1350-1351
BOCCACCIO AS AMBASSADOR--THE MEETING WITH PETRARCH
As we have seen, Boccaccio returned to Florence probably in the end
of 1349. His father, who was certainly living in July, 1348, for he
then added a codicil to his Will,[387] seems still to have been alive
in May, 1349,[388] but by January, 1350, he is spoken of as dead and
Giovanni is named as one of his heirs.[389] And in the same month
of January, 1350, on the 26th of the month, Boccaccio was appointed
guardian of his brother Jacopo,[390] then still a child. But these
were not the only duties which fell to him in that year, which, as
it proved, was to mark a new departure in his life. It is in 1350
that we find him, for the first time as we may think, acting as
ambassador for the Florentine Republic, and it is in 1350 that he
first met Petrarch face to face and entertained him in his house in
Florence.
The condition of Italy at this time was, as may be easily understood,
absolutely anarchical. While Florence and Naples were still in the
throes of revolution and war, the Visconti of Milan had not been
idle. Using every discontent that could be found in Italy, chiefly
of Ghibelline origin, they were in the way to threaten whatsoever
was left of liberty and independence. In the worst of this confusion
the plague had suddenly appeared in 1348 with the same result as an
earthquake might have caused. Old landmarks were overthrown, wealth
was, as it were, redistributed, and the whole social condition, often
bad enough, became indescribably confused.
[Illustration: THE STORY OF GRISELDA. (DEC. X, 10.)
_i. The Marquis of Saluzzo, while out hunting, meets with Griselda, a
peasant girl, and falls in love; he clothes her in fine things. From
the picture in the National Gallery by (?) Bernardino Fungai._]
The economical results of that awful catastrophe, not only for Italy,
but for Europe, were not easily defined or realised anywhere, and
least of all perhaps in Italy, where the conditions of life were so
complex. An enormous displacement of riches had taken place. All
those in any way concerned with the ministration to the sick or
the burial of the dead were, if they survived, greatly enriched;
and among these was such a society as that of the Or San Michele.
But individuals also found themselves suddenly wealthy: doctors
and druggists, undertakers, drapers, and poulterers, and such, all
who had been able to render help were seemingly benefited, but the
farmers and the merchants were ruined. Something perhaps of the awful
transformation brought about by the plague may berealised when we
consider that, according to Boccaccio, Florence lost three out of
every five[391] of her inhabitants, that is about 100,000 persons,
that at Pisa six out of every seven died, that Genoa lost 40,000
people, Siena 80,000, while every one died at Trapani, in Sicily, not
a soul escaping. Old Agnola de Tura, the Sienese historian, tells
us that he buried five of his sons in the same grave, and this was
not extraordinary. The economic result of such disaster may then
be better imagined than described in detail. No one realised what
had happened: it was inconceivable. Even the governments did not
understand the new position. They saw the needy suddenly rich, those
who had been clothed in rags went in silks and French fashions,
and they came to the conclusion that the state was suffering from
too great wealth: they revived sumptuary laws, raised taxes, fixed
prices, and did, in fact, no good, but much harm. The problem to be
solved was that of population and the prices of production. The moral
condition was as disastrous as the economic and left a more lasting
scar.
In this helpless and disastrous condition of the major part of Italy,
from which indeed some of the communes never wholly recovered,[392]
we find what in fact we might have expected, that those who had
suffered least threatened to become dominant. Now, as it happened, of
all Italy upper and lower Milan had escaped most easily, and it was
in fact a domination of Milan that, with Naples in the grip of the
invader and Tuscany almost depopulated, Florence had to face.
Things came to a head when the Visconti, in October, 1350, possessed
themselves of Bologna. In such a case Florence might have expected
help or at least resentment, one might think, from the Romagna, but
the unruly barons of that region were fighting for their lives and
their lordships with Duraforte, whom the Pope had sent to bring them
to order. Nor were Venice and Genoa able to render her aid, for they
had entered on a mortal duel and cared for nothing else. Naples of
course was helpless, and Siena and Perugia, the one stricken almost
to death by the plague, the other confident in her mountain passes,
thought themselves too far for the ambition of Milan.
