WEBVTT 00:00:00.040 --> 00:00:04.720 Today we talk about one of the most important cultural figures in all of Italian history. 00:00:04.720 --> 00:00:10.680 He is an author and it is an extraordinary historical and literary case: according to legend, he studied 00:00:10.680 --> 00:00:17.200 so much that he died leaning his head on his papers; he is the first human being 00:00:17.200 --> 00:00:23.240 in history about whom we have received so much information, and from first-hand sources at that; 00:00:23.240 --> 00:00:27.920 and he is also the author of one of the most influential works of Italian literature, 00:00:27.920 --> 00:00:34.880 to the point that not even Shakespeare would have been 100% the Shakespeare we all know, 00:00:34.880 --> 00:00:41.040 if it hadn't been for the work in question. I'm talking about Francesco Petrarca, 00:00:41.040 --> 00:00:46.720 who with Dante and Boccaccio is part of the so-called Three Crowns, the three major authors 00:00:46.720 --> 00:00:54.040 of the late Middle Ages in Florence, fundamental in the history of the Italian language and literature. 00:00:54.040 --> 00:00:59.280 This is the second video in this regard, after the one from a few years ago on Dante: naturally, 00:00:59.280 --> 00:01:05.400 in the future there will be a third, on Giovanni Boccaccio. But let's get straight to Petrarca: 00:01:05.400 --> 00:01:10.880 a stop in his world is an almost obligatory step, if you want to start studying and 00:01:10.880 --> 00:01:18.320 understanding Italian literature, because this author has forever influenced not only the fate 00:01:18.320 --> 00:01:23.960 of the literature of the Bel Paese, but also the fate of literary language in general, 00:01:23.960 --> 00:01:28.480 and in particular the language of poetry. Initially, therefore, 00:01:28.480 --> 00:01:34.360 we will focus on the author's life and his fortune, understood as success. Then we will take 00:01:34.360 --> 00:01:39.800 a look at his best known and most studied work, namely the Canzoniere; and, finally, 00:01:39.800 --> 00:01:45.040 we will try to understand the cultural, literary and linguistic legacy that 00:01:45.040 --> 00:01:51.600 Petrarca left us. I'm Davide and this is Podcast Italiano, a channel for those who learn or love 00:01:51.600 --> 00:01:58.080 Italian. If you learn the language of Dante, Petrarca and Boccaccio, you will find the transcription of everything 00:01:58.080 --> 00:02:08.320 I say on my website. I'll leave you the link in the description. And if you need it, turn on the subtitles. 00:02:08.320 --> 00:02:14.520 Francesco Petrarca was born in 1304 in Arezzo, Tuscany; between 19 and 20 July, 00:02:14.520 --> 00:02:20.120 according to tradition. He is the son of a notary banished from Florence, where 00:02:20.120 --> 00:02:25.600 great political battles had raged in previous decades. These are the same battles 00:02:25.600 --> 00:02:31.480 that led to Dante's exile, which – by the way – Petrarch's father knew about. 00:02:31.480 --> 00:02:38.120 But let's return immediately to our Francesco Petrarca. Already as a child, he became a traveler: in 1312, 00:02:38.120 --> 00:02:43.880 in fact, his father took the family to live in Avignon, in southern France, where 00:02:43.880 --> 00:02:50.240 Petrarch was educated by an Italian who was himself an exile. Access to these studies was not common: 00:02:50.240 --> 00:02:56.160 the very young Francesco was born into a fairly wealthy condition, and his father did not deny him 00:02:56.160 --> 00:03:03.400 the purchase of several manuscripts useful for his studies. Consider that we are in the 14th century, 00:03:03.400 --> 00:03:09.280 before the invention of printing: often, to have access to a text, the richest 00:03:09.280 --> 00:03:15.960 could commission its reproduction to a copyist, who copied everything; otherwise, 00:03:15.960 --> 00:03:21.080 you had to directly purchase the original or a copy already produced previously, 00:03:21.080 --> 00:03:27.640 or even - think about it - copy the text yourself, if possible - think about the effort -: in all cases, 00:03:27.640 --> 00:03:32.920 it was an