User:WhatADayToday12/Agostino Favoriti

Agostino Favoriti was born in Sarzana to Giacomo, a noble jurist from Sarzana, and Elisabetta Casoni, sister of Monsignor Filippo Casoni, bishop of San Donnino. After completing his early education in his hometown, he was sent to Rome, where he continued his studies with his mother's relatives. He was ordained as a priest in 1658 and became a familiar (attendant) at the court of Cardinal Fabio Chigi. Showing great talent in Latin poetry, he was soon admitted to the city's most prominent academies (Umoristi, Fantastici, Intrecciati). When Cardinal Fabio Chigi ascended to the papacy as Alexander VII, being a lover of letters and especially Latin poetry, he did not forget to include Favoriti among the learned individuals he surrounded himself with. He appointed him as his honorary chamberlain and personal secretary to his nephew, Cardinal Flavio Chigi. In 1666, Favoriti became a canon of Santa Maria Maggiore. He was then appointed to the important position of secretary of the College of Cardinals and secretary for Latin letters, holding these positions under four Popes: Alexander VII, Clement IX, Clement X, and Innocent XI. He delivered the funeral oration for Alexander VII in the Vatican Basilica in 1667 and was a key figure in papal politics and diplomacy for over twenty years. Many services rendered to the Roman court were about to be rewarded with a cardinal's hat when he was unexpectedly struck by death. He was buried with great honors in Santa Maria Maggiore, where his close friend Ferdinand von Fürstenberg, Prince-Bishop of Paderborn and Münster, erected a magnificent marble monument befitting a Pope in the left nave of the Basilica Liberiana, just a few meters from the Porta Santa. Favoriti was friends with men such as Leone Allacci, Stefano Gradi, Cardinal Pietro Sforza Pallavicino, and Christianus Lupus, as well as Christina of Sweden, whom he advised on numismatics.

Works
Most of Favoriti's poems are included in the collection Septem illustrium virorum poemata (Amstelodami 1672). The collection also includes two funeral orations (Oratio in funere Alexandri VII, pp. 157-165; Oratio in funere Clementis IX, pp. 166-172) and a Latin biography of Virginio Cesarini (pp. 421-438).

Favoriti's letters to Bartolomeo Beverini were edited by Giovanni Sforza. Other letters of Favoriti, including those preserved in the Biblioteca Angelica in Rome addressed to Luca Olstenio, Francesco Barberini, and Leone Allacci, are held in the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Biblioteca Casanatense in Rome.