Carlo Vecce - Biography#

Carlo Vecce is an Italian Renaissance scholar trained at the school of Giuseppe Billanovich in Catholic University of Milan, and a member of the Academy of Lincei. He actually teachs Italian Literature in the University of Naples “L’Orientale”. His researchs focus on Renaissance Literature and Civilization in Italy and Europe, mainly in the history of intellectual workshops in the dawn of Modern Age, and in relationships between languages (literature and visual culture).

Under the guide of Carlo Pedretti, he worked on the manuscripts and the library of Leonardo da Vinci, publishing the critical editions of the Book on Painting (Codex Urbinas, Vatican Library, 1995) and Codex Arundel (London, British Library, 1998). Since 1994 he is member of “Commissione Vinciana”.

He collaborated to several Leonardo exhibitions: the drawings and the manuscripts (Louvre, Paris 2003; Metropolitan Museum, New York 2003), the Fables in Codex Atlanticus (Ambrosian Library, Milan, 2013), the Codex Leicester (Uffizi, Florence 2018), the Books and the Library (Stanford University 2019; Museo Galileo, Florence 2019; Accademia dei Lincei, Rome 2019; Max Planck Institut, Berlin 2021).

His last book, Caterina’s smile, a novel about the incredible story of Leonardo’s mother, the Circassian slave Caterina, has been the literary case of 2023, and is going to be translated in more than 15 foreign languages.