Giusto Fontanini (30 October 1666 in
San Daniele del Friuli
San Daniele del Friuli ( fur, Sant Denêl) is a '' comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Udine in the Italian region Friuli Venezia Giulia, located about northwest of Trieste and about northwest of Udine.
San Daniele del Friuli borders ...
– 17 April 1736 in
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus ( legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
) was a
Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...
archbishop and an
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the st ...
.
Biography

A prelate and attentive bibliophile, in 1697 became a stubborn and reactionary defender of the Papal Curia. In 1708, he was a protagonist of a contentious controversy over the possession of the territory of
Comacchio Comacchio (; egl, label= Comacchiese, Cmâc' ) is a town and ''comune'' of Emilia Romagna, Italy, in the province of Ferrara, from the provincial capital Ferrara. It was founded about two thousand years ago; across its history it was first gove ...
between the Papacy and the
Este
Este may refer to:
Geography
* Este (woreda), a district in Ethiopia
* Este, Veneto, a town in Italy
* Este (Málaga), a district in Spain
* Este (river), a river in Germany
* Este (São Pedro), a parish in Portugal
* Este (São Mamede), a par ...
Dukes of Modena along with their protector, the Austrian Hapsburg empire. In 1597, the then Duke of Ferrara
Alfonso II d'Este
Alfonso II d'Este (24 November 1533 – 27 October 1597) was Duke of Ferrara from 1559 to 1597. He was a member of the House of Este.
Biography
He was the elder son of Ercole II d'Este and Renée de France, the daughter of Louis XII of Franc ...
died without heirs. While the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II recognized as heir to Alfonso, his cousin Cesare d'Este, his dubious legitimacy led the papal states to claim the Duchy of Ferrara, including Comacchio. Cesare and his successors were constrained to the Duchy of Modena. However in 1708, an Austrian army claimed Commacchio by marching an army to occupy the town. While the Papacy gathered an army to confront the imperial garrison, the rival political and legal claims were trumpeted in competing scholarly treatises: the Este claim by the erudite
Ludovico Antonio Muratori
Lodovico Antonio Muratori (21 October 1672 – 23 January 1750) was an Italian historian, notable as a leading scholar of his age, and for his discovery of the Muratorian fragment, the earliest known list of New Testament books.
Biography
Bor ...
, while Fontanini defended the papal claim. With free access to Vatican papers, Fontanini relied on countless texts and composed equally erudite works such as ''De antiquitatibus Hortae coloniae Etruscorum'' (1708), ''Dissertatio de corona ferrea langobardorum'', ''Delle masnade ed altri servi secondo l'uso dei Longobardi'' and several others. Ultimately, the papacy acquiesed to the occupation for some decades.
Fontanini's most important work is the "Library of Italian Eloquence" (1726), a bibliography of the letters, later corrected and supplemented by
Apostolo Zeno
Apostolo Zeno (11 December 1668 in Venice – 11 November 1750 in Venice) was a Venetian poet, librettist, journalist, and man of letters.
Early life
Apostolo Zeno was born in Venice to a colonial branch of the Zeno family, an ancient Vene ...
, historian and poet (1753). The importance of this project is highlighted in the subtitle: ''Where are neatly arranged works printed in our vulgar language over the disciplines and the main subjects''. A classification of knowledge, then, but with a revolutionary linguistic plan: the vulgar, now national language. The disciplines in which he shares his library of eloquence are: grammar, rhetoric, poetry, dramatic (theater), lyricism, history, philosophy, theology. There are, and legitimate, both vulgar works and the vulgarizations of ancient works.
Sharp criticism by the intellectuals of the time for the many omissions and inaccuracies does not diminish the value of this Library, which is recognized as the first step in the arrangement of Italian works.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Fontanini, Giusto
1666 births
1736 deaths
18th-century Italian Roman Catholic archbishops
18th-century Italian historians