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Dante Alighieri

Page 5

by Paget Toynbee


  * * *

  1 Villani, bk. vi. ch. 79.

  2 Villani, bk. vi. ch. 79.

  3 Villani, bk. vi. ch. 81; Inferno, x. 91-3.

  4 Villani, bk. vi. ch. 81.

  5 Villani, bk. vi. ch. 85.

  6 According to the reckoning of the Florentines, whose year began on 25 March, this was 26 February, 1265. See p. 36, note 3.

  7 Villani, bk. vii. ch. 9.

  8 Hitherto the office had always been filled by a single individual. The names of the two were Catalano de’ Malavolti and Loderingo degli Andalò, the former a Guelf, the latter a Ghibelline. Cf. Inferno, xxiii. 103-8.

  9 These were, the judges and notaries ; the merchants of Calimala, i.e. of French cloths ; the money-changers; the wool-workers; the physicians and apothecaries; the silk-workers and mercers ; and the furriers.

  10 The Calimala was the street which connected the Mercato Vecchio with the Mercato Nuovo. In it were located the cloth-merchants.

  11 Villani, bk. vii. ch. 13-14.

  12 Villani, bk, vii, ch. 15,

  13 Farinata had died in Florence about two years before. The name of his daughter was Beatrice; the actual date of her marriage to Guido Cavalcanti, by which they had two children, is unknown. Guido at the time of the betrothal cannot have been more than seventeen, at the outside.

  14 Villani, bk. vii. ch. 15.

  15 Villani, bk. vii. ch. 20.

  PART II

  DANTE IN FLORENCE

  CHAPTER I

  1265–1290

  Dante’s birth and ancestry—His father and mother—Cacciaguida—Geri del Bello—Beatrice Portinari—Episodes in the Vita Nuova—Folco Portinari—Death of Beatrice—Poetical correspondence with Cino da Pistoja, Guido Cavalcanti, and Forese Donati.

  DANTE ALIGHIERI1 was born in Florence in May,2 1265, a few months before, and, according to the Florentine reckoning,3 in the same year as, the great victory of Charles of Anjou over King Manfred at Benevento, which ruined the Ghibelline cause, and once more restored the Guelf supremacy in Florence and throughout Tuscany. Dante’s family were Guelfs.4 This he himself tells us in the Divina Commedia, in his account of his conversation with the Ghibelline Farinata degli Uberti in Hell. Dante having answered Farinata’s question as to who were his forefathers, Farinata says: “They were fierce foes of me and of my fathers and of my party, so that twice we scattered them” (i.e. in 1248 and 1260). To which Dante retorts: “If my side were driven out twice from Florence both times they returned (i.e. in 1251 and 1266), which your side have not been able to do”.5

  DANTE’S HOUSE IN FLORENCE

  Dante’s father, whose name was Alighiero, lived in the quarter of San Martino del Vescovo;6 he was the son of Bellincione degli Alighieri, and was descended, as is supposed, from the ancient and noble family of the Elisei, who lived in the Sesto di Porta San Piero in Florence. Boccaccio goes so far as to trace Dante’s descent from the noble Frangipani family of Rome, but of this connection we have no evidence. His connection with the Elisei, on the other hand, seems hardly doubtful. Several names occur among Dante’s ancestry which are common among the Elisei, and one of his ancestors, who is mentioned in the Divina Commedia, actually bore the name of Eliseo.7

  The name of Dante’s mother was Bella, but it is not known for certain to what family she belonged. There are grounds for believing that she was the daughter of Durante, son of Scolaio degli Abati (a Ghibelline family) ; in which case there can be little doubt that Dante’s Christian name (a contraction of Durante) was derived from his maternal grandfather. Dante’s father was a notary.8 He was twice married, and died when his son was about eighteen.9 Bella, who died in or before 1278, was Alighiero’s first wife, and Dante was their only child. By his second wife, Lapa, daughter of Chiarissimo Cialuffi,10 Alighiero had three children, a son Francesco,11 who survived his half-brother Dante more than twenty years, a daughter Tana (i.e. Gaetana),12 and another daughter,13 name unknown, who married one Leon Poggi. A son of this Leon Poggi, called Andrea, was an intimate friend of Boccaccio, who says that he bore a remarkable resemblance to his uncle Dante both in face and figure. From Andrea Poggi Boccaccio learned many details about Dante’s habits and manner of life.

