HANDBOOK TO THE WORKS OF DANTE LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS PORTUGAL STREET, KINGSWAY, W.C. CAMBRIDGE: DEIGHTON, BELL& co. NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO. BOMBAY: A. H. WHEELER & CO. HANDBOOK TO THE WORKS OF DANTE BY F. J. SNELL, M.A. AUTHOR OF "THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY," "TH E AGE OF CHAUCER," "THE AGE OF TRANSITION," ETC. ETC. LONDON GEORGE BELL AND SONS 1909 VNCliRY LANE, LONDON. PREFACE THIS work is designed as an introduction to Dante's works in general, and the " Commedia " in particular. It has not been at- tempted to deal with the various writings in chronological sequence, partly because there is no sort of certainty on the point, and partly because it has been my object to take up the different subjects relating to and treated by Dante in the order most advantageous to the understanding of his artistic and philosophical development, beginning with the bare facts of his life, proceeding to his intellectual inherit- ance, and concluding with the triumph of his poetical powers in their full splendour. Dante literature is so vast that no individual scholar can pretend to have read and digested it all, but I have sought to profit by the labours of distinguished contemporaries. At the same time I have made a special and independent study of Dante's writings, with which I have been familiar from early youth. v 2041914 vi PREFACE It should be pointed out that the references throughout are to the third edition of the ex- cellent " Oxford Dante," while the translations, unless otherwise stated, are those of Longfellow. F. J. SNELL. TlVERTON, NORTH DEVON, 2$th August, 1909. CORRIGENDA On p. 7 4 for " Marseilles " read " Marseille." ,, p. 12$ for "Curatii" read "Curiatii." ,, p. 140 for "Tresor" raza? "Tresor." ,, p. 226 for " Milanesi " read " Ed. Milanesi." CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE PREFACE v BOOK I OUTER LIFE AND LATIN WRITINGS PART I BIOGRAPHICAL I. LIFE OF DANTE i II. EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 29 PART II ARTISTIC I. DANTE'S PLACE IN LITERATURE .... 69 II. THE DE VULGARI ELOQUENTIA .... 83 PART III POLITICAL I. THE DE MONARCHIA PRELIMINARY . . 117 II. THE DE MONARCHIA THE ARGUMENT . 126 POSTSCRIPT 139 vii viii CONTENTS BOOK II INNER LIFE AND ITALIAN WRITINGS PART I MORAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL CHAP. PAGE I. THE VITA NUOVA 145 II. THE CANZONIERE 191 III. THE CONVIVIO 232 PART II SPIRITUAL I. THE COMMEDIA MECHANISM . . . . 271 II. THE COMMEDIA PRINCIPLES AND SYM- BOLISM 309 EPILOGUE CHARACTERISTICS 351 INDEX 372 BOOK I OUTER LIFE AND LATIN WRITINGS PART I BIOGRAPHICAL HANDBOOK TO DANTE CHAPTER I LIFE OF DANTE " T^V ANTE was not good company, and was not i J invited to dinner." This remark of Emerson, applicable to the later, rather than the earlier, phases of the poet's life, but more or less relevant to the whole, is eminently suggestive. If Dante had been of a sociable temperament, and less at odds with Fortune, much more that is authentic might have been recorded of him, and it is conceivable that he might have be- queathed, if not a complete autobiography, cheerful and copious accounts of his outward experiences. What he has actually left consists of little more than cryptic allusions to certain incidents of his youth and abundant evidence of his interest in the vivid politics, the scholastic learning, the art and literature of his time. The man has been, in a great measure, lost in the politician and the thinker. Dante, in fact, has observed too faithfully the formula, which he himself lays down, that it is not permitted to a writer to speak of himself. 1 1 "Convivio," i, 2. 3 4 HANDBOOK TO DANTE The period of Dante's life intellectually most fruit- ful was passed in exile and poverty; and well may Carlyle say of him: "An unimportant, wandering, sorrow-stricken man, not much note was taken of him while he lived; and most of that has vanished in the long space that now intervenes." Dante's loneliness was, in part, the fruit of distasteful opinions fearlessly avowed, but not entirely so. His elevated character manifested itself in silence and reserve, or in masterful self-assertion. His manners were not conciliating; he calls himself an alma sdegnosa, and such his country- men found him. There can be no suspicion of pre- judice in Villani's portrait: "This Dante, from his knowledge, was somewhat presumptuous, harsh and disdainful. Like an ungracious philosopher, he scarcely deigned to converse with laymen, but for his other virtues, science, and worth as a citizen, it seems but reasonable to give him perpetual remembrance in this our chronicle." While Dante himself was conscious of his extra- ordinary powers, the men and women of his own generation had no adequate conception of his genius. It was only towards the close of his life, and perhaps not then, that his reputation became full-orbed. Mean- while his peregrinations were incessant. For all these reasons the precise circumstances of his earthly pil- grimage are shrouded in mystery, and have given occasion to endless controversy and contradictions. When, too late, a sense of his greatness dawned on his repentant compatriots, homage was paid to his memory in a series of " romances " commencing with LIFE OF DANTE 5 Boccaccio's " Trattatello " and ending with Balbo's Life. Whether the neglect of former ages can be repaired by modern heroic research is doubtful. Scartazzini avers that in time a really scientific and possibly complete biography of Dante will be written, but he adds pathetically, " my eyes will certainly not behold it." Criticism in these last days has played havoc with much that our predecessors received as fact, and the tendency to depreciate Boccaccio's tes- timony is most marked. But this severe attitude towards Dante's illustrious panegyrist has not been universal, Witte, for example, being willing to concede far higher value to his evidence than is commonly accorded to it. i. BIRTH AND PARENTAGE Dante (or Durante) Alighieri was born at Florence on some date between i8th May and ryth June, 1265. From his deep veneration for St. Lucia, who, it may be recollected, is a beneficent and influential person- age in the " Commedia," it has been conjectured that he came into the world on her feast-day, 3oth May. The homes of the Alighieri were situated in the quarter of the Porta San Piero, near the Piazza San Martino. They no longer remain, and the house indicated by the official tablet is not that in which Dante first saw the light. He was baptized at the church of "my beautiful St. John," as he calls it. Here also the ancestor, whom he regarded with most pride, "Christian and Cacciaguida became"; and Dante in his great poem pauses to record that he had 6 HANDBOOK TO DANTE broken one of the stones of the ancient baptistery to save some one who was drowning. 