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Italian language
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Italian literature is literature written in the Italian language, particularly within Italy. It may also refer to literature written by Italians or in Italy in other languages spoken in Italy, often languages that are closely related to modern Italian. Italian ( , or lingua italiana) is a Romance language spoken by about 63 million people,[4] primarily in Italy. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (680x932, 148 KB) Summary Permission from www. ... The Accademia della Crusca is an Italian institution that brings together scholars and experts in Italian linguistics and philology. ... The Italian alphabet is a variant of the Latin alphabet used by the Italian language. ... The Italian people generally indicates as Italian dialects all vernacular idioms spoken in Italy other than Italian and other recognized languages. ... Italian grammar is the study of grammar of the Italian language. ... // Phonology Vowels Notes: In Italian there is no phonemic distinction between long and short vowels. ... Italian profanity (parolacce) is a set of words considered blasphemous or inflammatory in the Italian language. ... This article is about (usually written) works. ... Italian ( , or lingua italiana) is a Romance language spoken by about 63 million people,[4] primarily in Italy. ... Languages Italian, Sicilian, Neapolitan, Corsican, Sardinian, Emiliano-Romagnolo, Ligurian, Lombard, Piedmontese, Venetian, Ladin, Friulian Religions predominantly Roman Catholic      The Italians are a Southern European ethnic group found primarily in Italy and in a wide-ranging diaspora throughout Western Europe, the Americas and Australia. ...

Early medieval Latin literature

A depiction of Boetius teaching his students (1385). Boetius, a 6th century Christian philosopher, helped keep alive the classic tradition in post-Roman Italy.

As the Western Roman Empire declined, the Latin tradition was kept alive by writers such as Cassiodorus, Boethius, and Symmachus. The liberal arts flourished at Ravenna under Theodoric, and the Gothic kings surrounded themselves with masters of rhetoric and of grammar. Some lay schools remained in Italy, and noted scholars included Magnus Felix Ennodius (a pagan poet), Arator, Venantius Fortunatus, Felix the Grammarian, Peter of Pisa, Paulinus of Aquileia, and many others. Image File history File links Boethius_initial_consolation_philosophy. ... Image File history File links Boethius_initial_consolation_philosophy. ... Motto Senatus Populusque Romanus The Western Roman Empire in 395. ... Cassiodorus at his Vivarium library ( in Codex Amiatinus, 8th century). ... For other people of the same name, see Boethius (disambiguation). ... Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, c. ... Province of Ravenna Ravenna is a city and comune in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy. ... Theodoric the Great (454 - August 30, 526), known to the Romans as Flavius Theodoricus, was king of the Ostrogoths (488-526), ruler of Italy (493-526), and regent of the Visigoths (511-526). ... Rhetoric (from Greek , rhêtôr, orator, teacher) is generally understood to be the art or technique of persuasion through the use of oral, visual, or written language; however, this definition of rhetoric has expanded greatly since rhetoric emerged as a field of study in universities. ... For the rules of the English language, see English grammar. ... Magnus Felix Ennodius (AD 474 - July 17, 521), bishop of Pavia, Latin rhetorician and poet. ... Arator was a sixth century Christian poet from Liguria in northwestern Italy. ... Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus (c. ... Paulinus of Aquileia may refer to several clerics of Aquileia, including: Paulinus of Aquileia, Bishop of Aquileia, (557-71) moved his see to Grado, a small island opposite Aquileia, keeping, however, the old title, who under the pontificate of Pelagius I in synod renounced communion with Rome, and excommunicated the...

Italians who were interested in theology gravitated towards Paris. Those who remained were typically attracted by the study of Roman law. This furthered the later establishment of the medieval universities of Bologna, Padua, Vicenza, Naples, Salerno, Modena and Parma. These helped to spread culture, and prepared the ground in which the new vernacular literature would develop. Classical traditions did not disappear, and affection for the memory of Rome, a preoccupation with politics, and a preference for practice over theory combined to influence the development of Italian literature. Theology finds its scholars pursuing the understanding of and providing reasoned discourse of religion, spirituality and God or the gods. ... This article is about the capital of France. ... Using the term Roman law in a broader sense, one may say that Roman law is not only the legal system of ancient Rome but the law that was applied throughout most of Europe until the end of the 18th century. ... For the food product, see Bologna sausage. ... Padua, Italy, (Italian: IPA: , Latin: Patavium, Venetian: ) is a city in the Veneto, northern Italy, the economic and communications hub of the region. ... Vicenza is a city in northern Italy, is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, straddling the Bacchiglione. ... Location of the city of Naples (red dot) within Italy. ... Salerno is a town in Campania, south-western Italy, the capital of the province of the same name. ... Modena (Mòdna in Modenese dialect) is a city and a province on the south side of the Po valley, in Emilia-Romagna, Italy. ... This article is about the Italian city. ... Vernacular literature is literature written in the vernacular - the speech of the common people. ...

High medieval literature

Trovatori

The earliest vernacular literary tradition in Italy was not in the Italian language but rather in Occitan, a language which was spoken in parts of northwest Italy. A tradition of vernacular lyric poetry had arisen in Poitou in the early twelfth century and spread south and east eventually reaching Italy by the end of the century. The first troubadours (trovatori in Italian), as these Occitan lyric poets were called, to practise in Italy were from elsewhere, but the high aristocracy of Lombardy was ready to patronise them. It was not long before native Italians adopted Occitan as a vehicle for poetic expression. Italian ( , or lingua italiana) is a Romance language spoken by about 63 million people,[4] primarily in Italy. ... Occitan, or langue doc is a Romance language characterized by its richness, variability, and by the intelligibility of its dialects. ... // Lyric poetry refers to either poetry that has the form and musical quality of a song, or a usually short poem that expresses personal feelings, which may or may not be set to music. ... Coat of arms of Richard, Earl of Cornwall, Plantagenet claimant to the county of Poitou, now favored as the coat of arms of Poitou by people in Poitou Poitou was a province of France whose capital city was Poitiers. ... For the article about the night club in West Hollywood, California, see: Troubadour (nightclub). ... For the village of the same name in Ontario, Canada, see Lombardy, Ontario. ...

Among the early patrons of foreign troubadours were especially the House of Este, the Da Romano, House of Savoy, and the Malaspina. Azzo VI of Este entertained the troubadours Aimeric de Belenoi, Aimeric de Peguilhan, Albertet de Sestaro, and Peire Raimon de Tolosa from Occitania and Rambertino Buvalelli from Bologna, one of the earliest Italian troubadours. The influence of these poets on the native Italians got the attention of Aimeric de Peguilhan in 1220. Then at the Malaspina court, he penned a poem attacking a quintet of Occitan poets at the court of Manfred III of Saluzzo: Peire Guilhem de Luserna, Perceval Doria, Nicoletto da Torino, Chantarel, and Trufarel. Aimeric apparently feared the rise of native competitors. For Tolkiens fictional character, see Estë To know more about the city, see Este The House of Este is a European princely dynasty. ... The House of Savoy or in Italian, La Casa di Savoia, or simply Casa Savoia, (or Savoie, French) is a dynasty of nobles who traditionally had their domain in Savoy, a region that includes present-day Piemonte, other parts of Northern Italy, and a smaller region in France. ... Malaspina can refer to: People Alessandro Malaspina, Italian explorer Places and objects, mostly named after Alessandro Malaspina Malaspina Glacier, Alaska Malaspina Provincial Park, British Columbia Malaspina University-College, British Columbia M/V Malaspina, Alaskan ferry Category: ... Aimeric de Peguilhan (c. ... A version of the flag frequently used by Occitan activists. ... For the food product, see Bologna sausage. ... Manfred III (d. ...

The margraves of Montferrat—Boniface I, William VI, and Boniface II—were patrons of Occitan poetry. Peire de la Mula stayed at the Montferrat court around 1200 and Raimbaut de Vaqueiras spent most of his career as court poet and close friend of Boniface I. Raimbaut, along with several other troubadours, including Elias Cairel, followed Boniface on the Fourth Crusade and established, however briefly, Italo-Occitan literature in Thessalonica. Coat of Arms of Montferrat. ... William VI (circa 1173 – 17 September 1226) was the Marquess of Montferrat from 1203 and pretender to the Kingdom of Thessalonica from 1207. ... Boniface II (July 1202 – 12 June 1253), called the Giant, was the Margrave of Montferrat from 1225 until his death. ... Raimbaut de Vaqueiras (floruit 1180-1205) was a Provençal troubadour and warrior. ... Belligerents Crusaders Holy Roman Empire Republic of Venice Montferret Champagne Blois Amiens ÃŽle-de-France Saint-Pol Burgundy Flanders Balkans Byzantine Empire Kingdom of Hungary Croatia Dalmatia Commanders Otto IV Boniface I Theobald I Lois I Alexios V Doukas Isaac II Angelos Alexios III Angelos Emeric I The Fourth Crusade... The White Tower The Arch of Galerius Map showing the Thessaloníki prefecture Thessaloníki (Θεσσαλονίκη) is the second-largest city of Greece and is the principal city and the capital of the Greek region of Macedonia. ...

Azzo VI's daughter, Beatrice, was an object of the early poets "courtly love". Azzo's son, Azzo VII, hosted Elias Cairel and Arnaut Catalan. Rambertino was named podestà of Genoa between in 1218 and it was probably during his three-year tenure there that he introduced Occitan lyric poetry to the city, which was later to develop a fluorishing Occitan literary culture. Court of Love in Provence in the 14th Century (after a manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris). ... The Palace of the Podestà in Florence, known as the Palazzo Vecchio or the Palazzo della Signoria Podestà is the name given to certain high officials in many Italian cities, since the later middle ages, mainly as Chief magistrate of a city state (like otherwise styled counterparts in other cities... For other uses, see Genoa (disambiguation). ...

Among the Genoese troubadours were Lanfranc Cigala, a judge; Calega Panzan, a merchant; Jacme Grils, also a judge; and Bonifaci Calvo, a knight. Genoa was also the place of genesis of the podestà-troubadour phenomenon: men who served in several cities as podestàs on behalf of either the Guelph or Ghibelline party and who wrote political poetry in Occitan. Rambertino Buvalelli was the first podestà-troubadour and in Genoa there were the Guelphs Luca Grimaldi and Luchetto Gattilusio and the Ghibellines Perceval and Simon Doria. The Guelphs and Ghibellines were factions supporting, respectively, the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire in central and northern Italy during the 12th and 13th centuries. ...

The Occitan tradition in Italy was more broad than simply Genoa or even Lombardy. Bertolome Zorzi was from Venice. Girardo Cavallazzi was a Ghibelline from Novara. Nicoletto da Torino was probably from Turin. In Ferrara the Duecento was represented by Ferrari Trogni. Terramagnino da Pisa, from Pisa, wrote the Doctrina de cort as a manual of courtly love. He was one of the late 13th-century figures who wrote in both Occitan and Italian. Paolo Lanfranchi da Pistoia, from Pistoia, was another. Both wrote sonnets, but while Terramagnino was a critic of the Tuscan school, Paolo has been alleged as a member. On the other hand, he has much in common with the Sicilians and the Dolce Stil Novo. For other uses, see Venice (disambiguation). ... Novara is a city of Piedmont, in North-west Italy, to the west of Milan. ... Torino redirects here. ... Ferrara is a city in Emilia-Romagna, Italy, capital city of the province of Ferrara. ... For other uses, see Pisa (disambiguation). ... Pistoia (ancient Pistoria) is a city in the Tuscany region of Italy, the capital of a province of the same name, located about 30 km (18 mi) west and north of Florence. ... The term sonnet derives from the Provençal word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning little song. ... In a literary context, the term Sicilian School identifies a small community of Sicilian, and to a lesser extent, mainland Italian poets gathered around Frederick II, most of them belonging to his court, the Magna Curia. ... Dolce Stil Novo (Italian for The Sweet New Style) is the name given to the most important literary movement of 13th century Italy. ...

Perhaps the most important aspect of the Italian troubadour phenomenon was the production of chansonniers and the composition of vidas and razos. Uc de Saint Circ, who was associated with the Da Romano and Malaspina families, spent the last forty years of his life in Italy. He undertook to author the entire razo corpus and a great many of the vidas. The most famous and influential Italian troubadour, however, was from the small town of Goito near Mantua. Sordello (1220s–1230s) has been praised by such later poets as Dante Alighieri, Robert Browning, Oscar Wilde, and Ezra Pound. He was the inventor of the hybrid genre of the sirventes-planh in 1237. Canadian singer-songwriter Dayna Manning. ... Vida is the usual term for a brief prose biography, written in Occitan, of a troubadour or trobairitz. ... Razo is a small island in the Barlaventos archipelago of Cape Verde. ... Goito is a comune of Lombardy, Italy, in the Province of Mantua, from which it is 11 miles NW, on the road to Brescia. ... For other uses, see Mantua (disambiguation). ... Sordello was a 13th-century Italian troubadour, born in Mantua. ... Dante redirects here. ... Robert Browning (May 7, 1812 – December 12, 1889) was a British poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets. ... Oscar Fingal OFlahertie Wills Wilde (October 16, 1854 – November 30, 1900) was an Irish playwright, novelist, poet, and author of short stories. ... Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (Hailey, Idaho Territory, United States, October 30, 1885 – Venice, Italy, November 1, 1972) was an American expatriate poet, critic and intellectual who was a major figure of the Modernist movement in early-to-mid 20th century poetry. ... The sirventes is a form of poetry utilised by the troubadours. ... The planh is a funeral lament used by the troubadours, modeled on the medieval Latin planctus. ...

The troubadours had a connexion with the rise of a school of poetry in the Kingdom of Sicily. In 1220 Obs de Biguli was present as a "singer" at the coronation of the Emperor Frederick II, already King of Sicily. Guillem Augier Novella before 1230 and Guilhem Figueira thereafter were important Occitan poets at Frederick's court. Both had fled the Albigensian Crusade, like Aimeric de Peguilhan. The Crusade had devastated Languedoc and forced many troubadours of the area, whose poetry had not always been kind to the Church hierarchy, to flee to Italy, where an Italian tradition of papal criticism was begun. Protected by the emperor and the Ghibelline faction criticism of the Church establishment flourished. Flag The Kingdom of Sicily as it existed at the death of its founder, Roger II of Sicily, in 1154. ... Frederick II (left) meets al-Kamil (right) Frederick II (December 26, 1194 - (December 13, 1250), Holy Roman Emperor of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, was pretender to the title of King of the Romans from 1212, unopposed holder of that monarchy from 1215, and Holy Roman Emperor from 1220 until his death... The following is a list of monarchs of Naples and Sicily: See also: List of Counts of Apulia and Calabria Hauteville Counts of Sicily, 1071-1130 Roger I 1071-1101 Simon 1101-1105 Roger II 1105-1130 Hauteville Kings of Sicily, 1130-1198 Roger II 1130-1154 William I 1154... Guillem or Guilhem Figueira was a Languedocian jongleur and troubadour from Toulouse active at the court of the Emperor Frederick II in the 1230s. ... The Albigensian Crusade or Cathar Crusade (1209 - 1229) was a 20-year military campaign initiated by the Roman Catholic Church to eliminate the heresy of the Cathars of Languedoc. ... For the language called Langue doc, see Occitan language. ...

Chivalric romance

The Historia de excidio Trojae, attributed to Dares Phrygius, claimed to be an eyewitness account of the Trojan war. It provided inspiration for writers in other countries such as Benoît de Sainte-Maure, Herbort von Fritzlar, and Konrad von Würzburg. While Benoît wrote in French, he took his material from a Latin history. Herbort and Konrad used a French source to make an almost original work in their own language. Guido delle Colonne of Messina, one of the vernacular poets of the Sicilian school, composed the Historia destructionis Troiae. In his poetry Guido was an imitator of the Provençals, but in this book he converted Benoît's French romance into what sounded like serious Latin history. Dares Phrygius, according to Homer (Iliad, v. ... Benoît de Sainte-Maure (1154 - 1173) was a twelth century French poet and trouvere. ... Portrait of Konrad von Würzburg from the Codex Manesse (folio 383r). ... Guido delle Colonne (in Latin Guido de Columnis or de Columna) was an early 13th century Sicilian writer, living at Messina, who wrote in Latin. ... Messina, Italy Strait of Messina, Italy. ... Look up Vernacular in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Historia destructionis Troiae (History of the destruction of Troy) or Historia Troiana is a Latin prose narrative written by Guido delle Colonne, a Sicilian author, in the early 13th century. ... Coat of arms of Provence Provence (Provençal Occitan: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) was a Roman province and now is a region of southeastern France on the Mediterranean Sea adjacent to Italy. ...

Much the same thing occurred with other great legends. Qualichino of Arezzo wrote couplets about the legend of Alexander the Great. Europe was full of the legend of King Arthur, but the Italians contented themselves with translating and abridging French romances. Jacobus de Voragine, while collecting his Golden Legend (1260), remained a historian. He seemed doubtful of the truthfulness of the stories he told. The intellectual life of Italy showed itself in an altogether special, positive, almost scientific form in the study of Roman law. Farfa, Marsicano, and other scholars translated Aristotle, the precepts of the school of Salerno, and the travels of Marco Polo, linking the classics and the Renaissance. For the Angel episode, see Couplet (Angel episode). ... For the film of the same name, see Alexander the Great (1956 film). ... For other uses, see King Arthur (disambiguation). ... Jacobus de Voragine (c. ... For the Arthur Sullivan oratorio, see The Golden Legend (oratorio). ... Farfa is an Italian name which can refer to: A place name in the province of the Lazio in Italy, as: Farfa River Farfa (town) Farfa Abbey, one of the main medieval abbeys in Italy A personal name, as: Farfa (poet), an Italian Futurist poet (1881-1964) This is a... For other uses, see Aristotle (disambiguation). ... Salerno is a town in Campania, south-western Italy, the capital of the province of the same name. ... Marco Polo (September 15, 1254[1] – January 9, 1324 at earliest but no later than June 1325[2]) was a Venetian trader and explorer who gained fame for his worldwide travels, recorded in the book Il Milione (The Million or The Travels of Marco Polo). ...

