Article

1. Introduction
2. It is well known that most of the work on ancient Greek texts was transferred to Italy in the period from the conquest of Constantinople by the crusaders in 1204 –when the migration of Byzantine scholars to Western Europe began– to the late 15th century (see J. E. Sandys, A History of Classical Scholarship: From the Sixth Century B.C. to the End of the Middle Ages, v. 1, Cambridge 1903, 376-428; D. J. Geanakoplos, Greek Scholars in Venice: Studies in the Dissemination of Greek Learning from Byzantium to Western Europe, Cambridge 1962; N. G. Wilson, From Byzantium to Italy: Greek Studies in the Italian Renaissance, Baltimore 1992; J. Monfasani, Byzantine Scholars in Renaissance Italy: Cardinal Bessarion and Other Émigrés: Selected Essays). However, not all Greek-speaking scholars left Constantinople in the last two centuries of the Byzantine Empire or after its fall to the Ottomans in 1453. Some distinguished Greek learned men remained and continued their intellectual work, including the study of ancient Greek texts. There are several articles which deal with the interest of the Ottoman court in ancient Greek philosophy and art (H. Inalcik, The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age, 1300-1600, London 1973, 181; J. Raby, Mehmed the Conqueror as a Patron of the Arts, Oxford Art Journal 5, 1 (1982), 6; Idem, Mehmed the Conqueror’s Greek Scriptorium, DOP 37 (1983), 15-34; M. Mavroudi, ‘Ελληνικὴ φιλοσοφία στὴν αὐλὴ τοῦ Μωάμεθ Β´, Bυζαντινὰ 33 (2014), 151-182). They are mainly based on the evidence of Greek manuscripts that were produced in Mehmed’s Greek Scriptorium (hereafter ‘the Scriptorium’).

From at least 16 manuscripts that were produced in the Scriptorium, 14 still survive in the Topkapi Palace Museum Library, while one is now in Paris (National Library of France) and another one in the Vatican Library. Approximately half of these manuscripts deal with ancient Greek language and literature. Apart from the manuscripts that were actually written in the Scriptorium, the Topkapi Palace Museum Library also contains other manuscripts in ancient Greek that were produced in earlier or later centuries (from the twelfth to the sixteenth century) (A. Deissmann, Forschungen und Funde im Serail, Mit einem Verzeichnis der nichtislamischen Handschriften im Topkapi Serai zu Istanbul, Berlin – Leipzig 1933).

It has been suggested that the bulk of these manuscripts was collected by the Sultan himself, thus underlining his humanist leanings. Several authors have tried to answer the question as to why specific ancient Greek texts were copied or otherwise acquired for the purposes of the Ottoman court (Mavroudi, Ἑλληνικὴ φιλοσοφία στὴν αὐλὴ τοῦ Μωάμεθ Β´, 151-182; A. Akasoy, George Gemistos Pletho and Islam, in: Proceedings of the International Congress on Plethon and His Time, ed. L. G. Benakis and Ch. P. Baloglou, Athens – Mistra 2003, 351- 352; Raby, Mehmed the Conqueror as a Patron of the Arts, 6; Inalcik, The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age, 1300–1600, 181). Julian Raby assumes that, “some were probably intended for the training of Mehmed’s Greek chancellery staff, for Greek continued as a language of diplomatic exchange into the first decades of the sixteenth century. Others, on the other hand, bear directly in the Sultan’s interest (Raby, Mehmed the Conqueror as a Patron of the Arts, 6). Among the lastmentioned Raby lists Arrian’s Anabasis (Ἀλεξάνδρου Ἀνάβασις), the standard Greek biography of Alexander the Great, Homer’s Iliad (Ἰλιάς), Ptolemy’s Geography (Γεωγραφικὴ Ὑφήγησις) and Pletho’s Book of Laws (Νόμων συγγραφή). Maria Mavroudi, however, has concluded that the production of these manuscripts “was motivated by a desire to address political, social, and intellectual problems that were important for Ottoman Muslims” (Mavroudi, Ἑλληνικὴ φιλοσοφία στὴν αὐλὴ τοῦ Μωάμεθ Β´, 181).

