1 Carlo, Rosmini, Vita di Francesco Filelfo da Tolentino , 3 vols. (Milan , 1808) is the standard biography.Google Scholar On Filelfo's preeminence among the first Western European professors of Greek see especially Georg, Voigt, Die Wiederbelebung des Klassischen Altertums: das erste Jahrhundert des Humanismus ,Band I (Berlin , 1880), pp. 350-69;Google Scholar Voigt draws attention to the impact Filelfo's teaching had on a whole generation of students at the Studio Fiorentino; see also Giuseppe, Cammelli, I dotti bizantini e le origini dellumanesimo.vol. I: Manuele Crisolora (Florence , 1941), p. 6, passim;Google Scholar Cammelli writes that ot all the Italians who taught Greek in Florence Filelfo was the most distinguished. See also Vespasiano da, Bisticci, Vitedi uomini illustri del Secolo XV(Milan , 1951), pp. 35off.Google Scholar, Filelfo's, first biographer; Dissertazioni Vossiane di Apostolo Zeno , vol. I (Venice , 1752), pp. 275–305;Google Scholar Tiraboschi, , Storia della letieratura , vol. vi (Modena , 1787-94), libro III, pp. 1002-27;Google Scholar John Aldington, Symonds, The Revival of Learning: The Renaissance in Italy, vol. II (London , 1877; rpt. New York 1960);Google Scholar and William Harrison, Woodward, Vittorino da Feltre and Other Humanist Educators(Cambridge Univ., 1905), pp. 17, 30, 51, and passim.Google Scholar For an assessment of Filelfo's Latin poetry see Revilo P., Oliver, “The Satires of Filelfo,” Italica , 26 (1949), pp. 23–46.Google Scholar For further bibliography and an account of Filelfo's troubles in Florence see Giuseppe, Zippel, II Filelfo a Firenze(Rome , 1899); and my “A Reassessment of the Character of Francesco Filelfo,” Renaissance Quarterly, 36 (1983), pp. 202-24.Google Scholar

2 Francisci Philelfi Epistolarum familiarium libri XXXVII (Venice, 1502), the most complete of the printed editions of Filelfo's letters, hereafter cited as Epist., fol. 102v: “Nuper enim hoc quoque scribendi genus sum aggressus… . Latini vero non modo nunc nulli sunt hac tempestate, qui graecos versus scribant, sed ne ullos quidem de priscis accipimus … Ego autem … volui etiam tentare… . “ See also Emile, Legrand, Cent-dix Lettres Grecques de Francois Filelfe(Paris , 1892).Google Scholar In a letter dated 5 November 1457 Filelfo sent John Argyropulos one of the first Greek poems he wrote, apologizing for what he termed his tin ear (p. 90); and in a letter dated 13 November 1457 Filelfo sent Theodore Gaza the Greek elegy he had written in honor of Gaza's patron, King Alfonso of Naples (p. 91).

3 Legrand, p. 93 (13 November 1457).

4 Epist., fol. 173; see also Filelfo's Greek letters to Bessarion on his three books ofGreek poems in Legrand, p. 121 (1 December 1465).

5 Bandini, A. M., ed., Catalogus codicum manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Mediceae Laurentianae (Florence , 1764-70), II 450-54.Google Scholar Bandini prints the texts of two of the poems in full: 1.1 and 1.2. I have examined this codex in the Bibliotheca Laurenziana, and I am grateful to Dott. Antonietta Morandini, Director of the Library for allowing me to make a microfilm of the codex. The hand in Laur. 58.15 has been positively identified as Filelfo's own by Silvi, Bernardinello, Autograft Creci e Greco-Latini in Occidente(Padova , 1979), p. 55.Google Scholar See also Ruth, Barbour, Greek Literary Hands A.D. 400-1600 (Oxford , 1981);Google Scholar Barbour positively identifies the hand in Vat. Lat. 1790, fols. 155-58 as Filelfo's. Her photostat of the hand in Vat. 1790, fol. 158 contains a passage from Filelfo's Greek poem 3.3 and exactly matches the hand in Laur. 58.15, fol. 61, which contains the same passage. Laur. 58.15 is, as far as I know, the only complete extant codex of Filelfo's three books of Greek poems. The Bibliotheca Vallicclliana in Rome does have a manuscript dating to the fifteenth century which contains twenty of Filelfo's forty-four Greek poems; Cod. Vallicellianus 143, fols. 17-22; 25, has poems 1.1, 3-7, 10, 12, 15; and 2.1-4, 8-14. I have examined this codex myself; the quality of the paper is poor, and in no way does the hand resemble that of Laur. 58.15. Vat. Lat. 1790 contains only poem 3.3.

