Aldo s bernardo petrarch, laura, and the triumphs 1974

Petrarch, Laura, and theTriumphs
Aldo S. Bernardo
State University of New York Press Albany 1974

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Petrarch, Laura, and the Triumphs
Bernardo, Aldo S.
State University of New York Press
0873952898
9780873952897
9780585087047
English
Petrarca, Francesco,--1304-1374--Relations with
women, Noves, Laura de,--1308-1348, Petrarca,
Francesco,--1304-1374.--Trionfi.
1974
PQ4511.B47 1974eb
851/.1
Petrarca, Francesco,--1304-1374--Relations with

women, Noves, Laura de,--1308-1348, Petrarca,
Francesco,--1304-1374.--Trionfi.


Page iv

Published with assistance from the University Awards Committee of State University of
New York
Petrarch, Laura, and the Triumphs
First Edition
Published by State University of New York Press
99 Washington Avenue, Albany, New York 12210
© 1974 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Bernardo, Aldo S.
Petrarch, Laura, and the Triumphs.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Petrarca, Francesco, 1304-1374with womenLaura
de Noves. Relationship. 2. Noves, Laura de, 1308-1348.
3. Petrarca, Francesco, 1304-1374. Trionfi. I. Title.
PQ4511.B47
851'.I
74-22084
ISBN 0-87395-289-8
ISBN 0-87395-290-I microfiche

Page v

To My Beloved Mother
who instilled in me
the love of learning


Page vii

Contents
Preface
Introductory Notes
1. Laura and the Critics

ix
xiii
1

i. De Sanctis

2

ii. Croce

5

iii. Calcaterra

6

iv. Contini

14

v. Bosco

14

vi. Noferi

18

vii. Ramat

21

2. Laura and the Rime

26

i. The First Form of the Collection

26

ii. The Second Form of the Collection

28

iii. The Third Form of the Collection

29

iv. The Fourth Form of the Collection

32

v. The Fifth Form of the Collection

35

vi. The Sixth Form: First period

39

vii. The Sixth Form: Second period

41

viii. The Sixth Form: Third period

43

ix. The Sixth Form: Fourth period

47

x. The Seventh or Main Malatesta Form

51

xi. The Eighth or Quiriniano Form

56

xii. The Malatesta Supplements

56

xiii. The Ninth and Final Form

58

xiv. The Reordering of the Last Thirty Poems

60



Page viii

3. Laura in Petrarch's Latin Works

64

i. The Prose Letters

64

ii. Letters in Verse

68

iii. The Coronation Oration

75

iv. The Secretum

77

v. The Bucolicum Carmen

81

4. Petrarch's Triumphs and the Critics

88

i. Calcaterra

88

ii. Goffis

91

5. Triumphus Cupidinis

102

i. Triumphus cupidinis I

102

ii. Triumphus cupidinis 11

104

iii. Triumphus cupidinis III

107

iv. Triumphus cupidinis IV

108

6. From the Triumphus Pudicitiae to the Triumphus Famae

115

i. Triumphus pudicitiae

115

ii. Triumphus mortis I

119

iii. Triumphus mortis II

123

7. The Triumphus Famae and the Triumphus Temporis

128

i. Triumphus famae I

128

ii. Triumphus famae II

134

iii. Triumphus famae III

136

iv. Triumphus temporis

137

8. Triumphus Aeternitatis

141

9. Laura as Nova Figura

163

10. Conclusion

193

Notes

203


Bibliography
Index

219
223


Page ix

Preface
Only in Petrarch's coronation oration is it possible to gain real insight into his quasimystical attitude toward poetry. In it one senses the poet's thorough dedication to the art
not only as an activity reserved for the chosen few, but one on a par with the loftiest
human activity of all, maintaining, protecting, and defending one's homeland. Poets, like
Caesars, are deeply involved in assuring a better and happier future for mankind. Both
must possess a spark of divinity, for mere labor and dedication do not assure either
Caesars or poets. This is why the ultimate reward for both is symbolized in the laurel
crown whose leaves partake of qualities assuring an eternity of fame. Through his song
the poet must instill in his reader or listener a desire for virtue, in the sense of ben far,
just as in his battle and struggles a ruler seeks to accomplish a stable future for his
subjects. 1
In my book on the Africa2 I try to show the manner in which Scipio Africanus provided

Petrarch with a nearly ideal subject for his kind of poetry. A central point of the study is
that in the Africa, "Scipio summarizes in Latin a humanistic ideal whose counterpart
Petrarch had tried all his life to define in Italian through the image of Laura: a concept of
virtue that complements a concept of glory in a way that makes both acquire nearChristian hues."3 In the very first chapter of that book I also try to establish that in
Petrarch's aesthetic and moral philosophy there is the central conviction that ultimate
truth lies in the perfect fusion of the values inherent in poetry, history, and philosophythat
is to say, in beauty, glory and virtue. Just as in Scipio Petrarch thought he saw the
ultimate answer to the obvious clash between classical and Christian values, so in Laura
he sought a resolution to the conflict between spirit and flesh.
Given Petrarch's lofty concept of poetry as defined in the corona-