At the same time, epic poetry was written in a mixed language, a dialect of Italian based on French: hybrid words exhibited a treatment of sounds according to the rules of both languages, had French roots with Italian endings, and were pronounced according to Italian or Latin rules. In short, the language of the epic poetry belonged to both tongues. Examples include the chansons de geste, Macaire, the Entre en Espagne written by Niccola of Padua, the Prise de Pampelune, and others. All this preceded the appearance of a purely Italian literature. Roland pledges his fealty to Charlemagne; from a manuscript of a chanson de geste. ... Macaire is a common name for a 12th century French chanson de geste, named for one of its main characters. ...

Emergence of native vernacular literature

The French and Occitan languages gradually gave way to the native Italian. Hybridism recurred, but it no longer predominated. In the Bovo d'Antona and the Rainaldo e Lesengrino the Venetian dialect is clearly felt, although the language is influenced by French forms. These writings, which Graziadio Isaia Ascoli has called miste (mixed), immediately preceded the appearance of purely Italian works. A sign in Venetian reading Here we also speak Venetian Venetian or Venetan is a Romance language spoken by over five million people,[1] mostly in the Veneto region of Italy. ...

There is evidence that a kind of literature already existed before the 13th century: The Ritmo cassinese, Ritmo su Sant'Alessio, Laudes creaturarum, Ritmo Lucchese, Ritmo laurenziano, Ritmo bellunese are classified by Cesare Segre, et al. as "Archaic Works" (Componimenti Arcaici): "such are labeled the first literary works in the Italian vernacular, their dates ranging from the last decades of the 12th century to the early decades of the 13th" (Segre: 1997). However, as he points out, such early literature does not yet present any uniform stylistic or linguistic traits.

This early development, however, was simultaneous in the whole peninsula, varying only in the subject matter of the art. In the north, the poems of Giacomino da Verona and Bonvicino da Riva were specially religious, and were intended to be recited to the people. They were written in a dialect of Milanese and Venetian; their style bore the influence of French narrative poetry. They may be considered as belonging to the "popular" kind of poetry, taking the word, however, in a broad sense. This sort of composition may have been encouraged by the old custom in the north of Italy of listening in the piazzas and on the highways to the songs of the jongleurs. The crowds were delighted with the stories of romances, the wickedness of Macaire, and the misfortunes of Blanziflor, the terrors of the Babilonia Infernale and the blessedness of the Gerusalemme celeste, and the singers of religious poetry vied with those of the chansons de geste. Milanese (milanes, milanées, meneghin, meneghìn) is a variety of Western Lombard spoken in the city of Milan and in its province. ... A piazza is an open square in a city, often used as a marketplace, found in Italy. ... Juggling is a form of skillful, often artful, object manipulation. ... Macaire is a common name for a 12th century French chanson de geste, named for one of its main characters. ... Floris and Blancheflour is the name of a popular romantic story that was told in the Middle Ages in many different vernacular languages and versions. ... This article is about the art form. ...

Sicilian School

Main article: Sicilian School

The year 1230 marked the beginning of the Sicilian School and of a literature showing more uniform traits. Its importance lies more in the language (the creation of the first standard Italian) than its subject, a love-song partly modeled on the Provençal poetry imported to the south by the Normans and the Svevs under Frederick II. This poetry differs from the French equivalent in its treatment of the woman, less erotic and more platonic, a vein which further developed by Dolce Stil Novo in later 13th century Bologna and Florence. The customary repertoire of chivalry terms is adapted to Italian phonotactics, creating new Italian vocabulary. The French suffixes -ière and -ce generated hundreds of new Italian words in -iera and -za (for example, riv-iera and costan-za). These were adopted by Dante and his contemporaries, and handed on to future generations of Italian writers. In a literary context, the term Sicilian School identifies a small community of Sicilian, and to a lesser extent, mainland Italian poets gathered around Frederick II, most of them belonging to his court, the Magna Curia. ... In a literary context, the term Sicilian School identifies a small community of Sicilian, and to a lesser extent, mainland Italian poets gathered around Frederick II, most of them belonging to his court, the Magna Curia. ... Norman conquests in red. ... Germany, showing modern borders. ... Frederick II (December 26, 1194 – December 13, 1250), of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, was a pretender to the title of King of the Romans from 1212 and unopposed holder of that monarchy from 1215. ... Eroticism is an aesthetic focused on sexual desire, especially the feelings of anticipation of sexual activity. ... Platonic idealism is the theory that the substantive reality around us is only a reflection of a higher truth. ... Dolce Stil Novo (Italian for The Sweet New Style) is the name given to the most important literary movement of 13th century Italy. ... Florence (or Firenze, Florentia and Fiorenza) is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany, and of the province of Florence. ... For other uses, see Chivalry (disambiguation). ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Dante redirects here. ...

To the Sicilian school belonged Enzio, king of Sardinia, Pietro della Vigna, Inghilfredi, Guido and Odo delle Colonne, Jacopo d'Aquino, Ruggieri Apugliese, Giacomo da Lentini, Arrigo Testa, and others. Most famous is No m'aggio posto in core, by Giacomo da Lentini, the head of the movement, but there is also poetry written by Frederick himself. Giacomo da Lentini is also credited with inventing the sonnet, a form later perfected by Dante and Petrarch. The censorship imposed by Frederick meant that no political matter entered literary debate. In this respect, the poetry of the north, still divided into communes or city-states with relatively democratic governments, provided new ideas. These new ideas are shown in the Sirventese genre, and later, Dante's Commedia: his lines are full of invectives against contemporary political leaders and popes. Enzio (Enzo) of Sardinia (ca. ... Sardinia (pronounced ; Italian: ; Sardinian: or ) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea (after Sicily). ... Pietro della Vigna, or Pier delle Vigne [Petrus de Vineas or de Vineis] (c. ... Guido delle Colonne (in Latin Guido de Columnis or de Columna) was an early 13th century Sicilian writer, living at Messina, who wrote in Latin. ... Giacomo da Lentini (also known as Jacopo Da Lentini) was an Italian poet. ... The term sonnet derives from the Provençal word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning little song. ... From the c. ... For other uses, see Censor. ... Defensive towers at San Gimignano, Tuscany, bear witness to the factional strife within communes. ... A city-state is a region controlled exclusively by a city. ... For other uses see The Divine Comedy (disambiguation), Dantes Inferno (disambiguation), and The Inferno (disambiguation) Dante shown holding a copy of The Divine Comedy, next to the entrance to Hell, the seven terraces of Mount Purgatory and the city of Florence, with the spheres of Heaven above, in Michelino...

Though the conventional love-song prevailed at Frederick's (and later Manfred's) court, more spontaneous poetry existed in the Contrasto attributed to Cielo d'Alcamo. This contrasto (dispute) between two lovers in the Sicilian dialect is not the most ancient or the only southern poem of a popular kind. It belongs without doubt to the time of the emperor Frederick II (no later than 1250), and is important as proof that there existed a popular, independent of literary, poetry. The Contrasto is probably a scholarly re-elaboration of a lost popular rhyme and is the closest to a kind of poetry that perished or was smothered by the ancient Sicilian literature. Its distinguishing point was its possession of all qualities opposite to the poetry of the rhymers of the "Sicilian School", though its style may betray a knowledge of Frederick's poetry, and there is probably a satiric intent in the mind of the anonymous poet. It is vigorous in the expression of feelings. The conceits, sometimes bold and very coarse, show that its subject matter is popular. Everything about the Contrasto is original. Manfred (c. ... Sicilian (, Italian: ) is a Romance language. ... // April 30 - King Louis IX of France released by his Egyptian captors after paying a ransom of one million dinars and turning over the city of Damietta. ... 1867 edition of Punch, a ground-breaking British magazine of popular humour, including a good deal of satire of the contemporary social and political scene. ... Anonymous redirects here. ... Look up conceit in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

The poems of the Sicilian school were written in the first known standard Italian. This was elaborated by these poets under the direction of Frederick II and combines many traits typical of the Sicilian, and to a lesser, but not negligible extent, Apulian dialects and other southern dialects, with many words of Latin and French origin. Dante's styles illustre, cardinale, aulico, curiale were developed from his linguistic study of the Sicilian School, which had been re-founded by Guittone d'Arezzo in Tuscany. The standard changed slightly in Tuscany, because Tuscan scriveners perceived the five-vowel system used by southern Italian as a seven-vowel one. As a consequence, the texts that Italian students read in their anthology contain lines that do not rhyme with each other (sometimes Sic. -i > -e, -u > -o), and that may account for its decrease in popularity through the 19th and early 20th century. This article is bad because of the Italian region. ... Guittone dArezzo (Arezzo, c. ... For other uses, see Tuscany (disambiguation). ... Telling a problem to a public scrivener. ... Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Religious literature

In the 13th century a religious movement took place in Italy, with the rise of the Dominican and Franciscan Orders. Francis of Assisi, mystic and reformer in the Catholic Church, the founder of the Franciscans, also wrote poetry. Though he was educated, Francis's poetry was beneath the refined poetry at the center of Frederick's court. According to legend, Francis dictated the hymn Cantico del Sole in the eighteenth year of his penance, almost rapt in ecstasy; doubts remain about its authenticity. It was the first great poetical work of Northern Italy, written in a kind of verse marked by assonance, a poetic device more widespread in Northern Europe. Other poems previously attributed to Francis are now generally recognized as lacking in authenticity. The Order of Friars Minor and other Franciscan movements are disciples of Saint Francis of Assisi. ... Saint Francis of Assisi (September 26, 1181 or 1182 – October 3, 1226) was a Roman Catholic friar and the founder of the Order of Friars Minor, more commonly known as the Franciscans. ... Catholic Church redirects here. ... For other uses, see Hymn (disambiguation). ... Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in non-rhyming words, for example Do you like blue?. Here the oo sound is repeated within the sentence. ...

Jacopone da Todi was a poet who represented the religious feeling that had made special progress in Umbria. Jacopone was possessed by St. Francis's mysticism, but was also a satirist who mocked the corruption and hypocrisy of the Church personified by Pope Boniface VIII, persecutor of Jacopone and Dante. Jacopone's wife died after the stands at a public tournament collapsed, and the sorrow at her sudden death caused Jacopone to sell all he possessed and give it to the poor. Jacopone covered himself with rags, joined St. Francis's Third Order, took pleasure in being laughed at, and was followed by a crowd of people who mocked him and called after him Jacopone, Jacopone. He went on raving for years, subjecting himself to the severest sufferings, and giving vent to his religious intoxication in his poems. Jacopone was a mystic, who from his hermit's cell looked out into the world and specially watched the papacy, scourging with his words Pope Celestine V and Pope Boniface VIII, for which he was imprisoned. A modern collection of Jacopones Laudi, with a portrait. ... Umbria is a region of central Italy, bordered by Tuscany to the west, the Marche to the east and Lazio to the south. ... Hypocrisy is the act of condemning or calling for the condemnation of another person when the critic is guilty of the act for which he demands that the accused be condemned. ... Pope Boniface VIII (c. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Tertiaries. ... Topics in Christianity Movements · Denominations · Other religions Ecumenism · Preaching · Prayer Music · Liturgy · Calendar Symbols · Art · Criticism Important figures Apostle Paul · Church Fathers Constantine · Athanasius · Augustine Anselm · Aquinas · Palamas · Luther Calvin · Wesley Arius · Marcion of Sinope Archbishop of Canterbury · Catholic Pope Coptic Pope · Ecumenical Patriarch Christianity Portal This box:      Christian mysticism... For other uses, see Hermit (disambiguation). ... Pope Celestine V (c. ...

The religious movement in Umbria was followed by another literary phenomenon, the religious drama. In 1258 a hermit, Raniero Fasani, left the cavern in which he had lived for many years and suddenly appeared at Perugia. Fasani represented himself as sent by God to disclose mysterious visions, and to announce to the world terrible visitations. This was a turbulent period of political faction (the Guelphs and Ghibellines), interdicts and excommunications issued by the popes, and reprisals of the imperial party. In this environment, Fasani's pronouncements stimulated the formation of the Compagnie di Disciplinanti, who, for a penance, scourged themselves till they drew blood, and sang Laudi in dialogue in their confraternities. These laudi, closely connected with the liturgy, were the first example of the drama in the vernacular tongue of Italy. They were written in the Umbrian dialect, in verses of eight syllables, and, according to the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, "have not any artistic value." Their development, however, was rapid. As early as the end of the 13th century the Devozioni del Giovedi e Venerdi Santo appeared, mixing liturgy and drama. Later, di un Monaco che ando al servizio di Dio ("of a monk who entered the service of God") approached the definite form the religious drama would assume in the following centuries. Location of Perugia in Italy Coordinates: , Country Region Province Province of Perugia Government  - Mayor Renato Locchi Area  - City 449 km²  (1,165 sq mi) Elevation 493 m (1,617 ft) Population (July 2006)[1]  - City 161,390  - Density 359/km² (929. ... The Guelphs and Ghibellines were factions supporting, respectively, the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire in central and northern Italy during the 12th and 13th centuries. ... For other meanings see Interdict The word interdict usually refers to an ecclesiastical penalty in the Roman Catholic Church. ... Excommunication is a religious censure used to deprive or suspend membership in a religious community. ... Confraternities may refer to: Confraternities of the Cord Confraternity of Christian Doctrine Confraternity of the Rosary Archconfraternity Category: ... A liturgy is the customary public worship of a religious group, according to their particular traditions. ... The Encyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopaedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. ...

First Tuscan literature

Thirteenth century Tuscany was in a unique situation. The Tuscans spoke a dialect which closely resembled Latin - one which afterwards became almost exclusively the language of literature, and which was already regarded at the end of the 13th century as surpassing the other dialects; Lingua Tusca magis apta est ad literam sive literaturam ("The Tuscan tongue is better suited to the letter or literature") wrote Antonio da Tempo of Padua, born about 1275. After the fall of the Hohenstaufen at the Battle of Benevento in 1266, it was the first province of Italy. From 1266 Florence began the movement of political reform which in 1282 resulted in the appointment of the Priori delle Arti, and the establishment of the Arti Minori. This was later copied by Siena (with the Magistrato dei Nove), by Lucca, by Pistoia, and by other Guelph cities in Tuscany with similar popular institutions. The guilds took the government into their hands, and it was a time of social and political prosperity. Padua, Italy, (It. ... // April 22 - The first of the Statutes of Westminster are passed by the English parliament, establishing a series of laws in its 51 clauses, including equal treatment of rich and poor, free and fair elections, and definition of bailable and non-bailable offenses. ... Arms of the Hohenstaufen Dynasty The Hohenstaufen (or the Staufer(s)) were a dynasty of Kings of Germany, many of whom were also crowned Holy Roman Emperor and Dukes of Swabia. ... The Battle of Benevento was fought in Southern Italy on February 26, 1266, where the invading Angevin forces led by Charles, the Count of Anjou, overcame a combined German-Sicilian force led by Manfred of Sicily. ... For the Catholic Liberal Arts College in New York, see Siena College. ... For the Chrono Trigger character, see Lucca (Chrono Trigger). ... Pistoia (ancient Pistoria) is a city in the Tuscany region of Italy, the capital of a province of the same name, located about 30 km (18 mi) west and north of Florence. ... A guild is an association of craftspeople in a particular trade. ...

In Tuscany, too, popular love poetry existed. A school of imitators of the Sicilians was led by Dante da Majano, but its literary originality took another line — that of humorous and satirical poetry. The entirely democratic form of government created a style of poetry which stood strongly against the medieval mystic and chivalrous style. Devout invocation of God or of a lady came from the cloister and the castle; in the streets of the cities everything that had gone before was treated with ridicule or biting sarcasm. Folgore da San Gimignano laughs when in his sonnets he tells a party of Sienese youths the occupations of every month in the year, or when he teaches a party of Florentine lads the pleasures of every day in the week. Cenne della Chitarra laughs when he parodies Folgore's sonnets. The sonnets of Rustico di Filippo are half-fun and half-satire, as is the work of Cecco Angiolieri of Siena, the oldest humorist we know, a far-off precursor of Rabelais and Montaigne. For the Princeton University eating club, see Cloister Inn. ... For other uses, see Castle (disambiguation). ... Sarcasm is the sneering, sly, jesting, or mocking of a person, situation or thing. ... Folgóre da San Gimignano, pseudonym of Giacomo di Michele or Jacopo di Michele (c. ... Cecco Angiolieri (1260 - c. ... François Rabelais François Rabelais (c. ... Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (French pronounced ) (February 28, 1533–September 13, 1592) was one of the most influential writers of the French Renaissance. ...

Another kind of poetry also began in Tuscany. Guittone d'Arezzo made art quit chivalry and Provençal forms for national motives and Latin forms. He attempted political poetry, and, although his work is often obscure, he prepared the way for the Bolognese school. Bologna was the city of science, and philosophical poetry appeared there. Guido Guinizelli was the poet after the new fashion of the art. In his work the ideas of chivalry are changed and enlarged. Only those whose heart is pure can be blessed with true love, regardless of class. He refuted the traditional credo of courtly love, for which love is a subtle philosophy only a few chosen knights and princesses could grasp. Love is blind to blasons but not to a good heart when it finds one: when it succeeds it is the result of the spiritual, not physical affinity between teo souls. Guinizzelli's democratic view can be better understood in the light of the greater equality and freedom enjoyed by the city-states of the center-north and the rise of a middle class eager to legitimise itself in the eyes of the old nobility, still regarded with respect and admiration but in fact dispossessed of its political power. Guinizelli's Canzoni make up the bible of Dolce Stil Novo, and one in particular, "Al cor gentil" ("To a Kind Heart") is considered the manifesto of the new movement which will bloom in Florence under Cavalcanti, Dante and their followers. His poetry has some of the faults of the school of d'Arezzo. Nevertheless, he marks a great development in the history of Italian art, especially because of his close connection with Dante's lyric poetry. For other uses, see Philosophy (disambiguation). ... Guido Guinizzelli (c. ... Literally song in Italian, a canzone (plural: canzoni) (cognate with English to chant) is an Italian or Provençal song or ballad. ... // Lyric poetry refers to either poetry that has the form and musical quality of a song, or a usually short poem that expresses personal feelings, which may or may not be set to music. ...

