¹ Witt, Ronald G., In the Footsteps of the Ancients: The Origins of Humanism from Lovato to Bruni (Leiden, 2003); idem, The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy (Cambridge, 2012). But see the review article of the second of these books by Alexander Murray: “Out of Limbo: Devotion, Erudition and an Anticlerical Strain in a Remarkable Study of the ‘All-Conquering Classical Enthusiasm’ that Nourished the Renaissance,” The Times Literary Supplement (January 11, 2013): 3–4, for some limitations in Witt's perspective concerning theological matters and the role of religion in the Italian Renaissance.Google Scholar

² For a detailed account of Poliziano's intervention in this debate in the context of humanist theology, seeCamporeale, Salvatore I., “L'esegesi umanistica del Valla e il simposio teologico di Lorenzo il Magnifico a palazzo Medici: L'intervento di Poliziano,” in Poliziano nel suo tempo: Atti del VI convegno internazionale (Chianciano-Montepulciano 18–21 luglio 1994), ed. Tarugi, Luisa Secchi (Florence, 1996), 283–95. For more general accounts, seeVerde, Armando F., Lo studio fiorentino 1473–1503: Ricerche e documenti, vol. 4, La vita universitaria (Florence, 1985), 822–29; Kraye, Jill, “Lorenzo and the Philosophers,” in Classical Traditions in Renaissance Philosophy (Aldershot, 2002), chap. 4. For a detailed analysis of the main arguments in this debate and their implications, seeEdelheit, Amos, Scholastic Florence: Moral Psychology in the Quattrocento (Leiden, 2014), 33–81.Google Scholar

³ The crucial mention of Pico's role in encouraging Poliziano to study philosophy can be found in Poliziano's 1489 Miscellanea, which is cited and discussed inCelenza, Cristopher S., “Poliziano's Lamia in Context,” in Angelo Poliziano's Lamia: Text, Translation, and Introductory Studies (Leiden, 2010), 1–45, at 34 and 34n82, where we find that “is [Picus] me institit ad philosophiam, non, ut antea, somniculosis, sed vegetis vigilantibusque oculis explorandum, quasi quodam suae vocis animare classico.” Celenza's account is a very useful starting point for an examination of the relations between Poliziano and philosophy.Google Scholar

⁴ On this text seeHankins, James, Plato in the Italian Renaissance (Leiden, 1990), 2:449–53. For Poliziano's preface to this translation, and for Badius's remarks on this preface and on Ficino's and Poliziano's translations, see ibid., 623–29. At 449, Hankins points out how little scholarly attention this translation by Poliziano has received. One should add that Poliziano's general attitude to philosophy has not attracted enough scholarly attention either and that his interest in philosophy is still regarded as very marginal in comparison to his philological achievements. The fact that we find Plato, beside Homer and Demostenes, mentioned among his Musarum instrumenta in a letter to Lorenzo cited and discussed by Hankins, at 450–51, is yet another example of this.Google Scholar

⁵ Poliziano, Angelo, Due poemetti latini: Elegia a Bartolomeo Fonzio; Epicedio di Albiera degli Albizi, ed. Bausi, Francesco (Rome, 2003); see Ad Bartholomaeum Fontium, verses 155–90. And see an account of this elegy for Fonzio inCelenza, , “Poliziano's Lamia in Context,” 3. An important comparison between Poliziano's Panepistemon andFonzio's, Oratio in bonas artes can be found in Jean-Marc Mandosio, “Filosofia, arti e scienze: l'enciclopedismo di Angelo Poliziano,” in Poliziano nel suo tempo, ed. Tarugi, , 135–64, at 145–46.Google Scholar

⁶ Poliziano, Angelo, Omnia opera (Venice, 1498), Y8v: “Qui libros aliquos enarrare Aristotelis ingrediuntur consuevere a principio statim philosophiam ipsam velut in membra partiri, quod et Themistium facere videmus, et Simplicium et Ammonium et alios item peripateticos veteres.” Compare Poliziano's method of dividing the Aristotelian philosophy, and philosophy and science or knowledge in general, to Argyropoulos's method found in his Praefatio in libris Ethicorum quinque primis, in Reden und Briefen italienischer Humanisten, ed. Müllner, Karl(Vienna, 1899), reedited with bibliography and indices by Barbara Gerl (Munich, 1970), 3–18. For a different interpretation of the Panepistemon see Mikkeli, Heikki, “The Aristotelian Classification of Knowledge in the Early Sixteenth Century,” in Renaissance Readings of the Corpus Aristotelicum: Proceedings of the Conference Held in Copenhagen 23–25 April 1998, ed. Pade, Marianne(Copenhagen, 2001), 103–27, especially 110–18. An early version of the Panepistemon, found in Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana MS 2723, fols. 73v–74v, was published in Ida Maïer, “Un inédit de Politien: La classification des ‘arts,’” in Bibliothèque d'humanisme et Renaissance 22 (1960): 338–55; the text is on 343–44.Google Scholar

⁷ Ibid.: “Mihi vero nunc Aristotelis eiusdem libros de moribus interpretanti consilium est, ita divisionem istius modi aggredi, ut quoad eius fieri possit, non disciplinae modo et artes, vel liberales quae dicuntur vel machinales, sed etiam sordidae illae ac sellulariae, quibus tamen vita indiget, intra huius ambitum distributionis colligantur.”Google Scholar

⁸ Ibid.: “Imitabor igitur sectiones illas medicorum quas anatomas vocant. Imitabor et tabularium calculos.”Google Scholar

⁹ Ibid., Y8v–Z1r: “Nam et dividam singula prope minutatim et in summam summarum redigam, quo possit unumquodque vel facilius percipi vel fidelius retineri.”Google Scholar

¹⁰ Ibid., Z1r: “Nec autem me fallit quam sit operis ardui, quod nec ab ullo tentatum hactenus, quam denique obtrectatoribus opportunum quod polliceor.”Google Scholar

¹¹ Ibid.: “Sed ita homo sum. Sordent usitata ista et exculcata nimis, nec alienis demum vestigiis insistere didici, quoniam in magnis etiam voluntas ipsa laude sua non caret, et vilissimos hominum Plato existimat imitatores, meritoque ob id vate Horatio [Ep. I, 19, 19] servum pecus appellati sunt.”Google Scholar

¹² Ibid., Z1r: “Obtrectatorum vero nulla prorsus habenda ratio, qui si nunc desit occasio, facile tamen invenient alteram.”Google Scholar

¹³ Ibid.: “Illud obsecro ne quenquam perturbet, quod ipsis artium vocabulis etiamque Graecis utar interdum, si quidem pleraque sic exposita reperiuntur, ut Latine nondum loqui didicerint, sed et multa diversis artibus disciplinisque communia semel explicata, mox quasi digito notari, nutuque significari sat erit. Nunc adeste animis quaeso, et auribus omnes, ac favete dicenti magnam (ni fallor) et ex perspicua brevique rerum tantarum distinctione utilitatem, et ex erudita quadam novaque vocum diversarum varietate voluptatem percepturi.”Google Scholar

