The Unexpected Dante: Perspectives on the Divine Comedy 9781684483594

Table of contents :
Contents
Foreword
Preface
Alternative Names of Printers
Source Abbreviations
1 Crossing Borders
2 Notes on Musical Instruments in Dante’s Divine Comedy
3 The Mystery of Dante’s Cato in the Light of Roman Law
4 Dante in a Global World
5 A Florentine First
6 Crossing Borders with the Divine Comedy
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
About the Contributors
Illustration Credits
Index

Citation preview

The Unexpected Dante

Frontispiece: Raffaello Morghen (1761–1833). “Dante Alighieri.” Print of engraving by Raffaello Morghen after a picture by Tofanelli. Circa 1826. Engraving on paper. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

The Unexpected Dante Perspectives on the Divine Comedy Edited by Lucia Alma Wolf

Published by Bucknell University Press in association with the Library of Congress Lewisburg, PA • Washington, DC

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Wolf, Lucia Alma, editor. Title: The unexpected Dante : perspectives on the Divine comedy / edited by Lucia Alma Wolf. Description: Lewisburg, PA : Bucknell University Press, in association with the Library of Congress, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021016215 | ISBN 9781684483556 (paperback) | ISBN 9781684483563 (cloth) | ISBN 9781684483570 (epub) | ISBN 9781684483587 (mobi) | ISBN 9781684483594 (pdf) Subjects: LCSH: Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321. Divina commedia. | LCGFT: Literary criticism. Classification: LCC PQ4390 .U55 2022 | DDC 851/.1--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021016215 A British Cataloging-in-Publication record for this book is available from the British Library. This collection copyright © 2022 by the Library of Congress Individual chapters copyright © 2022 in the names of their authors All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Bucknell University Press, Hildreth-Mirza Hall, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA 17837-2005. The only exception to this prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law. References to internet websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor Rutgers University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared. The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992. www.bucknelluniversitypress.org Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

Foreword by Carla D. Hayden vii Preface by Lucia Alma Wolf ix Alternative Names of Printers xi Source Abbreviations xiii

1 Crossing Borders: The Library of Congress Dante Collections

1

Lucia Alma Wolf

2 Notes on Musical Instruments in Dante’s Divine Comedy 20 Francesco Ciabattoni

3 The Mystery of Dante’s Cato in the Light of Roman Law

34

Bernardo Piciché

4 Dante in a Global World: Sandow Birk’s Divine Comedy 47 Kristina M. Olson

5 A Florentine First: Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy in Print, 1481 Edition: Observations and Discoveries Sylvia R. Albro

6 Crossing Borders with the Divine Comedy: A Catalog of Selected Works from the Library of Congress Lucia Alma Wolf



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Acknowledgments 155 Notes 157 Bibliography 185 About the Contributors 217 Illustration Credits 219 Index 221 v

Foreword Thy fame is blown abroad from all the heights, Through all the nations, and a sound is heard, As of a mighty wind, and men devout, Strangers of Rome, and the new proselytes, In their own language hear thy wondrous word, And many are amazed and many doubt. —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Divina Commedia (1867)

The Library of Congress—the largest library in the world—holds millions of books in hundreds of languages, including many of the oldest, rarest, and most important volumes in all of literature. Among them are omnifarious copies of Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy. A medieval epic poem that first flourished in fourteenth-century Italy, the Comedy is a cornerstone of the Western canon, and still exercises its influence on readers to this day. Ironically, Dante’s use of his hometown vernacular and his own dialectal innovations were instrumental in standardizing the Italian language on that linguistically varied peninsula, only to have his work translated into numerous languages, from Arabic to Yiddish. Longfellow, who essentially introduced the Comedy to the United States with the first American edition (1867), observed in his own poem about Dante’s masterpiece that many had now heard “in their own language  .  .  . thy wondrous word.” Poets, artists, musicians, filmmakers, and students continue to find inspiration in the Comedy, producing twenty-first-century reinterpretations and referencing Dante in modern translations, comic books, video games, animations, and other media. The large number of Comedy translations and adaptations produced in the United States demonstrates that Italian culture—even medieval Italian culture—is not so remote from the American zeitgeist and is part of a larger, enduring connection. Beyond our own borders, the Comedy, with its dramatic themes on the human condition and a cast of international figures, is read all over the globe, even penetrating the isolated state of North Korea, which issued a translation of “The Inferno” in 1988. That edition is available at the Library of Congress under the call number PQ4322.K611 D36. Now in its eighth century, the Comedy remains an unexhausted source of scrutiny and investigation, as scholars and readers of all stripes continue to plumb the poem’s richness and its extraordinary publication history. Few works can claim such a

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Foreword

celebrated presence at the dawn of both printing and the digital age, and the Library of Congress holds many examples from each era. Almost since its inception in 1800, the Library has kept a copy—succeeded by hundreds more—of the Comedy on its shelves, and I am gratified that publication of The Unexpected Dante sheds intriguing new light on this classic work and its history. A particularly special feature is the catalog, showcasing select examples of the Comedy in our extensive collections. Volume editor Lucia Wolf, reference librarian for the Italian collections, brought together a talented group of scholars who have resolved longstanding questions, addressed previously unexplored material, and brought fresh perspectives to this work. They are, in a sense, continuing to spread with new layers of insight what Longfellow called Dante’s “wondrous word.” Should you be new to the Comedy or a veteran of Dante Studies, there is much to discover at the Library of Congress. The Library serves not only the legislative branch of the U.S. government, but as the American national library, it serves the public as well. I invite you to visit in person or online at www.loc.gov to see more of our remarkable collections. Carla D. Hayden Librarian of Congress

Preface La letteratura non è fatta solo di opere singole ma di biblioteche, sistemi in cui le varie epoche etradizioni organizzano i testi ‘canonici’ e quelli ‘apocrifi.’ [Literature is not only made of individual works but also of libraries, systems in which the various eras and traditions organize ‘canonical’ as well as ‘apocryphal’ texts.] —Italo Calvino, “La letteratura come proiezione del desiderio”

In 2015, when I first began to explore the possibility of an event for the celebration of Dante Alighieri, I had just started my Library of Congress career. All over the world, celebrations unfurled commemorating the 750th anniversary of Dante’s birth. Immediately, being an Italian proud of Dante’s reputation, I embraced the exciting challenge of organizing an event at the Library, and with a healthy dose of trepidation, I began the immense task. After all, I was embarking on a program dedicated to one of the world’s most important and well-known authors, and I was preparing it for the national library of the United States of America, an internationally revered cultural institution. Meanwhile, as a passionate librarian and with a sense of exhilaration, I started exploring the stacks to perform a first census of the Dante holdings at the Library. I discovered that the Dante collection consisted of more than five thousand items covering multiple centuries and countries as well as being available in diverse media. Thousands of editions of his masterpiece, La divina commedia (The Divine Comedy), starting with the one printed in Venice in 1477 up to the present, were available in almost every language in the world. Moreover, the holdings comprised hundreds of items representing different formats, such as prints, photographs, sound recordings, music scores, motion pictures, and maps, as well as a notable number of braille books, including translations by John Ciardi and Mary Jo Bang. Scouring the Library’s collections enabled me to curate a treasure display for our Dante celebration in December 2015. Given the vastness of the collections, I chose to center the display on the Comedy itself: its publication, circulation, transmission, and reception starting with its earliest printing history in Italy to its status as a world classic. The large number of visitors, of every nationality, age, and background, expressed sheer delight at the unexpected opportunity to view these beautiful and meaningful books and related artwork. Such was the interest that we created this volume for both our visitors and for all those who would like to have been there.

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Preface

The event also entailed original presentations on thought-provoking topics delivered by a panel of lively speakers who enriched Dante scholarship with new and exciting perspectives. In his essay, Francesco Ciabattoni conjures up the symbology of musical instruments in the Comedy and their metaphorical relations to the human body. Here, medieval music crosses over into the field of literary history and criticism. Bernardo Piciché follows with an astute investigation of the puzzling presence of Cato the Younger, the ancient Roman pagan and suicide, in Purgatory 1. Piciché argues that the solution to the long-debated mystery lies in an understanding of Roman law. Moving from the past to the present, Kristina M. Olson reviews Sandow Birk’s “urban American vernacular” translation of the Comedy, which he produced in collaboration with Marcus Sanders, adapting Dante’s original literary vision of the underworld to American urban landscapes, street life, pop culture, and slang. Likewise, she introduces us to Birk’s riveting artwork that reinterprets Gustav Doré’s famous illustrations of the Comedy, by setting them in contemporary locales, from Los Angeles to Tokyo to Mecca. Finally, paper conservator Sylvia R. Albro contributes a chapter on the early history of printing illustrations in the Comedy, focusing on the edition printed in Florence by Nicolaus Laurentii in 1481. Her discoveries include the source of paper used in the book and that the same type of paper was used for both the text and the rare, separately printed engraved images. In the first chapter, which serves as an introduction to the Library’s Dante collections, I tie together the history of these holdings with the history of the Library and the events leading to the earliest formation of foreign language collections. While reflecting on these topics, I stumbled on a line from an essay by Italo Calvino that aptly describes the relationship between culture and libraries in more symbiotic and interactive terms, as quoted in my epigraph. It provides a key to interpreting the Library’s collections in relation to particular historical periods and cultural shifts in American society that were as relevant as the strictly professional, economic, and pragmatic factors. Carl Ostrowski makes a similar argument for the interdependence between the Library’s history and Americans’ views about the literature under consideration for its collections. These concepts support my attempts to reconstruct some of the main events concerning the Library’s major efforts to collect Dante’s works while expanding the Italian collections in the twentieth century. I also individuate areas of strength in the collections coinciding with different moments of Dante’s reception, especially here in the United States, where the Comedy continues to enjoy success and attention. More than a century ago, Willard Fiske, one of the greatest American librarians and Dante book collectors, said, “I gradually picked up, by the way, fact after fact about the strange realm into which I had plunged. Possibly the earliest novel impression was a partial realization of the surprising extent of this great literary domain. Dr. Moore’s observation, anent the Divine Comedy, that ‘no work probably in the world, except the Bible, has given rise to so large a literature,’ was an early forewarning. . . .” (Fiske, 1:iv). This rings true even more today. Lucia Alma Wolf Reference Librarian, European Division Library of Congress

Alternative Names of Printers

Notable early printers often came to be known by more than one name, as many who settled in Italy from elsewhere in Europe, particularly Germany, were called by both their original names and Italian versions. Other early printers were known by Latin names that were later changed to Italian. By the sixteenth century, Italian vernacular had become more stable and the printers themselves started using Italian names in book colophons. Following is a list of printers who appear in this book and are also known by alternative names, as readers of book history may come to know a figure by one appellation but not another. There are extensive reference apparatuses in the endnotes of Chapter 1 providing bibliographic citations and links to some of the most authoritative sources on the names, biographies, and publications of early Italian printers, listed here with their frequently used abbreviations: Angelini, Evangelista, alias Evangelista da Foligno, alias Evangelista di Angelino da Trevi Augusta, Georgius de, alias Georg von Butzbach [in association with Paul von Butzbach] Benalius, Bernardinus, alias Bernardino Benali, alias Bernardino Benalio Boninis, Boninus de, alias Bonino Bonini, alias Dobrić Dobričević Burgofranco, Jacobus de, alias Iacopo da Burgofranco, alias Giacomo Pocatela Butzbach, Paulus, alias Paul von Butzbach Capcasa, Matthaeus, nicknamed Parmensis (of Parma), alias Matteo Capcasa, alias Matteo Codecà Comitibus, Federicus de, alias Federico de’ Conti Fine, Petrus de, alias Pietro da Fino, alias Pietro Fino Giolitus de Ferrariis, Gabriel, alias Gabriele Giolito de’ Ferrari, alias Gabriele Giolito Giolitus de Ferrariis, Joannes, alias Giovanni Giolito de’ Ferrari, alias Joannes de Tri­ dino (of Trino), alias Gioanni Giolitto da Trino

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Alternative Names of Printers

Giunta, Lucas Antonius, alias Lucantonio Giunti, alias Giunta Laurentii, Nicolaus, nicknamed “Alamanus” (“the German”), alias Niccolò di Lorenzo, alias Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna Manutius, Aldus, alias Aldo Manuzio, alias Manuzio il Vecchio, alias Aldus Manucius Romanus Manzani, Domenico, alias Domenico del Gatto Marcolinus, Franciscus, alias Francesco Marcolini, alias Francesco Marcolino de Forlì Numeister, Johannes, alias Johann Neumeister Plasiis, Petrus de, nicknamed Veronensis (“from Verona”) alias Cremonensis (“from Cremona”), alias Pietro de’ Piasi Quarengiis, Petrus de, nicknamed Bergomensis (“from Bergamo”), alias Pietro Quarengi Scotus I, Octavianus, nicknamed Modoetiensis (“from Monza”), alias Ottaviano Scoto (I), alias Scotto ed eredi (“Scotus and heirs”) Sessa, Joannes Baptista, alias Giovanni Battista Sessa Sessa, Melchior, alias Melchiorre Sessa, alias Marchiò Sessa Spira, Vindelinus de, alias Vindelino da Spira, alias Wendelin von Speyer [associated with Johannes de Spira, alias Johann of Speier] Stagninus, Bernardinus, alias Bernardino Stagnino, alias Bernardino Giolito de’ Ferrari of Trino

Source Abbreviations

The following abbreviations are used for sources cited in the endnotes. ARDS: Dante Society of America. Annual Reports of the Dante Society, no. 1–no. 68–72. Cambridge, MA: J. W. Wilson, 1882–1954. https://catalog.hathitrust.org /Record/007134995 and https://www.jstor.org/journal/annrepdantesoc. ARLC: Library of Congress. [Annual] Report of the Librarian of Congress. Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 1866–. Ascarelli-Menato: Ascarelli, Fernanda, and Marco Menato, eds. La tipografia del ‘500 in Italia. Florence: L. S. Olschki, 1989. BAL: Bibliography of American Literature. Compiled by Jacob Blanck for the Bibliographical Society of America. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1955–1991. Censimento 1: Malato, Enrico, and Andrea Mazzucchi, eds. Censimento dei commenti danteschi. Vol. 1, I commenti della tradizione manoscritta (fino al 1480). Rome: Salerno Editrice, 2011. Censimento 2: Malato, E., and A. Mazzucchi, eds. Censimento dei commenti danteschi. Vol. 2, I commenti di tradizione a stampa (dal 1477 al 2000) e altri di tradizione manoscritta posteriori al 1480. Rome: Salerno Editrice, 2014. CERL: CERL Thesaurus. London: Consortium of European Research Libraries. https://data.cerl.org/thesaurus. DBI: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1960–. https://www.treccani.it/biografico/index.html. De Batines: Colomb de Batines, Paul. Bibliografia dantesca: ossia, Catalogo delle edizioni, traduzioni, codici manoscritti e commenti della Divina commedia e delle opere minori di Dante, seguito dalla serie de’biografi di lui: Traduzione italiana fatta sul manoscritto francese dell’autore. 2 vols. Prato, Italy: Tipografia Aldina, 1845–1846. ED: Enciclopedia Dantesca. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1970–. https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/elenco-opere/Enciclopedia_Dantesca.

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Source Abbreviations

EdI: Enciclopedia dell’Italiano. 2 vols. Edited by Raffaele Simone et al. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 2010–2011. https://www.treccani.it. Edit 16. Censimento nazionale delle edizioni italiane del XVI secolo. Rome: Istituto per il Catalogo Unico, 1985–2007. http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/web_iccu/ihome.htm. EI: Enciclopedia Italiana delle Scienze, Lettere ed Arti. Indici e Appendici. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1929–. https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/ enciclopedia-italiana_(Enciclopedia-Italiana). Fiske: Cornell University. Libraries. Catalogue of the Dante Collection Presented by Willard Fiske. Compiled by Theodore Wesley Koch. 2 vols. Ithaca, NY: 1898–1900. GAO: Grove Art Online. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://www.oxford artonline.com/. GW: Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin. Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke. 11 vols. Stuttgart: Union Catalogue of Incunabula Publishing House, 1925–. Goff: Goff, Frederick R. Incunabula in American Libraries: A Third Census of Fifteenth-century Books Recorded in North American Libraries. New York: Bibliographical Society of America, 1964. IGI: Indice Generale degli Incunaboli nelle Biblioteche d’Italia. Indici e Cataloghi. Nuova Serie I. 6 vols. Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1943–1981. ISTC: British Library. Incunabula Short Title Catalogue. London: Consortium of European Research Libraries, 2016. http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/istc/. Jefferson: Sowerby, Emily Millicent, ed. Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson. Compiled with Annotations by E. Millicent Sowerby. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1952. LC Authorities: Library of Congress Authorities. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 2019. https://authorities.loc.gov/. Marinelli 1911: Marinelli, Angelo. La stampa della “Divina commedia” nel XV secolo. Florence: Per i Tipi di Salvadore Landi, 1911. Marinelli 1915: Marinelli, A. La stampa della “Divina commedia” nei sec. XVI e XVII. Città di Castello, Italy: S. Lapi, 1915. OBO: Oxford Bibliographies Online. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/. ODNB: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://www.oxforddnb.com/. OED: Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://www.oed.com/. ORO: Oxford Reference Online. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://www. oxfordreference.com/.



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PL: Migne, Jacques Paul. Patrologiae Cursus Completus. Series Latina, Paris: Garnier, 1841–1855. https://archive.org/details/patrologiaecurs142unkngoog. Pollard: Pollard, Alfred William. An Essay on Colophons: With Specimens and Translations. Chicago: Caxton Club, 1905. New York: Burt Franklin, 1968 facsimile reprint. Rosenwald: The Library of Congress. The Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection: A Catalog of the Gifts of Lessing J. Rosenwald to the Library of Congress, 1943 to 1975. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1977. Studi-I: Lai, Piero, and Anna Maria Menichelli, eds. Prima edizione a stampa della Di­vina Commedia. Studi I. Foligno, Italy: Comune di Foligno, Assessorato alla cultura, Consulta di coordinamento delle associazioni culturali Lions Club-Pro Foligno, 1994. Studi-II: Lai, Piero, and Anna Maria Menichelli, eds. Prima edizione a stampa della Divina Commedia. Studi II. Foligno, Italy: Comune di Foligno, Assessorato alla cultura, Consulta di coordinamento delle associazioni culturali Lions Club-Pro Foligno, 1999. USTC: University of St. Andrews. Universal Short Title Catalogue. St. Andrews, UK: University of St. Andrew, 2011–. VIAF: Virtual International Authority File. OCLC, 2010–2020. http://viaf.org/.

The Unexpected Dante

Antoine Du Pinet (sieur de Norcy, 1510?–1566?), “Description de la Cité de Florence.” In Plantz, pourtraitz et descriptions de plusieurs villes et forteresses, tant de l’Europe, Asie, & Afrique, que des Indes, & terres neuues. Lyon: Ian D’Ogerolles, 1564. View of the town of Florence, Italy. Includes the Arno River, angels, and coat of arms. Du Pinet, Antoine, active 16th century. 34 cm. / 31 cm. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.

1 Crossing Borders The Library of Congress Dante Collections Lucia Alma Wolf

Before Dante Alighieri,1 various Italian literary works had been written in one of the many vernacular dialects existing across the Italian peninsula.2 In Dante’s case, the obvious choice was the Florentine vernacular, his native city’s variant of early Italian, which later on was considered the supreme model for standard Italian.3 In other words, in the Italian social consciousness Dante is one of the founding fathers of Italian language and literature, a mantle that justifies the endurance of his legacy in Italy. Nonetheless, it cannot explain the widespread fame that Dante and especially his masterpiece, the Divine Comedy, continue to enjoy. Dante probably started writing the Comedy as early as 1304, completing it just one year before his death in 1321.4 It is an epic poem of its own kind,5 in which Dante himself, as the protagonist, narrates his journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise to atone for his sins, beginning on Good Friday and ending the following Wednesday.6 During Dante’s journey through the otherworld, the poet Virgil functions as his main guide, leading him through the various circles of Hell and the terraces of Purgatory, where he encounters the souls of the damned and the souls of the penitents, respectively.7 Finally, after being led through Paradise by his beloved Beatrice, he is redeemed and rises to the full vision of God. The Comedy comprises 14,2338 lines of verse, divided into three canticles (Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso), each consisting of thirty-three cantos. An additional canto serves as a prologue. Dante used hendecasyllabic meter in three-line stanzas (terza rima) rhyming in the chain pattern aba, bcb, cdc, ded, etc. for the whole length of the poem.9 From the start, English translators of the Comedy were challenged in using the terza rima stanza to replicate Dante’s use given the English language’s differing syntactic and phonetic systems and that it has fewer rhyming words than Italian.10 The preferred choice of various English translators fell on blank verse (with no rhyming pattern) and iambic pentameter, which has a long tradition for epic poems in English literature.11 The original title was Commedia or Comedìa12 and it only officially received the epithet divina13 with the 1555 Venetian edition by the humanist Lodovico Dolce, printed by Gabriel Giolitus de Ferrariis.14 The contextual and formal traits of the Comedy as well

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Lucia Alma Wolf

Fig. 1.1. Sandow Birk, Dante and Virgil Contemplate the Inferno. 2003. Oil and acrylic on canvas. Catharine Clark Gallery, San Francisco.

as its thrust are far too complex to be described briefly here, and the ongoing accumulation of Dante studies makes it clearly, as Giuseppe Mazzotta says, a task of “staggering proportions” because “Dante criticism, as practiced through the centuries, has itself become the object of a legitimate historical investigation.”15 We may well wonder why throngs of poets, artists, scholars, publishers, and translators around the globe have focused on this arduous Italian medieval work. Nonetheless, the Comedy was translated into many languages, including numerous English translations, making it possible for audiences worldwide to appreciate its bizarre flights of fancy and obscure historical references. In fact, this imposing poem has successfully endured across geography, language, culture, and time, especially if we consider the outstanding publishing achievements that began with its fourteenth century manuscripts.16 This success continued over the centuries from the first printed edition in 1472 to contemporary editions available on the internet.17

The Earliest Editions The heart of the Dante collections at the Library of Congress includes eight of the earliest print editions dating back to the fifteenth century—and they are some of the earliest



Crossing Borders

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books printed in Europe and certainly in Italy, where the first book was printed in 1465.18 Like other books printed at the time, the first editions of the Comedy were produced in print runs of four hundred to five hundred copies.19 As a consequence, surviving editions are very precious and rare. The Library’s earliest print edition is La Commedia printed in Venice in 1477 by the German printer Vindelinus de Spira and acquired in 1930.20 (The first printed edition of the Comedy was completed on April 11, 1472, by the German Johannes Numeister and the Italian Evangelista Angelini in Foligno.)21 Two more editions were printed in 1472, one in Mantua by Georgius de Augusta and Paulus Butzbach,22 and the other in Venice by Federicus de Comitibus.23 The Dante deluge had begun, with eight editions appearing in six years, including De Spira’s, which was the only one among them to be accompanied by a commentary.24 The first three editions, as well as one printed in Naples in 1477, can easily be compared in a large folio volume titled Le prime quattro edizioni della Divina commedia letteralmente ristampate per cura di G. G. Warren Lord Vernon (The first four editions of the Divine Comedy edited and reprinted by G. G. Warren Lord Vernon), published in London in 1858.25 De Spira’s 1477 edition is germane to the Library’s Dante collections not only for its intrinsic historical and cultural values, but as the first print edition with commentary. Written by the Bolognese Iacopo della Lana, the commentary first appeared in a manuscript version between 1324 and 1328.26 The success of Lana’s commentary is demonstrated by approximately one hundred codices preserved integrally or partially in various European libraries, one of which is a Latin translation. That particular version is all the more an interesting outcome, since Lana’s was the first full-length commentary in Italian vernacular, while more often Latin works were translated into the vernacular, not vice versa.27 The 1477 print edition of Lana’s 150-year-old commentary sealed its triumph—at least until the appearance of Cristoforo Landino’s in 1481.28 Formally and textually, Lana’s work conformed to the medieval tradition of commentaries to which Dante’s earliest audiences were accustomed.29 These readers were used to explanations of the Bible and classic texts that fundamentally consisted of line-by-line descriptions with many references to classical, mythological, biblical, and contemporary medieval knowledge.30 But his work did represent a shift in form and content. 31 To begin with, Lana added ample prefaces to each canto in which he dwells on particular doctrinal issues raised in Dante’s text.32 Furthermore, his commentary is filled with recommendations for appropriate diction and narrative breaks that vividly portray the Comedy’s characters and historical events, delivering welcome interruptions from the prescriptive matter in his prose.33 In spite of its lasting success throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth century, eventually, Lana’s commentary was surpassed by newer works with different aims.34 Most scholars accept that Dante’s son, Jacopo Alighieri, began the Comedy’s commentary tradition in the year following his father’s death by producing a partial treatise on the Inferno.35 A section of Jacopo’s commentary was reproduced in De Spira’s edition, and it also was copied entirely or in part in other manuscript and print editions.36 Commentaries already had a very long tradition by Dante’s time, and they had mainly been reserved for legal and religious works. In their most basic forms, they consisted of glosses or annotations by one or more authors that explained difficult concepts or

Lucia Alma Wolf

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Fig. 1.2. La Commedia Incunabula at the Library of Congress Year

Place

Printer

Number of Copies and LC Call Numbers

Permalinks

1477

Venice

Vindelinus de Spira

Copy 1: 1477 .D34

http://lccn.loc. gov/72214535

1481

Florence

Nicolaus Laurentii, “Alamanus”

Copy 1: Incun. 1481 .D3 Rosenwald Coll; Copy 2: Vollbehr Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/48035267

1484

Venice

Octavianus Scotus I

Copy 1: Incun. 1484.D34 Vollbehr Coll

https://lccn.loc. gov/72214537

1487

Brescia

Boninus de Boninis

Copy 1: Hain 5948 Vollbehr Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/65058961

1491

Venice

Petrus de Plasiis

Copy 1: Incun. 1491.D19 Rosenwald Coll; Copy 2: Incun. 1491.D19 Vollbehr Coll; Copy 3: unattributed Incun.1491 .D19; Copy 4: Incun. 1491.D19 Batchelder Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/48033715

1491 [1492]

Venice

Mattheus Capcasa and Bernardinus Benalius

Copy 1: Incun. 1491.D18 Rosenwald Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/47043553

1493

Venice

Mattheus Capcasa

Copy 1: Incun. 1493.D3 Rosenwald Coll; Copy 2: Incun. 1493.D3 Vollbehr Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/49030787

1497

Venice

Petrus de Quarengiis, Bergomensis

Copy 1: Incun. 1497.D34 Vollbehr Coll

http://lccn.loc. gov/72214536

obscure passages in a text. In the case of the Comedy, a work fitting into a somewhat traditional framework while adopting many untrodden stylistic, conceptual, and linguistic solutions, commentaries assumed other functions alongside the purely interpretive and didactic purposes of the exegetic tradition, such as defending Dante’s vernacular choice or his references to contemporary culture. All of these strategies were used to establish his authority in the Italian literary tradition.37 Various modern literary critics have debated the relevance of the Comedy commentaries in general, claiming that they were superfluous medieval vestiges that did little to advance a true



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understanding of Dante’s poem.38 For example, Benedetto Croce, one of the most influential Italian scholars of the twentieth century, proposed to “throw away” the commentaries altogether, although he admitted that “No one can read Dante without adequate preparation and culture, without the necessary mediation of philology.”39 The early twenty-first century saw a resurgence in the study of the commentaries as an integral part of the work itself. Not only are they an aspect of the poem’s complexity as a literary and cultural text, 40 but they are also a primary feature of the work’s physical appearance in books as material cultural objects.41 For instance, the specific layout of the poem and commentaries in the earliest manuscripts migrated to print in a similar style, with the commentary text surrounding a brief passage of the poem, which was often printed in a larger font size.42 Certain material and graphic features typical of the manuscript tradition also transferred to the earliest print books, establishing a continuum between the two media and creating an organic evolution between manuscript and print traditions.43 Many prototypographers who established the first presses in Italy were Germans, since Germany was where European printing had originated, and various prototypographers had worked either for or with Gutenberg.44 They often worked in partnership with local typographers. Nicolaus Laurentii, nicknamed “Alamanus” (the German),45 who actually was from Wrocław, Poland, first moved to Lendinara, in northern Italy, where he worked as a manuscript copyist. Many prototypographers, such as Johannes Numeister and Vindelinus de Spira, also had started their careers as copyists, a point that reinforces the idea of continuity between the manuscript and print traditions. Once established in Florence, where he operated between 1478 and 1486, Laurentii published at least twenty-one editions of classical and contemporary texts, including the Comedy. Undoubtedly, it is one of the most authoritative print editions of the poem produced in the fifteenth century.46 Over time, this edition has assumed a broader political and cultural significance, deriving from Landino’s prologue and commentary. As Deborah Parker argues, Renaissance commentaries with prologues “increasingly encompass a wide range of local issues that are more social.”47 Landino’s commentary, which would appear throughout the Renaissance and even later,48 is especially significant in its claiming Dante and the Comedy for Florence. He uses this approach to remark on the Florentine vernacular’s superiority over all other Italian vernaculars and to praise the city’s cultural supremacy over neighboring Italian city states, thus paying tribute to the ruling Medici, his patrons.49 The 1481 Florentine edition was the first to be printed in Dante’s hometown; the eight earlier printed editions had been perceived as an affront to Florence, its government, and the purity of the Florentine vernacular.50 In his Proemio (prologue), Landino proclaims Dante’s fiorentinità (that is, his “Florentiness”). In no half terms, Landino declares “Questo solo affermo, havere liberato el nostro cittadino dalle barbarie di molti externi idiomi, ne’ quali da’ commentatori era stato corropto” [“I only affirm this: that I have freed our citizen [Dante] from the barbarisms of many foreign idioms with which commentators had corrupted him.”]51 The mention of two other great Florentines in this editorial project, the humanist Marsilio Ficino52 and the painter Sandro Botticelli, confirms the underlying cultural intents of this commentary, this edition, and its distance from the

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older commentary tradition.53 Even from a physical point of view, Landino’s work is intentionally monumental since his prologue spreads over several pages. Laurentii’s beautiful 1481 folio edition also features the first illustrations in print of the Comedy, engraved by Baccio Baldini54 and supposedly inspired by Sandro Botticelli.55 Only a very few extant copies contain all of the nineteen illustrations by Baldini after Botticelli’s designs. The Rosenwald copy in the Dante holdings of the Library is one of the rarest, most complete, and remarkable copies in existence, as most other print copies of this edition that have survived do not show all nineteen illustrations.56

The Vollbehr and Rosenwald Collections Both the Otto Vollbehr and the Lessing Rosenwald collections at the Library of Congress have a copy of Nicolaus Laurentii’s 1481 edition of the Comedy.57 However, these two copies, as parts of larger separate collections, took very different routes in reaching the Library. Their acquisition encapsulates the debate over what type of material should be housed in the nation’s library and what kind of institution the Library should become. The Vollbehr collection comprised more than three thousand incunabula (i.e., books printed between 1450–1500) from a variety of early European presses and included additional editions of the Comedy from 1484, 1487, and 1497. A fervent discussion ensued within the House of Representatives when, on March 10, 1930, a bill came before the Joint Committee on the Library, authorizing $1.5 million to purchase this collection. Only five months earlier, the New York Stock Exchange crashed and the United States began slipping into the Great Depression. The committee, led by Robert Luce (R-MA), felt compelled to open a discussion on the costly acquisition. Chairman Luce, among others, expressed concern about the bill, asking if it was right to spend so much money “in this particular direction when the needs of the Library in other directions are considerable.”58 Librarian of Congress Herbert Putnam held that developing collections that could “serve American scholarship and culture in ways in which other American libraries fail to serve them adequately” was also a high priority.59 While Librarian Putnam wholeheartedly supported purchasing the Vollbehr collection, he also understood that for some special acquisitions, the Library could turn to generous donors, rather than Congress, for funding, and that “such generosity should be encouraged.”60 Since the Library’s role was to provide information first to Congress, then to the general public, some questioned how such a collection outside of the Library’s mission could be justified. Meanwhile, librarians, curators, congressional representatives, the press, and the American public directly or indirectly took part in this discussion that tested the limit of what was to be considered canonical for the Library’s holdings. The bill’s sponsor, Representative Ross A. Collins (D-MS), offered an energetic speech that featured compelling historical, literary, and bibliographical arguments to persuade his colleagues to support to the bill because The Congress now has an opportunity to still further add to the greatness and richness of its Library. The great collection of incunabula . . . a collection unequaled in America . . . can be secured for our Library for about half its actual value.



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(In 1926 the Vollbehr collection had been appraised at $2.5 million by the librarian of the Newberry Library in Chicago).61 Tracing the history of the Library, Collins recounted its first purchase of about one thousand books, including “standard works of law, archaeology, history, geography, politics, political economy, theology, and translations of Greek and Latin classics,”62 followed by the acquisition of Thomas Jefferson’s library in 1815 for $23,950. In recalling that “many of the books were regarded by some Members as ‘immoral, indecent, irreligious, and generally revolutionary,’”63 Collins suggested that opposition to the bill on the grounds that the Vollbehr collection was not appropriate or in keeping with Library acquisition standards was misguided and shortsighted. He also used public opinion to his advantage, citing press coverage and letters not only from people with passion for the rare and curious but from citizens at large whose sentiment and emotion seemed to be stirred by the prospect that our Congress might by its enactment demonstrate a sensibility to ‘things cultural’ with which neither it nor our country is habitually credited.64

Collins concluded that “these cradle books, representing, as they do, the earliest efforts of culture, thought, and printing should be preserved and kept by the United States Government for the people of America.”65 In the end, Congress voted in favor of the bill, which President Herbert Hoover signed into law, and the Library acquired the Vollbehr collection. Not surprisingly, the acquisition was considered a very unusual occurrence at the time and under the circumstances.66 The Vollbehr collection purchase succeeded thanks to the enlightened support of those who believed that the Library needed to become a model of culture for the entire world, rather than a library whose role was limited to serving only for the immediate use of the American government and its people. This trend toward a greater cultural and international outlook is represented in the works of more than four hundred languages in the Library’s collections,67 and it reflects one of the most endearing and unique traits of the American national library. The second major phase in developing the Library’s Dante holdings began in 1943 with the generous donation of incunabula and prints collected by Lessing J. Rosenwald,68 former chairman of the board of Sears, Roebuck, and Company. Rosenwald had formed one of the most outstanding private collections in America.69 At the time of the first donations, Librarian of Congress Archibald MacLeish laid the groundwork for a major reorganization and modernization of the Library, especially concerning acquisition and reference activities.70 MacLeish’s principal concern was “the prevailing mood of anti-intellectualism in America,”71 and in his effort to promote a broader “recognition of the Library as a major cultural institution,” he invited writers, artists, and scholars to the Library and also hired them as staff.72 His successors continued these efforts establishing a more desirable milieu for the arrival of the Rosenwald collection, which includes medieval illuminated manuscripts, woodcut books, and engravings as well as editions of the Comedy printed before 1500. The successful and long-term acquisition of a remarkably private and very specialized collection such as the Rosenwald shows that the Library finally had become a fertile ground for collecting books that represented

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the history of printing in Europe and expanded areas of the foreign language collections that had been neglected for a great part of the nineteenth century. Before the major Vollbehr and Rosenwald collections arrived, the acquisition of early European and Italian print books had occurred sporadically and by happenstance.73 The first mention of an Italian edition of Dante’s works in the Library’s collections occurred in 1815 with the acquisition of Jefferson’s library, which contained a single, eighteenth-century edition of the Comedy.74 In 1837, amid political squabbling, Congress thwarted acquisition of Count Dimitrii Buturlin’s stellar private library that included “419 copies of Aldine editions, 368 from the Bodoni press, [and] many hundred volumes printed in the fifteenth century.”75 A similar unsuccessful attempt followed in 1844 concerning acquisition of the Durazzo family collection in Genoa. According to the U.S. Congress, acquiring that collection would have created an imbalance between the Library’s holdings in Italian compared with those in other European languages.76 As early as the first decades of the nineteenth century, public support for an expansion of the Library’s collections was strong. An article in the North American Review dated July 1837 advocating for the Buturlin acquisition compared the Library’s limited book collection with the bourgeoning collections of the Boston Aetheneum and Harvard libraries: “The library of Cambridge is of high order. Forty thousand volumes of printed works go far toward supplying the ordinary wants of the members of our oldest university,” further describing its holdings as constituted of the most important English literature books and the classics “as well as of many of the most valuable among the great writers of Italy, Germany, France, and Spain.”77 References to the missed opportunity of acquiring the Buturlin collection echoed throughout the Library’s annual reports for the rest of the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth century. It became emblematic of the lack of a common effort to steer the Library in the direction of becoming a fully established national library comparable to the largest European national libraries as well as emphasizing its inability to rival the foreign literature collections of the oldest and most prestigious American libraries.78 In 1901, Putnam described the current collections of foreign literature as containing a total of 6,067 volumes mainly in French with some new purchases in Italian and other European languages, including 331 Dante books.79 In 1946, Luther H. Evans, Putnam’s successor, decried the state of the Library’s holdings, proposing an “introspective and historical statement” that would recount the progress of the Library’s collection development.80 Recollections of the Buturlin blunder reappeared as a cautionary tale against excessively conservative views of the Library’s functions.81 Fifteenth-century European books, as well as other rare books and special collections materials that Rosenwald collected for their value in the history of Western printing and book illustration, were no longer considered merely extravagant items reserved to a restricted circle of privileged experts and members of the elites.82 Unlike the books acquired from Jefferson in 1815 and the incunabula from Vollbehr in 1930—which some members of Congress and others vehemently contested as unnecessary and out of sync with American values—the donation of the Rosenwald Collection occurred at a turning point in the history of the Library. Major shifts in the American library community, championed by Putnam with the support of the American Library Association



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in promoting the Library’s national and international role as the leading American cultural institution, also influenced the Library’s symbolic function as a promoter of democratic cultural values. For example, under Putnam, free books were distributed to American troops during World War I, and public libraries across the country used card catalogs produced by the Library of Congress. The changes in the public’s perception of the Library’s central role may have helped the expansion of its foreign collections, since Putnam’s efforts to spread the Library’s services also engaged the scholarly community, which required comprehensive collections at the national Library, in addition to the private and academic collections dispersed across the country. Thus, new parameters for collecting rare European books and incunabula, including the earliest editions of Dante’s works, were no longer seen as “dangerous, useless, abstruse, expensive, and low on the agenda of public needs.”83 The Vollbehr and Rosenwald collections became a foundation of the Library’s rare book collections and consequently of the earliest Dante holdings.84 The editions printed by Octavianus Scotus I (1484)85 and Boninus de Boninis (1487)86 are the first print editions of the Comedy to reprint Landino’s commentary, a trend that continued throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Scotus I edition is considered an excellent example of refined early typography. Scotus I (from Monza, in northwestern Italy), was the prototypographer from a Venetian family of printers and editors. He inherited the business and started printing in Venice in 1479, specializing in missals, the classics, law books, and medicine, and he is considered the first printer of music incunabula.87 After the publication of the Comedy in 1484, he carried on as an editor until 1499.88 While continuing to distinguish themselves as music printers, his heirs Octavianus Scotus II and Hieronymus were renowned for publishing Latin translations of Greek philosophical works. As contemporaries of the famous and highly successful Venetian printer Aldus Manutius,89 the Scotus family had to compete for a portion of the book market. Manutius had solidly secured for himself a large segment in Venice; he dominated the publication of classic Greek texts, which earned him a reputation for being a “humanistic publisher.”90 Therefore, with the Scotus family’s publication of Latin translations of the Greek commentaries of Aristotle’s works that had been printed by Manutius, the family exploited a demand for textbooks at the nearby University of Padua.91 In the spirit of this competition with Manutius, Scotus I most likely decided to print his Comedy. While Scotus’ edition lacks illustrations, De Boninis’ edition deploys an impressive arrangement of images and ornamental elements throughout the work. De Boninis’ edition, completed in Brescia on May 31, 1487,92 set the precedent for future illustrated editions. By replacing copperplate engravings, like those used in the 1481 Florentine edition, with fewer time-consuming woodcuts, De Boninis established a more convenient printing process for illustrated works.93 His example shows that printing also thrived in other towns remotely situated from Venice. Book printers’ career trajectories could lead to many roles, as well as widespread travel, earning them the title of itinerant printers.94 De Boninis himself was originally from Ragusa, in Dalmatia (part of modern Croatia); he arrived in Brescia in 1483, after having published his first work in Venice in 1478 and briefly operating in Verona. He was active in Brescia until 1491, when he determined

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that he could no longer compete with the Britannico family. He finally settled in Lyon, working as a bookseller and editor.95 The flourishing printing business in Brescia, a landlocked town in Lombardy far from the vibrant maritime city of Venice, could perhaps be explained by its thriving papermaking industry and local demand for school textbooks. Still, printing in Brescia never was comparable with the far-reaching and cosmopolitan Venetian printing market.96 One of the Library’s most beautiful incunabula is the remarkable edition of La Commedia printed in Venice by Bernardinus Benalius97 and Mattheus Capcasa98 on March 3, 1491.99 Daniel De Simone, former curator of the Rosenwald collection, notes that it is “considered by many bibliographers to be one of the most important illustrated editions of Dante’s masterpiece in the fifteenth century.”100 (In the Rosenwald copy, a long handwritten note on a flyleaf reports that in Venice the new year began on March 1 and therefore the year of publication according to local custom is 1492.)101 Another edition of the Comedy was also printed in Venice in 1491 by Petrus de Plasiis.102 Both presented a revised version of Landino’s commentary, executed by the Franciscan friar Pietro Mazzanti da Figline.103 The typographical practice of using correctors connected to printing’s earliest days, given the need to establish a standard text or master copy by comparing, selecting, merging, and purging the multiple versions of a literary work circulating in manuscript forms. The corrector also provided the book’s front and back matter, and his work overlapped with that of an editor.104 Additionally, the employment of a Franciscan friar such as Pietro Mazzanti da Figline to edit Landino’s commentary was not exactly a novelty. Between 1470 and 1500, Venetian printers regularly employed Franciscan and Dominican friars to edit classical texts. For these printers, it was a natural evolution to rely on the same editors and correctors whom they already had in house for the publication of classical texts.105 This choice could explain why the first print editions of Dante’s masterpiece were closely modelled after print editions of classical texts. It could also signify, potentially, that the Comedy had become already a “classical” text or at least it had started to be perceived as such.106

The Sixteenth-Century Editions The first editions of the Comedy by Scotus I, De Boninis, Benalius, and Capcasa appeared in the late fifteenth century and represent an early, experimental phase in printing books in the vernacular in Italy. On the one hand, they had had to compete with prestigious manuscript production and, on the other, with the printed publication of the classics and Latin academic books. Manuscripts were more highly regarded than their new counterparts in print—and even more so than publications in the vernacular. For example, the Renaissance book merchant and librarian Vespasiano di Bisticci provided manuscript books for the libraries of noblemen and dignitaries and wrote about their lives in a monumental work titled Vite degli uomini illustri del sec. XV [The Vespasiano Memoirs: Lives of Illustrious Men of the Fifteenth Century].107 In describing the duke of Urbino, Federico da Montefeltro, Bisticci lamented that the duke would be ashamed to place print books among the most beautiful manuscripts in his collection.108 In the Renaissance, it took a while before print books, and especially works in



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the vernacular, gained in popularity among the wealthy classes who could afford to buy them and appreciate them; in general, literacy, even in vernacular languages, was limited to the upper classes and wealthy members of the middle class.109 One of the most interesting aspects of printing in Renaissance Italy—and especially Venice—is that it had become a fully fledged business. Printing, publishing, and book selling were often functions held by the same individual and, at any rate, concentrated within a family and passed down for generations, as in the cases of the Manutius, Stagninus, Giolitus, Giunta, and Sessa families. They formed commercial networks guaranteed by sophisticated systems of social, economic, and legal privileges.110 For instance, in Venice printers obtained upward mobility by assuming certain important offices for the Doge or establishing business ties with nobles who endowed their book enterprises.111 Most important, Venetian printers formed professional associations, such as one known simply as the “Company” in 1479, which controlled book distribution and sales. This allowed the trade to expand into international markets. Venice’s preeminence in the book trade remained unmatched into the early seventeenth century, even when the Counter-Reformation slowed down book production.112 Manutius exemplified the potential upward mobility of printers by demonstrating a well-rounded set of technical skills as well as business acumen and ambition.113 Consequently, Manutius created a brand of his own steeped in humanistic culture that elevated his books to an exclusive level. His development of the small, portable book has been compared to Steve Jobs’ invention of smart phones and tablets.114 Nonetheless, some scholars caution against misinterpreting Manutius’ impact. Instead, historian Martin Lowry suggests considering that Manutius’ great achievement was his insight into an existing market demand from a new order of career men, perhaps the “literarii ludi magistris” (literary school teachers) whom he mentions in his dedication of the new Latin grammar Rudimenta grammatices latinae linguae printed in 1501 and the “studiosis” (scholars) in his publications of the classics.115 This new readership that Manutius cultivated in his dedications and prefaces were not the noblemen to whom he had dedicated his books before, but a different class of well-to-do men who attended the local universities and ambitiously sought out the best positions at court. Manutius knew how to capitalize on these changes in Venetian society.116 The 1502 Aldine edition of the Comedy or Le terze rime is a primary example of the changing Renaissance book trade in Venice. Here Manutius advances the art of typography, the book trade itself, textual transmission, and the practice of personal reading. By using the compact octavo-size book for classics as well as vernacular works,117 Manutius revolutionized reading practices, allowing them to be read anywhere. His portable books (libelli portatiles) were also printed with cost-saving measures in mind and striking simplicity. Devoid of explanatory material that had normally encumbered medieval books, they focused the reader’s attention on the main work. Among his typographical inventions, Manutius’ new font, the Aldine italic, became the norm for printing humanistic texts. At first glance, the 1502 edition of the Comedy is a very humble-looking little book—especially as it lacks any of the critical and illustrative appendages of earlier print books—yet it changed the way in which the Comedy was transmitted to posterity, by way of Pietro Bembo’s critical new version of the text, which served as the vulgate for

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Fig. 1.3. Carol M. Highsmith, Printers’ marks of Aldus Manutius and Paul and Anthony Meietos in East Corridor, Thomas Jefferson Building, Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 2007. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

nearly a century.118 Bembo, a leading humanist scholar during the Renaissance, based his edition of the Comedy on one of the most precious manuscripts that could be found, the manuscript known as MS Vat. Lat. 3199.119 Giovanni Boccaccio120 gave this codex to Francesco Petrarca,121 and it subsequently became part of the Bembo family library. The printing and publishing practices introduced in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries became the mainstay of Renaissance humanistic printing. Bernardinus Giolitus de Ferrariis of Trino, also known as Bernardinus Stagninus,122 built on this groundwork with his editions in 1512 and 1520.123 Stagninus, as well as Johannes Giolitus, Stagninus’ cousin and the father of another successful printer, Gabriel Giolitus, were from Trino, in northwestern Italy, in the region of Piedmont. They also established themselves in Venice but expanded their book trade by building strong relationships with booksellers located across Lombardy and Piedmont.124 Thanks to their stable commercial networks, their businesses thrived, even though they had to carve very specific niches in the industry to compete with Manutius and his matchless entrepreneurial and intellectual skills. For example, the Giolitus firm chose to print mainly law, medicine, and philosophy textbooks that were in demand at the neighboring universities of Parma, Padua, Pavia, and Bologna.125



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The flourishing art of typography in Trino is a sign of the complex interconnections forming among printers, patrons, and localities.126 Trino was far removed from the commercial and cultural vitality that characterized sixteenth-century Venice, the capital of the international book trade. In Stagninus’ case, however, the patronage of the marquises of Montferrat, the local ruling house, guaranteed strong international connections that prompted his and the Giolitus family’s business to grow and expand toward Venice. Trino’s favorable geographic position on the river Po, which served as a commercial channel between the Adriatic and the inner landlocked regions, allowed for trade and cultural exchanges with Venice and other major European cities.127 On one side, the marquises of Montferrat, as vicars of the Holy Roman Empire, were associated with Germany; on the other side, they were tied to the Byzantine Greek family of the Palaeologus from whom they originated.128 Throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, various houses ruled in Trino, but the original ties between the Montferrat and their counterparts in Europe and Constantinople remained intact. The Giolitus and Stagninus families’ business experiences to some extent typify the Italian printing trade at the time. These moving and growing networks of bookmen were becoming highly competitive and had started challenging Venice’s long-held supremacy in the book trade.129 Even so, the Comedy editions Stagninus printed in Venice in 1512, 1516, and 1520, as well as the 1536 edition printed in collaboration with Joannes Giolitus de Tridino,130 were highly successful and representative examples of these shifting trends in Renaissance printing. While they stand out for their impressive aesthetic qualities and richness of detail, they represent the arrival point at which printing methods became more standardized. Stagninus and his competitors incorporated Manutius’ innovations, but they also created new features to attract customers: elaborate title pages with a profusion of decorative features such as rich ornamental borders, vignettes, and text in red and black ink, as well as full-page woodcut illustrations and decorative initials. Readers also welcomed the value-added paratextual apparatuses, including dedicatory prefaces, prologues, indexes, glossaries, maps, and traditional or new commentaries, which quickly became conventional and expected. Stagninus and other printers also embraced the smaller book format and the use of italic print. Starting with Stagninus, Landino’s commentary made its comeback and endured throughout the sixteenth century,131 as shown by Jacobus de Burgofranco’s edition of the Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino printed in 1529.132 This publishing trend was interrupted only twice: first, by Franciscus Marcolinus,133 who in 1544 introduced the new commentary by Alessandro Vellutello;134 and second, by Petrus de Fine, who printed Bernardino Daniello’s135 commentary in 1568.136 Meanwhile, Landino’s commentary continued to be printed alongside Vellutello’s commentaries, as in Joannes Baptista and Melchior Sessa’s 1564 edition.137 The intersection of Manutius’ novelties and the conventional printing practices that characterize the publication history of the Comedy finally come to fruition in the 1595 edition printed by Domenico Manzani in Florence, under the auspices of the Accademia della Crusca.138 Likewise, the accademia’s main objective to produce an official Italian language system based on the Florentine vernacular came full circle. Eventually, the Comedy and Dante fell

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into decline over the next two centuries.139 With its emphasis on democracy, scientific rationalism, and natural religion, the Enlightenment did not show appreciation for Dante’s poem based on autobiographical, theological, and medieval systems of thought. According to Voltaire, the Comedy was a “bizarre mixture of Christianity and paganism”140 whose obscurantism and symbolism needed to be explained by commentators, “which is perhaps yet another reason for not being understood. His reputation will always endure, since scarcely anyone reads him.”141 Not until the nineteenth century would Dante enjoy a notable resurgence in Europe and draw significant attention in America.142

The Nineteenth Century The nineteenth century was a period of revival for Dante not only in Europe, but in the United States as well with the first American translations of the Comedy. Consequently, a considerable number of libraries in America were collecting Dante’s books just a few decades after the publication of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s translation of the Comedy in 1867. By 1900, Dante collections were established in some two dozen American libraries.143 Unlike the renowned Dante collections at Harvard and Cornell, the extensive Dante holdings at the Library of Congress are less well known, but they do shed light on America’s acculturation of the medieval poet. The Library’s Dante collections started with the only copy of the Comedy that was part of Thomas Jefferson’s library, the largest private collection in the country. Congress purchased his library in 1815 to replace the one that was lost when the British torched the Capitol during the War of 1812.144 Unfortunately, Jefferson’s copy was later lost in a fire in 1851.145 The Alphabetical Catalogue of the Library: Authors, published in 1864 for “the convenience as well as the wishes of Congress, and other frequenters of the Library,” mentions fourteen Dante books.146 Some of the more notable ones are a collection of Dante’s works with annotations by Pompeo Venturi and copperplate engravings, printed in Venice 1757–1758;147 an edition of Ugo Foscolo’s commentary of the Comedy printed in London in 1842–1843;148 and various English translations, including the earliest, by Henry Boyd, printed in London in 1802,149 as well as Henry Francis Cary’s edition published in London in 1847.150 Ultimately, shifting American cultural perceptions influenced by New England intellectual circles and post-Civil War societal changes helped pave the way for Dante’s favorable reception in the United States.151 Curiously, while the views of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Dante are well known, the role of Walt Whitman in Dante’s reception in America is less acknowledged. Joshua Steven Matthews provides a detailed analysis of Whitman’s notebook from 1862152 that documents the poet’s interest in Dante and especially in the connections between Whitman’s readings of the Inferno and his composition of Drum-Taps.153 One copy of Longfellow’s 1867 translation154 of the Comedy held at the Library155 is even rarer and more significant than others since it bears Whitman’s autograph, creating an idealistic and in a certain sense tangible association between two great American poets of the Civil War era. Matthews places a direct connection between Dante’s first reception in America and the ideological context of

Fig. 1.4. Dante and Beatrice, Paradiso 20.29–30. La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri, con tavole in rame. Florence: Tipografia all’insegna dell’Ancora, 1817–19. Folio (49 cm). Copperplate engraving “a mezzo macchia” by Francesco Nenci (1781, Anghiari–1850, Siena). This is a very rare edition of one of the earliest Divina Commedia in Italian acquired by the Library of Congress. It appears for the first time in the Catalogue of the Library of Congress, 1830. General Collections, Library of Congress.

