* I thank Prof. P. O. Kristeller for his generosity in pointing out this manuscript, for advising me on the transcription of some of the more difficult textual passages, and for his helpful suggestions.

1 See most recently Geanakoplos, D., Creek Scholars in Venice (Harvard, 1962)Google Scholar; new ed., Byzantium and the Renaissance (Hamden, 1973).

2 Brucker, G., in his ‘Florence and Its University, 1348-1434’, in Action and Conviction in Early Modern Europe (Princeton, 1969)Google Scholar, ed. Rabb and Seigel, esp. p. 231. Cf. Ricci, P., ‘La prima catedra di Greco in Firenze’, Rinascimento 2 (1952), 159–165 Google Scholar.

3 See D. Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, esp. p. 24, and G. Cammelli, Manuele Crisolora (Florence, 1941). Also cf. Vergerius’ statement in ‘De ingenuis moribus’, in Woodward, W., Vittorino da Feltre and Other Humanist Educators (New York, 1963), p. 106 Google Scholar.

4 Geanakoplos, op. cit., esp. pp. 153 ff.

5 See recently J. Seigel, ‘The Teaching of Argyropoulos and the Rhetoric of the First Humanists’, Action and Conviction in Early Modern Europe; ed. T. Rabb, J. Seigel (Princeton, 1969).

6 This speech is uncatalogued and in the Munich Staatsbibliothek: Codex Latinus Monacensis, 28.128.

7 On Hartmann Schedel's career see esp. R. Stauber, Die Schedelsche Bibliothek (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1908), and Wattenbach, W., ‘Hartmann Schedel als Humanist’, Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte 2 (1871), 351–374 Google Scholar. Also Biographie Universale, vol. 38, pp. 256 ff., and references on Luder in Spitz, L., The Northern Renaissance (Englewood Cliffs, 1972), P- 5 Google Scholar.

8 Stauber, op. cit., p. 49, says Schedel had two years of Greek study with Chalcondyles; others say three.

9 Stauber, op. cit., pp. 48-50, 159.

10 Wattenbach, Forschungen, XI, 367; Stauber, p. 51.

11 See MS f. IOV: ‘Scripsi ego Hartmannus Schedel de Nuremberga artium ac medicine doctor Patavinus, in primordio studii de manu prefati Greci dum initia litterarum grecarum edocuit. Laus Deo’. This is the theory of Stauber, p. 49.

12 Stauber, p. 114, curiously entitles this later work the Ceorgica Hesiodii. Note esp. mention of Leonicenus (Thomaeus), later famous as probably the first lecturer at Padua on Aristotle in the original Greek.

13 On works mentioned here see esp. Stauber, pp. 52, 114, 159, 183, 3 n. 2.

14 See below, n. 60.

15 Legrand, E., Bibliographie Hellenioue … au XVe et XVIe siècles (Paris, 1885)Google Scholar, I,95, says Demetrius left Padua, apparently finally tired of the strain of having his Greek post renewed every year. Notably, at Padua he received the first fixed stipend in a European university. (Sandys, E., History of Classical Scholarship [Cambridge, 1903]Google Scholar, n, 64.) On the very brief biography of Chalcondyles by A. Kalosynas, in Hopf, C., Chroniques grlcoromanes (Berlin, 1873), pp. 243–245 Google Scholar, is rightly considered worthless by Legrand, op. cit., p. xciv.

16 On Chalcondyles’ life see Cammelli, G., Demetrio Calcondila (Florence, 1954)Google Scholar, esp. p. 132, for his length of tenure at Padua. The older biography (in Greek) of Kampourouglou, D., Hoi Chalkokondylai (Athens, 1926)Google Scholar, is now outdated; also see A. Badini Confalonieri and F. Gabotto, ‘Notizie biografiche di Calcondila’, D., Giomale ligustico, 2 (1892), 241 Google Scholar ff.

17 On his pupils see esp. Cammelli, op. cit., pp. 30 ff. Also Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, p. 113, who says Musurus probably studied in Florence with Chalcondyles.