1 At the close of his life he cherished a fond hope of receiving the laurel crown at his baptismal font. Throughout his writings Dante preserves the most absolute silence concerning his parents and kindred with one remarkable exception. In the " Paradise " he introduces the aforenamed Cacciaguida in a way that suggests that he was the source of whatever pre- tensions Dante may have had to nobility of birth : I was thine own root. 2 Cacciaguida had been knighted by the Emperor Conrad (1137-1152), and in 1147 accompanied that monarch on a crusade to the Holy Land, where the valiant Florentine was slain by the infidels. He had two brothers, Moronto and Eliseo, and a son Aldighiero, " from whom is named thy race," and who was Dante's great-grandsire. Cacciaguida further in- forms his descendant that his wife came to him from the Val di Pado, and that Dante's surname was derived from that place. Probably the lady was of Ferrara. Aldighiero had a son Bellincione, mentioned in old documents as a member of the Council and a popolano. Then came another Aldighiero, who seems to have been "a slight, unmeritable man," and is usually stated to have been a lawyer. He was Dante's father, and Forese Donati cast the circumstance in the poet's teeth : Well know I thou wast Alighieri's son.' " Inf." xix, 19-20. - "Par." xv, 89. 3 Son. LIV, i. LIFE OF DANTE 7 The name now became the family cognomen. It is said to be of German origin, and to signify "ruler of the spear." ' Strange that the names of the world's greatest poets should so nearly correspond ! Dante says of nobility: There where appetite is not perverted, I say in Heaven, in thee I made my boast. 2 In the face of this statement it may seem captious to raise doubts as to the standing of the family, but, in point of fact, there has been a good deal of dis- cussion as to the worldly position of the Alighieri. Boccaccio declares that they were a branch of the Elisei one of Cacciaguida's brothers was called Eliseo and that the Elisei were descended from the Frangi- pani of Rome. This last touch may be a pure embel- lishment, but it would hardly have been added if the Elisei had not been eminently respectable. If Dante's immediate ancestors were considered Elisei, this would explain why they are not named in Villani's lists of exiled nobles. The general character of the evidence inclines one to think that Dante was what is com- monly called a gentleman, notwithstanding the fact that, in accordance with the traditions of the poetical school to which he belonged, he declaimed against Frederick II's definition of nobility as "ancient riches and good manners." He appears to have had ample leisure in his youth for acquiring learning and engaging in the pleasant, but far from lucrative, pursuit of the Muse. 1 Federn, "Dante and his Time," p. 197. 2 "Par." xvi, 5-6. 8 HANDBOOK TO DANTE 2. EDUCATION Dante tells us practically nothing about his child- hood, except that, towards the close of his ninth year, he fell in love for the first time. By the time he was eighteen he taught himself the art of rhyming an art in which most poets are self-schooled. As regards more ordinary accomplishments, we find that Dante was under some obligation to Brunetto Latini (or Latino), but it is difficult to believe that this dis- tinguished writer and statesman was Dante's school- master. However, it may have been so. Dante says to him: In the world from hour to hour You taught me how a man becomes eternal. l Villani describes Brunetto as " a very great master of rhetoric," and states that he moulded the Flor- entines into expert speakers. Rhetoric, which Dante calls " the sweetest of all the sciences," was concerned not so much with elocution as with composition and style, and examples were drawn from the great writers of antiquity, Virgil, Ovid, Horace, Cicero, etc. Pupils were initiated into the whole art of expression from the nice choice of words to the construction of a pompous and well-balanced period, much as we find in the " De Vulgari Eloquentia." In imparting to Dante a sense of literary form Latini rendered him a priceless service without it he might never have achieved the immortality which he foresaw was to be 1 " Inf." xv, 84-5. LIFE OF DANTE 9 his portion. But, before Dante could profit by such instruction, he had to acquire a knowledge of Latin "grammar," as it was termed. Of this preliminary study he tells us no more than that he learnt Latin through the medium of Italian, and he expresses gratitude, not to any individual teacher, but to his mother-tongue, which certain sciolists were in the habit of disparaging. 1 Dante lost his father in boyhood possibly as early as 1270. His mother, a Donna Bella, had predeceased her husband, who had then married a lady named Lapa Cialuffi, and had issue a son Francesco, and a daughter (name unknown), who wedded one Leone Poggi. It is worth noting that Cialuffi and Poggi are both plebeian names. There is no evidence to show upon what terms Dante lived with his father's second family, but, bearing in mind the proverbial harshness of stepmothers, it would not be surprising if his childish years were somewhat clouded. As he speaks of Brunetto's " dear and kind paternal image," it is just possible that the latter stood in loco parentis to him, caring for his general interests and superintend- ing his studies. Brunette was the author of a French encyclopaedia entitled "Le Tresor," and thus it seems probable that Dante was indebted to him, amongst other things, for his early acquaintance with North French and Pro- vengal literature. If, as has been suspected, Dante's first sonnet, written in his eighteenth year, was suggested by &planh of Sordello, he would already have possessed 1 "Convivio," i, 13. io HANDBOOK TO DANTE some familiarity with the poetry of the Troubadours, as well as with that of the Italian dicitori, whose verdict he challenged. From his statements in the " Convivio " l one would infer that until he was twenty-five he devoted himself to belles lettres, and cared little for philosophy and science, his study of which dated from that period. At some time in his life, however, he proceeded to the famous university of Bologna, and, although Boccaccio does not explain whether this was before or after Dante's exile, it would perhaps be more natural to understand by the allusion that the poet completed his education, in the ordinary sense of the phrase, at that seat of learning, and there acquired the seven liberal arts grammar, dialectic, rhetoric, arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy. Villani informs us that Dante visited Bologna and Paris after his exile from Florence, and there is little doubt that he went on "hiving knowledge" to the end of his days. It is not impossible that he resided at Bologna on two separate occasions once in his youth, and subse- quently in his mature manhood. There is nothing in his writings that would lead us to conclude that he ever left Florence for the purpose of obtaining instruction, but, in view of his colossal attainments, it is hard to believe that he did not undergo systematic training in his adolescence. This conclusion, however, is rather opposed to his own account in the " Convivio," which leaves the impression that, beyond a bare knowledge of Latin, he gained his store of erudition by his own 1 ii, 13- LIFE OF DANTE IT efforts and attendance at the disputations of the filo- sofanti at Florence, when he had lost Beatrice. 1 It is quite possible that Brunetto Latini was one of the lecturers, and that Dante's friendship with him was cemented, if it did not originate, when the poet was between twenty and thirty years of age. Still, there is an air of probability about Boccaccio's assertion that Dante learned various sciences, at various ages, and under various teachers. No great writer impresses us less as being self-taught. 