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132-541: Il Canzoniere ( Italian pronunciation: [il kantsoˈnjɛːre] ; English: Song Book ), also known as the Rime Sparse (English: Scattered Rhymes ), but originally titled Rerum vulgarium fragmenta (English: Fragments of common things , that is Fragments composed in vernacular ), is a collection of poems by the Italian humanist, poet, and writer Petrarch . Though the majority of Petrarch 's output

264-536: A cardinal and priest of Saint Vitalis . His "Letter to Posterity" (the last letter in Seniles ) gives an autobiography and a synopsis of his philosophy in life. It was originally written in Latin and was completed in 1371 or 1372—the first such autobiography in a thousand years (since Saint Augustine ). While Petrarch's poetry was set to music frequently after his death, especially by Italian madrigal composers of

396-510: A clear disagreement with Dante, in 1346 Petrarch argued in De vita solitaria that Pope Celestine V 's refusal of the papacy in 1294 was a virtuous example of solitary life. Later the politician and thinker Leonardo Bruni (1370–1444) argued for the active life, or " civic humanism ". As a result, a number of political, military, and religious leaders during the Renaissance were inculcated with

528-571: A collection of Cicero 's letters not previously known to have existed, the collection Epistulae ad Atticum , in the Chapter Library ( Biblioteca Capitolare ) of Verona Cathedral . Disdaining what he believed to be the ignorance of the era in which he lived, Petrarch is credited with creating the concept of a historical " Dark Ages ", which most modern scholars now find inaccurate and misleading. Petrarch recounts that on 26 April 1336, with his brother and two servants, he climbed to

660-649: A fair degree of prosperity. Cangrande was admitted to Dante's Paradise ( Paradiso , XVII, 76). During the period of his exile, Dante corresponded with Dominican theologian Fr. Nicholas Brunacci (1240–1322), who had been a student of Thomas Aquinas at the Santa Sabina studium in Rome, later at Paris, and of Albert the Great at the Cologne studium . Brunacci became lector at the Santa Sabina studium , forerunner of

792-970: A famous essay ("Preliminari sulla lingua del Petrarca". Petrarca, Canzoniere. Turin, Einaudi, 1964), has described Petrarch's language in terms of "unilinguismo" (contrasted with Dantean "plurilinguismo"). Aura che quelle chiome bionde et crespe cercondi et movi, et se’ mossa da loro, soavemente, et spargi quel dolce oro, et poi ’l raccogli, e ’n bei nodi il rincrespe, tu stai nelli occhi ond’amorose vespe mi pungon sí, che ’nfin qua il sento et ploro, et vacillando cerco il mio tesoro, come animal che spesso adombre e ’ncespe: ch’or me ’l par ritrovar, et or m’accorgo ch’i’ ne son lunge, or mi sollievo or caggio, ch’or quel ch’i’ bramo, or quel ch’è vero scorgo. Aër felice, col bel vivo raggio rimanti; et tu corrente et chiaro gorgo, ché non poss’io cangiar teco vïaggio? Breeze, blowing that blonde curling hair, stirring it, and being softly stirred in turn, scattering that sweet gold about, then gathering it, in

924-851: A few written to long-dead figures from history such as Cicero and Virgil . Cicero, Virgil, and Seneca were his literary models. Most of his Latin writings are difficult to find today, but several of his works are available in English translations. Several of his Latin works are scheduled to appear in the Harvard University Press series I Tatti . It is difficult to assign any precise dates to his writings because he tended to revise them throughout his life. Petrarch collected his letters into two major sets of books called Rerum familiarum liber (" Letters on Familiar Matters ") and Seniles (" Letters of Old Age "), both of which are available in English translation. The plan for his letters

1056-471: A figure inspired by Augustine of Hippo ; De Viris Illustribus ("On Famous Men"), a series of moral biographies; Rerum Memorandarum Libri , an incomplete treatise on the cardinal virtues ; De Otio Religiosorum ("On Religious Leisure") and De vita solitaria ("On the Solitary Life"), which praise the contemplative life; De Remediis Utriusque Fortunae ("Remedies for Fortune Fair and Foul"),

1188-478: A fire, which he later lamented. Additionally, he proclaimed that through legal manipulation his guardians robbed him of his small property inheritance in Florence, which only reinforced his dislike for the legal system. He protested, "I couldn't face making a merchandise of my mind", since he viewed the legal system as the art of selling justice. Petrarch was a prolific letter writer and counted Boccaccio among

1320-469: A happy or amusing ending but one influenced by a Providential will that orders all things to an ultimate good. By this meaning of the word, as Dante himself allegedly wrote in a letter to Cangrande , the progression of the pilgrimage from Hell to Paradise is the paradigmatic expression of comedy, since the work begins with the pilgrim's moral confusion and ends with the vision of God. A number of other works are credited to Dante. Convivio ("The Banquet")

1452-422: A lifelong friend and schoolmate, Guido Sette , future archbishop of Genoa. Because his father was in the legal profession (a notary ), he insisted that Petrarch and his brother also study law. Petrarch, however, was primarily interested in writing and studying Latin literature and considered these seven years wasted. Petrarch became so distracted by his non-legal interests that his father once threw his books into

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1584-454: A limine mures, Ne domini exitio scripta diserta forent; Incutio trepidis eadem defuncta pavorem, Et viget exanimi in corpore prisca fides. The Tuscan bard of deathless fame       Nursed in his breast a double flame,         Unequally divided;       And when I say I had his heart,       While Laura play'd

1716-485: A lovely knot of curls again, you linger around bright eyes whose loving sting pierces me so, till I feel it and weep, and I wander searching for my treasure, like a creature that often shies and kicks: now I seem to find her, now I realise she’s far away, now I’m comforted, now despair, now longing for her, now truly seeing her. Happy air, remain here with your living rays: and you, clear running stream, why can’t I exchange my path for yours? Petrarch

1848-487: A miniature for solo piccolo flute titled Dolce tormento , in which the flutist whispers fragments of Petrarch's Sonnet 132 into the instrument. In November 2003, it was announced that pathological anatomists would be exhuming Petrarch's body from his casket in Arquà Petrarca , to verify 19th-century reports that he had stood 1.83 meters (about six feet), which would have been tall for his period. The team from

1980-618: A mountain merely for the delight of looking from its top. (Or almost the first; for in a high pasture he met an old shepherd, who said that fifty years before he had attained the summit, and had got nothing from it save toil and repentance and torn clothing.) Petrarch was dazed and stirred by the view of the Alps, the mountains around Lyons , the Rhone , the Bay of Marseilles . He took Augustine 's Confessions from his pocket and reflected that his climb

