we find Petrarch back in his old surroundings at Vaucluse. During his
brief stay here he was called upon to co-operate in no less a task than
the drafting of a constitution for Rome. The Pope, convinced by the
disorders of the past years that some change was necessary, deputed a
commission of cardinals to prepare a new form of government, and they,
aware of Petrarch's familiarity with the conditions in Rome, asked his
co-operation. Those curious to study the poet as constitution-monger
will find his plan among his letters.[85] The power, he urged, should
be given back to the people, and the barons should be excluded, for the
time being, from the government. It was about this time that he avoided
accepting an onerous papal secretaryship which his friends were anxious
to force upon him, by ingeniously submitting so elegant a sample of his
style that he was rejected on the ground that he could not write in the
barbarous but official forms of the curia.[86]
Pope Innocent VI., who followed Clement VI. at the close of the year
1352, was an exceptionally unenlightened person, who, from Petrarch's
well-known fondness for Virgil, inferred that he must be addicted to
magic. After the confidence and respect that he had enjoyed under the
preceding popes, Innocent's suspicions appeared to him intolerable,
and doubtless supplied one of the motives which led him definitely to
abandon his old haunts. The death, or departure from Avignon, of many
of his friends, and the loss of his trusted and faithful housekeeper
at Vaucluse, had helped to render the city and its surroundings more
distasteful than ever, and in May, 1353, he left the region forever and
joyfully saluted his own dear Italy:
Salve cara Deo tellus sanctissima salve,
... agnosco patriam gaudensque saluto,
Salve pulchra parens, terrarum gloria salve.[87]
Luchino Visconti had, at his death in 1349, been succeeded in Milan by
his brother, the famous Bishop Giovanni, from all accounts one of the
greatest rulers of his century. Like his brother, he was an admirer of
literature, or at least he realised that the presence of distinguished
scholars at his court might enhance his influence; and by the mild but
potent aid of science and letters he sought, as Rousseau declares the
tyrant is wont to do, "to overspread his iron chains with garlands
of flowers." His rule could not but receive a certain sanction,
which would serve to give it an air of legitimacy in the eyes of the
Italians, if Petrarch, the exponent of Italian patriotism, could be
induced to come and reside in his capital. The now homeless poet, while
doubtless flattered by the august attentions of the Bishop, evidently
felt some hesitation in accepting his hospitality. He objected on the
ground that the noise of a city disturbed him; he feared, too, that
his duties towards his new lord might restrict his now inveterate
and somewhat vagrant fondness for liberty and change. But upon his
inquiring what was expected of him, the Bishop replied that he asked
only his presence, "which, he believed, would grace both himself and
his reign."[88] To his scandalised friends in republican Florence the
poet confesses that he was induced to stay, partly because he was
quite at a loss where else to go, and partly out of respect for the
ill-disguised commands of "the greatest of the Italians." He defends
himself against the reproaches of Boccaccio and other friends on the
ground that he has in no way sacrificed his freedom; but he admits that
it will be no such easy matter to convince the public of the purity of
his motives.[89]
A commodious house was selected for the new-comer in the retired
western portion of the city, where he could look out upon the church of
St. Ambrose, and, far beyond the walls, could see the snowy circle of
the Alps. Eight years were spent in Milan, which, under the Visconti,
was rapidly becoming the busy capital of a small but important European
state. There is no reason to think that Petrarch did not sincerely
love the solitude and quiet delights of the country, but, like many a
modern man of letters, he recognised that urban life, if an evil, was
after all a necessary one. It is probable, too, that, like the later
Humanists, he was dependent upon princely patronage for the funds
required to support himself and to hire the necessary copyists, since
his benefices appear to have afforded him an insufficient income.
Whatever his motives, the precedent was established, and later
Humanists were not only subservient to princes, but even resorted to
a species of blackmail, by threatening, if money was not forthcoming
for dedications, to blast the reputation of the offender to all coming
generations.[90]
That Petrarch was a member of the Bishop's council of state is not
probable, but he certainly delivered more than one address upon
solemn occasions, and undertook several embassies for the Visconti.
Bishop Giovanni lived but a year and a half after his arrival, and
was succeeded by his three notorious nephews, Matteo, Bernabò, and
Galeazzo, the first of whom soon died, leaving the possessions of the
Visconti to be divided between the two other brothers.