¹⁴ Ibid.: “Nec pompam tamen hic orationis aut verborum phaleras expecteris, et pictae tectoria linguae. Nam quod eleganter Manilius inquit astronomus [Astronomicon, 3, 39]: ornari res ipsa negat contenta doceri.” The same citation from Manilius can be found in Pico's prooemium to his De ente et uno, which was dedicated to Poliziano; seedella Mirandola, Giovanni Pico, De hominis dignitate, Heptaplus, De ente et uno, e scritti vari, ed. Garin, Eugenio (Florence, 1942), 388. And see now in the more recent critical edition of this text, Dell'Ente e dell'Uno, ed. Ebgi, Raphael and Bacchelli, Franco(Milan, 2011), 204.Google Scholar

¹⁵ See, e.g., Niccolò Tignosi's prologue to his commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics, cited inLines, David A., Aristotle's Ethics in the Italian Renaissance (ca. 1300–1650): The Universities and the Problem of Moral Education (Leiden, 2002), 192n33: “Quisquis has glosulas lecturus es, quoniam elegantes minimum conscriptae sunt, praecor latio conveniens pone supercilium [Periapea 1.2]. Non enim omnia possumus omnes.” And see also Vincenzo Bandello da Castelnuovo, “Opusculum Fratris Vincentii de Castronovo Ordinis Praedicatorum ad magnificum ac generosum virum Laurentium Medicem quod beatitudo hominis in actu intellectus et non voluntatis essentialiter consistit incipit,” in Le Thomisme et la pensée italienne de la renaissance, ed. Kristeller, Paul Oskar(Paris, 1967), 187–278; see 196: “Reliquum est, Magnifice Laurenti, ut si in verborum compositione ornatuque sententiarum nos deficere tua eloquentia iudicarit, non propterea munusculum hoc minus gratum habeas. Siquidem theologorum consuetudinem imitamur, qui longo suo exemplo docuerunt oratione simplici huiscemodi gravissimas quaestiones clarius ab omnibus intelligi posse.”Google Scholar

¹⁶ Poliziano, , Omnia opera, Z1r: “Tria sunt igitur inter homines genera doctrinarum: inspiratum, inventum, mixtum. In primo genere theologia nostra; in secundo mater artium philosophia; in tertio divinatio sita est.”Google Scholar

¹⁷ Ibid.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Ibid.: “Philosophia spectativa est, actualis, rationalis. Sed spectativa pars aut res considerat materiae prorsus implicitas, aut a materia penitus abiunctas, aut medias, quasdam re coniunctas, intellectione distractas, easque vel substantias vel accidentia; rursus haec, aut qua multitudo sunt, aut qua magnitudo. Multitudo ut absoluta ut relata. Magnitudo ut manens ut mobilis.”Google Scholar

¹⁹ Ibid.: “Ex hoc igitur spectativi generis quasi stemmate naturalis, et prima philosophia tum quae de anima pertractat, et mathematicae quatuor seu doctrinales: arithmetica, musica, geometria, et sphaerica, cum suis illis quasi pedissequis: calculatoria, geodesia, canonice, astrologia, optica, et mecanica nascuntur.”Google Scholar

²⁰ Ibid.: “Actualis pars mores expendit, sed aut singulorum, aut familiae, aut civitatis. Unde quasi trigeminus partus moralem dispensativam civilemque pertulit.”Google Scholar

²¹ Ibid., Z1r–v: “Rationalis aut indicat, aut narrat, aut demonstrat, aut suadet, aut oblectat. Unde grammatica, historia, dialectica, rhetorica, et poetica emerserunt.” On this seeWesseling, Ari, “Poliziano and Ancient Rhetoric: Theory and Practice,” Rinascimento 30 (1990): 191–204, especially 194, where the author identifies the hidden source for Poliziano's account of rhetoric, grammar, and logic: Martianus Capella's De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii. On the other sources (Quintilian, Augustine, and Isidore) see ibid., nn10–11.Google Scholar

²² Ibid., Z1v: “Naturalis aut circa ea versatur quae communiter insunt rebus, aut circa ea quae videntur inesse, nec insunt. Inesse videntur nec insunt inane et infinitum. Insunt aut vel principia, vel quae principiis adnexa, vel quae de principiis exorta.”Google Scholar

²³ For one example of supporting the idea of the existence of actual infinity in the created world according to Richard Kilvington, seeJung, Elzbieta and Podkoński, Robert, “The Transmission of English Ideas in the Fourteenth Century: The Case of Richard Kilvington,” Mediaevalia Philosophica Polonorum 37, no. 3 (2008): 59–69, especially 64–67. For important general accounts of the concept of space seeAlgra, Keimpe, Concepts of Space in Greek Thought (Leiden, 1995); Grant, Edward, Much Ado about Nothing: Theories of Space and Vacuum from the Middle Ages to the Scientific Revolution (Cambridge, 1981).Google Scholar

²⁴ For an account of the academic status of natural philosophy in the Italian universities seeGrendler, Paul F., The Universities of the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore, 2002), 267–313.Google Scholar

²⁵ Poliziano, , Omnia opera, Z1v.Google Scholar

²⁶ Ibid.: “Prima philosophia deum mentesque corpore seiunctas, ac multiplicia doctrinarum omnium principia quae vocamus axiomata, sed naturae vestigiis indagat.”Google Scholar

²⁷ Ibid., Z1v–Z2r.Google Scholar

²⁸ Ibid., Z2r: “Expetitio vero in ratione voluntas, in sensibus, aut iracundia est, aut libido.”Google Scholar

²⁹ Ibid. On these debates see, e.g., the studies ofAlliney, Guido, “La contingenza della fruizione beatifica nello sviluppo del pensiero di Duns Scoto,” in Via Scoti: Methodologica ad mentem Joannis Duns Scoti; Atti del Congresso Scotistico Internazionale, Roma 9–11 marzo 1993, ed. Sileo, Leonardo (Rome, 1995), 2:633–60; idem, “Fra Scoto e Ockham: Giovanni di Reading e il dibattito sulla libertà a Oxford (1310–1320),” Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale 7 (1996): 243–368; idem, “La ricezione della teoria scotiana della volontà nell'ambiente teologico parigino (1307–1316),” Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale 14 (2005): 339–404; idem, “The Treatise on the Human Will in the Collationes oxonienses Attributed to John Duns Scotus,” Medioevo 30 (2005): 209–69.Google Scholar

³⁰ Ibid.: “Nemesius autem sic in libro De homine. Vis inquit animae triplex est: animalis, vitalis, naturalis. Primi generis mens, phantasia, ratiocinatio, memoria, cogitatio. Tum opinio, sensusque particulares et quicunque motus ab electione proficiscuntur. Secundum genus in respiratione continetur et pulsibus. Tertium vero in gignendo, nutriendo, augendo, continendo, transmutando, excernendo.”Google Scholar

³¹ Ibid.: “Fit et illa divisio de partibus corporis, ut in cerebro ratio, ira in corde. Cupiditas collocetur iecore, quod est virtutibus et vitiis commune seminarium.”Google Scholar

³² Ibid., Z2r–Z3r.Google Scholar

³³ Ibid., Z3r: “Moralis, pars civilitatis est, in qua de bonis agitur diversis. Quorum numero etiam virtus est seu rationalis anime sit, seu rationi obtemperantis.”Google Scholar

³⁴ Ibid.: “Tractantur igitur affectus et potestates et habitus animi, et in his excessus, defectus, mediocritates, arbitrium, electio, appetitus eiusque partes: cupiditas, furor, voluntas.”Google Scholar