So Florence faced the enemy alone, and while we admire her courage
we must admit that she had no choice, for she would never have
moved at all, nor in her condition would she have been justified in
moving, but that she was directly threatened; for with Bologna in
the hands of Milan her northern trade routes were at the mercy of
the enemy. Thus it became necessary before all else to secure the
Apennine passes, and this she foresaw so well that in February, 1350,
she bought Prato from the Queen of Naples, who held her rights by
inheritance from her father, Charles of Calabria; and not content
with this, for Prato was no use without Pistoia, she tried to
seize Pistoia also. There, however, she was not wholly or at first
successful, but she was allowed to garrison the citadel as well as
two important fortified places after guaranteeing full freedom to
the Pistolese. In the former of these transactions, the donation
of Prato, carried out by Niccolò Acciaiuoli, we catch a glimpse of
Boccaccio, who was present as a witness in Florence.[393]
Just before the sale of Bologna to the Visconti we find Boccaccio in
Romagna at Ravenna, whither he had gone apparently in September, as
we have seen,[394] on the delicate and honourable mission entrusted
to him by the Society of Or San Michele, of presenting a gift of
ten gold florins to the daughter of Dante, a nun in the convent of
S. Stefano dell' Uliva in that city. Thence he seems to have gone
as ambassador for the republic to Francesco degli Ordelaffi of
Forlì, who was of course already known to him. This, however, is
unfortunately but conjecture. We know in fact almost nothing of
what, for reasons which will presently appear, I consider to have
been Boccaccio's first embassy. All that we can assert is that
before November 11, 1350, he went as ambassador into Romagna, and
this we know from a document cited by the Abate Mehus,[395] bearing
that date which says, "Dominus Johannes Boccacci olim ambasciator
transmissus ad partes Romandioliæ."[396] Baldelli tells us[397]
without supporting his assertions by a single document that Boccaccio
went three times as ambassador for the republic into Romagna: first
in the time of Ostasio da Polenta; later in October, 1350; and again
a few months after. The first of these embassies, that to Ostasio, he
bases on Petrarch's letter of 1365, which we have already quoted and
used.[398] There Petrarch says: "Ortus est Adriæ in litore ea ferme
ætate, nisi fallor, qua tu ibi agebas cum antiquo plagæ illius Domino
ejus avo, qui nunc præsidet." That is to say, he says to Boccaccio:
"Unless I am mistaken, you were on the shores of the Adriatic in the
time of the grandfather of him who now rules there." He is speaking
of Ravenna, not of Rimini, and quite apart from the fact that he
says, "unless I am mistaken"--and he may have been mistaken--there
is no mention there of an embassy, but only of a visit, a visit to
Ostasio da Polenta, who died in 1346, and was the grandfather of
Guido da Polenta, who ruled in Ravenna when that letter was written
in 1365. We have already used this letter to prove the date of that
visit, in doing which we are making legitimate use of it, but to try
to prove an embassy from it is to use it improperly.
The second embassy, Baldelli tells us, was to Francesco degli
Ordelaffi, in October, 1350, "after the sale of Bologna on the 14th
of that month." This again is pure conjecture, the only document
which supports it being that quoted above, discovered by Mehus.
We have, however, reason to suppose that Baldelli may be right
here,[399] and may possibly have been in possession of a document or
documents since lost to us, which unfortunately he has not quoted
or even named. We know at least that Boccaccio was ambassador in
Romagna before November 11, 1350. Now until late in 1349 we have
seen him in Naples, and in January and February, 1350, in Florence.
In October, 1350, we know him to have been in Florence again, for he
there entertained Petrarch, as he did in December. What was he doing
between February and October in that year? Well, in September he was
in Romagna, in Ravenna fulfilling his mission from the Or San Michele
to the daughter of Dante. It seems likely, therefore, that it was at
this time he was acting as Florentine ambassador at the court of the
Ordelaffi of Forlì.