2112-643: A number of years in the 1340s and 1350s he lived in a small house at Fontaine-de-Vaucluse east of Avignon in France. Giovanni died of the plague in 1361. In the same year Petrarch was named canon in Monselice near Padua . Francesca married Francescuolo da Brossano (who was later named executor of Petrarch's will ) that same year. In 1362, shortly after the birth of a daughter, Eletta (the same name as Petrarch's mother), they joined Petrarch in Venice to flee

2244-812: A party of one. He went to Verona as a guest of Bartolomeo I della Scala , then moved to Sarzana in Liguria. Later he is supposed to have lived in Lucca with a woman named Gentucca. She apparently made his stay comfortable (and he later gratefully mentioned her in Purgatorio , XXIV, 37). Some speculative sources claim he visited Paris between 1308 and 1310, and other sources even less trustworthy say he went to Oxford ; these claims, first made in Giovanni Boccaccio 's book on Dante several decades after his death, seem inspired by readers who were impressed with

2376-657: A phenomenon developed in French and Provençal poetry of prior centuries. Dante's experience of such love was typical, but his expression of it was unique. It was in the name of this love that Dante left his imprint on the dolce stil nuovo ("sweet new style", a term that Dante himself coined), and he would join other contemporary poets and writers in exploring never-before-emphasized aspects of love. Love for Beatrice (as Petrarch would express for Laura somewhat differently) would be his reason for writing poetry and for living, together with political passions. In many of his poems, she

2508-625: A poem of epic structure and philosophic purpose, he established that the Italian language was suitable for the highest sort of expression. In French, Italian is sometimes nicknamed la langue de Dante . Publishing in the vernacular language marked Dante as one of the first in Roman Catholic Western Europe (among others such as Geoffrey Chaucer and Giovanni Boccaccio) to break free from standards of publishing in only Latin (the language of liturgy , history and scholarship in general, but often also of lyric poetry). This break set

2640-594: A precedent and allowed more literature to be published for a wider audience, setting the stage for greater levels of literacy in the future. However, unlike Boccaccio, Milton or Ariosto , Dante did not really become an author read across Europe until the Romantic era. To the Romantics, Dante, like Homer and Shakespeare , was a prime example of the "original genius" who set his own rules, created persons of overpowering stature and depth, and went beyond any imitation of

2772-623: A self-help book which remained popular for hundreds of years; Itinerarium ("Petrarch's Guide to the Holy Land"); invectives against opponents such as doctors, scholastics, and the French ; the Carmen Bucolicum , a collection of 12 pastoral poems; and the unfinished epic Africa . He translated seven psalms, a collection known as the Penitential Psalms . Petrarch also published many volumes of his letters, including

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2904-503: A syllable fell from my lips until we reached the bottom again. ... [W]e look about us for what is to be found only within. ... How many times, think you, did I turn back that day, to glance at the summit of the mountain which seemed scarcely a cubit high compared with the range of human contemplation James Hillman argues that this rediscovery of the inner world is the real significance of the Ventoux event. The Renaissance begins not with

3036-441: A tomb for him in 1483. On the grave, a verse of Bernardo Canaccio , a friend of Dante, is dedicated to Florence: parvi Florentia mater amoris Florence, mother of little love In 1329, Bertrand du Pouget , Cardinal and nephew of Pope John XXII , classified Dante's Monarchia as heretical and sought to have his bones burned at the stake. Ostasio I da Polenta and Pino della Tosa, allies of Pouget, interceded to prevent

3168-517: A warm winter dressing gown"; various legacies (a horse, a silver cup, a lute, a Madonna ) to his brother and his friends; his house in Vaucluse to its caretaker; money for Masses offered for his soul , and money for the poor; and the bulk of his estate to his son-in-law, Francescuolo da Brossano, who is to give half of it to "the person to whom, as he knows, I wish it to go"; presumably his daughter, Francesca, Brossano's wife. The will mentions neither

3300-536: Is 70 years; and since his imaginary travel to the netherworld took place in 1300, he was most probably born around 1265. Some verses of the Paradiso section of the Divine Comedy also provide a possible clue that he was born under the sign of Gemini : "As I revolved with the eternal twins, I saw revealed, from hills to river outlets, the threshing-floor that makes us so ferocious" (XXII  151–154). In 1265,

3432-480: Is a collection of his longest poems with an (unfinished) allegorical commentary. Monarchia ("Monarchy") is a summary treatise of political philosophy in Latin which was condemned and burned after Dante's death by the Papal Legate Bertrando del Poggetto ; it argues for the necessity of a universal or global monarchy to establish universal peace in this life, and this monarchy's relationship to

3564-468: Is a means of expressing this instability. The changing mind of man and the passing of time are also central themes, as is the consideration of the art of poetic creation itself. Some other themes are desire, isolation, unrequited love, and vanity of youth. In any case, it would be improper to see Canzoniere as uniquely inspired by love for Laura. Other themes are important: religion, poetry, politics, time, glory. The love theme itself should be considered as

3696-477: Is also known for being the first to develop the concept of the " Dark Ages ". Petrarch was born in the Tuscan city Arezzo on 20 July 1304. He was the son of Ser Petracco (a diminutive nickname for Pietro ) and his wife Eletta Canigiani. Petrarch's birth name was Francesco di Petracco ("Francesco [son] of Petracco"), which he Latinized to Franciscus Petrarcha . His younger brother Gherardo (Gerard Petrarch)

3828-412: Is coupled with an aspiration for a virtuous Christian life, and on reaching the summit, he took from his pocket a volume by his beloved mentor, Saint Augustine, that he always carried with him. For pleasure alone he climbed Mont Ventoux, which rises to more than six thousand feet, beyond Vaucluse. It was no great feat, of course; but he was the first recorded Alpinist of modern times, the first to climb

3960-574: Is depicted as semi-divine, watching over him constantly and providing spiritual instruction, sometimes harshly. When Beatrice died in 1290, Dante sought refuge in Latin literature. The Convivio chronicles his having read Boethius 's De consolatione philosophiae and Cicero's De Amicitia . He next dedicated himself to philosophical studies at religious schools like the Dominican one in Santa Maria Novella . He took part in

4092-516: Is likely he would have undertaken such a work only after he realized his political ambitions, which had been central to him up to his banishment, had been halted for some time, possibly forever. It is also noticeable that Beatrice has returned to his imagination with renewed force and with a wider meaning than in the Vita Nuova ; in Convivio (written c.  1304 –07) he had declared that

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4224-405: Is no evidence Petrarch actually had a cat). On the marble slab, there is a Latin inscription written by Antonio Quarenghi : Etruscus gemino vates ardebat amore: Maximus ignis ego; Laura secundus erat. Quid rides? divinæ illam si gratia formæ, Me dignam eximio fecit amante fides. Si numeros geniumque sacris dedit illa libellis Causa ego ne sævis muribus esca forent. Arcebam sacro vivens

4356-596: Is not known; the only certain information is that, before his exile in 1301, he had fathered three children with Gemma (Pietro, Jacopo and Antonia). Dante fought with the Guelph cavalry at the Battle of Campaldino (June 11, 1289). This victory brought about a reformation of the Florentine constitution. To take part in public life, one had to enroll in one of the city's many commercial or artisan guilds, so Dante entered

4488-595: Is now Italy. The exact date of his birth is unknown, although it is believed to be around May 1265. This can be deduced from autobiographic allusions in the Divine Comedy . Its first section, the Inferno , begins, " Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita " ("Midway upon the journey of our life"), implying that Dante was around 35 years old, since the average lifespan according to the Bible (Psalm 89:10, Vulgate)

4620-502: Is psychological realism in the description of Laura, although Petrarch draws heavily on conventionalised descriptions of love and lovers from troubadour songs and other literature of courtly love . Her presence causes him unspeakable joy, but his unrequited love creates unendurable desires, inner conflicts between the ardent lover and the mystic Christian , making it impossible to reconcile the two. Petrarch's quest for love leads to hopelessness and irreconcilable anguish, as he expresses in

4752-502: Is very different from Dante and his Divina Commedia . In spite of the metaphysical subject, the Commedia is deeply rooted in the cultural and social milieu of turn-of-the-century Florence : Dante's rise to power (1300) and exile (1302); his political passions call for a "violent" use of language, where he uses all the registers, from low and trivial to sublime and philosophical. Petrarch confessed to Boccaccio that he had never read

4884-582: Is widely considered one of the most important poems of the Middle Ages and the greatest literary work in the Italian language. Dante is known for establishing the use of the vernacular in literature at a time when most poetry was written in Latin , which was accessible only to educated readers. His De vulgari eloquentia ( On Eloquence in the Vernacular ) was one of the first scholarly defenses of

5016-693: The Canzoniere (dedicated to Laura) were sonnets , and the Petrarchan sonnet still bears his name. Petrarch is often referred to as the father of humanism and considered by many to be the "father of the Renaissance ". In Secretum meum , he points out that secular achievements do not necessarily preclude an authentic relationship with God, arguing instead that God has given humans their vast intellectual and creative potential to be used to its fullest. He inspired humanist philosophy, which led to

5148-548: The Comedy soon became a cornerstone in the evolution of Italian as an established literary language. Dante was more aware than most early Italian writers of the variety of Italian dialects and of the need to create a literature and a unified literary language beyond the limits of Latin writing at the time; in that sense, he is a forerunner of the Renaissance , with its effort to create vernacular literature in competition with earlier classical writers. Dante's in-depth knowledge (within

5280-702: The Comedy , regarding painting and music. Dante, like most Florentines of his day, was embroiled in the Guelph–Ghibelline conflict . He fought in the Battle of Campaldino (June 11, 1289), with the Florentine Guelphs against Arezzo Ghibellines; he fought as a feditore  [ it ] , responsible for the first attack. To further his political career, he obtained admission to the Guild of Physicians and Apothecaries around 1295. He likely joined

5412-639: The Commedia , remarks Contini, wondering whether this was true or Petrarch wanted to distance himself from Dante. Dante's language evolves as he grows old, from the courtly love of his early stilnovistic Rime and Vita nuova to the Convivio and Divina Commedia , where Beatrice is sanctified as the goddess of philosophy—the philosophy announced by the Donna Gentile at the death of Beatrice. In contrast, Petrarch's thought and style are relatively uniform throughout his life—he spent much of it revising

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5544-688: The Divina Commedia ), the quatrains prefer the ABBA–ABBA to the ABAB–ABAB scheme of the Sicilians . The imperfect rhymes of u with closed o and i with closed e (inherited from Guittone's mistaken rendering of Sicilian verse ) are excluded, but the rhyme of open and closed o is kept. Finally, Petrarch's enjambment creates longer semantic units by connecting one line to the following. The vast majority (317) of Petrarch's 366 poems collected in

5676-587: The Gherardini family , was condemned to exile for two years and ordered to pay a large fine. Dante was accused of corruption and financial wrongdoing by the Black Guelphs for the time that Dante was serving as city prior (Florence's highest position) for two months in 1300. The poet was still in Rome in 1302, as the Pope, who had backed the Black Guelphs, had "suggested" that Dante stay there. Florence under

5808-651: The Guelphs , who supported the papacy , and the Ghibellines , who supported the Holy Roman Empire . Dante's family was loyal to the Guelphs. The Ghibellines took over Florence at the Battle of Montaperti in 1260, forcing out many of the Guelphs. Although Dante's family were Guelphs, they suffered no reprisals after the battle, probably because of Alighiero's low public standing. The Guelphs later fought

5940-479: The Inferno had been published by 1317; this is established by quoted lines interspersed in the margins of contemporary dated records from Bologna , but there is no certainty as to whether the three parts of the poem were each published in full or, rather, a few cantos at a time. Paradiso was likely finished before he died, but it may have been published posthumously. In 1312, Henry assaulted Florence and defeated

6072-459: The Inferno , or that this part had been published at the time, but it indicates composition was well underway and that the sketching of the poem might have begun some years before. (It has been suggested that a knowledge of Dante's work also underlies some of the illuminations in Francesco da Barberino's earlier Officiolum [c. 1305–08], a manuscript that came to light in 2003. ) It is known that

6204-515: The Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas , and later served in the papal curia . In 1315, Florence was forced by Uguccione della Faggiuola (the military officer controlling the town) to grant an amnesty to those in exile, including Dante. But for this, Florence required public penance in addition to payment of a high fine. Dante refused, preferring to remain in exile. When Uguccione defeated Florence, Dante's death sentence

6336-534: The Renaissance in the 16th century, only one musical setting composed during Petrarch's lifetime survives. This is Non al suo amante by Jacopo da Bologna , written around 1350. On 6 April 1327, after Petrarch gave up his vocation as a priest, the sight of a woman called "Laura" in the church of Sainte-Claire d' Avignon awoke in him a lasting passion, celebrated in the Rerum vulgarium fragmenta ("Fragments of Vernacular Matters"). Laura may have been Laura de Noves ,

6468-457: The University of Padua also hoped to reconstruct his cranium to generate a computerized image of his features to coincide with his 700th birthday. The tomb had been opened previously in 1873 by Professor Giovanni Canestrini, also of Padua University. When the tomb was opened, the skull was discovered in fragments and a DNA test revealed that the skull was not Petrarch's, prompting calls for

6600-471: The University of Pisa and forensic engineers at the University of Bologna at Forlì constructed the model, portraying Dante's features as somewhat different from what was once thought. In 2008, the Municipality of Florence officially apologized for expelling Dante 700 years earlier. In May 2021, a symbolic re-trial was held virtually in Florence to posthumously clear his name. A celebration

6732-476: The 16th century, Pietro Bembo created the model for the modern Italian language based on Petrarch's works, as well as those of Giovanni Boccaccio , and, to a lesser extent, Dante Alighieri . Petrarch was later endorsed as a model for Italian style by the Accademia della Crusca . Petrarch's sonnets were admired and imitated throughout Europe during the Renaissance and became a model for lyrical poetry . He

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6864-588: The Black Guelphs ( Guelfi Neri ), led by Corso Donati . Although the split was along family lines at first, ideological differences arose based on opposing views of the papal role in Florentine affairs. The Blacks supported the Pope and the Whites wanted more freedom from Rome. The Whites took power first and expelled the Blacks. In response, Pope Boniface VIII planned a military occupation of Florence. In 1301, Charles of Valois , brother of King Philip IV of France ,

6996-551: The Black Guelphs, but there is no evidence that Dante was involved. Some say he refused to participate in the attack on his city by a foreigner; others suggest that he had become unpopular with the White Guelphs, too, and that any trace of his passage had carefully been removed. Henry VII died (from a fever) in 1313 and with him any hope for Dante to see Florence again. He returned to Verona, where Cangrande I della Scala allowed him to live in certain security and, presumably, in

7128-410: The Black Guelphs, therefore, considered Dante an absconder. Dante did not pay the fine, in part because he believed he was not guilty and in part because all his assets in Florence had been seized by the Black Guelphs. He was condemned to perpetual exile; if he had returned to Florence without paying the fine, he could have been burned at the stake. (In June 2008, nearly seven centuries after his death,

7260-483: The Canzoniere is Petrarch's courtly love for Laura , with whom he reportedly fell in love at first sight on 6 April 1327 and who died on that date in 1348. The poems however are so sparing of facts that Petrarch had to write his friend Giacomo Colonna to assert her existence against a charge that she was a fictional creation. The most evident purpose of the Canzoniere is to praise Laura, yet questions concerning

7392-543: The Canzoniere paved the way for the sonnet sequences of Sidney and Shakespeare. Early French sonneteers included Clément Marot and Mellin Saint Gelais . The latter spent nine years in Italy before returning to France to spread knowledge of Petrarch and Serafino. The first sonnet sequence to be published in France came in 1549 in the form of Joachim du Bellay 's L'Olive . When first published it contained 50 sonnets but

7524-520: The Church of Sainte Claire in Avignon . Though disputed, the inscription in his copy of Virgil records this information. Petrarch's meticulous dating of his manuscripts has allowed scholars to deduce that the poems were written over a period of forty years, with the earliest dating from shortly after 1327, and the latest around 1368. The transcription and ordering of the sequence itself went on until 1374,

7656-504: The Ghibellines again in 1266 at the Battle of Benevento, retaking Florence from the Ghibellines. Dante said he first met Beatrice Portinari , daughter of Folco Portinari , when he was nine (she was eight), and he claimed to have fallen in love with her " at first sight ", apparently without even talking with her. When he was 12, however, he was promised in marriage to Gemma di Manetto Donati , daughter of Manetto Donati, member of

7788-539: The Latin motu proprio titled Altissimi cantus , which was dedicated to Dante's figure and poetry. In that year, the pope also donated a golden iron Greek Cross to Dante's burial site in Ravenna, on the occasion of the 700th anniversary of his birth. The same cross was blessed by Pope Francis in October 2020. In 2007, a reconstruction of Dante's face was undertaken in a collaborative project. Artists from

7920-470: The Middle Ages and the libertarian spirit of the commune ; Petrarch's moral dilemmas, his refusal to take a stand in politics, his reclusive life point to a different direction, or time. The free commune, the place that had made Dante an eminent politician and scholar, was being dismantled: the signoria was taking its place. Humanism and its spirit of empirical inquiry, however, were making progress—but

8052-512: The Physicians' and Apothecaries' Guild. His name is occasionally recorded as speaking or voting in the councils of the republic. Many minutes from such meetings between 1298 and 1300 were lost, so the extent of his participation is uncertain. Not much is known about Dante's education; he presumably studied at home or in a chapter school attached to a church or monastery in Florence. It is known that he studied Tuscan poetry and that he admired

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8184-433: The Pope's dogma. A highly introspective man, Petrarch helped shape the nascent humanist movement as many of the internal conflicts and musings expressed in his writings were embraced by Renaissance humanist philosophers and argued continually for the next 200 years. For example, he struggled with the proper relation between the active and contemplative life, and tended to emphasize the importance of solitude and study. In

8316-720: The Roman Catholic Church as guide to eternal peace. De vulgari eloquentia ("On the Eloquence in the Vernacular") is a treatise on vernacular literature, partly inspired by the Razos de trobar of Raimon Vidal de Bezaudun . Quaestio de aqua et terra ("A Question of the Water and of the Land") is a theological work discussing the arrangement of Earth's dry land and ocean. The Eclogues are two poems addressed to

8448-553: The Vernacular Tongue (1525) Petrarch is the model of verse composition. Petrarch's influence is evident in the works of Serafino Ciminelli from Aquila (1466–1500) and in the works of Marin Držić (1508–1567) from Dubrovnik . The Romantic composer Franz Liszt set three of Petrarch's Sonnets (47, 104, and 123) to music for voice, Tre sonetti del Petrarca , which he later would transcribe for solo piano for inclusion in

8580-487: The ascent of Mont Ventoux but with the subsequent descent—the "return [...] to the valley of soul", as Hillman puts it. Arguing against such a singular and hyperbolic periodization, Paul James suggests a different reading: In the alternative argument that I want to make, these emotional responses, marked by the changing senses of space and time in Petrarch's writing, suggest a person caught in unsettled tension between two different but contemporaneous ontological formations:

