ADRIAN, Cardinal, an Italian of great learning and ability, was a native of Cornetto, in Tuscany, and studied at Rome. He was sent by Innocent VIII. as nuncio into England, where Henry VII. rewarded his services with the bishopric of Hereford, and afterwards with that of Bath and Wells; but he never resided in either of these dioceses. On his return to Rome, he became secretary to Pope Alexander VI., who employed him in various missions, and subsequently invested him with the purple. He narrowly escaped death on the day that Alexander VI. fell a victim to his own wickedness, in the plot which he had contrived, in concert with his son Caesar Borgia, against Adrian and several other cardinals, in order to seize upon their possessions; but although Adrian likewise partook of the poison, he recovered. He then took refuge in the mountains of Trent, where he remained until the elevation of Leo X. to the papal chair; but, not long after, he was implicated in the conspiracy of cardinal Petrucci against that pontiff, and obliged a second time to fly from Rome. His subsequent history has not been ascertained; but it is generally supposed that he was murdered by a domestic, who coveted his wealth. Adrian was one of the first who restored the Latin tongue to its original purity. He wrote two good works,—De Vera Philosophia, a religious treatise, printed at Cologne in 1548; and De Sermone Latino, a learned work, published at Rome in 1515, in folio.