TRAVERSARI, AMBROGIO. - Camaldolese theologian and humanist, b. at Portico di Romagna on 16 Sept. 1386, d. at Florence on 21 Oct. 1439. He entered the monastery of S. Maria degli Angeli, a Florentine center of humanistic culture, at the age of 14. There he devoted himself with enthusiasm to the study of Latin and Greek letters, in which he was a master to Giannozzo Manetti, to the sons of Cosimo de' Medici and to many of the patriciate. He had relations with the best men and men of letters of the time (N. Niccoli, P. Bracciolini, L. Giustiniani, F. Barbaro, T. Parentucelli), from whom he received visits and letters, codices to correct or to transcribe, manuscripts to revise or to submit to his judgment.
T. carried on a literary activity equal to that of the most fervent humanists. Indeed, for his translations of Greek authors he kept at least three amanuenses and translated with such rapidity as to astonish Niccoli himself. Famous are his Latin versions of the sermons of St. Ephrem and of the lives of the philosophers of Diogenes Laertius, both dedicated to his patron, Cosimo de' Medici. Very many are the codices that passed through his hands, often improved in their text, always in their script, for which he employed excellent miniaturists and calligraphers, who still existed at S. Maria degli Angeli.
His elevation to general (which took place in 1431 in the monastery of S. Maria in Urano, near Bertinoro), hindered this activity not a little, which had to give way to another, more difficult and more thankless: the reform of his Order, begun in 1431 with the visitation of the houses of the Congregation and continued until 1434. Of it he left a meticulous account in the Hodoeporicon or Itinerarium, which is a veristic documentation of the sad state in which, in general, the religious of the 15th century found themselves.
In 1435 he was sent on a diplomatic mission to the Council of Basel, where on 26 Aug. of that same year he delivered, in plenary session, a speech (Mansi, XXIX, 1250-57), with which he struck at the conciliar theory (v. CONCILIARISMO), appealing to the principle that in every society one must be the head, one the master; he warned that the correction of the pope, in case of error and fault, belonged rather to the piety of individual faithful than to the authority of a general assembly.
His intervention with Card. Cesarini, president of the Council, proved effective, and he won him back, along with others, to the cause of the Holy See. At Ferrara (1438) and at Florence (1439), where the Council was transferred, the presence of T. was, perhaps, even more precious, because with his tact he succeeded in smoothing the angularities of the character of Eugene IV, which would have compro-
(from K. Hielscher, Jugoslavien, Berlin 1918, plate 16)
TREBIGNE, DIOCESE of - A street of the city.
mised every good understanding with the Greeks, and with his profound knowledge of Greek and Latin he facilitated the conduct of the discussions and prepared the way for the happy conclusion. It is not known whether his work was only that of translator, or whether to the office of interpreter he joined the activity of theologian. One of his statements (lett. 555) makes it clear that he had entered the lists with the adversary in the same doctrinal debate. T. was entrusted with the task of drafting the decree of union. After a few months he died suddenly. He was buried in the church of the sacred hermitage of Camaldoli.
History has taken little interest in this great monk. If he himself had not left an Epistolario, rich in autobiographical information, and if in the Hodoeporicon he had not recounted the vicissitudes of his generalate, very little would be known of his work. Today his figure is once again attracting interest, because in T. the humanist it has been noted that what counts is not so much the devotee of classical studies as the man who, in the excesses of two opposing tendencies, followed the path of just equilibrium.
Bibliography8 works
Costanzo Somigli