Francesco Filelfo

Timeline

1. 1398–1420Padua · PaduaFilelfo was born in Tolentino, Marche, and went to Padua to study grammar, rhetoric, and Latin literature under Gasparino Barzizza, teaching by about age eighteen. In 1417 he was invited to Venice to lecture on rhetoric and moral philosophy and received citizenship, building the reputation that preceded his embassy to Byzantium.
2. 1420–1427Constantinople · ConstantinopleAround 1420 he arrived as secretary to the Venetian official in Constantinople, studied Greek under Manuel Chrysoloras's circle—specifically John Chrysoloras—and married his daughter Theodora. He won the favor of John VIII Palaeologus, took part in diplomacy, and collected dozens of Greek manuscripts. In 1427 he returned to Venice with his family and manuscripts, becoming one of the Italian humanists most versed in Greek at the time.
3. 1427–1434Florence · FlorenceAfter a plague in Venice he moved to Bologna, and in 1429 joined the Florentine studio to teach Greek and Latin classics, also lecturing on Dante to the public at the cathedral. He engaged in fierce disputes with Niccolò Niccoli, Carlo Marsuppini, and Cosimo de' Medici's circle, attacking them in satirical writings. After Cosimo returned to power in 1434, Filelfo was forced to leave and moved on to Siena.
4. 1439–1481Milan · MilanIn 1438–1439 he moved via Bologna to Milan, successively under the patronage of Filippo Maria Visconti and Francesco Sforza, received Milanese citizenship, wrote court poems including the Sforziada, and translated Greek works by Xenophon, Plutarch, and others. In the 1470s he briefly went to Rome, later reconciling with Lorenzo de' Medici. In 1481 he was invited back to Florence to teach Greek, dying on July 31 about two weeks after arriving, and was buried in the church of Santissima Annunziata.