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Alberico Gentili

Alberico Gentili (1552-1608) was born in San Ginesio, in the Marches region of central Italy.  He studied law in the Bartolist faculty at Perugia, then took up legal practice and scholarly pursuits in the Marches.  The arrival of the Inquisition in San Ginesio and the investigation of the strong Protestant convictions of members of the Gentili family precipitated Alberico’s abrupt departure with his father.  Reaching England by 1580, he gradually established himself in Oxford, and was appointed Regius Professor of Law in 1587.  After 1600, he became increasingly absorbed in legal practice in London, serving from 1605 until his death as an advocate for the Government of Spain in the English courts.  He produced numerous works on Roman law, and wrote tracts on controversies of theology and British constitutionalism.  His three books of most direct significance for international law are De legationibus (1585), a work concerned with the law of embassies and the conduct of ambassadors that arose from his successful argument that the Spanish Ambassador Mendoza ought to be expelled rather than criminally punished for plotting against Queen Elizabeth; De jure belli (1598), a work that began as three tracts prepared in 1588-1589 during English debates on issues of war prompted by the Spanish Armada; and Hispanicae advocationis (1613), a collection of legal opinions from his practice published posthumously by his brother Scipio. 

From:  Benedict Kingsbury, “Confronting Difference: The Puzzling Durability of Gentili’s Combination of Pragmatic Pluralism and Normative Judgement” (1998) 92 American Journal of International Law.

Further Reading:

Peter Haggenmacher, Grotius and Gentili: “A Reassessment of Thomas E. Holland’s Inaugural Lecture”, in Hugo Grotius and International Relations (Hedley Bull, Benedict Kingsbury and Adam Roberts eds, 1990). 

Diego Panizza, Alberico Gentili, Giurista Ideologo Nell’Inghilterra Elisabettiana (1981). 

Gezina van der Molen, Alberico Gentili and the Development of International Law: His Life Work and Times (2d edition 1968) (1937).