John Servopoulos was a Greek scribe and scholar. Few details are known of his life. He was originally from Constantinople

Constantinople

Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

 but from at least 1484 he was living in England where he copied Greek manuscripts for a living. From 1489 he was apparently working from the abbey of Reading

Reading, Berkshire

Reading is a large town and unitary authority area in England. It is located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet, and on both the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, some west of London....

 and he was active there until at least 1500. Some of his manuscripts may have been destined for students or teachers at the nearby University of Oxford

Oxford

The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...

. William Grocyn

William Grocyn

William Grocyn was an English scholar, a friend of Erasmus.He was born at Colerne, Wiltshire. Intended by his parents for the church, he was sent to Winchester College, and in 1465 was elected to a scholarship at New College, Oxford. In 1467 he became a fellow, and among his pupils was William...

 owned several of his manuscripts and so was probably one of his patrons.

See also

• Greek scholars in the Renaissance
  Greek scholars in the Renaissance
  The migration of Byzantine scholars and other émigrés from southern Italy and Byzantium during the decline of the Byzantine Empire and mainly after the fall of Constantinople in 1453 until the 16th century, is considered by some scholars as key to the revival of Greek and Roman studies and...
  
  
• Harris, Jonathan, Greek Émigrés in the West, 1400-1520 (Camberley: Porphyrogenitus, 1995)
• Harris, Jonathan, 'Greek scribes in England: the evidence of episcopal registers', in Through the Looking Glass: Byzantium through British Eyes, ed. Robin Cormack and Elizabeth Jeffreys(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000), pp. 121–6. ISBN 086078 667 6.
• Weiss, Roberto, Humanism in England during the Fifteenth Century (Oxford, 1957, 2nd ed.)