|
Happy Birthday Tommaso Parentucelli! |
|
|
|
|
[This feature was originally posted on November 15, 1997.]
On November 15, 1397, in the Italian region of Liguria, Tommaso Parentucelli was born to a poor physician and his wife. He would grow up to become a brilliant man whose love of books and reading would stand him in good stead as a teacher, as a diplomat, and as a cultural leader of the Renaissance. He would also become Pope Nicholas V.
In his career with the clergy, Parentucelli displayed a flair for delicate negotiation. His rise to the Bishopric took place during the Council of Basle (1431-1449), a time of uncertainty and division in the Church that harked back to the Western Schism and Avignon Papacy of the previous century. It was Parentucelli who, on the brink of becoming Pope, brought about the peaceful closing of the council and the resignation of Antipope Felix V.
As Pope, Nicholas V promoted reform and made great strides in restoring Rome. He was responsible for rebuilding aqueducts, strengthening city fortifications, restoring churches and renovating the Vatican. Through his office he encouraged art and culture of all kinds, employing artists and architects to bring about his restorations and scholars to translate and seek out ancient manuscripts. For these efforts and for his love of books, Nicholas was known as the Humanist Pope.
Perhaps his greatest achievement, one that reaches through the centuries to us today, is his founding of the Vatican Library.
There is some dispute over whether Nicholas is truly the engineer and founder of the Library. For one thing, the popes had always had a library, and Nicholas never issued any decree for a charter. However, there is no doubt of his intentions. In a letter to Enoch of Ascoli in 1451 he discussed his plan to provide a library for the "common convenience of the learned." Three rooms containing three separate collections -- the Bibliotheca secreta, Bibliotheca latina, and Bibliotheca greaca -- were evidently constructed under his orders. Unfortunately, this work was abandoned after his death, and three successive popes allowed the collections and the rooms that housed them to fall into disuse and disrepair.
Twenty years later Pope Sixtus IV took up where Nicholas left off, thanks to the urging of papal librarian Giovanni Andrea Bussi. In 1475, Sixtus issued a bull that served as the Vatican Library's foundation charter. He took a good deal of credit for the Library, and indeed he was responsible for much of its development, contributing his own manuscripts and setting in motion the renovation and construction of library rooms. This work was continued by succeeding popes, each of whom put their own stamp on the Library.
But the influence of Nicholas is unmistakable.
When Pope Nicholas V died in 1455, the Vatican Library contained more than 1200 manuscripts, 400 of them in Greek. Many of them had been accumulated by Nicholas, and they were not all of a religious character. Classical Greek and Roman works and manuscripts on many subjects, particularly the liberal arts and sciences, had been collected. And this vast collection of books was not intended for the sole use of the clergy. It was the pope's humanist viewpoint that knowledge should be made available to all who sought it, and that those who governed should be guided by such knowledge and seek to learn it.
By 1481 the Vatican Library contained over 3500 books -- far and away the largest collection in Western Europe. It was undoubtedly a rich resource for Renaissance scholars. It also served as an example for future libraries, including The U.S. Library of Congress. Today, western civilization owes a debt of gratitude to Nicholas, for his dreams of a library, for his attitude toward education, and for the Vatican Library itself.
So Happy 600th Birthday Tommaso Parentucelli. And thank you.
The Vatican and the U.S. Library of Congress have joined together to create the online exhibit: Rome Reborn, which includes a marvelous section on the Vatican Library.
Happy Birthday Tommaso Parentucelli! is copyright © 1997-2003 Melissa Snell. Permission is granted to reproduce this article for personal or classroom use only, provided that the URL below is included. For reprint permission, please contact Melissa Snell.
The URL for this feature is:
http://historymedren.about.com/library/weekly/aa111597.htm
More at the Medieval History Site
Site
Map
FAQs
Quizzes
Reviews
Daily
Features
More about the Knightly Newsletter
x
