=Pietro Comparini= (_The Ring and the Book_) was the reputed father of Pompilia, and was murdered with his wife by Count Guido.
=Pietro of Abano.= (_Dramatic Idyls_, second series, 1880.) [THE MAN.] Dr. Furnivall, in a note to Mr. Sharpe's excellent paper on Pietro of Abano in the _Browning Society's Reports_, No. V., gives the following particulars of the character from the _Nouvelle Biographie Universelle_, Paris, 1855, i. 29-31. "Pietro of A'bano, Petrus de A'pano or Aponensis, or Petrus de Padua, was an Italian physician and alchemist; born at Abano, near Padua, in 1246, died about 1320. He is said to have studied Greek at Constantinople, mathematics at Padua, and to have been made Doctor of Medicine and Philosophy at Paris. He then returned to Padua, where he was Professor of Medicine, and followed the Arabian physicians, especially Averroes. He got a great reputation, and charged enormous fees. He hated milk and cheese, and swooned at the sight of them. His enemies, jealous of his renown and wealth, denounced him to the Inquisition as a magician. They accused him of possessing the philosopher's stone, and of making, with the devil's help, all money spent by him come back to his purse, etc. His trial was begun; and had he not died naturally in time, he would have been burnt. The Inquisitors ordered his corpse to be burnt; and as a friend had taken that away, they had his portrait publicly burnt by the executioner. In 1560 a Latin epitaph in his memory was put up in the church of St. Augustine. The Duke of Urbino set his statue among those of illustrious men; and the Senate of Padua put one on the gate of its palace, beside those of Livy, etc. His best-known work is his _Conciliator Differentiarum quæ inter Philosophos et Medicos versantur_ (Mantua, 1472, and Venice, 1476, fol.); often reprinted. Other works are: 1. _De Venenis, eorumque Remediis_, translated into French by L. Boet (Lyons, 1593, 12mo); 2. _Geomantia_ (Venice, 1505, 1556, 8vo); 3. _Expositio Problematum Aristotelis_ (Mantua, 1475, 4to); 4. _Hippocrates de Medicorum Astrologia Libellus_, in Greek and Latin (Venice, 1485, 4to); 5. _Astrolabium planum in tabulis ascendens, continens qualibet hora atque minutæ æquationes Domorum Cæli_, etc. (Venice, 1502, 4to); 6. _Dioscorides digestus alphabetico ordine_ (Lyons, 1512, 4to); 7. _Heptameron_ (Paris, 1474, 4to); 8. _Textus Mesues noviter emendatus_, etc. (Venice, 1505, 8vo); 9. _Decisiones physionomiæ_ (1548, 8vo); 10. _Questiones de Febribus_ (Padua, 1482); 11. _Galeni tractatus varii a Petro Paduano, latinitate donati_, MS. in St. Mark's Library, Venice; 12. _Les Eléments pour opérer dans les Sciences magiques_, MS. in the Arsenal Library, Paris." Murray's _Guide to Northern Italy_ says that "Abano may be visited either from Padua or from Monselice. Its baths have retained their celebrity from the time of the Romans. The place is also remarkable as being the birthplace of Livy, and also of the physician and reputed necromancer, Pietro d'Abano, in whom the Paduans take almost equal pride. This village is about three miles from the Euganean hills." The medicinal springs procured this place its ancient name of _Aponon_, derived from [Greek: a], privative, and [Greek: ponos], pain. At Padua is the _Palazzo della Ragione_, built by _Pietro Cozzo_ between 1172 and 1219, a vast building standing entirely upon open arches, surrounded by a loggia. Murray says: "The history of this hall is as remarkable as its aspect. It was built in 1306 by an Austin friar, _Frate Giovanni_, a great traveller; and he asked no other pay for his work than the wood and tiles of the old roof which he was to take down. The interior of the hall is covered by strange, mystical paintings designed by Giotto according to the instructions of _Pietro d'Abano_." Pietro d'Abano was the first reviver of the art of medicine in Europe; and he travelled to Greece for the purpose of learning the language of Hippocrates and Galen, and of profiting by the stores which the Byzantine libraries yet contained. He practised with the greatest success; and his medical works were considered as amongst the most valuable volumes of the therapeutic library of the middle ages. His bust is over one of the doors of the hall; the inscription placed beneath it indignantly repudiates the magic and sorcery ascribed to him; but the votaries of the occult sciences smiled inwardly at this disclaimer. His treatises upon necromancy, geomancy, amulets and conjuration, were circulated from hand to hand. When at Padua, some years since, the Rev. John Sharpe found a stone set in the wall of the vestibule of the Sacristy of the Church of the Eremitani, to Pietro of Abano. It bore the following inscription:--