³⁵ Ibid.Google Scholar

³⁸ Ibid., Z3r–v.Google Scholar

³⁷ Ibid., Z3v–Z5r.Google Scholar

³⁸ Ibid., Z5r: “Sed iam video de fece haurimus. Itaque mox paulo meliora.” This faex is sharply contrasted to the “celebrated arts according to the authors,” described on Z3v.Google Scholar

³⁹ Ibid.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Ibid.: “Historia, vel fabularis vel ad fidem. Fabularis, aut voluptatis, ut in argumentis comicorum, aut adhortationis gratia; haec aut argumentum habet ex ficto ut Aesopeis fabulis, aut ex veri soliditate, quam aut per turpia contexitur, ut in quibusdam poeticis figmentis, aut pio tegitur velamine, quod solum genus philosophi veteres admiserunt. Ad fidem historia de locis est, ut geographia, vel de temporibus ut chronice, vel de natura ut animalium, plantarum, vel de gestis rebus ut annales, historiaeque ceterae: quarum elementa sunt personae, causae, locus, tempus, modus, instrumentum, materia, res. Stilus in historia fusus et continuus, non perihodicus, nisi cum prosopopoeias asciscit in contionibus.”Google Scholar

⁴¹ Wesseling, , “Poliziano and Ancient Rhetoric: Theory and Practice” (n. 21 above).Google Scholar

⁴² Poliziano, , Omnia opera (n. 6 above), Z5r–v: “Dialecticam prius latinitate donavit Marcus Varro, quam sex normis utitur. Et enim de loquendo, de eloquendo, de proloquendo, de proloquiorum summa, de iudicando, de his quae dicenda sunt quaerit.” It is beyond the scope of the present article to deal with the complex blend of Aristotelian and Stoic logic found in Martianus Capella. It is enough to point out that Poliziano in this case does not seem to be aware of these very different traditions reflected in his source.Google Scholar

⁴³ Ibid., Z5v.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ See n. 16 above.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Ibid., Z6v: “Reliqua divinatio est, quae prophetia quoque dicitur a nostris. Haec (ut ait sacer Chrysostomus) aut spiritalis, aut naturalis, aut artificiosa, aut popularis, aut damnata est et profana.”Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Ibid.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Ibid.: “Onirocriticon artificiosa est qua medici, qua consiliarii, qua gubernatores utuntur. Nam et medici morborum principia, momenta, finesque praesciscunt, et consiliarii, quid expediat in posterum coniectant, et gubernatores ventorum tempestatumque praevident varietates.”Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Ibid.: “Tum illa quoque pars damnata in primis, quae vel malos genios consulit, vel deos evocat manis, cuique magicae nomen fecimus … multaque id genus alia vana prorsus, et deridicula quaeque iam merito silentii nos admonent.”Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Poliziano, , Opera omnia (Lyon, 1546), 174–78. This rather short but dense text “has never … been correctly interpreted,” according toHunt, Jonathan, Politian and Scholastic Logic: An Unknown Dialogue by a Dominican Friar (Città di Castello, 1995), 27 (part of the introduction to the critical edition). This interesting account by Poliziano of dialectic, logic, and philosophy as a whole reflects his complex and more mature attitude to these disciplines and to scholastic philosophy, beyond his well-known attacks. One good example of such an attack is cited by Hunt, at 26n62 in his introduction. The basic facts concerning the date (October 1491, the beginning of the academic year 1491–92) and circumstances (introductory lecture to Poliziano's first course on logic) of the writing of the Praelectio de dialectica can be found inVerde, , Lo studio fiorentino (La vita universitaria), 3:1043–45. And see also the general account inBranca, Vittore, Poliziano e l'umanesimo della parola (Turin, 1983), 73–78. For the exact dating of the text and an account of the contents of Poliziano's courses on Aristotelian logic seeWolters, Al, “Poliziano as a Translator of Plotinus,” Renaissance Quarterly 40 (1987): 452–64, especially 463–64. For Hunt's speculations concerning this text see Politian and Scholastic Logic, 27–28. See also Hunt's general discussion of Poliziano and scholasticism, with further references to modern scholarly literature, on 23–33. Hunt's approach clearly prioritizes the humanists over the scholastics, as can be seen from the fact that the name of Francesco di Tommaso, the author of De negocio logico, is not even mentioned in the title of this critical edition of his text while the name of the dedicatee Poliziano is mentioned. (This reflects an overall attitude: the whole discussion and scholarly attention focused on Francesco di Tommaso, including the preparation of a critical edition of his text, is only justified by its relation to Poliziano!) Some remarks on the relations between the scholastic thinkers and the studia humanitatis (18), or on the dialogue form (21), reveal Hunt's limited understanding of some key features of Renaissance scholastic thinkers. In this respect Hunt reflects what is still quite a common perspective in Renaissance studies. I shall therefore offer a different interpretation of Poliziano's Praelectio de dialectica from the one presented by Hunt on 28–32. For the best previous attempt to deal with issues concerning Poliziano and dialectic seeVasoli, Cesare, La dialettica e la retorica dell'Umanesimo: “Invenzione” e “Metodo” nella cultura del XVe XVI secolo (Milan, 1968; repr., Naples, 2007), 183–203.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Ibid., 174–75: “Dialectica nobis in manibus, non illa quidem, quae ars una omnium artium maxima dicitur, eademque purissima philosophiae pars est, quaeque se supra disciplinas omnes explicat, omnibus vires accommodat, omnibus fastigium imponit. Illa enim (si Plotino credimus Platonicorum summo) praestat, ut ratione quadam de quovis dicere possimus, quod sit, quo differat ab alio, in quo conveniat, aut ubi quidque sit, an sit quod est, quot sint quae sunt, quot rursus quae non sunt, alia scilicet ab iis, quae sunt. Haec et de bono disputat, et de eo, quod bonum non est, omniaque pertractat, quaeque sub bono sunt, quaeque sub eo, quod contrarium bono.” In the passage between “ut ratione quadam” and “contrarium bono,” Poliziano is rendering in Latin parts of the Greek parts of Plotinus's account of dialectic found in Enneads I, 3, 4, and 5, as has been shown in Wolters, “Poliziano as a Translator of Plotinus.” For the above cited passage seePlotinus, , Enneads I, 3, 4 (2–7).Google Scholar

⁵¹ Ibid., 175: “ubi vero quieta, nihil iam quaerit ultra, sed in se ipsa considens, etiam, quaeque logica disciplina vocatur, inter propositiones, ratiocinationesque suas, interque regulas, et theoremata agitantem.” See Wolters's remarks on this passage in “Poliziano as a Translator of Plotinus,” 458–59, where he points out some grammatical problems including a lacuna before “interque.”Google Scholar

⁵² Ibid.: “Nec enim ipsa illa talibus, tamque minutis vacat, sicut neque literis, sed veritate perspecta, atque animi cognitis motibus, et haec ipsa plane pervidet, sed materiae sordes reformidans, volutare in eis logicam sinit.” Compare withPlotinus, , Enneads I, 3, 5 (17–19), and seeWolters, , “Poliziano as a Translator of Plotinus,” 458.Google Scholar