Page x

tion oration and as applied in the Africa, it is odd to speak of his love poetry as mere
outcries of the heart over an unrequited love simply because it is written in the
vernacular. The fact that so much of Petrarch's vernacular poetry was written during his
sojourns in Provence when the great bulk of his writing was in Latin, plus the fact that he
continued revising his lyrics down to the very last years of his life would seem to support
the contention that he deemed his subject matter rather than the language used of truly
central importance. From the moment he decided to give a definitive form to his
collection of lyrics he indicated his intention to endow the resulting body of poetry with
dimensions of meaning reflecting the high seriousness of learned Latin poetry.
Exactly what Petrarch sang when he celebrated Laura is a question that was asked by the
earliest commentators, but has been forgotten since the Romantics. The very fact that
Petrarch, as Dante before him, turns to a special form and metre in his attempt to sing
more appropriately of his beloved reveals a highly serious desire to endow Laura with a
dimension that goes beyond her image in the Canzoniere. It is indeed the Triumphs that
provide the catalyst sought by Petrarch to achieve the desired fusion of poetry, history
and philosophy. This consisted of a female figure that was considerably different from the

beloved of the Rime. Her role encompassed far more than one time, one place and one
man, while her greatest moments were her victories over cupidity and over time. She was
indeed a prefiguration of what the Romantics were later to call "the eternal feminine,"
and yet she was much more, for she was the outgrowth of what has been called "The
Chartrian ideal of a 'cohaerentia artium,' a perfect marriage of Philology and Mercury." 4
The purpose of this study is to analyze the poetic image of Laura from as many
perspectives as possible. The book is really a companion volume to my Petrarch, Scipio
and the 'Africa' (Johns Hopkins, 1962) since it attempts to examine Laura's image as
exhaustively as the previous study did the image of Scipio. Starting with the views of the
most important critics, it turns to the gradual evolution of the image in the Canzoniere as
the collection progressed through its many forms over most of the poet's lifetime. It then
examines the relatively rare occurrences of the image in Petrarch's Latin works before
turning to a detailed analysis of the Triumphs. Finally it undertakes a consideration of
Laura's image in terms of a new figura rather firmly anchored in a timehonored female
figure representative of the consolidation of wisdom and eloquence. The


Page xi

Laura of the Triumphs thus seemingly emerges as a figure showing the way to man's
moral, cultural and aesthetic fulfillment. As with Scipio in the Africa, however, she too
suffers considerably from the ambiguities resulting from the unfinished state of the
Triumphs. She nevertheless spawned a number of subsequent female figures that
became an integral part of the imaginative literature of Humanism, as the Conclusion will
show.
I am primarily indebted to the Guggenheim Foundation for a grant that allowed me to
spend a semester in the libraries of Florence in 196465 when a close reading of the early
commentators convinced me of the viability of my thesis. I am also grateful to the
Research Foundation of State University of New York for a summer grant in 1970, and to
the administration of SUNYBinghamton for a semester sabbatical in 1971. Finally, I wish

to express my deepest gratitude to my wife, Claudia, for her many sacrifices of time and
pleasure, and to Reta Mohney for her patient typing of the manuscript. Unless otherwise
stated, all translations into English are mine.


Page xiii

Introductory Notes
Quotations from the works of Petrarch are taken from the following editions unless
otherwise indicated:
Canzoniere
Ed. by Gianfranco Contini (Turin, 1964).
Triumphs
Trionfi, ed. Carlo Calcaterra (Turin, 1927).
Bucolicum carmen
Ed. by Antonio Avena (Padua, 1906).
Epistolae metricae
Poemata minora, ed. by Domenico Rossetti, Vols. II-III (Milan, 1831-1834).
Epistolae familiares
Le familiari, Vols. I-III ed. by V. Rossi and Vol. IV ed. by Rossi and Umberto Bosco
(Florence, 1933-1942).
Epistolae seniles
Lettere senile, trans. by G. Fracassetti, 2 vols. (Florence, 1869-1870).
Secretum
Prose, ed. by G. Martellott, P. G. Ricci, E. Carrara, and E. Bianchi (Milan and Naples,
1955), pp. 22-215.
Coronation Oration
E. H. Wilkins, Studies in the Life and Works of Petrarch (Cambridge, Mass., 1955), pp.
300-313.

