[2958] H. C. Lea, A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, III, 444.
Lea’s sources for his account of Cecco would seem somewhat dubious from his own description of them, since he says, “I owe many of the above details to a sketch of Cecco’s life in a Florentine MS which I judge from the handwriting to be of the seventeenth century and of which the anonymous author appears to be well informed; also to a MS copy of the elaborate sentence, much more full than the fragments given by Lami and Cantù.” Lea supplied no further means of identifying these MSS, but presumably he had reference to two of the following:
Poppi 199, 18th century folio, Vita e morte di Cecco d’Ascoli.
Panciatichiani 117, 18th century, p. 50—“Abiura di Cecco d’Ascoli e sua morte seguita in Firenze l’anno 1328, con altre notizie appartenenti alla sua vita.” Precede una nota sul padre Accursio Buonfantini Inquisitore, che esaminò e condannò Cecco d’Ascoli; pp. 51-9, Esame e condanna di Cecco d’Ascoli, “Al nome de Dio amen. Noi frate Accursio ... / ... Familiari e servitori dell’ Inquisizione e molte altre persone”; pp. 60-3, Memorie della vita e morte di Cecco d’Ascoli, “Nella città d’ascoli nella marca fu un artigiano assai commodo ... / ... che troppo dalla credenzia della vera fede si allontanano”; pp. 63-4, Altre notizie date dal Sig. A. M. Manni, “Maestro Cecco fu cittadino ascolano, filosofo et astrologo ... / ... delle Virtù delle Pietre, manoscritto del sig. Alessandro Cherubini.”
Palat. 895, 17th century, carte 15, Sentenzia contro a maestro Cecco di maestro Simone degli Stabili da Ascoli, data in Firenze l’anno di nostro Signore 1328, “Noi frate Accursio di Firenze, dell’ ordine de’ frati minori, per autorità appostolica Inquisitorre della eretica malignità della prouincia de Toscana ... / ... come in Firenze è pubblico è notorio per l’euidenza del fatto manifesto.”
Castelli, p. 42, says that the number of copies of the sentence and relation of the death of Cecco found in the libraries of Italy is incredible, but he mentions only two.
[2959] Cecco’s Commentary is not divided into such sections in the two editions and MS which I have seen.
[2960] “del Bavaro”; the illusion is presumably to the emperor, Louis of Bavaria.
[2961] Listed above, p. 951, note 5. Panciatich. 117 is very similar to Palat. 895, but the wording is not identical, and from fol. 56v on the former omits much of the diffuse moralizing of the latter on how wicked it is to pry into the future and to destroy faith in freedom of the will, the basis of all morality (see Palat. 895, fol. 9r-v).
[2962] Such as ascribing to Cecco views which he cites from other authors only to condemn immediately.