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the Civil War, claiming that “Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman, read and interpreted the Comedy in terms of national politics, and by the early 1860s, the Civil War.”156 Matthews argues that Dante was widely viewed as an important theological-political poet, a cultural representative of Italy and nineteenth-century Italian nationalism and liberalism, one who spoke powerfully to antebellum and wartime issues of national disunity, states’ rights, the nature of empire, and the justice and injustice of civil war.157

American writers such as Longfellow and Whitman, who voiced their ideas about the Civil War, strongly encouraged the dissemination of Dante’s reputation as a beacon of civil liberties and political renewal. They contributed to the effort through both their own translations and their own book collections, as demonstrated by Whitman’s possession of Longfellow’s translation. Longfellow and his peers admired Dante as the “star of morning and of liberty” given his association with the Italian Risorgimento, the long political warring process that culminated in 1861 with the unification of Italy.158 Longfellow had completed drafting his translation of the Comedy in 1863, at the height of the Civil War. He held back its publication so as to present it on the occasion of Dante’s six hundredth birth anniversary in Florence in 1865, during the celebrations that also honored Italy’s recently achieved unification.159 Long before Matthews, however, American scholars such as Theodore Koch, Willard Fiske, Angelina La Piana, and Werner P. Friederich pioneered studies dealing with Dante’s reception in America and abroad.160 They are proof of the Comedy as a cultural phenomenon in their own right, because they themselves directly contributed to the dissemination of knowledge about Dante and Italian culture in America. Matthews attributes the delayed reception of the Comedy in America, in comparison to its earlier circulation in Great Britain,, not only to the linguistic and cultural complexities of the poem, but also to Dante’s faith,161 since his medieval Catholic views contrasted profoundly with Protestant beliefs—especially in its Puritan versions—in North America.162 Once Henry Francis Cary’s translation of the Comedy in blank verse began to circulate in America alongside the ideals of Romanticism, many previous reservations against Dante also started to dissipate.163 His version was not immediately popular among the British public and it was only after the literary interventions of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the Italian writer Ugo Foscolo that it became successful in Europe and later in America. The earliest translation in the United States began with a partial rendering by Thomas William Parsons, whose volume, The first ten cantos of the Inferno of Dante Alighieri, Ticknor published in 1843.164 Parsons composed his translation in quatrains, a valued stanza in the English literary tradition, but in later translations he found the need to experiment with other solutions. He joined the Cambridge Dante Society alongside Longfellow, Lowell, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., and was very respected by his fellow American Danteans, although less renowned.165 The Comedy’s influence on mid-nineteenth-century American literature turns up in various American authors from Edgar Allen Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne to Herman Melville and others who, to different extents, were inspired by Dante’s work.166 Dante’s effect on Melville’s Moby-Dick is evident, such as the final scene of Captain



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Fig. 1.5. Ceremony at Dante Memorial, Meridian Hill Park, Washington, DC, 1921 [or 1922]. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

Ahab’s sinking with the Pequod echoing Ulysses’ shipwreck and death in Inferno 26. Less obvious are, however, the connections between the Comedy and Melville’s novel Mardi; and a Voyage Thither (1849), not only in the many textual references, but also in the author’s marginalia added to a copy of the Cary translation in his possession. Melville made annotations with cross-references to specific passages in Mardi.167 Alternatively, William Wells Brown’s Clotelle; or, the Colored Heroine, a Tale of the Southern States (1864), known as the first novel published by an African American, equates the status of Jerome, the protagonist, to Dante’s as an unrequited lover and a political exile, alluding to Brown’s own situation as a self-exile in London, where he first published his novel with the title Clotel (1853).168

The Modern Dante American translations of the Comedy multiplied in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. John Ciardi, the son of an Italian immigrant from Boston’s North End, who became a renowned scholar at Harvard and Rutgers University and an award-winning poet, authored a translation of The Inferno published in 1954, followed by the other two canticles in 1961 and 1970. Ciardi’s versions became the cornerstone of twentieth-century

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American translations of the Comedy, even though critics did not all agree on its merits.169 Ciardi, like his British contemporary Dorothy Sayers,170 chose to use their own individual versions of terza rima in respect of the original poem, but they each still intended to modernize and popularize the Comedy by incorporating modern English idiomatic forms.171 While their translations did in fact gain success among students and the general public, their literary standing—and consequently the deployment of any form of terza rima in modern English translations of the Comedy—received severe criticism from within the literary establishment.172 Since the first English editions of the Comedy in the nineteenth century, translators faced the dilemma of using Dante’s terza rima or opting for more acceptable English forms: mainly, blank verse or prose. In the spirit of their age, Sayers and Ciardi chose terza rima and modern familiar English, reflecting the Modernist propensity for experimentation and the postwar promotion of popular culture. Their renditions clashed with the accepted Victorian conventions established by Cary and continued by Longfellow of using blank verse as the preferred English verse form for the Comedy, a sign of Miltonian ascendance.173 Sayers’ and Ciardi’s attempts to revive terza rima in English endured the staunch scrutiny of scholars and translators, such as Charles Singleton who, instead, embraced prose translations of the Comedy as a return to the highest scholarly standards and its natural heuristic role in the classroom.174 In the 1980s, Allen Mandelbaum’s175 translation of the Comedy inaugurated a new phase, surpassing the reputation of previous translations by devising a sophisticated poetic system that cleverly mimicked in contemporary standard English terza rima’s rhyme scheme without repeating it literally. His ingenious poetic solutions represented an ideal compromise between the traditional use of blank verse for English translations of the Comedy and the application of enjambements, various types of rhymes, and other strategically placed phonetic devices, thus avoiding the necessity of terza rima’s fixed rhyme scheme. Mandelbaum’s work was further enhanced by American artist Barry Moser’s modern illustrations that were also “deeply rooted in tradition,” Moser having studied iconic illustrators such as Botticelli, Doré, and Flaxman.176 Moser’s full-page drawings in pencil, steelpoint, and black ink washes both draw on the Comedy’s illustrated history and “dance as the language dances; they are expedient as Dante is expedient; they are quick and terse. . . .”177 Illustrations in American editions of the Comedy since the latter part of the twentieth century have introduced elements of contemporary art that tend to be more abstract, self-referential, and experimental than their nineteenth-century models.178 Similarly, The Inferno of Dante: A New Verse Translation (1994) by the Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky with illustrations by Michael Mazur signals this modern drift in both poetic and artistic renditions of the Comedy that are more evocative than literal. English translators overcame the reservations of their predecessors who had escaped the pitfall of using terza rima or sometimes any poetic form, opting for safer prose translations and ingratiating academics and readers who preferred a more interpretative version. Like Mandelbaum, Pinsky employed his own bold technique, using “‘consonantical’ terza rima” and “near-ryhmes and rhymes in lines 1 and 3 of each tercet,” and only rarely at the end of the second line to replicate the chain effect of the original. Modern English



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translators of the Comedy need not fear some linguistic strain or, as translations theorists say, being “foreignized”; instead they can thrive “showing how powerfully [they are] affected by the foreign tongue.”179 On the other hand, Sandow Birk’s and Marcus Sanders’ twenty-first-century approach, both linguistically and artistically, demonstrates that there is no limit to the ways in which the Comedy still can be translated or even reimagined, generating utter surprise. By radically adapting Dante’s poem to urban American slang, lifestyle, and cityscapes, their translation provokes awareness of social contemporary issues at a cosmopolitan level.180 Birk also is the author of the drawings for the 210 lithographs appearing in the three volumes. His illustrations radically reinvent Doré’s classic engravings in a style reminiscent of graphic novels. One of the biggest developments of the modern era has been the emergence of women offering both scholarly and female perspectives on the Comedy. Women had already made their appearance as scholars in Italy in the sixteenth century, when they were banned outright from academic circles.181 With the resurgence of Dante as a national hero in nineteenth-century Italy following the country’s unification, women such as Erminia Fusinato, of Venice, and Margaret Oliphant, from Scotland, dedicated their work to divulging Dante within the context of rising social concerns about female education.182 In the United States, women have been on the membership roster of the Dante Society of America since its foundation in 1881.183 In the twentieth century, notable scholars such as Angelina La Piana, an Italian American, Englishwoman Dorothy Sayers, and Maria Corti, of Italy, still had to circumvent social, academic, and political roadblocks.184 These women paved the way for the many female scholars and translators who continue to lead the way in Dante’s reception and scholarship. And with her playful and sacrilegious translation of the Inferno published in 2013, American poet Mary Jo Bang perhaps can be considered a new starting point for authors to creatively and fearlessly venture out of the safer, traditional compounds of Dante scholarship and translation in which women have been excelling for centuries.185 Dante’s and the Comedy’s long and fascinating journey do not end here, even having reached the most unexpected corners of the earth. A quick glance at the Dante Society of America’s annual reports, new publication catalogs, and multiple cultural programs in libraries and museums around the world shows that the vitality of this great Italian author and his unique poem still have plenty of time and space in which to extend their regenerative influence.

2 Notes on Musical Instruments in Dante’s Divine Comedy Francesco Ciabattoni

The best way to begin a discussion of musical instruments in Dante’s Divine Comedy is by stating that there are no musical instruments in the Comedy.1 While that statement is almost entirely accurate, it needs some qualification. The only instrument in the poem that does not appear as a figure of speech is Nimrod’s horn in Inferno 31; all others are metaphors or similes that the poet employs for aesthetic purposes and to symbolically express theological values. Metaphors and similes transfer meaning upon a different signifier: this is exactly what Dante does in the episode of Master Adam (Inf. 30) by substituting a lower-status chordophone such as the lute for David’s noble cithara. Medieval writers followed the general principle, lucidly explained by Edmund Bowles, that “the portrayal of numerous and varied instruments was founded upon psychological, not practical, considerations.”2 Musical instruments were considered highly symbolic objects,3 and for centuries artists had employed them to evoke allegorical meaning. To shed light on the symbolic implications of musical instruments and their sounds in the aesthetic and theological environment of the Comedy, we can adopt a perspective suggested by Bruce Holsinger: Deep-seated assumptions about musical sonority as a practice of the flesh exerted a clear influence upon the composition, performance, reception, and representation of music from the twelfth through the fourteenth centuries and, further, that music played a central imaginative and ideological role in medieval representation of the human body.4

Let us begin with the three occurrences of the trumpet in Inferno. The most famous is without doubt the demon Barbariccia’s command to muster his squad by “making a trumpet of his asshole” (Inf. 21.136–139). Per l’argine sinistro volta dienno; ma prima avea ciascun la lingua stretta coi denti, verso lor duca, per cenno; ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta.



20

Fig. 2.1. Scene from the Inferno 21. Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Codex Palatinus 313, f.51v.

22

Francesco Ciabattoni [Off they set along the left-hand bank, / but first each pressed his tongue between his teeth to blow a signal to their leader, / and he had made a trumpet of his asshole.]

This filthy version of a bugle—whose vulgarity the Florence Codex Palatinus (ca. 1325–1350) mitigates by showing actual trumpets—is appropriate to the depraved crew of soldiers that Malacoda, the ranking officer among these demons, orders to accompany Virgil and a reluctant Dante (Fig. 2.1). As a fallen angel who had once sung in Heaven, Barbariccia emits a flatulence that is a degraded version of the breath [flatus] of angelic songs, a perverse form of liturgy that reverses a line of Psalm 44.2: “Eructavit cor meum verbum bonum: dico ego opera mea regi. Lingua mea calamus scribæ velociter scribentis” [My heart hath belched out a good word, I speak my works to the king; My tongue is the pen of a scrivener that writeth swiftly].5 This spontaneous emission of good words from the heart, similar to air emission from the mouth, found its way into the commentaries of important theologians and Church fathers. Valerie Allen glosses this “belch of the soul” with the words of no less than Bernard of Clairvaux, who goes on at length about the good smell of a belch exhaled by the bride of God from the Song of Songs: Quid inde? Ructus est. Quid tu in ructu quaeris orationum juncturas, solemnia dictionum? Quas tu tuo ructui leges imponis vel regulas? Non recipit tuam moderationem, non a te compositionem exspectat, non commoditatem, non opportunitatem requirit. Per se ex intimis, non modo cum non vis, sed et cum nescis, erumpit, evulsus potius quam emissus. Tamen odorem portat ructus, quandoque bonum, quandoque malum, pro vasorum, e quibus ascendit, contrariis qualitatibus. [ . . . ] Mihi, fateor, bene redolet ructus dilectae tuae, [ . . . ] odoratus sum in voce ista.6 [So what is it? It is a belch. Why should you look to find connected prayers or solemn declarations in a belch? What rules or regulations do you impose upon yours? They do not admit of your control, or wait for you to compose them, nor do they consult your leisure or convenience. They burst forth from within, without your will or knowledge, torn from yon rather than uttered. But a belch gives out an odor, sometimes good, sometimes bad, according to the quality of the vessel they come from. [ . . . ] The breath of your beloved is to me a goodly odor [ . . . ] I breathed it in.]

The scented belch in this passage is a spontaneous manifestation of love, while Barbariccia’s fart seems a deliberate, uncouth expression of false authority. Allen quotes Augustine who, in The City of God, explains how some people retain the prelapsarian ability to perform all bodily functions at will; no emission occurred without their reason and will controlling it, and flatulence functioned as a sort of song issued from their behinds: Nonnulli ab imo sine paedore ullo ita numerosos pro arbitrio sonitus edunt, ut ex illa etiam parte cantare videantur. [Some people produce at will without any stench such rhythmical sounds from their fundament that they appear to be making music even from that quarter.]7

The interpretation of farting as a degraded form of song is therefore well attested in literature and is a theological attempt to finding a plausible explanation for the existence of bodily excretions.



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This comic (but poignant) episode is a good place to start because the other evocations of a trumpet in the Inferno are of a much more serious sort. In Inferno 6, the glutton Ciacco has suddenly fallen into a silent trance after an ominous conversation with Dante and right before Virgil announces that the damned soul will not awake until the trumpets of Doomsday resonate (Inf. 6.94–99): . . . ‘Più non si desta di qua dal suon de l’angelica tromba, quando verrà la nimica Podesta ciascun rivederà la trista tomba, ripiglierà sua carne e sua figura, udirà quel ch’in etterno rimbomba.’ [And my leader said: ‘He wakes no more / until angelic trumpets sound: / the advent of the hostile Power. / Then each shall find again his miserable tomb, / shall take again his flesh and form, / and hear the judgment that eternally resounds.’]

The reference is to the Last Judgment, when the voice of God will announce the verdict, underscored by the sound of the trumpets, as we read in the Gospel of Matthew: “Et mittet angelos suos cum tuba et voce magna, et congregabunt electos eius a quattuor ventis.” [And he shall send his angels with a trumpet, and a great voice: and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the farthest parts of the heavens to the utmost bounds of them] (Matt. 24:30–31). Another trumpet reference in Inferno 19 features Dante’s invective against corrupt clergy, in particular Popes Nicholas III and Boniface VIII. The poet’s voice borrows godly authority by invoking the trumpet as a condemnation of corrupt popes and cardinals, as fifteenth-century commentator Giovanni da Serravalle noted, imbuing Dante’s poetic vengeance with moral authority. Historical facts add meaning to that acoustic image: the tradition of having civic trumpeters [banditori pubblici] underscore public announcements in the streets of Florence is one that goes back to the late thirteenth century, and more precisely, as Timothy J. McGee notes, the earliest evidence of a trumpet ensemble in Florence dates from February 8, 1292.8 Here the invective that opens the canto targets Simon Magus, the first to attempt to buy the ability to perform sacraments (Acts 8:18), after whom the sin was named (Inf. 19.1–6): O Simon mago, o miseri seguaci che le cose di Dio, che di bontate deon essere spose, e voi rapaci per oro e per argento avolterate, or convien che per voi suoni la tromba, però che ne la terza bolgia state. [O Simon Magus! O wretches of his band, / greedy for gold and silver, / who prostitute the things of God / that should be brides of goodness! / Now must the trumpet sound for you, / because your place is there in that third ditch.]

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McGee also comments on how civic heralds in Florence made public announcements in streets and piazzas with trumpets and winds underscoring their utterances.9 These civic musicians followed a strict protocol: they wore uniforms and could not play their trumpets or shawms outside of the official occasions mandated by the Commune.10 It is likely that Dante had in mind these musical fanfares when evoking his Aretine enemies in the mish-mash of soldiery and music that opens Inferno 22.1-12: Io vidi già cavalier muover campo, e cominciare stormo e far lor mostra, e talvolta partir per loro scampo; corridor vidi per la terra vostra, o Aretini, e vidi gir gualdane, fedir torneamenti e correr giostra; quando con trombe, e quando con campane, con tamburi e con cenni di castella, e con cose nostrali e con istrane; né già con sì diversa cennamella cavalier vidi muover né pedoni, né nave a segno di terra o di stella. [I have seen the cavalry break camp, / prepare for an attack, make their muster / and at times fall back to save themselves./ I have seen outriders in your land, / O Aretines. I have seen raiding-parties, / tournaments of teams, hand-to-hand jousts / begun with bells, trumpets, or drums, / with signals from the castle, / with summons of our own and those from foreign lands, / but never to such outlandish fanfare / have I seen horsemen move, or infantry, / or ship set sail at sign from land or star.] (Emphasis added.)

Here, Dante claims that he had joined the ranks of the cavalry in the Battle of Campaldino (1289), in which Florentine Guelfs defeated a Ghibelline army from Arezzo. Years later, the poet staged the military parade of the devils’ unruly posse by evoking the movements and sounds of real armies and contrasting them with the boorish crew commanded by Malacoda. The scene is constructed with musical and military elements that represent a perfect mockery of a true army: even the strangest things and behaviors that the poet witnessed on the battlefield, including trumpets, drums, bells, local and foreign customs, are not as absurd as the devils’ team, who will instigate a brawl among themselves (Inf. 22.91–151) out of sheer rowdiness. These opening lines of Inferno 22 proceed from and echo the final lines of Inferno 21: the trumpets, bells, and drums evoked in the Aretine battle resound ridiculously in the devils’ “cenno” (“signal,” Inf. 21.138), a raspberry blown with the tongue between the teeth, which also calls to mind “cenni di castella” (“signals from the castle,” Inf. 22.8), and the “diversa cennamella” (Inf. 22.10), which is properly a shawm (Fig. 2.2), although Hollander chooses a metonymic translation as “fanfare.” Leaving aside for the moment the lute-shaped belly of Master Adam in Inferno 30, one final note must be added about infernal instruments, and it is a note played on Nimrod’s horn. Walter Stephens explains that, while Nimrod is not characterized originally



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Fig. 2.2. Players with bagpipe and shawm. Bottom left corner detail of Severinus Boethius, De institutione musica. Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale, MS V.A.14, fol. 47r.

as a giant in Genesis, the Middle Ages thought of him as one because he rebelled against God, thus making him larger than regular human size.11 The origin of this transfer from a psychological and moral disproportion to a physical one is to be found in a passage by Augustine that calls him “gigans venator contra Dominum Deum” [“a gigantic hunter against the Lord”].12 Hunting oxhorns such as Nimrod’s, reminiscent of the horn that Roland sounded at his defeat in Roncevaux, were designed to sound a single loud note13 and were unfit for melodic modulation, in much the same way that Nimrod’s language is unfit for verbal communication: he can only utter meaningless babble and blast out a powerful note on his horn (Fig 2.3).

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Fig. 2.3. Nimrod’s horn. University of Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Holkham 48, f.48v.

With only one significant reference to an instrument, the Purgatorio stands out as an eminently vocal cantica. The organ evoked in Purgatorio (Purg. 9.144) is described with a lexical pattern that Dante borrows from treatises about church music, reproposing a formula formerly employed by Notker Balbulus, Aelred of Rievaulx, and others.14 Moving forward to the Paradiso, the chordophones that Dante mentions therein— the cetra, or cithara in Paradiso 20, the harp, and the lyre—are all instruments that, while different from one another, possessed similar symbolical associations.15 They were associated with David and divine musicianship. Harp, lyre, and cithara are all variants of David’s psaltery, whose salvific importance was such that a book of the Bible was named after it. In ancient Greek, as Isidore of Seville points out, the primary meaning of cithara is “human chest,” an etymological connection that explains the origin of the association between the instrument and the human body: Forma cytharae initio similis fuisse traditur pectori humano, quod veluti vox a pectore, ita ex ipsa cantus ederetur, adpellatamque eadem de causa: nam pectus dorica lingua cytharam vocari. Paullatim autem plures eius species exstiterunt, ut psalteria, lyrae, barbitae fenices, et pectices.16 [They say that the shape of the cithara was initially similar to the human chest, because the music issued forth from it was just like the voice from a chest, and it was called so for that reason: in Doric language, cithara means chest. Shortly after several types of cithara were invented, such as the psaltery, the lyre, the Phoenician barbitae, and the pectids.]17



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As can be seen, Isidore not only explains the etymology, but also asserts that lyre and psaltery are simply variants of the same instrument. No wonder, then, that chest, wood, and sinews would evoke, in the allegorically oriented medieval mind, the crucifixion of Christ. An example of the musico-corporeal ambivalence of the word cithara is in Paulinus of Nola, who parallels the instrument to the chest of Christ and attributes it with the ability to bring about spiritual healing: Ille igitur vere nobis est musicus auctor, Ille David verus, citharam qui corporis hujus Restituit putri dudum compage jacentem, Et tacitam ruptis antiquo crimine chordis Assumendo suum Dominus reparavit in usum, Consertisque Deo mortalibus, omnia rerum In speciem primae fecit revirescere formae, Ut nova cuncta forent, cunctis abeunte veterno. Hanc renovaturus citharam Deus ipse magister, Ipse sui positam suspendit in arbore ligni, Et cruce peccatum carnis perimente, novavit. Atque ita mortalem numeris caelestibus aptam Composuit citharam variis ex gentibus unam, Omnigenas populos compingens corpus in unum.18 [So He is truly our poetic inspiration, the true David who has restored the chest/ cithara of this body which had long lain idle, its frame crumbling. The Lord has restored it, adopting it for His use when it was silent and its strings broken by that ancient sin. By joining men to God, He has achieved the reinvigoration of all creation to the beauty of its original shape, so that all things might be new, and the dust removed from them. God our master sought to renew this cithara, and so He hung His own chest and flesh, nailed to the wood of the tree. Thus He ordered mortal man from the different nations into a single cithara, and tuned it for heavenly music, drawing peoples of all races into a single body.]19 (Emphasis added.)

In this poem for the feast of Saint Felix, Paulinus compares the cithara to Christ’s body hung on the cross, an association that is found in several Christian writers, but the cithara was also compared with the body of the church by Paulinus himself and by Rutilius Namatianus.20 In Paradiso, Dante features the cetra (Par. 20.22), as well as the harp (Par. 14.118) and the lyre (Par. 15.4). Patristic literature associated the harp, the lyre and cithara with David and divine musicianship. Starting with Cassiodorus (sixth century), the term cithara was applied to several types of stringed instruments, including harp, lyre, and rote, and the verb citharizare meant to play any stringed instrument, whether plucked or bowed, whether with open strings or fingerboard.21 The cithara was attributed with the ability to bring about spiritual healing: in addition to Paulinus of Nola and Cassiodorus, Nicetius of Trier (sixth century),22 later followed by Bede (eighth century) and Hugh of St. Victor (twelfth century) all see David’s cithara as a figure of Christ crucified: the instrument is made of wood and strings made from animal gut (chordae in Latin), just like the cords used to tie Jesus to the cross. This figural

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property of the cithara as a figure of crucifixion is what granted David the power to defeat the demon in Saul’s body (1 Samuel 16). These Christian writers explained the cithara’s divine powers on the basis of its resemblance to the cross. The high consideration they bestowed on the cithara is reflected in both in Dante’s Comedy and Convivio (The Banquet, the unfinished philosophical treatise written in 1304–1307 that included poems and prose commentary). The combined voices of six blessed souls (David, Trajan, Hezekiah, Constantine, William the Good, and Ripheus, who compose the figure of an eagle, the symbol of divine justice, and specifically form the eye of the sacred eagle of justice) sound like a cetra and like a bagpipe in the Heaven of Jupiter, where the mysteries of divine justice are presented to the pilgrim (Par. 20.22–24): E come suono al collo de la cetra prende sua forma, e sì com’ al pertugio de la sampogna vento che penètra . . . [And as a sound is given shape at the neck of the cithara or by the wind forced through the vent-holes of a bagpipe . . . ].23

In the Convivio (1.9.3) the cetera is granted a high status as an instrument that should not be rented out for profit but rather used for playing: E a vituperio di loro dico che non si deono chiamare litterati, però che non acquistano la lettera per lo suo uso, ma in quanto per quella guadagnano denari o dignitate: sì come non si dee chiamare citarista chi tiene la cetera in casa per prestarla per prezzo, e non per usarla per sonare. [To their shame I say that they should not be called learned, because they do not acquire learning for its own use but only insofar as through it they may gain money or honor; just as we should not call a lute-player someone who keeps a lute in his house for the purpose of renting it out, as opposed to playing on it.]

Nicetius, the bishop of Trier, gave birth to an exegetic tradition followed by Bede, Hugh of St. Victor, and the unknown author of the Vitis mystica. These authors explained the cithara’s divine powers on the basis of its resemblance to the cross: David adhuc puer in cithara suaviter, imo fortiter canens, malignum spiritum qui exagitabat Saulem compescebat: non quod eius cithara tantam virtutem haberet, sed figura crucis Christi, per lignum et chordarum extensionem mysticae gerebat, quae tunc daemones effugebat.24 [As a child, David played the cithara first softly, then loudly and forced out a spirit that oppressed Saul: this happened not because the cithara had in itself such power, but because he used it as a figure of the cross of Christ, in the wood and strings, so that the demons fled.]25

Bede too follows the same interpretive trend in his Allegoriae in Samuel: Neque enim putandum est, citharam illam, quamvis dulcissime resonantem, tantae potuisse virtutis existere, quae spiritus pelleret immundos: sed figura sanctae crucis, et ipsa quae canebatur passio dominica, jam tunc diaboli refringebat audaciam.26



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[In fact, we must not think that, although resounding most sweetly, the cithara had such a great virtue as to expel the evil spirits: but because it is a figure of the holy cross and because of the Sunday passion liturgy which was sung, the cithara could break the devil’s strength.]27

The high regard in which these Christian authors were held was reason enough for Dante to conceive of the cetra/cithara as a particularly noble instrument, as is proven not only by the simile in Paradiso 20, but also by the quoted passage from Convivio 1.9. In Paradiso 20, the pilgrim hears the voices of several souls blended together and speaking in harmony, and to express this, the poet uses the simile of the sampogna, or bagpipe. The term is a vulgarization of symphonia, which in the Middle Ages was used to describe a wind instrument capable of producing more than one sound simultaneously, as fourteenth-century commentators Francesco Buti and Benvenuto of Imola note. In Figure 2.2, a bagpipe player is portrayed standing next to the shawm player in the illustration from the manuscript V.A. 14 of the Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli, containing Boethius’ De musica. Having discussed paradisiac instruments, we can now return to Inferno 30 with a better understanding of how Master Adam’s lute-shaped belly should be seen as a version in malo of heavenly string instruments. Of Arabic origin (called al-oud in Arabic), the lute entered Europe during the ninth-century Moorish occupation of Spain, and illuminations are found in the Cantigas de Santa Maria, a Spanish-Portuguese royal music manuscript dated 1260–1280 (Fig. 2.4). Its associations with the body are strong and date back to its invention: an old Arab legend links the invention of the lute to a dead human body. The online Encyclopedia Britannica, under the entry for “music,” reports that Lamak, a grandson of Adam (the original one!), made the first lute out of the dead body of his son, specifically from one of his legs, the angled foot becoming the bent peg palette. 28 The lute ascended to high status only later, and not without some lasting ambivalence. In Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights (ca. 1500), a lute is crossbred with a harp to express the discord of Hell. Human bodies are tied to their strings, in a crucified position (Fig. 2.5). In Dante’s representation of the lute, a bent, disfigured body is the center of poetic attention: the falsifier Master Adam, having coined false florins, is punished here with never-ending dropsy and a scorching thirst. His body, horribly bloated because of the sickness, would look just like a lute, were it not for the legs (Inf. 30, 49–51): Io vidi un fatto a guisa di leuto pur ch’elli avesse avuta l’anguinaia tronca da l’altro che l’uomo ha forcuto [One I saw, fashioned like a lute— / had he been sundered at the groin / from the joining where a man goes forked.]

Master Adam will engage in a verbal and physical fight with another sinner, the Greek Sinon, who had pretended to be a renegade and a friend of the Trojans in order to help the Greeks get the warrior-loaded horse into the besieged city. When Adam

Fig. 2.4. A Muslim and a Christian playing ouds. Cantigas de Santa Maria. Madrid, Real Biblioteca del Monasterio de El Escorial, MS b.I.2, f.125r.



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Fig. 2.5. Hieronymus Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights, detail. Madrid, Museo Nacional del Prado.

exposes his treason, Sinon reacts by striking the lute-shaped belly, which sounds like a drum (Inf. 30.100–105): E l’un di lor che si recò a noia forse d’esser nomato sì oscuro col pugno li percosse l’epa croia quella sonò come fosse un tamburo e mastro Adamo li percosse il volto col braccio suo, che non parve men duro [And one of them, who took offense, perhaps / at being named so vilely, hit him / with a fist right on his rigid paunch. / It boomed out like a drum. Then Master Adam, / whose arm seemed just as sturdy, / used it, striking Sinon in the face]

Fig. 2.6. Musical instruments. Boethius, on top, holds the psaltery like a cross. Severinus Boethius, De institutione musica. Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale “Vittorio Emanuele III,” MS V.A.14, fol. 47r.



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One clever explanation of Master Adam’s deformity was offered by José Cea-­ Sanchez: as a falsifier Adam caused inflation of currency, thus his body is inflated as a result of the contrapasso, the law that matches the sin with the punishment in Dante’s underworld.29 Aristotle’s economic theories proposed in the fourth book of the Nichomachean Ethics must have been known to Dante, who had been a member of Florence’s financial administrative body, the Consiglio dei Cento. Denise Heilbronn30 proposed that the sinner’s deformed body should be seen as a perverse parody of Christ crucified, and indeed both patristic sources and sacred iconography testify to a tradition of representing David as crucified to his instrument, the psaltery, in a sort of imitatio crucis that follows the principle of “medieval music as an embodied material practice.”31 Analogies between musical instruments and the human body were frequent in the Fathers of the Church and sacred iconography, based on the metonymic parallel between the wood and animal sinew strings of the instrument and the flesh crucified on the cross, a corporeality of which Shakespeare was also very aware in The Two Gentlemen of Verona (3.2.77: “For Orpheus’ lute was strung with poets’ sinews”). The analogy of crucified Christ-cithara/psaltery has deep roots and lingers in mystic literature well into Dante’s time32 since at least the fourth century, in the time of Ambrose (“Psalterium ergo est homo consummatus in Christo; in quo sicut arte concinentium fila chordarum, ita convenientium resonat opera canora”33 [“The psaltery is man perfected in Christ, in whom, like strings plucked artfully, sound the melodious work of consonant virtues”]) and Augustine (“In tympano corium extenditur, in psalterio chordae extenduntur: in utroque organo caro crucifigitur”34 [“On the drum leather is stretched, on the psaltery gut is stretched; on either instrument the flesh is crucified”]). If we are to understand the meaning of musical imagery in the Comedy, we must reconstruct the allegorical context—the glosses, as it were—that surrounded musical instruments in the Middle Ages. Every one of Dante’s carefully crafted lines contains a microcosm of intertextual intricacies, which, while immediate to a medieval reader, we must reacquire and connect to a macrocosmic order. In the words of Amilcare Iannucci, “disorder in the macrocosm is but a sign of a corresponding imbalance in the microcosm, in the devastated souls of the damned, which are ‘untuned,’ and will remain so eternally in this realm ‘sanza tempo.’”35

3 The Mystery of Dante’s Cato in the Light of Roman Law Bernardo Piciché

Libertà va cercando, ch’è sì cara come sa chi per lei vita rifiuta. [He goes in search of liberty—so precious, as he who gives his life for it must know.] (Purg. 1.71–72)1 Ego [ . . . ] manumitto te P. servum meum, ut abinde sis liber civis Romanus. [I ( . . . ) enfranchise you, my slave, so that hereinafter you will be a free Roman citizen.] (Generale Instrumentum Manumissionis)2 De bonis libertorum [ . . . ] ex servitude ad civitatem Romanam perducuntur. [From slavery they (the emancipated slaves) are taken into Roman citizenship.] (Digesto, 38.2.1) Et omnes libertos [ . . . ] civitate Romana donavimus, multis modis additis per quos posit libertas servis cum civitate Romana, quae sola est in presenti, praestavi. [We have made all freedmen whomsoever Roman citizens ( . . . ) We have also introduced many new methods, by which slaves may become Roman citizens, the only kind of liberty that is now conferred.] (Institutiones Corpus Juris, 1.4)



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E sarai meco sanza fine cive di quella Roma onde Cristo è romano. [And with me shall eternally be a citizen of that Rome of which Christ himself is a Roman.] (Purg. 32.101–103) [Q]uesto regno ha fatto civi per la verace fede. [This realm has gained its citizens Through the true faith.] (Par. 24.43–44)

“Why to return to this old problem [the presence of Cato in Purgatory] unresolved after nearly seven centuries of debate?” wonders Robert Hollander in “Dante’s Cato Again.”3 Perhaps because a new hypothesis for solving the mystery can be presented: the choice of Cato must be linked to Roman legislation concerning the enfranchisement of slaves. We need to read the topic of Cato under the lens of the Roman law. The key to understanding Cato is in his role as a Roman jurist.4 Marcus Porcius Cato (95 BCE–46 BCE), better known as Cato the Younger or Cato Uticensis, whom Dante meets as the guardian of Purgatory, was a suicide, a pagan, and an enemy of Julius Caesar (the founder of the Roman Empire, in Dante’s historical vision). If this would not be enough to condemn him to perdition, we can also add the stigma of betraying his own family, due to his family connection with Caesar, and his eccentric matrimonial arrangement.5 According to the ethical paradigm presented in the Divine Comedy, Cato should not possess the credentials to be admitted in the realm of the saved, let alone to occupy such a prestigious position as guardian of Purgatory. Yet, there are no doubts that Cato will ascend to Heaven at the end (Purg. 75, “la vesta ch’al gran dì sarà sì chiara,” the resurrection in splendor of Cato’s body on the Day of Judgement, and in verse 88 of the same canto: “me n’usci’ fora,” says Cato, meaning that he was freed from sin). The presence and the role of such a character has therefore puzzled commentators over the centuries. One could argue that Dante’s “risky decision,” as Hollander calls it, intended to stress the unfathomability of God’s judgment.6 Indeed, the Comedy often reminds the reader about the human incapacity to predict God’s judgment. When Dante sends a widely reputed saintly pope into the abject group of Neutrals in the so-called Ante-Hell—i.e., an outlying region of Hell rather than Hell proper, a place for those disliked by both God and God’s enemies—whereas an excommunicated prince sits in Purgatory, commentators admonish that Dante intends to show how far God’s designs are from human predictability. With similar daring liberty, Dante creates a special niche in Inferno 4 for those pagans who shone for virtuosity and wisdom. As all know, there are no torments in this sort of “airport VIP lounge” of Hell, but rather the occupants will bemoan the lack

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Fig. 3.1. George Cooke, engraving, Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis, 95–46 B.C., 1810. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

of contemplation of God. Such a special treatment was Dante’s innovation that must have met the empathy of educated readers, imbued with admiration for those classics to whom Christian preachers owed their rhetorical skills. The same readers, however, may have been startled that this special place hosted Muslims, too. If the virtuous pagans had no fault in not being Christians, having died before the advent of Christ and not belonging to the people of Israel, what justification could Dante provide for Muslims, who came after Christ, and whose prophet Dante sharply punished in Hell? Dante is here paying homage to those Muslims who reintroduced the ancient Greeks to Western culture, thus providing a major intellectual source to Thomas Aquinas, whose thinking



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in turn provided the theological scaffold of the Comedy. Dante’s provocations continue so far as to include in this group Saladin, the condottiere-sultan who conquered Jerusalem but spared its inhabitants. With so many examples of Dante’s intellectual freedom in mind, one can easily read the case of Cato along these lines. But to justify the presence of Cato as an example of Dante’s intellectual freedom would be wrong, because the poet never subverts the established theology. In the examples cited, Dante fills the gaps when the theology does not express a clear opinion. To the contrary, Cato stands as a flagrant capsizing of the theological scaffold of the Comedy. Readers should not stay content with a pacifying “Vuolsi così colà dove si puote / ciò che si vuole, e più non dimandare” [“has been willed above when One / can do what he has willed; and ask no more”] (Inf. 3.95–96; see also Purg. 1.68–69), because this explanation, although plausible, is too facile. If we use it for all the cases of obscure interpretation, any critical inquiry of Dante would reach a dead end. In fact, scholars have searched for other hypotheses. Mainstream interpretation asserts that this pagan, suicide, and enemy of imperial Rome stands where he stands because he represents the epitome of love for liberty.7 However, from a Christian viewpoint, to raise Cato as a symbol against the slavery of sin seems amiss. Although correct intuitively, this popular explanation does not fully grasp the semantic density of Dante’s passage. Rather, the justification for Cato’s presence in the Comedy lies in the Roman law; in particular, in the legislation that enfranchised slaves through automatic Roman citizenship.8 Cato the Younger was a patrician, born in Rome in 95 BCE. He became the figurehead of the Republic after the death of Pompey, Julius Caesar’s enemy. He committed suicide in Utica, North Africa, not far from Carthage, in 46 BCE, rather than fall prey to Caesar.9 Dante had expressed his admiration for him in Convivio 28.15: “E quale uomo terreno più degno fu di significare Iddio, che Catone? Certo nullo.” [“What man on earth was more worthy of signifying God than Cato? Surely none.”] The reasons for Dante’s admiration are multiple. One is certainly the high reputation that he enjoyed among classical authors, although they were positively biased toward Cato. They belonged to the same ruling class and the advent of autocracy constituted a danger to their power.10 According to the historian Plutarch, Cato died in the best Stoic theatrical style, after reading passages from Plato’s Phaedo, the dialogue concerned with death and soul. Like Socrates, he refused the help of his friends, preferring a dignified end to captivity in Caesar’s hands.11 The poet Lucan is another eulogist. He presents Cato in Pharsalia12 with expressions such as “tuumque nomen, Libertas, et inanem persequar umbram.” [“Guard liberty”] and [“I will walk to your grave, Liberty, mourn your name.”] Lucan’s emphasis on liberty certainly inspired Dante, as in “Libertà va cercando, ch’è sì cara come sa chi per lei vita rifiuta.” [“Liberty he is seeking”] from Purgatorio I. As a confirmation of this, Jane Wilson Joyce writes: “The most important admirer of the Pharsalia in medieval Europe was Dante.”13 (Cato’s physical appearance in the Comedy also owes to Lucan, in particular the long hair and beard). There were critical voices against Cato, too. Caesar allegedly authored a denigrator script, now lost, against Cato, describing him as ebrius (drunkard). If Caesar’s account must be taken with grain of salt, Cato’s choice of committing suicide was also condemned by Christian authors—notably by Augustine.14 One must remember that

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Augustine in The City of God condemns Lucretia for committing suicide. Petrarch in De gestis Caesaris embraces the Augustinian condemnation of Cato’s suicide and charges the Roman with envy, shame, rage, and pride.15 (Petrarch is perhaps using Cato to jab at Dante, as Boccaccio did with Madonna Filippa.)16 On the Christian side, however, Thomas Aquinas presents a possible cautious understanding of suicide in exceptional cases in which “a divine inspiration” suggests the commission of the act as an example of moral fortitude (“nisi forte divino instinctu fiat, as exemplus fortitudinis ostendendum, ut mors contemnatur”),17 which somehow could have encouraged Dante in his decision to select Cato. Yet accepting this explanation brings us back to the initial remark that the attribution of each oddity to the will of God sounds like an easy way out. It is here, then, that it would be useful to highlight three reflections that could help explain Dante’s use for Cato, separate from the juridical point of view that will follow. First, one can easily agree with Simone Marchesi that “Cato stands in for all that was not only to be praised in Roman cultural lore, but also to be saved.”18 We can count the love for one’s own country (see, for instance in, the Comedy the episodes of Farinata and Sordello) and the love for one’s own dignity, qualities Dante would especially appreciate. It had been Dante’s own strong sense of dignity that caused him to reject a pardon and return home on the humiliating condition that he accept guilt for the alleged misdeeds that had condemned him to exile. Second, a passage from Cicero’s De Republica (3.16) describing Scipio’s dream (Somniun Scipionis) might have prompted Dante to conceive the salvation of Cato. There we read that to cultivate a sense of justice and respect toward one’s ancestors and, above all, one’s own homeland is the way that leads to Heaven. Third, Dante knew that “liberty” could mean murder or taking one’s own life in the honor code of the classical ethos. Soon this will be evoked by Boccaccio, who in De Casibus Virorum Illustriorum describes Virginius committing an honor killing against his daughter, although he knew that she was innocent, to prevent her from falling into the hands of an abuser: “Hac una—inquit—filia qua possum via libertatem tuam servo” [“I save your liberty— daughter—by the only way I can.”]19 That was the ethos of the pagans, though. Therefore, while it is not difficult to imagine why the “classicist” Dante admired Cato, it is more difficult to justify the “Christian” Dante breaking with his theological coherence. In the Comedy, Cato is mentioned for the first time in Inferno 14, in reference to the desert of Libya.20 The reader meets him “in person”—so to speak—in Purgatorio 1.31– 33: “Vidi presso di me un veglio solo/degno di tanta reverenza in vista / che più non dee, a padre alcun figliolo” [“I saw a solitary patriarch, near me—his aspect worthy of such reverence”]. What is relevant here is the juridical context of the canto, as suggested by signals of meaning: “pregione” [“prison”]; “chi va guidati uscendo” [“you were set free”]; “Son le leggi d’abisso così rotte?” [“The laws of the abyss—have they been broken?”]; “è mutato in ciel novo consiglio” [“a changed decree”]; “libertà va cercando” [“in search of liberty”]; “Non son li editti etterni per noi guasti” [“Eternal edicts are not broken for us”]; “Minòs me non lega” [“I’m not bound by Minos”] (archetypal Cretan king-judge in Mediterranean antiquity, mentioned both by Homer and Virgil); “per quella legge / che fatta fu quando me n’usci’ fora” [“the law decreed when I was freed.”]