18 Legrand, op. cit., p. 95; also Geanakoplos, op. cit., pp. 86-87; and Taylor, W., ‘Bessarion the Mediator’, Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, 2 (1924), 120–127 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On Chalcondyles’ earlier teaching in Venice see Heiberg, J., Beiträge zur Ceschichte Ceorg Valla's und Seiner Bibliothek (Leipzig, 1896)Google Scholar.

19 Ferrai, E., L'ellenismo nello studio di Padova (Padua, 1876), pp. 29 Google Scholar ff

20 On Strozzi's activities in Padua see Ferrai, op. at., p. 29; also Cammelli, op. at., pp. 28-30. On the Venetian decree see Cammelli, p. 28, and J. Facciolatti, Fasti Gymnasii Patavini (Padua, 1757) I, 54. The original of the decree has apparently been lost (Cammelli, p. 28, n.). Facciolatti says Demetrius taught at Padua rhetoric and Greek letters, was called ‘philosophus’, and was expert in both Greek and Latin.

21 Cammelli, p. 28.

22 See MS f. 2v: ‘Cum igitur ab illustrissimo ac inclito venetorum dominio rogatu Reverendissimi domini mei Cardinalis sedisque Apostolici legati de latere favoreque et auxilio magnifici Rectoris et egregiorum scolarium, ut ergo litteras Grecas publice legerem constitutus sum, idcirco quantum utilitatis ornamenti perfectionisque studia litterarum latinis afferant quantumque illustraverint et illustrent, non ab re aliquid dicere visum est.’

23 On Bessarion's library, see Geanakoplos, op. cit., p. 35 and bibl. there.

24 Ms f. 1or-1ov: ‘Et pro beneficio quod mihi haec preclara universitas contulit cuius consensu et rogatu, ac intercessione serenissimi domini mei singularissimi ac sapientissimi Cardinalis Niceni ab Illustrissimo ac munificentissimo Dominio venetorum lecturam istam obtinui, hanc remunerationem et gratiam plenissime pro viribus reddam. Tibi vero Magnifice ac humanissime Rector cui me ob tuas singulares virtutes tuamque precipuam doctrinam devinctum semper fatebor vobisque doctores sapientissimi et reliquis in me benignitatem ac et studium pro impetratione huius mee lecture viris cum virtute ac doctrina praeditis quas possum, non quas debeo gracias ago quod me tam benigne tamque equo animo audire dignati estis.’

25 Cammelli, p. 28.

26 On the custom, see Kristeller, P., Renaissance Philosophy of Man (Chicago, 1948), p. 198 Google Scholar.

27 See below, n. 29.

28 Ficino began his Plato translation in 1463, completed it c. 1470 (M. Gilmore, World of Humanism, p. 191, says it was completed in 1468), and printed it in 1484. See P. Kristeller, Supplementum Ficinianum (Florence, 1937), n, 105, for text of this preface. According to Legrand, Bibl. Hell., 1,101, this preface of Ficino appears in the Venice edition of 1491.

29 See MS f. iv: ‘Marsilius Ficinus in prohemio operum platonis de isto Demetrio mencionem facit eo modo.’ The corrected date, 1464, in die text (f. jv), incidentally, has a question mark after it.

30 For Ficino's own words see Legrand, op. cit., p. ci. Legrand, p. c, says a portrait of Boerner shows Ficino, Christophoro Landino, Poliziano, and Chalcondyles conversing amicably in the countryside, probably at the Platonic Academy at Careggi.

31 See quotation cited in Ferrai, op. cit., p. 39, n. 16: ‘apud Bernardum Bembum … Antonio Chronico veneto ac Demetrio Ataco.’

32 On the knowledge of Hesiod in the ‘West, see Bolgar, R., Classical Heritage and its Beneficiaries (Cambridge, 1958), p. 279 Google Scholar, who says, though Hesiod was scarcely known in the first part of die fifteenth century, he was represented in Giorgio Valla's library (1493) by two copies of the Works and Days. And earlier, in the fourteenth century we know that Greek monks of southern Italy were copying from Greek poets, esp. Homer and Hesiod. On the first edition of the Works and Days see Sandys, op. cit., n, 104. Nicolaus de Valle first translated into Latin and published Hesiod. See Geanakoplos, op. cit., p. 264, for the mention of Musurus’ scholia on Hesiod, loaned to Erasmus in Venice. Sandys, op. cit., n, 84, says Poliziano, after 1482, composed a Latin poem on Hesiod.

