The Letters of Marsilio Ficino

This series is the first English translation of the letters of the philosopher priest who helped to shape the Renaissance worldview. This volume spans the seventeen months from April 1491 to September 1492. This is a crucial period for Marsilio Ficino and Florence itself, for it witnessed the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent. In one of the letters Ficino calls him ‘the great and god-like Lorenzo’. In a letter to Lorenzo in Volume 1, he had written: ‘Almost all other rich men support servants of pleasure, but you support priests of the Muses’.Of the 34 letters in this volume, five are addressed to Martin Prenninger, Professor of Ecclesiastical Law at Tubingen University and counsellor to Count Eberhard. One, the longest in this volume, consists mainly of extracts selected by Ficino from his translation of Proclus’ commentaries on Plato’s Republic.Another letter to Prenninger gives an insight into Ficino’s activities in this period: his work with the Divine Names of Dionysius, the preparation of a copy of his Philebus commentary being made for Prenninger, and the reprinting, in Venice, of his translations of Plato’s dialogues and the Platonic Theology.Most interesting and intriguing is Ficino’s response to Prenninger’s frequent request to receive a list of his friends, with which he complies, requesting him not to infer any ranking from the order in which they are listed.