3. FRIENDSHIPS It is believed by some writers that Dante, when a young man, entered freely into the social pleasures of his native city. " We must imagine him," says Federn, " in the gay feasts of Florence, of which the chroniclers tell, with their baldechins and tribunes hung with wreaths of flowers, the great festival of St. John's Day, when the young men clad in white, led by the Signor d'Amore, went singing and dancing up the street of Santa Felicita, and women and girls also in wreaths of flowers partook of the festivities, and music and song and ringing bells filled the air with joyful sounds. It was still the time of fine chivalrous manners, the time of troubadours and of minstrelsy." 2 Dante, no doubt, witnessed such scenes, and, with his keen sense of the picturesque, must have appreciated their effectiveness. 1 See chapter on the " Vita Nuova," in which Dante's love for Beatrice fair lady or phantom is fully discussed. 2 Op. cit. p. 200. 12 HANDBOOK TO DANTE But it may be questioned whether he shared in them. He was constitutionally studious and shy; and, in later life, he had a positive aversion for the bold manners of the Florentine ladies. Even in his youth he expressed a desire to exchange the riot of the city for the solitude of the wide ocean, in company with chosen friends. Aloofness from the common concerns of life was characteristic of the school of poets to which Dante belonged, and, notably, of Guido Cavalcanti, its most eminent representative and Dante's chief friend. Boc- caccio tells us that the gentlemen of Florence had a kind of convivial club, which met at their respective houses; and on one day of the year they used to ride "triumphantly" through the city, "performing tilts, tourneys, and other martial exercises." Persistent efforts were made to induce Cavalcanti to join this club, but without success. 1 If Dante took part in social functions of any kind, it is far from unlikely that he attended the dinners of this joyous fraternity. It is beyond a doubt that, after the death of Beatrice, he fell into evil courses, and had a boon companion in Forese Donati, a great glutton. Guido Cavalcanti, who had praised his maiden effort in poetical composition, admonished him for his temporary lapse in scathing terms : I come to thee by daytime constantly, But in thy thoughts too much of baseness find ; Greatly it grieves me for thy gentle mind And for thy many virtues gone from thee : " Decameron," vi, 9. LIFE OF DANTE 13 It was thy wont to shun much company, Unto all sorry concourse ill-inclined; And still thy speech of me heart-felt and kind Had made me treasure up thy poetry. But now I dare not, for thy abject life, Make manifest that I approve thy rhymes; Nor come I in such sort that thou may'st know. Oh ! prythee, read this sonnet many times, So that that evil one who bred this strife Be thrust from thy dishonoured soul, and go. ' Cavalcante, Guide's father, is placed among the un- believers in the " Inferno," 2 and Guido himself was regarded as an atheist. Indeed, despite his pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James of Compostella, his sceptic ism may be considered proved. Among Dante's liter- ary friends were Lapo Gianni and Cino of Pistoia, the latter of whom stood very high in Dante's esteem, and is constantly cited in the " De Vulgari Eloquentia " in conjunction with "his friend," i.e., Dante himself. It may be observed, in passing, that Cino indited a .son- net on the death of Beatrice, and there is ample evi- dence that these poets formed a kind of brotherhood not devoid of that "vainglory" which Bacon discovered and condoned in noble intellects. A musical acquaintance of Dante was Casella, Whom he woo'd to sing Met in the milder shades of Purgatory. 3 The affectionate character of their meeting leaves no atom of doubt as to the reality of their friendship. 1 Rossetti's tr. 2 C. x. 3 Milton, Sonnet to Mr. H. Lawes. i 4 HANDBOOK TO DANTE The same certainty cannot be felt in the case of the artist Giotto. Faith in Dante's acquaintanceship with him depends on a tradition preserved by Benvenuto da Imola, and others of a later date, but it is a tradi- tion which the world will surrender very unwillingly, since it has some bearing on the genuineness of the portrait of the poet attributed to Giotto. It is reassur- ing that Kraus, who has gone fully into the subject, accepts the {portrait as authentic, and believes that it was executed between 1334 and 1337 many years after Dante's decease. 4. MILITARY SERVICE On nth June, 1289, the Florentines fought the fuorusciti) or banished Ghibellines, and their allies of Arezzo, in the plain of Campaldino, now a paradise of fruitful vines, and defeated them. Bruni states that, in one of his letters, Dante records that he was present at this combat, in the front ranks of the cavalry, and describes himself as being then " no child in arms." It is possible, therefore, that he took part in the opera- tions of the previous year, when the same two cities were at war. In the August of 1289, or, according to Del Lungo, in 1290, the Pisan town of Caprona capitulated to the joint forces of Florence and Lucca; and, if Benvenuto may be believed, Dante was in this expedition also. Allusions to both the battle and the siege occur in the "Commedia," 1 and Dante speaks as if he had been an eye-witness of the occurrences. 1 " Purg." v, 22; " Inf." xxi, 95. LIFE OF DANTE 15 5. POLITICS AND MARRIAGE The spirit of faction ran riot in the cities of Italy, and nowhere more than at Florence, in which, as in neighbouring communities, the inhabitants were divided into well-defined, historical parties, known as Guelfs and Ghibellines. In the broadest sense the former supported the Pope in his claim to theocratic govern- ment, and favoured democratic constitutions in the urban republics ; the latter were adherents of the Em- peror, and formed the aristocratic element in the municipalities. Dante's family was Guelf, and Dante himself remained a member of that party until after his banishment, when he substantially adopted the political creed of the Ghibellines. Guelf and Ghibel- line are really disguised German names, the former representing Welf and the latter Waiblingen: and, originally, the rivalry the terms import lay between the House of Hohenstaufen and the Saxon Dukes of Bavaria. In Italy local feuds were often the true source and life of these divisions. The " Commedia " contains a number of allusions to Florentine history, 1 and Dante accepts the traditional account of the formation of the parties in his own city, tracing it to a quarrel between the Amidei and'the Buondelmonti in the year 1215. As we shall see, Dante's exile was due to a reconstitution of the factions, or, it may be more correct to say, a split in the ranks of the victorious Guelfs, arising from a family difference that had no- thing to do with high politics. 