Petrus Nannius (; b. 1496,

Alkmaar Alkmaar () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands, located in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Holland. Alkmaar is well known fo ...

d. 1557) was a Dutch poet, accomplished

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 ...

scholar and

humanist Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential, and agency of human beings, whom it considers the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "humanism" ha ...

of the 16th century. A contemporary of

Desiderius Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus ( ; ; 28 October c. 1466 – 12 July 1536), commonly known in English as Erasmus of Rotterdam or simply Erasmus, was a Dutch Christian humanist, Catholic priest and Catholic theology, theologian, educationalist ...

, he was born in

and was an important figure in the humanism of the time, having provided a foundation with his teaching for the later flowering of humanism in the region.

Life

We first hear of Nannius teaching in

Gouda, South Holland Gouda () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province , city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands , municipality in the west of the Netherlands, between Rotterdam and Utrecht (city), Utrecht, in the Provinces of the Netherland ...

. His appointment here is considered a turning point in the humanism of Gouda, in that the humanistic spirit was being found less inside monasteries, and more in public, secular life. In 1539, Nannius succeeded

Conrad Goclenius Conrad Goclenius (or in German "Conrad Wackers" or "Conrad Gockelen") was a Renaissance humanist, and Latin scholar, and the closest confidant of humanist Desiderius Erasmus, who was born in Mengeringhausen in the Landgraviate of Hesse in 1490, ...

teacher at the

Collegium Trilingue The Collegium Trilingue, often also called Collegium trium linguarum, or, after its creator Collegium Buslidianum (, ), is a university that was founded in 1517 under the patronage of the humanist, Hieronymus van Busleyden. The three languages tau ...

, where he taught renowned intellectuals of the age such as Jacobus Cruquius. Nannius was described by Flemish humanist

Justus Lipsius Justus Lipsius (Joest Lips or Joost Lips; October 18, 1547 – March 23, 1606) was a Flemish Catholic philologist, philosopher, and humanist. Lipsius wrote a series of works designed to revive ancient Stoicism in a form that would be compatibl ...

as the first person to introduce a love of letters in the Collegium Trilingue. Nannius served in this capacity from 1539 to his death in 1557. For his many scholarly endeavours, he could rely on the financial help of influential patrons, such as

Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle (20 August 151721 September 1586), Comte de La Baume Saint Amour, typically known as Cardinal Granvelle in English, was a Burgundian statesman, made a cardinal, who followed his father as a leading minister of th ...

Works

Nannius was also a writer who wrote a commentary on the ''Ars Poetica'' of

Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 BC – 27 November 8 BC), Suetonius, Life of Horace commonly known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). Th ...

, and saw in it many similarities to

Menippean satire The genre of Menippean satire is a form of satire, usually in prose, that is characterized by attacking mental attitudes rather than specific individuals or entities. It has been broadly described as a mixture of allegory, picaresque narrative, an ...

. He translated the works of many Greek authors, including

Aeschines Aeschines (; Greek: ; 389314 BC) was a Greek statesman and one of the ten Attic orators. Biography Although it is known he was born in Athens, the records regarding his parentage and early life are conflicting; but it seems probable that h ...

Plutarch Plutarch (; , ''Ploútarchos'', ; – 120s) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo (Delphi), Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''Parallel Lives'', ...

, and

Athanasius Athanasius I of Alexandria ( – 2 May 373), also called Athanasius the Great, Athanasius the Confessor, or, among Coptic Christians, Athanasius the Apostolic, was a Christian theologian and the 20th patriarch of Alexandria (as Athanasius ...

. He also produced ten books of critical and explanatory ''Miscellanea'', and commentaries on the ''

Eclogues The ''Eclogues'' (; , ), also called the ''Bucolics'', is the first of the three major works of the Latin poet Virgil. Background Taking as his generic model the Greek bucolic poetry of Theocritus, Virgil created a Roman version partly by o ...

'' and fourth book of the ''

Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; or ) is a Latin Epic poetry, epic poem that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy, Trojan who fled the Trojan War#Sack of Troy, fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Ancient Rome ...

'' by

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; 15 October 70 BC21 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Rome, ancient Roman poet of the Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan period. He composed three of the most fa ...

Selective bibliography

Philological Commentaries * Vergil: ''Aeneis'' IV (1544), ''Bucolica'' (1559, published posthumously) * Livy: ''Ab Urbe condita'' III (1545) * Cicero: ''In Verrem'' (1546) * Σύμμικτα or ''Miscellanea'' (1548) * * Horace: ''Ars poetica'' (1608, published posthumously) Latin translations of Greek texts * Lucian: 7 ''Dialogues of the Gods'' and 4 ''Dialogues of the Sea Gods'' (1528) * Basil of Caesarea: several homilies (Leuven, 1538 and 1539). The 1538 edition is availabl
on KU Leuven Special Collections
* Plutarch: ''Lives of Phocion and Cato'' ''the Younger'' (1540) * Athenagoras: ''On the Resurrection of the Dead'' (1541, ''editio princeps'') * Athanasius: ''Complete works'' (1556) Original literary output * ''Vinctus'' (1522) *''Declamatio de Bello Turcis Inferendo'' (1535/6) *''Orationes tres'' (1541) *''Dialogismi heroinarum'' (1541 and 1550) *''Declamatio quodlibetica, de aeternitate mundi'' (1549) * Dream orations (1611, published posthumously) ** ''Somnium, sive Paralipomena Virgilii: Res Inferae a Poeta relictae'' ** ''Somnium alterum In lib. Il Lucretii Praefatio''

Notes

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Nannius, Petris Dutch humanists People from the Habsburg Netherlands 16th-century writers in Latin Academic staff of the Old University of Leuven 1557 deaths 1496 births People from Alkmaar