The Linguistic Problem in Dante:

A Gramscian Pathway toward the Modern Vernacular World

By Stefano Selenu

B.A., Università di Bologna, 2003

A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the

Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

in the Department of Italian Studies at Brown University

Providence, Rhode Island

May 2010

© 2010 by Stefano Selenu

iii

This dissertation by Stefano Selenu is accepted in its present form

by the Department of Italian Studies as satisfying the

dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

Date _______________ __________________________________

Ronald L. Martinez, Advisor

Recommended to the Graduate Council

Date _______________ __________________________________

Massimo Riva, Reader

Date _______________ __________________________________

Suzanne Stewart-Steinberg, Reader

Date _______________ __________________________________

Joseph A. Buttigieg, Reader

Approved by the Graduate Council

Date _______________ _________________________________

Sheila Bonde, Dean of the Graduate School

iv

CURRICULUM VITAE

Stefano Selenu was born on April 17, 1978 in Carbonia, Sardinia (Italy). He holds an

Italian laurea cum laude in Philosophy from the University of Bologna. His research

focuses primarily on the intersections of language, literature, and politics in Italian

culture and history, with a comparative approach across class, gender, geographical,

and cultural boundaries. His specific interests include Dante and early modern

literature; Antonio Gramsci and Marxism; Italian literature and philosophy; theories

of history, politics, and language; history of Italian and Sardinian languages and

philology.

In 2005, his tesi di laurea was awarded the first Antonio Gramsci Prize,

which included the publication in the collection Antologia del Premio Gramsci. IX

Edizione (Sassari: EDES, 2006. 223-358). This work investigates the question of

Sardinian language standardization in connection with both Antonio Gramsci‟s

thought on philology, contemporary philosophy of language and romance linguistics.

He is currently revising this into a book entitled, Ideas: Un sentiero gramsciano

verso la lingua sarda. He has also published several articles on Gramsci and

Benedetto Croce.

Thanks to a Tuition Fellowship from the Cogut Center for the Humanities at

Brown, in 2007 he attended the School of Criticism and Theory at Cornell

University. In 2009, he was a recipient of a Mellon grant to attend the Summer

Institute in Italian Paleography at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, CA. Furthermore,

with the collaboration of the graduate students in Italian Studies at Brown and

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Harvard Universities, in 2008 he founded and co-organized “Chiasmi,” the first

Brown-Harvard Graduate Student Conference in Italian Studies.

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PREFACE NOTE

In this work, I will refer to Gramsci‟s and Dante‟s works using the following

abbreviations.

Gramsci:

Q 1, §1. 1 = Quaderni del carcere, Notebook 1, note 1, page 1, with reference to the

Italian edition by Valentino Gerratana (1975).

Q 29, §1 (1935) = Quaderni del carcere, Notebook 29, note 1, year in which Gramsci

wrote the notebok.

Q 1, §1. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 1. 100 = Prison Notebook, Notebook 1, note 1, Vol. 1, page 1,

with reference to Joseph Buttigieg‟s English translation.

Dante:

Inf. 1.105-108 = Divina Commedia: Inferno, canto 1, verses 105-108.

Purg. 2.15-18 = Purgatorio, canto 2, verses 15-18.

Par. 15.105-108 = Paradiso, canto 15, verses 105-108.

VN 30.1 = Vita Nova, ch. 30, paragraph 1.

Dve I.xi.3 = De vulgari eloquentia, book 1, ch. 11, paragraph 3.

Conv. II.ii.1 = Convivio, book 2, ch. 2, paragraph 1.

Mon. I.iii.2 = De Monarchia, book 1, ch. 3, paragraph 2.

Ec. 1.3-5 = Ecloghe, first, verses 3-5.

Epistle 13.4 = Thirteenth epistle, paragraph 4.

Unless otherwise indicated, I will refer to the following editions of Gramsci‟s, Dante‟s,

and Brunetto Latini‟s works:

Gramsci:

Quaderni del carcere. Ed. Valentino Gerratana. 4 vols. Torino: Einaudi, 1975. (I will cite

this edition when dealing with Notebooks 9-29).

Lettere dal carcere. Ed. Antonio A. Santucci. 2 vols. Palermo: Sellerio, 1996.

Prison Notebooks. Ed. Joseph Buttigieg. 3 vols. New York: Columbia UP, 1991-2007. (I

will cite this edition when dealing with Notebooks 1-8).

Letters from Prison. Ed. Frank Rosengarten. 2 vols. New York: Columbia UP, 1994.

Dante:

Divina Commedia. Ed. Sapegno. 3 vols. Firenze: La Nuova Italia, 1979.

The Divine Comedy. Ed. and trans. Robert Durling and Ronald Martinez. 3 vols. Oxford:

Oxford UP, 1996-2010 (expected).

De vulgari eloquentia. Ed. Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo. Milano-Napoli: Ricciardi 1979.

---. English Trans. Steven Botterill. Cambrige, UK: Cambridge UP, 1996.

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Monarchia. Opere minori. Ed. Bruno Nardi. Vol. 3.1. Milano: Ricciardi, 1996.

---. English Trans. Prue Shaw. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 1995.

Brunetto Latini:

Trèsor. Ed. Pietro G. Beltrami, Paolo Squillaciotti, Plinio Torri, Sergio Vatteroni. Torino:

Einaudi, 2007.

The Book of the Treasure. Ed. and trans. Paul Barrette and Spurgeon Baldwin. New York-

London: Garland, 1993.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank my advisor Ron Martinez, a real teacher, guide, and generous

dragomanno; without his help and criticism I would have never reached the awareness of

how complex it is to be simple. I thank the members of my committee, Massimo Riva,

Suzanne Stewart-Steinberg, and Joseph Buttigieg. They all have been good mentors and

readers, who stimulated me to foster this piece of scholarship with their insights and

probing questions.

Along with them, I would like to thank all those who have contributed to my professional

development, among whom, Dedda DeAngelis, Cristina Abbona-Sneider, Caroline

Castiglione, Laura Hess, David Kertzer, and Evelyn Lincoln from Brown, Tim Brennan

from the University of Minnesota, Eric Cheyfitz from Cornell University, Peter Ives from

the University of Winnipeg, Mauro Pala from the University of Cagliari, Francesco

Borghesi from the University of Sidney, Barnaba Maj, Andrea Cristiani, and Derek

Boothman from the University of Bologna. I benefited from all of them and their work in

different ways. I would also like to thank Prof. Teodolinda Barolini from Columbia

University for her kind encouragement and Prof. Lino Pertile for hosting me in his course

on literature and Fascism at Harvard.

Thanks to Giorgio Baratta, who contributed to let me keep the Gramscian pathway firm

in this work. I recall our meeting in Cagliari for the foundation of Terra Gramsci, when

he asked me: “Certo Dante è importante, ma Gramsci è nel titolo della tesi, vero?”

Along with Giorgio, I thank the IGS Italia and the Regione Sardegna for supporting my

participation at the Third Conference of the IGS held in Sardinia in May 2007. I would

also like to thank the Associazione Gramsci in Ales, Salvatore Zucca, and Giorgio Serra

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for their appreciations of my work, and for stimulating me to continue my studies on

Gramsci and language.

Parts of this dissertation have been presented at conferences. I thank Kristina Olson for

allowing me to present a paper on Dante in the Risorgimento at the 2006 Conference in

Medieval Studies at Kalamazoo. Along with her, I thank the participants and attendants at

the panel who contributed with helpful comments and feedback.

I thank Prof. Dino Cervigni from the University of North Carolina for allowing me to

present a paper on Dante at the 2008 AAIS conference in New York and Prof. Christian

Moevs from the University of Notre Dame and Prof. Denis Looney from the University

of Pittsburg for accepting my paper on Dante‟s hunt for the illustrious vernacular at the

2009 MLA Convention in Philadelphia. Their comments and feedback, along with those

of Prof. Linda Carroll, James Nohrnberg, Bernardo Piciché, and other scholars and lovers

of Dante seating in the audience (whose names, unfortunately, I do not recall now),

helped me to improve my ideas on Dante‟s hunting metaphors and his dealing with

Babel, Adam, the panther, and the veltro.

I would also like to thank the Cogut Center for the Humanities and Prof. Michael

Steinberg for awarding me a tuition fellowship for attending the School of Criticism and

Theory at Cornell University, where I benefited from the teachings of theorists such as

Dominick LaCapra, Eric Cheyfitz, Gayatri Spivak, and many others; the Getty Research

Institute for awarding me a Mellon Grant to attend the Summer Institute in Italian

Paleography at the Getty in Los Angeles, where I benefited from the teachings of Prof.

Maddalena Signorini from the University of Rome and the numerous discussions and

surfings with the group; the Medieval Studies Group and the Renaissance and Early

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Modern Studies for awarding me both research and conference travel grants in these

years at Brown.

I would like to thank all my colleagues with whom I experienced the journey of the PhD;

their feedback and questions during the various Italian Studies Colloquia I attended have

been both challenging and stimulating. I also thank those who participated in the creation

and orgazination of Chiasmi in 2008, in particular my colleagues from Brown and

Harvard Universities, Prof. Francesco Erspamer from Harvard University, the Consul

General of Italy in Boston, Liborio Stellino, and Prof. Carlo Cipollone, and the various

sponsors.

I would like to thank Mona Delgado for keeping all the administrative business in order,

and Alice for making our departmental environment more enjoyable, in particular in the

evenings with friendly chats. Thanks to Mary-Therese, Cecilia, Marina, and Liliana

Martinez for treating Monica and me as part of their family.

Finally, I thank my family (both nuclear and enlarged) for supporting my „libero arbitrio‟

even when the wheel of Fortune has been cruel with us. I am sure that there will be times

in which we will have the strength to turn the wheel upside-down and sardonically smile

at its injustice.

To Monica, who has been so strong to s(o)pport my work and passionately helped me

detach dreams from nightmares, I dedicate this dissertation with all my love and

gratitude.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION 1

1. FROM MANZONI TO DANTE? QUESTIONE DELLA LINGUA

AND THE COMMUNES IN GRAMSCI

11

2. GRAMSCI‟S CONTRAPUNTAL READING OF INFERNO 10 34

1. An Unfinished Discourse in Chains: Dante, the Risorgimento, and

Gramsci

38

2. Disinterested Study and Philology 45

3. Inferno 10 51

4. Before Gramsci: De Sanctis and Croce 55

5. Gramsci‟s Aesthetics, Dante‟s Dramatization, and Medea‟s Veil 60

6. Counterpoint and Criticism in Gramsci‟s Reading 68

7. Between Silence and Dialectic: Can Cavalcante speak? 73

8. Humanism, Heresy, and the National-Cultural: Guido‟s Disdain and Gramsci‟s History of Intellectuals

78

3. “LOCUTIONI VULGARIUM GENTIUM PRODESSE

TEMPTABIMUS:” ON THE ETHICAL AND POLITICAL SENSE OF

DANTE‟S NOTION OF VULGARES GENTES

88

4. AGAINST BABEL, AGAINST DISPERSION: NIMROD AND

ADAM, THE PANTHER AND THE VELTRO

117

1. Nimrod and the Overthrown Hierarchy: Speaking Subalterns and Crying Rulers

125

2. The Hunter, the Panther, and the Sweet Glory of Poetry 135

3. Returning to Eden: the Death of Language, Adam‟s Joy, and the Fall of

Babel

145

5. DANTE‟S DE-VULGARIZATION OF THE VULGARE:

HEGEMONY, CAESARISM, AND POETRY OF PRAXIS

152

1. “Firenze esercita un‟egemonia culturale:” Cultural Hegemony from

Gramsci to Dante

152

2. Dante‟s Caesarism and Gramsci‟s Hegemony 161

3. Geography, Society, and the Ethical Court 165

4. Illustrious Vernacular, Poetic Justice, and Poetry of Praxis 171

5. Dante‟s Poetic Imperialism: a Project for a Future Cultural Hegemony? 178

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BIBLIOGRAPHY 184

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Ãqoj ¢nqrèpJ da…mwn

(Ethos is the human demon)

Heraclitus, Fr. 119.

Or dunque s‟ha da sapere che vi son cose, le quali, poichè non sono in nostro potere, noi

possiamo soltanto conoscere, ma non fare... Altre invece ve ne sono che, trovandosi in

nostro potere, noi siamo in grado non solo di conoscere, ma altresì di fare; e in tal caso,

non il fare è ordinato al conoscere, ma anzi questo a quello, poichè allora il fine si è

l‟operare.

Dante, Monarchia I.ii.5.

Croce rimprovera alla filosofia della praxis il suo „scientismo,‟ la sua superstizione

„materialistica,‟ un suo presunto ritorno al „medioevo intellettuale.‟

Antonio Gramsci, Q10, §41.i.

“...ahi se colpisce l‟occhio

della mente quel transito...”

Giorgio Caproni, Il passaggio d‟Enea

1

INTRODUCTION

The stimulus for investigation must start not

with philosophies, but with issues and problems.

Edmund Husserl

“However the topic is considered, the problem of language has never been simply

one problem among others. But never as much as at present has it invaded, as such, the

global horizon of the most diverse researches and the most heterogeneous discourses,

diverse and heterogeneous in their intention, method, and ideology.”1 The point made by

Jacques Derrida in his De la grammatologie well conveys a sense of what, from Richard

Rorty onwards, has been called the linguistic turn(s) of the twentieth century.2

That language has been conceived not only as an object among other objects to

study, but as a global focus on the humanities and social science is, arguably, related to a

growth of awareness that language itself is, as Antonio Gramsci contended, “una

molteplicità di fatti più o meno organicamente coerenti e coordinati.”3 In this light, the

word „language‟ does not only refer to one thing, idea, or concept; rather, it encompasses

a multifaceted composition of signs, cultures, contexts, ideas, forces, struggling theories,

ideologies, worldviews, and so on.

My dissertation focuses on the language question (“questione della lingua”) in Dante

and addresses it not as a single historical event or isolated object in Dante‟s works, but as

1 Jacques Derrida. Of Grammatology. Trans. Gayatri C. Spivak. Baltimore-London: The Johns Hopkins UP,

1997. 6. 2 See Richard Rorty, ed. The Linguistic Turn. Chicago-London: The U of Chicago P, 1967. Peter Ives

argued for a multiplicity of linguistic turns in the humanities and social science. See Peter Ives.

Language and Hegemony in Gramsci. London: Pluto, 2004. 3 Q 10, § 44. 1330.

2

a complex web of issues, discourses, and contexts concerning the theoretical problem of

language, its history, and its politics.

The objective of this dissertation is to elaborate the linguistic problem in Dante as

it „emerges‟ from a dialogic and reflective reading of Dante‟s works and Gramsci‟s

writings. While the aim of such a study could seem merely an exercise of philological

passion for the Florentine poet‟s texts, the objective of interrogating the linguistic

problem in Dante through Gramsci‟s writings might also be a stimulus in the reader‟s

mind to a variety of criticisms. The ambitious nature of this dissertation is however

proportional to the enthusiasm for “thinking in a different mode” that lies as an

unconscious desire of this project.

In what sense, does this dissertation search for and tackle the linguistic problem in

Dante through a Gramscian pathway?

To answer this question, some remarks on the Italian questione della lingua – an

expression with which my own title inherently plays – are needed.

The “questione della lingua” refers to the problem of the constitution and

popularization of a national Italian language, two of the most critical cultural-political

questions in Italian history. From a theoretical standpoint, considering the expression

“questione della lingua” in its broadest sense, which views the Renaissance debates after

Bembo‟s Prose della volgar lingua (1525) up to Manzoni (1785-1873) as only one phase

of the linguistic history of Italy, the questione can be traced back to Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia (1303-1304).

Although left unfinished, Dante‟s treatise is a major expression of the “passage

3

from the Middle Ages to the modern epoch”4 – and one that substantially contributed to

the late medieval contestation of Latin by vernacular culture.

A driving principle of this dissertation is the general view of the De vulgari

eloquentia not simply as a book to be studied, analyzed, and commented, but also as a

principium discorsi, as the beginning of a discourse on Dante and Gramsci focused on the

ethical-political dimension of the multifaceted problem of language. In other words,

understanding Dante‟s treatise is not only the goal of this research, but also the means for

achieving an understanding of both Dante and Gramsci.

My dissertation includes a challenge to our understanding of the relation between

texts and historical time. I will attempt to (de-)localize texts outside the confines of

historical epochs. In other words, I wish to challenge the naturalization of the relationship

between text and epoch, which is often pre-supposed in contemporary academic labor in

the humanities and social science – a labor often fractured according to the boundaries of

both discipline and historical periodization. When we presuppose that ancient, medieval,

early modern, modern, post-modern periods are organized as closed and autonomous

sectors of knowledge, historical epochs begin to carry in themselves a negative power of

closure, separation, incommunicability, untranslatability, and rupture.5

As a general method for thinking about the “language problem” I find Italian

glottologist Graziadio Isaia Ascoli‟s emphasis on the ambition to “spaziar largamente per

la storia”6 engaging and useful. This does not mean however a blindness to historical,

philological, and theoretical accuracy – on the contrary.

4 I borrow this historiographic expression from Gramsci. See Q 9, §121. 1187. 5 For a theoretical and critical reflection on notions of uncommunicability of culture and originality as

rupture see also Timothy Brennan. Wars of Positions: The Cultural Politics of Left and Right. New

4

Gramsci himself implicitly believed in and applied throughout his writings a

broad sense of historical thinking. His method of dealing with history, texts, and the

intellectual labor engages both a macro-logical and micro-logical scholarly approach – an

approach that points to and results in a balance between accounts of large historical

frameworks and analyses of those minute details that form and transform molecularly the

whole of these frameworks.

Taking this “molecular” approach to issues and problems as a general method for

our inquiry, this dissertation consists of a “critical journey”7 through Dante‟s and

Gramsci‟s writings – in my view, the „swan songs‟ of the 13th and 20

th centuries.

8 The

bridging pathway between them is the language problem viewed through an ethical-

political lens, also suggested in the antepenultimate note of the Prison Notebooks (Q 29,

§7).

By using this note as the magnetic compass that orients my research, I explore the

ethical, political, and historical significance of Dante‟s conceptualization of a new

vernacular language. By focusing on Gramsci‟s writings on Italian intellectual history, the

Middle Ages, and Dante, my work suggests a frame for discussing how, at the end of the

thirteenth century, Dante‟s linguistic project opens a way to redefine the social and

political position of those whom Dante called “vulgares gentes.”

Although most interpretations of Gramsci‟s thought generally overlook Dante‟s

contribution, placing Dante in the foreground of Gramsci‟s work produces insights both

into Gramsci‟s ideas on history, language, and the intellectuals, and into the long-term

York: Columbia UP, 2007. In particular, “Humanism, Philology, and Imperialism” at pp. 93-125.

6 Quoted in Sebastiano Timpanaro. Sulla linguistica dell‟Ottocento. Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005. 234. 7 Maria Corti. Il viaggio testuale. Torino: Einaudi, 1978. 16.

5

historical implications of Dante‟s work. Thus, I suggest that a dialogic reading of

Gramsci and Dante generates new meanings for both Gramsci and Dante studies and

foster the discussion of relevant issues in the humanities and social science more

generally.

The dissertation is organized into two sections. The first, consisting of two

chapters, is dedicated to Gramsci‟s reflections on the questione della lingua and the

communes, Dante criticism and Italian intellectual history. The second section,

distributed over three chapters, investigates the ethical and political implications of

Dante‟s theorization on the vernacular.

The first chapter is entitled “From Manzoni to Dante? Questione della lingua and

the Communes in Gramsci.” With the aim of fashioning a fuller understanding of the

notion of „common‟ in Gramsci, I focus on Gramsci‟s views on the medieval commune

and suggest a parallel that links his concept of philosophy of praxis to his ideas on the

vernacularization of culture within the thirteenth-century communes.9

Through a close and reflective reading of the Prison Notebooks and the Letters

from Prison, I suggest that a modernist approach to Gramsci‟s writings does not help our

understanding of either Gramsci or modernity. In fact, reducing Gramsci‟s work to a

8 I borrow the expression „swan song‟ from Gramsci. Q 6, §64. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 48. 9 Thus far, students of Gramsci have been relatively uninterested in studying the concept of “common” in

Gramsci‟s writings. From this perspective, my study here intersects both Giorgio Baratta‟s recent

emphasis on notions such as “comune, comunismo, and senso comune” in Gramsci and the ongoing

research pursued by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri on the political concept of “the common.” See

Giorgio Baratta. Gramsci in contrappunto: Dialoghi col presente. Roma: Carocci, 2007. 163. Michael

Hardt and Antonio Negri. Commonwealth. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard UP, 2009.

Commonwealth is the third major volume following Empire and Multitude. It is interesting that Hardt

and Negri, in their conclusions of Commonwealth, re-consider Dante‟s notion of love as “a practice of

the common. Love is able, traversing the city, to generate new forms of conviviality, of living-together, that affirm the autonomy and interaction of singularities in the common.” Commonwealth. 380. In the

fourth and fifth chapters, I highlight the role of Dante‟s notion of love in his hunt for the vernacular as it

6

theory of modern society and culture abstracted from history means to restrict his own

political reflection within a dialectical metaphysics of history that hypostatizes historical

epochs as distinct, totalizing, and unrelated realms.

I suggest that note 7 of Notebook 29, in the context of Gramsci‟s hyper-textual

body of writings confronts aesthetic-stylistic views about language and about Dante, and

makes possible a re-evaluation of the ethical-political political nature of the De vulgari

eloqeuntia. Thus, by engaging a comparative notion of language and history that Gramsci

himself points out in his Notebooks, I conclude that the contrast between his historical

materialism and Croce‟s idealism can be seen as an implicit re-articulation in modernity

of the rivalry in the age of the communes between vernacularization and elitist

conservation of culture.

In the second chapter, “Gramsci‟s Contrapuntal Reading of Inferno10,” I discuss

Gramsci‟s performance of criticism in the context of his reading of Inferno 10 and insert

this performance into a broader constellation of research interests including topics such as

the theory of historiography, the formation of Italian intellectual groups, popular

literature and folklore, the questione della lingua, and Croce‟s hermeneutics, among

others.

My general claim is that Gramsci‟s criticism of Inferno 10 results in a process of

differentiation that leads to change what once was considered secondary and subordinate

into the nucleus of a new ideological and theoretical nexus. Thus, after introducing the

historical and existential circumstances that frame Gramsci‟s writings, and closely

considering classic interpretations of this canto by Francesco De Sanctis and Benedetto

relates to a search for a cultural hegemony that could allow the overcoming of catastrophic wars and

7

Croce, I parse the strategies Gramsci employs to re-evaluate Cavalcante de‟ Cavalcanti as

the central figure in the canto. In critiquing traditional readings of the canto that consider

Cavalcante as a subordinate character with respect to Farinata, Gramsci emphasizes the

contrapuntal relationships between the two characters and exposes the limitations of

Croce‟s rigid separation of structure and poetry in his discussion of the Comedy.

Moreover, by considering Gramsci‟s interest in Canto 10 in association with

numerous topics outlined in the research plan of the Prison Notebooks, I suggest a way to

read his notes on Inferno 10 in conjunction with those on the communes, proto-

humanism, and late medieval intellectuals. In these notes, Gramsci parallels the contest

between Latin and the vernacular language to the dialectic between a secular-heretical

state of mind (like that of the poet Guido Cavalcanti and his father Cavalcante) and the

conservative linguistic view of early humanism (such as that of Alberto Mussato, to

whom Gramsci refers in his notes). Keeping this framework in mind, and juxtaposing it

to Gramsci‟s contention that Dante‟s De vulgari eloquentia is a “national-cultural

political act,” I raise the question of why Dante decided to write in vernacular language.

The subsequent three chapters attempt to answer this question.

Chapter Three, entitled “„Locutioni vulgarium gentium prodesse temptabimus:‟ on

the ethical and political sense of Dante‟s notion of vulgares gentes,” considers ways in

which the Latin expression vulgares gentes, referring to the speakers whose “locutio” is

addressed in the treatise, may be understood.

I do not find that a satisfactory equivalent for the expression exists in modern

languages. In particular, I find that Dante‟s uses of the term “vulgare” do not correspond

political dispersion.

8

to common understanding of the term as a synonym for “illiterate,” “lay,” or “speakers of

vernacular.” In my view, the defining trait of the term “vulgar,” as Dante uses it, does not

simply relate to notions of literacy, linguistic division, labor distribution, or power

relations, but to a complex ethical-political worldview, in which notions of individual

will, free choice, and vice are interdependently at stake. In my view, the notion of

vulgares gentes (whose “locutio” Dante wishes to help) is thus an open concept including

not only illiterate or lay persons, but also literate, cleric, and ruling people composing

Dante‟s potential audience, whose understanding he wished to enlighten (lucidare) with

his treatise.

In the fourth chapter, “Against Babel, Against Dispersion: Nimrod and Adam, the

Panther and the Veltro,” I discuss the political implications of Dante‟s confrontation with

Babel. As Giorgio Agamben suggested, Dante‟s use of the metaphor of the hunt to refer

to his own search for the illustrious vernacular may be assessed through juxtaposition

with the figure of Nimrod, the “mighty hunter against God” who planned the construction

of the tower of Babel.

My contention is that in focusing on the “locutio vulgarium gentium” Dante

needed to confront the myth of Babel as a typological expression of the political

dispersion and linguistic confusion prevailing on the contemporary Italian scene. In

overturning the power relationships between the architect, Nimrod, and the multitude of

workers at the bottom of the social hierarchy, Dante‟s search for an illustrious vernacular

represents an attempt to re-conceive master-servant relations and to regenerate the

linguistic and political order. Dante‟s hope is that, by gathering the “multitude,” the new

order might transcend dispersion and confusion.

9

In the final chapter, “Dante‟s De-Vulgarization of the Vulgare: Hegemony,

Cesarism, and Poetry of Praxis” I pose the question of whether we can read Dante‟s

search for an illustrious vernacular as the search for a cultural hegemony. In order to

answer this question, I draw on the embedded status of the “dispersed multitude” within

the vulgares gentes, and I reconsider Gramsci‟s claim that when the language question is

raised it indicates that there is a political need “to re-organize the cultural hegemony,”

that is, to re-establish the relationship between ruling and non-ruling groups.

Taking into consideration that, according to most recent scholarship, “hegemony”

can be understood as a political expression of unity in diversity, I propose to read Dante‟s

“imperialism” as an ideological complex aimed at reaching a cultural hegemony and

“unifying” the dispersed multitudes. In all of his works – particularly in the De

Monarchia – Dante employs the metaphysical principle of unity as a theoretical tool for

countering disruption and fragmentation. Accordingly, as Gramsci also suggests in his

notes on Dante‟s political theory, the Emperor can be considered as a power that, by

arbitrating forces in conflict, could bring humanity under a common associative will and

avoid catastrophic dispersion.

In my view, Dante‟s linguistic project also involves an “imperial” ideology. Dante

emphasizes the unity of the illustrious vernacular by paralleling it with the number “one,”

which is the measure through which all other vernaculars should be evaluated and

selected. In re-reading these issues through the notion of hegemony, I explore the ways in

which Dante tackles the tensions between notions of unity from above and diversity from

below. In this respect, the concept of “hegemony” gives us a better perspective for

understanding these tensions and for understanding Dante‟s imperialism as an ideological

10

response to the specific political and linguistic context of his age.

11

CHAPTER 1

FROM MANZONI TO DANTE?

QUESTIONE DELLA LINGUA AND THE COMMUNE IN GRAMSCI

In his body of writings, Gramsci displays a deep interest in the intersections of

language, politics, and intellectual history. In a critical climate more likely to accept that

his studies in glottology played a significant role in forming his political thought, scholars

have recently shown keen interests in Gramsci‟s views of language.10

After migrating from Sardinia to the mainland in 1911, at the age of 20, Gramsci

10 For Gramsci, language, and linguistics, the bibliography is vast and might include: Derek Boothman.

Traducibilità e processi traduttivi. Un caso: A. Gramsci linguista, Perugia: Guerra, 2004; Craig

Brandist. “Gramsci, Bakhtin, and the Semiotics of Hegemony.” New Left Review 216 (March-April

1996): 94-109; Alessandro Carlucci. “„Molteplicità culturale e processi di unificazione:‟ dialetto,

monolinguismo e plurilinguismo nella biografia e negli scritti di Antonio Gramsci.” Rivista italiana di dialettologia 29 (2005): 59-110; Antonio Carrannante. “Antonio Gramsci e i problemi della lingua

italiana.” Belfagor, 5 (1973): 544-56; Tullio De Mauro. “Alcuni appunti su Gramsci linguista.” In

Valerio Calzolaio, ed. Gramsci e la modernità. Napoli: CUEN, 1991. 135-144; “Il linguaggio dalla

natura alla storia. Ancora su Gramsci linguista.” In Giorgio Baratta e Guido Liguori, ed. Gramsci da un

secolo all‟altro. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1999. 68-79; Stefano Gensini. “Linguistica e questione della

lingua.” Critica Marxista 1 (1980): 152-64; Niels Helsloot. “Linguists of All Countries…! On

Gramsci‟s Premise of Coherence.” Journal of Pragmatics 4 (1989): 547-66; Renate Holub. Antonio

Gramsci: Beyond Marxism and Postmodernism. London-Nee York: Routledge, 1992; Peter Ives.

Gramsci‟s Politics of Language: Engaging the Bakhtin Circle and the Frankfurt School, Toronto: U of

Toronto P, 2004 and Language and Hegemony in Gramsci. London-Ann Arbor: Pluto, 2004; Franco Lo

Piparo. Lingua, intellettuali, egemonia in Gramsci. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1979; “Studio del linguaggio e

teoria gramsciana.” Critica Marxista 2.3 (1987): 167-75; Luigi Rosiello. “Problemi e orientamenti linguistici negli scritti di A. Gramsci.” Quaderni dell‟istituto di glottologia 2 (1957): 39-57; “Problemi

linguistici negli scritti di Gramsci.” In Pietro Rossi, ed. Gramsci e la cultura contemporanea. (Atti del

convegno internazionale di studi gramsciani tenuto a Cagliari il 23-27 aprile 1967). Vol. 2. Roma:

Editori Riuniti – Istituto Gramsci, 1970. 347-67; “La componente linguistica dello storicismo

gramsciano.” In Alberto Caracciolo e Gianni Scalia, ed. La città futura: Saggi sulla figura e il pensiero

di Antonio Gramsci. Milano: Feltrinelli, 1959. 299-327; “Linguistica e marxismo nel pensiero di

Antonio Gramsci.” Historiographia Linguistica 3 (1982): 431-452, republished in Paolo Ramat, Hans J.

Niederehe, and Konrad Koerner, ed. The History of Linguistics in Italy. Amsterdam: Benjamins, 1986.

237-258; Leonardo Salamini. “Gramsci and Marxist Sociology of Language.” International Journal of

the Sociology of Language 32 (1981): 27-44; Stefano Selenu. Ideas: un sentiero gramsciano verso la

lingua sarda. Sassari: EDES, forthcoming; “Grammatica, logica e storia in Antonio Gramsci.” In Mauro Pala, ed. Americanismi: sulla ricezione del pensiero di Gramsci in America. Cagliari: CUEC, 2009.

195-212; “Ives and Gramsci in Dialogue: Vernacular Subalternity, Cultural Interferences, and the Word-

Thing Interdependence.” Rethinking Marxism 21.3 (2009): 344-54; “Elaborando le tracce della storia.

Linguaggio, metafora e alterità in Antonio Gramsci.” In Barnaba Maj and Rossana Lista, ed. Sulla

“traccia” di Michel de Certeau. Discipline Filosofiche 1 (2008): 115-33.

12

enrolled at the University of Torino to study literature and linguistics. Among his

professors, linguist Matteo Bartoli, philosopher Annibale Pastore, and Dante scholar

Umberto Cosmo played a central role to form his criticism of Crocean idealism – at the

period, the hegemonic cultural paradigm in Italy.11

In particular his thesis advisor, Bartoli, shaped Gramsci‟s views on language and

linguistics. Influenced by, but not subordinated to Croce‟s aesthetic view of language,

Bartoli, by developing a radical critique of positivism in light of a more geographic and

historicist approach to linguistic facts, founded a new approach to linguistics, which he

called neolinguistica in open opposition to the neogrammarian paradigm.12

As many places of his texts show, Gramsci was particularly indebted to Bartoli‟s

teachings.13

As Gramsci reports in his letter to his sister in law, Tania Schucht, dated

March 19, 1927, Bartoli was convinced that his student “was the archangel destined to

put to definitive rout the neogrammarians.”14

Part of the prison writings is certainly

devoted to fulfilling Bartoli‟s wish, as also witnessed by the first letter from prison in

which the prisoner requested that his landlady, Clara Passarge, provide him with a

German grammar textbook, Matteo Bartoli‟s Breviario di neolinguistica, and Dante‟s

Comedy.

11 For a more articulate analysis about the influence of Bartoli and Pastore on Gramsci, see Stefano Selenu

“Grammatica, logica e storia in Antonio Gramsci.” In Mauro Pala, ed. Americanismi: Sulla ricezione

del pensiero di Gramsci in America. 195-212. 12 On Matteo Bartoli, see Tullio De Mauro. Idee e ricerche linguistiche nella cultura italiana. Bologna: Il

Mulino, 1980. 105-113. Gramsci highlighted Bartoli‟s distance from Croce in the Prison Notebook as

follows: “I do not perceive any direct relationship of dependence between Bartoli‟s method and Croce‟s

theories; Bartoli‟s relationship is with historicism in general, not with a particular form of historicism.

Bartoli‟s originality consists precisely in this: that he took linguistics, narrowly conceived as a natural

science, and transformed it into a historical science rooted in „space and time‟ and not in the

physiology of the vocal apparatus.” Q 3, §74. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 71. Emphasis mine. 13 Bartoli‟s teaching are in part recorded in the Appunti di glottologia Gramsci wrote as a teaching assistant

for Bartoli‟s course of glottology in 1912-1913. Among Bartoli‟s other students one can at least recall

linguist and Dante scholar Benvenuto Terracini.

13

Composed of both pre-prison writings and those from prison, Gramsci‟s work is

complex, fragmented, and highly stratified.15

As Joseph Buttigieg emphasized with

regard to the Prison Notebooks,

the fragmentary character of the notebooks is due, at least in part, to the

„philological‟ method governing their composition. „Philology‟ requires minute

attention to detail, it seeks to ascertain the specificity of the particular. Many of

the items that make up the notebooks do precisely this – they record history in its

infinite variety and multiplicity.16

Therefore,

it is only by going to and through the complete text of the notebooks that one can

gain a thorough appreciation of what it means to place the accent on history „in its

infinite variety and multiplicity.‟17

From this viewpoint, any attempt to create an imagined text fully grounded in and

systematically directed to modern events and perspectives, although fascinating, is

problematic. Indeed, such an approach would inevitably close the constitutive openness

and unresolved character of Gramsci‟s writings into one resolving and totalizing

historiographical perspective.

The unresolved and uncentered character of Gramsci‟s writing and thinking style

is linked to both the number of topics he planned to research and the vast articulations

through which he executed his research projects.18

Even simply skimming his

fragmentary body of writings, we can have a sense of Gramsci‟s predilection and

14 Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 1. 84. 15 Pre-prison writings include school materials and university writings, political documents, numerous

journalistic pieces, theater reviews and critical essays, while the writings from prison are composed of

numerous letters and 29 notebooks. 16 Joseph Buttigieg. Introduction. In Antonio Gramsci. Prison Notebooks. Vol. 1. New York: Columbia UP,

1992. 63. 17 Ibid. 18 I borrow the expression from a passage of Isaia Graziadio Ascoli quoted in Sebastiano Timpanaro. Sulla

linguistica dell‟Ottocento. Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005. 234.

14

ambition to “spaziar largamente per la storia.”19

A thorough understanding of Gramsci‟s writings is complicated by the fact that an

open and unresolved hyper-text lies at the core of his texts. At different moments of his

life in prison, Gramsci formulated diverse interrelated plans to shape his writing and

research activity, which results in a highly stratified interconnected body of texts. Given

this textual interconnectedness the diachronic links and shifts in his writings function as

semantic „molecules‟ to be detected, explored, and carefully discussed.20

From this general perspective, in this chapter, I will particularly focus on a shift

Gramsci appears to work out in his notes on the questione della lingua. While in his early

letters and notes, Gramsci takes Manzoni and Ascoli as pivotal points of reference for

discussing the questione della lingua, in the final Notebook (Q29) written in 1935, he

never mentions them and re-conceives the questione by focusing on Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia.21

If we also keep into consideration that Notebook 29 has generally taken as

19 For analytical discussions on Gramsci‟s research plans see Gianni Francioni. L‟officina gramsciana:

Ipotesi sulla struttura dei “Quaderni del carcere.” Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1984 and Fabio Frosini.

Gramsci e la filosofia: Saggio sui Quaderni del carcere. Roma: Carocci, 2003. 20 I borrow the metaphor of “molecule” from Gramsci himself, when he calls for a “„molecular‟ study of

Italian writings from the Middle Ages to understand the process of intellectual formation of the

bourgeoisie, whose historical development would reach its high point in the communes but would

subsequently break up and dissolve. One could do a similar study for the 1750-1850 period, which saw

the formation of a new bourgeoisie that culminated in the Risorgimento.” Q 8, §3. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3.

234. Gramsci also uses the expression „molecular‟ to refer to the way new social questions and groups

historically form. For Gramsci, they do not simply form after explosive events, but through a preliminary “an extremely minute, molecular process of exhaustive, capillary analysis. The

documentation it requires consists of an enormous number of books, pamphlets, newspaper and journal

articles, conversations and oral debates endlessly repeated; in their gigantic ensemble, they represent the

intense activity that gives birth to a collective will with a certain degree of homogeneity – the degree of

homogeneity that is necessary and sufficient to generate an action that is coordinated and simultaneous

in the time and geographical space in which the historical event takes place.” Q 8, §195. Ed. Buttigieg.

Vol. 3. 346. 21 The last time Gramsci mentions Manzoni in the Prison Notebooks is in Q 23, §56, written in 1934. In Q

29 (written in 1935), Gramsci only mentions the “Manzoniani e classicisti” in order to point out that

they had “un tipo di lingua da far prevalere.” The passage following this statement seems to weaken the

centrality usually attributed to nineteenth-century debates. In fact, for Gramsci “non è giusto dire che

queste discussioni siano state inutili e non abbiano lasciato tracce nella cultura moderna, anche se non molto grandi.” Emphasis mine. Gramsci‟s final remark “anche se non molto grandi” indicates that the

15

crucial for understanding Gramsci‟s linguistic thought, the absence of Manzoni and

Ascoli and the re-focusing on Dante appears worth discussing.

How should we consider this shift? Is it a fortuitous gesture of erudition or a

symptomatic clue leading to a deeper level of interpretation?

Though difficult to be answered in definitive terms, this question invites us to

carry a more skeptical and careful attitude in dealing with the questione della lingua in

Gramsci. It is not my intention to deny the relevance of Ascoli‟s critiques of Manzoni for

Gramsci‟s thought. On the contrary, it is exactly by following Gramsci‟s hints to

approach the questione by discussing Manzoni and Ascoli‟s debate that his

reconsideration of the political value of Dante‟s De vulgari eloquentia in the

antepenultimate note of the Prison Notebooks becomes even more relevant and rich with

hermeneutic implications. In other words, if we want to better understand Gramsci‟s own

politics of language and his critique of Manzoni, Gramsci‟s notes on Dante and the late

Middle Ages cannot be disregarded.

In the first note of the Prison Notebooks, Gramsci outlines a research plan

including sixteen topics, the twelfth of which concerns “La questione della lingua in

Italia: Manzoni e Ascoli.” Coherently with this plan we find several passages in the

Prison Notebooks in which Gramsci focuses on Manzoni‟s politics of language.22

Note 40

of the special Notebook 23, written in 1934, is particularly helpful to address the ways

Gramsci conceived Manzoni‟s proposal and Ascoli‟s critiques of it.

debates on Manzonism in the period around 1935 were not as central as Gramsci scholars recognize

today. 22 See Q 1, §0 (i.e. the annotation including the study plan at the beginning of the Prison Notebooks) and

§73; Q 21, §5 (p. 2118); Q 23, §40. See also Gramsci‟s article “La lingua unica e l‟Esperanto”

published on February 1918 in Il grido del popolo. Gramsci. La città futura (1917-1918). Ed. Sergio

Caprioglio. Torino: Einaudi, 1982. 668-73.

16

Il Bellonci – Gramsci argues – scrive contro l‟affermazione del Crémieux: “Sino

al cinquecento le forme linguistiche scendono dall‟alto, dal seicento in poi

salgono dal basso.” Sproposito madornale, per superficialità e per assenza di

critica e di capacità di distinguere. Poichè proprio fino al Cinquecento Firenze

esercita un‟egemonia culturale, connessa alla sua egemonia commerciale e

finanziaria (papa Bonifacio VIII diceva che i fiorentini erano il quinto elemento

del mondo) e c‟è uno sviluppo linguistico unitario dal basso, dal popolo alle

persone colte, sviluppo rinforzato dai grandi scrittori fiorentini e toscani. Dopo la

decadenza di Firenze, l‟italiano diventa sempre più la lingua di una casta chiusa,

senza contatto vivo con una parlata storica. Non è questa forse la quistione posta

dal Manzoni, di ritornare a un‟egemonia fiorentina con mezzi statali, ribattuta

dall‟Ascoli, che più storicista, non crede alle egemonie [culturali] per decreto, non

sorrette cioè da una funzione nazionale più profonda e necessaria?23

As this passage shows, Manzoni‟s proposal to spread the Tuscan idiom to the

entire national territory is based upon a specific conception of the historical development

of Italian vernaculars. For Gramsci, Manzoni‟s idea of re-affirming Florentine hegemony

through the power of the State is not a continuation of the type of cultural hegemony from

below existing in Florence in the Duecento and Trecento.

Thus, a brief discussion on the way Manzoni perceived Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia can help us to better view both Gramsci‟s contentions in Q29, §7 and his

critiques of Manzoni in other notes.

In his proposal for the unification of the Italian language sent to the Minister of

Education Emilio Broglio in 1868 (seven years after Italian unification), Manzoni argued

that, given that the canonical works of Italian literature were written in Tuscan idiom, the

model for the unified national language should have been Tuscan. Consequently, all

teachers of Italian, for Manzoni, had to spend a period in Florence to acquire the

language of Italians, which would have been then taught and spread through teachers‟s

23 Q 23, §40. 2237. This note replicates what Gramsci already wrote in 1929-1930 in Q 1, §73.

17

labor in the public schools.24

Five years later, Italian linguist Graziadio Isaia Ascoli replied critically to

Manzoni‟s views with a brief piece in the Proemio of the Archivio Glottologico Italiano

(1873). In his essay, Ascoli highlighted that Manzoni‟s politics of language was grounded

in an erroneous understanding of the Italian linguistic situation and argued that it was

based on an unsubstantiated analogy between the Italian case and the French and German

ones. According to Ascoli, the unification of the French language was strictly connected

to the presence in France of a centralizing capital, which helped to produce and spread

through national territory a unified language forged on the Parisian model. It is however

difficult – Ascoli claimed – to find a similar example in Italy, since no Italian city had

such a centralizing power as the one Paris historically retained in France.

Now, given the complexity of the debates on the Italian language unification

during the Risorgimento and its aftermath, why did Manzoni not mention Dante‟s De

vulgari eloquentia in his report sent to Minister Broglio?

In a letter to Ruggero Bonghi dated 1868, Manzoni explained why. In his letter,

by diverging from a long tradition beginning with Trissino‟s interpretation in the

sixteenth century and reaching the Risorgimento, Manzoni claims that Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia did not deal with the problem of establishing a notion of national language. In

fact, the central topic of the treatise was, according to Manzoni, the “language of poetry,

or better, a specific genre of poetry.”25

To support this general idea, Manzoni provides

various reasons, among which a crucial one is the idea that Dante never uses the term

24Alessandro Manzoni. “Dell‟unità della lingua e dei mezzi per diffonderla. Relazione al ministro della

Pubblica Istruzione proposta da Alessandro Manzoni agli amici colleghi Bonghi, Carcano ed accettato

da Caro.” In Scritti linguistici. Ed. Ferruccio Monterosso. Milano: Edizioni Paoline, 1972. 183-209.

18

“lingua” in his treatise.

Manzoni‟s argumentative strategy needs scrutiny. Indeed, from a textual

viewpoint, Dante actually used the term “lingua” at least twice in Dve I.x.6 – uses that,

however, do not necessarily confute Manzoni‟s point. Yet, if we also look at Convivio –

Dante‟s philosophical treatise in the vernacular written at about the same time as the De

vulgari eloquentia – we find that the term “lingua” occurs in contexts where issues of

national identity and culture are at stake.26

In this respect, a comparative gaze through

Dante‟s works undermines Manzoni‟s argument.

Next, it is significant that in his letter Manzoni mentions only textual excerpts

from the second book of the De vulgari eloquentia. As readers of the treatise know, it is

in the context of the first book that we find Dante‟s discussion on the illustrious

vernacular of Italy, while it is in the second book that Dante‟s discourse focuses mostly

on stylistic and poetic issues. From this angle, it is plausible to suppose that Manzoni‟s

claim concerning Dante‟s intention to deal with poetry, and not with the common

language of Italy, depends on his exclusive focus on the second book of the treatise.

