126 Bracton, Henry of
the deaths of his friends, laments over factional strife in
Florence, a serious feud with Lorenzo VALLA, and a long-
ing for leisure to study further the ancient world of
Rome. He was not interested in Greek literature and
deplored the growing interest in it near the end of his life.
This was the era in which he wrote the pessimistic On the
Misery of the Human Conditionin 1455. After retiring in
1456, he moved near Florence and tried to continue a
history of Florence begun by his friend Leonardo BRUNI.
He also maintained a voluminous personal and official
correspondence and continued to write joke books and
ribald short stories. He died in 1459.
Further reading:Poggio Bracciolini (trans. Joseph S.
Salemi), “Selections from the Facetiaeof Poggio Bracci-
olini,” Allegorica8 (1983); 77–183; “Further Selections
from Poggio Bracciolini’s Facetiae,” Allegorica11 (1990):
38–58; Phyllis Walter Goodhart Gordan, trans., Tw o
Renaissance Book Hunters: The Letters of Poggius Bracci-
olini to Nicolaus de Niccolis(New York: Columbia Univer-
sity Press, 1974); Iiro Kajanto, Poggio Bracciolini and
Classicism: A Study in Early Italian Humanism(Helsinki:
Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1987).
Bracton, Henry of (d. 1268)jurist, author
Little is known of the early life of Henry of Bracton. His
exact birth date is believed to be during King JOHN’s
reign, about 1210, in England. He is said to have
attended OXFORD University as a youth and to have
received a doctorate in civil and canon LAW.
CAREERBracton was made an itinerant judge in 1245, and from
1247 to 1250 he was an English judge of the Coram rege
or “Before the monarch,” later known as the King’s or
Queen’s Bench. He held this position again from 1253 to
- From the beginning of his judgeship in 1245 until
1267, he served as a justice in Eyre, in his native Devon,
or other neighboring counties or held court before King
HENRYIII. Although he continued his work on various
benches, he never held a permanent place as a royal
judge. He retired in 1257 but continued to serve on judi-
cial commissions. In 1265 he became chief justiciar of
England under Henry III. He was famous then and later
for following the principle that “the king was under the
law and God.”
LEGAL TREATISEBracton has been credited with producing an important
treatise on English jurisprudence, On the Laws and Cus-
toms of England.It is one of the oldest systematic works
on English common law. He attempted to make sense of
English law in terms of principles derived from civil or
Roman and canon or ecclesiastical law. It was never com-
pleted, and there is doubt about Bracton’s actual role in
its compilation.
As were many lawyers of his time, Bracton was also
supported by ecclesiastic benefices. In 1263 he was made
archdeacon of Barnstable, but in that same year he left
Barnstable to become chancellor of Exeter Cathedral,
where he remained until his death in 1268.
Further reading:G. E. Woodbine, ed., Bracton on the
Laws and Customs of England,trans. Samuel E. Thorne
(London: Selden Society, 1977); H. G. Richardson, Bracton:
The Problem of His Text(London: Selden Society, 1965).Brazil (Brasil)This refers not to the largest South
American country, but to an imaginary island in the
Atlantic Ocean found on many late medieval and early
Renaissance MAPSand charts. The word was likely Gaelic
in origin. Breas-ail,meaning “blessed,” was found in texts
describing the voyages of medieval Irish monks in search
of an “isle of the blessed” or a place where the blessed
awaited entrance into HEAVEN. Maps placed it in the cen-
tral north Atlantic Ocean, especially around 1500.
See alsoBRENDAN,SAINT;CABOT,JOHN; CABRAL, PEDRO
ALVARES.
Further reading:William H. Babcock, “The Island of
Brazil,” in Legendary Islands of the Atlantic(New York:
American Geographical Society, 1922).bread SeeFOOD, DRINK, AND NUTRITION.Brendan, Saint(ca. 486–577/583)fabled traveler
known as the Navigator
Brendan was born about 486 in Kerry. He was the
founder and abbot of the Monastery of Clonfert in county
Galway in IRELAND. The description of his voyage
claimed that he sailed to western Scotland, the island of
Iona, southern Britain, and BRITTANY. Irish monks of that
era did undertake difficult sea voyages in visits to other
monasteries and as acts of penitence. The story of his
voyage was told by an unknown author of the late ninth
or early 10th century. In it Saint Brendan and a group of
monks set sail from Ireland in a small boat made of ox
hides in search of a “Land of Promise of the Saints” or
heaven, supposedly somewhere west of Ireland. Many of
its details have been confirmed by archaeology and by
other texts. Some scholars have even proposed that the
monks reached North America. On the other hand, the
story could represent an allegorical tale of a community
of monks traveling in search of salvation, leading an
exemplary monastic life on the voyage. Brendan was one
of the most renowned Irish saints of the Middle Ages and
died between 577 and 583.
Further reading:John J. O’Meara, trans. The Voyage
of Saint Brendan: Journey to the Promised Land(1976; rpt.
Mountrath: Humanities Press, 1985); Carl Selmer, ed.
Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis from Early Latin
Manuscripts(Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame