano da Bisticci: "Master Giovanni was a man of excellent conscience, by nature most humane and very universal with all of those with whom he carne into conversation. He was sober of aspect and a man of great authority with all he dealt with. He

( 61 ) Per eum quo ad vixerit una cum quibusvis dignitatibus etiam catedralibus officiis et beneficiis A1 onasteriis Prioratibus ceterisque beneficiis ecclesiasticis secularibus vel regularibus cum cura et sinecura que ad presens obtinet vel infuturum obtinbit ac in quibus et ad quevis sibi quomdolibet competit aut competere poteri! quecumque quodcumque et qualemqunque motu auctoritate et scientia predictis commendamus.

(62 ) Mancini , 1920, p. 257. (63) Regoliosi, 1969, p. 185.

no I

r GIOVANNI TORTELLI AND TRE ABBEY

was not greedy far things but far honour, and was content with little" 64. All Tortelli's ben

efices are linked to significant places in his persona! history: Arezzo, Florence, Capolona, and finally , Alatri. Furthermore two of the four are dedicateci to the Virgin Mary, to whom Tortelli had a special devotion. The appointment as commendatory abbot of S. Sebastiano placed Tortelli on a more or less equal footing with the local ecclesiastica! authorities, the bishop and canons, who, by the pope's rather ad hoc intervention, were deprived of what must ha ve been a considerable incarne. This document thus illuminates the transfer from the bishop and canons to the commendatory abbots who received the rents from this time forward 65

.

The history of the monastery changed radically by becoming a commenda with serious administrative responsibilities. There was no attempt on the part of Nicholas V to reestablish a monastic community of any sort. The nuns remained in Alatri, in the house near S. Nicola, and the document reasserts that this property should revert to the monastery at the time of the death of the last nun. Thus, at this point the new commenda tory abbot, a dose collabora tor of the pope, becomes the most important figure in its history in this period.

III. Tortelli and the abbey of S. Sebastiano

New documents between 1453 and 1463

The discovery of the commenda of the abbey to Tortelli gives us an excellent context in which to place the life of one of the humanists at the centre of the Roman cultura! stage during Nicholas V's papacy 66

. The rebirth of the monastery was not, in fact, merely formal, but also implied a direct interest on the part of the person to whom it was invested. Tortelli took the charge to restare the buildings and to administer its properties seriously, as a new series of unpublished documents clearly demonstrates . Uncovering the link between the monastery and its first commendatarius opens a new chapter in his biography, illuminating a period far which we previously had little information 67

.

(64) Vespasiano da Bisticci, 1970- 1976, 2, p. 63. Fu messer Giovanni uomo di bonissima conscientia, et di natura umanissimo et molto universale con tutti quegli ch'egli aveva a conversare. Fu d'aspetto grave et uomo di grandissima autorità con tutti quegli praticava. Non fu cupido né di roba, ma d'onore, istava contento al poco.

(65 ) Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1916, p . 35, misread the name ofTortelli and identified him instead as: " Iohannes de Torbellis di Arezzo, che negli atti dell 'arch. not. di Alatri trovasi indicato 'artium et S. Theologie magister et pie bis d .ne Marie de Aretio Archipresbyter", p. 38. Caperna, 1987 repeats the same errar , clearly copying Scaccia-Scarafoni. This errar has prevented scholars from connecting the humanist to the abbey. The single exception is the Bullariumjì-anciscanum, which is briefly noted by Regoliosi , 1969, p . 185 n. 6.

(66) On this period and in particular these manuscripts, see most recently Rosella Bianchi and Silvia Rizzo, "Manoscritti e opere grammaticali nella Roma di Niccolò V", in A1anuscrip1s and Tradition of Grammatica[ Texts from Anliquity lo tlze Renaissance. Proceedings of a Conference lzeld al Erice, 16-23 Oclober 1997, as tlze Xlllz Course of lnlernational Sclzoolfor llze Sludy of Written Records, ed . by Mario De Nonno, Paolo De Paolis, and Louis Holtz (Cassino: Edizioni dell'Università degli studi di Cassino, 2000), pp . 587-653.

(67 ) In contrast to his earlier !ife, when his close involvement in the papa! service left a rich documentation.

I rn

ANTONIO MANFREDI

The fall of Constantinople in 1453 struck at the heart of the papal image and the ecdesiastical projects initiated by Nicholas V that had culminateci in his triumphal Jubilee of 1450. The pope himself was heavily tried by the event, and the <ledine of his health was noted with bitterness in the dispatches of Niccodemo Tranchedini, the Milanese ambassador to Rome and counsellor and compatriot of the pope himself68

. Gout constrained the pope to long periods of inactivity, which were probably spent primarily in his private room, the cubiculum, reading the new codices that were being produced for his library -almost sixty were recorded in his chamber at his death, and were then added to the rest of the collection 69

. In contrast, between 1453 and 1455 letters to and from Tortelli show the librarian full of activity, although the last days of the pope's life must have been particularly difficult, throwing into disarray a Curia of humanists who were now without a leader and looking at a uncertain future. In the pope's final days, Tranchedini recorded with much acerbity the flight of even the most trusted of Nicholas's secretaries, Pietro da Noceto 70

, and the presence around the dying pope's bedside of only four of his cubicularii, perhaps the most affectionate 71

