The Bookseller of Florence: Vespasiano da Bisticci

The Renaissance in Florence conjures images of beautiful frescoes and elegant buildings—the handiwork of the city’s artists and architects. But equally important were geniuses of another kind: Florence’s manuscript hunters, scribes, scholars and booksellers, who blew the dust off a thousand years of history and, through the discovery and diffusion of ancient knowledge, imagined a new and enlightened world. At the heart of this activity was Vespasiano da Bisticci, known as “the king of the world’s booksellers.” From his bookstore beside the Bargello he created deluxe manuscripts of the classics for clients that included popes, kings and three generations of Medici. This lecture, based on Ross’s new book, will introduce Vespasiano, one of the forgotten titans of fifteenth-century Florence.