Page 1

1
Laura and the Critics*
There is no disputing the fact that throughout Petrarch's life the two most consistent
sources of inspiration for his poetry were Scipio and Laura. In these two personages
Petrarch apparently saw the kind of foundations on which he felt that true poetry should
rest. In my book on Petrarch, Scipio and the Africa 1 I have analyzed Scipio's role in
Petrarch's poetic imagination. In this book I wish to do the same with Laura in an attempt
to show that the two are really complementary and represent, as it were, the opposite
sides of the same coin. Whereas in his abortive epic on Scipio's African campaigns
Petrarch attempted a fusion of Livy, Cicero and Virgil in the hope of producing a
distinctive work which enclosed the inherent values of History and Philosophy in the
glittering wrappings of Poetry; in his Canzoniere and Triumphs Petrarch sought to sing
and fuse the concomitant human ideals of Glory and Virtue within the wrappings of
Beauty, starting with a highly personal vision and ending with on unsuccessful attempt to
objectify the vision and apply it to Mankind generally.
Down through the ages, commentators and critics of Petrarch's Italian works have dealt
with Laura in a great variety of ways. Generally speaking, the very earliest commentators
showed concern either for her identity or for her allegorical significance. Following the
biography by the Abbé De Sade in the eighteenth century,2 interest in Laura's exact
identity began to wane. Nineteenth century Petrarchan criticism became primarily
philologicalaesthetic,
* A condensed version of Chapters One and Two was read at the SUNYBinghamton Conference on "Women in the
Middle Ages" held in May, 1973, and is scheduled to appear in the Proceedings of that Conference.


Page 2

and Laura was viewed basically as a beloved whose beauty had moved Petrarch to lyrical
song throughout most of his life. In keeping with the evolution of literary criticism since
then, subsequent critics have tended to disregard all the philological implications of
Laura, stressing rather her role as a persistent psychological stimulus of a complex love
drama. 3 As yet, no one, with the possible exception of Carlo Calcaterra, has undertaken
a truly comprehensive study showing the evolution or even the vicissitudes of Laura as a
purely poetic image either in the chronological succession of individual poems as Petrarch
wrote them and as they appear in the Canzoniere, or in the ordering of the poems as the
Canzoniere progressed from one form to the next. Nor, for that matter, has anyone
attempted to indicate in any extensive degree the distinction or connection between the
Laura of the Canzoniere and the Laura of the Triumphs. Since, however, previous criticism
has afforded some insights into the problem, it might be well to examine briefly the views
of those major critics who seemed to have the most to say on the subject.
i. De Sanctis
In his Saggio critico sul Petrarca4 De Sanctis distinguishes between the accomplishments
of Petrarch the man of letters and Petrarch the poet by noting that ''Le sue fatiche di
erudito gli hanno acquistato uno de' primi luoghi tra i benemeriti delle lettere; ma la
gloria, il nome di grand'uomo glieli'hanno acquistato le sue rime. E giunto a noi,
accompagnato con Laura" (p. 45). In tracing the particular directions taken by love poetry
in Italy, De Sanctis states: "Il concetto fondamentale è l'amore religiosamente chiamato
amicizia spirituale, e filosoficamente platonica, che suppone un'amata onesta ed un
amante cortese e gentile; un amore fonte di virtù, e, come dice il Petrarca, 'd'animosa
leggiadria,' tale cioè che dà animo ad opere leggiadre" (p. 49). Each love poet,
furthermore, had his own personal world, "più o meno vasto," in which he believed and
which influenced his imagination. Petrarch's world was Laura (p. 80). The fact that
Petrarch's love remains unrequited through-


Page 3

out causes De Sanctis to pose the problem of how best to define Laura. He concludes
that "Laura è una Dea, non è ancora una donna . . . è il genere, il femminile." She has
not yet assumed human for nor entered the stream of human events. She is rather Man's
ideal in life's journey, his star, the beacon that marks his ultimate destination. As with
earlier conventional types, she is an exemplar of perfection that directs the soul to the
contemplation of heavenly things. "E scala al Fattore, i suoi occhi mostrano la via che
conduce al cielo, da lei viene virtù e santità." And yet, as with Dante, Petrarch's PlatonicChristian tendencies prompted him to imply such super-human traits without losing sight
of the beloved's earthly body. It is always Laura's physical beauties that provide the
jumping-off point. Indeed, for De Sanctis, "Laura è la più bella creatura del Medio Evo, e
non ha altra vicina che Beatrice. Il poeta ne ha fatta una gloriosa trasfigurazione" (pp.
85-88).
De Sanctis' critical acumen emerges full force in his attempt to define this transformation.
Laura, he says, is like an actress before the play starts. She is not yet mother, bride, or
mistress; nor is she any particular woman in any particular situation. She is like a closed
book and almost like inert, spiritless nature. "Di qui quella quietudine d'aspetti che è
proprio della natura, e che esprime assenza di moto e di passione. . . ." She is in the
middle of events and yet remains outside them; she is on earth and yet no human misery
touches her. One almost feels that she is beyond death.
Although today this poetic creature appears cold and unreal, "è la creature più reale che il
Medio Evo . . . poteva produrre. . . . Reale non solo in sé, ma ben più nel Petrarca; non in
quello che sente, ma in quello che fa sentire, perché, se Laura è una Dea, Petrarca è un
uomo." She cannot stand alone or apart. She lives only for Petrarch and with Petrarch.
What the reader sees is not a particular Laura, but one as seen by Petrarch at a particular
moment. The fact that Petrarch never seems to see her in precisely the same way twice
is what constitutes her great and unusual beauty. Laura is a being whom Petrarch does
not understand because he cannot make up his mind as to whether love of such a
creature is sinful. Unlike Dante he takes no clear and definite stand, but rather wavers
(pp. 90-94).
Petrarch thus cannot be classified either as a platonic or as a passionate lover. He gave
substance to his Platonism by injecting into it the heat of true feeling which, however,

remains timid, irresolute, "quasi involontario." In short, "Resta un sentimento a due
facce . . ." (p. 100). He seems, in fact, to love Laura's image rather