8712-417: The basis of modern research, an earlier account of Dante's life and works had been included in the Nuova Cronica of the Florentine chronicler Giovanni Villani . Some 16th-century English Protestants, such as John Bale and John Foxe , argued that Dante was a proto-Protestant because of his opposition to the pope. The 19th century saw a "Dante revival", a product of the medieval revival , which

8844-411: The books, Purgatorio is arguably the most lyrical of the three, referring to more contemporary poets and artists than Inferno ; Paradiso is the most heavily theological, and the one in which, many scholars have argued, the Divine Comedy 's most beautiful and mystic passages appear. With its seriousness of purpose, its literary stature and the range—both stylistic and thematic—of its content,

8976-446: The city council of Florence passed a motion rescinding Dante's sentence.) In 1306–07, Dante was a guest of Moroello Malaspina  [ it ] in the region of Lunigiana . Dante took part in several attempts by the White Guelphs to regain power, but these failed due to treachery. Bitter at the treatment he received from his enemies, he grew disgusted with the infighting and ineffectiveness of his former allies and vowed to become

9108-490: The city in 1318 by its prince, Guido II da Polenta . Dante died in Ravenna on September 14, 1321, aged about 56, of quartan malaria contracted while returning from a diplomatic mission to the Republic of Venice . He was attended by his three children, and possibly by Gemma Donati , and by friends and admirers he had in the city. He was buried in Ravenna at the Church of San Pier Maggiore (later called Basilica di San Francesco ). Bernardo Bembo , praetor of Venice , erected

9240-519: The compositions of the Bolognese poet Guido Guinizelli —in Purgatorio XXVI he characterized him as his "father"—at a time when the Sicilian School ( Scuola poetica Siciliana ), a cultural group from Sicily , was becoming known in Tuscany. He also discovered the Provençal poetry of the troubadours , such as Arnaut Daniel , and the Latin writers of classical antiquity , including Cicero , Ovid and especially Virgil . Dante's interactions with Beatrice set an example of so-called courtly love ,

9372-548: The destruction of Dante's remains. Florence eventually came to regret having exiled Dante. The city made repeated requests for the return of his remains. The custodians of the body in Ravenna refused, at one point going so far as to conceal the bones in a false wall of the monastery. Florence built a tomb for Dante in 1829, in the Basilica of Santa Croce . That tomb has been empty ever since, with Dante's body remaining in Ravenna. The front of his tomb in Florence reads Onorate l'altissimo poeta — which roughly translates as "Honor

9504-414: The disputes that the two principal mendicant orders ( Franciscan and Dominican ) publicly or indirectly held in Florence, the former explaining the doctrines of the mystics and of St. Bonaventure , the latter expounding on the theories of St. Thomas Aquinas . At around the age of 18, Dante met Guido Cavalcanti , Lapo Gianni , Cino da Pistoia and, soon after, Brunetto Latini ; together they became

9636-508: The era. Italy's first dreadnought battleship was completed in 1913 and named Dante Alighieri in honor of him. On April 30, 1921, in honor of the 600th anniversary of Dante's death, Pope Benedict XV promulgated an encyclical named In praeclara summorum , naming Dante as one "of the many celebrated geniuses of whom the Catholic faith can boast" and the "pride and glory of humanity". On December 7, 1965, Pope Paul VI promulgated

9768-459: The female and proposed that the pursuit of love was a noble virtue. In 1380, Chaucer adopted part of the Canzoniere to form three stanzas of rhyme royal in Troilus and Criseyde , Book I. Over 150 years would pass until Sir Thomas Wyatt and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey , would translate several Rime in the court environment of Henry VIII . Their translations are largely credited with making

9900-533: The first use of the interlocking three-line rhyme scheme, or the terza rima , is attributed to him. He is described as the "father" of the Italian language, and in Italy he is often referred to as il Sommo Poeta ("the Supreme Poet"). Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio are also called the tre corone ("three crowns") of Italian literature. Dante was born in Florence , Republic of Florence , in what

10032-471: The flesh, but I would be lying if I did". While it is possible she was an idealized or pseudonymous character—particularly since the name "Laura" has a linguistic connection to the poetic "laurels" Petrarch coveted—Petrarch himself always denied it. His frequent use of l'aura is also remarkable: for example, the line "Erano i capei d'oro a l'aura sparsi" may mean both "her hair was all over Laura's body" and "the wind ( l'aura ) blew through her hair". There

10164-451: The guild due to association between philosophy and medicine, but also may have joined as apothecaries were also booksellers. His guild membership allowed him to hold public office in Florence. As a politician, he held various offices over some years in a city rife with political unrest. After defeating the Ghibellines, the Guelphs divided into two factions: the White Guelphs ( Guelfi Bianchi )—Dante's party, led by Vieri dei Cerchi—and

10296-413: The intellectual flowering of the Renaissance. He believed in the immense moral and practical value of the study of ancient history and literature—that is, the study of human thought and action. Petrarch was a devout Catholic and did not see a conflict between realizing humanity's potential and having religious faith , although many philosophers and scholars have styled him a Proto-Protestant who challenged

10428-461: The inventor of the sonnet form, Giacomo da Lentini . In addition, the troubadours who wrote love poems concerned with chivalry in Provençal (in the canso or canzone form) are likely to have had an influence, primarily because of the position of adoration in which they placed the female figure. Dante , and the school of the dolce stil nuovo , or new sweet style, developed this placement of

10560-496: The leaders of the dolce stil nuovo . Brunetto later received special mention in the Divine Comedy ( Inferno , XV, 28) for what he had taught Dante: "Nor speaking less on that account I go With Ser Brunetto, and I ask who are his most known and most eminent companions". Some fifty poetical commentaries by Dante are known (the so-called Rime , rhymes), others being included in the later Vita Nuova and Convivio . Other studies are reported, or deduced from Vita Nuova or

10692-484: The limits of his time) of Roman antiquity, and his evident admiration for some aspects of pagan Rome, also point forward to the 15th century. He wrote the Comedy in a language he called "Italian", in some sense an amalgamated literary language predominantly based on the regional dialect of Tuscany, but with some elements of Latin and other regional dialects. He deliberately aimed to reach a readership throughout Italy including laymen, clergymen and other poets. By creating

10824-545: The memory of this youthful romance belonged to the past. An early indication that the poem was underway is a notice by Francesco da Barberino , tucked into his Documenti d'Amore ( Lessons of Love ), probably written in 1314 or early 1315. Francesco notes that Dante followed the Aeneid in a poem called "Comedy" and that the setting of this poem (or part of it) was the underworld; i.e., hell. The brief note gives no incontestable indication that Barberino had seen or read even

