D. Jerónimo Osório da Fonseca (1506The Universities of Lisbon and Coimbra attribute 1515 as the birthdate, and held a quincentennial Congress, "O Humanismo Português e Europeu", in December 2015 in honour of Osorio. Plataforma9. Encyclopedia Britannica follows F.A. Lobo giving birthdate 1506. – 20 August 1580) was a Portuguese Roman Catholic humanist bishop, historian and polemicist.Encyclopedia Britannica depends largely upon F.A. Lobo, 'D. Jerónimo Ozório, e Jacinto Friere da Andrade', in Obras de D. Francisco Alexandre Lobo, Bispo de Vizeu Vol. I (José Baptisto Morando, Lisbon 1848), pp. 293–301. (In Portuguese) An extensive notice of his life and thought (Vita) was written by his nephew, a canon of Évora also named Jerónimo Osório, to introduce his edition of his uncle's Complete Works (dedicated to King Philip I of Portugal) published in 1592.'Hieronymi Osorii Lusitani Vita auctore Hieronymo Osorio nepote', in Hieronymi Osorii Lusitani Episcopi Algarbiensis Opera Omnia, Hieronymi Osorii Nepotis Canonici Eborensis Diligentia in unum collecta et in quatuor volumina distributa (ex bibliotheca Georgii Ferrarii, Romae; ex typographia Bartholomaei Bonfadini, Romae; ex typographia Gabiana, Romae 1592), Volume I, pages 1–19 (separate pagination). (In Latin). F.A. Lobo apparently depends upon this.
Life Young life and education Osório was a native of Lisbon and one of two sons of João Osório de Fonseca, and Francisca, daughter of Affonso Gil de Gouveia, Ouvidor of the lands of the Infante Ferdinand,Lobo, 'Jerónimo Osório', p. 294. both families of aristocratic lineage. His father, appointed by John III to be Ouvidor Geral (Auditor-GeneralN.R. Madhava Menon (ed.), Criminal Justice India Series, Vol. 9, Goa 2002 (Allied Publishers, 2003), p. 56.) of Portuguese rule in India, went alone, and there found himself under the authority of Vasco da Gama.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, p. 1. Jerónimo, at school in Portugal, showed such prodigious ability in Latin that in 1519, when aged 13, his mother sent him to Salamanca in Spain to study civil law.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, p. 1. Two years later, with further fluency in Latin and Greek, he returned home wanting to make a military career with the Knights Hospitaller in Rhodes: his father sent him back to Salamanca, where he worked to strengthen and discipline both body and mind for that calling when his father's objections should be overcome.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, pp. 1–2. But he developed strongly devotional feelings, and on his father's death his mother persuaded him to give up military ambitions.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, pp. 1–2.
In 1525, aged 19, he went to Paris to study Aristotelian logic and Natural philosophy.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, pp. 2–3. There he became a near associate of Peter Faber, who with his companion Francis Xavier and others was then drawing close to Ignatius of Loyola.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, p. 3. Returning to Portugal to settle his affairs, Osório next proceeded for Theology to Bologna, immersing himself in the Church Fathers (particularly Gregory Nazianzen, St Basil, John Chrysostom, Augustine of Hippo and St Jerome) and St Thomas Aquinas and making a higher study of Cicero, Demosthenes and Plato.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, p. 3. His Neoplatonic leanings were nourished by the Corpus Areopagiticum, the author of which he considered, next to the Apostles, to be the prince of theologians.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, p. 3. He made such a name that King John III invited him in 1536–1537 to lecture in the reorganized University of Coimbra, where he expounded on Isaiah and on St Paul's Epistle to the Romans.Lobo, 'Jerónimo Osório', p. 295.
