Ptolemy of Lucca 605and the West, illustrated Psalters had full-page paintings,
decorated with ornate initials, glosses, and marginal illus-
trations. These Psalter illustrations in the Middle Ages
were intended to transform the text of the psalms into lit-
eral and didactic images that reflected the content, mean-
ing, and sentiment of the psalms.
See alsoILLUMINATION; PRAYER.
Further reading: Janet Backhouse, Medieval Rural
Life in the Luttrell Psalter(Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 2000); Anthony Cutler, The Aristocratic Psalters of
Byzantium(Paris: Picard, 1984); Michael Camille, Mirror
in Parchment: The Luttrell Psalter and the Making of
Medieval England(Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1998); Adam Cleghorn Welch, The Psalter in Life, Wor-
ship and History(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1926).
Psellos, Michael (Constantine) (1018–ca. 1078)Byzan-
tinewriter, statesman
Constantine Psellos or Psellus was born at CONSTANTINO-
PLEor Nicomedia in 1018, in a noble but not rich family.
He later as a monk took the name Michael. He was raised
by his mother, for whom he expressed great admiration
in her funeral eulogy. He received a broad education in
the law, rhetoric, and PHILOSOPHY. After beginning a legal
career and service as a judge’s clerk in ANATOLIA,he
entered the administration of the central government in
Constantinople in about 1042, being favored as a coun-
selor of the intellectual emperor Constantine IX Mono-
machos (r. 1042–55). Appointed to the prestigious office
of chief of philosophers, Psellos taught philosophy at the
new University of Constantinople. He had wide interests
and wrote treatises on RHETORIC, the law, philosophy
(including NEOPLATONISM), MEDICINE, history, and
ALCHEMY.
This interest in the pagan philosophers and occult
sciences made him suspicious to some of the clergy of the
Orthodox Church. After accusations of being a pagan, he
had to make an explicit profession of the Orthodox faith
in 1054. In the meantime he had fallen into disgrace for
political reasons. Psellos had to move with his friend, the
patriarch of Constantinople, John VIII Xiphilinos (r.
1064–75), to a remote monastery on Mount Olympus. He
was recalled to court and once more played a political
role by helping secure the accession of Michael VII
Doukas (r. 1071–78) in 1071, after unscrupulously help-
ing in the deposing of the emperor Romanos IV Diogenes
(r. 1067–71), who had lost the catastrophic Battle of
MANZIKERTthat same year. However, another turn of
events and fortunes led to his retirement from the world
again in 1074. He died as a monk in about 1078 at the
monastery of Narsou.
BREADTH OF WRITINGBesides being known for his personal vanity and dubi-
ously ethical political activities, Psellos left a wide variety
of written work, including an encyclopedic manual on
the origin of numerous aspects of the fields of THEOLOGY,
PHILOSOPHY, and the natural sciences. In addition, he
wrote a legal treatise, important historical works on the
Byzantine Empire in the 10th and 11th centuries, funeral
eulogies, grammatical treatises, letters, several smaller
philosophical essays, his lecture notes, and a collection of
answers to miscellaneous philosophical and cultural
questions posed by students. He always strenuously
denied any belief in the pagan doctrines he discussed and
studied, asserting that he explored them better to serve
the Orthodox faith, though he continued to be attacked
throughout his life for his alleged pagan ideas.
See alsoMACEDONIAN DYNASTY.
Further reading:Michael Psellus, The Chronographia
of Michael Psellus,trans. E. R. A. Sewter (London: Rout-
ledge & Kegan Paul, 1953); Michael Psellus, Fourteen
Byzantine Rulers: The Chronographia,trans. E. R. A. Sewter
(Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1966); Anitra Gadolin, A The-
ory of History and Society with Special Reference to the
Chronographia of Michael Psellus: Eleventh Century Byzan-
tium and a Related Section on Islamic Ethics(Amsterdam:
Adolf M. Hakkert, 1987); Joan Hussey, Church & Learning
in the Byzantine Empire, 867–1185(London: Oxford Uni-
versity Press, 1937); Anthony Kaldellis, The Argument of
Psellos’ Chronographia (Leiden: Brill, 1999); Jaroslav L.
Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Develop-
ment of Doctrine.Vol. 2, The Spirit of Eastern Christendom
(600–1700)(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974);
Steven Runciman, The Eastern Schism: A Study of the
Papacy and the Eastern Churches during the XIth and the
XIIth Centuries(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955).Pseudo-Dionysian writings SeeDIONYSIS THE
AREOPAGITE.Ptolemeic astronomy SeeASTRONOMY.Ptolemy of Lucca(Bartolommeo Fiadoni, Tolomeo)
(ca. 1236–1327)civic and ecclesiastical author
Born into the Fiadoni family in LUCCA, Ptolemy joined
the DOMINICANSas an adult. He became a close friend of
Thomas AQUINAS, whose On the Regime of Princeshe sup-
posedly finished, in the early 1270s. Prior of convents at
Lucca and FLORENCE, Ptolemy spent a decade at AVI-
GNON, between 1309 and 1319. As the bishop of Torcello
from 1318, he was imprisoned by the patriarch of Grado,
but he was freed on orders from Pope JOHNXXII in 1323.
He was a supporter of communal theory of government
and a strong promoter of the hierocratic theory of papal
power. He also wrote a respected history of the church.
He died at Torcello in 1327.
Further reading:Ptolemy of Lucca, On the Govern-
ment of Rulers, De regimine principum, trans. James M.