Florence, a public lecture was founded for the purpose of explaining a poem, that was at the same time the boast and the disgrace of the city. The decree for this institution was passed in 1373; and in that year Boccaccio, the first of their writers in prose, was appointed, with an annual salary of a hundred florens, to deliver lectures in one of the churches, on the first of their poets. On this occasion he wrote his comment, which extends only to a part of the Inferno, and has been printed. In 1375 Boccaccio died; and among his successors in this honourable employment we find the names of Antonio Piovano in 1381, and of Filippo Villani in 1401. The example of Florence was speedily followed by Bologna, by Pisa, by Piacenza, and by Venice. Benvenuto da Imola, on whom the office of lecturer devolved at Bologna, sustained it for the space of ten years. From the comment, which he composed for the purpose, and which he sent abroad in 1379, those passages, that tend to illustrate the history of Italy, have been published by Muratori.1 At Pisa, the same charge was committed to Francesco da Buti about 1386. On the invention of printing, in the succeeding century, Dante was one of those writers who were first and most frequently given to the press. But I do not mean to enter on an account of the numerous editions of our author, which were then, or have since been published; but shall content myself with adding such remarks as have occurred to me on reading the principal writers, by whose notes those editions have been accompanied. Of the four chief commentators on Dante, namely, Landino, Vellutello, Venturi, and Lombardi, the first appears to enter most thoroughly into the mind of the Poet. Within little more than a century of the time in which Dante had lived; himself a Florentine, while Florence was still free, and still retained something of her ancient simplicity; the associate of those great men who adorned the age of Lorenzo de' Medici; Landino 2 was the most capable of forming some estimate of the mighty stature of his compatriot, who was indeed greater than them all. His taste for the classics, which were then newly revived, and had become the principal objects of public curiosity, as it impaired his relish for what has not inaptly 1 Antiq. Ital. vol. i. The Italian comment published under the name of Benvenuto da Imola, at Milan, in 1473, and at Venice in 1477, is altogether different from that which Muratori has brought to light, and appears to be the same as the Italian comment of Jacopo della Lana before mentioned. See Tiraboschi. 2 Cristofforo Landino was born in 1424, and died in 1504 or 1508. See Bandini, Specimen Litterat. Florent. edit. Florence, 1751. been termed the romantic literature, did not, it is true, improve him for a critic on the Divina Commedia. The adventures of King Arthur, by which1 Dante had been delighted, appeared to Landino no better than a fabulous and inelegant book. He is, besides, sometimes, unnecessarily prolix; at others, silent, where a real difficulty asks for solution; and, now and then, a little visionary in his interpretation. The commentary of his successor, Vellutello, is more evenly diffused over the text; and although without pretensions to the higher qualities, by which Landino is distinguished, he is generally under the influence of a sober good sense, which renders him a steady and useful guide. Venturi, who followed after a long interval of time, was too much swayed by his principles, or his prejudices, as a Jesuit, to suffer him to judge fairly of a Ghibelline poet; and either this bias, or a real want of tact for the higher excellence of his author, or, perhaps, both these imperfections together, betray him into such impertinent and injudicious sallies, as dispose us to quarrel with our companion, though, in the main, a very attentive one, generally acute and lively, and at times even not devoid of a better understanding for the merits of his master. To him, and in our own times, has succeeded the Padre Lombardi.5 This good Franciscan, no doubt, must have given himself much pains to pick out and separate those ears of grain, which had escaped the flail of those who had gone before him in that labour. But his zeal to do something new often leads him to do something that is not over wise; and if on certain occasions we applaud his sagaciousness, on others we do not less wonder that his ingenuity should have been so strangely perverted. His manner of writing is awkward and tedious; his attention, more than is necessary, directed to grammatical niceties; and his attachment to one of the old editions, so excessive, as to render him disingenuous or partial in his representation of the rest. But to compensate this, he is a good Ghibelline; and his opposition to Venturi seldom fails to awaken him into a perception of those beauties which had only exercised the spleen of the Jesuit. He, who shall undertake another commentary on Dante 6 yet com 1 See Note to Purgatory, xxvi. 132. 