THE MIDDLE AGES: ITALY
Troubadours of Southern Italy. Neapolitan and Sicilian Poets. Dante,
Petrarch, Boccaccio.
THE TROUBADOURS.--The Italian literature of the Middle Ages is intimately
associated with the literature of the Troubadours in the south of France.
To express the case more definitely, the literature styled "Provençal,"
apart from mere differences of dialect, extended from the Limousine to
the Roman campagna, and French literature existed only in the northern
and central provinces of France, the rest being Provençal-Italian
literature. The Italian Troubadours, by which I mean those born in Italy,
who must at least be cited, are Malaspina, Lanfranc Cicala, Bartolomeo
Ziorgi (of Venice), Bordello (of Mantua), etc.
NAPLES AND SICILY.--Naples and Sicily, where were founded large
universities, were the seat of a purely Italian literature in the
thirteenth century, thanks to the impetus of the Emperor Frederick II. At
this seat were Peter of Vignes (_Petrus de Vineis_), who passes as
inventor of the sonnet; Ciullo of Alcamo, author of the first known
Italian _canzone_, etc. The influence of Sicily on all Italy was
such that for long in Italy all writing in verse was termed Sicilian.
BOLOGNA; FLORENCE.--The literary centre then passed, that is in the
thirteenth century, to Bologna and Florence. Among the celebrated Tuscans
of this epoch was Guittone of Arezzo, mentioned by Dante and Petrarch
with more or less consideration; Jacopone of Todi, at once both mystic
and buffoon, in whom it has been sought, in a manner somewhat flattering
to him, to trace a predecessor of Dante; Brunetto Latini, the authentic
master of Dante, who was encyclopaedic, after a fashion, and who
published, first in French, whilst he was in Paris, _The Treasure_,
a compilation of the knowledge of his time, then, in Italian,
_Tesoretto_, a collection of maxims drawn from his previous work,
besides some poetry and translations from Latin.
The fourteenth century, which for the French, Germans, and English was
the last or even the last century but one of the Middle Ages, was for the
Italians the first of the Renaissance. Two great names dominate this
century: Dante and Petrarch.
DANTE: _THE DIVINE COMEDY_.--Dante, highly erudite, theologian,
philosopher, profound Latin scholar, not ignorant of Greek, much involved
in the agitations of his age, exiled from his home, Florence, in the
tumult of political discords, proscribed and a wanderer, coming as far as
France, studied at the University of Paris, wrote "songs," that is to
say, lyrical poetry gathered into the volume entitled _The
Canzoniere_, the _Vita Nuova_, which is also a collection of
lyric efforts, though more philosophical, and finally _The Divine
Comedy_, which is a theological epic poem. _The Divine Comedy_ is
composed of three parts: hell, purgatory, and heaven. Hell is composed
of nine circles which contract as they approach the centre of the earth.
There Dante placed the famous culprits of history and his own particular
enemies. The most popular episodes of hell are Ugolino in the tower of
hunger devouring his dead children, Francesca of Rimini relating her
guilty passions and their disastrous consequence, the meeting with
Sordello, the great Lord of Mantua, ever invincibly proud, looking "like
the lion when he reposes." Purgatory is a cone of nine circles which
contract as they rise to heaven. Heaven, finally, is composed of
nine globes superimposed on one another; over each of the first seven
presides a planet, the eighth is the home of the fixed stars, and the
last is pure infinity, home of the Trinity and of the elect. The power of
general imagination and of varied invention always renewed in style, and
the warmth of passion which throws life and heat into each part, have
assured Dante universal admiration. The community of literature
pre-eminently admires the hell; the eclectic have been compelled to
assert and therefore to believe that the paradise is infinitely superior.
PETRARCH.--Petrarch, a Florentine born in exile, brought up at Avignon,
Carpentras, and Montpellier, during four fifths of his life thought only
of being a great scholar, of writing in Latin, and of obtaining the
repute of an excellent humanist. Hence his innumerable works in Latin.
But when twenty-three he was deeply affected by love for a maiden of
Avignon, and he sang of her living and dead and still triumphant in glory
and eternity, and hence his poems in Italian, the _Rhymes_ and
_Triumphs_. The sensitiveness of Petrarch was admirable; never did
pure love, growing mystical and mingling with divine love, find accents
alike more profound and noble than came from this Platonist refined with
Italian subtlety. Petrarchism became a fashion among the mediocre and a
school among these above the common. In the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries there were innumerable imitators of Petrarch in Italy, and
later still in France. It is impossible not to instance Lamartine as the
last in date.
BOCCACCIO: _THE DECAMERON_.--Immediately after these two great men
came Boccaccio, born in Paris but of Italian parentage, who resided at
Naples at the court of King Robert. He was a great admirer of Dante and
Petrarch, and himself wrote several estimable poems, but, in despair no
doubt of attaining the height of his models and also to please the taste
of Mary, daughter of King Robert, he wrote the libertine tales which are
gathered in the collection entitled _The Decameron_ and which
established his fame. He is one of the purest authors, as stylist, of all
Italian literature, and may be regarded as the principle creator of prose
in his own land.
THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY IN ITALY.--The fifteenth century, less great among
the Italians than the fourteenth, yielded many wise men: Marsiglio
Ficino, Pico della Mirandola, Aurispa, etc. But omission must not be
made of poets such as Ange Politien, refined humanist, graceful lyrist;
and the earliest of dramatic poets of any rank, such as Pulci and
Bojardo. In prose note Pandolfini, master and delineator of domestic
life, as was Xenophon in Greece, and Leonardo da Vinci, the great painter
who left a treatise on his art; nor must it be forgotten that Savonarola
was a remarkably fine orator.