In the 13th century, there were several major allegorical poems. One of these is by Brunetto Latini, who was a close friend of Dante. His Tesoretto is a short poem, in seven-syllable verses, rhyming in couplets, in which the author professes to be lost in a wilderness and to meet with a lady, who represents Nature, from whom he receives much instruction. We see here the vision, the allegory, the instruction with a moral object, three elements which we shall find again in the Divine Comedy. Francesco da Barberino, a learned lawyer who was secretary to bishops, a judge, and a notary, wrote two little allegorical poems, the Documenti d'amore and Del reggimento e dei costumi delle donne. The poems today are generally studied not as literature, but for historical context. A fourth allegorical work was the Intelligenza, which is sometimes attributed to Compagni, but is probably only a translation of French poems. Allegory of Music by Filippino Lippi. ... Brunetto Latini (c. ... Topics in Christianity Movements · Denominations · Other religions Ecumenism · Preaching · Prayer Music · Liturgy · Calendar Symbols · Art · Criticism Important figures Apostle Paul · Church Fathers Constantine · Athanasius · Augustine Anselm · Aquinas · Palamas · Luther Calvin · Wesley Arius · Marcion of Sinope Archbishop of Canterbury · Catholic Pope Coptic Pope · Ecumenical Patriarch Christianity Portal This box:      This article... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... A US Embossed Notary Seal. ... Look up translate in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

In the 15th century, humanist and publisher Aldus Manutius published Tuscan poets Petrarch and Dante Alighieri (The Divine Comedy), creating the model for what became a standard for modern Italian. Aldus Manutius (1449/50 - February 6, 1515), the Latin form of Aldo Manuzio (born Teobaldo Mannucci) was the founder of the Aldine Press. ... From the c. ... Dante redirects here. ...

Development of early prose

Italian prose of the 13th century was as abundant and varied as its poetry. The earliest example dates from 1231, and consists of short notices of entries and expenses by Mattasala di Spinello dei Lambertini of Siena. At this time, there was no sign of literary prose in Italian, though there was in French. Halfway through the century, a certain Aldobrando or Aldobrandino, from either Florence or Siena, wrote a book for Beatrice of Savoy, countess of Provence, called Le Régime du corps. In 1267 Martino da Canale wrote a history of Venice in the same Old French (langue d'oïl). Rusticiano of Pisa, who was for a long while at the court of Edward I of England, composed many chivalrous romances, derived from the Arthurian cycle, and subsequently wrote the Travels of Marco Polo, which may have been dictated by Polo himself. And finally Brunetto Latini wrote his Tesoro in French. Latini also wrote some works in Italian prose such as La rettorica, an adaptation from Cicero's De inventione, and translated three orations from Cicero: Pro Ligario, Pro Marcello and Pro rege Deiotaro. Another important writer was the Florentine judge Bono Giamboni, who translated Orosius's Historiae adversus paganos, Vegetius's Epitoma rei militaris, made a translation/adaptation of Cicero's De inventione mixed with the Rethorica ad Erennium, and a translation/adaptation of Innocent III's De miseria humane conditionis. He also wrote an allegorical novel called Libro de' Vizi e delle Virtudi whose earlier version (Trattato delle virtù e dei vizi) is also preserved. Beatrice of Savoy (1198-1266), was the daughter of Thomas I of Savoy and Marguerite of Geneva. ... The langue doïl language family in linguistics comprises Romance languages originating in territories now occupied by northern France, part of Belgium and the Channel Islands. ... Rustichello da Pisa (fl. ... Edward I (17 June 1239 – 7 July 1307), popularly known as Longshanks[1], also as Edward the Lawgiver or the English Justinian because of his legal reforms, and as Hammer of the Scots,[2] achieved fame as the monarch who conquered Wales and tried to do the same to Scotland. ... The Matter of Britain is a name given collectively to the legends that concern the Celtic and legendary history of the British Isles, centering around King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. ... A page of The Travels of Marco Polo The Travels of Marco Polo is the usual English title of Marco Polos travel book, Il Milione (The Milione, short for Polo familys nickname Emilione). ... Brunetto Latini (c. ... For other uses, see Cicero (disambiguation). ... This page is a candidate to be copied to Wikisource. ... Paulus Orosius (c. ... Vegetius (Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus) was a celebrated military writer of the 4th century. ... De Re Militari (Latin On military matters) was a treatise of late Roman warfare that became a military guide in the middle ages. ... The Rhetorica ad Herennium is the oldest surviving Latin book on rhetoric. ... Innocent III, né Lotario de Conti ( 1161–June 16, 1216), was Pope from January 8, 1198 until his death. ...

After the original compositions in the langue d'oïl came translations or adaptations from the same. There are some moral narratives taken from religious legends, a romance of Julius Caesar, some short histories of ancient knights, the Tavola rotonda, translations of the Viaggi of Marco Polo, and of Latini's Tesoro. At the same time, translations from Latin of moral and ascetic works, histories, and treatises on rhetoric and oratory appeared. Some of the works previously regarded as the oldest in the Italian language have been shown to be forgeries of a much later time. The oldest prose writing is a scientific book, Composizione del mondo by Ristoro d'Arezzo, who lived about the middle of the 13th century. This work is a copious treatise on astronomy and geography. Ristoro was a careful observer of natural phenomena; many of the things he relates were the result of his personal investigations, and consequently his works are more reliable than those of other writers of the time on similar subjects. For other uses, see Julius Caesar (disambiguation). ... In Japanese pop music, Round Table (officially ROUND TABLE) is a band that produces music mostly for Anime soundtracks. ... Marco Polo (September 15, 1254[1] – January 9, 1324 at earliest but no later than June 1325[2]) was a Venetian trader and explorer who gained fame for his worldwide travels, recorded in the book Il Milione (The Million or The Travels of Marco Polo). ... Rhetoric (from Greek , rhêtôr, orator, teacher) is generally understood to be the art or technique of persuasion through the use of oral, visual, or written language; however, this definition of rhetoric has expanded greatly since rhetoric emerged as a field of study in universities. ... Oratory is the art of eloquent speech. ... For other uses, see Astronomy (disambiguation). ...

Another short treatise exists: De regimine rectoris, by Fra Paolino, a Minorite friar of Venice, who was probably bishop of Pozzuoli, and who also wrote a Latin chronicle. His treatise stands in close relation to that of Egidio Colonna, De regimine principum. It is written in the Venetian language. A minorite is a Franciscan friar, so-called because they believe they are humbler than members of other orders. ... A friar is a member of a religious mendicant order of men. ... A sign in Venetian reading Here we also speak Venetian Venetian or Venetan is a Romance language spoken by over five million people,[1] mostly in the Veneto region of Italy. ...

The 13th century was very rich in tales. A collection called the Cento Novelle antiche contains stories drawn from many sources, including Asian, Greek and Trojan traditions, ancient and medieval history, the legends of Brittany, Provence and Italy, the Bible, local Italian traditions, and histories of animals and old mythology. This book has a distant resemblance to the Spanish collection known as El Conde Lucanor. The peculiarity of the Italian book is that the stories are very short, and seem to be mere outlines to be filled in by the narrator as he goes along. Other prose novels were inserted by Francesco Barberino in his work Del reggimento e dei costumi delle donne, but they are of much less importance. This article is about the historical kingdom, duchy and French province, as well as one of the Celtic nations. ... Coat of arms of Provence Provence (Provençal Occitan: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) was a Roman province and now is a region of southeastern France on the Mediterranean Sea adjacent to Italy. ... For other uses, see Bible (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Mythology (disambiguation). ...

On the whole the Italian novels of the 13th century have little originality, and are a faint reflection of the very rich legendary literature of France. Some attention should be paid to the Lettere of Fra Guittone d'Arezzo, who wrote many poems and also some letters in prose, the subjects of which are moral and religious. Guittone's love of antiquity and the traditions of Rome and its language was so strong that he tried to write Italian in a Latin style. The letters are obscure, involved and altogether barbarous. Guittone took as his special model Seneca the Younger, and hence his prose became bombastic. Guittone viewed his style as very artistic, but later scholars view it as extravagant and grotesque. French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak other traditional non-French languages. ... Bust, traditionally thought to be Seneca, now identified by some as Hesiod. ...

The Renaissance

A new literature

In the year 1282 a period of new literature began, developing from the Tuscan beginnings. With the school of Lapo Gianni, Guido Cavalcanti, Cino da Pistoia and Dante Alighieri, lyric poetry became exclusively Tuscan. The whole novelty and poetic power of this school, consisted in, according to Dante, Quando Amore spira, noto, ed a quel niodo Ch'ei detta dentro, vo significando: that is, in a power of expressing the feelings of the soul in the way in which love inspires them, in an appropriate and graceful manner, fitting form to matter, and by art fusing one with the other. Love is a divine gift that redeems man in the eyes of God, and the poet's mistress is the angel sent from heaven to show the way to salvation. This a neo-platonic approach widely endorsed by Dolce Stil Novo, and although in Cavalcanti's case it can be upsetting and even destructive, it is nonetheless a metaphysical experience able to lift man onto a higher, spiritual dimension. Gianni's new style was still influenced by the Siculo-Provencal school. Lapo Gianni (died after 1328) was an Italian poet who lived in Florence in the 13th-14th centuries. ... Cavalcanti and Dante Guido Cavalcanti (c. ... Cino (dei Sighibuldi) da Pistoia (1270 - Italian poet and friend of Dante. ... Dante redirects here. ...

Cavalcanti's poems may be divided into two classes: those which portray the philosopher, (il sottilissimo dialettico, as Lorenzo the Magnificent called him) and those which are more directly the product of his poetic nature imbued with mysticism and metaphysics. To the first set belongs the famous poem Sulla natura d'amore, which in fact is a treatise on amorous metaphysics, and was annotated later in a learned way by renowned Platonic philosophers of the 15th century, such as Marsilius Ficinus and others. In other poems, Cavalcanti tends to stifle poetic imagery under a dead weight of philosophy. On the other hand, in his Ballate, he pours himself out ingenuously, but with a consciousness of his art. The greatest of these is considered to be the ballata composed by Cavalcanti when he was banished from Florence with the party of the Bianchi in 1300, and took refuge at Sarzana. The exact same full name was also carried by his grandson Lorenzo (1492 - 1519), Duke of Urbino, with whom he is sometimes confused. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), by Raphael (Stanza della Segnatura, Rome) Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy investigating principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. ... Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), by Raphael (Stanza della Segnatura, Rome) Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy investigating principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. ... Marsilio Ficino (also known by his Latin name, Marsilius Ficinus) (1433 – 1499) was one of the most influential humanist philosophers of the early Italian Renaissance, astrologer, and a reviver of Neoplatonism who was in touch with every major academic thinker and writer of his day. ... Bianchi, a plural of bianco (white in Italian) is a frequent proper name, and may refer, among others, to: the Bianchi, an early 15th‑century penitential movement Bianchi, a company that manufactures bicycles the Counts Bianchi (or Bianco), a Maltese noble house. ... Sarzana is a town and comune in the Province of La Spezia, of Liguria, Italy, 15 km east of Spezia, on the railway to Pisa, at the point where the railway to Parma diverges to the north. ...

The third poet among the followers of the new school was Cino da Pistoia, of the family of the Sinibuldi. His love poems are sweet, mellow and musical.

Dante

First page of an early printed edition of Dante's Divine Comedy.

Main article: Dante Alighieri

Dante, the greatest of Italian poets, also shows these lyrical tendencies. In 1293 he wrote La Vita Nuova ("new life" in English, so called to indicate that his first meeting with Beatrice was the beginning of a new life), in which he idealizes love. It is a collection of poems to which Dante added narration and explication. Everything is supersensual, aerial, heavenly, and the real Beatrice is supplanted by an idealized vision of her, losing her human nature and becoming a representation of the divine. Dante is the main character of the work, and the narration purports to be autobiographical, though historical information about Dante's life proves this to be poetic license. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (697x995, 214 KB) Licensing The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (697x995, 214 KB) Licensing The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... Dante shown holding a copy of the Divine Comedy, next to the entrance to Hell, the seven terraces of Mount Purgatory and the city of Florence, with the spheres of Heaven above, in Michelinos fresco. ... Dante redirects here. ... La Vita Nuova (English: New Life) is a book of verse written by Dante Alighieri, roughly around the year of 1293. ... Look up Beatrice in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Several of the lyrics of the Canzoniere deal with the theme of the new life. Not all the love poems refer to Beatrice, however—other pieces are philosophical and bridge over to the Convito.

The Divine Comedy

The work which made Dante immortal, and raised him above all other men of genius in Italy, was his Divina Commedia, which tells of the poet's travels through the three realms of the dead—Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise—accompanied by the Latin poet Virgil. An allegorical meaning is hidden under the literal one of this great epic. Dante, travelling through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise, is a symbol of mankind aiming at the double object of temporal and eternal happiness. The forest in which the poet loses himself symbolizes the civil and religious confusion of society, deprived of its two guides, the emperor and the pope. The mountain illuminated by the sun is universal monarchy. The three beasts are the three vices and the three powers which offered the greatest obstacles to Dante's designs: envy is Florence, light, fickle and divided by the Bianchi and Neri; pride is the house of France; avarice is the papal court. Virgil represents reason and the empire. Beatrice is the symbol of the supernatural aid without which man cannot attain the supreme end, which is God. For other uses see The Divine Comedy (disambiguation), Dantes Inferno (disambiguation), and The Inferno (disambiguation) Dante shown holding a copy of The Divine Comedy, next to the entrance to Hell, the seven terraces of Mount Purgatory and the city of Florence, with the spheres of Heaven above, in Michelino... This article is about the theological or philosophical afterlife. ... Illustration for Dantes Purgatorio (18), by Gustave Doré, an imaginative picturing of Purgatory. ... Paradise, Jan Bruegel Paradise is an English word from Persian roots that is generally identified with the Garden of Eden or with Heaven. ... For other uses, see Virgil (disambiguation). ... Bianchi, a plural of bianco (white in Italian) is a frequent proper name, and may refer, among others, to: the Bianchi, an early 15th‑century penitential movement Bianchi, a company that manufactures bicycles the Counts Bianchi (or Bianco), a Maltese noble house. ... Neri may be: Alain Néri, French polician Antonio Neri, Italian glassmaker Fernando Carlos Redondo Neri, Argentian footballer Filippo de Neri Francesca Neri, Italian actor Francesco Neri Giancarlo Neri, sculptor Giulio Neri Ippolito Neri (1652-1708) Joseph Neri, philosopher and Jesuit Laura Neri, Greek film director Luigi Del Neri, football...

The merit of the poem does not lie in the allegory, which still connects it with medieval literature. What is new is the individual art of the poet, the classic art transfused for the first time into a Romance form. Whether he describes nature, analyses passions, curses the vices or sings hymns to the virtues, Dante is notable for the grandeur and delicacy of his art. He took the materials for his poem from theology, philosophy, history, and mythology, but especially from his own passions, from hatred and love. Under the pen of the poet, the dead come to life again; they become men again, and speak the language of their time, of their passions. Farinata degli Uberti, Boniface VIII, Count Ugolino, Manfred, Sordello, Hugh Capet, St. Thomas Aquinas, Cacciaguida, St. Benedict, and St. Peter, are all so many objective creations; they stand before us in all the life of their characters, their feelings, and their habits. Medieval literature is a broad subject, encompassing essentially all written works available in Europe and beyond during the Middle Ages (encompassing the one thousand years from the fall of the Western Roman Empire ca. ... Theology finds its scholars pursuing the understanding of and providing reasoned discourse of religion, spirituality and God or the gods. ... Painting by Andrea del Castagno depicting Farinata degli Uberti Farinata degli Uberti (died Nov 11, 1264) was an Italian aristocrat and military leader, considered by some to be a heretic, who appears in Dantes Inferno and is mentioned in C.S. Lewiss short sequel to The Screwtape Letters... Boniface VIII, né Benedict Gaetano ( 1235 - October 11, 1303) was Pope of the Roman Catholic Church from 1294 to 1303. ... The Pisan Cannibal Count Ugolino Gherardesca was a historical personage best known from Dantes fictional depiction of him in Inferno. ... Scene from Manfred by Thomas Cole Manfred is a dramatic poem written in 1816-1817 by Lord Byron; it contains supernatural elements, in keeping with the popularity of the ghost story in England at the time. ... Sordello was a 13th-century Italian troubadour, born in Mantua. ... Hugh Capet[1] (c. ... Aquinas redirects here. ... Cacciaguida degli Elisei (1091? - c. ... This article is about Saint Benedict of Nursia, for other uses of the name Benedict see Benedict (disambiguation) Saint Benedict of Nursia (c. ... According to tradition, Peter was crucified upside-down, as shown in this painting by Caravaggio. ...

The real chastizer of the sins and rewarder of virtues is Dante himself. The personal interest he brings to bear on the historical representation of the three worlds is what most interests us and stirs us. Dante remakes history after his own passions. Thus the Divina Commedia is not only a life-like drama of contemporary thoughts and feelings, but also a clear and spontaneous reflection of the individual feelings of the poet, from the indignation of the citizen and the exile to the faith of the believer and the ardour of the philosopher. The Divina Commedia defined the destiny of Italian literature, giving artistic lustre to all forms of literature the Middle Ages had produced. Dante, some scholars say, began the Renaissance. The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ...

Petrarch

Main article: Petrarch

Statue outside the Uffizi, Florence

Two facts characterize the literary life of Petrarch: classical research and the new human feeling introduced into his lyric poetry. The facts are not separate; rather, the former caused the latter. The Petrarch who unearthed the works of the great Latin writers helps us understand the Petrarch who loved a real woman, named Laura, and celebrated her in her life and after her death in poems full of studied elegance. Petrarch was the first humanist, and he was at the same time the first modern lyric poet. His career was long and tempestuous. He lived for many years at Avignon, cursing the corruption of the papal court; he travelled through nearly the whole of Europe; he corresponded with emperors and popes, and he was considered the most important writer of his time. From the c. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (716x1252, 433 KB) Summary Francesco Petrarca or Petrarch (20 July 1304 – 19 July 1374) was an Italian scholar, poet, and early humanist Statue outside the Uffizi, Florence Own photo - photo made on 12 October 2005 Licensing File links The following pages... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (716x1252, 433 KB) Summary Francesco Petrarca or Petrarch (20 July 1304 – 19 July 1374) was an Italian scholar, poet, and early humanist Statue outside the Uffizi, Florence Own photo - photo made on 12 October 2005 Licensing File links The following pages... The narrow courtyard between the Uffizis two wings creates the effect of a short, idealized street. ... From the c. ... For the specific belief system, see Humanism (life stance). ... For the Municipality in Quebec, see Avignon Regional County Municipality, Quebec. ...