• We would like to believe that Tortelli was among them, but Tranchedini omits their names. lt was perhaps because of his well-known attachment to Nicholas V that Tortelli suffered the definitive loss of his prestige at the hands of his successor, Callixtus III, who, immediately after his election, gave over the administration of the library to his confessar, Cosimo di Montserrat 72

•

From this point until Tortelli's death in 1466, there is little trace of him. What we do know suggests that his life was not entirely easy 73

. Letters from his correspondents diminished 74

• Many of his colleagues and supporters died in these next years, induding his dear friend Lorenzo Valla in 1457 and Giovanni Aurispa, another dose collaborator of the humanist pope, in 1459. The pontificate of Pius II ( 1458-1464) gave renewed hope to the humanists and perhaps provided some new possibilities for Tortelli to reestablish his connection to the bibliotheca pontificia, as we read in letter of Pietro Odo da Montopoli 75

• Tortelli was even summoned by the pope to attend the diet in Mantua in 1459 to support the

(68 ) Paola Sverzellati , "Niccolò V visto da un umanista pontremolese: i dispacci di Nicodemo Tranchedini a Milano'', in Niccolo V nel sesto centenario della nascita. Atti del convegno internazionale di studi, Sarzana, 8-10 ottobre 1988, ed . by Franco Bonatti and Antonio Manfredi, Studi e testi, 397 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2000), pp. 329-50.

(69) Sverzellati, 2000, p. 337; Antonio Manfredi, I codici latini di Niccolo' V. Edizione degli inventari e identificazione dei manoscritti, Studi e testi, 359 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1994), pp. xc-xcii , 507-14.

(70) Ibid., p. 347. (71 ) Ibid. , pp. 347-48: Tranchedini declares explicitly that "the watch and the care ofour lord was left to

only four of his cubicularii" (" a la guardia et cura de nostro signore sono erstati solamente quatro soy cubicularii") . (72) Manfredi, 1994, pp. xlvii-liii. (73 ) Regoliosi , 1969, pp. 186-91. (74) He seems to have made contact with the Medici fam ily between 1456 and 1457 : this is seen in two let

ters, one concerning the sale of some books, the other regards the administration of his Fiorentine parish (Regoliosi , 1969, pp. 189-90).

(75 ) Graziosi Acquaro, 1970, p. 3 1. On this friend ofTortelli, who turns up numerous times in our reconstruction of his !ife, see pp. 178-79, 181, 183.

112 I


crusade against the Turks 76. He also seems to have travelled to Arezzo in 1458, in connec

tion with an inheritance from his mother 77. There is little trace of his literary activity in

this period. He dedicateci a compendium on the history of medicine, De medicina et medicis, extracted from the Orthographia, to Simone di Marco Tebaldi, doctor to Calixtus III 78

•

The Latin version of the so-called letter of Ariste a, translated ca 145 7 by Mattia Palmieri and dedicateci to the bishop of Brescia, Bartolomeo Malipier, reveals Tortelli in the Curia with Malipier's familiares 79

. On his new protector Malipier's death in 1464, we find him looking for another sponsor in the Curia: he dedicateci an old translation of Plutarch's Life of Romulus to Giovanni Mazzacolli 80

. However, he remained cubicularius under Pope Paul II ( 1464-71). The transfer of one of his benefices in 1466 is our only indication of Tortelli's death 81

• Tortelli's nomination as abbot in commenda at Alatri in 1453 is the last official document in his favour of which we know. Significantly then, his presence at the abbey sheds new light on his activities during this probable period of isolation from a greatly changed Curia following Nicholas's pontificate. This new information comes from both a study of the physical struéture of the abbey and a small group of notarial documents.

Restoration and Reconstruction

To fulfill the most significant task required of his commenda, Tortelli reconstructed almost all of the western block of the building, leaving only the chapel more or less untouched. The changes include the creation of a great double stairway and a two-storied loggia, the division of the ora tory into a smaller chapel, the possible reworking of the dormi tory space to create an enfilade of rooms, with a large sala, or hall, next to the ora tory, and the transformation of the refectory into a dining hall.

While the architecture will be discussed in full in the next chapter, the epigraphy that verifies this reconstruction will be discussed here. In the typical style of the humanists, Tortelli createci inscriptions to commemorate his buildings: three ha ve been found so far, testaments to the abbot's devotion to the site. Tortelli laid claim to his reconstruction by inscribing his name on the lintel of the new door leading from the head of his staircase into the oratory, which he transformed into a private chapel. Above the entryway "roHANNES ARRETINvs" is written in capitals, separateci by a Latin cross. (pl. 77, above) The excellent work of the stonecutter suggests that the humanist Tortelli was closely advising him; the letters are beautifully balanced, clear, and uniform, without contrasts or chiaroscuro effects .

(76 ) Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 131-33 and 191. (77 ) Mancini, 1920, p. 256. (78 ) Regoliosi, 1969, pp. 187-88. (79 ) Concetta Bianca, "Il soggiorno romano di Aristea'', in Roma nel Rinascimento (Rome: Roma nel Rina

scimento, 1996), pp. 36-41 (pp. 38-39) . Bianca also notes the passion of the bishop of Brescia, who is Venetian in origin, for books. Regarding this dedication to Malipier, see also Luciano Gargan, L'antica biblioteca della Certosa di Pavia , Sussidi eruditi, 4 7 (Rame: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1998), pp. 35, 64.

(80) Regoliosi, 1969, p. 191. (81 ) lbid. This is the benefice ofCapolana, which passed to his friend Leonardo Dati.

