- Paul of Middelburg
Paul of Middelburg was a
Roman Catholic scientist andbishop of Fossombrone .Biography and work
Paul was born in 1446 at
Middelburg , the ancient capital of the province ofZeeland , belonging then to theHoly Roman Empire , now to theNetherlands . His family name is unknown, but in one place he is called Paolo di Adriano (Moroni, XLIV, 120).Julius Caesar Scaliger , who calls him "Omnium sui sæculi mathematicorum . . . facile princeps", was his godson.After finishing his studies in Louvain he received a
canonry in his native town, of which he was afterwards deprived. The circumstances of this fact are not known, but in his apologetic letter on the celebration of Easter he calls it an usurpation, and shows great bitterness against his country, calling it "barbara Zelandiæ insula", "vervecum patria", "cerdonum regio", etc. He then taught for a while in Louvain, was invited by theSignoria of Venice to take a chair for sciences inPadua (1480), travelled through Italy, became physician toFrancesco Maria della Rovere , Duke ofUrbino , and friend toMaximilian, Archduke of Austria , afterwards emperor. By the former he was endowed with the Benedictine Abbey St. Christophorus inCastel Durante in 1488, and by the latter he was recommended toAlexander VI for theBishopric of Fossombrone (Moroni, LXXXV, 314). Being nominated to that see, in 1494, he destroyed some of his former publications; first "Giudizio dell' anno 1480", in which he had censured a number of mathematicians; then a "Practica de pravis Constellationibus", and a defence of that work against the nephew of Paul II (1484); and finally an "Invectiva in superstitiosum Vatem". He chose for himself an astronomical coat of arms, and, in 1497, enlarged and embellished the episcopal palace. Besides some smaller treatises againstusurer s and against the superstitious fear of a flood in 1524 (Fossombrone, 1523), he wrote important works on thereform of the Calendar , which procured for him invitations by popesJulius II andLeo X to theFifth Lateran Council (1512-1518). The contents and result of the work are described underAloysius Lilius . He died while assisting at the Divine Office in Rome on13 December 1534 , and was buried in S. Maria dell' Anima.Works
His "Epistola ad Universitatem Lovaniensem de Paschate recte observando" (1487) was followed by an "Epistola apologetica" (1488), and finally by his principal work "Paulina, de recta Pasch celebratione" (Fossombrone, 1513).
External links
*CathEncy|title=Paul of Middelburg|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11588b.htm
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