Kydones, Demetrios

   Leading statesman and intellectual of the 14th century, and one of the greater writers and theologians of the entire Palaiologan (q.v.) period. He was the chief minister (mesazon [q.v.]) of John VI Kantakouzenos (q.v.) until the emperor's abdication in 1354. In 1364 he resumed his political career in the court of John V Palaiologos (q.v.), and he helped arrange the emperor's conversion to Catholicism in 1369 on the steps of St. Peter's in Rome (q.v.). He was also an informal tutor and advisor to Manuel II (q.v.). Ardently pro-western, he was a convert to Catholicism who had an openness to Latin culture and civilization that he shared with a circle of like-minded intellectuals, who included his brothers Andrew and Theodore, also Maximos Chrysoberges (q.v.) and Manuel Kalekas. His devotion to translating the writings of Thomas Aquinas (q.v.), including sections of the Summa theologica, made him an ardent proponent of Thomism, and an opponent of the theology of Gregory Palamas (qq.v.). His voluminous correspondence with John VI Kantakouzenos, Manuel II, and many other leading personalities is of utmost significance for the cultural history of the 14th century.