42 Facts About Polydore Vergil

Polydore Vergil or Virgil, widely known as Polydore Vergil of Urbino, was an Italian humanist scholar, historian, priest and diplomat, who spent much of his life in England.

Polydore Vergil is particularly remembered for his works the Proverbiorum libellus, a collection of Latin proverbs; De inventoribus rerum, a history of discoveries and origins; and the Anglica Historia, an influential history of England.

Polydore Vergil has been dubbed the "Father of English History".

Vergil is sometimes referred to in contemporary documents as Polydore Vergil Castellensis or Castellen, leading some to assume that he was a kinsman of his patron, Cardinal Adriano Castellesi.

The niece of Polydore Vergil, Faustina, married Lorenzo Borgogelli, count of Fano, from whom descend the family of Borgogelli Virgili.

Polydore Vergil was educated at the University of Padua, and possibly at Bologna.

Polydore Vergil was probably in the service of Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino, before 1498, as in the dedication of his Proverbiorum Libellus he styles himself Guido's client.

At some point prior to 1502 Polydore Vergil entered the service of Pope Alexander VI.

In 1502, Polydore Vergil travelled to England as the deputy of Cardinal Adriano Castellesi in the office of Collector of Peter's Pence, and, in practice, the Cardinal's agent in a variety of affairs.

Polydore Vergil probably spent little time in Wells, but was active as the Chapter's representative in London.

Polydore Vergil donated a set of hangings for the quire of Wells Cathedral.

Polydore Vergil held other ecclesiastical sinecures, including, from 1503, the living of Church Langton, Leicestershire; from 1508 prebends in Lincoln and Hereford Cathedrals; and from 1513 the prebend of Oxgate in St Paul's Cathedral.

Polydore Vergil recognized the advantages humanism would offer to legitimise his claim to the throne, which was still vulnerable to challenge after his victory at the Battle of Bosworth Field, and the role that diffusion of humanist education would take in establishing a more educated, bureaucratic government than the feudal aristocracy.

Polydore Vergil was released before Christmas 1515, but never regained his subcollectorship.

In 1546 Polydore Vergil resigned the Archdeaconry of Wells to the Crown, perhaps in anticipation of his retirement to Italy.

Polydore Vergil was licensed to return to Urbino in 1550, and probably left England for the last time in the summer of 1553.

Polydore Vergil's Proverbiorum Libellus, retitled in later editions as Adagiorum Liber, and often known as the Adagia, was a collection of Latin proverbs.

The first edition of Polydore Vergil's work contained 306 proverbs taken from classical sources.

Polydore Vergil probably thought that this addition would be a popular one, but it was a concession towards critics who had labelled the De Inventoribus a work of heretics and depravity.

Thirty Latin editions had been published by the time Polydore Vergil died in 1555; and the work eventually ran to around 70 Latin editions, and another 35 translations.

The work is notable for the immense industry that went into its compilation, and the range of ancient and modern writers on which Polydore Vergil was able to draw.

In 1525 Polydore Vergil published an edition of Gildas' 6th-century history, De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae, probably at Antwerp.

Polydore Vergil dedicated it to Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of London.

In publishing it, Polydore Vergil reflected a growing interest in post-classical texts among German and Italian scholars.

Polydore Vergil did have a motive; this project provided a background for his anti-Arthurian position.

Polydore Vergil's role is to state the problems and supply the historical illustrations; his friend's to explain, rationalise and depreciate as best he can.

The most plausible interpretation of the evidence is that Polydore Vergil intended to present a fine manuscript to Henry VIII, and commissioned the work from Veterani, the most famous copyist of the day.

However, Polydore Vergil added a new book giving an account of Henry VIII's reign to 1537, and which included a highly critical portrait of Wolsey.

Polydore Vergil claimed that most of his work on the last book was done contemporaneously, and that the work was interrupted by a visit to Italy.

Denys Hay finds it reasonable to suppose that at first Polydore Vergil planned this book to describe events up to 1530, but that he postponed the publication of it due to the political uncertainties in England, enabling him to extend the terminal date.

Polydore Vergil drew on an impressively wide range of sources for his work, including published books and oral testimony.

Polydore Vergil claimed to have been diligent in collecting materials, and to have drawn on the work of foreign as well as English historians.

Polydore Vergil opened the Anglica Historia with a passage heavily influenced by Caesar's Commentarii de Bello Gallico:.

Polydore Vergil published a Commentariolum in Dominicam Precem at Basel in 1525, accompanying an edition of the De Inventoribus Rerum.

Polydore Vergil's comments owed much to Erasmus' Precatio Dominica in septem portiones distributa.

At Erasmus' request, Polydore Vergil worked on a translation from the Greek of Dio Chrysostom's De Perfecto Monacho, which he published in 1533.

Polydore Vergil was buried in Urbino Cathedral, in the chapel of St Andrew which he himself had endowed.

Polydore Vergil's family home and alleged birthplace in Urbino is marked by a plaque; and there is a bust of him in the city, unveiled in 2000.

In continental Europe, Vergil is principally remembered for the De Inventoribus Rerum and the Adagia: these are the works which secured his reputation before he ever came to England, and which he himself regarded as his masterpieces, writing "I, Polydore, was the first of the Romans to treat of these two matters".

In England Polydore Vergil is more often remembered as author of the Anglica Historia.

John Caius in 1574, for example, asserted that Polydore Vergil had "committed as many of our ancient and manuscript historians to the flames as would have filled a waggon, that the faults of his own work might pass undiscovered".

William Lambarde in 1576 commented that "as [Polydore Vergil] was by office Collector of the Peter pence to the Popes gain and lucre, so sheweth he himselfe throughout by profession, a covetous gatherer of lying Fables, fained to advaunce the Popish Religion, Kingdome, and Myter".