It would be a simple mistake to believe that this aesthetic-stylistic view of Dante

is peculiar to Manzoni. Rather, this view is, arguably, the most common one and,

needless to say, it greatly affected many readings of both the De vulgari eloquentia and

the Comedy. In this respect, while Manzoni‟s silence on the first book is symptomatic,

Benedetto Croce‟s quasi-indifference to Dante‟s treatise is even more remarkable. As

linguist Antonino Pagliaro highlighted, “Croce himself in the historical section of the

25 Alessandro Manzoni. “Lettera intorno al libro De vulgari eloquio di Dante Alighieri.” In Scritti

Linguistici. Ed. Ferruccio Monterosso. Milano: Edizioni Paoline, 1972. 240. Translation mine. 26 For instance, Dante used the expression “lingua Italica” in Conv. I.ix to distinguish Italian literates from

19

Aesthetics recalls [the De vulgari eloquentia], […] only for the definition of the noun as a

sign (rationale signum et sensuale).”27

Given the hegemonic power of Croce‟s idealism

on ideas of literature, philosophy, and history in 20th century Italy and, to a lesser extent,

Europe,28

Croce‟s silence cannot have been without effect on how Dante‟s treatise was

received and interpreted in the last century.

This silence, I suspect, is connected to Croce‟s theory of language as identical to

art, for both of them are expressions of the individual subject.29

Among the

interpretations of Dante influenced by Croce is that of Giulio Bertoni, whose reading is

particularly relevant for my argument. According to Bertoni,

la verità è che Dante, difendendo il volgare, difende il solo modo, nel quale gli è

concesso di poetare. Più che la forza degli argomenti addotti in favore del volgare,

Dante sente un‟altra forza: e, cioè, che egli non può non iscrivere in volgare.

Tanto è vero che la sua migliore difesa della nuova lingua si risolve in un volo di

poesia, quando paragona il volgare al nuove sole che sorgerà laddove l‟usato

tramonterà. La discriminazione di questa nota caratteristica, lo studio e l‟esame

delle opere considerate da questo punto di vista spettano all‟Estetica, che è

dunque Linguistica.30

Gramsci never hid his sarcastic and scornful criticisms of such interpretations.

One should write a severe critique of Bertoni as a linguist for the positions he has

taken recently in the Manualetto di linguistica… not only has Bertoni failed to

understand Bartoli, he has also failed to understand Croce‟s aesthetics in the sense

that he has been unable to derive from Crocean aesthetics rules for the research

non-Italian ones.

27 “Lo stesso Croce nella parte storica dell‟Estetica non ricorda (4a ed., p. 206 sg.), ma lo fa a titolo di

onore, se non la definizione della parola come segno (rationale signum et sensuale).” Antonino

Pagliaro. “I „primissima signa‟ nella dottrina linguistica di Dante”. Quaderni di Roma 1 (1947), republished in Nuovi saggi di critica semantica. Messina-Firenze: D‟Anna, 1971. 218. Translation

mine. 28 See for instance, for Dante and linguistic studies, the deep influence of Croce on Karl Vossler in

Germany. 29 See Benedetto Croce. Estetica come scienza dell‟espressione e linguistica generale. Bari: Laterza, 1928. 30 Giulio Bertoni. “Principi generali.” In Giulio Bertoni and Matteo G. Bartoli. Breviario di neolinguistica.

Modena: Società Tipografica Modenese (Soliani), 1925. 23. Emphasis mine. Other examples of the

aesthetic hermeneutic trend might include Augusto Simonini. La questione della lingua e il suo

fondamento estetico. Bologna: Calderini, 1969 and Maurizio Vitale. La questione della lingua.

Palumbo, 1967.

20

and construction of the science of language. He has done nothing but paraphrase,

exalt, and wax eloquent about certain impressions; he is essentially a positivist

who swoons at the sight of idealism because it is more fashionable and provides

the occasion for flights of rhetoric.31

Now, given Manzoni‟s failure to see the political implications of Dante‟s

discourse on vernacular eloquence and Croce‟s indifference to the treatise, we have a

better viewpoint from which evaluating Gramsci‟s contentions in Q29, §7.

For Gramsci,

pare chiaro che il De Vulgari Eloquio di Dante sia da considerare come

essenzialmente un atto di politica culturale-nazionale (nel senso che nazionale

aveva in quel tempo e in Dante), come un aspetto della lotta politica è stata

sempre quella che viene chiamata “la questione della lingua” che da questo punto

di vista diventa interessante da studiare. Essa è stata una reazione degli

intellettuali allo sfacelo dell‟unità politica che esistè in Italia sotto il nome di

“equilibrio degli Stati italiani,” allo sfacelo e alla disintegrazione delle classi

economiche e politiche che si erano venute formando dopo il Mille coi Comuni e

rappresenta il tentativo, che in parte notevole può dirsi riuscito, di conservare e

anzi di rafforzare un ceto intellettuale unitario, la cui esistenza doveva avere non

piccolo significato nel Settecento e Ottocento (nel Risorgimento). Il libretto di

Dante ha anch‟esso non piccolo significato per il tempo in cui fu scritto; non solo

di fatto, ma elevando il fatto a teoria, gli intellettuali italiani del periodo più

rigoglioso dei Comuni, “rompono” col latino e giustificano il volgare, esaltandolo

contro il “mandarinismo” latineggiante, nello stesso tempo in cui il volgare ha

così grandi manifestazioni artistiche. Che il tentativo di Dante abbia avuto enorme

importanza innovatrice, si vede più tardi col ritorno del latino a lingua delle

persone colte (e qui può innestarsi la quistione del doppio aspetto

dell‟Umanesimo e del Rinascimento, che furono essenzialmente reazionari dal

punto di vista nazionale-popolare e progressivi come espressione dello sviluppo

culturale dei gruppi intellettuali italiani e europei).32

As Gramsci suggests in this note, intellectuals such as Dante, by elevating fact

into theory, realized that the cultural manifestations in the vernacular represented a

historical discontinuity and expressed it by detaching them from what Gramsci calls

“mandarinismo latineggiante.” In this respect, Dante‟s treatise can be considered an

31 Q 3, §74. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 70-71. The title “Manualetto di neolinguistica” refers to Bartoli and

Bertoni‟s Breviario di neolinguistica.

21

intellectual-political attempt to restore the equilibrium among the Italian states – an

equilibrium lost after the break-up of the Roman Empire. Therefore, for Gramsci, Dante‟s

treatise not only entails a discourse on poetry and poetic style, but is rich with historical

and ethical-political implications.

To have a fuller understanding of Gramsci‟s re-evaluation of Dante‟s treatise from

a political standpoint, it is worth exploring the ways Gramsci conceptualizes the “age of

the communes,” i.e. the historical context in which Dante elaborated his ideas on the

vernacular.33

As is well known, in modern Italian history, the Risorgimento is a crucial moment

in which the modern myth of Dante was fostered and enforced. The first note of

Notebook 19 sheds light on Gramsci‟s awareness that a complex series of studies, both on

the nineteenth century and the preceding history spanning a long temporal arch from the

Roman Empire to 1870, is needed to understand the Italian Risorgimento. Indeed, among

the various topics to be researched, Gramsci includes: the meaning of the word „Italy;‟ the

role of Caesar for the development of the Roman Empire; the period of the Communes

and the formation of new urban social groups; the “età del mercantilismo e delle

monarchie assolute” and the influences exerted in Italy by foreign countries. By adopting

such a wide historiographical perspective,34

Gramsci was persuaded, on the one hand, to

reach a better focus on the “cultural elements” that played a pivotal role in the

32 Q 29, §7. Emphasis mine. 33 It is to notice that the studies on Gramsci‟s reflections on the Middle Ages are rare. See at least Massimo

Montanari “Gramsci e il Medioevo.” In Giuseppe Vacca and Marina Litri, eds. Gramsci e il Novecento.

Vol. 2. Roma: Carocci, 1999. 79-87. 34 Many other notes offer further evidence to Gramsci‟s long-range historiographical perspective. In the

Appunti di glottologia (1912-1913), several parts devote attention to Roman history and the ways the

history of Roman Empire, plays a central role to explain the history of languages in Western and Eastern

Europe.

22

Risorgimento struggles35

and, on the other, to write a series of essays for a “specific

audience” (unidentified in the note),

col fine di distruggere concezioni antiquate, scolastiche, retoriche, assorbite

passivamente per le idee diffuse in un dato ambiente di cultura popolaresca, per

suscitare quindi un interesse scientifico per le quistioni trattate, che perciò saranno

presentate come viventi e operanti anche nel presente, come forze in movimento,

sempre attuali.36

Among the various topics to be studied, Gramsci indicates the middle ages

identified symptomatically as “the age of the communes.” It is curious that the

approximately ten-century-long epoch of the Middle Ages is shortened to the “age of the

communes,” which covers about three centuries. As Massimo Montanari also

35 In Q19, §1, Gramsci envisions “una doppia serie di ricerche. Una sull‟età del Risorgimento e una

seconda sulla precedente storia che ha avuto luogo nella penisola italiana, in quanto ha creato elementi

culturali che hanno avuto una ripercussione nell‟età del Risorgimento (ripercussione positiva e

negativa) e continuano a operare (sia pure come dati ideologici di propaganda) anche nella vita

nazionale italiana, così come è stata formata dal Risorgimento. Questa seconda serie dovrebbe essere

una raccolta di saggi su quelle epoche della storia europea e mondiale che hanno avuto un riflesso nella

penisola. Per esempio: 1) I diversi significati che ha avuto la parola “Italia” nei diversi tempi,

prendendo lo spunto dal noto saggio del prof. Carlo Cipolla (che dovrebbe essere completato e

aggiornato). 2) Il periodo di storia romana che segna il passaggio dalla Repubblica all‟Impero, in quanto

crea la cornice generale di alcune tendenze ideologiche della futura nazione italiana. Non pare si sia

compreso che proprio Cesare ed Augusto in realtà modificano radicalmente la posizione relativa di Roma e della penisola nell‟equilibrio del mondo classico, togliendo all‟Italia l‟egemonia „territoriale‟ e

trasferendo la funzione egemonica a una classe „imperiale‟ cioè supernazionale. Se è vero che Cesare

continua e conclude il movimento democratico dei Gracchi, di Mario, di Catilina, è anche vero che

Cesare vince, in quanto il problema, che per i Gracchi, per Mario, per Catilina si poneva come problema

da risolversi nella penisola, a Roma, per Cesare si pone nella cornice di tutto l‟impero, di cui la penisola

è una parte e Roma la capitale „burocratica;‟ e ciò anche solo fino a un certo punto. Questo nesso storico

è della massima importanza per la storia della penisola e di Roma, poiché è l‟inizio del processo di

„snazionalizzazione‟ di Roma e della penisola e del suo diventare un „terreno cosmopolitico.‟

L‟aristocrazia romana, che aveva, nei modi e coi mezzi adeguati ai tempi, unificato la penisola e creato

una base di sviluppo nazionale, è soverchiata dalle forze imperiali e dai problemi che essa stessa ha

suscitato: il nodo storico-politico viene sciolto da Cesare con la spada e si inizia un‟epoca nuova, in cui l‟Oriente ha un peso talmente grande che finisce per soverchiare l‟Occidente e portare a una frattura tra

le due parti dell‟Impero. 3) Medioevo o età dei Comuni, in cui si costituiscono molecolarmente i nuovi

gruppi sociali cittadini, senza che il processo raggiunga la fase più alta di maturazione come in Francia,

in Ispagna, ecc. 4) Età del mercantilismo e delle monarchie assolute, che appunto in Italia ha

manifestazioni di scarsa portata nazionale, perché la penisola è sotto l‟influsso straniero, mentre nelle

grandi nazioni europee i nuovi gruppi sociali cittadini, inserendosi potentemente nella struttura statale a

tendenza unitaria, rinvigoriscono la struttura stessa e l‟unitarismo, introducono un nuovo equilibrio

nelle forze sociali e si creano le condizioni di uno sviluppo rapidamente progressivo.” Q 19, §1. 1959-

1960. In this note, Gramsci re-writes different insights of Q 9, §89. 36

Q 19, §1.

23

emphasized, Gramsci‟s use of the term “Middle Ages” corresponds to the “Medioevo dei

comuni” and the two terms of „Middle Ages‟ and „commune‟ are often used as

synonyms.37

The Duecento is the historical moment in which feudal society began its decline,

leaving European countries to diverse processes of nation-state formation. Gramsci

conceives the communes in this transitory age as germinal state formations, where new

urban social groups were formed,38

animating “un rinnovamento storico effettivo e

radicale.”39

Yet, in Italy this movement did not reach “the highest phase of development”

as it did in France and Spain, where the nation-state was formed earlier. To characterize

the germinal stage of the communes – a stage not led by ideals of national unity, but by

wars among classes – Gramsci used the term “economic-corporativist” (which he

generally employs in opposition to the term of Crocean origins, “ethical-political”).40

In

other words,

la funzione storica dei Comuni e della prima borghesia italiana [...] fu

disgregatrice dell‟unità esistente, senza sapere o poter sostituire una nuova propria

unità: il problema dell‟unità territoriale non fu neanche posto o sospettato e questa

fioritura borghese non ebbe seguito: fu interrotta dalle invasioni straniere.41

Though the communes did not lead toward the formation of a modern nation-

state, they are an important historical moment given that they mark the convergence of

three changes: the closed feudal system began its decline,42

new forms of democratic

37 Massimo Montanari. “Gramsci e il Medioevo.” In Vacca and Litri, eds. Gramsci e il Novecento. Vol. 2.

85. 38 Q 19, §1 and Q 9, §89. 39 Q 15, §48. 1809. 40 See Q 5, §31. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 295-6. 41 Ibid. Ed. Gerratana. 568. 42 On this point, see Q 5, §147, entitled “Funzione cosmopolita degli intellettuali italiani.” Gramsci notes:

“On the fact that the bourgeoisie of the communes was unable to go beyond the corporative phase and

hence cannot be said to have created a state, whereas the church and the empire were really the state:

24

participation in political life were generated, and intellectual movements closer to the

people took place.43

This is why the problem of understanding the actual “historical

function” of the Communes is for Gramsci “a very interesting problem from the point of

view of historical materialism” that “can be connected to the question of the international

function of Italian intellectuals.”44

In this respect, it is worth recalling a letter to Gramsci‟s sister in law, Tania

Schucht, dated September 7, 1931. In this letter Gramsci, when he claims that he greatly

amplifies the notion of intellectual, clarifies the intersections between his research on the

Communes and the history of the intellectuals:

My study also leads to certain definitions of the concept of the State that is

usually understood as a political Society (or dictatorship, or coercive apparatus

[…]) and not as a balance between the political Society and the civil Society (or

the hegemony of a social group over the entire national society […]) and it is

within the civil society that the intellectuals operate (Ben. Croce, for example, is a

sort of lay pope and he is a very effective instrument of hegemony […]). In my

opinion, this conception of the function of the intellectuals helps to cast light on

the reason or one of the reasons for the fall of the medieval Communes, that is, of

the government of an economic class that was unable to create its own category of

intellectuals ad thus exercize hegemony and not simply dictatorship; the character

of Italian intellectuals was not national-popular but rather cosmopolitan, patterned

after the Church […]. The Communes therefore were a syndicalist-state, which

never went beyond this place to become an integral State, as had pointed out in

vain by Machiavelli, who through the organization of the army wanted to

establish the city‟s hegemony over the countryside, and so he can be called the

first Italian Jacobin (the second was Carlo Cattaneo […]). It follows that the

Renaissance must be considered a reactionary and repressive movement when

compared to the development of the Communes, etc. I present you these

comments to convince you that every period of history that has unfolded in Italy,

from the Roman Empire to the Risorgimento, must be viewed from this

monographic standpoint.45

before writing anything on this, it is necessary to read Gioacchino Volpe Il Medio Evo.” Q 5, §147. Ed.

Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 395. 43 See Q 3, §16. “As the movement of emancipation gained ground, however, going beyond the boudnaries

and structures of these societies, the people started demanding and obtaining participation in the major public offices.” Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 23.

44 Q 5, §31. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 295. 45

Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 67. Emphasis mine.

25

As this letter indicates, for Gramsci the commune can be contrasted to the

regressive movement of the Renaissance – a point also recalled in Q 29, §7. Between the

lines of this letter lies an „implicit parallel‟46

between the communes and the intellectual

movement of the Reformation in Northen Europe – a parallel developed in Q8, §145

(1931-1932).

Yet, differently from the relationship of contiguity between Reformation and

Renaissance in Northern Europe, the relationship between the communes and the

Renaissance in Italy was historically discontinuous. Indeed,

In Italy … from the viewpoint of popular participation in public life there was a

historical hiatus between the movement of the communes [-reformation-] and the

Renaissance movement.47

In Italy the movements of the communes were in fact stopped by the growth of

Quattrocento humanism, when intellectuals return to Latin as the language of high

culture.

46 In Gramsci‟s view, “it should be pointed out tha the whole of language is a series of „elliptical

comparisons‟ and that history is and implicit comparison between the past and the present (historical

actuality).” Q 7, §42. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 191-2. See also Q 10, II, §38 and §41.vi. From an

interdiscursive viewpoint, it is worth to notice that the notion of “ellipsis” is the crucial concept Luigi

Sicardi used in his La lingua italiana in Dante to prove his new interpretation of Guido‟s disdain in Inf. 10. Gramsci cited this essay in the notes on Canto ten and praises it in other notes concerning

linguistics, as I will show in the next chapter. According to Sicardi, “è cosa non dubbia, nè del tutto

inosservata da‟ nostri più antichi e accurati grammatici, che la nostra lingua consentiva agli scrittori de‟

primi secoli, come a perdurarvi le tracce sporadiche del latino, di omettere talvolta preposizioni o i

segnacasi dinanzi a‟ sostantivi o a pronomi. [...] Ragion per cui non soltanto preposizioni e segnacasi

venivan non di rado omessi e non più spesso nella poesia che nella prosa, ma taciuta ogni altra parola

del discorso che poteva venir soppressa e che era consentito agli scrittori si potesse di leggieri

sottindendere dato il senso generale del periodo che tutto riusciva a chiarire. Dico la figura dell‟ellissi.

Ragione questa dell‟uso, in forza del quale era del tutto ovvio in que‟ secoli di coglier facilmente il

senso dell‟intero discorso; dove a noi ora, essendo così variato, così in questo come in tante altre cose,

l‟uso della nostra lingua sia parlata che scritta, e tanto sintatticamente impoverito, non ci riesce talvolta, nè prima nè poi, di coglierlo quel senso, e quindi d‟intendere non di rado o all‟ingrosso quegli antichi.

Ora la mancanza p. es. d‟un segnacaso, quando pure il senso del discorso ce ne facesse accorti – e non

sempre avviene – non si giudicherebbe che un vero e proprio errore materiale, mai proposito deliberato,

come allora in certi casi era uso.” Enrico Sicardi, La lingua italiana di Dante. Roma: Optima, 1928. 21-

22.

26

Gramsci attributes a sense of exemplarity to the communes. This is particularly

evident in those notes in which he makes various parallels between past and present in

order to reach a better understanding of contemporary events. From this comparative

perspective between past and present, Gramsci‟s interests in the late Middle Ages, Dante,

and the Italian communes are also relevant to better understanding Gramsci‟s view of

communism in modernity and his views on the cultural-political problems of his own

age.48

Three instances give us evidence on this point. First, in critiquing Croce‟s

intellectual detachment from politics Gramsci makes a parallel between the modern

idealist separation of intellectual and political activity and the conceptual distinction

between “potere temporale” and “potere spirituale” (temporal and spiritual powers) in

the late Middle Ages. Second, Gramsci used the Sicilian Vespers as an instance of

explosive revolution, to which he counteposes a concept of revolution as a molecular

elaboration of cultural and social relationships.49

Third, in discussing the role of

47 Q 8, §145. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 319. 48 As further evidence that historical materialists considered the communal epoch as particularly important

to review the role of communism in modernity, one can recall the way Antonio Labriola justified his

interests in studying the heretical figure of Fra‟ Dolcino. On April 24, 1897 Labriola wrote to Sorel that

he had in mind “di trattare all‟Università della condizione economica dell‟Italia superiore e media in su

la fine del XIII, e in sul cominciamento del XIV secolo, col principale intento di spiegare l‟origine del

proletariato di campagna e di città, per trovare poscia una qualche prammatica spiegazione al sorgere

di certe agitazioni comunistiche, e per dichiarare da ultimo le vicende assai oscure della eroica vita di

Fra Dolcino.” Antonio Labriola. Discorrendo di Socialismo e Filosofia. Ed. Benedetto Croce. Bari:

Laterza, 1947. 26. As Labriola himself mentions in the same letter, his idea of studying the life of Fra Dolcino perplexed intellectuals of his period, who saw this topic as inopportune for a Marxist. Yet,

Labriola had no doubt that “fu certo intento mio d‟essere e rimanere marxista,” and added that “non

posso non prendere sotto la mia responsabilità personale le cose che dissi a mio rischio e pericolo,

perchè le fonti su le quali mi toccava di lavorare son quelle che maneggiano tutti gli altri storici, d‟ogni

altra scuola e indirizzo, e a Marx non aveva niente da chiedere, poichè lui non aveva niente da offrirmi

nella fattispecie.” Ibid. The same volume includes a long letter to Sorel (July 2, 1897), in which

Labriola deals exactly with the question of interpreting the history of Christianity through the paradigm

of historical-genetic materialism. See pp. 118-146. As is well known, Gramsci considered Labriola‟s

general approach to historical materialism exemplary. 49

Q 8, §195.

27

expressions such as “Third Reich,” Gramsci analyzes the corresponding Italian version

“la terza Italia” and argues that in Italy a more effective notion would have been

Mazzini‟s “l‟Italia del popolo.”50

To explain the political potential of the democratic

orientation embedded in Mazzini‟s formula Gramsci establishes a parallel with with the

communes.

Un precedente per il Mazzini sarebbero potuti essere i Comuni medioevali che

furono un rinnovamento storico effettivo e radicale, ma essi furono sfruttati

piuttosto dai federalisti come Cattaneo. (L‟argomento è da porre in rapporto con le

prime note scritte nel quaderno speciale su Machiavelli).51

As this note suggests, in Gramsci‟s view, the efficacy of a historical movement

cannot be detached from the national-cultural history within which that movement

ferments.52

From this comparative perspective, the past can become a powerful political

tool in the present.

Indeed, differently from Mazzini, the parallel with the communes was developed by

Cattaneo and the federalists. As Croce also expressed in his Storia della storiografia

italiana del secolo decimonono (1921), Cattaneo,

giungendo al culmine, al movimento sociale del secolo undecimo, efficacemente lo

ritrae in tutti i suoi tratti caratteristici e nel nesso del suo svolgersi, sfatando la

teoria, invalsa nel Settecento, che poneva il principio del risorgimento europeo nelle

Crociate e nelle relazioni con l‟Oriente, laddove esso fu nei municipî e nel legittimo

possesso della ricchezza popolare. Alle lotte tra comune e comune, che sì profondo

sospiro traevano dai petti dei nazionalisti e unitarî, guarda con ben più largo senso

della vita e della civiltà umana; perchè “fra quelle battaglie il popolo cresceva, fra

50 “La relativa fortuna della parola mazziniana di “Italia del popolo” che tendeva a indicare un

rinnovamento completo, in senso democratico, di inizativa popolare, della nuova storia italiana in

contrapposto al “primato” giobertiano che tendeva a presentare il passato come continuità ideale

possibile col futuro, cioè un determinato programma politico presente presentato come di larga portata.

Ma il Mazzini non riuscì a radicare la sua formula mitica e i suoi successori la diluirono e la

immeschinirono nella retorica libresca.” Q 15, §48. 1808-1809. 51 Ibid. Italics mine. 52 In this respect, Q 5, §150 is quite relevant, for Gramsci conceives Mazzini‟s political failure as related to

the presence in his thought of “traces of medieval universalism.” This, in turn, did not allow Mazzini to

generate a real political formation and reduced his legacy to “a catalyst of ideological sectarianism and hence of disintegration.” Q 5, §150. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 398.

28

quelle depradazioni si svolgeva un‟insolita prosperità; e dai secoli precedenti a quel

secolo v‟è un trapasso come dalla putredine del sepolcro al fermento della vita.”53

As this passage also shows, the processes leading toward Italian unification in

nineteenth century constituted a laboratory for rethinking history and re-evaluating the

ideological links between past and present.

Similarly to Cattaneo, but from a different ideological orientation, Gramsci viewed

the age of the communes as a revolutionary period in Italian history – a period during

which the popular classes attained a central position both in the social and political life of

the urban governments. As observed in Q3, §16, entitled “Sviluppo politico della classe

popolare nel Comune medievale,” the reciprocal wars among the Communes “helped

stimulate the formation of parties”54

and allowed the “popolo” to become a “real political

party”55

in the second half of the Duecento. The “popolo,” therefore,

per dare maggiore efficacia alla sua azione si dà un capo, “il Capitano del popolo,”

ufficio che pare Siena abbia preso da Pisa e che nel nome come nella funzione

rivela insieme origini e funzioni militari e politiche. Il popolo che già, volta a volta,

ma sporadicamente, si era riunito e si era costituito e aveva prese deliberazioni

distinte, si costituisce come un ente a parte, che si dà anche leggi proprie. [...] Entra

in contrasto col Podestà a cui contesta il diritto di pubblicar bandi e con cui il

Capitano del popolo stipula delle “paci.” Quando il popolo non riesce ad ottenere

dalle Autorità comunali le riforme volute, fa la sua secessione, con l‟appoggio di

uomini eminenti del Comune e, costituitosi in assemblea indipendente, incomincia a

creare magistrature proprie ad immagine di quelle generali del Comune, ad

attribuire una giurisdizione al Capitano del popolo, e a deliberare di sua autorità,

dando inizio (dal 1255) a tutta un‟opera legislativa. (Questi dati sono del comune di

Siena).56

In conclusion, Gramsci notices,

Il popolo riesce, prima praticamente, e poi anche formalmente, a fare accettare negli

Statuti generali del Comune disposizioni che prima non legavano se non gli ascritti

53 Benedetto Croce. Storia della storiografia italiana del secolo decimonono. Vol. 2. Bari: Laterza, 1921.

13. Emphasis mine. 54 Q 3, §16. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 22. See also Q 25, §4. 55 Q 3, §16. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 23. 56 Ibid. 301-2. (Ed. Buttigieg, 23-24). Emphasis mine.

29

al “Popolo” e di uso interno. Il popolo giunge quindi a dominare il comune,

soverchiando la precedente classe dominante, come a Siena dopo il 1270, a Bologna

con gli ordinamenti “Sacrati” e “Sacratissimi,” a Firenze con gli “Ordinamenti di

giustizia.”57

As these passages indicate, Gramsci‟s knowledge of the “age of the communes”

was detailed and well-informed. Indeed, in his notes, we not only find general statements

concerning the political value of past phenomena, but also nuanced historical accounts

concerning particular case studies. Although Gramsci‟s readings on the Middle Ages are

scarce (if compared with other topics) and mostly composed of secondary sources, we

should highlight that Gramsci‟s interest in the epoch was certainly intense.58

Given the relevance Gramsci attributes to the communes it is noteworthy to point

out that his views on the Duecento are at odds with nationalistic interpretations of the

commune. By critiquing the idea of a “genetic” continuity between the Duecento and the

Risorgimento, Gramsci emphasized that Italian civilization (civiltà) in thirteenth century

was not linked to specific national ideals or movements, but to the vicissitudes of social

classes. This conditioned Italian civilization to assume “both „politically‟ and

„culturally‟… a „communal‟ and local form, not a unitary form.”59

In fact, Italian culture

“was born in „dialect‟ and would have to wait until the great [Tuscan] florescence of the

fourteenth century before it could meld linguistically, and even then only up to a certain

57 Ibid. Emphasis mine. In re-writing this note in 1934 on the special Notebook 25, entitled “Ai margini

della storia (Storia dei gruppi sociali subalterni),” Gramsci changed the expression “classe popolare”

with “gruppi sociali subalterni.” This terminological change provoked a rich debate among diverse

scholars, who argued that Gramsci began to use the term “subaltern” instead of “proletariat” in order to avoid the limitations of fascist censorship. As Marcus Green has emphasized, there is no evidence about

this censorship. In fact, Gramsci continued to use the notion in his late prison notebooks, for instance, in

notebook 25. See Marcus Green. Gramsci‟s Concept of Subaltern Social Groups. Diss. York U, 2006.

Ottawa, ON: Library and Archives Canada, 2006. 58 See Montanari. “Gramsci e il medioevo.” 85. 59 Q 6, §116. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 97.

30

point.”60

The unity of Italian culture

did not exist – quite the opposite. What existed was a cultural “Euro-Catholic

universality,” and the new culture reacted against this universality (which was based

in Italy) by means of the local dialects and by bringing to the fore the practical

interests of municipal bourgeois groups.61

It is in this context that Gramsci‟s final interpretation of Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia as an “act of national-cultural politics” appears significant.

Indeed, as claimed in Q 7, §78, Dante‟s “„…love for the plebeian language, born

out of the virtually heretical state of mind of the communes,‟ was bound to clash with a

quasi-humanistic concept of knowledge.”62

This can be better viewed, if we also consider

that the vernacularization of culture was, for Gramsci, a process counterposed to the

Catholic universalism – which, arguably, a proto-humanistic Italian „clerus‟ inherited and

reformulated into a love for Latinitas. As highlighted in Q 7, §68,

humanism was the first „clerical‟ phenomenon in the modern sense; it was a

Counter-Reformation in advance (besides, it was a Counter-Reformation vis-à-vis

the commune period). The humanists opposed the breakdown of medieval and

feudal universalism that the commune implied and that was smothered in its

infancy, etc.”63

While I will return to the contest between Dante and proto-humanists in chapter 3, it

is important now to emphasize that the contrast between cultural vernacularization and

clerical universalism does not indicate that the flowering of a vernacular culture

originated as a national culture. In fact, as Gramsci suggests, we should not confuse two

different historical moments:

60 Ibid. Gramsci‟s point here seems to be at odds with the more recent one of American historian Charles T.

Davis, who argued that, “The word Italy during Dante‟s lifetime (1265-1321) denoted a peninsula

united by language and history but not by any central government.” See C.T. Davis. Dante‟s Italy.

Philadeplhia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1984. 1. 61 Q 6, §116. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 97. 62 Q 7, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 205. 63

Ibid. 206. Emphasis mine.

31

(1) the rupture with medieval culture, the most significant evidence of which is the

emergence of the vernaculars; (2) the development of an “illustrious vulgar tongue”

– in other words, the fact that intellectual groups or, rather, professional men of

letters achieved a certain degree of centralization.64

It is this second point that describes what Dante attempted to do in writing De

vulgari eloquentia at the beginning of the fourteenth century. In this light, we can

appreciate Gramsci‟s argument that the development of vernacular languages was strictly

connected to the “virtually heretical state of mind” from which the institutions of the

communes arose.65

To better grasp the sense of the association of the commune with “heresy” we

should point out that Gramsci uses the term “heretical” not only to denote stricto sensu

those phenomena that the Catholic Church condemned as such, but also to refer to a

wider sense including “tutte le innovazioni nel seno della Chiesa…non… dovute a

iniziativa del centro.”66

This wider sense of heresy echoes the etymology itself of the

word, which, according to Isidore of Seville, derives from the Greek verb to „choose.‟

Heretics are, indeed, people who decide independently of the dogmas and teachings of

the Church.67

It is this broad sense of heresy that allows Gramsci to claim that even “the

commune was in itself a heresy because it was bound to clash with the papacy to become

64 Q 6, §118. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 97. 65 Q 7, §68. 66 Q 6, §188. 833. 67 “Haeresis Graece ab electione vocatur, quod scilicet unusquisque id sibi eligat quod melius illi esse

videtur , ut philosophi Peripatetici, Academici, et Epicurei et Stoici, vel sicut alii qui perversum dogma

cogitantes arbitrio suo de Ecclesia recesserunt. Inde ergo haeresis dicta Graeca voce, ex interpretation

electionis, qua quisque arbitrio suo ad instituenda, sive ad suspicienda quaelibet ipse sibi elegit.”

Etymologies VIII.iii.1-2. English Trans.: “Heresy (haeresis) is so called in Greek from „choice‟…,

doubtless because each person chooses (eligere) for himself that which seems best to him, as did the

Peripatetic, Academic, Epicurean, and Stoic philosophers – or just others who, pondering perverse

teachings, have withdrawn from the Church by thei own will. Hence, therefore, „heresy,‟ named with a

Greek word, takes its meaning from „choice,‟ by which each person, according to his own judgment,

chooses for himself whatever he pleases to institute and adopt.” Stephen A. Barney, Jennifer A. Beach,

Oliver Berghof, ed. Etymologies of Isidore of Seville. West Nyack, NY: Cambridge UP, 2002. 174.

32

independent.”68

Gramsci‟s view on the communes not only helps us to contextualize his ideas on

Dante‟s lingustic project, but also to re-address Gramsci‟s historical materialism and to

re-consider its opposition to Croce – a “lay pope”69

and “the last man of the

Renaissance,”70

in whose notion of intellectual “c‟è qualcosa di „cattolico e clericale.‟”71

In fact, Gramsci himself viewed his own version of communism, or philosophy of praxis,

as a „heresy‟ with regard to the idealism of “lay pope” Croce.72

Croce rimprovera alla filosofia della praxis il suo “scientismo,” la sua superstizione

“materialistica,” un suo presunto ritorno al “medioevo intellettuale.” Sono i

rimproveri che Erasmo, nel linguaggio del tempo, muoveva al luteranesimo.

L‟uomo del Rinascimento e l‟uomo creato dallo sviluppo della Riforma si sono fusi

nell‟intellettuale moderno del tipo Croce, ma se questo tipo sarebbe incomprensibile

senza la Riforma, esso non riesce più a comprendere il processo storico per cui dal

“medievale” Lutero si è necessariamente giunti allo Hegel e perciò di fronte alla

grande riforma intellettuale e morale rappresentata dal diffondersi della filosofia

della praxis riproduce meccanicamente l‟atteggiamento di Erasmo.73

In this light, Gramsci‟s refocusing on Dante‟s De vulgari eloquentia in the final

notebook and his programmatic anti-Crocian reading of Inferno 10 – the canto in which

Dante dramatizes the conditions of the heretics – can be conceived as expressions of the

virtually heretical state of mind embedded in his notion of communism and philosophy of

68

Q 7, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 206. Gramsci‟s notion of “heretical spirit” relates to an economic-

giuridical view of the historical development of the Communes, to which historians such as Felice

Tocco, Gioacchino Volpe, Gaetano Salvemini, Carlo Cipolla, and later on Giovanni de Vergottini, and

others dedicated their studies. Gramsci himself emphasizes in Q 6, §116 that “the heresies of the Middle

Ages will have to be studied (Tocco, Volpe, etc.).” For the relationship between Communes and heresy,

see also Giovanni de Vergottini. Studi sulla legislazione imperiale di Federico II in Italia. Milano:

Giuffrè, 1952 and Lezioni di storia del diritto pubblico italiano nei secoli XII-XV. Bologna: Zuffi, 1957,

2 vols. For a discussion (contemporary to Gramsci) about the communes, see also Gaetano Salvemini.

Magnati e popolani in Firenze dal 1280 al 1295. Firenze: Carnesecchi, 1899. 69 See Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 67. 70 On Croce and the model of civilization of the Renaissance see at least Q 3, §140; Q 7, §1 and §17; Q 10,

§41.i and §41.iv. 71 Q 10, § 41.iv. 72 For a discussion of the contest between the Reformation and the Church as it parallels the dialectic

between the philolosophy of praxis and Croce‟s idealism see also Q16, §9, entitled “Alcuni problemi

33

praxis. In this sense, a close and reflective reading of Inferno 10 can allow us to clarify

Gramsci‟s insights on Dante‟s intellectual labor in the context of the communes – the

only example, for Gramsci, of a movement in Italian history, akin to the Reformation,

that might have been used to reinforce modern democratic orientations.

per lo studio dello svolgimento della filosofia della praxis.”

73 Q 10, §41.i. Emphasis mine.

34

CHAPTER 2

GRAMSCI‟S CONTRAPUNTAL READING OF INFERNO 10

“Se per questo cieco

carcere vai per altezza d‟ingegno...”

Dante, Inf. 10.57-58

“...cotesto materialismo storico esige,

da chi voglia professarlo consapevolemente

e schiettamente professarlo,

una certa curiosa maniera di umiltà…”

Antonio Labriola

The relevance of Dante‟s position in Gramsci‟s thought has been not much

clarified by Gramsci scholars. Although such scholars as Frank Rosengarten, Renate

Holub, Paul Bovè, Geoffrey Hill, Guido Guglielmi, and others74

devoted their attention to

74 Frank Rosengarten. “Gramsci‟s „Little Discovery:‟ Gramsci‟s Interpretation of Canto X of Dante‟s

Inferno.” Boundary 2 14.3 (1986): 71-90; Renate Holub. Antonio Gramsci: Beyond Marixsm and

Postmodernism. 117-147; Paul Bovè. “Dante, Gramsci, and Cultural Criticism.” In Mastering

Discourse: the Politics of Intellectual Culture. Durham: Duke UP, 1992. 200-214; Geoffrey Hill.

“Between Politics and Eternity.” In Peter S. Hawkins and Rachel Jakoff, eds. The Poets‟ Dante. New

York: Reffar, Straus and Giroux, 2001. 319-332; Guido Guglielmi. “Il canto X dell‟Inferno.” In Da De

Sanctis a Gramsci: il linguaggio della critica. Bologna: Il Mulino, 1976; Sebastiano Aglianò. Il canto di

Farinata: Inf. X. Lucca: Casa Editrice “Lucentia”, 1953; Giorgio Padoan. “Il canto degli Epicurei.”

Convivium (January-February 1959): 12-39; Rocco Montano. “Per l‟interpretazione del Canto degli Epicurei.” Convivium (November-December 1960): 707-716; Odoardo Strigelli. “Il canto di Farinata

dopo gli appunti di Gramsci.” Inventario 1 (1952): 97-104; Mario Sansone. Il canto X dell‟Inferno.

Firenze: Le Monnier, 1961; Armanda Guiducci. “A proposito di estetica in Gramsci.” In Alberto

Caracciolo and Giovanni Scalia, eds. La città futura: Saggi sulla figura e il pensiero di Antonio

Gramsci. Milano: Feltrinelli, 1959. 371-389; Simonetta Piccone Stella. “Questioni di estetica nel

pensiero di Antonio Gramsci.” Il Contemporaneo 44 (January 1962): 7-23; Rino Dal Sasso. “Il rapporto

struttura-poesia nelle note di Gramsci sul decimo canto dell‟Inferno.” In Studi gramsciani. Roma:

Editori Riuniti, 1969. 123-142; Galvano Della Volpe. In Studi gramsciani. 543-548; Francesco

Mattarrese. Interpretazioni dantesche. Bari: Laterza, 1952; Bartolo Anglani. “La critica letteraria in

Antonio Gramsci.” Critica Marxista 3 (1967): 208-230; Bartolo Anglani. “La revisione gramsciana di

Croce e il concetto di struttura nelle note sul canto decimo dell‟Inferno.” In Pietro Rossi, ed. Gramsci e la cultura contemporanea. Vol. 2. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1970. 339-346; Bartolo Anglani. Egemonia e

poesia. Gramsci: l‟arte, la letteratura. Lecce: Pietro Manni, 1999; Carlo Muscetta. “Gramsci in

carcere.” In Letteratura militante. Firenze: Parenti editore, 2007. 109-119; Natalino Sapegno. Canto

Decimo. In Dante Alighieri. La Divina Commedia: Inferno. Firenze: La Nuova Italia, 1978. 108-109;

Betsy Emerick. “Auerbach and Gramsci on Dante: Criticism and Ideology.” Carte Italiane, 1 (1979-

1980): 9-22; Andrea Menetti. Il lettore in carcere: la critica letteraria nei Quaderni. Roma: Carocci,

2004; Angelo Rossi and Giuseppe Vacca. “Dante corriere segreto fra Gramsci e Togliatti.” In Gramsci

tra Mussolini e Stalin. Roma: Fazi, 2007. 38-46; Giuseppe Prestipino. “La „struttura‟ in Dante.” In Dai

maestri del pensiero e dell‟arte alla filosofia della praxis. Roma: SEAM, 2008. 15-23; Federico

35

Gramsci‟s reading of Inferno 10, so far no extended research has been attempted to

thoroughly clarify and debate the role, position, and meaning of Dante in the larger frame

of Gramsci‟s work. Furthermore, earlier discussions have tended to be confined to

questions such as why and how Gramsci read Inferno 10, or what this reading can suggest

us about Gramsci‟s aesthetics, hermeneutic philosophy, and theory of art.

In this chapter, my intention is not to review the research concerning Gramsci‟s

notes on Inferno 10 scholars have carried out, but to highlight, on the one side, the

several insights Gramsci, as a reader and performer of criticism, provides to us in the

course of what I term his contrapuntal reading of Inferno 10, and, on the other, to review

Gramsci‟s reading in light of his notes about the history of intellectuals. Actually, these

two aims are part of one single goal, i.e. to achieve a fuller understanding of Gramsci‟s

labor of criticism as it relates to Dante and the history of Italian intellectuals.

In order to point out those insights that characterize Gramsci as a reader and critic

of Dante, I will divide this chapter in different section. First, I will discuss the historical

context and existential circumstances in which Gramsci mostly read and wrote about

Dante and, by doing so, I will give a short account of Dante‟s reception in the

Risorgimento, which, arguably, Gramsci overcomes in his prison writings.

Next, after introducing Inferno 10, I will closely look at De Sanctis‟s and Croce‟s

interpretations of this canto and show the reading strategies Gramsci employs to critique

Croce‟s theoretical framework, which, grounded in a rigid separation of structural and

poetic parts in the Comedy, led Croce to de-value allegorical approaches to the poem and

debase the structural framework as an expression of poetry. Thus, in emphasizing the

Sanguineti, Gramsci e Machiavelli. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1981.

36

notion of “drama” embedded in Gramsci‟s vision of Dante‟s poetry, I will argue that the

logic at the basis of Gramsci‟s reading of Inferno 10 is similar to the dialectical logic he

employed in his Prison Notebooks. This logic enacts the notion of criticism Gramsci

expressed in theory in Q 8, §195, according to which,

criticism results in a process of differentiation and of change in the relative weight

that the adherents of the old ideologies used to possess. What was once considered

secondary and subordinate, or even incidental, comes to be seen as primary and

becomes the nucleus of a new ideological and theoretical complex. The old

collective will break up into its contradictory component parts, because those

parts of it that were subordinate develop socially, etc.75

In this light, I will display the ways Gramsci‟s contrapuntal reading of Inferno 10

radically counters the implicit conservative dialectic at work in Croce‟s interpretation of

the canto.

In the final section of the chapter, I will propose a way to discuss Gramsci‟s

interest in Inferno 10 in light of his reflections concerning the Italian Communes and the

history of the Italian intellectuals in the Duecento, to which I devoted my attention in the

first chapter.

As it will be more evident from a reading of this chapter in conjunction with the

first one, the method I employ in both of them is to view Gramsci‟s work on Inf. 10 in

light of the broad constellation of research interests Gramsci outlined in the first note of

the Prison Notebooks. In my view, the topic “Cavalcante Cavalcanti: his position in the

structure and art of the Divine Comedy,” noted as the fifth of sixteenth topics, should not

be considered in isolation from the other issues he annotated, but as an integral part of a

large constellation including at least the following topics:

75 Q 8, §195. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 346.

37

1. Theory of history and of historiography;

2. Development of the Italian bourgeoisie up to 1870;

3. Formation of Italian intellectual groups;

4. Popular literature;

5. The concept of folklore;

6. Common sense;

7. The question of the language in Italy: Manzoni e G. I. Ascoli;

8. Neo-grammarians and neo-linguists (“this round table is square”).

This list includes the same topics Franco Lo Piparo selected in his major study on

Gramsci as linguist, where he argued that in these topics linguistic issues play a central

role.76

Yet, given that the topic concerning the position of Cavalcante de‟ Cavalcanti in

the Comedy is a “molecule” through which to observe micro-logically the practices of

criticism Gramsci enacts by engaging in a series of reflections on language, textuality,

and history, it is odd that Lo Piparo did not mention it.

One more topic should be added to the ones listed before, i.e. the eighth of

Gramsci‟s list, “Experiences of prison life.” Actually, this topic could not be considered

as simply one issue among others. It is in fact a living dimension imprinted in Gramsci‟s

entire research project and writing activity in prison. Indeed, the state of vulnerability and

exclusion Gramsci lived in prison can be observed through the “double perspective” that

seems to affect his perception of his life and study:

Nella vita umana […] quanto più un individuo è costretto a difendere la propria

esistenza fisica immediata, tanto più sostiene e si pone dal punto di vista di tutti i

complessi e più elevati valori della civiltà e dell‟umanità.77

76 See Franco Lo Piparo. Lingua, intellettuali, egemonia in Gramsci. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1979. 9-10. 77 Q 13, §15 (1932-1934).