I 113

ANTONIO MANFREDI

Fig. 79 - lnscription on window ofroom L'l. (EF)

The round E's recall uncial script, dating the inscription securely to the middle of the fifteenth century 82

. The letters evoke both classica! epigraphy and the use of capitals far titles in eleventh- and twelfth-century manuscripts. This is probably the explanation far the execution of the final VS: the S, although still a capi tal, is superimposed and scaled down, a style frequently found in the titulationes of eleventh-century Italian codices 83

.

There is no doubt that this inscription refers to Tortelli himself, with his baptismal name followed by his city of origin. This formula , found also in his letters, has caused considerable confusion among his biographers 84

. In this case there can be no doubt to whom it refers, as the inscription aver one of the upstairs windows on the abbey's south side confirms it. This inscription reads, "NICOL PP v", recalling the well-known monogram NPPV

chosen by Nicholas to decorate his simple coat of arms, the crossed keys of St. Peter on a red ground, the emblem of the Holy See 85

. (pl. 79 ) Parentucelli was of bourgeois origins, ennobled only by his elevation to the papacy. Having no coat of arms of his own, he chose

(82 ) I am grateful to Flavia De Rubeis for confirming this view and for examining the epigraphy from S. Sebastiano with me.

(83) On these issues, see Armando Petrucci, Le scritture ultime: ideologia della morte e strategie dello scrivere nella tradizione occidentale (Torino: Giulio Einaudi, 1995) .

(84) This issue was resolved only rela tively recently by R egoliosi, 1969, pp. 131-33. (85 ) An example of a crest used on a manuscript is the published codex, BA V , Vat. lat. 171 , with the crest

and monogram abbreviated NP, reproduced in Antonio Manfredi and Anna Melograni, " Due nuovi codici del M agister Vitae imperatorum'', Aevum, 69 ( 1996), pp. 285-94. Nicholas's crests are also found on the façade of S. Teodoro al Pala tino. For further bibliography on the crest of Nicholas V, see Manfredi, 1994, pp. LXXVI-LXXVII. On the inscription's loca tion, see below, Leone, p . 200.

114 I


the arms of the Holy See as a sign of fidelity to his mm1stry. It may be that the crossed keys, no longer legible, were inscribed on the lintel of the window, just before the initial N where there is space. In Rome we find Nicholas V inscribing his own name on doors to record his restorations: at S. Stefano Rotondo the pope inscribed a hexameter distich dated 1453 on the architrave of the lower door into the church 86

. The restorations at Alatri thus accord well with the pope's restoration of early Christian churches in Rome, and we can see his secretary adopting similar techniques and criteria.

A third and longer inscription was placed over the entrance arch to the double staircase. Although it has now disappeared, its scar is still visible in the wall. (below, p. 80) A nineteenth-century transcription preserved in the Biblioteca Giovardiana di Veroli records its text 87

:

ioannes. tortel(lius). arret(inus). ro(manae). eccl( esiae). subd(iaconus). nicolai. v. pont(ificis). max(imi) imaginem. hanc. mariae . vir(ginis). omnibus. adorandam. hoc. in. loco. apposuit.

Here, Tortelli qualifies himself with his cognomen, his city of origin, and his role as apostolic subdeacon. The transcription may contain a lacuna: there are two genitives qualifying the title of apostolic subdeacon, without any conjunction, indeed, almost suspended. In fact, the first, Romanae ecclesiae subdiaconus) would be sufficient, while the second, Nicolai V would better parallel the first if it had modified Tortelli's second title, cubicularius. The double curial qualification would thus ha ve appeared: Ioannes Tortellius Arretinus Romanae ecclesiae subdiaconus Nicolai. V. pontificis maximi cubicularius 88

. A count of the letters seems to confirm the presence of a lacuna in the second line: the first contains 29 letters, the second only 23, the third 25, the fourth 24, and the fifth and final line 13. It is thus not improbable that the second line was as long as the first, containing perhaps an abbreviated formula such as 'cubie.', which would have brought the total up to 30 letters. The succeeding lines were slightly shorter, and the final line shorter still, with a probably elegant effect on the

(86) "ECCLESIAM HANC PROTOMARTYRIS STEPHANI DIV ANTE COLLAPSAM j NICOLAVS V. PONT. MAX. EX

INTEGRO INSTAVRAVIT ANNO MCCCLIII" (Nicholas V Pontifex Maximus restored as whole this church of the early martyr Stephen, long in ruins, in the year 1453). The inscription is reproduced in Mariano Armellini, Le chiese di Roma dal secolo IV al XIX (Rome: Tipografia Vaticana, 1891), p. 159.

(87) VBG, Archivio Campanari, busta provv. 114. We are extremely grateful to Paolo Scaccia-Scarafoni for bringing it to our attention though we ha ve been unable to consult the originai. The document reports the following: "Nell'architrave di un vano di muro a mano destra doppo (sic) entrato il portone nel primo cortile' '. To the transcription as I received it, I ha ve made small modifications, particularly the substitution of round brackets for square ones to indicate the completion of abbreviated words . An interpunct follows every word except maximi at the end of the second line.

(88) The title of cubicularius was normally placed beside that of the pope, thus various letters are addressed to " domino Iohanni Arretino S. Domini Nostri cubicularius" (Regoliosi, 1966, pp. 148 n . 72-73 and 154 n . 103) ; the formula sanctae romanae ecclesiae subdiaconus is used on letters from Guarini dating to 1453-54 (Regoliosi, 1966, p. 171 nn. 192-94, 195 ).

