Nicholas of Jamsilla

Nicholas of Jamsilla (Italian: Niccolò di Jamsilla) was a supposed historian of 13th century Italy. Modern scholarship casts doubt on his existence and identity, and he is therefore often referred to as "Pseudo-Jamsilla". Quotes Frederick was a man of great heart; but wisdom, which was not less great in him, tempered his magnanimity, so that his actions never proceeded from the intoxication of passion, but were ever matured by reason. He was a warm patron of philosophy, cultivating the study himself, and diffusing it throughout his dominions. Previously to the flourishing times of his reign, there were few or no men of letters in Sicily, but the emperor opened schools for the liberal arts and sciences, and summoned professors from different parts of the world, offering them liberal rewards. He was not content with granting them a salary, but maintained poor scholars out of his own purse that poverty might not tear men of any class from the pursuits of philosophy. He proved his own literary talents by composing a work on the nature and care of birds, (natural history was his favorite study,) which shows the emperor's proficiency in philosophy. He cherished justice, and so respected it that any one might bring his action against the emperor, without the monarch's rank securing him any favor with the bench, or any pleader hesitating to undertake the cause of the meanest of his subjects against him. But, notwithstanding his love of justice, he at times tempered its rigor by his clemency. Historia...Conradi et Manfredi, vol. viii, p. 498, in Sismondi; reported in Michelet, History of France, tr. G. H. Smith (New York, 1882), vol. i, p. 306 External links Encyclopedic article on Nicolaus de Jamsilla on Italian Wikipedia Category:Historians from Italy