Italian Humanism and Early Christian Literature

The fourteen essays in this volume examine the effect of Renaissance humanism on science, philosophy, biblical studies, conciliarism, patristic scholarship, East-West religious relations, and the Augustinian Order, including Giles of Viterbo, the head of the Order when Martin Luther rebelled. The essays, previously published in various books and journals, discuss not only major actors such as Galileo Galilei, Marsilio Ficino, Lorenzo Valla, Pietro Pomponazzi, Pope Nicholas V, George Scholarius, Cardinal Bessarion, and Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, but also lesser known ones such as Pietro Balbi, Zanobi Acciaiuoli, Theodore Gaza, John Plousiadenos, and Niccolò Scutelli. The history of patristic authors in the Renaissance looms large, especially St. Augustine, Ignatius of Antioch, Basil the Great, Eusebius of Caesaria, and Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite.