In the Memoir prefixed to the Aldine edition of the _Poetical Works of
Chaucer_, London, 1845, Sir Harris Nicolas expresses an opinion that Dan
Geoffrey was not acquainted with the Italian language, and therefore not
versed in Italian literature.
"Though Chaucer undoubtedly knew Latin and French, it is by no means
certain, notwithstanding his supposed obligations to the Decameron,
that he was as well acquainted with Italian. There may have been a
common Latin original of the main incidents of many, if not of all the
tales, for which Chaucer is supposed to have been wholly indebted to
Boccaccio, and from which originals Boccaccio himself may have taken
them. That Chaucer was not acquainted with Italian may be inferred from
his not having introduced any Italian quotation into his works,
redundant as they are with Latin and French words and phrases."--_Life
of Chaucer_, pp. 24, 25.
To which the following note is subjoined:
"Though Chaucer's writings have not been examined for the purpose, the
remark in the text is not made altogether from recollection, for at the
end of Speght's edition of Chaucer's _Works_, translations are given of
the Latin and French words in the poems, but not a single Italian word
is mentioned."
If Sir Harris Nicolas had examined the writings of Chaucer with any care,
he would scarcely have formed or expressed so strange an opinion, for he
must necessarily have discovered that Chaucer was not only well acquainted
with the language, but thoroughly well versed in Italian literature, and
that he paraphrased and translated freely from the works of Dante,
Petrarca, and Boccaccio. Chaucer would naturally quote Latin and French, as
being familiar to his cotemporaries, and would abstain from introducing
Italian, as a knowledge of that language must have been confined to a few
individuals in his day; and he wrote for the many, and not for the
minority.
The circumstances of Chaucer's life, his missions to Italy, during which he
resided several months in that country, when sent on the king's business to
Genoa, and Florence, and Lombardy, afforded {518} him ample opportunities
of becoming thoroughly acquainted with the language and literature of
Italy; the acquisition of which must have been of easy accomplishment to
Chaucer, already familiar with Latin and French. So that it is not
necessary to endow Chaucer "with all human attainments as proof of his
having spoken Italian."
Chaucer's own writings, however, afford the strongest evidence against the
opinion entertained by Sir Harris Nicolas, and such evidence as cannot be
controverted.
Chaucer loves to refer to Dante, and often translates passages from the
_Divine Comedy_. The following lines are very closely rendered from the
_Paradiso_, xiv. 28.:--
"Thou one, two, and thre, eterne on live,
That raignest aie in thre, two, and one,
Uncircumscript, and all maist circumscrive."
Last stanza of _Troilus and Creseide_.
"_Quell' uno e due e tre che sempre vive,_
_E regna sempre in tre e due ed uno_,
_Non circonscritto, e tutto circonscrive._"
Dante, _Il Paradiso_, xiv. 28.
"Wel can _the wise poet of Florence_,
That highte _Dant_, speken of this sentence:
Lo, in swiche maner rime is _Dantes_ tale.
_Ful selde up riseth by his branches smale_
_Prowesse of man, for God of his goodnesse_
_Wol that we claime of him our gentillesse._"
_Wif of Bathes Tale_, 6707.
"_Rade volte risurge per li rami_
_L' umana probità: e questo vuole_
_Quei che la dà, perchè da lui si chiami._"
_Purgatorio_, vii. 121.
After relating the dread story of the Conte Ugolino, Chaucer refers to
Dante, from whom perhaps he derived it. (Conf. _Inferno_, xxxiii.)
"Who so wol here it in a longer wise,
Redeth the grete poete of Itaille,
That highte _Dante_, for he can it devise
Fro point to point, not o word wol he faille."
_The Monkes Tale_, 14,769.
"Bet than Vergile, while he was on live,
Or _Dant_ also."--_The Freres Tale_, 7101.
The following lines refer to the _Inferno_, xiii. 64.:
"Envie is lavender of the court alway,
For she ne parteth neither night ne day,
Out of the house of Cesar, thus saith _Dant_."
Prologue to the _Legend of Good Women_, 359.
"_Dant_ that it tellen can" is mentioned in the _House of Fame_, book i.;
and Chaucer is indebted to him for some lines in that fine poem, as in the
description of the "egle, that with feathers shone all of gold" = _un'
aquila nel ciel con penne d'oro_; and the following line:
"O thought, that wrote all that I met."
_House of Fame_, ii. 18.
"_O mente, che scrivesti ciò ch' io vidi._"
_Inferno_, ii. 8.
The _Knightes Tale_ exhibits numerous passages, lines, and expressions
verbally translated from the _Teseide_ of Boccaccio, upon which it is
founded; such as _Idio armipotente_ = Mars armipotent; _Eterno admante_ =
Athamant eterne; _Paura palida_ = pale drede; _Le ire rosse come focho_ =
the cruel ire red as any glede. Boccaccio describes the wood in which "Mars
hath his sovereine mansion" as--
"_Una selva sterile de robusti_
_Cerri,_
_Nodosi aspri e rigidi e vetusti._
_Vi si sentia grandissimo romore,_
_Ne vera bestia anchora ne pastore._"
_Teseide_, book vii.
There is a purposed grisly ruggedness in the corresponding passage of the
_Knightes Tale_, which heightens the horrors of "thilke colde and frosty
region:"
"First on the wall was peinted _a forest,_
_In which ther wonneth neyther man ne best,_
_With knotty knarry barrein trees old_
_Of stubbes sharpe and hidous to behold_;
In which ther ran _a romble and a swough_,
As though a storme shuld bresten every bough."
_The Knightes Tale_, 1977.
