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Angelo Mai

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His Eminence
Angelo Mai
Bust of Angelo Mai by Pietro Tenerani, 1846
Bust of Angelo Mai by Pietro Tenerani, 1846
Diocese Diocese of Rome
Appointed 9 April 1657
Term ended 4 June 1667
Orders
Created cardinal 19 May 1837
by Pope Gregory XVI
Rank Cardinal-Priest of San Sant'Anastasia
Personal details
Born March 7, 1782
Schilpario, Republic of Venice
Died 8 September 1854 (aged 72)
Castel Gandolfo, Papal States
Buried Sant'Anastasia al Palatino
Denomination Roman Catholic
Parents Angelo Mai
Pietra di Antonio Mai dei Battistei
Alma mater Roman College

Angelo Mai (Latin Angelus Maius; 7 March 1782 – 8 September 1854) was an Italian Cardinal and philologist.[1] He won a European reputation for publishing for the first time a series of previously unknown ancient texts. These he was able to discover and publish, first while in charge of the Ambrosian Library in Milan and then in the same role at the Vatican Library. The texts were often in parchment manuscripts that had been washed off and reused; he was able to read the lower text using chemicals. In particular he was able to locate a substantial portion of the much sought-after De re publica of Cicero and the complete works of Virgilius Maro Grammaticus. In 1954, to celebrate the first century after his death, the public library of Bergamo, the city where he was from, was named after him Biblioteca civica Angelo Mai e archivi storici.[2]

Biography

He was born of humble parents at Schilpario in what is now the province of Bergamo, Lombardy.

In 1799 he entered the Society of Jesus, and in 1804 he became a teacher of classics in the college of Naples. After completing his studies at the Collegium Romanum, he lived for some time at Orvieto, where he was engaged in teaching and palaeographical studies. The political events of 1808, when French troops occupied the Papal States, necessitated his withdrawal from Rome (to which he had meanwhile returned) to Milan, where in 1813 he was made custodian of the Ambrosian library.

He now threw himself with characteristic energy and zeal into the task of examining the numerous manuscripts committed to his charge, and in the course of the next six years was able to restore to the world a considerable number of long-lost works. Having withdrawn from the Society of Jesus, he was invited to Rome in 1819 as chief keeper of the Vatican Library. In 1833 he was transferred to the office of secretary of the Congregation of the Propaganda; on 12 February 1838 he was raised to the dignity of cardinal. He died at Castel Gandolfo, near Albano, on 8 September 1854. His monumental tomb is located in the left transept of the Basilica di Sant'Anastasia al Palatino by the late neoclassical sculptor Giovanni Maria Benzoni.

Works

It is on his skill as a reader of palimpsests that Mai's fame chiefly rests. To the period of his residence at Milan belong:

  • fragments of Cicero's Pro Scauro, Pro Tullio, Pro Flacco, In Clodium et Curionem, De aere alieno Milonis, and De rege Alexandrino (1814)
  • M. Corn. Frontonis opera inedita, cum epistolis item ineditis, Antonini Pii, Marci Aurelii, Lucii Veri et Appiani (1815; new ed., 1823, with more than 100 additional letters found in the Vatican library)
  • portions of eight speeches of Quintus Aurelius Symmachus
  • fragments of Plautus
  • the oration of Isaeus' De hereditate Cleonymi
  • the last nine books of the Antiquities of Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and a number of other works.
  • M Tullii Ciceronis de republica quae supersunt appeared at Rome in 1822
  • Scriptorum veterum nova collectio, e Vaticanis codicibus edita ("A new collection of ancient writings, edited from Vatican codices") in 1825-1838
  • Classici scriptores e Vaticanis codicibus editi ("Classical writers edited from Vatican codices") in 1828-1838
  • Spicilegium Romanum ("A Roman gleaning") in 1839-1844
  • Patrum nova bibliotheca ("A new library of [Church] fathers") in 1845-1853

His edition of the celebrated Codex Vaticanus, completed in 1838, but not published (ostensibly on the ground of inaccuracies) till four years after his death (1858), is the least satisfactory of his labours and was superseded by the edition of Vercellone and Cozza (1868), which itself leaves much to be desired.

Although Mai was not as successful in textual criticism as in the decipherment of manuscripts, his works in this field allowed many ancient writings to be rescued from oblivion.

