Padua academic devoted his life to Aristotle
The leading Italian representative of Renaissance
Aristotelianism, Giacomo Zabarella, was born on this day in Padua in 1533.
His ability to translate ancient Greek enabled him to
understand the original texts written by Aristotle and he spent most of his
life presenting what he considered to be the true meaning of the philosopher’s
ideas.
 |
| Philosopher Giacomo Zabarella |
He had been born into a noble Paduan family who arranged for
him to receive a humanist education.
After entering the University of Padua he was taught by
Francesco Robortello in the humanities, Bernardino Tomitano in Logic,
Marcantonio Genua in physics and metaphysics and Pietro Catena in Mathematics.
They were all followers of Aristotle.
Zabarella obtained a Doctorate in Philosophy from the
university in 1553 and was offered the Chair of Logic in 1564. He was promoted
to the first extraordinary chair of natural philosophy in 1577.
Zabarella became well known for his writings on logic and
methodology and spent his entire teaching career at the University of Padua.
As an orthodox Aristotelian, he sought to defend the
scientific status of theoretical natural philosophy against the pressures
emanating from the practical disciplines such as the art of medicine and
anatomy.
His knowledge of Greek enabled him to consult Greek
commentators on Aristotle’s work as well as medieval writers.
Zabarella’s first published work was Opera Logica in 1577
and his commentary on Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics appeared in 1582.
Zabarella died in Padua at the age of 56 in 1589. His great
work in natural philosophy, De rebus naturalibus, was published posthumously in
1590. It contained 30 treatises of Aristotelian natural philosophy and an
introduction that he had written only weeks before his death. His two sons
edited his incomplete commentaries on Aristotle’s texts and published them a
few years later.
Zabarella’s works were reprinted in Germany early in the
17th century, where his brand of philosophy had a big following, especially
among Protestant Aristolelians.
The University of Padua was established in 1222 and is one
of the oldest in the world, second in Italy only to the University of Bologna .
The main university building, Palazzo del Bò is in Via VIII Febbraio in the
centre of Padua . It used to house the medical faculty and you can take a
guided tour to see the pulpit used by Galileo when he taught at the university
between 1592 and 1610.
