The Florentine humanist Marsilio Ficino (1433 - 1499) was one of the founders of the neo-Platonic movement. He studied Greek, translated the writings of Plato into Latin, and, in Florence, wrote commentaries on Plato, a philosophical treatise on Platonic ideas about the immortality of the soul and a work on the Christian religion.
He reconciled pagan and Christian ideas and so profoundly influenced much of the humanist thinking of the Renaissance. Ficino worked a great deal for the Medici family and was a leading member of the Platonic Academy which met at the Medici villa at Careggi, outside Florence.