Alfonso de Cartagena

Alfonso de Cartagena
Portrait of Alonso de Cartagena for the Retratos de los españoles ilustres, Madrid, Imprenta Real, 1791. National Library of Spain. Engraving by Manuel Salvador Carmona after a drawing by Manuel Eraso.
Born	(1384-07-06)July 6, 1384 Burgos
Died	July 12, 1456(1456-07-12) (aged 72) Villasandino
Occupations	translator, diplomat, chronicler

Alfonso or Alonso de Santa María de Cartagena, better known as Alfonso de Cartagena (Burgos, July 6, 1384 – Villasandino, Burgos, July 12, 1456) was a Castilian humanist, diplomat, historian and writer of the Pre-Renaissance.

Biography

He was the second son of the rabbi of Burgos, later the famous converted Jewish Bishop of Cartagena Pablo de Santa María, born of his lawful wife before he took religious orders. Alfonso studied law at the University of Salamanca and "was a great scholar in canon and civil law," according to the Claros varones de Castilla (1486), as well as a "great natural philosopher." He began his career as maestresala of Murcia Cathedral (seat of the Diocese of Cartagena) and later, in 1415, was appointed dean of Santiago and of Segovia, apostolic nuncio, and canon of Burgos in 1421, serving that year as ambassador to Portugal to secure peace between the two kingdoms.

While Dean of Santiago, he was one of those appointed by John II of Castile to attend the Council of Basel (1434) in place of Cardinal Alonso de Carrillo. There, with a famous speech that he composed in Latin and in Castilian (Propositio... super altercatione praeminentia, 1434), he succeeded in having the fathers of that council recognize the precedence of the King of Castile over that of England.

Just then, upon the death of his father in 1435, he was named his successor as Bishop of Burgos by Pope Eugene IV.

As early as 1422 he had undertaken the translation of some works of Cicero (De officiis, De senectute), commissioned by the secretary of King John II of Trastámara (1405–1454), Juan Alfonso de Zamora, as well as De inventione, for the use of the then prince Duarte of Portugal.

The "translations into the vernacular tongue," as he called them, respond to a clearly humanistic intention: that of instructing, with the wisdom of the classics, courtiers and knights who were interested in letters though not very learned. For this reason, but also out of a particular interest, he undertook the translation of the Tractados and the Tragedias of Seneca, since he was in fact quite inclined toward Stoicism, which suited better his moralizing and scholastic formation. This formation led him to uphold the value of the Holy Scriptures over profane writings, although, unlike others, he did not dispute their enormous pedagogical value, especially that of historians such as Thucydides or epic poets such as Homer, for the noble and ruling caste.

In this regard he disputed with the humanist Leonardo Bruni of Arezzo, or Aretino (1370–1444), over a new translation the latter had made of the Ethics of Aristotle, defending the medieval translation by Robert Grosseteste (1168–1253). The conflict was prolonged when Pier Candido Decembrio (1399–1477) defended Bruni and Cardinal Pizolpasso (1370–1443) intervened. The dispute gave rise to no fewer than six texts and nineteen letters exchanged between Cartagena and Decembrio. Cartagena wrote, for example, Declinationes or declamationes super translationem Ethicorum (c. 1432).

Inscription with his heraldry, Burgos Cathedral.

For some time he lived in Rome, devoted to study.

In 1438 he went to Breslau to meet with the Emperor Albert II of Habsburg, King of Germany and Rex Romanorum from 1438, upon the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund, until his own death in 1439, and secured peace between the King of Poland Władysław III Jagiellon and the Emperor.

In 1441 he went, together with the Bishop of Segovia, also a cardinal, Juan de Cervantes, before the supposed King of Navarre (in reality king consort of Navarre), recently widowed of the titular Queen of Navarre Blanche I, later John II of Aragon, in order to avoid war.

He also intervened in Castile's conflicts with Aragon and Granada.

The famous humanist Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini, later pope under the name of Pius II, called him Deliciae hispanorum decus praelatorum non minus eloquentia quam doctrina preclarus, inter omnes consilio et facundia praestans. Back in Burgos he founded a public school "of all doctrine," where the most learned Latinists of the Spain of the Catholic Monarchs studied, such as Rodrigo Sánchez de Arévalo, Alfonso de Palencia, Diego Rodríguez Almela and, perhaps, Fernán Díaz de Toledo.

He was a friend of the fellow writer and humanist Fernán Pérez de Guzmán, nephew of Pero López de Ayala and lord of Batres, who included an affectionate biographical sketch of him in his Generaciones y semblanzas (1450); Cartagena dedicated to him his Oracional (1454), a short treatise on prayer.