1. Mavroudi believes that this might have helped Ottoman intellectuals to understand better Pletho’s Book of Laws (or, more precisely, what remained of it that was translated into Arabic) and the use of Greek mythology as a tool of philosophical though: Pletho’s Book of Laws, where he explicates his paganism, was publicly burnt at the order of the patriarch Gennadios II Scholarios, a major opponent of Pletho. See, J. Monfasani, Pletho’s Date of Death and the Burning of His Laws, BZ 98 (2005), 459-463. An anthology of excerpts from Pletho’s works were translated from Greek into Arabic, most probably during the reign of Mehmed the Conqueror. For the context of Pletho’s Arabic translation, see M. Mavroudi, Pletho as Subversive and His Reception in the Islamic World, in: Power and Subversion in Byzantium, ed. D. Angelov and M. Saxby, London – New York (2013), 177-203. In the Ottoman lands of the 15th century, the international lingua franca used in science communication by educated Muslims was Arabic. As a result, a number of Greek texts were translated into Arabic at the court of Mehmed the Conqueror. For detailed information on these translations, see M. Mavroudi, Translations from Greek into Arabic at the court of Mehmed the Conqueror, in: The Byzantine Court: Source of Power and Culture, Papers From, The Second International Sevgi Gön|l Byzantine Studies Symposium, ed. A. Odekan – N. Necipoğlu – E. Akyurek, Istanbul 2013, 195-207: only a handful of such translations are currently known.

George Amiroutzes’ Studies of Ancient Greek Philosophical Texts

One of the most learned men of his day was George Amiroutzes (ca. 1400 – ca. 1469). In his native Trebizond, Amiroutzes held high government offices: he was μέγας λογοθέτης and πρωτοβεστιάριος (R. Guilland, Les Logothètes: Etudes sur l’histoire administrative de l’Empire byzantin, REB 29 (1971), 5-115, esp. 100-115. For the πρωτοβεστιάριος see R. Guilland, Le Protovestiaire, REB 2 (1944), 202–20 [= Idem, Recherches sur les institutions byzantines, v. 1, Berlin 1967, 216-236]. See also ODB, vols. 2, 3, entries Logothetes and Protovestiarios (A. Kazhdan). On the career of Amiroutzes, see B. Janssens and P. van Deun, George Amiroutzes and his Poetical Oeuvre, in: Philomathestatos: Studies in Greek and Byzantine Texts Presented to Jacques Noret for his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. B. Janssens and P. van Deun, Louvain – Paris – Dudley 2004, 297-324; also J. Monfasani, George Amiroutzes. The Philosopher and His Tractates [Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales, Bibliotheca 12], Leuven – Paris – Walpole (MA) 2011, 5-50). Amiroutzes was also active as a scholar, and his contemporaries simply referred to him as ‘the Philosopher’, a title he also used of himself (Critobuli Imbriotae historiae, ed. D. R. Reinsch [CFHB 22], Berolini et Novi Eboraci, 1983, 165-6, 195). Two or three years after the fall of the Empire of Trebizond to the Ottomans (in August 1461), Amiroutzes was invited to the court of Mehmed the Conqueror (Monfasani, George Amiroutzes 8, n. 20. On Amiroutzes’ religious attitude see, among others, N. B. Tomadakis, Ἐτούρκευσε). His contemporary, the Greek historiographer Michael Kritoboulos of Imbros (ca. 1410 – ca. 1470), who refers to him as Ἀμηρούκης, explained in his Histories13 how the Sultan received the learned man (Raby, Mehmed the Conqueror’s Greek Scriptorium, 15-30).

