Santes Pagninus

Santes Pagninus (born Oct. 18, 1470, Lucca, Republic of Lucca [now in Italy]—died Aug. 24, 1536, Lyon, Fr.) was a Dominican scholar whose Latin version of the Hebrew Bible—the first since St. Jerome’s—greatly aided other 16th-century scriptural translators.

In 1487 he joined the Dominicans at Fiesole, Republic of Florence, where he became a disciple of Girolamo Savonarola. In 1516 he went to Rome, where Pope Leo X encouraged his work. From 1523 to 1526 he lived in Avignon, then settled in Lyon, where in 1528 he published his Latin translation of the entire Bible, apparently the first to divide chapters into numbered verses. In 1529 Pagninus issued a Hebrew lexicon, Thesaurus linguae sanctae (“Thesaurus of the Sacred Language”), which was frequently republished.

Pagninus’ translation was remarkably literal, so, despite his inelegant, even crude, style, his Bible was reprinted several times. Although more accurate than the Vulgate, and hence more useful to other translators needing help with Hebrew or Greek, Pagninus’ version was not intended to supersede the Vulgate except for purely scholarly purposes; it is now chiefly of historical interest.