Dante Alighieri (9 page)

    
⁵
Inferno
, x .42-51.

    
⁶
See p. 38, note 3. The house in which Dante is supposed to have been born is still preserved. It is situated in what is now known as the Via Dante Alighieri, a continuation of the Via Tavolini, which starts from the Via Calzaioli, a little above Or San Michele, and leads at right angles into the Via de' Cerchi, on the opposite side of which begins the Via Dante. Doubts have been raised of late as to whether this could be the house in which Dante was born. M. Barbi, however, shows that the “case degli Alighieri.” were certainly situated on the spot indicated, and he holds that the traditional site of the actual house of Dante may be accepted as practically correct (see
Bullettino della Società Dantesca Italiana
, N.S. (1904), xi. 258-60; and (1905), xii. 314-20).

    
⁷
Paradiso
, xv. 136. Eliseo was the brother of Dante's great-great-grandfather, Cacciaguida, who had another brother called Moronto, one of the Elisei names.

    
⁸
His name occurs at the foot of three documents, one dated 1239, the other two 1256, as “Alagerius ymperiali auctoritate iudex atque notarius” (see Scherillo,
Alcuni Capitoli della Biografia di Dante
, p. 11).

    
⁹
Dante is mentioned in a document dated 1283 as “the heir of his father, the late Alighieri” (“Dante del già Alighieri del popolo di S. Martino del Vescovo, come herede del padre, vende,” etc.) (see
Bullettino della Società Dantesca Italiana
, No. 5-6 (1891), p. 40).

    
¹⁰
Both Lapa and Bella are mentioned in a document relating to the Alighieri family, dated 16 May, 1332, at which date Lapa was still alive (see Scherillo,
Alcuni Capitoli della Biografia di Dante
, p. 29).

    
¹¹
See p. 39, note 2.

    
¹²
See p. 39, note 2.

    
¹³
This half-sister of Dante's is supposed to be the “donna giovane e gentile, la quale era meco di propinquissima sanguinità congiunta” of
Vita Nuova
, § 23, 11. 86, 95-6.

    
¹⁴
Villani, bk. vii. ch. 15. See above, p. 33.

    
¹⁵
Dante's half-brother and sister, Francesco and Tana, are also mentioned by Forese in this
tenzone
, which is printed in the third edition of the Oxford Dante (1904), pp. 179-80.

    
¹⁶
Paradiso
, xv. 40-5;
Inferno
, xv. 74-8.

    
¹⁷
Villani, bk. v. ch. 39; bk. vi. ch. 33, 79.

    
¹⁸
Villani, bk. ix. ch. 136.

    
¹⁹
“Preitenittus et Alaghieri fratres, filii olim Cacciaguide “(see E. Frullani e G. Gargani,
Della Casa di Dante
, p. 29).

    
²⁰
“Cacciaguide filii Adami” (see Davidsohn,
Geschichte von Florenz
, i. 440 n.).

    
²¹
Paradiso
, xv. 19-xvi. 45.

    
²²
Paradiso
, xvi. 40-2

    
²³
The house of the Elisei stood not far from the junction of the Mercato Vecchio and the Corso, apparently just at the angle formed on the north side of the present Via de' Speziali by its intersection with the Via Calzaioli. The Sesto di Porta San Piero appears to have been the last of the city divisions to be traversed by the competitors in the yearly horserace, who entered the city probably at the Porta San Pancrazio, close to where the Palazzo Strozzi now stands, crossed the Mercato Vecchio, and finished in the Corso, which was thence so called.

    
²⁴
In the later recension of his commentary on the
Commedia
in a note on
Paradiso
, xvi. 97-9, he writes: “de quibus Ravegnanis descenderunt, scilicet de dicto domino Bellincione de dicta domo, comites Guidones, . . . ex domina Gualdrada ejus filia; cujus tres alie filie nupte sunt una in domo illorum de Donatis, alia in domo illorum de Adimaribus, alia in domo hujus auctoris, scilicet illorum de Alagheriis. Que tres domus jam multos habuerunt a dicto domino Bellincione nominatos Bellintiones “(see L. Rocca:
Del commento di Pietro di Dante alla D
.
C
.
contenuto nel codice Ashburnham
841, in
Giomale Storico della letter atura italiana
, vii. 366-85). Pietro's statement is confirmed by the fact that one of Alighiero's sons, Dante's grandfather, was named Bellincione (see
Table
in
Appendix
A).

    
²⁵
Inferno
, xxix. 3-36.

    
²⁶
The record of this act is still preserved (see
Dante Dictionary
, s.v. Bello, Geri del).

    
²⁷
Inferno
, xxiii. 94-5. In the
Convivio
(i. 3, 11. 21-5), he speaks of “that most beautiful and most famous daughter of Rome, Florence, where I was born and bred up until the climax of my life”.

    
²⁸
Paradiso
, xxv. 8-9.

    
²⁹
Inferno
, xix. 17-21.

    
³⁰
The name of the boy is given by one of the early commentators as Antonio di Baldinaccio de' Cavicciuli, a member of a branch of the Adimari family which was especially hostile to Dante. The font which Dante broke is said to have been removed in 1576, by the Grand Duke Francesco I de' Medici, on the occasion of the baptism of his son Philip. The present font was placed where it stands in 1658, but it is the work of an earlier period.

    
³¹
As baptisms used to take place only on two days in the year, on the eves of Easter and Pentecost, and in the Baptistery alone, the crowd on these occasions must have been very great. Villani, Dante's contemporary, says (bk. xi. ch. 94) that in his time the yearly baptisms averaged between five and six thousand; the numbers were checked by means of beans—a black one for every male, a white one for every female.

