Council of Florence

The Council of Florence

The Emperors

• Manuel II – First petitions Pope John XXIII then later his successor Martin V for a council to discuss union in the hopes of gaining his support in battle against Moslem forces whittling away at the Empire.
• John Palaeologus VI – The son of Manuel II and his successor is the prominent figure in the future discussions of the Council. He psychologically intimidates those whom he has brought with him to the council and to gain the support he needs he even goes so far as to solicit the vote of his Chamber Master, the man servant who turns down his sheets at night.

The Popes

• John XXIII – One of the three men claiming to be “Pope” during the papal crisis of the Avignon Popes. He receives Manuel II in the beginning as he pursued enlisting Western aid. He is later deposed.
• Martin V – Is the Pope of the initial phase of planning. We sends delegates to the Emperor demanding that the Council be held in Italia. With threats and bribes he manages to secure the promise of the Emperor to come to Italy with his delegates. A clever and conniving man, Martin realizes that his own future job security requires that the East back him as Pope since His Bishops were already gathering in Basle to depose him.
• Eugenius IV – The man of the show on the Latin side, he is the Pope actually alive and in attendance at the Council of Florence. He holds all the power, the Greek Emperor forbids his theologians from offending the man and his aging counterpart, the Patriarch Joseph is failing in health and impotent to defend his place of honor and rights. Eugenius holds the purse strings as well and the Greeks are even reliant on him for food, shelter, and transportation.

The Greek Delegates

• Mark, Metropolitan of Ephesus – By all accounts the most outspoken defender of Orthodoxy, he handles the discussions on the hard topics of Purgatory, the addition of the Filioque and its doctrinal errors. He is silenced in later debates by his own Emperor after harsh debates with John the Dominican Provincial in which it is obvious that the Latin position was faltering. He is by all accounts the only delegate present for the signing of the end documents who refused to do so.
• Bessarion of Nicea – Plays the reluctant second chair to Mark during the initial debates and helps throw the match later after Mark is silenced. For his loyalty to the union the Pope rewards him with the title of Cardinal and gives him lavish gifts.
• George Scholarius, philosopher – Plays a supportive roll in the discussions, is faithful to Orthodoxy. Is later in life made Patrirach by the Moslems and takes the name Gennadius Scholarius.
• Joseph, Patriarch of Constantinople – Initially strongly opposes the councils local, which to have it in Constantinople, but capitulates due to weakness and age. Dies mysterious in June before the documents are to be signed, but manages “supposedly” to make all the necessary concesions to the Pope, as to his authority and dignity in a letter left written two days before the request by the Pope was even made. He is buried in the cemetery of a Dominican Church dedicated the Theotokos.
• Isidore, Metropolitan of all Russia – Arrives late to the council in August, but manages to arrive before the transferal of the council from Ferrara to Florence due to “plague” conditions in the city of Ferrerra. Had made a grand tour of his territories before he went on to Italy. After Mark was silenced Isidore takes a minor roll as second fiddle to Besserion as the two trip over each other trying to sell Orthodoxy out. For his attempts to promote the Latin cause he is made a Cardinal by the Pope and given authority not only over the Russian lands but the Churches and Dioceses of the Former Russian lands. He is sent by the Pope to Constantinople to settle the uproar of Patriarchal elections and to officially declare the union there. Due to the uproar Metrophanes’ election by default causes he is forced to flee. He then goes to the territory of Russia to announce the Union and receives only slightly better treatment there.
• Metrophanes of Cyzicus - The future Patriarch of Constantinople, you surely wouldn’t guess by the minor roll he played in the debates, a sell out to the Latins and not even a strong figure he is chosen after literally everyone else refuses. I think they may even have asked the Master of the Bed Chamber mentioned earlier.

Minor Greek figures present

• Dorotheus of Trebizond
• Anthony of Heraclea
• Macarius of Nicomedia

The Latin Debaters

• Nicholas Albergati – Took the lead with the Purgatory issue.
• Jullian Caesarini – Lead debate on Filioque at first.
• John, Dominican Provincial – the strongest of the Latin speakers an O.P. he was highly educated and used scholastic methods and arguments to craft his defense of Latin practice. He later led the discussion without opposition on ezymes and papal authority.
• Andrew of Rhodes – Minor roll in the early discussions.

Works on the Council

• Edward Gibbon, William George Smith, William Smith, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Harper, 1857.
• Charles Diehl, Naomi Walford, and Peter Charanis, Byzantium: Greatness and Decline. Rutgers University Press, 1957
• Joseph Gill, The Council of Florence. Cambridge University Press, 1959. ISBN 0521050820, ISBN 9780521050821
• Joseph Gill, Personalities of the Council of Florence, and Other Essays. Barnes & Noble, 1965
• Ivan N. Ostroumov, The History of the Council of Florence. Holy Transfiguration Monastery, 1971.
• Constantine N. Tsirpanlis, Mark Eugenicus and the Council of Florence: A Historical Re-evaluation of His Personality. 1979.

Online

• The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge: Embracing Biblical, Historical, Doctrinal, and Practical Theology and Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Biography from the Earliest Times to the Present Day by Johann Jakob Herzog, Philip Schaff, Albert Hauck, Samuel Macauley Jackson, Charles Colebrook Sherman, George William Gilmore. Funk and Wagnalls Company, 1909.

• The History of the Council of Florence by Basil Popoff, Aleksandr Vasilýevich Gorski, John Mason Neale. Joseph Masters, 1861.