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Campanella, Tommaso

Born : 5 September 1568, Stilo, Calabria/Italy

Died : 21 May 1639, Paris/France

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy

Abstract

Tommaso Campanella was one of the foremost Italian philosophers of the late Renaissance. Known mostly today for his famous utopia, The City of the Sun (La Città del Sole/Civitas Solis), his many writings cover a range of subjects, including natural philosophy, ethics, politics, theology, metaphysics, epistemology, magic, astrology, medicine, education, rhetoric, historiography, and mathematics. Despite its apparent fragmentary structure, his overall project sought to establish an encyclopedia of knowledge that could serve as a basis for the reform of the sciences. This, in turn, was to lay the foundations for his project of universal political and religious reform and reconciliation. He is also known as a philosophical poet and his extant epistolary corpus includes some 170 letters. Most of his works were written during his almost 30-year long imprisonment in Naples and Rome. A self-described but often heterodox Thomist, Campanella was also among the staunchest critics of Aristotelianism and Machiavellism, and one of the most notable defenders of Galileo.

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References

Primary Literature

  • Archivio Tommaso Campanella. 2009. Istituto per il Lessico Intellettuale Europeo e Storia delle Idee (ILIESI), Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR). http://www.iliesi.cnr.it/ATC. Accessed 28 Nov 2020.

  • Note: The section ‘Testi’ in ATC contains digitalized versions of most of Campanella’s works (as facsimiles or transcriptions of original or modern editions). Full bibliographic references, including modern editions (where available), are provided alongside each title.

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Journal and Encyclopedia

  • Bruniana & Campanelliana (1995– ).

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  • Enciclopedia Bruniana e Campanelliana, vol. 1: 2006; vol. 2: 2010; vol. 3: 2017, eds Eugenio Canone and Germana Ernst. Pisa/Roma: F. Serra.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Malta, Msida, Malta

    Jean-Paul De Lucca

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  1. Jean-Paul De Lucca
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Correspondence to Jean-Paul De Lucca .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept. of Philosophy a. Cultural Heritage, Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia Dept. of Philosophy a. Cultural Heritage, Venezia, Italy

    Marco Sgarbi

Section Editor information

  1. Department of Philosophy, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy

    Luca Bianchi Ph.D

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De Lucca, JP. (2021). Campanella, Tommaso. In: Sgarbi, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02848-4_91-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02848-4_91-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-02848-4

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