It is nevertheless
honorable to the city that foreign warriors lie buried here by their
own wish, like Pietro de' Rossi of Parma, Filippo Arcelli of Piacenza,
and especially Gattemelata of Narni (d. 1443), whose brazen equestrian
statue, 'like a Caesar in triumph,' already stood by the church of the
Santo. The author then names a crowd of jurists and physicians, nobles
'who had not only, like so many others, received, but deserved, the
honour of knighthood.' Then follows a list of famous mechanicians,
painters, and musicians, and in conclusion the name of a fencing-master
Michele Rosso, who, as the most distinguished man in his profession,
was to be seen painted in many places.
By the side of these local temples of fame, which myth, legend, popular
admiration, and literary tradition combined to create, the poet-
scholars built up a great Pantheon of worldwide celebrity. They made
collections of famous men and famous women, often in direct imitation
of Cornelius Nepos, the pseudo-Suetonius, Valerius Maximus, Plutarch
_(Mulierum virtutes), _Jerome _(De viris illustribus), _and others: or
they wrote of imaginary triumphal processions and Olympian assemblies,
as was done by Petrarch in his 'Trionfo della Fama,' and Boccaccio in
the 'Amorosa Visione,' with hundreds of names, of which three-fourths
at least belong to antiquity and the rest to the Middle Ages.
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