Henry Savile's Tacitus in Italy

This article examines the Italian afterlife of Henry Savile's Tacitus. Approximately four years before his execution, Henry Cuffe (1562/3–1601), classical scholar and secretary to the Earl of Essex, produced a series of translations into Italian and Latin of Savile's commentary on Tacitus. Cuffe completed these at Padua in the company of Gian Vincenzo Pinelli (1535–1601), owner of one of the largest private libraries of the Renaissance. Pinelli subsequently produced a discourse responding to Savile's commentary, challenging Savile's reading of the Agricola. These works, preserved at the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan, reveal a fascinating exchange of ideas across languages and across cultures in the final years of the Cinquecento.