Antonio Urceo, called Codro (''Antonius Urceus Codrus'', 1446,
Rubiera
Rubiera ( Reggiano: ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Reggio Emilia in the Italian region Emilia-Romagna, located on the Via Emilia about northwest of Bologna and about southeast of Reggio Emilia.
History
The original name of t ...
–1500,
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different na ...
) was an Italian
humanist
Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry.
The meaning of the term "human ...
who taught grammar and eloquence in Bologna (where
Nicolaus Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus (; pl, Mikołaj Kopernik; gml, Niklas Koppernigk, german: Nikolaus Kopernikus; 19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic canon, who formulat ...
was among his students).
He studied in
Modena
Modena (, , ; egl, label= Modenese, Mòdna ; ett, Mutna; la, Mutina) is a city and '' comune'' (municipality) on the south side of the Po Valley, in the Province of Modena in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy.
A town, and seat o ...
under the poet and humanist
Gaspare Trimbocchi (il Tribraco). In
Forlì
Forlì ( , ; rgn, Furlè ; la, Forum Livii) is a '' comune'' (municipality) and city in Emilia-Romagna, Northern Italy, and is the capital of the province of Forlì-Cesena. It is the central city of Romagna.
The city is situated along the Vi ...
he was the teacher of
Sinibaldo Ordelaffi, son of the Lord of the city,
Pino III Ordelaffi
Pino III Ordelaffi (11 March 1436 – 10 February 1480) was an Italian condottiero and lord of Forlì. He was a member of the Ordelaffi family.
The son of Antonio I Ordelaffi, he was the brother of Francesco IV Ordelaffi, lord of Forlì from ...
.
Urceo Codro is remembered, among other things, for writing a new fifth act for the
Aulularia
''Aulularia'' is a Latin (language), Latin play by the early Ancient Rome, Roman playwright Titus Maccius Plautus. The title literally means ''The Little Pot'', but some translators provide ''The Pot of Gold'', and the plot revolves around a lit ...
of
Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the g ...
(of the original fifth act of the play only fragments survive). Later other authors, e.g.
Martin Dorp, provided their own versions of the missing scenes.
Urceo was esteemed in his time as a Greek scholar;
Angelo Poliziano
Agnolo (Angelo) Ambrogini (14 July 1454 – 24 September 1494), commonly known by his nickname Poliziano (; anglicized as Politian; Latin: '' Politianus''), was an Italian classical scholar and poet of the Florentine Renaissance. His sc ...
wrote to ask his opinion on some Greek poems, and the second volume of Greek epistolographers printed by
Aldus Manutius
Aldus Pius Manutius (; it, Aldo Pio Manuzio; 6 February 1515) was an Italian printer and humanist who founded the Aldine Press. Manutius devoted the later part of his life to publishing and disseminating rare texts. His interest in and preser ...
was dedicated to Urceo.
[Harold B. Segel, Renaissance Culture in Poland: The Rise of Humanism, 1470–1543, Cornell University Press, 1989, p. 130.]
Urceo's biography was written by
Carlo Malagola.
References
* Carlo Malagola: Della vita e delle opere di Antonio Urceo detto Codro: studi e ricerche (Fava e Garagnani, 1878)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Urceo, Antonio
Italian Renaissance humanists
1446 births
1500 deaths