PIETRO SABINO. - Humanist, pupil and colleague of Pomponio Leto (1429–98), he taught Greek and Latin letters at the Archiginnasio Romano, as is shown by the register of professors for 1514.
He is chiefly known as the author of an important epigraphic collection, compiled toward the end of the 15th century. He was, it may be said, the first to gather together and save from oblivion many Christian inscriptions preserved in churches, public buildings, and private dwellings; in a letter to Coccio Sabellico he observes that he had for the most part included inscriptions seen and transcribed by himself, and others taken from the collections of Ciriaco da Ancona (1319–1455) and fra' Giocondo da Verona (1435–1515). The collection was dedicated in 1495 to Carlo VIII, king of France, shortly after the invasion of Italy. A copy of the original collection is preserved in a Marciana manuscript (lat. X, 195, fols. 94–324), containing: inscriptions by fra' Giocondo (fols. 1–93), and the Sabinian collection divided into two parts: the first (fols. 94–274), comprising some twenty Christian inscriptions, in addition to many pagan ones from Italy and Rome; the second (fols. 235–324), comprising 245 inscriptions, all Christian. The collection was published by G. B. de Rossi, from a Marciana manuscript (X, 195), in Inscript. christ. urbis Romae septimo saeculo antiquiores, II, 1, Rome 1888, pp. 407–55.