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Humanism and Empire: Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, Cicero and the imperial ideal*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Cary J. Nederman
Cary J. Nederman
Affiliation:
University of Arizona
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Abstract

The paper argues that the De ortu et auctoritate imperii Romani of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (1446) has been unjustifiably ignored by historians of quattrocento humanist political thought simply because of its adherence to the ideal of universal imperial government. At present, when De ortu is addressed at all, it is considered merely as an anachronistic product of a ‘medieval’ mentality. It is shown, however, that Aeneas, by working within a demonstrably Ciceronian framework, actually articulates a philosophically coherent defence of a single universal empire by exploiting a conceptual ambiguity in Cicero's own presentation of the foundations of social and political association. Aeneas suggests that Cicero's account of the communal nature of human beings, so far from sanctioning republican civic institutions, actually justifies the imposition of universal empire. A study of Piccolomini's political thought thus points to a greater diversity within the political viewpoints associated with humanism than current scholarship on the subject acknowledges. Moreover, it reveals the level of philosophical sophistication to which renaissance defences of empire could aspire.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 36 , Issue 3 , September 1993 , pp. 499 - 515
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

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References

1 Brian Pullan describes Aeneas' career and contributions as a virtual archetype of the humanist experience in the fifteenth century (A history of early renaissance Italy [London, 1973], p. 182)Google Scholar.

2 Piccolomini's accomplishments have been surveyed most recently by Kisch, Guido, Enea Silvio Piccolomini und die Jurisprudent (Basel, 1967)Google Scholar and Widmer, Berthe, Enea Silvio Piccolomini in der sittluhen und politischen Entscheidung (Basel, 1963)Google Scholar.

3 The standard biography of Aeneas is by Voigt, Georg, Enea Silvio Piccolomini als Papst Pius der sweite undsein Zeitalter (3 vols., 1857–1863Google Scholar; reprinted Berlin, 1967). A more abbreviated account of Aeneas's career, albeit concentrating on his activities on the papal throne, is provided by R. J. Mitchell, The laurels and the tiara: Pope Pius II 1458–1464 (London, 1962).

4 The former judgement is addressed by Partner, Peter, Renaissance Rome 1500–1559 (Berkeley, 1976), p. 14Google Scholar and D'Amico, John F., Renaissance humanism in papal Rome (Baltimore, 1983), p. 8Google Scholar; the latter may be found in Brann, Noel L., ‘Humanism in Germany’, in Rabil, A. Jr, (ed.), Renaissance humanism: foundations, forms and legacy (3 vols.; Philadelphia, 1988), II, 126–7Google Scholar and Rado L. Lencek, ‘Humanism in the Slavic cultural tradition’, in ibid. II, 348–9.

5 For example, his political ideas receive no attention from Baron, Hans, The crisis of the early Italian renaissance (2nd edn; Princeton, 1966)Google Scholar; Seigel, Jerrold, Rhetoric and philosophy in renaissance humanism: the union of eloquence and wisdom, Petrarch to Valla (Princeton, 1968)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Skinner, Quentin, The foundations of modem political thought (2 vols.; Cambridge, 1978)Google Scholar; Baron, Hans, In search of Florentine civic humanism: essays on the transition from medieval to modem thought (2 vols.; Princeton, 1988)Google Scholar; Skinner, Quentin, ‘Political philosophy’, in Schmitt, C. B. and Skinner, Q. (eds.), The Cambridge history of renaissance philosophy (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 408–30Google Scholar; and Tuck, Richard, ‘Humanism and political thought’, in Goodman, A. and MacKay, A. (eds.), The impact of humanism on western Europe (London, 1990), pp. 43–65Google Scholar.

6 See Lewis, Ewart, Medieval political ideas (London, 1954), pp. 157–8Google Scholar and passim; Toews, John B., ‘The view of empire in Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (Pope Pius II)’, Traditio, XXIV (1968), 471–87CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schmidinger, Heinrich, Romana regia potestas: Stoats- und Reichsdenken bei Engelbert von Admont und Enea Silvio Piccolomini (Basel and Stuttgart, 1978)Google Scholar; and Luscombe, David, ‘The state of nature and the origin of the state’, in Kretzmann, N., Kenny, A. and Pinborg, J. (eds.), The Cambridge history of later medieval philosophy (Cambridge, 1982), pp. 763–4Google Scholar. Even this interpretation is not entirely uniform, however; for instance, Piccolomini's work is not cited at all in Burns, J. H. (ed.), The Cambridge history of medieval political thought (Cambridge, 1988)Google Scholar.

