Il contributo del latino allo sviluppo del concetto di umanesimo

The contribution of the classical Roman world to the development of the concept of humanism is primarily linguistic. The word humanitas itself is a peculiar elaboration of the Latin language: it joins into an inseparable unity two semantic nuclei, which the Greek expressed by two different words, paideia and philanthropia. The concept had its premises in archaic Latin literature, reached its maturation in the age of Cicero, and was finally reworked within Christianity, especially in Augustinus.