Bartolomeo Platina (1421–1481), historian, political theorist, and author of a best-selling cookbook, began life as a mercenary soldier and ended it as the head of the Vatican Library. A papal official under the humanist Pope Pius II, he was a member of the humanist academies of Cardinal Bessarion and Pomponio Leto, and was twice imprisoned for conspiring against Pope Paul II. Returning to favor under Pope Sixtus IV, he composed his most famous work, a biographical compendium of the Roman popes from St. Peter down to his own time. The work critically synthesized a wide range of sources and became the standard reference work on papal history for early modern Europe, reprinted dozens of times and translated into a number of languages. A characteristic work of Renaissance humanism, it used Christian antiquity as a standard against which to criticize modern churchmen. This edition contains the first complete translation into English and an improved Latin text. Volume 1, the first of a projected four, covers the period from the founding of the church through ad 461.

Contents
Introduction		000
LIVES OF THE POPES
Preface			000
Life of Christ		000
1. Peter			000
2. Linus			000
3. Cletus I		000
4. Clement I		000
5. Anacletus I		000
6. Evaristus I		000
7. Alexander I		000
8. Sixtus I		000
9. Telesphorus I	000
10. Hyginus I		000
11. Pius II		000
12. Anicetus I		000
13. Soter I		000
14. Eleutherius I	000
15. Victor I		000
16. Zephyrinus I	000
17. Calixtus 1		000
18. Urban I		000
19. Pontian I		000
20. Antherus I		000
21. Fabian I		000
22. Cornelius I		000
23. Lucius I		000
24. Stephen I		000
25. Sixtus II		000
26. Dionysius I		000
27. Felix I		000
28. Eutychian I		000
29. Gaius I		000
30. Marcellinus I	000
31. Marcellus I		000
32. Eusebius I		000
33. Miltiades I		000
34. Sylvester I		000
35. Mark I			000
36. Julius I		000
37. Liberius I		000
38. Felix II		000
39. Damasus I		000
40. Siricius I		000
41. Anastasius I	000
42. Innocent I		000
43. Zosimus I		000
44. Boniface I		000
45. Celestine I		000
46. Sixtus III		000
47. Leo I			000
Note on the Text and Translation
Notes to the Text
Notes to the Translation
Bibliography
Index