ABSTRACT
Georg voigt in his Wiederbelebung des klassischen Alterthums speaks of Petrarch as der Entdecker der neuen Welt des Humanismus, and, in view of the part which he played in the Revival of Learning, these words of praise are not extravagant. In the catalogues which have come down to us from the Middle Ages one finds now and then the title of a Greek or Latin classic, and a few men of learning would seem to have taken some interest in reading these books; but long before Petrarch’s day real knowledge of the works of antiquity was at a low ebb. Even Dante came but little under the influence of the new learning.