De Nobilitate Returning to Lisbon in 1540 he became secretary to Prince Luís, and tutor to his son António (afterwards Prior of Crato), obtaining also two benefices in the diocese of Viseu. Before the age of 30 he had begun his twin treatises De Nobilitate Civili and De Nobilitate Christiana: their publication in Lisbon in 1542 rapidly won him international acclaim.Hieronymi Osorij Lusitani, De Nobilitate Ciuili, libri duo; (eiusdem) De Nobilitate Christiana, libri tres (Ludovicum Rodericum [Luis Rodrigues], Olyssipone [Lisbon] 1542). Opera Omnia (1592), Vol. 1, pp. 1–36, 37–112. His mastery of Latin style earned him the name "The Portuguese Cicero". After the death of Prince Luís in 1553, he withdrew from court to his churches.Encyclopedia Britannica, after F.A. Lobo. De Nobilitate was promoted by his friend Roger AschamFor Ascham on Osório, see R. Greene, Five Words: Critical Semantics in the Age of Shakespeare and Cervantes (University of Chicago Press, 2013), pp. 27–29. in England to William Paget,L.V. Ryan, Roger Ascham, c. 1515–1568 (Stanford University Press, 1963), p. 196. Cuthbert Tunstall,St John's College, Cambridge, Aa. 6. 20/AsR 3.8. Sir William Petre and, in 1555, to Cardinal Pole.St John's College, Cambridge, Aa. 6. 20*/AsR 3.9. See S. Anglo, 'Osorio and Machiavelli: From Open Hostility to Covert Approbation', in Machiavelli – The First Century: Studies in Enthusiasm, Hostility and Irrelevance, Oxford Warburg Studies (Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 143–163. Images of Ascham's dedications can be seen at the St John's College, Cambridge website Library pages. (To Pole he afterwards dedicated his work De Justitia Caeli.) He was named archdeacon of Évora in 1560, and much against his will became Bishop of Silves, the diocese of the Algarve, in 1564.
The English question As Osório had denounced Machiavelli, so in addressing England he could denounce the influence of Martin Luther and Martin Bucer.E.F. Hirsch, Damião de Gois: The Life and Thought of a Portuguese Humanist, 1502–1574, International Archives of the History of Ideas, 19 (Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague 1967), pp. 182–84. As the Council of Trent drew towards its close, in 1562, at the prompting of Cardinal Henrique,Osório was reputedly moved to this by a dream in which, while fishing from the promontory, he caught a sea monster: brought to the beach, it turned into a beautiful woman wearing a royal crown, who kneeling at his feet begged for baptism. Osórius, Vita Auctoris, p. 5. Osório published a Latin epistle to Queen Elizabeth urging her to return to the Roman Catholic communion and to accept papal authority.Latin texts in A. Guimarães Pinto, Humanismo e Controvérsia Religiosa: Lusitanos e Anglicanos III (Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, Lisboa 2006).B.C. Lockey, Early Modern Catholics, Royalists and Cosmopolitans: English Transnationalism and the Christian Commonwealth (Routledge, 2016), pp. 39–48. An English translation, A Pearl for a Prince, was issued by Richard Shacklock, a Catholic Englishman at Louvain.(Richard Shacklock), An epistle of the reuerend father in God Hieronymus Osorius Bishop of Arcoburge in Portugale, to the most excellent Princesse Elizabeth by the grace of God Quene of England, Fraunce, and Ireland. &c. (Aegidius Diest, Antwerp 1565). Taken aback by this public reproach to its sovereign, the English government employed Walter Haddon to compose a Latin response, published in Paris (English translation by Abraham Hartwell (the elder)).(Abraham Hartwell), A sight of the Portugall pearle, that is, the aunswere of D. Haddon maister of the requests vnto our soueraigne lady Elizabeth by the grace of God quene of England Fraunce and Irelande, defendour of the faith. &c. against the epistle of Hieronimus Osorius a Portugall, entitled Pearle for a Prince. Translated out of lattyn into englishe by Abraham Hartwell, student in the kynges colledge in Cambridge (By Wiyllyam Seres dwelling at the west ende of Paules Church, at the sygne of the Hedgehogge, London 1565). Text at Umich/eebo. Osório exceeded himself in a lengthy Latin reply (English version by John Fenn).