His Canzoniere is divided into three parts: the first containing the poems written during Laura's lifetime, the second the poems written after her death, the third the Trionfi. The one and only subject of these poems is love; but the treatment is full of variety in conception, in imagery and in sentiment, derived from the most varied impressions of nature. Petrarch's lyric verse is quite different, not only from that of the Provencal troubadours and the Italian poets before him, but also from the lyrics of Dante. Petrarch is a psychological poet, who examines all his feelings and renders them with an art of exquisite sweetness. The lyrics of Petrarch are no longer transcendental like Dante's, but keep entirely within human limits. The second part of the Canzoniere is the more passionate. The Trionfi are inferior; in them Petrarch tried to imitate the Divina Commedia, but failed. The Canzoniere includes also a few political poems, one supposed to be addressed to Cola di Rienzi and several sonnets against the court of Avignon. These are remarkable for their vigour of feeling, and also for showing that, compared to Dante, Petrarch had a sense of a broader Italian consciousness. The Italy which he wooed was different from any conceived by the men of the Middle Ages, and in this also he was a precursor of modern times and of modern aspirations. Petrarch had no decided political idea. He exalted Cola di Rienzi, invoked the emperor Charles IV, and praised the Visconti; in fact, his politics were affected more by impressions than by principles. Above all this was his love of Italy, which in his mind is reunited with Rome, the great city of his heroes Cicero and Scipio. For other uses, see Troubadour (disambiguation). ... Cola di Rienzi (c. ... Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor. ... Visconti was a noble family that ruled Milan during the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance period. ... For other uses, see Cicero (disambiguation). ... Scipio (plural, Scipiones) is a Roman cognomen used by a branch of the Cornelii family. ...

Boccaccio

Main article: Giovanni Boccaccio

From an edition of Boccaccio's "De Casibus Virorum Illustrium" showing Lady Fortune spinning her wheel.

Boccaccio had the same enthusiastic love of antiquity and the same worship for the new Italian literature as Petrarch. He was the first to put together a Latin translation of the Iliad and, in 1375, the Odyssey. His classical learning was shown in the work De genealogia deorum, in which he enumerates the gods according to genealogical trees from the various authors who wrote about the pagan divinities. The Genealogia deorum is, as A. H. Heeren said, an encyclopaedia of mythological knowledge; and it was the precursor of the humanist movement of the 15th century. Boccaccio was also the first historian of women in his De mulieribus claris, and the first to tell the story of the great unfortunates in his De casibus virorum illustrium. He continued and perfected former geographical investigations in his interesting book De montibus, silvis, fontibus, lacubus, fluminibus, stagnis, et paludibus, et de nominibus maris, for which he made use of Vibius Sequester. Of his Italian works, his lyrics do not come anywhere near to the perfection of Petrarch's. His narrative poetry is better. He did not invent the octave stanza, but was the first to use it in a work of length and artistic merit, his Teseide, the oldest Italian romantic poem. The Filostrato relates the loves of Troiolo and Griseida (Troilus and Cressida). It may be that Boccaccio knew the French poem of the Trojan war by Benoit de Sainte-More; but the interest of his poem lies in the analysis of the passion of love. The Ninfale fiesolano tells the love story of the nymph Mesola and the shepherd Africo. The Amorosa Visione, a poem in triplets, doubtless owed its origin to the Divina Commedia. The Ameto is a mixture of prose and poetry, and is the first Italian pastoral romance. Giovanni Boccaccio (June 16, 1313 – December 21, 1375) was an Italian author and poet, a friend and correspondent of Petrarch, an important Renaissance humanist in his own right and author of a number of notable works including On Famous Women, the Decameron and his poetry in the vernacular. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (914x1291, 324 KB) Summary From: http://special. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (914x1291, 324 KB) Summary From: http://special. ... title page of the Rihel edition of ca. ... This article is about Homers epic poem. ... Arnold Hermann Ludwig Heeren (October 25, 1760 - March 6, 1842), was a German historian. ... For the specific belief system, see Humanism (life stance). ... De mulieribus claris (Latin for On Famous Women) is a collection of biographies of women by Giovanni Boccaccio. ... Vibius Sequester (4th or 5th century, AD), is the supposed author of an alphabetical list of geographical names occurring in the Roman poets, with special reference to Virgil, Ovid and Lucan. ... Il Filostrato is a poem by the Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio, and the inspiration for Geoffrey Chaucers Troilus and Criseyde (and later the Shakespeare play Troilus and Cressida). ... For the Chaucer poem, see Troilus and Criseyde. ... Benoît de Sainte-Maure (1154 – 1173) was a 12th century French poet and trouvère. ...

The Filocopo takes the earliest place among prose romances. In it Boccaccio tells the loves of Florio and Biancafiore. Probably for this work he drew materials from a popular source or from a Byzantine romance, which Leonzio Pilato may have mentioned to him. In the Filocopo there is a remarkable exuberance in the mythological part, which damages the romance as an artistic work, but which contributes to the history of Boccaccio's mind. The Fiammetta is another romance, about the loves of Boccaccio and Maria d'Aquino, a supposed natural daughter of King Robert, whom he always called by this name of Fiammetta. Byzantine redirects here. ... Leozio Pilatus, or Leontius [Leonzio Pilato] (d. ...

The Italian work which principally made Boccaccio famous was the Decamerone, a collection of a hundred novels, related by a party of men and women, who had retired to a villa near Florence to escape from the plague in 1348. Novel-writing, so abundant in the preceding centuries, especially in France, now for the first time assumed an artistic shape. The style of Boccaccio tends to the imitation of Latin, but in him prose first took the form of elaborated art. The rudeness of the old fabliaux gives place to the careful and conscientious work of a mind that has a feeling for what is beautiful, that has studied the classic authors, and that strives to imitate them as much as possible. Over and above this, in the Decamerone, Boccaccio is a delineator of character and an observer of passions. In this lies his novelty. Much has been written about the sources of the novels of the Decamerone. Probably Boccaccio made use both of written and of oral sources. Popular tradition must have furnished him with the materials of many stories, as, for example, that of Griselda. The Decameron is a collection of novellas that was finished by Giovanni Boccaccio in 1353. ... This article concerns the mid fourteenth century pandemic. ... The fabliau (plural fabliaux or fablieaux) is a comic, usually anonymous tale written by jongleurs in northeast France circa the 13th Century. ...

Unlike Petrarch, who was always discontented, preoccupied, wearied with life, disturbed by disappointments, we find Boccaccio calm, serene, satisfied with himself and with his surroundings. Notwithstanding these fundamental differences in their characters, the two great authors were old and warm friends. But their affection for Dante was not equal. Petrarch, who says that he saw him once in his childhood, did not preserve a pleasant recollection of him, and it would be useless to deny that he was jealous of his renown. The Divina Commedia was sent him by Boccaccio, when he was an old man, and he confessed that he never read it. On the other hand, Boccaccio felt for Dante something more than love--enthusiasm. He wrote a biography of him, of which the accuracy is now depreciated by some critics, and he gave public critical lectures on the poem in Santa Maria del Fiore at Florence. The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore is the cathedral church, or Duomo, of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Florence, noted for its distinctive dome. ...

Others

Imitators

Fazio degli Uberti and Federigo Frezzi were imitators of the Divina Commedia, but only in its external form. The former wrote the Dittamondo, a long poem, in which the author supposes that he was taken by the geographer Solinus into different parts of the world, and that his Commedia guide related the history of them. The legends of the rise of the different Italian cities have some importance historically. Frezzi, bishop of his native town Foligno, wrote the Quadriregio, a poem of the four kingdoms Love, Satan, the Vices, and the Virtues. This poem has many points of resemblance with the Divina Commedia. Frezzi pictures the condition of man who rises from a state of vice to one of virtue, and describes hell, limbo, purgatory and heaven. The poet has Pallas for a companion. Gaius Julius Solinus, Latin grammarian and compiler, probably flourished during the first half of the 3rd century. ... Foligno, (Latin: Fulginiae, Fulginium) an ancient town of Italy, in the province of Perugia in east central Umbria, at 233 meters (764 ft) above sea-level, on the Topino river where it leaves the Apennines and enters the wide plain of the Clitunno river system. ... Pallas Athena. ...

Ser Giovanni Fiorentino wrote, under the title of Pecorone, a collection of tales, which are supposed to have been related by a monk and a nun in the parlour of the monastery Novelists of Forli. He closely imitated Boccaccio, and drew on Villani's chronicle for his historical stories. Franco Sacchetti wrote tales too, for the most part on subjects taken from Florentine history. His book gives a life-like picture of Florentine society at the end of the 14th century. The subjects are almost always improper; but it is evident that Sacchetti collected all these anecdotes in order to draw from them his own conclusions and moral reflections, which are to be found at the end of every story. From this point of view Sacchetti's work comes near to the Monalisaliones of the Middle Ages. A third novelist was Giovanni Sercambi of Lucca, who after 1374 wrote a book, in imitation of Boccaccio, about a party of people who were supposed to fly from a plague and to go travelling about in different Italian cities, stopping here and there telling stories. Later, but important, names are those of Masuccio Salernitano (Tommaso Guardato), who wrote the Novellino, and Antonio Cornazzano whose Proverbii became extremely popular. It has been suggested that Franco Sachetti be merged into this article or section. ... Masuccio Salernitano (1410-1475) was an Italian poet. ...

Chronicles

Chronicles formerly believed to have been of the 13th century are now mainly regarded as forgeries. At the end of the 13th century there is a chronicle by Dino Compagni, probably authentic. Dino Compagni (Florence c. ...

Giovanni Villani, born in 1300, was more of a chronicler than an historian. He relates the events up to 1347. The journeys that he made in Italy and France, and the information thus acquired, mean that his chronicle, the Historie Fiorentine, covers events all over Europe. He speaks at length, not only of events in politics and war, but also of the stipends of public officials, of the sums of money used for paying soldiers and for public festivals, and of many other things of which the knowledge is very valuable. Villani's narrative is often encumbered with fables and errors, particularly when he speaks of things that happened before his own time. Giovanni Villani (ca 1275-1348), the Florentine writer of the famous chronicles (the Cronica) is the greatest Italian chronicler of his own times and the cornerstone of the early medieval history of Florence. ...

Matteo was the brother of Giovanni Villani, and continued the chronicle up to 1363. It was again continued by Filippo Villani.

Piero Capponi, author of the Commentari deli acquisto di Pisa and of the narration of the Tumulto dei Ciompi, belonged to both the 14th and the 15th centuries. Piero Capponi (1447 - September 25, 1496), Florentine statesman and warrior. ...

Ascetics

The Divine Commedia is ascetic in its conception, and in a good many points of its execution. Petrarch's work has similar qualities; yet neither Petrarch nor Dante could be classified among the pure ascetics of their time. But many other writers come under this head. St Catherine of Siena's mysticism was political. This extraordinary woman aspired to bring back the Church of Rome to evangelical virtue, and left a collection of letters written in a high and lofty tone to all kinds of people, including popes. Hers is the clearest religious utterance to have made itself heard in 14th century Italy. Although precise ideas of reformation did not enter her head, the want of a great moral reform was felt in her heart. She must take her place among those who prepared the way for the religious movement of the 16th century. Saint Catherine of Siena, O.P. (March 25, 1347 - April 29, 1380) was a Tertiary (a lay affiliate) of the Dominican Order, and a scholastic philosopher and theologian. ...

Another Sienese, Giovanni Colombini, founder of the order of Jesuati, preached poverty by precept and example, going back to the religious idea of St Francis of Assisi. His letters are among the most remarkable in the category of ascetic works in the 14th century. Jacopo Passavanti, in his Specchio della vera penitenza, attached instruction to narrative. Cavalca translated from the Latin the Vite dei santi padri. Rivalta left behind him many sermons, and Franco Sacchetti (the famous novelist) many discourses. On the whole, there is no doubt that one of the most important productions of the Italian spirit of the 14th century was religious literature. The Jesuati were a religious order founded by Giovanni Colombini of Siena in 1360. ... It has been suggested that Franco Sachetti be merged into this article or section. ...

Popular works

Humorous poetry, largely developed in the 13th century, was carried on in the 14th by Bindo Bonichi, Arrigo di Castruccio, Cecco Nuccoli, Andrea Orgagna, Filippo de Bardi, Adriano de Rossi, Antonio Pucci and other lesser writers. Orgagna was specially comic; Bonichi was comic with a satirical and moral purpose. Antonio Pucci (1310 ca. ...

Pucci was superior to all of them for the variety of his production. He put into triplets the chronicle of Giovanni Villani (Centiloquio), and wrote many historical poems called Serventesi, many comic poems, and not a few epico-popular compositions on various subjects. A little poem of his in seven cantos treats of the war between the Florentines and the Pisans from 1362 to 1365. For other uses, see Pisa (disambiguation). ...

Other poems drawn from a legendary source celebrate the Reina d'Oriente, Apollonio di Tiro, the Bel Gherardino, etc. These poems, meant to be recited, are the ancestors of the romantic epic.

Political works

Many poets of the 14th century produced political works. Fazio degli Uberti, the author of Dittamondo, who wrote a Serventese to the lords and people of Italy, a poem on Rome, and a fierce invective against Charles IV, deserves notice, as do Francesco di Vannozzo, Frate Stoppa and Matteo Frescobaldi. It may be said in general that following the example of Petrarch many writers devoted themselves to patriotic poetry. From this period also dates that literary phenomenon known under the name of Petrarchism. The Petrarchists, or those who sang of love, imitating Petrarch's manner, were found already in the 14th century. But others treated the same subject with more originality, in a manner that might be called semi-popular. Such were the Ballate of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, of Franco Sacchetti, of Niccolo Soldanieri, and of Guido and Bindo Donati. Ballate were poems sung to dancing, and we have very many songs for music of the 14th century. We have already stated that Antonio Pucci versified Villani's Chronicle. This instance of versified history is not unique, and it is evidently connected with the precisely similar phenomenon offered by the vulgar Latin literature. It is enough to notice a chronicle of Arezzo in terza rima by Gorello de Sinigardi, and the history, also in terza rima, of the journey of Pope Alexander III to Venice, by Pier de Natali. Besides this, every kind of subject, whether history, tragedy or husbandry, was treated in verse. Neri di Landocio wrote a life of St Catherine; Jacopo Gradenigo put the Gospels into triplets; Paganino Bonafede in the Tesoro de rustici gave many precepts in agriculture, beginning that kind of georgic poetry which was fully developed later by Alamanni in his Coltivazione, by Girolamo Baruffaldi in the Canapajo, by Rucellai in Le api, by Bartolomeo Lorenzi in the Coltivazione de' monti, and by Giambattista Spolverini in the Coltivazione del riso. Not to be confused with Latin profanity. ... Arezzo (Latin Arretium) is an old city in central Italy, capital of the province of the same name, located in Tuscany. ... Terza rima is a rhyming verse stanza form that was first used by the Italian poet Dante Alighieri. ... Area settled by the Alamanni, and sites of Roman-Alamannic battles, 3rd to 6th century The Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of west Germanic tribes located around the upper Main, a river that is one of the largest tributaries of the Rhine, on land that is today...

Drama

There cannot have been an entire absence of dramatic literature in Italy in the 14th century, but traces of it are wanting, although we find them again in great abundance in the drama of the 15th century. The 14th century had, however, one drama unique of its kind. In the sixty years (1250 to 1310) which ran from the death of the emperor Frederick II to the expedition of Henry VII, no emperor had come into Italy. In the north of Italy, Ezzelino da Romano, with the title of Imperial Vicar, had taken possession of almost the whole of the March of Treviso, and threatened Lombardy. The popes proclaimed a crusade against him and, crushed by it, the Ezzelini fell. Padua then began to breathe again, and took to extending its dominion. Ezzelino da Romano III (1194 - 1259) was an Italian conqueror, dictator, political figure and soldier. ... For the village of the same name in Ontario, Canada, see Lombardy, Ontario. ... Padua, Italy, (Italian: IPA: , Latin: Patavium, Venetian: ) is a city in the Veneto, northern Italy, the economic and communications hub of the region. ...

There lived at Padua a man named Albertino Mussato, born in 1261, a year after the catastrophe of the Ezzelini; he grew up among the survivors of a generation that hated the name of the tyrant. After having written in Latin a history of Henry VII he devoted himself to a dramatic work on Ezzelino, and wrote it also in Latin. The Eccerinus, which was probably never represented on the stage, has been by some critics compared to the great tragic works of Greece. It would probably be nearer the truth to say that it has nothing in common with the works of Aeschylus; but certainly the dramatic strength, the delineation of certain situations, and the narration of certain events are very original. Mussato's work stands alone in the history of Italian dramatic literature. Perhaps this would not have been the case if he had written it in Italian. Albertino Mussato (1261 - 31 May 1329) was an Italian statesman and writer. ... This article is about the ancient Greek playwright. ...

At Florence the most celebrated humanists wrote also in the vulgar tongue, and commented on Dante and Petrarch, and defended them from their enemies. Leone Battista Alberti, the learned Greek and Latin scholar, wrote in the vernacular, and Vespasiano da Bisticci, while he was constantly absorbed in Greek and Latin manuscripts, wrote the Vite di uomini illustri, valuable for their historical contents, and rivalling the best works of the 14th century in their candour and simplicity. Andrea da Barberino wrote the beautiful prose of the Reali di Francia, giving a coloring of romanità to the chivalrous romances. Belcari and Benivieni returned to the mystic idealism of earlier times. Late statue of Leon Battista Alberti. ... Vespasiano da Bisticci (Fiorentino) (1421-1498) was a Florentine humanist and librarian. ...

