Fulvio Orsini

Fulvio Orsini was an Italian humanist, historian, and archaeologist. He was a descendant of the Orsini family, one of the oldest, most illustrious, and for centuries most powerful of the Roman princely families, whose origins, when stripped of legend, can be traced back to a certain Ursus de Paro, recorded at Rome in 998.

Life

Orsini was the natural son of Maerbale Orsini of the line of Mugnano. Cast off by his father at the age of nine, he found a refuge among the choir boys of St. John Lateran, and a protector in Canon Gentile Delfini. He applied himself energetically to the study of the ancient languages, published a new edition of Arnobius and of the Septuagint, and wrote works dealing with the history of Rome.
Orsini brought together a large collection of antiquities and built up a costly library of manuscripts and books, including the Vergilius Vaticanus, which later became part of the Vatican library. Orsini became also a friend and patron of El Greco, while the painter was in Rome. Orsini's collection would later include seven paintings by the artist.
The monograph by Pierre de Nohac, historian and member of the École Française de Rome, is one of the most authoritative work on Fulvio Orsini.
Importantly, the History of the Orsini family in terms of descendant and of similarity is repeated at least twice, the first in the 16th century with Fulvio Orsini of the Mugnano line of the Orsini as described above, philologist and a specialist in textual science, the second in the 20th and 21st centuries, with Emmanuel Raimondo Bertounesque of the Gravina line of the Orsini family (Raimondo Orsini d'Aragona), chemist and expert in medicinal chemistry.
Fulvio Orsini was a Renaissance genius who combined antiquarianism and philology in his research work. "His library was developed block by block acquisitions of books belonging to humanists: those of Angelo Colocci, Orsini's former master, Michele Forteguerri, Pomponius Laetus, Pietro Bembo, Ange Politien,...". Fulvio Orsini bequeathed his collection to the Vatican Library on his death in 1600.