33 None of the manuscripts of Ficino's translation of Plato contains this Preface to the Reader as quoted by Schedel in this manuscript. It was taken then probably from the first printed edition of 1484. Therefore, unless the preface was added later by Schedel, our MS itself was copied after publication of Plato in 1484.

34 See most recently on this shift Seigel, op. cit, p. 237 ff., and also Holmes, G., The Florentine Enlightenment (London, 1969)Google Scholar, esp. p. 242 ff., and 262 ff.

35 On the various Erotemata, see Pertusi, A., ‘Erotemata’, It. Med. e Urn. 2 (1962), 324 Google Scholar, and Geanakoplos, , Greek Scholars, pp. 219-220, and his Byzantine East and Latin West (Oxford, 1966), p. 144 Google Scholar.

36 See Ferrai, op. cit., p. 29, n. 17.

37 See MS f. 2r: ‘Et si ego de studiis litterarum Grecarum orationem neque rei dignitate neque auribus vestris dignam, Magnifice Rector, doctores celeberrimi ceterique viri eruditissimi, non me videam habere posse cum magnitudine rei tumque ego parum admodum in huiuscemodi rebus exercitatus, parvo preterea ingenio et doctrina modica vobis doctissimis sapientissimisque viris nullo pacto satisfacere possem. Tamen quia rei novitas ac potissimum principiorum consuetudo hoc efflagitare videntur pingui (ut aiunt) Minerva hanc provinciam aggressus sum. Vos vero humanissimi ac sapientissimi viri cum in omnibus summan humanitatem atque mansuetudinem gerere consuevistis eandem ipsam vel mihi nullam homini novo et in litteris latinis mediocriter erudito prestare propicioque et ylari fronte meum audire sermonem velitis.’ Pingui Minerva is a well-known proverb found in Cicero, De amicitia v. 19.

38 Ms. f. 2v. Cf. Conrad Celtis’ similar remark in his oration (as quoted in L. Spitz, Northern Renaissance, p. 25) that Cato studied Greek in his 8o's in order better to leam to speak Latin.

39 Sabbadini, R., Giovanni da Ravenna, insigne figure d'umanista (Como, 1914), p. 103 Google Scholar and cf. p. 220. Also Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, pp. 26-27.

40 On Dominici see Holmes, G., The Florentine Enlightenment (London, 1969), pp. 32–35 Google Scholar.

41 Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, p. 39; Rossi, V., II Quattrocento (Milan, 1938) p. 92 Google Scholar. As late as c. 1531, Pietro Bembo gave a speech before the Venetian Senate extolling but also defending the Venetian study of Greek letters (Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, p. 279, n. 1).

42 See fs. 3v-4r: ‘Nemini credo vestrum esse ignotum omne genus liberalium artium a grecis latinos accepisse et cum auctores omnium istarum arcium grecos et ipsa nomina artibus indicta greca fuisse constat. Nam ut ab ipsis infimis incipiam et ipsorum elementorum et grammatice poesis oratorie artis ac hystorie logice matematicorum philosophic naturalis medicine ac ipsius denique divine science, quis idem mediocriter eruditus ignorat eos inventores fuisse, aut omnia aut aliqua ex his ab aliis accepta ipsos meliora perfectioraque reddidisse, at postea latinis tradidisse. Qui adeo in omni genere virtutis doctrinaque viguere ut nemini ea tempestate qua florebant in nulla re cessisse compertum est. Hos latini ad unguem sequuti usque ad ipsa litterarum elementa merito antecelluisse ceteris gentibus tarn in omni genere doctrine quam etiam in re militari existimantur. Cum itaque et studia litterarum et omnes artes ab eis accepissent auctoresque ipsos sequuntur, nemo inficias ibit, quin studia litterarum grecarum plurimum fructus latinis in omni genere doctrine afferant. Et enim ut de iis in primis quae ad grammaricam attinent aliquid dicam, cum grammarica latina grece coniuncta est et ab ipsa dependere videtur, quomodo quisquam cognitionem plenam eius habere putaverit nisi litteras grecas noverit Neque enim derivacionem complurium vocabulorum et significatus proprios neque declinacionem multorum nominum quantitatesque sillabarum scire aut denique recte ac eleganter loqui voluerit, si eas ignoraret.’

