Maffei, Giampietro

MAFFEI, GIAMPIETRO. - Jesuit, humanist and historiographer, b. in Bergamo in 1535, d. in Tivoli (Rome) on 21 Oct. 1603.

Already a professor of eloquence in Genoa and secretary of the Republic (1563-64), he entered the Society of Jesus in 1565 and by 1567-68 was already teaching eloquence at the Roman College. His version in exquisite Latin of the work of Fr. E. Acosta, Rerum a Societate Jesu in India gestarum (Dillingen 1571), with an appendix of letters from missionaries, earned him an invitation to Lisbon from Card. Henry of Portugal, so that with the rich material gathered there he might describe the Portuguese conquest and the evangelization of India. There he indeed prepared (1572-81) the work: Historiarum Iudicarum libri XVI (Florence 1588; classic Italian version by F. Serdonati, 2 vols., Florence-Venice 1589). Meanwhile he had published: De vita et miraculis s. Ignatii (Rome 1585) and was preparing Le vite di XVII santi confessori (ibid. 1609). Entrusted with composing the life of Gregory XIII and having gathered ample informative and documentary material (preserved in the Boncompagni Archive and described by Pastor, IX, pp. 816-922), he delivered it finished to the revisers in 1597. However, it was not printed, but manipulated, with many changes and alterations, by Paolo Teggia, secretary of the Boncompagni household. This deplored reworking never saw the light; and M.'s work, based on the Barberini codices, judged more authentic and free from tampering, finally appeared under the care of C. Coquelines: Annali di Gregorio XIII (2 vols., Rome 1742). He was also given the task of composing the life of Clement XIII and gathered much material (preserved in the Borghese collection of the Vatican Archive [III, 129 B]); but he drafted only the first three books of it, published posthumously under the title, not given by the author: Historiarum ab excessu Gregorii XIII libri tres, Sixti V pontificatum complexi (Bergamo 1746), which led to the belief that he had been commissioned to write the lives of the successors of Gregory XIII, whereas the work describes the missions carried out by Aldobrandini before his pontificate. These last two works still retain, even after subsequent research and studies, the value of primary and indispensable sources.

Celestino Testone