But it is in Lorenzo de Medici that the influence of Florence on the Renaissance is particularly seen. His mind was formed by the ancients: he attended the class of the Greek John Argyropulos, sat at Platonic banquets, took pains to collect codices, sculptures, vases, pictures, gems and drawings to ornament the gardens of San Marco and to form the library later named after him. In the saloons of his Florentine palace, in his villas at Careggi, Fiesole and Anibra, stood the wonderful chests painted by Dello di Niccolò Delli with stories from Ovid, the Hercules of Pollaiuolo, the Pallas of Botticelli, the works of Filippino and Verrocchio. De Medici lived entirely in the classical world; and yet if we read his poems we only see the man of his time, the admirer of Dante and of the old Tuscan poets, who takes inspiration from the popular muse, and who succeeds in giving to his poetry the colors of the most pronounced realism as well as of the loftiest idealism, who passes from the Platonic sonnet to the impassioned triplets of the Amori di Venere, from the grandiosity of the Salve to Nencia and to Beoni, from the Canto carnascialesco to the lauda. The feeling of nature is strong in him; at one time sweet and melancholy, at another vigorous and deep, as if an echo of the feelings, the sorrows, the ambitions of that deeply agitated life. He liked to look into his own heart with a severe eye, but he was also able to pour himself out with tumultuous fulness. He described with the art of a sculptor; he satirized, laughed, prayed, sighed, always elegant, always a Florentine, but a Florentine who read Anacreon, Ovid and Tibullus, who wished to enjoy life, but also to taste of the refinements of art. The exact same full name was also carried by his grandson Lorenzo (1492 - 1519), Duke of Urbino, with whom he is sometimes confused. ... ARGYROPULOS John (’Αργυροπουλος, Argiropulo, Giovanni); a Byzantine humanist, philosopher, and writer; born around 1415 in Constantinople, died July 16, 1487 in Rome. ... Villa Medici in Careggi. ... Florence as seen from Fiesole Fiesole is a town and comune (township) of Firenze province in the Italian region of Tuscany, 43°49N 11°18E, on a famously scenic height 346 m (1140 ft) above Florence, 8 km (5 mi) NE of that city. ... For other uses, see Ovid (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Hercules (disambiguation). ... Pollaiulo is the name of several people: Brothers Antonio Pollaiuolo and Piero Pollaiuolo, artists. ... Botticelli redirects here. ... Categories: Artist stubs | 1435 births | 1488 deaths | Italian painters | Italian sculptors ... The term sonnet derives from the Provençal word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning little song. ... Anacreon roman copy , Rome in Palazzo dei Conservatori Anacreon (also Anakreon) (born ca. ... This article contains translated text and needs attention from someone approaching dual fluency. ...

Next to Lorenzo comes Poliziano, who also united, and with greater art, the ancient and the modern, the popular and the classical style. In his Rispetti and in his Ballate the freshness of imagery and the plasticity of form are inimitable. A great Greek scholar, Piliziano wrote Italian verses with dazzling colors; the purest elegance of the Greek sources pervaded his art in all its varieties, in the Orfeo as well as the Stanze per la giostra. Angelo Poliziano. ...

y never had true epic poetry; but had, however, many poems called cantari, because they contained stories that were sung to the people; and besides there were romantic poems, such as the Buovo d'Antona, the Regina Ancroja and others. But the first to introduce life into this style was Luigi Pulci, who grew up in the house of the Medici, and who wrote the Morgante Maggiore at the request of Lucrezia Tornabuoni, mother of Lorenzo the Magnificent. The material of the Morgante is almost completely taken from an obscure chivalrous poem of the 15th century, rediscovered by Pio Rajna. Pulci erected a structure of his own, often turning the subject into ridicule, burlesquing the characters, introducing many digressions, now capricious, now scientific, now theological. Pulci raised the romantic epic into a work of art, and united the serious and the comic. For other meanings of epic, see Epic. ... Luigi Pulci (15 August 1432 - 1484) was an Italian poet most famous for his Morgante, an epic story of a giant who is converted to Christianity and follows Orlando, all written in a mock-heroic tone. ... The exact same full name was also carried by his grandson Lorenzo (1492 - 1519), Duke of Urbino, with whom he is sometimes confused. ...

With a more serious intention Matteo Boiardo, count of Scandiano, wrote his Orlando innamorato, in which he seems to have aspired to embrace the whole range of Carolingian legends; but he did not complete his task. We find here too a large vein of humour and burlesque. Still Boiardo was drawn to the world of romance by a profound sympathy for chivalrous manners and feelings; that is to say, for love, courtesy, valour and generosity. A third romantic poem of the 15th century was the Mambriano by Francesco Bello (Cieco of Ferrara). He drew from the Carolingian cycle, from the romances of the Round Table, and from classical antiquity. He was a poet of no common genius, and of ready imagination. He showed the influence of Boiardo, especially in something of the fantastic which he introduced into his work. Scandiano is a town in Emilia-Romagna, Italy, administratively part of the province of Reggio Emilia. ... Orlando Innamorato is an epic poem written by the Italian Renaissance author Matteo Maria Boiardo. ... Also see: France in the Middle Ages. ... The Matter of France, also known as the Carolingian cycle, is a body of legendary history that springs from the Old French medieval literature of the chansons de geste. ... In Japanese pop music, Round Table (officially ROUND TABLE) is a band that produces music mostly for Anime soundtracks. ...

Carnival songs

A completely new style of poetry arose, the Canto carnascialesco. These were a kind of choral songs, which were accompanied with symbolic masquerades, common in Florence at the carnival. They were written in a metre like that of the ballate; and for the most part they were put into the mouth of a party of workmen and tradesmen, who, with not very chaste allusions, sang the praises of their art. These triumphs and masquerades were directed by Lorenzo himself. In the evening, there set out into the city large companies on horseback, playing and singing these songs. There are some by Lorenzo himself, which surpass all the others in their mastery of art. That entitled Bacco ed Arianna is the most famous.

Drama

The development of the drama in the 15th century was very great. This kind of semi-popular literature was born in Florence, and attached itself to certain popular festivities that were usually held in honor of St John the Baptist, patron saint of the city. The Sacra Rappresentazione is the development of the medieval Mistero (mystery play). Although it belonged to popular poetry, some of its authors were literary men of much renown: Lorenzo de Medici, for example, wrote San Giovanni e Paolo, and Feo Belcari wrote San Panunzio, Abramo ed Isaac, and more. From the 15th century, some element of the comic-profane found its way into the Sacra Rappresentazione. From its Biblical and legendary conventionalism Poliziano emancipated himself in his Orfeo, which, although in its exterior form belonging to the sacred representations, yet substantially detaches itself from them in its contents and in the artistic element introduced. For the hip-hop producer with the same name, see John the Baptist (producer). ... Mystery plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. ...

Savonarola

Girolamo Savonarola, who came to Florence in 1489, arose to fight against the literary and social movement of the Renaissance. Some have tried to make out that Savonarola was an apostle of liberty, others that he was a precursor of the Reformation. In truth, however, he was neither. In his struggle with Lorenzo de Medici, he attacked the promoter of classical studies, the patron of pagan literature, rather than the political tyrant. Animated by mystic zeal, he took the line of a prophet, preaching against reading voluptuous authors, against the tyranny of the Medici, and calling for popular government. This, however, was not done from a desire for civil liberty, but because Savonarola saw in Lorenzo and his court the greatest obstacle to that return to Catholic doctrine which was his hearts desire; while he thought this return would be easily accomplished if, on the fall of the Medici, the Florentine republic should come into the hands of his supporters. Girolamo Savonarola by Fra Bartolomeo, c. ...

There may be more justice in looking on Savonarola as the forerunner of the Reformation. If he was so, it was more than he intended. The friar of Ferrara never thought of attacking the papal dogma, and always maintained that he wished to remain within the church of Rome. He had none of the great aspirations of Martin Luther. He only repeated the complaints and the exhortations of St Catherine of Siena; he desired a reform of manners, entirely of manners, not of doctrine. He prepared the ground for the German and English religious movement of the 16th century, but unconsciously. In the history of Italian civilization he represents retrogression, that is to say, the cancelling of the great fact of the Renaissance, and a return to medieval ideas. His attempt to put himself in opposition to his time, to arrest the course of events, to bring the people back to the faith of the past, the belief that all the social evils came from Medicis and Borgias, his not seeing the historical reality, as it was, his aspiring to found a republic with Jesus Christ for its king; all these things show that Savonarola was more of a fanatic than a thinker. Nor has he any great merit as a writer. He wrote Italian sermons, hymns (laudi), ascetic and political treatises, but they are roughly executed, and only important as throwing light on the history of his ideas. The religious poems of Girolamo Benivieni are better than his, and are drawn from the same inspirations. In these lyrics, sometimes sweet, always warm with religious feeling, Benivieni and with him Belcari carry us back to the literature of the 14th century. The Protestant Reformation was a movement which began in the 16th century as a series of attempts to reform the Roman Catholic Church, but ended in division and the establishment of new institutions, most importantly Lutheranism, Reformed churches, and Anabaptists. ... Martin Luther (November 10, 1483 – February 18, 1546) was a German monk,[1] priest, professor, theologian, and church reformer. ... Borja (better known by the Italian spelling of the name, Borgia) was an influential Spanish family during the Renaissance. ... Girolamo Benivieni (1453-1542), Florence; poet who was an intimate of several great men of Renaissance http://www. ...

Other

History had neither many nor very good students in the 15th century. Its revival belonged to the following age. It was mostly written in Latin. Leonardo Bruni of Arezzo wrote the history of Florence, Gioviano Pontano that of Naples, in Latin. Bernardino Corio wrote the history of Milan in Italian, but in a rude way. Leonardo Bruni Leonardo Bruni (c. ... Jovianus Pontanus (It. ... For other uses, see Milan (disambiguation). ...

Leonardo da Vinci wrote a treatise on painting, Leone Battista Alberti one on sculpture and architecture. But the names of these two men are important, not so much as authors of these treatises, but as being embodiments of another characteristic of the age of the Renaissance; versatility of genius, power of application along many and varied lines, and of being excellent in all. Leonardo was an architect, a poet, a painter, an hydraulic engineer and a distinguished mathematician. Alberti was a musician, studied jurisprudence, was an architect and a draughtsman, and had great fame in literature. He had a deep feeling for nature, and an almost unique faculty of assimilating all that he saw and heard. Leonardo and Alberti are representatives and almost a compendium in themselves of all that intellectual vigour of the Renaissance age, which in the 16th century took to developing itself in its individual parts, making way for what has by some been called the golden age of Italian literature. “Da Vinci” redirects here. ... Late statue of Leon Battista Alberti. ...

After the Renaissance

Baldassare Castiglione. Portrait by Raphael

The fundamental characteristic of the literary epoch following that of the Renaissance is that it perfected itself in every kind of art, in particular uniting the essentially Italian character of its language with classicism of style. This period lasted from about 1494 to about 1560; 1494 being the year in which Charles VIII descended into Italy, marking the beginning of Italy's political decadence and of foreign domination over it. Baldassare Castiglione The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... Baldassare Castiglione The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... This article is about the Renaissance artist. ...

The famous men of the first half of the 16th century had been educated in the preceding century. Pietro Pomponazzi was born in 1462, Marcello Adriani Virgilio in 1464, Castiglione in 1468, Machiavelli in 1469, Bembo in 1470, Michelangelo Buonarroti and Ariosto in 1474, Jacopo Nardi in 1476, Gian Giorgio Trissino in 1478, and Guicciardini in 1482. The literary activity which showed itself from the end of the 15th century to the middle of the following one was the product of the political and social conditions of an earlier age. Pietro Pomponazzi (September 16, 1462 – May 18, 1525) was an Italian philosopher. ... i love orange pekoe tea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ... Detail of the portrait of Machiavelli, ca 1500, in the robes of a Florentine public official Niccolò Machiavelli (May 3, 1469—June 21, 1527) was an Italian political philosopher during the Renaissance. ... Bembo was a Monotype “recutting” (in effect a revival and reworking) of type used by Aldus Manutius. ... Michelangelo (full name Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni) (March 6, 1475 - February 18, 1564) was a Renaissance sculptor, architect, painter, and poet. ... Ludovico Ariosto (September 8, 1474 _ July 6, 1533) was a Ferrarese poet, author of the epic poem Orlando furioso (1516), Orlando Enraged. He was born at Reggio, in Hungary in 1518, and wished Aniosto to accompany him. ... Jacopo Nardi (b. ... Gian Giorgio Trissino (Venezia, 1478 - Rome, 1550) was an Italian Renaissance humanist, poet, dramatist, diplomat and grammarian. ... Guicciardini Francesco Guicciardini (March 6, 1483 - May 22, 1540), Italian historian and statesman. ...

Machiavelli and Francesco Guicciardini were the chief originators of the science of history. Machiavelli's principal works are the Istorie fiorentine, the Discorsi sulla prima deca di Tito Livio, the Arte della guerra and the Principe. His merit consists in having been the creator of the experimental science of politics in having observed facts, studied histories and drawn consequences from them. His history is sometimes inexact in facts; it is rather a political than an historical work. The peculiarity of Machiavelli's genius lay, as has been said, in his artistic feeling for the treatment and discussion of politics in and for themselves, without regard to an immediate end in his power of abstracting himself from the partial appearances of the transitory present, in order more thoroughly to possess himself of the eternal and inborn kingdom, and to bring it into subjection to himself.

Next to Machiavelli both as an historian and a statesman comes Guicciardini. Guicciardini was very observant, and endeavoured to reduce his observations to a science. His Storia d'Italia, which extends from the death of Lorenzo de Medici to 1534, is full of political wisdom, is skillfully arranged in its parts, gives a lively picture of the character of the persons it treats of, and is written in a grand style. He shows a profound knowledge of the human heart, and depicts with truth the temperaments, the capabilities and habits of the different European nations. Going back to the causes of events, he looked for the explanation of the divergent interests of princes and of their reciprocal jealousies. The fact of his having witnessed many of the events he related, and having taken part in them, adds authority to his words. The political reflections are always deep; in the Pensieri, as Gino Capponi says, he seems to aim at extracting through self-examination a quintessence, as it were, of the things observed and done by him; thus endeavouring to form a political doctrine as adequate as possible in all its parts. Machiavelli and Guicciardini may be considered as distinguished historians as well as originators of the science of history founded on observation. The exact same full name was also carried by his grandson Lorenzo (1492 - 1519), Duke of Urbino, with whom he is sometimes confused. ... Marquis Gino Capponi (September 13, 1792 - February 3, 1876) was an Italian statesman and historian. ...

Inferior to them, but still always worthy of note, were Jacopo Nardi (a just and faithful historian and a virtuous man, who defended the rights of Florence against the Medici before Charles V), Benedetto Varchi, Giambattista Adriani, Bernardo Segni, and, outside Tuscany, Camillo Porzio, who related the Congiura de baroni and the history of Italy from 1547 to 1552; Angelo di Costanza, Pietro Bembo, Paolo Paruta, and others. Jacopo Nardi (b. ... Benedetto Varchi (born 1502 or 1503 in Florence; died 1565) was an Italian historian. ... Giovanni Battista Adriani (1511 or 1513-1579) was an Italian historian. ... Camillo Porzio (1526 - 1580) was an Italian historian. ... Pietro Bembo (May 20, 1470 - 18 January 1547), Italian cardinal and scholar. ... Paolo Paruta (1540 –1598), Venetian historian. ...

Page from 1565 edition of Orlando furioso by Francesco Franceschi.

Ariosto's Orlando furioso was a continuation of Boiardo's Innamorato. His characteristic is that he assimilated the romance of chivalry to the style and models of classicism. Romantic Ariosto was an artist only for the love of his art; his epic. Image File history File links Orlando_furioso_canto34. ... Image File history File links Orlando_furioso_canto34. ... Page from Francesco Franceschis 1565 edition of Orlando Furioso. ... Ruggiero Rescuing Angelica by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres. ...

His sole aim was to make a romance that would please himself and the generation in which he lived. His Orlando has no grave and serious purpose; on the contrary it creates a fantastic world, in which the poet rambles, indulging his caprice, and sometimes smiling at his own work. His great desire is to depict everything with the greatest possible perfection; the cultivation of style is what occupies him most. In his hands the style becomes wonderfully plastic to every conception, whether high or low, serious or sportive. The octave stanza reached in him the highest perfection of grace, variety, and harmony.

Meanwhile, side by side with the romantic, there was an attempt at the historical epic. Gian Giorgio Trissino of Vicenza composed a poem called Italia liberata dai Goti. Full of learning and of the rules of the ancients, he formed himself on the latter, in order to sing of the campaigns of Belisarius; he said that he had forced himself to observe all the rules of Aristotle, and that he had imitated Homer. In this again, we see one of the products of the Renaissance; and, although Trissino's work is poor in invention and without any original poetical coloring, yet it helps one to understand better what were the conditions of mind in the 16th century. Gian Giorgio Trissino (Venezia, 1478 - Rome, 1550) was an Italian Renaissance humanist, poet, dramatist, diplomat and grammarian. ... Vicenza is a city in northern Italy, is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, straddling the Bacchiglione. ... // Flavius Belisarius (505(?) – 565) was one of the greatest generals of the Byzantine Empire and one of the most acclaimed generals in history. ... For other uses, see Aristotle (disambiguation). ... This article is about the Greek poet Homer and the works attributed to him. ... This article is about the European Renaissance of the 14th-17th centuries. ...

Lyric poetry was certainly not one of the kinds that rose to any great height in the 16th century. Originality was entirely wanting, since it seemed in that century as if nothing better could be done than to copy Petrarch. Still, even in this style there were some vigorous poets. Monsignore Giovanni Guidiccioni of Lucca (1500-1541) showed that he had a generous heart. In fine sonnets he gave expression to his grief for the sad state to which his country was reduced. Francesco Molza of Modena (1489-1544), learned in Greek, Latin and Hebrew, wrote in a graceful style and with spirit. Giovanni della Casa (1503-1556) and Pietro Bembo (1470-1547), although Petrarchists, were elegant. Even Michelangelo was at times a Petrarchist, but his poems bear the stamp of his extraordinary and original genius. And a good many ladies are to be placed near these poets, such as Vittoria Colonna (loved by Michelangelo), Veronica Gambara, Tullia d'Aragona, and Giulia Gonzaga, poets of great delicacy, and superior in genius to many literary men of their time. Giovanni Guidiccioni (1480-1541), Italian poet, was born at Lucca, and died at Macerata. ... For the Chrono Trigger character, see Lucca (Chrono Trigger). ... Modena (Mòdna in Modenese dialect) is a city and a province on the south side of the Po valley, in Emilia-Romagna, Italy. ... Giovanni della Casa (28 June 1503 - 14 November 1556) was an Italian poet. ... Pietro Bembo (May 20, 1470 - 18 January 1547), Italian cardinal and scholar. ... Vittoria Colonna, drawing by Michelangelo. ... Tullia dAragona (ca. ... Giulia Gonzaga (1513 - April 16, 1566) was an Italian noblewoman of Renaissance age. ...

