Page:History of the German people at the close of the Middle Ages vol1.djvu/159

 UNIVERSITIES AND OTHER CENTRES OF LEARNING 147 antiquarian collection he had made during his student days at Padua : a collection from manuscripts and books, as well as personal research, of all the memorable relics of Italy — especially of Eome and Padua — and with special regard to legends and inscriptions, ' for the delight of posterity,' so he says, ' and for their encouragement to go on improving.' His friend Willibald Pirkheimer placed at his disposal many notes, extracts and copies for a similar work on German antiquities. The Bene- dictine monk, Siegmund Meisterlein, who wrote the history of Nuremberg from the earliest times, was the friend of Schedel and Schreyer. Nuremberg possessed so many patrons of belles-lettres that it was rightly considered the first town in Germany in which classic literature had been assiduously cultivated. Foremost among these for liberal generosity was Willibald Pirkheimer (born in 1470), the patron par excellence of learning ; he was equally renowned as jurist, statesman, speaker, historian and philologist ; and as commander-in-chief to Maximilian he was known abroad as well as at home. He was as a prince in the then world of scholars. His literary connections extended to France, Italy, and England. His house and library were stocked with treasures of art and learning, and formed the nucleus of the Humanist following in Germany. It is true that Pirkheimer does not bear comparison with his friends Wimpheling, Geiler von Kaisersberg, and Brant in purity of morals. He did not altogether keep free from the naturalistic theories of life of the ancients, whom he studied so eagerly. He was not always free from passions : he sometimes indulged in slander. Albert Dlirer's letters to him are proofs of i 2