Abstract
Travel, it has been argued, confronted the wisdom and truth long ascribed to the texts of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Even before the Age of Discovery, humanists were already employing personal experience and direct observation as a guide to knowledge. Paolo Marsi (1444–84), professor of rhetoric in Rome and member of Pomponio Leto's Roman Academy, represents the humanist caught between conflicting testimonies of verba and res. His 1468 versified travelogue of his journey to Spain and his 1482 published commentary on Ovid's Fasti on the one hand betray his belief and trust in the cultural and linguistic hegemony of the classical Roman past. However, they also reveal the renegotiation with auctoritas which takes place through firsthand encounters with the physical world. Paolo Marsi merits the distinction of being a truly liminal figure, a humanist open to historical awareness and new methods of learning.
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