I 11s

ANTONIO MANFREDI

proportions. I t is not impossible that the upper corner of the stone was damaged at the point where it engaged with the wall. We might thus propose the following reconstruction:

ioannes. tortel (lius) . arret(inus) . ro (manae). eccl(esiae). subd (iaconus). nicolai. v. pont(ificis). max(imi) . [cubic(ularius).] imaginem. hanc. mariae. vir (ginis). omnibus. adorandam. hoc. in. loco. apposuit.

(Giovanni Tortelli of Arezzo, subdeacon of the Roman church , cubicularius ofNicholas V, pontifex maximus, places this image ofthe Virgin Mary in this place to be venerateci by all. )

The name Ioannes appears, as it does on the door, without an H. Notably, the only unabbreviated words are the names of Tortelli (Ioannes), Nicholas V, and Mary. Tortelli thus manifested his devotion to the Virgin Mary, whom he had also favored in his benefices discussed above, by dedicating what was probably a statue of her in the arch above. The mention ofNicholas V shows that the inscription was erected before his death in 1455.

These three inscriptions confirm the attribution of this phase of the abbey's restructuring to Tortelli. As we will see in the chapter by Leone, he wished to transform it into a villa and summer retreat, without losing its religious character or obliterating its early monastic tradition. His restoration of the building illustrates the innovative side of the practice of granting commenda, particularly in the attention that Tortelli paid to the whole environment of the abbey. It is not clear whether he began the reconstruction in 1453 or slightly earlier, as the explicit reference to his devotion to the abbey in the document of suppression might suggest. Further, it seems hardly impossible that the abbey might have been proposed as his residence on the occasion when he visited the city as the pope's delegate. In any case his visits apud Alatrum would have acquainted him with the monastery in the surrounding countryside, so clearly visible from the city's cathedral, and the references in the document to the abbey's condition were surely due to Tortelli himself.

Administration of the properties

Tortelli's activities in the administration of the abbey can be seen in a series of documents, which record Tortelli letting a property and illuminate the circumstances of his occupation of S. Sebastiano, even after the death of Nicholas V in 1455, when his activities in the Curia became exiguous 89

. At that point Alatri and the abbey would thus ha ve become his frequent, if not permanent, residence.

The two oldest notarial registers of Alatri are now preserved in the Archivio di Stato in Frosinone. Both registers are ascribed to the notary V ittorio Mastronardi ( Victorius Magistri Nardi). The first register comprises two distinct parts, which ha ve been united for a long time (perhaps since the seventeenth century) 90

: the first part of this manuscript con-

(89) R egoliosi, 1969, pp. 186-91. (90) ASF, Notarile di Ala tri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 1.

116 I


tains a few sections of Mastronardi's register, with acts drawn up between the sixth and seventh decade of the fifteenth century, while the second part contain documents dating to the sixteenth century that must ha ve belonged to Mastronardi's successor 91

• The second register, which is almost complete, is entirely by Mastronardi and contains acts of the same date as the first part of the first register. These are summaries of acts drawn up in the city, possibly with members of the clergy, for the local curia. Unfortunately, since one register survives only in part and the other is damaged by the loss of folios, it seems that the collection is incomplete and surely does not cover all of the activity of this Ala trine notary.

The registers contain three documents that directly regard Tortelli as the commendatory abbot of S. Sebastiano. The first two concern administrative questions 92

, while the third 93 in the second register is a delegation and thus refers to Tortelli's personal affairs. The administrative documents both refer to the years following 1455 and thus enrich the meagre supply of documents concerning the humanist from that period. In the first of these administrative documents 94

, Tortelli - identified as "sanctissimi domini nostri pape subdiaconus ac commendatarius abbatie Sancti Sebastiani extra muros'' - leases a piece of the abbey's land to Giovanni Francioso, his wife Cecca, and their sons, on 26 Octo ber 1461. Tortelli was present at the granting of the lease and was in full possession of his commenda. In the second administrative document, the situation is analogous 95

: the granting of an emphyteutic lease with the aim of improving the land in question. Again, Tortelli, identified as Sacrosancte Romane Ecclesie subdiaconus ac abbas monasterii Sancti Sebastiani extra muros, is present as the abbot of S. Sebastiano. The act is dateci slightly later, 25 J uly 1463, three years before his death. The two acts from the months of July and October suggest that he normally spent the summer in the abbey.

The notary Vittorio Mastronardi appears also to have drawn up the 1451 agreement between Alatri and Frosinone brokered by Tortelli that first brought him to Campania. Apparently he became Tortelli's habitual notary. The third document sheds light on the choices made by Tortelli immediately after Nicholas V's death on 24 March 1455 96

. The document, dateci just aver three months later on 7 J uly 1455, is a power of attorney made at the abbey's door by its commendatory abbot. Tortelli - "Ecclesie Romane subdiaconus ac rector ecclesie Sancti Bartolomei de cursu de Florentia et cetera" - before witnesses, names as his procurator "verum et legitimum dominus Iohannes de Vulterra scriptorem litterarum apostolicarum absentem tamquam presentem'', before the newly elected pope Callixtus III ("coram sanctissimo domino nostro Calixto divina providentia papae tertio") 97

. With this act, Tortelli seems to distance himself from the pope, refusing to go to Rame in person and sending a procura tor to repre-

(91 ) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 2. (92 ) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 1, fols. 239v-240r and 261r. (93 ) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 2, fol. 48r. There are a few other fifteenth-century

notarial registers from Alatri (ASF, Notarile di Alatri, 4-7 ), but they contain nothing about S. Sebastiano. (94) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi , 1, fols. 239v-240r. (95 ) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 1, f. 361 r. (96 ) ASF, Notarile di Alatri, Victorius Magistri Nardi, 2, f. 48r. (97 ) For the election ofCallixtus III, see Hierarchia Catholica, 1914 [1960], pp. 10-11.

