130 Bruni, Leonardo
there for the next six years at MONTPELLIER, and later in
Arras and Bar-sur-Aube. After the defeat of the Ghi-
bellines and the death of Manfred at Benevento in Febru-
ary of 1266, he returned to Florence, where he held
several important communal offices.
BOOK OF THE TREASUREWhile in France, Brunetto wrote the Book of the Treasure,
an encyclopedic ethical and political manual dedicated to
CHARLESI OFANJOU. Writing in Picard French, he pre-
sented basic knowledge such as is found in the encyclo-
pedic collection of CASSIODORUS,BOETHIUS, and
MARTIANUSCAPELLA. Added to this he made a translation
of the Nichomachean Ethicsof ARISTOTLEand Cicero’s De
inventione.He ended with an outline of the procedures
and ideals of communal government. It was probably
intended to be an intellectual, ethical, and rhetorical
guide to understand and defend ideas about the laws and
ideals of the Italian COMMUNESfor Charles of Anjou or
just to help his fellow citizens understand the commune
better. It also contained much information on geography.
Popular in France, Italy, and the Iberian Peninsula
throughout the next two centuries, it was translated into
Italian as the Tesoro.Brunetto died in 1294 and was
buried in Santa Maggiore in Florence.
See also ROMAN DE LAROSE;MANDEVILLE,JOHN, AND
MANDEVILLE’STRAVELS; NOTARIES AND THE NOTARIATE.
Further reading: Brunetto Latini, The Book of the
Treasure (Li livres dou tresor),trans. Paul Barrette and
Spurgeon Baldwin (New York: Garland, 1993); Brunetto
Latini, Il Tesoretto,ed. and trans. Julia Bolton Holloway
(New York: Garland, 1981); Julia Bolton Holloway,
Brunetto Latini: An Analytic Bibliography(London: Grant
and Cutler, 1986); Julia Bolton Holloway, Twice-Told Tales:
Brunetto Latino and Dante Alighieri(New York: Peter Lang,
1993); Richard Kay, Dante’s Swiff and Strong: Essays on
Inferno XV(Lawrence: Regents Press of Kansas, 1978).
Bruni, Leonardo(1370–1444)Florentine humanist,
political author, translator
Bruni was born in Arezzo, which became part of the city-
state of Florence in 1385. His career and thought
revolved around the republic commune of Florence. One
of his earliest treatises was written to honor the city and
its civic traditions, The Praise of the City of Florence.From
1427 he was the chancellor of that city. At the urging of
Coluccio SALUTATI, Bruni studied Greek with Manuel
CHRYSOLORASand began translating Greek texts.
Bruni’s translations of some of the political and ethi-
cal works of Plutarch and Aristotle were widely circulated
and promoted a higher standard of Ciceronian Latin.
Some of his translations of Aristotle and Plato, whose
ideas he did not like, were controversial. Aristotle’s
ideas and prose were translated in a Ciceronian Latin
style, which implied that republican Rome and the Greek
city-state were similar. He further rejected as barbarous
and inappropriate the Scholastic vocabulary that had
been used by medieval Aristotelian translators.
Bruni’s writings went beyond translations and were
about, among other topics, communal military affairs and
the ideas of Plutarch as represented in his morally
attuned biographies and histories of ancient Greek and
Roman politicians. His historical writing was far more
analytical than the mere listing of facts common in con-
temporary and later chronicles. Bruni died much
respected and honored on March 9, 1444.
Further reading:Gordon Griffiths, James Hankins,
and David Thompson, eds., The Humanism of Leonardo
Bruni: Selected Texts(Binghamton: Medieval and Renais-
sance Texts & Studies, 1987); Leonardo Bruni, History of
the Florentine People,Vol. I, Books I–IV, ed. and trans.
James Hankins (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 2001); Hans Baron, From Petrarch to Leonardo
Bruni: Studies in Humanistic and Political Literature
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968); Charles
Calvert Bayley, War and Society in Renaissance Florence:
The De Militia of Leonardo Bruni(Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 1961); Gordon Griffiths, The Justification
of Florentine Foreign Policy, Offered by Leonardo Bruni in
His Public Letters (1428–1444): Based on Documents from
the Florentine and Venetian Archives (Rome: Istituto
storico italiano per il Medio Evo, 1999); Ronald G. Witt,
In the Footsteps of the Ancients: The Origins of Humanism
from Lovato to Bruni(Leiden: Brill, 2000).Bruno, Saint (925–965)chancellor for the emperor Otto I,
archbishop of Cologne
Born about 925, Bruno was the youngest son of Henry I
(ca. 876–936), king of Germany. In 941, already a deacon
he was appointed abbot of the monasteries of Lorsch and
Corvey by his brother, OTTOI. He reformed those abbeys
and their schools, where he trained the future clerks of the
imperial court. From 950, as arch chancellor, he was Otto’s
closest political adviser. In 953 he was appointed arch-
bishop of COLOGNE. He arranged Otto’s imperial corona-
tion in 962. Bruno sought a political and spiritual renewal
of the HOLYROMANEMPIRE. Bruno dominated Lothair (r.
954–986) the king of France, and Hugh the Great (d. 956),
the count of Paris, to maintain policies friendly to his
brother the emperor. As a patron of learning he was at the
center of the Ottonian Renaissance. He died on October
11, 965, and was soon venerated as a saint.
Further reading: Benjamin Arnold, Medieval Ger-
many, 500–300: A Political Interpretation(Toronto: Uni-
versity of Toronto Press, 1997).Bruno the Carthusian, Saint(Bruno of La Char-
treuse)(ca. 1030–1101)founder of the Carthusian order
Born at COLOGNEabout 1030, Bruno was educated there
and at the episcopal school at RHEIMS. He soon rose to