Percorsi letterari e storiografici di un allievo di Lorenzo Valla: il cronista piacentino Giacomo Mori

The humanist interests of Giacomo Mori, canon and chronicler from Piacenza, are reconstructed by examining both his letters, which shed light on his contacts with the humanist circles active between Milan and Pavia during the 1430s, his library, which was made up of mainly historical miscellaneous collections, and his transcription and revision of the fourteenth-century Chronica Placentina written by his fellow countryman Pietro da Ripalta. This revised text is an interesting attempt to link the notary-style town chronicles with elements from more modern humanist historiography: the sources and historiographic techniques used show the influence of Lorenzo Valla, whose lessons in rhetoric Mori attended at the University of Pavia in 1431.