38

1. An Unfinished Discourse in Chains: Dante, the Risorgimento, and

Gramsci

In one of his few remarks devoted to Gramsci, Edward Said pointed out that

Gramsci‟s mode of writing was a sort of “prismatic expression,”78

that is, a situated-and-

never-resolved-expression. In other words, it is a never-finished kind of writing whose

meaning is characterized by the momentary and transitory position of its writer.

Said‟s notion that Gramsci‟s writing is situated suggests the importance of

considering the historical context in which Gramsci read and wrote. In fact, his reading

and writing activity in prison are inseparable from his being an anti-fascist politician-

intellectual in chains.

Given the circumstances in which his unflagging and meticulous work of research

was pursued, Gramsci‟s activities of reading and writing in prison were “exceptional.”

They were exceptional because not situated in a professional context surrounded by

libraries and other services typical of academic research institutions. In addition, the

contingent circumstances affected the structure of his prison writings and the

development of his ideas. Indeed, as Giorgio Baratta emphasized in one of his last public

speeches on Gramsci, “Gramsci was a writer of non-books.”79

In general terms, Gramsci‟s reading, thinking, and writing activities were part of

the existential struggle he fought onto two fronts. On the one side, he struggled as a

78 Edward Said. “History, Literature, and Geography.” in Reflections on Exile and Other Essays.

Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 2003. 466-467. Said‟s idea has been followed by David Ruccio

“Unfinished Business: Gramsci‟s Prison Notebooks.” Rethinking Marxism. 18.1 (2006): 1-7, and Joseph

Buttigieg, “The Prison Notebooks: Antonio Gramsci‟s Work in Progress.” Rethinking Marxism. 18.1

(2006): 37-42, in particular 41. See also Giorgio Baratta. Gramsci in Contrappunto. Rome: Carocci,

2007.

39

political leader and intellectual against fascism and in favor of communism. On the other

side, he fought against the traumatic experience of fascist prisons, which imposed on him

conditions of vulnerability and exclusion.80

In fact, such conditions are historically not exceptional. As Walter Benjamin

emphasized in his eighth Thesis on the Philosophy of History, “the tradition of the

oppressed teaches us that the „state of emergency‟ in which we live is not the exception

but the rule.”81

Situations of exile, imprisonment, diaspora, and displacement are indeed

common in history. As Edward Said pointed out, “Modern Western culture is in large part

the work of exiles, émigrés, refugees”82

and between exile and nation building processes

there is a deep historical association.

From this broad perspective, a brief report on the meaning of Dante in the period

that led Italy and Italians to unification, from the Risorgimento to Fascism seems to be

relevant.

After Vico‟s and Alfieri‟s pioneering interest in Dante during the Settecento,

Dante‟s relevance to the Ottocento increased, to the point that he became a central

reference for Italian intellectuals such as Foscolo, Leopardi, Pellico, Mazzini, Manzoni,

79

Giorgio Baratta. “Dialoghetto tra Gramsci e una sua ombra.” The Third International Conference of the

International Gramsci Society, Cagliari-Ghilarza, 4-5 May 2007. 80 On the effects of the prison in Gramsci‟s subjectivity see Nereide Rudas. “Reclusione, solitudine e

creatività in Gramsci.” In Eugenio Orrù and N. Rudas, eds. Il pensiero permanente: Gramsci oltre il suo

tempo. Cagliari: Tema, 1999. 310-333; Betsy Emerick. “Auerbach and Gramsci on Dante: Criticism and

Ideology.” Carte Italiane 1 (1979-1980): 9-22. An appreciation of the psychosomatic effect of the

prison on Gramsci‟s mind is also at the center of Renate Holub‟s interpretation of Gramsci‟s reading of

Dante. See Renate Holub, Antonio Gramsci: Beyond Marixsm and Postmodernism. 117-147. See also

Joseph Francese. “Thoughts on Gramsci‟s Need „To Do Something „Für ewig.‟” Rethinking Marxism

21.1 (January 2009): 54-66; Massimo Lollini. “La questione del soggetto nelle Lettere dal carcere di Antonio Gramsci tra testimonianza e letteratura.” In Mauro Pala, ed. Americanismi: Sulla ricezione del

pensiero di Gramsci in America. 145-167. See also Stefano Selenu. “Elaborando le tracce della storia.

Linguaggio, metafora, alterità in Antonio Gramsci.” In Barnaba Maj and Rossana Lista, ed. Sulla

"traccia" di Michel de Certeau. Interpretazioni e percorsi. Discipline Filosofiche. 1 (2008): 115-133. 81 Walter Benjamin. “Theses on the Philosophy of History.” In Illuminations: Essays and Reflections. Ed.

40

Perticari, Settembrini, Rossetti, Balbo, Cattaneo, Gioberti, De Sanctis, and others.83

Most

of them spent at least part of their lives in exile and/or in prison. As Maurizio Isabella

highlighted,

between 1799 and 1850 exile was a phenomenon that affected a significant

section of the Italian educated classes, if not in quantitative terms, then in terms of

the importance that this group of exiled intellectuals had in Italy and continued to

have abroad in the creation of a national movement and a national identity.84

Exile was a contributory cause in the production of discursive and political

activity regarding the national identity, both at home in Italy and abroad. The existential

and spiritual conditions of exclusion, alienation, and vulnerability in which most

intellectuals and activists lived in the Risorgimento cannot be disregarded as irrelevant to

the generation of a cult around Dante.

The conditions of oppression and exile Italians experienced were denounced in

Manzoni‟s first published sonnet, entitled “A Francesco Lomonaco per la „Vita di

Dante.‟” In this poem, exile is described as the repression of both the individual and the

nation and, to Manzoni‟s understanding of the Italian situation, Dante‟s fate offered a

symbolic parallel.

Come il divo Alighier l‟ingrata Flora

errar fea per civil rabbia sanguigna,

pel suol, cui liberal natura infiora,

ove spesso il buon nasce, e rado alligna,

esule egregio narri, e Tu pur ora

duro esempio ne dai, Tu, cui maligna

sorte sospinse, e tiene incerto ancora

in questa di gentili alme madrigna.

Hannah Arendt. Trans. Harry Zohn. New York: Schocken Books, 1969. 257.

82 Edward Said. Reflections on Exile and Other Essays. 172. 83 On Risorgimento interpretation of Dante, see Aldo Vallone. Storia della Critica Dantesca dal XIV al XX

Secolo. Vol 2. Padova: Vallardi, 1981. 735-812. 84 See Maurizio Isabella. “Exile and Nationalism: the Case of the Risorgimento.” European History

Quarterly 36 (2006): 493.

41

Tal premj, Italia, i tuoi migliori, e poi

Che pro se piangi, e „l cener freddo adori,

e al nome voto onor divini fai?

Sì da‟ barbari oppressa opprimi i tuoi,

e ognor tuoi danni e tue colpe deplori,

pentita sempre, e non cangiata mai.85

The sonnet‟s comparison between the present time, represented by Lomonaco, and

the past of Dante is crucial for our analysis here. Indeed, what Manzoni‟s poem entails is

the view of an unchangeable historical situation, according to which, in a profound sense,

Italy, in punishing her intellectuals, remained always identical to herself.

From the early writings of Perticari (Sull‟amor patrio di Dante e il Vulgare

eloquio, 1921), Mazzini (Sull‟amor patrio di Dante, 1927) and Balbo (Vita di Dante,

1931) to the Italian unification in1861, debate on Dante became the terrain for political

and cultural struggles. Even the language employed in political discourse during these

twenty years express the centrality of Dante and late medieval culture. Indeed, notions

such as Guelf and Ghibelline were revitalized and widely used in both political and

cultural discourses of the period. Francesco Lanzani already highlighted in 1878 that the

Italian cultural-political struggles in the Risorgimento resembled the struggles between

the two Florentine political factions of Dante‟s age.86

In this respect, Gramsci‟s reading of Dante can be also seen as a critique of the

cultural legacy inherited from the Risorgimento. In fact, in his rejection of Morello‟s

85 Alessandro Manzoni. Poesie e Tragedie. Ed. Valter Boggione. Torino: Einaudi, 2002. 338-339. Manzoni

wrote this sonnet in honor to Francesco Lomonaco, who in 1802-1803 published his Vite degli

eccellenti italiani (Lives of excellent Italians). Lomonaco‟s work begins exactly with the life of Dante.

Furthermore, as is clear from Manzoni‟s sonnet, Lomonaco was exiled in 1799 and travelled to Paris, Geneva, and then Milan.

86 Lanzani. Del carattere e delle vicende della storiografia italiana nel sec. XIX. Padova, 1878. From

Benedetto Croce. Storia della storiografia italiana nel secolo decimonono. Vol. 2. Bari: Laterza, 1921.

42

interpretation, which viewed Farinata as the central figure of Inf. 10, Gramsci transcends

the patriotic views of the Risorgimento and adopts a less anachronistic approach to

Dante‟s political position.

Arguably, Mazzini, more than any other, was responsible for the patriotic

interpretation of Dante as the “Prophet of the Fatherland,” who suffered exile for

“l‟amore immenso, ch‟ei portava alla patria.”87

As Salvatore Battaglia observed,

nella valutazione del Mazzini l‟Italia di Dante si prospetta come una fucina di

passioni e disponibilità, vanificate dall‟incapacità delle classi dominanti e dalla

faziosità e dal particolarismo dei governi responsabili. Il quadro e le risultanze che

ne disegna il Mazzini coincidono con l‟ammonimento che ne aveva dato il

Machiavelli e che ancora ne darà ai giorni nostri Antonio Gramsci. Solo che nella

pagina del Mazzini la sua diagnosi acquista una concitazione da epopea e una

drammaticità biblica.88

In Mazzini‟s appropriation and self-identification with Dante‟s past, the Florentine

poet himself emerged as the symbolic equivalent of the national unity for which Italians

were struggling during the Risorgimento. According to Mazzini, Dante represented the

perfect symbolic figure for the imagined national unity for two main reasons. First, Dante

had created the idea of an Italian patria, and, second, Dante‟s suffering of body and spirit

in exile was a symbol for the suffering body and spirit of the Italian nation.

In his early essay entitled Dell‟amore patrio di Dante (1827), Mazzini was

already advocating that Italians would learn and absorb a spirit of patriotism from Dante

and from those who devoted their “life and intellect” (“vita e intelletto”) for their

Fatherland:

Avete voi versata mai una lacrima sulla bella contrada, che gli odi, i partiti, le

144.

87 See Giuseppe Mazzini. “Dell‟amor patrio di Dante.” In Opere. Ed. Luigi Salvatorelli. Milano: Rizzoli,

1967. 73. 88 Salvatore Battaglia. “Dante nel pensiero di G. Mazzini.” Filologia e letteratura 46 (1966): 119.

43

dissensioni, e la prepotenza straniera ridussero al nulla? – Se tali siete, studiate

Dante; da quelle pagine profondamente energiche, succhiate quello sdegno

magnanimo, onde l‟esule illustre nudriva l‟anima; chè l‟ira contro i vizi e le

corruttele è virtù. – Apprendete da lui, come si serva alla terra natia, finchè

l‟oprare non è vietato; come si viva nella sciagura.89

Furthermore, in his preface to Foscolo‟s edition of the Comedy,90

in following

Foscolo‟s idea to study Dante by focusing on his life, works, and historical context,

Mazzini claims that

lo studio ha da cominciare dalla vita del Poeta, dalla tradizione Italiana ch‟ei

compendiava e continuava del Genio, dall‟Opere Minori ch‟ei disegnava come

preparazione al Poema […]. Perchè Dante è una tremenda Unità: individuo che

racchiude, siccome in germe, l‟unità e l‟individualità nazionale; e la sua vita, i

suoi detti, i suoi scritti s‟incatenano in un‟Idea, e tutto Dante è un pensiero unico,

seguito, sviluppato, predicato nei cinquantasei anni della sua esistenza terrestre

con tale una costanza superior alle paure e alle seduzioni mondane che basterebbe

a consecrarlo Genio […]. Ed è. La Patria s‟è incarnata in Dante. La grande anima

sua ha presentito, più di cinque secoli addietro e tra le zuffe impotenti de‟ Guelfi e

de‟ Ghibellini, l‟Italia […].91

As this passage indicates, in the Risorgimento, studying Dante was not a neutral

act.92

Indeed, strictly related to the creation of a national identity and to the struggles for

unification, Dante was seen as a major subject to study not only philologically but as a

useful guide and master for the present.

Only after 1870 – when the Risorgimento period was definitely closed and new

89 Giuseppe Mazzini. “Dell‟amore patrio di Dante.” 61-79. 90 The publication of this edition of the Comedy was particularly complicated. After several difficulties, in

particular of economic kind, Mazzini published it at his own expense. For Mazzini, this publication

meant more than editorial success. In fact, he strongly believed that this edition would provide to Italians and Italy with a precious monument of Italian culture. He perceived the success of this

publication as the accomplishment of one of his most significant political missions. 91 Giuseppe Mazzini. “Prefazione all‟Edizione.” Dante Alighieri. La Commedia illustrata da Ugo Foscolo.

London, 1842. XIV-XV. 92 As Suzanne Stewart-Steinberg emphasized in her recent book, The Pinocchio Effect, in Italian modern

history up to Fascism education cannot be detached from the need of constructing and imposing an

imagined national identity on Italians. See The Pinocchio Effect: On Making Italians (1860-1920).

Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2007.

44

philological approaches were applied to Dante studies93

– the ideological potential of

Dante‟s cult begun to decline.

The philological study of Dante‟s texts contributed to de-mystify and secularize

Dante‟s figure in the political and public sphere. In other words, after the unification,

Dante studies began to be conceived more and more as a politically neutral intellectual

field. This allowed early twentieth-century scholars to study not only Dante, but also the

reception and commemoration of his works during the Risorgimento and its immediate

aftermath.94

In the twentieth century, Dante‟s significance continued to increase and it was

often used by both fascist and conservative intellectuals such as Mussolini himself,

Giovanni Gentile, Giuseppe Terragni,95

and “exiled” progressive intellectuals of Europe

93 The last three decades of the nineteenth century are the period in which the Società Dantesca Italiana

and the Società Dante Alighieri were founded, in 1888 and 1890 respectively. The name of the Società

Dante Alighieri was proposed by Bonghi, who looked at the name “Dante” as “politically neutral.”

Notably, to return Dante to a neutrally political terrain was exactly one of the aims of Ruggero Bonghi,

one of the Presidents of the Società Dante Alighieri, whose work is important for Gramsci. It was

indeed from Ruggero Bonghi that Gramsci derived the notion and question of the “non-national-

popular” character of Italian literature. The influences of Francesco De Sanctis and new critical

approaches from abroad, such as that of the German historicist Karl Witte, helped to stabilize and

institutionalize the studies on Dante. Moreover, in the last decades of the nineteenth-century, new

University positions were created and were occupied by outstanding Dante scholars such as Guido

Mazzoni, Pio Rajna, and Michele Barbi. For Dante abroad see Richard Lansing, ed. The Dante Encyclopedia. 255-286. For Dante in Germany see also Giovanni A. Scartazzini. Dante in Germania. 2

vols. Milano, 1881-1883. 94 See Pio Rajna. “I centenari danteschi passati e il centenario presente.” Nuova Antologia di Lettere,

Scienza ed Arti (May-June 1921): 2-23. See also Andrea Ciccarelli. “Dante and the Cultura of

Risorgimento: Literary, Political or Ideological Icon?” In Albert Russell Ascoli and Krystyna von

Henneberg, eds. Making and Remaking Italy: The Cultivation of National Identity around the

Risorgimento. Oxford-New York: Berg, 2001. 77-102; Bruno Tobia. “La statuaria dantesca nell‟Italia

liberale: tradizione, identità e culto nazionale.” In Mélanges de l‟École Française de Rome 109 (1997):

75-87. 95 A list might include Mussolini himself, philosopher Giovanni Gentile, architect Giuseppe Terragni.

Giuseppe Terragni, with the architect Pietro Lingeri tried to build a fascist apologetic work of architecture named “Danteum.” This building was designed in 1938, and its aim was to build a unique

building that could architectonically represent Dante‟s Divine Comedy. The project was both innovative

and ambitious. Its political aim was to create an allegory and analogy between the imperial political

project expressed in the Divine Comedy and Fascist Imperial Power. The building was never built, cause

of Mussolini‟s Fall in the Second World War. See Schumacher, Thomas L. The Danteum: Architecture,

45

and Russia such as Primo Levi, Osip Mandelštam, Erich Auerbach, and Leo Spitzer.

Between Gramsci and this last group of intellectuals lies a historical and

existential affinity. They all lived in an existential state of vulnerability, exclusion, and

exception.

2. Disinterested Study and Philology

The experience of vulnerability lived in prison also affected Gramsci‟s research

plans and, arguably, his ethical-political sensitivity as both a politician and a reader-

writer.96

Indeed, in his letter to his sister-in-law, Tania Schucht, dated March 19, 1927,

Gramsci expressed the need to “concentrate intensely and systematically on some subject

that would absorb and provide a center to [his] inner life.”97

To achieve this goal, he

expresses a particular desire to pursue a research plan from a “disinterested, „für ewig‟

point of view.”98

Gramsci‟s prison studies on Dante are also related to this desire. In another letter

to Tania, dated September 7, 1931,99

Gramsci himself links his interests in Inferno 10 to

his life in prison. In referring to his reading of the canto he ironically admits,

Don‟t think that I have given up studying or that I am discouraged because at a

certain point I cannot go ahead with my research. I have not yet lost a certain

Poetics, and Politics under Italian Fascism. New York: Princeton Architectural P, 1993.

96 Gramsci‟s ethical-political sensitivity has also been emphasized by Timothy Brennan. “Gramsci e gli

Stati Uniti: un‟esasperazione.” In Mauro Pala, ed. Americanismi. See in particular 126. 97 Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Vol. 1. Ed. Rosengarten. 83. 98 Ibid. In this letter Gramsci outlines a list of subjects to be studied when in prison. These subjects include:

a research on Italian intellectuals, their origins, their grouping according to the cultural movements,

their different thinking modes; a study of comparative linguistics; a study on Pirandello‟s theater and on

the transformation of Italian theatrical taste that Pirandello represented and contributed to determine; a

research on the appendix novels and the popular taste in literature. According to Gramsci all these major

topics are interrelated and homogeneous, since they all deal with “the creative spirit of the people in its

different stages and degrees of development.” Ibid. 99 This is the letter, in which Gramsci reflects on the concept of intellectual, the integral state, and the

Communes. See also chapter one.

46

inventive ability in the sense that every important thing I read stimulates my

thinking. Now, how would I go constructing an article on this subject? […] I

confine myself to writing on philological and philosophical subjects, the kind that

inspired Heine to write these words: They were so boring that I feel asleep, but

my boredom was so intense that it forced me to wake up.

In other words, Gramsci needed to study from a disinterested standpoint and to

occupy himself with philological and philosophical subjects in order to react against the

conditions of his life in prison.

If so, are these letters indications that Gramsci‟s studies are not part of a larger

political project? Or, in Gramsci‟s ironic attitude of disinterest and boredom can we also

detect a deeper cultural-political perspective?

Joseph Francese has recently suggested that incarceration led Gramsci to change

his political strategy from a “war of maneuver” to a “war of position.”100

In Francese‟s

argument, the idea of holding a disinterested research approach is also related to this

change in political strategy. Indeed, Francese emphasizes, “„disinterested,‟ in Gramsci‟s

parlance, is not an antonym of engaged or worldly, but instead expresses his wish to think

and theorize free from the pressures of immediate contingency.”101

According to

Francese, Gramsci borrows this sense of “disinterested” from Gaetano Salvemini‟s essay

Che cos‟è la cultura?102

In my view, we can add another hypothesis, which links his idea of „disinterested

study‟ to his confrontation with Croce.

The use of “disinterested” seems to enact an inter-textual game with Croce‟s

passage on Italian Marxism at the fin de siècle in his Storia della storiografia italiana nel

100 Joseph Francese. “Thoughts on Gramsci‟s Need „To Do Something „Für ewig.‟” In Rethinking Marxism

21.1 (January 2009): 54-66. 101 Ibid. 56.

47

secolo decimonono. For Croce, Marxist historiography was

una storiografia „interessata‟ nel senso buono della parola, simpatico cioè e

vibrante con gli avvenimenti che narra, in contrasto con quella filologica, che era

„disinteressata‟ nel cattivo senso, apatica e indifferente.103

And this historiography – Croce insists –

è anche, nel fatto e non solo nel programma, filologica, in buon accordo con la

paleografia e la diplomatica, con la genealogia delle fonti, con la letteratura

dell‟argomento; e nell‟adoperare tutti questi strumenti, ormai è in possesso di una

guida, di una misura del più e del meno importante, e non si lascia soverchiare dal

materiale incoerente. La precisione filologica e un certo acume realistico,

proveniente dall‟economia e dal materialismo storico, rendono questi nuovi storici

diffidenti delle ideologie, non solo della liberale e romantica, ma altresì in certa

misura della democratica e socialistica, e bramosi di osservar le cose nei loro tratti

particolari e diversi.104

Considered as a counterpoint to Croce, Gramsci‟s use of the term “disinterested”

acquires a different light. Gramsci‟s historical work drew heavily on fin de siècle Italian

historical materialism, represented by thinkers and scholars such as Antonio Labriola,

Gaetano Salvemini, Carlo Cippola, and others. In this respect, it is plausible to suggest

that Gramsci‟s use of the term “disinterested” is an inter-textual play with the way Croce

used the notions of “interest,” “ideology,” and “philology” to deal with Marxist

historiography.

Yet, we should also point out that Gramsci did not use the notion of

“disinterested” in a totally coherent way. Indeed, in a letter to his sister-in-law Tania,

dated December 15, 1930, Gramsci seems to overcome his early desire to pursue

„disinterested‟ research. When asserting that the dialogue with his wife in Russia was “a

real psychological need” for him, he explains that

102 Ibid. 58. 103 Benedetto Croce. Storia della storiografia italiana nel secolo decimonono. Bari: Laterza, 1921. 241.

Italics mine.

48

Perhaps it is because my entire intellectual formation has been of a polemical

order; even thinking “disinterestedly” is difficult for me, that is, studying for

study‟s sake. Only occasionally, but rarely, does it happens that I lose myself in a

specific order of reflections and find, so to speak, in the things themselves enough

interest to devote myself to their analysis. Ordinarily, I need to set out from a

dialogical or dialectical standpoint, otherwise I don‟t experience any intellectual

stimulation. As I once told you, I don‟t like to cast stones into the darkness; I want

to feel a concrete interlocutor or adversary…105

If one compares this passage with the letter to Tania (March 19, 1927), Gramsci

seems to convey a double perspective on the purposes of disinterested study: on the one

hand, the positive need of focusing his mind through such study, and, on the other, the

need to establish dialogue with both interlocutors and adversaries.

Despite this double perspective, from a more general viewpoint, we could say that

Gramsci never gave up a kind of disinterested approach as diffidence towards ideological

fanaticism.106

In Gramsci‟s view, this type of fanaticism is often caused by incapacity to

detach oneself from immediate desires and petty passions. Often,

i proprii desideri e le proprie passioni deteriori e immediate sono la causa

dell‟errore, in quanto essi sostituiscono l‟analisi obiettiva e imparziale e ciò

avviene non come „mezzo‟ consapevole per stimolare all‟azione ma come

autoinganno. La biscia, anche in questo caso, morde il ciarlatano ossia il

demagogo è la prima vittima della sua demagogia.107

From this perspective, Gramsci‟s harsh critiques of Nikholai Bukharin‟s Popular

Manual are memorable. In order to critique Bukharin, Gramsci enlists the figure of “the

serious reader” who could reject all those interpretations of reality and culture that show

themselves to be teleological, superficial, and determined by immediate and petty desires

104 Ibid. 105 Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 1. 369. The letter is dated December 15, 1930. 106 “La filosofia della praxis è una riforma e uno sviluppo dello hegelismo, è una filosofia liberata (o che

cerca liberarsi [sic]) da ogni elemento ideologico unilaterale e fanatico, è la coscienza piena delle contraddizioni, in cui lo stesso filosofo, inteso individualmente o inteso come intero gruppo sociale, non

solo comprende le contraddizioni ma pone se stesso come elemento delle contraddizioni, eleva questo

elemento a principio di conoscenza e quindi di azione.” Q 11, §62. 1487.

49

and passions.108

Dante also held existential and biographical importance for Gramsci. Indeed, the

books he firstly requested after he was brought to the Regina Coeli prison in 1926 were: a

German grammar; his own copy of the Breviario di neolinguistica by Giulio Bertoni and

Matteo Bartoli; and Dante‟s Comedy.109

It is interesting that in the letter to his landlady

Gramsci recalls precisely the locations in which to find the three books in his apartment.

Only the Comedy was not in the apartment, since Gramsci had lent it. The fact that the

prisoner wanted the Comedy, though unavailable in the apartment (and to be bought by

the landlady – a request that Gramsci conveys very gently110

–) provides further evidence

that reading Dante in prison was important for him.

Gramsci‟s interest in Dante originated during his years at the University of Torino,

as a student of the Dante scholar Umberto Cosmo, and lasted throughout his life. Indeed,

among Gramsci‟s requests for books during difficult moments of his life in prison, we

find titles such as Michele Barbi‟s Dante: Vita, Opere e Fortuna.111

In addition, Dante‟s

name is mentioned not only at the very beginning of the Prison Notebooks, but also in its

final pages, in Notebook 29, note 7 (1935).

His first publication on Inferno 10 is dated 1918 – the same year in which he

wrote his article on Esperanto and the questione della lingua in Manzoni. In this year

Gramsci wrote a small article entitled Il cieco Tiresia (“The Blind Tiresias”), which was

107 Q 13, §17. 1581. 108 See Q 4, §16. According to Croce, Antonio Labriola was the first to be aware of the need to contrast

teleological historiographies made up of historical schemes or, in Croce‟s parlance, “storie a disegno.”

See Croce. Storia della storiografia italiana del secolo decimonono. 222-238. 109 See letter to his landlady in November 1926. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 1. 35. 110 Gramsci‟s request is formulated as follows: “gratissimo le sarei se mi inviasse una Divina Commedia di

pochi soldi, perchè il mio testo lo avevo imprestato.” Emphasis mine. 111

Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 284-5. Letter to Tania, dated April 3, 1933.

50

published in the socialist newspaper “L‟Avanti!” Gramsci wrote this article when he

heard that a boy in a small village of the Marche and a girl housed in the Pia Casa del

Cottolengo, after predicting 1918 as the year of the end of the First World War, were

struck by blindness. In order to explain the “agglomerate” of cultural fragments

embodied in this story, Gramsci briefly mentions his main ideas on Inferno 10.

Ten years later, in prison, Gramsci felt the need to recast and expand these ideas

by highlighting in particular the role and position of Cavalcante in the “structure” of the

Comedy. As Gramsci admitted in a letter to Tania, he started focusing on Inf. 10 after

reading a review of Isidoro del Lungo‟s edition of the Chronicle by Giovanni Villani.112

According to Gramsci it was curious that del Lungo did not use Inf. 10 to establish the

date of Guido Cavalcanti‟s death.

The most important period in which Gramsci shows continuous interest in the

tenth canto of Inferno is between December 1928 and 1932. In a letter dated December

17, 1928, to his sister-in-law Tatiana, Gramsci asked her to send him a copy of Vincenzo

Morello‟s essay on the tenth of Inferno, and after eight months, in August 26, 1929, he

again asked her to send him the same essay, mentioning his objective to write more

systematically a note on a “little discovery” he had had regarding Dante.

This period is of paramount importance: it is also the moment in which he began

to write the Prison Notebooks.113

On the first page of the first Prison Notebook, dated

February 8, 1929, Gramsci outlines sixteen research topics for his intellectual work while

112 See Pio Rajna. “Isidoro del Lungo e la Cronica di D. Compagni.” Il Marzocco 20 (May 15, 1927). 113 The composition of the notes on the tenth canto of Inferno in Notebook 4 is discontinuous. Gramsci

began writing the fourth notebook with the group of notes concerning Inferno 10 in 1930, but he

finished it only in 1932, when he finally added the note entitled Shaw and Gordon Craig regarding the

role of didascalies in theater works. See Gianni Francioni. “Nota introduttiva al Quaderno 4 (1930-

1932).” In Antonio Gramsci. Quaderni del carcere. Edizione anastatica dei manoscritti. Ed. Gianni

51

in prison. At the fifth he records “Cavalcante Cavalcanti: la sua posizione nella

economia/struttura e nell‟arte della Divina Commedia.”114

The inclusion of the issue about Cavalcante prompts numerous questions: Why

did Gramsci decide to insert this topic as a relevant issue to study and note down in the

Prison Notebooks? What is the significance of this question in light of the constellation of

topics included in the very first note of the Prison Notebooks? How is this issue

connected to the other diverse subjects he planned to study and note down during his life

in prison?

Before answering these questions, it is important to look closely at the narrative of

Inf. 10 and, then, to highlight the hermeneutic strategies Gramsci employs in his reading

of the canto.

3. Inferno 10

Canto 10 begins narrating the pilgrim‟s coming to the Infernal city of Dis.

Entering the city, Virgil “walks along a secret path, between the wall of the city and the

torments”115

followed by the pilgrim. In the Infernal city – considered in the canto as a

Francioni. Vol. 8. Cagliari-Roma: Treccani-L‟Unione Sarda, 2009. 1-13.

114 In the manuscript the word “structure” substitutes “economy” that Gramsci crossed out. I write

“economia/struttura” to point out this terminological shift, which is certainly relevant. Arguably,

Gramsci changed the term “economy” to “structure” to address his critique of Croce in a more direct

way. The terminological shift between “economy” and “structure” suggests that Gramsci‟s critique of

Croce‟s reading of Dante parallels his critique of Croce‟s reading of Marx. Yet, it is curious that in this

note Gramsci does not use Croce‟s term “poetry,” but the more general one of „art.‟ In other words,

Gramsci‟s reading of Inferno 10 entails the question of the relationships between “structure” (economy,

language, and theoretical framework) and “superstructure” (art and culture). 115 Inf. 10.1-2.

52

“blind prison,”116

where, arguably, „blind‟ also refers to heresy –, in the sixth circle of the

Hell, is a valley of tombs, in which Epicurus and “more than a thousand”117

of his

followers “have their cemetery.”118

The punished people in the canto are heretics and, in

particular, those who made “the soul die with the body.”119

The exchange between Virgil

and Dante, through which the pilgrim and the reader learn the location of the scene and

the damned there, is abruptly interrupted by “dark o-sounds of O Tosco”120 that “came

forth from one of the arks.” This voice frightens Dante, who shrinks closer to his guide

Virgil. Forced by him to turn his face to “Farinata who has stood erect,” Dante describes

Farinata as an overshadowing, proud and imposing figure “as if he had Hell in great

disdain” (35-36). Farinata, whose baptismal name was Manente degli Uberti, a Florentine

Ghibelline party leader and captain who died in 1264 closely before Dante‟s birth,

recognizes Dante as a Tuscan from his accent. According to Farinata, Dante‟s speech

makes him “manifest as a native of” Florence, “that noble fatherland to which perhaps

[Farinata] was too harmful” (26-27).

Dante and Farinata‟s interaction in this canto, as seen through their dialogues, is

fragmented. The voices of the characters permit then the possibility of meeting,

recognizing, and speaking to each other. Dante‟s voice seems to incorporate the

resurrecting power of Christ‟s speech before Lazarus. Indeed, Dante‟s voice in this canto

is charged with a similar power: every time he speaks, a new character appears from the

tombs. His voice resurrects Farinata and makes him willing to talk with the pilgrim, and,

116 Inf. 10.58. 117 Inf. 10.118. 118 Inf. 10.13. 119 Inf. 10.15. 120 Erich Auerbach. “Farinata and Cavalcante.” In Mimesis. The Representation of Reality in Western

Literature. Trans. Willard Trask. New York: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1957. 153.

53

again, after Dante‟s first reply to Farinata, Cavalcante suddenly rises up with a series of

questions.

The pilgrim‟s reply to Farinata wounds his Ghibelline pride in recalling the fact

that Farinata did not fully eliminate the presence of the Guelf party (to which Dante

belonged), but moved the Guelfs out of Florence only temporarily. “Then,” as Dante

himself powerfully states using a “dramatically arresting „then,‟”121

another damned

figure rises up, stopping finally in a kneeling posture resembling that of a prayer.

Cavalcante Cavalcanti is this figure‟s unspoken name.122

With his posture of a supplicant to Christ/God and, at the same time, using a

formula similar to that used by God when he asks Cain “Where is your brother?”123

,

Cavalcante doubtfully asks Dante where his son Guido is and why he is not with him.

Dante‟s answer sounds enigmatic:

Da me stesso non vegno:

colui ch‟attende là per qui mi mena

forse cui Guido vostro ebbe a disdegno.124

The verb “ebbe” in the past tense and a delay in Dante‟s answer, which

121 Ibid. 157. 122 Contrary to Manente degli Uberti‟s nickname “Farinata,” a derivation from “farina” (flour) that recalls

the humble rural and gastronomic spheres, the name “Cavalcante,” recalling the action and practice of

riding, expresses an affiliation to chivalry and a sign of nobility. In searching through the database of

the Opera del Vocabolario Italiano (OVI), we find the gastronomic noun “farinata,” for instance, in

Rustico Filippi‟s Rime, sonata 4; in administrative documents of Dante‟s period, see Registro di Entrata

e Uscita di Santa Maria di Cafaggio (REU) 1286-1290. Ed. Eugenio M. Casalini. Firenze: Convento

della SS. Annunziata, 1998. 217; in an anonymous Florentine volgarizzatore of Seneca‟s epistles, see

Volgarizzamento delle Pistole di Seneca e del Trattato della Provvidenza di Dio. Ed. Giovanni Bottari.

Firenze, 1717. 37 and 45. From this perspective it is interesting to notice that the first place Dante mentions Farinata is in Inf. 6.79. In this verse Farinata‟s name matches that of Tegghiaio, which, like

“Farinata,” is a noun linked to gastronomy. In fact, “tegghiaio” is the producer of pans and griddles

(“tegghia”). But, in Inf. 10, through an ironic play, the names of Cavalcante and Farinata do not

represent the figural aspects of the characters they name. Farinata is no humble rural figure, but a

“magnanimous” and proud Florentine public figure, a political leader and military man; Cavalcante, on

the contrary, is not represented as a noble knight, but a humble praying father suffering a private drama. 123 A similar formula is in Aeneid 3.312, “aut, si lux alma recessit, Hector ubi est?” 124 Inf. 10.61-63.

54

Cavalcante misinterprets as a ominous sign, wrongly induce Cavalcante to think that his

son has died. At that moment, he dramatically disappears, sinking supine back in his

tomb.

As in framing a new shot in a movie comprising fragments of different stories,

Dante, with a dramatic “but” at the verse 73, suddenly changes scene, reintroducing the

“magnanimous” (v. 73) Farinata, who continues to talk to Dante without regard to the

events related to Cavalcante. Indeed, Farinata “did not change his expression, / nor move

his neck, nor bend his side.”125

Emotionless towards Cavalcante, Farinata continues his talk with Dante about the

political “art” of returning home from exile. In the shadow of this “art” also lies the

historical significance of Farinata, who is described by Giovanni Villani‟s Chronicle as

the “good man and citizen” thanks to whom the city of Florence escaped the “great fury,

and destruction, and ruin”126

perpetrated by the Ghibelline league of Tuscany headed by

the cities of Siena and Lucca – the two cities that rivaled Florence at that time.

The strongest torment for Farinata, he claims, is not Hell, but the fact that his

family and his party did not learn the political art of returning to Florence from exile.

Then, by using a similar argument about this political “art,” he foretells Dante‟s exile.

After a few exchanges stimulated by Dante‟s questioning, Farinata explains that the

damned of the sixth circle cannot know the present time, but only the future.

[Dante] “…El par che voi veggiate, se ben odo,

Dinanzi quel che „l tempo seco adduce,

e nel presente tenete altro modo.”

[Farinata] “Noi veggiam, come quei c‟ha mala luce,

125 Inf. 10.73-75. 126 See Villani. Cronica 6.81, quoted from Paget Toynbee. Dante Alighieri: His Life and Works. Ed.

Charles Singleton. New York: Harper and Row, 1965. 26-27.

55

le cose” disse “che ne son lontano;

cotanto ancor ne splende il sommo duce.

Quando s‟appressano o son, tutto è vano

nostro intelletto; e s‟altri non ci apporta,

nulla sapem di vostro stato umano.

Però comprender puoi che tutta morta

fia nostra conoscenza da quel punto

che del futuro fia chiusa la porta.”127

With another forcefully contrapuntal “then,” Dante wants to turn the discourse

back to Cavalcante‟s drama, “as if repentant of [his] fault” (v.109). Thus, the pilgrim tells

Farinata to say to Cavalcante that his son Guido is alive and that he (Dante) “was silent

before replying” to Cavalcante‟s original question (v. 112) only because he was already

thinking about Cavalcante‟s misconception. As I will show shortly, for Gramsci, this last

section of the canto is key to understanding Cavalcante‟s position in the structure of the

Comedy and the “drama in act” Dante represents in this canto through Cavalcante‟s

torments, whose conceptual justifications are clarified in the final part of the canto by the

“explicator” Farinata.

4. Before Gramsci: De Sanctis and Croce

The most important references for Gramsci‟s reading of Inferno 10 are Francesco

De Sanctis‟s Il Farinata di Dante (1869) and Benedetto Croce‟s La poesia di Dante

(1921). Gramsci recalls these two essays in his letter to his sister-in-law Tania dated

September 20, 1931, in which he argues that

in his essay on Farinata, De Sanctis remarks on the harshness that characterizes

the tenth canto of Dante‟s Inferno because Farinata, after having been depicted

heroically in the first part of the episode, in the final part becomes a pedagogue,

127 Inf. 10.97-108.

56

that is, to use Crocean terms, Farinata after having been poetry becomes

structure.128

It is curious that Gramsci attributes to De Sanctis the idea that Farinata in the final

part of the canto becomes a pedagogue. Actually, if we read De Sanctis‟s essay closely

we do not find such an idea, or at least we do not find that De Sanctis expressed it

through the clear contrast Gramsci makes with regard to the two parts of the Canto.

De Sanctis‟s essay begins with the depiction of a moment in which he finds

himself arrested by the “colossal conception”129

expressed by the figure of Farinata.

Followed by the following two questions, “What was in Dante‟s soul when he conceived

this image? What feelings, what opinions affected him and set his imagination afire?”130

,

De Sanctis‟s approach to the canto is driven by a Romantic view of the passions and

emotions that led Dante to produce Farinata‟s “colossal” image. This approach also sheds

light on the reasons why for De Sanctis Inferno 10 is Farinata‟s canto – as the title of his

essay also suggests.

The key notion leading De Sanctis‟s interpretation is that “il concetto del virile è

la Musa del sublime dantesco”131

and Farinata is one of its best expressions: “In Farinata

l‟uomo comparisce per la prima volta sul moderno orizzonte poetico.”132

According to De Sanctis, Dante‟s sorrow over Farinata‟s exile is tempered by his

love for the fatherland (amor della patria133

). This “noble feeling” of love for the

128 Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 73-74. 129 De Sanctis. “Farinata.” In De Sanctis on Dante. Madison: The U of Wisconsin P, 1957. 53. 130 Ibid. I have changed the word “mind” in Rossi and Galpin‟s translation into “soul,” accordingly to the

Italian original “anima” in the passage. 131 De Sanctis. “Il Farinata di Dante.” 369. 132 Ibid. 372. Notions of “great man” and “human” (umano) paradigmatically grounded Romantic-

Desanctisan readings of Dante. See Aldo Vallone. Storia della Critica Dantesca dal XIV al XX Secolo.

Vol. 2. Padova: Vallardi, 1981. 886. 133 De Sanctis. “Il Farinata di Dante.” 366. De Sanctis here is surely thinking to Perticari‟s and Mazzini‟s

57

fatherland – an expression evidently related to Risorgimento values – is the background

element through which the figure of Farinata becomes central in De Sanctis‟s reading.

By using the topical distinction between contemplative and active life,134

De

Sanctis considers Dante himself both as an example of the contemplative great man –

whose model was Saint Francis – and an instance of the active great man – whose model

was Farinata. According to De Sanctis, in the Comedy

sono in presenza due mondi irreconciliabili, un mondo teocratico-feudale, che ha

per dogma l‟annullamento della personalità ed il mondo del comune libero, dove

la personalità è tutto. Là hai un mondo lirico-didattico, dove l‟uomo è il santo che

prega e contempla; qui hai un mondo epico-drammatico, dove l‟uomo è l‟eroe che

opera e lotta; nell‟uno l‟uomo è ancora involto nell‟oscura lotta del mito, e ci sta

come genere anzi che come individuo perfetto; nell‟altro l‟uomo apparisce nel

pieno possesso e nella piena coscienza di sè stesso; l‟uno è il riflesso filosofico-

artistico del passato; l‟altro è il preludio della vita e dell‟arte moderna.135

As this passage indicates, De Sanctis developed a typological reading of the canto

grounded on the opposition between a lyrical-didactic and an epic-dramatic universe. The

first universe is typical of the feudal-theocratic world of the Middle Ages, while the latter

typifies the modern world. It is in this ideological framework that De Sanctis can

conceive of Farinata as a sublime figure of the Comedy – a “colossal conception” as he

says at the beginning of his essay.

In his own intentions, Benedetto Croce continued, developed, and theoretically re-

elaborated De Sanctis‟s work, as he declared in his Contributo per una critica di me

stesso (1926). Evidence of Croce‟s reliance on De Sanctis is, in my view, also expressed

in his La Poesia di Dante, in which he mainly focuses on Farinata implying that he was

essays on Dante‟s amor patrio. See Giuseppe Mazzini. “Dell‟amor patrio di Dante.” In Opere. Ed.

Luigi Salvatorelli. Milano: Rizzoli, 1967. 61-79; Giulio Perticari. “Sull‟amore patrio di Dante e del suo

libro intorno al volgare eloquio.” Opere. Vol. 1. Napoli, 1856. 159-196. 134 In this respect, the entire episode of Matelda is central. See Purg. 27-28. 135 Francesco De Sanctis. “Il Farinata di Dante.” 368. Italics are mine.

58

the main character of the canto and one of the most significant of the entire Comedy.

Though both Croce and De Sanctis considered Farinata as a paradigmatic figure of the

“active great man,” a significant difference between their readings is that while for Croce

Farinata represents an exemplar lyrical-poetic figure, for De Sanctis he is an expression

of the epic-dramatic.

This difference, in my view, should be considered in light of a broader perspective

regarding the relationship between literary criticism and cultural struggle. While Croce‟s

approach is aesthetic – Gramsci observes –

De Sanctis‟s criticism is militant not frigidly aesthetic: it belongs to a period of

cultural struggle. The analyses of content, the criticism of the „structure‟ of works

– that is, the logical and living-historical coherence of the mass of represented

sentiments – these are connected to the cultural struggle.136

Taking into consideration both De Sanctis‟s and Croce‟s dichotomous reasonings,

I argue that Gramsci worked out a different solution that overcomes both De Sanctis‟s

opposition between lyrical and epic and Croce‟s division between structure and poetry.

For Gramsci, the lyrical value of poetry is embedded in Dante‟s artistic capacity to

express the dramas in the poem and it is not separable from the Comedy‟s architecture

comprising allegorical, didactic, and conceptual elements, which Croce had called the

structure. In this sense, in transcending both emphases on the epic (De Sanctis) and the

lyrical (Croce), Gramsci seems to recuperate a notion of dramatic poetry, which Hegel

136 Q 4, §5. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 145. According to Gerratana‟s edition – which Buttigieg follows – this

note precedes the series of notes under the rubric “Il canto decimo dell‟Inferno.” However in the

original manuscript, this note (Q 4, §5 according to Gerratana) follows the notes on Inf. 10, which are in

fact the very first notes of the fourth notebook. In this respect, the contrast between Croce and De Sanctis outlined in Q 4, §5, arguably follows from Gramsci‟s critique of Croce‟s interpretation of Dante.

Gramsci‟s emphasis on the “criticism of the structure” seems to give support to this hypothesis.

59

defined as the form of art able to unify epic and lyric.137

Moreover, As Gramsci already pointed out in his 1918 article “Il cieco Tiresia,” in

depicting the damned, Dante shows himself to be a learned poet, who knows that the

popular imagination needs immediacy of expression. The depiction of the canto‟s

characters through statuesque postures is thus apt at conveying a sense of drama in the

most immediate way. In this respect, Gramsci‟s reading of Inf. 10 intersects topics 4, 7,

13 outlined in the first page of the Prison Notebooks concerning popular literature,

folklore, and common sense.

In addition, De Sanctis contrasted Farinata – a figure of the “active great man” –

with Saint Francis – the “contemplative man” and model of the lyrical-didactic character.

Despite the differences between Croce and De Sanctis, both of them articulate a linear

interpretation in which they positively recognize Farinata as the central figure of this

canto. Gramsci overturns De Sanctis‟s and Croce‟s linear reading by arguing that Dante

represents the figure of Farinata and his torment “negatively.” In doing so, Gramsci also

radically reverses the dialectical relation between Farinata and Cavalcante. As he wrote to

his sister-in-law Tania on September 20, 1931,

Traditionally, the tenth canto is Farinata‟s canto, hence the harshness noted by De

Sanctis has always appeared plausible. I maintain that two dramas are played out

in the tenth canto: Farinata‟s and Cavalcante‟s and not Farinata‟s drama alone. [...]