6 But see Epist., fol. 179 (1 August 1465): “Quintum enim opus totum versibus graecis constat. Sunt autem libri tres, et hi etiam editi.” Filelfo writes his friend Crivelli that he has recently completed a fifth major work, a collection of three books of Greek poems, and he adds that he has even published (editi) them.

7 Legrand, pp. 195-219.

8 John Edwin, Sandys, A History of Classical Scholarship , vol. 2 (Cambridge Univ., 1903-1908; rpt. New York , 1964), p. 56 Google Scholar mentions Filelfo's Greek poems in passing, but dismisses the poems as having no intrinsic merit or interest in themselves. Nor does James, Hutton, The Greek Anthology in Italy to the Year 1800. Cornell Studies in English XXIII (New York , 1935), pp. 95–96 Google Scholar, in his section on the influence of the Greek Anthology on Filelfo, make any mention of the existence of Filelfo's Greek poems.

9 A number of Aeolic and Ionic features are found in Filelfo's Greek poems. Final vowels in prepositions may be dropped (apocope). The Ionic ov as in μoῠvo ς, and ɛɩ as in ζɛίvo ς, and ηɛ as in ᾐέƛɷς, are found respectively for o , ɛ, and η. Whereas in other Greek poetry α, ɛ, and o are elided, here as in Homer the terminal dipthongs αɩ and oɩ are also elided. The oɩ in personal pronouns may also be elided. Consonants may be written singly or doubled to suit the metre, as in őơơov or ooaov. Homeric endings for the genitive singular and the genitive plural may be found:-oɷ, -ɛɷ, and -άɷv . Homeric prepositional suffixes also occur: - θɛv, -ơɛ, and θɩ. The Homeric pronouns ἄ μμɛζ, ἄ μμɩv, σɛῖo, σɛo, and the dative oὶ are characteristic features of the poems.The temporal augment in the imperfect and aorist tenses is omitted freely. Uncontractedforms, particularly in the case of contract verbs, are the rule rather than the exception,as for example ϕɩƛέεɩ, ϰέεɩ, ἅν or ϰε is frequently omitted where Attic would have it. Some epic forms of the verb to be occur: εἶς, ἐών, ἔσαν. Finally, the use of typically Homeric or Homeric-style epithets, such as ;μεγ αƛώ&n u;ʋμ ç,μεγαƛóϕϱω,

10 See Epist., fols. 103v-103 (1 November 1458): Filelfo expressed gratitude and amazement in two letters, to Bessarion and Pius II, at Pius’ promise to pay him an annual stipend of 200 ducats a year for the rest of his life.

