Interview with Ross King on the Bookseller of Florence, Vespasiano da Bisticci

Even in their own time the people of fifteenth-century Florence realised that they were living in a ‘Golden Age.’ In this episode we travel back to the year 1434 to meet some of the city’s most fascinating characters – among them, the young bookseller, Vespasiano da Bisticci.

Our guide for this episode is the New York Times bestselling historian Ross King, author of Brunelleschi’s Dome and Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling.

Vespasiano da Bisticci is the hero of King’s latest book, The Bookseller of Florence: Vespasiano da Bisticci and the manuscripts that illuminated the Renaissance.

As ever, much, much more about this episode – including a contemporary map of Florence and images of the key characters - is to be found at our website tttpodcast.com.

Show notes

Scene One: February, Vespasiano da Bisticci begins work in the bookshop of Michele Guardini.
Scene Two: June Pope Eugenius IV arrives in the city having fled Rome in terror for his life.
Scene Three: Cosimo de’Medici returns to Florence after a year-long exile in Venice.
Memento: The manuscript copy of Cicero’s Letters to Friends produced in Vespasiano’s workshop for the Hungarian scholar Janus Pannonius.

People/Social

Presenter: Violet Moller
Guest: Ross King
Production: Maria Nolan
Podcast partner: Colorgraph