Pietro Balbi (1399–1479), of Pisa

Pisa

Pisa is a city in Tuscany, Central Italy, on the right bank of the mouth of the River Arno on the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa...

, was an Italian humanist

Renaissance humanism

Renaissance humanism was an activity of cultural and educational reform engaged by scholars, writers, and civic leaders who are today known as Renaissance humanists. It developed during the fourteenth and the beginning of the fifteenth centuries, and was a response to the challenge of Mediæval...

, a longtime member of the familia of Cardinal Bessarion who moved in the same circle as Nicolas Cusanus, whom he served with his expertise in Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...

. During Pius II

Pope Pius II

Pope Pius II, born Enea Silvio Piccolomini was Pope from August 19, 1458 until his death in 1464. Pius II was born at Corsignano in the Sienese territory of a noble but decayed family...

's pontificate, Balbi was the most prolific translator of Greek patristics

Patristics

Patristics or Patrology is the study of Early Christian writers, known as the Church Fathers. The names derive from the Latin pater . The period is generally considered to run from the end of New Testament times or end of the Apostolic Age Patristics or Patrology is the study of Early Christian...

 in Rome, probably using the Greek manuscripts in Bessarion's own library. One of the quattrocento defenders of Plato

Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

, he translated for Cusanus the epitome

Epitome

An epitome is a summary or miniature form; an instance that represents a larger reality, also used as a synonym for embodiment....

 of Platonic Philosophy, Disciplinarium Platonis epitome, of the 2nd-century philosopher Albinus

Albinus (philosopher)

Albinus was a Platonist philosopher, who lived at Smyrna, and was teacher of Galen. A short tract by him, entitled Introduction to Plato's dialogues, has come down to us. From the title of one of the extant manuscripts we learn that Albinus was a pupil of Gaius the Platonist...

 and the immense Theologica Platonica of Proclus

Proclus

Proclus Lycaeus , called "The Successor" or "Diadochos" , was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Classical philosophers . He set forth one of the most elaborate and fully developed systems of Neoplatonism...

 in 1462, and circulated it in manuscript. Giovanni Andrea Bussi

Giovanni Andrea Bussi

Giovanni Andrea Bussi , also Giovan de' Bussi or Joannes Andreae, was an Italian Renaissance humanist and the Bishop of Aleria . He was a major editor of classical texts and produced many incunabular editiones principes...

 printed his translation of Alcinous

Alcinous (philosopher)

__FORCETOC__Alcinous , or Alcinoos, or Alkinoos, was a Middle Platonist philosopher. He probably lived in the 2nd century AD, although nothing is known about his life. He is the author of The Handbook of Platonism, an epitome of Middle Platonism intended as a manual for teachers...

, and Cusanus cast Balbi and Bussi as interlocutors in his dialogue De lì non aliud in the winter of 1462.

Balbi played a role in the deconstructing of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite

Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite

Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, also known as Pseudo-Denys, was a Christian theologian and philosopher of the late 5th to early 6th century, the author of the Corpus Areopagiticum . The author is identified as "Dionysos" in the corpus, which later incorrectly came to be attributed to Dionysius...

, unmasking the dionysian corpus as apocryphal.

In 1463 Balbi, who was bishop of Nicotera, was appointed bishop of Tropea in Calabria.