In their Latin
poems they sing his praises and celebrate his amour with the fair
Isotta, in whose honour and as whose monument the famous rebuilding of
San Francesco at Rimini took place 'Divae Isottae Sacrum.' When the
humanists themselves came to die, they were laid in or under the
sarcophagi with which the niches of the outside walls of the church
were adorned, with an inscription testifying that they were laid here
at the time when Sigismundus, the son of Pandulfus, ruled. It is hard
for us nowadays to believe that a monster like this prince felt
learning and the friendship of cultivated people to be a necessity of
life; and yet the man who excommunicated him, made war upon him, and
burnt him in effigy, Pope Pius II, says: 'Sigismondo knew history and
had a great store of philosophy; he seemed born to all that he
undertook.'
Propagators of Antiquity
We have here first to speak of those citizens, mostly Florentines, who
made antiquarian interests one of the chief objects of their lives, and
who were themselves either distinguished scholars, or else
distinguished _dilettanti_ who maintained the scholars. They were of
peculiar significance during the period of transition at the beginning
of the fifteenth century, since it was in them that humanism first
showed itself practically as an indispensable element in daily life.
Pages:
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255