1 See especially " Par." xvi. 1 6 HANDBOOK. TO DANTE Dante's entrance into the stormy arena of public affairs is ascribed by Boccaccio to his marriage, which took place in the last decade of the thirteenth century, apparently about the year 1 292. His bride was Gemma, daughter of Manetto Donati, who was a member of a family famous in the annals of Florence. The pair had four children, Pietro, Jacopo, Antonia, and Beatrice, though doubt has been entertained about the last, whilst some biographers say that there were seven children in all. Dante nowhere mentions his wife by name, and the character of their relations has been warmly debated. Boccaccio states that, after the separation necessitated by Dante's banishment, he had no wish for his wife's society; and this assertion has led to the conclusion that the fault was wholly or mainly on Gemma's side that she was, in fact, a shrew. We learn, however, from the same authority, that she was a good mother and a careful housewife, and Dante's distinction as a poet is no guarantee that he was a model husband. Probably it was a marriage of convenience, not of affection, and is said, indeed, to have been arranged by Dante's relations as a remedy for his distress on account of the death of his first love. Dante was twenty-eight years of age when the drastic reform of Giano della Bella was accomplished. The grandi, or nobles, of Florence were a turbulent class, and broke the peace of the city by frequent battles in the streets. In order to check their arrogance, Giano formulated certain "ordinances of justice," by which thirty-seven families were perpetually excluded from the sinoria or government; and that the statute might LIFE OF DANTE 17 not be evaded, no one belonging to any of these families was permitted to abdicate his rank and descend to the level of an ordinary citizen. The execution of justice was confided to a Gonfalonier (standard-bearer), who was empowered to take summary action against noble offenders by attacking them with the militia, razing their houses, and haling them before the podesta, or chief magistrate always a foreigner to be punished according to their guilt. The basis of the new constitution was the guilds, and only those who were enrolled in one or other of these trade unions were qualified to take part in public administration. On attaining the legal age of thirty, Dante was entered in one of the seven Greater Guilds that of the physicians and apothecaries, in which artists were included. He was elected to the Council of the Podesta, and that of the Capitudini, or Heads of the Guilds; and in another council that of the Hundred Men we find him an active debater, oppos- ing, perhaps, a grant of money to Charles the Cripple, King of Jerusalem and Apulia, in support of his cam- paign against the rebels of Sicily. During his six years of service from 1295 to 1301 Dante is credited with the performance of no fewer than fourteen separate embassies. This is a palpable exaggeration, contradicted by the ascertained fact that in the years when he is represented as journeying to Naples, Rome, Hungary, and France, he was almost continuously at Florence. It is known, however, that he went on a mission to the tiny republic of San Gemignano, in connection with the renewal of the c i8 HANDBOOK TO DANTE Guelfic League. This was in May, 1299. One homely piece of information is that he was chosen to super- intend the repairs of Via di San Procolo, 1 which is a tribute to his versatility, and seems like a forecast of the engineering skill displayed in his construction of the Inferno. From the middle of June to the middle of August, 1 300, Dante was one of the six priors who constituted the signoria. His promotion to this office undoubtedly proves that he enjoyed the respect and confidence of his fellow citizens, but we must beware of attaching too much importance to the distinction. As the tenure of the magistracy was limited to two months, and it was shared with five colleagues, it is evident that many Florentines could boast the same honour. To Dante the preferment was the cause of most of his woes. The Ghibellines had been expelled or deposed, but the Florentine community was now divided into Bianchi and Neri (whites and blacks). The infection was imported from Pistoia, where the numerous de- scendants of one Messer Cancelliere, with their friends, formed hostile camps, calling themselves Cancellieri Bianchi and Cancellieri Neri respectively. The people of Pistoia invoked the mediation of the Florentines, who entered the city and relegated the furious partisans to the neighbourhood of Florence. The result of this ill-judged proceeding was that the Bianchi took refuge in the houses of their kinsmen the Cerchi, and the Neri in those of Frescobaldi, and the feud was ex- tended to Florence. 1 Now the Via cle' Pandollini. LIFE OF DANTE 19 This was the difficult situation with which the Priors were confronted in 1300, and they attempted a solu- tion by banishing the chiefs of the Neri to the Cas- tello della Pieve, and those of the Bianchi to Sarzana. Amongst the latter was Guido Cavalcanti, who, having sickened in the pestilential air of Sarzana, was per- mitted to return to Florence, where he soon died. It has been frequently cited as a notable instance of Dante's inflexible justice that he should have con- curred in this treatment of his greatest friend, but the order of events as recorded by Villani renders it cer- tain that Dante was no longer in office when this measure was adopted. Not unnaturally, the Ghibel- lines sought to make capital out of these troubles by promises of good government, and members of that party were creeping into public positions, to the no small alarm of the Guelf leaders. For a time the Bianchi held the upper hand; their opponents were detected in a conspiracy, and the Neri chiefs, who had been allowed to return, were once more banished in June, 1301. In this same month Dante voted with the minority of the Council of the Hundred Men against furnishing troops to the Pope. Already he had been drawn into the vortex of faction and passed for a Bianco. But it is time that we turned our attention to the actions of the Holy See, since Dante attributes his exile directly to Boniface VIII. During the poet's term of office as prior, the Pope despatched Cardinal Matteo d'Acquasparta to Florence with the title of peacemaker. Boniface had revived the pretensions of 2 q HANDBOOK TO DANTE his predecessors to universal jurisdiction, and when Albert of Habsburg had applied for the Pope's con- firmation of his election as emperor, he had replied haughtily Ego sum imperator. It would seem also that the Pontiff laid special claim to Tuscany, as the former domain of the Countess Matilda, who, in 1175, had bequeathed her patrimonial estates to the Church. On his arrival the Cardinal was received by the Florentines with acclamation, but soon their sus- picions were aroused. "Those," says Villani, "of the White party, who directed the government of the country, from a fear of being deprived of their posi- tion and being deceived by the Pope and the Legate . . . would not obey; for which reason the said Legate was angered, returned to court, and left Florence ex- communicated and under an interdict." l Dante, as one of the priors, was responsible for the disobedience to Papal authority, and became a marked man. Sub- sequent events tended to widen the breach. When the rest of the Neri returned to Florence, Corso Donati remained at Rome inflaming the Pope's mind against the Bianchi, whom he represented as little better than Ghibellines. Then came Dante's resolu- tion, quod de servitio faciendo domino papae m 'hi 7 fiat, which must have appeared to the Curia convincing proof of his contumacy. 