The death of Arcite is thus related by Boccaccio:
"La morte in ciascun membro era venuta
Da piedi in su, venendo verso il petto,
Ed ancor nelle braccia era perduta
La vital forza; sol nello intelletto
E nel cuore era ancora sostenuta
La poca vita, ma già si ristretto
Eragli 'l tristo cor del mortal gelo
Che agli occhi fe' subitamente velo.
"Ma po' ch' egli ebbe perduto il vedere,
Con seco cominciò a mormorare,
Ognor mancando più del suo podere:
Nè troppo fece in ciò lungo durare;
Ma il mormorare trasportato in vere
Parole, con assai basso parlare
Addio Emilia; e più oltre non disse,
Chè l' anima convenne si partisse."
_Teseide_, book x. 112.
Chaucer loses nothing of this description in his condensed translation:
"For from his feet up to his brest was come
The cold of deth, that had him overnome.
And yet moreover in his armes two
The vital strength is lost, and all ago.
Only the intellect, withouten more,
That dwelled in his herte sike and sore,
Gan feillen, when the herte felte deth;
Dusked his eyen two, and failled his breth.
But on his ladie yet cast he his eye;
His laste word was; Mercy, Emelie!"
_The Knightes Tale_, 2301.
_Troilus and Creseide_ seems to have been translated from the _Filostrato_
of Boccaccio, when {519} Chaucer was a young man, as we are informed by Dan
John Lydgate in the Prologue to his Translation of Boccaccio's _Fall of
Princes_, where he speaks of his "Maister Chaucer" as the "chefe poete of
Bretayne," and tells us that--
"_In youthe he made a translacion_
Of a boke which called is Trophe,
In Lumbard tongue, as men may rede and se,
_And in our vulgar, long or that he deyde_
Gave it the name of Troylous and Cresseyde."
Chaucer's translation is sometimes very close, sometimes rather free and
paraphrastic, as may be seen in the following examples:
"But right as floures through the cold of night
Yclosed, stoupen in hir stalkes lowe,
Redressen hem ayen the Sunne bright,
And spreaden in hir kinde course by rowe."
_Troilus and Creseide_, b. ii.
"_Come fioretto dal notturno gelo_
_Chinato e chiuso, poi che il Sol l' imbianca,_
_S'apre, e si leva dritto sopra il stelo._"
Boccaccio, _Il Filostrato_, iii. st. 13.
"She was right soche to sene in her visage
As is that wight that men on bere ybinde."
_Troilus and Creseide_, b. iv.
"_Essa era tale, a guardarla nel viso,_
_Qual donna morta alla fossa portata._"
_Il Filostrato_, v. st. 83.
"As fresh as faucon coming out of mew."
_Troilus and Creseide_, b. iii.
"_Come falcon ch' uscisse dal cappello._"
_Il Filostrato_, iv. st. 83.
"The Song of Troilus," in the first book of _Troilus and Creseide_, is a
paraphrase from one of the Sonnets of Petrarca:
"_S' Amor non è, che dunque è quel ch' i' sento?_
_Ma s' egli è Amor, per Dio che cosa, e quale?_
_Se buona, ond' è l' effetto aspro mortale?_"
Petrarca, _Rime in Vita di Laura_, Son. cii.
"If no love is, O God, what feele I so?
And if love is, what thing and which is he?
If love be good, from whence cometh my wo?"
_Troilus and Creseide_, b. i.
Chaucer evidently had the following lines of the _Paradiso_ in view when
writing the invocation to the Virgin in _The Second Nonnes Tale_:
"Vergine Madre, figlia del tuo Figlio,
Umile e alta più che creatura,
Termine fisso d' eterno consiglio,
Tu se' colei, che l' umana Natura,
_Nobilitasti_ sì, che il suo Fattore
Non disdegno di farsi sua fattura."
_Paradiso_, xxxiii, I.
"Thou maide and mother, doughter of thy Son,
Thou well of mercy, sinful soules cure,
In whom that God of bountee chees to won;
Thou humble and high over every creature,
Thou _nobledest_ so fer forth our nature,
That no desdaine the maker had of kinde
His Son in blood and flesh to clothe and winde."
_The Second Nonnes Tale_, 15,504.
Traces of Chaucer's proficiency in Italian are discoverable in almost all
his poems; but I shall conclude with two citations from _The Assembly of
Foules_:
"The day gan failen, and the darke night,
That reveth beastes from hir businesse,
Berafte me my booke for lacke of light."
_The Assembly of Foules_, I. 85.
"_Lo giorno se n'andava, e l'aer bruno_
_Toglieva gli animai che sono in terra_
_Dalle fatiche loro._"--_Inf._ ii. 1.
"With that my hand in his he toke anon,
Of which I comfort caught, and went in fast."
_The Assembly of Foules_, I. 169.
"_E poiche la sua mano alla mia pose_
_Con lieto volto, ond' io mi confortai._"
_Inf._ iii. 19.
By the way, Chaucer commences _The Assembly of Foules_ with part of the
first aphorism of Hippocrates, "[Greek: Ho bios brachus hê de technê
makrê]" (but this, I suppose, had been noticed before):
"The lyfe so short, the craft so long to lerne."
Chaucer was forty years old, or upwards, in 1372, when he was sent as an
envoy to treat with the duke, citizens, and merchants of Genoa; and if, as
is probable, he had translated _Troilus and Creseide_ out of the "Lombarde
tonge" in his youth (according to the testimony of Lydgate), it is not
unreasonable to infer that his knowledge of Italian may have led to his
being chosen to fill that office. But, however this may be, abundant proof
has been adduced that Chaucer was familiarly acquainted with Italian.
I may briefly remark, in conclusion, that the dates and other circumstances
favour the supposed interview at Padua, between Fraunceis Petrark the
laureate poet, and Dan Chaucer,
"Floure of poets throughout all Bretaine."