Bessarion was a Byzantine Greek Renaissance humanist, theologian, Catholic cardinal and one of the famed Greek scholars who contributed to the so-called great revival of letters in the 15th century.
Painting c. 1476 by Justus van Gent and Pedro Berruguete
Wood engraving from Bibliotheca chalcographica, B1
The suburban residence of the bishops of Tusculum along the Appian way in Rome, believed to have been built and utilized by Cardinal Bessarion during his episcopate (1449–1468).
Tomb of Bessarion in the Santi Apostoli, Rome.
Renaissance humanism was a worldview centered on the nature and importance of humanity, that emerged from the study of Classical antiquity. This first began in Italy and then spread across Western Europe in the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries. During the period, the term humanist referred to teachers and students of the humanities, known as the studia humanitatis, which included the study of Latin and Ancient Greek literatures, grammar, rhetoric, history, poetry, and moral philosophy. It was not until the 19th century that this began to be called humanism instead of the original humanities, and later by the retronym Renaissance humanism to distinguish it from later humanist developments. During the Renaissance period most humanists were Christians, so their concern was to "purify and renew Christianity", not to do away with it. Their vision was to return ad fontes to the simplicity of the Gospels and of the New Testament, bypassing the complexities of medieval Christian theology.
Medieval and Renaissance Italian writers portrayed by Giorgio Vasari in Six Tuscan Poets (1544). From left to right: Cristoforo Landino, Marsilio Ficino, Francesco Petrarca, Giovanni Boccaccio, Dante Alighieri, and Guido Cavalcanti.
Frontispiece depicting Dante Alighieri, Giovanni Boccaccio, and Francesco Petrarca with the coat of arms of the Medici–Toledo family on top.