6. EXILE In 1301 the Pope, who was in secret league with the Neri, resolved to appoint a fresh peacemaker, and, 1 viii, 40. LIFE OF DANTE 21 on ist November, Charles of Valois, brother of Philip le Bel of France, entered Florence with an unarmed retinue. He had previously given a written assurance to the Priors that he would not act the part of a sovereign, but his peaceful professions were soon be- lied by the treacherous prince, who demanded large subsidies and stationed guards at the gates. Corso Donati, an ominous figure, rode into the city, attended by many friends, and a veritable panic ensued. The great bell was tolled, but there was no response to the summons, and the Priors, having resigned their offices, were succeeded by a signoria of the Neri party, who retaliated on their opponents in the most terrible fashion. Banishment, confiscation, and demolition of property were the order of the day. A new podesta, Cante de' Gabrielli, of Agubbio fulminated a decree against Dante and four associates, in which they were sentenced to a fine of 5,000 gold florins for various crimes, such as fraud, peculation, bribery, and rebellion against the Pope and his Vicar. In default of payment within three days their posses- sions were to be forfeited and they were to be banished from the province of Tuscany for two years. Whether payment were made or not, they were declared in- capable of ever holding any office under the Republic. This decree was dated 2yth January, 1301-2. On ist March another decree was issued, in which it was set out that, the accused having neither obeyed the summons nor paid the fine, their exile was made per- petual, and any of them who entered Florentine terri- tory was condemned to be burnt alive. In 1311, and 22 HANDBOOK TO DANTE again in 1315, the sentence of outlawry was confirmed, and twenty years after his death, Dante was still, to Florentine officialdom, a rebel and a peculator. Dante constantly affirmed his innocence of the crimes laid to his charge, and till recent years his denial, combined with the testimony of all his bio- graphers and the Guelf historian Villani, has seemed adequate disproof of the accusations levelled at him. Papa points out, however, that corruption was then almost universal, and Englishmen will naturally recall that the names of Bacon and Marlborough are sullied by dishonesty, proving that genius in itself is no safe- guard against this particular weakness. Dante was overwhelmed with debt, and that would have made the temptation all the stronger. In one of his canzoni there is a passage which, in the opinion of some, amounts to a confession that he was not entirely free from blame. 1 Still, we should hesitate to construe it as an admission that he was justly condemned. The person who obtained possession of Dante's property was Boccaccio Adimari, whose violence and rapacity inspired the allusion to The insolent race that like a dragon follows Whoever flees, and unto him that shows His teeth or purse is gentle as a lamb.' 2 Dante never forgave those who had been concerned in bringing about his exile. Boniface and Corso Donati, especially, were the objects of his vindictive hate, and as he could not punish them in any other 1 Canz. 3, xx, 88-9. ' "Par." xvi, 115-7. LIFE OF DANTE 23 way, gloated over their misfortunes in this world and their imagined tortures in the next. Dante's active career was now, to all intents and purposes, closed. For a time he co-operated with his fellow. Bianchi and the Ghibellines, but ultimately conceived a disgust for both. In the " Paradise " l he pillories a certain Lapo Salterello. Benvenuto says of this person that he was "a litigious and loquacious man, and very annoying to Dante during his exile." In the " Inferno," ~ mention is made of one Camicion de Pazzi, a murderer, who tells Dante that he is waiting for Carlino to " exonerate " him, i.e. by his greater weight of iniquity. Carlino de; Pazzi, for a sum of money, surrendered to the Neri the fortress of Piano in Valdarno, which he was defending, with the result that many exiled Bianchi were captured and put to death. If these comrades are specimens of those with whom Dante was associated on the morrow of his banishment, it is no wonder that he formed a party by himself. Dante's name appears in a document signed in the abbey church of San Gaudenzo, at the foot of the Alps, in which it was agreed to indemnify Ugolino di Feliccione Ubaldini and his sons for any fosses sus- tained through the operations against the Castello di Montaccianico. The document is undated, but some excellent authorities, including Del Lungo and Todes- chini, assign it to the year 1302. There seems to be little doubt that Dante's meeting with the other fugitives at San Gaudenzo occurred on 8th June, 1302. 1 xv, 128. 2 xxxii, 68. 24 HANDBOOK TO DANTE Bruni's account is that the exiles assembled at Gargonza, where they held many discussions, and finally established themselves at Arezzo, where they appointed Count Alessandro da Romena captain- general and elected a council of twelve, of >vhom Dante was one. They continued to hope against hope until 2oth July, 1304, when they made a grand attack upon Florence, in which they were joined by allies from Arezzo, Bologna, and Pistoia. One of the gates was seized and part of the Florentine territory con- quered, but the expedition proved fruitless, and Dante, in despair, betook himself to Verona, where he was received very courteously by the della Scala. In point of fact his withdrawal from the party took place somewhat earlier, since Bartolommeo della Scala, the "great Lombard" of the "Paradiso," died on yth March, 1304. According to Bruni, whilst Dante was at Verona, he humbled himself to write frequent letters to members of the victorious party at Florence with a view to his recall. Other letters were addressed to the Florentine people, and among the rest a long epistle beginning Papule mee, quid tibi fed? From Verona Dante may have proceeded to Bologna, as Villani records that he did at some time during his exile in 1305 ? for the purpose of study; and there he may have met Messer Fabbro, who receives honour- able mention in the " Purgatorio." * In 1306 Dante was almost certainly at Padua, and in the October of that year he was in the Lunigiana, where he was em- ployed by the Marchesi Malaspina to conclude a treaty 1 xiv, ioo. LIFE OF DANTE 25 with the^ Bishop of Luni. Dante's visit to Guido Sal- vatico in the Casentino, of which Boccaccio speaks, appears to have occurred in 1307. It may be noted that Manentessa, the wife of that nobleman, who seconded her husband's hospitality to the wandering poet, was a daughter of Buonconte of Montefeltro. 1 Whilst there, he is supposed to have written the letter to Moroello Malaspina, together with the accompany- ing poem, in which he owns to a passion for an Alpine beauty, who, according to the Anonimo Fiorentino, was of Pratovecchio. There is reason to think that in 1308 Dante was at Forli, acting as secretary to Scarpetta degli Ordelaffi. Flavio Biondo, the historian of the place, affirms that letters dictated by Dante were still to be seen in his time. (Flavio died in 1463.) One Messer Marchese, a tippler of Forli, is mentioned in a passage of the " Purgatorio," ' that possesses biographical value ; and there are other references to the neighbourhood notably in the sixteenth canto of the " Inferno," where Dante paints a vivid picture of a waterfall. Both Villani and Boccaccio assert that Dante travelled to Paris, and the latter adds that he triumph- antly disputed against the ablest scholars in the theo- logical school of the university. Some latter-day critics of unquestioned eminence have been inclined to scout this account of a visit to France, believing it to be a legend based on Dante's theological knowledge, which he might easily have acquired elsewhere. In so far as the story depends on the allusion to Sigier and the 1 "Purg." v. 2 xxiv, 31. 