Leandro Alberti (12 December 14799 April 1552) was an Italian Dominican friar, historian, and Renaissance humanist.

Life

Alberti was born and died at

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

. In his early youth he attracted the attention of the Bolognese rhetorician, Giovanni Garzoni, who volunteered to act as his tutor. He entered the

Dominican Order The Order of Preachers (, abbreviated OP), commonly known as the Dominican Order, is a Catholic Church, Catholic mendicant order of pontifical right that was founded in France by a Castilians, Castilian priest named Saint Dominic, Dominic de Gu ...

in 1493, and after the completion of his philosophical and theological studies was called to

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

by his friend, the Master General, Francesco Silvestri of

Ferrara Ferrara (; ; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Emilia-Romagna, Northern Italy, capital of the province of Ferrara. it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main ...

, called "Ferrariensis". He served him as secretary and ''socius'' until the death of Silvestri in 1528.

Works

In 1517, Alberti published in six books a treatise on the famous men of his order (''De viris illustribus Ordinis Praedicatorum'', Bologna 1517), that is still worth consulting.. This work has gone through numerous editions and been translated into many modern languages. Besides several lives of the saints, some of which Papebroch form part of the '' Acta Sanctorum'',a history of the Madonna di San Luca and the adjoining monastery, he published (Bologna, 1514, 1543) a chronicle of his native city (''Istoria di Bologna, etc.'') to 1273. It was continued by Lucio Caccianemici to 1279. The fame of Alberti rests chiefly on his ''Descrizione d'Italia'' (Bologna, 1550) a book comprising valuable topographical and archaeological observations. Many of the heraldic and historical facts are of little value, however, since Alberti followed closely the uncritical work written by Annius of Viterbo on the same subject. The work was translated into

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

in 1566, after the Italian version was considerably expanded. He also wrote a chronicle of events from 1499 to 1552, and sketches of famous Venetians. His explanations of the prophecies of Joachim of Fiore and his treatise on the beginnings of the Venetian Republic reflect the historical criticism of his day. He was a close friend of most of the contemporary literati, who frequently consulted him. He is often mentioned in the letters of the poet Giovanni Antonio Flaminio, who dedicated the tenth book of his poems to the friar.

Notes

References

* * * * ;Attribution 16th-century Italian historians 16th-century Italian male writers Italian male non-fiction writers Italian Dominicans 1479 births 1552 deaths Writers from Bologna {{Italy-historian-stub