As to the third embassy of which Baldelli speaks, that to Bernardino
da Polenta "a few months after" the second, we know nothing of it,
and it remains absolutely in the air--a mere conjecture.[400]
Putting aside Baldelli's assertion, we may take it on the evidence
as most probable that Boccaccio was the ambassador of Florence in
Romagna at some time between March and October, 1350. If we are
right in thinking so, his mission was of very great importance. What
Florence feared, as we have seen, was the growing power of Milan,
and, after the sale of Bologna, the loss of her trade routes north,
and finally perhaps even her liberty. Already, in the latter part of
1349,[401] she had offered again and again to mediate between the
Pope and Bologna and Romagna, fearing that in their distraction Milan
would be tempted to interfere for her own ends. In the first months
of 1350 she had written to the Pope, to Perugia, Siena, and to the
Senate of Rome, that they should send ambassadors to the congress
at Arezzo to form a confederation for their common protection.[402]
In September she wrote the Pope more than once explaining affairs
to him; but he had touched Visconti gold, and far away in Avignon
cared nothing and paid but little heed. The sale of Bologna, however,
brought things to a crisis so far as the policy of Florence was
concerned, and having secured Prato, Pistoia, and the passes, her
ambassadors in Romagna had apparently induced the Pepoli to replace
Bologna under the protection of the communes of Florence, Siena,
and Perugia, till the Papal army was ready to act. But the Papal
army was not likely to be ready so long as Visconti was willing to
pay,[403] and we find the Pope, while he thanks Florence effusively,
refusing to acknowledge the claim of the League to protect Bologna.
The sale of Bologna to Milan, its seizure by the Visconti, brought
all the diplomacy of Florence to naught for the moment, and in
another letter, written on November 9, 1350,[404] she returns once
more to plead with the Pope and to point out to him the danger of the
invasions of the Visconti in Lombardy and in Bologna, which placed in
peril not only the Parte Guelfa, but the territories of the Church
and the Florentine _contado_. By the time that letter was written
Boccaccio was back in Florence, and it must have been evident to
the Florentines that the Pope had no intention of giving them any
assistance and that they must look elsewhere for an ally.
That year, so troubled in Italy, incongruous as it may seem to us,
had been proclaimed by the Pope a year of Jubilee, not without some
intention that the Papal coffers should benefit from the faithful,
then eager to express their piety and their thankfulness for the
passing of the plague. To gain the indulgence of the Jubilee it was
necessary to spend fifteen days in Rome. On April 17, 1350, the
commune of Florence prayed the Papal Legate, partly, no doubt, on
account of the unsettled condition of the City, and partly, perhaps,
that Florence itself might not be long without as many citizens
as possible, to reduce the term of fifteen days to eight for all
Florentines and for those who dwelt in the _contado_.[405]
[Illustration: THE STORY OF GRISELDA. (DEC. X, 10.)
_ii. Her two children are taken from her, she is divorced, stripped,
and sent back to her father's house. From the picture in the National
Gallery by (?) Bernardino Fungai._]
Now Petrarch, always a man of sincere piety, and especially at this
time when he was mourning for Laura, had spent the earlier months
of the year in Padua, Parma, and Verona. On February 14, the feast
of S. Valentine, he had been present at the translation of the body
of S. Anthony of Padua from its first resting-place to the church
just built in its honour--Il Santo. On June 20 he had taken formal
possession of his archdeaconry in Parma; and so it was not till the
beginning of October that he set out, alone, on pilgrimage for Rome
to win the indulgences of the Jubilee. As it happened, he travelled
by way of Florence, entering that city for the first time about the
middle of the month, and there, as is generally supposed, for the
first time too, he met Boccaccio face to face.[406]
Petrarch, born in Arezzo on July 20, 1304, was nine years older
than Boccaccio, and differed from him so much both in intellect and
character that the two friends may almost be said to complement
one another. Of a very noble nature, Petrarch was nevertheless
introspective, jealous of his reputation, and absolutely personal in
his attitude towards life, of which, as his work shows, he was in
many ways so shy. Nor was he without a certain puritanism which was
his weakness as well as his strength. As a scholar he was at this
time, as he always remained, incomparably Boccaccio's superior. For
Boccaccio the ancient world was a kind of wonder and miracle that had
no relation to himself or to the modern world. But Petrarch regarded
antiquity almost as we do, and, though necessarily without our
knowledge of detail, such as it is, with a real historic sense--as
a living thing with which it was possible, though hardly, to hold
communion, by which it was possible to be guided, governed, and
taught, a reality out of which the modern world was born. Moreover,
in 1350, at the time of his meeting with Boccaccio, Petrarch was
indubitably the most renowned poet and man of letters in Europe.