He contributed a large sum to build the Convent of San Pablo of Burgos, where his parents and many of his relatives were buried, and rebuilt other churches and monasteries of his diocese, among them Burgos Cathedral, whose construction had long been at a standstill.

He also composed some treatises on moral philosophy and theology. At the age of sixty he resolved to go on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, which he was able to complete, although he died once he had returned to his diocese. His tomb is in the Chapel of the Visitation of Burgos Cathedral.

Works

Tomb in the Chapel of the Visitation of Burgos Cathedral.

Henry IV of Castile as depicted in the Genealogía... or Anacephaleosis.

In addition to his translations of the twelve books of Seneca, in which he was particularly interested, and of the aforementioned works of Cicero, he wrote the following works:

• 1) Rerum in Hispania gestarum Chronicon, from around 1456, is a history of Spain following Flavius Josephus, Florus and Jiménez de Rada, entitled Anacephaleosis, which emphasizes Castilian Gothicism; it was also circulated in Castilian in a translation attributed to Pérez de Guzmán and Juan de Villafuerte, under the title Genealogía de los Reyes de España (1463). This translation consists of an introductory prologue and 94 chapters, 7 of which contain a compendium of the origins of the monarchy in Spain from Athalaric to the Asturian and Castilian-Leonese kings, together with its family tree, showing its connection with the monarchies of Navarre, Aragon and Portugal.

• 2) Defensorium fidei, also called Defensorium unitatis christianae (1449–1450), is a plea in defense of converted Jews;

• 3) the exposition of the psalm Judica me, Deus;

• 4) an Oracional de Fernán Pérez (Burgos, 1487, composed around 1454),

• 5) a short treatise on prayer written around 1454 and addressed to his friend and confidant Fernán Pérez de Guzmán, in fifty-five chapters and an epilogue on virtues and on the Mass;

• 6) a Doctrinal de Caballeros (Burgos, 1487), composed around 1444, which consists of an adaptation of the second Partida of Alfonso X the Wise in four books on faith, laws, war, rewards and punishments, riots, duels and challenges, tournaments, vassals, misdeeds and privileges;

• 7) Memoriales virtutum or Memorial de virtudes,

• 8) various songs, decires and love compositions found scattered throughout the cancioneros,

• 9) Prefación a San Juan Crisóstomo,

• 10) some Allegationes... super conquista insularum Canariae (1437), which defend the Castilian rights to the Islands.

• 11) an Epistula... ad comitem de Haro (c. 1440), in which he prescribes a reading program for educating the nobility, including moral texts by Cato and Contemptus mundanorum;

• 12) the Duodenarium (1442), in which he answers twelve questions from Pérez de Guzmán;

• 13) a Tractatus questionis ortolanus (1443–1447), addressed to Rodrigo Sánchez de Arévalo, in which he defends the superiority of sight over hearing;

• 14) a reply to the Questión sobre la caballería (1444) of the Marquis of Santillana

• 15) a Devocional that has been lost, etc.

Alonso de Cartagena evolved from classical studies toward an ethical and, finally, ascetic orientation, but some maintain that in reality he adapted himself to each recipient with a suitable message.

Bibliography

• L. Fernández Gallardo, Alonso de Cartagena (1385-1456): una biografía política en la Castilla del siglo XV, Valladolid, Consejería de Educación y Cultura, 2002.
• L. Fernández Gallardo, Alonso de Cartagena: iglesia, política y cultura en la Castilla del siglo XV, Madrid, 2003, Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
• A. Birkenmajer, «Der Streit des Alonso von Cartagena mit Leonardo Bruni Aretino», in Clemens Baeumker (ed.), Vermischte Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der mittelalterlichen Philosophie, Münster, 1922, pp. 128–211.
• L. Serrano, Los conversos D. Pablo de Santa María y D. Alfonso de Cartagena, obispos de Burgos, gobernantes, diplomáticos y escritores, Madrid, 1942.
• F. Cantera, Burgos, Alvar García de Santa María y su familia de conversos. Historia de la judería de Burgos y sus conventos más egregios, Madrid, CSIC/Instituto Arias Montano, 1952.
• M. Penna, «Alfonso de Cartagena», Prosistas españoles del siglo XV, Madrid, Atlas (BAE), 1959, vol. I, pp. xxxvii–lxx.
• M. Morrás, «Sic et non: En torno a Alfonso de Cartagena y los studia humanitatis», Euphorosyne, 23 (1995), pp. 333–346.

External links

• Portrait of Alfonso de Cartagena with an epitome of his life included in the book Retratos de Españoles ilustres, published in 1791.
• La prosa en la época de Juan II
• Alonso de Cartagena: iglesia, política y cultura en la Castilla del siglo XV, digital edition of the work
• Works by Alfonso de Cartagena in the Biblioteca Digital Hispánica.