Pedro Mexía ( born between 17 January and 6 September , 1497 Seville

Seville

Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...

  - died 17 January , 1551 , also Seville ) was a Spanish

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

  Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 writer, humanist and historian. For the majority of his life he lived in his native city of Seville for which there is always a special affection in his writings .

He studied humanities and law at Seville and Salamanca universities . He maintained correspondence with Erasmus of Rotterdam , Luis Vives and Juan Gines de Sepulveda

Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda

Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda was a Spanish humanist, philosopher and theologian. In 1533 and 1534 he wrote to Desiderius Erasmus from Rome concerning differences between Erasmus's Greek New Testament , and the Codex Vaticanus Graecus 1209...

 . In 1548, he was appointed official chronicler of the court of Emperor Charles V.

His major work is Silva de varia leccion (A Miscellany of Several Lessons) (1540), which became an early best seller across Europe. It was reprinted 17 times in the sixteenth century and was translated into Italian (1542), French (1552) and English (1571). Within a century, Silva reached 31 editions in Spanish , and 75 in foreign languages. It is an encyclopedic miscellany or mixture of subjects of interest across the diverse repertoire of humanistic knowledge of the time. The work takes material from the Attic Nights by Aulus Gellius

Aulus Gellius

Aulus Gellius , was a Latin author and grammarian, who was probably born and certainly brought up in Rome. He was educated in Athens, after which he returned to Rome, where he held a judicial office...

 , the Banquet of the Sophists by Ateneo

Ateneo

Ateneo is a Spanish and an Italian term for the word Athenaeum. As a name, it may refer to:*Educational institutions established by the Society of Jesus in the Philippines; the Ateneos*El Ateneo, a bookshop in Buenos Aries, Argentina...

 , the Saturnalia of Macrobius , the Memorable deeds and sayings of Valerius Maximus

Valerius Maximus

Valerius Maximus was a Latin writer and author of a collection of historical anecdotes. He worked during the reign of Tiberius .-Biography:...

 , the Inventor of all things by Polidoro Virgilio , the Moralia and Parallel Lives of Plutarch

Plutarch

Plutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...

 and, above all, the Natural History of Pliny the Elder

Pliny the Elder

Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman author, naturalist, and natural philosopher, as well as naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and personal friend of the emperor Vespasian...

. It also contains work by Erasmus of Rotterdam . Traces of this miscellany can be found in works by Mateo Alemán

Mateo Alemán

Mateo Alemán y de Enero was a Spanish novelist and writer.He graduated at Seville University in 1564, studied later at Salamanca and Alcalá, and from 1571 to 1588 held a post in the treasury; in 1594 he was arrested on suspicion of malversation, but was speedily released...

 , Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright. His magnum opus, Don Quixote, considered the first modern novel, is a classic of Western literature, and is regarded amongst the best works of fiction ever written...

 , Shakespeare and Montaigne , to mention only a few of the authors he influenced.

Other major works by Mexia are Historia imperial y cesarea (1545), Historia del Emperador Carlos V (unfinished and unpublished) and Coloquios y Diálogos (1547).