Paolo Cortesi

Paolo Cortesi or Cortese,[1] in Latin Paulus Cortesius or de Cortesii[2] (1465–1510), was a Renaissance humanist from Rome.

He is known for his Ciceronianism, his dispute over literary style with Angelo Poliziano in 1485 and his treatise on the cardinalate, De cardinalatu.

With Alessandro, he visited many famous Roman men of learning in his youth, including Giulio Pomponio Leto, Lucio Fazini and Bartolomeo Platina.

[2] His brother arranged for him to succeed the late Platina as a scribe in the papal chancery in October 1481, when he was in his seventeenth year.

Among those that visited the home were Serafino Aquilano, Giovanni Lorenzi, Manilius Cabacius Rallus [nl], Pietro Gravina di Palermo, Leonardo Corvino, Michael Tarchaniota Marullus, Giacomo Corso and Bartolomeo Lampridio (uncle of Benedetto Lampridio [fr]).

[5] He sent Poliziano a collection of Latin letters with the intent to publish and asked the elder humanist his opinion of their quality.

[2] In 1504, Cortesi published at Rome In quatuor libros Sententiarum ... disputationes, "an attempt to elimintate the dissidence between theological wisdom and profane eloquence".

Giovanni Pontano cites it in his De rebus coelestibus and in Urania he indicates awareness of Cortesi's astronomical studies.

[2] Cortesi's last work and his magnum opus is De cardinalatu, published posthumously in 1510 by Simeone Nardi of Siena.