It is strange that Dante hermeneutics, though so minute and Byzantine, has never

noticed that Cavalcante is the one among the Epicureans of the fiery tombs who is

truly punished, I say punished with an immediate and personal punishment, and

that Farinata closely participates in this punishment, but also in this instance “as if

137 See Friedrich Hegel. Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Art. Trans. T. M. Knox. Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford UP,

1975. 1158-1237, in particular 1158-9: “Because drama has been developed into the most perfect

totality of content and form, it must be regarded as the highest stage of poetry and or art generally. […]

of the particular arts of speech dramatic poetry is the one which unites the objectivity of epic with the subjective character of lyric. It displays a complete action as actually taking place before our eyes; the

action originates in the minds of the characters who bring it about, but at the same time its outcome is

decided by the really substantive nature of the aims, individuals, and collisions involved.”

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he had great scorn of heaven.” The law of retribution in Cavalcante and Farinata

is this: for having wished to see into the future, they (theoretically) are deprived

of the knowledge of earthly things for a certain specific period of time, that is,

they live in a cone of darkness from whose center they can look both into the past

and the future but only beyond a certain perimeter. [...] We can see here the

difference between Cavalcante and Farinata. When the latter hears Florentine

spoken, he becomes a partisan again, the Ghibelline hero, while Cavalcante thinks

only of Guido and hearing Florentine spoken rises up to find whether Guido is

alive or dead at that moment…138

Thus, in this canto, Gramsci did not see only one drama, but two interconnected

and interdependent dramas, which are understandable only through Cavalcante‟s

intervention. According to Gramsci, the central figure of the canto is not Farinata, as De

Sanctis and Croce stated, but Cavalcante. This change of “accent” in reading the canto

also allows Gramsci to “mortally wound”139

– as Gramsci himself vividly observes –

Croce‟s theoretical distinction between stucture and poetry.

5. Gramsci‟s Aesthetics, Dante‟s Dramatization, and Medea‟s Veil

In most interpretations of Inferno 10, for Gramsci,

Farinata è ammirato per il plastico atteggiarsi della sua fierezza, per il suo

giganteggiare nell‟orrore infernale. Cavalcante è trascurato; eppure egli è co lpito a

morte da una parola: egli ebbe, che gli fa credere suo figlio essere morto. Egli non

conosce il presente: vede il futuro e nel futuro il figlio è morto; e nel presente?

Dubbio torturante, punizione tremenda in questo dubbio, dramma altissimo che si

consuma in poche parole. Ma dramma difficile, complicato, che per essere

compreso ha bisogno di riflessione e ragionamento; che agghiaccia d‟orrore per la

sua rapidità e intensità, ma dopo esame critico.140

To reach an accurate understanding of the drama represented in the canto Gramsci

138 Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 74. 139 Gramsci himself used this vivid expression that recalls dramatic situations such as the infantices by

Ugolino and Medea, which are recalled by Gramsci in his letter to Tania dated September 20, 1931. As

Gramsci stated, his “interpretation mortally wounds Croce‟s thesis on the poetry and structure of the

Divine Comedy.” See the entire letter in Letters from Prison. Vol. 2. 74-76. 140 Gramsci. “Il cieco Tiresia.” In La città futura. Ed. Sergio Caprioglio. Torino: Einaudi, 1982. 824.

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calls for a careful critical examination of Dante‟s text. The type of critical scrutiny

indicated in this passage does not only match a desire of Gramsci the reader, but also

corresponds to the efforts Dante the poet generally requires of his readers. Indeed, Dante

himself at the verses 61-63 of canto 9 invites those who have “li „ntelletti sani,” to look at

the doctrine “che s‟asconde / sotto „l velame de li versi strani.”141

The multi-accentual142

dynamics Dante represents in canto 10, and in other

moments in the Comedy, are poetically built through symbolic interrelationships between

what is visible and what is veiled to the reader. Within the symbolic relationships among

the suggested dramatic forces at play in canto 10, Cavalcante embodies and expresses, on

one hand, a sense of subalternity with respect to the domineering and “magnanimous”

figure of the Ghibelline leader Farinata and, on the other hand, his private and immediate

sorrows as a father, who is not able to see the present, and thus is worried about whether

his son is dead or alive.

Traditionally, this canto has been interpreted as an eminently political one.

Gramsci was particularly critical of this interpretation. In fact, he harshly critiqued

Vincenzo Morello‟s book Dante, Farinata e Cavalcanti, a book that was praised at that

time for its originality and novelty. By contrast, according to Gramsci, the political

interpretation expressed by Morello is grounded in the very old-fashioned question of

Emphasis mine (except for the adjective “difficile,” italicized in the original).

141 “You who have sound intellects, gaze on the teaching that is hidden beneath the veil of the strange

verses.” Dante. Inferno. Ed. and trans. Robert Durling. NewYork-Oxford: Oxford UP, 1996. 143. 142 Gramsci himself suggests reading the “accents” in the canto dynamics, when he argues that the

“„aesthetic‟ and „dramatic‟ accent” of the verse 63 primarily falls on the verb “ebbe” and not on “cui” or

“disdegno.” Q 4, §82. For the concept of meaning as “accent” see also the work (very close to

Gramsci‟s) V. N. Vološinov. Marxism and the Philosophy of Language. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard

UP, 1986. For a discussion on Gramsci and Vološinov, and on the notion of “multi-accentual”

dimension of language see also Peter Ives. Gramsci‟s Politics of Language: Engaging the Bakhtin

Circle and the Frankfurt School. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 2004; Renate Holub. Antonio Gramsci: Beyond Marxism and Postmodernism. London-New York: Routledge, 1992.

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whether Dante was a Guelf or a Ghibelline. “For Morello, Dante was essentially a

Ghibelline, and Farinata is „his hero;‟ Dante, however, was a Ghibelline in the same

manner as Farinata: in other words, a „politician‟ more than a „party man.‟”143

In critiquing Morello‟s essay – which Gramsci defined as “third-rate literature”144

around the Comedy – Gramsci here espouses a position similar to that of Giuseppe

Mazzini, who, in his 1844 essay on Dante written for the Italian workers in London,

shows the need to absolve Dante from the traditional question of his Guelfism or

Ghibellinism.145

In addition, we also find a similar critique to this political approach in

De Sanctis.146

In a way, Gramsci recasts De Sanctis‟s critique, but he goes further when

he moves the emphasis from the question about Dante‟s political allegiance to that about

the meaning of the political with regard to Dante. For Gramsci, Dante was “essentially an

intellectual,” and, faced with the question of whether Dante was a Guelf or a Ghibelline,

he argued that

One can say whatever one wants. In reality, Dante, as he himself says, „was party

unto himself;‟ he was basically an „intellectual,‟ and his sectarianism and

partisanship were more intellectual than political in the immediate sense. Besides,

Dante‟s political position could only be determined by a most detailed analysis

not only of all his writings but also of the political divisions of his time, which

were very different from what they had been fifty years earlier. Morello is much

too entangled in literary rhetoric to be able to have a realistic understanding of the

political position of the men of the Middle Ages vis-à-vis the empire, the papacy,

and their republican commune.147

143 Q 4, §83. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 254. 144 The Italian expression sounds “letteratura d‟appendice” which recalls the topic number 4 of the plan

outlined in the first note of the Prison Notebooks, i.e. “La letteratura popolare dei „romanzi

d‟appendice‟ e le ragioni della sua persistente fortuna.” (The popular literature of „serial novels‟ and the

reasons for its continued success). Ibid. 145 Mazzini claims that “il vero è che Dante non fu Guelfo nè Ghibellino, ma com‟egli dice in un verso del

suo poema, s‟era fatto parte per sè stesso. Le idee di Dante erano ben altre e più ardite che non quelle

dei Guelfi o dei Ghibellini.” Giuseppe Mazzini. “Dante.” In Dante Alighieri. La Commedia. Milano:

Istituto Editoriale Italiano, n.d. 10. 146 See Q 4, §83. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 252. 147 Ibid. 254. Emphasis mine.

63

In the first of note of the rubric “Il canto decimo dell‟Inferno”, which opens Q 4

(in my view, one of the most complicated notes of the Notebooks),148

Gramsci himself

suggests adopting the double bind between the concealed and the revealed as a

hermeneutic approach to the Divine Comedy.149

He suggests this by including in his

reading of this canto a reflection on a Pompeian picture of Medea, which portrays her

blindfolded. Gramsci also discusses this picture in a letter dated September 20, 1931, in

which he recalls an art history class taught by Prof. Toesca that he attended in 1912. In

this class, Toesca presented the Pompeian picture of Medea and explained that Lessing in

his Laocoön did not consider the artist‟s decision to veil Medea‟s eyes as an “artificio da

impotenti,” but as the best way “di dare l‟impressione dell‟infinito dolore di un genitore,

che rappresentato materialmente si sarebbe cristallizato in una smorfia.”

In Q 4, §80, recalling how “Pliny records that when Timanthes of Sicyon painted

the scene of the sacrifice of Iphigenia, he portrayed Agamemnon as veiled,”150

Gramsci

again reflects on Lessing‟s interpretation of the artist‟s masterful decision to veil Medea‟s

eyes. At the same time, Gramsci considers the Pompeian picture of Medea as analogous

to a painting of Agamemnon‟s suffering recorded by Pliny the Elder. However, as Frank

Rosengarten has pointed out, there is no Pompeian fresco depicting Medea killing her

children. For Rosengarten, “it is curious and psychologically significant perhaps that

Gramsci cites another analogy with veiled suffering in painting that turns out to be

148 According to the original manuscript, Q 4, §1. According to Gerratana‟s edition, which reverses the first

with second half of Notebook 4, Q 4, §78. For pragmatic reasons, I follow Gerratana‟s numeration. 149 Foscolo highlighted the concrete dimension of Dante‟s images and insights. It is also important to notice

that Foscolo pointed out the double bind between visible and hidden in the Comedy. As Foscolo says,

Dante‟s images “are the bold and prominent figures of an alto rilievo, which, it seems, we might almost

touch, and of which the imagination readily supplies those parts that are hidden from the view.”

Foscolo. A Parallel between Dante and Petrarch. Milano-Napoli: Ricciardi, 1974. 1773. Renate Holub

highlighted the connections between Gramsci‟s reading of Dante and phenomenology.

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incorrect.”151

In elaborating Rosengarten‟s point, we may note that, even if philologically

problematic, Gramsci‟s “mistake” provides us with at least two interesting possibilities.

First, both in the imagined Pompeian picture of Medea and in Inf. 10 a continuous

process of reversal between visible and veiled is in play. Moreover, the several

communicative breaks and counterpoints expressed among the performing figures of the

canto (Dante, Farinata, Cavalcante, and Virgil) are some of the symptoms of this play.

Second, analogously to the picture of Medea, this canto expresses several

interconnections among “liminal moments:” between the blind parent and child(ren),

between life and death, between the expressed and the unexpressed, between structure

and poetry, between obscurity in the present and knowledge of past and future.

Being half visible and half covered by the tomb, even Cavalcante‟s postures

embody the symbolic play between visible and veiled. The dialectic relationship between

revealed and concealed surely lies at the core of Cavalcante‟s intervention in the canto

narrative. The dialectic and contrapuntal interplay of visible and invisible is here not only

an aesthetic dimension within the canto‟s narrative, but also the method the reader should

employ in order to understand the dynamics that connect the various figures of the canto.

In the end, for Gramsci, Cavalcante‟s drama centers on his “blindness” and

inability to see the present. As Gramsci expresses in his note on Il cieco Tiresia, both

popular and literary „codes‟ indicate that traditionally the prophet is represented as able to

150 Q 4, §80. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 248. 151 Frank Rosengarten. “Gramsci‟s „Little Discovery:‟ Gramsci‟s Interpretation of Canto X of Dante‟s

Inferno.” Boundary 2 14.3 (1986): 81-82.

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see the past and the future, but is blind in the present.152

Similarly, Cavalcante does not

know the present and, in absence of this knowledge, considers his son as if he were dead.

Gramsci seems to be aware that the issue of how to articulate the chiastic relations

among blindness and insight, the visible and the hidden was of paramount importance to

Dante. In the Comedy, Conv. II.i.3, and the letter to Cangrande (still of disputed, though

likely, authenticity), the Florentine poet himself invites the reader to sharpen his/her sight

to see the various senses and meanings at play within and beyond the literal sense of his

works. Gramsci seems to be aware that the reader‟s gaze is crucial for Dante to

understanding the allegorical nature of his writings. Thus, from a general viewpoint,

Dante‟s notion of allegory is implied in Gramsci‟s notes – although in a nontheological

and historicized direction.153

In paralleling Inf. 10 with the Pompeian picture of Medea, Gramsci focuses on the

following question: Is Dante‟s representation of the drama a confession of his limited

poetic imagination or does it depend on a particular moral worldview? It is curious that

this question has never come out in Gramsci studies concerning Inf. 10, in particular, if

we take into account that this question is of paramount importance for understanding, on

the one hand, the debate among Gramsci‟s, Croce‟s, and the other traditional political

interpretations discussed earlier, and, on the other, Gramsci‟s comparison of Manzoni‟s

moralistic self-censorship to Dante‟s free speech.

In Q 4, §84, Gramsci expresses the question in a clear way when, by dealing with

what Luigi Russo called “renunciations of description,” he clarified that “one cannot

152 Q 4, §85. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 255-256. 153 On the contrary, Croce opposed allegorical approaches to the Comedy conditioning his reading of the

poem, as Charles Singleton also emphasized later on. See Charles Singleton. “Elements of Structure.”

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speak of renunciations of description in Dante. These renunciations are, in negative form,

full and sufficient expressions of everything that is really astir within the poet.”154

More

specifically, Russo criticized, on the one side, Guzzo for his use of the “renunciations of

description” in order to evaluate Dante‟s poetry in light of his psychological status

expressed in the poem155

, and, on the other, Vossler for using the “renunciations” to

propose a hierarchy of importance among the three canticles of the Comedy.

In addition, in his La poesia di Dante, Croce – and my hypothesis is that Gramsci

in this note was implicitly thinking of him – also employed a psychologistic approach

when he interpreted the obstacles that the pilgrim Dante encountered in the first cantos of

the Comedy as a mirror of the poet‟s difficulty in beginning the poem.156

By contrast, in

rejecting idealist and psychologizing critical approaches and developing Russo‟s

argument that Dante‟s renunciations are full and sufficient expressions of everything he

wanted to express, Gramsci also agrees with De Sanctis, when he claims that

sorrow is sublime when, at some unexpected news, the various emotions cluster

and crown in sudden confusion within the mind, overwhelm and prostrate it. To

say that our sorrow was inexpressible, ineffable, unspeakable; to say that tears

failed our eyes, words our tongue, is to use commonplace phrases that have lost

their efficacy. If you wish to give sublimity to the inexpressible, you must express

it. If you wish to make size sublime, show me a Pyramid. If you wish to make

sorrow sublime, cover with a veil the head of Agamemnon before Iphigenia‟s

sacrifice, or describe a man falling suddenly “like a dead body;” and, above all,

conceal it from my sight, for the less I see, the more I imagine. Of this nature is the

sudden fall of Cavalcante, then the silence of the tomb…157

Gramsci‟s reading here shares De Sanctis‟s insight, but, goes further because

Dante Studies. 1 (1954) and “Journey to Beatrice.” Dante Studies. 2 (1958).

154 Q 4, §84. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 255. 155 See A. Guzzo. “Il „Paradiso‟ e la critica del De Sanctis.” In Rivista d‟Italia (November 1924): 456-479. 156 As Croce posits it, “the first canto especially gives the sensation of effort, with that „midst of the

pathway of life,‟ where we find ourselves in a wood that is not a wood and see a hill that is not a hill and

gaze upon a sun that is not the sun…” See Croce. The Poetry of Dante. Trans. Douglas Ainslie.

Mamaroneck, NY: Appel, 1971. 102-104.

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itreevaluates Cavalcante‟s position in the structure of the Comedy. Dante did not

renounce describing Cavalcante‟s sorrow, but rather suggested it. The absence of a

description of Cavalcante‟s sorrow is thus to be conceived not as a limit to Dante‟s

lyricism, but as the best way to express the sublime sorrow of the damned.

Moreover, the question of the “renunciations of description” allows Gramsci to

highlight, by means of contrast, the intellectual attitudes of Dante and Manzoni. In the

note entitled Critica dell‟inespresso? (“Criticism of the unexpressed?”), Gramsci

discusses whether Dante‟s intention in “suggesting” (i.e. revealing-and-covering at the

same time) Cavalcante‟s pathos is similar or not to Manzoni‟s practice in the Promessi

sposi of omitting references to sexual desires, stimulating readers to imagine them for

themselves. Gramsci asks whether one can “reconstruct and criticize a poem other than in

the world of concrete expression, of historically realized language.”158

Answering his

own question, Gramsci claims that “it was not a „voluntary‟ factor of a practical or

intellective nature‟ that clipped Dante‟s wings. He „flew with the wings he had,‟ so to

speak, and he did not forgo anything voluntarily.”159

In other words, in contrast to

idealists‟ arguments about Dante‟s limited lyricism, for Gramsci, Dante‟s poem expresses

his world without voluntarily rejecting anything, for specific moral, psychological, or

even political reasons.

Consequently, Gramsci rejects the political interpretation according to which the

real protagonist of the canto is the Ghibelline Farinata because Dante himself was a

Ghibelline. On the contrary, Gramsci contends that the central dramatic figure is

157 Francesco De Sanctis. “Farinata.” 80-81. 158 Q 4, §79. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 248. Emphasis mine. 159 Ibid.

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Cavalcante because of his sorrow and immediate passions and Dante‟s position is thus to

be placed beyond the simplifying distinction between Guelfs and Ghibellines. As

Gramsci points out – by implicitly rephrasing what Cacciaguida says to the pilgrim in

Par. 17.68-69 – Dante “fece parte per se stesso.” Therefore, I argue, Gramsci invites the

reader to keep always in mind the philological method of reading Dante through his own

words in light of the specific historical context of his writings. That is, reading between

the lines, Gramsci suggests making all efforts to read “disinterested.”

6. Counterpoint and Criticism in Gramsci‟s Reading

Along with Erich Auerbach,

160 Gramsci proposes a contrapuntal and historicist

reading of the canto. By reflecting on his idea of writing about Inf. 10, in a letter to Tania

(February 22, 1932), Gramsci himself uses the concept of counterpoint to deal with the

relationship between Farinata and Cavalcante.

More recently and from another point of view, I again thought about that idea

when reading Croce‟s book Poesia di Dante [Dante‟s poetry], in which reference

is made to the Cavalcante episode in such a manner as to imply that Farinata‟s

„counterpoint‟ is not taken into account.161

From a general perspective, the fact that the figures Dante encounters in this canto

are contrapuntally interrelated cannot be considered as irrelevant for Gramsci‟s decision

160 See Erich Auerbach. Mimesis. 155-156. “Despite this rapid succession of scenes, there is no question of

any parataxis in Dante‟s style. […] The scenes are not set stiffly side by side and in the same key […]

they rise from the depths as particular forms of momentary prevailing tonality and stand in

contrapuntal relation to one another.” And writing about Farinata‟s exchange with Dante, Auerbach

restates the same point saying that “there is no question, then, of any straight-forward paratactic

attaching of the Farinata scene to the conversation of the two travelers. […] it is so strong, so violent, so

overpowering an interruption of a different realm - in the local, ethical, psychological, and aesthetic

senses - that its connection with what precedes is no mere juxtaposition but the vital relationship of

counterpoint, of the sudden breaking in of something dimly foreboded. The events are not […] divided

into little parcels; they live together, despite their contrast and actually because of it.” Italics are mine. 161

Gramsci. Letters. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 140. Italics mine.

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to write on this canto and not on another one. In contrast, it is noteworthy that a doctrinal

canto such as Purgatorio 6 was of particular interest for Fascists; memorable from this

perspective is Giovanni Gentile‟s interpretation of Sordello‟s canto as the “canto della

patria.”162

De Sanctis‟s and Croce‟s interpretations left Cavalcante in a shadow of his own,

making him a secondary figure. In Gramsci‟s reading, the shift of emphasis from Farinata

to Cavalcante is realized through more attentive philological study and criticism with the

result that what was previously subordinated is placed in the foreground and made the

center of “a new ideological and theoretical complex.”163

For Gramsci, Dante suggests Cavalcante‟s drama through a complex logical

mechanism in which Cavalcante‟s punishment and his human incapacity to contextualize

Dante‟s use of the verb “ebbe” in the past tense converge. Dante‟s emphasis on the past

tense of the verb “ebbe” at verses 63-68 is part of the structural and linguistic

construction of the poem.164

The particular focus on language – which, Gramsci also

considered “structure” and “technique”165

– leads Gramsci to radically confute Croce‟s

hermeneutic separation between structure and poetry.

Dante scholar Umberto Cosmo – one of Gramsci‟s professors at the University of

Torino –, in a passionate letter to his former student dated December 29, 1931, wrote that

162 See Giovanni Gentile. “Il canto VI del Purgatorio.” In Lectura Dantis, Firenze: Sansoni, 1940, reprinted

in Studi su Dante. Ed Vito A. Bellezza. Firenze: Sansoni, 1965. 230. 163 Q 8, §195. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 347. 164 This idea also mirrors Gramsci‟s contentions in Q 4, §82 and Q 5, §151, in which Gramsci praises the

method engaged by Enrico Sicardi when, in his book La lingua italiana in Dante, he insists on the

necessity to study the languages used by writers. 165 “Ogni espressione culturale, ogni attività morale e intellettuale ha una sua lingua storicamente

determinata: questa lingua è ciò che si chiama anche „tecnica‟ e anche „struttura.‟” Q 23, § 7. 2193.

Emphasis mine. On this note see also Stefano Selenu. Ideas: Un sentiero gramsciano verso la lingua

sarda. Sassari: EDES, forthcoming; and “Grammatica, logica e storia in Antonio Gramsci.” In Mauro Pala, ed. Americanismi.

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mi pare che l‟amico nostro [Gramsci] abbia colpito giusto, e qualche cosa che si

avvicinava alla sua interpretazione ho sempre insegnato anch‟io. Accanto al

dramma di Farinata c‟è anche il dramma di Cavalcante, e male hanno fatto i

critici, e fanno, a lasciarlo nell‟ombra. L‟amico farebbe dunque opera ottima a

lumeggiarlo. Ma per lumeggiarlo bisognerebbe discendere un po‟ più nell‟anima

medievale. Ognuno dei due, Farinata e Cavalcante, soffre il suo dramma. Ma il

proprio dramma non tocca l‟altro. Sono legati dalla parentela dei figli, ma sono

di parte avversa. Perciò non s‟incontrano. È la loro forza come dramatis

personae; è il loro torto come uomini.166

Despite Cosmo‟s appreciations of Gramsci‟s interpretation, in the second part of

the letter he doubted that such an approach could refute Croce‟s distinction between

structure and poetry.167

Gramsci did not reply directly to Cosmo articulating a critical

answer, but left the question “unsolved,” stating with evident sarcasm168

that

the literature on Dante is so plethoric and prolix that the only justification for

writing something on the subject would, it seems to me, be that of saying

something truly new, with the greatest possible precision and the fewest possible

words. I feel that Professor Cosmo himself suffers somewhat from the

professional disease of the Dante specialists; if his suggestions were followed to

the letter one would have to write an entire book. I‟m satisfied to know that the

interpretation of the canto I have outlined is relatively new and worthy of

treatment; for my humanity as an incarcerated man this is enough to encourage

me to distill a few pages of notes that will not a priori seem a superfluity to me.169

At the end of this letter, it is clear that Gramsci was still convinced that by

considering Cavalcante the real dramatic figure of the canto and by moving the emphasis

upon the linguistic dimension of the verb “ebbe,” he was able to invalidate Croce‟s

166 Gramsci. Lettere dal carcere 1931-1937. Edited by Antonio A. Santucci. Palermo: Sellerio, 1996. 848.

Italics mine. It is to be noticed that De Sanctis already criticqued Foscolo‟s interpretation that tied

Farinata‟s principal episode to Cavalcante‟s one through the argument of their kinship. De Sanctis

defined these types of interpretation “nuove miserie de‟ comentatori” (new miseries from the

commentators). De Sanctis. “Farinata.” 81. 167 Gramsci. Lettere dal carcere. Ed. Santucci. 848-849. 168 Gramsci was particularly aware of “sarcasm” as a critical strategy. “Il „sarcasmo‟ (come nel piano

letterario ristretto dell‟educazione dei piccolo gruppi, l‟„ironia‟) appare pertanto come la componente

letteraria di una serie di esigenze teoriche e pratiche che superficialmente possono apparire come

insanabilmente contraddittorie; il suo elemento essenziale è la „passionalità‟ che diventa criterio della potenza stilistica individuale (della sincerità, della profonda convinzione in opposto al pappagallismo e

al meccani<ci>smo).” Q 26, §5. 2301. 169

Gramsci. Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 152. This letter was sent to Tatiana Schucht and

71

theoretical distinction between structure and poetry and conclude that “without the

structure there would be no poetry and therefore the structure too has poetic value.” That

is, without a deeper look at the linguistic and conceptual structure of Dante‟s poem, that

poetry is impossible to appreciate.

Gramsci substitutes Croce‟s lyrically centered approach with a more dramatistic

one.170

This type of approach leads to consider both the figures in the canto‟s narrative

and the reader as performing their roles through the poem like actors on the stage. Both

the canto‟s figures and the readers follow the stage directions – which are part of the

structure – elaborated by the author and presented within the text. The reader‟s final

“recreation” of the poem is then the product of the complex interactions between the

spontaneous representation in the reader‟s mind and the author‟s directions deposited

within the text. The author‟s directions do not only express his intentionality, but also

limit and direct the reader‟s arbitrary interpretations. In other words, Gramsci‟s

hermeneutics is neither reader-centered nor author-centered; it is rather open to inter-

subjective processes of meaning negotiated through interactions among language, text,

and historical and ideological contexts.

In this respect, Gramsci‟s general reading approach is the same he suggests to his

own readers in the first note of Notebook 4, i.e. the notebook in which he wrote most of

his notes on Inf. 10. In this note he provides his future readers with the specific

“directions” to discipline their reading of his prison writings. As Gramsci shows in his

notes on Dante, this practice is crucial in Dante‟s work itself. From this perspective, an

dated March 21, 1932.

170 Frank Rosengarten rightly highlighted Gramsci‟s attention to “the dramatic component of Dante‟s

literary art.” Frank Rosengarten. “Gramsci‟s „Little Discovery.‟” Boundary 2 14.3 (1986): 76.

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interplay between Gramsci‟s and Dante‟s writings can be suggested.

Gramsci‟s reading of Dante‟s writing can be considered as a model for us to read

Gramsci‟s own writing. Indeed, analogously to Gramsci‟s claim that Machiavelli‟s and

Marx‟s works are to be viewed as expressions of historical dramas, Dante‟s and

Gramsci‟s writings, in my view, could be seen both as a „dramatic‟ work of writing and a

„dramatistic‟ labor of reading. In other words, they are actions – and not simply objects –

on the stage of history, culture, and society.

The lyrical-dramatic dimension of Inf. 10 works through a continuous counter-

positioning of Farinata and Cavalcante. Thus, De Sanctis‟s ideologic distinction between

the active hero and the contemplative saint is no longer a paradigmatic distinction for

Gramsci. In fact, this distinction does not permit an understanding of the profound

significance of Cavalcante‟s intervention in the canto, because it does not take into

account its contrapuntal relationship with Farinata. In addition, this relationship is what

Croce‟s distinction between poetry and structure conditions us to overlook, because it

leads us to read the canto as a linear representation of two independent figures.171

Against

Croce‟s interpretation, Gramsci claims that Farinata is not important as a lyrical figure,

but as a structural, “didascalic,” and “instrumental” means that allows Dante to express

Cavalcante‟s profound torment “in act.”

171 Moreover, in his reply to Gramsci, by arguing that in this canto there are two parallel and separate

dramas (“Ognuno dei due, Farinata e Cavalcante, soffre il suo dramma. Ma il proprio dramma non tocca

l‟altro”), Umberto Cosmo followed De Sanctis and Croce, thus overlooking the most important

innovation in Gramsci‟s reading of the canto. Indeed, what Gramsci was highlighting was that in this

canto Cavalcante‟s drama is not separate from Farinata‟s. On the contrary, for Gramsci, Dante

represents their dramas as contrapuntally interconnected.

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7. Between Silence and Dialectic: Can Cavalcante speak?

In Gramsci‟s criticism, the change in the relative weight attributed to Cavalcante

not only modifies the meaning given to Cavalcante in the canto, but also the entire logic

entailed in the way we read the canto.

Gramsci‟s reading not only is more attentive to the language and structure of the

canto, but also conveys a non-lyricist notion of poetry at odds with Croce‟s idealist one.

While Croce conceives poetry as the lyrical expression of the poet‟s feelings, Gramsci

elaborates a notion of poetry as an expression of drama.

Taking into consideration that Gramsci defined drama as “the depiction of living

people in a dramatic conflict”172

an implicit link between poetry and dialectic is also at

play in his interpretation of Dante. Indeed, if poetry is the expression of drama, and

drama is inherently dialectical – being expressions of conflicts –,173

we can argue that

poetry is for Gramsci expression of dialectical forces – which Croce understood as part of

the conceptual structure. Therefore, the semantic shift in the notion of “poetry” from

lyrical to dramatic also led Gramsci to invalidate Croce‟s ideological division between

poetry and structure.

Yet, how does this semantic shift of poetry toward drama and dialectic relate to

Gramsci‟s contrapuntal view of Farinata and Cavalcante?

In the Prison Notebooks, Gramsci delivers a particular vision of dialectic. As

172 See the entire letter in Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 74-76. This evokes Hegel‟s

definition of dramatic action. For Hegel a dramatic action “rests entirely on collisions of circumstances,

passions, and characters, and leads therefore to actions and then to the reactions which in turn

necessitate a resolution of the conflict and discord.” As this passage indicates, Hegel‟s notion of

dramatic action entails a specific dialectical structure composed of actions, reactions, and resolution.

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Italian philosopher Giuseppe Prestipino has observed, Gramsci‟s dialectic is not triadic,

but tetradic. From the tension between two opposed elements (thesis and antithesis),

according to Gramsci‟s notion of dialectic, two different solutions can be obtained. One

consists in the conservation of the thesis, while the other in the actualization of the

antithesis. Prestipino calls the first solution “thesis-made-synthesis,” the second

“antithesis-made-synthesis.” The first is regressive because it aims at consolidating the

“old” element, i.e. the thesis, while the second one is progressive because aims at

actualizing the “new” element, i.e. the antithesis.174

In following this logical scheme, one can consider De Sanctis‟s and Croce‟s

interpretations as enacting the first solution, while Gramsci‟s reading, the second one. In

other words, in overlooking the contrapuntal relationship between Farinata and

Cavalcante, De Sanctis and Croce do not see the “active” role of Cavalcante and interpret

him as a secondary figure unrelated to Farinata. They thus reject the active role of the

antithesis (Cavalcante) and reassert the thesis (Farinata), as if the antithesis had no active

function in changing the thesis.

Gramsci overturns this reading and conceives Cavalcante the active figure able to

change the dynamics of the canto, transforming Farinata‟s dominant figure into a

“didascalia”175

and an explicator of the represented drama. In other words, what was

passive and subordinated for De Sanctis and Croce now becomes active and leading for

Gramsci. In addition, after Cavalcante‟s intervention and Dante‟s desire to know about

173 Later on, Kenneth Burke also developed a similar idea in The Philosophy of Literary Forms. Berkeley:

U of California P, 1973. 107. 174 See Giuseppe Prestipino. “Dialettica.” In Fabio Frosini and Guido Liguori, eds. Le parole di Gramsci.

Roma: Carocci, 2004. 55-73. 175 This point is to be expanded because Gramsci uses the notion of “didascalia” several times both in his

reading of Inf. 10 and in those notes in which he explains his idea of dialectic.

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Cavalcante‟s torment, Farinata‟s proud political discourse turns into an explicative

discourse on Cavalcante‟s drama. This means that, by transforming Farinata‟s discourse,

the subaltern Cavalcante has now become the new nucleus of the scenic complex. This

new center influences and leads to change the old thesis, and in doing so, becomes the

new pivot in the canto structure. In fact, Gramsci seems to reflect on the two figures of

Cavalcante and Farinata as if they were respectively the direct picture of the damned in

the canto and the negative of this picture.

For Gramsci, Cavalcante‟s drama is what Dante wanted to expressely represent as

the actual drama (“il dramma in atto”) of the damned in this canto: Farinata, meanwhile,

is a sort of facilitator and medium for the representation of Cavalcante‟s torments.

Farinata‟s presence, stability, movements, and gestures have indeed their final target and

focus in Cavalcante, for Farinata changes his figural aspect and structural function after

Cavalcante‟s intervention. In other words, in the interactions among the canto‟s figures

(Dante, Virgil, Cavalcante, and Farinata), all of them change after Cavalcante‟s

intervention. As Gramsci points out,

Dante describes Farinata with a series of negatives in order to echo the (three)

movements of Cavalcante: the distortion of the face, the lowering of the head, th

bending of the back. Nonetheless, there is some change in Farinata as well. When

he resumes, he is no longer as haughty as at his first appearance. Dante does not

question Farinata just to “acquire information;” he questions him because he has

been struck by Cavalcante‟s disappearance. He wants the problem that prevented

him from answering Cavalcante to be resolved; he feels guilty about

Cavalcante.176

And then, Gramsci significantly emphasizes, “the structural passage […] is not

merely structure; it is also poetry, it is a necessary element of the drama that has taken

176 Q 4, §78. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 248.

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place.”177

This emphasis on the interdependence of poetry and structure as a necessary

element of the dramatic action needs a particular scrutiny, since it could allow us to

bridge Gramsci‟s reading of Inferno 10 with his concept of historical materialism.

Given that Gramsci organized the structure of Notebook 4 to mainly include two

series of notes, on Inferno 10 and the other about the relationship between historical

materialism and positivism, I suggest that between the two series there might be some

sort of theoretical continuity.178

Gramsci‟s view of historical materialism aims at transcending the idealist and

vulgar materialist separation between structure and superstructure. In Gramsci‟s parlance,

the moment of perfect balance and reciprocity between structure and superstructure is

indicated with the concept of historical block.179

Given that Gramsci‟s reading of Inf. 10

aims at transcending Croce‟s separation between structure and poetry, by means of

analogy, we can argue, that Gramsci‟s view of the Comedy is centered on the concept of

drama, which also points to a “logical-poetic block,” i.e. a balance and reciprocity

between structure and poetry.

What this point suggests is that Gramsci resists reading canto 10 through a

177

Ibid. 178 It is noteworthy that Gramsci organized Notebook 4 having a clear plan in mind. Indeed, he divided the

notebook in two sections and planned to use at least part of the first half for a series of notes on canto 10

of Inferno and Dante criticism; the second for a set of „Notes on Philosophy. Materialism and

Positivism. First Series.‟ 179 Gramsci derived his notion of “historical block” from Sorel. See Q 4, §15. It is to note that Sorel‟s ideas

on Marxism were strongly influenced by Antonio Labriola‟s Del Materialismo storico. As Sorel

emphasized in his review of Labriola‟s book published in 1896 on “Le devenir social,” Labriola

understood the importance that the innovation of historical materialism was to intend history as “a

unitary complex” and that it pivots on the notion that structure and superstructure are interdependent. See Gian Biagio Furiozzi. Sorel e l‟Italia. Messina-Firenze: D‟Anna, 1975. 31. I tried to emphasized the

centrality of the concept of “interdependence” among phenomena in response to Peter Ives‟s book,

Gramsci‟s Politics of Language, in which in criticizing interpretations of Gramsci and Marxism as a

dualist philosophy, Ives, in my view, weakened the notion of distinction itself, without considering the

fact that the central notion at play in Gramsci‟s (and in Labriola‟s) historical materialism is the concept

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vertical distinction between contemplative and active lives, as De Sanctis did. He rather

envisions a more horizontal relationship shaped by a counterpoint between the

domineering (and dominant) figure Farinata and the subfering (and subaltern) figure

Cavalcante.180

Gramsci shows himself to be aware of the humble character of Cavalcante‟s

suffering and uncertainty, and that Dante counterpoints (contrappone) this

characterization to Farinata‟s virility and pride. As he argues, “Cavalcante appears, not

upright and manly like Farinata, but humble, disheartened, perhaps on his knees, ans asks

uncertainly about his son.”181

And then he adds that Cavalcante “experiences doubt,

uncertainty.” In addition, in Cavalcante‟s paternal love, “generic human „life‟ is seen in a

concrete condition, in the enjoyment of light, which the damned and the dead have

lost.”182

For Gramsci, without considering Cavalcante‟s drama, “in quel girone non si

that, even if distinct, phenomena are interdependent. See also Stefano Selenu. “Ives and Gramsci in

Dialogue.” Rethinking Marxism Rethinking Marxism 21.3 (2009): 344-54. 180 Cavalcante‟s subalternity and suffering is also expressed by the movements of the characters within the

canto. While Farinata‟s movements are proud – “superbe” as Benvenuto da Imola wrote in his

commentary to the Comedy – and up-directed, which express the stability and certainty of a typical

virile figure (s‟ergea col petto e con la fronte / com‟avesse l'inferno in gran dispitto, v. 35; ond‟ei levò

le ciglia un poco in suso, v. 45), Cavalcante perfectly represents the down-directed movements of the

suffering and uncertain “humble.” The linguistic game between “subaltern” and “suffering” I am

proposing becomes clearer taking into account the etymological relationship between the two terms.

Both of them are compound words, whose first part is the particle “sub.” Indeed, subaltern is constituted

by sub- and -altern, i.e. the other that lives at the bottom of a hierarchical order; suffering by sub- and -ferre, which etymologically means “to bring below.” As Christopher Kleinhenz showed, there is a

common feature between Farinata‟s “erect” posture and Dante‟s towering of giants. According to

Kleinhenz, both Farinata and the Towers (whose model is surely Babel) are symbol of superbia.

Superbia is the counter-vice of humility, a fundamental ethical virtue for Dante. From this perspective,

Dante‟s idea of a “humble Italy” is crucial. I will develop these ideas in the fourth chapter, in which I

analyze Dante‟s project as a counter-babelic ethical-political act. See Christopher Kleinhenz. “Dante‟s

Towering Giants: Inferno XXXI.” In Romance Philology 27.3 (February 1974): 269-285. For Farinata‟s

superbia see also Robert Durling. “Farinata and the Body of Christ.” Stanford Italian Review 2.1

(Spring 1981): 5-35. 181 Q 4, §78. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 247. Italics mine. 182 Ibid. It is worthy to notice that the features Gramsci highlighted – the humbleness, the doubtfulness, and

the joy for light - are particular significant in light of the entire Comedy. As an instance, the joy for light

contrasts with the obscurity in the scripture on the gates of the Hell and with the obscurity in the final

canto of the Inferno in which Dante visions Lucifer. It is also important to notice that, Farinata and

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vede in atto il tormento del dannato.”

The damned soul is unable to see the present, to understand Dante‟s words

correctly, and, thus, to “speak” by and for himself. Yet, as Gramsci sees it, he is able to

transform Farinata‟s attitude and function in the canto.

Cavalcante and Farinata are close to each other (some illustrators even depict

them as being in the same tomb); their dramas are tighly intertwined, and Farinata

is reduced to the structural role of “explicator” in order to make the reader enter

deeply into the drama of Cavalcante.183

In other words, Cavalcante is the antithesis whose influence tempers Farinata‟s

political pride and intellectual theorization with a more humble dimension. This changes

Farinata, who cannot turn back to his original dimension, but becomes the “explicator”

with the role of solving the knot tied in Dante‟s soul by the intervention and

disappearance of Cavalcante.

8. Humanism, Heresy, and the National-Cultural: Guido‟s Disdain and

Gramsci‟s History of Intellectuals

As I have also mentioned earlier, the dialectical interplay between the visible and

the veiled is a powerful hermeneutic device for reading the Comedy. In this respect, in the

background of the thesis-Farinata and the antithesis-Cavalcante, Guido stands as a

parenthesis. Guido‟s presence in the canto (and, arguably, in Dante‟s Comedy in general)

is placed in a state of suspension. In this parenthesis lies the veiled motif for Cavalcante‟s

actual drama, if we follow Gramsci‟s contention that the aesthetic and dramatic accent of

the canto falls upon the verb ebbe in the perfect tense. In other words, Gramsci‟s reading

Lucifer share a similar body language: Farinata “levò le ciglia un poco in suso” (in Inf. 10.45) contra

Dante similarly to Lucifer, who “contra il suo fattor alzò le ciglia” (Inf. 34.35).

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of the canto leads us to consider Guido‟s presence as the structural force needed to depict

Cavalcante‟s actual drama.

In this final section of the chapter, I consider Gramsci‟s interest in Inferno 10 in

light of his understanding of the Italian Communes, to which I have devoted some

attention in the first chapter. In order to show that the question of Cavalcante‟s position in

the Divine Comedy is for Gramsci not an episodic and apparently out-of-context topic

with respect to the other issues he deals with, I investigate the position of Guido

Cavalcanti in the context of Inferno 10 and discuss Gramsci‟s interpretation of verses 61-

63, which most Dante scholars have recognized as the most problematic verses of the

canto. I conclude that, by juxtaposing Gramsci‟s interpretation of Inf. 10 with his research

on the Italian intellectual history, we obtain a useful perspective for decoding the

relevance of Gramsci‟s general interest in Dante and the „age of the communes.‟

At verses 61-63, in replying to Cavalcante‟s question why Guido was not

traveling through the afterlife with him, the pilgrim-poet states that,

Da me stesso non vegno:

colui ch‟attende là per qui mi mena

forse cui Guido vostro ebbe a disdegno.184

The “cui” toward which Guido had disdain is a textual variable with an

unspecified semantic value. It is a voided center or null-point that absorbs the differential

relationship between Dante and Guido.

The formal nature of the variable “cui” gave rise to an extraordinary exegetic

production. Even Croce‟s approach to the Comedy is related to an exegetic tradition

concerning these verses of Inf. 10 – a tradition that stems from Vincenzo Borghini‟s

183

Q 4, §83. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 253.

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interpretation of the Comedy.

Dante è stimato da noi e tenuto in conto – Borghini argues – come Poeta e non

come filosofo; ora aggiungo che così volle egli, e così intese. E mostrasi che

domandandol messer Cavalcante perchè Guido suo figlio non era seco, se per

altezza d‟ingegno facea quel cammino, Dante ne assegnò la cagione subito, che

Guido avea dispregiata la poesia e tenuta per una cosa vile, il che non avea fatto

egli, e per quella gli era concesso quel cammino, e non al suo Guido gran filosofo,

a quella scienza tutto inteso. Mostra dunque che faccia questo cammino come

Poeta.185

Borghini‟s reading is one of the principal ideological sources for Croce‟s La

poesia di Dante.186

Along with Borghini, Croce considered Dante a poet and not a

theologian or philosopher. Since Dante is a poet, according to Croce, we should devote

our attention to his poetry and not the conceptual and allegorical structure of the Comedy.

Gramsci refers to the problem of understanding Guido‟s disdain in Q4, §82, in

which he recalls a review by Gargano about Sicardi‟s La lingua italiana in Dante.

Gramsci will also refer to Sicardi‟s book in Q 5, §151, where he praises its emphasis on

the study of “language” for interpreting the writers‟ poetic world187

– an argument also

developed in Q4, §82.

To better understand this note, I suggest it be viewed as composed of two

argumentative sections. In the first section, Gramsci comments on Sicardi‟s arguments

concerning the semantic value of “cui” and “ebbe a disdegno.” Gramsci follows Sicardi

184 Inf. 10.61-63. Emphasis mine. 185 Vincenzo Borghini. “Pensieri diversi.” In Ottavio Gigli, ed. Studi sulla Divina Commedia di Galileo

Galilei, Vincenzo Borghini ed altri. Firenze, 1855 (reprinted in 2000 with a presentation of Franco

Brioschi). 320. Emphasis mine. 186 See Croce. The Poetry of Dante. Trans. Douglas Ainslie. Mamaroneck, NY: Appel, 1971. 5. The fact that

Croce draws on Borghini‟s views about Dante seems to confirm Gramsci‟s view of Croce as the last

man of the Renaissance. See Q 10, §41. 1302-1303. See also Charles Singleton. Journey to Beatrice

(Dante Studies 2). v-vi: “no one seems to have noted that Croce‟s rejection of the allegory and the

„allotria,‟ as he called it, is but a late example of what is clearly a very old trend – as old as the

Renaissance, in fact, which means about as old as may be, in this case, since that followed so closely

upon Dante‟s.” 187 The review is Giuseppe S. Gargano. “La lingua nei tempi di Dante e l‟interpretazione della poesia.”

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in taking “cui” to refer to Virgil. From a grammatical viewpoint, “cui” is not a direct, but

rather an indirect object. Thus, the verse should be paraphrased as „[con] cui Guido

vostro ebbe a disdegno,‟188

in which “cui” follows the implicit preposition “con” and

refers to Virgil, i.e. the person through (con) whom Dante‟s journey can be realized.