His first tractate, I: The Philosopher’s16 [Tractate] on What the Ancients Taught Concerning Being (A΄: Τοῦ φιλοσόφου ὅπως ἐδόξaζον οἱ παλαιοὶ περὶ τῶν ὄντων), differs significantly from the other 14: rather than a philosophical treatise, it is an enumeration of the greatest ancient Greek philosophers and their main beliefs on being. In this tractate, the author tells of, in chronological order, Thales, Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Democritus, Leucippus, Parmenides, Melissus, Empedocles, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Zeno and Chrysippus and what they said concerning the principle or principles of being; whether there were one or several principles, for example, water or fire, or both, and so on. Amiroutzes does not mention his sources. However, in the footnotes of this treatise, the editor of the text John Monfasani carefully indicates similar passages in the writings of Diogenes Laertius, the Stoics, and especially Aristotle – like Metaphysics (Τὰ μετὰ τὰ φυσικά), Physics (Φυσικὴ ἀκρόασις), On the Heavens (Περὶ οὐρανοῦ), On Generation and Corruption (Περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φθορᾶς), which Amiroutzes apparently had studied.
Amiroutzes’ own philosophical ideas on being and its procession can be found in a number of later tractates: IV: The Philosopher’s [Tractate] Concerning the Procession of Being (Δ΄: Τοῦ φιλοσόφου περὶ τῆς προόδου), V: The Same Author’s [Tractate] [on Procession from the First Principle] (Ε΄: Τοῦ αὐτοῦ), VI: The Same Author’s [Tractate] Concerning the Procession of Being (ς΄: Τοῦ αὐτοῦ περί τῆς προόδου τῶν ὄντων), VIII: The Same Author’s [Tractate] Concerning the First Principle (Η΄: Τοῦ αὐτοῦ περὶ τῆς πρώτης ἀρχῆς), IX: The Same Author’s [Tractate] [on Motion and the First Principle] (Θ΄: Τοῦ αὐτοῦ)22 and XIV: The Same Author’s [Tractate] Concerning the First Principle (ΙΔ΄: Τοῦ αὐτοῦ περὶ τῆς πρώτης ἀρχῆς). In these treatises, the author discusses what philosophers have said on the First Principle (the One, a God), identifying the philosopher from time to time as Aristotle23, Plato and the Platonists, Melissus, Parmenides or Anaxagoras, and further explaining what they have said on the production of being: whether it arises from the First Principle or not.
Whatever the level of Amiroutzes’ teaching as reflected in his tractates, they clearly show that he studied the philosophical works of the greatest ancient Greek learned men. His tractates, though short and fragmentary, reveal erudition in ancient Greek philosophical thought and prove that he had access to works by or on Aristotle, Plato, the Stoics, Plotinus and others. In his treatises, Amiroutzes appears as an Aristotelian philosopher. They are full of references to Aristotle’s thoughts, beliefs and sometimes even include quotations, albeit often without any reference. As Aristotle’s teachings were considered fundamental in Byzantium and every Greek intellectual knew his works well, scrupulous references to them would have been superfluous. These treatises were probably written with a Greek readership in mind, but it is nevertheless believed that Amiroutzes’ knowledge of ancient Greek philosophical thought inspired his Ottoman peers to study and interpret Aristotle, Plato and others (S. P. Lambros, Ποιήματα Γεωργίου τοῦ Ἀμιρούτζη, ΔΙΕΕ 2 (1885), 279-280 and Janssens – van Deun, George Amiroutzes, 314-315).
The Dispute between Platonists and Aristotelians in the Ottoman Court?
The philosophical works of the late Pletho and his major opponent Scholarios, an ardent Aristotelian, may also have contributed significantly to the study of the greatest authors of the ancient Greek past at the Ottoman court. Several of Scholarios’ works from the last decade before 1453 were written to oppose Pletho, whose works were attempts to demonstrate Plato’s superiority to Aristotle as a philosopher and show that Plato’s philosophy was more compatible with Christian revelation. For example, the voluminous Scholarios’ work Against the Ignorance of Pletho on Aristotle (Contra Plethonis ignorationem de Aristotele) originated as a response to Pletho’s On the Differences between Aristotle and Plato (De differentiis Aristotelis et Platonis). To this work, Pletho reacted once again in Against the Objections of Scholarios Concerning Aristotle (Contra Scholarii pro Aristotele obiectiones) (N. Siniossoglou, Radical Platonism in Byzantium: Illumination and Utopian in Gemistos Plethon, Cambridge 2011, 125-160). Pletho and Scholarios’ exchange of treatises resulted in a controversy that continued in Italy between Platonists and Aristotelians for decades (J. Monfasani, A Tale of Two Books: Bessarion’s In Calumniatorem Platonis and George of Trebizond’s Comparatio Philosophorum Platonis et Aristotelis, Renaissance Studies 22 (2008), 1-13; P. Schulz, George Gemistos Plethon (ca. 1360–1454), George of Trebizond (1396–1472) and Cardinal Bessarion (1403–1472): the Controversy Between Platonists and Aristotelians in the Fifteenth Century, in: Philosophers of the Renaissance, ed. P. R. Blum, Washington, D.C. 2010, 23-32).

Amiroutzes’ Work on Ptolemy’s Individual Regional Maps

According to Kritoboulos, Amiroutzes’ activity at the Sultan’s court was not limited to philosophical discussion of the teachings of the ancients. In the summer of 1465, the Sultan commissioned Amiroutzes to carry out a challenging task related to ancient Greek scholarship.