26 HANDBOOK TO DANTE Rue du Fouarre in the tenth Canto of the " Paradise," it may be frankly admitted that the evidence is worth little or nothing. The Rue du Fouarre (Street of the Straw) was the Quartier Latin of the Middle Ages, and as for Sigier (or Siger, as the name should be spelled), Dante might have heard enough of that un- lucky champion of freedom without going beyond the limits of the peninsula. The tradition that Dante studied at Oxford, to which Gladstone, Plumptre, and other English enthusiasts have clung, is utterly im- probable, but Villani's testimony regarding the poet's residence in Paris is not to be lightly laid aside. If this chapter in his life be real, it must be allotted to the year 1309. In the twenty-fourth Canto of the " Purgatorio," Dante refers to a stay at Lucca, and a scandal that arose out of a friendship between himself and a young lady of the place. Gaspary suggests that this occurred between 1307 and 1310, but in those days Lucca was an ally of Florence. From June, 1314, to April, 1316, Uguccione della Faggiuola was tyrant of the town, and then Dante would have been safer. Dante's son, Pietro, adopted the view that the affair in question was a guilty liaison? but Buti, a fourteenth-century commentator, states that " he formed an attachment to a gentle lady called Madonna Gentucca, of the family of Rossimpelo, on account of her great virtue and modesty, and not with any other love." In 1310, the Emperor Henry VII arrived in Italy, and Dante trusted that the two objects on which he 1 SeeScheffer-Boichorst/'AusDanle's Verbannung,"pp. 216-8. LIFE OF DANTE 27 had set his heart the restoration of Imperial ascend- ancy and his own return to Florence were in a fair way of fulfilment. If the epistle to the Emperor is genuine, the poet paid his court to the monarch, and sought to promote the success of the expedition by advising him to raise the siege of Brescia. Henry entered Rome, where he was crowned by the Papal legates, and he then proceeded to invest Florence. Dante's heart must have beat high at the news, but poet and emperor were both doomed to disappoint- ment. Florence was not captured. Worse was to follow. Henry was on the march to attack King Robert of Naples, when, on 23rd August, 1313, he suddenly expired at Buonconvento. It was expected that Frederick of Aragon would assume the leader- ship of the Ghibelline cause, but that prince retired to Sicily, and refused to intervene in Italian affairs. Accordingly, Dante has never a good word to say of him. Very different is his attitude towards Can Grande della Scala, who was elected captain of the Ghibelline league in 1318, and from whom the poet anticipated great indeed, the greatest things. During the last years of his life Dante fixed his headquarters at the court of Guido Novello da Polenta at Ravenna. Thither, if his letter to that nobleman is authentic, he must have repaired as early as 1313, but this circumstance does not preclude one or several visits to Can Grande at Verona, and the anecdotes recorded by Petrarch, and quoted by Balbo in his Life of Dante, 1 almost necessitate this conclusion. 1 Mrs. Bunbury's tr. ii, 207. 28 HANDBOOK TO DANTE 7. DEATH AND BURIAL Guido Novello, a nephew of Francesca da Rimini, the fair sinner compassionated by Dante in the " Inferno," ' employed him as an ambassador to Venice, for the purpose of staving off the war with which he was threatened by that republic and Forli. On his way back, Dante was seized by mortal sickness, and died at Ravenna on the night of i3th September, 1321. He was buried with great honour at the Church of St. Peter (now the Chiesa di San Francesco), and it was intended by Guido Novello to erect a sumptuous tomb to his memory. Soon afterwards, however, Dante's patron and admirer was driven from Ravenna, and thus the project was defeated, but in 1483, Bern- ardo Bembo, father of the celebrated cardinal, gave effect to the design by commissioning a superb monument. Dante's life is a torso in all outer respects broken and incomplete, but throughout he kept his eyes steadily fixed on the prize of poetical immortality, symbolized, perhaps, by the constant stars, with the mention of which each cantica of the "Commedia" closes. Accomplished amidst wretchedness, weariness, exile, perpetual disappointment, and ill-relished depend- ence, the Sacred Poem is a perfect and inspiring ex- ample of moral courage and intellectual pains. Sic itur ad astra. 1 "Inf."v. CHAPTER II EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES i. GENERAL IN the preceding chapter reference has been made to Dante's letters always in a cautious and hesi- tating tone, such as befits the general uncertainty of the subject. These letters relate to the historical aspects of Dante's career, and therefore with the facts or probabilities fresh in our minds, we may well pro- ceed to consider the epistles and eclogues before be- stowing attention on those compositions which are unquestionably genuine, and on which his great reputa- tion so securely depends. As Mr. Gardner observes, the point of departure for any such study is Villani's rubric: " Amongst others he wrote three noble epistles. One he sent to the Florentine government, complaining of his unmerited exile. Another to the Emperor Henry, when he was at the siege of Brescia, chiding him for his delay and almost prophesying. The third to the cardinals of Italy, when there was the vacancy after the death of Pope Clement, in order that they might agree in choosing an Italian pope. All in Latin with lofty diction and with excellent sentences and author- 29 3 o HANDBOOK TO DANTE ities, which were much commended by the wise and understanding." l Next we have Dante's statement in " Vita Nuova " 2 that, after the death of his lady, he wrote to the princes of the country regarding its state, taking for commencement the words of the prophet Jeremiah: Quomodo sedet sola civitas! It is worthy of remark that the letter addressed to the cardinals of Italy in 1314, supposing the extant epistle to be genuine, begins with those words. The latter is, of course, not to be confounded with that mentioned in the " Vita Nuova," which would have been composed many years pre- viously. Another matter for observation is that the second and third books of the " De Monarchia," which may be described as an epistle on a grand scale, are introduced with quotations from the Old Testament, proving that Dante had a predilection for this ecclesiastical sort of preface. It may be added that the practice, on the part of distinguished writers, of addressing governments and communities, may be traced, as far as Italy is concerned, to the example of Guittone of Arezzo, who wrote more than one epistle to the Florentines, the most interesting being the fourteenth letter, which refers to the battle of Monte- aperto. Returning to Dante, Cecco d'Ascoli, an eccentric contemporary, claims to have received a letter from him when the poet was at Ravenna;' 1 and Boccaccio asserts that Dante wrote many letters in prose, a number of which were still to be seen. Bruni speaks 1 >x, 136. - S xxxi. : ' "Acerba,"ii, 12. EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 31 of several letters, one of which must have corre- sponded, with respect to its tenor, to Epistle VI in the " Oxford Dante." In another the poet is said to have stated his unwillingness to take part in the siege of Florence. Bruni not only cites Dante's letters, but describes his handwriting, which, he informs us, was thin, long, and very correct, as he could testify from personal inspection. If the biographer reproduces the ipsissima verba of the letters