Every one knew his sonnets, and his incoronation as Laureate on the
Capitol had sufficed in the imagination of the world, quite apart
from the intrinsic and very real value of his work, to set him above
all other poets of his time. He was the Pope's friend, and was
honoured and welcomed in every court in Italy--at the court, for
instance, of King Robert of Naples, where he had left so splendid a
memory on his way to the triumph of the Capitol, at the courts of
the _signorotti_ of the Romagna. The youth of Italy had his sonnets
by heart; all women read with envy his praise of Madonna Laura;
the learned reverenced him as the most learned man of his time and
thought him the peer of Virgil and of Cicero. Nor was the Church
behind in an admiration wherein all the world was agreed, for she saw
in the lettered _canonico_ the glory of the priesthood, and would
gladly have led him forward to the highest honours.[407] It was this
man, one of the most famous and as it happened one of the best of
the age, that Boccaccio met in Florence in 1350.
Petrarch himself gives us an account of their first meeting.[408]
"In days gone by," he says in a letter to Boccaccio,[409] "I was
hurrying across Central Italy in midwinter; you hastened to greet me,
not only with affection, the message of soul to soul, but in person,
impelled by a wonderful desire to see one you had never yet beheld,
but whom nevertheless you were minded to love. You had sent before
you a piece of beautiful verse, thus showing me first the aspect of
your genius and then of your person. It was evening and the light was
fading, when, returning from my long exile, I found myself at last
within my native walls. You welcomed me with a courtesy and respect
greater than I merited, recalling the poetic meeting of Anchises
with the king of Arcadia, who, "in the ardour of youth," longed to
speak with the hero and to press his hand.[410] Although I did not,
like him, stand "above all others," but rather beneath, your zeal
was none the less ardent. You introduced me, not within the walls of
Pheneus, but into the sacred penetralia of your friendship. Nor did
I present you with a "superb quiver and arrows of Lycia," but rather
with my sincere and unchangeable affection. While acknowledging my
inferiority in many respects, I will never willingly concede it in
this either to Nisus or to Pythias or to Lælius.--Farewell."
Thus began a friendship that lasted nearly twenty-five years. They
were, says Filippo Villani, "one soul in two bodies."
But Petrarch did not remain long in Florence; after a few days he
hurried on to Rome, whence he wrote to Boccaccio on his arrival:--
"... After leaving you I betook myself, as you know, to Rome, where
the year of Jubilee has called--sinners that we are--almost all
Christendom. In order not to be condemned to the burden of travelling
alone I chose some companions for the way; of whom one, the oldest,
by the prestige of his age and his religious profession, another
by his knowledge and talk, others by their experience of affairs
and their kind affection, seemed likely to sweeten the journey that
nevertheless was very tiring. I took these precautions, which were
rather wise than happy as the event proved, and I went with a fervent
heart, ready to make an end at last of my iniquities. For, as Horace
says, 'I am not ashamed of past follies, but I should be, if now I
did not end them.'[411] Fortune, I hope, has not and will not be able
to alter my resolution in anything...."[412]
But as he himself seems to have feared, he was unlucky that day,
for as he passed with his companions up the hillside out of Bolsena
he was kicked badly on the leg by his companion's horse and came to
Rome with difficulty, suffering great pain all the time he was there.
He seems to have reached the City on November 1, and to have left
it again early in December for Arezzo, his birthplace, where he was
received with extraordinary honour. Thence he returned to Florence,
where he again saw Boccaccio with his friends Lapo da Castiglionchio
and Francescho Nelli, whose father had been Gonfalonier of Justice
and who himself became Secretary to Niccolò Acciaiuoli when he was
Grand Seneschal of Naples. Nelli was in Holy Orders and Prior of SS.
Apostoli. Lapo was a man of great learning; he now presented Petrarch
with a copy of the newly discovered _Institutions_ of Quintillian.
