Vaenius See VEEN, OTTO VAN
Vair, Guillaume du See DU VAIR, GUILLAUME
Valdés, Alfonso de (c. 1490–1532) Spanish humanist
and writer
Born like his brother Juan at Cuenca, Valdés, a converso,
became a Latin secretary (1526) to CHARLES Vand left
Spain with the imperial court in 1529. Like Juan, he was a
disciple of ERASMUS, with whom he carried on a corre-
spondence. His two dialogues, biting satirical attacks on
the corruption of the Church, written in an austere, ironic
Erasmian style, were published together in 1530 and
reprinted several times in the 16th century. Although he
was reported to the Inquisition, he died as a Catholic, a
victim of the plague in Vienna.
Diálogo de las cosas acaecidas en Roma is a defense of
the Sack of ROMEby the imperial armies in 1527, which is
interpreted as a divine punishment of the papal Curia and
the clergy in general for their failure to heed the criticisms
of such writers as Erasmus. Diálogo de Mercurio y Carón
continues the justification of Charles V’s imperial policy
and broadens the anticlerical satire by contrasting exempla
of corrupt clergy, dedicated to the letter of religion, and
good clergy, dedicated to its spirit.
Valdés, Juan de (c. 1491–1541) Spanish humanist and
religious writer
A converso, born at Cuenca, he studied classical languages
at Alcalá and, like his brother Alfonso, became a commit-
ted follower of ERASMUS, with whom he corresponded.
Diálogo de doctrina cristiana (1529) caused him to be de-
nounced for heresy and he moved to Rome in 1531 to es-
cape the Inquisition. He lived the final years of his life in
Naples where he gathered a circle of followers who shared
his Protestant, though not strictly Calvinistic or Lutheran,
religious views on JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH, biblical exege-
sis, and dogma.
The theological thought of Valdés is summed up in
Ciento y diez consideraciones divinas (One hundred and ten
religious considerations; 1539), written with his brother.
His most important work, however, is Diálogo de la lengua
(written c. 1535, published 1737), a dialogue in which
two Italians and two Spaniards (one called “Valdés”) dis-
cuss the Spanish language in all aspects of vocabulary,
spelling, style, and so on. The work was influenced by
Pietro BEMBO’s Prose della volgar lingua (1525). Valdés rec-
ommends an unadorned plain style and mocks the ex-
cesses of the chivalric narratives. The Italians are
encouraged to improve their Spanish by considering fault-
lessly chosen literary examples and some 200 proverbs
that are models of terseness.
Further reading: José C. Nieto, Juan de Valdés and the
Origins of the Spanish and Italian Reformation (Geneva:
Droz, 1970).Valencia A city in eastern Spain, on the River Turia, close
to the Mediterranean. It was a Roman settlement in the
second century BCE, was taken by the Visigoths (413), and
subsequently changed hands between Moors and Chris-
tians several times before becoming part of Aragonese ter-
ritory (1238). It was the site of Spain’s first printing press
(1474), and its university was founded around 1500.
From the late 14th century Valencia had a thriving school
of artists, the early ones mainly anonymous, but the later
ones including Luis DALMAUand Francisco de RIBALTA. It448822