⁵³ Ibid.: “Quae tamen quoniam similitudine quapiam dialecticam repraesentat, nata inde contentio inter philosophos est, philosophiaene pars, an instrumentum dialectica sit, an (quod Boetius existimavit) utrumque.”Plotinus, Compare, Enneads I, 3, 5 (8–10): ἡ φιλοσοφία τὸ τιμιώτατον; ἢ ταὐτὸν φιλοσοφία καὶ διαλεκτική; ἢ φιλοσοφίας μέρος τὸ τίμιον. οὐ γὰρ δὴ οἰητέον ὄργανον τοῦτο εἶναι τοῦ φιλοσόφου. Plotinus's point here is that Aristotelian logic is related to philosophy only as far as it is connected to reality. For some discussions of Boethius's logic see, e.g., Ebbesen, Sten, “The Aristotelian Commentator,” in The Cambridge Companion to Boethius, ed. Marenbon, John(Cambridge, 2009), 34–55; Suto, Taki, Boethius on Mind, Grammar and Logic: A Study of Boethius’ Commentaries on Peri Hermeneias (Leiden, 2012); Nikitas, Dimitrios, “Exemplum logicum Boethii: Reception and Renewal,” in Greek into Latin from Antiquity until the Nineteenth Century, ed. Glucker, John and Burnett, Charles(London, 2012), 131–44.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Ibid.: “Verum Platonica ista remota nimis, nimisque etiam fortasis ardua quibusdam videri poterit.”Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Ibid., 176: “Et ego igitur, si ex me quaeratis, qui mihi praeceptores in Peripateticorum fuerint scolis, strues vobis monstrare librarias potero, ubi Theophrastos, Alexandros, Themistios, Hammonios, Simplicios, Philoponos, aliosque praeterea ex Aristotelis familia numerabitis, quorum nunc in locum (si diis placet) Burleus [Walter Burley], Erueus [Herveus Natalis], Occan [William Ockham], Tisperus, Antisberus [William Heytesbury], Strodusque [Ralph Strode] succedunt.” It is important to mention here a dramatic shift from Averroës to Themistius and Simplicius as the best interpreters of Aristotle in both Nicoletto Vernia and Agostino Nifo during the 1490s. On this seeMahoney, Edward P., “Philosophy and Science in Nicoletto Vernia and Agostino Nifo,” in Two Aristotelians of the Italian Renaissance (Aldershot, 2000), chap. 1.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ On this seeDionisotti, Carlo, “Ermolao Barbaro e la fortuna di Suiseth,” in Medioevo e Rinascimento: Studi in onore di Bruno Nardi (Florence, 1955), 1:217–53.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Poliziano, , Opera omnia, 176: “Et quidem ego adulescens doctoribus quibusdam, nec iis quidem obscuris philosophiae, dialecticaeque operam dabam, quorum alii Graecarum nostrarumque iuxta ignari literarum, ita omnem Aristotelis librorum puritatem dira quadam morositatis illuvie foedabant, ut risum mihi aliquando, interdum etiam stomachum moverent.” I cannot accept Hunt's speculations on the meaning of adulescens here and his conclusion inHunt, , Politian and Scholastic Logic, 32: “Politian is using adulescens in the wider sense allowed by classical Latin, meaning a young man roughly between the ages of fifteen and thirty; and it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that he is deliberately exploiting the ambiguity of the word to distance himself from his debt to scholasticism, even as he avows it.” This humanist theme of the purity of the Aristotelian texts, or their sweetness, which was corrupted by ignorant scholastic philosophers and medieval translators, found in our sources at least since the days of Petrarch (e.g., De sui ipsius et multorum ignorantia, in Invectives, ed. and trans. Marsh, David[Cambridge, MA, 2003], 232), probably comes, when it refers to the original texts of Aristotle, from an uncritical reading of Cicero (e.g., De oratore 1, 49), who praises Aristotle's style while referring to Aristotle's “exoteric” works (most of them now lost) such as his dialogues, and not to his “acroamatic” writings, which, after their publication in the first century BCE, slowly became one of the basic textual, philosophical, and scientific foundations for centuries in the Latin West.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Ibid., 176–77. On this seeFryde, E. B., Greek Manuscripts in the Private Library of the Medici, 1469–1510 (Aberystwyth, 1996).Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Ibid., 177: “Quocirca cum ne ipsi quidem quiquam nisi (quod dicitur) ex commentario saperent, libenter ego quoque ad illos adiunxi me duces, quorum trita vestigiis ad usque lares philosophiae semita patebat.”Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Ibid.: “Sed cum ad ipsam quoque dominam affectarem viam, nequaquam postrema fuit cura etiam eius mihi ancillas et pedissequas conciliandi, quae liberales a nostris artes appellantur.” Compare this attitude with the one we find in Pico's letter to Andrea Corneo (1486), where he defends philosophy from its bad image as a discipline of no value unless it can lead to an active political life; he also regrets the expectation that future leaders should only have a taste of philosophy for their general education, or for the sake of showing off their knowledge. Thus he is not willing to turn philosophical learning into some temporary stage during the training of an educated man, a view of philosophy implied in Corneo's letter. SeePico, , Opera omnia (Basel, 1557; repr., Hildesheim, 1969), 376–79, e.g., 377: “Adhortaris me tu ad actuosam vitam et civilem, frustra me et in ignominiam quasi, ac contumeliam tam diu philosophatum dicens, nisi tandem in agendarum tractandarumque rerum palaestra desudem. Et equidem mi Andrea oleum operamque meorum studiorum perdidissem, si ita essem nunc animatus, ut hac tibi parte accedere et assentiri possem. Exitialis haec illa est et monstrosa persuasio, quae hominum mentes invasit, aut non esse philosophiae studia viris principibus attingenda, aut summis labiis ad pompam potius ingenii, quam animi cultum vel ociose etiam delibenda.”Google Scholar

⁶¹ Ibid.: “Earum igitur me scitis ad hanc usque diem familiaritate intima esse usum, quoniam non inutiles esse audieram, praesertim si praepararent ingenium, non detinerent.”Google Scholar

⁶² Ibid.: “Nam si philosophiam non docent, ipsae mox tamen percipiendae locum parant, si non perducunt, ac certe expediunt: quapropter minime equidem negaverim harum quoque beneficio factum, ut ipsis aliquando dominae mensis accubuerim, de cuius videlicet cratera vobis in praesentia propino.”Google Scholar

⁶³ Ibid.: “Nec tamen haec prima nostra sunt rudimenta iuvenes: nam et in palaestram quandoque disputationis, non sine laude descendimus, et philosophiae libros nonnullos vel publice vobis (quod scitis) vel privatim studiosis aliquot hominibus enarravimus.”Google Scholar