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Dante is leading the reader to assume that the character in the canto must have some connections with the legal world. Cato reveals his personality to become “self-expressing” (to put it in Erich Auerbach’s words),21 that is, he speaks the way we expect him to speak as a jurist. Winthrop Wetherbee asserts: “In the realm where grace is the operative power, Cato is associated emphatically with old and unalterable laws.”22 Although Wetherbee was probably unaware of the juridical symbolism assigned to Cato, he nonetheless seems to sense the juridical nature of the episode. Cato is endowed of an extradiegetic attribution of jurist; he was mentioned in Aeneid23 as the one “dantem iura” [“giving them their laws.”] (Dante must have been particularly pleased to extrapolate his own name from the line “Dantem iura”!) Whereas it is understood that the “historical” accounts of each character in the Comedy prefigure what they will become once they reach their perfect form, they speak according to their portraits in mortal life. Therefore, one can reasonably presume that Dante’s choice of language for Cato is suggesting something. Is Dante building up a juridical persona for the historical Cato? To portray the “historical” Cato as a jurist gives meaning, thus justification, to Cato—the character. As will be shown, this meaning and consequent justification are unequivocally juridical. The hypothesis that the explanation for Cato in the Comedy must be found in the juridical domain does not ignore the theological core of the poem. Indeed, in Canto 1 of Purgatorio the juridical language is intertwined with the biblical-religious one: the very physical description of Cato parallels the figure of a patriarch. More biblical-like echoes include “Li raggi de le quattro luci sante” [“The rays of the four holy stars”] (probably a reference to the four cardinal virtues), “li tuoi sette regni” [“your seven realms”] (reference to the seven sins purged in the terraces of Purgatory), and “la vesta ch’al gran dì sarà sì chiara” [“the garb that you will be bright on the great day”] (allusion to the day in which Cato will resurrect after doomsday). The theological meaning, at times with its political resonances, is the one that critics have considered thus far: Cato stands to emphasize that real liberty is away from Satan.24 The righteousness of mainstream interpretation notwithstanding, the episode of Cato is reinforced by a precise legal tradition that Dante knew: the Roman law. The concept of liberty is insistently recurrent in Canto 1: “libertà va cercando” [“He goes in search of liberty”] (71) and “ché non ti fu per lei amara / in Utica la morte” [“death for freedom in Utica was not bitter”] (73–74). Along with the concept of law, the concept of liberty occupies a crucial role in Dante’s entire body of work. In Epistle 6, To the Florentines, dated March 11, 1311,25 one reads: “sacratissimis legibus, quae iustitiae naturalis imitantur imaginem [  .  .  . ] observantia quarum, si laeta, si libera, non tantum non servitus esse probatur, quin immo, perspicaciter intuenti, liquet ut est ipsa summa libertas” [“Sacrosanct laws, modeled after the justice of Nature [ . . . ] the observance of which, if joyful, if spontaneous, not only is not serfdom, but, to the eyes of those who know how to see, shows to be the most perfect form of liberty”].26 Dante shares with jurists and theologians the opinion that liberty exists only within respect for the law. There is no contradiction between the juridical and the theological sources of the Comedy: in theology, too, there is no liberty outside the law of God (“no salus

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extra ecclesiam”—“there is no safety [from the slavery of the devil] outside the rules of the Church”). Sin brings about the “cieco carcere” [“blind prison”] (Inf. 10.58), and the “pregione etterna?” [“eternal prison”] (Purg. 1.41) because Solo il peccato è quel che la disfranca “only man’s sin annuls man’s liberty” (Par. 7.79).27 Since in any juridical system, the penitentiary rules belong to the larger body of laws issued by a unique legislative authority, the rules that are codified to manage Hell must not be seen as issued from a different authority than the one that established Purgatory and Paradise. Furthermore, the Supreme legislator also constitutes the grundnorm—the fundamental law—for the legal systems on earth. Dante can parallel human and divine laws and, consequently, attribute the status of liberty in respect to both those laws: the human law to acquire liberty on the earth, and the divine law to acquire liberty in the sky. This is made possible because in the medieval vision of the laws, the systems created by human jurists had to take inspiration from the one created by God. In the aforementioned letter, Dante offers also another piece of helpful information. He restates his view of Florence as modern Rome, against those who may act “ut alias sit Florentina civilitas, alia sit Romana?” [“as if Florentine civilization were other from the Roman.”]28 He is reproaching Florentine civilization “iugum libertatis horrentes, in Romani principis, mundi regis and Dei ministri, gloriam fremuistis” [for abhorring “the yoke of liberty” by revolting against the Holy Roman Emperor, ruler of the world and “minister of God”].29 And Dante does not hesitate to evoke the “second death,” the death of the soul, for those Florentines who reject the imperial decrees, in the same Epistle 6. Particularly interesting—from both a literary and juridical point of view—appears the apparent oxymoron “yoke of liberty,” since yokes are usually associated with burdensome impositions. Dante is reaffirming his opinion that it is necessary to accept the rules for the sake of being “free.” Relating “yoke” to something positive is not unusual among poets, who most commonly associate it with being in love, as in a “sweet yoke.” In Dante’s time, the glossary for love, law, philosophy, and theology is osmotic, in that earthly erotic content can represent theological, juridical, and philosophical concepts. For Cato, it is the very term “liberty” that functions as the ring of conjunction between the poetical, theological, and juridical domains, the divine and the mundane, damnation and safety. But how? The connection between Hell-slavery and Purgatory-liberty30 is corroborated in that the Comedy is modeled after the Book of Exodus. While analyzing the various meanings of Exodus (Epistle 13), Dante mentions the way to the liberty of eternal glory for the holy souls enslaved in their own corruption. That Dante had Exodus in mind as the paradigm of enfranchisement from the slavery of sin finds its confirmation in the psalm that saved souls sing when they first debark in Purgatory, “In Exitu Israel de Aegypto,” Psalm 113. In the Bible, Egypt represents various forms of slavery, including, allegorically, the one to Satan. The years spent wandering in the desert become symbolic of the penitentiary path of humanity. In the Comedy, Hell is like Egypt while Purgatory corresponds to the desert.31 The biblical Promised Land is of course represented by Heaven. Dante—the pilgrim—epitomizes humanity marching from slavery into freedom. More specifically, he embodies Israel in the flight from Egypt / Hell to the Promised Land / Paradise. This appears clear in Paradiso 25.55–56: “però li è conceduto



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che d’Egitto / vegna in Ierusalemme per vedere” [“Thus it is granted to him to come from Egypt / into Jerusalem.”]32 Virgil is to Dante what Moses was to his people. Like Moses, Virgil will not be able to lead his protégé to the Promised Land (both Moses and Virgil are stained with a macula that will make it impossible for them to continue on the final leg toward salvation). Thus, being in Purgatory means to be already out of slavery and be entitled to reach Heaven, the sole, absolute form of liberty.33 Dante’s choice of Cato as the guardian of the realm of the saved appears even less extraordinary, even theologically, if we consider the relation between Rome and Heaven (Purgatory being a temporary province of the latter). Purgatorio 1 does not mention explicitly this relation. Yet Dante in his works, especially in the Comedy, Convivio, and De Monarchia, advocates for the divine legitimacy of Roman authority.34 “Rome’s ascent to power is an integral part of the divine plan for the redemption of humankind” because “Dante values Rome as an essential instrument of God’s writing of history, both in the ancient incarnation of Roman Empire and in its modern, Christianized continuation.”35 Luciano Canfora seems to avail this interpretation, which is based especially on Paradiso 6.55–72, writing that the victory of Caesar over Cato, in Thapsu—premise of the heroic suicide of the irreducible republican—represents [ . . . ] the apex of the triumphal march of Caesar, that in turn towers over Roman history that is conceived as the triumphal march of the imperial eagle.36

Remarkably, in Paradiso 32.116–117, Dante defines the celestial assembly of Heaven as “patricians,” thus adopting the appellation used for the Roman oligarchs: “I grandi patrici / di questo imperio giustissimo e pio” [“the great patricians / of this most just and merciful empire”].37 The two societies are connected by a divine design in which Christ was born a subject of Rome (like Cato), and a new Rome is established in Heaven. Rome is the City of God on the earth. Heaven is the “Celestial Rome.” Giuseppe Mazzotta remarks that “Like Aeneas and Paul who stand for the political and spiritual mission of Rome, Dante, too, seeks that Rome ‘onde Cristo è Romano’” [whence, Christ is a Roman] (Purg. 32).38 Down on earth, there reside Roman citizens, whereas up in the heavens, celestial citizens joyfully dwell. There is further evidence to consider: legal systems constitute metonymy of the societies they regulate. Hence, if Rome and Heaven mirror each other, their legal systems must be similar. The legal system of the “celestial Rome” conferred citizenship to those liberated by Christ from the slavery of Satan. In the words of Beatrice, “ma perché questo regno ha fatto civi / per la verace fede” [“this realm has gained its citizens / through the true faith”] (Par. 24.43–44). Heaven confers citizenship to those liberated from the slavery of sin. What about Rome? Similarly, Roman laws granted Roman citizenship to the liberti, the liberated slaves. The logical connection appears flawless: the souls need to be disenfranchised from the slavery of sin to become citizens of Heaven; Rome is the specular image of Heaven. Enfranchised slaves in Rome automatically became citizens, therefore the key to decipher the nonobvious rank of Cato lies in his being a Roman jurist. Cato is familiar with the Roman rules concerning the enfranchisement of slaves. In this dense semantic entanglement, the venerable

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Fig. 3.2. Umberto Romano, Cato, Dante, and Virgil, 1946. General Collections, Library of Congress.

elder at the gate of Purgatory stands there because he could fully comprehend what Virgil meant by saying that Dante was seeking liberty. Cato in his capacity as “customs agent” of the celestial Rome acknowledges Dante’s right to pass not so much because he himself had been a champion of liberty in his life, but because he had been a Roman lawgiver. He acknowledges the applicant’s request for celestial citizenship, precisely because he knows that in Rome a freed slave was automatically conferred citizenship. Cato does not embody here the symbol of an abstract idea of liberty. He represents the Roman law. Had Cato been a jurist from other juridical systems that did not grant full citizenship to the enfranchised slaves, he would have not grasped the meaning of Virgil’s words. Dante needed a Roman jurist at the entrance of the city of the saved—the Rome in the sky—because a Roman jurist, more so than others, could fully grasp that being freed from slavery entailed citizenship by default. All the more so if, as in the case of Cato, this jurist was hailed as a champion of liberty. All of this raises several questions: to what extent did Dante know Roman law? And which one, since Rome’s legal system spanned several centuries? Dante shows admiration for the classical legal legacy: “Atene e Lacedemona, che fenno / l’antiche leggi e furon sì civili” [“Athens and Sparta who were law-givers / in ancient times, and



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were so civilized”] (Purg. 6.139–140) 39 and “Roma, che ‘l buon mondo feo” [“Rome, which was the maker of the good world”] (Purg. 16.106).40 Is this enough to state that Dante knew the Roman law of slave emancipation? The quotation regarding Athens and Sparta is clearly inspired by a passage from the Institutiones: “Origo eius [jus civilis] ab institutis duarum civitatum, Athenarum scilicet et Lacedaemonis, fluxisse videtur” [“The source of Civil Law seems to derivate from the constitutions of the two cities Athens and Sparta”] (Instit. 1.2.10).41 In general, the reference work for Roman law is the monumental Corpus Juris Civilis.42 Emperor Justinian (482–565) ordered its compilation—the whole Roman legislative and jurisprudential tradition—and says of himself in Paradiso 6.12: “D’entro le leggi trassi il troppo e il vano” [“(I) removed from the laws what was superfluous or pointless.”] He also added new laws and doctrinal statements. The Corpus Juris is an ensemble of texts: Digesta, Institutiones, Codex Repetitae Praelectiones, and Novellae. The Digesta, published in 533, is a compilation of iura, jurisprudential statements, chosen from the books of thirty-nine jurists of the classical period. The iura are to be distinguished from the leges, which were the legislative acts issued by the emperor. The Institutiones, also published in 533, is another jurisprudential compilation, yet with legislative value and, unlike the Digesta, with no indication of sources. It was used as a manual of law for students in the first year at the law school in Byzantium and was ostensibly dictated by Justinian himself. Dante could have had knowledge only of the first two, since the last one, 168 rules written in Greek, were rediscovered only in the fifteenth century. The ensemble of the Corpus Juris was dismembered, modified, and reassembled during the Middle Ages, but the words of the emperor still resonated: “Et omnes libertos [ . . . ] civitate Romana donavimus, multis modis additis per quos posit libertas servis cum civitate Romana, quae sola est in presenti, praestavi” [“We have made all freedmen whomsoever Roman citizens ( . . . ) We have also introduced many new methods, by which slaves may become Roman citizens, the only kind of liberty that is now conferred”] (Inst. 1.4). Before enquiring if Dante had knowledge of Roman law, the question is whether Dante had any juridical culture.43 Dante notoriously spent harsh words against jurists (Convivium 3.11.10; Par. 9.133–135; Par. 11.1–3, etc.). Yet, one should consider that he ranted against those who neglect the social importance of their profession by not pursuing “la verace manna” [“the true manna”] (Par. 12.82–84). In other words, Dante does not despise jurists in general but rather those among them who betray the ontological component of their status by not acting as they should. That is tantamount to saying that he knew how a jurist should act. And we saw that, for Dante, a society based on the law represented the highest form of civilization. The same concept is epitomized in Cicero’s already mentioned passage regarding Scipio: “nihil est enim illi principi deo, qui omnem mundum regit, quod quidem in terris fiat, acceptius quam concilia coetusque hominum iure sociati, quae ‘civitates’ appellantur” [“To God no terrestrial endeavor is dearer than the congregation of human beings, based on the law that are called cities. Those who rule and defend their laws come from Heaven and return to it”] (De Republica 6. 13).44 Whether or not he was a jurist, Dante in the Comedy definitely demonstrates a sound knowledge of juridical concepts and rules. Although there is nothing that proves that the poet ever obtained a law degree (he would certainly have had the opportunity

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to let us know it somewhere in the Comedy), for a number of reasons it is impossible to imagine Dante without any juridical background: first, any educated person in the Middle Ages had some juridical formation, even without attending a law course. Just as, in the twenty-first century, we do not necessarily assume that the young person sitting at the computer in a café is a high-tech engineer, because computer literacy is part of a standard educational upbringing, so law, rhetoric, philosophy, and theology were part of the cultural curriculum in the medieval period.45 Law was not distinct from philosophy and literature. The period in which Dante lived enjoyed a so-called juridical renaissance.46 Second, Dante’s teacher, Messer Brunetto, the one who taught him “time and again,”47 was a jurist, and so were some of the poet’s best friends, such as Lapo Gianni and Guido Cavalcanti. Formative conversation was the principal occupation of intellectuals at the time. Third, in Florence, Dante used to frequent both Dominican and Franciscan houses, whose friars were primarily from Bologna, the cradle of juridical studies. Dante himself had travelled to Bologna.48 Clearly, the theological and philosophical arguments that he must have heard there were intertwined with juridical ideas. Fourth, as a politician, administrator, and orator, Dante needed awareness of juridical matters. Last, but not least, in some of his other works, he left several extremely pertinent definitions of law.49 Even if those definitions were not his own, he nevertheless committed them to paper. In addition, a large part of the legal classical heritage present in the Comedy can be shown to originate in sources other than the Corpus Juris. In particular, Dante owes much of his Roman legal knowledge to the glossae and to the Decretales, the former being commentaries on the law, the latter the bulk of rules composing the Jus Canonicum (laws issued by papal jurists). Even legal questions that were not contemplated by Roman law, such as the regulation of duelling (of Germanic origin) were explained by Dante’s contemporaries with principles and examples absorbed from antiquity. His son, Pietro, commented that his father’s poem “Tre donne intorn al cor mi son venute” [“Three Women Came by My Heart”] constitutes an allusion to the Jus divinum et naturale, Jus gentium sive humanum, and Lex positiva [divine and natural law, the law of tradition, i.e, common law, and positive law, i.e., statutory law].50 It seems that the arguments to prove the exact origin of any juridical presence, let alone a classical one, in the Comedy, are destined to lead us into a vicious circle. It is arduous to trace precise borders between law, grammar, philosophy, and theology in intellectual formation during the Res Publica Sub Deo, or the Commonwealth under God. Categories and concepts elaborated by Roman jurists owe a lot to Greek thought. In turn, the imposing system of Thomas Aquinas owes a lot to the Roman and Byzantine jurists. Analogously, the decretalists (scholars of jus canonici, the law of the Church) were trying to enforce worldly applications of the word of God, while re-elaborating categories derived from the legal Roman tradition. Canto 11 of Inferno can be taken as a model for the syncretism of the Comedy. Here Dante defines the hierarchy of sins— violence, fraud, and treachery: “D’ogni malizia, ch’odio in cielo acquista / ingiuria è il fine, ed ogni fin cotale/ o con forza o con frode altrui contrista,/ ma perché frode è de l’uom proprio male/ più spiace a Dio” [“The object of all malice, which earns Heaven’s



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hatred / is injury; every object of that kind / Causes distress to others by force or fraud / And because fraud is an evil peculiar to men / it displeases God the more”] (Inf. 11.22– 26). These lines echo both Aristotle’s view of a human being as a social creature who is perfected within a social context and Cicero’s words: “Cum autem duobus modis, id est aut vi aut fraude fiat iniuria [ . . . ] utrumque homine alienissimum, sed fraus odio digna maior” [“There are two ways or methods whereby one man may injure or oppress another; the one is fraud and subtlety, the other open force and violence [ . . . ] fraud, I think, is the more odious of the two”] (De Officiis 1.13). A few lines further, in the same canto, Aristotle appears again regarding “Μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα λεκτέον, ἄλλην ποιησαμένους ἀρχήν, ὅτι τῶν περὶ τὰ ἤθη φευκτῶν τρία ἐστὶν εἴδη, κακία ἀκρασία θηριότης. τὰ δ᾽ ἐναντία τοῖς μὲν δυσὶ δῆλα” [“Let us next begin a fresh part of the subject by laying down that the states of moral character to be avoided are of three kinds—Vice, Unrestraint, and Bestiality”] (Nicomachian Ethics 7.1.1),51 a probable inspiration for Dante’s notion for “Tre disposizion che il cielo non vole / incontinenza, malizia e la matta / bestialitade” [“The three dispositions which Heaven does not want / incontinence, malice and frantic bestiality”] (Inf. 11.22). Injury, iniuria in the etymological sense of breaking the “iura,” the rules, constitutes “Omne enim quod non iure fit, iniuria fieri dicitur” [“All that which is not according to Law is considered injury”] according to the definition by Ulpian. Moreover, Dante derived part of his juridical references from sources well beyond legal studies. The poet, at times, may have not even been aware that he was echoing such sources. This might be the case for his verse: “E le Romane antiche, per lor bere, / contente furon d’acqua” [“And the women of ancient Rome, for their drink, / were content with water”] (Purg. 22.145–146). Here Dante is indirectly mentioning a Roman rule that enumerated three admissible reasons for repudiating a wife: attempting to poison her husband, adultery, and Si vinum bibit,52 i.e., if she drinks wine, notably in secret! Hence, Roman ladies had to be content with water, lest they lose their husband and their respectability. This rule was no longer enforced later on. Since Dante was not a scholar of Roman law history, he must have taken these lines from other sources, most likely literary or historiographical. Two potential sources, neither strictly legal, can be found in Marcus Terentius Varro and in the massive Factorum et Dictorum Memorabilium Libri Novem by Valerius Maximus: “Vini usus olim Romanis foeminis ignotus fuit, ne per id in aliquod dedecus prolaberentur” [“In early epoch, the consumption of wine by Roman women was unheard of, in order not to have them indulge in improper behavior”].53 As Di Fonzo put it: “The connection between literature and law in the Middle Ages is strong, not only in material terms (jurists often held power and culture), but also under a theoretical perspective.”54 What was the extent of Dante’s knowledge of Roman law? Did he know at least the part concerning the enfranchisement of slaves, the one that supports, according to the thesis presented here, the metaphor of liberty in Canto 1 of Purgatory? It appears he did. He knew exactly the ones from the Corpus Juris, not the precedent rules that had been abrogated by the new code, such as Lex Furia Caninia (2 BCE), Lex Aelia Sentia (4 CE), and Lex Iunia Norbana (19 CE), that aimed at restricting access to Roman citizenship. Examining how Dante probes the limits of the law in the juridical otherworld, Justin Steinberg argues that exceptions were vital to the medieval legal order and that Dante’s

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otherworld represents an ideal “system of exception.”55 It may seem that Cato really fits into this “system of exception.” Yet, as jurists know, exceptions are never arbitrary in a solid juridical system. There must always exist a rationale, a motivated reason according to the spirit of the law, to induce a judge to make exceptions to a rule, otherwise it would be an arbitrary decision. Thus, the only plausible explanation, the only legitimate reason for Dante’s choice, is that Cato was a Roman jurist. All of Cato’s merits (in the eyes of Dante) would not sustain the examination of an impartial judge: “No strategy has been able to defuse the scandal of Cato’s location in the poem,” writes Marchesi.56 Perhaps here, though, is the key to reading Dante’s strategy: the poet needed to enrich his choice of the guardian of Purgatory with semantic value. Cato’s declaration (Purg. 1.90) “quando me n’usci’ fora” [“when I was freed”] did not suffice for the poet. To heighten the climax, he needed to say: “Listen reader, I needed a Roman jurist like Cato, who understands that an individual who left slavery in the City of Dis is entitled to apply for citizenship in the city of God, a society in which all enjoy full freedom.” What needs to be explained with so many words to a nonjurist needs only a concise line for a Roman jurist to immediately grasp the situation: “He goes in search of liberty.” Dante inhabited perfectly the cultural dimension of his epoch, one in which literature becomes an authoritative source of law and law at time assumes a literary vest.57 The law in Dante’s rendition of Cato turns into literature through the rhetorical device of analogy. Analogy is not a rare occurrence in medieval culture, as pointed out by Maria Corti, who has examined the parallelism between the relationships of troubadour / dame and vassal / lord.58 Dante is producing a dense semantic nucleus. He assembled in analogical pattern the Roman society (therefore the Roman body of law) with Heaven (therefore its body of law), the Roman champion of freedom with the jurist who knows that freed slaves were automatically proclaimed Roman citizens, and the guardian who grants celestial citizenship to the pilgrim freed from sin. Beatrice’s words, “E sarai meco senza fine / di quella Roma onde Cristo è romano” [“And with me shall eternally be a citizen / of that Rome of which Christ himself is a Roman”] (Purg. 32.101–103), made even more explicit the alluded parallelism between the society of those rescued by Christ (celestial Rome) and Rome on earth. In De Monarchia 2 and Paradiso 6, Dante connects the event of Christ coming to earth and his dying on the cross for the redemption of humanity from sin, to the jurisdiction of Rome. Returning to the initial statement by Hollander, perhaps the presence of Cato in Purgatorio will constitute an “unresolved and vexed question” no more.59 The words used by Virgil to introduce his protégé to Cato at the gates of Purgatory can finally be fully understood: “Libertà va cercando, ch’è sì cara / come sa chi per lei vita rifiuta” [“He goes in search of liberty—so precious, / as he who gives his life for it must know”] (Purg. 1.71–72). Besides offering a solution to the mystery of Cato, perhaps this study will act as a reminder that juridical knowledge is essential to understanding the Comedy. Moreover, Dante is a marvellous example of how a poet can turn the law into poetry.

4 Dante in a Global World Sandow Birk’s Divine Comedy Kristina M. Olson

If the literal sense of the Divine Comedy addresses the state of souls after death, then the allegorical sense of Dante’s poem references, comments upon, and lives in the political and social realities of the author’s world. To read the Comedy across centuries and continents involves translating the poem’s historically specific social and political commentary to our own geographical and chronological coordinates as modern readers distant from Dante’s world and times. These are the challenges to postmodern adaptations of the poem. How does one link Dante’s fourteenth-century Florence, for instance, to twenty-first century urban life in Los Angeles? The California-born artist Sandow Birk, in collaboration with writer and editor Marcus Sanders, took up these challenges when he adapted, translated, and “carried over” one world to the other in his series of paintings, lithographs, and an accompanying free-verse translation of Dante’s poem that was completed in 2005. Offering graphic-novel style illustrations inspired by Gustave Doré, Birk adapts the Comedy to an urban American landscape: Inferno is set in Los Angeles, Purgatorio in San Francisco, and Paradiso in New York City.1 Interpreting Birk and Sanders’ translation within the terms of a “fidelity analysis,” where “adaptation is betrayal,”2 can lead to an inaccurate understanding of Birk’s and Dante’s cultural projects. By incorporating the ideals of translation theory, such as that found in Walter Benjamin’s “Task of the Translator,” Birk’s translation carries over the historical, moral, political, and social content of the Comedy to new geographic and chronological coordinates—while, of course, modifying the content in a way that re­ creates the intent of the original.3 His adaptation, willingly or unwillingly, reflects the global spirit of the original poem in its lateral translation of the afterlife to other faiths and lands. Not only does Birk craft a new “urban American vernacular” when he adapts Dante’s poem to these domestic cityscapes,4 but he also executes a further translation in showing the cosmopolitan locations of Dante’s afterlife outside of America: in Tokyo (Purg. 17, frontispiece, 21, and 25; Par. 20, frontispiece and main illustration), Tijuana (Par. 2), and Mecca (Par. 31). In “carrying over” Dante’s world across our ethnically and religiously diverse cosmopolitan world—more specifically, in showing that this

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originally Christian vision of the afterlife can be illustrated with images referencing Islam and Hinduism (such as the gates of Purgatory in Purgatorio 9 and Mecca in Paradiso 31)—Birk makes the case that the artistic reception of the poem should not be limited by place or faith. This geographic and ethnic diversity is rare, if not unprecedented, in adaptations of the Comedy.5 This essay compares the multiculturalism present in Birk’s adaptation with that which is in the original poem, questioning the nature of its adherence to and departure from Dante’s vision. Ultimately, Birk’s illustrations can be perceived to come from the same spirit of open-minded inquisitiveness toward the cultural other that is discernible in the Comedy. In approaching Birk’s seemingly radical adaptation of Dante’s poem, and specifically of its religious topography, it is useful to use Benjamin’s understanding of translation, which I extend here to encompass the act of adaptation. Though Benjamin specifically addresses the linguistic challenges at the heart of translation, his assertion that the translator must find “the intended effect [Intention] upon the language into which he is translating which produces in it the echo of the original” without enslavement to a literal fidelity speaks to Birk’s project.6 As translations and adaptations negotiate the balance between fidelity and license, they enable the Comedy to enjoy its poetic afterlife, its reception: Translations that are more than transmissions of subject matter come into being when in the course of its survival a work has reached the age of its fame. Contrary, therefore, to the claims of bad translators, such translations do not so much serve the work as owe their existence to it. The life of the original attains in them to its ever-renewed latest and most abundant flowering.7

According to Benjamin, the spirit of Dante must be given its “latest and most abundant flowering” in its subsequent translations—and, it would seem, in adaptations as well. It is this project that Birk willingly embarks on when he attempts to render a vision of the Christian afterlife accessible to what he views as a secular audience. In his attempt to make the poem more relevant to a modern readership, Birk seems to have considered how to include a religiously and ethnically diverse readership in its vision of a blessed afterlife. As Peter Hawkins writes, “For all the tweaking, Birk’s intent is serious: ‘I would like to imagine a heaven where everyone can go—the Jews, the Muslims, even ‘the people from beyond the Ganges’ who have never heard of Jesus.’”8 In part, that entails loosening what Birk perceives as the rigidly theological nature of the poem by seeing it both as a religious and not as a religious text, in the same way that he does not see it as a scientific treatise or as history, as he himself claimed during an interview with medievalist Karl Fugelso: KF: Do you think of the Commedia as a “medieval” text? Why or why not? SB: I’m not a medieval scholar, so I’ll answer as best I can. I’m aware that the Commedia came out of the medieval era, but I think you’re asking a different question. I’m guessing you’re implying that the Commedia might be outside the standard definition of “medieval” in a time sense, since it is so complex and multilayered and expansive, that it might be the result of more Renaissance thinking? I guess it depends on how you label things, and I think that the Commedia has always



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been outside of the boxes of labels and beyond the limits of standard definitions. Is it a poem? It’s a poem, but it’s an amazing one and it’s much more than a poem. It’s not really a religious text and it is at the same time. It’s not a scientific treatise but it sort of is that too. It’s not a history, but it has elements of that throughout it. It’s also philosophical and entertaining and beautiful. [Emphasis added.] 9

Yet this element of Birk’s adaptation also involved translating the “philosophical and theological ideas” of Catholicism and Christianity for an American readership: KF: What, if anything, do you think your illustrations tell us about the world you inhabited when you were making them? SB: Well, there are a lot of them, and, so, I hope they talk about many different things, but in general I wanted my works to put the philosophical and theological ideas of Dante’s poem, and of Catholicism and Christianity, in relation to our lives in America today. I wanted to ponder those ideas and consider their relevance in the world, and I hoped to make works that are interesting and thought provoking and that might make one reconsider both the Commedia and our daily existence. And on a more simple level, I hope that in some way my works might bring more people to be interested in Dante and to read the Commedia.10

As he claims here, Birk considered the translation of these Christian elements of Dante’s poem in order to make it more “relevant” to an American audience. While Birk will achieve that also by substituting Muslim and Hindu iconography and places for Christian symbols in his adaptation, he also achieves this degree of American relevance by translating Dante laterally, across the country and the globe, and not vertically along the axis that extends from hell to the heavenly spheres. Hence, Birk largely relies on moving back and forth between his American settings of the realms and cities in other countries. His mixture of multiculturalism into Dante’s vision is executed by references to ethnic neighborhoods in American cities and by traveling to Japan, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia. To render Dante’s philosophy and theology accessible to an American audience, his adaptation must draw on local and cosmopolitan encounters with alterity, what one might call a global vision of the afterlife. The departures from Birk’s general American settings for the three realms—Los Angeles (Hell), San Francisco (Purgatory), and New York (Heaven)11—occur most in his visual interpretations of Dante’s Purgatorio and Paradiso. While his illustrations of the Inferno are filled with the global consumerist icons of Hell that are found throughout America, his Purgatorio hinges on the process of negotiating one’s linguistic and ethnic identity in response to the icons of an urban landscape. The English of franchise signs and advertisements in Hell is replaced by elements of multilingualism: road signs appear not only in Spanish, but also in Chinese, Japanese, and Arabic. As Birk expands this linguistic focus, he shows us that non-American contexts aptly speak to the meaning of Dante’s text. When Birk’s Statius, portrayed in a business suit, bows before Virgil in Purgatorio 21.131–33, not only does his genuflection seem more typical of Eastern Asian ritual, but a close look at the setting reveals that this scene takes place in Tokyo and not in San Francisco (Fig. 4.1).

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Fig. 4.1. Sandow Birk, Purgatorio 21.130. Virgil and Statius. Statius kneeling before Virgil in a Tokyo subway station.

The signs, written in Japanese characters, indicate a mass transit station on the Yamanote Line (山手線), the rapid transit loop operated by the East Japan Railway company. If the emotional encounter between the two poets in Dante’s poem causes Statius to temporarily forget Virgil’s and his own existence as aerial bodies, treating shades as one treats solid things, then Birk will depart from his pilgrim’s journey in San



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Francisco to a location in Tokyo. The change in setting evokes the momentary forgetfulness of their immaterial existence (Purg. 21). Statius’ emotions require a change in geography to reflect the interior, emotional journey of the souls, and not the trajectory up the physical mountain. The lateral ascent up the mountain is replaced by a change in longitude; the voyage up the mountain becomes, momentarily, the voyage to non-­ American—yet still earthly—terrain. But it is not a departure entirely from American shores; it is part of travel along a cosmopolitan network to which generations of immigrants to America belong. Specifically, Birk speaks here to immigration from Asian countries to the West Coast, which is fitting for this canticle set in San Francisco. Birk visualizes the return to origins of Virgil and Statius by gesturing to the geographical distance that most any American would travel to reach their own ancestral homeland. The multicultural vision that Birk attributes to his adaptation of Dante’s afterlife involves multilingualism as well, which we encounter with increasing numbers in Purgatorio and Paradiso. The English of franchise signs and advertisements in Hell becomes the multilingualism of English, Spanish, Chinese, and Japanese of road signs and mass transit (among others), the Spanish of Arnaut Daniel (now a chef at a taco stand) and Beatrice, a Latina, in the transitional space of Purgatory. If Purgatory is the realm of Dante’s afterlife that most represents our life on earth, then for an American reader of the twenty-first century, this means an inclusion of the multilingual, multiethnic, and multireligious nature of an urban American existence. The appearance of languages other than English distinguishes Birk’s Purgatorio from his Inferno, perhaps also as a reflection of the more harmonious society that can be found in the second realm. In the opening image to Purgatorio 31, escobas (brooms) are for sale, underlining the domestic and quotidian symbols of purification that will be treated in an allegorical ritual when Matilda submerges the pilgrim in Lethe. Earlier, in another frontispiece, Japanese characters line the stairway to the fourth terrace, the terrace of the indolent, an ironic play on the stereotype, perhaps, of a Japanese work ethos (Purg. 17). It is the incorporation of Japanese characters in the marquee along a brick-lined street, where television sets featuring ads for “Goku” (an anime character) are sold (along the seventh terrace in Purgatorio 25), that test the reader’s sense of orientation: are we in Japantown, San Francisco, or back in Tokyo? This seamless movement between our shores and foreign ones underscores the inclusion of other cultures into the fabric of our own American cities. We see this integration of multiculturalism on the local level most of all in Birk’s incorporation of ethnic food establishments in his Purgatory. In his Inferno, American fast-food franchises (such as McDonalds, KFC, Starbucks, Subway, and 7-Eleven) and restaurants prevail over “ethnic” eateries (one only need to look at the illustrations to Inferno 6 and 8). There, American cuisine establishments vied with only two small signs for Vietnamese food and Chinese fast food, besides the presence of one falafel stand (Inf. 7), Mediterranean food stand (Inf. 12), and one Mexican food restaurant, “El Diablito” (Inf. 24.91–93). The ratio shifts in Birk’s Purgatorio, however, as American fast food franchises disappear, except for one KFC that looms over the souls of the envious, depicted as skaters (Purg. 14). Here there is a predominance of East Asian food establishments, sprinkled with occasional American bars, lounges, and diners, such as

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Fig. 4.2. Sandow Birk, Purgatorio 26. The Provençal poet Arnaut Daniel working at a taco stand.

“Smitty’s” lounge (Purg. 12)—an actual establishment in Oakland, California; the fictional “Avarice Cafè” (Purg. 20); and “Tommy’s Joint: Sandwiches, Cocktails,” on the street corner (Purg. 23), also a real establishment, this one located in San Francisco. Along the restaurant-lined streets of Chinatown (such as the “Imperial Palace” of Purgatorio 5), Pia, whose dual-syllabic name with an “a” ending resonates with Chinese



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names of the same composition, speaks to the pilgrim and his guide. An Asian restaurant sign (Purg. 3), and in the frontispiece a Mexican restaurant (Purg. 7), also make their appearance. There are two taquerias: one in a frontispiece (Purg. 7)—and, more provocatively, the taco stand of Arnaut Daniel (Purg. 26). The only character to speak in his mother tongue (Provençal) in Dante’s poem— and who does not have his words translated—here (and in the verse translation) speaks Spanish, as the caption to the illustration reads: “Tan chulas y suaves son tus palavras que me llaman que no me dejan esconderte mi nombre. Me llaman el Chavo Arnoldo” [“So pretty and cool are your words that call me that they do not allow me to hide my name from you. They call me Arnoldo the Suave”].12 This is a translation of Arnaut’s words in Occitan from the poem: “Tan m’abellis vostre cortes deman, / qu’ieu no me puesc ni voill a vos cobrire” (Purg. 26.139–41). If the great master of Provençal lyric speaks Spanish and works at a taco stand, then we are reminded not only of contemporary linguistic and racial realities in America—namely, the prevalence of Spanish—but also of vernaculars other than English across the Americas. The American pilgrim of Birk’s vision of the afterlife must naturally orient himself in such multilingual realities. By figuring the great Provençal poet as a taco-stand worker, the artist also conveys the realities of individuals who are white-collar professionals in their home countries, but then immigrate to the United States and must take on blue-collar work.13 In Dante’s poem, Arnaut Daniel is recognized for his lyric authority on the terrace of the lustful, but Birk asks us to think whether that might not be the case in our contemporary American realities. Beatrice, on the other hand, dresses her curvaceous body in a spare, black dress that is cut low in both the front and the back, her feet adorned with high-heeled shoes. Her tirade in Purgatorio 31 is translated visually into a sassy facial expression and an indignant hand placed on her left hip, while the pilgrim sits immobile on the sidewalk under a series of pay phones. Birk retains her characterization while translating her mannerisms and appearance along the lines of current ethnic stereotypes for Latina women. Birk’s thirty-four illustrations of the third canticle, Paradiso—which outnumber those completed by Doré, his clear influence in this adaptation—recount subdued conversations that take place between Dante, Beatrice, and the blessed souls they encounter, along the streets of Manhattan and in Tokyo, Mexico City, and Mecca. Birk illustrates these moments of interior and conversational dialogue by moving away from Doré’s more grandiose depictions of the heavenly masses and portraying this journey as a spiritual passage into the soul. Birk emphasizes the existence of the individual who travels through American and non-American cities as he journeys into himself. In charting this exploration, Birk largely eliminates Christian religious symbols and emphasizes instead the urban landscape or, even, other religions, leading us to view spirituality in pluralist terms. Here in Paradiso, this depiction returns to a lesser degree but replete with biting sarcasm. The eagle of Justice in his illustrations of Paradiso 19 and 20 are two different glowing “M”‘s of a McDonalds marquee: one in Times Square (where Birk also inserts an advertisement for Dante’s Inferno), and another, suddenly, in Tokyo, Japan. There is an irony in this visual analogy, whereby the “M” of the largest American fast-food empire reproduces the shape of the imperial eagle of the Sphere of Jupiter, the symbol

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Fig. 4.3. Sandow Birk, Purgatorio 31. Beatrice as a Latina in a black dress and high-heel shoes eyes Dante on the sidewalk next to a bank of pay phones.

of justice. But if the empire of commercialism has staked its claim in Birk’s Paradiso, the same cannot be said for a Christian theological framework. As Birk exchanges pigeons for angels, he does not allow a theologized, Christian vision to dominate this canticle. That Birk would substitute a Hindu temple for the gate of Purgatory is one earlier example of that effort (Purg. 9).



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Fig. 4.4. Sandow Birk, Purgatorio 9. The gates of Purgatory: a Hindu temple.

Christian iconography likewise disappears, replaced by statues of Buddha (frontispiece to Par. 11), a depiction of the Hindu god Vishnu (frontispiece to Par. 23), and Aztec art (frontispiece to Par. 33). But most surprising is the inclusion of Hinduism and Islam in the Celestial Rose itself. The Virgin Mary is replaced by a Hindu goddess (Saraswati), but in her hands she bears bottled water, a remote control, a cell phone, and a cigarette, instead of the weapons that she is often depicted carrying (Par. 32).

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Fig. 4.5. Sandow Birk, Paradiso 32. Dante and Beatrice contemplate the vision of Mary, as the Hindu goddess Saraswati.

In one of Birk’s most radical departures from Dante’s poem, he figures the Celestial Rose as the Kaaba, the black stone at the center of Mecca, whose numerous concentric circles evoke the design of the rose (Par. 31). With this one illustration, Birk describes Dante’s Empyrean as the land of Islam, and no longer as a Christian setting. This appears as a radical move that can be interpreted in many ways, including as a negation of the poem’s intention (to



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Fig. 4.6. Sandow Birk, Paradiso 31. Dante and Beatrice looking out over Mecca with the Kaaba (the Celestial Rose).

return to Benjamin’s parsing of the act of translation). But this move is harmonious with the intention of the poem for several reasons. First, this adaptation might be in the spirit of the original pilgrim’s own dilemma as expressed in the Heaven of Jupiter, where he wonders about the salvation of the man born on the banks of the Indus (Par. 19). Here, the eagle articulates the pilgrim’s question regarding divine justice:

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Kristina M. Olson ché tu dicevi: “Un uom nasce a la riva de l’Indo, e quivi non è chi ragioni di Cristo né chi legga né chi scriva; e tutti suoi voleri e atti buoni sono, quanto ragione umana vede, sanza peccato in vita o in sermoni. Muore non battezzato e sanza fede: ov’ è questa giustizia che ’l condanna? ov’ è la colpa sua, se ei non crede?” (Par. 19.70–78) [For you have often asked: “A man is born / upon the bank along the Indus, with no one there / to speak, or read, or write of Christ, / and all that he desires, everything he does, is good. / As far as human reason can discern, / he is sinless in his deeds and in his words. / He dies unbaptized, dies outside the faith. / Wherein lies the justice that condemns him? / Wherein lies his fault if he does not believe?”]14

The eagle does not give an answer to this question, thereby underlining the limitations of human intelligence in comprehending divine will. While the canto claims to illustrate this point, one might also read this passage as an insistence on the injustice of divine will: the poet includes this question in the text instead of not including it, which would accept the inscrutability of God’s will a priori. Should this alternative reading be the true spirit of this passage, then Birk’s adaptation is harmonious with the original. Birk thus seems to say: if a Christian God sporadically dispenses grace for those who are disadvantaged by geography and time, then I will depict the hypocrisy of such justice by figuring it as an empire of commerce in one illustration (Par. 19), as well as move the center of Heaven itself from a cruel god to the center of worship on earth for those who have been excluded by that inscrutable justice (Par. 31). The theory that the pilgrim’s question about the man on the banks of the Indus is meant to show up divine injustice regarding the cultural other, and not justice, becomes clear further along in this canto. One only need to consider the eagle’s statement about the virtuous Ethiopian who will be closer to God after the Final Judgement and will distance Himself from hypocritical Christians:15 Ma vedi: molti gridan “Cristo, Cristo!” che saranno in giudicio assai men prope a lui, che tal che non conosce Cristo; e tai Cristian dannerà l’Etïòpe, quando si partiranno i due collegi, l’uno in etterno ricco e l’altro inòpe. (Par. 19.106–11) [“But observe that many shout out ‘Christ, O Christ!’ / who shall be farther off from Him, / on Judgment Day, than such as know not Christ. / The Ethiopian shall condemn such Christians / when the two assemblies go their separate ways, / the one forever rich, the other poor.”]16



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Here the eagle gives the answer he withheld from the pilgrim’s previous question: the virtuous person who does not know Christ might in fact enjoy a closer proximity to God, despite his lack of Christian faith. Thus, being Christian does not guarantee salvation in the afterlife. If Birk’s translatio of the Celestial Rose to Mecca was in the spirit of a radical revisionism that meant to bring it away from Christianity, it instead highlights Dante’s own particular take on divine justice, which does not take faith as a guarantee of salvation. It is thus that Birk partakes in Dante’s nonexclusive, revolutionary thought for his times, who promises salvation for the non-Christian other. Birk highlights the current omnipresence of ethnic pluralism in a postmodern existence by featuring Hinduism and Islam at the center of Paradise, and he achieves his objective of rendering the poem relevant to a diverse readership in a move that can be seen as a faithful rendering of the original. By erasing Christianity from the theological center of Paradise, as we have seen here, Birk departs from the original poem in name, but not in spirit. This innovative spirit in Dante has been noted by Teodolinda Barolini, who posits that there exists a correlation between “the embrace of difference in the metaphysical domain . . . in the Paradiso and Dante’s many startlingly nonnormative postures in the social and historical sphere.”17 Birk’s inclusion of Islam and Hinduism is thus more harmonious with Dante’s vision than might be assumed. While the main geographic coordinates in Dante’s poem are centered in a Christian West, ethnic and religious pluralism are not absent from the original poem. Dante’s poem already speaks in global and ethnically pluralistic terms, both in the passages observed here and elsewhere. That is, “global” here signifies a sense of geographic awareness and curiosity of other lands and faiths beyond the Italian peninsula, which is demonstrated by Dante not only in his treatment of the man at the Indus and the Ethiopian, but in his variety of both Western and Eastern sources, as well as his inclusion of non-Western figures. One here only need think of the population of Limbo, which includes Saladin, Avicenna, and Averroes from the Arab-speaking world. Critics have long studied the idea that Italy participated in a Mediterranean multiculturalism.18 But Dante’s poem will always be interpreted primarily by nonspecialists as a poem of the Christian world. Sandow Birk’s adaptation, taking the artist’s intention to open the readership of the Comedy to a nondenominational audience, in attempting to show us the afterlife that can always be found on this globe, demonstrates that this poem was always open to a non-Christian audience, even as it revises the terms of salvation for different faiths. By insisting on the location of Heaven as existing outside of America, but still on this earth, Birk illustrates Dante’s response to the disadvantages of time and space for the religious other. Just as Dante makes salvation a possibility for virtuous souls across the globe, so Birk renders the poem accessible to all readers by locating Heaven in another part of the world.

5 A Florentine First Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy in Print, 1481 Edition: Observations and Discoveries Sylvia R. Albro

By the time Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna1 contemplated printing an illustrated version of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy in Florence in 1481, eight editions of the celebrated fourteenth-century Italian work had already appeared in print elsewhere in Italy. Florence lagged behind other major Italian cities in embracing movable type, continuing to prefer illuminated manuscripts above printed books. Meanwhile, the cities of Foligno, Mantua, Naples, Venice, and Milan had all produced printed editions of the Comedy, beginning in 1472. The time was ripe for Florence to reclaim its literary native son with a print version of its own, and Nicholo seemed the right man for the job. Originally from Breslau in Silesia (now Wrocław, Poland), Nicholo had joined the wave of northern European printers relocating south of the Alps after Gutenberg’s introduction of the craft. Nicholo’s reputation as a calligrapher of manuscripts was established before he began printing in Florence around 1475. The relatively high rate of literacy throughout the Italian peninsula at the end of the fifteenth century was certainly a draw for both manuscript copyists and printers, given the substantial investment and guaranteed book sales required to cover the costs of production. With a particularly literate population of 30–33 percent in the Tuscan volgare, or common language,2 wealthy Florence presented an ideal location for Nicholo to pursue his trade. The availability of prepared manuscript texts in the volgare (vernacular) in a variety of subjects promised to attract a wider clientele than the traditional religious or legal texts in Latin favored by other printers thus far. Dante’s masterwork existed in at least four hundred contemporary manuscript copies in Italy, second only to the Bible,3 and many of these were produced and often illustrated in the city of Florence. As to Nicholo himself, there is still some mystery. What is known about him comes primarily from surviving records of his Florentine print workshop; from his occasional collaborations with the Ripoli Press, one of the earliest presses to operate in late medieval Florence;4 and from a few sentences in Bernardo Machiavelli’s Libro di ricordi, an account of Florentine daily life from 1474–1487.5 Scholars disagree on whether there were actually two different individuals from northern Europe with the name Nicholas

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Fig. 5.1. One of the three engravings in this work attributed to Baccio Baldini, which preceded his nineteen engravings for the 1481 Florentine Commedia also published by Nicholo di Lorenzo. Antonio Bettini, Monte santo di Dio, Florence, Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna, September 10, 1477. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

(Niccolò or Nicholo) at work in Florence at the same time.6 Reference to a Niccolò Tedesco (Donnus Nicholaus Germanus), who was a priest and an astrologer as well as an expert map and globe maker, contrasts with the printer Nicholo who does not mention his ecclesiastical status in any of his colophons. (See images of the Library of Congress’ Rosenwald Collection copy of the 1481 Comedy, Catalog no. 2, Figs. 3–5).7 The printer was known to have had a son, Gianni, born of an Italian mother, who followed in his father’s footsteps in the printing industry.8 What is certain is that upon his arrival in Florence, Nicholo di Lorenzo immediately set about cultivating relationships with the city’s intelligentsia, printing three of their books on religious and philosophical themes in his first year there, in both Latin and the Tuscan volgare (referred to here as Italian). By 1481 Nicholo had successfully printed at least twenty-two works in Florence, including some large, fancy volumes such as Pietro de Crescenzi’s Ruralia commoda, a popular book on husbandry and agriculture, printed in Italian three years before. He had already tested the inclusion of engraved illustrations in another typeset book, the quarto-size Monte santo di Dio by Antonio Bettini da Siena, in 1477. Bettini’s book was printed in Italian with large roman type that was easy to read and included, for the first

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time in Florence, three successfully printed engravings by Baccio Baldini (1436–1487), a former goldsmith turned copperplate engraver in the Florentine tradition. Thus when Nicholo began his ambitious first illustrated print edition of the Comedy, it was not without prior experience and collaboration on challenging projects, for he was by now an accomplished professional printer. Nicholo enjoyed the support of the Florentine educated class, having printed works by two of their most respected philosophers, Marsilio Ficino and Angelo Poliziano. His new volume was designed to include an engraving for each of Dante’s one hundred cantos describing the complete cycles of Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. Of equal importance to the newly introduced illustrations in this 1481 edition are both the preface, or Proemio, and a new commentary on Dante’s Comedy by the poet and prominent humanist Cristoforo Landino (1425–1498).9 Landino was a favorite of the elite intellectual circle associated with the ruling Medici family and a popular lecturer at the university in Florence known as Lo Studio.10 His role was to reinterpret Dante’s work in the spirit of the Neoplatonic philosophy espoused by humanists of the Medici court, supplanting an antiquated commentary printed in the 1477–1478 rival edition of the Comedy published in Milan.11 Previous printed editions such as those produced in Milan or Venice were particularly unpopular in Florence, given their use of Milanese and Venetian vernacular, which were not authentic to Dante’s time and origins. Substantial funds were required to embark on printing any book, but for one of such complexity, Nicholo needed partners with deep pockets. Lorenzo de’ Medici himself had admired Nicholo’s work in manuscript and possessed several of his illustrated works.12 For centuries it was generally assumed that the Medici family had underwritten the cost of Nicholo’s Comedy, though no written proof had ever been found. Lorenz Böninger’s astonishing discovery in 2013 of a surviving copy of the original book contract found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze (ASF) revealed important details about the project, including the revelation of a different and unexpected financier: Bernardo d’Antonio di Ricciardo degli Alberti (1435–1495).13 Bernardo was certainly of illustrious parentage. He belonged to a branch of the same family as the celebrated architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472), though Bernardo had neither the stature nor the fortune of his famous relative. He hoped to win acclaim in his own right by sponsoring the new Dante volume. The document also sheds light on the planning, execution, and complexities associated with the production of this legendary work. According to the contract, Nicholo, Landino, and Bernardo formed a society on December 24, 1480. Their plan stipulated that Landino would provide his commentary to the printer in daily installments; Nicholo would employ no fewer than three presses to execute the job, working simultaneously on Inferno, Purgatorioi, and Paradiso; and Landino and Alberti would correct the proofs on the same day they were printed, returning them immediately to Nicholo. (This quick turnaround was only possible because all three partners resided in the same neighborhood.) Nicholo would also be responsible for managing the production of the illustrations and their integration into the volume. The print run was set at 1,125 copies, a considerable quantity, but not the first incunabula edition of this size. For all this, Alberti agreed to pay a total of 360 large gold Florins; 100 up front as an advance for the printer’s expenses—including



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the first allotment of paper—and the remaining 260 in regular payments to cover the printer and his workshop’s expenses and the illustrations. The entire enterprise was to be conducted in absolute secrecy: none of the partners could share any part of the original copy or printed proofs with anyone outside the partnership until the project was completed. The trio wanted to be the first to produce such a book in a fast-developing competitive environment. Afterward, all three partners would divide the sales profits equally.14 Although there are no names of artists or engravers mentioned in this copy of the contract, we have Giorgio Vasari’s account that the artist responsible for the accompanying illustrations was none other than Sandro Botticelli, whose preparatory drawings were to be models for new copperplate engravings by Baccio Baldini, Nicholo’s chosen intaglio cutter for the book. (Baldini would incise the line drawings into copper plates using a sharp burin, a technique adapted from decorating armor and requiring a high degree of skill.) Vasari noted that Baldini customarily based his engravings on original drawings by other artists; in his estimation Baldini did not possess the ability to come up with his own original designs. Vasari enjoins the names of Baldini and Botticelli as known collaborators.15 With the addition of the engraved illustrations and new commentary, Nicholo, Landino and Alberti hoped to generate more sales. One of the principal aims in producing this new edition of the Comedy was to elevate the prestige of Florence and spread Dante’s literary reputation among a wider readership. With the signature of all three partners, the ambitious book enterprise began. In his Proemio, Landino sketched a glorious history of the city and describes its famous artists, musicians, poets, and philosophers. He included a detailed biography of Dante, praising his literary output as well as his devotion to his hometown, despite his notorious exile. Landino also penned an elegy to Leon Battista Alberti in his praise of the great men of Florence, presumably with the enthusiastic support of Bernardo, the project’s financier. Landino’s extensive commentary on the poem itself explored both its language and substance to generate a new level of interest and pride in the city’s native son, reclaiming him for the generation of Florentines born more than a century after his death. He filled his text with references to ancient Hebrew, Greek, and Roman philosophers, opening the door to a classical past formerly inaccessible to many Italian language readers.16 The production was elaborate and luxurious, designed in two sizes of roman type on large format (approx. 44 x 60 cm., or 17 x 23 in.) “royal” sized thick white paper with generous margins and reserve spaces left blank for positioning the illustrations. With its elegant design and spacing, the layout reflected Nicholo’s background and training in manuscript production. The book was not only large in dimensions for the time, it was also lengthy: almost four hundred pages, due to the extraordinarily loquacious commentary surrounding Dante’s original text. When looking at the book today one is struck by how much of the actual text printed on the page belongs to Landino in contrast to the small area reserved to Dante’s poem! Both the smaller type used for the commentary and the larger one used for the poem are elegant and highly legible. Despite the trio’s good intentions, the Comedy project faced obstacles from the start, due to the considerable size of the edition and the complexity of the tasks set for

Fig. 5.2. Copy 1. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia, Florence, Nicolaus Laurentii, Alamanus, August 30, 1481. Engraving by Baccio Baldini for Inferno 12, the seventh circle housing the violent; shows Dante and Virgil in the center surrounded by the centaurs. Illustration is printed on a separate piece of paper and pasted into the space left for it on the printed text page (of Inferno 11). Whole sheet dimensions measure 39.5 cm x 53 cm. (Paper was trimmed for current binding.) Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 5.3. Copy 2. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia, Florence, Nicolaus Laurentii, Alamanus, August 30, 1481. Bookplate and super ex-libris of Frederick Perkins, Chipstead Place, Kent, England. This engraving by Baldini refers to Inferno 2, Dante and Virgil in Limbo with Beatrice’s first appearance. This engraving was printed directly onto the printed page. The same engraving is used twice in this copy of the 1481 Commedia (see Fig. 5.5). 41.3 cm x 56 cm whole sheet dimensions. (Paper was trimmed for current binding.) Otto H. F. Vollbehr Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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each of the participants. Getting each to complete his respective part proved elusive given the prominence of Botticelli in particular and his looming obligations to other commissioned projects. Vasari recounts how after completing some initial designs for the Inferno, Botticelli was called to Rome by Pope Sixtus IV to decorate the Sistine Chapel walls. There he remained until 1482, an entire year after the printed text was completed in August 1481. According to Vasari, when Botticelli returned to Florence he eventually began work again on a set of Dante drawings and this project took up so much of his time and caused so much chaos in his life, that he was not able to earn any income from painting and subsequently lived in “great disorder.”17 Another rather persuasive cause for delay can be drawn from the financial disagreements that developed fairly early on between the three partners. These are revealed in additional archival documents that accompany the copy of the original contract found in the ASF.18 The first discord occurred in early June 1482 when Landino and Nicholo protested in court against Bernardo for unreimbursed expenses and for violating the terms of their contract.19 At this juncture, Bernardo had possession of a large number of the printed books, albeit in an incomplete state. Without permission from the other two partners, he had hired a certain middleman, “Io” (Iohanni), at a high salary to travel around the Italian peninsula offering the books for sale. Bernardo paid Iohanni’s salary even though it is clear from the court case that he was short on cash and already behind in his installment of payments to the printer.20 As Nicholo was responsible for the illustrations and their placement in the text, he may have run out of funds to pay for the engraver and/or the design artist to finish the work. Perhaps it was this situation that contributed to the insolvency and “chaos” described so vividly by Vasari regarding Botticelli. The financial disagreements between partners continued with more appearances before judges and notaries, which at least partly explains why in 1484, three years after the text had been printed, the volume still contained only three of the planned one hundred engravings. It was clear that the time needed and the cost of the project were underestimated.21 There also had been technical glitches with the production. The first illustration was already problematic in that the typographer did not leave enough space on the page to comfortably fit the entire image.22 In many examples of the book listed in subsequent catalogues, this same print is cut off at the bottom or overlaps the last line of the type.23 Both of the Library of Congress’ copies reflect this particular defect. In one case, the print was not properly registered on the page and therefore is not fully represented.24 In the second, the bottom one-third of the page was cut off and the full print applied to a second sheet of paper, which was then attached to the bottom of the original trimmed typeset page.25 As the current binding is from a later period than the printed text, it is not clear when this change was made. Another ASF document dated June 1483 notes that after the initial complaint lodged by Nicholo and Landino against Bernardo, more than 1,100 copies of the book had been printed, but not all had sold. Of the remaining unbound copies, Bernardo had one set and Nicholo and Landino the other.26 Although Bernardo was not on board, Landino and Nicholo arranged to sell five hundred copies of the book in its current state for three gold florins each to a middleman, with the payment to be made in installments. This price is the first one cited in the project records.27



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A full set of illustrations for the entire trio of cycles of the Commedia never made it into Nicholo’s 1481 edition. The most images ever included amounted to nineteen illustrations for the Inferno cycle alone, and for only a small percentage of the total number of books printed. (See the description of Catalog no. 2). Of the 157 original volumes documented in the early twentieth century by Arthur M. Hind of the British Museum,28 only twenty-one contained all nineteen engravings, sixteen of which were printed on separate loose pieces of paper and pasted into the book at a later date.29 Other volumes contained fewer engravings, generally only two or three, as in the gift copy Landino sent to the Venetian diplomat Bernardo Bembo in Paris, leaving more than ninety blank spaces meant for the other original prints. Some copies contained illustrations and/or embellishments done by hand. Why this was the case—and what happened to the other illustrations for the book—has been the subject of speculation by historians for generations. Many believe the technical challenges of printing the copperplate engravings on the previously typeset book pages were too difficult. The paper with the printed text would have had to be put through the press a second time, with the inked copperplate in the correct position. The difficulty of achieving an accurate registration may have led to the decision to print the images on separate paper, trim them, and paste them in place.30 Even though Nicholo had successfully combined typeset printing with engravings in the earlier Monte santo volume, in the case of the Comedy, the typesetter inexplicably did not always leave enough space on the page for the print to easily fit. Another possible explanation is that the typeset books with the initial three prints were already bound when the sixteen additional prints were completed, making it impossible to print them directly on the page and requiring that they be attached separately.31 This seems less plausible in that printers normally did not arrange for a large number of books to be bound before selling, as it was a considerable added expense.32 Rather, printers supplied their stationers with a limited number of unbound copies at a time. The stationer might then have arranged for one or two copies of the book to be bound for display and kept other unbound copies wrapped in blue paper (carta turchiniccia) on the shelves of his shop. This way, a client could select a custom binding style for his or her personal library and could commission what hand embellishments were desired for their copy.33 At the very least, we know based on the contract’s accompanying documents that the books were not bound in 1482, when the two unbound sets were divided between the partners.34 The idea of printing illustrations separately from the book and pasting them in later might not have been a new concept for Nicholo. Printers in Bruges had already used the same process in 1476, in a book by Boccaccio. This work was familiar to many Florentine book dealers because of a recorded ongoing exchange with Bruges book dealers, and thus would have been known to printers working in Florence as well.35 Only one set of Botticelli drawings illustrating Dante’s Comedy survives, divided between collections in Berlin and the Vatican Library.36 The drawings are executed in metalpoint on cartapecora (parchment) and were referred to by Vasari and another contemporary anonymous manuscript in the Florentine Biblioteca Nazionale as a commission for Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici, a younger cousin of Lorenzo. These drawings have been stylistically attributed to the last decade of the fifteenth century by

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Fig. 5.4. Baldini engraving for Inferno 5, second circle of Hell with the lustful eternally blown around by relentless windstorms. As in Fig. 5.2, this engraving was printed on a separate paper and pasted onto the previously printed text page from the Rosenwald 1481 Commedia (copy 1). The Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Bernard Berenson and others.37 While they have design elements in common with the nineteen engravings of the Inferno in Nicholo’s volumes, they are considerably larger in dimension, more delicate in line and color and far more complex in subject matter. The drawings are universally considered masterful, whereas Baldini’s work is viewed more critically for not reflecting Botticelli’s graceful drawing style: “ma quanto sieno lontani dagli originali” [“but how far they seem to be from the originals”].38 Thus, a number of historians believe that there had to have been an earlier set of drawings for the Inferno engravings, a set that did not survive and may even have been consumed in reproducing the images during the intaglio process.39 In considering the products by artist and engraver, the difference in format of the extant drawings and the much smaller blank spaces left in the book for the intended illustrations is a major factor. The lightness and delicate spare quality of Botticelli’s metalpoint images drawn directly on large parchment sheets make for a strong contrast with the densely crowded images of figures and landscapes in Baldini’s much smaller engravings made in reverse and cut into metal plates. The heavier outlines produced by the engraver’s burin resulted



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Fig. 5.5. Baldini engraving for Inferno 2, showing Dante, Virgil, and Beatrice in Limbo, printed directly into the typeset page of the Vollbehr 1481 Commedia. Otto H. F. Vollbehr Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

in images that are stiffer and less curvilinear than the freely drawn originals. In many examples, the density of the printing ink across the image and the precision of the plate impression are both very uneven, the result of copperplates worn down from the pulling of multiple copies, possibly later reworked by another hand, and even printed at different times and with different inks. One historian who has closely examined the iconography of the engraved images makes a persuasive argument that they are based on an (envisioned) lost painting by Botticelli: the Spaccato dell’ Inferno, known today only by what is thought to be its hand-painted reproduction in miniature held by the Vatican library.40 Another sees echoes in Baccio’s iconography of images from illustrated manuscripts of Dante’s Comedy circulating in Florence, with familiar passages illustrated in similar styles.41 A subsequent 1487 edition of the Comedy was printed in Brescia and contains Landino’s same commentary and new woodcut illustrations for all three cycles of the poem.42 The scenes in the first nineteen woodcuts have some elements in common with Baldini’s engraved work from the 1481 Florentine Dante. However, the Brescia woodcut illustrations of Purgatorio and Paradiso have no similarity whatsoever to the surviving original Botticelli drawings on parchment.