No very satisfactory history of the Visconti has been written; the
opinions of their contemporary judges, as well as of later writers,
are exceedingly contradictory. In reaching a conclusion as to the
character of the more prominent members of the family, the reader
may always choose between the seemingly irreconcilable epithets of
_vir diabolicus_ and _pater patriæ_. There is nothing extraordinary
in this, however, and when the earnest investigator has examined all
the testimony he will doubtless accept both titles, for they are
not really incompatible. All periods offer instances of the most
conflicting qualities in the leaders of men, and the Renaissance was
especially rich in examples, from the conduct of Boniface VI., that
upright and conscientious savage, who read the hours in a loud voice
as he walked up and down near the place of torture, listening to the
cries of his aged victims,[91] to the licentious pranks which Cellini
narrates of himself and his fellow-artists. Especially common are the
examples of bad men who were unquestionably great statesmen. It may
be true that Galeazzo Visconti introduced the most hideous system
of producing death, by a carefully graduated process of mutilation,
but it may be equally true that he himself suffered tortures of gout
little inferior to those of the unfortunate criminal with a fortitude
and equanimity which brought tears to the eyes of his attendants.
For years he not only endured these torments with patience, but,
according to Petrarch, carried on his government with magnanimity
and foresight, and when fortune went against him,[92] exhibited a
high degree of philosophical resignation. The same man who induced
his courtiers to play at dice to their undoing, might conciliate the
learned by supporting scholars or establishing a university. The
magnificent palace at Pavia, although one of the most beautiful in the
whole world, as Corio declares,[93] may well have sadly afflicted the
tax-payer. The public man, whatever his character and aims, is pretty
sure, if he rises above mediocrity, to be accused of unscrupulousness.
The expedients of a fifteenth-century tyrant were doubtless of a
fiercer stamp than the shifts of to-day, but that need not prevent our
understanding the admiration expressed by Petrarch or Machiavelli for
the better qualities of a Giacomo di Carrara, a Galeazzo Visconti, or a
Cæsar Borgia.
The sojourn at Milan was interrupted, as we have said, by several
diplomatic missions. In November, 1353, Petrarch was sent to Venice to
try to arrange a peace between that city and Genoa. But his eloquence
was vain, and the war was continued, in spite of a personal letter of
expostulation to the Doge.[94] Of Petrarch's relations with the Emperor
Charles IV. something will be said later.[95] In 1356, the year after
he first met Charles in Italy, Petrarch was sent to Prague as the
representative of the ruler of Milan. He tells us little or nothing
of his experiences, but he evidently made several friends in this
northern centre of culture, with whom he continued to correspond after
his return, thereby greatly widening the scope of his influence.[96]
Still a third mission remained, which was to carry him beyond the Alps.
King John of France had, in 1356, been defeated by the Black Prince and
carried a prisoner to England, where, four years later, he gained his
freedom only by the payment of an enormous ransom. At this juncture
Galeazzo Visconti offered him timely pecuniary aid, upon condition that
his son, Gian Galeazzo, should marry King John's daughter. The match
was promptly arranged, and the nuptials took place in October, 1360.
It then seemed only proper that Galeazzo should give some formal proof
of the satisfaction he felt at King John's release, and Petrarch was
chosen as a fitting person to carry his congratulations. The King and
his court were so delighted with the poet that they would gladly have
induced him to remain at Paris. This was, as Petrarch complacently
points out in a letter to the Emperor Charles, but another proof of the
skill of the astrologer who had long before predicted that he would be
upon terms of intimacy with almost all the great princes of his age.[97]
A new outbreak of the plague, the invasion of the mercenary troops
(_compagnies_) which had been left without resources by the temporary
cessation of the Hundred Years' War, and personal bereavement in the
death of his son and of his friend "Socrates," all served to cast a
shadow over the opening years of the period covered by the _Letters of
Old Age_ (1363-1374). The plague, which had spared Milan in 1348, raged
there with especial fury in 1361, and compelled Petrarch to leave the
city. After a time of hesitation, during which he resolved first to
return to Vaucluse, and then to accept Charles's invitation to Prague,
he was forced, by the uncertainty of the roads, to give up both plans.
He decided in the fall of 1362 to establish himself in Venice. Here he
was furnished with a mansion, on the Riva degli Schiavoni, upon the
condition that he should leave his library to the city. But, while
Venice fulfilled her part of the bargain, the books, as we have seen,
were never delivered.[98] The quiet of the city and its freedom from
the martial turmoil of Lombardy, as well as the circumstance that
it was the home of his daughter, who was happily married to a young
nobleman,--all served to make Venice an attractive refuge. The city
was naturally much visited by travellers, and Petrarch often had the
pleasure of entertaining distinguished guests in his charming home,
from the windows of which he could look off upon the busy harbour.