Page 4

than the woman. As a result, the reader is moved but not disturbed when ". . . il poeta
obblia i moti del cuore, le discordie della coscienza, e come farfalla gira intorno alla luce
dell'immagine. Questa è la sua tendenza; qui è la sua sincerità e il suo genio. Il dolore è
bello, la lacrima è bella; anche la morte è bella, anche la morte l'innamora: non la morte
di chicchessia, la morte di Laura" (pp. 108-112). So accustomed had Petrarch become to
enjoying his visions of Laura in his imagination that when in Chiare, fresche e dolci acque
(No. 126) the poet's ecstasy in beholding Laura's deification comes to an end, there is no
lament over its end (p. 188).
Laura's death brings to an end all indecision and wavering. In the poet's grief one feels
not only the death of Laura, but the death of all passion and of worldly disenchantments.
The new situation "è una tomba, che a poco a poco si trasforma in un paradiso: è la
morte, dal cui seno spunta la vita nuova." His grief thus remains purely elegiac; it does
not become tragic. There is no resignation or rebellion, but an inexhaustible lament that
lightens the poet's grief. As a pure creature of the poet's imagination, Laura in death
appears more alive than ever. This theme of death being the true life gives rise to "un
contenuto straordinariamente meraviglioso, un mondo che è proprio il rovescio del mondo
volgare." The poet's heart, having died with Laura, "risuscita insieme con lei in questo
paradiso dell'amore" (pp. 191-207).
There is for De Sanctis the birth of a second Laura following her death, a heavenly figure
that slowly causes the earthly image to vanish and is itself ultimately replaced by the
Virgin. Throughout the process the poet struggles not to lose sight of the living image.
When he turns to heaven, he does so to find his beloved there. "Questo cielo del Petrarca
è per ora non l'annullamento, ma la sanctificazione della passione, la trasfigurazione di
Laura." Despite the disappearance of the physical Laura, the new one appears still more

real because the goddess has now become a real woman with a soul. "L'equivoce è finito:
Laura vive della stessa vita del poeta, entra a parte di tutte le sue emozioni, lo consola,
gli asciuga gli occhi. . . ." But the new love is still tinged with the old; whence a human
paradise. Notwithstanding Petrarch's constant attempts to depict Laura as a non-earthly
creature, she, unlike Dante's Beatrice, is also pictured looking behind to see if her lover is
following (No. 346, vv. 11-12). She furthermore feels alone in her heaven. She misses
both her lover and her body, and thus remains an incomplete saint (pp. 210-225).


Page 5

When, towards the end, Petrarch begins to see his love story as though another's and to
view it with the calm eye of a spectator, Laura vacillates and dies. "E se si volge a Dio,
non è già passione, ma stanchezza d'ogni passione." The Triumphs suffer the same fault,
for they too view Man "fuori dell'azione e della passione, nel punto che sono soggiaciuti,
vale a dire quando ogni storia ed ogni interesse è finito. . . ." When, however, the
Triumphs become essentially a second framework within which to view the drama of the
two lovers, then do we once again glimpse the master's hand despite a certain
weariness. Even at the very end, when the poet comes closest to imparting epic qualities
to his poem, it is the lyrical tone that interferes and we find Laura assuming the
proportions of Creation itself as the poet sings: "La notte che seguì l'orribil caso/ Che
spense 'l Sol, anzi 'l ripose in cielo" (pp. 227-237).
ii. Croce
For Benedetto Croce also Petrarch's love represents a complicated experience, not so
much because it roared into his life like a blinding hurricane, but because it penetrated all
of his being completely and forever and became its center and its fulcrum. 5 Since this
love caused the poet to dare "patteggiar con la morte," it follows that the very soul of
that love was indeed a passion and not a religious, moral, political or other ideal. While it
is true that the poet does call upon the Christian God and the Virgin for support, "il suo
Dio o la sua dea, il suo ethos, la sua politica appassionante si chiamò Laura." This

pervasive love is highly human, entailing as it does "il ricambio e il possesso," and the
poet's perennial disappointed hope. When the poet asserts that his love raises him to the
Eternal Good and teaches him the straight path to heaven, it is a mere manner of
speaking, for basically he himself does not believe it. His happiness resides not in heaven
but in Laura who is no ladder to something else, but is rather herself all, the beginning
and end. When, finally, the lover's hopes become dashed by the death of his beloved, he
transfers and tenaciously continues his love in heaven where Laura is as human as ever.
Following Laura's death, Petrarch