George of Trebizond’s Introduction to Ptolemy’s Great Arrangement

The activity of George of Trebizond (1395–1486) –a Greek émigré in Italy – in Constantinople demonstrates that there was strong interest among the Ottomans in ancient Greek scientific writings. George of Trebizond was well known in Italy as a rhetorician and Latin translator from Greek. He belonged to the so-called ‘Aristotelians’, and his A Comparison of the Philosophers Aristotle and Plato (Comparatio philosophorum Aristotelis et Platonis) published in 1459 was the first major Latin work in the above-mentioned Plato–Aristotle controversy. Monfasani treats George of Trebizond as one of the major intellectual figures of the mid-15th century (J. Monfasani, George of Trebizond: A Biography and a Study of his Rhetoric and Logic, Leiden 1976). In the spring of 1465, George of Trebizond went to Constantinople as an emissary of Pope Paul II to make contact with the Sultan (Monfasani, George of Trebizond, 185).
Matthew Kamariotes’ Teachings on the Ancient Greek Language and Literature
The study of ancient Greek texts in early Ottoman Constantinople was not linked only with the court. Some writings of Matthew Kamariotes that are dated post-1453 clearly demonstrate that he was active as a teacher of grammar, rhetoric and perhaps also philosophy. From Martinus Crusius’ (German philologist, historian, 1526–1607) notes in his Turcograecia we learn that Kamariotes came to Constantinople from Thessalonica in the final years of the Palaiologan dynasty (Crusius, Turcograeciae libri Octo, Basel 1584, 187). It is also known that Kamariotes worked together with Scholarios. Judging by the fact that Scholarios dedicated his work Commentary on Thomas Aquinas “On Being and Essence” (Commentarium Thomae Aquinae “De ente et essentia”) to Kamariotes, many assume that he was pupil (K. Papadakis, Ματθαῖος Καμαριώτης. Τὸ θεολογικό του ἔργο, μετὰ ἐκδόσεως ἀνεκδότων ἔργων του, Thessaloniki 2000, (=http://hdl.handle/. net/10442/hedi/23093), 41, and D. Chatzemichael, Ματθαίος Καμαριώτης: συμβολή στη μελέτη του βίου, του έργου και της εποχής του ( doctoral thesis), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 2002 (=http://hdl.handle.net/10442/hedi/20545),70) of Scholarios. Indeed, in the preface of the aforementioned work, Scholarios praises Kamariotes’ προθυμίαν (eagerness) and φιλομαθές (diligence), but this could indicate either a relationship as colleagues or a teacher-student relationship (Jugie – Petit – Siderides, Oeuvres complètes de Georges (Gennadios) Scholarios, v. 6, 178). It has been assumed that Kamariotes was the first teacher or even a principal66 of the so-called ‘Patriarchal School’ (better known later on as the Patriarchal Academy or the Great School of the Nation) established soon after the fall of Constantinople by the newly appointed patriarch Gennadios II Scholarios (1454?) (M.-H. Blanchet, Georges-Gennadios Scholarios (vers 1400 – vers 1472). Un intellectuel orthodoxe face à la disparition de l’Empire byzantine, Paris 2008).

The manuscripts show that contemporary learned men and their students were interested in a very wide range of topics – from ancient Greek language and literature to sciences and philosophy. They also indicate that the study, and moreover the transmission, of ancient Greek texts in Constantinople should not be associated only with the Ottoman court. The same process was occurring in the educational circle of Matthew Kamariotes and probably also of some other highly educated Greeks. The philosophical writings of the scholar George Amiroutzes suggest that he and his peers, and his students, whoever they were, were especially interested in Aristotelian philosophy and the differences between Aristotle’s and Plato’s views. Kritoboulos’ statement in his Histories on Amiroutzes’ position in the court of Mehmed the Conqueror strongly indicates that it was Amiroutzes who assisted Ottoman intellectuals and the Sultan himself in the study of ancient Greek philosophical thought and its later interpretations. From George of Trebizond’s writings and activities we learn that Mehmed the Conqueror was especially interested in Aristotelian philosophy and that the Plato-Aristotle controversy which had begun some ten years before 1453 was probably also well-known to him. Indeed, judging by the manuscripts in ancient Greek acquired for the Sultan’s Library, it seems that this debate might have inspired the Ottoman intellectuals to study not only ancient Greek philosophers and their followers, but also a number of other ancient Greek authors. From Kritoboulos and George of Trebizond we learn that the Ottomans, as well as studying the ancient Greek philosophical writings, were also interested in at least two ancient Greek scientific texts and their practical use.
Kritoboulos describes in detail the study of Ptolemy’s Geography at the Ottoman court. George of Trebizond’s work in Constantinople in 1465 suggests that the Sultan might have had an interest in another scientific work by Ptolemy – the Almagest, an astronomical manual. Undoubtedly, the personality of Mehmed the Conqueror and his obvious interest in science and the humanities contributed a great deal to the study of these works at the Ottoman court. Some writings of Kamariotes that are dated after 1453 show that he in his educational circle, which was apparently connected to the patriarch Gennadios II Scholarios, was teaching grammar, rhetoric and perhaps also philosophy to his Greek students. The available information about his works, as well as his two edited rhetorical texts, tell us that Kamariotes and his students might have studied such ancient Greek authors as Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Epictetus, Hermogenes and Aphthonios. Unfortunately, due to the lack of edited material, it is as yet impossible to discuss at length and evaluate Kamariotes’ contribution to the study of ancient Greek texts in his educational circle in early Ottoman Constantinople. Further studies of the surviving manuscripts in ancient Greek that were produced in Constantinople in the second half of the 15th century but which are now dispersed among several European libraries might well reveal more important information about the study of ancient Greek texts by the contemporary Greek and Ottoman intellectuals