  Dante’s father can hardly have been a person of much consequence in Florence; otherwise, as a Guelf, he would have shared the exile of his party after the disastrous defeat of the Florentine Guelfs at Montaperti (4 September, 1260), which, from the fact that Dante was born in Florence in 1265, it would appear that he did not do. At any rate if he did leave Florence on that occasion he must have returned before the rest of his party, since the restoration of the Guelfs did not take place, as has been related in a former chapter, until January, 1267.14 The only contemporary references to Alighiero occur in a poetical (and not very edifying) correspondence (or tenzone)15 between Dante and his friend Forese Donati, from whose expressions it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Dante’s father was either a personal coward or of little moral worth.

  Judging from the position of their house in the heart of the city, and from Dante’s own allusions in the Divina Commedia,16 the Alighieri would seem to have been a noble family, as nobility went in those days. The fact that they are not mentioned by Giovanni Villani in his several lists of the important Guelf families of Florence17 may be accounted for on the ground that though of “ancient and honourable lineage,”18 they were neither wealthy nor numerous.

  Nothing is known for certain of any of Dante’s ancestors further back than his great-great-grandfather, Cacciaguida, whose existence is attested by a document dated 9 December, 1189, in which his two sons, Preitenitto and Alighiero,19 bind themselves to remove a fig tree growing against the wall of the Church of San Martino. In another document recently discovered, and dated 28 April, 1131, appears the name of a Cacciaguida, son of Adamo,20 who on plausible grounds has been identified with Dante’s ancestor; in which case our knowledge of Dante’s ancestry goes back one generation further. Cacciaguida’s history, in so far as we are acquainted with it, is related in the Divina Commedia,21 where we are told that he was born in Florence in the Sesto di Porta San Piero about the year 1090; that he belonged (as is supposed) to the Elisei, one of the old Florentine families which boasted Roman descent; that he was baptized in the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence; that he had two brothers, Moronto and Eliseo; that his wife came from the valley of the Po (probably from Ferrara), and that from her, through his son, Dante got his surname of Alighieri; that he followed the Emperor Conrad III on the Second Crusade, and was knighted by him; and finally that he fell fighting against the infidel about the year 1147. Cacciaguida indicates 22 the situation of the house in which he and his ancestors lived in Florence as being “in the place where the last sextary is first attained by him who runs in the yearly horse-race,” i.e. on the boundary of the district known later as the Sesto di Porta San Piero.23

  By his wife, Alighiera degli Alighieri, Cacciaguida had two sons, already mentioned, namely, Preitenitto and Alighiero. The latter (who it seems, according to Pietro di Dante,24 Dante’s eldest son, married a sister of “la buona Gualdrada” of Inferno, xvi. 37, and daughter of Bellincion Berti of Paradiso, xv. 112; xvi. 99) in his turn had two sons, one of whom, Bellincione, was Dante’s grandfather; while the other, Bello (i.e. Gabriello), was the father of the Geri del Bello, in connection with whom Dante alludes in the Divina Commedia25 to a piece of family history, which shows that the Vendetta was a recognized institution in Florence in those days, and moreover that it was approved by Dante. It appears that Geri was a turbulent and quarrelsome person, and had stirred up bad blood among certain members of the Sacchetti family of Florence, one of whom retaliated by killing him. His murder had not been avenged at the time Dante wrote, and consequently Dante represents him as regarding himself, when they met in Hell, with a threatening and indignant mien because of this neglect on the part of his kindred. Subsequently, more than thirty years after the event, and quite possibly as a result of Dante’s allusion to th
e incident, Geri’s death was avenged by his nephews, who murdered one of the Sacchetti in his own house. This blood-feud between the Alighieri and the Sacchetti lasted till 1342, when an act of reconciliation26 was entered into between the two families at the instance of the Duke of Athens, the guarantor on the part of the Alighieri being Dante’s half-brother, Francesco, who appeared on behalf of himself, and his two nephews, Dante’s two sons, Pietro and Jacopo.

