I have spoken at great length as if thou wert present. Emerging now from those very vivid flights of the imagination, I realize how very far removed thou art, and I fear lest it may be annoying to thee to read so lengthy a letter in the dim light of the lower world. I reassure myself when I remember that also thy letter was long.
Farewell forever. And when thou wilt have returned to thy seat of honor, pray give kindly greetings to Orpheus, Linus, Euripides, and the rest.
_Written in the world above, in that city lying between the famous rivers Po, Ticino, Adda, and others, whence some say Milan derives its name, on the ninth of October in the thirteen hundred and sixtieth year of this last era._
[109]. The man who taught Petrarch the elements of Greek was Bernardo Barlaamo, theologian, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher. This learned Italian monk was born at Seminara, Calabria Ulteriore, and entered the Roman Catholic monastery of St. Basil. From Calabria he journeyed to Aetolia, afterward studied at Thessalonica (at that time a center of learning), and finally (1327 or 1328) went to Constantinople, the better to learn Greek and thus be able to read Aristotle in the original. He at once became a member of the Greek church, and in 1331 was appointed Abbot of the Convent of St. Salvator at Constantinople. He was protected by Andronicus III (Palaeologus, 1328-41), who in 1339 sent him to Avignon on a diplomatic mission to Pope Benedict XII, endeavoring to bring about the union of the two churches in common cause against the Turks. In this mission Barlaamo was unsuccessful. Returning to Greece, he attacked the Hesychasts (or Quietists) of Mt. Athos, and became involved with Gregory Palamas (afterward archbishop of Thessalonica) on the question of the light which had been manifested to the disciples on Mt. Tabor at the Transfiguration. At a synod held at Constantinople in 1341, the Hesychasts defended themselves so ably that Barlaamo was condemned. Since his protector was now dead, he was compelled to flee into Italy.
He at once re-entered the Roman church and was made librarian by King Robert. In 1342 he revisited Avignon on a second mission, and it is on this occasion that he must have made the acquaintance of Petrarch (P. de Nolhac, II, p. 136), who during the summer of 1342 received from him daily instruction in Greek--whether at Avignon or at Vaucluse is not clear. At the end of the summer Petrarch had made but small progress. Still he added his recommendation to those of others when Pope Clement VI nominated Barlaamo bishop of Gerace, a town in Calabria sixty miles northeast of Reggio. He was consecrated bishop at Avignon on October 2, 1342, and thereafter left for Gerace, dying in that town six years later, in 1348.