Paul of Venice

Paul of Venice (or Paulus Venetus) (1369–1429) was a Roman Catholic Scholastic philosopher, theologian, and realist logician and metaphysician of the Hermits of the Order of Saint Augustine. He was teacher to Paolo da Pergola.

He was born, according to the chroniclers of his order, at Udine, about 1369 and died at Venice on June 15, 1429, as Paolo Nicoletti. He joined the Augustinian Order at around 1383, at the convent of Santo Stefano in Venice. In 1390 he is said to have been sent to Oxford for his studies in theology, but returned to Italy, and finished his course at Padua. He lectured in the University at Padua during the first quarter of the fifteenth century.

Paul was one of the theologians called to Rome in 1427 by Pope Martin V, to take cognizance of the charges brought against St. Bernardino of Siena, occasioned by Bernardino's use of inscriptions of the name of Jesus in worship.

With regard to the problem of universals he adhered to realism, since he maintained that universal essences are real entities.

His writings show a wide knowledge and interest in the scientific problems of his time.

• Commentaries on the works of Aristotle:
  • Expositio in libros Posteriorum Aristotelis.
  • Expositio super VIII libros Physicorum necnon super Commento Averrois (1409).
  • Expositio super libros De generatione et corruptione.
  • Lectura super librum De Anima.
  • Conclusiones Ethicorum.
  • Conclusiones Politicorum.
  • Expositio super Praedicabilia et Praedicamenta (1428).
• Logical works:
  • Logica Parva or Tractatus Summularum (1395–96).
  • Logica Magna (1397–98).
  • Quadratura.
  • Sophismata Aurea.
• Other works:
  • Super Primum Sententiarum Johannis de Ripa Lecturae Abbreviatio (1401).
  • Summa philosophiae naturalis (1408).
  • De compositione mundi.
  • Quaestiones adversus Judaeos.
  • Sermones.

• Logica Parva. München: Philosophia Verlag 1984.

Translation of the 1472 Edition with introduction and notes by Alan R. Perreiah.

• Logica Magna. Tractatus de suppositionibus. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute 1971.

Edited and translated by Alan R. Perreiah

• Logica Magna. Part I Fascicule 1: Tractatus de terminis. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1979.

Edited with an English translation and notes by Norman Kretzmann.

• Logica Magna. Part I Fascicule 7: Tractatus De scire et dubitare. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1981.

Edited with an English translation and notes by Patricia Clarke.

• Logica Magna. Part I Fascicule 8: Tractatus De necessitate et contingentia futurorum. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1991.

Edited with an English translation and notes by C. J. F. Williams.

• Logica Magna. Part II Fascicule 3: Tractatus De hypotheticis. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1990.

Edited with an English translation and notes by Alexander Broadie.

• Logica Magna. Part II Fascicule 4: Capitula De conditionali et de rationali. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1990.

Edited with an English translation and notes by George Edward Hughes.

• Logica Magna. Part II Fascicule 6: Tractatus de veritate et falsitate propositionis et Tractatus de significato propositionis. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1978.

Edited with notes on the sources by Francesco del Punta; translated into English with explanatory notes by Marilyn McCord Adams.

• Logica Magna. Part II Fascicule 8: Tractatus De obligationibus. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1988.

Edited with an English translation and notes by E. Jennifer Ashworth.