According to Sicardi, the three canticle of the Comedy –as well as classic Latin works –

were rich with implicit elements like the preposition “con” in Inf. 10. These elements are

unexpressed but present in the text.

Thus, Gramsci asks, what is the object of „ebbe a disdegno?‟ According to Sicardi,

the object of „had in disdain‟ “is to be found in „da me stesso non vegno‟ and is, let us

suppose, either the noun „venuta‟[sic!] or, if one prefers, an object clause, „di venire.‟”189

In other words, for Sicardi, Guido disdained to come to the other world through Virgil.

While the first section mainly deals with Sicardi‟s arguments, in the second one,

by critiquing Gargano‟s review, Gramsci draws the main conclusion of his reading of the

canto. In this section he contends that the aesthetic and dramatic accent of the canto falls

on the verb “ebbe,” and not on “cui” or “ebbe a disdegno.”

Given the definitive tone of this contention, should we consider this final

argument a rejection of the arguments in the first section of the note? In other words,

should we reject any effort to understand the value of “cui” and “ebbe a disdegno” as

Sicardi tried to do?

In my view, the argument that the aesthetic and dramatic accent of the canto falls

on “ebbe” should not be taken as a normative direction to reject any attempt to interpret

Marzocco (14 aprile 1929).

188 English Trans.: „the one... [with] whom Guido disdained to come here.‟ 189 Q 4, §82. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 250.

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“cui” and the object of Guido‟s disdain. The trajectory Gramsci wanted to draw is

directed to a better evaluation of the fact that Cavalcante‟s drama does not deal with his

rationality, as Gargano‟s interpretation implied, but with his passions. As Gramsci

highlights Cavalcante is not simply disappointed that Guido is not coming with Dante,

which implies that Cavalcante suffers after rationally reflecting on the reasons why Guido

is not accompanying Dante. By contrast – Gramsci insists – Cavalcante‟s drama concerns

the passions he immediately feels for the death of his son. As Gramsci says, “in the case

of Cavalcante, the sole dramatic factor is paternal love.”190

Moreover, the fact that the general tone Gramsci adopted in commenting Sicardi‟s

interpretation is not polemical helps the final argument to appear as a general

hermeneutic trajectory without a totalizing normative charge. In fact, Gramsci both cites

and comments Sicardi‟s insights, but never critiques them. In particular, he emphasizes

that Sicardi‟s interpretation is formal and not substantive and states that Sicardi “does not

pause to explain what is „disdained‟ (whether it is the Latin language, or Virgil‟s

imperialism, or the other things proposed by the interpreters).”

In this comment to Sicardi, Gramsci‟s emphasis falls on the questione della lingua

and Virgil‟s imperialism. Although he did not develop further this train of thought, the

fact that he suggested a potential interpretation of Guido‟s disdain is revealing of his

reflections on Guido Cavalcanti.

This provides us with a fruitful perspective to re-consider Gramsci‟s notes on Inf.

10 within the constellation of topics outlined in his plans of study, in particular the one in

Q1, §1. Indeed, the fact that Gramsci noted the Latin language and Virgilian imperialism

190

Q 4, §83. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 253.

83

as possible signifiers for a more substantial reading of Guido‟s disdain seems to be

coherent with Gramsci‟s reflections on the history of Italian intellectuals, humanism, and

the communes.

In this respect, Q 7, §68 is insightful. In discussing an essay by Luigi Arezio,

Gramsci highlights that Giuseppe Toffanin‟s book, Che cosa fu l‟Umanesimo (1929),

seems to him to be very relevant for his research in prison. According to Gramsci,

“Toffanin asserts that humanism must not be confused with the progressive reawakening

that came after the year 1000.”191

Moreover, he adds that

humanism is an essentially Italian phenomenon […]. In a certain sense, it is the

thirteenth-century civilization of the communes that may be called heretical; it

appeared as an irruption of the most refined sentiments and thoughts in plebeian

form […]. The vernacular literature emanating from the civilization of the

communes and independently of classicism was indicative of a society “in which

the leaven of heresy fermented” – a leaven that, among the masses, weakened

respect for ecclesiastical authority, while, among the few, it became an open break

with the „Romanitas‟ that was characteristic of the period between the Middle

Ages (in the precise sense) and humanism. Some intellectuals appear to have been

conscious of this historical discontinuity: they claimed to be cultured without

reading Virgil, that is, without liberal studies, the general abandonment of which,

according to Boccaccio, justified the use of the vernacular, rather than Latin, in

the Divine Comedy. The greatest of these intellectuals was Guido Cavalcanti.192

In this light, Guido, the parenthetical and quasi-visible figure of Inferno 10 – the

canto about heretics –, is thus the intellectual who in the most radical way “had in

disdain,” Dante‟s journey, Virgil, and the „Romanitas‟ of liberal studies, as the passage

above indicates. In other words, as Gramsci‟s notes on the history of Italian intellectuals

suggest, Guido held in disdain the cultural politics of early humanism in the Late Middle

Ages.

191 Q 8, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 204. 192

Ibid. 204-205. Emphasis mine.

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The passage above – though unexploited by Gramsci scholars – is poignant for

understanding both Dante and Gramsci dialogically, because they highlight the role of

humanism in Italian and European Late medieval culture. My argument is then that this

note along with those on the Risorgimento and the communes, are precious elements of

the complex historical-dramatic scenario Gramsci depicted in his prison writings. The

notes on Dante and the Duecento are relevant parts of Gramsci‟s multifaceted reflection

on central notions such as the national-popular, cosmopolitanism, humanism, political

and civil societies, and hegemony, as also a letter to Tania dated September 7, 1931

witnesses.193

What is at stake in Gramsci‟s annotations on Dante and Guido is the relationship

between democratic and heretical movements in the communes.

In Dante, „the love of the plebeian language, born out of the virtually heretical

state of mind of the communes,‟ was bound to clash with a quasi-humanistic

concept of knowledge. Humanism, from Dante until just before Machiavelli, is a

distinctly separate epoch, and, contrary to what some people think, the affinity

between humanism and scholasticism is not superficial – they have the same

antidemocratic and antiheretical impulse.194

Gramsci‟s notes on the intellectual history in late Duecento suggest that Guido

held in disdain all the reactionary visions of humanists on the classic Latin world, and, by

contrast, he preferred to write in vernacular. If so, verses 61-63 of Inferno 10 acquire a

peculiar historical meaning if read from the perspective of intellectual, cultural, and

linguistic history. If Guido, while embracing Averroism, rejected humanistic, reactionary

classicism, Dante neither rejected classical culture nor the spiritual mission of the Church

in history. On the contrary, Dante re-affirmed and confronted both of them placing

193 This is the letter in which Gramsci expresses his idea of intellectual, and its relationships with the notion

of the state, and the medieval Communes. See Letters from Prison. Ed. Rosengarten. Vol. 2. 66-67.

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himself as the producer of a new vision of poetry, politics, history, and love.195

If we juxtapose Q 7, §68 with Q 5, §85, entitled “Sviluppo dello spirito borghese

in Italia,”196

we obtain further insights on both the cultural politics of the Communes and

Dante. The starting point of the latter note is Manlio Dazzi‟s article Nel VI centenario

della morte di Albertino Mussato, according to which, Mussato was the forerunner of

modern (i.e. humanist, according to Dazzi) historiography. As Gramsci observes,

Mussato, according to Dazzi, broke with the theological tradition of history, and

more than any other individual of his time he was responsible for the introduction

of modern or humanistic history. […] In Mussato, the passions and utilitarian

motifs of men appear as motifs of history. The fierce struggles among the factions

in the communes and among the early country squires contributed to this

transformation of the conception of the world.197

And then he adds that the development of Mussato‟s conception “can be traced all

the way back to Machiavelli, Guicciardini, and L. B. Alberti.”198

These annotations are not only curiosities of an erudite scholar. Indeed, in Q 5,

§31, entitled “Sulla tradizione nazionale italiana” – which in Togliatti and Platone‟s

edition of the Notebooks precedes Q 5, §85 – by tackling the problem of the “funzione

storica dei Comuni e della prima borghesia italiana” Gramsci emphasized that “this is a

very interesting problem from the point of view of historical materialism, and I think it

can be connected to the question of the international function of Italian intellectuals…”199

From this perspective, Dante‟s linguistic project becomes a relevant historical

194 Q7, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 205. 195 As it is known, in Inferno 4, Dante assigns to himself the sixth position among the classical poets

Homer, Statius, Lucretius, Horatio, and Virgil. In doing so, Dante not only praises the classic models of

poetry, but aims at positioning himself in a precise historical trajectory from ancient to modern times. 196 Topic that intersects his views on the theory of historiography, for it interconnects Gramsci‟s own views

of historical materialism with those of de Gröythusen, as I have already mentioned in the previous

chapter. 197 Q 5, §85. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 337-8. 198 Ibid.

86

referent for Gramsci‟s political project as Q 29, §7 also suggests. It is in this note that

Gramsci defines the De vulgari eloquentia as a “national-cultural political act,” in which

the historical “fact” is elevated into theory.200

Then, in returning to Gramsci‟s note on Mussato, we find that the dialectic

between cosmopolitanism and particularism was already germinal in Mussato‟s proto-

humanism.

According to Gramsci, in the development of early humanistic history following

Mussato, one can distinguish two main currents. The first one begins with Mussato,

reaches its high point in Alberti, and “directs its attention toward the „particular,‟ toward

the bourgeois as an individual who develops within civil society and who has no

conception of political society outside his „particular‟ sphere.”201

This current is tied to

Guelfism, which, for Gramsci, “can be said to be a medieval theoretical syndicalism. It is

federalist without having a federal center. It entrusts intellectual questions to the church,

which is the de facto federal center by virtue of its intellectual as well as political

hegemony.”202

To have a better understanding of the role and position of the Roman Catholic

Church and, therefore, the development of this current, according to Gramsci, “one must

study the way in which the communes were really constituted: in other words, the

concrete attitude adopted by the representatives toward the government of the

199 Q 5, §31. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 295. Emphasis mine. 200 In order to understand how the national consciousness in the Risorgimento generated it is fundamental

to take into account the notion that the modern elaboration of the national consciousness is not only a

product of modernity, but it is an elaboration of the historical elements and traces Italians inherited from

the Middles Ages. And we find a confirmation of this last point in the introductory note of Notebook 19

(1934-1935), which deals with the “Study of the Risorgimento.” 201 Q 5, §85. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 338. 202

Ibid. See also the letter to Tania, September 7, 1931.

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commune.”203

The other current is Ghibelline in the broad sense and reached its high point in

Machiavelli, who viewed the Roman Catholic Church as a negative national problem. As

Gramsci contends in the final part of the note,

Dante belonged to this current, he opposed the anarchy of the communes and of

feudalism, but he looked for a semimedieval solution. In any case, he posed the

question of the church as an international problem, and he pointed out the need to

limit its power and its activity. [...] Dante is really a transition: there is the

assertion of secularism but still couched in medieval language.204

Dante‟s assertion of secularism, as well as Machiavelli‟s, seems then to be

paramount for that „tradition of secular humanism‟ which, in dealing with Antonio

Labriola‟s central role for Marxism, Gramsci viewed as the ethical ground of the modern

State.205

Gramsci‟s notes suggest that the love for the vernacular and for Latin respectively,

relates to the contests between a secular-heretical state of mind, such as Guido‟s, and the

“clerical” proto-humanism, such as Mussato‟s and Del Virgilio‟s.206

Keeping this

framework in mind and juxtaposing it with Gramsci‟s contention that Dante‟s De vulgari

eloquentia is a national-cultural political act, we should ask: What is Dante‟s position

with regard to the opposition between Latin and the vernacular? Why did Dante choose to

write in the vernacular?

203 “Power used to last for a very short time (often, just two months), and in those days government

members were made to live in seclusion, without women. They were very uncouth people who were

stimulated by the immediate interests of their craft.” Q 5, §85. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 2. 338. 204 Ibid. 205 Q 11, §70. 1509. 206 Here I use the term “clerical” in the sense Gramsci employs it in Q 7, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 206.

“Humanism was the first „clerical‟ phenomenon in the modern sense; it was a Counter-Reformation in

advance (besides, it was a Counter-Reformation vis-à-vis the commune period). The humanists opposed

the breakdown of medieval and feudal universalism that the commune implied and that was smothered

in its infancy, etc.”

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CHAPTER 3

“LOCUTIONI VULGARIUM GENTIUM PRODESSE TEMPTABIMUS:”

ON THE ETHICAL AND POLITICAL SENSE OF DANTE‟S NOTION OF

“VULGARES GENTES”

In Dante, „the love of the plebeian language,

born out of the virtually heretical state of mind

of the communes,‟ was bound to clash with a

quasi-humanistic concept of knowledge.

Antonio Gramsci.

Heresy (haeresis) is so called in Greek from

„choice‟…, doubtless because each person

chooses… for himself that which seems best

to him… Hence, therefore, „heresy‟… takes

its meaning from „choice,‟ by which each

person, according to his own judgment,

chooses for himself whatever he pleases to

institute and adopt.

Isidore of Seville. Etymologies VIII.iii.2207

“Opera naturale è ch‟uom favella;

ma così o così, natura lascia

poi fare a voi secondo che v‟abbella.”

These verses from Adam‟s discourse with the pilgrim Dante in Par. 26.130-2,

convey a general theory of language entailing a complex view of linguistic choice. For a

bilingual and linguistically well-informed intellectual as Dante, the choice of writing in

one language rather than the other and of mixing rather than dividing diverse linguistic

codes is not only rich with aesthetic and stylistic implications but also with ethical and

political ones.

The linguistic choice of a poet like Dante is historically even more relevant when

the chosen language is – through an inherited tradition – culturally and politically

subordinated to the other. Indeed, although in Dante‟s age different literary manifestations

207 “Haeresis Graece ab electione vocatur, quod scilicet unusquisque id sibi eligat quod melius illi esse

videtur... Inde ergo haeresis dicta Graeca voce, ex interpretation electionis, qua quisque arbitrio suo ad instituenda, sive ad suspicienda quaelibet ipse sibi elegit.” English Trans. Stephen A. Barney, Jennifer

A. Beach, Oliver Berghof, ed. Etymologies of Isidore of Seville. West Nyack, NY: Cambridge UP, 2002.

89

in the vernacular showed the possibility for the vernaculars to become the languages of a

prestigious cultural development, at the end of the Duecento, Latin still held the highest

cultural and institutional prestige. Its institutional power, its status as language of the

artes liberales, and the general recognition of cultural forms inherited from the past

contributed to maintain the prestige of Latin.

As I have shown in the previous chapter, according to Gramsci,

The vernacular literature emanating from the civilization of the communes and

independently of classicism was indicative of a society “in which the leaven of

heresy fermented” – a leaven that, among the masses, weakened respect for

ecclesiastical authority, while, among the few, it became an open break with the

„Romanitas‟ that was characteristic of the period between the Middle Ages (in the

precise sense) and humanism. Some intellectuals appear to have been conscious of

this historical discontinuity: they claimed to be cultured without reading Virgil,

that is, without liberal studies, the general abandonment of which, according to

Boccaccio, justified the use of the vernacular, rather than Latin, in the Divine

Comedy. The greatest of these intellectuals was Guido Cavalcanti. In Dante, „the

love of the plebeian language, born out of the virtually heretical state of mind of

the communes,‟ was bound to clash with a quasi-humanistic concept of

knowledge.208

This passage not only helps us to draw a general image of the cultural demeanors

within the age of the communes from which, according to Gramsci, Dante‟s love for the

vernacular fermented, but also provides us with a useful clue to focus on Dante‟s

linguistic problem and the ethical-political implications embedded in his views on the

vernacular.

As this passage witnesses, Boccaccio is the authoritative source Gramsci used to

deal with Dante‟s decision to write his masterpiece in the vernacular rather than Latin.209

In this respect, it is worthy to recall that Boccaccio‟s views on Dante‟s choice to write in

174.

208 Q 7, §68. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 205. Emphasis mine. 209 In the note cited above, Gramsci quotes and discusses Luigi Arezio‟s review of Giuseppe Toffanin‟s

90

the vernacular depend on the poetic exchange between Dante and Italian proto-humanist

Giovanni del Virgilio known as the Eclogues.210

Moreover, as I suspect, Gramsci‟s

definition of Dante‟s Comedy as “il canto del cigno medioevale, che pure anticipa i nuovi

tempi e la nuova storia,”211

arguably, has some connection with del Virgilio‟s expression

“arguto olori”212

(“clear-toned swan,” It. “cigno canoro”) used to refer to Dante in his

carmen.

Therefore, given this sub-textual constellation and also considering the emphasis

given by Gramsci to the fact that Dante‟s love for the vernacular “was bound to clash

with a quasi-humanistic concept of knowledge,” a preliminary reflection on the Eclogues

seems to be quite relevant for our dialogic reading of Dante and Gramsci and for

decoding the ethical, political, and historical significance of Dante‟s linguistic project.

In 1319, when Dante was still working on the third canticle of the Comedy,

Giovanni del Virgilio wrote the carmen known as the first of the Eclogues, at the

beginning of which lies the following question:

book Che cosa fu l‟Umanesimo. Firenze: Sansoni, 1929. As I have also remarked in the first two

chapters, Gramsci found Toffanin‟s book “very interesting” for his own studies in prison. 210 See Todd Boli “Boccaccio.” In Richard Lansing, ed. Dante Encyclopedia. New York-London: Garland,

2000. 110. “The Eclogues had particular interest for Boccaccio in that they bear upon the question of

Dante‟s use of the vernacular. In the Eclogues, Dante declines an invitation from the learned Bolognese

professor of letters, Giovanni del Virgilio, to earn a poetic coronation by setting aside his work on the

nearly completed Commedia and writing a poem in Latin instead.” The Eclogues are an epistolary

exchange about the role of poetry and the vernacular and consist of four compositions, one carme by del

Virgilio and three Eclogues in the stylistic form of Virgilian eclogue. The first eclogue is Dante‟s and

replies to Del Virgilio‟s carmen, the second is written by del Virgilio and the last one is Dante‟s closing answer. On Giovanni del Virgilio and Dante see also Philip H. Wicksteed and Edmund G. Gardner.

Dante and Giovanni del Virgilio: Including a Critical Edition of the Text of Dante‟s “Eclogae Latinae”

and of the Poetic Remains of Giovanni del Virgilio. Reprint. Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries P, 1971;

Giuseppe Vecchi. “Giovanni del Virgilio e Dante. La polemica tra latino e volgare nella corrispondenza

poetica” e Eugenio Chiarini. “I „decem vascula‟ della prima ecloga dantesca.” In Dante e Bologna nei

tempi di Dante. Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1967. 61-76 and 77-88. See also Enrico

Malato. Dante. Roma: Salerno Editrice, 1999. 216-223. 211 See Q 6, §64. Ed. Buttigieg. Vol. 3. 48: “Isn‟t the Divine Comedy, to some extent, the swan song of the

Middle Ages but also a harbinger of the new age and the new history?” Emphasis mine. 212

Ec. I.50.

91

Pieridum vox alma, novis qui cantibus orbem

mulces letifluum, vitali tollere ramo

dum cupis evolvens triplicis confinia sortis

indita pro meritis animarum, sontibus Orcum,

astripetis Lethen, epiphoebia regna beatis;

tanta quid heu semper jactabis seria vulgo,

et nos pallentes nihil ex te vate legemus?213

This question drives the entire exchange between the two poets and encompasses

at least two issues. The first one concerns the reasons why Dante decided to write his

Comedy in the vernacular, while the second one deals with a sociolinguistic divide within

late medieval society, expressed here as a radical split between the “vulgus” and the

“pallentes” (the pale intellectuals). According to del Virgilio, in writing in the vernacular

Dante was directing his poems only to a part of his potential audience, excluding in this

way those who were dedicated to study (“nos pallentes nihil ex te vate legemus”).

It is implicit in del Virgilio‟s conservative view of literature that only those who

write and read in Latin can be considered as part of the “pallentes.” From del Virgilio‟s

carmen it can be inferred that the language divide between Latin and the vernaculars in

medieval culture is rich with sociocultural implications. Accordingly, the division

between Latin and the vernacular implied in del Virgilio‟s text indicates not only a

distinction in terms of poetic style, but a rigid sociolinguistic separation of Dante‟s

audience into “vulgus” and “pallentes.”

The ways Del Virgilio terms the “vulgus” and “vulgare” in the remnant of his

carminis is symptomatic of his conservative view of language. Indeed, in dealing with the

213 Ec. I.1-7. English trans.: “Sacred voice of the Pierides who with unwonted songs doest sweeten the

stagnant world, as with life-giving branch thou longest to upraise it, unfolding the regions of threefold

fate assigned according to deserts of souls, Orcus to the guilty, Lethe to them that seek the stars, the

realms above the sun to the blest; such weighty themes why wilt thou still cast to the vulgar, while we

pale students shall read nought from thee as bard?” Trans. Philip H. Wicksteed and Edmund G. Gardner.

Dante and Giovanni del Virgilio. Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries P, 1902 (1971 reprint). 147.

92

“vulgus” he uses expressions such as “gens ydiota”214

and “apris”215

(“swine”).

Moreover, terms as “laico,”216

“sermone forensi,”217

and “indigna veste”218

are used to

express the notion of “vulgare,” and del Virgilio associates the linguistic opposition

between vernacular and Latin to the genre distinction between “carmen laicum”219

and

“carmen vatisonum.”220

For del Virgilio, who considered himself as a “clericus Aonidum,

vocalis verna Maronis”221

(“cleric of the Muses and, in his name, Virgil‟s servant”), by

writing in the vernacular, Dante could only produce “lay” poems but not “carmina

vatisona.”

In addition, Del Virgilio insists that by writing in Latin Dante would have had a

broader audience than the “vulgus.” Given this, and since “clerus vulgaria tempnit… cum

sint idiomata mille,”222

del Virgilio insists that with his invitation to Dante to come to

Bologna and receive the poetic laurel, Dante could have been hosted in the schools where

“the smell of laurel spreads from the crowns of winning poets” and the poetic glory

recalls the triumphant glory of the “ducis populo”223

if only he had written in Latin.

However, by refusing to write in Latin, Dante constrained del Virgilio to award the laurel

214 Ec. I.10. 215

Ec. I.21. Del Virgilio‟s expression “margaritas profliga prodigus apris” re-writes Matthew 7:6 “Neque

mittatis margaritas vestras ante porcos.” Alberto Colunga and Laurentio Turrado, ed. Biblia Sacra iuxta

Vulgatam Clementinam: Nova Editio. Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 1946. 1278. 216 Ec. I.15. 217 Ec. I.18. 218 Ec. I.22. 219 Ec. I.15. 220 Ec. I.24. 221 Ec. I.36. 222 Ec. I.15-6. Emphasis mine. English Trans.: “Clergy scorns the vernaculars… whereas there are a

thousands idioms.” As Mengaldo emphasized, the expression “cum sint idiomata mille” derives from

Dante‟s De vulgari eloquentia (see I.x.9). See Mengaldo. “De vulgari eloquentia.” In Umberto Bosco.

Enciclopedia Dantesca. Vol. 2. Roma: Treccani, 1970. 405. 223 Ec. I.37-40. “gymnasiis the delectabor ovantum, inclita Peneis redolentem tempora sertis; ut praefectus

equo sibi plaudit preco sonorus festa trophea ducis populo praetendere lato.” It. Trans.: “ginnasi con le

illustre tempie profumate dai serti d‟alloro dei trionfatori; così come l‟araldo dalla forte voce,

cavalcando avanti, si compiace di mostrare al popolo lieto i solenni trofei del duce.”

93

to the Paduan poet Alberto Mussato224

– the most representative poet of proto-humanism

in Italy, as discussed in the previous chapter.225

Finally, by highlighting the conflicts

around Dante,226

he adds that, using Latin, Dante by offering songs to everybody would

bring peace among rivals, while using the vernacular destines his songs to remain

unheard.227

Why then did Dante choose to write his masterpiece in vernacular?

In this chapter, I will discuss the ethical-political implications of Dante‟s

discourse on vernacular eloquence and emphasize the effects that these implications have

for our understanding of Dante‟s search for an illustrious vernacular language. To prepare

my discussion, I will investigate the ethical and political sense embedded in the

expression “locutio vulgarium gentium,” introduced by Dante in the very first paragraph

of the Dve:

volentes discretionem aliquater lucidare illorum qui tanquam ceci ambulant per

plateas, plerunque anterior posteriora putantes, Verbo aspirante de celis locutioni

vulgarium gentium prodesse temptabimus [...].228

As Dante himself states in the incipit of his treatise, no one had ever written

anything similar before.229

Dante was not only aware that the topic he was proposing was

unprecedented, but was also very cautious in his statements, as it is clear from several

224 “Sitim Phrygio Musone levabo.” Ec. III.88. 225 Giovanni del Virgilio met Albertino Mussato in 1319 in Bologna and wrote for him the Ecloga ad

Mussatum included in the Zibaldone Laurenziano. 226 “Iam michi bellisonis horrent clangoris aures.” Ec. I.41. 227 “Omnibus ut solus dicas, indicta manebunt” Ec. I.46. 228 Dve I.i.1. Emphasis mine. English Trans.: “I shall try, inspired by the Word that comes from above, to

say something useful about the language of people of speak the vulgar tongue, hoping thereby to

enlighten somewhat the understanding of those who walk the streets like the blind, ever thinking that

what lies ahead is behind them.” 229 “Cum neminem ante nos de vulgaris eloquentie doctrina quicquam inveniamus tractasse.” Dve I.i.1. For

a discussion on Dante‟s declaration of originality in light of the authorship-authority problematic, see

Albert R. Ascoli. Dante and the Making of a Modern Author. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2008.

94

passages within the De vulgari eloquentia.230

The co-presence in the treatise of certainty

in claiming his authorial originality and his cautiousness in delivering his own ideas

witnesses Dante‟s desire to deliver a new authoritative form of knowledge as well as

awareness that his readers could have received his work critically or even rejected it.

Indeed, as Robert Durling emphasized, Dante‟s warfare metaphors in the De vulgari

eloquentia may imply hostile relationships between Dante and his audience(s).231

Dante‟s discourse on the vernacular eloquence, Maria Corti has argued, draws on

key notions on philosophical discourses about grammar by the modistae (also known as

speculative grammarians), in particular from Boethius of Dacia‟s De modi significandi.232

In the context of these speculative discourses on grammar, the modistae engaged diverse

theoretical distinctions such as the one between inventores gramatice and gramatice

positores (respectively, philosophers of grammar and grammarians),233

and the one

concerning the three epistemic modes of the modi essendi, modi intelligendi, and modi

significandi. While philosophers of grammar (inventores gramatice) were focused on

studying the modi intelligendi, grammarians (gramatice positores) devoted their attention

to the modi significandi.

In considering Corti‟s discourse, one can infer that, through the De vulgari

eloquentia, one of Dante‟s aims is to find some sort of grammar for the vernacular

language – that, according to the definition provided in the treatise, was not a regulated

grammatical language.234

Yet, as Corti insisted, Dante‟s goal was to find a form of poetic

230 See Dve I.ix.1 and Dve I.x.1. 231 Robert Durling. “The Audience(s) of the De vulgari eloquentia and the Petrose.” In Dante Studies 110

(1992): 25-35. 232 Maria Corti. Dante a un nuovo crocevia. Firenze: Sansoni, 1982. 233 Dante uses these two expressions in Dve I.ix.11 and Dve I.x.2. 234 Though from a different angle Karl Vossler had a similar view to the one expressed by Maria Corti about

95

language able to re-enact the original universality and naturalness of Adam‟s language

lost after the punishment of Babel.

Corti‟s attempt to relate Dante‟s discourse on the vernacular eloquence to the

speculative grammar has been widely critiqued as philologically problematic.235

Nonetheless, it gave rise to a hermeneutic trend that interprets Dante‟s hunt for the

illustrious vernacular as a search for a perfect language – a trend that finds its major

expression in Umberto Eco‟s book La ricerca della lingua perfetta nella cultura europea.

In his chapter-length essay “La lingua perfetta in Dante,” Eco attempts to re-conceive

Dante‟s notion of illustrious vernacular under the concept of perfect language described

as a sort of universal grammatical matrix, or even a sort of “innate” forma locutionis.236

Dante‟s grammatization of the vernacular, when he claimed: “Forse l‟unico scopo del de Vulgari

eloquio, è di far sì che il volgare italiano si trasformi in una specie di grammatica e che dai mutevoli

parlari si svolga un tipo unico di italiano scritto.” See Karl Vossler. La Divina Commedia studiata nella

sua genesi e interpretata. Trans. S. Iacini. Vol. I.1. Bari: Laterza: 1909-1913. 244. For a critique of

Vossler, see also Bruno Nardi. Dante e la cultura medievale. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1985. 189. According

to Nardi, “il volgare illustre […] è il sustrato comune che affratella fra loro tutti i dialetti d‟Italia, ed

esiste già in atto, commisto con essi. Dante vuol solo liberarlo dalla scoria municipale dei volgari propri

delle diverse regioni italiane.” And then he adds “Questo volgare illustre non attende che lo si formi;

esso esiste di già come lingua viva ed espressione naturale della rinovellata anima della gente itálica,

come segno, anzi, dello stesso rinovellarsi della coscienza della stirpe latina. Il volgare illustre esiste di

già, e attende che lo si scopra e lo si adopri da tutti, per esprimere i sentimenti più alti e più nobili che sbocciano nell‟anima italiana. Nel De vulgari eloquentia, il concetto del variare delle lingue non è più

concetto astratto, come presso i trattatisti scolastici, ma diventa concreto, solido, storico: è coscienza

dello storico divenire del linguaggio di un popolo. In ciò sta appunto la novità del trattato dantesco.” 235 See Alfonso Maierù. “Dante al crocevia?” Studi medievali 25.2 (1983): 735-48; Ileana Pagani. Teoria

linguistica di Dante, Napoli: Liguori, 1982, in particular the last chapter; and Franco Lo Piparo. “Dante

linguista anti-modista.” In Federico Albano Leoni, et al., eds. Italia linguistica: idee, storia, strutture.

Bologna: Il Mulino, 1983. 9-30. For a further reflection on the issue, see also Giuseppe Mazzotta,

Dante‟s Vision and the Circle of Knowledge. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993 and Marianne Shapiro. De

vulgari eloquentia: Dante‟s Book of Exile. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1990. 236 According to Umberto Eco, “la tesi di Maria Corti è stata veementemente contestata (cfr. in particolare

Pagani 1982 e Maierù 1983), obiettando che non ci sono prove evidenti che Dante conoscesse il testo di Boezio di Dacia, che in vari casi Maria Corti stabilisce tra i due testi analogie non sostenibili e che le

idee linguistiche che si possono ritrovare in Dante circolavano in altri filosofi e grammatici anche prima

del XIII secolo. Ora, anche se si concedono i due primi punti, rimane il terzo, che cioè l‟idea di una

grammatica universale circolasse ampiamente nella cultura medievale e che, come nessuno dei critici di

Corti mette in dubbio, Dante fosse a conoscenza di queste discussioni. Dire, come fa Maierù, che non

era necessario conoscere il testo di Boezio per sapere che „la grammatica è una e medesima per sostanza

in tutte le lingue, anche se varia in superficie,” perchè questa affermazione ricorre anche in Ruggero

Bacone, è se mai prova convincente che Dante poteva pensare a una grammatica universale. Pertanto

96

Although fascinating, this interpretation needs careful scrutiny, for it appears to lack

direct textual evidence. Indeed, Dante never explicitly refers to the illustrious vernacular

as a “perfect language” and never points out that what he was hunting for was a universal

forma locutionis or “innate” set of grammatical principles.

Without entering in a detailed analysis of this interpretation, it is worthy to notice

that scholars of Dante‟s treatise have rarely discussed the important text of of Dve I.ix.11

in its entirety.237

It is in this passage that Dante uses the expression “inventores

gramatice” and it is in this passage that he makes clear that what ancient Romans called

“gramatica”238

was a historical invention created through the “common consent” of many

people(s).

Hic moti sunt inventores gramatice facultatis: que quidem gramatica nichil aliud

est quam quedam inalterabilis locutionis ydemptitas diversibus temporibus atque

locis. Hec cum de comuni consensu multarum gentium fuerit regulata, nulli

singulari arbitrio videtur obnoxia, et per consequens nec variabilis esse potest.

Adivenerunt ergo, illam ne, propter variationem sermonis arbitrio singularium

fluitantis, vel nullo modo vel saltim imperfecte antiquorum actingeremus

poteva pensare alla forma locutionis data da Dio come a una sorta di meccanismo innato che a noi

contemporanei ricorda esattamente quei principi universali di cui si occupa la grammatica generativa

chomskiana (la quale d‟altra parte si ispira agli ideali razionalistici di Descartes e dei grammatici

secenteschi di Port-Royal, i quali rappresentano).” Umberto Eco. La ricerca della lingua perfetta.

Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1999. 51-52. Emphasis mine. 237 Lo Piparo “Dante linguista anti-modista” is an exception in this sense. In his essay, Lo Piparo uses this

passage to clarify a profound difference between Dante and Boethius of Dace. See “Dante linguista

anti-modista,” in particular p. 19: “Le differenze rispetto alla linguistica boeziana sono notevoli. La

grammatica in Boezio è contemporaneamente una realtà naturale (esiste ab aeterno nella mente umana)

e una raffigurazione filosofica. In Dante ad essere naturali e universali sono gli idiomi-volgari; le grammatiche sono idiomi ausiliari artificialmente costruiti che si aggiungono ai primi. Gli inventores

gramatice facultatis danteschi svolgono pertanto un ruolo del tutto diverso dalla filosofica inventio

grammaticae di Boezio, Il filosofo boeziano invenit grammaticam nel senso che porta alla luce per così

dire teorica una realtà che comunque esiste: dal momento che „inventor grammaticae a proprietate rei

regulatur,‟ la grammatica „ideo non est pure a voluntate nostra‟ [Mod. sign., Qu. 9]. I danteschi

inventores gramatice facultatis non scoprono una grammatica naturale ma producono un idioma-

grammatica artificiale. La loro grammatica non „a proprietate rei regulatur‟ (Boezio) ma „de comuni

consensu multarum gentium fuerit regulata‟ [DVE I, IX, 11]. Non essendo fondata sull‟organizzazione

razionale del mondo (proprietate rei) ma sul consenso delle genti, può anche differenziarsi nei diversi

popoli: non sono infatti solo i Romani a possedere una grammatica-idioma ma „hanc quidem

secundariam Greci habent et alii, sed non omnes‟ [I, I, 3].” It is curious that Umberto Eco never

mentions Lo Piparo‟s essay. 238 Dve I.i.3.

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autoritates et gesta, sive illorum quos a nobis locorum diversitas facit esse

diversos.239

To our purpose it is useful to recall three of Dante‟s arguments concerning his

idea of grammar. First, grammar is a secondary language in respect to the first one, i.e.,

the vernacular (“Est et inde alia locutio secundaria nobis,” Dve I, i, 3). Second, this form

of language differs from the vernaculars not because of its perfection but because of its

artificial nature (Dve I.i.4) and its stability in time and space (Dve I.ix.11). Third, for

Dante, the spatial-temporal stability of grammar does not imply any positive value,

except that it allows the study of ancient authors. As Dve I.ix.11 makes clear, the stability

of grammar rather derives from a consensual decision of many people to have a common

regulated language, needed for the very pragmatic reason of studying the ancient texts.240

In other words, Dante never refers to his idea of illustrious vernacular or to the

“gramatica” as a sort of innate linguistic matrix (which, as Eco suggests in his argument,

can be paralleled to Chomski‟s Cartesian linguistics). Rather the formation and

acquisition of both the vernaculars (the inferior ones and the ideal illustrious one) and the

“gramatica” are related to human practices and needs, the first to the nursing of children

and the labor of poets, the second to the need for understanding the authors of the past. In

both cases it is evident that, for Dante, language is always a socio-historical product.

According to Dve I.i.3, not only Romans but also Greeks and other peoples

239 Dve I.ix.11. Emphasis mine. English Trans.: “This was the point from which the inventors of the art of

grammar began: for their gramatica is nothing less than a certain immutable identity of language in

different times and places. Its rules having been formulated with the common consent of many peoples,

it can be subject to no individual will; and, as a result, it cannot change. So those whose devised this language did so lest, through changes in language dependent on the arbitrary judgment of individuals,

we should become either unable, or, at best, only partially able, to enter into contact with the deeds and

authoritative writings of the ancients, or of those whose difference of location makes them different

from us.” 240 Dve I.ix.11.

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“possessed” this secondary language, although not all of them had the rules and

knowledge to understand it, because, in order to learn these, one must spend much time

and dedicated study (spatium temporis et studii assiduitatem).241

On the contrary, the

vulgare is, for Dante, the speech (locutione) that we acquire imitating (imitantes

accipimus) the nurse (nutrix), without the direction of any rules (sine omni regula). For

this reason, vernacular eloquence is necessary to everyone. Dante‟s belief that eloquence

is necessary for everybody allows us to expand the question of authorship242

towards

concerns regarding the ethical-political implications entailed in Dante‟s argument.

From this perspective, we should consider at least three arguments condensed in

Dante‟s incipit. First, Dante contends that he is the first author of a doctrine of vernacular

eloquence (“cum neminem ante nos de vulgaris eloquentie doctrina quicquam inveniamus

tractasse”); second, vernacular eloquence is necessary to everybody (“talem scilicet

eloquentiam penitus omnibus necessariam videamus”); third, the term “everybody”

(omnibus) includes men, women, and children (“cum ad eam non tantum viri sed etiam

mulieres et parvuli nituntur, in quantum natura permictit”).

As Mengaldo highlighted, in Dante‟s incipit we find the presence of a

“democratic opening” (apertura “democratica”).243

According to Dante, only humans

need language, because only human beings need this medium in order to communicate.

Moreover, every human being needs to speak and talk to other humans. Therefore, in

Dante‟s view, every human being needs a form of eloquence. In this respect, Pasolini‟s

contention that “l‟allargamento linguistico di Dante, dovuto allo spostamento del suo

241 Dve I.i.2-3. 242 See Albert Ascoli. Dante and the Making of a Modern Author. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2008. 243 See Dante Alighieri. De vulgari eloquentia. Ed. Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo. 26 note 1.

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punto di vista in alto – l‟universalismo teologico medioevale – non è solo un

allargamento dell‟orizzonte lessicale e espressivo: ma, insieme, anche sociale”244

seems

particularly appropriate. However, this does not mean that Dante saw in any potential

reader his ideal audience. On the contrary, as Durling contended, from Dante‟s texts it is

evident that Dante is “torn between his scornful elitism, which is both reasoned and a

matter of temperament, and his desire to reach a larger public.”245

In the first paragraph of the treatise, the contrapuntal play between the negative

universal “neminem” used in the beginning sentence “cum neminem ante nos” and the

affirmative universal “omnibus” in the subsequent sentence is, in my view, poignant. It

underscores the historical and ethical-political significance of Dante‟s project. The fact

that he sees himself as the first intellectual who decided to write a “vulgaris eloquentie

doctrina” becomes even more significant in light of the fact that this doctrina is

necessary to everybody. This necessity renders the treatise itself necessary and intensifies

the reader‟s perception of Dante‟s desire to help (prodesse) what he called the “locutio

vulgarium gentium” (Dve I.i.1).

It is curious and revealing that thus far the expression “locutio vulgarium

gentium” has been not much researched and discussed. It is the aim of the remainder of

this chapter to examine this expression, and, in doing so, to show that it entails a complex

semantic cluster intersecting both social and ethnic domains. By looking at modern

editions of the De vulgari eloquentia, it is symptomatic that in translating the notion of

244 Pier Paolo Pasolini. “La volontà di Dante a essere poeta.” In Empirismo eretico. Milano: Garzanti, 2000.

104. Although I find Pasolini‟s statement on Dante‟s pluristylism as an index to an enlargement of the

social basis, the preceding idea that Dante decided to use “per la Commedia la lingua della borghesia

comunale fiorentina” seems to me not compelling, even misleading. See also the final chapter of this

dissertation. 245 Robert Durling. “The Audience(s) of the De vulgari eloquentia and the Petrose.” In Dante Studies 110

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“locutio vulgarium gentium,” translators have not reached a common term. Indeed,

“locutio vulgarium gentium” has been multifariously translated as “la lingua della gente

volgare” (Marigo), “lingua della gente illetterata” (Mengaldo), “la lingua della gente

comune” (Marazzini e Del Popolo), “the speech of the common people” (Shapiro), il

“parlare della gente che si esprime in volgare” (Cecchin) “the language of people who

speak the vulgar tongue” (Botterill). It is noteworthy that this expression has been

translated in such different ways, but no translator provided an articulated explanation to

his/her choice.

In addition, while Dante scholars have devoted their attention to the first term

“locutio” in the expression,246

no discussion has been fostered on the second part of it. By

keeping in mind that Dante‟s treatise on the doctrine of vernacular eloquence has a

twofold goal (i.e. to illuminate the discernment of „erring‟ people and to help the “locutio

vulgarium gentium”), I suggest that we attain a better understanding of Dante‟s linguistic

project after discussing the meaning(s) of the expression “vulgarium gentium.”

The adjective “vulgar” is rooted in the Latin term “vulgus.” Taking into

consideration that, in his first Eclogue, Giovanni del Virgilio used precisely the term

“vulgus,”247

a preliminary examination of this term is particularly helpful for a fuller

(1992): 29.

246 An analytic discussion of the term “locutio” in the Dve is offered by Mirko Tavoni. “Contributo

all‟interpretazione di De vulgari eloquentia I 1-9.” In Rivista di letteratura italiana 5.3 (1987): 385-

453. See also Umberto Eco. La ricerca della lingua perfetta. 45-47. 247 Mengaldo emphasized the significance of Giovanni del Virgilio‟s knowledge of De vulgari eloquentia.

For Mengaldo, the only evidence we have that Dante‟s treatise circulated before his death is “il Carmen

di del Virgilio, che potrebbe rieccheggiarla qua e là (cfr. l‟uso di astripetus, prezioso composto non

attestato anteriormente a VE II iv 11, al v. 5, nonchè il v. 50 che potrebbe pure aver un rapporto con lo

stesso luogo dantesco; e specialmente i vv. 15-16 „clerus vulgaria tempnit, / et si non varient, / cum sint

ydiomata mille,‟ da raffrontare con l‟affermazione dell‟esistenza di mille e forse più volgari italiani in VE I x 9, e forse anche con la dottrina svolta nel trattato dell‟intrinseca mutevolezza dei volgari di

fronte alla stabilità del latino): spie notevoli...” See Mengaldo. “De vulgari eloquentia.” In U. Bosco, ed.

Enciclopedia Dantesca. Vol. 2. Roma: Treccani, 1970. 405. In my view, another clue is the expression

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understanding of Dante‟s concept of “vulgares gentes.” I also claim that the link between

the notion of “vulgus” and the term “vulgares gentes” finally forces us to look at the term

“locutio vulgarium gentium” not only from a literary-centered perspective but also from

an ethical-political one.

The Latin notion “vulgus” betrays a complex view of citizenship. Isidore of

Seville provides us with a useful definition of “vulgus,” when, defining various notions

of citizenship, he contrasts the concept of “vulgus” with that of “populus.”248

The

populace (populus) is “a human multitude, allied through their agreed practice of law

and by willing association” and is “distinct from the plebeians (plebs), because a

populace consists of all the citizens.”249

While “the populace is the whole city”250

gathered and bound by the law and willing association in a compact body like a stone,251

the vulgus is a dispersed multitude, i.e. the plebeians, a plurality of scattered people, as

the etymology of “plebs,” according to Isidore, suggests. In other words, the vulgus is

“the multitude living here and there – as if it were “each one where he wishes (vult, from

velle, „wish‟).”252

“vulgus” used in first paragraph of his Carmen, which seems to reformulate Dante‟s expression

“vulgares gentes” used in the first paragraph of De vulgari eloquentia. 248 Isidore of Seville. Etymologies IX.iv.2-7. Emphasis mine. It is to be noticed that words such as “popolo”

in modern Italian, or its analogous term “people” in English, “Volk” in German, and so on and so forth,

do not help us understanding the difference between “vulgus” and “populus” in Medieval Latin. In fact,

we no longer distinguish these two notions with the same conceptual precision Isidore was able to do in

the Middle Ages. Moreover, it is to add that after Romanticism, “popolo” has become a notion strictly

tied with that of nation and state. In fact, we distinguish the notion of the modern nation state from early

forms of statehood because the processes of nation-state building in the modern age were led through

the ideological equation of state = nation = people (It. “popolo”). In modernity, the two Latin notions of “populus” and “vulgus” were blurred, establishing a homology between them. In order to keep the

„alterity‟ between medieval meanings and the modern ones, I maintain the medieval distinction as a key

element to interpret Dante‟s linguistic problem. 249 Ibid. 250 Ibid. 251 Isidore mentions the Greek term lapis for “populus” and, by considering its etymology laÒj, establishes

a parallel between „populus‟ and „stone.‟ 252 We also find a similar distinction between “populus” and “vulgus” in Genoese writings in the second

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The notion of “will” is indeed the central concept through which the distinction

between “populus” and “vulgus” can be understood. In the populace there is a common

willing association through law, while the “vulgus” is scattered because of the absence of

a kind of collective will that could allow dispersed people to associate themselves and

become a community. What is at play within the distinction between “populus” and

“vulgus” then is the relationship between collective and individual wills and notions of

citizenship and city governance, which is possible only when and where some form of

collective will exists beside the individual one. As Brunetto Latini indeed pointed out in

his Trèsor, “Maintes citez sont ou le governement de la vie de l‟homme est destruis, et

vivent disoluement, car chascuns vait aprés sa volenté.”253

Now, refocusing our attention on Dante‟s expression “locutio vulgarium

gentium,” both Del Virgilio‟s precise use of the term “vulgus” and Isidore‟s definition of

the notion sheds a particular light on Dante‟s aim to help the speech of the “vulgarium

gentium.”