Many tragedies were written in the 16th century, but they are all weak. The cause of this was the moral and religious indifference of the Italians, the lack of strong passions and vigorous characters. The first to occupy the tragic stage was Trissino with his Sofonisba, following the rules of the art most scrupulously, but written in sickly verses, and without warmth of feeling. The Oreste and the Rosmunda of Giovanni Rucellai were no better, nor Luigi Alamanni's Antigone. Sperone Speroni in his Canace and Giraldi Cintio in his Orbecche tried to become innovators in tragic literature, but they only succeeded in making it grotesque. Decidedly superior to these was the Torrismondo of Torquato Tasso, specially remarkable for the choruses, which sometimes remind one of the chorus of the Greek tragedies. Giovanni Rucellai (1475-1525) was an Italian humanist, poet, dramatist and man of letters. ... Luigi Alamanni (sometimes spelt Alemanni) (1495-1556), Italian poet and statesman, was born in Florence. ... For other uses, see Antigone (disambiguation). ... Sperone Speroni degli Alvarotti (1500-1588) was an Italian Renaissance humanist, scholar, and dramatist. ... Giovanni Battista Giraldi (November, 1504 - December 30, 1573), surnamed Cynthitus, Cinthio or Cintio, was an Italian novelist and poet. ... The tone or style of this article or section may not be appropriate for Wikipedia. ... Greek theatre or Greek Drama came into its own between 600 and 200 BC in the ancient city of Athens. ...

The Italian comedy of the 16th century was almost entirely modelled on the Latin comedy. They were almost always alike in the plot, in the characters of the old man, of the servant, of the waiting-maid; and the argument was often the same. Thus the Lucidi of Agnolo Firenzuola, and the Vecchio amoroso of Donato Giannotti were modelled on comedies by Plautus, as were the Sporta by Giambattista Gelli, the Marito by Lodovico Dolce, and others. There appear to be only three writers who should be distinguished among the many who wrote comedies: Machiavelli, Ariosto, and Giovan Maria Cecchi. In his Mandragora Machiavelli, unlike all the others, composed a comedy of character, creating types which seem living even now, because they were copied from reality seen with a finely observant eye. Ariosto, on the other hand, was distinguished for his picture of the habits of his time, and especially of those of the Ferrarese nobles, rather than for the objective delineation of character. Lastly, Cecchi left in his comedies a treasure of spoken language, which nowadays enables us in a wonderful way to make ourselves acquainted with that age. The notorious Pietro Aretino might also be included in the list of the best writers of comedy. Agnolo Firenzuola (28 September 1493-ca. ... Donato Giannotti (1492-1573) was a Florentine political writer and playwright. ... Titus Macchius Plautus, generally referred to simply as Plautus, was a playwright of Ancient Rome. ... Giambattista Gelli (1498 - 1563) was a Florentine humanist man of letters, from an artisan background. ... Lodovico Dolce (1508-1568) was an Italian theorist of painting. ... Categories: People stubs | 1492 births | 1556 deaths ...

The 15th century did include some humorous poetry. Antonio Cammelli, surnamed the Pistoian, is specially deserving of notice, because of his pungent bonhomie, as Sainte-Beuve called it. But it was Francesco Berni who and satire, carried this kind of literature to perfection in the 16th century. From him the style has been called bernesque poetry. In the Berneschi we find nearly the same phenomenon that we already noticed with regard to Orlando furioso. It was art for arts sake that inspired and moved Berni to write, as well as Antonio Francesco Grazzini, called Il Lasca, and other lesser writers. It may be said that there is nothing in their poetry; and it is true that they specially delight in praising low and disgusting things and in jeering at what is noble and serious. Bernesque poetry is the clearest reflection of that religious and moral scepticism which was one of the characteristics of Italian social life in the 16th century, and which showed itself more or less in all the works of that period, that scepticism which stopped the religious Reformation in Italy, and which in its turn was an effect of historical conditions. The Berneschi, and especially Berni himself, sometimes assumed a satirical tone. But theirs could not be called true satire. Pure satirists, on the other hand, were Antonio Vinciguerra, a Venetian, Lodovico Alamanni and Ariosto, the last superior to the others for the Attic elegance of his style, and for a certain frankness, passing into malice, which is particularly interesting when the poet talks of himself. Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (December 23, 1804 - October 13, 1869) was a literary critic and one of the major figures of French literary history. ... Francesco Berni (1497 - 1536), Italian poet, was born about 1497 at Lamporecchio, in Bibbiena, a district of Tuscany lying along the Upper Arno. ... Antonio Francesco Grazzini (March 22, 1503 _ February 18, 1583), was an Italian author. ... Attic Greek is the ancient dialect of the Greek language that was spoken in Attica, which includes Athens. ...

In the 16th century there were not a few didactic works. In his poem Api Giovanni Rucellai approaches to the perfection of Virgil. His style is clear and light, and he adds interest to his book by frequent allusions to the events of the time. But of the didactic works that which surpasses all the others in importance is Baldassare Castiglione's Cortigiano, in which he imagines a discussion in the palace of the dukes of Urbino between knights and ladies as to what are the gifts required in a perfect courtier. This book is valuable as an illustration of the intellectual and moral state of the highest Italian society in the first half of the 16th century. The Didactic is facts based as opposed to the Dialectic which is feelings based. ... Giovanni Rucellai (1475-1525) was an Italian humanist, poet, dramatist and man of letters. ... For other uses, see Virgil (disambiguation). ... i love orange pekoe tea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ... Urbino is a walled city in the Marche region in Italy, south-west of Pesaro, a World Heritage Site notable for a remarkable historical legacy of independent Renaissance culture, especially under the patronage of Federico da Montefeltro, duke of Urbino from 1444 to 1482. ... A courtier is a person who attends upon, and thus receives a privileged position from, a powerful person, usually a head of state. ...

Of the novelists of the 16th century, the two most important were Grazzini, and Matteo Bandello; the former as playful and bizarre as the latter is grave and solemn. Bandello was a Dominican friar and a bishop, but that notwithstanding his novels were very loose in subject, and that he often holds up the ecclesiastics of his time to ridicule. Matteo Bandello (c. ... A friar is a member of a religious mendicant order of men. ...

At a time when admiration for qualities of style, the desire for classical elegance, was so strong as in the 16th century, much attention was naturally paid to translating Latin and Greek authors. Among the very numerous translations of the time those of the Aeneid and of the Pastorals of Longus the Sophist by Annibale Caro are still famous; as are also the translations of Ovid's Metamorphoses by Giovanni Andrea dell'Anguillare, of Apuleius's The Golden Ass by Firenzuola, and of Plutarch's Lives and Moralia by Marcello Adriani. Aeneas flees burning Troy, Federico Barocci, 1598 Galleria Borghese, Rome The Aeneid (IPA English pronunciation: ; in Latin Aeneis, pronounced — the title is Greek in form: genitive case Aeneidos) is a Latin epic written by Virgil in the 1st century BC (between 29 and 19 BC) that tells the legendary story... Daphnis and Chloe by Jean-Pierre Cortot Longus (Greek: Λόγγος) was a Greek novelist and romancer, and author of Daphnis and Chloe. ... Annibale Caro (June 19, 1507-November 21, 1566) was an Italian poet. ... For other uses, see Ovid (disambiguation). ... // Cover of George Sandyss 1632 edition of Ovids Metamorphosis Englished The Metamorphoses by the Roman poet Ovid is a poem in fifteen books that describes the creation and history of the world in terms according to Greek and Roman points of view. ... Lucius Apuleius (c. ... The Metamorphoses of Lucius Apuleius, which according to St. ... Mestrius Plutarchus (Greek: Πλούταρχος; 46 - 127), better known in English as Plutarch, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist. ...

The historians of Italian literature are in doubt whether Tasso should be placed in the period of the highest development of the Renaissance, or whether he should form a period by himself, intermediate between that and the one following. Certainly he was profoundly out of harmony with the century in which he lived. His religious faith, the seriousness of his character, the deep melancholy settled in his heart, his continued aspiration after an ideal perfection, all place him as it were outside the literary epoch represented by Machiavelli, Ariosto, and Berni. As Carducci has well said, Tasso is the legitimate heir of Dante: he believes, and reasons on his faith by philosophy; he loves, and comments on his love in a learned style; he is an artist, and writes dialogues of scholastic speculation that would be considered Platonic. He was only eighteen years old when, in 1562, he tried his hand at epic poetry, and wrote Rinaldo, in which be said that he had tried to reconcile the Aristotelian rules with the variety of Ariosto. He afterwards wrote the Aminta, a pastoral drama of exquisite grace. But the work to which he had long turned his thoughts was an heroic poem, and that absorbed all his powers. He himself explains what his intention was in the three Discorsi written whilst he was composing the Gerusalemme: he would choose a great and wonderful subject, not so ancient as to have lost all interest, nor so recent as to prevent the poet from embellishing it with invented circumstances; he meant to treat it rigorously according to the rules of the unity of action observed in Greek and Latin poems, but with a far greater variety and splendour of episodes, so that in this point it should not fall short of the romantic poem; and finally, he would write it in a lofty and ornate style. This is what Tasso has done in the Gerusalemme liberata, the subject of which is the liberation of the sepulchre of Jesus Christ in the 11th century by Godfrey of Bouillon. The poet does not follow faithfully all the historical facts, but sets before us the principal causes of them, bringing in the supernatural agency of God and Satan. The Gerusalemme is the best heroic poem that Italy can show. It approaches to classical perfection. Its episodes above all are most beautiful. There is profound feeling in it, and everything reflects the melancholy soul of the poet. As regards the style, however, although Tasso studiously endeavoured to keep close to the classical models, one cannot help noticing that he makes excessive use of metaphor, of antithesis, of far-fetched conceits; and it is specially from this point of view that some historians have placed Tasso in the literary period generally known under the name of Secentismo, and that others, more moderate in their criticism, have said that he prepared the way for it. Torquato Tasso (March 11, 1544 - April 25, 1595) was an Italian poet of the 16th century, best known for his poem La Gerusalemme liberata (Jerusalem Delivered; 1575), in which he describes the imaginary combats between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade, during the siege of Jerusalem. ... Carducci is a common Italian family name; among people bearing the name are: Florentine artists and brothers: Bartolommeo Carducci (1560-1610) Vincenzo Carducci (1568-1638) poet Giosuè Carducci (1835-1907) This is a disambiguation page — a list of articles associated with the same title. ... Scholasticism comes from the Latin word scholasticus, which means that [which] belongs to the school, and is the school of philosophy taught by the academics (or schoolmen) of medieval universities circa 1100–1500. ... Jerusalem Delivered (La Gerusalemme liberata) 1580) is a baroque epic poem by Torquato Tasso which tells the (largely fictionalized) story of the First Crusade in which Christians knights, lead by Godfrey of Bouillon, battle Muslims in order to raise the siege of Jerusalem. ... For the sepulchral burial site of Jesus in Jerusalem, see Church of the Holy Sepulchre. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... Bronze statue in the Hofkirche of Innsbruck. ... This article is about metaphor in literature and rhetoric. ... Look up Antithesis in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Period of decadence

From about 1559 began a period of decadence in Italian literature. Tommaso Campanella was tortured by the Inquisition, and Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake. Cesare Balbo says that, if the happiness of the masses consists in peace without industry, if the nobility's consists in titles without power, if princes are satisfied by acquiescence in their rule without real independence, without sovereignty, if literary men and artists are content to write, paint and build with the approbation of their contemporaries, but to the contempt of posterity, if a whole nation is happy in ease without dignity and the tranquil progress of corruption,then no period ever was so happy for Italy as the 140 years from the Peace of Cateau Cambrésis to the War of the Spanish Succession. This period is known in the history of Italian literature as the Secentismo. Its writers resorted to exaggeration; they tried to produce effect with what in art is called mannerism or barocchism. Writers vied with one another in their use of metaphors, affectations, hyperbole and other oddities and draw it off from the substantial element of thought. Tommaso Campanella (September 5, 1568–May 21, 1639), baptized Giovanni Domenico Campanella, was an Italian philosopher, theologian and poet. ... This article is about the Inquisition by the Roman Catholic Church. ... Giordano Bruno Giordano Bruno (1548, Nola – February 17, 1600, Rome) was an Italian philosopher, priest, cosmologist, and occultist. ... Cesare Balbo (1789‑1853), Italian writer and statesman, was born at Turin on the 21st of November 1789. ... The Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis is an agreement reached between Elizabeth I of England and Henry II of France on April 2 and between Henry II and Philip II of Spain on April 3, 1559, at Le Cateau-Cambrésis, around twenty kilometres south-east of Cambrai, that ended... Combatants Habsburg Empire England (1701-6) Great Britain (1707-14)[1] Dutch Republic Kingdom of Portugal Crown of Aragon Duchy of Savoy [2] Kingdom of France Kingdom of Spain Electorate of Bavaria Hungarian Rebels [3] Commanders Eugene of Savoy Margrave of Baden Count Starhemberg Duke of Marlborough Marquis de Ruvigny... In Parmigianinos Madonna with the Long Neck (1534-40), Mannerism makes itself known by elongated proportions, affected poses, and unclear perspective. ... Not to be confused with Hyperbola. ...

At the head of the school of the Secentisti was Giambattista Marino of Naples, born in 1569, especially known for his long poem, Adone. He used the most extravagant metaphors, the most forced antitheses and the most far-fetched conceits. He strings antitheses together one after the other, so that they fill up whole stanzas without a break. Alessandro Achillini of Bologna followed in Marino's footsteps, but his peculiarities were even more extravagant. Almost all the poets of the 17th century were more or less infected with Marinism. Alessandro Guidi, although he does not attain to the exaggeration of his master, is bombastic and turgid, while Fulvio Testi is artificial and affected. Yet Guidi as well as Testi felt the influence of another poet, Gabriello Chiabrera, born at Savona in 1552. Enamoured of the Greeks, he made new metres, especially in imitation of Pindar, treating of religious, moral, historical, and amatory subjects. Chiabrera, though elegant in form, attempts to disguise a lack of substance with poetical ornaments of every kind. Nevertheless, Chiabrera's school marks an improvement; and sometimes he shows lyrical capacities, wasted on his literary environment. Giambattista Marini (or Marino) (October 18, 1569 - March 25, 1625) was an Italian poet, born at Naples. ... Alessandro Achillini (October 20, 1463 - August 12, 1512), Italian philosopher, was born at Bologna. ... Gabriello Chiabrera (June 18, 1552 – October 14, 1637) was an Italian poet, sometimes called the Italian Pindar. ... Savona (Sàn-na in the local dialect of Ligurian) is a seaport and comune in the northern Italian region of Liguria, capital of the Province of Savona, in the Riviera di Ponente on the Mediterranean Sea, at sea-level. ... For the PINDAR military bunker in London, please see the PINDAR section of Military citadels under London Pindar (or Pindarus, Greek: ) (probably born 522 BC in Cynoscephalae, a village in Boeotia; died 443 BC in Argos), was a Greek lyric poet. ...

Vincenzo da Filicaja, a Florentine, had a lyric talent, particularly in the songs about Vienna besieged by the Turks, which raised him above the vices of the time; but even in him we see clearly the rhetorical artifice and false conceits. In general all the lyric poetry of the 17th century had the same defects, but in different degrees. These defects may be summed up as absence of feeling and exaggeration of form. For other uses, see Vienna (disambiguation). ...

The belief arose that it would be necessary to change the form in order to restore literature. In 1690 the Academy of Arcadia was instituted. Its founders were Giovan Maria Crescimbeni and Gian Vincenzo Gravina. The Arcadia was so called because its chief aim was to imitate the simplicity of the ancient shepherds who were supposed to have lived in Arcadia in the golden age. As the Secentisti erred by an overweening desire for novelty, so the Arcadians proposed to return to the fields of truth, always singing of subjects of pastoral simplicity. This was merely the substitution of a new artifice for the old one; and they fell from bombast into effeminacy, from the hyperbolical into the petty, from the turgid into the over-refined. The Arcadia was a reaction against Secentismo, but a reaction which only succeeded in impoverishing still further and completely withering Italian literature. The poems of the Arcadians fill many volumes, and are made up of sonnets, madrigals, canzonette and blank verse. The one whe most distinguished himself among the sonneteers was Felice Zappi. Among the authors of songs, Paolo Rolli was illustrious. Innocenzo Frugoni was more famous than all the others, a man of fruitful imagination but of shallow intellect. The Academy of Arcadia or Academy of Arcadians (Italian official name: Pontificia Accademia degli Arcadi) was an Italian literary academy founded in Rome during 1690. ... Giovanni Vincenzo Gravina (January 20, 1664 – January 6, 1718) was an Italian man of letters and jurist, was born at Roggiano, a small town near Cosenza, in Calabria. ... Arcadia is a poetical name for fantasy land (having more or less the same notation as Utopia ), named after the Greek land. ... The term sonnet derives from the Provençal word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning little song. ... A madrigal is a setting for two or more voices of a secular text, often in Italian. ... In music, a canzonetta (pl. ... Blank verse is a type of poetry, distinguished by having a regular meter, but no rhyme. ...

Whilst the political and social conditions in Italy in the 17th century made it appear that every light of intelligence was extinguished, some strong and independent thinkers, such as Bernardino Telesio, Lucilio Vanini, Bruno and Campanella turned philosophical inquiry into fresh channels, and opened the way for the scientific conquests of Galileo Galilei, the great contemporary of René Descartes in France and of Francis Bacon in England. Galileo was not only a great man of science, but also occupied a conspicuous place in the history of letters. A devoted student of Ariosto, he seemed to transfuse into his prose the qualities of that great poet: clear and frank freedom of expression, precision and ease, and at the same time elegance. Galileo's prose is in perfect antithesis to the poetry of his time and is regarded by some as the best prose that Italy has ever had. Bernardino Telesio (1509 - 1588) was an Italian philosopher and natural scientist. ... Lucilio Vanini, or, as he styled himself in his works, Giulio Cesare (1585 - February 9, 1619), was an Italian free-thinker, born at Taurisano, near Lecce, in 1585. ... Galileo redirects here. ... René Descartes (French IPA:  Latin:Renatus Cartesius) (March 31, 1596 – February 11, 1650), also known as Renatus Cartesius (latinized form), was a highly influential French philosopher, mathematician, scientist, and writer. ... For other persons named Francis Bacon, see Francis Bacon (disambiguation). ...

