(in Latin Accurius), FRANCIS, the elder, an eminent lawyer, was born at Bagnolo, near Florence, in 1182. He began the study of law at a late period of life; but such were his affluency and proficiency, that he soon distinguished himself. He was appointed professor at Bologna, and became a very eminent teacher. He undertook the great work of uniting and arranging into one body the almost endless comments and remarks upon the Code, the Institutes, and Digests, which, he observed, only tended to involve the subjects in obscurity and contradiction. When he was employed in this work, it is said, that hearing of a similar one proposed and begun by Odofred, another lawyer of Bologna, he feigned indisposition, interrupted his public lectures, and shut himself up, till he had, with the utmost expedition, accomplished his design. His work, entitled "A Perpetual Commentary," was much esteemed. It was printed with the "Body of Law," published at Lyons in 1627. He died in 1260, and left very great riches. His son, the younger Francis Accorso, succeeded him in his professorship, and accompanied Edward I. to England, on his return from the crusade in 1237. (Gen. Biog.)

Accorso, Mariangelo, a learned and ingenious critic, was a native of Aquila, in the kingdom of Naples, and lived about the beginning of the sixteenth century. To a perfect knowledge of Greek and Latin, he added an intimate acquaintance with several modern languages. Classical literature was much improved and promoted by his labours. In discovering and collating ancient manuscripts he displayed uncommon affluency and diligence. His work, entitled "Diatribae," printed at Rome, in folio, in 1524, is a singular monument of erudition and critical skill. He bestowed, it is said, unusual pains on Claudian, and made above seven hundred corrections in the works of that poet, from different manuscripts. Unfortunately the world has been deprived of the advantage of these criticisms; for they were never published. These corrections were made while he travelled on horseback during a tour through Germany, a circumstance which is strongly characteristic of his industry and affluency. An edition of Ammianus Marcellinus, which he published at Augsburg in 1533, contains five books more than any former one. He was the first editor of the "Letters of Cassiodorus," with his "Treatise on the Soul." The affected Accretion, among civilians, the property acquired in a vague or unoccupied thing, by its adhering to or following another already occupied; thus, if a legacy be left to two persons, one of whom dies before the testator, the legacy devolves to the survivor by right of accretion.