Brian Copenhaver

Although Giovanni Pico della Mirandola has been called the most important voice for human dignity of postmedieval times, he had nothing to say about this concept—neither its ancient and medieval versions nor, of course, the modern, post-Kantian notion. Pico’s celebrated _Oration on the Dignity of Man_ was not given that title by its author. However, a near contemporary who revised older concepts of _dignitas_—like Cicero’s—was Giannozzo Manetti. Unlike Pico, Manetti also confronted the best-known medieval statement on the topic, by Cardinal Lothario dei Segni. From earlier Christian traditions, the cardinal inherited—and aggravated—a harshly ascetic view of the human condition. Although Manetti repeats some of this Christian pessimism, his attitudes toward the body and human agency are remarkably less dismal. Today, if we ignore Manetti and misread Pico, our philosophical understanding of _dignitas_ and its progeny suffers.