investment, often of money or , alternatively, of time. 00:03:32.920 --> 00:03:38.120 A few years later, Petrarca began studying law in Montpellier, still in France, 00:03:38.120 --> 00:03:43.800 which however he tackled reluctantly. Always in the period of his early youth, he 00:03:43.800 --> 00:03:49.200 also visited Rimini, Venice and, above all, Bologna, a very important destination for honing 00:03:49.200 --> 00:03:54.920 his literary skills. In fact, at the time, the city was a very important center 00:03:54.920 --> 00:04:02.360 for the radiation of poetry in the vernacular, that is, in this specific case, in one of the many 00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:09.080 Italian languages ​​that had evolved from Latin. Incidentally today, in Italian, 00:04:09.080 --> 00:04:17.320 vulgar typically means coarse, rude, scurrilous or, in other words, rude. In 00:04:17.320 --> 00:04:22.600 technical jargon, however, this word indicates, especially when talking about the Middle Ages, because 00:04:22.600 --> 00:04:28.880 then in the future we start talking about dialects, it indicates, I was saying, the languages ​​spoken by the vulgar, 00:04:28.880 --> 00:04:36.080 that is, by the people, as opposed to the higher and more literary language noble, which was Latin. 00:04:36.080 --> 00:04:43.280 In 1326, there is a turning point: the father of our young scholar dies, leading the family to a 00:04:43.280 --> 00:04:49.040 period of economic difficulty. Precisely on this occasion Petrarch definitively abandons 00:04:49.040 --> 00:04:54.840 he studied law and, perhaps, in turn began to produce works in the vernacular. 00:04:54.840 --> 00:05:00.640 He soon settled in Avignon, where at the time, among other things, the seat of the 00:05:00.640 --> 00:05:07.280 papal curia was located. As some of you may know, in fact, for much of the 14th century the Pope did not reside 00:05:07.280 --> 00:05:14.600 in Rome, but rather in Avignon, France. Speaking of religion... In Avignon, Petrarch 00:05:14.600 --> 00:05:20.640 decides to take the minor orders, which, in short, represent an affiliation to the Church 00:05:20.640 --> 00:05:27.640 which involves some tasks, but, above all, which guarantees all the economic benefits that at the time 00:05:27.640 --> 00:05:34.080 were reserved for men of church. Smart, our Francesco. This practice was actually 00:05:34.080 --> 00:05:40.200 not rare, precisely because it did not require great effort, but it gave considerable advantages. In this way, 00:05:40.200 --> 00:05:44.800 Petrarch basically frees himself from major economic worries, 00:05:44.800 --> 00:05:50.600 and has the opportunity to do what he likes. The years of youth are characterized, 00:05:50.600 --> 00:05:57.440 at least according to Petrarca, by a certain abandonment to worldly life - even if we must consider 00:05:57.440 --> 00:06:02.480 that we are talking about the criteria of a severe man, who wants to give a certain image of himself, 00:06:02.480 --> 00:06:07.840 and we will talk about it later. In this period, perhaps, Petrarch also indulged in love 00:06:07.840 --> 00:06:13.360 for a woman, about whom, once again, we know little: some scholars believe they have 00:06:13.360 --> 00:06:18.960 even found her identity, while others strongly doubt it. In any case, 00:06:18.960 --> 00:06:25.080 this relationship will later be taken up in Petrarch's most important work, so let's keep it in mind. 00:06:25.080 --> 00:06:30.240 Meanwhile, the years pass, and our Francesco becomes closer, thanks to his culture and 00:06:30.240 --> 00:06:36.280 knowledge, to important personalities, to visit whom he makes several other trips. 00:06:36.280 --> 00:06:41.360 We are now around the 1930s when we see big steps forward in studies too: 00:06:41.360 --> 00:06:47.600 Petrarch, in fact, was very close to the texts of antiquity, and constantly tried to 00:06:47.600 --> 00:06:53.560 understand and analyze the Latin texts. It even produces editions, for example of 00:06:53.560 --> 00:07:00.400 a work by the famous Latin author Livy; and, perhaps even more surprisingly, he discovered the 00:07:00.400 --> 00:07:06.800 manuscripts of some very important Latin texts, such as that of Cicero's Pro Archia. 