Boccaccio came to see him more than once, but would not consent, in
spite of Petrarch's entreaties, to make his permanent home with him.
The rest of the story is soon told. After five years at Venice the
restless old man moved to Padua, where Francesco di Carrara, the son
of his former friend, was in power. It was for this younger prince,
with whom he lived upon the happiest terms, that he composed his little
work upon _The Best Form of Government_.[99] This affords, as may
readily be inferred, a marked contrast to the practical suggestions of
Machiavelli's famous hand-book. The latter, however, only formulated
principles of conduct already discovered by the very house of Carrara
for which Petrarch prepared his manual.
Distracted by the noise of the city, which his failing health rendered
the more distressing, the poet found a charming home at Arquà,
pleasantly situated in the Euganean Hills, some twelve miles south of
Padua. In this new Vaucluse he passed, with few interruptions, the last
four years of his life. He was found by his attendants upon the 18th of
July, 1374, his face bowed upon the book before him, dead.
* * * * *
During the long life that we have just reviewed Petrarch allowed
scarcely a day to pass without writing one or more letters. The
historical importance and multiform interest of his correspondence
have already been dwelt upon. Letter-writing was, as he was aware,
a veritable passion with him, which was destined to retain its hold
until the very end. He frequently reasoned about it with characteristic
self-consciousness, and the reader will note many allusions to the
subject throughout the present collection. There is, however, one
particularly full discussion of his feelings towards his favourite
literary occupation, which is to be found in the following dedicatory
preface, written, probably in 1359, as an introduction to his first
collection of letters. In many ways it is one of the most suggestive of
the epistles and merits careful study.
1: None of the portraits of Petrarch, not even the well-known one in a
codex of the Laurentian library, are authentic, unless it be the one
reproduced at the beginning of this volume. See page vii. (Prefatory
Note to First Edition).
2: Eye-glasses were a somewhat new invention when Petrarch resorted
to them. Poggendorf (_Geschichte der Physik_, pp. 93 _sqq_.) cites
the first reference to them (1299), which reads as follows: "I found
myself so oppressed by age that without the so-called eye-glasses,
which have recently been discovered as a godsend to poor old persons,
I could neither read nor write." We know little of the construction of
these first spectacles. An early German painting (15th century), in the
National Gallery at London, shows a saint with a completely developed
_pince-nez_.
3: Petrarch's father and Dante were banished forever from Florence upon
the same day, January 27, 1302.
4: This is doubtless one of the two or three obscure references to
Laura, in Petrarch's correspondence. His frigid statement of the case
is characteristic of Petrarch the Humanist as contrasted with Petrarch
the singer. Compare the fervour of the sonnets with the original of
this passage:--Amore acerrimo, sed unico et honesto, in adolescentia
laboravi, et diutius laborassem, nisi iam tepescentem ignem mors
acerba, sed utilis, extinxisset.
5: Petrarch, although a churchman, was the father of two illegitimate
children, a son, Giovanni, born in 1337, and a daughter, Francesca,
born, probably of the same mother, some six years later. The
unfortunate mother was, according to Petrarch's own story, very harshly
treated by him. This obscure _liaison_ seems not to have afflicted
him with the remorse which his purer attachment for Laura caused
him. Only the latter is spoken of, and that at great length, in his
imaginary confession to St. Augustine (see below, p. 93 _sqq_.). The
son proved an idle fellow who caused his father a world of trouble,
even entering into collusion with a band of thievish servants to rob
him. The plague cut short his unpromising career in his twenty-fourth
year. Petrarch noted in his copy of Virgil, which he used as a family
record: "Our Giovanni was born to be a trial and burden to me. While
alive he tormented me with perpetual anxiety, and his death has
wounded me deeply." The daughter was of a happier disposition. She
married, and Petrarch rejoiced in two grandchildren. One of these,
the little Francesco, was, when but a year old, a "perfect picture"
of his illustrious grandfather, but the great hopes for the child's
future were cut short by its early death. Petrarch comforts himself
with the thought that the child "has gained eternal happiness without
effort, and by his departure has freed me from a continual source of
solicitude." _Sen_., x., 4. See Fracassetti's Italian translation of
Petrarch's letters, _Lettere delle Cose Familiari_, ii., 256; Körting,
_Petrarca's Leben und Werke_, Leipzig, 1878, pp. 143 _sqq_.