(John Fenn), A learned and very eloquent treatie, written in Latin by the famous man Hieronymus Osorius Bishop of Sylva in Portugal, wherein he confuteth a certayne Aunswere made by M. Waltere Haddon against the Epistle of the said Bishoppe unto the Queenes Maiestie. Translated into English by Iohn Fen student of Divinitie in the Universitie of Louen (Joannes Foulerus, Louvain 1568). Full text at Umich/eebo (open). Haddon prepared a rejoinder, but it remained unfinished at his death in 1572With native casuistry Osório's biographer attributed Haddon's illness and death to spiritual degeneration: Osório, Vita Auctoris, p. 10. and was completed in excellent style, and with additions, by John Foxe.J. Strype, Annals of the Reformation and Establishment of Religion... Under Queen Elizabeth, 2nd edition (Thomas Edlin, London 1725), Vol. I, Chapter 37, pp. 422–33.W. Haddon & J. Foxe, Contra Hieron. Osorium, eiusq; odiosas infectationes pro Evangelicae veritatis necessaria Defensione, Responsio Apologetica. Per clariss. virum, Gualt. Haddonum inchoata: Deinde suscepta & continuata per Ioan. Foxum (Iohannis Daij Typographi, London 1577). Full text (page views) at Google. (open). The controversy was notorious and widely-read, and culminated in the Papal Bull Regnans in Excelsis being issued against Elizabeth.Lockey, Early Modern Catholics, p. 48. It is held that the name and colour of Osorio's diatribes influenced the character of Hieronimo in Thomas Kyd's drama The Spanish Tragedy.R. Hillman, 'Thomas Kyd, The Spanish Tragedy,' (Chapter 33), in T. Betteridge & G. Walker (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Tudor Drama (Oxford University Press, Oxford 2012), pp. 566–83.
Later years The Cardinal Prince Henry, who had advanced him to the see of Silves, wished to employ him at Lisbon in state business when King Sebastian took up the reins of power in 1568, but Osório excused himself on the ground of his pastoral duties. In 1571 his extensive History of the reign of King Emmanuel was published at Lisbon,De Rebus Emmanuelis Regis Lusitaniae Invictissimi Virtute et Auspicio Gestis, libri duodecim, auctore Hieronimo Osorio Episcopo Sylvensi (Apud Antonium Gondisaluum Typographum, Olyssipone 1571) Cum Privilegio Regio. which rendered in his accomplished Latin much of the material in the Chronicle on the same subject by Damião de Góis.D. de Góis, Crónica do Felicíssimo Rei Dom Emanuel (casa de Françisco Correa, Lisboa 1566–67) digitized (Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal). Encompassing the adventures of Vasco da Gama, it coincided with the publication of Os Lusíadas, The Lusiads, of his great contemporary Luís Vaz de Camões.L. de Camões, Os Lusíadas (casa de Antonio Gõçaluez, Lisboa 1572) digitized (Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal).
He further showed his zeal for the commonwealth by writing two letters, one seeking to dissuade the King from going to Africa, and the other sent during the latter's first expedition there calling upon him to return to his kingdom.Osorio, Vita Auctoris, pp. 14–15. Sebastian looked with disfavour on opponents of his African adventure, and Osório found it prudent to leave Portugal for Parma and Rome to make a visit ad limina. His scruples regarding residence, and the appeals of the King and the Cardinal Prince, prevented him from long enjoying the hospitality of Pope Gregory XIII.L. Bourdon, 'Le voyage de Jerónimo Osório évêque de Silves en Italie (1576–77)', Annales publiées par la Faculté de Lettres de Toulouse (1951). He therefore returned to his diocese, the seat of which was transferred from Silves to Faro in 1577,J.A. Pinheiro e Rosa, 'A Diocese do Algarve e a Universidade de Coimbra', Revista da Universidade de Coimbra XXXVII (1992), pp. 77–91, at p. 78. and continued there through the brief reign of the Cardinal King. He died at Tavira on 20 August 1580.Encyclopedia Britannica, which follows F.A. Lobo, which follows Osorio, Auctoris Vita.
The library
Haddon said of him that "he was a most perverse, overthwart Brawler, who besides a commendable Facility in the Latin Tongue, could profit the Publick nothing at all."Strype, Annals of the Reformation, I, p. 422.