7 This was the judgement of Voigt's seminal study and it has persisted into the present century; see Joachimsen, Paul, ‘Der Humanismus und die Entwicklung des deutschen Geistes’, Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift für Literaturwissenschaft, VIII (1930), 435Google Scholar.

8 Rowe, John Gordon, ‘The tragedy of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (Pope Pius II): an interpretation’, Church History, XXX (09 1961), 290–3Google Scholar; and Toews, , ‘The view of empire in Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini’, 472–4Google Scholar and passim.

9 This is stated most forcefully, of course, by Hans Baron in The crisis of the early Italian renaissance. For elaboration and defence of the basic hypothesis, see Pocock, J. G. A., The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine political thought and the Atlantic republican tradition (Princeton, 1975), esp. pp. 49–80Google Scholar and Baron, , In search of Florentine civic humanism, esp. II, 194–211Google Scholar.

10 For example, Kristeller, Paul O., ‘The moral thought of renaissance humanism’, in Renaissance thought II: papers on humanism and the arts (New York, 1965), pp. 46–7Google Scholar and passim; Kristeller, Paul O., Renaissance thought and its sources (ed.) Mooney, M. (New York, 1979), pp. 243–4Google Scholar and passim; Seigel, Jerrold E., ‘“Civic humanism” or Ciceronian rhetoric? The culture of Petrarch and Bruni’, Past and Present, XXXIV (1966), 3–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Seigel, Rhetoric and philosophy in renaissance humanism.

11 See the survey by Rabil, Albert Jr, of the major contributions to the debate: ‘The significance of “civic humanism” in the interpretation of the Italian renaissance’, in Rabil, (ed.), Renaissance humanism, pp. 141–74Google Scholar.

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13 The dilemma posed by the very notion of a single, coherent definition of medieval or renaissance ‘Aristotelianism’ has engendered a growing body of literature; some of aspects of the problem are treated by Cranz, F. Edward, ‘Aristotelianism in medieval political theory: a study of the reception of the politics’ (Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Harvard University, 1940)Google Scholar; Schmitt, Charles B., Aristotle and the renaissance (Cambridge, Mass., 1983), pp. 10–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Grant, Edward, ‘Ways to interpret the terms “Aristotelian” and “Aristotelianism” in medieval and renaissance natural philosophy’, History of Science, XXV (1987), 335–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Nederman, Cary J., ‘Aristotle as authority: alternative aristotelian sources of late medieval political theory’, History of European ideas, VIII (1987), 31–44CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 Baron, , The crisis of the early Italian renaissance, p. 121Google Scholar.

15 The continuity of facets of Ciceronianism in medieval and Renaissance political thought has lately been stressed by Skinner, Quentin, ‘Ambrogio Lorenzetti: the artist as political philosopher’, Proceedings of the British Academy, LXXII (1986), 1–56Google Scholar; Nederman, Cary J., ‘Nature, sin and the origins of society: the Ciceronian tradition in medieval political thought’, Journal of the History of Ideas, XLIX (01 1988), 3–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Tuck, , ‘and political thought’, pp. 48–50Google Scholar. This is not to deny all difference between Ciceronian thought in the middle ages and renaissance, as Tuck stresses (pp. 50–1), a subject which I address in a paper, ‘Reason, speech and the foundation of political society: conflicting Ciceronianisms in medieval and renaissance thought’, presented to the American Political Science Association, Washington, , DC, 09 1991Google Scholar.

16 Skinner, , The foundations of modem political thought, I, 88Google Scholar; also see Seigel, , Rhetoric and philosophy in renaissance humanism, p. 30Google Scholar. This is a position which Skinner himself has surrendered in favour of the view posited in ‘Ambrogio Lorenzetti.’

