Urbano Dalle Fosse, better known as Urbano Bolzanio (

Belluno Belluno (; lld, Belum; vec, Belùn) is a town and province in the Veneto region of northern Italy. Located about north of Venice, Belluno is the capital of the province of Belluno and the most important city in the Eastern Dolomites region ...

, 1442 –

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...

, April 1524), was an Italian

humanist Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "humani ...

and

Hellenist Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek literature, Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient ...

Life

On the right side the tombstone of Pierio Valeriano and on the left that of his uncle Urban Bolzanio The epithet "Bolzanio", by which he is universally known, was never used by Urbano, but was an invention of his nephew Pierio Valeriano which was subsequently extended to his whole family (Urbano is referred to by the sobriquet in his grammatical work's posthumous edition of 1545). It is not inappropriate, however, since the Delle Fosse family was originally from

Bolzano Bolzano ( or ; german: Bozen, (formerly ); bar, Bozn; lld, Balsan or ) is the capital city of the province of South Tyrol in northern Italy. With a population of 108,245, Bolzano is also by far the largest city in South Tyrol and the third la ...

, a village near Belluno. Despite the claims of Pierio Valeriano, the Dalle Fosse family was not noble and Urbano himself was the son of a craftsman (a "mastro Pietro"). In 1450, when he was eight years old, Urbano appears as a

novice A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession A profession is a field of work that has ...

at the

Conventual Franciscan The Order of Friars Minor Conventual (OFM Conv) is a male religious fraternity in the Roman Catholic Church that is a branch of the Franciscans. The friars in OFM CONV are also known as Conventual Franciscans, or Minorites. Dating back to ...

convent of San Pietro di Belluno. In 1465 he was still a student at the monastery, but in 1466 he was in

Treviso Treviso ( , ; vec, Trevixo) is a city and ''comune'' in the Veneto region of northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Treviso and the municipality has 84,669 inhabitants (as of September 2017). Some 3,000 live within the Veneti ...

, perhaps to study

theology Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

. In 1472 he spent time in the convent of San Nicolò della Lattuga in

, probably in order to further his studies in

philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...

and

dialectic Dialectic ( grc-gre, διαλεκτική, ''dialektikḗ''; related to dialogue; german: Dialektik), also known as the dialectical method, is a discourse between two or more people holding different points of view about a subject but wishing ...

. Wishing to study eastern languages and learn about eastern civilizations, he travelled by foot to

Thrace Thrace (; el, Θράκη, Thráki; bg, Тракия, Trakiya; tr, Trakya) or Thrake is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe, now split among Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey, which is bounded by the Balkan Mountains to t ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

Arabia The Arabian Peninsula, (; ar, شِبْهُ الْجَزِيرَةِ الْعَرَبِيَّة, , "Arabian Peninsula" or , , "Island of the Arabs") or Arabia, is a peninsula of Western Asia, situated northeast of Africa on the Arabian Plate. ...

Palestine __NOTOC__ Palestine may refer to: * State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia * Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia * Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...

and

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

between 1473 and 1489. His account of these travels is lost, but is referenced by many surviving works. Returning to Italy, he climbed

Mount Etna Mount Etna, or simply Etna ( it, Etna or ; scn, Muncibbeḍḍu or ; la, Aetna; grc, Αἴτνα and ), is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, in the Metropolitan City of Catania, between the cities of Messina a ...

twice to study the

crater Crater may refer to: Landforms *Impact crater, a depression caused by two celestial bodies impacting each other, such as a meteorite hitting a planet *Explosion crater, a hole formed in the ground produced by an explosion near or below the surfac ...

, which

Pietro Bembo Pietro Bembo, ( la, Petrus Bembus; 20 May 1470 – 18 January 1547) was an Italian scholar, poet, and literary theorist who also was a member of the Knights Hospitaller, and a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. As an intellectual of the It ...

references in his dialogue '' De Aetna''. He was follower of

Constantine Lascaris Constantine Lascaris ( el, Κωνσταντῖνος Λάσκαρις ''Kostantinos Láskaris''; 1434 – 15 August 1501) was a Greek scholar and grammarian, one of the promoters of the revival of Greek learning in Italy during the Renaissance, ...