I 1n

ANTONIO MANFREDI

sent him. The act harshly demonstrates how much his position had changed: substituted as librarian, no longer at the pope's side, his ties to the other humanists broken. Further, it offers another reason why Tortelli would have decided to remain in Alatri and work for 'his' monastery. Given the circumstances, S. Sebastiano must have offered a retreat where Tortelli could cultivate his studies and his few remaining friendships.

Thus, well administered and reconstructed, the abbey of S. Sebastiano became a valuable property. At the death of its first commendatory abbot, despite the dispositions of Eugenius IV and Nicholas V that it should return to the bishop and canons, S. Sebastiano received a new commenda tory abbot: Franciscus de Portuncis de Ferentino, of whom we first hear in 1484 98

. The series of commenda tory abbots then continues unbroken through to lnnocent X, after the council ofTrent 99

.

Alatri and the < Orthographia'

Alatri was thus Tortelli's second, and particularly summer, home between the last years of Nicholas's papacy and his death. A letter from Odo da Montopoli speaks clearly of his improvements to the building. Much younger than Tortelli, the friend and pupil Pietro Odo da Montopoli was a humanist who can be described as minor, but certainly not minimal. Born between 1425 and 1430, he collaborateci with Tortelli in the 1450s under Nicholas V, revising texts for the new library. His own pupil was Pomponius Leto, at the Studium Urbis, where he held a chai r for many years. Such a brilliant start should have brought greater fame, as his growing reputation under Pius II shows, but a serious mental illness first destroyed his reason and then his existence. He dieci at Sulmona, after an unhappy voyage early in the 1460s, probably 1463, thus a few years before Tortelli, with whom he remained in contact until the last months of his life 100

. He left behind teaching notes, annotations on manuscripts, a varied if not numerous sylloge of poetic compositions in Latin, and three letters sent to Tortelli, preserved in their original version in Vat. lat. 3908 101

. These letters testify to the friendship and devotion of one of Tortelli's few correspondents who remained in contact with him after 1455. Unfortunately, they are undated, although the mention of Pius II places two of them during his reign, between 1458 and 1464. One letter treats at length the Orthographia, which Odo knew well, perhaps from Tortelli's own copy (Vat. lat. 14 78). In the other, the author thanks his friend for his concern for his precarious health 102

: we are thus near the end of Odo's life, probably in August 1462, as Gemma Donati has proposed 103

. The incipit of the letter, which has remained a mystery until now, is easily explained in the light of our recent findings:

(98) Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1916, pp. 35, 38. (99 ) lbid., p. 34. The succession of abbots is discussed below by Leone, pp. 227-29. (100) Most recently, Donati, 2000. (101 ) Graziosi Acquaro, 1970. ( 102) lbid., pp. 33-35. (103 ) Donati, 2000, pp. 37-39.

11s I


loannes Tortelli Arretine, vir eruditissime, amicissime, salve! Quod te ut scribis cumfamulatu tuo in abbatiam Sancti Sebastiani per hos aestus receperis et recte valeas, gaudeo; quod des operam ut iucundius et securius agas, idque possis valida imprimisque nocturna custodia perficere, et probo factum, et gratulor, cum qui a velis id, tum quia possis ef.ficere, quorum alterum consilii ree ti, alterum et opum et virium est valida rum ; quod me istc invitas ad medium usque Septembrem, cum et locum et amici voluntatem noverim permagnas gratias ago, habeoque maiores.

(Giovanni Tortelli of Arezzo, most learned man and most friendly, greetings. I am delighted that, as you write, you and your servants ha ve returned to the abbey of S. Sebastiano for this summer and that you are well ; that you are working to live there more pleasingly and with greater safety, and that you are managing first to complete a strong night watch. I approve and congratulate you on this, both because you want it, and because you are capable of doing it: on the one hand it is a wise plan, on the other the work of a strong and capable man. I am very grateful for your invitation to join you there until around the middle of September, because I know the place and the wishes of the friend. )

The letter addresses Tortelli's summer retirement at S. Sebastiano and his desire to render his stay more comfortable and secure. Odo says that he already knows the site, probably because he has already been a guest there. The letter is written from Alvito, on the way to Sulmona, by the ancient road that led from Sora into the Abruzzo through the Appenines . Odo was thus not far from Tortelli, who lived just slightly further south. Thus, Tortelli's summer residence at Alatri was a fixed point for both the humanist and his friends, who knew that he was studying there and restoring the building that had been entrusted to him. It is not clear whether Odo's comments refer to a night watch or to building works, as it seems clear from our analysis of the architecture that T ortelli reconstructed the north wall of the church court, as well as built the monumental staircase that blocks entry into his private sector.

