Ambrogio Traversari – Wikipedia

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Ambrogio Traversari , Also known as Ambrogio Camaldolese (Portico di Romagna, 16 September 1386 – Florence, 21 October 1439), was a priest, theologian and humanist, Italian, general of the Camaldolese; It is venerated as blessed by the Catholic Church.

At the age of fourteen Ambrogio, left the Forlì Apennines, entered the order of the Camaldolese at the Florentine convent of Santa Maria degli Angeli. Soon, thanks to his studies, he became a famous theologian and Hellenist. In learning the Greek language he was a pupil of Emanuele Crisolora (Emmanuel Chrysoloras).

In 1431 Traversari became general of the Order and was entrusted with the guide of the Congregation for Canon Law. In this role he was the strenuous lawyer of the Papacy, especially when he participated in the Council of Basel as a legate of Pope Eugene IV. Such was his hostility to some conciliar delegates and to the secularization of the clergy they represented, that Traversari came to describe Basel as a modern Babylon. He also supported the Pope in Ferrara, together with other prelates, among which the bishop of Forlì, Luigi Pirano stands out. At the Council, his main concern was the reconciliation between Orthodox and Catholics. He drawn up together with Basilio Bessarione, the decree of Florence and Ferrara who should have ended the schism between the two churches dating back to 1054. This rapprochement was also favored by the Turkish threat (the Ottomans had now most of the Balkans) that yes It would be concretized further in 1453 with the fall of Constantinople.

In the years 1431-1437, the Traversari, as a prior general of the Camaldolese Congregation, devoted attention to the question of the jurisdictional rights of the abbey of Sansepolcro, implementing a vast diplomatic action aimed at recognizing its exercise, without however being able to achieve the ‘objective.

He dedicated particular attention to the life of female monasteries, visiting, among others, those of San Giovanni Evangelista in Pratovecchio and the two of Sansepolcro. In the latter case, the Traversari, in 1436, united the two monasteries of Santa Margherita and Santa Caterina in a single community named in Santa Margherita [first] .

Ambrogio Traversari is an interesting figure of the new humanism who was developing within the church and who will subsequently see Monache-humanist such as Camilla da Varano. Thanks to his great classical and humanistic erudition he was a theologian who knew how to confront the sciences, literature and the arts. While some of his confreres considered him only a hypocritical and arrogant priest, he excelled in his relationships with other humanists such as Cosimo de ‘Medici, of which he was a friend. Traversari shone as a scholar of classical antiquities, of ancient theology and especially of the great Greek theologians, who with his translations made available to the West: Giovanni Crisostomo, Basilio Magno and Efrem the Siro. Also translated the four books Against Greece by Manuel Kalekas, Greek theologian and Dominican friar (P.G., Clii, col. 13-661), a work that we only know only in the Latin translation of Traversari. It was also the first to latinize the Vite dei filosofi by Diogenes Laerzio [2] .

Among his disciples, Giannozzo Manetti and Poggio Bracciolini can be remembered.

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The works [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

Among his main works:

  • Hodoeporicon , story of a mission accomplished on behalf of the Pope during which he visited many monasteries of Italy;
  • the translation of the life of Chrysostom of Palladio;
  • the translation of the nineteen sermons of Sant’Efrem Il Siro;
  • the translation of the About virginity of San Basilio the Great.
  • Diogene Laerzio, Of philosophers , Latin translation, 1424-1433.

His manuscripts are kept at the library of the National Museum of San Marco.

  1. ^ E. Agnoletti, Sansepolcro in the period of the abbots , Città di Castello 1979
  2. ^ Saccenti .
  • Salvatore Frigerio, Ambrogio Traversari. A monk and a monastery in Florentine humanism , Siena, Alsaba graphics, 1988, not existing isbn.
  • Gian Carlo Garfagnini (edited by), Ambrogio Traversari in the VI centenary of birth. International Study Conference (Camaldoli-Florence, 15-18 September 1986) , Florence, Leo S. Olschki, 1988, ISBN 88-222-3626-2.
  • Riccardo Saccenti, Ambrogio Traversari , in Biographical Dictionary of Italians , vol. 96, Rome, Institute of the Italian Encyclopedia, 2019.
  • Costanzo Somagli and Tommaso Bargellini, Ambrogio Traversari Monaco Camaldolese. The figure and monastic doctrine , Bologna, Dehonian editions Bologna, 1986, ISBN 88-10-50707-X.

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