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Fig. 5.6. Beta-radiograph image of cardinal’s hat watermark on page from Inferno 25 of Copy 1. Principal chain line distance: 40mm.

In an intriguing side note, copies of the Baccio Baldini prints developed for the Inferno appear in a 1544 edition of the Comedy printed in Venice, indicating that the copperplates were still in circulation sixty years after Nicholo printed his work. This suggests that some images could have been added to copies of the 1481 edition long after it was considered complete.43 Even without all of its intended illustrations, the book produced by Nicholo and his associates was an expensive acquisition.44 From the history of sales it seems there was not a full return of investment for the project’s supporters, as 150 previously unsold copies from Bernardo’s share were recorded for sale in 1496 for one gold florin, a dramatic drop in price.45 Fifty years later there were still unsold copies in a Florentine stationer’s shop that had once belonged to a descendent of Nicholo, and a 1604 Giunti catalog lists copies still for sale.46 One reason for the initial high price of Nicholo’s edition was the expense of the paper, which in the fifteenth century represented half the cost of printing a book.47 The paper was ordered long in advance for a project of this size, which required a substantial



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Fig. 5.7. Beta-radiograph image of cardinal’s hat watermark on page from Inferno 29 of Copy 1. Principal chain line distance: 40mm.

quantity of large format sheets and was a reason why printers and paper suppliers often established joint business relationships.48 In Florence, some important printers, including Nicholo, preferred paper from Fabriano, in the Marche region, rather than locally sourced paper for their most prestigious publications and drawings.49 At the time, the cities of Florence and Fabriano shared both political and commercial interests. Nicholo’s use of Fabriano paper for the 1481 Dante edition is confirmed by

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Fig. 5.8. Paper sample with cardinal’s hat watermark shown in natural light emphasizing the whiteness of the five-hundred-year-old paper. Sample is dated 1454 and from document Archivio Comunale Catasto v68–72 in the Augusto Zonghi Collection (Raccolta di carte antiche fabrianesi dal 1267 al 1799) in the historical archive of the Fondazione Fedrigoni Fabriano.

examining the watermarks of the Library of Congress’ two 1481 copies, recorded with beta-radiography. The paper mills of Fabriano were particularly admired for their high-quality paper made in large dimensions, which required skilled craftsmanship and an abundant supply of water and good rags as raw material. Quite a few of Nicholo’s other large-format books were executed on paper with the same Fabriano watermark, indicating he frequently made use of a particular mill for his productions. Merchant documents from the Fabriano city archives record large amounts of the best-quality paper available sent to Florence beginning in the fourteenth century and continuing through the period of Nicholo’s activity, including paper with the cardinal’s hat watermark.50 If we take the figure of 1,125 books cited in the contract, the necessary paper would have amounted to more than four hundred reams, costing a small fortune.51 Recall that the cost of a partial order of paper is specifically included in the financier’s first payment enabling the project to begin. Nicholo’s ability to count on a steady supply of expensive, oversized paper from Fabriano is a testament to the respect he commanded as a printer and to his merchant connections.



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Fig. 5.9. Paper with a cardinal’s hat watermark from a document dated 1473 in the Augusto Zonghi Collection (Raccolta di carte antiche fabrianesi dal 1267 al 1799) in the historical archive of the Fondazione Fedrigoni Fabriano.

The leading aristocratic families of both cities were connected by marriage and by business: the Chiavelli family of Fabriano were proprietors of paper mills, and the daughter of Battista Chiavelli married Cosimo de’ Medici in the mid-fifteenth century. Unfortunately, the Chiavelli family business archive is incomplete, having been partially destroyed in a fourteenth-century uprising, making the precise history of mills’ output and paper sales difficult to trace.52 Nevertheless, dated papers with the same cardinal’s hat watermark of the 1481 Dante publication in exactly the same dimensions and from the same time period have been identified in a collection of historical paper samples from Fabriano.53 Nicholo’s connections to the paper industry may also be inferred by the presence of a possible relative, Antonio di Lorenzo (Antonius Laurentii Nicolai), who was a paper dealer. He is frequently listed in the records of the Ripoli Press from 1478–1481 as a supplier of Fabriano paper, as is another well-known stationer and paper supplier, Zanobi, from 1477–1481.54 In Landino’s 1484 letter to Venetian diplomat Bembo in France, he references a figure of 1,200 copies of the Comedy. These are thought now to include the original 1,125 cited in the contract, along with at least one specialty copy on parchment presented to the Medici family and/or a few others left blank for illuminations by hand, and possibly some errata copies.55 There was a precedent for a folio edition of 1,025 books: Landino’s Italian translation of Pliny’s Historia naturalis, printed in 1476 in Venice, again on a

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paper imported from Fabriano.56 Yet, most incunabula in Italy were printed in editions of much smaller numbers, especially books of such relatively large dimensions.57 To obtain sufficient paper of this size for an edition of 1,125 would have required extraordinary organization and industry contacts, especially given that Nicholo sandwiched this project between two other equally large format books with the same watermark. Both Nicholo’s editions of the de Crescenzi Ruralia commoda of 1478 and the Berlinghieri Geografia of 1482 consumed similar amounts of paper. It is quite remarkable that in the same year as the large 1481 Dante, Nicholo also printed five other works. He worked fast, possibly too fast; there are a number of typographical errors and irregularities in the book. The paper details of the Berlinghieri Geografia again bring up the possibility of distinct figures of engraver and typographer working together on an illustrated book printed in Florence. The thirty-one unsigned engraved maps in this book are based on the Latin translations of Ptolemy’s Greek coordinates, configured into images with all the place names—a major contribution to existing cartography of the time. On the other hand, Berlinghieri’s text on geography was printed with the colophon of Niccolò Tedesco (another name by which our Nicholo was known). Only the text has the same identified Fabriano watermark of the cardinal’s hat. The watermark in the map paper is an encircled moon with a cross above, a symbol more closely associated with mills near Siena, suggesting the text and maps were not printed together in the same workshop. On the other hand, at least some of the paper used for the separately printed engravings of the 1481 Dante edition is of a similar origin to the text. A loose copy of the engraving from the first canto—one from the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress that had never been affixed to book pages—was examined and found to be printed on paper made with the same type of mould as that which was used for the text paper (though the resulting image paper is only half the thickness).58 The fact that the papers are so similar reinforces the tie between engraver and typographer using the same supplier of paper stock and working during the same time period. The excellent paper used for the 1481 Dante edition may be credited for the survival of so many copies in good condition today. The book has been valued for academic study of Dante’s poem, the Italian language, and the neoplatonic Florentine philosophy by many collectors across Europe since it was first issued. Most existing copies have been treasured, but probably also handled a great deal. The paper in the Library’s two copies is thick, sized, and still a creamy white color, reflecting the advancements in paper manufacture introduced to the industry by Fabriano mills.59 If in the end the book was a disappointment to Nicholo and others involved in its production—the few illustrations, the printing imperfections, the modest sales, and rival editions that were fully illustrated in smaller, more affordable formats with the same Landino commentary—the printer quickly moved on to other projects. Bernardo apparently was so compromised financially that he had to give up his family house to a creditor.60 Within a few years, Nicholo also was forced to close his workshop. Landino, however, continued to work successfully, translating and commenting on classical texts. Toward the end of his life, he received the honorary title of segretario della Signoria.



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Nevertheless, on the positive side, the Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna Comedy has survived in more than 160 known original copies held in the great national and university libraries of Europe, North America, Japan, and Russia, where they are well known and frequently studied and exhibited.61 The book was admired enough to be copied in idea and design as early as 1487 in Brescia, and in text in 1484 in Venice, followed by ever larger markets. Landino’s commentary was well received and reprinted in at least fifteen other editions; his interpretation of Dante was the dominant one until the mid-sixteenth century and continued to be an integral part of student curricula long after that.62 The 1481 Dante was known to be in the collections of such luminaries as Lucrezia Borgia and Goethe.63 The book and prints have been the subject of study by historians of every generation since 1900 and have continued to spark lively discussion more than five hundred years after their printing. Many even argue convincingly that this book effectively contributed to Dante’s stature as a national figure and to the emergence of the Tuscan volgare as the language of the Italian peninsula, thus fulfilling some of its original aims. Nicholo’s Comedy is a beautiful book, in its design, its format, paper, and illustrations. The spacing and type remain clear, elegant, and quite readable, the paper still white and pristine, the images compelling and mysterious. The monsters and their fantastic surroundings; the terrible dilemmas of its subjects, their tribulations and their wanderings; the narrative line of poet and sage making their way through a world of chaos and suffering to finally reach a place of peace; the ancient story and Renaissance designs still constitute the stuff of a great graphic novel, even today.

6 Crossing Borders with the Divine Comedy A Catalog of Selected Works from the Library of Congress Lucia Alma Wolf

Dante Alighieri and his Divine Comedy are especially well represented at the Library of Congress: before one has even stepped inside the Jefferson Building, his threefoot-high granite portico bust gazes out at visitors approaching from the southwest. At the front entrance, above the right arch, the carved figure of a sculptor considers the marble block on which she has begun fashioning Dante’s visage. And once inside, one can spot on the elaborately decorated ceiling the poet’s name on a bannered tablet set between white dolphins. Honored in the Library’s art and architecture, Dante and his work appear throughout its contents as well—in rare book vaults and on ordinary bookshelves, in sound recordings and on film, on paper and in digital form, and in handwritten and electronic catalogs. Many examples of others’ work that he profoundly influenced or indirectly inspired are here, too. The Library holds more than five thousand items related to the poet and his masterwork, ranging from an early print edition of the Comedy (1477) to twenty-first-century translations and visual art. The following entries showcase the variety and highlights of these holdings, including books, prints, photographs, artwork, and music scores that trace the Comedy’s genealogy through time, place, and medium. These featured items also were chosen with the preceding essays in mind and to serve as jumping off points for further exploration of the Comedy and the Library’s Dante collections.

Incunabula and Sixteenth-Century Editions 1. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Venice: Vindelinus de Spira (De Spiera Vendelin in the colophon), 1477. fo Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Vindelinus de Spira was a German printer active between ca. 1469 and 1477. Vindelinus and his brother Johannes started their press in Venice in 1469 and they were the first to be granted a monopoly over the printing business there.1 At his brother’s death, Vindelinus took over the press, completing the editio princeps of Petrarch’s Canzoniere

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Fig. 6.1. La Commedia. Vindelinus de Spira, 1477. First page with incipit. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

(1470). The 1477 edition of the Comedy features the commentary of Jacopo della Lana or Iacomo della Lana (active fourteenth century), the first complete commentary accompanying each canto; it was falsely attributed to Benvenuto d’Imola in the colophon that also names the corrector, Christofal Berardi.2 This edition includes Giovanni Boccaccio’s “Vita di Dante” [“Life of Dante”]; verses by Busone da Gubbio, a politician and friend of

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Fig. 6.2. La Commedia. Vindelinus de Spira, 1477. End of Paradiso with the colophon. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Dante, and his son, Jacopo; and the “Credo” [“Creed”] attributed to Dante, but unlikely his work. On first front flyleaf: “Acquistato dal Sigr. prior cavaliere Gaetano Antinori l’anno 1756” [“Purchased by Sir Prior Knight Gaetano Antinori in the year 1756”]. Notice the use of miniature gothic typeface, a font conventionally used for religious works. Note, too, the absence of a title page, a practice borrowed from the manuscript



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tradition, like the folio size, two-column text layout, and red initials. The book opens with Boccaccio’s piece and an incipit (literally, beginning) at the top of the page: “Qui comincia la vita e costumi dello excellente Poeta vulgari Dante Alighieri di Firenze . . .” [“Here starts the life and customs of the excellent vernacular poet Dante Alighieri of Florence . . .”] Description: 34.3 cm; 376 leaves, ([1], [17], a­nd [376] blank; the first and last wanting). Call number: Incun. 1477.D34 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/72214535 References: De Batines, 1:23–29; Censimento 2, ix, 4–6; Fiske, 1:3–4; Goff, D27; GW, 7964; IGI, 358; ISTC, id00027000; USTC, 995476. See also Pollard, 40–41. 2. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. With Comento di Cristoforo Landino Fiorentino sopra La Comedia di Dante Alighieri Poeta Fiorentino. Florence: Nicolaus Laurentii, Alamanus (Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna in the colophon), August 30, 1481. fo Rosenwald Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Nicolaus Laurentii (active 1475–1504) produced the first print edition of the Comedy in Florence; it also presents Cristoforo Landino’s (1424–1504) commentary for the first time. Landino’s landmark piece was reprinted at least fifteen times between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. His “Proemio” (prologue) makes a cultural claim to Dante and a civic statement of the superiority of Renaissance Florence over other Italian city states, especially Venice, its rival in printing. The luxury manuscript copy of this edition, in vellum and illuminated, was used in a public presentation before an audience of Florentine dignitaries; the ceremony took place in a tower-­palace located in Borgo alla Collina in Casentino, a Medici residence. In the page layout, Landino’s commentary is printed in smaller fonts in roman or “humanist” typeface, emulating the script of ancient classical writers. The commentary surrounds the text of the poem set in one column to the left. Notice the empty space left for the decorative initial; the first verse running vertically along the side of the empty box reads “[ . . . ] el mezzo del camino di nostra vita” (with missing initial ‘N’). The Rosenwald copy of this edition is a rare copy since it includes nineteen copperplate engravings. Inspired by Sandro Botticelli designs, the images are attributed to the goldsmith and engraver Baccio Baldini. The Library holds a second copy of this edition in the Vollbehr collection.3 Description: 41.3 cm; 372 leaves ([1], [14-15], [169], and [371-372] blank); 19 copperplate engravings; From the library of Sir George Holford; ex libris Cortland F. Bishop. Call number: Incun. 1481 .D3 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/48035267 References: De Batines, 1:36–47; Censimento 2, 9–31, 92–105; Fiske, 1:4–5; Goff, D29; GW, 7966; IGI, 360; ISTC, id00029000; Marinelli 1911, 24–26; Rosenwald, 229; USTC, 995474.

Fig. 6.3. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. With Comento di Cristoforo Landino Fiorentino sopra La Comedia di Dante Alighieri Poeta Fiorentino. Nicolaus Laurentii, 1481. Cristoforo Landino’s famous “Proemio” (Prologue). Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.4. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Nicolaus Laurentii, 1481. The beginning of Inferno 1, showing text of the poem on the left, Landino’s commentary on the right and below the poem, and Baccio Baldini’s engraving of Dante and Virgil in the dark woods with the three beasts. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.5. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Nicolaus Laurentii, 1481. The end of Paradiso 33 and the colophon. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

3. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Venice: Octavianus Scotus (Octaviano Scoto da Monza in the colophon), March 23, 1484. fo Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Octavianus Scotus I (d. 1498) issued the first reprint of Cristoforo Landino’s commentary, which debuted in the 1481 Florentine edition. By typographical standards, Scotus’ edition is considered one of the best fifteenth-century examples of the Comedy.



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Fig. 6.6. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Octavianus Scotus, 1484. The first page of Inferno 1, with poem to the left, Landino’s commentary on the right and at the bottom, and an elaborately decorated woodcut initial. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

This copy contains the bookplate of Tommaso, Duke of Vargas Macciucca, on verso of the front hard cover; handwritten notes on verso of the front free endpaper and in margins; and, on the last page, Scotus’ printer’s device. The vellum binding is original. There are no illustrations, but the capital initials at the head of the cantos and printer’s device are from woodcuts.

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Fig. 6.7. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Octavianus Scotus, 1484. On verso, last lines of Paradiso 33 with commentary by Landino and bottom two-line colophon; on recto, “Registro,” advice for the binder, and the woodcut printer’s mark of Scotus. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Description: 31.7 cm; [270] leaves; woodcuts: printer’s device, and initials. Call number: Incun. 1484 .D34 Vollbehr Coll Copy 1 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/72214537 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 330; De Batines, 1:47–49; Fiske, 1:5; GW, 7967; Goff, D30; IGI, 361; ISTC, id00030000; Marinelli 1911, 26–27; USTC, 995473. 4. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Brescia: Boninus de Boninis (Boninum de Boninis di Raguxi in the colophon), May 31, 1487. fo Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Boninus de Boninis (ca. 1450–1528) was originally from Dalmatia (modern Croatia) and moved to Brescia in 1483. There he introduced innovations in printing woodcuts (see his use of woodcuts, Fig. 6.8) and in marketing. This edition is considered chronologically the second edition of the Comedy with printed illustrations and the first



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Fig. 6.8. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Boninus de Boninis, 1487. On the left, a full-page woodcut features scenes from the beginning of the Inferno: Dante in the woods, lost and sleepy; Dante looking up at the cliff bathed in sunrays; and Dante threatened by three beasts while in conversation with Virgil. On the right, the beginning stanzas of Inferno 1 and Landino’s commentary. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

to be more fully illustrated, as it contains sixty-eight full-page woodcuts accompanying the text. De Boninis employed woodcuts instead of the copperplate engravings used by Laurentii for the 1481 Florentine Comedy. He preferred woodcuts since they were less expensive and were printed with the text in one session. However, De Boninis’ project came to a halt because of time constraints and other typographic projects. Thus, only sixty woodblocks were created and some were reused for the remaining illustrations.4 In spite of these outcomes, De Boninis initiated a printing practice that would become the mainstay for later editions of the Comedy, as printers continued to use woodcut illustrations throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In this copy the woodcuts are inscribed in rich borders with a black background and ornamental motifs. Description: 32.8 cm; [310] leaves (the last blank, wanting); 68 woodcuts, including printer’s device. Call number: Hain 5948 Vollbehr Coll Copy 2

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Fig. 6.9. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Boninus de Boninis, 1487. The end of Paradiso 33, a colophon, and a printer’s mark. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/65058961 References: De Batines, 1:49–52; Fiske, 1:5; GW, 7968; Goff, D31; IGI, 362; ISTC, id00031000; Marinelli 1911, 26–27; USTC, 995472. Also, Petrella, Dante Alighieri, Commedia, Brescia, Bonino Bonini, 1487, vol. 12; and Petrella, “Dante in tipografia.”



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5. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Venice: Bernardinus Benalius and Mattheus Capcasa (Bernardino Benali & Matthio da Parma in the colophon), March 3, 1491 [1492]. fo Rosenwald Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Bernardinus Benalius Bergomensis (active 1483–1543) and Mattheus Capacasa Parmensis (active 1492) operated in Venice. This beautiful incunabulum edition features folio-size woodcuts at the beginning of the canticles, block capitals, and a smaller vignette on the right-hand side of each beginning canto. The corrector was Pietro da Figino, a Franciscan preacher who possibly corrected the similar edition printed by Petrus de Plasiis in Venice in 1491, but never finished it. He began anew and completed

Fig. 6.10. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Bernardinus Benalius and Mattheus Capcasa, 1491 [1492]. Open book with full-page Inferno woodcut on verso; beginning stanzas of Inferno 1 and Landino’s commentary on recto. Notice name tags for Dante, Virgil, and beasts and the decorative larger and smaller woodcut initials. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.11. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia. Bernardinus Benalius and Mattheus Capcasa, 1491 [1492]. Open book with colophon on verso and printer’s mark on recto. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

his corrections for the Benalius-Capcasa edition. It has usually been attributed to the year 1491, but more likely it is from 1492, based on the Venetian calendar. Sixty-one lines of commentary in smaller-size font surround the text of the poem; roman typeface; three full-page woodcuts at the beginning of each canticle are set within a decorative border adorned with columns and other architectural elements as well as angels, caryatids, sphinxes, and griffins. There are ninety-seven woodcut vignettes illustrating scenes from various cantos. The woodcuts have been attributed to a Venetian known as the Pico Master.5 Description: 30.4 cm; 302 leaves; 3 full-page woodcuts; 97 vignette woodcuts; woodcut printer’s device on the last page. Bookplate of C.W. Dyson Perrins. Call number: Incun. 1491 .D18 Rosenwald Coll Copy 1



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Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/47043553 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 334–35; De Batines, 1: 52–53; Fiske, 1:5; GW, 7969; Goff, D32; IGI, 363; ISTC, id00032000; Marinelli 1911, 26–27; Rosenwald, 260; USTC, 995471. 6. Dante Alighieri, Le terze rime di Dante. Venice: Aldus Manutius (Venetiis, in aedi[bus] Aldi. accvratissime. mens[is] avg[ustus] in the colophon), 1502. 8° Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress Aldus Manutius (1449 or 1450–1515) was born in Bassiano near Rome, moved to Venice about 1489 and established his famous press. It is the first Aldine edition of the Comedy in the innovative “pocket book” format, introduced by Manutius as “libelli portatiles in formam enchiridii” [portable booklets in the form of a handbook]. All previous fifteenth-century editions of the Comedy were folios. Manutius’ italic type became the standard for humanistic publications. This is also the first edition of the Comedy by

Fig. 6.12. Dante Alighieri, Le terze rime di Dante. Aldus Manutius, 1502. Side-by-side arrangement of first page of Inferno and last page of Paradiso. Notice the lack of commentary and illustrations as well as the Italic script, traits of Manutius’ editions. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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the major Venetian humanist Pietro Bembo (1470–1547), based on his own manuscript edition of a codex known as MS Vatican 3197 (from an original, MS Vatican 3199). This new edition is without a preface, commentary, or illustrations. It became the vulgate of the Comedy, until the publication of the 1595 edition by Accademia della Crusca by Domenico Manzani (see Catalog no. 12, figures 6.27–6.29). There is a second Aldine Comedy at the Library with the title Dante col sito, et forma dell’inferno tratta dalla istessa descrittione del poeta. The colophon reads: “Vinegia, nelle case d’Aldo et d’Andrea di Asola suo suocero nell’ anno MDXV. del mese di Agosto” [“Venice, the houses of Aldus and Andrea of Asola, his father-in-law, in the year 1515 and month of August”]. It shows Aldus’ famous printer’s mark, an anchor with a dolphin curled around it. This edition is dedicated to Vittoria Colonna, marchioness of Pescara, Abruzzo.6 Description: Aldine octavo: 16.2 x 9.4 cm; leaves 244. Signatures: a-z8, A-G8, II4 (1[ii], verso and H[iv], verso blank); on verso of title page: Lo ‘inferno e ‘l Pvrgatorio e ‘l Paradiso di Dante Alaghieri. Italic type. This copy is missing the characteristic Aldine device with the image of a dolphin curled around an anchor and motto “Festina lente” [Make haste slowly]. Contemporary binding: wooden boards covered with leather; clasps lost; goffered edges. Imperfect title page mended; stamped in gold on front and back cover; gilt dentelle decoration on the book cover and gilt edges. Call number: PQ4302 .B02 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/27001189 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 323–25; De Batines, 1:60–62; Censimento 2, xi; Fiske, 1:6; USTC, 808768. 7. Dante Alighieri, Opere del divino poeta Danthe con svoi comenti. Venice: Bernardinus Stagninus, 1512. 4o Rosenwald Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Bernardinus Stagninus (d. 1540), nicknamed Stagnino [tinsmith], was from Trino. In Venice, he established the successful Giolitus family press, a strong competitor of Manutius and heirs (see chapter 1). Stagninus specialized in academic books in the university towns of Padua, Pavia, and others. He published four editions of the Comedy (1512, 1516, 1520, and 1536, of which all but the 1516 edition are at the Library of Congress) and some editions of Francesco Petrarca’s works. He printed Cristoforo Landino’s commentary with the text of the Comedy prepared by Pietro Bembo for Manutius’ 1502 print edition (cfr. Catalog no. 6). In the colophon, he mentions Pietro da Figino, the same corrector used by Benalius and Capcasa in 1491 (cfr. Catalog no. 5). Following Manutius’ typographic innovations, Stagninus used italic type and a smaller book size. However, he chose the quarto format over the octavo favored by Manutius, which was too small to adequately accommodate the commentary as well as the rich illustrative apparatus that Stagninus incorporated.7 The epithet of divino [divine] is applied to Dante’s name in the title. Notice the use of black and red ink on the title page, also richly decorated with woodcut borders, showing angels on the top and caryatids on the sides, surrounding a portrait of Saint Bernardino da Siena, Stagninus’ patron saint, and a small

Fig. 6.13. Dante Alighieri, Opere del divino poeta Danthe con svoi comenti. Bernardinus Stagninus, 1512. Title page. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.14. Dante Alighieri, Opere del divino poeta Danthe con svoi comenti. Bernardinus Stagninus, 1512. Open book with full-page woodcut and first stanzas of Inferno 1, elaborately decorated with woodcut borders and a vignette depicting the Emperor Octavian and the Tiburtine Sybil. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

vignette on the bottom, depicting Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Stagninus’ title page makes a decisive statement, in keeping with the era’s artistic trends. This edition features elaborate woodcut illustrations throughout, including the title page with an ornamental border; a full-page woodcut preceding only the first canto of Inferno; and smaller woodcut vignettes before each canto. Description: 22 cm; 452 leaves; 1 full-page woodcut and 98 vignette woodcuts as well as numerous woodcut initials. Call number: PQ4302 .B22 1512 (Rosenwald Coll) Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/72209753 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 242–43, 244; De Batines, 1:69–71; Fiske, 1:7 (but Fiske has it as an 8o, while it is a 4o); USTC, 808772.



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Fig. 6.15. Dante Alighieri, Opere del divino poeta Danthe con svoi comenti. Bernardinus Stagninus, 1512. Final page with Dante’s “Pater nostro” (Our Father) and “Ave Maria”; printer’s mark. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

8. Dante Alighieri, Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino, con l’espositione di Christophoro Landino nuovamente impressa e con somma diligentia revista e emendata e di nuovissime postille adornata. Venice: Jacobus de Burgofranco & Lucas Antonius Giunta (Iacob del Burgofranco, Pavese, ad instantia del nobile messere Lucantonio Giunta, Fiorentino in the colophon), 1529. fo Rare Book & Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Jacobus de Burgofranco, (active 1504–ca. 1538) was a publisher and printer of academic books in Pavia, as well as the caretaker at the University of Pavia, until he moved

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to Venice around 1526. Later, he focused on books in the vernacular, the classics, and religious texts. Note the relationship with Lucas Antonius Giunta in the role of the publisher of this edition. Giunta (1457–1538) of Florence moved to Venice in 1477 and worked mostly as a publisher and bookseller, but he also printed a few titles. He had established a publishing enterprise with his brother, a bookseller, in Florence with a

Fig. 6.16. Dante Alighieri, Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino. Jacobus de Burgofranco & Lucas Antonius Giunta, 1529. Ornate title page with detailed woodcut borders showing ancient poets on the left and “modern” poets on the right; woodcut vignette at the bottom with the nine muses and the red fleur de lis of the Giunta coat of arms. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.



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starting budget of 4,500 florins. The business flourished and he was able to transfer his publishing house to Venice, where he often worked in collaboration with the De Spira family. On the title page the border shows portraits on the left of Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Lucretius, and Terence; on the right, Dante, Petrarch, Pietro Aretino, Boccaccio, and Bernardo Accolti, called “Unico Aretino.” Description: 30 x 20.5 cm; 12 preliminary blank leaves, 295 leaves, 1; 3 full-page woodcuts at the beginning of each canto, 96 woodcut vignettes, and portrait of Dante. Call number: PQ4302 .B29 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/03030392 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 328–29, 362; De Batines, 1:79–81; Fiske, 1:7–8; USTC, 808784.

Fig. 6.17. Dante Alighieri, Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino. Jacobus de Burgofranco & Lucas Antonius Giunta, 1529. Frontispiece full-page portrait of Dante, the first edition to include one, and Landino’s prologue with decorated initial. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.18. Dante Alighieri, Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino. Jacobus de Burgofranco & Lucas Antonius Giunta, 1529. Colophon. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.



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9. Dante Alighieri, La Comedia. Venice: Franciscus Marcolinus, 1544. 4o Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. This is the first publication of Alessandro Vellutello’s commentary. Vellutello (b. 1473) moved from Lucca in Tuscany to Venice after producing successful commentaries on Petrarch (1525) and Virgil (1533). Vellutello may have commissioned this edition of the Comedy, which was reprinted only once more in its entirety (1554). Otherwise, only some parts of it reappeared in later editions and in combination with Landino’s commentary, as in Joannes Baptista Sessa’s edition in 1564. 8 Franciscus Marcolinus (active 1535–1559) from Forlì, in Emilia Romagna, was first a merchant, bookseller, and publisher before he came to be a prolific printer.9 Additionally, he

Fig. 6.19. Dante Alighieri, La Comedia. Franciscus Marcolinus, 1544. Full-page woodcut of Dante, marked with letter “D” in classic attire with a beard. He is also shown emerging from the woods and running away from the three beasts. Virgil, also in classic attire with laurel wreath on long hair, watches in the background. On recto, first stanzas of Inferno 1 surrounded by commentary. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.20. Dante Alighieri, La Comedia. Franciscus Marcolinus, 1544. Aerial perspective of first and second circles of Hell: Limbo, from Inferno 4, and the lustful from Inferno 5. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

became a renowned public figure in Venice, where he established his press in 1535. His works are known for their refined layout and copious woodcut illustrations. This edition has three full-page woodcuts at the beginning of each canticle and eightyfour woodcut vignettes spread throughout the cantos. According to Volkmann, most of the woodcut illustrations of the Comedy in the sixteenth century repeat the themes and styles of the Benalius-Capcasa edition of 1491. Marcolinus’ edition is an example of a more modern visual interpretation of the Comedy—for instance, in the ways in which Dante and Virgil are represented in the classical styles of the Renaissance, even if the general composition of the illustrations remain anchored to the precedent tradition.10 This edition also shows Vellutello’s illustrations of Dante’s cosmography of Hell, a new branch of science founded by the Florentine mathematician Antonio Manetti (1423–1497). Description: 24 x 15.6 cm; 442 leaves; 87 woodcuts.



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Fig. 6.21. La Comedia. Franciscus Marcolinus, 1544. The end of Paradiso 33 and colophon. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Call number: PQ4302 .B44 (Rare Bk Coll) Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/02004034 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 369–70; De Batines, 1:82–84; Censimento 2, 24–31; Fiske, 1:8; USTC, 808777; Quondam, “Nel giardino del Marcolini, un editore veneziano tra Aretino e Doni.”

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10. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di Christoforo Landino. Venice: Joannes Baptista and Melchior Sessa, 1564. fo Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. The brothers Joannes Baptista and Melchior Sessa were active in Venice between 1564 and 1578. The Sessa family (active 1489–1630) was from Sessa, Switzerland. They started as booksellers and then mainly acted as publishers, but occasionally they also

Fig. 6.22. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di Christoforo Landino. Joannes Baptista & Melchior Sessa, 1564. Title page with Dante’s portrait. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.



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Fig. 6.23. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di Christoforo Landino. Joannes Baptista & Melchior Sessa, 1564. A large woodcut showing Dante in the woods and the three beasts in the opening of Inferno 1, with commentary. Notice the very ornate initials and frieze at the top of the page. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

printed. They collaborated with other printers in Venice, as with their three editions of the Comedy (1564, 1578, and 1596). For this 1564 edition, they used the typographer Domenico Niccolini da Sabbio (active 1557–1600). This edition by the Humanist editor Francesco Sansovino (1521–1586) includes the Cristoforo Landino and Alessandro Vellutello commentaries, as well as his own annotations. They are set in sequence one after the other surrounding the text of the poem and marked by abbreviations in the margins to indicate the authors (see Figs. 6.23 and 6.24). Description: 31 cm; 28 preliminary leaves, 392 numbered leaves, 4 end leaves; 96 large woodcuts; numerous woodcut ornate initials and friezes. Call number: PQ PQ4302 .B64 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/02014347 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 327–28, 355; Censimento 2, 30, 104; De Batines, 1:91–92; Fiske, 1:8–9; USTC, 808794.

Fig. 6.24. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di Christoforo Landino. Joannes Baptista & Melchior Sessa, 1564. Vellutello’s commentary, colophon, and printer’s mark. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.



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11. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lvcca, sopra la sua Comedia dell’Inferno, del Purgatorio, e del Paradiso; nuovamente stampato, e posto in luce. Venice: Petrus de Fine, 1568. 4o Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Petrus de Fine (active 1555–1576) was a publisher and bookseller (or libraio-editore in Italian) in Venice, whose publishing activity was limited having produced just ten works, including this edition of the Comedy. Bernardino Daniello (1500–1565), from Lucca, was the author of the last integral new commentary of the sixteenth century.

Fig. 6.25. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello. Petrus de Fine, 1568. Title page with printer’s mark, the rooster, and motto “Tota nocte excubo” [“All night I keep watch”]. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.26. Dante Alighieri, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello. Petrus de Fine, 1568. Diagram of Hell on verso and beginning of Inferno on recto. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

It denoted a trend inspired by Vellutello of producing commentaries at variance with Bembo’s edition. While Bembo focused on the language of the poem, Daniello’s commentary paid more attention to Dante’s stylistic solutions and his multiple references to classical and contemporary authors such as Virgil and Petrarch. After Daniello, it was not until 1732 that a new commentary appeared, by Pompeo Venturi (see chapter 1). This edition is relatively bare of illustrations but shows three copperplate engravings of maps of Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise and abundant woodcut initials throughout. Description: 21 cm; 6 preliminary leaves, 727; 3 full-page copperplate engravings; woodcut initials. Call number: PE4302 .B68 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/01013683 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 127, 398; De Batines, 1:93–94; Censimento 2, 76–82; Fiske, 1:9; USTC, 808795.



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12. Dante Alighieri, La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri, nobile Fiorentino, ridotta a miglior lezione dagli Accademici della Crusca. Con Privilegio. Florence: Domenico Manzani, con licenza de’ Superiori, 1595. 8o Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. This is the renowned Accademia della Crusca edition of the Comedy that became the new vulgate replacing the 1502 Aldine. The Academy regarded an improved edition of the Comedy’s text as a necessary step toward their major project of publishing the first Italian language dictionary, the Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca, printed in

Fig. 6.27. Dante Alighieri, La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri. Domenico Manzani, 1595. Title page with Accademia della Crusca bran sifter. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.28. Dante Alighieri, La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri. Domenico Manzani, 1595. Beginning of Inferno 1 with decorative woodcut initial and frieze. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.



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Fig. 6.29. Dante Alighieri, La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri. Domenico Manzani, 1595. Printer’s mark and colophon on verso; printer’s device of Accademia della Crusca on recto. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

Venice in 1612. Their efforts consisted fundamentally in examining the works of Dante, Boccaccio, and Petrarch in order to codify a standard for Italian modelled after the prestigious Florentine vernacular. This edition is the result of the Academy’s collation of the 1502 Aldine edition against 100 manuscripts of the Comedy that produced at least 465 variants. Domenico Manzani, also called “Domenico of the cat” because of his printer’s device, worked as a printer for the Accademia della Crusca from 1582 to 1600. He sometimes used the Academy’s frullone (bran sifter) as a printer’s mark alongside his own. Description: 16 cm; 7 preliminary leaves, 493 numbered, [57]; woodcut initials and folded plate with copperplate engraving of a diagram of Hell. Call number: PQ4302 .B95 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/01019858 References: Ascarelli-Menato, 288, 289–90; De Batines, 1:98–100; Censimento 2, xi, 84; Fiske, 1:9; USTC, 808804.

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Nineteenth Century 13. Henry Boyd, The Divina commedia of Dante Alighieri. Consisting of the Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. Translated into English verse, with preliminary essays, notes, and illustrations, by the Rev. Henry Boyd. London: T. Cadell, Jr., and W. Davies, 1802. 8o General Collections, Library of Congress. Henry Boyd (1748, Dromore, Antrim County, Ireland–1832, Ballintemple, near Newry, Down County, Ireland) was a translator and clergyman as well as the Artium Magister (“Master of Arts”) chaplain to Viscount Charleville. He first published his translation of Inferno in English verse in 1785 in Dublin. The intent was to revive Dante’s reputation, after the hiatus it had suffered during the previous two centuries. This

Fig. 6.30. Henry Boyd, The Divina commedia of Dante Alighieri. London, 1802. Frontispiece portrait of Dante by Thomas Stothard and title page. General Collections, Library of Congress.



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complete edition in three volumes includes preliminary essays, notes, and a portrait of Dante. Boyd’s translation is in pentameters, arranged in six-line stanzas rhyming aabccb that do not replicate Dante’s terza rima. Boyd adapts the poem’s rendition to the sensibility of a contemporary English audience or, in translation theory terms, naturalizes it. The complete set cost one pound sterling and seven shillings at the time of its release. It includes half titles in all three volumes and an engraved frontispiece portrait of Dante in the first volume designed by artist Thomas Stothard (1755–1834) and engraved by Robert Hartley Cromek (1770–1812). It was reviewed in the Edinburgh Review, where it was critiqued as an “easy style of versification, commonly somewhat dull, but always fluent”; and more negatively in the North American Review.11 Description: 22 cm; 3 volumes; pages vi, [2], 408; [4], 384; [4], 420; frontispiece portrait of Dante. Call number: PQ4315 .B7 1802 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/16003547 References: Lowell, s.v. “Dante,” ARDS, no. 5, Appendix (May 18, 1886), 28; De Batines, 1:265; De Sua, Dante into English, 11–21; Cunningham, The Divine Comedy in English, 1:14–16; “The Divina Commedia of Dante Alighieri”; Fiske, 1:43; Friederich, Dante’s Fame Abroad 1350–1850, 228–29; La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 22–23, 28; “Dante, and His Latest Translators”; Toynbee, “Dante in English Art,” 9; Talbot, “Lord Charlemont’s Dante and Irish Culture,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 312–15. 14. John Flaxman, La Divina Comedía di Dante Alighieri. Cioè l’Inferno, il Purgatorio, ed il Paradiso. Composto da Giovanni Flaxman Scultore Inglese ed inciso da Tommaso Piroli Romano. Rome: n.p., 1802. Print and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. John Flaxman (1755, York, Yorkshire, England–1826, London), a British sculptor and book illustrator, was a leading artist in the European Neoclassical movement. In his youth, he assisted his father in his plaster casting business in London and eagerly read the classics. In 1770, he started his studies at the Royal Academy in London. Then, in 1775, he went to work for English pottery designer and maker Josiah Wedgewood (1730, Stokeon-Trent, Staffordshire, England–1795, Etruria, Staffordshire) with whom he gained his invaluable skill as a designer of silhouettes and line drawing for Wedgewood’s jasperware. Attracted by classical art and architecture, he travelled in 1787 to Rome, where he accepted art commissions until 1794. During that time, he produced huge group sculptures such as The Fury of Athamas (1790–1794) and Cephalus and Aurora (1790), competing for fame with renowned Neoclassical artists such as Antonio Canova (1757, Possagno, Republic of Venice–1822, Venice). The Italian engraver and publisher Tommaso Piroli (1750, Rome–1824, Rome) engraved Flaxman’s Comedy drawings in Rome between 1792 and 1793. The Dutchman Thomas Hope published the editio princeps of the Comedy with Flaxman’s drawings in limited edition in Amsterdam in 1793. Nine years later in Rome, Piroli republished Flaxman’s drawings without Hope’s permission, but with Flaxman’s approval. The English edition with quotations from Henry Boyd’s translation of the

Fig. 6.31. John Flaxman, artist. Inferno, Canto 1: Dante with Virgil in the dark wood, 1802. Engraved by Tommaso Piroli. Print and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.32. John Flaxman, artist. Inferno, Canto 5: Paolo and Francesca, 1802. Engraved by Tommaso Piroli. Print and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.



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Fig. 6.33. John Flaxman, artist. Inferno, Canto 31: the giant Antaeus picks up Dante and Virgil to place them in the ninth and last circle of Hell, 1802. Engraved by Tommaso Piroli. Print and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

Comedy was published in 1807. Flaxman’s illustrations were paramount in popularizing the Comedy in Britain and reviving its reception during the Romantic era.12 Description: 21 x 28 cm.; line engravings; 1 preliminary leaf, 110 plates. Visual materials from the Bancroft-Bliss families’ papers. Call number: Unprocessed in PR 13 CN 1976:127 [P&P] Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/2010632353 References: Audeh, “Gustave Doré’s Illustrations for Dante’s Divine Comedy,” 126, 131– 32, 135, 138–39, 154n10, 155n15, 157n23, 158n28; Braida, Dante and the Romantics, 15, 18, 21, 24–26, 153–54, 162, 167, 170, 184n73, 185n76, 211n5; Dinoia, “Alcune aggiunte e precisazioni su Tommaso Piroli incisore (1750–1824),” in Cristallini, Memoria e materia

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dell’opera d’arte per nuovi orizzonti di ricerca, 133–42; Symmons, “John Flaxman and Francisco Goya: Infernos Transcribed”; Querci, “il culto di Dante nell’Ottocento e le arti,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 35–52, and especially 35–37. 15. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno, translated by the Rev. Henry Francis Cary, M. A., from the original of Dante Alighieri, and illustrated with the designs of M. Gustave Doré. New ed., with critical and explanatory notes, life of Dante, and chronology. New York, London, and Paris: Cassell & Company Limited, ca. 1885. fo General Collections, Library of Congress. Henry Francis Cary (1772, Gibraltar–1844, London) started his translation of the Comedy in 1797, completing it in 1812 and publishing it with his own means in 1814. It was not a very successful book, until the profile-raising literary interventions of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772, Ottery St. Mary, Devonshire, England–1834, Highgate, near London) and the Italian writer Ugo Foscolo (1778, Venetian Republic of Zacynthus, now Zákinthos, Greece–1827, Turnham Green, near London). Foscolo was a patriot who fought alongside Napoleon Bonaparte and then lived in exile in England starting in 1816, after fleeing Italy upon the restoration of Austrian rule (1814). Both Coleridge and Foscolo were instrumental to the critical reception of Cary’s translation, but the Whigs’ support for the ideals of the Italian revolution were also relevant in Foscolo’s case. Cary first published a partial translation of the Inferno (London: J. Carpenter, 1805–1806), followed by his full translation with the title The Vision, or Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise of Dante Alighieri (London: Taylor and Hessey, 1814). After Coleridge’s Dante lecture in 1818, it sold one thousand copies in less than three months and led to a second edition (London: Taylor and Hessey, 1819), followed by two more (1831, 1844) during Cary’s lifetime. In the meantime, a pirated copy had reached Philadelphia, where the first American edition was printed (Philadelphia: Samuel Bradford, 1822) and succeeded by a second American edition (New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1845). Multiple reprints and editions of Cary’s translation appeared in the later part of the nineteenth century (for instance, Philadelphia, 1888–1889; New York, 1889; see “American Dante Bibliography” in the references). Between 1844 and 1914 it was reprinted at least thirty times, according to one source.13 The Library holds at least twenty-seven copies of different editions from 1831 to 2015. The long success of Cary’s translation resulted from his particular prosodic choices and his use of the classic English Miltonic blank verse. That style tries to emulate in English the unwavering rhythm of Dante’s poem by introducing frequent enjambments, but falls short of replicating the variety of stylistic traits in the original Italian. (See also Catalog no. 17, figures 6. 37–40). Description: 34 x 36 cm;1 preliminary leaf, xxiv, 183; frontispiece portrait; 75 plates. Call number: PQ4315.2 .C4 1885 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/33016262 References: ARDS, “American Dante Bibliography,” 15 (May 19, 1896): 77, 83, 118, 120– 21; Barrows, “Translating Dante: The Art of the Impossible,” especially 361, 366; Braida, Dante and the Romantics, 27– 54, 60–69; Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 147–48, 160; Crisafulli, The Vision, 13–96, 259–76; Cunningham, The Divine Comedy in



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Fig. 6.34. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno translation. Published in New York by Cassell & Company, ca. 1885. Frontispiece portrait of Dante and title page. General Collections, Library of Congress.

English, 1:16–22; De Batines, 1:265, 266–68 (only cites the first five editions printed in London between 1806 and 1844); De Sua, Dante into English, 26–50; Fiske, 1:43–45; Ferrante, “A Poetics of Chaos and Harmony,” 153–57; Friederich, Dante’s Fame Abroad 1350–1850, 229–32, 231n1, 283n1, 284n1, 525, 533–34; Koch, “Dante in America,” 9, 49; La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 23–24; Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” 20–26, 43–45, 70–86; “La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri . . . by H. F. Cary”; Verduin, “Emerson, Dante, and American Nationalism,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 268, 272. 16. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The divine comedy of Dante Alighieri translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1867. 40 Inscribed by Walt Whitman on flyleaf of Vol. 1. Charles E. Feinberg Collection of Walt Whitman. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807, Portland, Maine–1882, Cambridge, Massachusetts) accepted the professorship of modern languages at Bowdoin College (Brunswick, Maine), when he graduated in 1825. In 1829, he began teaching at Bowdoin after

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Fig. 6.35. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1867. At right, the title page, at left an inscription by Walt Whitman. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

having taken a three-year trip to Europe to study languages and literatures, including Italian. In 1836, following his second tour in Europe accompanied by his wife, Mary Potter, he succeeded George Ticknor as the Smith Professor of Modern Languages at Harvard College, a position he held until his retirement in 1854. In the meantime, he began his translation of the Purgatorio (1843) and in 1861, he resumed the translation of the remaining canticles, Inferno and Paradiso, completing them in 1863. The manuscript underwent a long revision process, during which Charles Eliot Norton, James Russell Lowell, and Longfellow—founders of the Dante Club—met every Wednesday evening to review the proofs. Furthermore, the six hundredth anniversary of Dante’s birth in 1865 was an excellent reason to publish Longfellow’s translation of the Inferno and send copies directly to Florence, where celebrations were to be held “as a tribute from America.”14 Eight English translations of the entire Comedy and fifteen translations of the Inferno had been published by the time Longfellow’s was published. In America, his translation appeared two decades after Thomas W. Parsons (1819, Boston–1892, Scituate, Massachusetts), a dentist, poet, and contributor to The Atlantic Monthly, published The First Ten Cantos of the Inferno of Dante (Boston: W.D. Ticknor, 1843),15 followed by his edition of



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Fig. 6.36. Nineteenth-century English translations of the first stanzas of Inferno 1. Left to right: Henry Boyd, The Inferno of Dante Alighieri, Canto The First (1802); Henry F. Cary, Dante’s Inferno (1885), and Henry W. Longfellow, The Inferno (1867). Boyd and Cary, General Collections; Longfellow, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

the first seventeen cantos of the Inferno (1865). While Dante and his masterpiece were known in the United States in the antebellum period, both enjoyed wider recognition after the Civil War. His poem influenced many American writers of the period, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman. Longfellow chose to deliver a literal, unrhymed translation to preserve the original poem as much as possible in English. He also decided on a particular adaptation of the three-line verse format (terzina) to the blank verse. While Norton and his fellow Dantists hailed his translation, other contemporary literary critics harshly critiqued it for its awkward English wording and hybrid meter. Description: 25 cm; copy 4. Imperfect: v. 1–2 only (originally published in 3 vols.). [In double slipcase.] Call number: PQ4315 .L7 1867 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/16003552 References: ARDS, no. 1 (May 16, 1882): 17–25; BAL, 12146; Censimento 2, 261–64; Cherchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 23–29; Cunningham, The Divine Comedy in English, 1:65–71; De Sua, Dante into English, 64–71; Fiske, 1:46; Friederich, Dante’s Fame Abroad 1350 – 1850, 542–50; Koch, Dante in America, 36–47; Irmscher, “Reading for Our Delight,” in Havely, Dante in the Nineteenth Century, 159–79; Hollander, “Translating Dante into English Again and

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Again,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 43–48; La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 96–114; Mathews, “Walt Whitman’s Reading of Dante”; Mathews, “Melville and Dante”; Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” 5–9nn7–8, 16–19, 58, 67, 73, 76, 86–157; Matthews, “Walt Whitman’s Vision of the Inferno,” 37, 42, 62–63n3, 64n7, 65nn9 and 11; Norton, “Remarks of Mr. Norton at the Annual Meeting of the Dante Society, May 16, 1882”; Verduin, “Grace of Action: Dante in the Life of Longfellow.” 17. Gustave Doré, artist. Illustrations from Dante’s Inferno, translated by the Rev. Henry Francis Cary, M. A., from the original of Dante Alighieri, and illustrated with the designs of M. Gustave Doré. Engraver: Héliodore-Joseph Pisan (1822, Marseille–1890, Bailly). Publisher: New York, London and Paris, Cassell & Company Limited. Date: [ca. 1885]. General Collections, Library of Congress. Gustave Doré, in full Paul-Gustave Doré (1832, Strasbourg, France–1883, Paris), was a printmaker and a popular book illustrator. He established himself in Paris in 1847 and mainly created lithographic caricatures and albums until 1854. He became renowned for his production of wood-engraved book illustrations included in more than ninety books, including Oeuvres de Rabelais (1854), Les Contes drolatiques of Balzac (1855), a large folio Bible (1866), and the Inferno of Dante (1861). His illustrations of the Comedy are still used today and have been used in more than 150 editions of the Comedy in different languages. He started working on the Comedy illustrations in 1855, then financed his own first edition in folio of the Inferno since publishers interested in his project were hard to come by.

