Ptolemy of Lucca

Biography[edit]

Ptolemy was born in Lucca in the 1230s. The year 1236 is given in late sources, but may well stem from an accurate tradition.^[1] His Italian given name was Tolomeo, variuosly spelled "Tolomeus", "Tholomeus", "Thollomeus", "Ptolomeus" and "Ptholomeus" in the Latin documents of the time. One document gives his name as Bartolomeus de Luca and several modern scholars have called him Bartholomew, but this is probably a hypercorrection of his unusual name.^[2] His family name was Fiadoni. They were a non-noble but wealthy merchant family. Ptolemy's relationship to other recorded Fiadonis is uncertain. He was probably the son of Rayno and brother of Homodeo.^[3] He had a niece named Tolomea.^[2]


At an early age Ptolemy entered the Dominican Order. He was distinguished for piety, and his intense application to study, for which reasons he won the respect and warm friendship of Thomas Aquinas. He was not only his disciple, but also his confidant and confessor.^[4] In 1272 he accompanied Aquinas from Rome to Naples where he still was in 1274, when the news of his master's death at Fossa Nuova reached him. He was elected prior of the convent of his native city in 1288. At Naples (1294), he took an active part in the public demonstration which was made to prevent Pope Celestine V from resigning.


In 1301 he was elected Prior of Santa Maria Novella at Florence. Later he removed to Avignon where he was chaplain for nine years (1309–1318) to Cardinal Leonardo Patrasso, Bishop of Albano, and after the Cardinal's death in 1311 to his fellow-religious Cardinal William of Bayonne. Jacques Échard affirms that he was the close friend and often the confessor of John XXII, who appointed him Bishop of Torcello, March 15, 1318. A conflict with the Patriarch of Grado concerning the appointment of an abbess of Sant'Antonio di Torcello led to his excommunication in 1321, and exile. In 1323 he made peace with the patriarch, returned to his see, and died there in 1327.^[5]