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INTRODUCTION Agostino Nifo Was a Prolific Writer. During His

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INTRODUCTION Agostino Nifo Was a Prolific Writer. During His INTRODUCTION Agostino Nifo was a prolific writer. During his lifetime, thirty-five works were published, and after his death another five came out. His books appeared in more than one hundred and sixty editions, from to , at Venice, Pavia, Lyon, Paris, Naples, Florence, Augsburg, Bologna, Rome,Leiden,Basel,Marburg,Troyes,Rouen,Parma,andGenoa.1 In , Nifo published De intellectu,themajorworkofhisearly career, touching on questions of philosophical psychology. Based on a detailed assessment of the views of his predecessors, Nifo in this work presented an analysis of the main issues of Peripatetic noetics, namely origin and immortality of the intellect or rational soul, its relation to the body, its unity and parts, the speculative intellect, and intellectual beatitude. Although the bulk of the work was presumably composed in the early s at Padua, there is good evidence that it was completed and drastically reorientated before publication. This introduction offers a cursory view of Peripatetic noetics and the doctrinal context of Nifo’s work, as well as a short analysis of his shift toward anti-Averroism. It also dwells on Nifo’s use of philosophical and other sources, and on the issue of the ‘lost’ works of Siger of Brabant quoted in De intellectu. Subsequently, the general structure of the work, i.e. its main themes and issues, recurring argumentative strategies, and the fortune of the work are discussed. Finally, I present a note on the transcription of this text and on the works quoted or cited by Nifo. The Introduction is followed by an extensive analytical summary ofthe contents of the work. The Appendix contains a chronology of Nifo’s life and works, and a full index of the chapters of De intellectu. Peripatetic Noetics: An Overview Peripatetic noetics is based on a fairly restricted number of quite ambigu- ous statements in Aristotle’s De anima and a few other works. Their enigmatic quality pushed Greek commentators, medieval Islamic, Jewish and Christian as well as early modern European philosophers to dwell 1 For a virtually complete bibliography, see De Bellis . introduction on the master’s words, seeking in them the key for deciphering man’s essence, his fate and the structure of the universe. Pertinent ancient, post- Aristotelian texts that play a role in medieval and Renaissance psycholog- ical debates are: fragments of Theophrastus that are traceable in the works of later authors;2 Alexander of Aphrodisias, De anima;3 aworkentitledDe intellectu, which is likewise attributed to Alexander;4 Plotinus’ Enneads;5 Themistius’ paraphrases of Aristotle’s De anima, Metaphysics, bk. XII, and Physics;6 a Greek commentary on Aristotle’s De anima attributed to John Philoponus;7 a different Greek commentary on book III of the De anima, also attributed to Philoponus, which is preserved in a Latin translation;8 and finally, Simplicius’ commentary on De anima,availablesincetheend of the fifteenth century.9 2 For a reconstruction, edition and commentary of Theophrastus’ fragments, see Barbotin . For discussion, see also Forthenbaugh and Forthenbaugh (ed.) . 3 The Greek edition is Alexander Aphrodiensis ; the Latin translation by Giro- lamo Donato, also used by Nifo, appeared in at Venice; cf. Alexander Aphrodisiensis . 4 Alexander Aphrodisiensis b; a medieval translation is in Théry , pp. – . It was translated again and printed in ; for further information, see Cranz , pp. –. The authenticity has been questioned by Moraux , pp. –. Later he changed his mind; cf. Moraux , pp. and ; cf. Bazán . Also Nifo noted in his edition of his De anima commentary, that Alexander’s positions in the two mentioned works were contradictory; cf. Nifo , fol. r. For discussion of Alexander’s psychology, see also: Hager ; Donini ; Bazán ; Schroeder and ; Fotinis ; Thillet ; Blumenthal ; Sharples and ; Alexander Aphrodisiensis . 5 The standard edition is Plotinus . This work was translated in Latin by Ficino, who also wrote an extensive commentary; see Plotinus , and Ficino , pp. – , respectively. 6 Themistius , , and (a medieval Hebrew translation from the Arabic). A medieval translation of the Paraphrasis de anima is Themistius . Nifo used the translation by Ermolao Barbaro, which was printed in ; cf. Themistius . For discussion, see Martin ; Ballériaux . 7 Philoponus . For discussion, see Blumenthal b and ; Philoponus a, b, c, and . 8 Philoponus . Nifo mentioned Philoponus rarely. 9 The Greek text is in Simplicius ; Simplicius’ commentary on De anima,either in Greek or in some translation unknown to us, was known to Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Agostino Nifo, Nicoletto Vernia and others. See B. Nardi’sessay on Simplicius’ De anima commentary in the fifteenth and sixteenth-century controversies, in Nardi , pp. f. and . It became available in Latin through Faseolo’s translation in , then it was translated again by Evangelista Longo; see Simplicius . For discussion, see Blumenthal a; Bossier-Steel ; Hadot , chap. VIII. The authenticity of Simplicius’ De anima commentary was challenged in the sixteenth century by Francesco Piccolomini, and in by F. Bossier and C. Steel (see supra).Recently,I.Hadothas argued that there is not one decisive argument (either stylistic or doctrinal) which would.
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