1910 Articles

Barthelemy Aneau: a Study in Humanism

Gerig, John L.

Barthélemy Aneau, poet, historian, jurisconsult and educator, was one of the many interesting personages of the early French Renaissance. His interests were so numerous, his struggles so great, and his erudition so profound, that no complete history of this period of French literature can any longer neglect to give him just consideration. His influence on the Lyonnese Renaissance is incontestable, while his name is inseparably connected with the history of the Pléiade through his criticism–not always just–of the Deffence et Illustration of Du Bellay. As an educator, he was highly esteemed by his scholarly contemporaries. Influenced by Rabelais, for whom he did not conceal his admiration, he anticipated in many respects our modern methods of instruction. Under his able direction, the small Collège de la Trinité acquired a national reputation. He was not a poet of importance: he was merely one of the many clever versifiers, last offshoots of the dead rhetorical school.