AFFLACIO, GIOVANNI

AFFLACIO, GIOVANNI. — A physician from Salerno, from the second half of the eleventh century. He is said to have been a disciple of Costantino l'Africano. Seven physicians named Giovanni lived at almost the same time, so that it is not always easy to identify their lives and works. Following the studies of De Renzi, it has emerged that the A. is Giovanni, the Benedictine, mentioned by Pietro Diacono. A physician before withdrawing to the cloister, and perhaps also a teacher in Salerno, he seems to have shut himself away in a monastery in 1075, when the city fell into the hands of Roberto il Guiscardo. Having declared himself a disciple of Costantino, he collected his books. He is recognized as the author of a Liber urinarum, although it ends with the words «Explicit liber aureus», a book said to be by Costantino. Another of his books is entitled Curiae Iohannis Afflatii discipuli Constantini de febribus.