Ammannati Piccolomini, Jacopo

AMMANNATI PICCOLOMINI, JACOPO. - Cardinal, b. in 1422, d. in 1479. He studied letters in Florence and took his doctorate in jurisprudence in Siena. He was secretary to Cardinal Domenico Capranica (1450-60) and by his learning and piety earned the esteem of Callixtus III, who appointed him Secretary of Briefs. His successor Pius II elected him bishop of Pavia (18 July 1460) and the following year created him cardinal of St. Chrysogonus (18 Dec. 1461). Out of gratitude A. assumed the appellation Piccolomini. Paul II kept him in the background, as indeed he did the other cardinals of Pius II. Sixtus IV entrusted him with the legation of Umbria (Sept. 1471), which he soon renounced (July 1472). In Aug. 1477 he passed to the see of Frascati and received that of Lucca, while still retaining the administration of the bishopric of Pavia. He spent his last years mostly outside Rome, in the Sienese territory. Siena granted him its citizenship.

He left various writings. Some have been lost. Among these the collection of the Lives of the Popes of his time is especially regretted. His Letters (782, from 1462 to 1479) and the Commentaries, which continue in seven books those of Pius II, have for the most part been published (ed. G. Gherardi, Milan 1506, and better Frankfurt 1614). Other letters survive in manuscript in the Vatican Archive (arm. XXXIX, t. X). Of a Concistorial Diary only a part has been published (ed. E. Carusi, in the new edition of the Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, XXIII, III, Bologna 1904).

AMMENDA: V. MULTA.