10956-620: The mice away,         His love repaid my duty.       Through all my exemplary life,       So well did I in constant strife         Employ my claws and curses,       That even now, though I am dead,       Those nibbling wretches dare not tread         On one of Petrarch's verses. Petrarch's will (dated 4 April 1370) leaves fifty florins to Boccaccio "to buy

11088-574: The most exalted poet" and is a quote from the fourth canto of the Inferno . In 1945, the fascist government discussed bringing Dante's remains to the Valtellina Redoubt , the Alpine valley in which the regime intended to make its last stand against the Allies . The case was made that "the greatest symbol of Italianness" should be present at fascism's "heroic" end, but ultimately, no action

11220-439: The next year Bellay added more poems and raised the total number to 115 - references to Petrarch are made in fourteen of these sonnets. Pierre de Ronsard also took up Petrarch's influence and his sonnets are credited for their originality. Francesco Petrarca Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero 's letters is often credited with initiating the 14th-century Italian Renaissance and the founding of Renaissance humanism . In

11352-447: The notable friends with whom he regularly corresponded. After the death of their parents, Petrarch and his brother Gherardo went back to Avignon in 1326, where he worked in numerous clerical offices. This work gave him much time to devote to his writing. With his first large-scale work, Africa , an epic poem in Latin about the great Roman general Scipio Africanus , Petrarch emerged as a European celebrity. On 8 April 1341, he became

11484-762: The notion that their pursuit of personal fulfillment should be grounded in classical example and philosophical contemplation. Petrarchism was a 16th-century literary movement of Petrarch's style by Italian, French, Spanish and English followers (partially coincident with Mannerism ), who regarded his collection of poetry Il Canzoniere as a canonical text. Among them, the names are listed in order of precedence: Pietro Bembo , Michelangelo , Mellin de Saint-Gelais , Vittoria Colonna , Clément Marot , Garcilaso de la Vega , Giovanni della Casa , Thomas Wyatt , Henry Howard , Joachim du Bellay , Edmund Spenser , and Philip Sidney . Thus, in Pietro Bembo's book Prose of

11616-711: The nucleus around which Petrarch develops his deep psychological analysis: thanks to his poems inspired by Laura ( laurus is the symbol for poetry) the poet aspires to reach glory, which in turn can fight the all-destroying power of time. Even glory, however, cannot guarantee real eternity, because in Christianity, only faith in Jesus Christ can guarantee it. Petrarch uses Ovid 's Metamorphoses to convey themes of instability, and also sources Virgil 's Aeneid . Petrarch inherited aspects of artifice and rhetorical skill from Sicilian courtly poetry , including that of

11748-431: The other delegates and asked Dante alone to remain in Rome. At the same time (November 1, 1301), Charles of Valois entered Florence with the Black Guelphs, who in the next six days destroyed much of the city and killed many of their enemies. A new Black Guelph government was installed, and Cante dei Gabrielli da Gubbio was appointed podestà of the city. In March 1302, Dante, a White Guelph by affiliation, along with

11880-439: The outer world of nature to the inner world of "soul": I closed the book, angry with myself that I should still be admiring earthly things who might long ago have learned from even the pagan philosophers that nothing is wonderful but the soul, which, when great itself, finds nothing great outside itself. Then, in truth, I was satisfied that I had seen enough of the mountain; I turned my inward eye upon myself, and from that time not

12012-489: The papacy (especially after Avignon) and the empire ( Henry VII , the last hope of the white Guelphs , died near Siena in 1313) had lost much of their original prestige. Petrarch polished and perfected the sonnet form inherited from Giacomo da Lentini and which Dante widely used in his Vita nuova to popularise the new courtly love of the Dolce Stil Novo . The tercet benefits from Dante's terza rima (compare

12144-557: The patterns of earlier masters; and who, in turn, could not truly be imitated. Throughout the 19th century, Dante's reputation grew and solidified; and by 1865, the 600th anniversary of his birth, he had become established as one of the greatest literary icons of the Western world. New readers often wonder how such a serious work may be called a "comedy". In the classical sense the word comedy refers to works that reflect belief in an ordered universe, in which events tend toward not only

12276-460: The plague then ravaging parts of Europe. A second grandchild, Francesco, was born in 1366, but died before his second birthday. Francesca and her family lived with Petrarch in Venice for five years from 1362 to 1367 at Palazzo Molina ; although Petrarch continued to travel in those years. Between 1361 and 1369 the younger Boccaccio paid the older Petrarch two visits. The first was in Venice, the second

12408-437: The poet Giovanni del Virgilio. Dante is also sometimes credited with writing Il Fiore ("The Flower"), a series of sonnets summarizing Le Roman de la Rose , and Detto d'Amore ("Tale of Love"), a short narrative poem also based on Le Roman de la Rose . These would be the earliest, and most novice, of his known works. Le Rime is a posthumous collection of miscellaneous poems. The major works of Dante's are

12540-451: The poet found that his grief was as difficult to live with as was his former despair. Later, in his "Letter to Posterity", Petrarch wrote: "In my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure love affair—my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the cooling flames. I certainly wish I could say that I have always been entirely free from desires of

12672-433: The poet's wide learning and erudition. Evidently, Dante's command of philosophy and his literary interests deepened in exile and when he was no longer busy with the day-to-day business of Florentine domestic politics, and this is evidenced in his prose writings in this period. There is no real evidence that he ever left Italy. Dante's Immensa Dei dilectione testante to Henry VII of Luxembourg confirms his residence "beneath

12804-623: The powerful Donati family. Contracting marriages for children at such an early age was quite common and involved a formal ceremony, including contracts signed before a notary . Dante claimed to have seen Beatrice again frequently after he turned 18, exchanging greetings with her in the streets of Florence, though he never knew her well. Years after his marriage to Gemma, he claims to have met Beatrice again; he wrote several sonnets to Beatrice but never mentioned Gemma in any of his poems. He refers to other Donati relations, notably Forese and Piccarda, in his Divine Comedy . The exact date of his marriage

12936-648: The property in Arquà nor his library; Petrarch's library of notable manuscripts was already promised to Venice, in exchange for the Palazzo Molina. This arrangement was probably cancelled when he moved to Padua, the enemy of Venice, in 1368. The library was seized by the lords of Padua, and his books and manuscripts are now widely scattered over Europe. Nevertheless, the Biblioteca Marciana traditionally claimed this bequest as its founding, although it

13068-434: The return of Petrarch's skull. The researchers are fairly certain that the body in the tomb is Petrarch's due to the fact that the skeleton bears evidence of injuries mentioned by Petrarch in his writings, including a kick from a donkey when he was 42. He is credited with being the first and most famous aficionado of Numismatics . He described visiting Rome and asking peasants to bring him ancient coins they would find in

