Benedetto Accolti and the Florentine Renaissance [Paperback]

The first biography of one of the outstanding humanists of the fifteenth-century Renaissance.Benedetto Accolti was one of the outstanding humanists of the fifteenth-century Renaissance. This biography explores the intellectual, political and economic milieu of his native city of Arezzo, the importance of his career as chancellor of Florence and his work as an administrative reformer.Benedetto Accolti was one of the outstanding humanists of the fifteenth-century Renaissance. This biography explores the intellectual, political and economic milieu of his native city of Arezzo, the importance of his career as chancellor of Florence and his work as an administrative reformer.This is the first biography of one of the outstanding humanists of the fifteenth-century Renaissance. Benedetto Accolti's interests ranged from rhetoric, humanism and Italian poetry to Roman law, from historical thought and medieval antiquarianism to the crusades and church history, and his work as a scholar, author and historian is placed in a wide context stretching from antiquity to the eighteenth century. The intellectual, political and economic milieu of Accolti's native city of Arezzo, neglected in modern scholarship, is explored, and the importance of Accolti's career as chancellor of Florence, his role in bringing the new learning to the chancery and his work as an administrative reformer are recognized for the first time. Florence's response to the Turkish menace and contribution to papal crusading efforts are reinterpreted, and new information regarding Accolti's connections with leading Florentine patricians is brought to light.Preface; Abbreviations; 1. Arezzo in the early Renaissance; 2. The Accolti family; 3. Benedetto Accolti's early life and works; 4. Accolti in Florence and Arezzo in the 1440's and the early 1450's; 5. Accolti's election as chancellor of Florence; 6. The Florentine chancellorship; 7. Accolti's Dialogus; 8. Accolti's history of the first crusade and the Turkish menacelD