CAMILLO

PORZIO (1526-1580?)  , Italian historian, belonged to a wealthy and noble Neapolitan family, and was the son of the philosopher, Simone Porzio . He studied law, first at Bologna and later at Pisa, and after graduating in utroque jure, practised as a lawyer in Naples . He died in 1580 . His chief literary work is La Congiura dei baroni, a history of the unsuccessful conspiracy of the Neapolitan barons against King Ferdinand I. of Naples in 1485; it is based on the authentic records of the state trials, but is prejudiced in favour of the royal power . It was first published by Manutius in Rome in 1565 . Of Porzio's other works, the Storia d'Italia (from 1547 to 1552), of which only the first two books have survived, is the most important . The best edition of these two works is that edited by C . Monzani (Florence, 1855) .