Page 6

passes from a beautiful dream of profane love "al sogno di una sorta di umanizzamento e
profanamento del paradiso." Dante would never have placed his Francesca in paradise,
"ma il Petrarca v'innalzò Laura, così sensibilmente e sensualmente da lui amata e
idoleggiata." His desire to turn from earthly things, his calling his love "non degno," his
view of God as his true refuge, ''è cotesta un'aggiunta, perfettamente conforme a quel
che abbiamo chiamato il suo mondo teorico, ma che non può spegnere la calda vita di
quel che sentì e cantò da poeta."
Croce thinks it wrong to call Laura an ideal which afforded Petrarch spiritual sanity, for his
love was a passion "che tiranneggiarlo ed estasiarlo poteva e non punto infondergli il
calmo vigore della regola accettata." Nor can the poet's love be viewed within a religious
framework, for Laura never resembles a demon of perdition. What makes Petrarch's love
poetry truly modern is that "in lui pel primo si vede l'aspirazione a un'inconseguibile
beatitudine nell'amore di una creatura, magicamente concepita come datrice di perfetta
beatitudine; la felicità ricercata nel sentimento e nella passione, ossia nel particolare non
redento nell'universale ma posto esso come l'universale; con la disperazione e la
malinconia che a ciò segue o s'accompagna, col senso continuo della caducità e della
morte e del disfacimento." In Croce's opinion, the principal quality of Petrarch's poetry
was defined by Carducci when, in speaking of his canzoni, he asserted that we see the

poet continually "sighing among the laurels."
iii. Calcaterra
In his series of studies that appeared in 1942 under the significant title of Nella selva del
Petrarca, 6 Carlo Calcaterra undertook to trace the evolution of Petrarch's spiritual and
artistic development by analyzing the changing aspects of Laura's image as she appears
in Petrarch's poetry. Following a general survey of the opposing schools of thought on
what constitutes Petrarch's essential greatness, Calcaterra concentrates on the basic view
of contemporary critics who see a profound human orientation as the keystone of
Petrarch's


Page 7

greatness. In redefining Petrarch's spiritual dilemma, these critics agree that Petrarch's
great struggle against the torments of the flesh was rooted in the conviction that sensual
pleasure in itself could not be the end of man. Yet, his strong desire for glory and
prominence, and his sense of superiority arising from his awareness that his personal
ideals derived from his intimate knowledge of all that was best in antiquity, were
counterbalanced by a sense of his own limits and those of human powers generally. This
led to a strong awareness of the vanity of earthly striving and of the strong contrast
between what is transitory and what is eternal (pp. 1-8).
It is at this point that Calcaterra begins to interject his own interpretation of the drama
that Petrarch lived throughout his life. "Nei giorni radiosi della giovinezza, quando il volto
di Laura gli apparve come la bellezza della vita, e l'arte del dire e la gloria come la
ragione e il fine del suo operare, per sua stessa confessione fu così preso da un'ebrezza
pagana e apollinea, che quasi pose in quelle affascinanti immagini la dolcezza del vivere,
anzi l'apice della felicità (felicitatis apicem)." But he was also plagued by the sense of
transitoriness of all things. It is within this context that Petrarch has St. Augustine remind
him of the intimate religion of his early youth and express the fear that "quel fiore fuor di
stagione fosse scosso e abbattuto dai forti venti di primavera, che, se fosse rimasto sano

e intatto, avrebbe a suo tempo prodotto un frutto mirabile." For Calcaterra, the
''springtime of strong winds" fell between 1327 and 1342 when the poet's passion for
Laura and desire for glory led him into a "splendid abyss" from which he managed to
extricate himself following the spiritual crisis of 1335-1342 during which the Christian
religion played the central role. The poet's spiritual state at this time could best be
described by a phrase appearing in the Secretum with its clear Augustinian ring: "Sentio
inexpletum quoddam in praecordiis meis semper." This, for Calcaterra, is not the
inexpletum of a Leopardi or of an Amiel, but of a Christian wayfarer who had been
bewitched by an evanescent earthly beauty, had consequently found himself trapped in a
splendid abyss and had tried desperately to rise above it.
In Calcaterra's view, the "splendid abyss" resulted from the inspiration provided by the
myth of Parnasia laurus in which the poet saw the correspondence between his love for
the fleeing Laura and the myth of Daphne. "Dafne gli era apparsa la fantasia immortale
dell'amore terreno, che, sfuggendo ai sensi, diviene pura bellezza nell'arte." Petrarch had
thus focused his earliest poems on the name


Page 8

of Laura and on the green laurel, "simbolo della poesia ispiratagli dall'amore inafferrabile,
giacché Laura, come Dafne per Apollo, non poteva essere per lui se non poesia. . . ." As a
result, this earliest poetry, best represented in canzone No. 23, Nel dolce tempo della
prima etade, is essentially literary, academic and Parnassian, as are all subsequent
poems that repeat this same theme. They all have as their primary focus the spellbinding
contemplation of a beautiful image.
In the Secretum Petrarch condemns this early bent for pure imagery as "delirationes." Yet
he could not turn his back upon it, and came to regard it as an example of his "primo
giovenile errore," and of his "vario stile." Already in 1338 he had admitted that he had
become ''preda degli spiriti immondi e ludibrio dei cani famelici delle passioni." In time his
poetic horizons widened beyond the Daphnean. The irreproachable conduct of Laura