⁶⁴ Ibid.: “Denique quid verbis opus est? spectemur agendo: ut enim oves, quod Stoicus inquit Epictetus, in pascua dimissae, nequaquam illae quidem apud pastorem gloriantur, plurimo se pastas gramine, sed lac ei potius, vellusque praebent; ita philosophus minime quidem praedicare ipsa debet, quantum in studiis desudaverit, sed ipsam suae doctrinae frugem proferre in medium, quod et nobis erit, opinor, faciendum.”Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Ibid., 177–78: “Quare ades auribus, atque animis Florentina iuventus, ac verae philosophiae primordia, non iam de lutosis Barbarorum lacubus, sed de Graecorum Latinorumque nitidis fontibus hauri mecum. Curae autem nobis erit, ne quid huc afferatur, quod non vel ratione tueri, vel autoritate possimus.”Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Humanism, according to Kristeller, was an important cultural movement, but it was focused on a very specific part of culture, basically the linguistic disciplines. He saw no relation between the humanists’ interest in rhetoric (both in theory and in practice), their new attitude to Aristotle and Cicero, their critique of scholasticism, their political activity, and their philosophical viewpoint. See, e.g., Kristeller, , “Humanism and Scholasticism in the Italian Renaissance,” in Studies in Renaissance Thought and Letters (Rome, 1956), 553–83, especially 560–74. As the case of Poliziano's attitude to philosophy and logic shows, Poliziano's interest in these disciplines began at least around 1480, when the Dominican Francesco di Tommaso dedicated to him his dialogue De negocio logico, which seems to reflect previous encounters and common interest in scholastic logic. This means that Poliziano's attraction to philosophy and logic is not only the result of Pico's influence in the late 1480s, nor is it some very late development in his intellectual interests that occurred in his last years, during the early 1490s. This interest can be dated at least more than a decade before Poliziano's death in 1494. A general discussion of these issues can be found inHunt, , Politian and Scholastic Logic, 23–33. For a more adequate perspective on the relations between the humanists and philosophy seeKraye, Jill, “Philologists and Philosophers,” in The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Humanism, ed. eadem (Cambridge, 1996), 142–60. For a detailed account of Poliziano's Platonic interpretation of Epictetus's Enchiridion see eadem, “L'interprétation platonicienne de l’Enchiridion d’Épictète proposée par Politien: Philologie et philosophie dans la Florence du XVème siècle, à la fin des années 70,” in Pensé entre les lignes: Philologie et philosophie au Quattrocento, ed. Mariani Zini, F.(Villeneuve d'Ascq, 2001), 161–77.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Poliziano, , Opera omnia (n. 49 above), 178: “Nec vero verbositate nimia, aut perplexitate orationis, aut quaestionum molibus vestrae mentis acies retundetur. Etenim perspicua brevitas, atque expeditus erit nostrae orationis cursus.”Google Scholar

⁶⁸ Ibid.: “Dubitationes autem nec omnes, nec ubique aut interponemus, aut omittemus, sicut vestra quam commodissime exerceantur ingenia, non fatigentur.”Google Scholar

⁶⁹ The perception of Poliziano's model of doing philosophy and his historical and philological approach to philosophical texts presented here is different from the one found in Celenza, “Poliziano's Lamia in Context” (n. 3 above), 28. While Poliziano certainly does not represent anything close to a “formal history of philosophy” in the spirit of Brucker, he still presents something more systematic than “a dialogical reflection on the search for wisdom.” On this see also idem, “What Counted as Philosophy in the Italian Renaissance? The History of Philosophy, the History of Science, and Styles of Life,” Critical Inquiry 39 (2013): 367–401.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ This is yet another example of the need for a detailed reconstruction of the Florentine scholastic discourse in the last decades of the fifteenth century. The phrase “vecchi autori scolastici” used by Vasoli in his La dialettica e la retorica dell'Umanesimo (n. 49 above), 190, to describe those possible opponents against whom Poliziano was reacting is not only too general but also a bit pejorative. I could not find any evidence to support Vasoli's speculation, ibid., that Landino or Ficino are also objects of Poliziano's reaction in the Lamia. We should not forget, however, that Poliziano had some very good relations with Francesco di Tommaso and probably also with other scholastic philosophers.Google Scholar

⁷¹ For Poliziano's text seePoliziano, Angelo, Lamia: Praelectio in priora Aristotelis analytica, ed. Wesseling, Ari (Leiden, 1986); see also the Latin text (with some minor variations from Wesseling's edition) with annotated English translation, in Angelo Poliziano's Lamia, ed. and trans. Celenza, Christopher(Leiden, 2010), 191–253. I shall refer here to this edition. For Poliziano's description of the lamia see 194–98; for the analogy between seeing and philosophizing see 218–20. Igor Candido in “The Role of the Philosopher in Late Quattrocento Florence: Poliziano's Lamia and the Legacy of the Pico-Barbaro Epistolary Controversy,” in Angelo Poliziano's Lamia, ed. Celenza, , 95–129, justly cites a passage from Plato's Timaeus as one possible source for this well-known analogy (110), but his overall interpretation of the importance of Poliziano's Lamia relies too heavily on unhelpful phrases such as “Socratic irony” and “ironic method” (99), or “the Socratic doctrine of inner knowledge” (114), and even on “complex irony,” which he takes from Gregory Vlastos (116). For this reason he misses, for instance, the important differences between Poliziano's and Pico's approaches (122).Google Scholar

⁷² Poliziano, , Lamia, 218–20: “Quod si philosophandum non est, secundum animi virtutem vivendum non est. At sicut animo vivimus, ita animi virtute bene vivimus, quemadmodum sicuti oculis videmus, ita oculorum virtute bene videmus. Qui bene vivere igitur non vult, is ne philosophetur; qui turpiter vivere vult, is philosophiam ne sectetur.”Google Scholar

⁷³ Ibid., 208: “Illam tamen in primis necessariam esse artem qua verum a falso dignoscitur, qua mendacium refutatur, sicuti e diverso, esse occupatissimam vanitatem quae artificium hoc non sequitur sed simulat, verumque colorem fuco mentitur.” The reference to Plato appears earlier, at 206: “Sed extitit Atheniensis quidam senex altis eminens humeris….” This is a hint to an ancient popular etymology of Plaon, “broad-shouldered.”Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Ibid., 228: “At nihil agit philosophia, tantum contemplationi vacat.”Google Scholar

⁷⁵ Ibid., 220: “Mihi autem videtur et illud: qui philosophari nolit etiam felix esse nolle”; “profecto ut felices efficiamur philosophandum est”; “Ut autem medicina corpus, ita animum curat philosophia.”Google Scholar

⁷⁶ Ibid., 222: “Sed quae sola iudicium teneat rectum, quaeque ratione ipsa utatur atque universum bonum contempletur, ea certe vel uti vel imperare omnibus suapte natura potest. Talis autem praeter philosophiam nulla omnino est. Cur igitur pudeat philosophari?” Poliziano's remarks here seem more than the words of “the amateur philosopher, the accomplished Latinist and the imaginative poet”; seeWolters, , “Poliziano as a Translator of Plotinus” (n. 49 above), 460.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ Ibid., 240: “Audio equidem nunc vero et intellego quid dicatis, quid sentiatis, bonae Lamiae. Sed vicissim vos quoque audite me parumper, si vacat. Ego me Aristotelis profiteor interpretem. Quam idoneum non attinet dicere, sed certe interpretem profiteor, philosophum non profiteor. Nec enim si regis quoque essem interpres, regem me esse ob id putarem.” This passage, without the last sentence, is also cited and discussed inVasoli, , La dialettica e la retorica dell'Umanesimo (n. 49 above), 191–92.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ On this issue see the important but inconclusive remarks inVasoli, , La dialettica e la retorica dell'Umanesimo, 202–3. See also the remarks on Poliziano's philological method and its relation to ethics and moral issues inOliver, Revilo P., “Politian's Translation of the Enchiridion,” Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association 89 (1958): 185–217, at 203–7.Google Scholar

