I. Andreas Joannes

I. Andreas Joannes, surnamed Rhyndacenus, a Greek philologist, born on the banks of the Rhyndacus in Phrygia about 1445, died in Rome in 1535. He belonged to a family which counted among its members three Greek emperors reigning at Nicaea, viz.: Theodore I.,1206-,22; Theodore II., 1255-'9; and John IV., 1259-'61. He went to Italy on the final overthrow of the Byzantine empire, and found a refuge at the court of Lorenzo de' Medici, who sent him twice to Greece to collect valuable manuscripts. Before his return the second time Lorenzo died, and Lascaris, at the invitation of Charles VIII. of France, removed to Paris about 1495, and began to teach Greek publicly. In 1503 and 1505 Louis XII. sent him as ambassador to Venice; and on the rupture between France and Venice in 1508 he remained there as a private citizen. In 1513, on the invitation of Leo X., he took charge of the Greek college and press lately founded in Rome, and published editions of many of the Greek classics. In 1518 he returned to Paris, and assisted Budaeus in forming the royal library at Fontainebleau. He was subsequently sent to Venice to procure Grecian youths to officiate in the Greek college contemplated by Francis I. Paul III. importuned him to return to Rome, and he died a few months after his arrival there.

He edited the works of several of the Greek poets, and translated into Latin some military treatises of Polybius. - See Villemain, Lascaris (Paris, 1825).

II. Constan-Tine

II. Constan-Tine, a Greek grammarian, of the same family with the preceding, born in Constantinople, died in 1493. On the capture of his native city by the Turks he repaired to the court of Francesco Sforza, duke of Milan, who intrusted him with the education of his daughter. He taught Greek and rhetoric in Rome and Naples, and subsequently established in Messina a school which enjoyed great celebrity while he lived. He bequeathed his library and manuscripts to the senate of Messina. These were afterward carried to Spain, and are still preserved in the Escurial. His Grammatica Grceca (Milan, 1476) was the first Greek book printed in Italy.