6: Petrarch's father, being still an exile, could not return with the
family to Ancisa, in Florentine territory, but joined them when they
moved to Pisa, which did not in those days belong to Florence.
7: Urban V. (1362-1370) had transferred the papal court back to
Rome after it had remained for sixty years in France and Avignon,
but after a year or two the disorder in Italy, as well as his own
longing and that of his cardinals for their native land, overcame
his good intentions and he returned to Avignon, where he died almost
immediately, in December, 1370.
8: Petrarch had not only exhorted Urban V. to return to Rome, but had
previously sent metrical epistles to his predecessors, Benedict XII.
and Clement VI., urging them to restore the papacy to its ancient
seat. The letters which Petrarch wrote to his friends in regard to the
abominations of the "Babylonish Captivity" form a separate collection
of his correspondence, _Epistolæ sine Titulo_, in which the names
of those to whom they were addressed are suppressed for fear of
compromising them.
9: The news of the death of Petrarch's father recalled him and his
brother from Bologna in April, 1326. _Cf. Fam_., iv., 1.
10: It seems strange that at twenty-two Petrarch should already have
spent some seven years at the universities. It was not, however,
unusual then. There were no entrance requirements, and the students
were often mere boys. Rashdall places the age of freshmen at thirteen
to sixteen years, but they might enter still younger. See _Universities
of Europe in the Middle Ages_, vol. ii., p. 604.
11: Some thirty miles southwest of Toulouse.
12: It was on this occasion that Petrarch formed his life-long
friendship with "Socrates," who lived at Avignon, and with "Lælius," a
Roman, who also resided at Avignon until the death of Cardinal Colonna,
in 1348. To these two a great many of his letters are addressed.
13: Petrarch was a commensal chaplain in the house of the Cardinal,
as we learn from the Papal document granting him his first benefice,
_apud_ De Sade, _Mémoires sur la Vie de Pétrarque_, "Pièces
justificatives," vol. iii., No. 15.
14: Petrarch's letters relating to Paris and Cologne are given below,
Part iv.
15: Probably some three years after the journey to the north.
16: See below, p. 373 _sq_. (... and that they had caught the eye ...)
17: The castle of Cavaillon is close by the valley of the Sorgue.
18: September 1, 1340, when Petrarch was thirty-six years old.
19: The invitations to Rome and Paris to receive the laurel crown have
a history, as the reader will easily infer. See below, p. 100 _sqq_.
20: Robert (who died in 1343) was the grandson of that Charles of Anjou
(the brother of St. Louis) who had been called in by the popes to
succeed the house of Hohenstaufen in the kingdom of Naples and Sicily.
He was Petrarch's sovereign (_Fam_., iv., 3), for Avignon belonged to
him as Count of Provence, until sold to the popes by Robert's successor
in 1348. Robert had resided at Avignon, 1318-1324. A letter from
Petrarch to Robert, dated December 26, 1338, is preserved, as well as a
second one (Pisa, April 21, 1341), describing his coronation at Rome:
_Fam._, iv., 3, 7.
21: The Latin--ut eam (scil. Africam) sibi inscribi magno pro munere
posceret--may perhaps mean that the king asked that the book be
dedicated to him as a _great favour_. If, however, Petrarch was
rewarded for the attention, he was only one of the first to enjoy a
source of revenue which was well known to later Humanists.
22: Upon Easter Sunday, April 8, 1341.
23: See below, p. 105 _sq._ (As he tells us in his Letter to
Posterity...)
24: The great epic was never really finished (_cf. Fam_., xiii., 11),
and Petrarch came in his old age to dislike even the mention of it.
Corradini's edition is the best we have of the poem. An analysis of the
_Africa_ may be found in Körting, _op. cit_., 654 _sqq._
25: Petrarch returned to Vaucluse in 1342, when he was toward
_thirty-eight_ years old. There is an air of _Wahrheit und Dichtung_
noticeable elsewhere in the letter. It was, for example, probably
later, in 1344, on a second visit to Parma, that he bought his house,
and then went to Verona, where he found the letters of Cicero.
26: 1349.
27: Giacomo was killed by his nephew, December, 1350.
28: The autobiography breaks off abruptly here; we know not why.
29: The fact that Petrarch mentions the death of Urban V., which
occurred in December, 1370, indicates that the autobiography was
written during the last three years of its author's life.
30: See the pathetic passage in the _Convito_, i., ch. 3.