2 "Il favoloso, e non molto elegante libro della Tavola Rotonda." Landino, in the Notes to the Paradise, xvi. 3 Alessandro Vellutello was born in 1519. 4 Pompeo Venturi was born in 1693, and died in 1752. 5 Baldassare Lombardi died January 2, 1802. See Cancellieri, Osservazioni, etc., Roma, 1814, p. 112. 6 Francesco Cionacci, a noble Florentine, projected an edition of the Divina Commedia in one hundred volumes, each containing a single canto, followed by pleter than any of those which have hitherto appeared, must make use of these four, but depend on none. To them he must add several others of minor note, whose diligence will nevertheless be found of some advantage, and among whom I can particularly distinguish Volpi. Besides this, many commentaries and marginal annotations, that are yet inedited, remain to be examined; many editions and manuscripts to be more carefully collated; and many separate dissertations and works of criticism to be considered. But this is not all. That line of reading which the Poet himself appears to have pursued (and there are many vestiges in his works by which we shall be enabled to discover it) must be diligently tracked; and the search, I have little doubt, would lead to sources of information, equally profitable and unexpected. If there is any thing of novelty in the Notes which accompany the following translation, it will be found to consist chiefly in a comparison of the Poet with himself, that is, of the Divina Commedia with his other writings; 2 a mode of illustration so obvious, that it is only to be wondered how others should happen to have made so little use of it. As to the imitations of my author by later poets, Italian and English, which I have collected in addition to those few that had been already remarked, they contribute little or nothing to the purposes of illustration, but must be considered merely as matter of curiosity, and as instances of the manner in which the great practitioners in art do not scruple to profit by their predecessors. all the commentaries, according to the order of time in which they were written, and accompanied by a Latin translation for the use of foreigners. Cancellieri, ibid. p. 64. 1 The Count Mortara has lately shown me many various readings he has remarked on collating the numerous MSS. of Dante in the Canonici collection at the Bodleian. It is to be hoped he will make them public. [Janry, 1843.] 2 The edition which is referred to in the following notes, is that printed at Venice in 2 vols. 8vo, 1793. CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW OF THE AGE OF DANTE. A.D. 1265 May.-DANTE, son of Alighieri degli Alighieri and Bella, is born at Florence. Of his own ancestry he speaks in the Paradise, Canto xv. and xvi. In the same year, Manfredi, king of Naples and Sicily, is Guido Novello of Polenta obtains the sovereignty of Ravenna. Battle of Evesham. Simon de Montfort, leader of the barons, 1266 Two of the Frati Godenti chosen arbitrators of the differences of Florence. H. xxiii. 104. Gianni de' Soldanieri heads the populace in that city. Roger Bacon sends a copy of his Opus Majus to Pope Clement 1268 Charles of Anjou puts Conradine to death, and becomes king of Naples. H. xxviii. 16, and Purg. xx. 66. 1270 Louis IX. of France dies before Tunis. His widow, Beatrice, daughter of Raymond Berenger, lived till 1295. Purg. vii. 126; Par. vi. 135. A. D. 1272 Henry III. of England is succeeded by Edward I. Purg. vii. 129. Guy de Montfort murders Prince Henry, son of Ricnard, king of the Romans, and nephew of Henry III. of England, at Viterbo. H. xii. 119. Richard dies, as is supposed, of grief for this event. Abulfeda, the Arabic writer, is born. 1274 Our Poet first sees Beatrice, daughter of Folco Portinari. Rodolph acknowledged emperor. Philip III. of France marries Mary of Brabant, who lived till 1321. Purg. vi. 24. Thomas Aquinas dies. Buonaventura dies. Purg. xx. 67, and Par. x. 96. Par. xii. 25. 1275 Pierre de la Brosse, secretary to Philip III. of France, executed. Purg. vi. 23. 1276 Giotto, the painter, is born. Purg. xi. 95. Pope Adrian V. dies. Purg. xix. 97. Guido Guinicelli, the poet, dies. Purg. xi. 96, and xxvi. 83. 1277 Pope John XXI. dies. Par. xii. 126, 1278 Ottocar, king of Bohemia, dies. Purg. vii. 97. Robert of Gloucester is living at this time. 1279 Dionysius succeeds to the throne of Portugal. Par. xix. 135. 1280 Albertus Magnus dies. Par. x. 95. Our Poet's friend, Busone da Gubbio, is born about this time. See the Life of Dante prefixed. William of Ockham is born about this time. 1281 Pope Nicholas III. dies. H. xix. 71. Dante studies at the universities of Bologna and Padua. About this time Ricordano Malaspina, the Florentine annalist, dies. 1282 The Sicilian vespers. Par. viii. 80. The French defeated by the people of Forli. H. xxvii. 41. 119. |