Fig. 6.37. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno, ca. 1885. Illustration by Gustave Doré of Dante in the dark wood in Inferno 1.1–2: “In the midway of this our mortal life, / I found me in a gloomy wood, astray.” Compare to illustrations of this same scene in early printed books from 1481, 1487, 1491, 1512, 1544, and 1564 (Catalog no. 2, Fig. 6.4; Catalog no. 4, Fig. 6.8; Catalog no. 5, Fig. 6.10; Catalog no.7, Fig. 6.14; Catalog no. 9, Fig. 6.19; and Catalog no. 10, Fig. 6.23); as well as Flaxman, Moser, and Drescher (Catalog no. 14, Fig. 6.31; Catalog no. 21, Fig. 6.45; and Catalog no. 26, Figure 6.50a). General Collections, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.38. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno, ca. 1885. Illustration by Gustave Doré of Paolo and Francesca in Inferno 5.72–74: “Bard, willingly / I would address those two together coming, / Which seem so light before the wind.” General Collections, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.39. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno, ca. 1885. Illustration by Gustave Doré of Bertrand de Born among the Sowers of Discord, Inferno 28.116–119: “By the hair / It bore the severed member lantern-wise / Pendent in hand, which look’d at us, and said / ‘Woe’s me!’” General Collections, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.40. Henry Francis Cary, Dante’s Inferno, ca. 1885. Illustration by Gustave Doré of the Giant Antaeus in Inferno 31, 133–135: “Yet in the abyss / That Lucifer with Judas low ingulfs, / Lightly he placed us.” General Collections, Library of Congress.

This first volume (Paris: Louis Hatchette, 1861)16 was so successful in spite of its high cost of 100 Francs that the publisher agreed to the production of Purgatorio and Paradiso in a single folio volume (1868). In 1861, Doré’s paintings inspired by the Comedy were put on exhibit at the Salon of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Description: Wood engraved illustrations. Dimensions: 15 1/8 x 12 x 13/4 in. [these 4 plates from the 1885 edition] Call number: PQ4315.2 .C4 1885 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/33016262 References: Audeh, “Gustave Doré’s Illustrations for Dante’s Divine Comedy,” 125–31; Blanchard, The Life of Gustave Doré, 107–21; Braida and Calè, Dante on View, 17, 53–54, 58n49, 61–63, 68n20, 106, 109n49, 117–18, 143, 148n17, 162–64, 171n17, 173, 177–78; Dupont, “Reading and Collecting Dante in America,” 49; Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” 5, 58n63, 120, 161, 197–98, 234–35; The Printing Times and Lithographer, 53; Matthews, “Walt Whitman’s Vision of the Inferno,” 36, 43, 57–59. 18. William Wells Brown, Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States. Boston: J. Redpath, ca. 1864. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. William Wells Brown (ca. 1814, Lexington, Kentucky–1884, Chelsea, Massachusetts) is the first known African American writer to have published an autobiography, Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave (Boston, MA: Anti-slavery Office, 1847);



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Fig. 6.41. Front cover of William Wells Brown, Clotelle, 1864, in the series Redpath’s Book for the Camp Fires. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress

a novel, Clotel (London, UK: Partridge & Oakey, 1853); and a play, The Escape; or, A Leap for Freedom (Philadelphia: Historic Publications, 1858). His mother was a slave and his father was a relative of their owner. In St. Louis, an important slave trade port, he worked for the abolitionist Elijah P. Lovejoy at the St. Louis Times. Brown escaped in 1834, adopting the name of the Quaker who assisted him, Wells Brown, and he worked on a steamboat that helped fugitive slaves reach Canada. In 1836, he settled in Buffalo where he was very active in the abolitionist movement. During the 1843 national antislavery conventions in Buffalo, he befriended Frederick Douglass. He lectured at the annual meeting of the American Anti–Slavery Society in New York in 1844. He moved

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Fig 6.42. William Wells Brown, Clotelle, 1864. Title page and frontispiece with Jerome standing on the table while he gives a speech to onlookers. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

to Boston in 1847 to start his career as a Massachusetts Anti–Slavery Society lecture agent and published his memoir Narrative. In 1849, he travelled to Great Britain to promote the abolitionist cause and stayed in Europe until 1854 for personal and political reasons. It was during this time that he first published the novel Clotel; however, the first edition did not contain references to Dante. Three more versions of the novel were published in the United States: Miralda; or, The Beautiful Quadroon. A Romance of American Slavery, Founded on Fact, In Sixteen Installments (New York, Weekly Anglo African, December 1, 1860 to March 16, 1861); Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States (Boston: J. Redpath, 1864); and Clotelle; or The Colored Heroine, A Tale of the Southern States (Boston: Lee & Shepard, 1867). The references to Dante and Beatrice in the edition shown here occur when the slave and protagonist Jerome, in love with Clotelle, a beautiful light-skinned slave, declares that “Dante did not more love his Beatrice, Swift his



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Stella, Waller his Saccharissa, Goldsmith his Jessamy bride, or Burns his Mary, than did Jerome his Clotelle” (page 58 of this edition). Description:18 cm; 104; including frontispiece plates. Call number: PZ3 .B8199 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/06017232 References: Andrews, To Tell a Free Story; Baraw, “William Wells Brown, Three Years in Europe, and Fugitive Tourism”; Farrison, William Wells Brown; Frye, “The Case against Whiteness in William Wells Brown Clotel”; Greenspan, William Wells Brown, ix–xxvi, 173–211; Havely, Dante’s British Public, 275; Looney, Freedom Readers, 51–54, 87–183; Soderberg, “One More Time with Feeling,” especially 254; Sommers, “A Tangled,” 52–63.

Modern and Contemporary British and American Translations of the Comedy 19. Dante Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. Hell, Purgatory, Paradise. Translated by Dorothy L. Sayers and partially Barbara Reynolds. Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books [1950–1963]. General Collections, Library of Congress. Dorothy Leigh Sayers (1893, Oxford–1957, Witham, Essex) was born into a family of Anglo-Irish descent. Her father was the headmaster of Christ Church Cathedral School. At the time, women could attend but not earn degrees at Oxford University; therefore, Sayers enrolled at nearby Somerville College. In 1915, she graduated in modern languages with honors and formed lasting bonds with other like-minded women. She worked for the publisher Blackwell, then at L’École des Roches in Normandy, and from 1922 to 1929 as a copywriter for the advertising company Bensons in London. In 1923, she published her first novel, Whose Body, and became a very popular detective storywriter. After World War II, she taught herself Italian and started translating the Comedy in terza rima. About her translation she admitted, “It is not, of course, Dante; no translation could ever be Dante,” but “I have stuck to the terza rima, despite the alleged impossibility of finding sufficient rhymes in English.”17 She published Hell (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, UK: Penguin Books, November 1949), followed by Purgatory (1955) and Paradise (1962). Critics, such as Charles S. Singleton, considered Sayers’ translation in terza rima “a failure. . . . Once more by a failure in verse translation we are persuaded that a prose translation of this poem will always be far the better.”18 She died of heart failure before she could finish her translation of Paradise, but her friend Dr. Barbara Reynolds completed the last thirteen cantos. Sayers asserted, “The ideal way of reading The Divine Comedy would be to start at the first line and go straight through to the end, surrendering to the vigor of the story-telling and the swift movement of the verse, and not bothering with any historical allusions or theological explanations which do not occur in the text itself.”19 For a comparison of Sayers’ translation with John Ciardi’s and Allen Mandelbaum’s translations of the first stanzas Inferno, see Fig. 6.46.

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Fig. 6.43. Front cover of The Divine Comedy translated by Dorothy L. Sayers, Cantica I Hell, published by Penguin Classics, 1950. General Collections, Library of Congress.

Description: 18 cm; 3 volumes; with maps and diagrams by C.W. Scott-Giles; genealogical tables. Call number: PQ4315 .S3 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/a52001983 References: Barrows, “Translating Dante,” especially 363, 367–68; Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 150n10, 152n14, 53–54, 158; Cunningham, The Divine Comedy



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into English, 2:211–20; De Rooy, “The Poet Translated by American Poets,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 56–58, 62; De Sua, Dante into English, 109–10, 114–16n48; The Dorothy L. Sayers Society website, https://www.sayers.org.uk/; Heilbrun, “Dorothy Sayers between the Lines”; Hollander, “Translating Dante into English Again and Again,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium 43–44; Prescott, “A Mutual Admiration”; Reynolds, The Passionate Intellect, especially 42–44, 113; Reynolds, “The Importance of Being Dorothy L. Sayers,”; Sayers, “Introduction,” in Dante. The Divine Comedy. I: Hell, 9–69; Singleton, “Review of Dorothy Sayers’ translation”; Verduin, “Sayers, Sex, and Dante.” 20. Dante Alighieri, The Inferno. Translated in Verse by John Ciardi. Historical introduction by A.T. McAllister. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1954. General Collections, Library of Congress. John Ciardi (1916, Boston–1986, Edison, New Jersey) was an American poet, critic, and translator. Born into an Italian-American family from Boston’s North End, he served as an aerial gunner in the U.S. Army Air Corps (1942–1945) and taught at Harvard (1946–1953) and Rutgers University (1953–1961). He retired from teaching to dedicate himself fully to literature. After publishing his translation of The Inferno (1954), he followed it with The Purgatorio (1961) and The Paradiso (1970). Ciardi translated the Comedy using a three-line stanza with a rhyming pattern that is not a proper terza rima, but a dummy terza rima.20 Many literary critics regard his version as a classic, the first American attempt at “idiomatic liveliness” and remarkably readable for a general audience, with a contemporary and democratic scope.21 Ciardi asserted that “Language is an instrument, and each language has its own logic. I believe that the process of rendering from language to language is better conceived as a ‘transposition’ than as a ‘translation’” (Ciardi, “Translator’s Note,” ix). For a sense of his style and a comparison with Sayers’ and Mandelbaum’s translations of the first stanzas Inferno, see Fig. 6.46. Description: 22 cm; 288; illustrations. Call number: PQ4315.2 .C5 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/54009668 References: Altieri, “Dante’s Inferno in Translation”; Barbarese, “Four Translations of Dante’s Inferno”; Barrows, “Translating Dante,” especially 362–64; Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 151–53nn12–13; Cherchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 31–34; Ciardi, “Translator’s Note,” in Dante Alighieri. The Inferno, ix–xi; Cunningham, The Divine Comedy into English, 2:225–33; De Sua, Dante into English, 110–15n50; De Rooy, “The Poet Translated by American Poets,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 55–58; Havely, Dante’s Modern Afterlife, 214; Boorstin, “John Ciardi, a Poet, Essayist, and Dante Translator, Dies.”

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Fig. 6.44. Frontispiece with Dante’s portrait by artist Barry Moser and title page of The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, translated by Allen Mandelbaum. General Collections, Library of Congress.

21. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, I. Inferno. A verse translation, with introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum. Drawings by Barry Moser. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. fo General Collections, Library of Congress. Allen Mandelbaum (1926, Albany, New York–2011, Winston-Salem, North Carolina), son of Albert Naphtali Mandelbaum, a rabbi, and Leah (Gordon) Mandelbaum, lived in half a dozen cities from Louisville to New York City, where his family finally settled when he was thirteen. Mandelbaum earned an M.A. (1946) and a Ph.D. (1951) from Columbia University defending the thesis “Stasis and Dynamis: Two Modes of the Literary Imagination.” He was a member of Harvard University’s Society of Fellows, spending most of his appointment in Italy, where he stayed on as a Fulbright Research Scholar from 1954 to 1956, then as director of printing at Cassino and La Tipografica in Rome until 1964. In 1979, he was decorated with the Order of Merit by the Republic of Italy. He taught at Cornell, Columbia, Yeshiva University, and the City University of New York, where he was Professor of English and Comparative Literature from 1965 to



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1980. At CUNY, he also chaired the English Department, became professor emeritus, and managed the Italian Literature Ph.D. track in Comparative Literature in consortium with New York University. His three-volume verse translation began with Inferno (1980), followed by Purgatorio (1982), and Paradiso (1984). For his meter, Mandelbaum chose the terzina (three-line stanza) with blank verses (no rhymes and Miltonian pentameter; see Cerchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America”). Notice the page layout, with Mandelbaum’s translation facing the original text in Italian. Together with the companion volume California Lectura Dantis (1999–2008), edited by Mandelbaum, this translation became a landmark among American contemporary editions. The illustrations by Barry Moser (1940, Chattanooga, Tennessee, – ) have a unique and very compelling system of reference to specific verses in the text.

Fig. 6.45. Barry Moser, illustration of Dante in the woods, Inferno 1. General Collections, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.46. Translations of the first verses of Inferno 1. Top left, John Ciardi, Inferno (1954); bottom center, Allen Mandelbaum, Inferno (1980); top right, Dorothy Sayers, Hell (1950). General Collections, Library of Congress.

Moser studied at Auburn University, the University of Tennessee, and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is renowned for his book illustrations, printed by his own press, Pennyroyal, such as the large-scale volumes of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass (West Hatfield, MA: Pennyroyal Press, 1982) for which he won the American Book Award in 1983. He taught art at Smith College, the Rhode Island School of Design, and the Williston-Northampton School in Massachusetts, and has exhibited his work internationally. Description: 29 cm; 3 volumes; xxiv, 307; illustrations by Barry Moser. Call number: PQ4315.2 .M3 1980 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/73094441 References: Barbarese, “Four Translations of Dante’s Inferno,” 647–48, 651–53; Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 144, 156–60nn2, 27; Cecchetti, “L’Inferno e il Purgatorio di A. Mandelbaum,” 268–75; Cherchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 38–39; De Rooy, “Introduction. Divine Comedies for the New Millennium. Humbleness and Hubris,” in



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De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 8–9; Grimes, “Allen Mandelbaum, Translator of ‘Divine Comedy,’ Dies at 85”; Carne-Ross, “Giants in Dwarfs’ Jackets.” 22. Tom Phillips, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri. A verse translation by Tom Phillips with images and commentary. London: Talfourd Press, 1983. fo Artists’ Books Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. Tom Phillips (1937, Clapham, London– ) is a British singer (with London Philharmonia Chorus, until 1962), sculptor, artist, and composer—Irma is an experimental opera that he composed in 1969. Phillips studied English literature and live drawing

Fig. 6.47. Tom Phillips, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, 1983. Half title page of Inferno. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.48. Tom Phillips, artist. Inferno 4: Dante becomes part of the group of five great classical poets: Virgil, Homer, Horace, Ovid, and Lucan. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

classes, respectively, at St. Catherine’s College and Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art at Oxford (1958–1960). While teaching English, music, and art at a secondary school in London, he took evening classes at Camberwell School of Fine Arts. He held his first solo exhibition in London in 1965 and four years later won a John Moores Painting Prize. He taught at Bath Academy of Art, Ipswich School of Art (where he mentored his best student, Brian Eno), and Wolverhampton School of Art. For his artistic accomplishments as well as his remarkable teaching career, he earned the honored title



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Fig. 6.49. Tom Phillips’ rendition of the Paolo and Francesca story, in Inferno 5. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

of Royal Academician from the Royal Academy of Arts. He works in a variety of media and is known for his artist’s books. The Divine Comedy project took seven years to complete (1976–1983). When a fire destroyed one-year’s work at Alecto print studios, he founded his own publishing house, Talfourd Press. In the meantime, he also started translating the Comedy, mediating between poetry and illustration. His Comedy utilizes different visual media and highbrow as well as consumerist genres, layered via “a cut-up technique.”22 He uses text balloons

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and stenciled lettering set in the images modelled after Gustave Doré’s illustrations, postcards, magazines, Picasso, and Michelangelo to translate the Comedy into a very original visual representation of Dante’s poem, alongside Phillips’ own full translation of the text. Words and phrases run through the illustrations as “rivers” as in his first book, A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel (London: Thames and Hudson, 1982), in which he first experimented with these artistic techniques. For his translation, Phillips used easily readable blank verse. His Inferno became a Channel 4 production codirected with Peter Greenaway called A TV Dante (1990). For a sample of Phillips’ translation, see Fig. 6.50a: a comparison of translations from Inferno 1 by Phillips, Robert and Jean Hollander, and Mary Jo Bang. Description: 43 cm. large folio volumes, in limited edition of 185 copies; 3 volumes; 139 colored prints (lithographs, etchings, aquatints, and silkscreens); letterpress from Walbaum type designed by Ian Mortimor on artist’s own paper made at Inveresk Mills (Wells, Somerset) with his signature as watermark. Call number: PQ4315 .P49 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/83226337 References: Calè, “From Dante’s Inferno to A TV Dante,” in Braida and Calè, Dante on View, 177–91; Caws, “Tom Phillips: Treating and Translating”; Kretschmann, “A TV Dante—Cantos I–VIII (1989) by Peter Greenaway and Tom Phillips”; Phillips, A Humument; Phillips, Works and Texts, 227–245; Phillips, Bookworks by Tom Phillips: An Exhibition at the Center for Book Arts, April 3-May 16, 1986 (New York: The Center, ca. 1983); Woods “A New ‘Inferno’.” 23. Robert Pinsky and Michael Mazur, The Inferno of Dante. A new verse translation by Robert Pinsky; illustrated by Michael Mazur; with notes by Nicole Pinsky; foreword by John Freccero. First edition. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1994. General Collections, Library of Congress. Robert Pinsky (1940, Long Branch, New Jersey– ) is one of the most relevant American poets of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. He is also a literary critic, translator, and professor of English and creative writing at Boston University, where in 2015 he was named a William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor. He was appointed poet laureate of the United States in 1997 and was the first to hold three terms. Among his notable poetry collections are: Selected Poems (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2011); Gulf Music (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2007); Jersey Rain (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2001); and the anthology The Figured Wheel: New and Collected Poems 1966–1996 (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1997), which was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Description: 24 cm.; xxiv, 427; illustrations by Michael Mazur. Call number: PQ4315.2 .P47 1994 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/93040169



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References: Acocella, “What the Hell”; Ahern, “Vulgar Eloquence”; Corn, “Robert Pinsky’s Inferno”; Jacoff, “Robert Pinsky, The Inferno of Dante”; Lummus, “Dante’s Inferno: Critical Reception and Influence,” in Hunt, Critical Insights, especially 63n1; Pinsky, “The Pageant of Unbeing,” in Hawkins and Jacoff, The Poets’ Dante, 306–18; Pinsky, Mazur, and Laqueur, Image and Text, 1–42. 24. Robert and Jean Hollander, translators. Dante Alighieri, Inferno. Introduction and notes by Robert Hollander. New York: Doubleday, 2000. General Collections, Library of Congress. Married in 1964, Robert (1933, Manhattan–2021, Pau’uilo, Hawaii) and Jean (1928, Vienna–2019, Hopewell, New Jersey) Hollander collaborated on these English editions: she as the poet working in blank verse contributed to the English sound and he as a longtime Dante authority was responsible for the accuracy of the translation and its correspondence to the Italian text, while also providing extensive accompanying notes. Following the release of Paradiso in 2007, the New Yorker deemed the Hollanders’ translation of the Comedy as “now the best on the market,” and it quickly became among the most recommended versions for students and general readers alike. Robert Hollander stated, “We have tried to bring Dante into our English without being led into the temptation of making the translation sound better than the original allows. . . . This is not Dante but an approximation. . . . Every translation begins and ends in failure.”23 After earning degrees in English and French at Princeton University, Robert Hollander completed his Ph.D. in comparative literature at Columbia University and received Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Humanities fellowships for study in Italy. His prolific research and lengthy teaching career, primarily at Princeton, centered on Dante and Boccaccio and led the City of Florence to award him a gold medal and the City of Certaldo, Italy, to make him an honorary citizen for his work on their respective poets. His publications include Dante: A Life in Works (2001), Boccaccio’s Dante and the Shaping Force of Satire (1997), Studies in Dante (1980) and Allegory in Dante’s Commedia (1969). Jean Hollander, who as a child escaped with her family from Nazi-occupied Austria, was raised in Brooklyn. She studied at Brooklyn College and did graduate work at Columbia University. She taught literature at Princeton and Columbia, and for more than two decades she served as director of the Annual Writers Conference at the College of New Jersey. Her five published books of poetry include the acclaimed Crushed into Honey (1986) and And They Shall Wear Purple (2016). Description: 24 cm.; xxxiii, 634; “Map of Dante’s Hell.” Call number: PQ4315.2 .H65 2000 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/00034531 References: Acocella, “Cloud Nine: A New Translation of The Paradiso”; Barbarese, “Four Translations of Dante’s ‘Inferno’,” 647, 653–54; Cherchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 15–17; “Jean Hollander,” The Times (Trenton, NJ), June 2, 2019; Klopp, “Inferno by

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Dante Alighieri, Robert Hollander, Jean Hollander; Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri, Robert Hollander, Jean Hollander”; Pertile, “Per Bob Hollander,” in Picone, Cachey, and Mesirca, Le culture di Dante. 25. Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders, Dante’s Inferno. With introductions by Doug Harvey and Michael Meister. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2004. General Collections, Library of Congress. Raised in Southern California, Sandow Birk (1962, Detroit– ) is an illustrator, painter, sculptor, writer, and filmmaker who focuses on contemporary urban life, social issues, and surf and skateboard culture in his art. He has exhibited from coast to coast and internationally, with shows at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Getty Center, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Birk attended the Otis Art Institute of Parson’s School of Design, Los Angeles; the American College in Paris; Bath Academy of Art; and the Escola de Artes Visuais Parque Lage, Brazil. He is also the recipient of Getty, Guggenheim, and Fulbright fellowships. His publications include his lavishly illustrated American Qur’an (2015), in which he also transcribed by hand a complete translation in English, and Incarcerated: Visions of California in the 21st Century (2002), showcasing a major series of landscape paintings and prints of prisons. Marcus Sanders grew up in Toronto, attended San Francisco State University, and is a writer and the editor-in-chief at Surfline. Birk and Sanders rendered their free-verse translation of the Comedy’s text in colloquial modern American English and slang, much as Dante wrote in the Florentine vernacular of his time. Finding existing English translations of the Comedy to be difficult reads, Birk said, “It was sort of [through] the frustration of slogging through them that we came up with the idea that maybe we can just rewrite it ourselves.”24 Inspired by Gustave Doré’s classic images produced in the 1860s for the Comedy, Birk created 210 hand-drawn lithographs and a series of paintings that feature a hoodie-wearing young Dante in gritty and commercialized twenty-first century Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York, as well a diverse cast of characters appearing around the globe, from Tokyo to Mecca.25 Between 2003 and 2005, Trillium Press published limited editions, each of 100 copies, of Dante’s Inferno, Dante’s Purgatorio, and Dante’s Paradiso. For these editions, each of the lithographic plates—71 (Inferno), 69 (Purgatorio), and 70 (Paradiso) were hand-drawn by Birk and completed one year prior to the publication of each volume. Birk collaborated with Master Printer David Salgado of Trillium Press to develop the special lithographic treatment for producing the illustrations for the three volumes. In 2004–2005, Chronicle Books published the trade editions of Birk and Sanders’ trilogy based on the prints provided by Trillium Press. Description: 28 cm.; xxi, 218; 71 continuous tone lithographic illustrations. Call number: PQ4315.2 .B57 2004 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/2003017911



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References: Birk, Dante’s Divine Comedy (Website), https://sandowbirk.com/divine­ C atharine Clark Gallery, “Sandow Birk” (Website), https://cclarkgallery.com/ artists/bios/sandow-birk; Hawkins, “Modern Uso”; Olson, “Dante’s Urban American Vernacular”; P.P.O.W. Gallery, “Sandow Birk” (Website), https://www.ppowgallery. com/artist/sandow-birk/biography; Schoenkopf, “Sandow Birk Goes to Hell”; Shulman, “Sandow’s Inferno”; Solnit, “Check Out the Parking Lot.” 26. Dante Alighieri, Inferno. Translated, with an Introduction and Notes, by Mary Jo Bang. Illustrations by Henrik Drescher. Minneapolis, MN: Graywolf Press, 2012. General Collections, Library of Congress. Mary Jo Bang (1946, Waynesville, Missouri– ) received a B.A. and an M.A. in sociology from Northwestern University, a B.A. in photography from the Polytechnic of Central London, and an M.F.A. in creative writing from Columbia University. She is the author of Elegy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2007, as well as other nationally and internationally acclaimed poetry books. She was the poetry coeditor of the Boston Review from 1995 to 2005. She teaches English and creative writing at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Her awards include the Hodder Award from Princeton University (1999–2000), a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship (2004), and the Berlin Prize Fellowship (2015). In her “A Note on The Translation,” Bang recounts how she first thought about translating the Inferno after reading a poem by Caroline Bergvall titled “Via (48 Dante Variations)” that comprised forty-seven different English translations of the first three lines of the Inferno. Bang noted “The unrelenting repetition-with-revision of the piece creates an incantatory quality. . . . I was fascinated by the fact that . . . no two translations were identical.”26 This experience led her to think about how she would have translated those same three lines and her translation was born. Henrik Drescher (1955, Copenhagen, Denmark– ) is a Danish artist who immigrated to the United States with his family in 1967. He established himself in New York in 1982 to pursue a full-time career as an illustrator. In 1993, the Library of Congress held an exhibition dedicated to his work titled Mental Pictures. See Fig. 6.50a for image of Drescher’s illustration and Bang’s translation of Inferno 1. Description: 24 cm; vii, 340; illustrations by Henrik Drescher; text sent in font called “Dante” designed by typeface artist Giovanni Madersteig, first used to publish Boccaccio’s Trattatello in Laude di Dante in 1955. Call number: PQ4315.2 .B36 2012 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/201293622 References: Acocella, “What the Hell”; Bang, “A Note on the Translation,” in Dante Alighieri. Inferno, 7–12; Lazar, “Mary Jo Bang”; Fitzgerald, “In Conversation: Mary Jo Bang with Adam Fitzgerald”; James, “Mary Jo Bang’s Inferno”; Lamolinara, “Mind Control: Pictures of Henry Drescher Display a Singular Vision”; Poetry Foundation, “Mary Jo Bang’s Inferno Translation Reviewed”; Young, “Mary Jo Bang Discusses Purgatorio.”



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Modern American Art and Graphic Representations of Dante’s Comedy 27. Art Young, artist. Cartoon drawings. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Art Young (1866, Orangeville, Illinois–1943, New York City) was a cartoonist raised in Wisconsin whose work appeared in periodicals such as Judge, Saturday Evening Post, and The Masses from the 1930s into World War II. He created booklength satires dedicated to Dante and the Inferno. This caricature portrait of Dante as a hobo first appeared in Hell Up to Date: The Reckless Journey of R. Palasco Drant, Newspaper Correspondent, Through the Infernal Regions, as Reported by Himself (Chicago: Schulte, July 1894). The caption of the caricature portrait in the original book says “The Late Mr. Dante of Italy. [From a picture supposed to have been made just after his return from the Infernal Regions.].” The same caricature portrait reappeared in Young’s book Through Hell with Hiprah Hunt (New York: Zimmerman, 1901). Finally, he published Art Young’s Inferno: A Journey Through Hell Six Hundred Years After Dante (New York: Delphic Studios, 1934). The second cartoon drawing featuring “The professional tramps” also appeared in Through Hell with Hiprah Hunt and depicts a scene from Inferno 22: “Mr. Hunt takes his way down a long declivity up which the blinding steam hurries. . . . Here he looks over the vast territory where the professional tramps are made miserable. They are compelled to submit to everlasting baths in vats of boiling water.” (n.p.) Description 1: drawing on paper: pen and ink over graphite; cartoon; 22.9 x 20.1 cm. Call number: LC classification: Goldstein, no. 1345 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/2010643744 Description 2: 1 drawing: India ink over pencil, with scraping out on Bristol board; 31.4 x 42.2 cm. Call number: SWANN - no. 1421 (B size): Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/2009617614 References: Cox, “Art Young: Cartoonist from the Middle Border”; ’t Hart and Dennis, Humour and Social Protest, 43–51; Mouly and Spiegelman, “Art Young: A Cartoonist for the Ages”; Spiegelman, “To Laugh That We May Not Weep.”

Fig. 6.50 (opposite). Translations of the first lines of Inferno 1 from: a. Top right, Tom Phillips, Inferno (London: Talfourd Press, 1983); center bottom, Robert and Jean Hollander, Inferno (New York: Doubleday, 2000); top left, Mary Jo Bang and Henrik Drescher, Inferno (Minneapolis, MN: Graywolf, 2012). Rare Book and Special Collections Division; General Collections, Library of Congress. b. Sandow Birk and Marcus Sander, Dante’s Inferno (Brisbane, CA: Trillium Press, 2003) and Robert Pinsky, The Inferno of Dante (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1994). General Collections, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.51. Art Young, artist. “Dante” (caricature portrait), ca. 1894. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.52. Art Young, artist. “The professional tramps,” 1901. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.



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28. Lute Pease, “The Inferno” [between 1918 and 1925]. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Lute C. Pease (1869, Winnemucca, Nevada–1963, Maplewood, New Jersey) was an American editorial cartoonist for the Newark Evening News (1914–1954) and the Pacific Monthly (1906–1911). In 1949, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his editorial cartoons. This drawing is after an illustration by Gustave Doré for the Comedy (see Fig. 6.39) that shows Dante and Virgil in Hell during their encounter with Bertran de Born, who is holding up his severed head. De Born, a French soldier, was blamed for the rebellion against King Henry II of England that his own sons had perpetrated. In the cartoon, Pease converts de Born into the “Bolshevik ‘Ideal’,” crying out “Woe’s me!” Virgil and Dante represent “Liberty” and “Civilization.” The implication is that the Bolsheviks betrayed the Russians, transforming their country into a hell. Description: drawing. Call number: CD 1 - Pease, no. 36 (B size) [P&P]

Fig. 6.53. Lute Pease, editorial cartoonist. “The Inferno” [between 1918 and 1925]. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

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Permalink: http://www.loc.gov/item/acd1996005934/PP/ References: Apostol and Pease, “Lute Pease of the Pacific Monthly”; Fischer, Political Caricatures on Global Issues, 30, 58–9; Gill and Kinney, “Fuss.” 29. Michael Mazur, The Inferno of Dante. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Michael Mazur (1936, New York City–2009, Cambridge, Massachusetts) was an artist, printmaker, teacher, and writer. He received his B.A. from Amherst College in 1957 and his M.A. from the Yale School of Art and Architecture in 1961. He taught at the Rhode Island School of Design (1961–1964), then at Brandeis University (1965–1976), and at Harvard (1976–1978). He was awarded the Guggenheim Foundation fellowship for 1964–1965. He was known for his abstract paintings and for having revitalized the art

Fig. 6.54. Inferno 3: Charon, the demon, ferrying the souls across the river Acheron. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.



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of the monotype, as seen in his prints inspired by Dante’s Inferno. His monotypes were used in Robert Pinsky’s translation The Inferno of Dante, published in 1994 by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Mazur’s paintings, prints, and drawings are held at the Art Institute of Chicago, the Harvard Art Museums, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Yale University Art Gallery. They have been featured in many exhibitions in the United States as well as abroad. Description: 1 print; etching and aquatint; 65 x 50 cm. Call number: Unprocessed in PR 13 CN 2003:075 (MCD size) Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/2004675116 References: Schwartz, “Michael Mazur: The Poetry of Illustration,” in Hansen et al., The Prints of Michael Mazur with a Catalogue Raisonné 1956–1999, 109–26; Mecklenburg, Modern American Realism; Pinsky, Mazur, and Laqueur, Image and Text, 1–42. 30. Ronald Kowalke, “Dante’s Inferno: Ten Etchings by Ronald Kowalke; Accompanied by Fragments of Text Taken from the English Translation by Henry Francis Cary.” Boston: Impressions Workshop, 1970. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Ronald Kowalke (1936, Chicago–2021, Kailua, Hawaii) taught art at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa (Honolulu) for more than thirty years. After graduating from Rockford University in 1959, he received his M.F.A. from Cranbrook Academy of Art

Fig. 6.55. Ronald Kowalke, artist. Rain, Inferno 14. From “Dante’s Inferno: Ten Etchings by Ronald Kowalke.” 1970. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.56. Ronald Kowalke, artist. Paolo and Francesca, Inferno 5. “Dante’s Inferno: Ten Etchings by Ronald Kowalke.” 1970. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

the following year. He was a polyvalent artist whose paintings, sculptures, and prints are held in museums and galleries nationwide, including at the Metropolitan Museum, New York, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Kowalke said of his approach to art that “It is an arena for struggle, flight, brain-bending concepts, visual games and attitude. . . . My mind travels in a war between heaven and earth with my hands and heart trembling with excitement.” Description: Art prints; 1 case ([2] leaves, [10] leaves of plates: ill.); 59 x 82 cm. The text fragments are printed on translucent overlay sheets accompanying the prints. “The edition consists of fifty numbered portfolios as follows: numbers 1–40 contain the ten etchings signed by the artist; numbers I–X contain an additional original artist’s drawing.” no. 4/40. Call number: NE2012.K68 A4 1970 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/81454218 References: Haar, Artists of Hawaii, 2:48–53; Kowalke, “Artist Statement,” Beijing Tomorrow Art Gallery, http://www.beijing-tomorrow.com/rkowalke.en.html; Wisnosky and Klobe, A Tradition of Excellence, 72–75; “Ronald Leroy Kowalke,” Honolulu Star Advertiser, March 28, 2021.



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A Selection of Translations of the Comedy in Other Languages27 31. Dante Alighieri, O Inferno, poema em trinta e quatro cantos. Illustrado com as celebres composições de Gustavo Doré. Versão Portugueza em tercetos por Domingo Ennes. Acompanhada do texto italiano, seguida da notas e antecedida de uma breve noticia preliminar por Xavier da Cunha, 2o Conservador da Bibliotheca Nacional de Lisboa. Lisbon: David Corazzi, 1887. fo General Collections, Library of Congress. The Italian studies scholar Domingo Ennes (1836, Lisbon–1885, Lisbon) produced this Portuguese translation of the Inferno in tercets. His brother, Guilherme José Ennes (n.d., Lisbon–1893, Lisbon), was a well-reputed doctor, a member of the Lisbon

Fig. 6.57. Book cover. Dante Alighieri, O Inferno, Lisbon, 1887. Blue and gold book cover. General Collections, Library of Congress.

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Fig. 6.58. Title page and the first stanzas of Inferno 1. Dante Alighieri, O Inferno, Lisbon, 1887. General Collections, Library of Congress.

Academy of Science, and a brigade general involved in the modernization movement in Portugal. Because of poor health, Domingo Ennes could not join the military as his father and brothers had. Instead, he studied the humanities and translated the Comedy while working at the Portuguese Public Finance and Treasury Department and then at the Department of Justice. He did not complete it, dying suddenly at age forty-nine. The rediscovery of Dante in the Romantic period was as much a Portuguese language translation affair as an English one. In Portugal, Dante was admired as the representative par excellence of the human condition and he was likened to the poet Luís Vaz de Camões (ca. 1524, n.p.–1580, Lisbon) for the influence he exerted on the national Portuguese language. While Camões is said to have been familiar with Dante’s Comedy, he must have read it in Italian or more likely in Spanish—the earliest Spanish translation dates to 1428 with Enrique de Villena’s translation of the Inferno, followed in 1429 by Andreu Febrer’s translation of the entire Comedy. It was followed by other translations in Portuguese in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in Europe and Brazil: the Inferno by J.  Pinto de Campos (Lisbon: Imprensa nacional, 1886); the complete poem by José Pedro Xavier Pinheiro (Rio de Janeiro: Capital Federal, 1907); and Barão de Vila da Barra (Rio de Janeiro: H. Garnier, 1907).



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Description: 37 cm; 4 preliminary leaves, [3]–17; illustrations, plates. Call number: PQ4305 .C01 1887 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/42045961 References: Cioffari, “Camões and Dante: A Source Study,” especially 284; Fiske, 1:213; Palumbo, s.v. “Portogallo,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/portogallo_%28 Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/; Pereira, Portugal, 3:149; Flor, “Publishing Translated Literature in Late 19th Century Portugal,” in Seruya, Hulst, et al., Translation in Anthologies and Collections, 125–36. 32. Dante Alig’eri, Bozhestvennaia komediia: Chistilishche [The Divine Comedy: Purgatory], translated with notes by Mikhail Lozinskiĭ; introductory article by A. K. Dzhivelegov. Moscow: OGIz, 1944. General Collections, Library of Congress. Mikhail Leonidovič Lozinskiĭ, or Mikhail Leonidovich Lozinsky (1886, Gatchina, Leningrad Oblast, Russia–1955, St. Petersburg, Russia) was a literary critic, poet, and translator. He was member of Acmeism, or the Guild of Poets, an intellectual circle to

Fig. 6.59. Title page and the beginning tercets of Purgatory. Dante Alig’eri, Bozhestvennaia komediia, translated into Russian by Mikhail Lozinskiĭ, 1944. General Collections, Library of Congress.

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which Anna Akhmatova, Osip Mandel’štam, and Robert Roždestvenskij also belonged. One of their literary underpinnings was the translation of foreign works to let other cultures into their own world. Lozinskiĭ is considered one of the finest Russian translators of the twentieth century, best known for his translations of Shakespeare, Lope de Vega, and Benvenuto Cellini. The first complete Russian translation of Dante by the physician Dmitrij Egorovič Min had been originally published as a few initial installations of the Inferno in the journal Moskvitjanin in 1843, followed by the entire canticle in 1855, while Purgatorio and Paradiso were published posthumously in 1907. Literary critics considered Lozinskiĭ’s translation of the Comedy in terza rima as one of the finest, and it became the most widely known translation in Russia. It was awarded the Stalin State Prize in 1946. Description: 20 cm; 244. Call number: Cyr4 PQ 40 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/ltf89006686 References: Akhmatova, My Half Century, 73–75; Aleksandrov, “Russkij Dante,” in Li︠ u︡ di i knigi; sbornik stateĭ, 334–39; Baer and Olshanskaya, Russian Writers on Translation, 98; De Michelis, s.v. “Lozinskij, Michail Leonidovic,” in ED, http://www.treccani .it/enciclopedia/michail-leonidovic-lozinskij_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/; Friedberg, Literary Translation in Russia, 55, 87–88, 102, 119, 137; Gianascian and De Michelis, s.v. “U.S.S.R.” in ED, https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/u-r-s-s_%28Enciclopedia -Dantesca%29/; LC Authorities, n 85218523, https://lccn.loc.gov/n85218523; Lo Gatto, “Sulla fortuna di Dante in Russia,” in Saggi sulla cultura russa, 167–74; Sandomirsky, “The New Russian Dante”; Terras, Handbook of Russian Literature, 266. 33. Dantte, Sin’gok. Chŏng Mun-hyang yŏk [pʻyŏnjip Chŏng Sŏng-suk]. [Pʻyŏngyang]: Munye Chʻulpʻansa, 1988. (North Korean). Asian Division, Library of Congress. The first partial translation in Korean of Paradiso by Jeon Young-Taek appeared in 1926, followed by an abridged version by Kwak Yong-Oh in 1933. The first complete translation in Korean from Spanish was published in 1957 and the first translation in Korean from Italian in 1973.28 Two translations with the same title were published by two different Korean authors in Seoul, Min-sun Ch’oe (Seoul: Ŭryu Munhwasa, 1972) and In Hoˇm (Seoul: Tongsoˇ munhwasa, 1975). The Korean translation featured here is a two-volume work and the only known edition published in North Korea; it also was published the same year in Seoul (Seoul: Pŏmusa, 1988). In 1988, another Korean translation also titled Sin’gok was published by Sangjin Park (Seoul: Sŏhae Munjip, 1988), an internationally renowned professor of Italian and Comparative Literature at Busan University of Foreign Studies (South Korea). He has written several works on the translation and reception of the Comedy in Korea. Park identifies three stages of Dante’s reception that he describes as “engagement with modern Western civilization (1897–1918); the resistance to Japanese colonial rule (1919–1934); and the reconceptualization of literature (1935–1945).”29



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Fig. 6.60. Dantte, Sin’gok. 1988. (North Korean). Front cover with black Korean characters and the first stanzas. Asian Division, Library of Congress.

Description: vols. 2; 21 cm. Call number: PQ4322.K611 D36 1988 Permalink: http://lccn.loc.gov/90225020 References: Park, A Comparative Study of Korean Literature.

Music Associated with the Divine Comedy 34. Choir Manual (late 14th c.). Regina caeli. [A] Marian antiphon sung at Compline for the Office in honor of the Virgin. Volume also known as the “Cummings” Antiphonal. Music Division, Library of Congress. Marian antiphones are a form of Gregorian chant, independent of psalmody. In the Roman Catholic Church tradition, the association of the Regina caeli (Queen of Heaven) with compline, the last hour of the liturgical day, dates back to the thirteenth century, during Dante’s lifetime. It is one of the four large-scale Marian antiphones (Alma redemptoris mater; Ave regina cealorum; Regina caeli; and Salve regina) dedicated

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Fig. 6.61. Choir manual (late 14th c.). Regina caeli. Black and red handwritten gothic text. Music Division, Library of Congress.

to the Virgin Mary that are sung in different periods of the liturgical calendar. In particular, the Regina caeli was related to devotions in Paschaltide (or Eastertime). The earliest manuscript source is in an antiphonary dating back to the early thirteenth century held in the Vatican Library (Cod. Archivii S. Petri, B. 79). In the Comedy, Dante makes numerous musical references to liturgical chants; among them are three Marian antiphons: the Salve Regina (Purg. 7.82–83), Ave Maria (Par. 3.122 and 32.96) and the Regina caeli (Par. 23.128). Paradiso 23 has a mystical overtone marking Dante’s experience of



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visions of Christ and Mary in a state of ecstatic contemplation reflected in the preponderant liturgical musical references of this canto. The Library of Congress’ Regina caeli manuscript was copied most likely in the area of Lower Rhine shortly after Dante’s death in 1321. According to Svato Schutzner, “The notation is Hufnagel (nail and horseshoe) or possibly St. Gall passing into Hufnagel”. The Library acquired the manual at the William H. Cummings sale in London, May 17, 1917. The transcription of the text is: Regina caeli, laetare, alleluia; quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia; resurrexit sicut dixit, alleluia; ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia. [Queen of Heaven, rejoice, alleluia; for He whom thou was chosen to bear, alleluia; has risen as He said, alleluia; pray for us to God, alleluia].

Description: Variant title: Fourteenth century liturgical fragments; 1 score (2 unnumbered leaves); 19 x 25 and 34 x 25 cm. Cataloger devised title. Manuscript. In ink on vellum. Removed from binding of Britton, Johannes. De legibus Angliae (Law Library ms. 7. Br. XIV). Texts in Latin. Mensural notation. Call number: M2147 XIV M2 Case Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/2013566953 References: Falconer, s.v. “Regina caeli,” in GAO, https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/978156 1592630.article.23069; McKinnon, s.v. “Gregorian Chant,” in GAO, https://doi.org/10. 1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.11726; Schutzner, Medieval and renaissance manuscript books in the Library of Congress, 133. 35. Francesco Soriano, “Quivi sospiri.” Il primo libro dei madrigali a cinque voci. Nouamente ristampati e dal Reuverendo Pre Giouanni Croce Chiozzotte corretti. Venice: Presso Giacomo Vincenzi, 1588. Music Division, Library of Congress. Francesco Soriano (1548/9, Soriano, near Viterbo, Italy–1621, Rome) was a choirboy at S. Giovanni in Laterano under Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (ca. 1525, Palestrina, near Rome–1594, Rome), the most relevant composer of polyphony of the Renaissance Roman School. From 1581 to 1586, Soriano served as the maestro of the Mantuan court of Guglielmo Gonzaga, who entertained regular correspondence with Palestrina, the maestro di cappella (choir master) in four of the major basilicas in Rome. At the Vatican, Soriano served as choir master at St. Peter’s, working with the prodigious organist from the Duchy of Ferrara, Girolamo Alessandro Frescobaldi (1583, Ferrara–1643, Rome). A great part of Soriano’s most important work concerned religious music for masses, motets, psalms, settings for the Passion, and Marian antiphons. However, he also composed secular music and the first of these works was this book of madrigals for five voices. “Quivi sospiri” [“Here are the sighs”] shown here is the madrigal dedicated to Inferno 5, featuring the story of Paolo and Francesca. Description: 22 cm; 5 parts. Call number: M1490.S73 Case Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/2008561345

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Fig. 6.62. Francesco Soriano, Il primo libro de madrigali a cinque voci. (1588). “Quivi Sospiri.” Title page and score. Music Division, Library of Congress.

References: Report of the Librarian of Congress (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1920), 178; Fenlon, Music and Patronage in Sixteenth-Century Mantua, 1:79–118; O’Regan, s.v. “Soriano [Suriano, Suriani, Surianus], Francesco,” in GAO, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630. 001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000026258; O’Regan, “The Performance of Roman Polyphonic Music in the Late Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries.” 36. Franz Liszt, Eine symphonie zu Dantes Divina Commedia. Movement II. Purgatorio: Lamentoso. N.d. Harry Rosenthal Collection, Music Division, Library of Congress. Franz Liszt (1811, Doborján, Hungary, now Raiding, Austria–1886, Bayreuth, Bavaria, Germany) was a composer, pianist, and teacher. He was a leader of the Romantic movement in music and considered the greatest pianist of his time. A captivating performer with extraordinary technique, he promoted knowledge of other composers, such as Wagner and Berlioz. As a conductor and teacher at Weimar, he became the most influential musician of the New German School. During the age of Romanticism,



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Fig. 6.63. Franz Liszt. Eine symphonie zu Dantes Divina Commedia. Movement II. Purgatorio: Lamentoso. Harry Rosenthal Collection, Music Division, Library of Congress.

when Europe rediscovered the Comedy, his companion, the Countess Marie d’Agoult (1805–1876) inspired him to write the Dante Symphony. It took him twenty years to conceive and develop the symphony; he wrote the entire score between 1855 and 1856. This is an album leaf with a brief excerpt from the third section of the second movement of “Purgatorio” for violin and viola. At the bottom of the leaf, the inscription reads: “aus den ‘Purgatorio’ der ‘Dante Sinfonie’ F. Liszt.” Description: 1 manuscript score ([1] leaf); 21 x 33 cm. Signed holograph manuscript in ink. Sketch of a section of the second part of the Symphonie zu Dantes, “Purgatorio”; second movement Call number: ML31 .R67 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/2011567016 References: Eckhardt, Mueller, and Walker, s.v. “Liszt, Franz [Ferenc],” in GAO, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.48265; Navarrini and Vannoni, “L’oeuvre de Dante Alighieri comme source d’inspiration pour Augusta Holmès et Franz Liszt”; Ragni, “Dante in chiave di sol,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 67–68, 72–73, 77–78; Roglieri, “Appendix: Dante and Nineteenth-Century Music,”

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in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 372–90, especially 374– 75 for Liszt. 37. Sergei Rachmaninoff, Francesca da Rimini. Source: Sergei Rachmaninoff archive, 1872–1992 (bulk 1919–1943). Music Division, Library of Congress. Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873, Oneg, Novgorod, Russia–1943, Beverly Hills, California), composer, pianist, and conductor, was one of the finest pianists and composers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory under Nikolay Zverev, a pupil of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and a renowned pianist and music teacher. Rachmaninoff made his first international appearance in London as the guest of the Philarmonic Society (1899). His performance at Queen’s Hall earned him mixed reviews from the press, causing him to lose confidence in his talents. Upon return to Russia, he took time to mend psychologically, and in the summer of 1901 he went to Italy, where he started composing his opera Francesca da Rimini. In this work, influences by Tchaikovsky, Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, and other Russian composers yield to Rachmaninoff ’s personal idiom, characterized by an unmistakable lyrical quality. Modest Tchaikovsky, brother of the more famous Pyotr Illych Tchaikovsky, pitched to Rachmaninoff the idea of a musical composition based on Francesca da Rimini’s story, narrated by Dante in the fifth canto of the Inferno. (Pyotr later wrote an orchestral work based on the entire description of Paolo’s and Francesca’s plight in Inferno 5). Rachmaninoff interrupted work on this opera when he served as conductor of the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow (1904–1905). Soon after his appointment, however, he featured a scaled-down Francesca da Rimini on a double-billed program along with his one-act opera The Miserly Knight. The first performance of the completed opera Francesca da Rimini was on January 24, 1906, at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow with Rachmaninoff himself conducting. The Russian soprano Antonina Nezhdanova (1873, Krivaya Balka, near Odessa–1950, Moscow) graduated at the Moscow Conservatory in 1902 and in the same year the Bolshoi hired her as a soloist, where she remained for forty years. In 1906 she assumed the title role in Rachmaninoff ’s Francesca da Rimini in a performance conducted by the composer. Description: (Sergei Rachmaninoff archive) 17,668 items (89 containers, 68.6 linear feet) Organized into the following series: I. Musical Scores, II. Correspondence, 1903– 1968, III. Writings, 1872–1958, IV. Official Documents, 1918–1938, V. Awards, Honors and Tributes, 1920–1974, VI. Programs of SR’s Performances and Related Correspondence, 1919–1966, VII. Articles and Clippings, 1892–1973, VIII. Financial Papers, 1918–1937, IX. Iconography, 1885–1992, X. Books and Publications, 1886–1973, XI. Realia, XII. Papers of Sophie Satin, 1929–1974. Call number: ML31 .R33 Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/2014571125 Finding aid links: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.music/eadmus.mu015003; (PDF) http://hdl .loc.gov/loc.music/eadmus.mu015003.3



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Fig. 6.64. Sergei Rachmaninoff. Franceska da Rimini, op. 25. Moscow: A. Gutkheĭl, undated. Full score. Music Division, Library of Congress.

Note: Gift; Sergei and Natalie Rachmaninoff, Sophie Satin, and others; 1943–1992. The Sergei Rachmaninoff Archive contains material related to his life and career after he and his family left Russia in 1917 to establish themselves in the United States. Of particular importance are Rachmaninoff ’s holograph music manuscript scores and sketches, representing his compositional process and creative thought during the last half of his life. These scores include not only manuscript and published scores of Rachmaninoff ’s

Fig. 6.65. Sergei Rachmaninoff. Franceska da Rimini, op. 25. Libretto. German opera, undated. Music Division, Library of Congress.

Fig. 6.66. Sergei Rachmaninoff. Franceska da Rimini, op. 25. Moscow: Izdatel’stvo Muzyka, 1964. Poster. Paolo and Francesca illustration. Music Division, Library of Congress.



