Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, Conte Di Concordia

Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, Conte Di Concordia

▪ Italian scholar
born Feb. 24, 1463, Mirandola, duchy of Ferrara [Italy]
died Nov. 17, 1494, Florence

      Italian scholar and Platonist philosopher whose De hominis dignitate oratio (“Oration on the Dignity of Man”), a characteristic Renaissance work composed in 1486, reflected his syncretistic method of taking the best elements from other philosophies and combining them in his own work.

      His father, Giovanni Francesco Pico, prince of the small territory of Mirandola, provided for his precocious child's thorough humanistic education at home. Pico then studied canon law at Bologna and Aristotelian philosophy at Padua and visited Paris and Florence, where he learned Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic. At Florence he met Marsilio Ficino, a leading Renaissance Platonist philosopher.

      Introduced to the Hebrew Kabbala, Pico became the first Christian scholar to use Kabbalistic doctrine in support of Christian theology. In 1486, planning to defend 900 theses he had drawn from diverse Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Latin writers, he invited scholars from all of Europe to Rome for a public disputation. For the occasion he composed his celebrated Oratio. A papal commission, however, denounced 13 of the theses as heretical, and the assembly was prohibited by Pope Innocent VIII. Despite his ensuing Apologia for the theses, Pico thought it prudent to flee to France but was arrested there. After a brief imprisonment he settled in Florence, where he became associated with the Platonic Academy, under the protection of the Florentine prince Lorenzo de' Medici. Except for short trips to Ferrara, Pico spent the rest of his life there. He was absolved from the charge of heresy by Pope Alexander VI in 1492. Toward the end of his life he came under the influence of the strictly orthodox Girolamo Savonarola, martyr and enemy of Lorenzo.

      Pico's unfinished treatise against enemies of the church includes a discussion of the deficiencies of astrology. Though this critique was religious rather than scientific in its foundation, it influenced the astronomer Johannes Kepler (Kepler, Johannes), whose studies of planetary movements underlie modern astronomy. Pico's other works include an exposition of Genesis under the title Heptaplus (Greek hepta, “seven”), indicating his seven points of argument, and a synoptic treatment of Plato and Aristotle, of which the completed work De ente et uno (Of Being and Unity) is a portion. Pico's works were first collected in Commentationes Joannis Pici Mirandulae (1495–96).

* * *


Universalium. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Нужно сделать НИР?

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, conte (count) di Concordia — born Feb. 24, 1463, Mirandola, duchy of Ferrara died Nov. 17, 1494, Florence Italian scholar, philosopher, and humanist. He settled in Florence in 1484 as a protégé of Lorenzo de Medici and Marsilio Ficino. In 1486 he posted in Rome a list of 900 …   Universalium

  • Giovanni Pico della Mirandola — Portrait from the Uffizi Gallery, in Florence. Full name Giovanni Pico della Mirandola Born 24 February 1463(1463 02 24) Mirandola, Italy …   Wikipedia

  • Giovanni — (as used in expressions) Giovanni Antonio Canal Giovanni da Bologna Tommaso Di Giovanni Di Simone Guidi Stefano di Giovanni Albinoni Tomaso Giovanni Boccaccio Giovanni Enrico Giuseppe Giovanni Boito Bononcini Giovanni Giovanni Caboto Casanova… …   Universalium

  • della — /del lah/ (in names of Italian derivation) a contraction of di and the article la: Andrea della Robbia. * * * (as used in expressions) Baccio della Porta Giacomo Della Chiesa Della Robbia family Jacopo della Quercia Giuliano della Rovere Andrea… …   Universalium

  • Pico — (as used in expressions) Pico Bolívar Pico della Mirandola Giovanni conte count di Concordia Teide Pico de Pico de Tenerife * * * …   Universalium

  • Della — /del euh/, n. a female given name, form of Delia. * * * (as used in expressions) Baccio della Porta Giacomo Della Chiesa Della Robbia family Jacopo della Quercia Giuliano della Rovere Andrea di Pietro della Gondola Pico della Mirandola Giovanni… …   Universalium

  • Leo X — (Giovanni de Medici) 1475 1521, Italian ecclesiastic: pope 1513 21 (son of Lorenzo de Medici). * * * orig. Giovanni de Medici born Dec. 1, 1475, Florence died Dec. 1, 1521, Rome Pope (1513–21), one of the most extravagant of the Renaissance… …   Universalium

  • Italian literature — Introduction       the body of written works produced in the Italian language that had its beginnings in the 13th century. Until that time nearly all literary work composed in the Middle Ages was written in Latin. Moreover, it was predominantly… …   Universalium

  • humanism — /hyooh meuh niz euhm/ or, often, /yooh /, n. 1. any system or mode of thought or action in which human interests, values, and dignity predominate. 2. devotion to or study of the humanities. 3. (sometimes cap.) the studies, principles, or culture… …   Universalium

  • Italy — /it l ee/, n. a republic in S Europe, comprising a peninsula S of the Alps, and Sicily, Sardinia, Elba, and other smaller islands: a kingdom 1870 1946. 57,534,088; 116,294 sq. mi. (301,200 sq. km). Cap.: Rome. Italian, Italia. * * * Italy… …   Universalium

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”