BRANDOLINI, Aurelio. - Humanist and Augustinian theologian, b. in Florence in the second quarter of the 15th century, d. in Rome in 1497. Despite being almost blind from birth, he devoted himself with incredible zeal and fruitfulness to studies, primarily humanistic. From his early youth he endured severe material and spiritual hardships, which he bore with constancy. Gifted with a prodigious memory and a fertile and ornate eloquence, he was chosen by Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, as his intimate counsellor and orator, as well as a teacher of rhetoric in his kingdom. In 1490, after the death of that prince, he returned to Italy and donned the habit of the Augustinian Hermits. He was also tutor to Giovanni Maria del Monte (later Pope Julius III), and a most applauded preacher in the courts and most celebrated cities of Italy, a prolific writer and esteemed Latin poet.
Principal works: *De humanae vitae conditione et tollenda corporis aegritudine dialogus* (Basel 1498, 1540, 1541, 1543; Paris 1543; Lengdburg [translated into German] 1622); *De laudibus Sixti IV Pont. Max. elegiarum libri 2*, cod. Vat. lat. 5008 and Vat. Urbin. lat. 739; *De ratione scribendi libri 3* (Basel 1498; 1543, 1549 and 1565; Frankfurt 1568; Cologne 1573; Basel 1585; Rome 1735); *Christiana paradoxa* (Basel 1498; Rome 1531; Basel 1543 and 1545; Cologne 1573; Rome 1581); *Oratio de virtutibus Iesu Christi nobis in eius passione ostensis* (Rome 1596; Cologne 1645; Rome 1735; and Venice 1596; Rome 1767 [the last two editions in Italian]); *In sacram hebraeorum historiam libri XXI* (v. cod. Vat. Ottobon. R. 6, 35).