John Latin

Juan Latino, also known as Juan de Sessa (Córdoba, c. 1518 - 1594<1597 Granada) was a poet and humanist of the Spanish Renaissance. He can be considered the first black person who received university studies in Europe and who achieved a professorship; This was from Grammar and Latin Language at the University of Granada.

Biography

According to the most reliable historical evidence that is preserved, Juan de Sessa was born in Córdoba around 1518, the son of a black African slave, bought by Luis Fernández de Córdoba y Zúñiga, the IV Count of Cabra, and his wife Elvira Fernández of Córdoba, II Duchess of Sessa, daughter of the Great Captain. In a verse of his work (& # 34; Aethiopum terris venit & # 34;), Juan Latino claimed to have been born in Ethiopia, but this place name generally referred to Sub-Saharan Africa at the time. It is known with certainty that he spent his childhood as a slave in the service of a grandee of Spain. His staunch literary enemy, León Roque de Santiago, assured that he was the natural son of Luis Fernández de Córdoba y Zúñiga, and therefore Gonzalo's half-brother, something that none of his contemporary opponents affirmed.

He was assigned to the son of his lords Gonzalo, somewhat younger than him and with whom he would develop a strong relationship. In 1524, the Duchess died in Italy, and two years later the Count would do so, Gonzalo and his sisters settling in Granada under the care of their maternal grandmother, where Gonzalo was educated and instructed in the liberal arts. During those years, Juan took advantage of the education given to the young duke by participating with him in lessons. Later, having to accompany him to his classes at the University of Granada, he managed to follow them too, quite a challenge, "because he was not allowed to enter the classrooms and had to listen from outside ".

He was manumitted in 1538 and continued his studies in Granada. They were also there, and perhaps he would get to know them, Juan Boscán, Garcilaso de la Vega and Juan Rufo; Juan Latino was often confused with the latter, since he composed a poem with the same title as him, Austriada. The subject of that epic composition in Latin hexameters had to do with the stay of Juan de Austria in Granada, which suggested that Deza entrust Juan Latino with the task of writing a great poem that sang the great feat of the victory of Lepanto in verses. Latinos; Presumably, to gather first-hand information, he interviewed him at the time.

On February 2, 1546, he obtained a Bachelor's degree in Philosophy. He fell in love with one of his students to whom he gave music classes, the young noblewoman Ana de Carleval, a distinguished lady, daughter of twenty-four (administrator of the Duchy of Sessa). The fact is that the unusual interracial relationship bore fruit and the marriage took place between 1547 and 1548, the couple had four children. The Sevillian playwright, Diego Jiménez de Enciso, composed about him and his love affairs with his student and future white wife, named Latin John.

In 1556 he achieved the degree of university graduate and on December 31, 1556 he received the Chair of Grammar and Latin Language of the Cathedral from Pedro Guerrero, Archbishop of Granada, to govern it, a position he held for twenty years.

On December 3, 1578, his childhood friend and protector Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba died, and Juan Latino told the new archbishop, Juan Méndez de Salvatierra, also of humble birth, his affection for his childhood friend in a heartfelt elegy: "Letters can do so much -le-, that when we lack these, neither will you leave the field after a plow, nor I from a stable grooming horses".

Retired from teaching in 1586, died between 1594 and 1597, he was buried in the church of Santa Ana, where his wife and descendants would also be.

Works

The preserved poetic production of Juan Latino is summarized in three volumes:

Epigrams (Ad catholicum pariter... Philippum, Deque Sanctissimi Pii Quinti... and Austrias Carmen(1573)

Compositions dedicated to the alleged heir to the crown, Fernando, son of Philip II and his second wife, Doña María de Portugal, born in 1571, dedicated to Pope Pius V, and his most extensive poetic composition, Austriadis Carmen, the first poetic work, with proven date, which refers to the battle of Lepanto (it was on October 7, 1571). He composed it in less than a year, because the privilege of printing is dated in October 1572, and uses the difficult humanistic Latin of the time, pre-empted of evocations of Virgilio and a great rhetorical style.

De translatione corporum royalium (1576)

A thorough and detailed account of the transfer to the pantheon of the Royal Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial of the real bodies deposited in Granada, by mandate of Felipe II: that of his mother the Empress Isabel, her first wife Mary of Portugal and her two brothers Fernando and Juan. Next to the story is published the set of epigrams decorated by the tumulus.

Ad Excellentissimum et Invictissimum D. D. Gonzalum Ferdinandez a Corduba(1585)

A seated woman chose her friend and protector.