Introduction

This paper focuses on two subjects: the Italian intercultural intermediaries of classical culture (the case of Leonardo Bruni) and their reception outside the Italian peninsula (the case of the Cracow intellectual milieu). Italian humanists played a crucial role in the transmission of ancient classical traditions. They made a major contribution to both the rediscovery of many ancient texts and their subsequent dissemination; they also helped to shape a particular vision of ancient classical traditions, and adopted certain rhetorical patterns specific to classical authors. It is thanks to these humanists that knowledge of ancient classical traditions reached the intellectual circles of Northern Europe – for instance, those in Cracow – where direct reception of ancient traditions would have been impossible due to the lack of both Greek learning and original manuscripts.

Leonardo Bruni, also called Aretino, (Arezzo ca. 1370–Florence 1444) has been chosen as a case study because he was one the most influential representatives of the first generation of Florentine humanists. Bruni acted as a cultural intermediary by translating the works of the ancient Greeks and also by writing texts in which he tried to emulate both the style of classical writers (mainly Cicero) and classical literary genres. The intellectual formation of Bruni and his attitude toward ancient Greek and Roman literature was strongly influenced by Coluccio Salutati (1331–1406), chancellor of Florence and himself a humanist.