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Marsilio Ficino
1433–1499 · Florence
Description
Marsilio Ficino was an Italian scholar and Catholic priest who was one of the most influential humanist philosophers of the early Italian Renaissance. He was an astrologer, a reviver of Neoplatonism in touch with the major academics of his day, and the first translator of Plato's complete extant works into Latin. His Florentine Academy, an attempt to revive Plato's Academy, influenced the direction and tenor of the Italian Renaissance and the development of European philosophy.
Facts
| Born | 19 October 1433, Figline Valdarno, Republic of Florence |
| Died | 1 October 1499(1499-10-01) (aged 65), Careggi, Republic of Florence |
| Era | Renaissance philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
| School | Christian humanism, Neohermeticism, Neoplatonism, Augustinianism, Thomism |
| Institutions | Platonic Academy of Florence |
| Main interests | Theology, astrology, metaphysics |
| Notable works | De Christiana religione (1474) Theologia Platonica de immortalitate animae (1482) De amore (1484) De vita libri tres (1489) |
| Notable ideas | Platonic love, Prisca theologia |
Life & work in brief
Summarised by section — one row per topic, for fast reading.
| Work / contribution | Significance |
|---|---|
| Early life | Ficino was born at Figline Valdarno. |
| Career and thought | During the sessions at Florence of the Council of Ferrara-Florence in 1438–1445, when attempts to heal the schism of the Eastern (Orthodox) and Western (Catholic) churches had thus far failed, Cosimo de' Medici and his intellectual circle had made acquaintance with the Neoplatonic philosopher George Gemistos Plethon, whose discourses upon Plato and the Alexandrian mystics so fascinated the humanists of Florence that they named him the second Plato. |
| Death | Ficino died on 1 October 1499 at Careggi. |