Per l'epistolario di Isidoro di Kiev (II): la lettera al Doge Francesco Foscari dell'8 luglio 1453, Orientalia Christiana Periodica 84.1 (2018), pp 99-132 (original) (raw)

2018, Orientalia Christiana Periodica

In early July of 1453, some six weeks after the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans, Cardinal Isidore of Kiev, having escaped from Turkish captivity, managed to find shelter in Crete. From there he wrote letters (in Latin) to the Pope and to the Western principalities, urging them to form a Christian coalition against Mehmet II. One of these was addressed to the Venetian Doge Francesco Foscari. This paper contains a new edition of this epistle, based on two previously disregarded manuscripts that allow for the correction of several mistakes in existing editions. The text is equipped with an Italian translation and a historical and philological commentary