13200-428: The same mountain a few years before, and ascents accomplished during the Middle Ages have been recorded, including that of Anno II, Archbishop of Cologne . Scholars note that Petrarch's letter to Dionigi displays a strikingly "modern" attitude of aesthetic gratification in the grandeur of the scenery and is still often cited in books and journals devoted to the sport of mountaineering . In Petrarch, this attitude

13332-472: The second poet laureate since classical antiquity and was crowned by Roman Senatori Giordano Orsini and Orso dell'Anguillara on the holy grounds of Rome's Capitol . He traveled widely in Europe, served as an ambassador, and has been called "the first tourist " because he traveled for pleasure such as his ascent of Mont Ventoux . During his travels, he collected crumbling Latin manuscripts and

13464-427: The second part,         I must not be derided.       For my fidelity was such,       It merited regard as much         As Laura's grace and beauty;       She first inspired the poet's lay,       But since I drove

13596-483: The series of paradoxes in Rima 134 "Pace non trovo, et non ò da far guerra;/e temo, et spero; et ardo, et son un ghiaccio": "I find no peace, and yet I make no war:/and fear, and hope: and burn, and I am ice". Laura is unreachable and evanescent – descriptions of her are evocative yet fragmentary. Francesco de Sanctis praises the powerful music of his verse in his Storia della letteratura italiana . Gianfranco Contini, in

13728-557: The soil which he would buy from them, and writes of his delight at being able to identify the names and features of Roman emperors. Dante Dante Alighieri ( Italian: [ˈdante aliˈɡjɛːri] ; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri ; c.  May 1265 – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante , was an Italian poet , writer, and philosopher. His Divine Comedy , originally called Comedìa (modern Italian: Commedia ) and later christened Divina by Giovanni Boccaccio ,

13860-534: The songs and sonnets of the Canzoniere rather than moving to new subjects or poetry. Here, poetry alone provides a consolation for personal grief, much less philosophy or politics (as in Dante), for Petrarch fights within himself (sensuality versus mysticism , profane versus Christian literature ), not against anything outside of himself. The strong moral and political convictions which had inspired Dante belong to

13992-598: The springs of Arno, near Tuscany" in April 1311. In 1310, Holy Roman Emperor Henry VII of Luxembourg marched into Italy at the head of 5,000 troops. Dante saw in him a new Charlemagne who would restore the office of the Holy Roman Emperor to its former glory and also retake Florence from the Black Guelphs. He wrote to Henry and several Italian princes, demanding that they destroy the Black Guelphs. Mixing religion and private concerns in his writings, he invoked

14124-575: The suite Années de Pèlerinage . Liszt also set a poem by Victor Hugo , "Oh! quand je dors" in which Petrarch and Laura are invoked as the epitome of erotic love. While in Avignon in 1991, Modernist composer Elliott Carter completed his solo flute piece Scrivo in Vento which is in part inspired by and structured by Petrarch's Sonnet 212, Beato in sogno . It was premiered on Petrarch's 687th birthday. In 2004, Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho crafted

14256-488: The sun was in Gemini between approximately May 11 and June 11 ( Julian calendar ). Dante claimed that his family descended from the ancient Romans ( Inferno , XV, 76), but the earliest relative he could mention by name was his great-great-grandfather Cacciaguida degli Elisei ( Paradiso , XV, 135), born no earlier than about 1100. Dante's father was Alighiero di Bellincione , a businessman and moneylender, and Dante's mother

14388-522: The ten-syllable line normative in English, and in George Puttenham 's 1589 Art of English Poesie are credited with reforming the English language: As novices newly crept out of the schooles of Dante, Arioste and Petrarch, they greatly polished our rude and homely manner of vulgar poesie, from that it had bene before, and for that cause may justly be sayd the first reformers of our English meetre and stile. Thus, their translations of Rimes from

14520-456: The thirteenth century. However, Dante's commentary on his own work is also in the vernacular—both in the Vita Nuova and in the Convivio —instead of the Latin that was almost universally used. The Divine Comedy describes Dante's journey through Hell ( Inferno ), Purgatory ( Purgatorio ), and Paradise ( Paradiso ); he is first guided by the Roman poet Virgil and then by Beatrice. Of

14652-632: The top of Mont Ventoux (1,912 meters (6,273 ft), a feat which he undertook for recreation rather than necessity. The exploit is described in a famous letter addressed to his friend and confessor, the monk Dionigi di Borgo San Sepolcro , composed some time after the fact. In it, Petrarch claimed to have been inspired by Philip V of Macedon 's ascent of Mount Haemo and that an aged peasant had told him that nobody had ascended Ventoux before or after himself, 50 years earlier, and warned him against attempting to do so. The nineteenth-century Swiss historian Jacob Burckhardt noted that Jean Buridan had climbed

14784-438: The traditional and the modern. Petrarch spent the later part of his life journeying through northern Italy and southern France as an international scholar and poet-diplomat. His career in the Church did not allow him to marry, but he is believed to have fathered two children by a woman (or women) unknown to posterity. A son, Giovanni, was born in 1337, and a daughter, Francesca, was born in 1343. He later legitimized both. For

14916-553: The vernacular. His use of the Florentine dialect for works such as The New Life (1295) and Divine Comedy helped establish the modern-day standardized Italian language. By writing his poem in the Italian vernacular rather than in Latin, Dante influenced the course of literary development, making Italian the literary language in western Europe for several centuries. His work set a precedent that important Italian writers such as Petrarch and Boccaccio would later follow. Dante

15048-520: The virtue of love in relation to the Christian religion and desire are always present. Antithesis are also key to the sequence and in one sense represent Petrarch's search for balance; these would later be exploited by Petrarchists in Europe but represent only one aspect of the Rimes. This leads on to the essential paradox of Petrarchan love, where love is desired yet painful: fluctuation between states

15180-655: The wife of Count Hugues de Sade (an ancestor of the Marquis de Sade ). There is little definite information in Petrarch's work concerning Laura, except that she is lovely to look at, fair-haired, with a modest, dignified bearing. Laura and Petrarch had little or no personal contact. According to his "Secretum", she refused him because she was already married. He channeled his feelings into love poems that were exclamatory rather than persuasive, and wrote prose that showed his contempt for men who pursue women. Upon her death in 1348,

15312-415: The worst anger of God against his city and suggested several particular targets, who were also his personal enemies. It was during this time that he wrote De Monarchia , proposing a universal monarchy under Henry VII. At some point during his exile, he conceived of the Comedy , but the date is uncertain. The work is much more assured and on a larger scale than anything he had written in Florence; it