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works, but those of other composers as well, reflecting the musical interests of the composer and his family members. References: Norris, s.v. “Rachmaninoff [Rakhmaninov, Rachmaninov], Serge.” GAO. 2001, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/97815615 92630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000050146; Roglieri, “Appendix: Dante and Nineteenth-Century Music,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 372–90; Scott, Rachmaninoff; Taruskin, s.v. “Francesca da Rimini (i).” GAO. 2002, https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.O901676; Yampolsky, s.v. “Nezh­ danova, Antonina,” GAO. 2001, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/ view/10.1093/gmo./9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000019853.

Acknowledgments

My idea for this book hatched on December 3, 2015: the night of Dante’s 750th birthday celebration at the Library of Congress. In the West Dining Room on the sixth floor of the Madison Building, lined with tables showcasing treasures from the Library’s Dante collections, ecstatic visitors stopped me to ask if the exhibit would continue on the following days. While the display lasted only for that evening, I promised visitors that they could expect a book detailing many of these beautiful collection items. But a book like this is the result of a lot of moving pieces and efforts by a number of individuals and institutions, maybe too many to adequately recall and mention here. Knowing that, I would like to mention those without whose inspiration, encouragement, support, and work this book would not have been possible. First and foremost, this book project came to life thanks to the enthusiastic initiative and championing of my dear friend Greg Clingham. As the director of Bucknell University Press, Greg immediately embraced and supported my plan for the Dante 750th anniversary symposium and a publication featuring the Dante collections at the Library of Congress. Through many trials and a four-year-long process, this book took its current shape. When Greg retired, his successor at Bucknell, Suzanne E. Guiod, continued to embrace this project, particularly during the COVID-19 crisis that highly tested our ability to maintain our set deadlines. I am especially thankful to Suzanne for her continued support and encouragement throughout the concluding phases of the final manuscript. Many thanks also go to the editing and production team at Rutgers University Press, especially Vincent Nordhaus, Marianna Vertullo, and Leslie Jones. I am deeply indebted to Becky Clark, director of the Library’s Publishing Office, and the staff for their sustained efforts to keep this project going, under all circumstances. And a special thanks goes to Zach Klitzman, editorial assistant. This book would have never taken this form if we had not been so blessed to work with my dear colleague, Susan Reyburn, a writer-editor in the Publishing Office. A beacon of expertise, sound judgement, and constructive criticism, coupled with her love for books and for the Library’s collections, Susan has been for me and for my other four authors an incredible source of unrelenting assistance and effective work. Susan has been a delight to work with, even in the dimmest moments of this extensive process. Ambassador of Italy to the United States Claudio Bisogniero and Mrs. Laura Bisogniero, an honored attendee of my cultural programs, both remained ardent supporters

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throughout their assignment to America. I am truly humbled by their authentic interest in my work promoting Italian culture through the Library’s collections. I also need to express my gratitude to Ambassador Armando Varricchio and his wife Mrs. Micaela Barbagallo for continuing to support my work promoting Italian culture through the Library’s collections; Ambassador Varricchio has been a true source of encouragement. Renato Miracco, the former Italian cultural attaché and my dear friend, has always shown his passion and dedication to our common interest of expanding all the diverse facets of the Italian culture. His unrelenting and contagious energy carry on through the esteemed collaboration with the staff at the Embassy of Italy. Angela Tangianu and staff from the Italian Institute of Culture in DC also have been a tremendous source of support for this book and many other programs over the years. The four contributors to this volume who have each borne the vicissitudes of this long process will forever have my thanks and be in my heart. In carrying this project to completion, they created remarkably insightful works that render this volume a unique work. My gratitude to my dear colleague and friend Sylvia Albro is impossible to put into a few words, but it suffices to say that she has been a constant buffer and confidante for me throughout this process. In the European Division, former chiefs Georgette Dorn and Grant Harris graciously provided me with unending support to pursue and complete this project with my colleagues Angela Cannon, Harry Leich, and Taru Spiegel all participating in its creation. Curators, specialists, and librarians across the Library provided invaluable help, including the Rare Book and Special Collections Division staff under Mark Dimunation. Librarians Eric Frazier, Maphon Ashmon, Amanda Zimmerman, and Marianna Stell each helped me curate and present a multitude of amazing works rarely viewed by the public. A special thanks goes to my colleagues Katherine Blood in the Prints and Photographs Division; Susan Clermont in the Music Division; Robert Morris in the Geography and Map Division; Sonya Lee in the Asian Division; and Ann Brenner in the African and Middle Eastern Division. Each of these talented, caring, and generous people have given freely of their time and expertise, all in masterly ways. In too many ways to count, I could not have completed this book without the constant, loving, and ingenious support of my husband, Eric. At every step along this road, he has been an eager reader of drafts, a critical eye for ideas, and the reason why these acknowledgments are not six pages long. Plenty of weekends disappeared over coffee as we worked out (argued over) image edits and ideas. With his remarkable photographic eye and editing talent, he helped me prepare every one of the photographs included in the catalog at the end of this volume. For this, and most importantly everything else he is and does, I will always be grateful to have Eric in my life. In drawing to a close, my thoughts go to my father, Amerigo Braconi, who instilled in me my love for Dante, my passion for different cultures, and who passed away while I worked on this book. My mother, Giuseppina Braconi, a constant reason for my smile, and my dear brother, Marcello, his wife Elvira, little Sveva, and Damiano, have all sustained me with their unconditional love. Finally, to Italy, my native country, you are loved and I thank you for giving me—and all of us—Dante.

Notes

Chapter 1 1. For a select bibliography of works on relevant historical and literary criticism aspects concerning Dante and his masterpiece, see: Albert Russell Ascoli (2009, 2008, 2003, 1995); Zygmunt G. Barański (2009, 2002, 1995a, 1995b, 1988); Zygmunt G. Barański, Andreas Kablitz, and Ülar Ploom (2015); Zygmunt G. Barański and Lino Pertile (2015); Zygmunt G. Barański and Theodore J. Cachey (2009); Michele Barbi (1954, 1941); Teodolinda Barolini (2014, 2011, 2009, 2006, 2003, 2001, 2000, 1997, 1992, 1984); Stephen Bemrose (2000); Theodore J. Cachey, Jr. (2009, 1995, 1990); Michael Camille (2001); George Corbett and Heather Webb (2015); Maria Corti (2001, 1995, 1987, 1983, 1981); Maria Corti and Kyle M. Hall (2007); Joan M. Ferrante (2005, 1998, 1995, 1993a, 1993b, 1992, 1985, 1984, 1983); Simona Foà and Sonia Gentili (2000); John Freccero (2009); Eric C. Haywood (2003); Robert Hollander (2001, 2000, 1997, 1993, 1992, 1983, 1980, 1969); Christopher Kleinhenz (2013, 2005, 2003, 1997, 1988, 1986); Christopher Kleinhenz and Kristina M. Olson (2020); Richard Lansing (2003, 2000); Enrico Malato and Andrea Mazzucchi (2016, 2012); Francesco Mazzoni (2017, 1997, 1967, 1966); Giuseppe Mazzotta (2014a, 2014b, 2009, 1993, 1991, 1979); Bruno Nardi (1992, 1983, 1944); Deborah Parker (2017, 2013, 2001a, 2001b, 1998a, 1998b, 1997, 1993); Deborah Parker and Mark Parker (2013); Lino Pertile (2013, 2005, 1997, 1993, 1980); Giorgio Petrocchi (1983, 1969); Michelangelo Picone, Theodore J. Cachey, Jr., and Margherita Mesirca (2004); Barbara Reynolds (2006); Marco Santagata (2016); John A. Scott (2004, 1996, 1977, 1971, 1970a, 1970b). Also see Sapegno, A Literary History of the Fourteenth Century. The majority of primary and secondary sources cited throughout the chapters, the bibliography, and the art catalog of this volume are in the collections of the Library of Congress and are available to the general public. For a comprehensive bibliography of past and present Dante studies, see American Dante Bibliography by Year, in appendix to Dante Studies (The Dante Society of America, 1953–2014), https://www.dantesociety.org/publications/american-dante -bibliography; and Bibliografia Dantesca Internazionale/International Dante Bibliography (Società Dantesca Italiana in partnership with The Dante Society of America, 2015–), http://dantesca.ntc.it /dnt-fo-catalog/pages/material-search.jsf. For reference, see Chimenz, s.v. “Alighieri, Dante,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/dante-alighieri_%28DizionarioBiografico%29/. Winthrop Wetherbee, s.v. “Dante Alighieri,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, https://plato.stanford.edu /entries/dante/. Also, see Pertile, “Life” and “Works,” in Barański and Pertile, Dante in Context, 461– 508. For an overview, see Hawkins, Dante; and, Shaw, Reading Dante, 67–97, 205–61. 2. See Baldelli, “Dai siciliani a Dante,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:581– 609; Cherchi, “Vernacular Literatures,” in Barański and Pertile, Dante in Context, 371–88, and in particular 377–84; and Cachey, “Between Petrarch and Dante: Prolegomenon to a Critical Discourse,” in Barański, Cachey, and Yocum, Petrarch & Dante, 3–49. This volume includes essays by Ascoli, Barolini, Barański, and Mazzotta on the relationship between Dante and Petrarch in relation to the use of the Italian vernacular: see Bibliography. On Dante’s contributions to the history of Italian language, see



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Contini, Varianti e altra linguistica, especially “Esercizio d’interpretazione sopra un sonetto di Dante,” 163–68, and “Preliminari sulla lingua del Petrarca,” 169–92; also Dionisotti, Gli umanisti e il volgare fra Quattro e Cinquecento, 3–5; Eisner, Boccaccio and the Invention of Italian Literature. In addition, see the classic work by Migliorini, Storia della lingua italiana, 179–94, 204–14, which is available in English translation by T. Gwynfor Griffith, The Italian Language. 3. For reference sources about the questione della lingua, see Marazzini, “Questione della lingua,” EdI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/questione-della-lingua_%28Enciclopedia-dell%27Italiano %29/; and Marazzini, “Storia della lingusitica italiana,” EdI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/storia -della-linguistica-italiana%28Enciclopedia-del%27Italiano%29. For English sources see ORO, s.v. “Questione della lingua,” http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100358729; Hall, “The Significance of the Italian ‘Questione Della Lingua’.” On the history of Italian as a national language, see Dionisotti, Geografia e storia della letteratura italiana, 89–178; Fournel, “Questione della lingua e lingue degli stati” in Fournel, Camos, and Mattioda, Ai confini della letteratura, 3–18; Gambarota, Irresistible Signs, 33–34, 36–45, 82, 100, 130–44; Hall, The Italian Questione Della Lingua, 11–21, 49–53; Lepschy, Mother Tongues and Other Reflections on the Italian Language, 7–8, 9, 17–39; Maiden, A Linguistic History of Italian, 1–23; Marazzini, Il perfetto parlare, 59–68, 75–86; Marazzini, Da Dante alla lingua selvaggia, 11–45; Marazzini, “Le teorie,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:231–329. Additionally, see Tavoni, Storia della lingua italiana, 57–83, especially 68–79 for Landino’s and Lorenzo de’ Medici’s cultural and political program; also Tavoni, Qualche idea su Dante, 25–146; Tavoni, Latino, grammatica, volgare, ix–xvii, 16, 76–79, 165–69. For relations between early editors and vernacular language issues in the Comedy, see Richardson, “Editing Dante’s Commedia, 1472–1629,” in Cachey, Dante Now, 237–62; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance, 28–47. For later contributions to research on the questione della lingua, see Khachaturyan, ed. Language–Nation–Identity. 4. The initial date 1304 and the end date 1321 are derived from Petrocchi, Itinerari danteschi, 85; other scholars prefer the dates 1306 or 1307. The most widely accepted standard critical Italian edition of the poem, the four-volume La commedia secondo l’antica vulgata, was edited by Petrocchi, a major twentieth-century Italian literary critic and Dante scholar. However, Federico Sanguineti’s newer Italian edition, Dantiis Alagherii Comedia, is also recommended by the Dante Society of America. On the complexities of scholarly editing to establish a standard Italian critical edition of the Comedy, see Coluccia, “Sul testo della Divina Commedia,” and Storey, “Interpretative Mechanisms in the Textual Cultures of Scholarly Editing.” 5. For an insightful and accessible approach to Dante’s particular use of the epic poem genre, see Parker and Parker, Inferno Revealed, especially 1–5 and chap. 1, “Dante as Protagonist: How Making Yourself the Hero of Your Own Poem Changes Everything,” 7–24. 6. For a thorough critical overview of the Comedy, see Scott, Understanding Dante, especially 167–230. For Dante as the protagonist of the Comedy, see Contini, “Dante come personaggio-poeta della Commedia,” in Varianti e altra linguistica, 335–61. Additionally, see Barolini, Dante’s Poets, 3–14, for autobiographic references in the Comedy. 7. On the topics of Virgil (Inferno and Purgatorio) and Beatrice (Paradiso) as Dante’s guides, see Scott, Understanding Dante, 178–81, 181–82, 187–90, and 233–41. Also, see Comparetti, Vergil in the Middle Ages, 195–209; Comparetti differentiates Vergil, the ancient Roman poet, from Virgil, Dante’s guide in the Comedy. Finally, see Hollander, Il Virgilio dantesco. 8. See Princeton Dante Project, https://dante.princeton.edu. 9. Hendecasyllabic verses constituted of eleven syllables are organized in the terza rima stanza (in English literally “third rhyme”): three verses forming the mentioned rhyming chain pattern. Concerning the challenges of using this verse pattern in English, see Scott, Understanding Dante, 262– 64, 271–93 for other aspects of Dante’s versification and figures of speech in the Comedy. Also see Baldelli, s.v. “Rima,” in ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/rima_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca %29/; Baldelli, s.v. “Terzina,” in ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/terzina_%28Enciclopedia -Dantesca%29/; Baldelli, s.v. “Lingua e stile della Commedia,” in ED, Appendice, 93–112.



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10. For instance, Courtney Langdon’s translation in blank verse, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, vii–xvii, also at https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000845588. Braida, “Dante and Translation: An Approach to Untranslatability in the Poet’s Work,” in Barnes and Zaccarello, Language and Style in Dante, 13–61. For the most widely used modern English versions in the United States, see Hollander and Hollander, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso; Mandelbaum, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso; Singleton, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. Additionally, see Catalog nos. 21 and 24, as well as Figs. 6. 44–46 and 50a. For online editions in full-text of these same translations, see Princeton Dante Project website at https://dante.princeton.edu/pdp/; Digital Dante at https://digitaldante. columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/; on the same site see also Teodolinda Barolini’s commentary, “Commento Baroliniano” https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/commento-baroliniano/; and, finally, The World of Dante at http://www.worldofdante.org/about.html. For comprehensive information about the history of English translations of the Comedy, see the American Dante Bibliography by Year, at https://www.dantesociety.org/publications/american-dante-bibliography. 11. Blank verse in iambic pentameter (ten-syllable verses in which an unstressed syllable is followed by a stressed syllable forming five stressed syllables) is more congenial to an epic poem in English, as in John Milton’s Paradise Lost and the final words of each verse do not have to rhyme in a regular chained pattern as in Dante’s Comedy. 12. Commedia was also spelled Comedìa in the earliest print editions. 13. Actually, Boccaccio was the first to call the Commedia “divina.” 14. Concerning the names of early printers, for uniformity and convenience I will be using the Latin names. Some of the commonly used variants are listed in the Alternative Names List (see pages xi–xii). For Gabriel Giolitus, see LC Authorities, no. 94022029, https://lccn.loc.gov/ no94022029; CERL, cni00020928, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00020928; Edit 16, CNCT 33, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext.dll?fn=13&i=33; VIAF, 311112780, http://viaf.org/viaf/ 311112780/#Giolito_de’_Ferrari_Gabriele. For biographic information, see Ceresa, s.v. “Giolito de’ Ferrari, Gabriele,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giolito-de-ferrari-gabriele_(Dizionario -Biografico)/. 15. Mazzotta, Dante, Poet of the Desert, ix. 16. The earliest known codex is held at the Biblioteca Comunale di Piacenza (Emilia Romagna) and is known as MS Landiano (or Beccario) 190. It was commissioned in 1336 by Beccario Beccaria and made by the famous copyist Antonio da Fermo. For information about Beccario Beccaria and Antonio da Fermo, see Criniti, s.v. “Beccaria, Beccario,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia /beccario-beccaria_(Dizionario-Biografico)/; ED, s.v. “Antonio da Fermo,” http://www.treccani.it /enciclopedia/antonio-da-fermo_(Enciclopedia-Dantesca)/. The manuscript tradition of the Comedy lasted well into the fifteenth century (at least until 1480) overlapping with its first print editions. This is visible, for instance, in their page layout. See Catalog nos. 2–5, Figs. 6.4–10 for some examples. About the manuscript tradition, see Censimento 1 providing a census of 702 manuscript editions. Additionally, the website Dante Online shows approximately eight hundred extant manuscripts, https://www.danteonline.it/italiano/home_ita.asp. Also, see Dartmouth Dante Project for commentaries with full texts at https://dante.dartmouth.edu/. 17. On the reception of Dante, see Havely, Dante’s British Public, 260–98; Dimock, “Literature for the Planet.” Also see Havely, ed., Dante in the Nineteenth Century, for various scholarly contributions to the theme of the reinvention of Dante in the Romantic period, first presented at a conference held at the University of York in July 2008. 18. The earliest books printed in Italy in 1465 by Arnold Pannartz and Conrad Sweynheim were Cicero’s De Oratore, followed shortly by Lactantius’ De Divinis Institutionibus at the Abbey of Santa Scolastica near Subiaco (Rome). On Gutenberg’s experiments with the movable type as early as 1438 in Strasburg, see McNutt and Lauber, The People’s Book, 89–109; Schneider, “Johannes Gutenberg e la strada verso la scoperta,” in Studi-II, 7–19. Finally, see Hellinga, “Advertising and Selling Books in the Fifteenth Century,” in Icunabula in Transit: People and Trade, 20–39, 126–203.

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19. On the number of press runs for incunabula and cinquecentine (sixteenth-century books), see Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 99–116, especially 99–109 for incunabula. Also see Lowry, Nicholas Jenson and the Rise of Venetian Publishing in Renaissance Europe, 182, and in particular 173–206. 20. For Vindelinus de Spira, see LC Authorities, nr96032843, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr96032843; CERL, cnp00526230, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp00526230. View De Spira’s colophon at Catalog no. 1, Fig. 6.2. For more about Johannes and Vindelinus de Spira, see Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 21–22; Pollard, 30–41; Marinelli 1911, 19–22; as well as Marinelli 1915, 9n1. For quick biographic reference, see Vianello, s.v. “Vindelino da Spira,” ED (1970), http://www.treccani. it/enciclopedia/vindelino-da-spira_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. In particular, for the year of acquisition of this De Spira 1477 Comedy, see ARLC, 1923, 36. Also, for the historical context of early printing presses in Venice, see Lowry, The World of Aldus Manutius, 7–47. 21. Concerning dates in colophons, Pollard, 175; for examples of other colophons see Catalog nos. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, and 12; and corresponding Figs. 6.5, 6.7, 6.9, 6.11, 6.12, 6.18, 6.21, 6.24, 6.29. For Johannes Numeister, see LC Authorities, nr 96032695, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr96032695; CERL, cni00039279, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00068569; VIAF, 18014506, https://viaf.org/viaf/18014506. For reference, see Campbell, s.v. “Neumeister, Johann,“ GAO, https://www.oxfordartonline.com/grove art/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7002083763. Also see de Marinis, s.v. “Numeister, Johann,” EI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/johannnumeister_%28 Enciclopedia-Italiana%29/; De Vinne, Notable Printers of Italy During the Fifteenth Century, 117. For Evangelista Angelini, see CERL, cni00069044, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00069044); Tentori, s.v. “Angelini, Evangelista, detto Evangelista da Foligno,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it /enciclopedia/angelini-evangelista-detto-evangelista-da-foligno_(Dizionario-Biografico)/. Also see Valenti and Blondus, “Un documento decisivo per il ‘Dante’ di Foligno (1472),” 131–42. 22. Georgius de Augusta in Fattori, “Nuove ricerche sulla tipografia veronese del Quattrocento,” 3 and 17, normally associated with Paulus Butzbach as Georgius Butzbach or Georg von Butzbach as in CERL, cni00067808, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00067808; more likely, he was not Paulus Butzbach’s brother, but rather “magister Georgius filius quondam Gerardi de Augusta de Elemenea” [master Georgius son of Gerardus of Augusta of Elemenea]. For Paulus Butzbach, see LC Authorities, nr 94031116, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr94031116; and in CERL, cni00067808, http://thesaurus.cerl.org /record/cni00067808. 23. For Federicus de Comitibus, see LC Authorities, n 00065413, https://lccn.loc.gov/n00065413; VIAF, 16003979, https://viaf.org/viaf/16003979; CERL, cni00070348, http://thesaurus.cerl.org /record/cni00070348. Regarding the confusion between Jesi and Venice as places of publication of this 1472 Comedy edition, see Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 23–24. 24. A fourth edition of the Comedy was printed in Naples by the anonymous Tipografia del Dante in 1477, before Vindelinus de Spira’s edition. Finally, three more editions followed: in Milan, by Ludovico and Alberto Piemontesi in 1477–1478; Naples, by Francesco del Tuppo between 1478 and 1479; and lastly, Venice, by Filippo di Pietro in 1478. For further information on these eight early Comedy editions, see Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 19–29; Trovato, “Le prime edizioni a stampa di Dante, Petrarca, Boccaccio e la fissazione dell’italiano letterario,” Studi-II, 43–55; Quondam, “La nascita del libro volgare,” Studi-II, 85–107. 25. For biographic information about George John Warren Vernon, fifth Baron Vernon (1803– 1866), see Biagiarelli, s.v. “Vernon, George John Warren lord,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia /george-john-warren-lord-vernon_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/; see also Tedder, “Warren [formerly Venables-Vernon], George John, fifth Baron Vernon (1803–1866),” ODNB, https://doi.org/10.10 93/ref:odnb/28242; and Barlow, On the Vernon Dante. Vernon’s Le prime quattro edizioni della Divina commedia contains images of the four early print editions held at the British Museum. The preface is by Anthony Panizzi (1797–1879), chief of the British Museum Library from 1856 to 1866; see Britannica Academic, s.v. “Sir Anthony Panizzi,” https://academic.eb.com/levels/collegiate/article/Sir



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-Anthony-Panizzi/58271. On the significance of Lord Vernon’s Comedy edition, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 7–8. 26. For Iacopo della Lana (ca. 1290–ca. 1365), see LC Authorities, no2006029721, https://lccn. loc.gov/no2006029721; CERL, cnp01409467, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp01409467. For biographic information, see Mazzoni, “Lana, Iacopo della,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia /iacopo-della-lana_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. Finally, for the most recent authoritative edition of Lana’s commentary, see Iacomo della Lana, Commento alla “Commedia,” edited by Volpi and Terzi; also see Volpi, s.v. “Iacomo della Lana,” Censimento 1:1, 290–315; and, Volpi, “Per manifestare polida paraladura,” Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 12, 29, 31, 41–42, 133. 27. Specifically, the Latin translation by the jurist Alberico da Rosciate from Bergamo; see Censimento 1:1, 290. For a listing of the holdings of these codices in European libraries, see Censimento 1:1, 306–10. Not all of these codices are integral copies; some are only fragments. On vernacular translations during Dante’s times, see Cornish, Vernacular Translation in Dante’s Italy, 2, and chapter 2, “The Authorship of Readers,” 44–69. See also Tavoni, “Linguistic Italy,” in Barański and Pertile, Dante in Context, 243–59. 28. For information about Cristoforo Landino, see LC Authorities, n82113100, https://lccn.loc. gov/n82113100; CERL, cnp00395576, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp00395576. For biographic reference, see Foà, “Landino, Cristoforo,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/cristoforo-landino _%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/; Kraye, “Landino, Cristoforo,” GAO, https://doi.org/10.1093/gao /9781884446054.article.T049019; Kallendorf, “Cristoforo Landino,“ OBO, http://www.oxfordbiblio graphies.com/view/document/obo-9780195399301/obo-9780195399301-0202.xml. To view some of Landino’s autograph manuscripts, see Sanzotta, “Cristoforo Landino,” in Bausi, Campanelli et al., Autografi dei letterati italiani; also online at ALI, Autografi dei letterati italiani, http://www.autografi .net/dl/search?rows=10&start=0&q=fulltext_search:landino. Additionally, see the most complete edition of the comentary in Landino, Comento sopra la Comedia, edited by Procaccioli, 4 vols. 29. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 27–38, 60–75. Bellomo, “How to Read the Early Commentaries,” in Nasti and Rossignoli, Interpreting Dante, 84–109. 30. Censimento 1:1, 196; Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 25–27, 36–37; Barański, “Textual Transmission,” and “Early Reception (1290–1481),” in Barański and Pertile, Dante in Context, 509–37; Gilson, Dante and Renaissance Florence, 1–17. 31. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 16–17, 41–42, 166n30, 175n32. 32. For prefaces and summaries in Lana’s commentary, see transcription of his commentary online at Dante Dartmouth Project, Scarabelli, Comedia di Dante degli Allaghieri col Commento di Jacopo della Lana bolognese, https://dante.dartmouth.edu. 33. For reference to specific stylistic and topical attributes of Lana’s commentary, see Mazzoni, s.v. “Lana, Iacopo della,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/iacopo-della-lana_%28Enciclopedia -Dantesca%29/. 34. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 30–49. 35. Jacopo (or Iacopo) Alighieri, Chiose all’Inferno di Dante, possibly dated 1322 (one year after Dante’s death). Mazzoni, “Alighieri, Iacopo,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/iacopo -alighieri_(Enciclopedia-Dantesca)/. For information about Jacopo Alighieri, see LC Authorities, n 86095747, https://lccn.loc.gov/n86095747; CERL, cnp00152171, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record /cnp00152171. 36. See Michael Caesar, “Jacopo Alighieri, notes to the Inferno. Between 1322 and 1333, prob. before 1324,” in Dante, 114–16. For detailed information on Jacopo Alighieri’s commentary, see Censimento 1:1, 316–27; s.v. “Jacopo della Lana, 1324–28,” in Scarabelli, Comedia di Dante degli Allaghieri col Commento di Jacopo della Lana bolognese, as found in Dartmouth Dante Project, https://dante. dartmouth.edu/biblio.php?comm_id=13247 (bibliographic record); and to view the full text of the commentary, https://dante.dartmouth.edu/search.php?query=&cmd=Search&commentary. 37. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 28–30.

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38. For this argument and a synopsis of the studies on this topic, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 11–24. 39. Quoted from the English translation of Croce, The Poetry of Dante, Translated by Douglas Ainslie, 29, https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001015741; in the original Italian, Croce, La poesia di Dante, 26. 40. Mazzucchi takes the idea of the specificity of the Comedy’s commentaries further, defining them as an “autonomous genre” in Censimento 1:1, xxiii. For later perspectives on the tradition of Dante commentaries, see Nasti and Rossignoli, eds., Interpreting Dante. 41. For the concept of the materiality of books in relation to readership, see Moylan and Stiles, Reading Books, 1–15. 42. See Cristoforo Landino’s commentary surrounding the text of the poem in Catalog no. 2, Figs. 6.4–5. In De Spira’s edition with Lana’s commentary the layout is in columns, with the text of the poem in one and the commentary in the other; see Catalog no. 1, Figs. 6.1–2. 43. Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 20. 44. This term applies to the earliest European printers in the fifteenth century; see s.v. “prototypographer, n.,” in OED, http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/238428. On the movement of German printers to Italy, see Lowry, “Venetian Capital, German Technology, and Renaissance Culture in the Later Fifteenth Century,” 5–9. 45. For information about Nicolaus Laurentii “Alamanus”, see LC Authorities, nr 94030737, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr94030737; CERL, cnp01014646, https://thesaurus.cerl.org/cgibin/record.pl ?rid=cnp01014646; VIAF, nr 94030737, http://viaf.org/viaf/71275185. For biographic reference, see Scapecchi, s.v. “Niccolò di Lorenzo,” DBI, 2013, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/niccolo-di -lorenzo_(Dizionario-Biografico)/. 46. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 75–85; Gilson, Dante and Renaissance Florence, 194–230. 47. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 37. For contemporary editions of Landino’s commentary, see Landino, Commento sopra la Comedia. 48. On the success of Landino’s prologue and commentary especially from their political and cultural standpoint, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 37–38, 76–79; Gilson, Dante and Renaissance Florence, 163–93; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 24–46; Barański and Pertile, Dante in Context, 531–37; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 38–39, 43–44, 52–53; Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 26–27; Censimento 2, 9–31, 92–105. Also, for an electronic version of the Landino commentary, see “Cristoforo Landino, 1481,” ed. Francesca Ferrario, as found in the Dartmouth Dante Project, at (bibliographic record) https://dante.dartmouth.edu/biblio. php?comm_id=14815; and to view the full text of Landino‘s commentary, https://dante.dartmouth. edu/search.php?query=&cmd=Search&commentary. 49. Marlis von Hessert et al., s.v. “Medici, de’ family,” GAO, https://doi.org/10.1093/gao/978 1884446054.article.T056375. On the role of Lorenzo de’ Medici in the promotion of the Florentine vernacular, see Gambarota, Irresistible Signs, 24, 32, 36–37. 50. In the Library’s holdings, there are two early print editions of Dante’s De vulgari eloquentia [On the eloquence of the vernacular], promoting the use of vernaculars as literary languages. Both are Italian translations of the original Latin version by the humanist Gian Giorgio Trissino (1478– 1550): Dante De la vulgare eloquenzia published in Vicenza by Tolomeo Ianiculo da Bressa in 1529, http://lccn.loc.gov/03024140; and De la volgare eloqvenzia published in Ferrara by D. Mamarelli in 1583, http://lccn.loc.gov/04030425. For an English translation of this work, see Botterill, De vulgari Eloquentia, https://www.danteonline.it/english/opere.asp?idope=3&idlang=UK. 51. Quoted from Gilson, Dante and Renaissance Florence, 168. On other aspects concerning Landino’s prologue and commentary, see Censimento 2, 8–13. 52. On Marsilio Ficino, see Celenza, s.v. “Marsilio Ficino,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://palto.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/entries/ficino/.



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53. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 47–49, 134–37. 54. Petrucci, s.v. “Baldini, Baccio,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/baccio-baldini _%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/; Whitaker, s.v. “Baldini, Baccio,” GAO, https://www.oxfordartonline. com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001oao-9781884446054-e-7000005880. For the history of illustrations of the Comedy, see Volkmann, Iconografia dantesca. Also, see Biagi, Passerini, and Rostagno, eds., La Divina commedia nella figurazione artistica e nel secolare commento. For Dante portraits, see Parsons “The Portrait of Dante,” Catholic World, 78 (1904), 749–66. 55. For information about Sandro Botticelli, see Dempsey, s.v. “Botticelli, Sandro,” GAO, https:// www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054 -e-7000010385; and under his birth name “Alessandro Filipepi”—“Botticelli” derives from the nickname given to his brother Giovanni—see Lightbown, s.v. “Filipepi, Alessandro,” DBI, http://www. treccani.it/enciclopedia/alessandro-filipepi_%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/. 56. For a view of the Library’s Rosenwald copy of the 1481 Nicolaus Laurentii Comedy with nineteen illustrations, see Catalog no. 2, Figs. 6.3–5; a second copy of this 1481 edition is available in the Vollbehr collection. Additionally, see Figure 1.2 with the list of the Library’s incunabula. Also refer to chapter 5 by Sylvia Albro for a more detailed history of Baldini’s illustrations. 57. For reference to Otto Heinrich Friedrich Vollbehr, see VIAF, 7758429, http://viaf.org /viaf/7758429. The exact number of volumes in the Vollbehr collection is 3,114, including incunabula printed by 635 printers in fifteenth-century Europe; see the Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collection Division, Selected Special Collections, “Otto Vollbehr Collection. Incunabula,” at https://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/coll/255.html. For a better understanding of the history of the acquisition of the Vollbehr collection, see Ashley, The Story of the Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula; Van Wingen, “The Incunabula Collections at the Library of Congress,” https://rbml.acrl.org/index.php /rbml/article/viewFile/46/46; and Snapp, “The Acquisition of the Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula for the Library of Congress.” For the legislative record, see United States, Laws, Statutes, etc., A Bill Authorizing an Appropriation for the Purchase of the Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, https://www.loc. gov/law/help/statutes-at-large/71st-congress/session-2/c71s2ch846.pdf. 58. United States, Congress, House, Committee on the Library, Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula: Hearing before the Committee on the Library, 2. 59. House, Committee on the Library, Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, 2. Rosenberg, The Nation’s Great Library, 101–20. 60. ARLC, 1930, 1. 61. House, Committee on the Library, Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, 2. For the appraisal of the Vollbehr collection at $2,500,000, see Snapp, “The Acquisition of the Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula,” 152. In 1926, when he first came to the United States, Vollbehr had appraised his collection at $3,000,000; see Van Wingen, “The Incunabula Collections at the Library of Congress,” 85. 62. Collins, The Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, 1. 63. Collins, The Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, 1. Also see Cole, For Congress and the Nation, 7–10. 64. ARLC, 1930, 14. 65. House, Committee on the Library, Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula, 7. For a different perspective on the intellectual debates surrounding bibliographic research, incunabula, and library collections, see Dane, Abstractions of Evidence in the Study of Manuscripts and Early Printed Books, 160–61. About Vollbehr and political propaganda, see Manning and Romerstein, Historical Dictionary of American Propaganda, 310–11. 66. Harris, “Public Funding for Rarity,” in particular 50–52. 67. For the variety of languages in the Library’s collections, see, for example, Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), s.v. “MARC Languages,” https://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/languages. html; and s.v. “Extinct Languages,” http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85046567. For the

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development of the Library of Congress’ international collections, see Mumford, “The Library of Congress—Twice as Fast,” 771. 68. For information on Lessing Julius Rosenwald, see Matheson, “Lessing J. Rosenwald”; Goff, “Lessing Julius Rosenwald.” 69. Matheson, “Lessing J. Rosenwald,” 3; Rosenwald, “The Formation of the Rosenwald Collection”; Rosenwald, Aufhäuser, and Mundo, “Reminiscences of a Print Collector.” Additionally, see Goff, “Incunabula in the Library of Congress”; Goff, “Rare Books”; Goff, “Catalog of Fine Books and Manuscripts.” For an overview of the Rosenwald Collection, Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Vision of a Collector, 19–54 for early printing and typography; 55–186 for incunabula. Finally, for aspects related to the acquisition of the Rosenwald and rare book collections, see Matheson, “Microcosm of the Library”; Evans, “The Rosenwald Collection”; Wroth, “Toward a Rare Book Policy in the Library of Congress.” For books in the Rosenwald Collection, see Library of Congress, The Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, in particular, Konrad Oberhuber, “Dante Alighieri. La Commedia. Florence: Nicolaus Laurentii, Alamanus, 30 August 1481. Rosenwald Collection 229; Goff D-29,” 86–87. Finally, see essays from a 1980 symposium in Hindman, The Early Illustrated Book. 70. Benco, “Archibald MacLeish.” 71. Benco, “Archibald MacLeish,” 242. 72. Benco, “Archibald MacLeish,” 245–46. For the continuation and expansion of MacLeish’s concept of the Library’s role and collections under his successor Luther Evans, see Sittig, “Luther Evans: Man for a New Age.” 73. The first significant acquisitions of early print books at the Library of Congress occurred during Librarian of Congress Ainsworth Rand Spofford’s term (1864–1897). They were the Smithsonian Institution Collection (1866), the Peter Force Collection (1867), and the Joseph Toner Collection (1882). During Putnam’s tenure (1899–1939) and before the acquisition of the Vollbehr Collection (1930), the most significant acquisition of early print books was through the donation of the John Boyd Thacher Collection (1925). For more information on the history of the early print collection at the Library, see Cole and Aikin, Encyclopedia of the Library of Congress, 4–10, 443–45, 447–48, 487–89. 74. The Comedy edition in Thomas Jefferson’s library, also called Il Dante del Venture, or La Divina Commedia published in Venice by Giambattista Pasquali in 1751, was edited by the Italian humanist Pompeo Venturi (1693–1753). See the related entry in Sowerby, Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, 435. For information about Jefferson’s library, see Library, “Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson’s Library,” online exhibit https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jefflib.html. 75. Johnston, History of the Library of Congress, 1:241. Count Dimitrii Petrovich Buturlin (1763– 1829) resided in Florence for fifteen years, where he amassed a significant collection of rare books and manuscripts. Richard Henry Wilde (1789–1847), former representative from Georgia to the U.S. Congress (1815–1817; 1829–1835) brought the Buturlin collection to the attention of the Committee on the Library. At the time, Wilde was in Florence researching and writing the manuscript for The Life and Times Dante.Wilde’s manuscripts are held in the Library’s collections: Manuscript Division, Wilde, Papers, Library, Washington DC, https://lccn.loc.gov/mm81045633. For more information on Wilde, see Tucker and Wilde, “Richard Henry Wilde in New Orleans.” 76. Johnston, History of the Library of Congress, 242. Also, on ideological constructs behind the decisions concerning the development of rare book European collections in the history of the Library, see Ostrowski, Books, Maps, and Politics, 24–38, and in particular 29, 31, 33; also 194–200; 210–15. 77. Johnston, History of the Library of Congress, 232–33. 78. For the development of Italian collections at Cornell, Harvard, and major American libraries at the beginning of the twentieth century, see Dupont, “Reading and Collecting Dante in America.” Also see Johnston, “A Supplement Listing Recent Collections.” For the history of the incunabula collections at the Library of Congress, see Pinthus, “The World’s Largest Theater Library”; and Goff, “Incunabula in the Library of Congress,” 5.



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79. ARLC, 1901, 311; 322. In addition, note this quote “The collection of incunabula, however, is not monumental or extraordinary,” 322. 80. ARLC, 1946, 11–12. Evans attaches to his report the survey by Mearns, The Story Up to Now, 13–227. 81. ARLC, 1946, 55–61. 82. Harris, “Public Funding for Rarity,” 38–40. In addition, see Wroth, “Toward a Rare Book Policy in the Library of Congress.” 83. Harris, “Public Funding for Rarity,” 40. For the institutional history of American libraries and their influence on shaping different communities of readers, see Augst and Carpenter, Institutions of Reading. Before the Vollbehr (1930), Batchelder (1936), and Rosenwald (1943–1975) collections, the Library acquired John Boyd Thacher’s collection of 840 incunabula, printed in five hundred different presses across Europe; see ARLC, 1927, 25–29. Only one of Dante’s books is in this collection: the Convito, printed in Florence by Francesco Buonaccorsi in 1490; see Library, Catalogue of the John Boyd Thacher Collection of Incunabula, 170, item no. 522; see also biographic information about Thacher, 7–17. 84. At least four incunabula of the Comedy (see Fig. 1.2) as well as the 1512 edition printed in Venice by Bernardinus Stagninus are in the Rosenwald Collection. The Rosenwald Collection also includes a copy of Henry Francis Cary’s translation of La divina commedia, or The divine vision of Dante Alighieri in Italian & English, https://lccn.loc.gov/49036306. 85. I am using the name Octavianus Scotus I (n.d.–1498), to distinguish him from his heir Octavianus Scotus II (1495–ca. 1566) For reference, see LC Authorities, n 87922108 at https://lccn.loc.gov /n87922108; CERL, cni00066650 at http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00066650. His printer’s mark is a circle with an inscribed double cross and the letters O.S.M. standing for Octavianus Scotus Modoetiensis (from Monza): See Catalog no. 3, Figs. 6.6–7. For information on Scotus I, see de Marinis, s.v. “Scoto, Ottaviano,” EI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/ottaviano-scoto_%28Enciclopedia -Italiana%29/; Bridges and Bernstein, s.v. “Scotto Family,” GAO, https://www.oxfordmusiconline. com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000025261; Ascarelli-Menato, 330–31; Lohr, “Latin Translations of the Greek Commentaries of Aristoteles,” in Kraye and Stone, Humanism and Early Modern Philosophy, 30. Also see Volpati, “Gli Scotti di Monza tipografi–editori in Venezia”; Posset, Marcus Marulus and the Biblia Latina of 1489, 53. 86. For information about Boninus de Boninis, see LC Authorities, nr 94029983, https://lccn .loc.gov/nr94029983; CERL, cnp01388493, https://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp01388493, VIAF, nr 94029983, http://viaf.org/viaf/290844. For biographic information, see Cioni, s.v. “Bonini, Bonino,” http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/bonino-bonini_(Dizionario-Biografico)/. See also Peddie, Printing at Brescia in the Fifteenth Century, 15–16, https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nyp.3343306 9139958;view=1up;seq=7. For more information about De Boninis, see Santoro et al., Dizionario degli editori, 1:ix–xxii, 164–65; Veneziani, La tipografia a Brescia nel XV secolo, 25, 32, 36, 68–78; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 38, 199n40; Duggan, Italian Music, 171–73, http://ark.cdlib.org /ark:/13030/ft409nb31c/. Also see the description of this incunabulum in Goff, “The Gift of Lessing J. Rosenwald to the Library.” 87. Lohr, “Latin Translations of the Greek Commentaries of Aristoteles,” 30. Also see Volpati, “Gli Scotti di Monza tipografi–editori in Venezia,” Posset, Marcus Marulus and the Biblia Latina of 1489, 53. 88. Ascarelli-Menato, 330–31; Lohr, “Latin Translations of the Greek Commentaries of Aristoteles,” 30. 89. For information about Aldus Manutius, see LC Authorities, n 79117173, https://lccn.loc. gov/n79117173; CERL, cni00066847, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00066847; Edit 16, CNCT 200, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext.dll?fn=13&i=200. Also see reference to Manutius’ fifth centenary in 2015 at CERL’s Collaboration Network, Manutius Network 2015,  https://www. cerl.org/collaboration/manutius_network_2015/main. For biographic reference, see Infelise, s.v. “Manuzio, Aldo, il Vecchio,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/manuzio-aldo-il-vecchio

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_(Dizionario-Biografico)/; Kallendorf, s.v. “Aldo Manuzio (Aldus Manutius),” OBO, https://www. oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195399301/obo-9780195399301-0031.xml. Also see Infelise, Aldo Manuzio, especially Kikuchi, “How Did Aldus Manutius Start a Printing Dynasty?” 25–38; Davies, Aldus Manutius; Lowry, The World of Aldus Manutius, 48–71, 217–36. Also see Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 1–17, 23–61. Finally, see Torre, ed., Aldo Manuzio. Dal folio al tascabile, published on the occasion of an exhibit held in Bassiano (near Rome) to commemorate the five hundredth anniversary of Manutius’ death in 2015. 90. Dionisotti, Aldo Manuzio, especially 37–65, 91–138; Fletcher, “Aldus and Greek Learning”; Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 47; Barbieri, “Aldo Manuzio e le ‘rivoluzioni’ del libro,” in Torre, Aldo Manuzio, 9–16. 91. Lohr, “Latin Translations of the Greek Commentaries of Aristoteles,” 26–30. 92. See Catalog no. 4, Figs. 6.8–9. 93. See Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 27–28; Veneziani, La tipografia a Brescia nel XV secolo, 20, 22, 25, 28–29, 32, 36–39, 67–71; Petrella, “Dante in tipografia”; Petrella, Dante Alighieri, Commedia, Brescia, Bonino Bonini, 1487, 3–5. See Sandal, La stampa a Brescia nel Cinquecento, 8–20. See also Davies, ed., Incunabula. 94. For the concept of “itinerant printers” in Renaissance Europe relating to De Boninis, see Veneziani, “Bonino Bonini (in parte con Miniato Delsera),” in La tipografia a Brescia nel XV secolo, 68–78. Ascarelli-Menato do not mention De Boninis under the section for printers in “Brescia,” 167–74; they mention him in s.v. “Fiorentino Luca Antonio,” 456, a Florentine typographer active in 1503–1504. Additionally, for the relationship between Humanistic teaching and typography in Brescia, see Signaroli, Maestri e tipografi a Brescia, 1471–1519, 1–12, 21–79. 95. For further information on De Boninis’ printing of the Comedy, see Brumana, “Nota su Bonino Bonini,” 95–96, 117–20; and Martinelli, “Dal Torchio del Bonini ‘La Commedia’,” 73–78. 96. Signaroli, Maestri e tipografi a Brescia, 10. Also, Sandal, La stampa a Brescia nel Cinquecento, 8, 10, 12; and Veneziani, “La stampa a Brescia e nel bresciano 1472–1511,” 1–23. 97. For information about Bernardinus Benalius, see LC Authorities, nr 94029702, https://lccn .loc.gov/nr94029702; CERL, cni00020108, https://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00020108; Edit 16, CNCT 212, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext.dll?fn=13&i=212; VIAF, nr 94029702, Permalink: http://viaf.org/viaf/17107050. For biographic information, see Cioni, s.v. “Benali, Bernardino,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/bernardino-benali_%28DizionarioBiografico %29/; Benvenuti, s.v. “Benalio [Benali; Benalius], Bernardino,” in GAO, http://www.oxfordartonline. com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T007796. Also see Ascarelli-Menato, 334–35; Santoro et al., Dizionario degli editori, tipografi, librai itineranti, 85–87. For the importance of woodcuts in book printing during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, see Colletta, “Vincenzo Coronelli, cosmografo della Repubblica Veneta,” 9–10. 98. For Mattheus Capcasa, see LC Authorities, no 89008084, https://lccn.loc.gov/no89008084; CERL, cni00063435, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00063435, VIAF, no 89008084, http://viaf. org/viaf/127197734/#Capcasa,_Matteo. For biographic reference, see Cioni, s.v. “Capcasa, Matteo,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/matteo-capcasa_%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/. See also Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 38–39; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 29–31. See Catalog no. 5, Figs. 6.10–11. 99. De Batines, 1:52–53; Fiske, 1:5; IGI, 48, no. 363; ISTC, id00032000; Marinelli 1911, 26–27; Rosenwald, 56, no. 260; USTC, 995471. 100. De Simone, A Heavenly Craft, 93–95. Also, Armstrong, “Venetian and Renaissance Woodcuts for Bibles, Liturgical Books and Devotional Books,” in De Simone, A Heavenly Craft, 26–29. 101. Sanudo, Venice, Cità Excelentissima, xxii. 102. A copy of this incunabulum by Petrus de Plasiis, edited by Pietro da Figino, is in the Dante collections at the Library. It is considered an earlier and incomplete version of Pietro da Figino’s edition completed for the Benalius and Capcasa 1492 edition. See Fig. 1.2. For information on Petrus



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de Plasiis, see LC Authorities, nr 96001397, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr96001397; CERL, cnp00525445, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp00525445. Plebani, s.v. “Piasi, Pietro de’,” DBI, http://www. treccani.it/enciclopedia/pietro-de-piasi_(Dizionario-Biografico)/. Additionally, Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 28. 103. For more information on Renaissance correctors/editors, see Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 1–47; Trovato, Con ogni diligenza corretto, 7–17, 19–71; Pollard, 31, 105, 192; Hellinga, Incunabula in Transit, 105, 192, 305. Pietro Mazzanti da Figline has been identified as Pietro da Figino. For information about the editor Pietro da Figino, LC Authorities, nr 96002114, https://lccn.loc. gov/nr96002114; CERL, cnp01360198, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp01360198. For biographic reference, see Ragni, s.v. “Pietro da Figino,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/pietro-dafigino_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. For Figino’s role as an early editor of vernacular works, see Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 26–27. 104. McMurtrie, The Corrector of the Press in the Early Days of Printing, 5. 105. Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 28–30, 36–39. 106. Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” 28; Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 132. 107. See Carrara, s. .v. “Vespasiano da Bisticci,” EI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/vespasiano -da-bisticci_%28Enciclopedia-Italiana%29/. He was a book dealer and author of Vite di uomini illustri del sec. XVI stampate la prima volta da Angelo Mai e nuovamente da Adolfo Bartoli, available at the Library also in English translation, The Vespasiano Memoirs: Lives of Illustrious Men of the XVth Century, by Vespasiano da Bisticci, Bookseller; Now First Translated into English by William George and Emily Waters. 108. Citation from Marazzini, “Gli editori vercellesi-trinesi e la lingua italiana,” 165. In the English translation in Vespasiano Memoirs, it reads “In this library all the books are superlatively good, and written with the pen, and had there been one printed volume it would have been ashamed in such company,” 104, referring to the Duke of Montefeltro’s library. Also see Tocci, “Montefeltro, Federico da,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/federico-da-montefeltro_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. 109. For the complexities of defining and quantifying the extent of literacy in Renaissance Italy, see Richardson, Printers, Writers, and Readers in Renaissance Italy, 107–12, 144–51. Also see Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, 42–47, 71–78, 87–108; 403–10. 110. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 21–22, 47–71, 73, 80–87, 89–96, 173–81, 195–220. 111. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 10, 21–24. 112. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 99–116. 113. On Manutius’ strategies as a bookman in Venice, see de Michelis, “Aldus Manutius and Venetian Humanism,” in Beltramini et al., Aldo Manuzio, Renaissance in Venice, 20–27; in the same volume, also see Callegari et al. “From Rome to Venice, Manutius’ Enterprise and Impresa,” 165–85; and Landau, “Printmaking in Venice at the Times of Manutius,” 107–35. Also see Pozza, “L’editoria veneziana da Giovanni Spira ad Aldo Manuzio. I centri editoriali di terraferma,” in Arnaldi and Pastore Stocchi, Storia della cultura veneta, 3.2.215–44. 114. For Manutius’ innovations in book making, see Nuvoloni, Parkin, and Sachet, “Aldus Manutius and the Book as Artefact,” in Beltramini et al., Aldo Manuzio, 77–89. Upon special commissions, Manutius also printed more luxurious books on vellum with ornamental features. 115. See Plebani, “Aldo Manuzio e il patto con i lettori,” in Plebani, Aldo al lettore, 142–43. Plebani shows how Aldus’ books opened with the dedication “Aldus Manucius Romanus Studiosis [sic]” (the Roman Aldus Manutius to scholars); or, in the case of Latin or Greek grammars, “Aldus Manutius literarii ludi magistris [sic]” (Aldus Manutius to teachers). As Plebani points out, the terms “studiosis” and “magistris” used in these dedications correspond to Manutius’ own version of Latin; see Plebani, “Aldo Manuzio e il patto con i lettori,” 142. For Manutius’ interests in Humanism, see Dionisotti, Aldo Manuzio umanista e editore, especially 37–65; Dionisotti, “Introduzione,” in Aldo Manuzio editore, 1:xi–l; Dionisotti, Gli umanisti e il volgare fra Quattro e Cinquecento, 1–14; Barker, “A Manuscript Made