In the New Year Petrarch left Florence, and three months later we
find Boccaccio visiting him in Padua as ambassador for the republic,
which, no doubt to his delight and very probably at his suggestion,
wished to offer the great poet a chair in her new university. For
partly in rivalry with Pisa, partly to attract foreigners and even
new citizens after the plague,[413] the republic had founded a new
university in Florence at the end of 1348, to which, in May, 1349,
Pope Clement VI had conceded all the privileges and liberties of
the universities of Paris and Bologna. For some reason or another,
however, the new university had not brought to Florence either the
fame or the population she desired. It was therefore a brilliant and
characteristic policy which prompted her to invite the most famous
man of learning of the day to accept a chair in it; for if Petrarch
could have been persuaded to accept the offer, the university of
Florence would have easily outshone any other then in existence: all
Italy and half Europe might well have flocked thither.
The offer thus made, and if at Boccaccio's suggestion, then so far
as he was concerned in all good faith, was characteristic in its
impudence or astonishing in its generosity according to the point of
view, for it will be remembered that Florence had banished Petrarch's
father and confiscated his goods and all such property as it could
lay its hands on two years before the birth of his son in 1302.
With him into exile went his young wife. They found a refuge in the
Ghibelline city of Arezzo, where for this cause Petrarch was born.
Even in 1350, the year in which the poet entered Florence for the
first time, the decree of banishment was in force against him; had he
been less famous, less well protected, he would have been in peril of
his life. As it was, Florence dared not attack him; nor, seeing the
glory he had won, did she wish to do anything but claim a share in
it. It was doubtless this consideration and some remembrance of her
humiliation before the contempt of that other exile who had died in
Ravenna, that prompted Florence, always so business-like, to try to
repair the wrong she had done to Petrarch. So she decided to return
him in money the value of the property confiscated from his father,
and to send Boccaccio on the delicate mission of persuading him to
accept the offer she now made him of a chair in her university.[414]
With a letter then from the Republic, Boccaccio set out for Padua in
the spring of 1351, meeting Petrarch there, as De Sade tells us, on
April 6, the anniversary of the day of Petrarch's first meeting with
Laura and of her death.
[Illustration: THE STORY OF GRISELDA. (DEC. X, 10.)
_iii. A banquet is prepared for the new bride; Griselda is sent for
to serve, but is reinstated in her husband's affections and finds her
children. From the picture in the National Gallery by (?) Bernardino
Fungai._]
The letter which Boccaccio took with him was from the Prior of the
_Arti_: Reverendo Viro D. Francisco Petrarcha, Canonico Padoano,
Laureato Poetæ, concivi nostro carissimo, Prior Artium Vexillifer
Justitiæ Populi et Communis Florentiæ. It was very flattering,
laudatory, and moving. It greeted Petrarch as a citizen of Florence,
spoke of his "admirable profession," his "excellent merit in
studies," his "utter worthiness of the laurel crown," his "most rare
genius which shall be an example to latest posterity," etc. etc.
etc. Then it spoke of the offer. "No long time since," it said,
"seeing our city deprived of learning and study, we wisely decided
that henceforth the arts must flourish and ought to be cultivated
among us, and that it would be necessary to introduce studies of
every sort into our city so that by their help our Republic, like
Rome of old, should be glorious above the other cities of Italy and
grow always more happy and more illustrious. Now our fatherland
believes that you are the one and only man by whom this result can be
attained. The Republic prays you, then, as warmly as it may, to give
yourself to these studies and to make them flourish...." So on and so
forth, quoting Virgil, Sallust, and Cicero, with allusions to that
"immortal work the _Africa_ which...." Boccaccio was to do the rest.
"Other things," the letter ends, "many and of infinitely greater
consideration, you will hear from Giovanni Boccaccio, our citizen,
who is sent to you by special commission...."[415]
With this letter in his pocket Boccaccio made his way to Padua,
where, as we know, he was delighted to come, nor was Petrarch less
happy to see him. And when he returned he bore Petrarch's answer
to the Republic: "Boccaccio, the bearer of your letter and of your
commands, will tell you how I desire to obey you and what are
my projects." No doubt while Boccaccio was with him, seeing his
sincerity, Petrarch felt half inclined to accept; but he was at
all times infirm of purpose. "If I break my word that I have given
to my friends," he writes,[416] "it is because of the variation of
the human spirit, from which none is exempt except the perfect man.
Uniformity is the mother of boredom, that one can only avoid by
changing one's place." However that may be, when later in the year he
left Padua, it was to return not to Florence, but to France.