⁷⁹ Poliziano, , Lamia, 222: “Sit huius argumentum facilitatis et illud: quod ad maximum incrementum brevi pervenit philosophia nulla etiam proposita mercede. Et quotus est ingeniosorum cui non otium sit in votis ut philosophari liceat? Hoc autem profecto non fieret, si philosophari labor ac non potius voluptas esset. Quid quod exercere id studium semper meditarique possumus, ut quod nullis extrinsecus indigeat instrumentis, ut cui nullus incongruens sit locus? Ubi ubi enim fueris, praesto erit veritas.” I prefer to translate in this polemical context the word labor as “task” (and almost as a job) rather than Celenza's “labor” (ibid., 223).Google Scholar

⁸⁰ Poliziano, , Lamia, 224–26: “Cur autem et mortem prope omnes expavescimus? Quoniam, puto, cuique terribile quod ignoratur, ut quod obscurum, quod tenebricosum est, sicuti contra amabile quod intellegitur, ut quod apertum, quod illustre est.” For this argument in three contemporary thinkers see, e.g., Donati, Alamanno, “De intellectus voluntatisque excellentia,” ed.Borghi, Lambertus, Bibliofilia 42 (1940): 108–15, especially 109: “Id proculdubio quod sibi nequaquam sufficere valet ignobilius est et imperfectius eo quod sibi sufficit. Ex quo perfectissimum in natura dicitur quod nihilo indiget. Is est intellectus, qui operationem suam absque voluntate utique producit, cum absque ea intelligere possit. Voluntas vero minime, quando invisa diligamus, incognita nequaquam.” See alsoSalviati, Giorgio Benigno, “Fridericus, De animae regni principe,” in P. Zvonimir Cornelius Šojat, OFM, De voluntate hominis eiusque praeeminentia et dominatione in anima secundum Georgium Dragisic (c. 1448–1520), studium historico-doctrinale et editio Tractatus: “Fridericus, De animae regni principe” (Rome, 1972), 139–219; especially 151: “coexigere aliquid necessario et indigere illo, si non sit mutua coexigentia, ignobilius et imperfectius est: unde qui nullius indiget, perfectissimus dicitur; sed actus voluntatis poscit et coexigit actum intellectus, hic vero non exigit illum (intelligere namque possumus absque voluntate, velie certo non valemus nisi cognoscamus: ferimur enim in ea solum quae praenovimus); praeclarior igitur intellectus ipse”; and see also at 191: “Cur igitur homo, qui hanc picturam agnoscit, non poterit erga eam elicere amorem, ex quo sequitur voluptas? Unde quamvis homo non possit amare incognita, potest tamen diligere quoquo modo cognita.” As we can see, the context of this argument is the debate concerning the will (which is related through its activity to love) and the intellect (which is related through its activity to reasoning). For the last example see Vincenzo Bandello da Castelnuovo, “Opusculum,” in Le Thomisme et la pensée italienne de la renaissance, ed. Kristeller, (n. 15 above), 245: “Ad idem respondet S. Thomas in quaestionibus De veritate, q. 14, a. 5, ad quintum. Intellectus, inquit, praecedit voluntatem in via receptionis, quia nihil potest velle voluntas nisi id primo in intellectu recipiatur, ut dicitur in tertio De anima. At voluntas praecedit intellectum in movendo seu agendo…. Praemium autem dicitur per modum receptionis, sed meritum per modum actionis. Et inde est quod totum praemium beatificum principaliter ascribitur intellectui, unde dei visio dicitur tota merces beatitudinis…. Meritum autem principals cantati attribuitur quae perficit voluntatem quae movet omnes potentias ad operandum opera meritoria.“Google Scholar

⁸¹ Ibid., 226: “Si igitur quae nota sunt delectant, cur etiam nosse ipsum ac sapere non delectet? At id maxime proprium philosophiae est. Aut igitur nihil agendum in hac vita, nihil expetendum est, aut in sola philosophia tanquam in portu requiescendum.” Compare with the words of Cristoforo Landino from his Praefatio in Tusculanis, written around 1458, inCardini, Roberto, La critica del Landino (Florence, 1973), 304: “Quam ob rem, si humanas solicitudines atque miserias sola philosophia potest pellere, eius saluberrima praecepta diligentissime attendamus illique ceteris posthabitis negociis incumbamus; cuius quidem, etiam si maximus proponeretur labor, summa tamen rei utilitas omnem difficultatem vincere deberet.”Google Scholar

⁸² On the institutional status of theology in the Italian universities and in the academic life of the Renaissance, seeGrendler, , The Universities of the Italian Renaissance (n. 24 above), 353–92. Crucial to this point are Grendler's remarks on 353 that subjects like theology, metaphysics, and scripture “remained minor subjects in universities dominated by arts, medicine, and law.”Google Scholar

⁸³ Poliziano, , Lamia, 226: “Subiciamus, quaeso, oculis hominum vitam. Quid ea est omnis praeter inanem umbram vel, ut significantius ait Pindarus, umbrae somnium? ‘Homo bulla est,’ antiquum inquit proverbium.”Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Ibid.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Ibid., 228: “Nam cum sit anima iuncta agglutinataque corpori ac per omnis artus omnisque sensuum quasi meatus extenta et explicata, non alio mihi videtur supplicio affecta quam quo Mazentius ille Vergilianus miseros cives suos afficiebat. Ita enim de eo canit Poeta noster: ‘Mortua quin etiam iungebat corpora vivis, / componens manibusque manus atque oribus ora, / tormenti genus, et sanie taboque fluenti / Complexu in misero, longa sic morte necabat.’” For the reference to Virgil see ibid., 229n46.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Ibid.: “Nihil igitur in rebus humanis studio curaque dignum praeter illam quam pulchere vocat Horatius ‘divinae particulam aurae,’ quae ut in hoc caeco rerum turbine tamen vita hominum tuto gubernetur. Deus enim est animus nobis, deus profecto, sive hoc Euripides primus dicere ausus, sive Hermotimus, sive Anaxagoras.” For the references to Horace and Iamblichus see ibid., 229nn47–48. For more sources see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, (n. 71 above), 83.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ In Stoic sources animus is a translation of logos; see Adler's index to the Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, collegit Ionnes ab Arnim, Volumen IV, quo indices continentur, conscripsit Maximilianus Adler, Lipsiae in Aedibus B. G. Teubneri, 1924 (and reprints), 91. This logos emerges from the hegemonikon but is not equal to it. In this regard Horace's expression reflects just that: our own human animus is a spark of the divine pneuma = hegemonikon. One need not assume that Poliziano was fully aware of all these Stoic connections.Google Scholar

⁸⁸ On this point seeGrafton, Anthony, “On the Scholarship of Politian and its Context,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 40 (1977): 150–88. And see alsoReeve, Michael D., “Classical Scholarship,” in The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Humanism, ed. Kraye, (n. 66 above), 20–46, especially at 29–30.Google Scholar