inspired him to superimpose a Christian view of woman on his beloved. He thus began to
endow his image of Laura with the characteristics necessary to convert her into a
ladyguide to the Christian heaven. Later, indeed, he anchored the entire architecture of
the Canzoniere in the spiritual contrast between the two configurations with the ultimate
victory of the latter, and even referred to the region where his love had evolved as ". . . il
mio Parnaso" (pp. 8-18). The general architecture of the Canzoniere is consequently not
only aesthetic but moral and religious in its attempt to reflect this "redenzione interiore"
(p. 32). The structure emerges from the alternating of the two basic themes of the
Parnasia laurus with its Apollonian contemplation, and the di sesto d'aprile with its
implication of Christian redemption (p. 44).
In Chapter II Calcaterra deals with the poem, Giovane donna sotto un verde lauro, and
gives a lengthy analysis of Petrarch's use of myth. He touches upon Petrarch's reputation
as the great myth expert of his day, showing, among other things, how in his works they
appear strictly as artistic embellishments and as indestructible fantasies of life. He then
marshals available evidence to show how in fact Petrarch's early poetry contained clear
indications of a symbolic intent. He refers to Giacomo Colonna's suspicion that Laura was
not a real woman, to the statements put into the mouth of St. Augustine in the Secretum
regarding the dangerous appeal of Laura's name, and to Petrarch's avowal to his brother
that he had labored hard to hide his love under figures (pp. 47-49). He also presents
proof of the early presence of the theme of redemption in


Page 9

Petrarch's poetry and of Petrarch's awareness of the strong pulls exercised upon him by
both the profane and the sacred (pp. 50-55). For Calcaterra, the true beauty of the
Canzoniere emerges when the two themes of Laura-Daphne and Lauraguide-to-heaven
are complemented by an imaginative handling of the inexpletum quoddam (p. 71).
The prevailing Daphne theme of the earlier poems ended with the writing of the
Secretum and of the poem on Glory, No. 119. From that moment the poet's search turned

to the laurel of Virtue, having assimiliated the Ciceronian-Senecan concept that virtue
possesses a loftier value than glory. This new direction is also symbolized in the "Triumph
of Chastity" when Laura solemnly places her crown and Cupid's spoils in the Temple of
Chastity in Rome. Calcaterra finds it significant that in sestina No. 142, which presumably
closed the first form of the Canzoniere, the two concepts are juxtaposed as if calling for a
choice, and that in the second part of the poem the poet turns to a "new love" and a
"new tree" which are the Christian God and Heaven (pp. 75-77). Yet, the perennial
wavering recurs shortly afterwards, in No. 148, where the traditional laurel appears once
again. Indeed, in the final form of the Canzoniere, the very last poem on Laura alive, No.
263, is a hymn to the laurel. Following Laura's death, the image of the earthly laurel
breaks in poem No. 269. The poet's attempt to sanctify the laurel in No. 228 is never
followed through, but in his ordering of the poems so as to ''far quasi un poema lirico del
giovenile errore e della sua purificazione," a point of juncture is reached in the tercets of
No. 289 which express the conviction that the poet had procured a justifiable glory for his
beloved inasmuch as she had "oprato virtute" in him. In such wise does the poet fuse the
two themes of the donna lauro and Laura inexpugnabilis et firma who iuvenilem eius
animum ab omni turpitudine revocaverat. By the time we reach poem No. 318 we learn
that "Quel vivo lauro," though now in heaven, had left deep roots in the poet's heart (p.
80).
In Chapter III Calcaterra analyzes Petrarch's coronation oration, focusing upon the central
image of the laurel and the Horatian phrase Sub lauro mea which stands "come gemma
nel discorso." This "birth certificate of Humanism," as Calcaterra calls the oration, reflects
a large network of connections in Petrarch's mind between his Latin and Italian works,
between his concept of poetic glory and Laura, and between the laurel crown of old and
the one that is being bestowed upon him. So taken was Petrarch with the


Page 10

implications of the laurel and its tie-in with the name of his beloved that "In alcuni

momenti il poeta si addentrava veramente, estasiato, in una selva di lauro . . ." (pp. 103104).
Having already shown the indisputable connection between Laura and Petrarch's personal
aspiration for the poetic laurel by recalling that in the Eclogue Amor pastorius it is Laura
herself who crowns him, Calcaterra in Chapters IV and V of his book discusses Petrarch's
poetics as reflected particularly in the coronation ceremony, in Petrarch's oration for the
occasion, and in the Eclogue Dedalus. The events leading to the coronation which
occurred on Easter Sunday of 1341, the substance of the oration with its source in a verse
of the Aeneid, its stress on the magical qualities of poetry, and its extensive classical
borrowings, the depositing of the crown on the altar of St. Peter's, the elaborate
ceremonies that prevailed throughout the coronation with their implications of the close
ties between classical and Christian Rome, and the fact that the crown had been
bestowed upon Petrarch for his accomplishments as poet, historian, and teacher tell us a
great deal about Petrarch's view of poetry.
Similarly, the Eclogue Dedalus written some five years later affords further insights into
this view. In it Petrarch accepts Virgil's account of Dedalus as the originator of the cult of
Apollo in Italy, as the builder of the first temple to poetry in Italy, and as the first
consecrator of the Italic progeny to the god of the arts. When Aeneas first landed in
Cumae, it was at Delalus' temple to Apollo that he first worshipped and learned of his
subsequent fate. Aeneas' vow to raise a similar temple in Rome if he succeeded in
transporting the Trojan gods to Latium was presumably kept by Augustus centuries later
when he erected such a temple on the Palatine. Through Dedalus, therefore, the tie
between Troy and Rome was achieved. When later in the same Eclogue Petrarch
connects the history of Florence and Rome, we see him emerge as the poet of a new
Tusco-Roman civilization whose poetic heritage is shrouded in the magic of classical
mythology and especially of the Apollo myth.
Having thus analyzed the essential nature of Petrarch's poetics and his basic poetic
inspiration, Calcaterra, in Chapter VII, elaborates further on the Christian superstructure
that seemed to pervade Petrarch's thinking. The theme of the Chapter is Petrarch's
obvious concern to immerse his two most important works, the Africa and the Canzoniere,
within the framework of the Christian ethic by emphasizing the role played by the drama