17 The text of the Pentalogus was edited by Pez, B., Thesaurus antecdotorum novissimus (Augsburg, 1721), III, 637–744Google Scholar. On its dating and substance, see Hallauer, H. J., Der Pentalogus des Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini (Unpublished dissertation, University of Cologne, 1951)Google Scholar.

18 We shall employ the text of De ortu et auctoritate imperii Romani edited by Wolkan, R., Der Briefwechsel des Eneas Silvius Piccolomini in Fontes rerum austriacarum, LXII (1912), 6–24Google Scholar. The text and a German translation are also available in Kallen, Gerhard, Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini als Publizist in der epistola De ortu et auctoritate imperii Romani (Cologne, 1939), pp. 52–100Google Scholar.

19 Within the main twentieth-century discussions of De ortu, Cicero is accorded no special place among the sources upon which Aeneas relied, and his name often appears only in a list alongside other classical and Christian authorities. See Muesel, Alfred, Enea Silvio als Publicist (Breslau, 1905), pp. 36–8Google Scholar; Battaglia, Felice, ‘II pensiero politico di Enea Silvio Piccolomini’, in Enea Silvio Piccolomini e Francesco Patrizi: due politici senesi del quattrocento (Siena, 1936), pp. 9, 30, 44Google Scholar; Kallen, , Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini als Publizist, p. 29Google Scholar; and Schmidinger, , Romana regia potestas, p. 21Google Scholar. Toews, ‘The view of empire in Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini’, does not mention Cicero at all.

20 Bruni's status as the paradigmatic renaissance Ciceronian is championed especially by Baron, , In search of Florentine civic humanism, I, 121–3Google Scholar and passim.

21 This tension has recently been highlighted by Walter Nicgorski, ‘Cicero on the functions and limits of Roman nationalism’, presented to the Second Conference of the International Society for the Study of European Ideas, Leuven, Belgium, September 1990. This paper will be integrated into a larger study of Cicero's political theory which Professor Nicgorski is presently completing.

22 A clear example has been documented by Nederman, Cary J., ‘Nature, justice and duty in the Defensor pads: Marsiglio of Padua's Ciceronian impulse’, Political Theory, XVIII (11 1990). 615–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23 The features of diis model are examined in depth by Lewis, , Medieval political ideas, pp. 430–66Google Scholar.

24 For a more extensive treatment of the following themes in Cicero, see Wood, Neal, Cicero's social and political thought: an introduction (Berkeley, 1988), pp. 78–89Google Scholar.

25 Cicero, , De finibus, ed. Rackha, H. III (London, 1931), II.xiv.45Google Scholar.

26 Cicero, , De officiis, ed. Miller, W. (Cambridge, Mass., 1913), Liv.12Google Scholar.

27 Ibid. II.iii.12–iv.15.

28 Ibid. II.v.16.

29 Ibid. II.v.17.

30 Ibid. I.vii.20.

31 Ibid. III.v.21–2.

32 Ibid. III.v.23.

33 Ibid. III.vi.27.

34 Ibid. II.xii.41.

35 Ibid. II.xii.41.

36 Ibid. II.xii.41–2.

37 Ibid. III.xvii.69.

38 Ibid. III.xvu.69.

39 Ibid. I.xli.149.

40 Ibid. III.vi.27.

41 Ibid. I.xvii.53–8.

42 Ibid. III.xvii.69.

43 De ortu, p. 7. The phrasing of this statement is unmistakably Ciceronian in character; cf. De finibus, II. II.34.

44 These justifications included: the contemporaneity of Christ's birth and Augustus' rule; the anaology between God as the single ruler of the universe and the emperor as the single ruler of the earth; and the reliance of the unity of Christian faith upon the unity of political power. Perhaps the classic medieval defence of the Empire was offered by Dante, , De monarchal, trans. Schneider, H. W. (Indianapolis, 1949)Google Scholar.

45 This does not mean, of course, that Piccolomini excludes God as either a proximate or an immediate cause of the Empire. De ortu contains some of the same religious justifications for Roman domination that one finds in the medieval tradition; and it also accepts (as did the medievals) that nature itself was ultimately beholden to God. Yet De ortu keeps the theological bases for the Roman empire conceptually distinct from the naturalistic ones.

46 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 7Google Scholar.