00:07:06.800 --> 00:07:12.720 At the same time, these texts served as teachers for Petrarch, who absorbed the subtleties of the 00:07:12.720 --> 00:07:20.040 Latin language and reproduced them with mastery. A mastery to which his contemporaries did not remain 00:07:20.040 --> 00:07:28.960 indifferent: in 1341, Petrarch was crowned poet in Rome, in the Campidoglio, by none other than 00:07:28.960 --> 00:07:35.720 King Robert of Anjou, who at the time was the sovereign of the Kingdom of Naples. This rite was intended to 00:07:35.720 --> 00:07:41.280 explicitly recall the Latin tradition, in which, according to the information available at the time, 00:07:41.280 --> 00:07:47.800 it was customary to honor poetic glory in this way. And Petrarch is crowned 00:07:47.800 --> 00:07:52.520 precisely for his production in Latin, which was considered the most beautiful: for now, 00:07:52.520 --> 00:07:59.440 his verses in the vernacular are not yet ready to shine, even if, as they say, 00:07:59.960 --> 00:08:04.560 something is cooking. Meanwhile, a laurel wreath 00:08:04.560 --> 00:08:10.880 is placed on our author's head , making him, so to speak, a VIP of his era; and with good reason, 00:08:10.880 --> 00:08:17.400 because we do not forget that Petrarch is one of the greatest authors in the Latin language of his time. 00:08:17.400 --> 00:08:22.600 But our Petrarch does not rest on his laurels: the journeys continue, thanks to 00:08:22.600 --> 00:08:29.520 ecclesiastical benefits and, even more so now, thanks to the protection of the powerful, who are happy 00:08:29.520 --> 00:08:35.120 to support an intellectual of this caliber. In 1348, when Italy and Europe are on 00:08:35.120 --> 00:08:41.320 their knees due to a plague epidemic, Petrarca overcomes the crisis unscathed, but the woman 00:08:41.320 --> 00:08:47.760 he loves - remember? – but he doesn't survive. This event will also be very important for what 00:08:47.760 --> 00:08:53.920 we will say later, so let's keep it in mind. In 1350, the poet finally visited Florence: 00:08:53.920 --> 00:08:59.560 the family's exile had been lifted in the meantime, and there were friends and 00:08:59.560 --> 00:09:05.440 admirers in the city. Furthermore, our poet meets another very important writer for his 00:09:05.440 --> 00:09:12.200 era and for future centuries, the third crown we will talk about, namely Giovanni Boccaccio, 00:09:12.200 --> 00:09:18.080 also influencing his artistic production. The travels between Italy and France still do not 00:09:18.080 --> 00:09:24.840 stop, until, in 1352, Petrarch definitively leaves France for Milan. In 00:09:24.840 --> 00:09:29.920 that year, in fact, Innocent VI became pope; and relations with Petrarca were not 00:09:29.920 --> 00:09:34.720 exactly the best. Remember that the Pope was in France at the time; 00:09:34.720 --> 00:09:41.120 so our friend decides it's time to pack his bags and return to his homeland. 00:09:41.120 --> 00:09:46.480 Starting from his stay in Milan, his literary activity grew further, even if there was no 00:09:46.480 --> 00:09:51.840 shortage of travel and political commitments. The powerful of the time did not mind having 00:09:51.840 --> 00:09:57.560 a great intellectual at their service, nor entrusting him, for example, with diplomatic missions. 00:09:57.560 --> 00:10:02.680 Over time, however, Petrarch decided that he wanted to dedicate himself to his studies in peace: 00:10:02.680 --> 00:10:10.600 starting from 1369-70 he settled, as far as possible, in Arquà, not far from Padua, 00:10:10.600 --> 00:10:16.720 in Veneto, where he died in 1374. Today, in his honor, Arquà is a 00:10:16.720 --> 00:10:21.360 village also known by the name of Arquà Petrarca, where it is still possible 00:10:21.360 --> 00:10:27.760 to visit the house where the great poet lived. Great, yes – and now we will see why – to the point that, 00:10:27.760 --> 00:10:33.920 after his death, admirers and scholars began to look for his books. And to this day 00:10:33.920 --> 00:10:41.880 a huge amount of