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for Pier Francesco Barbarigo,” in Infelise, Aldo Manuzio, 81–86; Chatzopoulou, “A Contribution to the Study of Aldine Editing from the Documents of the Humanist Library in Sélestat,” in Infelise, Aldo Manuzio, 87–104; as well as the entire part 2, “Pubblicare i greci,” in Infelise, Aldo Manuzio, 81–159, dedicated to Manutius’ focus on printing classical Greek philosophical texts. 116. Lowry, The World of Aldus Manutius, 146–48. 117. The folio editions of the Comedy printed by De Spira, Laurentii, Scotus I, De Boninis, and Benalius-Capcasa, average approximately 19 (height) x 12 (width) inches (48 x 30.5 centimeters); Aldus Manutius’ Terze rime is an octavo equivalent to about 6.2 (height) x 3.7 (width) inches (15.7 x 9.5 centimeters). Cfr. Catalog nos. 1–6, for comparison. 118. For information about Pietro Bembo, see LC Authorities: n 50078865, https://lccn.loc. gov/n50078865; CERL, cnp01316547, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp01316547; VIAF, n 50078865, http://viaf.org/viaf/54144140; Edit 16, CNCA 1170, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts /iccu_ext.dll?fn=11&i=1170. Also see Dionisotti, s.v. “Bembo, Pietro,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it /enciclopedia/pietro-bembo_(Dizionario-Biografico); Kallendorf, s.v. “Pietro Bembo,” OBO, https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195399301/obo-9780195399301 -0321.xml; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 48–63. Also see Kidwell, Pietro Bembo, 3–23. For Bembo’s influence on Italian vernacular, see Marazzini, Il perfetto parlare, 77–86, 89–90, 93–94, 113–15; Maraschio, “Grafia e ortografia: evoluzione e codificazione,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:139–227, in particular on Bembo, 173–80. 119. For more information on Manutius and Bembo, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 137–41; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 31–35. 120. For information on Boccaccio, see Umberto Bosco, s.v. “Giovanni Boccaccio,” Britannica Academic, http://academic.eb.com/levels/collegiate/article/Giovanni-Boccaccio/15826; Branca, s.v. “Boccaccio, Giovanni,” Enciclopedia dell’arte medievale, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giovanni -boccaccio_%28Enciclopedia-dell%27-Arte-Medievale%29/; Houston, s.v. “Giovanni Boccaccio,” in OBO, https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-780195399301/obo9780195399 301-0203.xml. 121. Known in English as Petrarch; for quick reference, see Rico and Marcozzi, s.v. “Petrarca, Francesco,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/francesco-petrarca_%28Dizionario-Biografico %29/; Kleinhenz, s.v. “Petrarch,” OBO, https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document /obo-9780195396584/obo-9780195396584-0024.xml. For topics concerning Dante in relation to Petrarch, see Contini, Varianti e altra linguistica, 85–90, 170–75, and also his essay “Preliminary sulla lingua del Petrarca,” 169–92; Cornish, Vernacular Translation in Dante’s Italy, 36–39; Petrocchi, Itinerari danteschi, 10, 134, 251; Lansing and Barolini, “Petrarch,” in Lansing et al., The Dante Encyclopedia, 685–87; Patota, “I percorsi grammaticali,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:94–137, especially 93–95, 97, 100, 102n50, 105–16; Trifone, “La lingua e la stampa nel Cinquecento,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:425–46, especially 433–38; Soletti, “Dal Petrarca al Seicento,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:611–78, in particular, 618–25; Scott, Understanding Dante, 264–66, 273. 122. For information about Bernardinus Stagninus and his ties to the Giolitus family, see LC Authorities, nr 94029733, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr94029733; CERL, cni00021843, http://thesaurus. cerl.org/record/cni00021843; VIAF, nr 94029733, http://viaf.org/viaf/85054806; Edit 16, CNCT 489, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext.dll?fn=13&i=489. For biographic information, see Booton, “Publisher Bernardino Stagnino”; Nuovo and Coppens, I Giolito e la stampa nell’Italia del XVI secolo, 70–76. 123. The 1512 edition from the Rosenwald collection is viewable in Catalog no. 7, Figs. 6.13–15. On the acquisition of the Comedy printed by Stagninus in 1520 also at the Library, see Library of Congress, Catalogue of Books Added to the Library from December 1, 1869, to December 1, 1870, 91. 124. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 81–82; also see Ascarelli-Menato, 337, for Stagninus’ specialization in printing law, medicine, and philosophy books. For the connections



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between the Marquises of Monferrat and printing in Trino, see Rosso, “La politica culturale dei Paleologi fra Quattro e Cinquecento e i suoi riflessi nell’editoria del marchesato,” in Balboni, Trino e l’arte tipografica nel XVI secolo, 71–90. 125. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 81–82; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 107–18. 126. Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 47–96, in particular 72, 77, 81–82, 89; Cavagna, “Mappa e tipologia delle migrazioni di tipografi-editori,” in Santoro et al., Mobilità dei mestieri del libro tra quattrocento e seicento, 267–82; Montecchi, “Circolazione libraria e mobilità dei primi tipografi,” in Santoro et al., Mobilità dei mestieri del libro tra quattrocento e seicento, 245–54; Volpato, “La mobilità dei mestieri del libro nell’area veneta tra quattro e seicento,” in Santoro et al., Mobilità dei mestieri del libro tra quattrocento e seicento, 333–59; Santoro, “La mobilità dei mestieri del libro: caratteristiche e valenze,” in Santoro et al., Mobilità dei mestieri del libro tra quattrocento e seicento, 333–59. 127. See Pozzati, “Trino fra Quattrocento e Cinquecento. Famiglie illustri, personaggi eminenti,” in Balboni, Trino e l’arte tipografica nel XVI secolo: Dal marchesato del Monferrato all’Europa al mondo. Atti del convegno di Trino e Vercelli, 13–14 aprile 2013. Novara, Italy: Interlinea, 2014, 35–44. 128. Balboni, Trino e l’arte tipografica nel XVI secolo, 8; and also Raviola, “La città sul Po,” in Balboni, Trino e l’arte tipografica nel XVI secolo, 20–22, 25, 29. 129. On the phenomenon of itinerant bookmen and growing networks of the books trade in Renaissance Italy and beyond its borders, see Santoro et al., Dizionario degli editori, tipografi, librai itineranti in Italia tra Quattrocento e Seicento, 1:ix–xxii and, in particular, xix on Venice as one of the main centers of this phenomenon. Also see nn. 87 and 127. 130. The 1536 Stagninus edition printed in collaboration with Joannes Giolitus is also in the Library’s holdings. The colophon of the 1536 edition on the title page reads “In Vinegia ad instantia di M. Gioanni Giolitto da Trino, MDXXXVI” [in Venice commissioned by Joannes Giolitus of Trino, 1536]; the colophon on the last page says “In Vineggia per M. Bernardino Stagnino. MDXXXVI” [in Venice by Bernardinus Stagninus, 1536]. For reference to Joannes Giolitus see LC Authorities, nr 94029732, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr94029732; CERL, cni00050998, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record /cni00050998; VIAF, nr 94029732, http://viaf.org/viaf/300694035; Edit 16, CNCT 472, http:// edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext2.dll?fn=13&i=472. For biographic information, see Ceresa, s.v. “Giolito de’ Ferrari, Giovanni senior,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giolito-de-ferrari -giovanni-senior_(Dizionario-Biografico)/. Additionally, Campbell, s.v. “Giolito Press,” The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance, https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198601753 .001.0001/acref9780198601753-e-1629; and Harris, “The History of the Book in Italy,“ The Oxford Companion to the Book, https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198606536.001.0001 /acref9780198606536-e-0030. On Stagninus’ different Comedy editions, see De Batines, 1:69–71, 78–79, 81–82; Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 144–45; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 43; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 59. 131. Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 134–49. 132. See Catalog no. 8 and Figs. 6.16–18. For Jacobus de Burgofranco, see LC Authorities, nr94031118, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr94031118; CERL, cni00021526, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record /cni00021526; VIAF, also see Vianello, s.v. “Iacopo da Burgofranco,” ED, https://www.treccani. it/enciclopedia/iacopo-da-burgofranco_%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. For Lucas Antonius Giunta, see LC Authorities, no2011002146, https://lccn.loc.gov/no2011002146; CERL, cni00012231, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00012231; VIAF, no2011002146, Permalink: http://viaf.org/viaf /102355090; Edit 16, CNCT 2111, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/scripts/iccu_ext.dll?fn=13&i=2111. Also, see Ceresa, s.v. “Giunti, Lucantonio, Il Vecchio,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giunti -lucantonio-il-vecchio_%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/. 133. See Catalog no. 9, Figs. 6.19–21. For biographic information about Franciscus Marcolinus, see Veneziani, s.v. “Marcolini, Francesco,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/francesco -marcolini_(Dizionario-Biografico)/; Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 85–88, 144; Gilson, Reading

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Dante in Renaissance Italy, 178–79, 218. Also, see s.v. “Francesco Marcolini,” in ORO, http://www. oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100133359. 134. For Alessandro Vellutello, see LC Authorities, nr 89003079, https://lccn.loc.gov/nr89 003079; CERL, cni00022031, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00022031. Also, see Dionisotti, s.v. “Vellutello, Alessandro,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/alessandro-vellutello_%28 Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. Also, see Lansing and Barolini, s.v. “Vellutello, Alessandro,” The Dante Encyclopedia, 850–51. Finally, on aspects of Vellutello’s commentary in comparison to Daniello’s, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 38, 85–88, 120, 149–150, 196n90; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 175–208, especially 184–194 for Vellutello. 135. For Bernardino Daniello, see LC Authorities, n 85109983, https://lccn.loc.gov/n85109983; CERL, cnp01330871, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnp01330871. For biographic information, De Gramatica, s.v. “Daniello, Bernardino,” DBI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/bernardino -daniello_(Dizionario-Biografico)/; Lansing and Barolini, s.v. “Daniello, Bernardino,” in The Dante Encyclopedia, 246. Also see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 85–88; 109–23; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 194–208. 136. For the 1568 Petrus de Fine Comedy edition in the Library’s collections, see Catalog no. 11 and Figs. 6.25–26. For information on Petrus de Fine, see LC Authorities, no 96032212, https://lccn. loc.gov/no96032212; CERL, cni00020587, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00020587; VIAF, 63601840, http://viaf.org/viaf/63601840; Edit 16, http://edit16.iccu.sbn.it/web_iccu/imain.htm. For Petrus de Fine’s printer’s mark, see Bernstein, Print Culture and Music in Sixteenth-century Venice, 47, 102, 111n26; and Bernstein, Music Printing in Renaissance Venice, 46, 85, 144n25, 705, 728. Additionally, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 85, 119, 144–45; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 145; Richardson, Printing, Writers, and Readers in Renaissance Italy, 34. 137. The 1564 Comedy edition was printed by the Sessa family, who operated presses in Venice from 1489 to 1630; see Nuovo, The Book Trade in the Italian Renaissance, 82–85. With this edition, the brothers Joannes Baptista and Melchior Sessa published Vellutello’s commentary, edited by Francesco Sansovino. See Catalog no. 10, Figs. 6.22–24. For reference to Joannes Baptista Sessa and Melchior Sessa, see LC Authorities, n 93037389, https://lccn.loc.gov/n93037389 and nr 94032723, https://lccn.loc.gov /nr94032723; CERL, cni00048482, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00048482 and cni00021781, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00021781; For information about Francesco Sansovino, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 111–12, 120, 148–50; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 144–46. For biographic reference, see LC Authorities, n 85101175, https://lccn.loc.gov/n85101175; CERL, cni00021711, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00021711; Reichenbach, s.v. “Sansovino, Francesco,” EI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/francesco-sansovino_%28Enciclopedia-Italiana%29/. 138. The copy of this 1595 edition in the Library’s rare book collections is a gift of Lessing J. Rosenwald (1943–1975). For reference to Domenico Manzani see LC Authorities, no2008062943, https://lccn.loc.gov/no2008062943; CERL, cni00021171, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cni00021 171; VIAF, no2008062943, http://viaf.org/viaf/39184754; Edit 16, CNCT 50. For Accademia della Crusca, see LC Authorities, n 81073787, https://lccn.loc.gov/n81073787; CERL, cnc00009913, http://thesaurus.cerl.org/record/cnc00009913. For more information on Accademia della Crusca, see Schiaffini, s.v. “Crusca, Accademia della,” EI, https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/accademia -della-crusca_%28Enciclopedia-Italiana%29/]; and the Accademia della Crusca website in English version, http://www.accademiadellacrusca.it/en/pagina-d-entrata. Also see, Della Valle, “La lessicografia,” in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:45–51; Maraschio, “Grafia e ortografia: evoluzione e codificazione,”in Serianni and Trifone, Storia della lingua italiana, 1:179–83. Additionally, see Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 150; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 155–81. See Catalog no. 12 and Figs. 6.27–29. Notice the epithet “divina” in the title, following Lodovico Dolce’s introduction of it in the 1555 Venetian edition printed by Gabriel Giolitus de Ferrariis. 139. On the decline in Dante’s reception in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and resurgence in the nineteenth century, see Caesar, Dante: The Critical Heritage, 35–42; De Sua, Dante into



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English, 1–21; Friederich, Dante’s Fame Abroad 1350–1850, 72–116, 199–236; La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 20–22; Koch, Dante in America, 7–10. Additionally, for a general overview of the history of Dante scholarship in America, see Giamatti, Dante in America: The First Two Centuries. 140. See Braida, Dante and the Romantics, 191n10. I am quoting from Voltaire’s “Lettre XII. Sur le Dante,”, 497: “s’il était possible de mettre de la vraisemblance dans ce mélange bizarre de christianisme et de paganism” [my translation: if it were possible to conceive as plausible, this bizarre mixture of Christianity and paganism]. 141. My translation of: “c’est peut-être encore une raison de plus pour n’être pas compris. Sa réputation s’aſſermira toujours, parce qu’on ne lit guère.” Voltaire, “Dante, (Le),” 706. 142. About the revival of Dante’s reputation in the nineteenth century, see Havley, Dante’s British Public, 68–79; Peluffo, “Un secolo nel nome di Dante,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 15–18; Querci, “Il culto di Dante nell’Ottocento e le arti,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 35–52; Ragni, “Dante in chiave di sol,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 67–79; Tobia, “Le feste dantesche di Firenze del 1865,” in Querci, Dante vittorioso, 31–34. For a nineteenth-century work explaining Dante’s world to the British public, see Maria Francesca Rossetti’s, A Shadow of Dante, with interspersed translations by William Michael Rossetti and Henry W. Longfellow. 143. Dupont, “Collecting Dante in America at the End of the Nineteenth Century”; Dupont, “Reading and Collecting Dante in America”; and Dupont, “Collecting and Reading Dante in the Nineteenth Century and the Birth of Italian Studies in American Universities.” 144. For information about Jefferson’s library, see Library, “Thomas Jefferson: Jefferson’s Library,” online exhibit, https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jefflib.html. 145. For Jefferson’s copy of the Comedy, see n. 74. 146. Library of Congress, Alphabetical Catalogue of the Library: Authors, 4, 320–21 for the list of fourteen Dante books, http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001165831. 147. Opere di Dante Alighieri (Venezia, A. Zatta, 1757–58), at the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, https://lccn.loc.gov/15023765. 148. Ugo Foscolo, La Commedia di Dante Alighieri, illustrata da Ugo Foscolo (London: Pickering, 1825). 149. The Divina commedia of Dante Alighieri: consisting of the Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso, translated into English verse, with preliminary essays, notes, and illustrations, by the Rev. Henry Boyd. See Catalog no. 13 and Fig. 6.30. For information about Henry Boyd, see Skottowe, s.v. “Boyd, Henry (1748/9–1832), translator and Church of Ireland clergyman,” ODNB, https://www.oxforddnb.com /view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-3104. For information on Boyd’s translation, see Friederich, Dante’s Fame Abroad, 228–29; La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 22. 150. The Vision; or Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. Translated by Henry F. Cary; with life of Dante, notes, etc., in Alphabetical Catalogue of the Library: Authors (1864), 320. See Catalog nos. 15 and 17, as well as Figs. 6.34, 6.37–40 for the 1885 edition of this work published in New York. For biographic information and general reference, see Harris, s.v. “Cary, Henry Francis (1772–1844), translator,” ODNB, https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128 -e-4838; Britannica Academic, s.v. “Henry Francis Cary,” https://academic.eb.com/levels/collegiate /article/Henry-Francis-Cary/20582; Abhba [alias Rev. Beaver Henry Blacker], “The REV. Henry Francis Cary.” For the reception of Cary’s translation in England, see Celer et Audax, “Henry Francis Cary.” Also, see Cary, Memoir of the Rev. Henry Francis Cary, M. A. Finally, King, The Translator of Dante. 151. On American readership and their cultural perceptions shaping the literary marketplace in the nineteenth century, see Wadsworth, In the Company of Books. 152. Whitman’s notebook is also accessible online at the Library’s website https://www.loc.gov /collections/harned-whitman-collection/. See Matthews, “Walt Whitman’s Vision of the Inferno.” 153. Matthews, “Walt Whitman’s Vision of the Inferno,” 39–40, nn. 14–15. Whitman’s 1862 notebook and papers held in the Library’s Thomas Biggs Harned Collection of Walt Whitman Papers

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are accessible online at https://www.loc.gov/collections/harned-whitman-collection/about-this -collection/. 154. In the Library’s collections, there are various editions of The divine comedy of Dante Alighieri translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow from 1867 to the present. The holdings include at least four copies of the 1867 edition published by Ticknor and Fields (first edition), including the copy that came to the Library through Walt Whitman’s collection. See Catalog no. 16 and Figs. 6.35 and 6.36. For information on Longfellow’s translation, see Lansing and Barolini, s.v. “Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth,” in The Dante Encyclopedia, 571–72; and also Norton, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Balée and Gioia, s.v. “Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth,” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature, https://oxfordre .com/literature/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.001.0001/acrefore-9780190201098-e-714. Finally, Dupont, “Charles Eliot Norton and the Rationale for American Dante Studies,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 248–65. 155. On the Feinberg-Whitman Collection, see Broderick, “The Greatest Whitman Collector and the Great Whitman Collection”; Sprague, A List of Manuscripts, Books, Portraits, Prints, Broadsides, and Memorabilia in Commemoration of the One Hundred and Twentieth Anniversary of the Birth of Walt Whitman. 156. Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” v; concerning Dante and national politics see 20–69. Matthews, “Walt Whitman’s Vision of the Inferno,” 37. 157. Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” v; and, on Dante’s reception in the antebellum period, also 4–19 as well as 20–26. 158. On the Italian nation’s independence and unification process, see Riall, The Italian Risorgimento, and also Patriarca and Riall, The Risorgimento Revisited. Also see Braida, “Dante and the Creation of the poeta vate in Nineteenth-Century Italy,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 51–69. 159. Raffa, “Longfellow’s Great Liberators.” 160. Theodore Wesley Koch (1871–1941) catalogued the Fiske Collection of Dante materials at Cornell University’s Library. See biography in Theodore Wesley Koch (1871–1941) Papers, Northwestern University Archives, https://findingaids.library.northwestern.edu/repositories/6/resources/271. Willard Fiske (1831–1904) developed Cornell’s collections of Dante, Petrarch, Icelandic, and Rhaeto– Romenic literature. See the website The Passionate Collector: Willard Fiske and His Libraries, http:// rmc.library.cornell.edu/collector/introduction/index.html. Werner Paul Friederich (1905–1993) was a pioneering scholar in comparative literature in the United States. See Smith, “In Memoriam: Werner Paul Friederich.” Angelina La Piana (1891-1970) belonged to a family of Italian immigrants who came from Sicily in the early twentieth century; she taught Italian at Wellesley College and wrote two groundbreaking books on the reception of Italian literature in America; also see n. 184. See Altrocchi, “Dante’s American Pilgrimage” and also Shaw’s review, “Angelina La Piana: Dante’s American Pilgrimage.” For European studies on Dante’s reception abroad: Besso, La fortuna di Dante fuori d’Italia; Farinelli, Dante in Spagna, Francia, Inghilterra, Germania; Toynbee, Dante in English Literature. 161. Matthews, “The American Alighieri,” 4–5, 10, 53–55. Redling, “Of Heroes and Mockingbirds,” in Redling, Travelling Traditions: Nineteenth-Century Cultural Concepts and Transatlantic Intellectual Networks, 63–78. 162. For La Piana’s opinion on the role played by Puritans in delaying Dante’s reception in America, see La Piana, Dante’s American Pilgrimage, 13–15. Havely argues that Dante was appropriated by Protestant authors in sixteenth-century England; see Havely, Dante’s British Public, 48, 50–53. 163. Braida, Dante and the Romantics, 56–91. On the influence of Cary’s translation in America, see Verduin, “Dante in America,” in Moylan and Stiles, Reading Books, 16–51; and also, Verduin, “Emerson, Dante, and American Nationalism,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 266–83, especially 70–72. 164. See Mathews, “Dantean Influence in the Poems of T.W. Parsons”; “The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri.” For biographic information about Parsons, see McKenzie, s.v. “Parsons, Thomas



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William,” EdI, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/thomas-william-parsons_(Enciclopedia-Italiana)/; Drake, s.v. “Parsons, Thomas William, M.D.,” Dictionary of American Biography, 692. 165. See Cunningham, The Divine Comedy in English, 77–82. 166. Cambon, “Dante’s Presence in American Literature.” 167. Newman, “Melville’s Copy of Dante.” 168. Actually, in this first edition, Brown did not include any reference to Dante; he did later in his first American edition titled Miranda (1861) and later Clotelle (1864, 1867). For information on the influence of Dante in Brown’s and other African American authors’ work, see Looney, Freedom Readers, 24, 52–54. 169. For a sense of the tenor of the critical debates about the translations of the Comedy in the United States, see Brandeis, “Shall We Dante?” Brandeis (1905–1990) was a relevant Dante scholar who taught at Bard College and whose main work The Ladder of Vision (1960) was considered a pinnacle in Dantean studies at that time. 170. Sayers’ Inferno was published in 1949, followed by Purgatorio in 1955. Ciardi’s The Inferno was published in 1954 by Rutgers University Press; The Purgatorio in 1961; and, The Paradiso in 1970. See Catalog nos. 19 and 20, as well as Figs. 6.43 and 6.46. 171. Ciardi’s choice actually was a “dummy terza rima” for which he replicated Dante’s three-line stanza, avoiding the triple rhyme. He explained that the “approximately 1,500 triple rhymes” for the Inferno alone do not exist in English. He introduced rhymes where possible to recreate Dante’s scheme at least partially. See Ciardi, “Translator’s Note,” in his translation The Inferno, ix–xi. For an overall sense of American Modernist and post-Modernist interpretations, see Hawkins and Jacoff, “Still Here: Dante after Modernism,” in Barolini and Storey, eds., Dante for the New Millennium, 451–64. Additionally, see Ciardi’s “The Relevance of the Inferno,” in Dante Alighieri: Three Lectures, 35–53. This was Ciardi’s contribution to the Library of Congress’ celebration in 1965 marking the 700th anniversary of Dante’s birth. 172. For an understanding of modern translation approaches to the Comedy in English, see Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics.” 173. Longfellow adapts terzine, a three-line verse form, to the blank verse providing a different effect from Cary’s blank verse translation. 174. For the contrast between Sayers’ and Ciardi’s translation and Singleton’s and Musa’s, see Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 151–58. 175. Mandelbaum, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri. See Catalog no. 21 and Figs. 6.44–46, also showcasing examples of Barry Moser’s drawings. 176. For John Flaxman, British sculptor and book illustrator, see Catalog no. 14 and Figs. 6.31–33. For interesting connections between Flaxman and the artistic scene in Rome, see Dinoia, “Alcune aggiunte e precisazioni su Tommaso Piroli incisore (1750–1824)” in Cristallini, ed., Memoria e materia dell’opera d’arte, 133–45. 177. Moser, “A Note on the Drawings for the California Dante,” in Mandelbaum, The Divine Comedy, Inferno, 305–06. 178. See Braida, Dante and the Romantics, 3, 9–26. Also see Straub, “Dante’s Beatrice and Victorian Gender Ideology,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 204–22; Audeh, “Dufau’s La Mort d’Ugolin: Dante, Nationalism, and French Art, c. 1800,” in Audeh and Havely, Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century, 141–63. 179. Peterson, “The Inferno of Dante by Robert Pinsky, Michael Mazur, Nicole Pinsky and John Freccero.” For the concept of foreignization versus domestication in translation studies, see Venuti, The Translator’s Invisibility. 180. Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders published the work in 3 separate volumes, Dante’s Inferno (2003), Dante’s Purgatorio (2004), Dante’s Paradiso (2005). Trillium Press in Brisbane, CA, published the deluxe folio first edition now available at the Library of Congress. Chronicle Books published the trade edition of the three volumes between 2004 and 2005. For more on Birk’s and Sander’s translation, see chapter 4 in the present volume.

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181. Concerning sixteenth-century female Dante readers, see Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 3n14. 182. Bonfatti, “Dante e il Risorgimento educatore delle donne: percorsi anglo-italiani,” in Alfonzetti, Baldassarri, and Tomassi, I cantieri dell’italianistica, 1–8. 183. For women in the early Dante Society of America, see “First Annual Report of the Dante Society,” ARDS no. 1, May 16, 1882, hosted by Longfellow as president and Lowell as vice president. 184. As an Italian American, Angelina La Piana (18?–1970) suffered biases to which Italian immigrants were subjected. She became an assiduous member of the Dante Society, a revered college professor at Wellesley, and together with her brother Giorgio, who taught at Harvard Divinity, an active member of the Italian American community supporting Italian refugees from the Italian Fascist regime. For the very sparse information on Angelina La Piana’s life and work, see n. 161. Also, “News Notes,” Italica 9, no. 4 (1932): 124–27, http://www.jstor.org/stable/476464. ARDS, no. 55–67 (1951): iv; ARDS, no. 68–72 (1954): iv, ix; ARDS, no. 73 (1955): v, xvii, for her activity in the Dante Society. For her relationship with her brother and the Italian community, see Richet, Women, Antifascism and Mussolini’s Italy, 201, 208, 209, 211–12, 224, 305n42. Finally, Clark, The Fathers Refounded, 143–59. As a woman, Dorothy Sayers (1893–1957) could not attend classes at Oxford University, although she attended Somerville College, one of Oxford’s first two women’s colleges. See Reynolds, The Passionate Intellect, ix–xiii, 1–30; additionally, see The Dorothy L. Sayers Society website, https://www.sayers. org.uk/ and Catalog no. 19. Maria Corti (1915–2002) could not teach in Italian universities because the Fascist regime precluded women from university careers but even after the Fascist regime’s demise she could only apply to teach in the Italian ginnasio comparable to American preparatory high schools. Nonetheless, Corti became one of the most relevant literary critics and writers of the twentieth century. See West, “Maria Corti,” in Marrone et al., Encyclopedia of Italian Literary Studies: A–J, 1: 513–15; also see Corti, “Autointervista.” 185. For information on some of the most relevant women Dante scholars, see n.2 and those mentioned throughout this chapter, as well the bibliography and catalog, under Audeh, Barolini, Braida, Corti, Ferrante, Parker, Reynolds, Verduin. For research relating to other gender issues in Dante scholarship, see Hollander, “Dante’s Harmonious Homosexuals”; Barolini, “Contemporaries Who Found Heterodoxy in Dante”; Barolini, “Dante’s Sympathy for the Other”; Cestaro, “Professing Dante LGBTQ”; and, Gardini, “Dante as a Gay Poet,” in Metamorphosing Dante: Appropriations, Manipulations, and Rewritings, edited by Manuele Gragnolati et al. Information on the many others who have and continue to contribute significantly to Dante studies can be found in the American Dante Bibliography by Year, https://www.dantesociety.org/publications/american-dante-bibliography.

Chapter 2 1. The Italian text of the Comedy to which I refer is the one established by Petrocchi, La Commedia secondo l’antica vulgata; and the English translation is by Hollander and Hollander, Inferno; Purgatorio; Paradiso; both texts are quoted from the Princeton Dante Project. 2. Bowles, “Were Musical Instruments Used in the Liturgical Service During the Middle Ages?” 44. 3. Van Schaik, The Harp in the Middle Ages, 12, 37. 4. Holsinger, Music, Body, and Desire in Medieval Culture, 2. 5. This verse is from Psalm 44 in the Vulgate, the edition that Dante most likely knew. The Catholic Church changed the Psalm numbering from Vulgate to Hebrew in 1969. The Vulgate’s Psalter conflates the Hebrew’s Psalms 9 and 10 into one, causing a numeration change. I have followed the Douay-Rheims version available at http://www.drbo.org/drl/index.htm. 6. Allen, On Farting, 32; Bernard of Clairvaux, Sermones in Cantica canticorum, Ser. 67.4–5, in PL 183: 1104, B–D. Trans. Irene Edmonds, On The Song of Songs, 7–9. 7. Augustine, De civitate Dei, 14:xxiv, 388–89.



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8. McGee, “In the Service of the Commune,” 728; McGee, “Giovanni Cellini, Piffero of Florence,” 220n4. 9. McGee, “In the Service of the Commune,” 728–29. 10. McGee, “In the Service of the Commune,” 729. 11. Stephens, Giants in Those Days, 228. 12. Augustine, De civitate Dei, 16:3. 13. Monelle, The Musical Topic, 35. 14. Ciabattoni, “Il dolce ruggito del tuono,” 65–86. 15. Van Schaik, The Harp in the Middle Ages, 12, 37. 16. Isidore of Seville, Sententiae de musica, 8, in Gerbert, Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra potissimum, 1:23. 17. “Barbitae” and “pectids” are clearly also chordophones, at least according to Isidore, who relies on former musico-literary authorities perhaps without a clear idea of what the actual instrument looked like. As Martin L. West suggests: “Isidore clearly understands pectis to be a stringed instrument, but he has probably taken it from some older source without having any clear conception of its nature” (Hellenica, 219). This entry from the National Encyclopedia gives a useful account of the barbiton: BARBITON, the name of an ancient Greek instrument. It had many strings and was made wholly or in part of ivory, but it differed from the lyre. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the name was used for an instrument of the viol class, probably by an error of spelling for the BARYTON. The original barbiton (or barbitos) is incorrectly attributed by a careless error to Anacreon, but the poet alludes to it as already in existence. It had more strings than the lyre, and greater resonance—hence the preference of Anacreon; and is sometimes called by the Greeks the “many sounding or Asiatic lyre.” Horace (Ode 1) alludes to it as a native of Lesbia (Asia Minor). (“Barbiton,” 2:252). I thank Anne-Emmanuelle Ceulemans, Jeffrey Dean, and Leofranc Holford Strevens for the help that they offered on this matter. 18. Paulinus of Nola, Poema XX, xii, ll.43–56; PL 61: 553 A–B. 19. Cullhed, The Shadow of Creusa, 489, with revisions. 20. Fontaine, “Les symbolismes de la cithare dans la poesie de Paulin de Nole,” in Den Boer et al., Romanitas et Christianitas, 130–34. 21. Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus: “Tensibilia sunt chordarum fila, sub arte religata, quae amodo plectro percussa mulcent aurium delectabiliter sensum: in quibus sunt species cythararum diversarum.” De institutione musica, 2: 6, in Gerbert, Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra potissimum, 1:16. See Heilbronn, “Master Adam and the Fat-Bellied Lute (Inf. XXX),” especially 56. 22. “Figura crucis Christi, quae in ligno et extensione nervorum mystice gerebatur.” De Psalmodiae bono, PL 68:371. Nicetius is today thought of as being the same as Niceta of Remesiana; however, he is listed as Nicetius Trevirensis in Migne’s collection. 23. I amended Hollander’s translation here, which had “lute” for cetra, because in Dante’s musical symbolism the lute has a very different connotation. 24. Richard of Saint Victor, Allegoriae in Vetus Testamentum, in PL 175:692. Richard quotes verbatim Niceta Ramesiana, De laude et utilitate spiritualium canticorum quae fiunt in ecclesia cristiana; seu de psalmodiae bono. In Gerbert, Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra potissimum, 1:10. Cesarius of Arles, too, in Expositio in Apocalypsim, IV, presents the same analogy between cithara and cross. See also Bonaventure’s Vitis mystica in Bernard of Calirvaux Opera omnia, PL 184:655. Bonaventure’s Vitis mystica seems to be included in Migne’s Patrologia Latina with works by Bernard of Clairvaux, but Migne does preface the work by saying that it is not by Bernard, as on page 636 of volume 184. 25. Author’s translation. 26. Bede, Allegoriae in Samuel, III, in PL 91:609, A-B.

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27. Author’s translation. 28. See http://www.britannica.com/topic/Islamic-arts/Music. 29. José Cea-Sanchez, a graduate student in the author’s 2016 course on Dante at Georgetown University. 30. Heilbronn, “Master Adam and the Fat-Bellied Lute. (Inf. XXX).” 31. Holsinger, Music, Body, and Desire in Medieval Culture, 2. 32. Ciabattoni, “Salmodia, parodia e perversione musicale,” in preparation. 33. Saint Ambrose, Enarrationes in XII davidicos, 40, in PL 14:1086, C. 34. Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos CXLIX, in PL 37:1953. 35. Iannucci, “Musical Imagery in the Mastro Adamo Episode,” in Da una riva e dall’altra, 112.

Chapter 3 1. The text and translation used in this chapter is from “The World of Dante,” Institute for Advanced Technologies in the Humanities, University of Virginia, http://www.worldofdante.org /comedy/dante/purgatory.xml/2.1. 2. Generale Instrumentum manumissionis, quoted in Rigo, Memoria classica e memoria biblica in Dante, 145n15. See also Wirszubski, Libertas. 3. Hollander, “Dante’s Cato Again,” in Kilgour and Lombardi, Dantean Dialogues, 66. Hollander’s contribution is an indispensable guide to the commentaries regarding Cato. 4. I presented the hypothesis of the solution for the so-called mystery of Cato at the Kalamazoo International Congress of Medieval Studies, May 2–5, 2002 (“Dante and the Classical Legacy: Influence of Juridical Roman Tradition in the Divine Comedy”) and have continued sharing it at scholarly conferences ever since. I found encouraging supporting evidence in the seminal work by Rigo, Memoria classica e memoria biblica in Dante, 149. In Rigo’s reading of Paradiso 25.1–12, one passage reads: “Segno di libertà è dunque il cappello, l’antico Pilleus, in una Firenze che si configura come nuova Roma” [“The hat called as pilleus is understood as a sign of liberty in a Florence that poses itself as a new Rome.”] (My translation.) The pilleus was the typical headgear that slaves in ancient Rome wore during the ceremony of emancipation, which in turn automatically conferred Roman citizenship. In that canto, Dante demands to return to Florence from exile as a full citizen. The evocation of Roman law in Rigo confirms that my hypothesis was not without basis. She does not develop this point because her analysis focused on the controversial interpretation of the “hat” in the canto and the Germanic approach to the concept of exile. 5. Marcus Junius Brutus, the adopted son of Julius Caesar—and his murderer—was Cato’s nephew by his sister Servilla, who allegedly had been a mistress of Caesar. Classical sources mention an embarrassing episode for Cato in the Senate due to a salacious letter from Servilla to Caesar. Brutus was also the son-in-law of Cato through his marriage to Porcia, Cato’s daughter. Dante chooses to ignore Cato’s marital behavior: Cato divorced his beloved wife Marcia to let his friend Quintus Hortensius Ortalus marry her. After Quintus died, Marcia returned to Cato. Although this was a legitimate practice in Rome to prevent a patrician lineage from extinction, Caesar criticized Cato, alledging that economic interest, rather than the interest of the Republic, moved Cato to divorce Marcia and remarry her once she became a rich widow. Dante is so partial to Cato as to compare Cato’s odd case with a metaphor of the soul that leaves God to go into the world, just to return to Him at the end (Convivium 4.15.18). 6. Hollander, “Dante’s Cato Again,” 93. 7. Among the best syntheses of Cato: Hollander, “Dante’s Cato Again” and Fubini, s.v. “Catone l’Uticense,” ED, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/catone-l-uticense_(Enciclopedia-Dantesca)/. 8. Hollander’s essay “Dante’s Cato Again” represents a magisterial chronicle of the entire corpus of commentaries debating the baffling presence of Cato in Purgatorio. (For another synthesis on the problematics concerning Cato, see Fubini, “Catone l’Uticense”). Hollander’s essay made it



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unnecessary for me to summarize the century-old debate regarding Cato, his status as a pagan, his view of monarchy, and the theological squabbling about the legitimacy of his suicide. Hollander does not reach any conclusion, though. He presents the state of the question, but for him Cato is destined to remain a mystery. My role is to move beyond this fatalistic resignation and provide evidence of my proposed solution: that Cato’s presence makes sense in the light of Roman law. 9. This younger Cato descended from that Marcus Porcius Cato known as “the Elder” or “the Censor,” who had been a rabid enemy of Carthage and who concluded all his public speeches with the admonition “Carthago delenda est!” [“Carthage must be destroyed!”] Indeed, the Punic city would be destroyed in 146 BCE, two years after Cato the Censor’s death. In a curious circumstance, a century later, the very descendent of the worst enemy of Carthage took his life near the city. 10. Cato owes his golden legend to his son-in-law, Cicero, who modeled the title character of his Brutus after him. In Brutus, Cicero claims Cato as the first eloquent Stoic, and he is joined by Sallust in demonstrating Cato’s integrity toward the good of the state. For example, in the election of 54 BCE, their hero was appointed to overview the electoral process. 11. Plutarch, “The Life of Cato the Younger,” in Plutarch’s Lives, 393–403. 12. Lucan, Pharsalia. In Book 2.234–391; “guard liberty,” 282; “I will walk to your . . .” 301–302. 13. Joyce, in Lucan, Pharsalia, xvi. 14. Marchesi, Dante and Augustine. See also footnote 2 in that volume for a selected biography on this topic. 15. See Petrarca, Gli uomini illustri, xxiv, 586–607. Petrarch expresses his disdain toward Cato in several other scripts, such as Fam., 2.3.10; Disp. 16, 118; Sen. 8, 2, 28–33; e De rem. 2, 98; 2.118, etc. 16. See Piciché, “Diritto e letteratura a dialogo nella tradizione italiana,” Forum Italicum 53, no. 2 (August 2019): 201–31. 17. Sum. Theol., Suppl. 96 6 ad 6. 18. Marchesi, Dante and Augustine, 167. 19. Branca, Tutte le opere di Giovanni Boccaccio, 238. 20. Cato led the republican army across a desert. Any comparison between Cato and Moses (Hollander, “Dante’s Cato Again,” 73) seems to me Pindaric. It is true that both characters give laws and are leaders, but Cato will not bring his people to victory. 21. Auerbach, “Cavalcanti and Farinata,” 194. See also Auerbach, Figura, 11–76. 22. Wetherbee, The Ancient Flame, 101. 23. Virgil, Aeneid, 8.670. 24. Interestingly, the Italian word cattivo means both “prisoner” and “bad,” from the Latin captivus diaboli, which means “prisoner of the devil”. 25. The original is in Codex Vaticano-Palatino, 1729. 26. “[S]acrosante leggi esemplante a immagine della natura giustizia [  .  .  . ] l’osservanza delle quali, se lieta, se spontanea, non solo si prova non essere servitù; che anzi a chi bene consideri mostra di essere la più perfetta libertà.” My translation. Monti, Dantis Alagherii Epistolae, 162, 129–69. 27. Barolini, “Multiculturalismo medievale e teologia dell’Inferno dantesco,” 23. 28. Italian: “come se altra fosse la civiltà fiorentina e altra la romana?” in Monti, Dantis Alagherii Epistolae, 142. My translation. 29. Italian: “aborrendo il giogo di libertà, vi levaste contro la maestà del principe romano, re del mondo e ministro di Dio?” Monti, Dantis Alagherii Epistolae, 140. 30. From a legal point of view, the status of souls in Purgatory should be compared to citizenship and/or legal personality (personalità giuridica), versus the full “ability to act” (capacità di agire) of the souls in Heaven. The souls of Purgatory are not yet fully formed citizens of Heaven and are like minors and other categories in terrestrial societies. 31. Mazzotta, Dante, Poet of the Desert. 32. “[P]erò li è conceduto che d’Egitto/Vegna in Ierusalemme per vedere.”

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33. In Purgatory, the presence of the night, the snake of temptation, the episodes of discomfort or weakness (such the one in Canto 2 that will force Cato to intervene), etc., are a mere dramatization of the dangers that one finds on the penitentiary walk during mortal life. 34. Such as in Paradiso 6; Convivio 4.4–5; De Monarchia 2. 35. Marchesi, Dante and Augustine, 155–56. 36. “la vittoria di Cesare su Catone, a Tapso, premessa del suicidio eroico dell’irriducibile repubblicano, rappresenta [  .  .  . ] il culmine della marcia trionfale di Cesare, che a sua volta campeggia al centro del profilo della storia di Roma concepita come marcia trionfale dell’aquila imperiale” (my translation). Luciano Canfora, “Il destino imperiale della libertà. Catone e Cesare secondo Dante,” Corriere della Sera, January 7, 2015, 35. https://www.pressreader.com/italy/corriere-della-sera /20150107/282372627985053. 37. Interestingly, in the King James Bible, the Judean chiefs are called “dukes” (Genesis 36:15). 38. Mazzotta, Dante, Poet of the Desert, 30. 39. The presence of Greek influence is visible in the corpus. It informs generally those rules with a higher degree of psychology, nuance, and thoughtfulness. 40. The Divine Comedy, trans. Charles Hubert Sisson. 41. Since antiquity, many have joked that the Roman strategy in establishing laws is to borrow them from Greece. 42. The letter “J” first appears in the medieval period. 43. See Bianchini Jesurum, Dante giurista?, in particular: 83–86, and Ercole, Il pensiero politico di Dante, 2:9–37. 44. My translation. 45. See Di Fonzo, “Dante tra diritto, letteratura e politica.” 46. While researching this chapter I had the honor to enjoy a brief exchange of ideas with Professor Francisco Rico at the end of a Lectio Magistralis in Rome. The famous Spanish philologist, while referring to Petrarch (but his opinion is applicable to Dante), firmly insisted on consideration of the spirit of the time as a source, without necessarily looking for the exact philological source of a text. For the same reason, one can say that the spirit of the age of Dante was deeply juridical, and this explains Dante’s knowledge of juridical concepts. May 23, 2017. 47. ad ora ad ora m’insegnavate come l’uom s’etterna: “ . . . And time and again / instructed me how man may be eternal” (Inf. 15.83–84). 48. It is thought that Dante visited Bologna, perhaps in 1287 and again in 1302–1304, although concrete evidence is lacking. 49. See Alighieri, De Monarchia. 50. See also Gorni, “Filologia e nazionalismo,” in Dante prima della Commedia, 217–251. For a less juridically focused interpretation of the poem, see López Cortezo, “Analisi di ‘Tre donne intorno al cor mi son venute’,” in Varela-Portas de Orduña, Tre donne intorno al cor me son venute, 157–82, https:// webs.ucm.es/info/italiano/acd/tenzone/biblioteca/tre_donne/premessa.pdf. 51. Aristotle, Ethic Nichomachean, trans. Harris Rackham; original from Aristotle’s Ethica Nicomachea, 393–407. 52. Aulus Gellius, Noctes atticae 10.23.4: “mulieri iudex pro censore est, imperium quod videtur habet, si quid perverse taetreque factum est a muliere; multitatur, si vinum bibit.” [“The judge is the censor of the wife. When an improper or indecent action has been committed, he has the authority to decide what to do. It is customary to punish her, if she drinks wine.”] 53. Valerius Maximus, Factorum et Dictorum Memorabilium Libri Novem 2.1.3. My translation. 54. “Il legame esistente tra letteratura e diritto nel Medievo è un legame forte, non solo sotto il profilo materiale (i giuristi erano spesso i detentori del potere e della cultura), ma anche sotto il profile teorico.” Di Fonzo, Dante e la tradizione giuridica, 17. My translation. See https://www.ibs.it /dante-tradizione-giuridica-libro-claudia-di-fonzo/e/9788843077915. 55. Steinberg, Dante and the Limits of the Law.



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56. Marchesi, Dante and Augustine, 170. 57. “La letteratura diventa fonte autoritaria del diritto e il diritto talvolta assume veste letteraria,” Di Fonzo, “Dante tra diritto, letteratura e politica,” 18. My translation. (See n. 53.) 58. See Corti, “Il modello analogico del pensiero medievale dantesco,” in Picone, Dante e le forme dell’allegoresi, 11–20. 59. Hollander, “Dante’s Cato Again,” 68.

Chapter 4 1. Birk began illustrations of the Inferno in 2001 and completed 100 engravings for all three canticles by 2005. He then translated the poem with Marcus Sanders to accompany the illustrations. These volumes, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso, published by Trillium Press as a three-volume set in a limited edition of 100 copies with embossed leather-bound covers and a total of 210 of Birk’s original hand-signed lithographs, are available at the Library of Congress (copy 95/100). Birk’s same adaptation and illustrations were published by Chronicle Books in paperback form between 2004 and 2006. He also executed approximately ten large, full-color paintings relating to the Comedy. Birk’s film, Inferno, was produced in collaboration with puppeteer Paul Zaloom, directed by Sean Meredith, and released in 2007. 2. Rentschler, German Film and Literature, 2. 3. Benjamin, “The Task of the Translator,” in Venuti, The Translation Studies Reader, 75–82. 4. Olson, “Dante’s Urban American Vernacular: Sandow Birk’s Comedy.” 5. The Comedy claims a long history of adaptations within various arts and media. See, among others, Braida and Calè, Dante on View, and the bibliography provided on the website Dante Today: Citings and Sightings of Dante’s Works in Contemporary Culture, https://research.bowdoin.edu /dante-today/bibliography/. 6. Benjamin, “Task,” 79–80. 7. Benjamin, “Task,” 77. 8. See Hawkins, “Moderno Uso,” in Birk and Sanders, Dante’s Paradiso, xiv. 9. From Fugelso, “‘It’s More a Part of Living Culture.’” 10. Fugelso, “‘It’s More a Part of Living Culture’.” 11. Birk himself has noted that his adaptation does not discretely translate these three realms to these three different cities. Instead, there are images from all three cities scattered throughout the three canticles. 12. Birk and Sanders, Dante’s “Purgatorio,” 167. 13. Sandow Birk, personal correspondence with author, September 15, 2017. 14. Hollander and Hollander, Paradiso. 15. Also see Barolini, “Dante’s Sympathy for the Other, or the Non-Stereotyping Imagination,” especially 20–23. 16. Hollander and Hollander, Paradiso. 17. Barolini, “Dante’s Sympathy for the Other,” 177. 18. See, among others, the contributions in Zilkowski, Dante and Islam; Stone, Dante’s Pluralism and the Islamic Philosophy of Religion; and Schildgen, Dante and the Orient.

Chapter 5 1. Also known as Nicolaus Laurentii and also Niccolò della Magna. 2. Nuovo and Sandal, Il libro nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 73. 3. Veneziani, “Alle origini dell’editoria dantesca,” Studi-I, 20. At present we have evidence of about eight hundred extant manuscripts of The Divine Comedy; see the website of Società Dantesca Italiana, Dante Online, at https://www.danteonline.it/italiano/codici_indice.htm.

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Notes to Pages 60–67

4. The printing press of the monastery of San Jacopo di Ripoli was one of the earliest presses to operate in late medieval Florence, producing secular as well as religious texts. The expense book or “Diario” of the Printing Press of S. Jacopo di Ripoli 1476–1484 was discovered in the monastery archive in the eighteenth century and contains a wealth of information on clients, costs, and collaborators, as well as materials and equipment, subjects of the printed output, and the day-to-day activities of the press. 5. Atkinson, Debts, Dowries, Donkeys. Bernardo Machiavelli (Messer Bernardo) was the father of Niccolò Machiavelli. His surviving diary of life in Florence 1474–1487 paints a colorful picture of the life of a wealthy landowner and humanist during the Medici reign. Bernardo was an early collector of printed books and left a catalog of his library. 6. Atkinson, Debts, Dowries, Donkeys, 142–43. A priest or monk known as Niccolò Tedesco worked in Rome, then in Florence, making important cartographic contributions to both manuscript and printed Ptolemy atlases and globes. Whether he and the printer Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna were one and the same is not clear, but it seems unlikely. 7. Ridolfi, “Contributi sopra Niccolò Tedesco,” 3. 8. Ridolfi, La stampa in Firenze nel secolo XV, 51n3. 9. ISTC, id00029000 at http://data.cerl.org/istc/id00029000. 10. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa e gli inizi del commercio del Comento sopra la Comedia,” in Böninger and Procaccioli, Per Cristoforo Landino lettore di Dante, 106n19. 11. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” in Gentile, Sandro Botticelli, pittore della Divina Commedia, 1:44; Cardini, Cristoforo Landino, 1:99. 12. Ridolfi, “Contributi sopra Niccolò Tedesco,” 4. While Ridolfi was convinced that Niccolò Tedesco and Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna were one and the same person, others are decidedly not convinced. It is possible that the illuminated Ptolemy works cited in Lorenzo de’ Medici’s library were by the former and not the latter. 13. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 98–99. The discovery is astonishing, coming more than five hundred years after the printing of the book. 14. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 100, 111–13. 15. Vasari, “Vita di Marcantonio Bolognese e d’altri intagliatori di stampe,” in Le Opere, 1:682. 16. Landino, Comento sopra la Comedia, 1:97. 17. Vasari, “Vita di Sandro Botticelli, pittore fiorentino,” Le Opere, 1:387. 18. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 99. 19. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 98–99, 112–14. 20. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 98, 115. 21. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 44–47. 22. Donati, Il Botticelli e le prime illustrazioni della Divina Commedia, 34. 23. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 46. 24. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia (Florence: Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna, 1481), Inferno, 1; Incun. 1481.D3, copy 2, Vollbehr collection, Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections. 25. Dante Alighieri, La Commedia (Florence: Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna. 1481), Inferno, 1; Incun. 1481.D3, copy 1, LC Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection #229, Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections. See chapter 6, Catalog no. 2, Fig. 6.4. 26. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 104. 27. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 104–105. 28. Hind, Early Italian Engraving, 100–10. 29. ISTC lists over 160 copies in known collections presently. 30. Donati, Il Botticelli e le prime illustrazioni della Divina Commedia, 35–36. 31. Dreyer, “Botticelli’s Series of Engravings of ‘1481’.” 32. Nuovo and Sandal, Il libro nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 72. 33. Nuovo and Sandal, Il libro nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 80.



Notes to Pages 67–74

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34. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 104. 35. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 46. 36. The ninety-two extant drawings by Botticelli are divided between the Codex Hamilton 201 Cim. 33 (Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin) and Codex Reginensis Latinus 1896 (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana). See Dreyer and Risset, La Divina Commedia. Dante Alighieri, illustrazioni Sandro Botticelli, 7, 28. This beautiful limited-edition facsimile reproduces all of Botticelli’s drawings in their original size, format, and colors, in correspondence with their specific cantos. 37. Bellini, “Le due serie di disegni del Botticelli per la Commedia” in Gizzi, Botticelli e Dante, 41–50; see also Hind, Early Italian Engraving, 99. 38. Donati, Il Botticelli e le prime illustrazioni della Divina Commedia, 11. Also see Hind, Early Italian Engraving, 100. The parchment drawings measure approximately 320 x 470mm (http://www.smb -digital.de) while the engraved prints in the 1481 Dante measure approximately 97mm x 174mm (LC Rosenwald copy). 39. Zucker, Early Italian Masters, 223; and Baroni, “L’autore delle incisioni del Comento e la controversa figura di Baccio Baldini” in Böninger and Procaccioli, Per Cristoforo Landino Lettore di Dante, 155–71. 40. Donati, Il Botticelli e le prime illustrazioni della Divina Commedia, 32. 41. Baroni, “L’autore delle incisioni del Comento,” 165. 42. See the Library of Congress copy of Boninus de Boninis Divina Commedia of 1487, Incun.1487 .D3. See Catalog no. 4, Figs. 8–9 in chapter 6. 43. Landino, Comento sopra la Comedia, 91. 44. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 44–45. 45. Böninger, “Il contratto per la stampa,” 107. 46. Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 44. 47. Stevenson, “Briquet and the Future of Paper Studies,” xxxiii. 48. Nuovo and Sandal, Il Libro nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 27. 49. Ridolfi, Le filigrane dei paleotipi, saggio metodologico, 15. 50. Lipparoni, “Produzione e commercio della carta nel XV secolo,” 15–31. 51. One ream is five hundred sheets of paper. 52. Albro, Fabriano: City of Medieval and Renaissance Papermaking, 115–17. At least four papermakers were involved in a conspiracy against the Chiavelli in 1435, when almost all male members of the family were killed in an attack in the cathedral of S. Venanzio of Fabriano. It is generally thought that the uprising was the result of the Chiavelli takeover of many paper mills run by guild members, thus weakening the guilds’ political power. 53. Two historical collections of paper samples, the Aurelio and the Augusto Zonghi collections, belonging to the Fabriano Museum of Paper and the Watermark, and the Fondazione Fedrigoni Fabriano (FFF) respectively, comprise samples of papers made in the Fabriano area from the 1200s to the 1600s. Beta-radiograph watermark images taken by the author of papers in the two 1481 Dante Commedia volumes in the Library of Congress collections were compared to historic paper samples with the same watermarks in Fabriano in the Augusto Zonghi collection. The latter collection was acquired by FFF, the foundation arm of the Cartiere Miliani Fabriano-Fedrigoni Group paper mills (see illustrations 5.8 and 5.9). The same cardinal’s hat watermark is found in Nicholo’s Monte santo di Dio of 1475 in the Lessing Rosenwald collection at LC, along with other Fabriano identified watermarks. 54. Conway, The Diario of the Printing Press of San Jacopo di Ripoli, 337–43; and Scapecchi, “Cristoforo Landino, Niccolò di Lorenzo e la ‘Commedia’,” 45. 55. Hind, Early Italian Engraving, 102; Donati, Il Botticelli e le prime illustrazioni della Divina Commedia 35. 56. Nuovo, Il Commercio librario nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 38; Atkinson, Debts, Dowries, Donkeys, 141. 57. Nuovo, Il Commercio librario nell’Italia del Rinascimento, 42–43.