If we know nothing else of this embassy, we know, at least, that
this sojourn in Padua passed pleasantly for Boccaccio. In a letter
written to Petrarch from Ravenna, in July, 1353,[417] he reminds his
"best master" of his visit. "I think," he writes, "that you have not
forgotten how, when less than three years ago I came to you in Padua
the ambassador of our Senate, my commission fulfilled, I remained
with you for some days, and how that those days were all passed in
the same way: you gave yourself to sacred studies, and I, desiring
your compositions, copied them. When the day waned to sunset we left
work and went into your garden, already filled by spring with flowers
and leaves.... Now sitting, now talking, we passed what remained of
the day in placid and delightful idleness, even till night."
Some of that talk was doubtless given to Letters, but some too fell,
as it could not but do, on politics. For that letter, so charming
in the scene it brings before us of that garden at nightfall, goes
on to speak in a transparent allegory of the affairs of Italy
and of Petrarch's sudden change of plans, for whereas in 1351 he
had promised to enter the service of Florence and had cursed the
Visconti, when he returned to Italy in 1353, it was with these very
Visconti he had taken shameful service--with the enemies of "his
own country" Florence, whom he had spurned, and who in return had
repealed the repeal of his banishment and refrained from returning
to him the money value of his father's possessions. Is it in revenge
for this, Boccaccio asks, that he has taken service with the enemy?
He reproaches him in the subtlest and gentlest way, yet with an eager
patriotism that does him the greatest honour, representing him to
himself even as a third person, one Sylvanus, who "had been of their
company" in Padua. Yet Boccaccio does not spare him, and though he
loved and revered him beyond any other living man, he bravely tells
him his mind and points out his treachery, when his country is at
stake.
That Sylvanus, it seems--Petrarch himself really--had lamented
bitterly enough the unhappy state of Italy, neglected by the Emperors
and the Popes, and exposed to the brutality and tyranny of the
Archbishop Giovanni Visconti of Milan. More and more he cursed the
tyrants, and especially the Visconti, and "how eagerly you agreed
with him!... But now," the letter continues,[418] "I have heard that
this Sylvanus is about to enter the service of those very Visconti,
who even now menace his country. I would not have believed it had
not I had a letter from him in which he tells me it is so himself.
Who would ever have suspected him of so much mobility of character,
or as likely to forswear his own faith out of greediness? But he has
done so perhaps to avenge himself on his fellow-citizens who have
retaken the property of his father, which they had once returned
to him. But what man of honour, even when he has received a wrong
from his country, would unite himself with her enemies? How much has
Sylvanus mystified and compromised, by these acts, all his admirers
and friends...."
Just here we come upon something noble and firm in the character of
Boccaccio, something of the "nationalism" too which was to be the
great force of the future, to which Petrarch was less clairvoyant
and which Dante had never perceived at all. The Empire was dead; in
less than a hundred years men were to protest they did not understand
what it meant. The Papacy then too seemed almost as helpless as it
is to-day. Internationalism--the latest cry of the modern decadent
or dreamer--was already a mere ghost frightened and gibbering in
the dawn, and the future lay in the growth of nationalities, in the
variety and freedom of the world, perhaps in the federation of Italy.
Were these the thoughts that occupied the two pioneers of the modern
world on those spring nights in that garden at Padua?
FOOTNOTES:
[387] See _supra_, p. 128.
[388] See CRESCINI, _op. cit._, p. 258. He quotes the following
from Libro Primo del Monte, Quartiere S. Spirito, cap. 162: "Anno
mcccxlviij [=1349 n.s.] Ind j^a die nono mensis Maij positum est
dictum creditum ad aliam rationem dicti Boccaccij sive Boccaccini in
presenti quarterio ad car 110, ad instantiam eiusdem Bocchaccij per
me dinum M^l Attaviani notarium."
[389] Cf. CRESCINI, _op. cit._, p. 258. He quotes the following from
the Libro Primo above, cap. 110^b: "Mcccxlviiij, Ind iij^a die XXV
Ianuarij, de licencia domini Iohannis filij et heredis, ut dixit,
dicti Boccaccij hereditario nomine concessa dicto per me Bartalum
maççatelli notarium positum est dictum creditum in libro quarterij
S^e Crucis et carta 50."
[390] The document is quoted by MANNI, _op. cit._, p. 21. It is as
follows: "Mcccxlviiij 26 Ianuarii D. Ioannes q. Boccacci pop. S.
