Vita di Lionardo di Capoa, detto fra gli Arcadi Alcesto Cilleneo …

AMENTA, Niccolò (detto Pisandro Antiniano )

Verlag: no printer, Venice [i.e. Naples], 1710

THE LIFE OF A SUSPECTED HERETIC IN THE TRADITION OF GALILEO AND GASSENDI. 8vo. (16), 72 pp, including initial blank. Bound in contemporary mottled calf; all edges gilt. A neat, crisp copy. Rare first edition clandestinely printed in Naples of this biography of a celebrated libertine and atheist , founder of the Accademia degli Investiganti, who died while being investigated by the Inquisition for suspected heresy. Amenta s Vita is the best source on the life of Lionardo di Capua (1617-1695), and gives a full account of Capua s staunch anti-Aristotelianism, his dispute with the Jesuit Benedictis which led to his Inquisitorial interrogation, and all of his published and unpublished works (the latter were unfortunately lost when Capua was attacked by bandits outside of Naples). Although trained in law and medicine, Capua became enamored by the new science of Galileo, Gassendi, and Descartes, particularly after receiving in 1649 a trunkful of titles brought back from Rome by his friend Tommaso Cornelio. These are described here as having been the works of Francis Bacon, Galileo, William Gilbert, Gassendi, Francis Glisson, Descartes, Robert Boyle, Thomas Willis, Campanella, Giordano Bruno, and so on (pp. 15-16). A year later, Capua and Cornelio launched their Accademia degli Investiganti in Naples devoted to embracing the new philosophy; it was dissolved in 1657 due to the plague, but reconstituted in 1662 under the protection of Andrea Concublet Marquis d'Arena. In addition to the lost manuscript works mainly of a literary character described by Amenta here, Capua s magnum opus appeared in 1681 under the title of Parere [Opinions]. In it, he specifically attacked Aristotelianism in medicine and the perceived blind adherence to Galen, which he saw as contrary to the investigative spirit of modern enquiry. On pp 52-54 we find an account of the censure of his Parere, thanks in part to the Lettere apologetiche in difesa della teologia scolastica of the Jesuit Benedictis (1694), which accused Capua of being a libertine and atheist. Ultimately, Capua was called before the Inquisition as part of the broader trials of the atheists [processo agli ateisti] which took place in Naples between 1688-1697, seen as a reaction to the creeping influence of Cartesianism in a traditionally theologically conservative enclave. However, Capua passed away at the age of 77 in 1695 before his trial was officially concluded. Although Capua seems long forgotten, his Accademia even attracted the young Giambattista Vico, as well as Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz. A lawyer by training, the author of this biography, Niccolo? Amenta (1659-1719), was also a fellow Academician. OCLC shows just a handful of copies worldwide, including three in US libraries (Morgan, Illinois, and Cornell); the text also appeared in the same year in Rome as part of Crescimbeni s Vite degli Arcadi Illustri, without the prefatory text etc. * cf the lengthy entry in the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani by Silvano Scalabrella (Volume 39, pp. 712-715). Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers D0256

Bibliografische Details

Titel: Vita di Lionardo di Capoa, detto fra gli ...
Verlag: no printer, Venice [i.e. Naples]
Erscheinungsdatum: 1710
Einband: Hardcover
Auflage: 1. Auflage