Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/221

197 CLASSICAL LEARNING. — SCIENCE. 197 sador at Rome, induced Martyr to visit Spain, and chapter XIX who was grandson of the famous marquis of Santi- — ' — '— liana, and nephew of the grand cardinal. ~° This il- lustrious family, rendered yet more illustrious by its merits than its birth, is worthy of specification, as affording altogether the most remarkable combina- tion of literary talent in the enlightened court of Castile. The queen's instructer in the Latin lan- guage was a lady named Dona Beatriz de Galindo, called from her peculiar attainments la Latina. Another lady, Doiia Lucia de Medrano, publicly lectured on the Latin classics in the university of Salamanca. And another. Dona Francisca de Le- brija, daughter of the historian of that name, filled the chair of rhetoric with applause at Alcala. But our limits will not allow a further enumeration of names, which should never be permitted to sink into oblivion, were it only for the rare scholarship, peculiarly rare in the female sex, which they dis- played, in an age comparatively unenlightened. ^* Female education in that day embraced a wider 20 For an account of Santillana, culture of the nation under Isabel- see the First Chapter of this Histo- la, in the sixteenth Ilustradon of ry. The cardinal, in early life, is his work. He has touched lightly said to have translated for his fath- on its poetical character, consider- er the ^neid, the Odyssey, Ovid, ing, no doubt, that this had been Valerius Maxiraus, and Sallust. sufficiently developed by other crit- (Mem. de la Acad, de Hist., torn. ics. His essay, however, is rich vi. Ilust. 16.) This Herculean feat in information in regard to the would put modern school-boys to scholarship and severer studies shame, and we may suppose that of the period. The reader, who partial versions only of these au- would pursue the inquiry still fur- thers are intended. ther, may find abundant materials 21 Mem. de la Acad, de Hist., in Nic. Antonio, Bibliotheca Ve- tom. vi. Ilust. 16. — Oviedo, Quin- tus, torn. ii. lib. 10, cap. 13 et cuagenas, MS., dial, de Grizio. seq. — Idem, Bibliotheca Hispana Sefior Clemencin has examined Nova, (Matriti, 1783-8,) — torn, with much care the intellectual- i. ii. passim.