of Holy Week in both the bio-


Page 11

graphical and artistic textures of the works. In a thorough and scientific way, Calcaterra
shows how for Petrarch the date of April 6 (feria sexta aprilis) represented the true day of
Christ's Passion without regard to the moveable recurrence of Good Friday. This explains
the puzzling problem of how Petrarch was able to set his first meeting with Laura as well
as her death on the day of Christ's death despite the fact that neither in 1327 nor in 1348
did Good Friday fall on April 6. In fact, April 6 was also traditionally considered the day on
which man was created and Adam sinned. This finds its importance in the fact that
Petrarch accepted fully St. Augustine's view that "omnis homo Adam et omnis homo
Christus." By connecting his drama with Laura to all these divine events, Petrarch was
consciously implying a connection with the Christian drama of the redemption (pp. 210226).
The extent to which these connections permeated Petrarch's thinking can be seen in his
attempts to link them with other important events in his life. Not only did he presumably
start the Africa on April 6, but he actually arranged for his coronation to take place within
the same period. Following his qualifying examination administered by King Robert, he
set out for Rome on April 4 of 1341, arrived in the Holy City on April 6 and was crowned
on Easter Sunday. Within this context, even the poet's depositing of his crown on the
altar of St. Peter assumes truly symbolic proportions. Thus, there is also a conscious
connection between the Africa and the theme of the redemption of mankind.
Calcaterra sees still further ramifications in the death and burial of Laura taking place on
April 6 of 1348. Since in that year Easter Sunday happened to fall on April 6 the poet was
clearly implying both Laura's enjoyment of divine grace and her resurrection in Christ.
This is why the poet could view that date as marking his liberation from all earthly
passion and his preparation for a resurrection in Christ.
In trying to summarize how Petrarch had organized his personal life around the date of
April 6, Calcaterra points out that love had first smitten the poet on that day as he

observed the rites of Holy Week, whence the poet's assertion that it was born at a time
of "comune dolor." Eleven years later, in 1338, while again meditating during his
observance of Holy Week, he was inspired to write his Africa. Ten years later, in 1348,
Laura died on an Easter Sunday. Laura had thus captured him on the day of Christ's
Passion and had freed him on the day of the Resurrection. In fact, even the number


Page 12

21 which Petrarch saw surrounding all these events found symbolic overtones in the
meaning of the digits 7 and 3 in medieval numerology. In short, as is the case with the
Divine Comedy, the poet naturally expected his readers to feel the additional dimensions
of meaning provided by this superstructure both in the Africa and in the two parts of the
Canzoniere. For Calcaterra the full force of these various dimensions can even be felt in
such individual verses as "Era de l'anno e di mia etate aprile" (pp. 227-237).
Calcaterra synthesized his views in a later study which appeared in 1949. 7 Having
pointed out Petrarch's awareness of the originality of his poetry, Calcaterra asserts that
the theme of Parnasia laurus was, in the poet's mind, at the heart of such an awareness.
Unlike the poets of Provence for whom love was a "vassallaggio alla dama"; or Guinicelli
for whom it was "gentilezza o nobilità di cuore"; or Cavalcanti for whom love was
essentially "senso e passione"; or even Dante who considered it "nobilità e sublimazione
alla salvezza"; Petrarch, conscious of being a victim of a forbidden love, transfigures his
love into pure poetry. In short, Laura's refusal made his love a Parnassus and a Calvary
and thus the very poetry of life.
Calcaterra disagrees with the position of contemporary critics who see in the Daphnean
and Christian configurations an external framework that hampers the true poetry of the
Canzoniere. In his opinion, for Petrarch "anche quelle figurazioni, che noi giudichiamo
sovrastrutture, erano parte viva del mondo lirico, perché egli con l'immaginazione le
vedeva non in margine al suo tormento, ma immedesimate con esso, quasi fossero verità
poetiche innegabili, cioè da lui inscindibili." In fact, Petrarch developed a new kind of

contemplation of the beloved in which she becomes one with the poet. This is why
Petrarch's internal conflict seems to increase in intensity "quanto più la donna si allontana
e si isola." What is more, the new form of contemplation actually underwent an evolution
in the mind and art of Petrarch. "Lo stesso mito dafneo, del tutto pagano, su cui egli
innesta la coscienza cristiano dell'amore vietato, il quale soltanto in un atmosfera di pura
poesia può essere giustificato e innanzi a Dio redento, è la prova che nell'animo del poeta
il nodo doloroso di quell'amore proibito si scioglie per virtù non soltanto della fede, ma
della poesia stessa. L'amore che ha radice nell'anima ed è perciò immortale come
l'anima, vince la caducita terrena e l'intima guerra, giungendo purificato innanzi a Dio
come poesia."