43 On Erasmus, see Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars, p. 258.

44 See, on Guarino, , Woodward, Vittorino da Fettre and Other Humanist Educators (New York, 1963) p. 166 Google Scholar, and for Vergerius, op. cit., p. 106. Cf. also Guarino's statement (p. 166): ‘I am well aware that those ignorant of Greek decry its necessity for reasons which are sufficiently evident.”

45 Ms f. 4r (11. 10 ff.).

46 This reminds one of Erasmus’ remark: ‘We have in Latin at best small books and turbid pools while the Greeks have the purest fountains and rivers running with gold' (Geanakoplos, Creek Scholars, p. 258).

47 Ms f. 4X-4.V. One wonders what influence, if any, the seven categories of the most studied Byzantine rhetorician, Hermogenes, may have had on this listing of qualities. See G. Kustas, ‘Function and Evolution of Byzantine Rhetoric’, Viator, Medieval and Renaissance Studies 1 (London, 1970), 1, 64. Also on Hermogenes and his chief commentator Aphthonius see L. Reynolds and Wilson, N., Scribes and Scholars (Oxford, 1968) p. 68 Google Scholar.

48 Ms f. 4v: ‘Pariter quoque dicendum censeo de his que ad poetas atque artem oratoriam et omne genus dicendi spectare videantur, cum neque poema neque oracionem sine nominibus atque recta loquucione figuris coloribus argumentisque aliquis confid posse existimaret. Cumque ars utriusque abunde et copiose ab his tradita et in eorum poematibus ac orationibus ac hystoriis quam plene perfecteque digesta sit, confirmant sentenciam meam veteres auctores latini tarn poete quam oratores etqui historias conscripsere. Quorum nullum ignarum litterarum grecarum fuisse constat. Quin complures eorum adeo bene pleneque eas venerasse, ut dubium esset an litteras grecas vel latinas melius scirent.’

49 Ms f. 5r.

50 From Horace, Ars Poetica, 11. 323-324.

51 Yet Legrand, op. tit., I, 96, quotes a source saying Chalcondyles was versed in Latin and Greek: ‘qui quanta sit et graecarum et latinorum litterarum eruditione refertus’.

52 According to Kustas, op. cit., pp. 64-65, prose was much more valued in Byzantine rhetoric because it was the proper medium of education.

53 Of all the Latins, apparently only Guarino, Aurispa, and Filelfo ever learned both to read and speak Greek well.

54 See Holmes, op. cit., pp. 113, 115 ff.; cf. pp. 262 ff.

55 Ms f. 5r, 11. 11 ff.

56 Argyropoulos criticized Bruni's translations of Aristotle as too free, as overly stressing eloquence. Recall also the Scholastic Bishop of Burgos’ criticism of Bruni's translations (Seigel, op. cit., p. 246). Also on the matter of translation see Holmes, pp. 152 ff.

57 In Zdekauer, L., Lo studio di Siena net rinascimento (Milan, 1894)Google Scholar there is mentioned a chair of astrology at the Siena studium, meaning ‘of astronomy.’ For quotation see MS f. 5v.

58 Ms f. 5v (11. 4-15). One might well compare the similar remarks on the difficulty of learning Greek made by Argyropoulos in 1456 to the students at the Florentine studium.

59 See MS f. 5v. The Greek original from Hesiod, Works and Days (Loed ed., 1. 289) is doubtless the following line:

60 The Latin text (f. IOV) reads: ‘Finiunt foeliciter Orationes viri clarissimi Greci preceptoris mei in studio paduano ac principio sue lecture lepidissime recitate. Scripsi ego Hartmannus Schedel de Nuremberga artium ac medicine doctor Patavinus, in primordio studii de manu prefati Greci dum initia litterarum grecarum edocuit.’ Stauber, Schedelschen Bibliothek, p. 49, believes Schedel could only later have copied the speeches of Chalcondyles, since he was not a Paduan doctor in 1463 or 1464. (The speeches are attached to a printed book in Schedel's library.)