  Bellincione, the son of Alighiero, had four sons, of whom the eldest, Alighiero, was Dante’s father; the youngest, Brunetto, took part in the battle of Montaperti, where he was in charge of the Florentine Carroccio.

  That Dante was born in Florence we know from his own statements several times repeated in his works, the most explicit of which occurs in the Divina Commedia27 where he says: “I was born and bred up in the great city on the fair river Arno”. We know from himself too that, like his ancestor Cacciaguida, he was baptized in the ancient Baptistery of San Giovanni.28 Years afterwards, he tells us,29 he was instrumental in breaking the font for the purpose of rescuing from suffocation a small boy30 who had fallen into one of the circular spaces at the side, where the officiating priest stood during baptisms in order to escape the pressure of the crowd.31

  BAPTISTERY OF SAN GIOVANNI AT FLORENCE

  Of the history of Dante’s early years we know little beyond the episode of his love for Beatrice, which is narrated in the Vita Nuova. Dante says that he first saw Beatrice when she was at the beginning of her ninth year, and he had nearly completed his ninth year, that is to say in the spring of 1274. “Her dress on that day,” he narrates,32 “was of a most noble colour, a subdued and goodly crimson, girdled and adorned in such sort as best suited her very tender age.” At the moment when he saw her Dante’s heart was possessed by a passionate love for her, which from that time forward, he declares, completely mastered his soul. Boccaccio, who probably had the information from one of the Portinari family,33 and (quite independently) Dante’s own son, Pietro, tell us that this Beatrice was the daughter of Folco Portinari, a highly respected and influential citizen of Florence. Boccaccio gives the following description of the scene of their first meeting, as he, with his intimate knowledge of Florence and of Florentine ways, imagines it to have taken place:—

  “In that season of the year when the tender heavens clothe the earth once more with its adornments, and make it everywhere smile with many-coloured flowers mingled with green leaves, it was the custom in our city for the men and women of the several districts to hold festival together in companies, each in his own.34 Wherefore it came to pass that, among the rest, Folco Portinari, a man much in honour at that time among his fellow-citizens, had on the first of May assembled his neighbours for a festival at his own house. Among the company was the Alighiero of whom we have spoken, attended (as children are wont to attend their parents, especially on festal occasions) by Dante, who had not yet completed his ninth year. And it befell that mingling here with the others of his own age, both boys and girls, of whom there were many in the house of the giver of the feast, after the first course had been served, in childish fashion he began to play with the others in such wise as befitted his tender years. Among the crowd of children was a daughter of the aforesaid Folco, whose name was Bice (although Dante always called her by her full name Beatrice), and who was then about eight years old. She was very graceful and pretty in her girlish way, and very gentle and pleasing in her manners, and more grave and modest in her demeanour and speech than might have been expected of her years. Besides this the features of her face were very delicate and regular, and full not only of beauty but of such comeliness and charm that by many she was held to be little short of an angel. She then, such as I describe her, or, it may be, far more beautiful, appeared at this feast, not as I suppose for the first time, but for the first time with the power to kindle love, before the eyes of our Dante, who, though still a boy, received into his heart the beauteous image of her with so great affection that from that day forward, so long as he lived, it never departed from him.”35

  Nine years later, when they were both in their eighteenth year, that is to say in 1283, Dante saw Beatrice dressed all in pure white, walking in the street between two ladies older than herself. On this occasion she turned her eyes upon Dante, and saluted him. After this greeting, which, he says, seemed to reveal to him the utmost limits of happiness, Dante retired to the solitude of his own chamber and sat himself down to think of Beatrice. And as he sat thinking he fell asleep, and had a marvellous vision, whereon he composed a sonnet beginning

  “To every captive soul, and gentle heart,”36

  which is his earliest known composition. This sonnet he sent to various famous poets of the day, and among those from whom he received replies was Guido Cavalcanti, who from this time became Dante’s most intimate friend.37