Page 13

Calcaterra sees in Petrarch's choice of poem No. 23 as the first canzone of the Canzoniere
an indication of the poet's high regard for allegory as a poetic device. For Petrarch as for
the great artists of his day, allegory was "una sintesi fantastica di modi d'essere dello
spirito, che prendevano linea, colore, volto in forme concrete, le quali essi vedevano e
quasi toccavano." Petrarch's use of allegory in Nos. 23 and 135 as well as in his Triumphs
shows his originality in having "plasmate l'allegoria in raffigurazioni concrete dei propri
stati d'animo, l'averla cioè soggettivata, non solo vedendo rinnovarsi nella propria vita lo
spirito umanissimo e perenne dei miti antichi, ma facendone dirette e trasmutevoli
imagini dei propri modi d'essere." Whence the poet's outcry: "Qual più diversa e nova/
cosa fu mai. . . . più mi rassembra: a tal son giunto, Amore."
In this study Calcaterra also elaborates on the peculiar qualities of Petrarch's humanism
resulting from his Augustinian perspective toward antiquity. Petrarch's view of history is
anthropocentric without denying the divine. "Riguarda l'humanitas quale ha vissuto,
combattuto e dolorato prima dell'avvento di Cristo e quale vive, combatte e dolora dopo
la venuta del redentore." For him also Christ's birth lies at the center of history, but he
holds that humankind continues to possess those qualities of Adam that required

redemption. Thus, the deeds of the ancients, the lives of illustrious men, the works of
historians, of philosophers and of poets, and even myths, anecdotes, and sentences
retain a moral and poetic value as a mirror of humanity which has remained just as blind
since the advent of Christ whose booming voice continues tirelessly to point the way of
salvation. This is the nucleus of Petrarch's religious thought, and explains why he
considered the ancient stories such as the myth of Parnasia laurus on which he "grafts"
the myth of the dì sesto d'aprile, as images of our grieving and wayfaring humanity. So
firmly were these convictions rooted in Petrarch's mind that he was able to view poetry as
a legitimate means of justifying and purifying before God his inextinguishable love for a
woman whom he was forbidden to desire by divine law. "In questa esplicita
consapevolezza che l'amore irraggiunto si giustifica e sublima innanzi a Dio come pura
poesia e che questa non può essere sradicata dall'anima perchè è l'unica via di salvezza
lasciata all'infelice, è l'originalita lirica del Petrarca . . ." (p. 197).


Page 14

iv. Contini
In his famous Saggio d'un commento alle correzioni del Petrarca volgare 8 Gianfranco
Contini uses a particularly happy phrase to define the manner in which Petrarch's poetic
imagination viewed nature. In his analysis of poem No. 188 of the Canzoniere he
formalistically summarizes Calcaterra's position regarding Petrarch's attitude toward
classical mythology and toward the history of mankind. Having granted that there is some
justification for viewing the poem as an example of a baroque Petrarch, especially in the
opening quatrains, he proceeds to show how suddenly the reader is confronted with an
unexpected development. ". . . il lauro lievemente ombrato sull'inizio viene a occupare il
primo piano, la fronde sostituisce la luce, la sua vita si fa vegetale. . . . I richiamo della
donna al lauro, di questo all'Apollo-sole lega le sostanze, fonda un sistema di universale
compenetrazione della natura." Similarly in No. 34 the poet, in inviting Apollo-sun to
contemplate his beloved Laura-laurel with him, changes the original "rami" to "braccia" in

his reference to Laura's pose, and we have another example of "quell'amorosa
compenetrazione" (pp. 22-23). The extent of such interpenetration may be seen in the
amazing fact that the poet often sees himself assuming the same forms assumed by
Laura, such as the phoenix in No. 135 or the laurel in No. 23. That the poet is aware of
this phenomenon may be seen in the "Triumph of Love,'' capitolo III, verse 162 when he
confesses "e so in qual guisa/ L'amante ne l'amato si transforme." In such wise do we see
"l'interpenetrazione . . .serrare l'universo petrarchesco" (p. 46). It might be well to recall
at this point that the fusion of Laura and Scipio that I documented in the central chapter
of my book, Petrarch, Scipio and the 'Africa' provides still another example of the
multiform aspects of such interpenetration.
v. Bosco
In 1946 Umberto Bosco set the direction of the most recent Petrarchan criticism in his
highly perceptive Francesco Petrarca.9