⁸⁹ Poliziano, , Lamia, 232–34: “An is non eum deridebit qui se generosissimum putet quod avos quinque forte aut sex nobiles numeret et divites? Cum sciat in stemmate cuiusvis et serie generis prope innumeros inveniri et servos et barbaros et mendicos, nec esse regem quemquam qui non sit e servis natus nec item servum cui non origo sint reges. Omnia enim ista, quae distant, longa aetas miscuit.” It seems that Poliziano is combining here two sources: Plato and Seneca. Compare Seneca (probably Poliziano's first source where he found the reference to Plato), Ad Lucilium epistulae morales, ed. Reynolds, L. D.(Oxford, 1965), 1:44: “Platon ait [Theaet. 174e5–175a5] neminem regem non ex servis esse oriundum, neminem servum non ex regibus. Omnia ista longa varietas miscuit et sursum deorsum fortuna versavit.” See also Plato's account (and the manner in which Poliziano modified it): ὡς γενναῖός τις ἑπτὰ πάππους πλουσίους ἔχων ἀποφῆναι … (174e6–7); … ὃτι πάππων καὶ προγόνων μυριάδες ἑκάστῳ γεγόνασιν ἀναρίθμητοι, ἐν αἷς πλούσιοι καὶ πτωχοὶ καὶ βασιλῆς καὶ δοῦλοι βάρβαροί τε καὶ Ἕλληνες πολλάκις μυρίοι γεγόνασιν ὁτωοῦν … (175a2–5). And see also Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 89.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ Compare Poliziano's account of noble origins with the words of his student and follower in the Studio fiorentino, Marcello di Virgilio Adriani, who was also the chancellor of the Florentine republic and served in different political positions during the last decade of the fifteenth century and the first two decades of the sixteenth century, found in his 1516 funeral oration for Giuliano de'Medici, inMcManamon, John M. S.J., “Marketing a Medici Regime: The Funeral Oration of Marcello Virgilio Adriani for Giuliano de'Medici (1516),” Renaissance Quarterly 44 (1991): 1–41; see 29–30: “Dum enim eandem urbem incolentes omnes aequa virtutis suae proportione, eadem dignitate et civilitatis honore esse voluistis, dum novae peregrinaeque virtuti aditum ad honores in vobis non precluditis speratisque et alienum et e plebe hominem posse inter vos fieri in curia sapientem, in foro facundum, domi utilem, foris honestum, bello paceque bonum civem, nec (quod fere ubique fit) nobilitati tantum sed virtuti honorum titulos et praemia decernitis, dum acerbissimarum ignavae nobilitatis legum vinculis solutos cives vestros esse voluistis licereque omnibus quod virtuti suae respondeat confidentius quaerere — nuptias, magistratus, honores, clientelas, et imperia — et, ubi virtus sit, paupertatem aliasque Fortunae Naturaeve iniurias nihil obesse, et, ne longiores simus, dum licet in consortio et societate reipublicae esse et, quod aequae libertatis est, sortito et invicem annuis magistratibus parere atque imperitare, eo incrementi et gloriae res vestra perducta est ut rerum gestarum gloriae imperium accesserit et gloriam studiumque eius tanta imperii merces nunc etiam accendat.” McManamon's observation on 4 that “Florence's humanist chancellors were committed public servants but cautious ideologues” who “lent their academic prestige to a variety of regimes” is crucial here. For some “classic” scholarly accounts of these issues with further references, see, e.g., Baron, Hans, The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance: Civic Humanism and Republican Liberty in an Age of Classicism and Tyranny (Princeton, NJ, 1966); idem, In Search of Civic Humanism, 2 vols. (Princeton, NJ, 1988). For a critical evaluation of Baron's thesis see especiallyHankins, James, ed., Renaissance Civic Humanism: Reappraisals and Reflections (Cambridge, 2000). See alsoRabil, Albert Jr., “The Significance of ‘Civic Humanism’ in the Interpretation of the Italian Renaissance,” in Renaissance Humanism: Foundations, Forms, and Legacy, ed. Rabil, Albert Jr.(Philadelphia, 1988), 1:141–74; Hankins, James, “The ‘Baron Thesis’ after Forty Years and Some Recent Studies of Leonardo Bruni,” Journal of the History of Ideas 56 (1995): 309–38.Google Scholar

⁹¹ Poliziano, , Lamia, 234–40; see 238: “Cedo, quid hic volutabit animo? Quid faciet? Quoties carcerem caecum, quoties vincula, quoties vere umbratilem sapientiam, recordabitur, equidem puto gratias diis aget magnas, ingentes, quod inde se emerserit tandem dolebitque vicem sociorum, quos in tantis reliquerit malis.” For the source of this version see ibid., 235n55.Google Scholar

⁹² Ibid., 240: “Nunc illud tantum admonebo: vinctos in tenebris homines nullos esse alios quam vulgus et ineruditos, liberum autem ilium clara in luce et exemptum vinculis, hunc esse ipsum philosophum de quo iamdiu loquimur. Atque utinam is ego essem! Non enim tam metuo invidiam crimenque nominis huius ut esse philosophus nolim, si liceat.”Google Scholar

⁹³ Ibid.: “Nec ita imperitae aut praeposterae sumus ut philosophiam tibi obiectaremus pro crimine. Sed illud indignabamur, facere te (ne graviore utamur verbo) subarroganter, qui triennio iam philosophum te profitearis ac nunquam scilicet ante id tempus operam philosophiae dederis. Ob id enim nugatorem quoque te diximus, quod illa diu iam doceas quae nescias, quae non didiceris.”Google Scholar

⁹⁴ See n. 77 above.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Ibid.: “Nec apud nos Donatus, puta, et Servius, apud Graecos Aristarchus et Zenodotus continuo se poetas profitentur, quoniam quidem poetas interpretentur.” For the sources here seeLamia, ed. Wesseling, , 98.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ Ibid., 240–44: “An non Philoponus ille Ammonii discipulus Simpliciique condiscipulus idoneus Aristotelis est interpres? At eum nemo philosophum vocat, omnes grammaticum. Quid? Non grammaticus etiam Cous ille Xenocritus et Rhodii duo Aristocles atque Aristeas et Alexandrini item duo Antigonus ac Didymus et omnium celeberrimus idem ille Aristarchus? Qui tamen omnes (ut Erotianus est auctor) Hippocratis interpretati sunt libros, sicuti alii quoque, quos Galenus enumerat. Nec eos tamen quisquam medicos esse ob id putat.” In this context Celenza is of course right in maintaining that the Latin grammaticus should be rendered as “philologist,” See ibid., 243n60. For the sources here see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 99.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ Ibid., 244: “Grammaticorum enim sunt hae partes, ut omne scriptorum genus, poetas, historicos, oratores, philosophos, medicos, iureconsultos excutiant atque enarrent.” For the sources here see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 99–101.Google Scholar

⁹⁸ Ibid.: “Nostra aetas, parum perita rerum veterum, nimis brevi gyro grammaticum sepsit. At apud antiquos olim tantum auctoritatis hic ordo habuit ut censores essent et iudices scriptorum omnium soli grammatici, quos ob id etiam criticos vocabant.” For the sources here seeLamia, ed. Wesseling, , 101–2.Google Scholar

⁹⁹ Ibid.: “Indignari litterati possunt quod grammatici nunc appellentur etiam qui prima doceant elementa. Ceterum apud Graecos hoc genus non ‘grammatici’ sed ‘grammatistae,’ non ‘litterati’ apud Latinos sed ‘litteratores’ vocabantur.” For the source here see ibid., 245–47n65. See also Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 100–101, for an important account of a change in the usage of the term grammaticus in Poliziano.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁰ Ibid., 246: “Rogo vos, adeone esse me insolentem putatis aut stolidum ut, si quis iurisconsultum me salutet aut medicum, non me ab eo derideri prorsus credam? Commentarios tamen iamdiu (quod sine arrogantia dictum videri velim) simul in ius ipsum civile, simul in medicinae auctores parturio et quidem multis vigiliis, nec aliud inde mihi nomen postulo quam grammatici.” For the sources here see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 104–5.Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ Ibid.: “Quomodo enim tu philosophus qui nec magistros habueris nec id genus unquam libros attigeris?”Google Scholar