    
³²
Vita Nuova
, § 2, 11. 15-18.

    
³³
See Del Lungo,
Beatrice nella Vita e nella Poesia del Secolo xiii
. pp. 49-52.

    
³⁴
Cf. Villani, bk. vii. ch. 132 (
ad fin
.).

    
³⁵
Vita di Dante
, ed. Macri-Leone, § 3, pp. 13-15. This work was probably written between 1357 and 1362 (see O. Hecker,
Boccaccio-Funde
, p. 154
n
.).

    
³⁶
“A ciascun' alma presa e gentil core.”

    
³⁷
Vita Nuova
, § 3.

    
³⁸
Vita Nuova
, § 10.

    
³⁹
Vita Nuova
, § 14.

    
⁴⁰
This marriage (which Del Lungo thinks took place as early as 1283), like many others of that period, was probably political, that is to say, it was a “matrimonial alliance,” not in any sense a marriage of affection (see Del Lungo,
op
.
cit
. pp. 13-14, 66-7).

    
⁴¹
The Bardi, who were Guelfs, were of European celebrity as bankers. They had extensive relations with Edward III, through whose default they failed, together with several other important Florentine houses, in 1345, twenty-four years after Dante's death. Edward's debt to the Bardi amounted to nearly a million gold florins.

    
⁴²
Vita Nuova
, § 22, 11. 1-18.

    
⁴³
Folco Portinari had been one of the fourteen “Buonomini” instituted in 1281 by Cardinal Latino; and he subsequently three times (in 1282, 1285, and 1287) held the office of Prior. He died on 31 December, 1289, and was buried in the chapel of the hospital founded by himself, his funeral being honoured by the official attendance of the Signoria of Florence. The monument erected over his tomb is still preserved, though not in its original site. The inscription on it runs as follows:—

    
“Hic iacet Fulchus de Portinariis qui fuit fundator et edificator uius ecclesie et ospitalis S. Marie Nove et decessit anno MCCLXXXIX die XXXI decembris. Cuius anima pro Dei misericordia requiescat in pace” (Del Lungo,
op
.
cit
. pp. 8-9).

    
Folco married Cilia di Gherardo de' Caponsacchi of Florence, and had by her ten children (five sons and five daughters) besides Beatrice, who are all mentioned by name in his will (dated 15 January,
). To the four unmarried daughters, Vanna, Fia, Margarita, and Castoria, he left eighty Florentine pounds each for a dowry. To the son of his daughter Ravignana, wife of Bandino Falconieri, he left fifty Florentine pounds; and he left the like sum to “mistress Bice, his daughter, the wife of Simone de' Bardi” (
Item domine Bici etiam filie sue, et uxori domini Simonis de Bardis, legavit de bonis suis libras L ad florenos
). His five sons, Manetto, Ricovero, Pigello, Gherardo, and Jacopo (of whom the last three were minors) were named as residuary legatees. Manetto (d. 1334), Beatrice's eldest brother, was most probably the near relation of Beatrice who is mentioned by Dante in the
Vita Nuova
as being his dearest friend after Guido Cavalcanti (
Vita Nuova
, § 33, 11. 2-7 : “Si venne a me uno, il quali, secondo li gradi dell' amistade, è amico a me immediatamente dopo il primo: e questi fu tanto distretto di sanguinità con questa gloriosa, che nullo più presso 1' era”). Manetto, it appears, was also a friend of Guido's, who addressed a sonnet to him, which has been preserved among Guido's poems (see Ercole,
Guido Cavalcanti e le sue Rime
, pp. 145-6, 353, 355).

    
⁴⁴
The endowment of this hospital is said to have been suggested to Folco by the then Bishop of Florence, Andrea de' Mozzi (whose name appears in the deed of foundation)—the same Bishop who is branded by Dante in the
Inferno
(xv. 112-14) as an unclean liver. The deed of foundation is printed by L. Passerini in
Storia degli Stabilimenti di Beneficenza
. . .
delta Città di Firenze
(1853), pp. 835-9.

    
⁴⁵
The exact date on which Beatrice died was 8 June, as follows from what Dante says in § 30 of the
Vita Nuova
. His aim is to prove that the number
nine
was intimately connected with the day, the month, and the year of Beatrice's death. As regards the year his statement (11. 7-13) presents no difficulty—she died in 1290. In order to bring in the number nine in the case of the month and the day Dante has recourse to the Syrian and Arabian calendars (“io dico che, secondo l' usanza d' Arabia, 1' anima sua nobilissima si partì nella prima ora del nono giorno del mese; e secondo 1' usanza di Siria, ella si partì nel nono mese dell' anno; perchè il primo mese è ivi Tisrin primo, il quale a noi è Ottobre”). He says Beatrice died in the ninth month according to the Syrian reckoning, which (as he learned from Alfraganus, his astronomical authority) corresponds to our sixth month, namely June. The difficulty, therefore, as to her having died in June, the sixth month according to our reckoning, is got over by saying that she died in the ninth month according to the Syrian reckoning. As regards the day, Dante says that she died in the first hour of the ninth day of the month, according to Arabian usage. Now Alfraganus explains that according to the Arabian usage the day begins, not at sunrise, as with the Romans and others, but at sunset. If, then, Dante, in order to get the required connexion between the number nine and the day of the month on which Beatrice died, was obliged to have recourse to the Arabian usage, in the same way as he fell back upon the Syrian usage in the case of the month itself, we are forced to the conclusion that the actual date of Beatrice's death was not, as has been too hastily assumed, the ninth of the month, but
the evening of the eighth
, which according to the Arabian reckoning would be the beginning of the ninth day (see Paget Toynbee,
Dante Studies and Researches
, pp. 61-4).