[1][2] The son of a rich merchant, Musurus became at an early age a pupil of Janus Lascaris in Venice.

However, when the university was closed in 1509 during the War of the League of Cambrai, he returned to Venice where he filled a similar post.

In recognition of a Greek poem prefixed to the editio princeps of Plato, Leo appointed him archbishop of Monemvasia (Malvasia) in the Peloponnese, but he died before he left the Italian peninsula.

Many of the Aldine classics were published under Musurus' supervision, and he is credited with the first editions of the scholia of Aristophanes (1498), Athenaeus (1514), Hesychius of Alexandria (1514) and Pausanias (1516).

Among his original compositions Musurus wrote a dedicatory epigram for Zacharias Kallierges' edition of the Etymologicum Magnum,[4] in which he praised the genius of the Cretans.