¹⁰² Ibid., 248: “Nec autem allegabo nunc vobis familiaritates quae mihi semper cum doctissimis fuere philosophis, non etiam extructa mihi ad tectum usque loculamenta veterum commentariorum praesertimque Graecorum, qui omnium mihi doctores prestantissimi videri solent.” For the background here see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 107–9. This does not mean of course that Poliziano did not use many other ancient philosophical sources; see, e.g., his excessive use of Sextus shown in Lucia Cesarini Martinelli, “Sesto Empirico e una dispersa enciclopedia delle arti e delle scienze di Angelo Poliziano,” Rinascimento 20 (1980): 327–58.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ See n. 55 above.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁴ The list of philosophy teachers at the University of Florence in the early 1490s presented inLamia, ed. Wesseling, , xiv, n. 6(and based on Verde's essential volumes on the Florentine Studium), is, of course, only a possible starting point for reconstructing this intellectual context.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁵ Poliziano, , Lamia, 248: “Sed ita vobiscum paciscar: si nullus in nostris aut scriptis aut sermonibus odor est philosophiae, nemo audisse me philosophos aut eorum attigisse libros arbitretur. Sin plurima sunt in eis quae sectam redoleant aliquam, tunc me, si non peperisse ipsum talia, saltem didicisse credite a doctoribus.”Google Scholar

¹⁰⁶ Ibid., 250.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ Ibid.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁸ Ibid.: “… fere in omnibus gymnasiis a nostrae aetatis philosophis, non quia parum utiles, sed quia nimis scrupulosi, praetereuntur. Quis mihi igitur iure succenseat, si laborem hunc interpretandi difficillima quaeque sumpsero, nomen vero aliis philosophi relinquero?” In the annotations added to Poliziano's contract with the University of Florence in 1489–90 and 1491–92 we find that utility is mentioned; see Celenza (citing documents that were first published by Verde), “Poliziano's Lamia in Context” (n. 3 above), 7: “Cum latine tum grece eas lectiones quas studiosis utiles esse arbitratur”; 8: “… lectiones … quas ipsemet utiliores et fructuosiores florentinae iuventuti esse cognoverit.”Google Scholar

¹⁰⁹ SeeCelenza, , “Poliziano's Lamia in Context,” 43–44.Google Scholar

¹¹⁰ Poliziano, , Lamia, 250–52. For some sources and background see Lamia, ed. Wesseling, , 113–15.Google Scholar

¹¹¹ For this text I shall usePoliziano, , Omnia opera (n. 6 above), aa7v–bb8v.Google Scholar

¹¹² Ibid., aa7v: “Quod facere navium gubernatores solent, ut maria, portus, litora, insulas intra unam paginam colligant, unde quantum per actum quantumque supersit itineris ratiocinentur, idem mihi nunc arbitror faciendum libris his enarrandis, quibus argumentandi verissima percepta comprehenduntur.”Google Scholar

¹¹³ Ibid., bb2v: “Verum nec una dialectici interrogatio, quae vel unum quaerit de pluribus vel de uno plura, quare nec una responsione excipitur.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁴ Ibid., bb3r: “Praecepta igitur de demonstratione daturus Aristoteles ipsam prioribus libris ratiocinationem, quoniam communior edocet propositionem finiens, quae aliquid aut confirmet aut neget de aliquo. Sed vel universalem esse ait, vel particularem, vel indefinitam, tum aliud demonstrativam propositionem, atque aliud dialecticam, quoniam sumat illa propositionem contradictionis alteram. Haec ipsius contradictionis interrogationem si quaeras illius optionem quod verisimile videatur si respondeas. Terminum quo propositio resolvatur.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁵ Ibid., bb5r: “Principiis credendum potius quam conclusionibus. Praedicatum dici per se de subiecto debet, priusque de omni, per se nunc accipe vel essentia vel proprio, sed et universaliter, universale hic intellige, quod et de omni et per se et qua ipsum est nec in alio prius. Nec ideas demonstraveris.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁶ Ibid.: “Cum discrimen inter universale non cernimus et quod de omni. Nec veritas modo sed et necessitas exigitur. Eaque non conclusionum modo sed et principiorum, non modo esse indicans sed et cur sit, non modo ex necessariis sed et e suis, hoc est ex iis, quae vel unius, vel cognati generis, tum ex universalibus, nec enim corruptibilium, nec autem scientia ulla sua tuetur principia, sed ad unam rediguntur omnes, quae sapientia vocatur.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁷ See n. 53 above.Google Scholar

¹¹⁸ Ibid.: “Quaeque [sapientia] primas et easdem maxime causas considerat, subiectum statuimus esse.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁹ Ibid.: “Proprium quaerimus quid significet, axiomatis utrunque debemus. Quorum interdum vi utimur potius, sed et quaedam sunt axiomata, quae scientiis congruunt omnibus, duae scientiam facultates constituunt, sapientia et dialectica.”Google Scholar

¹²⁰ Ibid.: “Particulari praestat universale, affirmatio negationi, iusta demonstratio illi quae sit ex impossibili. Potior illa et prior facultas quae causam docet alterius, quae circa intelligibile, circa universale vertitur, quae superior, quae simpliciora habet principia.”Google Scholar

¹²¹ Ibid., bb5r–v: “Nam quarum diversa principia sunt, hae diversae scientiae, res eadem variis demonstratur mediis, nulla fortuiti scientia, nihil sensibile demonstratur, demonstrationis origo in sensibus, diversarum scientiarum, nec eadem propria principia, nec communia. Etiam utra opinio et subiecto differt a scientia et aestimationis modo. Nec eiusdem omnino rei opinio et scientia.”Google Scholar

¹²² Ibid., bb5v: “Postremo semen carentis medio propositionis in animo habemus, quando universale illud, quod unum praeter multa sit sensibus imaginatione memoria intellectu, formisque et notis quibusdam paritur. Principium scientiae intellectus hoc est cognitio principiorum scibilis rei.”Google Scholar

¹²³ Ibid.: “Nunc et Topica percurramus. Disserere hic in quo vis negotio docemur. Tractaturque dialectica potissimum ratiocinatio ex probabilibus, differens a litigiosa. Quoniam in ea non tam probabilia sunt quam videntur.” Interestingly, Poliziano presents here the standard Aristotelian definition of accepted or common views (ἔνδοξα), the starting point of any scientific investigation, which was wrongly understood in the Latin tradition at least since Boethius as probabilia, possibly under the influence of Cicero and because of a lack of familiarity with the ancient skeptical terminology in Greek as it is reflected in Sextus Empiricus.Google Scholar

¹²⁴ Ibid., bb6r: “Cernitur et idem et alterorum quod utrunque genere specie numero, quatuor dialectici instrumenta: acceptio propositionum, distinctio intellectuum, inventio differentiarum, consideratio similitudinis.”Google Scholar

¹²⁵ Ibid., bb8v: “Hactenus Aristotelis ars omnis vel ratiocinandi, vel peculiariter demonstrandi, vel differendi, vel postremo cavillandi. Quam qui penitus spexerit, edidicerit, exercuerit, et secum quod opus est argumentando colliget, ac demonstrabit, et cum alio disputans facile quod volet, aut impugnabit, aut tuebitur.”Google Scholar