Poggio Bracciolini

Bracciolini, Poggio (Italian scholar, collector, and writer, 1380-1459)

Born of a modest family, Poggio was however well educated. He worked as a papal bureaucrat under 7 popes 1404-1453; was a Florentine chancellor 1453-1456. He is noted for discoveries of ancient Latin texts that had been lost to posterity, including works of Lucretius, speeches of Cicero, Vitruvius’ "On Architecture," and the complete works of Quintilian. He later wrote histories and treatises on moral, social, and scholarly questions. He is also noted for copying and distributing these ancinet works; he invented, under the influence of Salutati and Niccolo de' Niccoli, a new humanistic script based on Carolingian script and Roman inscriptions. The clarity and beauty of his book hand led to this script gradually replacing Gothic lettering in manuscripts and print. The family name "Bracciolini," which was a noble house, appears to have been first adopted by Poggio in 1443 in his will, when he was 63 years of age.

LC name authority rec. n50043172

LC Heading: Bracciolini, Poggio, 1380-1459