ALEANDRO, GIROLAMO, known as IL GIOVANE (to distinguish him from the cardinal of the same name, his uncle). — A scholar, born at Motta di Livenza on 29 July 1574, died in Rome on 9 March 1629.
Having completed his legal and literary studies at Padua, he moved to Rome, where he became secretary to Cardinal Ottavio Bandini and, twenty years later, to Cardinal Francesco Barberini, nephew of Urban VIII. A member and “prince” of the Accademia degli Umoristi, he took the name l’Aggiato. He was buried in the basilica of S. Lorenzo al Verano, where Barberini erected a fine monument to him, designed by Pietro da Cortona: the bust is the work of F. Duquesnoy “il Fiammingo.”
A learned and versatile man, he took part in the debates of his time on literary and scientific matters. He left about thirty works, one third of them unpublished, concerning literature, law, history, and religion. We recall: 1) Psalmi paenitentiales versibus elegiacis expressi, a youthful work (Treviso 1593); 2) a commentary on the Institutes of Gaius, fragments then known through the Pandects (Venice 1600); 3) the Difesa dell'Adone del cav. Marino (Venice 1629); 4) poetic compositions, Carmina, such as the “heroic poem” in honor of the Virgin of S. Luca in Bologna; 5) Dissertazioni varie and Epistolae, four of which, concerning the Samaritans (de characteribus, de siclis, de Pentateucho Samaritano), and addressed to Jean Morin (v.), were reproduced in the Antiquitates Ecclesiae Orientalis, the posthumous work of the celebrated Oratorian, edited by R. Simon (London 1682).
ALEANDRO GHOLAMO — Bust by Duquesnoy (1629). Rome, Basilica of S. Lorenzo al Verano.