In 1345 he personally discovered a collection of Cicero's letters not previously known to have existed, the collection Epistulae ad Atticum, in the Chapter Library Biblioteca Capitolare of Verona Cathedral.ĭisdaining what he believed to be the ignorance of the centuries preceding the era in which he lived, Petrarch is credited or charged with creating the concept of a historical "Dark Ages". Petrarch had acquired a copy, which he did not entrust to Leontius, but he knew no Greek Petrarch said, "Homer was dumb to him, while he was deaf to Homer". He encouraged and advised Leontius Pilatus's translation of Homer from a manuscript purchased by Boccaccio, although he was severely critical of the result. During his travels, he collected crumbling Latin manuscripts and was a prime mover in the recovery of knowledge from writers of Rome and Greece.
He traveled widely in Europe, served as an ambassador, and because he traveled for pleasure, as with his ascent of Mont Ventoux, has been called "the first tourist". On April 8, 1341, he became the second poet laureate since antiquity and was crowned by Roman Senatori Giordano Orsini and Orso dell'Anguillara on the holy grounds of Rome's Capitol. With his first large-scale work, Africa, an epic in Latin about the great Roman general Scipio Africanus, Petrarch emerged as a European celebrity. This work gave him much time to devote to his writing. After the death of their parents, Petrarch and his brother Gherardo went back to Avignon in 1326, where he worked in numerous clerical offices. Petrarch was a prolific letter writer and counted Boccaccio among his notable friends to whom he wrote often. He protested, "I couldn't face making a merchandise of my mind," as he viewed the legal system as the art of selling justice. Additionally, he proclaimed that through legal manipulation his guardians robbed him of his small property inheritance in Florence, which only reinforced his dislike for the legal system. Petrarch, however, was primarily interested in writing and Latin literature and considered these seven years wasted. Because his father was in the legal profession a notary, he insisted that Petrarch and his brother also study law. Petrarch studied law at the University of Montpellier 1316–20 and Bologna 1320–23 with a lifelong friend and schoolmate called Guido Sette. He spent much of his early life at Avignon and nearby Carpentras, where his family moved to follow Pope Clement V, who moved there in 1309 to begin the Avignon Papacy. Petrarch spent his early childhood in the village of Incisa, near Florence. Dante Alighieri was a friend of his father. Petrarch's younger brother was born in Incisa in Val d'Arno in 1307. His given name was Francesco Petracco, which was Latinized to Petrarca.
He was the son of Ser Petracco and his wife Eletta Canigiani.
Petrarch was born in the Tuscan city of Arezzo on 20 July 1304.
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