  Later on, Dante meanwhile, in order to conceal his love for Beatrice, having paid attentions to another lady, Beatrice denied him her salutation, which plunged him into the deepest grief.38 The next time he saw her was at a wedding-feast, whither he had been taken by a friend, and on this occasion his emotion so overcame him that his confusion was remarked, and the ladies, including Beatrice herself, whispered and mocked at him, whereupon his friend, perceiving his distress, led him from the house.39 This episode may perhaps be connected with the marriage of Beatrice Portinari, to which Dante never directly refers in the Vita Nuova, but which is known to have taken place before the year 1288, her husband being Simone de’ Bardi,40 a member of one of the great banking-houses of Florence.41

  Not long after this Dante learned of the death of Beatrice’s father, Folco Portinari, whom he describes as a man “of exceeding goodness,”42 and who was a personage of no little importance in Florence, for he had held high office in the city, and had several times served as Prior.43 He was also a great public benefactor, for in June, 1288, the same year in which he made his will, he had founded the well-known hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence.44 Folco’s death, and the grief of Beatrice for him, brought into Dante’s mind the thought that one day Beatrice herself too must die; and in a very short time his forebodings were realised. Beatrice died, within six months of her father, in June, 1290, just on the completion of her twenty-fourth year.45 Dante was for a time over-whelmed with grief,46 but after a while he devoted himself to the study of philosophy, and having thereby regained his peace of mind, he made the resolve, which is recorded at the conclusion of the Vita Nuova, that, should his life be spared, he would write of Beatrice what had never yet been written of any woman, a resolve which was carried into execution in the Divina Commedia.

  A beautiful canzone on the death of Beatrice was addressed to Dante by his friend Cino da Pistoja,47 one of the “famosi trovatori,” to whom Dante had sent his earliest sonnet.48 In this canzone, from which it appears that Dante in his despair had been tempted to seek death, Cino strives to console him with the thought that Beatrice is glorified in heaven, where she watches over him and recalls his devotion to her on earth:—

  How ever shouldst thou see the lovely face

  If any desperate death should once be thine?

  From justice so condign

  Withdraw thyself even now: that in the end

  Thy heart may not offend

  Against thy soul, which in the holy place,

  In Heaven, still hopes to see her and to be

  Within her arms. Let this hope comfort thee.

  Look thou into the pleasure wherein dwells

  Thy lovely lady who is in Heaven crown’d,

  Who is herself thy hope in Heaven, the while

  To make thy memory hallowed she avails;

  Being a soul within the deep Heaven bound,

  A face on thy heart painted, to beguile

  Thy heart of grief, which else should turn it vile.

  Even as she seemed a wonder here below,

  On high she seemeth so,—

  Yea, better known, is there more wondrous yet.

&n
bsp; And even as she was met

  First by the angels with sweet song and smile,

  Thy spirit bears her back upon the wing,

  Which often in those ways is journeying.

  Of thee she entertains the blessed throngs,

  And says to them : “While yet my body thrave

  On earth, I gat much honour which he gave,

  Commending me in his commended songs”.

  Also she asks alway of God our Lord

  To give thee peace according to His word.49

  Cino, who subsequently wrote a canzone on the death of Dante himself,50 was one of several friends of his youth with whom Dante held a poetical correspondence. As in the case of Guido Cavalcanti,51 this friendship doubtless owed its origin to the fact of Dante’s having sent to him the sonnet referred to above, the first in the Vita Nuova, to which Cino returned a sonnet in reply.52 At least five other sonnets addressed by Cino to Dante have been preserved,53 and two of Dante’s to him,54 besides a Latin letter on a subject connected with love.55

  Guido Cavalcanti,56 one of the most distinguished poets of the day, and Dante’s earliest friend, addressed five sonnets to Dante57 (including his reply to Dante’s first sonnet), mostly on the subject of love; but one of them contains a severe reproof to Dante for falling away from his former high standard of life:—

  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.

  It was thy wont to shun much company,

  Unto all sorry concourse ill inclin’d:

  And still thy speech of me, heartfelt and kind,

  Had made me treasure up thy poetry.

  But now I dare not, for thine abject life,

 

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