La riscoperta di Pausania nel Rinascimento. Stephanus Niger e l'eredità di Demetrio Calcondila

Pausanias’ Periegesis was rediscovered in Italy in the 15th century in a gradual way, without causing wide appeal; above all, there was not a complete Latin translation of it, as it happened, instead, with the most important ancient Greek prose works. A turning point in Pausanias’ text-history is represented by the first decades of the 16th century: the Aldine editio princeps dates back to 1516 and the Dialogus ex Pausania de reconditis Graecarum literarum penetralibus by Stephanus Niger, a humanist from Cremona, was printed in 1517. This paper is focused on Niger and his above-mentioned Dialogus, which was wrongly considered the first Latin translation of the Periegesis. Niger’s dialogue, instead, is a more complex work, which has several features that are typical of the commentary genre. The main character within the Dialogus is Demetrius Chalcondylas, who was Niger’s professor in Milan. In fact, Chalcondylas’ interest in Pausanias is proved by the philological activity on the Periegesis which he carried out in his school.