11 See Eugenio, Garin, Portraits from the Quattrocento (New York , 1963), pp. 30–54 Google Scholar for an account of the mounting of the crusade and for samples of Pius’ rhetoric. See also Florence A., Gragg, Memoirs of a Renaissance Pope(New York , 1959)Google Scholar for selected speeches of Enea Silvio, Piccolomini (Pius II) from his Commentarii(Rome , 1584).Google Scholar

12 Epist., fol. 121: ”… triticum [esse] … rem sane utramque non gratam minus quam necessariam homini praesertim, cui nulli sunt fundi, nulla praedia, et omnia nummis comparanda sunt, et nummi admodum pauci, vel potius nulli propter Appula ista regia bella, quae errarium nostri principis omne exhauriunt. Nam annum iam mihi integrum e constituta pecunia nihil solvitur, at nc alii quidem cuique… . “

13 Epist., fol. 131: here Filelfo laments the suspension of his pensions on the parts of both Pius and Sforza, ”… Quare potes existimare qua ipse conditione sum, qui pccunias contemnere semper consuevi. Quo factum est ut ne iam libri quidem, neque vestimenta ipsa mihi sunt reliqua. Omnia sunt apud focnatorem, quae pereunt et ipse ob inopiam periclitor.“

14 See Dissertazioni Vossiane, pp. 290-305 for a compact list of Filelfo's works, their dates, and dedications. Between 1458 and 1465 Filelfo completed two major works with little monetary result: 8 books of his Latin epic poem, entitled Sfortiados, dedicated of course to Sforza; and 10 books of miscellaneous Latin poems, entitled De iocis et Seriis, dedicated to Malatesta Novello, Duke of Cesena, and Alessandro Sforza of Pesaro. See also Rosmini, p. 121: in 1458 alone Filelfo wrote among other orations lengthy epithalamia commemorating the marriages of Margherita Arcimbolda and Antonio Crivelli, Pietro Birago and Elisabetta Lampugnano, and Giovanni Antonio Simonetta and Margherita Lotta. See also Filelfo's letter to Alberto Zancario in llpist. fol. 127 (7 July 1462): Filelfo received a silver and gold embossed basin worth over a hundred ducats from the Venetian nobleman Jacopo Antonio Marcello as payment for his Consolatio on Marcello's son's death; but in what must have amounted to an act of civil disobedience, Filelfo made a presentation of the silver trophy to Francesco Sforza in the midst of a packed assembly of Sforza's men. He did this, he said, to demonstrate to Sforza that he placed his hopes “not in gold and silver … but in virtue alone.“

15 Aristide, Calderini in his monumental work, “Riccrche intorno alia biblioteca e cultura greca di Francesco Filelfo,” Studi Italiani di Fililogia Classica , 20 (1913), pp. 204– 424 Google Scholar, traced and catalogued all Filelfo's references to his Greek sources throughout the Epistulae and his other works. Calderini evidently did not know Filelfo's Greek poems; nevertheless it is to Calderini's pioneer study that I am profoundly indebted in the commentaries on the poems that follow.

16 De morali disciplina (Venice, 1552), p. 2: Filelfo uses the Greek word ἐϰƛεϰʈɩϰóv to define his own philosophical stand, asking only that he be allowed to “wander through all the precepts of the philosophers” (“per omnia eorum pracccpta vagari“). Paul Oskar, Kristeller, “Marsilio Ficino as a Man of Letters and the Glosses Attributed to Him in the Caetani Codex of Dante,” Renaissance Quarterly , 36 (1983), p. 16 Google Scholar has pointed out that around 1457 a number of treatises on the doctrines of various Greek philosophers came out, two of them by Ficino.

17 See Lauro, Martines, The Social World of the Florentine Humanists: 1390-1460 (Princeton , 1963), p. 317 Google Scholar and passim for bibliography. See also Vespasiano, pp. 235-45 for a portrait of Palla that matches Filelfo's.

18 Calderini, pp. 377f. lists the passages Filelfo used from Plutarch's Consolatio. Unless otherwise noted, all Greek texts cited in this article arc from the Loeb Classical Library editions (London, 1925-76). All the translations in this article are mine.