Messina Messina (, also , ) is a harbour city and the capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of more than 219,000 inhabitants in ...

, friend of Pietro Bembo, and collaborator of

Aldo Manuzio Aldus Pius Manutius (; it, Aldo Pio Manuzio; 6 February 1515) was an Italian printer and humanist who founded the Aldine Press. Manutius devoted the later part of his life to publishing and disseminating rare texts. His interest in and preserv ...

, for whose circle he published a

grammar In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structure, structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clause (linguistics), clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraint ...

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

in 1498. Urbano was well integrated into the cultural life of Venice, where he was soon joined by his nephew Pietro Valeriano. In 1484 Urbano moved to

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

at the invitation of

Lorenzo de' Medici Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici (; 1 January 1449 – 8 April 1492) was an Italian statesman, banker, ''de facto'' ruler of the Florentine Republic and the most powerful and enthusiastic patron of Renaissance culture in Italy. Also known as Lorenzo ...

who appointed him tutor of his son Giovanni, the future

Pope Leo X Pope Leo X ( it, Leone X; born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici, 11 December 14751 December 1521) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 9 March 1513 to his death in December 1521. Born into the prominent political an ...

. When Giovanni became a

cardinal Cardinal or The Cardinal may refer to: Animals * Cardinal (bird) or Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of cardinal in the family Cardinalidae **''Cardinalis cardinalis'', or northern cardinal, the ...

and was transferred to

Pisa Pisa ( , or ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, central Italy, straddling the Arno just before it empties into the Ligurian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa. Although Pisa is known worldwide for its leaning tower, the cit ...

, Urbano returned to Venice, where he taught Greek from 1489 to 1497. In 1502, in the company of

Andrea Gritti Andrea Gritti (17 April 1455 – 28 December 1538) was the Doge of the Venetian Republic from 1523 to 1538, following a distinguished diplomatic and military career. He started out as a successful merchant in Constantinople and transitioned into t ...

, Urbano travelled to

Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...

. The last journey of which we have record is a trip to Rome in 1515 to visit his former pupil, Pope Leo X. He died in 1525 aged 81 years, as recorded by Pierio Valeriano on his tombstone in the wall of the Basilica Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari in Venice.

Works

Bolzanio's most important work i
Institutiones Graecae Grammatices
a grammar of Ancient Greek published for the ciricle of Aldo Manuzio and dedicated to Giovanni Francesco Pico della Mirandola. In this work, originally written entirely in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

, he describes the

noun A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for: * Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...

verb A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...

s, and other

parts of speech In grammar, a part of speech or part-of-speech (abbreviated as POS or PoS, also known as word class or grammatical category) is a category of words (or, more generally, of lexical items) that have similar grammatical properties. Words that are assi ...

.''Aldo Manuzio Editore- Dediche prefazioni-note ai testi'', Milano, Il polifilo, 1976 p.321 It was extraordinarily successful, enjoying 23 editions in only a few years.

References

Bibliography

* Lucia Gualdo Rosa,
DALLE FOSSE (Bolzanio), Urbano
�, in ''Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani'', Volume 32, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 1986.
Ticozzi Stefano, ''Storia dei letterati ed artisti del dipartimento della Piave'', Belluno, presso Francesc'Antonio Tissi, 1813, Lib. II, cap.I
* Schiavi Alessandro, ''Urbano Valeriano nei suoi viaggi in Grecia, Egitto, Turchia'',Belluno, Delibarali, 1842 * Doglioni Lucio,''Vita di Urbano Valeriano'',Belluno, Tipografia Tissi, 1874 * Bustico Giovanni, ''Due umanisti veneti, Urbano Bolzanio e Pierio Valeriano'' in ''Civiltà moderna'',IV,1-2, 1932 * Rollo Antonio, ''La grammatica greca di Urbano Bolzanio'' in ''Umanisti bellunesi fra Quattro e Cinquecento'' Atti del convegno (Belluno, 5 novembre 1999), a cura di Paolo Pellegrini, Firenze, Leo S. Olschki Editore, 2001 {{DEFAULTSORT:Bolzanio, Urbano Italian Renaissance humanists 1442 births 1524 deaths Italian volcanologists Hellenists Death in Italy by place Italian travel writers 15th-century travel writers Italian male non-fiction writers