material arrives: works, notes, letters. Letters then carefully copied and, 00:10:41.880 --> 00:10:47.320 always along the lines of the great Latin models, designed to be actually read 00:10:47.320 --> 00:10:53.400 by posterity. Petrarch knew that his letters would be read, and for this very reason 00:10:53.400 --> 00:10:58.680 we cannot blindly trust their content: the author wanted to outline an 00:10:59.360 --> 00:11:04.880 ideal autobiography, in order to show the world and posterity that he had retraced as much as 00:11:04.880 --> 00:11:13.360 possible the steps of a great ideal Roman. Throughout the 14th century and part of the 15th, 00:11:13.360 --> 00:11:18.640 Petrarch was admired as a fine Latin poet; until something changes: 00:11:18.640 --> 00:11:25.840 starting from the second half of the fifteenth century, attention for the Latin Petrarch decreases, while the fame 00:11:25.840 --> 00:11:33.000 of the poet in the vernacular increases. Soon, our poet becomes the poet, 00:11:33.000 --> 00:11:39.960 the unsurpassed model of poetry, both in the Italian peninsula and outside. 00:11:39.960 --> 00:11:48.920 But thanks to which work, exactly? The work in question is typically called 00:11:48.920 --> 00:11:55.120 Canzoniere, a generic word which, in Italian, indicates a collection of poems. 00:11:55.120 --> 00:12:01.840 It goes without saying that Petrarch's has become the songbook par excellence, and this is 00:12:01.840 --> 00:12:07.320 the title of the work. In reality, however, the real title was Rerum vulgarium fragmenta, 00:12:07.320 --> 00:12:12.840 that is, fragments of vulgar things, that is, various texts written in the vulgar language. 00:12:12.840 --> 00:12:20.560 In all, we received 72 sheets of parchment, which contain all 366 poems that make up 00:12:20.560 --> 00:12:25.680 the work (one for each day of the year, if we exclude the poem that serves as an introduction 00:12:25.680 --> 00:12:31.760 to the work). Both Petrarch himself and a copyist 00:12:31.760 --> 00:12:37.960 who worked under his direct supervision wrote on these sheets of parchment. These sheets were bound, that is, put together, 00:12:37.960 --> 00:12:43.480 after the author's death, and are now found in the Vatican Apostolic Library, 00:12:43.480 --> 00:12:51.560 with the Latin Vatican code name 3195: there is almost no scholar of Italian literature who does not 00:12:51.560 --> 00:12:57.080 know this number. The fact that we have an entire work by Petrarch written by 00:12:57.080 --> 00:13:03.760 Petrarch himself is extraordinary: just think that we do not have a single word of Dante written 00:13:03.760 --> 00:13:08.520 first hand, nor, in reality, written under his direct supervision (in these cases, 00:13:08.520 --> 00:13:14.880 in jargon technical, we speak of an idiographic text). But there is an even more extraordinary fact: 00:13:14.880 --> 00:13:20.840 the papers containing the drafts of the work, and other drafts still, have even reached us (the 00:13:20.840 --> 00:13:27.480 manuscript, in this case, is called Vaticano Latino 3196). These papers give us the possibility 00:13:27.480 --> 00:13:33.600 of studying how the text was improved, reworked and brought to its final form: 00:13:33.600 --> 00:13:39.360 today this exercise might seem obvious, but at the time it was not, and Petrarca's papers 00:13:39.360 --> 00:13:45.240 played the role of driving force, of engine that gave a boost to these reflections. 00:13:45.240 --> 00:13:49.720 At this point, it is impossible not to ask ourselves: what is the work about? 