Odo probably died in the next year, 1463. Especially after the election of Paul II in 1464, Tortelli's own presence i'n the Curia between the apostolic subdeacons was ever rarer. Most ofTortelli's friends and contemporaries were dead. One of his last friends, Gaspare da Verona, remembers him in 1465 in Rome, at the deathbed of cardinal Ludovico Trevisan, with whom Tortelli had travelled to Florence fifteen years prior 10 4

. To this ultimate memory of Tortelli, we can add his handwritten dedication to Giovanni Mazzacolli in 1465, ofan edition of Plutarch's Ramuli Vita 105

. This manuscript, certainly one ofthe last on which he worked, contains a version of Palmieri's Aristea with Tortelli's annotations; his hand is still firm but he clearly trembled as he wrote.

Tortelli's massive reconstruction of the original monastic buildings into a villa-monastery gives us a new picture of his last years, a portrait that includes a playing out of humanist culture and a way of life immersed in archaeological and literary activities. At this point we must ask whether the erudite librarian was aware of the monastery's ancient tra-

(104) Pio Paschini, Lodovico cardinal camerlengo ( t 1465), Lateranum, n .s . voi. 5, I (Rome : Facultas theologica Ponificii athenaei lateranensis, 1939), p. 207 .

(105) BAV, Ottob. lat. 1863, fol. 160v.

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ANTONIO MANFREDI

ditions, which could easily have been deduced from reading Gregory the Great or Cassiodorus's Variae. We have no direct evidence that Tortelli had read these or even that the Dialogi of Gregory were in the new papal library, despite being well-known in the period. The 1455 inventory lists Gregory's Registrum epistolarum, a fine early medieval manuscript with annotations in the pope's hand, but none about Alatri 106

• However, we do know that Tortelli was profaundly interested in patristic studies and wrote the lives of two saints 107

,

an interest, as we ha ve seen, that he shared with Nicholas V 108• His rebuilding of the mon

astery, in which he combined Renaissance farms with a respect far the existing structures, and his dedication of a statue of the Virgin seem to indicate Tortelli's intention to construct a house that was not simply a living space but was also adapted to retreat, meditation, and the religious life. This combination is an explicit imitation of the ancient monastic ideal, an ideal that could not ha ve escaped our humanist scholar of patristic texts .

Direct evidence far his knowledge of the building's history comes from the inscription on the altar, whose author entrusted his soul to Saint Servandus 109

. And, of course, there is no reason to believe that the account of its faundation was not preserved in local tradition: the inscription shows that it was still remembered in the twelfth century, while the presence of Benedict in the frescoes commissioned far the nuns suggest that they kept the memory alive. Finally, we must remember that Nicholas had specifically charged Tortelli with restoring the abbey, which is probably related to the pope's project to restare early Christian buildings in Rame, such as S. Teodoro al Palatino and S. Stefano Rotondo on the Caelian hill. The inscriptions at S. Stefano Rotondo date to exactly the same year as his gift of the abbey, 1453. While many abbeys were falling into ruins throughout ltaly, S. Sebastiano might have been singled out far special care by both Nicholas and Tortelli because of Saint Benedict's legendary visit. Although we cannot be certain that Tortelli

( 106) Today it is BA V , Vat. lat. 621; see Manfredi, I 994, pp. 115-16. In the Biblioteca Vaticana, there is a single manuscript of the fourteenth century containing the Variae of Cassiodorus: Vat. lat. 570. However, it does not seem to ha ve been part of the origina! collection but instead was left to the library by J ulius II. There is no trace of the work in Nicholas V's inventories. The manuscript is described in Marco Vattasso and Pio Franchi de ' Cavalieri, Codices Vaticani Latini, 3 vols., ed . by Marco Vattasso (Rame: Typis polyglottis vaticani, 1902-1959), 1: Codices 1-678, ed. by Marco Vattasso and Pio Franchi de'Cavalieri (1902), p. 425.

(107) He wrote the !ife of Saint Zanobius (Francesca Violoni, "La 'Vita sancti Zanobii ' di Giovanni Tortelli: l'architettura delle fonti", Aevum, 68 (1994), pp . 407-27 and also that of Saint Athanasius (Mariarosa Cortesi, " Giovanni Tortelli alla ricerca dei padri" , in Tradizioni patristiche nell' Umanesimo. Atti del convegno, Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Firenze, 6-8 febbraio 1997, ed. by Mariarosa Cortesi and Claudio Leonardi (Florence: SISMEL Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2000), pp. 230-72 (p. 236 and n. 16), which includes the earlier bibliography).

(108) Far two recent articles on the subject, see Mariarosa Cortesi, "Umanisti greci alla ricerca dei padri'', in Umanesimo e Padri della Chiesa. Manoscritti e incunaboli di testi patristici da Francesco Petrarca al primo Cinquecento, ed. by Sebastiano Gentile (Rame: Rose, 1997), pp. 63-75; Cortesi, 2000. On patristic studies during Nicholas V's papacy, see Massimo Miglio, "Niccolò V umanista di Cristo", in Umanesimo e Padri della Chiesa. Manoscritti e incunaboli di testi patristici da Francesco Petrarca al primo Cinquecento, ed. by Sebastiano Gentile (Rame: Rose, 1997), pp. 77-83; and Concetta Bianca, " Il pontificato di Niccolò V e i Padri della Chiesa'', in Umanesimo e Padri della Chiesa, Manoscritti e incunaboli di testi patristici da Francesco Petrarca al primo Cinquecento, ed. by Sebastiano Gentile (Rame: Rose, 1997), pp. 85-92.

(109) See above, pp. 97-98.