The expression “vulgares gentes” used in the plural form at the beginning of the

half of twelfth century. For instance, in the context of the construction of new walls of the city of Genoa

in 1159, Caffaro talks about the “homines civitatis et plebeium secundum quarteria et alias suas

distinctiones,” i.e. the men of the city and the plebs had to be differentiated through neighborhoods and

other sub-divisions. See Giovanna Petti Balbi. Una città e il suo mare. Genova nel Medioevo. Bologna:

CLUEB, 1991. 125-126. I suggest that the notion of “multitude living here and there as they like,” i.e.

the “vulgus” according to Isidore, will also play a certain role in the ways the “vagabond” and the

“beggar” was perceived in the Enlighenment. As Robert Castel pointed out in his revealing study on the

transformation of the social question, the vagabonds and beggars are described by Les Trosne as “the

most terrible scourge of the countryside. [...] They are, if one can speak figuratively, like enemy troops

spead out on the surface of the territory, who live as they like, just as in a conquered nation upon which they levy virtual taxes which they call by the name of alms.” As Castel emphasizes, the hardest element

to accept for Les Trosne were not simply the alms, but the fact that these vagabonds were not domiciled.

Indeed, Les Trosne “laid claim… to the right to give alms to beggars „who are domiciled, who have a

dwelling, a family.‟” Robert Castel. From Manual Workers to Wage Laborers. Transformation of the

Social Question. New Brunswick-London: Transaction Publishers, 2003. 65. 253 Brunetto Latini. Trèsor. II.49.1. It. Trans: “ci sono molte città dove il governo della vita dell‟uomo è

distrutto, e vivono in modo dissoluto, perchè ognuno va dietro alla propria volontà.” English Trans.:

“Although many cities do well, there are some in which the government of men is destroyed and where

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Latin treatise is a hapax legomenon. It is worthy to notice that, in Dante‟s vernacular

writings, the expression “gente volgare”/“volgare gente” is widely used, but we never

find the plural form “genti volgari.”254

This forces us to posit the question about the

conceptual meaning of the plural form in the Latin version. According to Aristide

Marigo‟s critical edition of the De vulgari eloquentia (1938), the plural is simply a

stylistic vulgarism, implying that it has no specific relevance for our understanding of

Dante‟s theorization on the vernacular eloquence.

However, it seems to me that Dante‟s use of the plural form is a sign that remarks

the multiplicity and diversity of the vulgar people(s). I place the “s” in parentheses

because the Latin “gentium” embodies an ambiguity for the modern reader. Indeed,

“gentes” can be translated either as „people‟ (It. “persone,” “gente”) or as „peoples‟ (It.

“popoli”).255

Moreover, the multiplicity in the term “gentium” is expressed in two ways.

On the one hand, it is inscribed in the grammar of the plural genitive “-ium;” on the other,

the plural is incorporated in the Latin collective noun “gens,” which could refer, either to

a multiplicity of people (persone, gente) or to a singular people (popolo).

Therefore, after a close and reflective reading of Dante‟s texts, it is difficult to

detach Dante‟s notion of “vulgarium gentium” from both a social and an ethnic

dimension. In reading both the De vulgari eloquentia and the Convivio intertextually one

could recognize that Dante‟s views are elaborated through diverse discourses in which

people live in dissolute fashion, for each person works for his own interests” (191).

254 The only exception is Conv. I.ix.5, in which, however, we find only the adjective “volgari” but not

“genti volgari.” 255 For instance, Dante uses “gente” in the second sense as a synonym for “population” in Dve I.ix. 10. The

ambivalence of the term “gentes” (and its declined forms) is also evident in the English translations.

The term is indeed translated with “people” in Dve I.i.1 (“vulgarium gentium”), and with “peoples” in

Dve I.vi.3 (“plerasque nationes et gentes”), Dve I.ix.11 (“multarum gentium”). This is why I suggest to

employ the term “people(s),” which, although more artificial, preserve the ambivalence of the Latin

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takes on ethnic, social, and cultural affiliations are at play. Moreover, Dante‟s mapping of

the diverse “vulgares” accounts for the different ethno-linguistic groups (“gentes” in

Latin) inhabiting the world after the punishment of Babel.

The notion of “vulgarium gentium” used in the De vulgari eloquentia condenses

therefore ethnic and social semantic ciphers. Although the term “gentium” incorporates a

complex semantic cluster, there is nonetheless a trait that keeps all the embodied ciphers

together, that is, the fact that these gentes are vulgares. This trait indicates that the will of

the gentium is fragmented, incoherent, and dissociated, since they, incapable of

discernment, follow only their individual will (singulari arbitrio, according to Dve

I.ix.11) In other words, the vulgares gentes are not associated through a coherent

collective will, i.e. a type of common law and willing association the notion of populus

rather possessed.

Members of the “vulgus” do not recognize each other as affiliated to a common

law or willing association. This also helps to highlight a crucial difference between the

stability of grammar against the variability of the vernacular idioms. As Dve I.ix.11

suggests, grammar is stable because many people(s) (multarum gentium) gave their

consent/consensus (de comuni consensu) to compose an inalterable and regulated

linguistic identity, while the vernacular idioms are variable because they are conditioned

by diverse individual arbitrations (singulari arbitrio).

Hinc molti sunt inventores gramatice facultatis: que quidem gramatica nichil aliud

est quam quedam inalterabilis locutionis ydemptitas diversibus temporibus atque

locis. Hec cum de comuni consensu multarum gentium fuerit regulata, nulli

singulari arbitrio videtur obnoxia, et per consequens nec variabilis esse potest.256

term “gentes.”

256 Dve I.ix.11.

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In other words, Dante understood that the Babelic character of Europe and Italy

was related to the absence of a common consent/consensus, that is, a common collective

will or “concordia” (using a pivotal term of De Monarchia). Both in his political treatise

and the Comedy, Dante points out in clear terms that what makes people and

communities disaggregated and conflicting is vice and sin. As Justinian‟s words in Par. 7

highlights, sin makes the human creature servile and deprives him/her of nobility (i.e.

„vulgar‟ according to Convivio).

Solo il peccato è quel che la disfranca,

e falla dissimile al sommo bene;

per che del lume suo poco s‟imbianca.257

Accordingly, sin is what Dante considers the ultimate root of the vulgares gentes‟s

vulgarity. This last point leads me to diverge from the commonly accepted understanding

of the term “vulgare” as a synonym of illiterate, introduced by Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo

in his critical edition of Dante‟s treatise. Mengaldo supported his choice by suggesting a

parallel between Dve I.i.1 and the notion of illiterate in Conv. I.ix.5, when he glossed that

“la chiosa esatta [per vulgarium gentium] è Conv. I.ix.5.” The same argument was

provided in the Enciclopedia dantesca, according to which “scivola senz‟altro dal

significato generico a quello più specifico l‟esempio di Cv I ix 5 molt‟altra nobile gente,

non solamente maschi ma femmine… volgari e non literati, così come il vulgarium

gentium di VE I i 1 (i due casi si appoggiano a vicenda).”

If we observe this argument closely, we find that it is not so straightforward as it

appears. Indeed, in Conv. I.ix.5, what Dante proposes is not simply a definition of terms

such as “volgare,” “literate,” and “illiterate.” In fact, what is at stake in Conv. I.ix.5 is not

257

Par. 7.78-80. See also Conv. III.ii.5-6.

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literacy, but the commodification of literature. As Dante argues in this passage, kings,

princes, knights, and many noble people were “vulgar” because, by following “il giudicio

falso e vile / di quei che voglion che di gentilezza / sia principio ricchezza,”258

they used

literacy and literature as a mercantile commodity. Therefore, Dante was not referring to

the literacy of people, but to what he considered an immoral demeanor of specific strata

of the noble class, which, led by their greedy desire for wealth, treated literature as a

“donna meretrice” and thus, for Dante, should be considered vulgar rather than noble

literate people.259

Now, it is worth noticing that as avarice and greed can make the ruling groups

“vulgar,” likewise the illustrious vernacular language has, for Dante, the power to give

glory to those people who, though coming from subaltern groups (domestici), can become

illuminated and elevate themselves over kings, princes, and aristocrats. As Dante points

out in Dve I.xvii.4-5, the illustrious vernacular language he was hunting has the power to

change the desires and ideas of people, to reverse their wills and elevate them beyond

their social positions.

258 Le dolci rime d‟amor ch‟i‟ solia in Conv. IV, vv. 16-17. 259 It is clear that Dante‟s passage is highly sarcastic and ironic. It is curious that commentators of this

passage did not notice the crucial role played by irony here, which led Vasoli and De Robertis to

consider the term “volgari” as equivalent to those who “ignorano la lingua latina,” see note 5 p. 62 in

Cesare Vasoli and Domenico De Robertis, eds. Convivio. In Opere minori. Vol. 1.2. Milano: Ricciardi,

1979. Accordingly, Franco Lo Piparo viewed Dante‟s expression “volgari e non litterati” as referring to

“un pubblico che ha poca pratica di scrittura (un pubblico non grammaticale) ed è perciò raggiungibile

soprattutto mediante la comunicazione orale.” For Lo Piparo, “l‟elenco dei „volgari e non litterati‟

comprende – abbiamo visto – „principi, baroni, cavalieri, e molt‟altra nobile gente. È un pubblico

tecnicamente „non litterato‟ ma ha tutte le opportunità e i mezzi, anche finanziari, per organizzare letture e recite pubbliche. È un pubblico che si istruisce per via orale. Non sa leggere il latino ma „intende‟ il

volgare, non solo quello popolare ma anche quello illustre.” It is noteworthy that the passage before has

said exactly the opposite: literature had been left to those noble people who used it as a “donna

meretrice.” This leads me to claim that in the conjunction between “volgari” and “non litterati” lies an

ironic counterpoint, through which Dante was contending that the noble people, although possessing the

“literatura” are not really “litterati,” but vulgar people, since they greedily used literature to earn money.

“E a vituperio di loro dico che non si deono chiamare literati, 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

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Quod autem exaltatum sit potestate, videtur. Et quid maioris potestatis est quam

quod humana corda versare potest, ita ut nolentem volentem et volentem

nolentem faciat, velut ipsum et fecit et facit? Quod autem honore sublimet, in

promptu est. Nonne domestici sui reges, marchiones, comites et magnates

quoslibet fama vincunt? Minime hoc probatione indiget.

Dante also alludes to the transformative power of the illustrious vernacular

language at the beginning of the treatise, when he claims, on the one side, that his

doctrine of the vernacular eloquence would have been helpful for the “locutio vulgarium

gentium” and, on the other, that with his treatise he whishes to “illuminate the capacity of

discernment of those who wander through the streets like blind people.”260

As is stated in

Conv. IV.iii.5 and IV.25, the “gente volgare” is “d‟ogni ragione ignuda,” and incapable of

discerning the three passions needed to have a good life (buona vita)261

– a type of

goodness that should characterize the noble people, according to Conv. IV.xxix.10. The

inability to discern virtue from vice is then for Dante what keeps people away from

freedom making them wander here and there rather than follow the right way

(rectitude).262

In this respect, vices are strictly related to, or even caused by, the inability

to discern passions and virtues from vices.263

chi tiene la cetera in casa per prestarla per prezzo, e non usarla per sonare.” Conv. I.ix.3.

260 “volentes discretionem aliqualiter lucidare illorum qui tanquam ceci ambulant per plateas, plerunque

anterior posteriora putantes.” Dve I.i.1. 261 According to Convivio IV.25, there are “tre passioni necessarie al fondamento della nostra vita buona:

l‟una si è Stupore; l‟altra si è Pudore; la terza si è Verecundia.” For Dante, “avegna che la volgare gente

questa distinzione non discerna.” “Stupor” is exactly what Dante, in his epistle to Moroello, Marquis of

Malaspina, claims to feel when a woman (“mulier”) appeared to him as a “thunderbolt from above”

(“fulgur descendens”). See Epistle 4.2-3. Similarly, as is well known, in his encounter with God in the

closing verses of Par. 33.140-1, Dante states that his mind “fu percossa da un fulgore” coming from the

divine will (“in che sua voglia venne”). 262 According Conv. I.viii.14, “atto libero è quando una persona va volentieri ad alcuna parte, che si mostra

nel tener volto lo viso in quella; atto sforzato è quando contra voglia si va, che si mostra in non guardare

ne la parte dove si va.” In addition, the interdependence between ability of discernment and

illustriousness is witnessed also in Dve I.xiv.6, when Dante explains that even the Bolognese “doctores

illustres,” capable of “vulgarium discretione,” were not the exemplary users of the courtly and

illustrious vernacular he was looking for. 263 As pointed out in Epistle 6.22-23, “Nec advertitis dominantem cupidinem, quia ceci estis, venenoso

susurrio blandientem, nec captivantem vos in lege peccati, ac sacratissimis legibus que iustitie naturalis

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Given all this and considering the textual proximity between the two objectives

stated at the beginning of the treatise – the first, to help the “locutio vulgarium gentium;”

the second, to illuminate the discernment of people wandering like the blind –

Mengaldo‟s equation of “vulgarium” with “illiterate” can be further complicated. Since

the treatise is written in Latin, we should suppose that the people whose discernment

Dante whishes to enlighten (lucidare) were not the illiterate, but the literate readers of the

treatise who, arguably, belonged to that “clerus” which “vulgaria tempnit,” as del Virgilio

will later state in his Carmen to Dante.

Therefore, we can suppose that the vulgar people whose “locutio” Dante wished

to help are not only illiterate people who spoke a vernacular idiom, but also, and in the

first place, the literate readers of the Dve who are characterized as wandering here and

there as if blind.264

And, as said in the “harsh and keen” rhymes265

of Le dolci rime

imitantur ymaginem, papere vetantem; obesrvantia quarum, si leta, si libera, non tantum non servitus

esse probatur, quin ymo perspicaciter intuenti liquet u test ipsa summa libertas. Nam quid aliud hec nisi

liber cursus voluntatis in actum quem suis leges mansuetis expedient? Itaque solis existentibus liberis

qui voluntarie legi obedient, quos, vos essere consebitis qui, dum pretenditis libertatis affectum, contra

leges universas in legume principem conspiratis?” 264 From this perspective, it is interesting to notice that Dante addresses with a very direct tone his reader in

the chapter on the Tower of Babel, which is presented as a revealing exemplum for all human sins. Dve

I.vii.2-3. “O semper natura nostra prona peccatis! O ab initio et nunquam desinens nequitatrix! Num

fuerat satis ad tui correptionem quod, per primam prevaricationem eluminata, delitiarum exulabas a

patria? Num satis quod, per universalem familie tue luxuriem et trucitatem, unica reservata domo,

quicquid tui iuris erat cataclismo pererat, et <que> commiseras tu animalia celi terreque iam luerant ? Quippe satis extiterat. Sed, sicut proverbialiter dici solet, „Non ante tertium equitabis,‟ misera miserum

maluisti ad equum. Ecce, lector, quod vel oblitus homo vel vilipendens disciplinas priores, et avertens

oculos a vicibus que remanserant, tertio isurrexit ad verbera, per superbam stultitiam presumendo.”

English trans.: “Oh human nature, always inclined towards sin! Engaged in evil from the beginning, and

never changing your ways! Was it not enough to correct you that, banished from the light for the first

transgression, you should live in exile from the delights of your homeland? Was it not enough that,

because of the all-pervading lust and cruelty of your race, everything that was yours should have

perished in a cataclysm, one family alone being spared, and that the creatures of earth and sky should

have had to pay for the wrongs that you had committed? It should indeed have been enough. But, as we

often say in the form of a proverb, „not before the third time will you ride;‟ and you, wretched humanity,

chose to mount a fractious steed. And so, reader, the human race, either forgetful or disdainful of earlier punishments, and averting its eyes from the bruises that remained, came for a third time to deserve a

beating, putting its trust in its own foolish pride.” Emphasis mine. The movement in the passage from

the “nostra natura” (our) to its interpellation with the “tu” and “tuus” (you and yours) to the final one to

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d‟amor ch‟i‟ solia in Conv. IV, numerous are “l‟ingannati” and “li-erranti” against whom

his canzone was addressed.266

If so, a more careful scrutiny of the distinction between

clerics and laypersons is germane to a fuller understanding of Dante‟s linguistic project.

In his Trèsor, Brunetto Latini defines the power relationship between cleric and

lay by emphasizing the respective position and function of the sovereign (signore) and

the subalterns (subiez) in the social structure. In doing so, he also conceives a conceptual

square in which the sovereign is paralleled to the clerics and the subalterns to the

laypersons:

Sovereign Cleric

Subaltern Lay

In addition, according to Brunetto Latini, this square is interrelated to the labor

division between intellectual and manual workers. Indeed,

li sires est por garder ses subiez, et il sont por obeir a son seingnor, et les uns et

les autres beent au profit de la comune compaingnie des genz sens tort et sens

honte. Et ja soit ce que li un soi[en]t clers (dont [li uns] nos mostre la religion et la

foi Jhesu Crist et la gloire des bons et l‟enfer des mauvais, les autres sont juges,

ou mires, ou d‟autre mestier de clergie) ; et les autres sont lais (dont les [uns] font

les maisons, les autres cortivent terre gaaingnable, les autres sont fevres ou

courduaniers ou d‟autre mestier que il soient) je di que il sont toz entendanz a

celui bien qui apartient a la paisible comunauté des homes et des citez ; por quoi il

apert que le bien ou entent le governeor des autres est plus noble et plus honorable

de toz autres, car il les adrece toz et toz sont por adescier lui.267

the you-reader sounds particular revealing of Dante‟s intendment to illuminate the ethical discernment

of the reader. 265 Conv. IV, canzone, v. 14. 266 Ibid. vv. 140-1. 267 Brunetto Latini. Trèsor II.50.3. Italian Trans.: “il signore ha la funzione di salvaguardare i propri sudditi,

ed essi hanno il compito di ubbidire al loro signore, e gli uni e gli altri mirano al bene della società

senza ingiustizia e senza disonore. E sebbene gli uni siano chierici (dei quali gli uni mostrano la

religione e la fede di Gesù Cristo e la gloria dei buoni e l‟inferno dei cattivi, gli altri sono giudici o

medici, o di un‟altra professione intellettuale) e gli altri siano laici (dei quali alcuni fanno le case, altri

lavorano la terra coltivabile, altri ancora sono fabbri o calzolai o fanno un qualsiasi altro mestiere), dico che tutti tendono a quel bene che è proprio della pacifica comunità degli uomini e della città.” English

Trans.: “the lord is meant to watch over men and they are meant to obey thier lord, and both strive for

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On the one side, there are the “clerics” who comprise functionaries of religious

institutions, judges, physicians, and intellectuals; on the other side, there are the

laypersons, composed by workers, peasants, and other manual laborers. In other words,

the first square can be now expanded into the following one:

Sovereign Cleric Intellectual work

Subaltern Lay Manual work

The labor division between intellectual work and manual work corresponds to the

medieval educational division between the artes in liberal and mechanical ones. The

liberal arts are seven and organized into the trivium, which includes the arts of language

(grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic) and the quadrivium composed of physics, metaphysics,

ethics, and theology.268

In his Didascalicon, Hugh of Saint Victor lists seven mechanical

arts including theatrics, weaving, blacksmithing, navigation, agriculture, medicine,

hunting, architecture. While the liberal arts were aimed at wisdom and knowledge, the

purpose of the mechanical arts was to produce material goods. Given this, we can further

expand the scheme above into the following one:

Sovereign Cleric Intellectual work artes liberale wisdom and knowledge

Subaltern Lay Manual work artes meccanicae material goods

the advantage and the common good of the people, without worng or shame. Although some are clerics

and some of these teach religion and the faith of Jesus Christ and the glory of the good and the hell of

the bad, others are judges or doctors or have some other capacity in the clergy; others are laborers, with

some making houses and others cultivating the arable land, and others still are smiths and cobblers or practice some other trade. I say that they all work towards the common and peaceful good of the cities.”

(192). 268 See David Wagner, ed. The Seven Liberal Arts in the Middle Ages. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1983. On

the history of eloquence see Galletti A. L‟eloquenza (dalle origini al XVI secolo): Storia dei generi

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If we follow Mengaldo‟s translation of “vulgarium gentium” as “illiterate,” we

should suppose that the adjective „vulgar‟ corresponds to that of „lay.‟ However, since the

distinction between lay and cleric was commonly used in medieval Italy and Europe,269

and given that in Dve Dante never uses it in an explicit way, it is reasonable to be

skeptical on this presupposed correspondence between the two terms. Moreover, while

Dante widely used the notion of “volgare” in his writings, (except for the Comedy, where

the term “volgare” is a hapax legomenon), the distinction between “laico” and “clerico”

occurs only once in the passage of Inf. 18.112-117:

Quivi venimmo; e quindi giù nel fosso

vidi gente attuffata in uno sterco

cha da li umani privadi parea mosso.

E mentre ch'io là giù con l'occhio cerco,

vidi un col capo sì di merda lordo,

che non parëa s‟ era laico o cherco.270

Needless to say, in this passage the rhyming triad sterco-cerco-cherco (dung-

search-cleric) is irreverently subversive. Indeed, these rhyming verses and the potential

displacement of the hierarchical power structure between laypersons and clerics in the

dung of Malebolge fundamentally aims at subverting the social order built through an

essentializing correlation between labor division and power distribution.

As readers of Convivio know, Dante connects the liberal arts to the seven heavens

of Paradise.271

While the description of the liberal arts and the sciences points to a

letterari. Milano: Vallardi, 1938. For Dante and the liberal arts see Giuseppe Mazzotta. Dante‟s Vision

and the Circle of Knowledge. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993. 269 For instance, Jan Van Boendale wrote his treatise Der Leken Spieghel to “acculturate” the “laymen,” i.e.

the illiterate people. See Jan Van Boendale. Der Leken Spieghel. A translation of Book III.15 is in Erik Kooper. Medieval Dutch Literature in its European Context. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1994. 245-260.

270 English Trans.: “There we came; and from there I saw, down in the ditch, people immersed in dung that

seemed to have come from human privies. And while I am searching with my eyes down there, I saw

one with his head so filthy with shit that whether he was lay or clerck did not show.” 271 “A li sette primi [cieli] rispondono le sette scienze del Trivio e del Quadrivio, cioè Grammatica,

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semantic field of paradisiac loftiness, the figurative language Dante uses to refer to his

dealings with them are often derived from the field of the mechanical arts. In other

words, Dante represents his own social position as that of a lay manual worker, i.e. a

“subaltern”272

placed, as Convivio also makes clear, at the bottom of the table of the wise

intellects.

In the Duecento there are different cultural changes that deeply affected both the

self-perception of the people and the prominent emergence of the Popolo in the political

life of the communes. The education of children was a revolution in Florentine politics

and society, a revolution that made the prominence of the popolo possible, as John

Najemy emphasized. In Florence,

as in many other north and central Italian cities, a veritable revolution in the

history of education occurred. For the first time in European history, literacy

spread significantly beyond the clerical establishment and elite classes to include

more modest merchants, shopkeepers, artisans, and even some laborers. Literacy

obviously means different things at each of these levels, but by 1300 the large

majority of Florence men and a sizable minority of women could read and write,

at least in the vernacular, at basic levels of competence needed for keeping

account books, religious devotions, and participation in their guilds and

confraternities. A small number had formal training in Latin, first in the language

and then in the study of classical authors, and some went on to careers as jurists or

churchmen when they did not join the family business. The real revolution was

that thousands of families below the level of the elite educated their children.273

In addition to this revolution in education, as I have also recalled in the two

previous chapters, other radical changes occurred in the religious life of the Duecento.

These include the rise of heretical movements, the emergence of mendicant orders, and

Dialettica, Rettorica, Arismetrica, Musica, Geometria e Astrologia. A l‟ottava spera, cioè a la stellata,

risponde la scienza naturale, che Fisica si chiama, e la prima scienza, che si chiama Metafisica; a la

nona spera risponde la Scienza morale; ed al cielo quieto risponde la scienza divina, che è Teologia

appellata.” See Conv. II.xiii.7-8. 272 I use the term in its etymological sense of being “beneath” and “other” with respect to the one(s) who

stay(s) over the others, i.e. the sovereign(s) (sovrano). 273

John Najemy. A History of Florence. Oxford: Blackwell, 2006. 45.

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the creation of legal secularizing principles and codes that functioned as new agents in

religious life.274

As it is well known, along with his personal re-reading of the Bible (along with

Aristotle, and Virgil), which contributed to challenge the worldly authority of the Pope,275

Dante‟s model of the Roman Catholic Church was also inspired by the examples of Saint

Francis‟ and Saint Dominic‟s teachings.276

In Paradise, we find both the most explicit

praise for the movements began by Francis and Dominic and the harshest critique of their

followers who forgot the teaching of the two saints about poverty and humility.277

Moreover, it is useful to recall that Dante had an ambivalent relationship with the

popolo of his contemporary Florence. On one hand, as Najemy highlighted, Dante‟s

punishment of elite families in the Comedy and his contentions in particular in Paradiso

16, the canto of Cacciaguida, are inspired by the ideological framework typical of the

popolo. On the other hand, in the same canto, Dante saw his contemporary Florence

ruined in comparison to the noble city of the twelfth century Florence. In the epistles,

274 In the Florentine context, “by the 1220s the Franciscans and Dominicans were established at opposite

ends of the city, respectively at Santa Croce and Santa Maria Novella, where they later constructed the

enormous basilicas that still dominate their neighborhoods. […] The friars were popular among

immigrants in need of the community and social services that the new orders provided or supported:

care for the sick, alms for the poor, lodging for travelers, honorable burials, but also preaching and

organized devotion. Some Florentines joined the orders, but many more from all over the city imitated

the forms and aims of mendicant piety in lay society: social commitment, expressed through practical

attention to the needs and problems of urban society, pastoral work in the world, the sanctification of

everyday life, renunciation of ostentious wealth, and, in all these respects, the imitation of Christ.” Ibid.

50-51. 275 See Mon. III. x.3-20. 276 For the relationship between Dante and the Franciscan tradition, see Nick Havely. Dante and the

Franciscans: Poverty and the Papacy in the Commedia. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004. On Saint

Dominic, in Par. 12.56-100, Dante makes Saint Bonaventure claim that “il santo atleta / benigno a‟ suoi,

ed a‟ nimici crudo […] contro al mondo errante […] con l‟officio apostolico si mosse, / quasi torrente

c‟alta vena preme: / e nelli sterpi eretici percosse / l‟impeto suo più vivamente quivi / dove le resistenze

eran più grosse.” 277 In the fourteenth century, poetic critiques of the friars became an established genre.See Antonio Pucci‟s I

fra‟ minori del la pover vita and I fra‟ predicator non mangian carne. In Giuseppe Corsi, ed. Rimatori

del Trecento. Torino: UTET, 1969. 815-816.

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Dante had defined his condition of exile by recalling the figural city of Babylon,278

and

contemporary fellow Florentines as new Babylonians (“alteri Babilonii”) who were

building a corrupt city.279

The linkage between Florence and Babel could have not been

more radical and subversive for the ruling class of the city. If we take this simile

seriously, we could argue that, according to Dante, those who led the city of Florence,

like Nimrod in the Dve and the Comedy, were placed at the bottom of the social hierarchy

and had the least capacity to speak before God.

In the old Florence, Dante praised the fact that the government of the city was

based on an ideal good citizenry. For Dante, the notion of a good citizenry was also

related to the fact that the city was not yet led by the “gente nuova” (Inf. 16) composed of

merchants and bankers, but by the artisans and humble workers. In other words, the

leading value of the city was not the “auri sacra fames”280

– in the sense Virgil used it –

and the “subiti guadagni,”281

but justice, peace, and balanced social relationships among

citizens.

Dante‟s praises of the old Florence in which Cacciaguida lived is not detached

from an idea of labor distribution. In Cacciaguida‟s age, Florence was not yet one of the

centers of early European capitalism. As Najemy has argued, for Dante,

Cacciaguida‟s city was a community of loyal citizenry „pure down to the humblest

278 See Epistle 7.30, addressed to the Emperor Henry VII. 279 Epistle 6.8. “Quid, fatua tali oppinione summota, tanquam alteri Babilonii, pium deserentes imperium

nova regna temptatis, ut alia sit Florentina civilitas, alia sit Romana?” 280 Virgil used the expression “auri sacra fames” in the invective against avarice in Aen. 3.56-7: “Quid non

mortalia pectora cogis, Auri sacra fames?” Dante uses it in the vernacular version “sacra fame

dell‟oro” in Purg. 22.40-1 and is implied in the question “di che sapore è l‟oro?” in Purg. 20.114-5.

Moreover, as Durling and Martinez have emphasized, the term “infamia” at verse 114 “puns on Vergil‟s

fames.” Dante Alighieri. Purgatorio. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003. 344 note v. 114-5. For a discussion of

Dante‟s use of Virgil‟s expression in Purg. 22, see Ronald Martinez. “La sacra fame dell‟oro

(Purgatorio 22, 41) tra Virgilio e Stazio: dal testo all‟interpretazione.” Letture classensi 18 (1989): 177-

185. 281 Inf. 16.

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artisan.‟ Dante‟s language [in Par. XV-XVII] directly echoes the popolo here: the

old Florence of his imagination was a city of artisans, guildsmen, exercising their

arti. The eminent families whose names Cacciaguida evokes were not yet „undone

by their pride‟ or ruinous factionalism and were still committed to an ethic of

good citizenship and civic duty.282

Moreover, it is also noteworthy that the historical period in which Cacciaguida

lived is a fundamental moment for Dante‟s view of the history of the vernacular

language. Indeed, it was the time in which, according to what Dante claims in Vita Nova

25, vernacular poetry originated. Thus, in addition to the innovations in the perception of

the intellectual work introduced during the Duecento, the role of labor distribution and

the interplay of labor, language, and politics in Dante‟s work ought to be kept in mind.

In the cantos of Cacciaguida, Dante imagines a form of community of artisans in

which the shared ethics leading the “popolo” was not yet corrupted by the new social

groups of merchants and bankers or by peasants who have migrated from the countryside

in order to participate in the mercantile development the city could offer them. From an

ideological viewpoint, Dante‟s aim in condemning Florentine elites was to turn the

“popolo” of his age toward the idealized community of the guilds in which nobility and

good citizenry were strictly associated values.283

From this perspective, Dante elaborates a path that does not simply follow the

binaries of sovereign/subaltern and cleric/lay that Brunetto used to parallel the power and

labor distributions in the social organization of the communes. This is because – and, as I

contend, Dante seems to be particularly conscious of it – Duecento and Trecento poets

282 John Najemy. A History of Florence. 61. 283 On the political and juridical relationships between “popolo” and “arti” see also Giovanni de Vergottini.

Arti e popolo nella prima metà del sec. XIII. Milano: Giuffrè, 1943.

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are no longer among the clerics.284

They are laypersons and, in writing in the vernacular,

they express an innovating alternative with regard to the traditional clerics and the new

proto-humanist ones, who, as del Virgilio remarked “vulgaria tempnit.”

Dante never explicitly represents himself as a cleric, but as a hunter, a knight, a

peasant, a smith, among others. In other words, Dante removes the social identity of

“cleric” from his intellectual work and reconceives it employing metaphors from the

mechanical arts. This does not mean that his intellectual work, as well as the work of

other poets and intellectuals of the period writing in the vernacular, could be seen as the

work of illiterates, as most translations of Dve I.i.1 might lead one to believe.

284 See Roberto Antonelli and Simonetta Bianchini. “Dal clericus al Poeta.” In Alberto Asor Rosa, ed.

Letteratura italiana. Vol. 2. Torino: Einaudi, 1983. 171-227.

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CHAPTER 4

AGAINST BABEL, AGAINST DISPERSION:

NIMROD AND ADAM, THE PANTHER AND THE VELTRO

“Quivi si vive e gode del tesoro

che s‟acquistò piangendo nello essilio

di Babilon, ove si lasciò l‟oro.”

Dante, Par. 23.135

“Quelli che non danno cose (in senso largo)

non possono dare parole.”

Gramsci, Appunti di glottologia (1912-1913)

At the beginning of the Trecento, when Italian vernacular poetry began to be

historicized and canonized in written anthologies,285

Dante imagines his search for the

illustrious vernacular language as a hunt in the Italian wood (“ytalia silva,” Dve I.xv.1).

This hunt is configured as a rational investigation (“rationalibus investigemus,” Dve

I.xvi.1) of a “supreme” object (“sola supprema venamur,” Dve II.vi.3) through the

laborious use of discernment. As the hunting metaphor also implies and Dve II.iv.10

confirms, Dante was aware that to his objetive was not easy to attain, since the skills and

competence needed to discern are, for Dante, particularly difficult to acquire286

– an idea

already emphasized in Brunetto Latini‟s Trèsor II.x.1.287

As I have shown in the previous chapter, Dante‟s twofold objective was to

illuminate the understanding of the “erring” people and help the “locutio vulgarium

285 For a recent account on the anthologization of Italian vernacular poetry in relation to Dante, see Justin

Steinberg. Accounting for Dante. Notre Dame, IN: U of Notre Dame P, 2007. For the anthologies of the

Canzonieri, see Lino Leonardi, ed. I canzonieri della lirica italiana delle origini. 4 vols. Firenze:

SISMEL – Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2001. 286 “Cautionem atque discretionem hanc accipere, sicut decet, hic opus et labor est, quoniam numquam sine

strenuitate ingenii et artis assiduitate scientiarumque habitu fiery potest.” English Trans.: “Learning the

necessary caution and discernment is the „difficult part, requiring much effort,‟ since these can never be

achieved without exertion of the intellect, dedicated study of technique, and immersion in knowledge.”

Dve II.iv.10. 287 “la vertu de l‟entendement est engendree et escreue en l‟ome par doctrine et par enseignement, et por ce

li covient esperience et lonc tens.” See Brunetto Latini. Trèsor. II.x.1. Emphasis mine. English trans.

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gentium.” If the rational “discernment” is the means through which Dante could help the

“locutio” of dispersed vulgar people(s), his choice to write a “doctrine” of vernacular

eloquence faces a Babelic situation that he means to confront and overcome. In other

words, in focusing on the “locutio vulgarium gentium,” Dante had to confront the

problem of Babel, understood not only as the well-known narrative told in Genesis but

also as a typological expression of the political dispersion and linguistic confusion of his

own historical times.

Consequently, he had to re-conceive the myth of Adam‟s original language in

order to have a measure through which the Babelic dispersion of the vulgar people(s) and

the linguistic confusion inhabiting Italy and Europe in the late Middle Ages might be

transcended. From this perspective, Dante‟s “doctrine” of vernacular eloquence may be

seen as an antidote against the Babelic confusion and Dante himself as Nimrod‟s anti-

type.

In Inf. 2.4, Dante depicts the journey of the Comedy as a war, a “guerra sì del

cammino e sì della pietade / che ritrarrà la mente che non erra.”288

The warfare metaphor

used to depict the enterprise of the Comedy ascribes to the journey of the exile-pilgrim

Dante a sense of both reality and exceptionality. The poetic enterprise, whose “reality”

the “unerring mind” wants to depict and maintain (“ritrarrà”) – a mind that contrasts

with the “erring” understanding of vulgar people(s) in Dve –, is both, as we readers know,

a literary object and an intellectual struggle against the ethical, political, and intellectual

corruption that caused the exile of its writer. In this respect, the Comedy enterprise is

“The virtue of understanding is born and increases in man through doctrine and instruction, and for this

long experience is needed” (150). 288 English Trans.: “The war both of the journey and of pity, / which memory, unerring, will depict.”

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therefore both indicated as an artistic effort to re-call and depict the exilic journey of the

pilgrim and an allegorical war against the corruption that produced the historical exile of

Dante the poet.

As Durling remarked in dealing with the audience(s) of the Dve, the use of

warfare metaphors points to potential conflictual relationships between the author and his

readers.289

Analogously, we can suppose that Cacciaguida‟s claims in Par. 17.129-132

that Dante‟s voice would have sounded to his contemporary readers “molesta” and have

caused them a painful “rogna” is certainly noticeable in revealing Dante‟s self-perception

of the „war of position‟ he was conducting.290

Moreover, the reader of the Comedy, already from the first cantos, engages with

different textual clues linked to a metaphoric language of warfare. In addition to the term

“war” in Inf. 2.4, the term “schiera” in the expression “volgare schiera” of Inf. 1.105,

alluding to a troop-like formation, stimulates an image of warfare. As other uses of the

term suggest, “schiera” can indeed be metaphorically linked to the image of a troop as in

Purg. 24.95, “lo cavalier di schiera che cavalchi,” or to a beehive in movement as in Par.

31.7, “sì come schiera d‟ape, che s‟infiora.” In this respect, the “schiera” could be

intertextually related respectively to the “exercitus” of “pessimis” whom Boethius

opposes at the beginning of De Consolatio Philosophiae,291

and to the fourth of Virgil‟s

289 Durling also adds that “there is an implicit realization, I think in the choice of the metaphor of combat,

which occurs in two passages: in the first, Dante is arguing that only the best poets should use the

volgare illustre, just as the best horses should be reserved for the best knights. The second, speaking of

“Amor, tu vedi ben che questa donna,” compares that poem to the special exploit appropriate to the day

of a knight‟s investiture.” Robert Durling. “The Audience(s) of the De vulgari eloquentia and the

Petrose.” In Dante Studies 110 (1992): 28. 290 From this perspective, the connection between the linguistic signifier of the name „Cacciaguida‟ and its

meaning seems to be revealing. Caccia-guida is the „guide of the hunt‟ and/or „the hunt of the guide.‟ It

is Dante himself to emphasize the significance of his relative‟s proper name also in its relation with the

Christian baptism in Par. 15.135, “insieme fui cristiano e Cacciaguida.” 291 “Itaque nihil est, quod ammirare, si in hoc vitae salo circumflantibus agitemur procellis, quibus hoc

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Georgics. Given this „military‟ sense, we can also counter-pose the “vulgare schiera” at

the beginning of Inferno to the “milizia di paradiso” pointed out in the Empyrean, when

Beatrice says to Dante that they emerged (“siamo usciti fore”) from the “maggior corpo”

towards the “ciel ch‟è pura luce: luce intellettual, piena d‟amore.” In this place Dante will

see “l‟una e l‟altra milizia / di paradiso, e l‟una in quelli aspetti / che tu vedrai all‟ultima

giustizia.”292

Moreover, coherently to the warfare figurative language employed by Dante, we

should also notice that, in proximity to the verses concerning the poet‟s emergence from

the “volgare schiera,” the poet depicts the pilgrim as fighting against death (“non vedi tu

la morte che „l combatte”).293

Dante himself historicizes the difficult conditions of both the poet and the pilgrim,

in particular when he challenges his own historical position with respect to Virgil (as a

poet), and to Aeneas and Saint Paul (as a pilgrim). After confronting the danger of death –

acted in the narrative of the first canto through the intervention of the three fierce beasts –

Dante now interrogates his own capacity to come to the other world and consider three

major characters of Western civilization: Virgil, i.e. the major poet of Ancient Rome for

Dante; Aeneas, the founder of the Roman Empire and Dante‟s precursor, as the reader

will definitely recognize later on in Par. 15-6;294

and Paul, an exemplary figure of the

Church who ascended to Paradise, and, as witnessed by the fifth/sixth-century Latin Visio

Pauli (“Apocalypse of Paul”), went to Hell, as only Christ had done before him.

maxime propositum est pessimis displicere. Quorum quidem tametsi est numerosus exercitus,

spernendus tamen est, quoniam nullo duce regitur, sed errore tantum temere ac passim lymphante

raptatur.” Cons. Phil. I.3. Emphasis mine. 292 Par. 30.38-45. Emphasis mine. 293 Inf. 2.107 294 Aeneas went down to the Hades in order to meet his father Anchises and to learn from him the mission

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Ma io perchè venirvi? O chi „l concede?

Io non Enea, io non Paulo sono:

me degno a ciò nè io nè altri crede.

Per che, se del venire io m‟abbandono,

temo che la venuta non sia folle:

se‟ savio; intendi me‟ ch‟i‟ non ragiono.295

Dante‟s self-interrogation through Virgil here is an important part of the strategy

through which the poet wants to represent the conflict and doubtful position in which he

– both as a poet and as a pilgrim – is placed. Moreover, as Durling and Martinez have

pointed out, the raising of the question „But, I, why come there?‟ “serves to emphasize

the iconoclastic, in fact epoch-making importance of a journey to the other world being

claimed by a layman and politically active private individual.”296

In other words, Dante

depicts his historical position as a difference with regard to the historical auctoritas Virgil

and the figural exempla of Aeneas and Saint Paul.

The epoch-making character of the Comedy is also entailed in another, more

subtle, dimension. This dimension no longer regards the relationship with past

experiences of journeys to the other world, rather with the overcoming of what Dante in

Dve II.ii.8 had configured as a limit of Italian vernacular poetry. In fact, Dante‟s depiction

of his journey as a war allows us to consider the “poema sacro” that made the poet

“macro” (Par. 15.1-3) as an attempt to overcome the fact that “arma vero nullum latium

adhuc invenio poetasse.”297

According to Dante, while Italian poets had reached the

of the Roman Empire.

295 Inf. 2.31-36. English trans.: “But, I, why come there? Or who grants? I am / not Aeneas, I am not Paul;

neither I nor others / believe me worthy of that. / Therefore, if I abandon myself to the journey, I fear /

lest my coming may be folly. You are wise, you / understand better than I speak.” 296 Robert M. Durling and Ronald L. Martinez. The Divine Comedy: Inferno. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1996. 50

note to Inf. 2.32. 297 Dve II.ii.8. English Trans.: “As for arms, I find that no Italian has yet treated them in poetry.”

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highest levels of poetry in dealing with the topics of love and rectitude,298

no such a level

was reached for military topics. In stating this, Dante arguably is not only describing a

difference between Italy and other European literatures, but, implicitly, he is also

indicating a distance between „modern‟ Italian vernacular culture and classic Latin

poems, in particular from Virgil‟s Aeneid, which „Arma virumque can[et]...,‟ and Statius,

presented in Purg. 22.55 as the poet of the “crude armi / de la doppia trestizia di

Giocasta.”

From this perspective, Dante‟s metaphorization of his own journey in the Comedy

as a war could be seen as an attempt to emphasize not only the exceptionality of the

pilgrim‟s journey but also the innovative nature of the poet‟s enterprise aimed at

confronting and overcoming this deficiency in „modern‟ Italian vernacular poetry.

Given that from a historical-anthropological viewpoint, hunting was the sport of

European nobility and that the role of hunting in medieval society was exactly to prepare

and teach young aristocrats for war,299

Dante‟s hunting in Dve can be read allegorically

and intertextually as an attempt to prepare Dante‟s „voice‟ for the “war” of the Comedy.

Although Dante‟s uses of hunting metaphors have received the critical attention of

Roberto Mercuri, Lino Pertile, Giovanni Barberi Squarotti, Daniela Boccassini,300

and, to

298 The exemplary poets for Dante are respectively Cino da Pistoia and Dante himself. See Dve II.ii. On the

contrary, Dante found in provençal poetry exemplary poets for what he considered the three highest

topics for the vernacular poetry, i.e. Bertand de Born for the arms, Arnaut Daniel for love, Gerald de

Bornel for rectitude. 299 See Paolo Galloni. Il cervo e il lupo: caccia e cultura nobiliare nel Medioevo. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1993

and Storia e cultura della caccia: dalla preistoria a oggi. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2000; Johan Huizinga.

Homo ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture. London: Routledge, 2000 (first edition 1949). On

the topic of the hunt in literature, see also Giovanni Barberi Squarotti. Selvaggia dilettanza: la caccia

nella letteratura italiana dalle origini a Marino. Venezia: Marsilio, 2000; Dennis P. Seniff. Noble

Pursuits: Literature and the Hunt. Selected Articles. Ed. Diane M. Wright and Connie L. Scarborough. Newark, Del.: Juan de la Cuesta, 1992; Marcelle Thiébaux. The Stag of Love: The Chase in Medieval

Literature. Ithaca-London: Cornell UP, 1974. 300

See Roberto Mercuri. Semantica di Gerione: Il motivo del viaggio nella “Commedia” di Dante. Roma:

123

a lesser extent, Maria Corti, Giorgio Agamben, and Teodolinda Barolini,301

it is singular

that the connection between the metaphor of warfare used to depict the journey of the

Comedy and the hunting metaphor used in De vulgari eloquentia has been overlooked. In

my view, the semantic interrelation between the two metaphors points to a possible

intertextuality between the Latin treatise on vernacular eloquence and the poem.