00:13:49.720 --> 00:13:56.040 The Canzoniere tells of Petrarch's love for Laura, a beautiful woman who represents 00:13:56.040 --> 00:14:01.760 not only the object of an earthly love, but also poetic glory itself. This 00:14:01.760 --> 00:14:07.720 interpretation arises from the fact that Petrarca continually compares Laura's name with a 00:14:07.720 --> 00:14:13.960 series of words that have the same etymology, that is, the same origin, and which refer to laurel: 00:14:13.960 --> 00:14:20.080 this plant, also called laurel, is the same one that it was made of the crown with which - you 00:14:20.080 --> 00:14:26.920 remember - Petrarch was crowned, and it is precisely a symbol that represents poetry. Among other things, 00:14:26.920 --> 00:14:32.440 this is also why in Italy, when you finish university, you graduate from "lauro", and 00:14:32.440 --> 00:14:38.920 a laurel wreath is worn in the ceremony. Our Petrarch, therefore, loves a woman and loves 00:14:38.920 --> 00:14:44.800 poetic glory: you are perhaps wondering what the problem is. The fact is that Petrarch 00:14:44.800 --> 00:14:51.240 would like to love eternal things, and therefore dedicate his spirit to the adoration of God. This generates 00:14:51.240 --> 00:14:58.040 an internal conflict: either one loves earthly things, or one loves otherworldly things, and there 00:14:58.040 --> 00:15:03.880 is no way medium as possible. Yet Petrarch struggles to let go of his love for Laura: 00:15:03.880 --> 00:15:10.560 he himself tells us, thinking about his past self, that he is now a different man, but only "in part" (and 00:15:11.160 --> 00:15:16.320 he uses exactly these two words, "in part"). This internal struggle lasts an entire life, 00:15:16.320 --> 00:15:22.400 and condemns Petrarch to eternal restlessness: he cannot enjoy love and poetic glory, 00:15:22.400 --> 00:15:28.480 because he feels guilty; and, at the same time, he cannot enjoy the love for God, because the love for Laura 00:15:28.480 --> 00:15:34.760 never dies completely, no matter how much the work constantly leads us towards the adoration of God. 00:15:34.760 --> 00:15:41.120 We see, or rather we read with our eyes : below you will listen to the poem (or more precisely 00:15:41.120 --> 00:15:46.920 the sonnet) which, in fourteen verses, serves as an introduction to the entire work. 00:15:46.920 --> 00:15:53.440 You who listen in scattered rhymes to the sound of those sighs with which I nourished my heart 00:15:53.440 --> 00:15:59.920 in my first youthful error when I was partly a different man from what I am, 00:15:59.920 --> 00:16:04.800 of the various style in which I cry and I reason between vain hopes and vain pain, 00:16:04.800 --> 00:16:11.640 where there is someone who intends love by test, I hope to find pity, as well as forgiveness. 00:16:11.640 --> 00:16:15.960 But I see well now how 00:16:15.960 --> 00:16:22.960 I was a complete fable to the people for a long time, so that I am often ashamed of myself; 00:16:22.960 --> 00:16:25.360 and shame is the fruit of my raving, 00:16:25.360 --> 00:16:33.000 and repentance, and clearly knowing that what pleases the world is a brief dream. 00:16:33.000 --> 00:16:38.320 Petrarch, with this text, addresses those who are reading the text, and in particular those who, 00:16:38.320 --> 00:16:45.040 like him and many of us, have suffered for love: his hope is to be understood and 00:16:45.040 --> 00:16:50.920 forgiven for having made the mistake of love Laura. His youthful mistake led him to 00:16:50.920 --> 00:16:57.320 be mocked, to repent, and above all to understand that earthly things are only a 00:16:57.320 --> 00:17:03.120 brief dream, in the sense that they are not eternal like divine things. Yet Petrarch's change 00:17:03.120 --> 00:17:08.400 is not complete: it occurred, as we have already seen, only "in part". 00:17:08.400 --> 00:17:13.200 There is not the time necessary to analyze the text in detail or read others, 00:17:13.200 --> 00:17:18.960 but I would like to point out, in the meantime, that fundamentally Petrarch's Italian is also our Italian, 00:17:18.960 --> 00:17:25.320 for the most part, and this is because Petrarch himself contributed indirectly to create literary Italian 00:17:25.320 --> 00:17:29.760 , and because the Florentine vernacular, which was the language of Petrarca, 00:17:29.760 --> 00:17:35.720 over the centuries, as you know, would have been chosen as the reference language for Italians. 00:17:35.720 --> 00:17:42.200 Let's just think about the first verse: You who listen to the sound in scattered rhymes. Phonetically, all 00:17:42.200 --> 00:17:47.240 words remained identical. It would be really difficult to say the same about a verse written 00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:54.120 in English, in French, in German, in Greek or in Chinese in the 14th century, it is astonishing. 