Felicitatis tutor Iacobi pupilli eius fratris, et filii quondam, et
heredis D. Bicis olim matris suæ, et uxoris q. dicti Boccaccii, et
filiæ q. Ubaldini Nepi de Bosticcis."
SANESI, in _Rassegna Bib. della Lett. It._ (Pisa, 1893), Vol. I,
No. 4, p. 120 _et seq._, publishes a document dated May 17, 1351,
in which certain "actores, factores et certos numptios speciales"
are appointed to act with Giovanni as guardians of Jacopo, viz. Ser
Domenico di Jacopo and Ser Francesco di Vanello _notari fiorentini_.
This leads Sanesi to suggest that Boccaccio was a failure as a
guardian. The document, however, by no means deposes him and on the
same day he inscribed himself in the Matricoli dell' Arte dei Giudici
et Notari. The document speaks of "Iacobi ... pupilli majoris tamen
infante," which leads Sanesi to think that Jacopo was out of his
infancy. CRESCINI in _Rassegna Bib._, _cit._, An. I, Nos. 8-9, pp.
243-5, disputes Sanesi's conclusions as to the incapacity of Giovanni
and the age of Jacopo. I agree with Crescini.
[391] This was about the average loss throughout Europe.
[392] Siena never really recovered, nor did Pisa.
[393] Cf. TANFANI, _Niccolò Acciaiuoli, studi storici_ (Firenze,
1863), p. 82.
[394] _Supra_, p. 120, n. 1.
[395] MEHUS, _Ambrosii Traversarii Vita_ (Firenze, 1759).
[396] It has been said by Hortis that the "olim" is unlikely to have
referred to so recent an embassy, one which, in fact, was only in
being two months before. I do not see the force of this. The "olim"
is used in our sense of late, "the late ambassador." In November, as
we shall see, Boccaccio was back in Florence. In the sense of "late"
we find the "olim" used in the document already quoted in which
Giovanni is appointed guardian of his brother Jacopo (_supra_, cap.
x. n. 4): "... et heredis D. Bicis olim matris suæ," _i.e._ "and heir
of Donna Bice, his late mother."
[397] BALDELLI, _op. cit._, p. 377. Baldelli seems here to have
confused himself--at any rate he expresses himself badly. It is
difficult to see clearly what he means. He is wrong too when he gives
the commission from the Or San Michele as being of the month of
December; Landau follows him in this. The commission was of the month
of September. See _supra_, p. 120, n. 1.
[398] See _supra_, p. 119, n. 1.
[399] CIAMPI, _Monumenti di un Manoscritto autografo di Messer G. B._
(Firenze, 1827), goes further than Baldelli and is in evident error.
He connects this embassy of 1350 with the descent of King Louis of
Hungary. This is impossible. That Boccaccio did meet King Louis in
Forlì, and that he accompanied him with "suo signore" Francesco degli
Ordelaffi into Campania is certain, as we have seen (_supra_, p.
124); but that was in 1347, not in 1350, and when he was a visitor
at Forlì, not when he was Florentine ambassador there. How could he
call Ordelaffo "suo signore" when he was the servant of Florence? And
how could he follow Ordelaffo and the King, when he was ambassador,
without the permission of Florence? Moreover, according to Ciampi,
all this occurred, not in 1347, but in 1350. Now in May, 1350, King
Louis was in Aversa, and from February, 1350, Ordelaffo was fighting
the Papal arms in Romagna, which had been turned against him on
account of the rebellion of the Manfredi of Faenza, which he was
supposed to have instigated. We see him victor in fight after fight;
he took Bertinoro in May, Castracaro in July, Meldola in August,
and the war continued throughout 1351 and longer. In 1350 then
neither did the King descend into Italy nor did Ordelaffo accompany
him. These things happened in 1347. Besides, in February, 1350,
Boccaccio was in accord with Niccolò Acciaiuoli and, as we have seen,
assisted as witness at the donation of Prato. Cf. TANFANI, _Niccolò
Acciaiuoli_, pp. 79-82.
[400] Of course, Boccaccio was in Ravenna in September, 1350, and
probably saw Bernardino there, for he must have known him very well.