31: _Fam_., xxi., 15 (vol. iii., p. 110).
32: _Fam_., vi., 3 (vol. i., p. 324).
33: Cantiunculæ inanes, falsis et obscœnis muliercularum laudibus
refertæ.--_Fam_., x., 3 (vol. ii., p. 73).
34: See below, Part VI.
35: _De Vulgari Eloquio_, lib. i., cap. 13.
36: See _Sen_., xv., 1 (_Opera_, 946).
37: _Fam_., iv., 16 (vol. i., p. 246).
38: _Sen_., xv., I (_Opera_, 947).
39: _Fam_., ix., 5 (toward the end). _Cf._ Körting, _op. cit_., 99
_sqq_.
40: See Pastor, _Geschichte der Päpste_, vol. i., p. 3, n. 1,
who asserts that "officium quotidianum celebrare," in _De Otio
Religiosorum_, does not refer to the celebration of the mass, as
previous writers inferred.
41: Nos autem cui mundus est patria, velut piscibus æquor.--_De Vulgari
Eloquio_, lib. i., cap. 6.
42: Described by M. Faucon, in the _Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises
d'Athènes et de Rome_, Fas. 43, 50.
43: _Ep. sine Titulo_, No. 7; also _Sen_., x., 2.
44: See the facsimile of this famous entry in Geiger's _Humanismus_,
p. 44, and the corrected transcription furnished by M. de Nolhac, _op.
cit_., pp. 407, 408.
45: _Fam_., ii., 9 (vol. i., p. 124).
46: Many attempts have been made to establish some theory of Laura's
life; the most plausible, by reason of the documentary evidence which
he adduces, is that given in the eighteenth century by De Sade, in
his well-known _Mémoires pour la Vie de Pétrarque_ (vol. i., pp. 111
_sqq_., and appendix; also _Pièces Justificatives_, at the end of vol.
iii., containing Laura di Noves's marriage contract, etc.). Even if
the documents were not forged or modified by the lawyers of Avignon,
in view of De Sade's asserted descent from Laura, and even if, as is
not certain, they refer at all to Petrarch's Laura, we learn little or
nothing from them. It may be inferred from the _Canzoniere_ that Laura
belonged to a good family, and almost everyone (except Geiger) agrees,
nowadays, that there is every reason to suppose that she was married,
since the freedom she appears to have enjoyed and the ornaments she
wore, as well as Petrarch's use of the word _Mulier_, all seem to
render the assumption a natural one. Any other view would indeed be
out of harmony with the habits of an Italian lover of the fourteenth
century. The reader who wishes to pursue a somewhat fruitless line
of research may compare the views of De Sade with those of Geiger,
_Petrarka_, pp. 211 _sqq_., and Körting, _op. cit_., pp. 687 _sqq_.,
and may proceed from the references there given to the sources
themselves, such as they are.
47: _Ep. Poet. Lat_., i., 7, lines 38 _sqq_. A German version of these
will be found in Körting, _op. cit_., pp. 689 _sqq_.
48: The passage here referred to is in the third book of the
Confessions (_Suum Secretum_), _Opera_, pp. 352 _sqq_. Those portions
which relate to his love for Laura have been translated into German by
Geiger, _Petrarka_, 231 _sqq_., and summarised by Körting, _op. cit.,_
pp. 639 _sqq_. The whole work is translated by Develay into French.
49: Peter Lombard reproduces, in the middle of the twelfth century,
much of Augustine's reasoning, in his _Sentences_, a work destined to
be the standard theological manual for generations to follow.
50: _Cf. Anecdotes historiques tirés du recueil inédit d'Etienne de
Bourbon, publiés pour la Société de l'Histoire de France par Leroy de
la Marche_, 1867. Professor Crane, of Cornell, has edited the _Exempla
of Jacques de Vitry_ for the Folk-Lore Society, London, 1890.
51: This subject will be considered later. See below, Part VI.
52: _Cf_. the lines:--
Onde s' alcun bel frutto
Nasce di me, da voi vien prima il seme.
Io per me son quasi un terreno asciutto,
Colto da voi; e' l pregio è vostro in tutto--
in the canzone beginning, Perchè la vita.
53: For Petrarch's views of marriage see _Fam_., xxii., 1, as well as
several unworthy dialogues in _De Remediis Utriusque Fortunæ, e. g._,
i., 45-47; ii., 18, 20, 22.
54: Cogita quantum professio tua discordet a moribus.--_Opera_, p. 363.