00:17:54.120 --> 00:18:00.640 As for the meaning, scattered rhymes could rather be translated as loose poems, that is, not 00:18:00.640 --> 00:18:07.480 collected in a well-ordered and concluded work. In general, however, the poem is quite easy, 00:18:07.480 --> 00:18:12.440 all things considered, to understand for an Italian in 2024, obviously provided 00:18:12.440 --> 00:18:17.040 that some indication is provided. The message is that Petrarch's Italian, 00:18:17.040 --> 00:18:21.720 for a series of reasons, is very similar to our Italian, and this applies to a 00:18:21.720 --> 00:18:27.240 good portion of literary Italian. This is excellent news for those who already know and study 00:18:27.240 --> 00:18:32.520 Italian, because it means that those who know the contemporary language can also, 00:18:32.520 --> 00:18:43.400 with a little effort and patience, access eight hundred years of literature. It's not bad, right? 00:18:43.400 --> 00:18:48.560 Before closing the video, I would like to try to explain more explicitly why Petrarca 00:18:48.560 --> 00:18:53.080 is such an important author and why I dedicated such a long video to him. 00:18:53.080 --> 00:18:57.360 First of all, he left us a huge cultural and 00:18:57.360 --> 00:19:02.720 literary legacy, both with his Latin and vernacular works, both with the works he discovered, 00:19:02.720 --> 00:19:07.320 and with the works he studied and commented on. But if this is also a merit of several other 00:19:07.320 --> 00:19:14.000 authors, with Petrarch there is something else. With the Canzoniere the poetic forms of Italian were basically definitively established 00:19:14.000 --> 00:19:20.600 : they range from the canzone, which is the noblest form, 00:19:20.600 --> 00:19:26.480 used for the highest and most political topics, to the sestinas, ballads and madrigals, 00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:32.560 up to the sonnet, that is, the form used to write the poem we read just now, composed of 00:19:32.560 --> 00:19:38.480 fourteen verses. In the Canzoniere, the sonnet is the quantitatively most represented form, 00:19:38.480 --> 00:19:43.680 and in general, starting from Petrarch, it will often be used to deal with 00:19:43.680 --> 00:19:49.400 slightly lighter topics than those of the song, and in particular obviously love. 00:19:49.400 --> 00:19:54.400 It is, by the way, an entirely Italian form, given that it was born in Italy in the early 00:19:54.400 --> 00:20:00.480 thirteenth century, soon spread throughout the peninsula and, thanks to Petrarch, even went beyond the 00:20:00.480 --> 00:20:06.360 borders of Italy. In fact, in the sixteenth century, Henry Howard, an English poet, translated several 00:20:06.360 --> 00:20:12.080 texts by Petrarch. Thomas Wyatt, himself a poet, tends to use translation 00:20:12.080 --> 00:20:17.880 and imitation less, and rather writes his own sonnets, always based on the form established 00:20:17.880 --> 00:20:24.760 by Petrarch. Starting from these inputs, and then from the contributions of other followers of Petrarch, 00:20:24.760 --> 00:20:30.520 the sonnet spread more and more. The number of these followers rose to the point where 00:20:30.520 --> 00:20:37.360 we can speak of a real artistic phenomenon, called Petrarchism: in the 16th century 00:20:37.360 --> 00:20:43.200 we find signs of it, not only in England, but also in France and Spain, and beyond. Shakespeare 00:20:43.200 --> 00:20:48.240 probably read only part of Petrarch's works, also because he did not know 00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:58.640 Italian very well; however, he could not fail to know the Petrarchists of his era, and in fact Shakespeare's sonnets 00:20:58.640 --> 00:20:59.520 are not without this influence. If we had not had Petrarch, we would not 00:20:59.520 --> 00:21:04.640 even have had the Shakespeare we know, nor would we have had several other works as we have 00:21:04.640 --> 00:21:10.360 known them, both