Rodolphus Agricola

Rodolphus Agricola (Latin: Rudolphus Agricola Phrisius; February 17, 1444? / August 28, 1443? – October 27, 1485) was a pre-Erasmian humanist of the northern Low Countries, famous for his supple Latin and one of the first north of the Alps to know Greek well. Agricola was a Hebrew scholar towards the end of his life, an educator, musician and builder of a church organ, a poet in Latin as well as the vernacular, a diplomat and a sportsman of sorts (boxing). He is best known today as the author of De inventione dialectica, as the father of northern European humanism and as a zealous anti-scholastic in the late-fifteenth century.

Agricola was born at Baflo in the Dutch province of Groningen as the illegitimate son of the cleric Hendrik Vries, who later became an abbot, and Zycka Huesman, a rich farmer's daughter. He was originally named Roelof Huesman or Huisman by his mother's surname. The Latin adjective Phrisius identifies him as a Frisian.

Educated first by the celebrated school of St. Maarten in Groningen, thanks to his father's help he matriculated at the university of Erfurt (BA in 1458). He went on to Louvain University (MA in 1465), where he won renown for the purity of his Latin and for his skill in disputation. He concentrated his studies on Cicero and Quintilian, and during his university years added French and Greek to his ever-growing list of languages. At the end of his life he would learn Hebrew in order to be able to read the Old Testament - and especially the Psalms - unadulterated by translation.

In the 1460s Agricola travelled to Italy, where he associated with humanist masters and statesmen. From 1468 (?) until 1475 he studied civil law at the university of Pavia, and later went to Ferrara (1475–1479), where he became the protégé of Prince d'Este of Ferrara, was a pupil of Theodor Gaza and attended lectures by the famous Battista Guarino. He devoted himself wholly to the study of classical texts. He won renown for the elegance of his Latin style and his knowledge of philosophy. Also while in Ferrara he gained formal employment as the organist to the ducal chapel, at that time one of the most opulent musical establishments in Europe. He held that post until 1479, after which he returned to the North to become secretary to the city of Groningen. Here at the Cistercian Abbey of St Bernard at Aduard near Groningen and at 's-Heerenbergh near Emmerich in the south-east he was at the centre of a group of scholars and humanists with whom he kept up a lively exchange of letters. His correspondents included the musician and choirmaster of Antwerp, Jacobus Barbirianus (Barbireau), Alexander Hegius von Heek, rector of the Latin school at Deventer (of Erasmian fame), and the humanist scholar and later famed student of Hebrew, Johannes Reuchlin.

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