Another symptom of revival, a sign of rebellion against the vileness of Italian social life, is given us in satire, particularly that of Salvator Rosa and Alessandro Tassoni. Rosa, born in 1615 near Naples, was a painter, a musician and a poet. As a poet he mourned the sad condition of his country, and gave vent to his feeling (as another satire-writer, Giuseppe Giusti, said) in generosi rabbuffi. He was a precursor of the patriotic literature which inaugurated the revival of the 18th century. 1867 edition of Punch, a ground-breaking British magazine of popular humour, including a good deal of satire of the contemporary social and political scene. ... self-portrait by Salvator Rosa, 1640. ... The life Alessandro Tassoni (Modena 1565 – Modena 1635) was an Italian poet and writer. ... Giuseppe Giusti (May 12, 1809 - May 31, 1850), Tuscan satirical poet, was born at Monsummano, a small village of the Valdinievole, now in the province of Pistoia. ...

Tassoni, a man really quite exceptional in this century, was superior to Rosa. He showed independent judgment in the midst of universal servility, and his Secchia Rapita proved that he was an eminent writer. This is an heroic comic poem, which is at the same time an epic and a personal satire. He was bold enough to attack the Spaniards in his Filippiche, in which he urged Duke Carlo Emanuele of Savoy to persist in the war against them.

The revival in the 18th century

In the 18th century, the new political condition of Italy began to improve, under Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, and his successors. These princes were influenced by philosophers, who in their turn felt the influence of a general movement of ideas at large in many parts of Europe, sometimes called The Enlightenment. Joseph II (full name: Joseph Benedikt August Johannes Anton Michel Adam; March 13, 1741 – February 20, 1790) was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. ... ...

Giambattista Vico showed the awakening of historical consciousness in Italy. In his Scienza nuova, he investigated the laws governing the progress of the human race, and according to which events are developed. From the psychological study of man he tried to infer the comune natura delle nazioni, i.e., the universal laws of history, by which civilizations rise, flourish and fall. From the same scientific spirit which inspired Vico came a different kind of investigation, that of the sources of Italian civil and literary history. Giambattista Vico or Giovanni Battista Vico (June 23, 1668 – January 23, 1744) was an Italian philosopher, historian, and jurist. ...

Lodovico Antonio Muratori, after having collected in his Rerum Italicarum scriptores the chronicles, biographies, letters and diaries of Italian history from 500 to 1500, and having discussed the most obscure historical questions in the Antiquitates Italicae medii aevi, wrote the Annali d'Italia, minutely narrating facts derived from authentic sources. Muratori's associates in his historical research were Scipione Maffei of Verona and Apostolo Zeno of Venice. In his Verona ilustrata Maffei left a treasure of learning which was also an excellent historical monograph. Zeno added much to the erudition of literary history, both in his Dissertazioni Vossiane and in his notes to the Biblioteca dell'eloquenza italiana of Monsignore Giusto Fontanini. Girolamo Tiraboschi and Count Giovanni Maria Mazzuchelli of Brescia devoted themselves to literary history. Lodovico Antonio Muratori (1672 - 1750) was an Italian antiquarian and historian. ... Generally a chronicle (Latin chronica, from Greek Χρόνος) is historical account of facts and events in chronological order. ... Scipione Maffei (b. ... Apostolo Zeno (born in Venice, December 11, 1668; died in Venice, November 11, 1750) was an Italian poet, librettist, journalist, and man of letters. ... Girolamo Tiraboschi (December 8, 1731 - June 3, 1794) was an Italian author. ...

While the new spirit of the times led to the investigation of historical sources, it also encouraged inquiry into the mechanism of economic and social laws. Francesco Galiani wrote on currency; Gaetano Filangieri wrote a Scienza della legislazione. Cesare Beccaria, in his Trattato dei delitti e delle pene, made a contribution to the reform of the penal system and promoted the abolition of torture. Gaetano Filangieri (August 18, 1752 - July 21, 1788), Italian publicist, was born at Naples. ... Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria (or the Marchese de Beccaria-Bonesana) (March 11, 1738 - November 28, 1794) was an Italian philosopher and politician. ... For other uses, see Torture (disambiguation). ...

The leading figure of the literary revival of the 18th century was Giuseppe Parini. Born in a Lombard village in 1729, he was educated at Milan, and as a youth was known among the Arcadian poets by the name of Darisbo Elidonio. Even as an Arcadian, Parini showed originality. In a collection of poems he published at twenty-three years of age, under the name of Ripano Eupilino, the poet shows his faculty of taking his scenes from real life, and in his satirical pieces he exhibits a spirit of outspoken opposition to his own times. These poems, though derivative, indicate a resolute determination to challenge the literary conventionalities. Improving on the poems of his youth, he showed himself an innovator in his lyrics, rejecting at once Petrarchism, Secentismo and Arcadia, the three maladies that he thought had weakened Italian art in the preceding centuries. In the Odi the satirical note is already heard, but it comes out more strongly in Del giorno, in which he imagines himself to be teaching a young Milanese patrician all the habits and ways of gallant life; he shows up all its ridiculous frivolities, and with delicate irony unmasks the futilities of aristocratic habits. Dividing the day into four parts, the Mattino, the Mezzogiorno, the Vespero, and the Notte, he describes the trifles of which they were made up, and the book thus assumes major social and historical value. As an artist, going straight back to classical forms, aspiring to imitate Virgil and Dante, he opened the way to the school of Vittorio Alfieri, Ugo Foscolo and Vincenzo Monti. As a work of art, the Giorno is wonderful for its delicate irony. The verse has new harmonies; sometimes it is a little hard and broken, as a protest against the Arcadian monotony. Giuseppe Parini (Bosisio, now in Lecco province, May 23, 1729 - Milan, 1799) was an Italian satirist and poet. ... For the village of the same name in Ontario, Canada, see Lombardy, Ontario. ... Vittorio Alfieri painted by Davids pupil François-Xavier Fabre, in Florence 1793. ... Ugo Foscolo (1778-1827), Italian writer, was born at Zakynthos in the Ionian Isles on 6 Febraury 1778. ... Vincenzo Monti (1754 - 1828) was an Italian poet. ...

Gasparo Gozzi's satire was less elevated, but directed towards the same end as Parini's. In his Osservatore, something like Joseph Addison's Spectator, in his Gazzetta veneta, and in the Mondo morale, by means of allegories and novelties he hit the vices with a delicate touch, introducing a practical moral. Gozzi's satire has some slight resemblance in style to Lucian's. Gozzi's prose is graceful and lively, but imitates the writers of the 14th century. Another satirical writer of the first half of the 18th century was Giuseppe Baretti of Turin. In a journal called the Frusta letteraria he mercilessly criticized the works then being published in Italy. He had learnt much by travelling; his long stay in Britain had contributed to the independent character of his mind. The Frusta was the first book of independent criticism directed particularly against the Arcadians and the pedants. Gasparo, count Gozzi (December 4, 1713 - December 26, 1786), was an Italian critic and dramatist. ... Joseph Addison, the Kit-cat portrait, circa 1703–1712, by Godfrey Kneller. ... For other uses, see Lucian (disambiguation). ... Giuseppe MarcAntonio Baretti (April 24, 1719 - May 5, 1789) was an Italian critic. ...

The reforming movement sought to throw off the conventional and the artificial, and to return to truth. Apostolo Zeno and Metastasio (the Arcadian name for Pietro Trapassi, a native of Rome) had endeavoured to make melodrama and reason compatible. Metastasio gave fresh expression to the affections, a natural turn to the dialogue and some interest to the plot; if he had not fallen into constant unnatural overrefinement and mawkishness, and into frequent anachronisms, he might have been considered the first dramatic reformer of the 18th century. Carlo Goldoni, a Venetian, overcame resistance from the old popular form of comedy, with the masks of pantalone, of the doctor, harlequin, Brighella, etc., and created the comedy of character, following Molière's example. Goldoni's characters are often superficial, but he wrote lively dialogue. He produced over 150 comedies, and had no time to polish and perfect his works; but for a comedy of character we must go straight from Machiavelli's Mandragora to him. Goldoni's dramatic aptitude is illustrated by the fact that he took nearly all his types from Venetian society, yet managed to give them an inexhaustible variety. Many of his comedies were written in Venetian dialect. Apostolo Zeno (born in Venice, December 11, 1668; died in Venice, November 11, 1750) was an Italian poet, librettist, journalist, and man of letters. ... Pietro Trapassi (January 13, 1698 - April 12, 1782), Italian poet, is better known by his pseudonym of Metastasio. ... Poster for The Perils of Pauline (1914). ... Look up Anachronism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Carlo Goldoni Carlo Osvaldo Goldoni (25 February 1707 - 6 February 1793) was a celebrated Italian playwright, whom critics today rank among the European theatres greatest authors. ... Pantalone, year 1550, by Maurice Sand Pantalone (French: Pantaloon) is a stock character that is classified as one of the vecchi (old men) in Commedia dellarte. ... “Arlecchino” redirects here. ... Brighella, from the 16th century. ... For the 2007 film, see Molière (film). ... Detail of the portrait of Machiavelli, ca 1500, in the robes of a Florentine public official Niccolò Machiavelli (May 3, 1469—June 21, 1527) was an Italian political philosopher during the Renaissance. ... A sign in Venetian reading Here we also speak Venetian Venetian or Venetan is a Romance language spoken by over five million people,[1] mostly in the Veneto region of Italy. ...

The ideas behind the French Revolution of 1789 gave a special direction to Italian literature in the second half of the 18th century. Love of liberty and desire for equality created a literature which aimed at national objects, seeking to improve the condition of the country by freeing it from the double yoke of political and religious despotism. The Italians who aspired to political redemption believed it inseparable from an intellectual revival, and thought that this could only be effected by a reunion with ancient classicism. This was a repetition of what had occurred in the first half of the 15th century. The French Revolution (1789–1815) was a period of political and social upheaval in the political history of France and Europe as a whole, during which the French governmental structure, previously an absolute monarchy with feudal privileges for the aristocracy and Catholic clergy, underwent radical change to forms based on...

Patriotism and classicism were the two principles that inspired the literature which began with Vittorio Alfieri. He worshipped the Greek and Roman idea of popular liberty in arms against tyranny. He took the subjects of his tragedies from the history of these nations and made his ancient characters talk like revolutionists of his time. The Arcadian school, with its verbosity and triviality, was rejected. His aim was to be brief, concise, strong and bitter, to aim at the sublime as opposed to the lowly and pastoral. He saved literature from Arcadian vacuities, leading it towards a national end, and armed himself with patriotism and classicism. Vittorio Alfieri painted by Davids pupil François-Xavier Fabre, in Florence 1793. ...

Ugo Foscolo was an eager patriot, inspired by classical models. The Lettere di Jacopo Ortis, inspired by Goethe's Werther, are a love story with a mixture of patriotism; they contain a violent protest against the Treaty of Campo Formio, and an outburst from Foscolo's own heart about an unhappy love-affair of his. His passions were sudden and violent. To one of these passions Ortis owed its origin, and it is perhaps the best and most sincere of all his writings. He is still sometimes pompous and rhetorical, but less so than, for example, in the lectures Dell'origine e dell'ufficio della letteratura. On the whole, Foscolo's prose is turgid and affected, and reflects the character of a man who always tried to pose in dramatic attitudes. This was indeed the defect of the Napoleonic epoch; there was a horror of anything common, simple, natural; everything must assume some heroic shape. In Foscolo this tendency was excessive. The Sepolcri, which is his best poem, was prompted by high feeling, and the mastery of versification shows wonderful art. There are most obscure passages in it, as to the meaning of which it would seem as if even the author himself had not formed a clear idea. He left incomplete three hymns to the Graces, in which he sang of beauty as the source of courtesy, of all high qualities and of happiness. Among his prose works a high place belongs to his translation of the Sentimental Journey of Laurence Sterne, a writer by whom Foscolo was deeply affected. He went as an exile to England, and died there. He wrote for English readers some Essays on Petrarch and on the texts of the Decamerone and of Dante, which are remarkable for the time at which they were written, and which may be said to have initiated a new kind of literary criticism in Italy. Foscolo is still greatly admired, and not without reason. The men who made the revolution of 1848 were brought up on his work. Ugo Foscolo (1778-1827), Italian writer, was born at Zakynthos in the Ionian Isles on 6 Febraury 1778. ... Goethe redirects here. ... Werther is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, based on the novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Goethe. ... The Treaty of Campo Formio was signed on October 17, 1797 (26 Vendémiaire, Year VI of the French Republic) by Napoleon Bonaparte and Count Ludwig von Cobenzl as representatives of France and Austria. ... For other uses, see Napoleon (disambiguation). ... The Three Graces, from Sandro Botticellis painting Primavera Uffizi Gallery In Greek mythology, the Charites were the graces. ... A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy is a novel by the Irish-born English author Laurence Sterne, written and first published in 1768, as Sterne was facing death. ... Laurence Sterne Laurence Sterne (November 24, 1713 – March 18, 1768) was an Irish-born English novelist and an Anglican clergyman. ... —Alexis de Tocqueville, Recollections The European Revolutions of 1848, in some countries known as the Spring of Nations, were the bloody consequences of a variety of changes that had been taking place in Europe in the first half of the 19th century. ...

Vincenzo Monti was a patriot too, but in his own way. He had no one deep feeling that ruled him, or rather the mobility of his feelings is his characteristic; but each of these was a new form of patriotism that took the place of an old one. He saw danger to his country in the French Revolution, and wrote the Pellegrino apostolico, the Bassvilliana and the Feroniade; Napoleon's victories caused him to write the Pronreteo and the Musagonia; in his Fanatismo and his Superstizione he attacked the papacy; afterwards he sang the praises of the Austrians. Thus every great event made him change his mind, with a readiness which might seem incredible, but is yet most easily explained. Monti was above everything an artist; everything else in him was liable to change. Knowing little Greek, he succeeded in making a translation of the Iliad which is remarkable for its Homeric feeling, and in his Bassvilliana he is on a level with Dante. In him classical poetry seemed to revive in all its florid grandeur. Vincenzo Monti (1754 - 1828) was an Italian poet. ... The Pope is the Catholic Bishop and patriarch of Rome, and head of the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Catholic Churches. ...

Monti was born in 1754, Foscolo in 1778; four years later still was born another poet of the same school, Giambattista Niccolini. In literature he was a classicist; in politics he was a Ghibelline, a rare exception in Guelph Florence, his birthplace. In imitating Aeschylus, as well as in writing the Discorsi sulla tragedia greca, and on the Sublime Michelangelo, Niccolini displayed his passionate devotion to ancient literature. In his tragedies he set himself free from the excessive rigidity of Alfieri, and partly approached the English and German tragic authors. He nearly always chose political subjects, striving to keep alive in his compatriots the love of liberty. Such are Nabucco, Antonio Foscarini, Giovanni da Procida, Lodovico il Moro and others. He assailed papal Rome in Arnaldo da Brescia, a long tragic piece, not suited for acting, and epic rather than dramatic. Niccolini's tragedies show a rich lyric vein rather than dramatic genius. He has the merit of having vindicated liberal ideas, and of having opened a new path to Italian tragedy. The Guelphs and Ghibellines were factions supporting, respectively, the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire in Italy during the 12th century and 13th century. ... The Guelphs and Ghibellines were factions supporting, respectively, the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire in central and northern Italy during the 12th and 13th centuries. ... This article is about the ancient Greek playwright. ... Nabucco is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on the biblical story and the play by Anicet-Bourgeois and Francis Cornu. ... Ludovico Sforza (Ludovico il Moro, The Moor) (July 27, 1452–May 27, 1508), a member of the Sforza dynasty of Milan, Italy, was the second son of Francesco Sforza, and was famed as patron of Leonardo da Vinci and other artists. ... Arnold of Brescia, (c. ...

Carlo Botta, born in 1766, was a spectator of French spoliation in Italy and of the overbearing rule of Napoleon. He wrote a History of Italy from 1789 to 1814; and later continued Guicciardini's History up to 1789. He wrote after the manner of the Latin authors, trying to imitate Livy, putting together long and sonorous periods in a style that aimed at being like Boccaccio's, caring little about that which constitutes the critical material of history, only intent on declaiming his academic prose for his country's benefit. Botta wanted to be classical in a style that could no longer be so, and hence he failed completely to attain his literary goal. His fame is only that of a man of a noble and patriotic heart. Not so bad as the two histories of Italy is that of the Guerra dell'indipendenza americana. Carlo Giuseppe Guglielmo Botta (1766 - August 1837) was an Italian historian. ...

Close to Botta comes Pietro Colletta, a Neapolitan born nine years after him. He also in his Storia del reame di Napoli dal 1734 al 1825 had the idea of defending the independence and liberty of Italy in a style borrowed from Tacitus; and he succeeded rather better than Botta. He has a rapid, brief, nervous style, which makes his book attractive reading. But it is said that Pietro Giordani and Gino Capponi corrected it for him. Lazzaro Papi of Lucca, author of the Commentari della rivoluzione francese dal 1789 al 1814, was not altogether unlike Botta and Colletta. He also was an historian in the classical style, and treats his subject with patriotic feeling; but as an artist he perhaps excels the other two. Pietro Colletta (1775 - 1831), Neapolitan general and historian, entered the Neapolitan artillery in 1796 and took part in the campaign against the French in 1798. ... For other uses, see Tacitus (disambiguation). ... Pietro Giordani Pietro Giordani (Piacenza, January 1 1774 – Parma, September 2, 1848) was a very important Italian writer, classical literary scholar, and an extremely close friend of, and influence on, Giacomo Leopardi. ... Marquis Gino Capponi (September 13, 1792 - February 3, 1876) was an Italian statesman and historian. ...

