New arguments to identify the recipient of the letter of Antonio Agustin dated October 21, 1576 (BNE Ms. 1854)

Abstract

The Spanish National Library preserves the autographic draft of a letter by the great humanist Antonio Agustín, dated October 21^st, 1576. The letter is the answer to a recipient whose name is not mentioned in the draft. Previous bibliography, beginning with the National Library’s inventory of manuscripts, has surmised that the letter was addressed to the famous biblical scholar Benito Arias Montano. However, in the last two decades many publications dealing with the correspondence of Arias Montano have come to light, from which new evidence can be obtained to identify him as the sure recipient of Agustín's letter. The objectives of this article are to expose these new arguments and demonstrate that the letter in question is a key piece for the reconstruction of the puzzle of the controversial reception of the Polyglot Bible of Antwerp supervised by Arias Montano.