19 In addition to the Laws and Republic, Filelfo cites by name Alcibiades, Cratylus, Phaedo, Phaedrus, Gorgias, Meno, Parmenides, Symposium, and Timaeus in his letters and other works; see esp. Epist., fols. 130, 131, 136, 159, 206, 217, 223, 230, 264, 278 (I caution the reader here that in the 1502 edition of Epist. I am working with the numbering of the folios seems to disagree with Calderini by one or two pages throughout), as cited in Calderini; See also Legrand, pp. 43-44.

20 Cf. Marsilio, Ficino's letter to Rucellai on fortune (c. 1460) in Ausgewaehlte Schriftcn , ed. Wuttke, D., 2nd ed. (Baden-Baden , 1980), pp. 149-50Google Scholar, as cited by Kristeller, “Marsilio Ficino as a Man of Letters,” p. 17, n.61.

21 Filelfo's indebtedness to Plutarch has been noted above. For the quotation from Persaeus of Citium (Zeno's pupil) see Ioannes von, Arnim, ed., Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta (Leipzig 1905-24), vol. 1, p. 99 Google Scholar, hereafter cited as Arnim; the citation in Arnim comes from Themistius, some of whose writings we can be certain Filelfo knew from a letter of 8 October 1450 (see Epist., fol. 49v) of his. For other sources for the topos see Arnim, vol. 1, pp. 53f.

22 A copy of the De Exilio of Plutarch in Filelfo's own hand is preserved in Laurentianus 80.20, as listed in Bandini, II, pp. 210-12. Filelfo quotes lines 676-81 from Aristophanes' Plutus in his own Latin translation in a letter to his son Xenophon (see Epist., fol. 174).

23 Philo, De nominum mutat., as cited in Arnim, vol. 3, p. 159. Filelfo listed Philo among the works he brought back to Italy in 1427 in his famous letter to Traversari; see Ambrosii Traversari Latinae Epistolae, ed. L. Melius (Florence, 1759), bk. xxiv, Letter xxxii.

24 Clemens, as cited in Arnim, vol. 3, p. 159. Filelfo does not refer to Clemens by name in his writings.

25 Proclus, Commentary on Plato's Alcibiades, as cited in Arnim, vol. 3., p. 159. Filelfo specifically lists Proclus’ commentary on Plato in the inventory of 1427 of the books he brought back from Constantinople; see Traversarii Epistolae, bk. xxiv, Letter xxxii. Another reference to the commentaries of Proclus is in Epist., fol. 49v (8 October 1450) to Cassiani.

26 Calderini, p. 361 points out that Filelfo cites a neighboring passage (Republic 508) in his Commentationes Florentinae, II, 48v and in his Convivia Mediolanensia, I, 10v.

27 Liddell-Scott Greek-English Lexicon, ed. S. Jones (Oxford, 1977; 9th ed.) draws a distinction between oἶδα, “to know by reflection” and γɩγνώσϰω (γνῶναɩ), “to know by observation“; however Filelfo's preference for oἶδα throughout the Psychagogia in disparate kinds of contexts cautions us not to press the distinction.

28 If Filelfo's use of the metaphor were an intentional allusion to Solon's first elegy, it would be a highly appropriate one, since Solon's use of the metaphor occurs in the context of his prayer to the Muses in which he, a bard—like Filelfo in line 26—hopes for both material rewards and fame (Solon, 1.3: őƛβνo μoɩ … δóτε ϰαἱ δóζαν). It is not entirely unlikely that Filelfo knew Solon's elegy, which is first quoted by Strobaeus (3.9.23), since Filelfo appears to have acquired a text of Stobaeus’ Florilegio; the hypothesis that Filelfo had seen the Florilegio however rests on his citation in a letter of a line from Sophocles only preserved in Stobaeus (see Epist., fol. 253v, September 1472, as cited in Calderini, p. 393).

