New Alexander to “rex theologus”

Theodore Gaza and the Portrayal of Alfonso the Magnanimous in the Prefaces to Latin Translations of Greek Works

Abstract

The essay examines the assimilation of Alfonso the Magnanimous with the figure of Alexander the Great as example of a conqueror and rex sapiens. It specifically focuses on some prefatory letters to Latin translations of Greek works dedicated to the Aragonese king in the 1450s. These dedicatory writings, part of an intensive translation campaign promoted by the court of Naples, reveal themselves to be an expression of Alfonso’s cultural policy, that in the years of the fall of Constantinople aims to represent the Magnanimous as a wise king, philosopher, and even theologian, the ideal ruler to defend the West from Ottoman expansion. In this paper, particular attention is paid to Theodore Gaza’s prefatory epistle to his translation of John Chrysostom’s De incomprehensibili Dei natura homilies, where the inclusion of a theological wisdom among Alfonso’s virtues is fully developed.