PIZZICOLI, CIRIACO DE' (KYRIACUS DE PICENI COLLIBUS)

Ciriaco de' Pizzicoli (Kyriacus de Piceni collibus). — One of the most singular figures of Humanism for the versatility of his intellect and the curiosity of his learning: painter, poet, orator, above all an archaeologist, born in Ancona in 1391, died in Cremona in 1452. He began traveling extensively through Italy and beyond at an early age.

He spent a large part of his life in Greek lands, attentive to discovering and transcribing Greek, Latin, and Egyptian inscriptions, collecting manuscripts, sculptures, works of art, and sketching profiles of famous monuments. The immense and valuable material he gathered was organized in his voluminous *Commentarii*, which were never published and were likely lost in the fire that destroyed the Sforza Library in Pesaro (1514), where they were deposited. Today, only scant remnants of his autographs and copies made by friends remain.

P. is the pioneer of epigraphic science (though not without errors and shortcomings), whose historical value he recognized and defended against literary tradition.