The Accademia degli Oziosi (Academy of the Idle) was the most famous

Neapolitan Neapolitan means of or pertaining to Naples, a city in Italy; or to: Geography and history * Province of Naples, a province in the Campania region of southern Italy that includes the city * Duchy of Naples, in existence during the Early and Hig ...

literary academies of the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

History

The Accademia degli Oziosi was founded in 1611 by

Giovanni Battista Manso Giovanni Battista Manso (1570- 28 December 1645) was an Italian aristocrat, scholar, and patron of the arts and artists. Biography Giambattista Manso was a wealthy nobleman and a prominent patron of the arts and letters in Naples during the late ...

, Marquis of Villa. The Academy was officially inaugurated on May 3, 1611 in the cloister of Santa Maria delle Grazie. It played a key role in introducing

conceptismo ''Conceptismo'' (literally, conceptism) is a literary movement of the Baroque period in the Spanish literature. It began in the late 16th century and lasted through the 17th century, also the period of the Spanish Golden Age. ''Conceptismo'' is ch ...

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, where orthodox Petrarchism had displaced the richly experimental poetry produced there in the previous decades. The Academy soon became one of the places for the formation of the Neapolitan intellectual elite. When

Giambattista Marino Giovanni Battista was a common Italian given name (see Battista for those with the surname) in the 16th-18th centuries. It refers to "John the Baptist" in English, the French equivalent is "Jean-Baptiste". Common nicknames include Giambattista, Gia ...

returned to his native city in 1624, he was elected the Academy's ''Principe''. After the death of Marino in 1625 Manso himself became ''Principe'' of the Oziosi, a position which he was to hold until his own death on 28 December 1645. The Academy originally met in the cloister of Santa Maria delle Grazie e Sant'Agnello. From 1615 onwards the meetings were held at

San Domenico Maggiore San Domenico Maggiore is a Gothic, Roman Catholic church and monastery, founded by the friars of the Dominican Order, and located in the square of the same name in the historic center of Naples. History The square is bordered by a street/alle ...

. The Oziosi numbered many notable men of letters, including

Angelo Grillo Dom Angelo Grillo O.S.B. (1557–1629) was an Italian early baroque poet belonging to the noble Genoese family of the Spinola. He wrote mostly religious verse under his own name, but as Livio Celiano, his pseudonym, he wrote amorous madrigal texts. ...

Giambattista della Porta Giambattista della Porta (; 1535 – 4 February 1615), also known as Giovanni Battista Della Porta, was an Italian scholar, polymath and playwright who lived in Naples at the time of the Renaissance, Scientific Revolution and Reformation. Giamba ...

and Giovanni Vincenzo Imperiale. Among its foreign members the Academy numbered the brothers Bartolomé and

Lupercio Leonardo de Argensola Lupercio Leonardo de Argensola (baptised 14 December 1559 – 2 March 1613) was a Spanish dramatist and poet. Biography He was born in Barbastro. He was educated at the universities of Huesca and Zaragoza, becoming secretary to the duke de Villa ...

. The Academy enjoyed patronage from the viceroy of Naples

Pedro Fernández de Castro, Count of Lemos Pedro Fernández de Castro y Andrade (1576–1622), better known as the Great Count of Lemos, was a Galician (Spanish) nobleman who was viceroy of Naples from 1608, and was also president of the Council of the Indies. Biography A member of the H ...

. In the early seventeenth century it was the most important cultural institution of the city outside the

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

. Manso introduced

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

to the Accademia degli Oziosi in 1638. By the mid 1650s the Academy became the launching platform for the literary careers of a long series of poets who moved conceptismo towards ever more elaborate and ornately erudite forms, most notably Giuseppe Battista. The Academy became defunct around 1700. The laws of the Oziosi are preserved in a manuscript in the

Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III The Biblioteca nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III (''Victor Emmanuel III National Library'') is a national library of Italy. It occupies the eastern wing of the 18th-century Royal Palace (Naples), Palazzo Reale in Naples, at 1 Piazza del Plebiscito, ...

.'Regole dell'Accademia degli Oziosi,' BNN, ms. Brancacciana V.D.14 (miscellanea manoscritti), ff. 127r–134r. This text, first published in Carlo Padiglione, ''Le leggi dell'Accademia degli Oziosi in Napoli ritrovate nella Biblioteca Brancacciana'' (Napoli: F. Giannini, 1878), is now in De Miranda, ''Una quiete operosa'', 327–43.

Members

* Torquato Accetto * Bartolomé Leonardo de Argensola *

* Giuseppe Artale *

Giambattista Basile Giambattista Basile (February 1566 – February 1632) was an Italian poet, courtier, and fairy tale collector. His collections include the oldest recorded forms of many well-known (and more obscure) European fairy tales. He is chiefly remembere ...

* Giuseppe Battista * Maiolino Bisaccioni * Antonio Bruni * Julius Capaccio * Lorenzo Crasso *

* Girolamo Fontanella *

* Giovanni Vincenzo Imperiale * Giovanni Battista Manna *

(''Tardo'') *

Vincenzo Mirabella Vincenzo Mirabella Alagona (Syracuse, Sicily 1570 - Modica, 1624) was an Italian historian, archaeologist and architect, best known for his work ''Plans of Ancient Syracuse''. Family life Vincenzo Mirabella, son of Michele Mirabella and Giovann ...

* Antonio Muscettola * Margherita Sarrocchi * Camillo Tutini

Notes

Bibliography

* * * * Aurelio Musi, “‘Non pigra quies’. Il linguaggio politico degli Accademici Oziosi e la rivolta napoletana del 1647–48,” in Musi, ''L’Italia dei viceré. Integrazione e resistenza nel sistema imperiale spagnolo'' (Cava de’ Tirreni, 2000, pp. 129-147). * * {{Authority control Learned societies of Italy 17th-century establishments in Italy Culture in Naples