Whilst the most burning political passions were raging, and whilst the most brilliant men of genius in the new classical and patriotic school were purists at the height of their influence, a question arose about purism of language. In the second half of the 18th century the Italian language was specially full of French expressions. There was great indifference about fitness, still more about elegance of style. Prose needed to be restored for the sake of national dignity, and it was believed that this could not be done except by going back to the writers of the 14th century, to the aurei trecentisti, as they were called, or else to the classics of Italian literature. One of the promoters of the new school was Antonio Cesari of Verona, who republished ancient authors, and brought out a new edition, with additions, of the Vocabolario della Crusca. He wrote a dissertation Sopra lo stato presente della lingua italiana, and endeavoured to establish the supremacy of Tuscan and of the three great writers, Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio. In accordance with that principle he wrote several books, taking pains to copy the trecentisti as closely as possible. But patriotism in Italy has always had something municipal in it; so to this Tuscan supremacy, proclaimed and upheld by Cesari, there was opposed a Lombard school, which would know nothing of Tuscan, and with Dante's De vulgari eloquentia returned to the idea of the lingua illustre. This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ... De vulgari eloquentia (On Vernacular Speech) is the title of an important essay by Dante Alighieri, written in Latin and initially meant to consist in four books, but aborted after the second. ...

This was an old question, largely and bitterly argued in the Cinquecento (16th century) by Varchi, Muzio, Lodovico Castelvetro, Speroni, and others. Now the question was raised afresh. At the head of the Lombard school were Monti and his son-in-law Count Giulio Perticari. This caused Monti to write Pro pasta di alcune correzioni ed aggiunte al vocabolario della Crusca, in which he attacked the Tuscanism of the Crusca, but in a graceful and easy style, so as to form a prose that is one of the most beautiful in Italian literature. Perticari, whose intellect was inferior, narrowed and exasperated the question in two treatises, Degli scrittori del Trecento and Dell'amor patrio di Dante. The dispute about language took its place beside literary and political disputes, and all Italy took part in it: Basilio Puoti at Naples, Paolo Costa in the Romagna, Marc Antonio Parenti at Modena, Salvatore Betti at Rome, Giovanni Gherardini in Lombardy, Luigi Fornaciari at Lucca, and Vincenzo Nannucci at Florence. Lodovico Castelvetro (c. ... Speroni is a surname, and may refer to Francesco Speroni, Italian politician Julián Speroni, Argentinian footballer Sperone Speroni, Italian humanist playwright This human name article is a disambiguation page — a list of pages that might otherwise share the same title, which is a persons or persons name. ... Paolo Costa (born July 23, 1943 in Venice) is an Italian Member of the European Parliament. ... Emilia-Romagna is an administrative region of Northern Italy comprising the two historic regions of Emilia and Romagna. ... Modena (Mòdna in Modenese dialect) is a city and a province on the south side of the Po valley, in Emilia-Romagna, Italy. ...

A patriot, a classicist and a purist all at once was Pietro Giordani, born in 1774; he was almost a compendium of the literary movement of the time. His whole life was a battle for liberty. Learned in Greek and Latin authors, and in the Italian trecentisti, he left only a few writings, but they were carefully elaborated in point of style, and his prose was greatly admired in its time. Giordani closes the literary epoch of the classicists. Pietro Giordani Pietro Giordani (Piacenza, January 1 1774 – Parma, September 2, 1848) was a very important Italian writer, classical literary scholar, and an extremely close friend of, and influence on, Giacomo Leopardi. ...

Nineteenth century and after

Alessandro Manzoni

The romantic school had as its organ the Conciliatore established in 1818 at Milan, on the staff of which were Silvio Pellico, Lodovico di Breme, Giovile Scalvini, Tommaso Grossi, Giovanni Berchet, Samuele Biava, and Alessandro Manzoni. All were influenced by the ideas that, especially in Germany, constituted the movement called Romanticism. In Italy the course of literary reform took another direction. The main instigator of the reform was Manzoni. He formulated the objects of the new school, saying that it aspired to try to discover and express il vero storico and il vero morale, not only as an end, but as the widest and eternal source of the beautiful. It is realism in art that characterizes Italian literature from Manzoni onwards. The Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed) is the work that has made him immortal. No doubt the idea of the historical novel came to him from Sir Walter Scott, but Manzoni succeeded in something more than an historical novel in the narrow meaning of that word; he created an eminently realistic work of art. The reader's attention is entirely fixed on the powerful objective creation of the characters. From the greatest to the least they have a wonderful verisimilitude. Manzoni is able to unfold a character in all particulars and to follow it through its different phases. Don Abbondio and Renzo are as perfect as Azzeccagarbugli and Il Sarto. Manzoni dives down into the innermost recesses of the human heart, and draws from it the most subtle psychological reality. In this his greatness lies, which was recognized first by his companion in genius, Goethe. As a poet too he had gleams of genius, especially in the Napoleonic ode, Il Cinque Maggio, and where he describes human affections, as in some stanzas of the Inni and in the chorus of the Adelchi. Italian poet and novelist Alessandro Manzoni. ... Italian poet and novelist Alessandro Manzoni. ... Silvio Pellico (born June 24, 1788 in Saluzzo (Piedmont); died January 31, 1854) was an Italian dramatist. ... Tommaso Grossi (January 20, 1791 - December 10, 1853), Lombard poet and novelist, was born at Bellano, on the Lake of Como. ... Alessandro Manzoni (Francesco Hayez, 1841, Brera Art Gallery). ... Romantics redirects here. ... I Promessi Sposi (in English, The Betrothed) is an Italian historical novel by Alessandro Manzoni. ... A historical novel a novel in which the story is set among historical events, or more generally, in which the time of the action predates the lifetime of the author. ... Raeburns portrait of Sir Walter Scott in 1822. ...

Giacomo Leopardi

The great poet of the age was Giacomo Leopardi, born thirteen years after Manzoni at Recanati, of a patrician family. He became so familiar with Greek authors that he used afterwards to say that the Greek mode of thought was more clear and living to his mind than the Latin or even the Italian. Solitude, sickness, and domestic tyranny prepared him for profound melancholy. He passed into complete religious scepticism, from which he sought rest in art. Everything is terrible and grand in his poems, which are the most agonizing cry in modern literature, uttered with a solemn quietness that at once elevates and terrifies us. He was also an admirable prose writer. In his Operette morali--dialogues and discourses marked by a cold and bitter smile at human destinies which freezes the reader--the clearness of style, the simplicity of language and the depth of conception are such that perhaps he is not only the greatest lyrical poet since Dante, but also one of the most perfect writers of prose that Italian literature has had. Giacomo Leopardi from http://www. ... Giacomo Leopardi from http://www. ... Giacomo Leopardi, Count (June 29, 1798 – June 14, 1837) is generally considered, along with such figures as Dante, Petrarca, Ariosto and Tasso, to be among Italys greatest poets and one of its greatest thinkers. ... Recanati is a town of about 20,650 inhabitants in the Marche region of Italy. ...

As realism in art gained ground, the positive method in criticism kept pace with it. History returned to its spirit of learned research, as is shown in such works as the Archivio storico italiano, established at Florence by Giampietro Vieusseux, the Storia d'Italia nel medio evo by Carlo Troya, a remarkable treatise by Manzoni himself, Sopra alcuni punti della storia longobardica in Italia, and the very fine history of the Vespri siciliani by Michele Amari. Alongside the great artists Leopardi and Manzoni, alongside the learned scholars, there was also in the first half of the 19th century a patriotic literature. Vieusseux had a distinct political object when in 1820 he established the monthly review Antologia. His Archivio storico italiano (1842) was, under a different form, a continuation of the Antologia, which was suppressed in 1833 owing to the action of the Russian government. Florence was in those days the asylum of all the Italian exiles, and these exiles met and shook hands in Vieusseux's rooms, where there was more literary than political talk, but where one thought and one only animated all minds, the thought of Italy. Sicilian Vespers (1846), by Francesco Hayez The Sicilian Vespers is the name given to a rebellion in Sicily in 1282 against the rule of the Angevin king Charles I, who had taken control of the island with Papal support in 1266. ... Michele Amari (1806-1889) was an Italian patriot, born at Palermo, devoted a great part of his life to the history of Sicily, and took part in its emancipation; was an Orientalist as well; he is famous for throwing light on the true character of the Sicilian Vespers. ...

The literary movement which preceded and was contemporary with the political revolution of 1848 may be said to be represented by four writers - Giuseppe Giusti, Francesco Domenico Guerrazzi, Vincenzo Gioberti and Cesare Balbo. Giusti wrote epigrammatic satires in popular language. In incisive phrases he scourged the enemies of Italy. He was a telling political writer, but a mediocre poet. Guerrazzi had a great reputation and great influence, but his historical novels, though avidly read before 1848, were soon forgotten. Gioberti, a powerful polemical writer, had a noble heart and a great mind; his philosophical works are now as good as dead, but the Primato morale e civile degli Italiani will last as an important document of the times, and the Gesuita moderno is the most tremendous indictment of the Jesuits ever written. Balbo was an earnest student of history, and made history useful for politics. Like Gioberti in his first period, Balbo was zealous for the civil papacy, and for a federation of the Italian states presided over by it. His Sommario della storia d'Italia is an excellent epitome. Giuseppe Giusti (May 12, 1809 - May 31, 1850), Tuscan satirical poet, was born at Monsummano, a small village of the Valdinievole, now in the province of Pistoia. ... Francesco Domenico Guerrazzi (1804 - September 25, 1873), was an Italian writer and politician. ... Vincenzo Gioberti (April 5, 1801 - October 26, 1852) was an Italian philosopher, publicist and politician Gioberti was born in Turin. ... Cesare Balbo (1789‑1853), Italian writer and statesman, was born at Turin on the 21st of November 1789. ... An epigram is a short poem with a clever twist at the end or a concise and witty statement. ... Look up Polemic in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The Society of Jesus (Latin: Societas Iesu), commonly known as the Jesuits, is a Roman Catholic religious order. ...

Political literature becomes less important

Gabriele D'Annunzio

After 1850 political literature becomes less important, one of the last poets distinguished in this genre being Francesco dall'Ongaro, with his stornelli politici. Giovanni Prati and Aleardo Aleardi continue romantic traditions. The dominant figure of this later period, however, is Giosuè Carducci, the opponent of the Romantics and restorer of the ancient metres and spirit who, great as a poet, was scarcely less distinguished as a literary critic and historian. Other classical poets are Giuseppe Chiarini, Domenico Guoli, Arturo Graf, Guido Mazzoni and Giovanni Marradi, of whom the two last named may perhaps be regarded as special disciples of Carducci, while another, Giovanni Pascoli, best known by his Myricae and Poemetti, only began as such. Enrico Panzacchi was at heart still a romantic. Olindo Guerrini (who wrote under the pseudonym of Lorenzo Stecchetti) is the chief representative of verismo in poetry, and, though his early works obtained a succès de scandale, he is the author of many lyrics of intrinsic value. Alfredo Baccelli and Mario Rapisardi are epic poets of distinction. Felice Cavallotti is the author of the stirring Marcia de Leonida. Francesco DallOngaro (1808 - January 10, 1873), Italian writer, born in Friuli, was educated for the priesthood, but abandoned his orders, and taking to political journalism founded the Favilla at Trieste in the Liberal interest. ... Giovanni Prati (1815-1884) was an Italian poet born at Dasindo and educated in law at Padua. ... Aleardo Aleardi (November 14, 1812-July 17, 1878) was an Italian poet who belonged to the so-called Neo-romanticists. ... Giosuè Carducci. ... Arturo Graf (1848 - 1913), Italian poet, of German ancestry, was born at Athens. ... Guido Mazzoni may be either of two notables: Guido Mazzoni (1450-1518), sculptor Guido Mazzoni (1859-1943), poet and professor This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Giovanni Marradi (1852-1922) was an Italian poet born at Leghorn and educated at Pisa and Florence. ... Giovanni Pascoli (December 31, 1855—April 6, 1912) was an Italian poet and classical scholar. ... Olindo Guerrini (14 October 1845 - 1916) was an Italian poet who also published under the pseudonyms Lorenzo Stechetti and Argia Sbolenfi. ... Please wikify (format) this article or section as suggested in the Guide to layout and the Manual of Style. ...

Among dialect writers, the great Roman poet Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli found numerous successors, such as Renato Fucini (Pisa), Berto Barbarani (Verona) and Cesare Pascarella (Rome). Among the women poets, Ada Negri, with her socialistic Fatalità and Tempeste, achieved a great reputation; and others, such as Vittoria Aganoor, A. Brunacci-Brunamonti, and Annie Vivanti, were highly esteemed in Italy. Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli (March 7, 1791 - December 21, 1863) was an Italian poet, born in Rome. ... Cesare Pascarella (28 April 1858 - 8 May 1940), was an Italian dialect poet and a painter, appointed to the Accademia d’Italia in 1930. ... Ada Negri (February 3, 1870, Lodi, Italy - January 11, 1945, Milano) was an Italian poet. ... Vittoria Aganoor (Padova,1855-Perugia, 1910) was an Italian poet with Armenian ancestry. ...

Among the dramatists, Pietro Cossa in tragedy, Gherardi del Testa, Ferdinando Martini, and Paolo Ferrari in comedy, represent the older schools. More modern methods were adopted by Giuseppe Giacosa and Gerolamo Rovetta. Pietro Cossa (1830 - 1880), Italian dramatist, was born at Rome, and claimed descent from the family of Pope John XXIII, deposed by the council of Constance. ... Paolo Ferrari Paolo Ferrari (1822-1889), Italian dramatist, was born at Modena. ... Giuseppe Giacosa Giuseppe Giacosa (21 October 1847 – 1 September 1906) was an Italian poet, playwright and librettist. ...

In fiction, the historical romance fell into disfavour, though Emilio de Marchi produced some good examples. The novel of intrigue was cultivated by Anton Giulio Barrili and Salvatore Farina, the psychological novel by Enrico Annibale Butti, the realistic local tale by Giovanni Verga, and the mystic philosophical novel by Antonio Fogazzaro. Edmondo de Amicis is better known for his moral works and travels than for his fiction. Of the women novelists, Matilde Serao and Grazia Deledda became popular. Antonio (or Anton) Giulio Barrili (1836—Italian novelist, was born at Savona, and was educated for the legal profession, which he abandoned for journalism in Genoa. ... Salvatore Farina (10 January 1846 - 15 December 1918) was an Italian novelist whose style of sentimental humor has been compared to that of Charles Dickens. ... Giovanni Verga. ... Antonio Fogazzaro (March 25, 1842 - March 7, 1911) was an Italian novelist born in Vicenza from a rich family. ... Edmondo De Amicis (Oneglia (Imperia), October 21, 1846 - Bordighera, 1908), is a notable Italian childrens writer. ... Matilde Serao (1856—1927) was a Greek-born Italian journalist and novelist. ... Grazia Deledda (September 27, 1871 – August 15, 1936), born in Nuoro, Sardinia, was an Italian writer whose works won her a Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926. ...

Gabriele d'Annunzio produced original work in poetry, drama and fiction, of extraordinary quality. He began with some lyrics which were distinguished no less by their exquisite beauty of form than by their licence, and these characteristics reappeared in a long series of poems, plays and novels. Gabriele dAnnunzio (12 March 1863, Pescara – 1 March 1938, Gardone Riviera, province of Brescia) was an Italian poet, writer, novelist, dramatist and daredevil, who went on to have a controversial role in politics as a precursor of the fascist movement. ...

Also, the canon of Italian literature was introduced to postmodernism in the 20th century by Italo Calvino. Postmodernism (sometimes abbreviated Po-mo[1]) is a term originating in architecture, literally after the modern, denoting a style that is more ornamental than modernism, and which borrows from previous architectural styles, often in a playful or ironic fashion. ... Italo Calvino, on the cover of Lezioni americane: Sei proposte per il prossimo millennio Italo Calvino (October 15, 1923 – September 19, 1985) (pronounced ) was an Italian writer and novelist. ...

Bibliography

Further reading

Important German works, besides Gaspary, are those of Wilse and Percopo (illustrated; Leipzig, 1899), and of Tommaso Casini (in Grober's Grundr. der rom. Phil., Strasbourg, 1896-1899).

English students are referred to John Addington Symonds's Renaissance in Italy (especially, but not exclusively, vols. iv. and v.; new ed., London, 1902), and to Richard Garnett's History of Italian Literature (London, 1898). John Addington Symonds was the name of a father and son, both English writers. ... Richard Garnett (February 27, 1835 – April 13, 1906) was a scholar, librarian, biographer and poet. ...

Original texts and criticism

• AA.VV., Antologia della poesia italiana, ed. C. Segre and C. Ossola. Torino, Einaudi, 1997
• Giudice, A., Bruni, G., Problemi e scrittori della letteratura italiana. Torino, 1973
• Bruni F., Testi e documenti. Torino, UTET, 1984
• Bruni, F. L'Italiano nelle regioni. Torino, UTET, 1997

See also

• Sicilian School
• Dolce Stil Novo
• List of Italian writers
• List of Italian language poets
• Storia della letteratura italiana (De Sanctis)

In a literary context, the term Sicilian School identifies a small community of Sicilian, and to a lesser extent, mainland Italian poets gathered around Frederick II, most of them belonging to his court, the Magna Curia. ... Dolce Stil Novo (Italian for The Sweet New Style) is the name given to the most important literary movement of 13th century Italy. ... // [edit] Italian writers [edit] A Ludovico Ariosto [edit] B Alessandro Baricco Giorgio Bassani Stefano Benni Mario Benzing Giovanni Boccaccio Vitaliano Brancati Gesualdo Bufalino Aldo Busi Dino Buzzati [edit] C Italo Calvino Andrea Camilleri Greg Camilleri Mauro Campagnoli Dino Campana Achille Campanile Luigi Capuana Carlo Collodi [edit] D Gabriele DAnnunzio... Poets who wrote in Italian (or Italian dialects): Antonio Abati Luigi Alamanni Aleardo Aleardi Cecco Angiolieri Francis of Assisi Dante Alighieri Guittone dArezzo Matteo Boiardo (Epic poet, 1441-94) Ludovico Ariosto Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli (Roman dialect) Giovanni Boccaccio Ignazio Buttitta (Sicilian dialect) Giosuè Carducci Guido Cavalcanti Dario Chioli Gabriele... The Storia della letteratura italiana (History of Italian literature) is an essay written by Italian literary critic Francesco De Sanctis, published in two volumes in 1870 and 1871. ...

Article sources

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain. Encyclopædia Britannica, the eleventh edition The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1910–1911) is perhaps the most famous edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ...

External links

• Liber Liber(progetto Manuzio) Italian literature texts.
• www.StoriaDellaLetteratura.it - Storia della letteratura italiana (history of italian literature, full text, by Antonio Piromalli)