47 Cicero, , De inventione, ed. Hubbell, H. M. (Cambridge Mass., 1949), I.i.i–ii.3Google Scholar and De oratore, ed. Sutton, E. W. and Rackham, H. (Cambridge, Mass., 1942), I.viii.33–4, I.ix.36Google Scholar.

48 Piccolomini, , De ortu, pp. 7–8Google Scholar.

49 Ibid. p. 8.

50 Ibid. p. 8.

51 Ibid. p. 8.

52 Ibid. p. 8. Aeneas expands upon the centrality of justice to the function of kingship in his letter of 1 June 1444 to Wilhelm von Stein: ‘Sed nesciunt hii stulti atque dementes, equitatem plus in principe locum habere quam rigorum. Quod si non juri scripto cesar nonnunquam obtemperet, satis est, quia sequitur equitatem, apud philosophos late descriptam…’ (Baca, A. R. [ed.], Selected letters of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini [Northridge, Calif., 1969], p. 102Google Scholar.

53 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 8Google Scholar.

54 Ibid. p. 9.

55 Ibid. p. 8.

56 Ibid. pp. 8–9.

57 Ibid. p. 9.

58 Ibid. p. 9.

59 Ibid. pp. 9–10.

60 Ibid. pp. 10–13.

61 For example, at ibid. pp. 9, 10 and 13.

62 Ibid. p. 14.

63 Ibid. pp. 14–15.

64 Ibid. p. 15.

65 Ibid. p. 16.

66 The distance in this regard may be judged by the diametrical opposition of their judgements of the significance of Julius Caesar. For Cicero, Caesar was a hated tyrant, an enslaver of his people (De officiis, II.vii.23 and III.xxi.83–5); for Aeneas, Julius was the glorious founder of the imperial majesty of Rome, (De ortu, p. 10)Google Scholar. For a full appreciation of the significance of the evaluation of Caesar's and Cicero's reputations in renaissance political thought, see Baron, , The crisis of the early Italian renaissance, pp. 94–166Google Scholar passim.

67 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 18Google Scholar.

68 Cicero, , De officiis, I.vii.22Google Scholar and Definibus, II.xiv.45.

69 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 18Google Scholar.

70 Cicero, , De officiis, III v.25-vi.26Google Scholar.

71 Piccolomini, , De ortu, pp. 20Google Scholar and 21. The formula is derived from Codex I.14.4.

72 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 20Google Scholar. This statement may be compared to his remarks in his letter to Wilhelm von Stein, 1 June 1444 (Baca [ed.], pp. 101–2).

73 See Kelley, Donald R., Foundations of modem historical scholarship (New York, 1970), pp. 19–50Google Scholar.

74 Piccolomini, , De ortu, p. 20Google Scholar.

75 Kristeller, Paul O., ‘Humanism and moral philosophy’, in Rabil, (ed.), Renaissance humanism, II, 289Google Scholar. Similar views are cited by Rabil, , ‘The significance of ‘civic humanism’, in the interpretation of the Italian renaissance’ pp. 155–6Google Scholar.

76 In this way, ‘imperial’ humanism has detectable echoes in what John D'Amico has identified as the ‘Roman’ version of Ciceronianism, which constituted ‘the chief means of expressing Roman humanism's authoritarian and imperial associations…Roman humanists neglected the political side of Cicero's life and teachings…they preferred to look at Cicero as the great Latin stylist rather than as a politician and defender of the Republic’ (Renaissance humanism in papal Rome, pp. 126, 125).

77 Battaglia, , ‘II pensiero politico di Enea Silvio Piccolomini’, pp. 33–4Google Scholar and passim.

78 Lewis, , Medieval political ideas, p. 465Google Scholar.

79 Toews, , ‘The view of empire in Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini’, p. 476Google Scholar n. 17.

80 For the fourteenth-century background, see Canning, Joseph P., The political thought of Baldus de Ubaldus (Cambridge, 1987)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

81 Rowe, , ‘The tragedy of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini’, pp. 301–3Google Scholar.

82 This was indeed noted by Morrall, J. B., ‘Pius II: humanist and crusader’, History Today 01 1958), pp. 33–4Google Scholar.