[401] See the letter to the Pope of September 10, 1349, given in
_Arch. Stor. Ital._, Series I, Appendix, Vol. VI, p. 369.
[402] See the letters of February 17, February 23, February 28, 1350,
in _Arch., cit., u.s._, pp. 373-4.
[403] "The luxury, vice, and iniquity of Avignon during the Papal
residence became proverbial throughout Europe; and the corruption of
the Church was most clearly visible in the immediate neighbourhood of
its princely head. Luxury and vice, however, are costly, and during
the Pope's absence from Italy the Papal States were in confusion and
yielded scanty revenues. Money had to be raised from ecclesiastical
property throughout Europe, and the Popes in Avignon carried
extortion and oppression of the Church to an extent it had never
reached before." (CREIGHTON, _History of the Papacy_, Vol. I, p. 51.)
[404] Letter of November, 1350, in _Arch., cit., u.s._, p. 378.
[405] _Arch. Stor. It., u.s._, p. 376.
[406] It seems certain that they had been in correspondence for some
years, perhaps for more than fifteen. In the letter to Boccaccio of
January 7, 1351, Petrarch speaks of a poem that Boccaccio had long
since sent him (? 1349) (_Famil._, XI, 1); while in the letter to
Franceschino da Brossano, written after Petrarch's death in 1374,
Boccaccio says "I was his for forty years or more" (CORAZZINI, _op.
cit._, p. 382). This would seem to mean he had loved his work for so
long, and brings us to 1341-4. It still seems to me just doubtful
whether this meeting in Florence in 1350 was their first encounter.
As I have said, Petrarch came to Florence in October; by November 2
he was in Rome, whence he wrote Boccaccio on that date an account
of his journey. Now as we shall presently see, in a letter written
much later (_Epist. Fam._, XXI, 15), he distinctly says that he
first met Boccaccio, who had come to meet him when he was hurrying
across Central Italy _in midwinter_. No one, least of all an Italian
and a somewhat scrupulous scholar, would call October 15 midwinter.
Perhaps then it will be said that he met him on his return from Rome
in December. But already in November he is writing to Boccaccio--we
have the letter--in the most familiar and affectionate terms. Can
it be that they met after all (see _supra_, pp. 60 and 111) in 1341
or perhaps in 1343? The problem seems insoluble on our present
information.
[407] Cf. HORTIS, _op. cit._, pp. 509-10.
[408] I have already shown (_supra_, p. 153, n. 2) that it is
possible to doubt whether the meeting in Florence was their first
meeting. It is, however, generally accepted as the first by modern
scholars. Cf. Landau and Antona Traversi.
[409] Cf. _Epistol. Famil._, Lib. XXI, 15.
[410] See _Æneid_, VIII, 162 _et seq._
[411] HORACE, _Epistolæ_, Lib. I, 14.
[412] _Epistol. Famil._, Lib. XI, 1.
[413] Cf. M. VILLANI, in _R. I. S._, XIV, 18.
[414] The chair was to be in any faculty Petrarch chose. D. ROSETTI
insists that it was offered at Boccaccio's suggestion (_Petrarca,
Giulio Celso e Boccaccio_ (Trieste, 1823), p. 351), and asserts that
the short biography of Petrarch which he attributes to Boccaccio was
composed to persuade the Government of Florence to repair Petrarch's
wrongs. TIRABOSCHI (_op. cit._, Vol. II, pp. 253-4), with tears
in his voice, cannot decide whether the affair did more honour to
Petrarch or to Florence. So far as Florence is concerned, I see no
honour in the affair at all. She was asking Petrarch to do her an
inestimable service by bolstering up her third-rate university. In
order to get him to do this, she was willing to pay back what she
had stolen and (a poor gift when she was begging for foreigners as
citizens) to repeal the edict of banishment against him. Petrarch
treated the whole impudent attempt to get round him in the right
way. And Florence, when she found nothing was to be got out of him,
repealed the repeal. But surely we know the Florentines!
[415] CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 391 and HORTIS, _Boccaccio
Ambasciatore in Avignone_ (Trieste, 1875)
[416] _Epist. Famil._, II, xii.
[417] Cf. CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 47.
[418] CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 47. Letter of July, 1353. Petrarch in
May-June, 1353, had accepted the patronage of Giovanni Visconti.