Marko Marulić
![1903 illustration](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Marco_Marulo_1903_Ljetopis_dru%C5%A1tva_hrvatskih_knji%C5%BEevnika_za_1900-1903.jpg)
Marulić scholar Bratislav Lučin notes that he was well-versed in both the Christian Bible and in the Fathers of the Church. At the same time, Marulić also attentively read the Pre-Christian Greek and Latin classics. He read and interpreted Latin epigrams, wrote glosses on the erotic poetry of Catullus, read Petronius' ''Satyricon'', and admired Erasmus of Rotterdam. Marulić also composed epic works of Christian poetry, humanist elegies, and even satirical and erotic epigrams.
According to Franz Posset, Marulić aspired to the Renaissance humanist ideal of the ''uomo universale'' ("universal man"). To this end, he was interested in painting and drawing, local and national history, languages, and poetry. His overall goal always remained ''renovatio Christiana'' ("The Renewal of Christianity") as represented by the future Counter-Reformation. Accordingly, like many other Renaissance humanists who shared his views, Marulić denounced simony and immorality among Roman Catholic priests and members of the hierarchy in often violent language throughout his writings.
Although Marulić and Martin Luther lived at the same time and were published by two of the same Basel printers, their collected writings make no mention of each other. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, it must be assumed that both theologians were simply unaware of the other's existence. At the same time, both men shared a common belief in ''Evangelica Veritas'' ("Gospel Truth") and "theology for piety". They both built their differing theology upon the similar training they received in scholasticism, Renaissance humanism, and ''Devotio Moderna''. Like fellow Renaissance humanists Johann Reuchlin, Erasmus of Rotterdam, Thomas More, and John Fisher, however, Marko Marulić remained committed to an internal renewal of Roman Catholicism and loyal to the Holy See, while Martin Luther and his adherents did not.
Marulić's work was admired both by many of the greatest and most influential Catholic saints of the Counter-Reformation and also, since much of Marulić could be read without violating ''sola scriptura'', by generations of believers in Protestantism.
His writings in Renaissance Latin, once adored and envied across Europe, shared the destiny that befell most Renaissance Humanist literature and faded into obscurity. According to Lučin, however, the passage of time has slowly revealed the important web of influence that the poet and writer wove all over Europe and far beyond its borders. Marulić's writings were admired by churchmen such as Saints Francis Xavier, Francis de Sales, Peter Canisius, and Charles Borromeo, by monarchs and statesmen such as King Henry VIII, Thomas More, and Emperor Carl V, and emulated by poets like Jan Dantyszek, Conrad Peutinger, and Francisco de Quevedo. Furthermore, manuscripts of Marulić works previously thought lost, such as his Christian epic poem the ''Davidiad'' in 1952, his Latin-Croatian literary translation of Thomas à Kempis' ''The Imitation of Christ'' in 1989, and the Glasgow Codex in 1995, continue to resurface and to belatedly see publication for the first time.
More recently, Pope John Paul II quoted from a Marulić poem during his 1998 apostolic visit to Solin, Croatia. Provided by Wikipedia
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Published: 2006.
Superior document: Mittellateinische Studien und Texte ; Bd. 33
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Published: 2005
Links: Inhaltsverzeichnis
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Published: 1950
Superior document: Djela Jugoslavenske Akademije Znanosti i Umjetnosti 39 [vielm. 40]