29 The epigram Filelfo knew (A.P. 10.65) is contained in a collection of over a hundred Greek epigrams preserved in Laurentianus 32.16, fols. 4-8. The codex (which I have examined only on microfilm) dates to 1281 according to an inscription on fol. 295; on fol. 9 Filelfo recorded his purchase of the codex from the wife of John Chrysoloras in Constantinople in 1423. See also Bandini, II, 369; and James Hutton, The Greek Anthology in Italy to the Year 1800. Cornell Studies in English XXIII, pp. 95f. It should also be noted here that Filelfo paraphrases another epigram from Laur. 32.16 (A.P. I I . 193) in lines 37-40 of this poem. Other epigrams on the unreliability of fortune contained in Laur. 32.16 include A.P 10.62, 64, and 80.

30 For some citations of Plato's Laws in Filelfo's works see: De moral, disc, p. 2; Oratio ad Marcellum, xxix; Comment. Flor., fol. 88; Conv. Med., I, 38; Epist. fols. 179 and 237 (August 1465 and September 1471), as cited in Calderini, p. 362. For other sources on the same theme see also Laws 662b, Republic 580b; Diog. Laert. VII. 87; Alexander of Aphrodisias et al. in Arnim, Vol. 3, pp. 14-16.

31 See letters in the unpublished collection of Greek and Latin letters of Filelfo in the Bibliotheca Trivulziana in Milan Cod. Triv. 873, fol. 27 (May 1433) and fol. 121v (March 1461), both of which are cited in Calderini, p. 276.

32 For portraits of Acciaiuoli see Garin, pp. 55-117; and Vespasiano, pp. 276-304.

33 As early as 1428 Filelfo had written to Nicolò Fava (see Epist., fol. 7v) to say he was at work on a translation of the Nicomachean Ethics; in 1431 Filelfo completed a translation of the Rhetoric; in the introduction to De morali disciplina, p. 2, Filelfo states that Aristotle was a principal influence on his thought. See Calderini, pp. 271f. for Filelfo's numerous citations from the Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics in his letters and other works from 1428—76.

34 See Liddell-Scott, p. 1453 for a full run-down; for a precedent for this usage see Sophocles, Trachiniae 550. Cf. also the not over-delicate caveat Filelfo issued to Donato on the conflicting claims of sex and the intellect in a letter of November 1460 (Epist., fol. 119v): “utrique arundini et nymphae et Musae simul studere non potes” (“you can't play the bride's pipe and the Muse's at the same time“).

35 For a list of citations from the Laws in Filelfo's other works see n. 30 above.

36 A manuscript of Plutarch's De morali virtute in Filelfo's own hand is preserved in Laurentianus 80.22 (see Calderini, pp. 374ff.). The epithet ƛoγɩϰòν ζῷoν , attributed to Chrysippus in Plutarch, is also found in Galen, Alexander of Aphrodisias, as cited in Arnim, vol. 3, p. 113 and vol. 2, p. 295; and in Diogenes Laertius’ Lives, VII. 130.

37 See n. 32 above. But see also Plato on the opposition between reason and appetite: Republic 439c-442, 586d; Laws 689a.

38 See n. 29 and n. 31 above.

39 See Calderini, p. 361 for Filelfo's citations from the Republic.

40 The same passage from Hesiod is quoted again in Plato, Laws 718e.

41 The passage in Plutarch is more complex however, breaking down the functions of ƛóγoς, and νoṽς, into three distinct categories: ƛoγɩσμóς, ἐπɩμέƛεɩα, πϱoνoῖα, “reasoning,” “concern,” and “forethought.“

42 See for example Galen, as cited in Arnim, vol. 3, p. 113: δεῖ δὲ πϱῶτoν ἐντεθν- μῆσθαɩ, őτɩ τò ƛoγɩϰòν ζῷoν ἀϰoνƛoθητɩϰòν ϕύσεɩ ἐστὶ τῷ ƛóγῳ ϰαὶ ϰατὰ τòν ƛóγoν ὼς ἂν ἡγεμóνα πϱαϰτɩϰóν , “it is first necessary to conclude that a rational animal is naturally disposed to follow reason and to act in accord with reason, as though it were its leader.” On the other hand, as Calderini notes, p. 317, there is no mention of Galen by name in Filelfo's works until a letter of 1473 preserved in Cod. Triv. 873, fol. 449.