15444-421: The year of the poet's death. The two sections of the sequence which are divided by Laura's death have traditionally been labelled 'In vita' (In life') and 'In morte' (In death) respectively, though Petrarch made no such distinction. His work would go on to become what Spiller calls 'the single greatest influence on the love poetry of Renaissance Europe until well into the seventeenth century'. The central theme in

15576-543: Was Bella, probably a member of the Abati family, a noble Florentine family. She died when Dante was not yet ten years old. Alighiero soon married again, to Lapa di Chiarissimo Cialuffi. It is uncertain whether he really married her, since widowers were socially limited in such matters, but she definitely bore him two children, Dante's half-brother Francesco and half-sister Tana (Gaetana). During Dante's time, most Northern Italian city states were split into two political factions:

15708-450: Was a prime mover in the recovery of knowledge from writers of Rome and Greece . He encouraged and advised Leontius Pilatus 's translation of Homer from a manuscript purchased by Boccaccio, although he was severely critical of the result. Petrarch had acquired a copy, which he did not entrust to Leontius, but he knew no Greek ; Petrarch said of himself, "Homer was dumb to him, while he was deaf to Homer". In 1345 he personally discovered

15840-607: Was born in Incisa in Val d'Arno in 1307. Dante Alighieri was a friend of his father. Petrarch spent his early childhood in the village of Incisa , near Florence . He spent much of his early life at Avignon and nearby Carpentras , where his family moved to follow Pope Clement V , who moved there in 1309 to begin the Avignon Papacy . Petrarch studied law at the University of Montpellier (1316–20) and Bologna (1320–23) with

15972-473: Was commuted to house arrest, on condition that he go to Florence to swear he would never enter the town again. He refused to go, and his death sentence was confirmed and extended to his sons. Despite this, he still hoped late in life that he might be invited back to Florence on honorable terms, particularly in praise of his poetry. Dante's final days were spent in Ravenna , where he had been invited to stay in

16104-463: Was customary for such poems. It also contains, or constructs, the story of his love for Beatrice Portinari, who later served as the ultimate symbol of salvation in the Comedy , a function already indicated in the final pages of the Vita Nuova . The work contains many of Dante's love poems in Tuscan, which was not unprecedented; the vernacular had been regularly used for lyric works before, during all

16236-441: Was expected to visit Florence because the Pope had appointed him as peacemaker for Tuscany. But the city's government had treated the Pope's ambassadors badly a few weeks before, seeking independence from papal influence. It was believed Charles had received other unofficial instructions, so the council sent a delegation that included Dante to Rome to persuade the Pope not to send Charles to Florence. Pope Boniface quickly dismissed

16368-584: Was held in 2015 at Italy's Senate of the Republic for the 750th anniversary of Dante's birth. It included a commemoration from Pope Francis, who also issued the apostolic letter Cando lucis aeternae in honor of the anniversary. Most of Dante's literary work was composed after his exile in 1301. La Vita Nuova ("The New Life") is the only major work that predates it; it is a collection of lyric poems (sonnets and songs) with commentary in prose, ostensibly intended to be circulated in manuscript form, as

16500-431: Was in Latin , the Canzoniere was written in the vernacular , a language of trade, despite Petrarch's view that Italian was less adequate for expression. Of its 366 poems, the vast majority are in sonnet form (317), though the sequence contains a number of canzoni (29), sestine (9), madrigals (4), and ballate (7). Its central theme is the poet's love for Laura , a woman Petrarch allegedly met on April 6, 1327, in

16632-539: Was in Padua. About 1368 Petrarch and Francesca (with her family) moved to the small town of Arquà in the Euganean Hills near Padua, where he passed his remaining years in religious contemplation. He died in his house in Arquà on 18/19 July 1374. The house now hosts a permanent exhibition of Petrarch's works and curiosities, including the famous tomb of an embalmed cat long believed to be Petrarch's (although there

16764-693: Was in fact founded by Cardinal Bessarion in 1468. Petrarch is best known for his Italian poetry, notably the Rerum vulgarium fragmenta ("Fragments of Vernacular Matters"), a collection of 366 lyric poems in various genres also known as 'canzoniere' ('songbook'), and I trionfi ("The Triumphs "), a six-part narrative poem of Dantean inspiration. However, Petrarch was an enthusiastic Latin scholar and did most of his writing in this language. His Latin writings include scholarly works, introspective essays, letters, and more poetry. Among them are Secretum ("My Secret Book"), an intensely personal, imaginary dialogue with

16896-426: Was instrumental in establishing the literature of Italy, and is considered to be among the country's national poets and the Western world's greatest literary icons. His depictions of Hell , Purgatory , and Heaven provided inspiration for the larger body of Western art and literature . He influenced English writers such as Geoffrey Chaucer , John Milton , and Alfred Tennyson , among many others. In addition,

17028-692: Was itself an important aspect of Romanticism . Thomas Carlyle profiled him in "The Hero as Poet", the third lecture in On Heroes, Hero-Worship, & the Heroic in History (1841): "He is world-great not because he is worldwide, but because he is world-deep… Dante is the spokesman of the Middle Ages; the Thought they lived by stands here, in everlasting music." Leigh Hunt , Henry Francis Cary and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow were among Dante's translators of

17160-412: Was merely an allegory of aspiration toward a better life. As the book fell open , Petrarch's eyes were immediately drawn to the following words: And men go about to wonder at the heights of the mountains, and the mighty waves of the sea, and the wide sweep of rivers, and the circuit of the ocean, and the revolution of the stars, but themselves they consider not. Petrarch's response was to turn from

17292-568: Was suggested to him by knowledge of Cicero 's letters. These were published "without names" to protect the recipients, all of whom had close relationships to Petrarch. The recipients of these letters included Philippe de Cabassoles , bishop of Cavaillon ; Ildebrandino Conti , bishop of Padua ; Cola di Rienzo , tribune of Rome; Francesco Nelli , priest of the Prior of the Church of the Holy Apostles in Florence ; and Niccolò di Capoccia ,

17424-586: Was taken. A copy of Dante's so-called death mask has been displayed since 1911 in the Palazzo Vecchio ; scholars today believe it is not a true death mask and was probably carved in 1483, perhaps by Pietro and Tullio Lombardo . The first formal biography of Dante was the Vita di Dante (also known as Trattatello in laude di Dante ), written after 1348 by Giovanni Boccaccio. Although several statements and episodes of it have been deemed unreliable on

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