e, and such was doubtless the training he
received. He spent some years at the ducal court of Milan, but there
is no indication that he frequented the schools of such famous
Hellenists as Francesco Filelfo who, in 1471, was there lecturing
on the Politics of Aristotle, and of Constantine Lascaris whom the
reigning duke, Galeazzo Maria Sforza, commissioned to compile a Greek
grammar for the use of his daughter. In later years, when he found
his chief delight and highest distinction in intercourse with men of
letters, Peter Martyr would hardly have neglected to mention such
precious early associations had they existed.

The fortunes of the family of Anghera were the reverse of opulent at
that period of its history, and the sons obtained careers under the
patronage of Count Giovanni Borromeo. The times were troublous in
Lombardy. The assassination, in 1476, of Gian Galeazzo was followed
by commotions and unrest little conducive to the cultivation of the
humanities, and which provoked an exodus of humanists and their
disciples. Many sought refuge from the turbulence prevailing in the
north, in the more pacific atmosphere of Rome, where a numerous colony
of Lombards was consequently formed. The following year Peter Martyr,
being then twenty years of age, joined his compatriots in their
congenial exile. His rank and personal qualities, as well as the
protection accorded him by Giovanni Arcimboldo, Archbishop of Milan,
and Ascanio Sforza, brother of the Duke, Lodovico il Moro, assured him
a cordial welcome. For a youth devoid of pretensions to humanistic
culture, he penetrated with singular ease and rapidity into the
innermost academic circle, over which reigned the most amiable of
modern pagans, Pomponius Laetus.

It was the age of the Academies. During the Ecumenical Council of
Florence, Giovanni de' Medici, fired with enthusiasm for the study
of Platonic philosophy, brilliantly expounded by the learned Greek,
Gemisto, conceived the plan of promoting the revival of classical
learning by the formation of an academy, in imitation of that founded
by the immortal Plato. Under such lofty patronage, this genial
conception, so entirely in consonance with the intellectual tendencies
of the age, attracted to its support every Florentine who aspired to
a reputation for culture, at a time when culture was fashionable. The
Greek Cardinal, Bessarion, whom Eugene IV. had raised to the purple at
the close of the Council, carried the Medi