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knew S. Sebastiano's early history, it seems very likely that he was not only aware but passionately interested in it.

In this context the explicit reference to Alatri in the Orthographia gains newfound significance. The city, and S. Sebastiano itself, offered Tortelli a summer retreat and the peace in which he could complete his work. Discussion of the date of the work's first circulation has oscillateci between 1448 and 1453 110

. Today, it is generally agreed that 1451 best fits the evidence, since the papal biographer Michele Canensi refers to the publication as recent, using the adverb nuperrime 111

, very dose to the adverbs used by Tortelli (nuper, cum) in referring to the last phase of the work's composition. The new evidence does not contradict this conclusion, and thus it is still likely that Tortelli reordered the Orthographia at Alatri and there decided to dedicate it to the pope. However, recent assessments have extended the timeframe of its completion, in particular that of the most important manuscript, Vat. lat. 14 78. While this manuscript is not the dedication copy, it is probably the personal copy upon which both the author and his friend Pietro Odo da Montopoli annotateci 11 2

• As we have seen, Odo was invited to S. Sebastiano in 1463. This summons, along with the encyclopaedic character of the work, which required numerous changes and additions, suggests that its creation may have been much slower than previously thought. Further, there is no evidence that a definitive copy entered the library before Nicholas V's death, as its author had desired. This new analysis does not negate the idea that it was first circulated in 1451, but it does suggest that Tortelli continued to work on it and may never really have considered it finished.

The dedica tory letter of the Orthographia to the pope Nicholas V of 1451 contains Tortelli's ideas for the development of the library, after the end of the J ubilee year, the income from which seems to have been used primarily for the purchase and the preparation of books and the payment of the humanists working there 113

• Tortelli's policy for the library - the acquisition of books, the preparation of copies, and the translation of Greek works unknown in the West - seems to have come to fruition during these same years of rapid expansion and ended only with the pope's death in 1455 11 4

•

(110) A synthesis ofthe debate is found in Rizzo, 1995, p. 402 n. 120. ( 111 ) Capoduro, 1983, p. 40. (112 ) Manfredi, 2001 , pp. 286-98; Donati, 2000 , pp. 159-89. This copy, BAV, Vat. lat. 1478, arrived in

the Vatican in the early sixteenth century. ( 113) Gianozzo Manetti, "Vita Nicolai V summi pontificis Libri II " , in Rerum italicarium scriptores, 7 vols. ,

ed. by Lodovico Antonio Muratori and Filippo Argelati (Milan: Typographia Societatis Palatinae, I 723-51 ), 3.2 (1734) pp. 905-60 (p. 924) ; and Vespasiano da Bisticci, 1970, p. 63.

(114) For example, the important group of largely Greek manuscripts collected by Cristoforo Garatone arrived around 1450 ; see Mercati, 1926, pp. I 06-22, and L . Pesce, " Cristoforo Garatone trevigiano nunzio di Eugenio IV" , Rivista di storia della chiesa in Italia, 28 ( 1974), pp. 23-93. This influx of splendidly decorated contemporary copies of precious works, majestic and filled with symbolism, is impressive. The list of dated volumes in Nicholas V's Latin collection is found in Manfredi, 1994, p. 537. They have recently been studied by E. Caldelli, "Copisti alla corte di Niccolò V ", in Niccolò V nel sesto centenario della nascita. Atti del convegno internazionale di studi, Sarzana, 8-10 ottobre 1988, ed . by Franco Bonatti and Antonio Manfredi, Studi e testi, 397 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2000), pp. 72-102; and Francesca Pasut, "Per la miniature a Roma alla metà del Quattrocento: il 'Miniatore di Niccolò"' , in Niccolò V nel sesto centenario della nascita. Atti del

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ANTONIO MANFREDI

Tortelli's appointment as commendatory abbot of S. Sebastiano carne at the apex of his work in the library and about a year after the dedication of his magnum opus, which suggests that Nicholas V wanted to reward his principal collabora tor for the dedication of the Orthographia with the donation of the abbey. While this return was generous, it was not out ofline wi th similar cases in the lif e of Paren tucelli 1 15

.

A later letter indirectly supports this connection between the abbey and the Orthographia. In 1510 the commenda was given to a well-known prelate, Andrea della Valle, who was to become a powerful cardinal under Leo X and Clement VII 116

. Della Valle was educated in the humanist tradition and was a great patron and collector of the arts. In 1516 the humanist Evangelista Maddaleni Capodiferro wrote to him 117

:

Ioannes Tortellus Aretinus, qui commentaria grammatica condidit, quihus omnem litterariam antiquitatem et orthographiae rationem cum oportunis historiis pro poetarum declaratione connectere conatus est, tenuit istam ipsam villam, quam tu possides. In quam quom illhaec commentaria ahsolveret, ait se isthuc apud Alatrium, Campaniae oppidum, ex aeris romani molestia tunc secessisse . Credo te lzac villa non minus memoria tanti viri tenere quam aeris amoenitate delectari, locique commoditate, uhi vix aestas sentiatur, uhi in tot negociis liceat te esse ociosus.

