Collecting books in Thessalonica: Manuel Tarchaneiotes Boullotes from Greece to Italy

Throughout the Byzantine age, the paths taken by book collections and collectors allow us to identify the groups of scholars who used these books, as well as to shed light on the single individuals, their literary interests and their lives. Manuel Tarchaneiotes Boullotes, a member of a well-known Thessalonian family living between the late 14th and the first half of the 15th century, moved to Constantinople in his youth: he spent there the first part of his life as a scholar collecting Greek books, and ending up later as a successful diplomat. This paper attempts to shed light on Boullotes by dealing with the different and, unfortunately, rather scanty sources relating to him. These include a Greek epigram in dodecasyllables, his private correspondence with John Chortasmenos, several documents of the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1431-1439), his autograph professio fidei, as well as, more tentatively, the biography of the Italian humanist Ciriaco d'Ancona written by Francesco Scalamonti.