Yet, in what ways this intertextuality speaks for a thematic continuity or

discontinuity?

It is the aim of the remainder of this chapter to explore the ethical-political

implications of Dante‟s use of the hunting metaphor in connection with his theorization

of the illustrious vernacular language and to show the ways specific intertexts between

the treatise and the poem can allow us to see both elements of thematic continuity and

discontinuity. In particular, my focus will be on the ways the archetypal figure of the

hunter may be placed in intertextual and interdiscursive relation with the Dve, with the

intervention of the veltro foreseen in Inf. 1, and with the figure of Adam in Paradiso 26. I

will show that Dante‟s representation of Adam (Dve I.iv-vi and Par. 26), Nimrod

(Dve.I.vii; Inf. 31; Purg. 12.34-36; Par. 26.126), the panther (Dve I.xvi) and the veltro

(Inf. 1) can be seen as part of a complex typological and theological framework through

Bulzoni, 1984 and “Genesi della tradizione letteraria italiana in Dante, Petrarca e Boccaccio.” In

Alberto Asor Rosa, ed. Letteratura italiana: Storia e geografia. Vol. 7.1. Torino: Einaudi, 1987. 229-

455; Lino Pertile. “Il nodo di Bonagiunta, le penne di Dante e il Dolce Stil Novo.” Lettere italiane 26.1

(Jan-March 1994): 44-75 (republished in La punta del disio: Semantica del desiderio nella

“Commedia.” Fiesole: Cadmo, 2005. 85-113); Giovanni Barberi Squarotti. Selvaggia dilettanza;

Daniela Boccassini. Il volo della mente. Falconeria e Sofia nel mondo mediterraneo. Islam, Federico II,

Dante. Ravenna: Longo, 2003 and “Falconry as a Transmutative Art: Dante, Frederick II, and Islam.”

Dante Studies 125 (2007): 157-82. 301 Maria Corti. Percorsi dell‟invenzione: Il linguaggio poetico e Dante. Torino: Einaudi, 1993. 87; Corti.

“De Vulgari Eloquentia.” In Alberto Asor Rosa, ed. Letteratura Italiana. Le Opere. Torino: Einaudi, 1992. 193 and 199-200; Giorgio Agamben . “La caccia della lingua.” In Categorie italiane. Venezia:

Marsilio, 1996; Teodolinda Barolini. Dante and the Origins of Italian Literary Culture. New York:

Fordham UP, 2006. 281-303.

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which to discuss ethical and political implications of Dante‟s conceptualization of an

illustrious vernacular language.

In this framework, the veltro can be re-conceived in two ways. On one side, it can

be seen as the hunting dog needed by Dante the hunter (as an anti-type of the „robustus

venator‟ Nimrod) to dispel the vicious beasts encountered at the beginning of the journey

and fulfill the hunting project begun with the Latin treatise. On the other, it can be

compared to Dante‟s own mission as a poet to chase away the two master poets in the

vernacular, Guido Guinizelli and Guido Cavalcanti. By chasing away the beasts and the

preceding major poetic authorities in the vernacular, Dante also hopes and anticipates to

reach the glory of the language, which, arguably, is, on the one side, metaphorized in the

Dve as the sweet scent produced by the panther and, on the other, typologically expressed

in the momentous encounter between the pilgrim and Adam in Par. 26.

I will therefore suggest that Dante introduces Adam in Par. 26.80ff. for at least

two reasons. First, as Contini pointed out, Dante viewed in Adam a justification (“blasone

interno” in Contini‟s terms) for his poetic and linguistic project.302

Second, by posing the

question about which tongue gave rise to Nimrod‟s language and produced Babel‟s

confusion, I argue that in Par. 26 Dante aimed to exculpate Adam‟s historical language

from any possible charge of generating Babel. Since Adam‟s language was already dead

when Nimrod was planning the construction of the Tower, his project could not be related

to Adam‟s language. The historical discontinuity between Adam‟s and Nimrod‟s

languages makes the latter the only one accountable for the Babelic confusion. Therefore,

302 “Quei versi sulla lingua di Adamo sono una sorta di blasone interno alla Commedia, ad autogiustificare

il paradosso del poema sacro in una lingua peritura.” Gianfranco Contini. “Dante come personaggio-

poeta della Commedia.” In Varianti e altra linguistica: una raccolta di saggi (1938-1968). Torino:

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as I draw my conclusions, Adam can be conceived as a type of both the panther, which

creates a joyful fragrance (in my view, also an allegory for the poetic glory Dante was

hoping to reach with the Comedy), and of the veltro, which will chase away (“caccerà,”

Inf. 1.109) the power-hungry she-wolf and dispel any attempt to produce a new corrupt

Babel in history.

1. Nimrod and the Overthrown Hierarchy: Speaking Subalterns and Crying

Rulers

The primeval history portrayed in the book of Genesis narrates how, in his

blessing and punishing, God multiplied, diversified, and dispersed humanity across the

earth. After the ruinous event of the Flood, the only human beings living on the earth

were Noah, his wife, and their three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, from whose lineage

descended Cush, the ancestor of Nimrod. According to the Biblia Vulgata, Nimrod is

portrayed as a “potens in terra” (Gen. 10.8) and a “robustus venator coram Domino” (“a

mighty hunter before God” Gen. 10.9). Moreover, that Nimrod was truly a model for the

figure of the hunter is witnessed by the popular proverb “Quasi Nemrod robustus venator

coram Domino.” As is known, his kingdom is remembered as the proud city responsible

for scattering the peoples and dispersing the common language that the “whole earth had”

before the construction of the Tower.

Dante encounters Nimrod in Inf. 31, in an intermediate place between the tenth

and last bolgia and the frozen lake of Cocytus. In the last bolgia, impersonators,

alchemists, counterfeiters, and false witnesses are punished, while in the lake the

punished sinners are traitors. In a way, all these sinners have a relation to the truth or

Einaudi, 1970. 343.

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falsehood of language, as does of course the poet, who introduces these categories in the

lines beginning the canto, when he asks for the Muses‟ help so that “il dir dal fatto non

sia diverso.”303

This diversion of the word from fact will be Dante‟s object of reflection in

Canto 32, when, “nel loco onde parlare è duro” (14), he has to describe the Cocytus and

the places that decline to the “tristo buco” (2).

In this place, six giants are imprisoned. All of them, except Nimrod, participated

in the pagan gigantomachy. The canto begins with a description of Virgil‟s reproach of

the pilgrim. The beginning is emblematic: “Una medesma lingua pria mi morse...” Here,

the poet plays with two fields of signification related to the images of Babel and Eden.

Indeed, the expression “una medesma lingua” is the translation of the Latin “una

eademque loquela,” used in Dve I.vii.6 to identify the Babelic dispersal and confusion in

contrast to the Adamic language. We do not know if Dante at the moment in which he

was writing the Inferno (1307-13??) was already persuaded that Adam‟s language was

dead before the Babelic project, to which Par. 26.125 refers with the hapax legomenon of

“l‟ovra inconsummabile.”

Yet, the significance of the intertext between Inf. 31 and Dve I.vii.6 is that Dante

uses the expression “una medesma lingua” as an ironic signal that foreshadows the figure

of Nimrod, which the reader will encounter just after a few verses in the canto. The

expression „one and selfsame tongue‟ which evokes Adam‟s speech is now incorporated

by Virgil in the moment of his reproach to the pilgrim, in which the metonymic

relationship between tongue and the typical dental action of the “bite” is particularly

revealing. The image of the biting tongue echoes the medieval rhetorical topos of “giving

303

Inf. 32.12.

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speech teeth” against the absurd and ridiculous.304

In this respect, we should also recall

the bite of Love in Adam‟s canto (Par. 26),

Ma di‟ ancor se tu senti altre corde

tirarti verso lui, sì che tu suone

con quanti denti questo amor ti morde.305

The metonymy embedded in the image of the tongue-bite of Inf. 31.1 enacts a set

of reversals played through the articulation of polysemic signs whose regular sense is

ironically reconfigured. Indeed, by making the tongue bite, Dante enacts a replacement of

what lies physiologically ahead (the teeth) with what lies behind (the tongue). This

replacement alludes to a counterpoint between the revitalizing bite of the allegorically

Adamic tongue of Virgil and the mortal bite of the teeth,306

whose figural referent is not

only the snake, but also Ugolino in Inf. 32-33. In substituting the violent teeth with the

Adamic tongue, Dante also transforms the mortal, bestial bite into a moral pedagogical

moment enacted through the leader and master Virgil.

References to Genesis are present not only in the figurative language the poet uses

at the beginning of the canto, but also in the effects in the piglrim‟s spirit after Virgil‟s

reproach. Dante is shamed before Virgil for his wickedness and errors, as Adam and Eve

were before God after eating the prohibited apple. In this regard, one can also recall Dve

I.vii, in which sin (now, referring to Nimrod‟s pride) is described as producing redness

(“rubor”) on the face:

Dispudet, heu, nunc humani generis ignominiam renovare! Sed quia preterite non

304 “If you wish to rise up in full strength against the ridiculous, assail them in this form of speech: offer

praise, but in a facetious manner; reprove, but with wit and grace; have recourse to gestures, but let

these be consistently fitting. Give your speech teeth; attack with biting force – but let your manner

rather than your lips devour the absurd.” Geoffrey of Vinsauf. Poetria nova. Trans. Margaret F. Nims. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1967. 31. (III.435).

305 Par. 26.51. 306

It is to recall the acoustic similarity between “morso” (bite) and “mors” (death).

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possumus quin transeamus per illam, quanquam rubor ad ora consurgat

animusque refugiat, percurremus.307

In addition, Saint Peter will also refer to similar shameful redness in the Canto

following Adam‟s (“nè ch‟io fossi figura di sigillo / a privilegi venduti e mendaci, /

ond‟io sovente arrosso e disfavillo”).308

Soon after Virgil‟s reproach, Dante‟s uncertainty shifts from moral to

epistemological, when looking at the giants he describes them as “alte torri” (Inf. 31.20).

This image evokes the medieval imagery of the city, in which towers were possessed by

and representative of powerful families ruling the city.309

Illuminations of Purg. 12 resemble the metaphoric image of the giants as towers,

where the proud people (superbi) are punished. Among these superbi, Dante “vedea

Nembròt a piè del gran lavoro / quasi smarrito, e riguardar le genti / che ‟n Sennaàr con

lui superbi foro” (34-36). At the end of the canto, Dante again uses the metaphor of the

tower, when he makes an analogy between the giant Antaeus and the Tower of the

Garisenda in Bologna. After Virgil‟s brief talk addressed to Antaeus, the giant bends

toward Dante and Virgil in order to pick them up and bring them to the far shore of the

307 Dve. I.vii.1. Emphases mine. The “heu” in the passage directly connects the shame for Babel to the

shame following original sin (“Nam sicut post prevaricationem humani generis quilibet exordium sue

locutionis incitpit ab „heu‟”). Dve I.vi.4. 308 Par. 27.52-54. One could also make a parallel between the textual proximity of Par. 26 and Par. 27 and

the proximity between Dante‟s discussions on Adam and Nimrod respectively in Dve I.vi and I.vii. 309 See Albert R. Ascoli. “„Cum neminem ante nos:‟ Historicity and Authority in the De vulgari eloquentia.”

Annali d‟italianistica 8 (1990): 186-231, republished in Dante and the Making of the Modern Author.

Cambrdige: Cambridge UP, 2008; Dante. Inferno. Ed. Durling and Martinez. Note to Inf. 31.136; Dante

Alighieri. Rime giovanili e della Vita Nuova. Ed. Teodolinda Barolini and notes by Manuele Gragnolati.

Milano: BUR, 2009. 15. From the political implications of the symbol of the Tower, as Barolini

suggested (see p. 160), several linguistic elements from the early sonnet No me poriano zamai far

ammenda – where Dante refers to the Bolognese towers, with explicit reference to the Garisenda – are

recuperated in Inf. 27 and Purg. 20, two cantos particularly critical against Boniface VIII and his

politics. On the relationship between politics and the towers, see also Edward Coleman. “Cities and

Communes.” In Italy in the Central Middle Ages. Ed. David Abulafia. Oxford-New York: Oxford UP,

2004. 48.

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Cocytus.310

In the metaphor of the tower used to depict the giants, the allusion to Babel is quite

evident. Actually, the entire canto is composed around allusions to the story of Babel in

Genesis. By generating plurilingualism, the divine punishment of the Tower also

generated a universal inability to understand the other. For the first time in the Biblical

narrative, the other becomes an unintelligible monolingual Other, through the myth of

Babel.311

From a theoretical viewpoint, Babel synthesizes two possibilities of linguistic

unintelligibility. On the one hand, language is not understandable because the speaker

uses an idiom unknown to the listener (for instance, when speaker and listener belong to

different linguistic communities), and, on the other hand, because the language used is

inherently illogical. In other words, the story of Babel embeds two linguistic thresholds:

first, the co-existence of different communities of language; and, second, the use of an

310 The destruction of a tower had a special meaning in the Middle Ages, especially for a Florentine

intellectual involved in the politics of the city such as Dante. In fact, among the memories concerning

the various struggles between ghibellines and guelfs, the 1248 destruction of the tower of the

Guardamorto in Florence was of particular significance. At that time, the leading family of the

Ghibellines was the Uberti, the family of Farinata, who is punished in Inf. 10. According to Vasari the

method of throwing down high towers was invented by the architect Niccola Pisano exactly in the

occasion of the destruction of the Guardamorto Tower. The demolition of the Tower had a particular

significance for the Guelfs – which included the Cavalcanti family –, as it is witnessed by Villani‟s

Chronicle. “The Ghibellines, who now remained masters of Florence set to work to refashion the city

after their own manner, razing to the ground thirty-six strongholds of the Guelfs, both palaces and great

towers, among them being the noble residence of the Tosinghi in the old Market Place, known as the Palace, which was ninety cubits high, built with marble columns, and had a tower above of a hundred

and thirty cubits. And still greater wickedness were the Ghibellines guilty of; for inasmuch as the Guelfs

used to come together often to the Church of San Giovanni, and all the good people went there every

Sunday morning, and were married there, when the Ghibellines came to destroy the towers of the

Guelfs, among the rest was a very tall and beautiful one, which stood upon the Piazza of San Giovanni,

at the entrance of the Corso degli Adimari, and it was called the „Torre del Guardamorto,‟ because

anciently all the good folk who died were buried in San Giovanni, and the foot of this tower the

Ghibellines caused to be cut away, and props to be inserted in such wise that when fire was set to the

props, the tower might fall upon the Church of San Giovanni. And this was done; but […] when the

tower, which was a hundred and twenty cubits high, began to fall, it appeared clearly that it would miss

the church…” See Toynbee. Dante Alighieri: His Life and Works. 11-12. The passage is from Villani, Cronica VI.33. The tradition, to which Villani also believed, attributed this event to a miracle.

311 In a contemporary theoretical perspective, the other as monolingual has been discussed by Jacques

Derrida in Il monolinguismo dell‟altro o la protesi d‟origine. Milano: Raffaello Cortina Editore, 2004.

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arbitrary, individualized, non-shared language.

In Dante‟s imagination of Babel both limits are discussed. We find the first limit in

particular in Dve I.vii.7, in which Dante argues that the divine punishment of Babel

caused the formation of many languages and communities. The second type of linguistic

limit is expressed in Inf. 31.67-81, in which Dante depicts Nimrod as a “fiera bocca” that

cries incomprehensible sentences. Indeed, Nimrod‟s figure is reduced to a foolish and

confused soul who can only play a hunting horn to satisfy his rage and passions. As Virgil

says to Dante,

... Elli stessi s‟accusa:

questi è Nembrotto per lo cui mal coto

pur un linguaggio nel mondo non s‟usa.

Lasciànlo stare e non parliamo a vòto;

ché così è a lui ciascun linguaggio

come ‟l suo ad altrui, ch‟a nullo è noto.”

The expression “ch‟a nullo è noto” at the end of these verses can bear the two

interrelated senses of „is known to nobody‟ or „is noted to nothing.‟

The first sense – arguably, the most intuitive one – allows considering Nimrod‟s

language as unintelligible to other people because it is not shared by them. Since

language, for Dante, presupposes exchange and commonality with others,312

the idiom

spoken by one single person is the zero-degree form of language.313

This seems to be a

thematic continuity between De vulgari eloquentia and Inf. 31. Indeed, according to Dve

I.xix.3, the lowest form of vernacular idiom is “quod unius solius familiae proprium est.”

According to Mengaldo, the phrase “quod unius solius familiae proprium est… va

naturalmente intesa alla lettera („il volgare che è proprio di una sola famiglia‟), e non

312 See Dve I.ii. 313

With „zero-degree form of language‟ I refer to the lowest capacity or form of language, to which Dante

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nella maniera del tutto forzata e improbabile che suggerisce il Marigo.‟”314

Differently

from modern translations of Dante‟s treatise, which follow Mengaldo‟s view, I suggest

that what Dante is addressing with the phrase „unius solius familiae‟ is not the language

of one single family, but the idiom of „a family composed of one single person.‟315

According to Dve I.xix.3, Dante plans to devote the fouth and final book of his

treatise to the vernacular idiom proper to „unius solius familiae.‟ As it is known, Dante

never wrote this book. Yet, one can hypothesize that this idiom is a zero-degree form of

language of which an ideal type of speaker might be Nimrod in the Comedy.

By considering the second sense of „ch‟ha nullo è noto,‟ a different interpretation of

the passage is also possible. This second sense points to an onto-linguistic limit, which

does not concern the relationship between language and community, but that between

language and being.

In these verses, what is at stake in the figure of Nimrod is a type of language that

does not refer to anything different from language itself. Indeed, according to Dante,

Nimrod “stessi s‟accusa” – a verse that allows us to see Nimrod as a figure of linguistic

self-referentiality. Within Nimrod‟s self-referentiality lies the death of the community,

since language becomes a private performance in which the signifying game does not

refer to anything but itself. As Virgil says to Dante: “Lasciànlo stare e non parliamo a

vòto.” To talk to and about Nimrod means to talk in vain. His language is empty because

for him other languages are empty in the same way his own language is meaningless for

also points in Dve I.xix.3.

314 Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo. “De vulgari eloquentia.” In Umberto Bosco, ed. Enciclopedia Dantesca. Vol.

2. Roma: Treccani, 1970. 403-404. 315 The expression “unius solius familiae” has been translated as „of one single family.‟ Actually, this

translation seems at odds with regard to the grammar of the sentence. Since “familie” is feminine, the

expression “of one single family” should have been “une sole familie.”

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other people, “ch‟a nullo è noto.” Thus, Nimrod‟s language is a multiplicity of signs

expressing nothing, because they do not interrelate with Being/beings.

This onto-linguistic limit is antipathetic to Dante‟s own poetic theology. Nimrod‟s

language can, in fact, be counter-posed to God‟s will, which is to provide humans with

meaningful signs – an idea expressed, for instance, in Purg. 6.93, “Ahi gente che dovresti

essere devota… se bene intendi ciò che Dio ti nota.” Moreover, it is at odds with Dante‟s

own poetics, according to which, Dante is

... un che, quando

Amor mi spira, noto, e a quel modo

ch‟e‟ ditta dentro vo significando.”316

Both God‟s and Dante‟s “notare” – an activity also implied in the “significar” of

Par. 1.70 and “vo significando” in Purg. 24.54 – are diametrically opposed to the

expression “ch‟a nullo è noto” which refers to the zero-degree form of language spoken

by Nimrod.

Nimrod‟s cry “Raphèl maì amècche zabì almì” (Inf. 31. 67) is the only example of

Nimrod‟s idiom that Dante gives us. Several attempts have been proposed in order to

explain the sense of this sentence.317

Among them, Peter Dronke claims that this sentence

316

Purg. 25.52-54. 317 Among the diverse interpretations one can recall the ones by Guerri, Lemay, Nohrnberg, and Barànski.

According to Guerri, the sentence “Raphèl mài amèch zabì almì” traces out the biblical “Raphaim man

Amalech Zabulon alma,” and its meaning would be “Giganti, che! Gente che rasenta l‟abitacolo segreto

della bellezza.” In other words, “I giganti ai quali Nembrotte grida all‟erta, son quelle tali torracce che

gli fanno compagnia,... ; la gente che comparisce... è Dante col suo Virgilio; l‟abitacolo è il pozzo di

Cocito, dove Lucifero, l‟angelo bello, non impera, ma regge...” See Domenico Guerri. “Il nome di Dio

nella lingua di Adamo secondo il XXVI del Paradiso e il verso di Nembrotto nel XXXI dell‟Inferno.”

Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 54 (1909): 65-76, in particular 70 and 74-75. Richard Lemay

has seen the figure of Nimrod in Inf. 31 as related to the mythical author of the Liber Nimroth and has argued that the sentence would mean “Cet abîme et moi-même sommes devenus stupides par la

science.” See Richard Lemay. “Le Nemrod de l‟Enfer de Dante et le Liber Nemroth.” Studi danteschi 40

(1963): 57-128, in particular 83. For a different explanation, see also James Nohrnberg. The Analogy of

“The Faerie Queene.” Princeton: Princeton UP, 1976. 274 note 470. According to Nohrnberg, “Raphèl

mày amèch zabì almì, which is rimed with salmi, is a distorted version of Ps. 22:1, as it appears in Matt.

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can be rooted in the tradition of invented languages, which were widely used for comic

effect in the Church plays during Twelfth Night and Easter.318

Massimo Mandolini Pesaresi emphasizes that Nimrod‟s cry is related to Dante‟s

definition of power. Dante‟s link between language and power “goes beyond Augustine‟s

statement on language as the instrument, par excellence, of social and political power (De

civitate Dei XVI.4),”319

because for Dante linguistic power is an effect of the division of

labor during the construction of the Tower, as pointed out in Dve I.vii.7.

For Dante, people were divided into groups according to the distribution of labor

and, after the punishment, “the more skill required for the type of work, the more

rudimentary and barbaric the language they now spoke” (et quanto excellentius

excerbant, tanto rudius nunc barbariusque locuntur). Since Nimrod was the master and

architect of the tower, his language was the most barbaric. In my view, Dante appears to

be aware of Aristotle‟s view of knowledge as it relates to labor division – a view

expressed in Metaphysics A.I.981b.1-7 when he claimed that “the master craftsmen in

every profession are more estimable and know more and are wiser than the artisans […]

27:46, Eli, Eli, lamma sabatchthani: Nimrod is praying to Raphèl, or “giant-god.” In other words, “we

almost hear the forsaken cry from the Cross here, as Dante himself confirms. One can also show that a

parody of the same Psalmic cry has been put into the mouth of the unintelligible Nimrod.” See

“Inferno.” In Michael Seidel and Edward Mendelson, eds. Homer to Brecht. New Haven: Yale UP,

1977. 99; See also “Inferno XVIII: Introduction to Malebolge.” In Allen Mandelbaum, Anthony

Oldcorn, and Charles Ross, eds. Lectura Dantis: Inferno. Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: U of

California P, 1998. 238-61, in particular 253-54. Zygmunt Baranski has also suggested “Saba, Sabaeos

e samech quail fonti per „amècche zabì,‟ preferendole a quelle avanzate da Guerri. ... quale ulteriore

prova vorrei far notare che Dante usa la parola almi nel Paradiso per riferirsi specificamente alla

Pentecoste, l‟„anti-figura‟ per eccellenza di Babele...” See Zygmunt Barànski. “La linguistica scritturale di Dante.” In “Sole nuovo, luce nuova:” Saggi sul rinnovamento culturale in Dante. Torino:

Scriptorium, 1996. 123-124. For a general discussion of Nimrod‟s sentence, see Ettore Caccia. “Raphèl

maì amècche zabì almi.” In Umberto Bosco. Ed. Enciclopedia dantesca. Vol. 4. Roma: Treccani, 1973.

851-2. 318 Peter Dronke. Dante and Medieval Latin Traditions. Cambridge-New York: Cambridge UP, 1986. 319 Massimo Mandolini Pesaresi. “Canto XXXI. The Giants: Majesty and Terror.” In Allen Mandelbaum,

Anthony Oldcorn, and Charles Ross, ed. Lectura Dantis: Inferno. Berkeley-Los Angeles: U of

California P, 1998. 410.

134

The master craftsmen are superior in wisdom.”320

Therefore, Nimrod, being the most

expert among the workers who build the Tower, can only cry meaninglessly after divine

punishment.

As Durling also observes, the structure entailed in Dante‟s punishment of Nimrod

expresses “greater wickedness, greater social power, and more barbarous language at the

top, more community and nobler language toward the bottom.”321

In doing so, Dante

overturns the power relationships between master-servant, as when Dve I.xvii implies that

the illustrious vernacular is able to elevate the servant over the noble people.

Dante structures his discourse on Babel through a system of counterbalances. This

system is grounded in Aristotle‟s conception of proportional justice, according to which

“the just is the proportionate, and the unjust is that which violates proportion.”322

If

justice can be established through a mathematical and geometric direct proportion, in

following this reasoning, Dante poses an inverse proportionality as the basis of the

punishment of injustice. For this reason, Nimrod cannot speak an understandable

language, but, in order to “express” his anger and passions, instead of ideas and concepts,

he can only play his hunting horn of war. As Virgil says to Nimrod

... “Anima sciocca,

Tienti col corno, e con quell ti disfoga

Quand‟ ira o altra passion ti tocca!...”323

320 Aristotle. Metaphysics I.i.11-2. Trans. Hugh Tredennick. Cambride, MA: Harvard UP; London:

Heinemann, 1977. 321 Robert Durling. “The Audience(s) of the De vulgari eloquentia and the Petrose.” Dante Studies 110

(1992): 31. 322 Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics V.iii.14. Trans. H. Rackham. Cambride, MA: Harvard UP; London:

Heinemann, 1982. As witnessed in Conv. III.i.7, Dante is aware of the importance of the notion of

proportion in Aristostle‟s Ethics, when he claims that “Onde è da sapere che, sì come dice lo Filosofo

nel nono de l‟Etica, ne l‟amistade de le persone dissimili di stato conviene, a conservazione di quella,

una proporzione essere intra loro che la dissimilitudine a similitudine quasi reduca. Sì com‟è intra lo

signore e lo servo...” 323 Inf. 31.70-72. “Foolish soul, be content with your horn, give vent with that, when anger or some other

passion touches you!”

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Thus, we could further argue that Dante, through Virgil‟s words, wants to debase

the figure of Nimrod by considering him as a hunter/warrior who can only express his

passions and anger.

2. The Hunter, the Panther, and the Sweet Glory of Poetry

Dante‟s characterization of Nimrod is particularly interesting for us because Dante

provides a complex image of this figure as a giant, high tower, horn player, and speaker

of an unintelligible and confused language. According to Mandolini Pesaresi, among the

giants of Inf. 31,

Nimrod stands out as a powerful and original artistic invention. In fact, while

Ephialtes is a rather plain citation from Virgil (Aeneid VI, 577-584) and Ovid

(Metamorphoses VI, 151-155), Dante‟s Nimrod is different from the strong hunter

of the Vulgate.324

The depiction of Nimrod as a giant is not found in the Old Testament. Dante based

the idea that Nimrod was a giant adversary of God on Augustine‟s De Civitate Dei (16.3-

5). By paraphrasing and explaining the events narrated in Genesis 9-11, through the Old

Latin translation of the Greek Septuagint version,325

Augustine originates the idea that

Nimrod was a giant. Dante accepts this tradition both in the Comedy (see, for instance,

Purg. 12.34-36) and in Dve I.vii.4-8.

In a brief and intriguing essay entitled La caccia della lingua, Giorgio Agamben

has argued that God punished Nimrod because his plan “had to do with an artificial

improvement of the one human language that was to grant reason unlimited power. Dante

324 Massimo Mandolini Pesaresi. “Canto XXXI. The Giants: Majesty and Terror.” 409. 325 See Dante. Inferno. Eds. R. M. Durling and R. L. Martinez. 493 note to vv. 67-81.

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at least suggests this much when, in characterizing the perfidy of the giants, he speaks of

an „instrument of the mind‟ (argomento della mente) (Inferno, XXXI, 55).”326

Consequently, Agamben asks,

Is it mere chance that in De vulgari eloquentia Dante also constantly presents his

own search for the “illustrious vernacular” in terms of a hunt (“we are hunting

down language” [I, XI, 1] “what we are hunting for” [I, XV, 8]; “our hunting

arms” [I, XVI, 2]) and that language is thus assimilated to a ferocious beast, a

panther? At the origins of the Italian literary tradition, the search for an illustrious

poetic language is placed under the disturbing sign of Nemrod and his titanic

hunt, almost as if to signify the mortal risk implicit in every search for language

that seeks in some way to restore its originary splendor.327

As this passage suggests, by embodying the same metaphor of the hunter, Dante is

directly confronting Nimrod, his senseless language, and his proud project.

By engaging the hunting metaphor, Dante was not only confronting the myth of

Babel but also the exegetic tradition that viewed the archetype of the hunter as a negative

figure.328

Indeed, while Augustine considers the hunter as an anti-divine figure – a

“deceiver, oppressor, and destroyer of the animals of the earth” – Dante does not oppose

or reject the hunting metaphor. He rather elaborates a different way to look at it by

embodying the figure of the hunter in his search for an illustrious vernacular. In doing so,

Dante engages another view of the hunter, arguably, that of the hunter as a figura Christi,

as Mercuri pointed out, citing a passage from Rabano Mauro‟s De Universo, “Venator

326 Emphasis mine. The term “improvement” in the original was “perfezionamento” (perfecting). “Se la

punizione di Babele è stata la confusione delle lingue, è probabile che la caccia di Nemrod avesse a che

fare con un perfezionamento artificiale dell‟unica lingua degli uomini, che doveva schiudere alla

ragione un potere senza limiti.” Giorgio Agamben. “La caccia della lingua.” In Categorie Italiane. Trans. Daniel Hellen-Roazen. The End of the Poem: Studies in Poetics. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1999.

140. For the hermeneutic trend that relates Dante to the search for a perfect language see also the

previous chapter. 327 Ibid. 141. 328 “Nemrod est sovent décrit comme le type de l‟hominum oppressor, le prelatus malus qui spolie le pauvre

people confié à ses soins.” See Lemay. “Le Nemrod de l‟“Enfer” de Dante.” 88.

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Christus est […] venatores apostoli vel caeteri praedicatores.”329

Yet, in engaging the

hunting metaphor Dante was certainly exposing himself to a risky position, since the

metaphor of the “venator” was widely employed to refer to heresy and fraud.330

The hunting metaphor is evident not only in the De vulgari eloquentia but also in

the enigmatic figure of the “veltro” introduced by Virgil in Inf. 1.100-2. At the beginning

of his journey, lost in the “selva oscura,” Dante encounters three beasts, a lonza, a lion,

and a she-wolf. Symbolizing cupidity, this last beast “molti son li animali a cui

s‟ammoglia / e più saranno ancora, infin che ‟l veltro / verrà, che la farà morir con

doglia.” The “veltro” is literally a hunting dog, which Dante also mentions in his early

sonnet Sonar brachetti and in Conv. I.xii.8, in which he provides a characterization of the

“bracco” and the “veltro” for their “bene odorare” and “ben correre” – important

characterizations for the occurrence of the term in Inf. 13.126: “di rietro a loro era la

selva piena / di nere cagne, bramose e correnti / come veltri ch‟uscisser di catena.”

Dante uses both positive and negative connotations of the figure of the “veltro.”

The “veltro” belongs to a semiotic universe Dante had rejected in his early lyric poem

Sonar brachetti, but which he later recuperates and re-evaluates in the first canto of the

Comedy. In doing so, Dante overcomes the previous separation of the spheres of the hunt

and that of the stilnovo conception of noble love,331

now re-conceived as two

329 See Roberto Mercuri. “Genesi della tradizione letteraria italiana in Dante, Petrarca e Boccaccio.” 296. 330 Ibid. See also Roberto Mercuri. La semantica di Gerione. 331 According to Gianfranco Contini, in Sonar brachetti Dante “si fa rivolgere, come da un folletto, da un

„pensamento‟ (ossia preoccupazione) amoroso di rimprovero, o diremo il „gabbo,‟ di sostituire le

soddisfazioni borghesi della caccia al dovere cortese del joi d‟amor.” Gianfranco Contini. “Introduzione

alle Rime di Dante.” Republished in Varianti e altra linguistica. 326. Contini‟s use of a modern

oppositional imagination between “bourgeois” and “courtly” values seems to be problematic. In fact,

the hunt was the sport of noble courtly people – needless to support this idea by referring to Frederick

II‟s treatise on De arte venandi. As Teodolinda Barolini has remarked, more correctly in my view,

Dante‟s blame for his juvenile passion for hunting is tied to a reconsideration of the two gender-biased universes of the male-centered realm of the hunt and the female-directed realm of love. See Teodolinda

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complementary and interdependent realms in the all-encompassing universe of the

Comedy.

Numerous interpretations have been offered for the meaning and identity of the

veltro.332

What I find significant in Dante‟s use of the figure is the function it serves in

the narrative of the poem. In Inf. 1, the veltro appears to stand for a Messianic figure

who, as is said at verses 104-105, will neither nurture land nor precious metals, but

wisdom, love, and virtue.

Dante‟s use of this „icon‟ both reflects and departs from diverse biblical, literary,

and cultural topoi concerning dogs. For instance, we can, on one side, contrast the veltro

with the greedy beasts described in Isaiah 56.11 or Boethius‟s Cons. Phil. I.4,333

or, on the

other, parallel it with the dog as a divine weapon in Jeremiah 15.3334

or the very useful

and human-friendly animal in medieval romances.335

Furthermore, we can make a parallel between the veltro and the iconography of

Saint Dominic and the Dominicans – an iconography that often diplays representations of

Barolini‟s comment to the sonnet in Dante Alighieri. Rime giovanili e della Vita Nuova. Milano: BUR,

2009. 168-9. 332 From this perspective then, Dante betrays his early poetic experience of the rustic-comic Rime into the

more elevated poetry of the Comedy. For the veltro, see Charles T. Davis. “Veltro.” In Umberto Bosco.

Enciclopedia Dantesca. Vol. 5. Roma: Treccani, 1976. 908-912. See also Giorgio Barberi Squarotti. “Il veltro e l‟umile Italia.” In Francesco Spera, ed. Novella Fronda: Studi Danteschi. Napoli: D‟Auria,

2008. 11-21. 333 Jer. 56.11: “et canes impudentissimi, nescierunt saturitatem; ipsi pastores ignoraverunt intelligentiam;

omnes in viam suam declinaverunt; unusquisque ad avaritiam suam, a summo usque ad novissimum.”

English Trans.: “they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot

understand: they all look to their own way, every one for his gain, from his quarter.” Boethius Cons.

Phil. I.4: “Paulinum consularem virum, cuius opes Palatinae canes iam spe atque ambitione

devorassent…” 334 “et visitabo super eos quatuor species, dicit Dominus: gladium ad occisionem, et canes ad lacerandum,

et volatilia caeli et bestias terrae ad devorandum et dissipandum.” English Trans.: “And I will appoint

over them four kinds, saith the Lord: the sword to slay, and the dogs to tear, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the earth, to devour and destroy.”

335 As an instance one can recall the closing statement of chapter 8 in Beroul‟s The Romance of Tristan:

“Dogs are very useful creatures!” See Beroul. The Romance of Tristan. Trans. Alan S. Fredrick. New

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dogs. As the noun itself „Domini-canes‟ also implies, Dominicans were represented as the

dogs (canes) of Christ (domini). This iconography relates to a legend, according to which

St. Dominic‟s mother, while pregnant, dreamed of giving birth to a dog holding a torch in

its mouth through which he would set the world on fire.336

For this reason, a dog is often

displayed at the Saint‟s feet holding a torch in its mouth. That Dante might be aware of

this legend is evident in Par. 12.67-70, in which the poet emphasizes the etymology of the

Saint‟s name.

Poi che le sponsalizie fuor compiute…

la donna che per lui l‟assenso diede,

vide nel sonno il mirabile frutto

ch‟uscir dovea di lui e delle rede.

E perchè fosse qual era il costrutto,

quinci si mosse spirito a nomarlo

del possessivo di cui era tutto.

Domenico fu detto...337

Another pun is embedded in the name of the Ghibelline ruler of Verona,

Cangrande della Scala, who hosted Dante during his exile and to whom Cacciaguida will

also refer in Par. 17.70-72.

Lo primo tuo refugio e „l primo ostello

sarà la cortesia del gran Lombardo

che „n su la scala porta il santo uccello.338

In Inf. 1, the veltro is the expected redemptive figure that can chase away the

three beasts and dispatch the she-wolf – an allegory of avarice, and “the source for all

other vices,” according to Saint Thomas and Dante himself (Conv. 4).

With the introduction of the veltro in Inferno 1, in my view, Dante was

York: Penguin, 1970. 80-84.

336 See Jacopo da Varagine. Legenda Aurea. Ed. Arrigo Levasti. Vol. 2. Firenze: Le Lettere, 2000. 65-79. 337 Par. 12.61-70. Emphases mine. 338 Par. 17.70-72.

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establishing a thematic continuity between the hunting metaphor as used in the Dve and

as used in the Comedy. The hound stands for an expected figure that can help the hunter

find the illustrious vernacular, i.e. the panther that by breathing out a sweet scent can

gather all animals together.

By considering the Greek etymology, in Etymologies XII.2.8-9, Isidore of Seville

points out that the “pan-ther” is called this because it is a friend to all (pan) animals, and

all animals befriend him. Moreover, as we know from Brunetto Latini‟s bestiary

contained in the first book of the Trèsor,

Panthere est une petite beste tachiee de petiz cercles blans et noirs autresi come

petiz iauz et est aimés de touz animaus fors que dou dragon. Et sa nature est que

tout mantenant que ele a sa viande prise, si entre en sa spelonque et se dort .iii.

jors; lors se lieve et ovre sa boche. Et fleire si douz et si soef que toutes bestes qui

sent[ent] l‟odor s‟en vont devant li; soulement le dragon se fiche es petuis

de[sous] terre, por la paor qu‟il en a, que il set bien que a morir li convient.339

In addition to Brunetto‟s bestiary, other bestiaries also point out that, with his

sweet fragrance, the panther – a symbol for Christ – is able to attract all the animals

except the dragon and gather them to follow him. The dragon – allegory of Satan and the

Anti-Christ340

– “cannot stand the panther‟s sweetness and thus flees to his underground

cave where he lies in a motionless slumber as if dead.” 341

The contrast between the panther and the dragon in the bestiaries is re-conceived

in Dante as a dialectic between sweet scent and noxious air. Indeed, while the illustrious

339 Brunetto Latini. Trèsor I.193.1. English Trans.: “The panther is an animal with little black and white

rings, like little eyes, and it is loved by all animals except the dragon. Its nature is such that as soon as it

has caught food, it goes into its cave and sleeps for three days. Then it gets up and opens its mouth, and

its breath is so sweet and pleasant that all animals which smell it go towards it, except the dragon, which, because of the smell, hides in openings underground out of fear, for it knows well that it will

die.” 340 See (pseudo) Rabano Mauro. Allegorie della scrittura. Introduction and translation Pier Giorgio di

Domenico. Città del Vaticano: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2002. 105-6. 341 Debra Hassig. Medieval Bestiaries. Text, Image, Ideology. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1995. 156.

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vernacular in Dve is presented as a sweet-smelling panther, in the epistles Dante refers to

different noxious animals as the “hydra pestifera” and “pestilens animal” able to ruin city

governments due to its multiple heads,342

or the “vipera,” the “languida pecus,” and the

“vulpecula fetoris” hidden in a shelter and safe from the attacks of the hunters.343

The

noxious air is a symbol of the corruption expanding through the people that Dante

represents as a sheep. Being unaware of the wicked power of the noxious promises

produced by rulers, the sheep can easily be “infected.”344

In a similar light, Dante,

through Saint Peter‟s invective in Par. 27.55-57, will condemn the rulers who, though

masked as shepherds, behave as wolves.345

These rulers usurp the Church and transform

Peter‟s cemetery into a sewer of “blood and stink.”

Quelli ch‟usurpa il luogo mio,

il luogo mio, il luogo mio, che vaca

nella presenza del Figliuol di Dio,

fatt‟ha del cimitero mio cloaca

del sangue e della puzza; onde „l perverso

che cadde di qua su, là più si placa.346

My reading at this point differs from that of Roberto Mercuri. While for Mercuri

the panther is the same animal as the dangerous lonza at the beginning of the Comedy,

which Dante also recalls in the canto of Gerione (Inf. 16.106-109), the panther, in my

view, is the animal Dante finally finds in writing the Comedy. By contending that the

panther of the Dve and the lonza of the Comedy are essentially the same animal Mercuri

seems to presume that there is a sharp discontinuity between the two works, since the

342 See Epistle 7.20. 343 Epistle 7.23-26. 344 Epistle 7.26. 345 Par. 27.55-57: “In vesta di pastor lupi rapaci / sì veggion di qua su per tutti i paschi / o difesa di Dio,

perchè pur giaci?” See also Matt. 7.15: “Attendite a falsis prophetis, qui veniunt ad vos in vestimentis

ovium, intrinsecus autem sunt lupi rapaces.” Dante uses similar figurative language from shepherdy in

the Eclogues in order to explain why he chose to write in the vernacular rather than in Latin.

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panther is positively viewed in the Dve, and the lonza viewed negatively in the

Comedy.347

I suggest on the contrary that the two works are continuous, and the animals

are thus quite distinct, indeed opposed to one another.

If we arrange the elements found so far, we have: Dante is a hunter of a panther,

and he is waiting for a hound that can defeat the she-wolf. The panther produces and

emits with his roar a sweet and irresistible fragrance that attracts all the animals except

the dragon. If the avid she-wolf nurtured by luxury and wealth can couple with to

numerous animals, the panther, with its scent, can attract and gather all the animals to

follow it.The constellation of metaphoric images provided by Dante seems to be

coherent.

Given all this, in what sense can we interpret the mission of the veltro sub specie

linguae?

A linguistic trace embedded in Dante‟s uses of the verb „cacciare‟ may help us to

see the implicit intersections between Dante‟s ethical-political view of the veltro and his

linguistic-poetic project. Indeed, the way Dante uses the verb cacciare in both contexts

seems to be symptomatic. Since the verb „cacciare‟ can mean both „to hunt‟ and „to chase

346

Par. 27.22-27. 347 The ambivalent sense, both positive and negative, of the symbol of the panther has been indicated by

Aldo Vallone. Studi su Dante medievale. Firenze: Olschki, 1965. 55. “Si pensi alla panthera che in

quanto „bestia‟ in generale rappresenta „quilibet a peccato conversus‟ e in particolare come „pardus‟ è

„quilibet vitiorum varietate plenus.‟ Può però significare il „presbyter,‟ e i sette colori di quella le

„septem vestes et septem virtutes‟ di questo. Si passa così da un‟analogia semplice ad un agglomerato

analogico per giungere poi ad associazioni prelogiche e immotivate.” Vallone cites Rabano Mauro.

Allegorie sulla scrittura. CXII.875 and 1022. In this last passage, Rabano Mauro cites Isa. 11.6:

“Habitabit lupus cum agno, et pardus sum haedo accubabit; vitulus, et leo, et ovis, simul morabuntutr, et

puer parvulus minabit eos.” It is noteworthy that Dante seems to overturn the peaceful world of cohabitation among animals into a more painful one. In fact, Dante‟s dream is that the veltro would

finally kill the she-wolf “con doglia” (Inf. 1.102). Actually, Dante overturns the imagination of co-

existence among animals as an adulterous sign, when he claims that the she-wolf “s‟ammoglia” to

numerous animals.

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away,‟ Dante‟s use of the verb in the second sense to refer both to the veltro‟s mission348

and to his own poetry349

seems to provide evidence of a significant intertext. In these uses

of “caccerà,” we can perhaps find the core of his hunt for the illustrious vernacular: it is

both a hunt for justice and a struggle against the vices as well as a hunt for the glory of

language and a cultural struggle against early views of vernacular poetry.

Traditionally, the veltro has been seen as a figura Christi and/or a figura Augusti.

There is no doubt that it constitutes an allegorical icon for a Messiah (either an Emperor

or a defender of the Church, or both). According to an exegetical tradition of the Psalms,

the dog symbolizes a defender of the “civitatem” and the Ecclesiam gentium. In the

Enciclopedia Dantesca, Charles T. Davis also recalls medieval artistic and literary

representations “nelle quali il cane simboleggia la fides e anche la sagacia, l‟alacrità e la

fedeltà dei difensori del gregge cristiano contro la voracità dei lupi, mentre il lupo

simboleggia tanto la rapacità e l‟astuzia, quanto il demonio e i suoi accoliti, e anche

Roma.”350

Dante‟s expression “locutio vulgarium gentium” in Dve I.i.1 evokes the

expression “Ecclesia gentium” as “domina gentium” he used at the very beginning of the

letter to the Italian cardinals written around 1314. In this letter, Dante cites the passage

from the Lamentations of Jeremiah I.1, “Quomodo sola sedet civitas plena populo! Facta

est quasi vidua domina gentium.”351

According to VN 30.1, Dante used the same passage

to begin the letter to the princes of the world after the death of Beatrice:

348 Inf. 1.109. 349 “così ha tolto l‟uno all‟altro Guido / la gloria della lingua; e forse è nato / chi l‟uno e l‟altro caccerà del

nido” Purg. 11.97-98. 350 Charles T. Davis “Veltro.” In Umberto Bosco, ed. Enciclopedia dantesca. Vol. 5. Roma: Treccani, 1976.

