Encyclopedia of the Renaissance and the Reformation

Further reading: Liba Chaia Taub, Ptolemy’s Universe:

The Natural, Philosophical, and Ethical Foundations of

Ptolemy’s Universe (La Salle, Ill.: Open Court, 1993).

Puglia, Niccolò da See NICCOLÒ DELL’ARCA

Pulci, Luigi (1432–1484) Italian writer and poet

Born into a patrician but impoverished Guelph family in

Florence, Pulci was helped by a friend who was close to

Pierfrancesco de’ Medici, in whose house he studied under

the poet and humanist Bartolommeo SCALA. From age 29,

Pulci was a member of Lorenzo de’ MEDICI’s circle, and his

numerous poems reflect Lorenzo’s enthusiastic interest in

popular Tuscan verse. His masterpiece, the epic Il Mor-

gante (1478; expanded version, 1483), draws on such

anonymous popular material: a 14th-century version of

the Roland story and an account of the adventures of

Charlemagne’s peers (see CHARLEMAGNE, LEGEND OF).

Though loosely structured and digressive, Pulci’s fantastic

chivalric epic is enlivened by some mock-heroic comic in-

ventions, especially the giant Morgante, dedicated to glut-

tony, and the demigiant Margutte, who manages to confess

to 77 mortal sins. (RABELAISwas much indebted to the

comic grotesque of Il Morgante.) The irreverent and occa-

sionally bitter note in Pulci’s writings contributed to his

being charged, by FICINOamong others, with heresy, and

he was not afforded a Christian burial. His other works in-

clude Vocabolista (Lexicon; 1465), a compilation of La-

tinisms, and La Beca de Dicomano (before 1470), which

parodies La Nencia da Barberino, a pastoral by Lorenzo de’

Medici.

Pulci’s brothers Luca (1431–70) and Bernardo

(1438–88) were also poets. Luca, like Luigi, exploited the

materia cavalleresca in his Ciriffo Calvaneo, and Bernardo’s

best-known work is the sacred play Barlaam e Josafat.

Further reading: Mark Davie, Half-Serious Rhymes:

The Narrative Poetry of Luigi Pulci (Dublin: Irish Academic

Press, 1997).

Purchas, Samuel (1575–1626) English clergyman and

editor of travel accounts

Following his ordination Purchas held church appoint-

ments in London and Essex. His first publication, Purchas

His Pilgrimage; or, Relations of the World and the Religions

Observed in all Ages and Places Discovered, from the Cre-

ation unto this Present (1613), was a historical geography

of religion, drawing on a vast array of sources as well as

information from contemporaries, including Sir Walter

RALEIGH. He was also assisted by Richard HAKLUYT, whose

unpublished manuscripts he obtained around 1620. These

formed the basis for his monumental four-volume Hak-

luytus Posthumus; or, Purchas His Pilgrimes: Contayning a

History of the World, in Sea Voyages, & Lande-Travells, by

Englishmen & others (1625). It was invaluable in preserv-

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Fig. 1. Epicycle and deferent

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center of planet’s orbit

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center of planet’s orbit

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