Nicolas de cusa biography

Quick Info

Born
1401
Kues, Trier (now Germany)
Died
11 August 1464
Todi, Papal States (now Italy)
Summary
Nicholas of Cusa was a German philosopher and bishop. He was interested in geometry and logic as well as in philosophy and astronomy.

Biography

Nicholas Kryffs or Krebs was the son of Johan Krebs (or Cryfts), a wealthy shipper on the river Moselle, and Catharina Roemers. Nicholas was one of his parents' four children. He was born in Kues, now Bernkastel-Kues, about 30 km from Trier, an old town in the Palatinate, founded by the Romans. His name often appears as Nikolaus Cusanus, following the usual practice in the Latin speaking church environment, from the Latin name of the town. He left his home and was sent to Deventer, in the Netherlands, by Count Theodoric von Manderscheid. It is claimed that the reason he left home was to escape from ill-treatment by his father (the story being that Nicholas was only interested in books and annoyed his father by being unable to handle an oar). Although this appears in ancient biographies of Nicholas, there is little evidence to support it. In Deventer, his early education took place at the Brothers of the Common Life. Certainly the Brothers of the Common Life, a Roman Catholic religious community founded by Gerard Groote in the 14th century, would have strongly influenced the young Nicholas with their mixture of mysticism and reason.

The first certain information about Nicholas's education is in 1416 when he matriculated at the University of Heidelberg. The record, as one would expect, lists him as from the diocese of Trier. In Heidelberg Nicholas studied liberal arts, particularly philosophy, for a year before going to the University of Padua in 1417. At Padua he studied canon law under Giuliano Cesarini, who was only three years older than Nicholas, having just completed his own doctorate in canon law at Padua. At Padua he became friends with fellow student Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli, w
  • Nicholas of cusa quotes

    • Nicholas of Cusa
    by
    Jason Aleksander
    • LAST REVIEWED: 25 February 2016
    • LAST MODIFIED: 25 February 2016
    • DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195396584-0192

  • Albertson, David. “Mystical Philosophy in the Fifteenth Century: New Directions in Research on Nicholas of Cusa.” Religion Compass 4 (2010): 471–485.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1749-8171.2010.00232.x

    Albertson’s review of recent literature on Nicholas of Cusa highlights scholarship that attempts “to unify potential divisions in the German cardinal’s writings: between science and religion, novelty and tradition, action and contemplation, and mathematics and theology” (p. 471).

  • Bellitto, Christopher M., Thomas M. Izbicki, and Gerald Christianson, eds. Introducing Nicholas of Cusa: A Guide to a Renaissance Man. New York: Paulist, 2004.

    Contains thirteen essays providing overviews of the main topics of inquiry in Cusanus studies as well as a glossary and an extensive, topically arranged bibliography (pp. 409–457) that “attempts to list all published literature in English on Nicholas of Cusa from Tudor times to the end of 2002” (p. 411).

  • Flasch, Kurt. Nikolaus von Kues in Seiner Zeit: Ein Essay. Stuttgart: Reclam, 2004.

    Flasch’s scholarship on Nicholas of Cusa has made a significant impact on the field for more than forty years. In this brief volume (111 pages), however, Flasch intends to reach an audience of non-specialists. His essay focuses on Nicholas’s biography and career and includes annotated selections from Nicholas’s writings.

  • Gandillac, Maurice de. Nicolas de Cues. Paris: Ellipses, 2001.

    Gandillac’s first major contribution to scholarship on Nicholas of Cusa was his 1942 dissertation La philosophie de Nicolas de Cues. In this brief (128 pages) introduction, Gandillac intends to reach an audience of non-specialists. Includes annotated selections from Nicholas’s writings.

  • Kremer, Klaus. Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464). One of the Greatest Germans of the 1

    • Nicholas of Cusa

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    German cardinal, philosopher, and administrator, b. at Cues on the Moselle, in the Archdiocese of Trier, 1400 or 1401; d. at Todi, in Umbria, 11 August, 1464. His father, Johann Cryfts (Krebs), a wealthy boatman (nauta, not a "poor fisherman"), died in 1450 or 1451, and his mother, Catharina Roemers, in 1427. The legend that Nicholas fled from the ill-treatment of his father to Count Ulrich of Mandersheid is doubtfully reported by Hartzheim (Vita N. de Cusa, Trier, 1730), and has never been proved. Of his early education in a school of Deventer nothing is known; but in 1416 he was matriculated in the University of Heidelberg, by Rector Nicholas of Bettenberg, as "Nicholaus Cancer de Coesze, cler[icus] Trever[ensis] dioc[esis]". A year later, 1417, he left for Padua, where he graduated, in 1423, as doctor in canon law (decretorum doctor) under the celebrated Giuliano Cesarini. It is said that in later years, he was honoured with the doctorate in civil law by the University of Bologna. At Padua he became the friend of Paolo Toscanelli, afterwards a celebrated physician and scientist. He studied Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and, in later years, Arabic, though, as his friend Johannes Andreæ, Bishop of Aleria, testifies, and as appears from the style of his writings, he was not a lover of rhetoric and poetry. That the loss of a lawsuit at Mainz should have decided his choice of the clerical state, is not supported by his previous career. Aided by the Archbishop of Trier, he matriculated in the University of Cologne, for divinity, under the rectorship of Petrus von Weiler, in 1425. His identity with the "Nicolaus Trevirensis", who is mentioned as secretary to Cardinal Orsini, and papal legate for Germany in 1426, is not certain. Af

  • Nicholas of cusa philosophy

    • Nicholas of Cusa

    German cardinal and philosopher (1401–1464)

    "Cusa" and "Cusanus" redirect here. For the lunar crater, see Cusanus (crater). For other uses, see CUSA (disambiguation).

    His Eminence

    Nicholas of Cusa

    Nicholas of Cusa, by Master of the Life of the Virgin

    Born1401

    Kues, Electorate of Trier,
    Holy Roman Empire

    Died11 August 1464

    Todi, Umbria,
    Papal States

    Other namesDoctor Christianus, Nikolaus Cryfftz, Nicholas of Kues, Nicolaus Cusanus
    Alma materHeidelberg University
    University of Padua
    EraMedieval philosophy
    Renaissance philosophy
    RegionWestern philosophy
    SchoolChristian Neoplatonism
    Renaissance humanism
    Christian humanism

    Main interests

    Notable ideas

    		Learned ignorance, coincidence of opposites
    ChurchCatholic Church
    In office1450–1464
    Other post(s)Cardinal-Priest of San Pietro in Vincoli
    Ordination1436
    Consecration26 April 1450
    by Pope Nicholas V
    Created cardinal20 December 1448
    by Pope Nicholas V

    Nicholas of Cusa (1401 – 11 August 1464), also referred to as Nicholas of Kues and Nicolaus Cusanus (), was a German Catholic bishop and polymath active as a philosopher, theologian, jurist, mathematician, and astronomer. One of the first German proponents of Renaissance humanism, he made spiritual and political contributions to European culture. A notable example of this is his mystical or spiritual writings on "learned ignorance," as well as his participation in power struggles between Rome and the German states of the Holy Roman Empire.

    As papal legate to Germany from 1446, he was appointed cardinal for his merits by Pope Nicholas V in 1448 and Prince-Bishop of Brixen two years later. In 1459, he became vicar general in the Papal States.

    Nicholas has remained an influential figure. In 2001, the sixth centennial of his birth was celebrated on four continents and commemora