Zacharias Kallierges

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Printer's mark by Zacharias Calliergis

Zacharias Kallierges ( Greek Ζαχαρίας Καλλιέργης , also Kallergēs or Kalliergis , Italianized Zaccaria Calliergi , * around 1473 in Rethymnon in Crete; † after 1524) was a Greek typographer and printer in Venice and Rome .

Life

Zacharias Kallierges was born around the same time as Marcus Musurus and Nikolaos Vlastos in Rethymnon on Crete, which was then part of the Republic of Venice . He came from a noble family that claimed to be from the Laskarids . Kallierges then also chose the crowned double-headed eagle - a dynastic symbol in Byzantium - as a printer's mark , together with its initials ZK in a heraldic shield.

In 1490 he moved to Venice, where he first worked with Nikolaos Vlastos in Aldus Manutius' office as a copyist of Greek manuscripts. On September 21, 1498, Vlastos received the privilege of Greek types from the Signoria for ten years. In 1499 Kallierges brought out the Etymologicum magnum , on which Vlastos, Kallierges and Musurus had worked for six years. It is considered to be one of the most famous examples of early Venetian printing. It is printed with a Greek cursive newly created by Vlastos and Kallierges , which largely corresponds to the handwriting of Kallierges. The foreword addressed to the professors at the University of Padua was written by Marcus Musurus. The work is equipped with rich ornamental borders and initials in red. It was co-financed by Anna Notaras , daughter of the last Byzantine admiral Loukas Notaras , who was the center of the large Greek community in exile in Venice. The target group of the work were not only the members of this community, but above all the professors and students of the Venetian University of Padua .

In 1501 he moved with his family to Padua , where he earned his living copying Greek manuscripts. In 1509 he returned to Venice, where he resumed his work as a printer. He brought out several Greek books, including the Horologion , a liturgical book for use in the Church. The very rare book in octave format is characterized by its careful typography and the red initials and borders typical of Kallierges.

Because of the tense economic situation in which the republic got through actions by the League of Cambrai , he moved to Rome in 1514, where he found a financially strong patron in the banker Agostino Chigi . In Rome he set up the first printing press for Greek literature only. His Pindar edition came out as early as 1515 . Manutius had published a Pindar edition as early as 1513, but the Roman edition was regarded by humanistic scholars as the authoritative one for the next three centuries.

literature

  • Elpidio Mioni:  Calliergi (Callergi), Zaccaria. In: Alberto M. Ghisalberti (Ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 16:  Caccianiga-Caluso. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 1973.
  • Konstantinos Staikos: The printing shop of Nikolaos Vlastos and Zacharias Kallierges. 500 years from the establishment of the first Greek press . In: La bibliofila 102, 2000, pp. 11-32.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Proof in the ISTC
  2. ↑ Elizabethanne Boran: The Etymologicum Magnum .
  3. ↑ Federica Cicolella: Donati Graeci. Learning Greek in the Renaissance . New York 2008, p. 207.
  4. ↑ Elpidio Mioni in: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani .
personal data
SURNAME Kallierges, Zacharias
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kallergēs; Kalliergis; Calliergi, Zaccaria; Καλλιέργης, Ζαχαρίας (Greek)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek typographer and printer in Venice and Rome
DATE OF BIRTH around 1473
PLACE OF BIRTH Rethymnon in Crete
DATE OF DEATH after 1524