from which he culls, some of them must have been in Italian. It is more likely, however, that he translated from Latin originals, Dante not having emancipated himself from the trammels of mediaeval custom in this particular. A letter to Guido da Polenta is in Italian, but it is almost universally rejected as a clumsy forgery, and is not to be found in the Oxford edition of Dante's works. Still, it must not be forgotten that Dante was one of the greatest of innovators in the use of the vernacular, differing in that respect from Petrarch, who was also a voluminous letter-writer. The " Oxford Dante " contains ten letters, all of which are at least discussible. The general attitude towards the Dantesque letters is questioning, and the views that have been put forward represent various degrees of scepticism. Imbriani ' will not allow that any of them are genuine, and Scartazzini, 2 though he would fain grant that three or four are what they pro- fess, arrives at the reluctant conclusion that not one of them is beyond reasonable doubt. With others it is a matter of picking and choosing, letters being pro- 1 " Propugn." xiii, 2", 229-33. '" " Dantologia," p. 341. 32 HANDBOOK TO DANTE nounced genuine or spurious in accordance with purely subjective canons of criticism. Mr. Edmund G. Gardner has devoted a valuable essay to the topic of Dante's letters, and in the face of the desolating scepticism which leaves hardly one stone upon another, his verdict possesses uncommon interest. He decides that " setting aside the letters to Cino da Pistoia and to Moroello Malaspina, which are usually rejected as spurious . . . the probability in favour of the genuineness of the Epistles to the Princes and People, to the Florentines, to the Emperor, and to the Italian Cardinals, together with the two Eclogues, is so strong as almost to amount to certitude; and the arguments against the Letter to the Florentine friend, and the Epistle to Can Grande seem to me decidedly the reverse of conclusive." 1 He concedes the possibility that the Epistles to the Emperor and to the Cardinals are fourteenth-century forgeries based on Villani's statement and concocted for political purposes, but in disproof of this suggestion, he appeals to the internal evidence of the letters, which, if they are spurious, reveal a striking acquaintance with Dante's modes of thought, when tested by corresponding passages in the " Commedia." The question is, therefore, whether these are not undesigned coincidences due to common authorship. On this point it need only be observed that the rigid application of this principle might carry Mr. Gardner farther than he might be willing to go, as it is easy to indicate similarities of language and senti- ment between letters which he accounts genuine, and 1 Dante's "Ten Heavens," p. 296. EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 33 those that he excludes. Close investigation will bring to light links of connection, in the shape of words and phrases, which might set before us the choice of ac- cepting or rejecting practically the whole collection. As regards the letter to Moroello Malaspina, which is especially an object of suspicion, it contains expres- sions parallel to some contained in Canzone XI. Until late in the eighteenth century only one letter of Dante was known to exist that to Can Grande (X). Translations of those to the Princes and People of Italy and the Emperor considered to be the work of Marsilio Ficino were available also, and that was all. The first addition to this scanty store was made by Dionisi, who published Epistle IX. In 1827 Witte printed the original of the letter to the Emperor (VII), the letter to the Italian Cardinals (VIII), and that to Cino of Pistoia (IV). Continuing his researches, he discovered among the MSS. presented to Gregory XV by Maximilian of Bavaria in 1622 a number of other letters attributed to Dante, including I, II, III, V, and VI in the "Oxford Dante." There were three more letters written in the name of the Countess G. of Battifolle to the Empress Margaret of Brabant, wife of Henry VII, which Witte l judged from internal evidence to have been Dante's compositions, but this opinion has received little support from the generality of scholars. We will now proceed to consider the ten epistles of our text in order which, as far as can be ascertained, is the chronological order. 1 "Essays on Dante," Lawrence and Wicksteed's tr., p. 221. D 34 HANDBOOK TO DANTE 2. EPISTLES I AND II Epistles I and II date from that comparatively early period of Dante's exile, when, according to Bruni, Bianchi and Ghibellines ranged themselves under the command of Count Alessandro da Romena, and elected a council of twelve for managing the affairs of the party, Dante being one. It has been suspected that Alessandro and the council are both mythical, since neither Villani nor any other contemporary seems to have known anything of them. They are named, however, in the inscription of Epistle I, which, if it is not a downright forgery, affords valuable con- firmation of Bruni's account. It will be observed that from the first word to the last there is nothing to indicate that Dante was concerned in the production, and Del Lungo maintains that it was written after the attempt of the exiles to storm Florence, when Dante had severed his connection with the party. The same writer affirms his belief that the document is genuine in the sense that it was drawn up at the time in other words, that it is the serious official communica- tion that it purports to be; and few persons, on a careful perusal of its contents, will find reason for denying this character to it. Although it is considered most improbable that Dante had anything to do with its production, a brief note on the circumstances in which it was composed will not be out of place. Early in 1304 Cardinal Nicholas of Ostia was despatched by the new pope, EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 35 Benedict IX, on a mission of peace to Tuscany, the Maremma, and Romagna. Forged letters created the impression that he unduly favoured the Bianchi; and on 8th May, when he attempted to enter Florence for the second time, admission was refused. This letter appears to have been written some time in March from the valley of the Upper Arno, and is couched in a strain of confident anticipation and reverent submis- sion, very different from what we should have expected in view of the hostile relations between the leaders of the Bianchi and the Papacy before the expulsion of the former from Florence, and the external fortunes of the party subsequently. The letter renders it evident that the Cardinal, in his desire to placate the Bianchi, had conceded too much. A certain Friar B. had been sent to the exiles with a promise of restoring them to their civic rights and giving back the laws and institu- tions to which they were attached. In return, the author or authors of the epistle express warm gratitude and filial obedience to the Cardinal, who, however, had undertaken more than he was able to perform. Epistle II is interesting for various reasons. As in the case of Epistle I, we are not obliged to regard the letter as either Dante's or a later forgery. It may be a genuine epistle written by somebody else. One stumbling-block in the way of believing that Dante was the author, is the startling contrast between the tone of this letter and the allusion to the House of Romena in the thirtieth canto of the " Inferno." This argument, however, is not conclusive, since we find another Alexander of more historical importance, 36 HANDBOOK TO DANTE praised for his liberality in the "Convivio," ' and yet assigned to the circle of Hell in which tyrants expiate their inhumanity. 