Orazio Torsellino

Title page of Orazio Torsellino's Histoire universelle, 1708

Orazio Torsellino (1545 – 6 April), known in Latin as Horatius Torsellinus, was an Italian historian and man of letters. He wrote books on Christianity, world history, and Latin grammar.

Life and works

Orazio Torsellino was born in Rome and joined the Jesuit order. He was later assigned to Florence and Loreto, before returning to Rome. Among his writings were:

• De vita San Francisci Xaverii libri VI (Rome, 1596, in quarto)
• La Vie du bienheureux père François Xavier [Life of the blessed father Francis Xavier]. Douay: Baltazar Bellere. 1608.
• De particulis Latinae orationis (1598, 12mo)
• Epitome historiarum a mundo condito ad ann. 1598 (Rome, in quarto)

which continued under the editors PC Caraffa and Philippe Briet. The work in 1761 was decreed to be prohibited by the Inquisition.

His Universal History volumes are divided into chapters mainly about emperors from history. For example, Volume III, in order, has chapters about the Holy Roman Emperors (or disputed pretenders): Henry II, Conrad II, Henry III, Henry IV, Henry V, Lothario II, Conrad III, Frederick Barbarossa, Henry VI, Othon IV, Frederick II, Rudolph of Hapsburg, Adolph of Nassau, Albert of Austria, Henry VII of Luxembourg, Louis of Bavaria, Charles IV of Luxembourg, Wenceslaus of Luxembourg, Rupert of Bavaria, Sigismund of Luxembourg, Albert II of Austria, Frederick III, Maximilian I, and Charles V of Austria.

Bibliography

• Sowerby, E.M. (1952). Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson. Vol. 1. Washington, D.C.: The Library of Congress. p. 22.

External links

• Orazio Torsellini in the Historical Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University