61 See MS f. 6r, 1. 4.

62 Is Chalcondyles obliquely suggesting this by his words that ‘this lectureship is instituted at this famous university for its honor, enlargement, and its utility’ (see MS f. 6,1. 10)?

63 See MS f. 6v ‘Quod potissimum sese impetraturam ab illustrissimo venetorum dominio per dims potenciam et voluntatem sanctissimam et piissimam ab infidelibus liberata Deo propicio et auxiliante et in pristinum statum redacta immortales ei gracias pro tali beneficio perpetuo aget, idque non secus ad salutem suam apparuisse existimabit ac illi qui a malo ut in inferno Dantis Christum pro sua liberatione in infemum descendisse viderant.’

64 See R. Lopez, ‘II principio della guerra veneto-turca nel 1463’, Archivio Veneto, ser. v, xv (1934), 45-131. On Western attempts to aid Byzantium against the Turks see now D. Geanakoplos, ‘Byzantium and the Later Crusades,’ chaps. 2-3, in K. Setton, ed., The Crusades, m (Madison, 1974).

65 ‘Oratio Secunda Greci initio Studii habita Padue Anno domini MCCCCLXxnn' (should be 1464 as indicated in margin). Text in MS f. 7v.

66 It may be that Chalcondyles in his second year's course also taught the Greek historians. Note the use of the words hystoriis (f. 4v) in the first oration and hystoriarum (f. or) in the second oration.

67 Stauber, op. cit., p. 48.

68 Possibly in 1484 because not until then was the preface of Ficino to Plato's Dialogues published, which preface Schedel mentions at the beginning of this document.

69 Cf. the eleventh-century Byzantine Psellus who said one should study a combination of rhetoric and philosophy and then political action (Kustas, op. at., p. 72). On the stages of Byzantine education and subjects studied esp. in the last century, see Brehier, L., Les Institutions Byzantines (Paris, 1949), pp. 467–485 Google Scholar. Baynes, and Moss, , Byzantium (Oxford, 1948)Google Scholar p. 205, say (correctly) that neither the names nor sequences of different branches of Byzantine education are very clear to us. School and university subjects seem to overlap.

70 On history see MS fs. 3V, 4v, and or. The latter famous Latin phrase on history reverts to Petrarch and is found also in Salutati and Vergerio (M. Gilmore, Humanists and Jurists, pp. 18-20). Cf. the ninth-century Byzantine Photius who said: ‘History teaches events done in our midst we can learn about now’ (Kustas, op. tit., p. 71).

71 See Baynes and Moss, op. cit., p. 489.

72 This speech is probably even more extravagantly expressed than the inaugural speech of Argyropoulos in 1456 in Florence, which Seigel, op. cit., p. 250, believes to be the most extravagant of all such speeches.

73 Geanakoplos, D., ‘A Byzantine Looks at the Renaissance: The Attitude of Michael Apostolis to the Rise of Italy to Cultural Eminence’, Greek and Byzantine Studies 2 (1958)Google Scholar 157-162.

74 See summary in Kustas, ‘Function and Evolution of Byzantine Rhetoric’, p. 65. Hermogenes stresses clarity, loftiness, sincerity, beauty, conciseness, and above all force (deinoles). Hermogenes MSS were known in the West since 1425 and 1427, when Filelfo sent a list of MSS, including Hermogenes, to Florence (see A. Traversari, Epistolae, xxrv, 32).

75 Ferrai, op. tit., p. 30, n. 18, and p. 31. Kustas, op. tit., p. 56, n. 3, states, ‘The study of Byzantine rhetoric is still in its infancy’.

76 See MS f. 9r: ‘Romani etiam qui terre marisque domini … suos liberos Athenas mittere consueverunt.’ One might profitably compare this oration with the inaugural oration given in Florence in 1456 by Argyropoulos (see Seigel, op. tit., pp. 257 ff.).