Pomponio Leto

Julius Pomponius Laetus (1428 – 9 June 1498), also known as Giulio Pomponio Leto, was an Italian humanist.

Laetus was born at Teggiano, near Salerno, the illegitimate scion of the princely house of Sanseverino, the German historian Ludwig von Pastor reported. He studied at Rome under Lorenzo Valla, whom he succeeded in 1457 as professor of eloquence in the Gymnasium Romanum. About this time he founded an academy (Accademia Romana), the members of which adopted Greek and Latin names, and met at the house of Laetus on the Quirinal, which was filled with fragments and inscriptions and Roman coins collected by this early antiquarian, to discuss classical questions; they celebrated the birthday of Romulus. Its constitution resembled that of an ancient priestly college, and Laetus was styled pontifex maximus. Bartolomeo Platina and Filippo Buonaccorsi were among the most distinguished members of the circle, which also included Giovanni Sulpizio da Veroli, the editor of the first printed De architectura of Vitruvius and organizer of the first production of a Senecan tragedy mounted since Antiquity.

In 1466 on his way to take up an appointment at the University of Rome, Laetus stopped for a sojourn in Venice. Here he was brought under investigation by the Council of Ten on suspicion of having seduced his students, whom he was said to have praised with excessive ardour in some Latin poems. Charged with sodomy he was imprisoned.

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