Francesco Petrarch was born in 1304 at Arezzo, whither his father, a prominent lawyer of Florence, had gone on being exiled in 1302, at the same time as Dante. After moving about some time in Italy, the family finally settled at Avignon, in southern France, then famous as the seat of the Roman papacy during the so-called Babylonian captivity. From 1315 to 1319 Francesco was sent to school at the neighboring town of Charpentras; in 1319 he went to the University of Montpellier to study law, and in 1323 went to the University of Bologna. At the university, however, he neglected law for the classic writers, and he tells us how one day his father appeared and burnt all his Latin books, with the exception of Vergil and Cicero's Rhetoric, which by means of tears and entreaties he succeeded in saving from the flames. After the death of his parents, in 1326, Petrarch settled down in Avignon and devoted himself to his favorite studies. As he was without means he entered the clergy and henceforth was relieved of all anxiety in regard to money. From this time on his life was spent in study, in the collection of a library, in writing books, in travel, and visits to his friends. Petrarch was very fond of traveling and his letters abound with interesting descriptions of the places he had seen. Yet, in spite of this passion for travel, he loved also the quiet and tranquil existence of country life. Here he could indulge to his heart's content his love for nature, the beauty of which he was practically the first to describe in sympathetic language. It was to satisfy this love for nature and the "quiet life," that Petrarch bought a small property in Vaucluse, near Avignon, and here he never failed to return from time to time during all his later life, when tired of travel, weighed down by care, or depressed by the loss of friends and the "creeping steps of age." Petrarch seemed to have had a peculiar faculty for making friends; he was loved and admired by high and low. Among these countless friends are worthy of especial mention the powerful Colonna family, father and two sons, who played so important a part in the history of Italy; King Robert of Naples; the Emperor Charles IV., who wished to have Petrarch accompany him to Germany; King John of France, who wished to retain him in Paris; Pope Urban IV., who offered him the position of papal secretary. There were scores of others of humbler rank, among them Boccaccio, his faithful admirer and lifelong friend. Not only kings and princes lavished honors on Petrarch, but cities as well: Florence offered to restore his father's property and make him professor at the university if he would live there; Venice gave him a palace in return for his library; and in 1340 the cities of Paris and Rome, at the same time, invited him to receive the laurel crown of poet.