(Giovanni Tortelli d'Arezzo, who composed a grammatical commentary, in which he interrelated ali of literary antiquity and the rules of orthography with appropriate narratives apt to the discussion of poets, himself held the very same villa which you now possess. And he finished the commentary in that place, saying that he h ad retired to Alatri, a city of Campania, away from the dangers of the Roman air. I believe that you should preserve in this villa the memory of such a great man just as strongly as you delight in the healthy air, in the comfort of a place where summer is scarcely noticeable, where, in the midst of so much business, you are allowed to be at leisure. )

The references in this long passage to the Orthographia are obvious and bear witness to the high reputation which Tortelli's work still commanded in the early sixteenth century: indeed these are the years in which the author's copy of the Orthographia finally arrived in the Vatican ofjulius II. Capodiferro's letter makes it clear that he believed Tortelli had finished the work at S. Sebastiano. The use of the word "villa" for the monastery and the ideals of negotia ociosa, a retreat for study, which inspired the new commendatory abbot, were inaugurated by Tortelli himself in this place so pleasant that "summer was scarcely noticeable' ' .

convegno internazionale di studi, Sarzana, 8-10 ottobre 1988, ed . by Franco Bonatti and Antonio Manfredi, Studi e tesi, 397 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2000), pp. 103-55. For miniatures in Rome in the mid-fifteenth century, see Pasut, 2000.

(115) Vespasiano da Bisticci, 1970, p. 67. It underlines the generous gratitude ofthe pope towards his dose collaborators and gives us an example of a similar reward, the gift of 500 ducats to Perotti for his translation of Polybius.

(116) Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1916, p. 38. For the biography of Della Valle, Dizionario biografico degli italiani (Rome : I stituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1960-), 37, pp . 720-23, s.v . "Andrea della Valle" (C. Riebesel).

( 11 7) Oreste Tommasini, "Evangelista Maddaleni de' Capodiferro accademico e storico", Atti della R. Accademia dei L incei, s. 4, I O ( 1893), pp. 3-20 (pp. 19-20) . This text seems to ha ve escaped Scaccia-Scarafoni, 1916. It was noted, however, by Mercati, 1926, who annotateci it in his copy ofMancini, 1920, now in the Biblioteca Vaticana with the rest ofhis papers.

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Mariangela Regoliosi has suggested to me that Evangelista, the author of the letter, was probably the son of Marcello Capodiferro, who was in turn the son of another Evangelista . If indeed Marcello was the father of the second Evangelista, who wrote to D ella Valle in the early sixteenth century, then the ties between Evangelista and the world of Tortelli become that much closer: the Roman nobleman Marcello Capodiferro was, in fact, a pupil of Lorenzo V alla, and in exactly 1453 his teacher lent him some works 11 8

.

Further, Lorenzo Valla considered Tortelli the dearest of friends, as has been noted

already. Even if all of these ties of family and friendship were to dissolve, Evangelista Madda

leni Capodiferro lived sufficiently dose to the events that we may perhaps trust his account. He too was a humanist and scholar, and had grown up in the Accademia Romana of Pomponius Leto, who in turn was a pupil of Odo da Montopoli. Capodiferro, well acquainted with the Curia and the literary world of his time, clearly saw Tortelli's experience at Alatri as a scholarly ideal. The same admiring gaze was exhibited by the miniaturist who painted folio l'" of the copy of the Orthographia owned by Lorenzo Zane, now BA V, Vat. lat. 5229-5230, which depicts not only the dedication of the work but also its creation, with the learned cleric intent on his studies, in a place of peace and repose 119

• (below, colour pl. 12) Even Zane, who owned this codex many years after these events, was closely connected to them and knew the biographical context intimately. lndeed , coming from the rich and cultivated world of humanist Venice, Zane made his first appearance in the Curia under Nicholas V, arriving as the young and brillian t pupil of V alla, who, as we ha ve said, was Tortelli's friend. Thus, it is possible that Zane knew Nicholas's cubicularius personally 120

.

His ecclesiastical career was rather rich and important: this codex of the Orthographia, locateci in the splendici, personal library of the by-now high prelate, records his erudite and decisive thoughts, which shaped his humanist sensibility and culture. Capodiferro, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, and Zane, at the end of the preceding century, thus return us to the people and world of the previous generation, now belonging to a mythicised past according to the humanist style ofliterary otium, but nonetheless their testimonies contain undoubtable biographical connections, which will need to be validateci and better understood, also in respect to Alatri and the memory of Tortelli there in the immediately successive generations.

After the death of Nicholas V, the gift of S. Sebastiano must have become even more dear to Tortelli, who continued to retreat to its shelter. lndeed, I wonder if the total lack of any document referring to his death does not suggest that he died, not only isolateci from the cultural world of Paul II 's court, but far from Rome itself. New research at S. Sebastiano might prove that the monastery was the location of his death and burial. The

(118) Valle, 1984, pp. 294 and 333-34. On the family in generai and rela ted information, see Bianchi and Rizzo, 2000, pp. 642-46.

( 11 9) Regarding the decoration of this manuscript, see below, Rowland, pp. 185-89. (120) Valle, 1984, pp. 13, 58, 268, 358-63, 365, 375-77, 378, 380, 382, 388-89.

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memory of Tortelli's stay at Alatri was not lost on the learned readers of the Orthographia, while the study of the abbey confirms the importance of his reconstruction that created a setting fundamental for his work. In the abbey and the papal library, Nicholas V's secretary found the ideal environments for his studies, places where he could create a balance between religious life and erudite reflection. This balance reflected his double preparation as a theologian and grammarian, scholar of both the early church fathers and the Latin and Greek classics. At Alatri he found tranquillity, a rich historical context, and an eminently beautiful site : here he constructed, with the help of Nicholas's gift, an estate on the ancient model.

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