Andrea, Giovanni Antonio

Andrea, Giovanni Antonio bishop of Aleria, in Corsica, was born at Vigevano in 1417, and was the friend of the celebrated cardinal Nicolas Cusa, who advanced him to the post of secretary to the apostolic library, or librarian at the Vatican. He was particularly instrumental in introducing the art of printing into Italy and fixing it at Rome. He died in 1475, or, according to Trithemius, in 1493. He is known to the literary world not so much for his original compositions as by the care he bestowed in superintending many valuable works when the invention of printing was introduced at Rome by those celebrated printers Conrad Sweynheym and Arnold Pannartz. The works he superintended were, in 1468-9, Epistole Ciceronis ad Familiares, Hieronymi Epistole, and editions of Julius Caesar, Livy, Virgil, Lucan, Aulus Gellius, Apuleius: and in 1470-1, Lactantius, Cicero's Orations, Cyprian, Ovid's Metam., Pliniy, Quintifian, etc.