43 Filelfo specifically cites the influence of the Phaedrus in the development of his thought in De moral, disc, p. 2. See again Calderini, pp. 360n and 362n for lists of references to the Laws in Filelfo's works.

44 See n. 29 and n. 31 above. Filelfo quotes Plutarch, Cons, in Apoll. 104a in a letter to Gaza of Feb. 1456 (Legrand, p. 79).

45 For other sources for 11. 35-36 see also Republic 490b and Plutarch, Moralia 108- b-d.

46 Cf. Diog. Laert., Lives, VII. 88; 101; see also as cited in Arnim: Plutarch, de Stoicrepugn., Philo, deposteritate; and Alexander of Aphrodisias, Quaest. (vol. 3, pp. 9-10).

47 Vespasiano, p. 70.

48 Bandini, II, 452-53.

49 On Chrysococces’ school see Epist. fol. 41 (February 1448). This poem may have been written as early as June 1459 when Filelfo wrote Bessarion that he would “delight your divine ears … with Greek poems in the Sapphic and Adonic mode.” (Legrand, p. 104).

50 Legrand, p. 195; Bandini, II, 453-454.

51 Epist., fol. I02v.

52 Lauro Martines, Power and Imagination (New York, 1979), p. 222.

53 Legrand, pp. I97ff.

54 A., Frizzi, Memorie per la storia di Ferrara (Ferrara, 1847-1850), vol. IV, p. 73 Google Scholar, as cited in Martines, pp. 227f. For a portrait of Borso and his court see Werner L. Gundesheimer, Ferrara: The Style of Renaissance Despotism (Princeton, 1973).

55 Mario Emilio, Cosenza, Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of the Italian Humanists and of the World of Classical Scholarship in Italy, 1300-1800 (New York , 1962), pp. 297f.Google Scholar

56 Legrand, pp. 199f.

57 Hutton, p. 96; Cosenza, p. 1563.

58 Legrand, pp. 200f.

59 Legrand, pp. 201ff.

60 Legrand, pp. 203 ff.

61 Legrand, pp. 205ff.

62 Cosenza, p. 1062.

63 Legrand, pp. 207ff. The poem may be dated 1457 from a Greek letter to Bessarion (19 December 1457) similar in context: see Legrand, p. 95. Filelfo had lent his copy of the Parallel Lives to Nicholas V, and after Nicholas’ death the manuscript had disappeared. Filelfo finally retrieved the manuscript on his visit to Pius II in 1458: see Epist., fol. 103.

64 Cammelli, vol. I, pp. 522ff.

65 Legrand, pp. 210f.

66 Chamberlin, E.R., The Bad Popes(New York , 1969), pp. 163-64.Google Scholar An excellent account of the reign of Calixtus III can be found in Michael, Mallett ,The Borgias: The Rise and Fall of a Renaissance Dynasty(New York , 1969), pp. 59–81.Google Scholar

67 Legrand, pp. 210f.

68 Legrand, pp. 211f.

69 Legrand, pp. 214ff.

70 See Garin, pp. 30-54 on Piccolomini.

71 Jacob, Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy(New York , 1929; rpt. 1958), vol. I, p. 52.Google Scholar

72 Legrand, pp. 215ff.

73 I believe this Greek verse epistle is also contained in Vat. Lat. 1790; but I have not seen the codex myself. It was for this Consolatio that Filelfo received a silver basin from Marcello.

74 Epist., fols. 102, 103, 120v.

75 Cosenza, pp. 2580ff.

76 Legrand, pp. 218f.

77 The text here is ἀƛƛὰ δɩστάζoνσɩν ἀεὶ σνμπoƛεμoῦντες; δɩστάζεɩν literally means “to falter” or “to hesitate.“