2 Moreover, Dante does not spare his best friends, to whom he acknowledges his indebt- edness. But there is a suspicion that Alessandro da Romena, captain of the Bianchi, is a figment. The passage in the " Inferno," 3 which is supported by historical evid- ence, proves that there was an Alessandro, who, according to Passerini and Troya, was the son or brother of Guido Pace, 4 but the latter authority does not identify him with the Alessandro who is said to have commanded the exiles, and of whom, in that case, mention occurs only in Bruni's " Life of Dante," and in this letter. If there were two of the name then living, apart from the future Bishop of Urbino, who would have been a boy, the general of the Bianchi was nephew of the other. Passerini guesses that the Alessandro, whom he makes the eldest son of Guido Pace, and Troya represents as his brother, died in 1305, and Troya's later opinion was that Alessandro, the third son of Guido Pace, died in that year. Al- together it is a fine tangle, which can only be under- stood by means of genealogical tables, but in this, at any rate, we have a point of agreement that an Ales- sandro da Romena died in 1305, if, that is to say, the views of the rival heralds are worth anything at all. Provisionally, then, we may accept 1305 as the date of the present letter. 1 iv, II. 2 "Inf." xii, 107. 3 xxx, 77. 4 Witte, op. at. p. 182. EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 37 As to whether the epistle is Dante's, there is not much to show, but, if we accept it as a genuine letter of the period, it is quite probable that he wrote it. One cannot but be struck with the expression exul immeritus, which figures in the inscriptions of Epistles V, VI, and VII, and seems to have been adopted by Dante as a standing description. Again, the plea of poverty which he advances in the conclusion as an excuse for not attending the funeral of his illustrious comrade, will naturally remind us of the famous pass- age in the " Convivio," * in which he deplores his miserable lot. The grand manner is also rather in- dicative of Dantesque origin. 3. EPISTLE III Epistle III is remarkable both for its contents and the person to whom it is addressed. The topic with which it deals is a sudden and violent attack of love which has constrained the writer to break his good resolution not again to meddle with frivolous themes, but to make study his constant occupation. Accom- panying the letter was a copy of a poem which has been identified with Canzone XI, in the fifth stanza of which the lightnings, if not the thunders, of passion are similarly recorded. It has been considered ex- traordinary that Dante should have confided these sentiments to Moroello Malaspina, who had been commander of the Neri army that inflicted a crushing 38 HANDBOOK TO DANTE defeat on the Bianchi at Serravalle in 1302^ and, having conquered Pistoia for Florence and Lucca, had governed it as Capitano del Popolo. On the other hand, it must be remembered that, assuming this letter to have been written in 1307, some years had elapsed since Dante had renounced all connec- tion with the Bianchi as a party, and he had been in- timately associated with members of the Malaspina family. Dante praises Alagia, Moroello's wife, in the nineteenth canto of the " Purgatorio " ; 2 and in the same cantica he does not scruple to refer to an equi- vocal friendship with a lady of Lucca. The simile, in which he likens Love to an exile returning to his own country, with all the severity which usually marked coups d'etat in the city-republics, is most natural in the circumstances, and the phrase pitlsus a patria has already occurred in Epistle II. It may also be noted that the expression praesentis oratiunculae seriem re- sembles vestrantm Htterarum seriem in Epistle I, pointing to community of origin or imitation. 4. EPISTLE IV Epistle IV, addressed to Cino of Pistoia, is a fitting sequel to the foregoing, treating as it does of the philosophy of love. In the previous letter Dante (if Dante was the author) owns to a new attachment ; here the point on which Cino is supposed to have consulted him is whether, and in what way, the soul can be transformed from one passion to another. 1 " Inf." xxiv, 148. 2 11. 42-44. EPISTLES AND ECLOGUES 39 Dante decides that, while a passion may die, the faculty of desire, which is the seat of love, is reserved for further activity. He specifies Ovid's " De Rerum Transformatione," and Seneca's " Remedia Amoris," l as authoritative works, which his correspondent will do well to peruse; and he seems to have appended a versified discourse of his own, conjectured to be either Sonnet XXXVI of the " Oxford Dante," or Canzone I of the "Convivio." It should be pointed out that Sonnet XXXIV also, in which Dante taxes Cino, in reply to a sonnet received from him, with a dubious facility in transferring his affections, though contra- dictory in tone, belongs to the same cycle of composi- tions in respect of its subject. If we could be sure that the first four letters are genuine, they might be grouped as a single family, dating from the period between Dante's banishment and the advent of the Emperor Henry, and linked each to each by verbal affinities or identity of plan, such as the subjoining of a poem. The hyperbolical note dis- covered in the preceding epistles reappears in the fourth, the commencement of which is positively volcanic. 5. LETTER OF FRATE ILARIO Before proceeding to discuss the remainder of the epistles, it will be expedient to touch upon an effusion which is not found in the " Oxford Dante." Obviously, for it neither is nor purports to be a composition of 1 Apocryphal; Dante cites it, "Conv."iii, 8; " De Mon." ii, 8. 40 HANDBOOK TO DANTE the poet, though it is associated with his real or pre- tended letters in the Laurentian codex, an autograph of Boccaccio's. We allude to the famous letter of Frate Ilario. Scartazzini ridicules its pretensions, and, regarding it as so much fooling, takes occasion to make an excellent pun by dubbing it &preziosa ilarita. 1 Scheffer-Boichorst 2 was at one time strongly inclined to accept it as genuine; and very few readers will feel anything but regret at the sacrifice of the dramatic incident it relates as having occurred in the Convent of Santa Croce del Corvo in the Lunigiana. " Hither he came, passing through the diocese of Luni, moved either by the religion of the place or by some other feeling. And seeing him, as yet unknown to me and to all my brethren, I questioned him of his wishings and seekings there. He moved not, but stood silently contemplating the columns and arches of the cloister. And again I asked him what he wished, and whom he sought. Then slowly turning his head and looking at the friars and at me, he answered, ' Peace ! ' " Unfortunately, the genuineness of an Epistle is not to be determined by the mere desire that it may be authentic. To this point we shall have to recur in a later section. 3 Here, however, it may be recalled that Dante was undoubtedly in the Lunigiana in 1306, to which year Scheffer-Boichorst assigned the letter. It is addressed to Uguccione della Faggiuola, and con- veys the information that Dante proposed to dedicate 1 " Dantologia," p. 346. 2 Aus Dante's Verb. pp. 151 el se