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

Angelo Mai — Roman cardinal and celebrated philologist, b. at Schilpario, in the Diocese of Bergamo, 7 March 1782; d. at Albano, 9 September 1854. At an early age he entered the Society of Jesus (he was a novice in 1779 [sic; 1799?]), was sent to the residence in Naples (1804) and was also stationed at Orviet and Rome. However, on account of his proficiency in palæography he was appointed in 1811 to a position in the Ambrosian Library, Milan. This led to his initial discoveries: Cicero's orations: "Pro Scau ro", "Pro Tullio", "Pro Flacco", "In Clodium", and "In Curionem" (1814); the correspondence of Fronto, Marcus Aurellius, and Verus (1815); the speech of Isæus, "De hæreditate Cleonymi" (1915); a fragment of the "Vidularia" of Plautus, and commentaries on Terrence (1816); Philo, "De Virtute"; a discourse of Themistius; a fragment of Dionysius of Halicarnassus (1816); a Gothic version of St. Paul; the "Itinerarium Alexandri"; a biography of Alexander by Julius Valerius (1817); and an Armenian version of the"Chronicle" of Eusebiuis (1818). So many new texts, almost all of which were found in palimpsests, not to mention some editions of already known texts, drew worldwide attention to Mai. In 1819, his superiors decided that he could render greater service in the ranks of the secular clergy; he therefore left the Society and was called by the pope to the Vatican Library. He then worked with increased zest in a richer field. His most brilliant find at this time was the "Republic" of Cicero (1822). To insure the regular publication of his discoveries, he began a regular series of Anecdota: "Scriptorum veterum nova collectio" (10 vols., 1825-38); "Classici auctores" (10 vols., 1825-38); "Spicilegium Romanum" (10 vols., 1839-44); "Novum Patrum bibliotheca" (7 vols. 1852-54), published by Mai himself. The profane authors who profited by Mai's labours are: Diodorus of Sicily; Polybius; Oribasus; Procopius; Cicero (especially the Verrine orations), and the Roman jurisconsults. Important discoveries were likewise made with regard to the works of the Fathers: Saints Augustine, Hilary, Cyprian, Jerome, Ambrose, Athanasius, Cyril, Basil, and Origen, Irenæus, Eusebius of Cæsarea, etc. To these ancient writers must be added the Italian Humanists, the Latin poets of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Poliziano, Sannazaro, Bembo, Sadoleto, and others, whose works he printed for the first time in the "Spicilegium Romanum". He gave to the world unpublished pages of more than 350 authors. Finally, he did not overlook the Bible. After long delays, inspired by timidity, he was at last authorized to make known one of the most important Greek MS. of the Bible (Vetus et Noum Testamentum ex antiquissimo codice Vaticano, 1858). It has been stated that the gall nut used by Mai to revive the writings of the palimpsests half destroyed them. The truth is that all reagents injure parchments. Soon little will remain of the palimpsest of Plautus in the Ambrosian Library. But the work of Studemund, Mai's successor, will insure its perpetuity. Mai's brilliant discoveries won him the homage and affection of many. He was an intimate friend of Leopardi, the poet of New Italy, a friendship equally honourable to both. Mai was blamed for his great unwillingness to allow the learned to share in the treasures he guarded so jealously. He wished to enjoy them all alone. In 1838, the pope named him cardinal; but he continued his researches, and his publications were interrupted only by his death.

SOMMERVOGEL, Bibliothèque de la compagnie de Jésus, V, 323, till 1819; BONNETTY, Table alphabétique analytique et raisonnés de tous le auteurs sacrés et profanes qui ont été découverts et édités récemment dans les 43 vol. publiés par le cardinal Mai (Paris, 1850); POLLETO, PHINA, and others, Nel primo centario del cardinali Angelo Mai, atti della solenne Accademia tenustasi in suo onore il 7 Marzo 1882 (Bergamo, 1882); POLLETTO, Del cardinale Angelo Mai e de' suoi studi e scoperte (Sienna, 1886); CHATELAIN, Les palimpsestes latins in Annuaire de L'Ecole pratique des hautes études (1904), 5.

References

  1. Back to citation Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Angelo Mai". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
  2. Back to citation www.bibliotecamai.org
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