Federico Petrucci
Federico Petrucci (Latin: Fredericus Petrucius; born in the last decade of the thirteenth century and died in 1348) was an Italian jurisconsult and scholar of the fourteenth century.
Biography
Federico Petrucci was born in all probability in the last decade of the thirteenth century in Siena. He was the son of Petruccio, in turn the son of Cambio of the Petrucci family, and Panchina. His paternal family was part of the political and economic elite of Siena. His father, Petruccio, became an authoritative exponent of the Noveschi faction, covered the positions of Consul of Merchandise and Prior of the Nine, remaining a component of the General Council until his death in 1305.
Federico, around the age of fourteen, took the habit of the Carmelites, but after about a year he returned to secular life. He dedicated himself to the study of law at the University of Bologna, becoming a student of Giovanni d'Andrea between 1311 and 1317. At the end of that year Federico got his degree. He embarked on a teaching career probably at the University of Padua, where Giovanni d'Andrea, who taught there in 1319, claimed to have witnessed a dispute with the protagonist his young student. In September 1321 ,Federico returned to Siena, where he began to teach canon law, receiving an annual salary of 260 gold florins. In the same period the study of Siena was living an era of great prestige, taking advantage of the presence of jurists like Cino da Pistoia and Paul Liazari, doctors like Dino del Garbo and Gentile da Foligno and philosophers like Taddeo da Parma.
In the second half of 1323 Federico Petrucci moved, going to teach at the Studium generale in Verona, where he was engaged for one academic year. At the end of 1324 he returned to Siena, although with a reduced salary, continuing to teach canonical subjects at least until 1330. In the same period of time Petrucci, in the double role of jurist and member of one of the families in power, carried out the activity of consultant of the town of Siena. In this period he also lived in Avignon, where he earned the esteem of Pope John XXII.
At the latest in the spring of 1333 Federico Petrucci became professor of canon law at the University of Perugia, which in those years was imposing itself as the seat of the most authoritative juridical school of Europe. With this role he succeeded Paolo Liazari and Ricovero da San Miniato, keeping the chair at least until 1343 and boasting among his students also Baldo degli Ubaldi.
In 1343, confessing to Pope Clement VI that he had obtained the dissolution of his obligations to the Carmelite order thanks to false testimonies, Federico Petrucci asked and obtained readmission to the clergy, adhering to the Benedictine order after having destined his goods to the sisters Cia and Fiore. He soon became abbot of the monastery of Sant'Eugenio, near Siena, and between 1344 and 1345 moved to the papal curia.
It is believed that Federico Petrucci died in 1348 because of the great epidemic of black plague that struck Europe in those years.
Works
- Disputationes, quaestiones et consilia
- Tractatus super permutatione beneficiorum (1339)
External links
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Federico Petrucci. |
