Quirini, Lauro : Born: Venice or Candia, 1420, Died: Candia, c. 1480

Lauro Quirini was a Venetian humanist, educated at the University of Padua, who took part in disputations with Leonardo Bruni, Lorenzo Valla, and Poggio Bracciolini. He made a key contribution to one of the most important debates of fifteenth-century humanism by using Aristotelian arguments against Bracciolini to defend the claim that nobility was based on descent. Around 1450 he wrote a political treatise in which he combined Aristotle’s analysis of the best form of government with Cicero’s idea of the republic. He may therefore be considered one of the leading figures of the Italian Renaissance.