Leontios Pilatus

Leontius Pilatus (Greek: Λεόντιος Πιλάτος, Leontios Pilatos, Italian: Leonzio Pilato; died 1366) was a Greek scholar from Calabria and was one of the earliest promoters of Greek studies in Western Europe. Leontius translated into Latin and commented upon works of Euripides, Aristotle and Homer, including the Odyssey and the Iliad, and was the first professor of Greek in western Europe.

Biography

Leontius Pilatus was of Greek origin, born in Calabria. Giovanni Boccaccio and Petrarch persuaded Leontius to produce a complete translation of the Homeric poems. For more than two years, from 1360 to 1362, Leontius lived in Boccaccio's house in Florence, worked with him on Homer, and taught Greek. Boccaccio's mythological works, and especially, The Genealogy of the Pagan Gods were influenced by Leontius and his knowledge; according to Edward Gibbon: "a work, in that age, of stupendous erudition, and which he ostentatiously sprinkled with Greek characters and passages, to excite the wonder and applause of his more ignorant readers." Petrarch received copies of Leontius' translations around 1367, from Boccaccio. It is through this connection with Petrarch and Boccaccio, that the important contribution of Pilatus to the revival of Greek in Western scholarship was effected. He and his translations were made known in modern times through the writings and acknowledgments of Humphrey Hody and the Marquis de Sade.