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Notes to Pages 74–132

58. The print paper was measured at .13mm and the text paper varied from .16–.26mm. Fucini, in Graziaplena and Livesey, “L’evoluzione delle forme per la produzione della carta in epoca tardo medievale attraverso l’analisi dei dati strumentali,” 185–201, especially 189. 59. Albro, Fabriano, City of Medieval and Renaissance Papermaking, 157–63. 60. Boschetto, “Ritratto di Bernardo d’Antonio degli Alberti” in Böninger and Procaccioli, Per Cristoforo Landino Lettore di Dante, 134. 61. ISTC lists the locations of over 160 copies of the volume. 62. Landino, Comento sopra la Comedia, 96. 63. Landino, Comento sopra la Comedia, 98–99.

Chapter 6 1. As documented in the manuscript of the grant ASV, NC, reg. 1, c.55r, held at Venetian State Archives. 2. Goffis, “Berardi, Cristoforo,” ED, https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/cristoforo-berardi _%28Enciclopedia-Dantesca%29/. 3. For more information on both copies, see chapter 5 “A Florentine First.” 4. Petrella, Dante Alighieri, Commedia, Brescia, Bonino Bonini, 1487, 12:4. Petrella says that the sixty-eight illustrations were created from sixty woodblocks of which eight were repurposed for the remaining illustrations. Petrella points out that this is reason for some striking resemblances among some of these illustrations. 5. See Jackson and Rothkopf, Book Talk, 63. 6. See LC online catalog (OPAC) at https://lccn.loc.gov/42043663. 7. See Gilson, Reading Dante in the Renaissance, 43; Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 54; Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy, 59. 8. See next catalog entry. Also, Parker, Commentary and Ideology, 85, 144; Gilson, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy, 175–94. 9. Ascarelli-Menato, 369. 10. See Volkmann, Iconografia dantesca, 117–18. 11. “The Divina Commedia of Dante Alighieri”; “Dante and His Latest Translators.” 12. See Dinoia, “Alcune aggiunte e precisazioni su Tommaso Piroli incisore,” 136, 139–40, 143nn38– 39; Symmons, “John Flaxman and Francisco Goya: Infernos Transcribed,” 510–12. 13. See Beatty, “A Century of Cary’s Dante.” 14. Norton, “Remarks of Mr. Norton at the Annual Meeting of the Dante Society, May 16, 1882.” 15. See PQ4315.21 .P28 Rare Book Coll. http://lccn.loc.gov/21010569. 16. The first English edition to publish Doré’s engravings with Cary’s translation was Cassell, Petter, and Gulpin’s London edition 1865. Doré’s engravings appeared for the first time in the French edition of the Inferno published in 1861 by Louis Hatchette. The Library holds an 1862 copy of L’Enfer de Dante Alighieri (Paris: L. Hatchette, 1862) at https://lccn.loc.gov/16010605. 17. Sayers, “Introduction,” Hell, 55–56. 18. Singleton, “Review,” 394. 19. Sayers, “Introduction,” Hell, 9. 20. Cachey, “Between Hermeneutics and Poetics,” 151. 21. Cherchi, “The Translations of Dante’s Comedy in America,” in De Rooy, Divine Comedies for the New Millennium, 31–34. 22. Calè, “From Dante’s Inferno to A TV Dante,” 176. 23. Hollander, “Note on the Translation,” in Alighieri, Inferno, vii–ix. 24. Quotation from Cheverton, “L.A.’s ‘Inferno’.” 25. Also see Olson, chapter 4, “Dante in a Global World: Sandow Birk’s Divine Comedy,” in this volume.



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26. Bang, “A Note on the Translation,” in Dante Alighieri. Inferno, 7. 27. See OCLC for the various translations available in Portuguese, Russian, Korean, and other languages at https://firstsearch.oclc.org/. 28. Park, A Comparative Study of Korean Literature, 139. 29. Park, A Comparative Study of Korean Literature, 136–37.

Bibliography

With the exception of a few online sources and books, all of the books, periodicals, manuscripts, prints, sound recordings, and electronic resources that are cited in this bibliography are in the collections of the Library of Congress and are available to the public.

Incunabula and Rare Books Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Venice: Vindelinus de Spira, 1477. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Florence: Nicolaus Laurentii, 1481. Rare Book and Special Collections, Lessing J Rosenwald Collection, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Florence: Nicolaus Laurentii, 1481. Rare Book and Special Collections, Otto H. F. Vollbehr Collection, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Venice: Octavianus Scotus, 1484. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Brescia: Boninus de Boninis, 1487. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Commedia. Venice: Bernardinus Benalius and Mattheus Capcasa, 1491 [1492]. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Comedia, Venice: Franciscus Marcolinus, 1544. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta diuino, con l’espositione di Christophoro Landino. Venice: Jacobus de Burgofranco and Lucas Antonius Giunta, 1529. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Dante con l’espositione di Christoforo Landino. Venice: Joannes Baptista Sessa, 1564. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lvcca. Venice: Petrus de Fine, 1568. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. La Divina commedia di Dante Alighieri, nobile Fiorentino, ridotta a miglior lezione dagli Accademici della Crusca. Con Privilegio. Florence: Domenico Manzani, 1595. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Opere del divino poeta Danthe con svoi comenti. Venice: Bernardinus Stagninus, 1512. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Opere di Dante Alighieri. Venice: A. Zatta, 1757–1758. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Alighieri, Dante. Le terze rime. Venice: Aldus Manutius, 1502. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress.



185

186

Bibliography

English and American Special Collections Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Inferno, translated by the Rev. Henry Francis Cary, M. A., from the original of Dante Alighieri, and illustrated with the designs of M. Gustave Doré. New York: P. F. Collier, ca. 1885. Alighieri, Dante. La divina commedia, or The divine vision of Dante Alighieri in Italian & English. The Italian text edited by Mario Casella, with the English version of Henry Francis Cary and 42 illustrations after the drawings by Sandro Botticelli. London: The Nonesuch Press, 1928. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, consisting of the Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. Translated into English verse with preliminary essays, notes, and illustrations, by the Rev. Henry Boyd, A.M., Chaplain to the Right Honourable the Lord Viscount Charleville. 3 vols. London: Printed by A. Strahan, New Street Square; for T. Cadell Jun. and W. Davies in The Strand, 1802. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1867. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress, Brown, William Wells. Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States. Boston: J. Redpath, 1864. Melville, Herman. Mardi; and a Voyage Thither. New York: Harper, 1849. Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress. Wilde, Richard Henry. “The Life and Times Dante.” Papers. Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

Modern English and American Translations Alighieri, Dante. Convivio. Edited by Franca Brambilla Ageno. Florence: Le Lettere, 1995. Alighieri, Dante. Il Convivio = The Banquet. Translated by Richard Lansing. New York: Garland, 1990. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Inferno. [Limited-edition 95/100, at Library of Congress]. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Translated by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Brisbane, CA: Trillium Press, 2003. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Inferno. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Text adapted by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Preface by Doug Harvey. Introduction by Michael F. Meister. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2004. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Paradiso. [Limited-edition 95/100, at Library of Congress]. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Translated by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Brisbane, CA: Trillium Press, 2005. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Paradiso. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Text adapted by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Preface by Peter S. Hawkins. Foreword by Mary Campbell. Introduction by Michael F. Meister. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2005. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Purgatorio. [Limited-edition 95/100, at Library of Congress]. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Translated by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Brisbane, CA: Trillium Press, 2004. Alighieri, Dante. Dante’s Purgatorio. Illustrated by Sandow Birk. Text adapted by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders. Preface by Marcia Tanner. Introduction by Michael F. Meister. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2005. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. Translated by Charles Hubert Sisson. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. Translated by John Ciardi. Braille. Washington, DC: National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress, 2000. National Braille Press, transcribing agency. National Braille Press, distributor. http://nlscatalog.loc.gov /cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?DB=local&PAGE=First. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy: Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. Translated by Dorothy L. Sayers and Barbara Reynolds. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books [1950–1963; v. 2, 1963]. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. I. Inferno. Translated, with a commentary, by Charles S. Singleton. Bollingen Series, LXXX. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1970. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. II. Purgatorio. Translated, with a commentary, by Charles S. Singleton. Bollingen Series, LXXX. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973.



Bibliography

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Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. III. Paradiso. Translated, with a commentary, by Charles S. Singleton. Bollingen Series, LXXX. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, I. Inferno. A verse translation, with introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum. Drawings by Barry Moser. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, II. Purgatorio. A verse translation, with introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum. Drawings by Barry Moser. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, III. Paradiso. A verse translation, with introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum. Drawings by Barry Moser. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. A verse translation by Tom Phillips with images and commentary. London: Talfourd Press, 1983. Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno. Translated in Verse by John Ciardi. Historical Introduction by A. T. McAllister. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1954. Alighieri, Dante. Inferno. Translated by Robert and Jean Hollander. Introduction and notes by Robert Hollander. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Alighieri, Dante. Inferno. Translated with an Introduction and Notes by Mary Jo Bang. Illustrations by Henrik Drescher. Minneapolis, MN: Graywolf Press, 2012. Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno of Dante. A new verse translation by Robert Pinsky; illustrated by Michael Mazur; with notes by Nicole Pinsky. Foreword by John Freccero. 1st edition. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1994. Alighieri, Dante. The Paradiso. A verse rendering for the modern reader by John Ciardi. Introduction by John Freccero. New York: New American Library, 1970. Alighieri, Dante. Paradiso. Translated by Robert and Jean Hollander. Introduction and notes by Robert Hollander. New York: Doubleday, 2007. Alighieri, Dante. The Purgatorio. A Verse Translation for the Modern Reader, by John Ciardi. Introduction by Archibald T. MacAllister. New York: The New American Library, 1961. Alighieri, Dante. Purgatorio. Translated by Robert and Jean Hollander. Introduction and notes by Robert Hollander. New York: Doubleday, 2003.

Translations of the Comedy in Other Languages Alig’eri, Dante. Bozhestvennaia komediia: Chistilishche [The Divine Comedy: Purgatory], translated with notes by Mikhail Lozinskiĭ. Introductory article by A. K. Dzhivelegov. Moscow: OGIz, 1944. Alighieri, Dante. O Inferno, poema em trinta e quatro cantos. Illustrado com as celebres composições de Gustavo Doré. Versão Portugueza em tercetos por Domingo Ennes. Acompanhada do texto italiano, seguida da notas e antecedida de uma breve noticia preliminar por Xavier da Cunha, 2o Conservador da Bibliotheca Nacional de Lisboa. Lisbon: David Corazzi, 1887. Dantte, Sin’gok. Chŏng Mun-hyang yŏk [pʻyŏnjip Chŏng Sŏng-suk]. [Pyongyang]: Munye Chʻulpʻansa, 1988.

Secondary Sources Abhba [Rev. Beaver Henry Blacker]. “The REV. Henry Francis Cary.” Notes and Queries s4-VII, no. 164 (1871): 137. https://doi.org/10.1093/nq/s4-VII.164.137b. Acocella, Joan. “Cloud Nine: A New Translation of The Paradiso.” New Yorker, Sept. 3, 2007. https:// www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/09/03/cloud-nine. Acocella, Joan. “What the Hell: Dante in Translation and in Dan Brown’s New Novel,” New Yorker, May 27, 2013. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/05/27/what-the-hell. Agamben, Giorgio. Homo sacer: Il potere sovrano e la nuda vita. Turin: Einaudi, 1995.

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Ahern, John. “Vulgar Eloquence.” New York Times, Jan. 1, 1995. https://archive.nytimes.com/www .nytimes.com/books/97/11/23/nnp/17672.html. Akhmatova, Anna A. My Half Century: Selected Prose. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1997. Albro, Sylvia R. Fabriano: City of Medieval and Renaissance Papermaking. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press, 2016. Aleksandrov, Vladimir Borisovich. “Russkij Dante.” In Li︠ u︡ di i knigi; sbornik stateĭ. 334–39. Moskva: Sovetskiĭ pisatelʹ, 1956. Alighieri, Dante. De Monarchia. Edited by Diego Quaglioni. Milan: Mondadori, 2015. Allen, Valerie. On Farting: Language and Laughter in the Middle Ages. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Altieri, Joan Taber. “Dante’s Inferno in Translation.” Translation Review 54, no. 1 (1998): 28–34. Altrocchi, Rudolph. “Dante’s American Pilgrimage. Angelina La Piana.” Modern Philology 46, no. 4 (1949): 276–277. https://doi.org/10.1086/388810. Andrews, William L. To Tell a Free Story: The First Century of Afro-American Autobiography, 1760–1865. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1986. Annual Reports of the Dante Society, no. 1 (May 16, 1882): 1–25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40114201. Annual Reports of the Dante Society, no. 55–67 (1951): i-xv, 1–13. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40165979. Annual Reports of the Dante Society, no. 68–72 (1954): i–x, 1–49. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40166028. Annual Report of the Dante Society, with Accompanying Papers, no. 73 (1955): i–xix, 1–66. http://www. jstor.org/stable/40166013. Apostol, Jane, and Lute Pease. “Lute Pease of the Pacific Monthly.” Pacific Northwest Quarterly 74, no. 3 ( July 1983): 98–105. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40490547. Aristotle. Aristotle’s Ethica Nicomachea. Edited by J. Bywater. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1894. Aristotle. Ethic Nichomachean. Translated by Harris Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1934. Arnaldi, Girolamo, and Manlio Pastore Stocchi, eds. Dal Primo Quattrocento al concilio di Trento. Vol. 3, parts 1–3, of Storia della cultura veneta. Vicenza, Italy: Neri Pozza Editore, 1980–1981. Ascarelli, Fernanda, and Marco Menato, eds. La tipografia del ‘500 in Italia. Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1989. Ascoli, Albert Russell. “Blinding the Cyclops: Petrarch after Dante.” In Petrarch and Dante: Anti-Dantism, Metaphysics, Tradition. Edited by Zygmunt G. Barański, Theodore J. Cachey Jr., and Demetrio S. Yocum, 114–73. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2009. Ascoli, Albert Russell. “Dante After Dante.” In Dante for the New Millennium. Edited by Teodolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey, 349–68. New York: Fordham University Press, 2003. Ascoli, Albert Russell. Dante and the Making of a Modern Author. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Ascoli, Albert Russell. “Palinode and History in the Oeuvre of Dante.” In Dante Now: Current Trends in Dante Studies. Edited by Theodore Cachey, Jr., 155–86. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1995. Ashley, Frederick William. The Story of the Vollbehr Collection of Incunabula: An Address Delivered before the Eleventh Annual Conference on Printing Education at a Session in the Coolidge Auditorium. Library of Congress, June 27, 1932. Providence, RI: Privately printed, [1934]. Atkinson, Catherine. Debts, Dowries, Donkeys: The Diary of Niccolò Machiavelli’s Father, Messer Bernardo, in Quattrocento Florence. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2002. Audeh, Aida. “Dufau’s La Mort d’Ugolin: Dante, Nationalism, and French Art, c. 1800.” In Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century. Edited by Aida Audeh and Nick Havely, 141–63. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Audeh, Aida. “Gustave Doré’s Illustrations for Dante’s Divine Comedy: Innovation, Influence, and Reception.” Studies in Medievalism 28 (2009): 125–64. Audeh, Aida, and Nick Havely, eds. Dante in the Long Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.



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Websites Accademia della Crusca. Florence, Italy: Accademia della Crusca, 2019. http://www.accademia dellacrusca.it/. Dante Online. Società Dantesca Italiana. Florence, Italy: Società Dantesca Italiana. http://www.dante online.it/italiano/vita_indice.htm. Dante Society of America. Newtonville, MA: Dante Society of America. https://www.dantesociety. org/. Dante Today: Citings and Sightings of Dante’s Works in Contemporary Culture, https://research. bowdoin.edu/dante-today/bibliography/. Dante Worlds. Guy P. Raffa. Austin: University of Texas at Austin, 2002–2007. http://danteworlds. laits.utexas.edu/. Dartmouth Dante Project, The. Robert Hollander, Stephen Campbell, Simone Marchesi, and Dartmouth College. Hanover, NH: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 2021. http://dante.dartmouth. edu/. Digital Dante: Original Research and Ideas. Columbia University Italian Department in Partnership with Columbia University Libraries, 2014–2019. https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/. Manutius Network 2015. Consortium of European Research Libraries. London: Consortium of European Research Libraries, 2017. https://www.cerl.org/collaboration/manutius_network_2015 /main. Princeton Dante Project, The. Princeton University, Robert Hollander, and Giorgio Petrocchi. Prince­ ton, NJ: Trustees of Princeton University and Robert Hollander, 1999–2000. https://dante. princeton.edu. Renaissance Dante in Print (1472–1629). Theodore J. Cachey, Jr. and Louis E. Jordan. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Library, 1995–. http://www3.nd.edu/~italnet/Dante/. World of Dante, The. Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, University of Virginia. http://www.worldofdante.org.

About the Contributors

Sylvia R. Albro is a senior paper conservator at the Library of Congress and the author of Fabriano: City of Medieval and Renaissance Papermaking (2016). From 1992–2006 she was also a guest instructor at the European School for the Conservation of Library Materials in Spoleto, Italy. She holds a B.A. in fine arts and Italian from the University of Santa Clara in California and an M.A. and a certificate of advanced study in conservation from the Cooperstown Graduate Program in the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, State University at Oneonta, New York. Francesco Ciabattoni is a professor of Italian literature at Georgetown University and a specialist in Dante and medieval studies. He is the author of Dante’s Journey to Polyphony (2010) and has published articles on Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio. His research focuses on Dante and the Middle Ages, the twentieth-century short story, and the interplay of music and literature. He received his Laurea in Lettere from the Università degli Studi di Torino and his Ph.D. in Italian Studies from Johns Hopkins University. Kristina M. Olson is an associate professor of Italian in the Department of Modern and Classical Languages at George Mason University. She is the author of Courtesy Lost: Dante, Boccaccio, and the Literature of History (2014) and several articles on Dante, Boccaccio, and Petrarch. She is the coeditor of three volumes: Open City: Seven Writers in Postwar Rome (1997); Boccaccio 1313–2013 (2015); and Approaches to Teaching Dante’s Divine Comedy (2nd ed.) with the Modern Language Association (2020). She is the president of the American Boccaccio Association (2020–2023) and served as the vice president of the Dante Society of America for two years (2016–2018). She earned her Ph.D. at Columbia University. Bernardo Piciché is an associate professor of International Studies at the School of World Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. His research interests include Mediterranean studies, film studies, and Roman law applied to medieval literature. He is the author of Argisto Giuffredi: Gentiluomo Borghese nel vicereame di Sicilia (2006). At the University of Rome, he earned a Laurea in law and a Laurea in Italian literature; he also holds an M.A. in diplomatic studies from the Italian Society for

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About the Contributors

International Organizations, Rome; an M.A. in contemporary Italian literature from the University of Paris; and an M.A., M.Phil, and Ph.D. in in medieval and Renaissance literature from Yale University. Lucia Alma Wolf is the Italian reference librarian and Italian collections specialist in the European Division at the Library of Congress. She has written extensively on medieval and Renaissance institutions and related archival materials. After graduating from the University of Rome (La Sapienza), where she studied medieval history, she earned a B.A. in English literature at the University of Maryland. She also holds M.A. degrees in English literature from George Mason University and in Library and Information Science from the University of Maryland.

Illustration Credits

Images noted LAW were photographed by Lucia Alma Wolf, Library of Congress. Cover and Figs. 6.65 and 6.66: Izdatel’stvo Muzyka. Courtesy of Mark Zilberquit. Page xviii: LAW. Fig. 1.1: Courtesy of the artist, Catharine Clark Gallery, San Francisco, Koplin Del Rio Gallery, Seattle. Fig. 1.5: LAW. Fig. 2.1: Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale. By permission of the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities and for Tourism / National Central Library of Florence. Any reproduction or duplication by any means is prohibited. Figs. 2.2 and 2.6: Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale “Vittorio Emanuele III.” By permission of the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities and for Tourism © National Library of Naples. Fig. 2.3: The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, Holkham 48, f. 48 v. Nimrod’s horn. Fig. 2.4: Patrimonio Nacional, Real Biblioteca del Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial, b-I-2. Fig. 3.2: Courtesy of the Umberto and Clorinda Romano Foundation. Figs. 4.1–4.6: From Dante’s Divine Comedy Box, © 2006 by Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders, used with permission of Chronicle Books LLC, San Francisco. Visit ChronicleBooks.com. Figs. 5.1–5.7: Courtesy of Sylvia R. Albro, Library of Congress. Figs. 5.8 and 5.9: © Fondazione Fedrigoni Fabriano, Augusto Zonghi Collection. Figs. 6.1–6.30, 6.34–6.42: LAW. Fig. 6.50a: Dante Alighieri, excerpts from Inferno: A New Translation, translated by Mary Jo Bang and illustrated by Henrik Drescher. Translation copyright © 2013 by Mary Jo Bang. Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Henrik Drescher. Reprinted with the permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, graywolfpress.org. Excerpt(s) from The Inferno by Dante Alighieri and translated by Robert and Jean Hollander, translation copyright © 2000 by Robert Hollander and Jean Hollander. Used by permission of Doubleday, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, as well as Georges Borchardt, Inc., on behalf of Robert Hollander and Jean Hollander. Fig. 6.54: Michael Mazur, Canto IIIi (Charon), 1996. © Michael Mazur; Courtesy of the estate of the artist and RYAN LEE Gallery, New York. Figs. 6.55 and 6.56: Courtesy of Ron Kowalke. Figs. 6.57–6.66: LAW.



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Index

Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations. belching, 22 Bembo, Bernardo, 67, 73 Bembo, Pietro, 11–12, 90, 104 Benalius, Bernardinus, 4, 10, 87, 87–89, 88 Benjamin, Walter, 47, 48 Berardi, Christofal, 77 Berenson, Bernard, 68 Bergvall, Caroline, 133 Berlinghieri, Francesco, Geografia, 74 Bernardino da Siena, Saint, 90, 91, 92 Bernard of Clairvaux, 22, 175n24 Bettini da Siena, Antonio, Monte santo di Dio, 61–62 Birk, Sandow: commercialism in adaptation by, 51, 52–53, 58; multiculturalism in adaptation by, 49–53, 50, 52, 54; religion in adaptation by, 49, 53, 54–59, 55, 56, 57; on religion in Divine Comedy, 48–49; translation overview, 19, 47–48, 132–33, 134, 173n180, 179n1; American Qur’an, 132; Dante and Virgil Contemplate the Inferno, 2; Incarcerated: Visions of California in the 21st Century, 132 Bisticci, Vespasiano di, Vite degli uomini illustri del sec. XV, 10 blank verse, 1, 16, 18, 112, 125, 130, 131, 159n11, 173n173 Boccaccio, Giovanni, 12; De Casibus Virorum Illustriorum, 38; “Vita di Dante,” 77 body, and musical instruments, 20, 26–27, 29, 33 Boethius, De institutione musica, 25, 29, 32 Bonaventure, Vitis mystica, 175n24 Boniface VIII, Pope, 23 Böninger, Lorenz, 62

Accademia della Crusca, 13, 105–106, 105–107 Akhmatova, Anna, 144 adaptations, and translation theory, 47, 48 Aelred of Rievaulx, 26 Agoult, Marie d’, 149 Alberti, Bernardo d’Antonio di Ricciardo degli, 62–63, 66, 74 Alberti, Leon Battista, 62, 63 Allen, Valerie, 22 Alphabetical Catalogue of the Library: Authors (1864), 14 Alighieri, Dante. See Dante Alighieri Alighieri, Jacopo, 3 Ambrose of Milan, 33 American literature, 16–17, 115 Angelini, Evangelista, 3 Antonio da Fermo, 159n16 Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, 33, 45 Arnaut Daniel, 52, 53 art. See illustrations, art, and graphic representations Auerbach, Erich, 39 Augusta, Georgius de, 3 Augustine of Hippo, 33, 37; The City of God, 38 bagpipes, 25, 28 Baldini, Baccio, 6, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 68–70, 68, 69, 79, 81 Bang, Mary Jo, 19, 133, 134 Barbariccia (demon), 20–22, 21 Barolini, Teodolinda, 59 Beatrice, 53, 54, 57 Beccaria, Beccario, 159n16 Bede, 27, 28–29



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222

Index

Boninis, Boninus de, 4, 9–10, 84–86, 85, 86 book production. See manuscript tradition; printing Born, Bertran de, 137 Bosch, Hieronymus, The Garden of Earthly Delights, 29, 31 Botticelli, Sandro, 5, 6, 63, 66, 67–68, 79, 181n36; Spaccato dell’ Inferno, 69 Bowles, Edmund, 20 Boyd, Henry, 14, 108, 108–9, 115 Brandeis, Irma, The Ladder of Vision, 173n169 Brescia editions, 9–10, 69, 84–86, 85, 86 Brown, William Wells: Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States, 17, 118–21, 119, 120, 173n168; The Escape; or, A Leap for Freedom, 119; Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave, 118 Brunetto, Messer, 44 Brutus, Marcus Junius, 176n5 Burgofranco, Jacobus de, 13, 93–95, 94, 95, 96 Busone da Gubbio, 77–78 Buturlin collection, 8, 164n75 Butzbach, Paulus, 3 Caesar, Julius, 35, 37, 176n5 Calvino, Italo, ix, x Camões, Luís Vaz de, 142 Campaldino, Battle of (1289), 24 Campos, J. Pinto de, 142 Canfora, Luciano, 41 Canova, Antonio, 109 Cantigas de Santa Maria, 29, 30 Capcasa, Mattheus, 4, 10, 87, 87–89, 88 cardinal’s hat watermark, 71, 72, 72, 73, 181n53 Cary, Henry Francis, 14, 16, 18, 112–13, 113, 115, 116 Cassiodorus, 27 Cato the Elder, 177n9 Cato the Younger, 34–46, 36; admirers and critics of, 37–38, 177n10; background, 37, 176n5; juridical persona, 38–39; and liberty, 37, 38, 39–42, 46; and Moses, 177n20; scholarly debate on presence in Purgatory, 35, 37, 176–77n8 Cea-Sanchez, José, 33 Cellini, Benvenuto, 144 Cesarius of Arles, 175n24 Chiavelli family, 73, 181n52 Ch’oe, Min-sun, 144 Christ, crucifixion of, 27–28, 33 Christianity, 49, 53, 54–59

Ciacco (glutton), 23 Ciardi, John, 17–18, 123, 126, 173n171 Cicero: Brutus, 177n10; De Officiis, 45; De Oratore, 159n18; De Republica, 38, 43 cithara, 26–29 citizenship, 41–42, 46, 177n30 civic trumpeters, 23–24 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 16, 112 Collins, Ross A., 6–7 Colonna, Vittoria, 90 Comitibus, Federicus de, 3 Commedia. See Divine Comedy commentaries: as genre, 3–5, 162n40; Daniello, 13, 103–4; Foscolo, 14, 16, 112; Jacopo Alighieri, 3; Lana, 3, 77; Vellutello, 13, 97, 98, 101, 104, 170n137; Venturi, 14, 104. See also Landino, Cristoforo commercialism, 51, 52–53, 54 copperplate engravings, 9, 14, 15, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 67–69, 68, 69, 79, 104, 107 Corpus Juris Civilis, 43, 45 Corti, Maria, 19, 46, 174n184 cosmography, 98 Crescenzi, Pietro de, Ruralia commoda, 61, 74 Croce, Benedetto, 5 Cromek, Robert Hartley, 109 Daniello, Bernardino, 13, 103–4 Dante Alighieri: juridical knowledge, 43–45, 178n46; portraits, ii, 95, 100, 108, 109, 113, 124, 135, 136; Convivio, 28, 37, 43; “Credo” (attributed), 78; De Monarchia, 41; De vulgari eloquentia, 162n50; To the Florentines (Epistle 6), 39–40. See also Divine Comedy Dante Memorial (Meridian Hill Park, Washington, DC), 17 Dante Society of America, 16, 19, 114, 158n4 David, and divine musicianship, 26, 27–28, 33 Del Tuppo, Francesco, 160n24 De Simone, Daniel, 10 Di Fonzo, Claudia, 45 Digesta (Corpus Juris Civilis), 34, 43 Divine Comedy (Dante), overview, 1–2. See also Cato the Younger; commentaries; editions; illustrations, art, and graphic representations; musical compositions; musical instruments; translations —Inferno: in Birk’s adaptation, 2, 47, 48, 51; musical instruments in, 20–25; pagans and Muslims in, 35–37



Index

—Paradiso: in Birk’s adaptation, 47, 48, 53–59, 56, 57; musical instruments in, 26, 29–33 —Purgatorio: in Birk’s adaptation, 47, 48–53, 50, 52, 54, 54, 55; musical instruments in, 26 divine justice, 28, 57–59 Dolce, Lodovico, 1 Doré, Gustave, 47, 53, 116, 116–18, 117, 118, 130, 132, 137, 182n16 Douglass, Frederick, 119 Drescher, Henrik, 133, 134 Du Pinet, Antoine, “Description de la Cité de Florence,” xviii Durazzo family collection, 8 Dzhivelegov, A. K., 143 eagle of Justice, 28, 53–54, 57–59 editions of the Divine Comedy: —incunabula, 2–10, 4, 76–89, 160n24, 168n117; (1477) De Spira, 3, 76–79, 77, 78; (1481) Laurentii, 5–6, 64, 65, 79, 80, 81, 82 (see also under Laurentii, Nicolaus); (1484) Scotus I, 9, 10, 82–84, 83, 84; (1487) De Boninis, 9–10, 69, 84–86, 85, 86; (1491) De Plasiis, 10, 87, 166n102; (1491 [1492]) Benalius and Capcasa, 10, 87, 87–89, 88, 90, 98 —sixteenth-century, 10–13, 89–107; (1502) Manutius, 11, 89, 89–90; (1512) Stagninus, 13, 90–92, 91, 92, 93; (1529) Burgofranco and Giunta, 13, 93–95, 94, 95, 96; (1536) Stagninus and Giolitus, 13, 169n130; (1544) Marcolinus, 13, 97, 97–99, 98, 99; (1564) Sessa brothers, 13, 100, 100–101, 101, 102, 170n137; (1568) De Fine, 13, 103, 103–4, 104; (1595) Manzani, 13, 90, 105, 105–7, 106, 107 —nineteenth-century, 14–17, 108–21; (1802) Boyd, 14, 108, 108–9, 115; (1814) Cary, 14, 16, 17, 18, 112–13, 113, 115; (1843) Parsons, 16, 114; (1867) Longfellow, 14–16, 18, 113–16, 114, 115, 172n154, 173n173 —modern, 17–19, 121–34; standard critical Italian editions, 158n4; (1950) Sayers, 18, 19, 121–23, 122, 126, 174n184; (1954) Ciardi, 17–18, 123, 126, 173n171; (1980) Mandelbaum, 18, 124, 124–27, 125, 126; (1983) Phillips, 127, 127–30, 128, 129, 135; (1994) Pinsky, 18, 130–31, 134, 139; (2000) Hollander, Robert and Jean, 131–32, 134;

223

(2004) Birk and Sanders, 132–33, 134 (see also Birk, Sandow); (2012) Bang, Mary Jo, 19, 133, 134 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 115 English translations. See translations, English engravings: copperplate, 9, 14, 15, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 67–69, 68, 69, 79, 104, 107; wood, 116, 116, 117, 118 Ennes, Domingo, 141, 141–43, 142 Ennes, Guilherme José, 141–42 Evans, Luther H., 8 Exodus narrative, 40–41 Fabriano paper, 71–74, 181nn52–53 Febrer, Andreu, 142 Federico da Montefeltro, 10 Ficino, Marsilio, 5, 62 Fine, Petrus de, 13, 103, 103–4, 104 Fiske, Willard, x, 16, 172n160 flatulence, 22 Flaxman, John, 109–12, 110, 111; Cephalus and Aurora, 109; The Fury of Athamas, 109 Florence: book trade in, 60, 180n3; Laurentii edition, 5–6, 64, 65, 79, 80, 81, 82 (see also under Laurentii, Nicolaus); Manzani edition, 13, 90, 105, 105–7, 106, 107; as modern Rome, 40; vernacular, 1, 5, 13, 60, 75, 107 fonts (scripts), 11, 13, 78, 79, 89 Foscolo, Ugo, 14, 16, 112 Freccero, John, 130 freedom and liberty, 37, 38, 39–42, 46, 177n30 Frescobaldi, Girolamo Alessandro, 147 Friederich, Werner Paul, 16, 172n160 Fugelso, Karl, 48–49 Fusinato, Erminia, 19 Giolitus de Ferrariis, Gabriel, 1, 12 Giolitus de Ferrariis, Joannes, 12–13, 169n130 Giovanni da Serravalle, 23 Giunta, Lucas Antonius, 93–95, 94, 95, 96 Gonzaga, Guglielmo, 147 gothic typeface, miniature, 78 graphic representations. See illustrations, art, and graphic representations Greenaway, Peter, 130 Guelfs vs. Ghibellines, 24 harps, 26, 27, 29, 31. See also cithara Harvey, Doug, 132 Havely, Nick, 172n162

224

Index

Hawkins, Peter, 48 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 16, 115 Heaven, and Rome, 41–42, 46 Heilbronn, Denise, 33 hendecasyllabic meter, 1, 158n9 Highsmith, Carol M., 12 Hind, Arthur M., 67 Hinduism, 48, 54–55, 55, 56, 59 Hollander, Jean, 131–32, 134; And They Shall Wear Purple, 131; Crushed into Honey, 131 Hollander, Robert, 24, 35, 131–32, 134, 176–77n8; Allegory in Dante’s Commedia, 131; Boccaccio’s Dante and the Shaping Force of Satire, 131; Dante: A Life in Works, 131; Studies in Dante, 131 Holsinger, Bruce, 20 Hoˇm, In, 144 Hoover, Herbert, 7 Hope, Thomas, 109 Hugh of St. Victor, 27, 28 iambic pentameter, 1, 159n11 Iannucci, Amilcare, 33 illustrations, art, and graphic representations, 135–40; Baldini, 6, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66–70, 68, 69, 79, 81; in De Boninis edition, 85, 85; Dante portraits, ii, 95, 100, 108, 109, 113, 124, 135, 136; Doré, 116, 116–18, 117, 118, 137, 182n16; Drescher, 133, 134; in De Fine edition, 104, 104; Flaxman, 109–12, 110, 111; Kowalke, 139, 139–40, 140; in Marcolinus edition, 97, 98, 98; Mazur, 18, 138, 138–39; Moser, 18, 124, 125, 125–26; Pease, Lute C., 137, 137; Phillips, 127, 128, 129, 129–30; Pico Master, 87, 88; in Sessa edition, 100, 101; in Stagninus edition, 90, 91, 92, 92; Young, 135, 136. See also Birk, Sandow Institutiones (Corpus Juris Civilis), 34, 43 Isidore of Seville, 26–27, 175n17 Islam and Muslims, 36–37, 48, 56–57, 57, 59 Italian language: Florentine (Tuscan) vernacular, 1, 5, 13, 60, 75, 107; and literacy, 11, 60; Milanese vernacular, 62; Venetian vernacular, 62; vernacular promoted as literary language, 162n50 italic type, 11, 89, 89, 90 Jefferson, Thomas, library of, 7, 14, 164n74 Joyce, Jane Wilson, 37 juridical system. See law

justice, divine, 57–59 Justinian I, Byzantine Emperor, 43 Koch, Theodore Wesley, 16, 172n160 Korean translations, 144–45, 145 Kowalke, Ronald, 139, 139–40, 140 Lana, Iacopo della, 3, 77 Landino, Cristoforo: commentary in 1481 edition, 5–6, 62, 63, 79, 80, 81, 82; commentary reprints, 9, 10, 13, 69, 75, 79, 82, 83, 84, 85, 87, 90, 95, 97, 101; mentioned, 3, 67, 74; as partner in 1481 edition, 62–63, 66, 73 language. See Italian language; translations La Piana, Angelina, 16, 19, 172n160, 174n184 Last Judgment, 23 Laurentii, Nicolaus: career overview, 5, 60, 61–62; identity, 60–61, 180n6, 180n12; publications of: Geografia (Francesco Berlinghieri), 74; Monte santo di Dio, 61, 61, 181n53; Ruralia commoda (Pietro de Crescenzi), 61, 74 —Divine Comedy (1481 edition): Baldini’s illustrations, 6, 61, 63, 64, 65, 66–69, 68, 69, 81; funding and production process, 62–66; Landino’s prologue and commentary, 5–6, 62, 63, 79, 80, 81, 82; legacy, 75; overview, 79; paper for, 70–74; sales of, 63, 66, 70 law: Cato’s juridical persona, 38–39; Dante’s juridical knowledge, 42–46, 178n46; human and divine, 39–40; and literature, 45, 46; Roman, 41–43, 44–45 Lessing J. Rosenwald collection. See Rosenwald collection liberty and freedom, 37, 38, 39–42, 46, 177n30 Library of Congress, Dante collections: and Buturlin collection, 8, 164n75; first significant acquisitions of early print books, 164n73, 165n83; Jefferson’s library acquisition, 14; and role as cultural institution, 7, 9; Rosenwald collection acquisition, 7–8, 165n84; Vollbehr collection acquisition, 6–7, 163n57, 163n61. See also editions; illustrations, art, and graphic representations; musical compositions; translations Liszt, Franz, Eine symphonie zu Dantes Divina Commedia, 148–50, 149 literacy, 11, 60 lithographs, 47, 50, 52, 54, 55, 56, 57, 116, 132



Index

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 14–16, 18, 113–16, 114, 115, 172n154, 173n173 Lorenzo, Antonio di (Antonius Laurentii Nicolai), 73 Lovejoy, Elijah P., 119 Lowell, James Russell, 16, 114 Lowry, Martin, 11 Lozinskiĭ, Mikhail Leonidovič, 143, 143–44 Lucan, Pharsalia, 37 Luce, Robert, 6 lutes, 29–31, 30, 31, 32 lyres, 26, 27, 175n17. See also cithara Machiavelli, Bernardo, 180n5; Libro di ricordi, 60 MacLeish, Archibald, 7 Malacoda (demon), 22, 24 Mandelbaum, Allen, 18, 124, 124–27, 126 Mandel’štam, Osip, 144 Manetti, Antonio, 98 Mantua editions, 3, 60 manuscripts: Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, Hamilton 201 Cim. 33: 181n36; Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, 313: 21, 22; Madrid, Real Biblioteca del Monasterio de El Escorial, MS b.I.2: 30; Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale, MS V.A.14: 25, 29, 32; Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Holkham 48: 26; Piacenza, Biblioteca Comunale, MS Landiano 190: 159n16; Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. Lat. 1896: 181n36; Vat. Lat. 3197: 90; Vat. Lat. 3199: 12, 90 manuscript tradition, 10, 63, 78–79, 159n16 Manutius, Aldus: competition with, 9, 12, 90; impact of, 11; printer’s mark, 12; Divine Comedy (1502 edition), 11, 89, 89–90 Manzani, Domenico, 13, 90, 105, 105–7, 106, 107 Marchesi, Simone, 38, 46 Marcolinus, Franciscus, 13, 97, 97–99, 98, 99 Marian antiphones, 145–47, 146 Master Adam, 29–33 Matthews, Joshua Steven, 14–16 Mazur, Michael, 18, 130, 138, 138–39 Mazzotta, Giuseppe, 2, 41 Mazzucchi, Andrea, 162n40 McAllister, A.T., 123 McGee, Timothy J., 23–24 Medici, Lorenzo de’, 62 Medici, Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’, 67 Medici family, 5, 62, 73

225

Meietos, Anthony, 12 Meister, Michael, 132 Melville, Herman, 16, 115; Mardi; and a Voyage Thither, 17; Moby-Dick, 16–17 Meredith, Sean, 179n1 Michelangelo, 130 Milanese vernacular, 62 military imagery, 24 Milton, John, Paradise Lost, 159n11 Min, Dmitrij Egorovič, 144 Montferrat, marquises of, 13 Moser, Barry, 18, 124, 124–27, 125 Moses (biblical figure), 41, 177n20 multiculturalism, 49–53, 50, 52, 54, 59. See also religious pluralism musical compositions, 145–53; Liszt, 148–50, 149; Marian antiphones, 145–47, 146; Rachmaninoff, 150–53, 151, 152; Soriano, 147–48, 148 musical instruments, 20–33, 32; and the body, 20, 26–27, 29, 33; cithara, 26–29; lutes, 29–31, 30, 31, 32; as metaphors or similes, 20; organs, 26; trumpets, 20–25, 21, 25, 26 Muslims and Islam, 36–37, 48, 56–57, 57, 59 Nenci, Francesco, 15 Nezhdanova, Antonina, 150 Niccolini da Sabbio, Domenico, 101 Nicetius of Trier, 27, 28, 175n22 Nicholas III, Pope, 23 Nicholo di Lorenzo della Magna. See Laurentii, Nicolaus Nimrod (giant), 20, 24–25, 26 Norton, Charles Eliot, 114, 115 Notker Balbulus, 26 Numeister, Johannes, 3, 5 Oliphant, Margaret, 19 organ (musical instrument), 26 Ostrowski, Carl, x Otto Vollbehr collection. See Vollbehr collection ouds (lutes), 29–31, 30, 31, 32 pagans, 35–36, 38 Palestrina, Giovanni Pierluigi da, 147 Panizzi, Anthony, 160n25 Pannartz, Arnold, 159n18 paper industry, 70–74, 71, 72, 73, 181nn52–53 Park, Sangjin, 144 Parker, Deborah, 5

226

Index

Parsons, Thomas William, 16, 114–15 Pasquali, Giambattista, 164n74 Paulinus of Nola, 27 Pease, Lute C., 137, 137–138 Petrarca, Francesco [Petrarch], 12, 38, 90, 97, 104, 168n121, 177n15, 178n46; Canzoniere, 76–77; De gestis Caesaris, 38 Petrella, Giancarlo, 182n4 Petrocchi, Giorgio, 158n4 Phillips, Tom, 127, 127–30, 128, 129, 134; A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel, 130; Irma, 127 Picasso, Pablo, 130 Pico Master, 87, 88 Piemontesi, Ludovico and Alberto, 160n24 Pietro, Filippo di, 160n24 Pietro da Figino, 87–88, 90, 166–67n102. See also Pietro Mazzanti da Figline Pietro Mazzanti da Figline, 10. See also Pietro da Figino Pinheiro, José Pedro Xavier, 142 Pinsky, Nicole, 130 Pinsky, Robert, 18, 130–31, 134, 139 Piroli, Tommaso, 109 Plasiis, Petrus de, 4, 10, 87, 166n102 Plato, Phaedo, 37 Pliny, Historia naturalis, 73 Plutarch, 37 Poe, Edgar Allen, 16 Poliziano, Angelo, 62 Portuguese translations, 141, 141–43, 142 printer’s marks, 12, 84, 86, 88, 90, 93, 102, 103, 107, 107, 165n85 printing: emergence and development of, 10–13, 159n18; illustration process, 66, 67–69, 74; and manuscript tradition, 5, 10, 63, 78–79, 159n16; paper industry, 70–74, 71, 72, 73, 181nn52–53 psaltery, 26–27, 33 Purgatory, and liberty, 40–41, 177n30 Putnam, Herbert, 6, 8, 9, 164n73 Rachmaninoff, Sergei: Francesca da Rimini, 150–53, 151, 152; The Miserly Knight, 150 Regina caeli (Marian antiphone), 145–47, 146 religious pluralism, 49, 54–59 Reynolds, Barbara, 121 Richard of St. Victor, 175n24 Rico, Francisco, 178n46 Ridolfi, Roberto, 180n12

Rigo, Paola, 176n4 Rimsky-Korsakov, Nikolay, 150 Ripoli Press, 60, 180n4 Romano, Umberto, Cato, Dante, and Virgil, 42 Rome: and Heaven, 41–42, 46; law, 41–43, 44–45 Rosenwald collection, 4, 6–10, 64, 68, 79, 87–88, 90, 91, 91, 92, 92, 165n84 Roždestvenskij, Robert, 144 Russian translations, 143, 143–44 Rutilius Namatianus, 27 Salgado, David, 132 Sanders, Marcus, 19, 47, 132–33, 134, 173n180, 179n1. See also Birk, Sandow Sanguineti, Federico, 158n4 San Jacopo di Ripoli (monastery), 180n4 Sansovino, Francesco, 101, 170n137 Sayers, Dorothy, 18, 19, 121–23, 122, 126, 174n184; Whose Body, 121 Schutzner, Svato, 147 Scotus, Hieronymus, 9 Scotus I, Octavianus, 4, 9, 10, 82–84, 83, 84 Scotus II, Octavianus, 9 scripts (fonts), 11, 13, 78, 89 Sessa, Joannes Baptista, 13, 97, 100, 100–101, 101, 102, 170n137 Sessa, Melchior, 13, 100, 100–101, 101, 102, 170n137 Shakespeare, William, 144; The Two Gentlemen of Verona, 33 shawms, 24, 25 Simon Magus, 23 simony, 23 Singleton, Charles S., 18, 121 Sinon (Greek traitor), 29–31 Sixtus IV, Pope, 66 slavery, and liberty, 40–42 Socrates, 37 Soriano, Francesco, Il primo libro de madrigali a cinque voci, 147–48, 148 Spanish translations, 142. See also Portuguese translations Spira, Vindelinus de, 3, 5, 76–79, 77, 78 Spofford, Ainsworth Rand, 164n73 Stagninus, Bernardinus, 12–13, 90–92, 91, 92, 93, 169n130 Statius, 49–51, 50 Steinberg, Justin, 45–46 Stephens, Walter, 24–25 Stothard, Thomas, 109 stringed instruments, 26–31, 30, 31, 32, 175n17



Index

suicide, 37–38 Sweynheim, Conrad, 159n18 Tchaikovsky, Pyotr Ilyich, 150 Tedesco, Niccolò, 61, 74, 180n6 terza rima stanza, 1, 18, 109, 121, 123, 158n9, 173n171 theology, and liberty, 39–40 Thomas Aquinas, 36–37, 38, 44 Tipografia del Dante, 160n24 title pages: absence of, 78; sixteenth-century, 13, 90–92, 91, 94, 95, 100, 103, 105; nineteenth-century, 108, 113, 114, 120; modern, 124, 127, 142, 143 translations: meter and rhyme choices, 1, 18–19, 109, 115, 121, 123, 125, 173n171, 173n173; Campos (Portuguese), 142; Ch’oe (Korean), 144; Ennes (Portuguese), 141, 141–43, 142; Febrer (Spanish), 142; Hoˇm (Korean), 144; Lozinskiĭ (Russian), 143, 143–44; Min (Russian), 144; Munye Chʻulpʻansa publishing (Korean), 144–45, 145; Park (Korean), 144; Pinheiro (Portuguese), 142; Vila da Barra (Portuguese), 142; Villena (Spanish), 142; Yong-Oh (Korean), 144; Young-Taek (Korean), 144 —English: Bang, Mary Jo, 19, 133, 134–135; Birk and Sanders, 132–33, 134–135 (see also Birk, Sandow); Boyd, 14, 108, 108–9, 115; Cary, 14, 16, 18, 112–13, 113, 115; Ciardi, 17–18, 123, 126, 173n171; Hollander, Robert and Jean, 131–32, 134–135; Longfellow, 14–16, 18, 113–16, 114, 115, 172n154, 173n173; Mandelbaum, 18, 124, 124–25, 126; Parsons, 16, 114; Phillips, 127, 127–30, 128, 129, 134–135; Pinsky, 18, 130–31, 134–135, 139; Sayers, 18, 19, 121–23, 122, 126, 174n184 translation theory, 47, 48 Trino, book trade in, 12–13 trumpets, 20–25, 21, 25, 26 Tuscan (Florentine) vernacular, 1, 5, 13, 60, 75, 107 typography, 9, 11, 13, 78, 89

227

Varro, Marcus Terentius, 45 Vasari, Giorgio, 63, 66, 67 Vega, Lope de, 144 Vellutello, Alessandro, 13, 97, 98, 101, 102, 104, 170n137 Venice: book trade in, 11, 13; vernacular, 62 Venice editions: Benalius and Capcasa, 10, 87, 87–89, 88; Burgofranco and Giunta, 13, 93–95, 94, 95, 96; Comitibus, 3; De Fine, 13, 103, 103–4, 104; Manutius, 11, 89, 89–90; Marcolinus, 13, 97, 97–98, 98, 99; De Plasiis, 10, 87, 166n102; Scotus I, 9, 82–84, 83, 84; Sessa brothers, 13, 100, 100–101, 101, 102, 170n137; De Spira, 3, 76–79, 77, 78; Stagninus, 13, 90–92, 91, 92, 93; Stagninus and Giolitus, 13, 169n130 Venturi, Pompeo, 14, 104, 164n74 vernacular. See Italian language Vernon, G. G. Warren, 3, 160n25 Vila da Barra, Barão de, 142 Villena, Enrique de, 142 Virgil: in commentaries, 97, 104; in illustrations, 2, 42, 50, 64, 65, 69, 81, 85, 87, 97, 110, 111, 137; and Moses, 41; Aeneid, 39 Volkmann, Ludwig, 98 Vollbehr collection, 4, 6–9, 65, 69, 79, 163n56– 57, 163n61 Voltaire, 14 watermarks, 71, 72, 72, 73, 181n53 Wedgewood, Josiah, 109 West, Martin L., 175n17 Wetherbee, Winthrop, 39 Whitman, Walt, 14, 16, 114, 115; Drum-Taps, 14 Wilde, Richard Henry, 164n74 women, Dante scholarship by, 19 woodcuts, 9, 69, 83, 83, 84, 84, 85, 85, 87, 87, 88, 90–92, 92, 94, 97, 97–98, 98, 101, 106

Ulpian, 45

Yong-Oh, Kwak, 144 Young, Art, 135, 136; Art Young’s Inferno, 135; Hell Up to Date, 135; Through Hell with Hiprah Hunt, 135 Young-Taek, Jeon, 144

Valerius Maximus, Factorum et Dictorum Memorabilium Libri Novem, 45

Zaloom, Paul, 179n1 Zverev, Nikolay, 150