GIORGIO ACROPOLITA. - Byzantine writer of the 13th century. Born in Costantinopoli, a disciple of Niccolò Blemmydes and teacher of the emperor of Nicaea Teodoro II Laskaris. He took part in the war against Epirus and was captured there (1257–59); the emperor Michele VII Paleologo freed him and sent him as one of his legates to the Second Council of Lyons. There, on 6 July 1274, G., in the name of his emperor, took the oath of submission to the Roman Church. Having still defended, in the years 1257–59, the doctrine opposed to the Filioque, he sincerely converted to the Catholic Church and remained faithful to it until his death in 1282.
G. was a prolific and versatile writer, in poetry, eloquence, history, philosophy, and theology; he was also a teacher of philosophy and had as a pupil the future patriarch Gregorio di Cipro, who, though initially a friend of the Union, became its most bitter opponent.