Toward the middle of the fifteenth century, it was the fancy of the wits
and learned men of the age, particularly in Italy, to change their
baptismal names for classical ones. As Sannazarius, for instance, who
altered his own plain name “Jacopo” to “Actius Syncerus.” Numbers did
the same, and among the rest, Platina the historian, at Rome, who, not
without a solemn ceremonial, took the name of “Callimachus,” instead of
“Philip.” Pope Paul II., who reigned about that time, unluckily chanced
to be suspicious, illiterate, and heavy of comprehension. He had no idea
that persons could wish to alter their names, unless they had some bad
design, and actually scrupled not to employ imprisonment, and other
violent methods, to discover the fancied mystery. Platina was most
cruelly tortured on this frivolous account; he had nothing to confess,
so the pope, after endeavouring in vain to convict him of heresy,
sedition, &c. released him, after a long imprisonment.
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Formerly there were many persons surnamed _Devil_. In an old book, the
title of which does not recur, mention is made of one Rogerius Diabolus,
lord of Montresor.
An English monk, “Willelmus, cognomento Diabolus,” and another person,
“Hughes le Diable, lord of Lusignan.”
Robert, duke of Normandy, son to William the Conqueror, was surnamed
“the Devil.”
In Norway and Sweden there were two families of the name of “Trolle,” in
English “Devil,” and every branch of these families had an emblem of the
“Devil” for their coat of arms.
In Utrecht there was a family of “Teufels,” or “Devils,” and another in
Brittany named “Diable.”
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