in Italy and abroad. As for the Italian language, Petrarchism 00:21:10.360 --> 00:21:14.640 arrived at the right time, because at the beginning of the sixteenth century the debate on the 00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:19.800 language was quite intense: the Peninsula was divided into many political entities, 00:21:19.800 --> 00:21:25.680 there was no nation, as you know, and yet people were looking for a language to Italy, 00:21:25.680 --> 00:21:31.360 to write and communicate among the various reasons. It is at this point that Pietro Bembo, 00:21:31.360 --> 00:21:36.760 an Italian intellectual who we will talk about in more detail in a future video, enters the scene . Bembo, 00:21:36.760 --> 00:21:42.440 an Italian intellectual and man of letters, understands that choosing an Italian vernacular as the reference language 00:21:42.440 --> 00:21:49.040 also means making one language prevail over all the others, and he also understands that 00:21:49.040 --> 00:21:56.120 this imposition can only occur successfully if it is based on prestige. For this reason, as a model 00:21:56.120 --> 00:22:02.000 for prose (i.e. non-poetic writing) he chooses the famous Decameron by Boccaccio, 00:22:02.000 --> 00:22:08.480 the author I mentioned before, who Petrarch met in Florence in 1350, we will talk about it; 00:22:08.480 --> 00:22:15.080 and as a model of poetic language, instead, it indicates the Canzoniere of our Petrarch. Perhaps Bembo 00:22:15.080 --> 00:22:21.160 indicates the only winning solution, the only one possible in that precise cultural, 00:22:21.160 --> 00:22:26.880 historical and geographical context. In the fifteenth century there had been much more linguistic heterogeneity, 00:22:26.880 --> 00:22:33.200 but the sixteenth century, the first true century of printing, required greater uniformity; 00:22:33.200 --> 00:22:41.600 and Bembo gives the right proposals at the right time. In 1525 he composed the Prose della volgar lingua, 00:22:41.600 --> 00:22:47.440 in which the models just mentioned are given, thus constituting a sort of grammar of 00:22:47.440 --> 00:22:52.480 fourteenth-century Tuscan literature, that is, two centuries ahead of his time. Furthermore, 00:22:52.480 --> 00:22:57.400 Bembo himself composes, on this basis, several texts, which will then be taken as examples. 00:22:57.400 --> 00:23:03.120 The proposal works, it works incredibly well: Petrarca remains unquestionably the 00:23:03.120 --> 00:23:08.240 greatest poetic model for over five hundred - five hundred! – years, 00:23:08.240 --> 00:23:13.200 so much so that we can still clearly see its influence in nineteenth-century poems. 00:23:13.200 --> 00:23:19.440 Let's take The Saturday of the Village, a poem written by Giacomo Leopardi in 1829. At a certain point, 00:23:19.440 --> 00:23:24.360 we find "the little old lady up the stairs"; in the Canzoniere, however, 00:23:24.360 --> 00:23:30.040 we find «risata era a filar la rossarella»: not only is the language very similar, but also the 00:23:30.040 --> 00:23:35.720 poetic images that Leopardi selects are often of Petrarchan inspiration. And again: 00:23:35.720 --> 00:23:40.520 we read «already all the dark air» in the Saturday of the village, while in the Canzoniere we find 00:23:40.520 --> 00:23:50.680 «et l'aere nostra et la mia mente bruna». In short, we have discovered an 00:23:50.680 --> 00:23:56.280 important Italian author: important from every point of view (cultural, literary, linguistic), even 00:23:56.280 --> 00:24:02.200 European level. The examples could not be counted: just think of how many intellectuals of 00:24:02.200 --> 00:24:08.320 eighteenth-century Vienna knew Italian thanks to the Canzoniere... And then, thanks to his role as a great 00:24:08.320 --> 00:24:13.880 model of poetic language, Petrarch has forever influenced the fate of Italian, even if the 00:24:13.880 --> 00:24:19.560 story is much longer. In the next video of this series we will talk about the third crown, namely 00:24:19.560 --> 00:24:25.000 Giovanni Boccaccio. In the meantime, if you haven't seen it yet, I'll leave you my video on Dante here.