908. 351 Epistle 11.1.

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Poi che fue partita da questo secolo, rimase tutta la sopradetta cittade quasi

vedova dispogliata da ogni dignitade; onde io, ancora lagrimando in questa

desolata cittade, scrissi a li principi de la terra alquanto de la sua condizione,

pigliando quello cominciamento di Geremia profeta che dice Quomodo sedet sola

civitas.352

That Dante conflated the two issues of civic politics and language is also

witnessed by the proximity between the passage just quoted and the explanation of his

intention to write in the vernacular – an intention shared with his “primo amico” Guido

Cavalcanti.

Lo intendimento mio non fue dal principio di scrivere altro che per volgare; onde,

con ciò sia cosa che le parole che seguitano a quelle che sono allegate, siano tutte

latine, sarebbe fuori del mio intendimento se le scrivessi. E simile intenzione so

ch‟ebbe questo mio primo amico a cui io ciò scrivo, cioè ch‟io li scrivessi

solamente volgare. 353

In all these reverberations we could find at least one trace that allows us to

connect the veltro with Dante‟s search for an illustrious vernacular. As I mentioned in the

previous chapter, the term “vulgare” is rooted in that of “vulgus,” i.e. a multitude of

persons who live here and there according to their individual wills. As Brunetto Latini

pointed out in his Trèsor, “ci sono molte città dove il governo della vita dell‟uomo è

distrutto, e vivono in modo dissoluto, perchè ognuno va dietro alla propria volontà.” As

we have seen, the dog is a symbol for a Messianic figure needed to defend both the city

and the Ecclesia gentium from dispersion. The killing of the she-wolf of avarice by the

veltro would signify for Dante the gathering together of citizens within a civic

government and the unification of the Ecclesia gentium: the two equal and distinct

352 VN 30.1. For the use of Lamentationes in this passage see Ronald Martinez. “Mourning Beatrice: The

Rhetoric of Threnody in the Vita nuova.” MLN 113.1 (1998): 1-29. For other uses in the Comedy see

also Martinez. “Dante between Hope and Despair: The Tradition of the Lamentations in the Divine

Comedy.” Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture 5.3 (2002): 45-76; and “Dante‟s

Jeremiads: The Burden of Florence.” In Teodolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey, eds. Dante for the

New Millennium. New York: Fordham UP, 2003. 301-319.

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institutional authorities of the world as Dante conceived it.

We should also keep in mind that the veltro is a hunting dog, whose strength is

that of “ben correre.” Developing traces implicit in the metaphor itself, one could also

deduce that the ben correre makes the veltro particularly adapted to hunt a fast animal

such as the panther, which, with its scent (in my view, a metaphor for “the glory of

language” recalled in Purg. 11), can gather the dispersed vulgarium gentium. My general

hypothesis is therefore that Dante saw in the illustrious vernacular language a gathering

“power,” which (sub specie linguae) parallels the unifying power of the Emperor (sub

specie politicae), and the Church (sub specie spiritualis) – though from the historical

perspective of the Dve neither the Emperor nor the Church had provided the unifying

court, where such a vernacular could assume its proper place.

3. Returning to Eden: the Death of Language, Adam‟s Joy, and the Fall of

Babel

Dante links the stories of Adam and Babel both in De vulgari Eloquentia (in

particular in I.xi.5) and in Par. 26, where in his final ascent to God he encounters Adam.

This is surely a moment of extraordinary importance in both Dante‟s journey and poem,

since it follows the triple examination that sentences the pilgrim‟s ability to ascend to the

Empirean.

References to Eden abound in the cantos of Paradise. For instance, we find

allusions when in Par. 12.70-72 Dante considers Saint Dominic as the “agricola che

Cristo elesse all‟orto suo per aiutarlo” or Christ and God as an “ortolano etterno” (Par.

26.65) and the Roman Catholic Church as the “orto cattolico,” which is crossed by

353 VN 30.2-3.

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different rivers (Par. 12.103-4) – an image that evokes the rivers of Eden, i.e. Pishon,

Gihon, Tigris, and Euphrates.354

Images of the Edenic garden are expressed in Par. 26.64-

66, when during his last examination on charity, Dante talks about the right love and says

Le fronde onde s‟infronda tutto l‟orto

dell‟ortolano etterno, am‟io cotanto

quanto da lui a lor di bene è porto.355

In Par. 26, Dante after revealing his conception about the right love, which,

according to him, should be guided by Christ‟s teachings, the vernacular version of the

Psalm chant “Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus” surrounds the heaven indicating Dante‟s

readiness to go further toward the vision of God. Yet, like unexpected lightning, a new

flame materializes before the pilgrim‟s eyes.

This presence seems to break the narrative continuum of the canto and delay the

pilgrim‟s ascent to the Empirean. Answering Dante‟s question concerning the identity of

this light, Beatrice says that those luminous rays covers “l‟anima prima che [il suo fattor]

la prima virtù creasse mai.”356

During Beatrice‟s brief explanation, Dante raises himself

up,

Come la fronda che flette la cima

nel transito del vento, e poi si leva

per la propria virtú che la sublima.357

Adam in the Garden of Eden-Ecclesia makes Dante like one of the beloved

“fronde” of the „orto dell‟ortolano etterno.‟ The image of Dante as a fronda here

354 See Genesis 2.10-14. For the Eden as the Garden of God symbolizing the Church, see also “Paradisus,

giardino” in Rabano Mauro. Allegorie della Scrittura. 282. Rabano Mauro recalls Genesis 2.8,

“Plantaverat autem Dominus Deus paradisum voluptatis a principio.” 355 Par. 26.64-66. In the metaphor of God as the “ortolano etterno” Dante alludes to John 15.1: “Ego sum

vitis vera, et pater meus agricola est;” and 20.15, “Illa existimas quia hortolanus esset...” See also

Mengaldo, Linguistica e retorica di Dante, Pisa: Nistri-Lischi, 1978. 227. 356 Par. 26.83-84. 357

Par. 26.85-87.

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intertextually relates to Par. 15.88, in which Cacciaguida addresses the pilgrim with “O

fronda mia in che io compiacemmi.” As Ronald Martinez suggested, Dante‟s use of the

tree metaphor in this Cantos is an instance of a figurative language pointing to the

pilgrim‟s return to first principles, among which Cacciaguida, Adam, and the Creator are

pivotal.358

Furthermore, we can also hypothesize that at this point the image of the fronda

alludes to Genesis 2.5-8, which tells us that Adam was created to cultivate the ground and

care for the trees.359

Dante does not talk about Adam as a laborer, but in Par. 23 he talks

about the “labor” of the bird (Beatrice) that stays on the branch of a tree, waiting for the

sunrise (image of Christ), in order to hunt (labor) the food for its nestlings.

Come l‟augello, intra l‟amate fronde,

posato al nido de‟ suoi dolci nati

la notte che le cose ci nasconde,

che, per veder li aspetti disiati

e per trovar lo cibo onde li pasca,

in che gravi labor li sono aggrati,

previene il tempo in sull‟aperta frasca,

e con ardente affetto il sole aspetta,

fiso guardando pur che l‟alba nasca...360

Arguably, the laborer mother-bird Beatrice embodies a motif from Adam (and

Eve), the first laborer, parent, and nurturer of all creatures.361

358 See Ronald Martinez. “Canto XV: The Tempered Soul in the Tempered Poem.” Forthcoming in the

California Lectura dantis: Paradiso, ed. Allen Mandelbaum and Anthony Oldcorn. 359 “Et omne virgultum agri antequam oriretur in terra, omnemque herbam regionis priusquam germinaret:

non enim pluerat Dominus Deus super terram, et homo non erat qui operaretur terram: sed fons

ascendebat e terra, irrigans universam superficiem terrae. Formavit igitur Dominus Deus hominem de

limo terrae, et inspiravit in faciem eius spiraculum vitae, et factus est homo in animam viventem.”

Colunga and Turrado. Biblia Vulgata. 5. 360 Italics mine. 361 Not distant from Dante‟s epoch, Christine de Pizan described Adam and Eve as the noblest human

beings because of their labor. Adam and Eve, “the two heads of the world, from whom all human life is descended, were labourers of the earth. The first head was Adam, the first father, about whom it is

written in the second chapter of Genesis, „God took the first man and put him in a paradise of pleasures,

to work, cultivate and take care of it.‟ And from this Scripture one can draw two arguments to prove the

148

If so, the counterpoint with Nimrod here becomes quite significant. While

Nimrod, as Augustine contended, was a hunter against God and a deceiver and oppressor

of animals, Adam – as well as the mother-bird Beatrice – is the generator and curator of

the living beings on the earth. Moreover, if we think of Adam and Nimrod as two types of

a theology of language – Adam as the first speaker and Nimrod the cause of the linguistic

confusion – we should take into account a significant difference in their “social”

belonging and collocation in the social distribution of labor.

As we have already seen, Dante argues that the punishment of Babel generated

numerous languages on the basis of the division of labor. Indeed, Nimrod, the leading

architect of the Tower, spoke an unintelligible language “ch‟a nullo è noto.” Given that,

Dante in order to refer to his own intellectual labor uses metaphors from the mechanical

arts (i.e. the arts of manual workers), the pilgrim‟s return to Adam also embeds a

reference to the interrelation between labor and linguistic divisions indicated in Dve. This

at least Dante leads us to believe if we also keep in mind that, to refer to his own labor, he

does not only employ the hunting metaphor but also a peasant one, when in Dve I.xviii.1

he refers to the paterfamilias as an “agricola” who plants and transplants trees, or when

he uses terms such as the “cribrum” (sieve) for selecting the illustrious vernaculars from

the inferior ones, or the “fascio” to indicate his grouping different “branches” of

knowledge.362

Now, is Dante‟s return to Adam expressed only in terms of figurative language? If

honesty of labour: the first is that God commanded it and made it first of all crafts; the second, that this

craft was created during the state of innocence.” Cary J. Nederman and Kate Langdon Forhan, ed.

Medieval Political Theory. A Reader: the Quest for the Body Politic, 1100-1400. London-New York:

Routledge, 1993. 245. 362 For the “cribrum” see Dve I.xii.1; for the “fascio,” Dve II.viii.1: “Preparatis fustibus torquibusque ad

fascem, nunc fasciandi tempus incumbit.”

149

we follow Singleton‟s and Contini‟s major contributions on the topic, the answer is

certainly negative. Indeed, if Singleton has argued that Dante‟s journey is in a profound

allegorical sense a “return to Eden,” Contini contended that Dante‟s encounter with Adam

in Par. 26 was meant to justify Dante‟s own choice to write in the vernacular.

Yet, Dante‟s return to Adam in Par. 26 has not been easy to understand for Dante

scholars. This is in particular because in this Canto Dante appears to reverse his early

positions on Adam‟s language as stated in Dve. While in Dve I.vi.5, Dante claims that

Adam‟s language was still alive when the building of the Tower of Babel was planned, in

Par. 26, Dante indicates that it was already dead. Given this evident palinode, a careful

scrutiny of the question seems to be paramount. In order to do so, I will focus mainly on

Mengaldo‟s interpretation. But, it is helpful to first read Adam‟s entire discourse in the

Canto

la lingua ch‟io parlai fu tutta spenta

innanzi che all‟ovra inconsummabile

fosse la gente di Nembròt attenta;

chè nullo effetto mai razionabile,

per lo piacere uman che rinovella

seguendo il cielo, sempre fu durabile.

Opera naturale è ch‟uom favella;

ma così o così, natura lascia

poi fare a voi secondo che v‟abbella.

Prima ch‟i‟ scendessi all‟infernale ambascia,

I s‟appellava in terra il sommo bene

onde vien la letizia che mi fascia;

e EL si chiamò poi: e ciò convene,

chè l‟uso de‟ mortali è come fronda

in ramo, che sen va e altra vene.363

Following Contini‟s lead, Mengaldo attempted to explain Dante‟s palinode

concerning the historicity of Adam‟s language by arguing that it was after discovering the

363 Par. 16.124-138.

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general principle that all languages change historically that Dante changed his mind in

Par. 26.364

Although suggestive, this argument appears problematic. Indeed, Dante was

conscious of the importance of the general principle of the historicity of languages

already in the Dve, where he articulates the principle as well as asserting the historical

continuity of Adam‟s language with Nimrod‟s.365

In my view, the shift or palinode

observable between the Dve and the Comedy, that is, between a historical continuity

joining Adamic and Nimrodic language in the Dve, and their historical discontinuity in

Par. 26, is not dependent on a general theory of the historical mutability of languages.

As I see it, with the intervention of Adam in Par. 26, Dante conflates two

questions dealt with in the De vulgari eloquentia and, perhaps, tackles a third problem.

The first concerns the identity of the original language Adam spoke to God, while the

second concerns the historical mutability of languages. The third problem Dante faced

can be expressed in the following way: if Adam‟s language is also Nimrod‟s, as claimed

in the Dve, then this language could be in part responsible for producing Babelic

confusion. And if Adam‟s language is genetically related to Babel, Dante could not

consider it the model of the language for which he hunts.

In Par. 26, Adam, by emphasizing that his language was already extinct before

Babel, liberated his language from being held accountable for Nimrod‟s pride and

Babelic confusion. In other words, by historicizing his language, Adam emphasizes the

genetic discontinuity between his and Nimrod‟s language. This discontinuity is echoed in

364 Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo. Linguistica e retorica di Dante. Pisa: Nistri-Lischi, 1978. See in particular pp.

239-246. 365 Dve I.vi.5.

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the opposed emotions these two figures manifest within the narrative of the poem.

Nimrod embodies anger, but Adam expresses total joy.366

Indeed in Par. 26 Adam‟s light

immediately attracts Dante and transfers to him a joyful sweetness that affects not only

Dante‟s mind but also his body. Arguably, this relates to a joy of being together, which

equals then the final Fall of Babel and the possibility of being “cives et respirantes in

pace”367

beyond the exile of Babylon. Detached genetically from Nimrod‟s linguistic

lineage, Adam‟s light and speech therefore points to a power of gathering, needed to

overcome Babelic confusion and prepare the pilgrim for his inclusion in the community

of the blessed.

366 We should also recall that, according to Dve I.iv, Adam‟s first speech expressed joy in the name of

“Deus,” whose meaning, for Dante, is joy. “Rationabile est quod ante qui fuit inciperet a gaudio; et cum

nullum gaudium sit extra Deum, sed totum in Deo, et ipse Deus totus sit gaudium, consequens est quod

primus loquens primo et ante omnia dixisset „Deus.‟” 367 Here I am also referring to Dante‟s epistle to Henry VII: “Ac quemadmodum, sacrosancta Ierusalem

memores, exules in Babilonie gemiscimus, ita tunc cives et respirantes in pace, confusionis miserias in

gaudio recolemus.” Epistle 7.30. Emphasis mine.

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CHAPTER 5

DANTE‟S DE-VULGARIZATION OF THE VULGARE:

HEGEMONY, CAESARISM, AND POETRY OF PRAXIS

“Questo sarà luce nuova, sole nuovo,

lo quale surgerà là dove l‟usato tramonterà,

e darà lume a coloro che sono in tenebre e in

oscuritade, per lo usato sole che a loro non luce.”

Dante, Convivio, I, xiii, 12

“l‟identificazione di teoria e pratica è un atto critico...

Ecco perchè il problema dell‟identità di teoria e

pratica si pone specialmente in certi momenti storici

così detti di transizione, cioè di più rapido

movimento trasformativo.”

Gramsci. Quaderni del carcere

1. “Firenze esercita un‟egemonia culturale:” Cultural Hegemony from

Gramsci to Dante

By dialogically reading Dante and Gramsci we earn a historical perspective that

allows us to view Dante‟s conceptualization of an illustrious language as an anti-Babelic

search for unity, which, for Gramsci, should be considered as a national-cultural political

act. The ante-penultimate note of the Prison Notebooks, mostly overlooked by Gramsci

scholars and dantisti, turns the entire questione della lingua to new challenging

directions. As I have also shown in the first chapter, by addressing De vulgari eloquentia

as an “act of national-cultural politics” Gramsci is both interpreting Dante‟s treatise and,

indirectly, challenging a hermeneutic tradition that led to consider the treatise as

principally a book on poetry and style. Gramsci‟s attempt in Q 29, §7 to re-conceive

Dante‟s treatise and the questione della lingua as a cultural-political act invites us to

redirect our gaze on language to its historicity and constitutive ethical-political

dimension.

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Gramsci‟s final notebook wraps up a set of issues, studies, and researches he

tackled during an extended period of gestation beginning with the years at the University

of Torino (1911-1914) and extending to the composition of the Prison Notebooks (1929-

1935). Passages such as the following, respectively from Q 1, §73 (1929-1930) and Q 3,

§76 (1930) provide evidence that in the final Notebook Gramsci re-elaborates complex

sets of early reflections:

Fino al 500 Firenze esercita l‟egemonia culturale, perchè esercita un‟egemonia

economica (papa Bonifacio VIII diceva che i fiorentini erano il quinto elemento

della terra) e c‟è uno sviluppo dal basso, dal popolo alle persone colte. Dopo la

decadenza di Firenze, l‟italiano è la lingua di una casta casta chiusa, senza

contatto con una parlata storica.368

Il fiorire dei Comuni dà sviluppo ai volgari e l‟egemonia intellettuale di Firenze

dà una unità al volgare, cioè crea un volgare illustre. Ma cos‟è questo volgare

illustre? È il fiorentino elaborato dalla vecchia tradizione: è il fiorentino di

vocabolario e anche di fonetica, ma è un latino di sintassi. D‟altronde la vittoria

del volgare sul latino non era facile: i dotti italiani, eccettuati i poeti e gli artisti in

generale, scrivevano per l‟Europa cristiana e non per l‟Italia, erano una

concentrazione di intellettuali cosmopoliti e non nazionali. La caduta dei Comuni

e l‟avvento del principato, la creazione di una casta di governo staccata dal

popolo, cristallizza questo volgare, allo stesso modo che si era cristallizzato il

latino letterario. L‟italiano è di nuovo una lingua scritta e non parlata, dei dotti e

non della nazione. […]369

368 Q 1, §73. Emphasis mine. Gramsci will re-write the passage in Q 23, §58 as follows: “Fino al

Cinquecento Firenze esercita un‟egemonia culturale, connessa alla sua egemonia commerciale e

finanziaria (papa Bonifacio VIII diceva che i fiorentini erano il quinto elemento del mondo) e c‟è uno sviluppo linguistico unitario dal basso, dal popolo alle persone colte, sviluppo rinforzato dai grandi

scrittori fiorentini e toscani. Dopo la decadenza di Firenze, l‟italiano diventa sempre più la lingua di una

casta chiusa, senza contatto vivo con una parlata storica.” Italics mine. I have highlighted the changes

Gramsci made in rewriting the note. As the text witnesses, the term “hegemony” remains a key concept.

As Franco Lo Piparo pointed out, Gramsci in these notes rephrases D‟Ovidio‟s texts concerning the

history of the Italian language. See Franco Lo Piparo. Lingua, intellettuali, egemonia in Gramsci. 128-

9. 369 Q 3, §76. 354. Emphases mine. According to Lo Piparo, the type of illustrious vernacular with which

Gramsci deals in these notes does not correspond to Dante‟s one. In my view, it is difficult to say

whether Gramsci was thinking at Dante‟s notion of illustrious vernacular as expressed in the Dve or not.

Two traces might help us to support that the type of vernacular idiom Dante configured is central to Gramsci‟s reflection. First, Gramsci considered Dante‟s linguistic treatise at the end of the Prison

Notebooks as a pivotal point of reference. Second, Gramsci‟s positive judgments of Enrico Sicardi‟s

book, La lingua italiana in Dante, gives us a way to have a better understanding of what Gramsci meant

154

These notes can help us to parallel the linguistic contests between Latin and the

vernacular language with the political forms of government. As they make clear, for

Gramsci, there is isomorphism between language and political and social organization.370

And, it is noteworthy that in the juxtaposition of vernacular with Latin and Commune

with Principality, the concept of “hegemony” – modified by the adjectives “cultural” and

“intellectual” – plays a central role.

Gramsci‟s counterpoint between the vernacular languages in the thirteenth century

Communes and Latin in the fifteenth century Principalities will be re-articulated in the

note 7 of Notebook 29 in which Gramsci refers to the innovative character of Dante‟s

treatise. As Q29, 3 then wraps up,

Ogni volta che affiora, in un modo o nell‟altro, la quistione della lingua, significa

che si sta imponendo una serie di altri problemi: la formazione e l‟allargamento

della classe dirigente, la necessità di stabilire rapporti più intimi e sicuri tra i

gruppi dirigenti e la massa popolare-nazionale, cioè di riorganizzare l‟egemonia

culturale.371

From this perspective, we might ask whether Dante, with his search for an

illustrious vernacular language, was attempting to establish a cultural hegemony. This

chapter aims at providing a tentative answer to this question by tackling a set of issues,

which could allow us to rethink Dante‟s linguistic problem under the concept of

when he says that the illustrious Florentine idiom is “il fiorentino di vocabolario e anche di fonetica, ma

è un latino di sintassi.” As Sicardi highlights in his study, linguistic structures based on rhetorical

devices as the ellipsis, while unusual in modern Italian language, were particularly common in ancient languages, and in particular in Latin. Most of Sicardi‟s book demonstrates precisely the hermeneutic

values of Dante‟s uses of devices as the ellipsis in the Comedy. As I have shown in the second chapter,

Sicardi‟s book is central for Gramsci‟s critiques to Croce with regard to Inferno 10. Moreover, as

suggested in the first chapter, Sicardi‟s study might also be relevant for Gramsci‟s general statement that

both language and history are composed of elliptical parallels between past and present. 370 See also Lo Piparo. Lingua, intellettuali, egemonia in Gramsci. 252. 371 Q 29, §3. 2345-6.

155

hegemony.

Most debates in the humanities and social science today refer to Gramsci‟s prison

writings as the texts in which the notion of hegemony has been accounted for in the most

extended way. Reading Gramsci‟s complex body of writings closely, one finds that in

diverse contexts the term hegemony is modified through different adjectives such as

“political,”372

“ethical-political” and “economic,”373

“commercial and financial,”374

“social,”375

“civil,”376

“intellectual,”377

“political and cultural,”378

“cultural-political” and

“intellectual-political,”379

“intellectual, moral, and political.”380

Therefore the noun

“hegemony” not only refers to a stable theory of power relationship, but also constitutes a

prism through which we can follow the various discourses explored by Gramsci‟s

writings in different textual contexts.

The prismatic and hyper-textual nature of Gramsci‟s work has led scholars to

scrutinize how Gramsci used the concept of hegemony within his body of writings.381

Scholars have worked out both theoretical approaches to the concept382

and analyzed

372 Q 7, §83. 373 Q 13, §18. 1591. 374 Q 23, §40. 2237. 375 Q 12, §1. 1519. 376

Q 13, §7. 1566. 377 Q 13, §18. 1590. 378 Q 6, §24. 915. 379 Q 13, §26. 1618. 380 Q 19, §24. 2011. For a discussion on Gramsci‟s multiple ways to refer to the notion of hegemony, see

also Alberto Burgio. “Il nodo dell‟egemonia in Gramsci. Appunti sulla struttura plurale di un concetto.”

In Angelo d‟Orsi, ed. Egemonie. Napoli: Edizioni Dante & Descartes, 2008. 253-269. 381 Edward Said remarked in 1987. “Il concetto di egemonia è in Gramsci probabilmente il concetto più

complesso, che ha dato luogo ad interpretazioni le più diverse e incerte.” See Said. “Gramsci e l‟unità di

filosofia, politica, economia.” In Giorgio Baratta and Andrea Catone, ed. Modern Times: Gramsci e la

critica dell‟Americanismo. Milano: Diffusioni, 1987. 354. 382 An incomplete bibliography might include: Perry Anderson. “The Antinomies of Antonio Gramsci.”

New Left Review 100 (November 1976-January 1977): 5-78; Norberto Bobbio. “Gramsci e la

concezione della società civile.” In Pietro Rossi, ed. Gramsci e la cultura contemporanea. Vol. 1.

Roma: Editori Riuniti-Istituto Gramsci, 1969. 75-100; Robert Bocock. Hegemony. London-New York:

156

philologically the contexts in which the term appears.383

Moreover, Gramsci‟s

multifarious uses of the term “hegemony” moved scholars such as historian Perry

Anderson to discuss the antinomies within Gramsci‟s thought, which, in turn, stimulated

the attentive philological scholarship of Gianni Francioni, who argued for a more

attentive diachronic analysis of the ways Gramsci‟s writing-practices evolved during the

prison years.384

Furthermore, the “plural structure”385

of the notion of hegemony has been

explored in its interrelations with such concepts as civil society, consent, the organic

intellectual, ideology, super-structure and historic block, and it has been discussed as a

sign of Gramsci‟s Leninism (Togliatti), as an expression of a “culturalist” approach to

politics (Bobbio), as a non-Marxist legacy Gramsci inherited from his studies in

Tavistock; Chichester: Ellis Horwood, 1986; Alberto Burgio. Gramsci storico: Una lettura dei

“Quaderni del carcere.” Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2002; Angelo D‟Orsi, ed. Egemonie. Napoli:

Dante&Descartes, 2008; Benedetto Fontana. Hegemony and Power: On the Relation between Gramsci

and Machiavelli. Minneapolis-London: U of Minnesota P, 1993; Benedetto Fontana. “The Democratic

Philosopher: Rhetoric as Hegemony in Gramsci.” Italian Culture 23 (2005): 97-123; Valentino

Gerratana. “Le forme dell‟egemonia.” In Gramsci: Problemi di metodo. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1997.

119-126; Peter Ives. Gramsci‟s Politics of Language: Engaging the Bakhtin Circle and the Frankfurt

School, Toronto: U of Toronto P, 2004; Peter Ives. Language and Hegemony in Gramsci. London-Ann

Arbor: Pluto, 2004; Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a

Radical Democratic Politics. London-New York: Verso, 1985; Leonardo Paggi. “Gramsci e l‟egemonia dall‟„Ordine nuovo‟ alla „Quistione meridionale.‟” In Biagio De Giovanni, Valentino Gerratana,

Leonardo Paggi. Egemonia, Stato, partito in Gramsci. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1977. 17-36; Palmiro

Togliatti. “Il leninismo nel pensiero e nell‟azione di A. Gramsci.” Scritti su Gramsci. Ed. Guido Liguori.

Roma: Ediori Riuniti, 2001; Giuseppe Vacca. “Egemonia e politica-potenza. La „filosofia della praxis‟

come programma.” Gramsci e Togliatti. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1991; Raymond Williams. “Hegemony.”

Keywords. New York: Oxford UP, 1976. 117-118. 383 See Franco Lo Piparo. Lingua, intellettuali, egemonia in Gramsci. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1979; Gianni

Francioni. L‟officina gramsciana. Ipotesi sulla struttura dei “Quaderni del carcere.” Napoli:

Bibliopolis, 1984; Giuseppe Cospito. “Egemonia.” In Fabio Frosini and Guido Liguori, eds. Le parole

di Gramsci: Per un lessico dei Quaderni del carcere. Ed. Fabio Frosini and Guido Liguori. Roma:

Carocci, 2004. 74-92; Cospito Giuseppe. “Egemonia.” In Guido Liguori and Pasquale Voza, eds.

Dizionario Gramsciano. Roma: Carocci, 2009. 266-269. Derek Boothman “The Sources for Gramsci‟s Concept of Hegemony.” Rethinking Marxism 20.2 (2008): 201-215 offers new important insights and

information for the discussion about the sources of Gramsci‟s pivotal concept. 384 A diachronic view allowed Francioni to critique what Perry Anderson considered antinomies of

Gramsci‟s thought. See Anderson. “The Antinomies of Antonio Gramsci.” See Gianni Francioni.

L‟officina gramsciana.

157

linguistics at the University of Torino (Lo Piparo), and as a strategic term leading towards

a post-Marxist notion of power and ideology (Laclau-Mouffe).386

If we look at Gramsci‟s notes closely, we can observe that the wide range of his

uses of the concept of hegemony is both applied as a category to discuss theoretical

issues concerning the political situation contemporary to him, but also adopted as an

insightful category for investigating, interpreting, and re-writing the past in its long arch

from antiquity to modernity.

This chapter is not dedicated to a nuanced philological search about Gramsci‟s

varied views on hegemony. It is rather devoted to trace one way through which Gramsci‟s

uses of the notion of hegemony in his notes concerning the medieval vernacular language

can be brought to bear on to reconsider Dante‟s hunt for an illustrious vernacular. From

this perspective, Dante‟s hunt appears as a search for cultural hegemony.

The modern term “hegemony” derives from the ancient Greek ¹ghmon…a

(hegemonia), whose root is the verb ¥gw (ago), to lead, to guide, to push forward.387

This

verb is also the basis of the Latin verb “agire,” to act. As the Etymological Dictionary of

Italian language records, the original idea incorporated in the verb “agire” “è quella di

muovere, d‟onde ne sorsero poi diversi significati, tali nel greco quelli di guidare,

menare, portare, alzare, allevare, sollevare (un peso), pesare, e fig. osservare, stimare,

giudicare, assumere in incarico, e nel latino anche andare, venire, fare, operare,

385 Alberto Burgio. “Il nodo dell‟egemonia in Gramsci. Appunti sulla struttura plurale di un concetto.” 386 For additional information on Gramsci‟s notion of hegemony and its interpreters see Guido Liguori.

“L‟egemonia e i suoi interpreti.” In Angelo D‟Orsi, ed. Egemonie. 45-64. See also Guido Liguori.

Gramsci conteso: Storia di un dibattito 1922-1996. Roma: Editori Riuniti, 1996. 387 From a historical perspective, the decision of which city should have be the ¹ghmon (hegemon, i.e. the

leader) among the most powerful cities of ancient Greece traces a crucial moment in the history of the

Greek civilization. See, for instance, John Wickersham. Hegemony and Greek Historians. Lanham:

Rowman&Littlefield, 1994.

158

diportarsi, vivere, procurare, trattare, dire, raccontare.”388

Throughout Gramsci‟s notes, “hegemony” does not simply equal generic terms

such as power (potere) or dominion (dominio), as an ordinary understanding of the word

might suggest. As Giuseppe Cospito observed, in dealing with the concept of hegemony,

already in the first notebook (Q 1, §44) “Gramsci oscilla tra un senso più ristretto di

„direzione,‟ contrapposto a „dominio,‟ e uno più ampio comprensivo di entrambi

(direzione e dominio).”389

Indeed, for Gramsci, a social group exerts its supremacy in two

ways, as political “dominion” and as “intellectual and moral direction.” Schematically,

political dominion, for Gramsci, is exerted over the political adversaries, while

“leadership” or “direction” is the type of relationship exerted on similar and allied

groups.390

As Q19, 24 (p. 2010) makes clear, Gramsci does not see these two modes as

simply opposed. He rather conceives them as two different phases of achieving political

hegemony, composed of both coercion and consent. Indeed, before achieving the political

governance,

un gruppo sociale può e anzi deve essere dirigente […]; dopo, quando esercita il

potere e anche se lo tiene fortemente in pugno, diventa dominante ma deve

continuare ad essere anche “dirigente.”391

In general terms, a cultural direction can be considered hegemonic, though not

fully dominant, when operatively it is able lead toward a diverse understanding of

reality.392

For this reason, cultural divulgation, i.e. the diffusion of culture in society, is a

388

Ottorino Pianigiani. Vocabolario etimologico della lingua italiana. Roma-Milano: Società editrice

Dante Alighieri di Albrighi Segati, 1907. 389 Giuseppe Cospito. “Egemonia.” In Guido Liguori and Pasquale Voza, eds. Dizionario Gramsciano. 266.

See also Cospito. “Egemonia.” In Fabio Frosini and Guido Liguori, eds. Le parole di Gramsci. 74-92. 390 See Q 4, §49. 476. 391 Q 19, §24. 2010-1. 392

Derek Boothman re-considered the notion of hegemony in comparison with Thomas Kuhn‟s concept of

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crucial element for achieving and/or changing the hegemony of one worldview or

another.393

In this respect, two notions are pivotal for Gramsci‟s view of hegemony. The first

is that “ogni rapporto di „egemonia‟ è necessariamente un rapporto pedagogico;”394

the

second, connected to the first, is that the conquest of hegemony cannot occur without

influencing the centers through which culture, language, and knowledge is diffused, as Q

29 finally emphasizes. For this reason, ethical-political history is crucial for Gramsci‟s

philosophy of praxis, because through this kind of history is possible to recognize “the

reality of a moment of hegemony,” i.e. of “the cultural and moral direction.”395

Hegemony is thus never a natural and eternal characteristic of our epistemological

and ideological view of reality.396

It is always involved in the historical world and, thus,

modifiable through both theoretical elaboration and political agency.397

This is why the

notion of hegemony does not refer to one specific ideology, although debates about

hegemony can involve discussions on different ideologies.

paradigm. See his Traduzione e traducibilità. Perugia: Guerra, 2004.

393 See Rocco Lacorte. “Divulgazione.” In Guido Liguori and Pasquale Voza, eds. Dizionario Gramsciano.

240. 394 See Q10(II), §44. 1331. In Gramsci‟s notion of pedagogy lies a complex notion of dialogue between

teacher and learner, in which both the teacher and the learner can be teachers and learners at the same

time. It is also to be recalled that Gramsci follows the distinction between instruction and education.

While for fascist philosopher and Minister of Education Giovanni Gentile, the pedagogical moment had

to focus on the instruction provided by the teacher to the learner, for Gramsci education as an inter-

subjective dialogue between teacher and learner is the key moment of both teaching and learning. 395 Q 10, §7. 1224. 396 A similar idea has been pointed out by Edward Said: “L‟egemonia non è un fatto scontato o naturale

della vita, ma è un prodotto storico, intorno al quale si svolge continuamente una lotta.” “Gramsci e

l‟unità di filosofia, politica, economia.” In Giorgio Baratta and Andrea Catone, eds. Modern Times:

Gramsci e la critica dell‟Americanismo. Milano: Diffusioni, 1987. 355. 397 Eternity as un-modifiability is what the notion of hegemony opposes the most. Not in the sense that faith

in eternal truths cannot be part of hegemonic ideological beliefs, which, on the contrary, is the most

commonly ideological notion used to maintain the stability of power relationships. In fact, the

consideration of hegemony as opposed to eternity means that hegemony presupposes notions of

contingency, sub-alternity, translation, metaphor, change and transformation of present states of affairs.

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Diverse ideologies can in turn be used to achieve hegemony. Therefore, processes

of achieving hegemony and engaging ideology are strictly connected. This corresponds to

Gramsci‟s contention that “l‟affermazione di Marx che gli uomini prendono coscienza nel

terreno delle ideologie ha un valore gnoseologico e non puramente psicologico e morale,

avrebbe anch‟esso pertanto un valore gnoseologico.”398

In other words, the consideration

of awareness-achievement through ideological-confrontation is rich with epistemic

implications.

This is also true for literary criticism, cultural studies, and intellectual history. As

Larry Scanlon observed, “the terms ideology and hegemony are crucial to redefining the

problem of authority, because they correct the idealizations of traditionalists like Hannah

Arendt. At the same time, we cannot use them as simple replacements of the older

term.”399

Gramsci‟s notion of “national-cultural politics” used in Q 29, §7 implies the

notion of cultural direction, as Q 29, §2 suggests.400

De vulgari eloquentia was, according

to Gramsci‟s interpretation, an attempt to give a new direction to culture against the

conservative view and use of Latin (that Gramsci in Q29, §7 called “mandarinismo

latineggiante”) and the political fragmentation of Italy. In this respect, Dante‟s search for

a vernacular eloquence is for Gramsci a cultural-political act aimed at attempting to

establish unity.

398 See Q 4, §38. 464-5; Q 10 II, §12. 1249. See also Boothman. “The Sources for Gramsci‟s Concept of

Hegemony.” 201-202. 399 Larry Scanlon. Narrative, Authority, and Power: The Medieval Exemplum and the Chaucerian

Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1994. 52. 400 “La grammatica normativa scritta è quindi sempre una „scelta‟, un indirizzo culturale, è cioè sempre un

atto di politica culturale-nazionale.” Q 29, §2. 2344.

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In the remainder of this chapter, I interpret Dante‟s hunt for an illustrious

vernacular as a search for a cultural hegemony. In doing so, I do not conceive the concept

of hegemony as a theoretical grid or structure to be mechanically imposed on Dante‟s

text, but I suggest a way to read Dante‟s poetic labor and his conceptualization of an

illustrious vernacular language as a process, both ideological and performative, to

achieve a leading cultural direction, i.e. a cultural hegemony.

2. Dante‟s Caesarism and Gramsci‟s Hegemony

Gramsci‟s notes on Dante imply and suggest that we obtain a better understanding

of Dante‟s writings and his intellectual evolution if we consider them from a historicist

perspective. In Q6, §85, Gramsci indeed pointed out that Dante‟s political theory (for

Gramsci, a utopia) was strictly related to his experience as an exile, marginalized by the

political struggles. In Dante‟s utopia – Gramsci contends – the war between classes could

have been abolished through the intervention of an “arbitrating power.”

Al disopra delle lotte interne comunali, che erano un alternarsi di distruzioni ed

estermini, Dante sogna una società superiore al Comune, superiore sia alla Chiesa

che appoggia i Neri come al vecchio impero che appoggiava i ghibellini, sogna

una forma che imponga una legge superiore alle parti ecc. È un vinto della guerra

delle classi che sogna l‟abolizione di questa guerra sotto il segno di un potere

arbitrale.401

The general purpose of this note is to distinguish the ways Dante and Machiavelli

deal with the historical past. Gramsci wishes to perform a strategy of criticism against

fascist (mis)uses of both Dante and Machiavelli as anticipatory theorists of the Duce –

Dante with the theory of the Emperor, Machiavelli with that of the Prince. For Gramsci,

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Dante looked at the Latin past to find and justify his view of Empire as the only form of

government that might have solved the class struggles, which generated his own defeat

and exile. As Gramsci emphasizes at the end of the note, Dante

è un vinto della guerra delle classi… Ma il vinto, con tutti i rancori, le passioni, i

sentimenti del vinto, è anche un “dotto” che conosce le dottrine e la storia del

passato. Il passato gli offre lo schema romano augusteo e il suo riflesso

medioevale, l‟Impero romano della nazione germanica. Egli vuole superare il

presente, ma con gli occhi rivolti al passato. Anche il Machiavelli aveva gli occhi

al passato, ma in ben altro modo di Dante ecc.402

Without analyzing in depth Gramsci‟s dialectical reasoning on Dante‟s and

Machiavelli‟s views on the past, it is worth noticing that the notion of an “arbitrating

power” between destructive forces is what Gramsci will consider as the essence of

Caesarism in Q 13.

Il cesarismo esprime una situazione in cui le forze in lotta si equilibrano in modo

catastrofico, cioè si equilibrano in modo che la continuazione della lotta non può

concludersi che con la ditruzione reciproca. Quando la forza progressiva A lotta

con la forza regressiva B, può avvenire che non solo che A vinca B o B vinca A,

può avvenire anche che non vinca nè A nè B, ma si svenino reciprocamente e una

terza forza C intervenga dall‟esterno assoggettando ciò che resta di A e di B. Ma il

cesarismo, se esprime sempre la “soluzione arbitrale,” affidata a una grande

personalità, di una situazione storico-politica caratterizzata da un equilibrio di

forze a prospettiva catastrofica, non ha sempre lo stesso significato storico.403

401 Q 6, §85. 759-60. Emphasis mine. 402 Ibid. 403 Q 13, §27. 1619. In a recent piece on the Corriere della sera, Luciano Canfora developed the idea that

Gramsci‟s reflections on Caesarism have important theoretical implications. As Canfora posits it, “in

queste pagine – nella prima e soprattutto nella seconda stesura – è racchiuso un giudizio meditato sia

sull‟esperienza del fascismo che – probabilmente – su quella dello stalinismo, considerate non già con

l‟occhio e il tono agitatorio di chi è immerso nella lotta e ne è parte, ma assunti in una razionalità della

storia di cui la categoria del „cesarismo‟ è la chiave. Ed è forse una chiave primaria per intendere

l‟intero corpus gramsciano carcerario, cioè successivo alla sconfitta ed al progressivo affermarsi del „Cesare.‟” See Luciano Canfora, “Così Gramsci disobbedì a Marx. Contro le sue indicazioni, applicò il

„cesarismo‟ a Napoleone III, Mussolini e forse anche Stalin.” Corriere della sera (August 28, 2009).

See also Canfora. Su Gramsci. Roma: Datanews, 2007. From this viewpoint, Gramsci‟s reflection on

Dante seems to be particular significant. Given that from a philological viewpoint, Q 6 (1930-1934)

chronologically precedes Q 13 (1932-1934), the use of the expression “arbitrating power” with regard

to Dante seems to anticipates the later use of the term in the notes about Caesarism. In this respect,

Gramsci‟s reflection on Dante‟s ethical-political views seems to be more relevant than it has been

recognized thus far.

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For Gramsci, the fatal divisions of the Communes in Dante‟s age conditioned the

Florentine poet to turn his gaze to the past in search for a theory of the Emperor as an

“arbitrating power” able to balance the divisive forces at play in the Communes.

Gramsci‟s idea can be supported through textual evidence from those of Dante‟s texts in

which the Florentine intellectual claimed that the offitium of the Emperor is to arbitrate

the conflicting parties and bring concordia to humanity.404

Indeed, passages such as De

Monarchia I.x, makes this clear.

Et ubicunque potest esse litigium, ibi debest esse iudicium; aliter esset

inperfectum sine proprio perfectivo: quod est inpossibile, cum Deus et natura in

necessariis non deficiat. Inter omnes duos principes, quorum alter alteri minime

subiectus est, potest esse litigium vel culpa ipsorum vel etiam subditorum – quod

de se patet –: ergo inter tales oportet esse iudicium. Et cum alter de altero

cognoscere non possit ex quo alter alteri non subditur – nam par in parem non

habet imperium – oportet esse tertium iurisdictionis amplioris qui ambitu sui iuris

ambobus principetur. Et hic aut erit Monarchia aut non. Si sic, habetur

propositum; si non, iterum habebit sibi coequalem extra ambitum sue

iurisdictionis: tunc iterum necessaries erit tertius alius. Et sic aut erit processus in

infinitu, quod esse non potest, aut oportebit divenire ad iudicem primum et

summum, de cuius iudicio cuncta litigia dirimantur sive mediate sive immediate:

et hic erit Monarcha sive Imperator. Est igitur Monarchia necessaria mundo. Et

hanc rationem videbat Phylosophus cum dicebat: “Entia nolunt male disponi;

malum autem pluralitas principatuum: unus ergo principes.” (Emphasis mine)

This passage describes in clear terms Dante‟s view on the Emperor as a historical

figure who incorporates an “arbitrating power” within a situation of conflict. It is this

situation to lead Dante claiming that the world-Monarchy was historically necessary (“est

igitur Monarchia necessaria mundo”). In other words, as Gramsci also emphasized, a

Caesarist arbitration is necessary when the forces at play in the political struggle “si

equilibrano in modo che la continuazione della lotta non può concludersi che con la

distruzione reciproca.” The arbitrating authority therefore does not simply intervene to

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absorb, appropriate or dominate other subaltern authorities, but to balance and provide a

common measure to their behaviors in order to keep them alive and allow them to co-

exist.

It should be highlighted that Marxist notions of hegemony, and particularly

Gramsci‟s, do not correspond to this notion of Caesarist authority. Actually, from a

typological viewpoint on politics, what characterizes political systems founded on

hegemony, such as modern democracies, is the absence of an arbitrating party external to

those in conflict. These political systems allow and are constitutively made through the

acceptance of a dialectic between at least two parties, coalition, or social groups, A and B,

in which one can influence and rule the other, and vice versa. In this sense, for Gramsci,

hegemony, dialectics, and modern democracy are interrelated ideas.405

Though hegemonic systems are not based on the arbitrating power of an authority

external to the conflict among parties, we should point out that power relationships such

as arbitration and hegemony are not simply mutually exclusive. One can indeed argue

that arbitration among conflicting groups and individuals is a determinant relationship

needed to achieve hegemony in specific context. In fact, in those situations “a prospettiva

catastrofica,” without forms of arbitration, the dispersion and destruction of conflicting

elements cannot be transcended, and social groups cannot be formed. In other words,

hegemony can be achieved only when a concordia discors (i.e. a form of unity in

diversity and diversity in unity406

) is realized within the party, coalition, or the social

404 Mon. III.x.5. 405 Q 8, §191. 1056. “Egemonia e democrazia. Tra i tanti significati di democrazia, quello più realistico e

concreto mi pare si possa trarre in connessione col concetto di egemonia. Nel sistema egemonico, esiste

democrazia tra il gruppo dirigente e i gruppi diretti.” 406 The expression “unity in diversity” is also employed by Christian Moevs in “The Metaphysical Basis of

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group.

Now, turning back to Gramsci‟s assertion that “Ogni volta che affiora... la

quistione della lingua, significa che si sta imponendo una serie di altri problemi: la

formazione e l‟allargamento della classe dirigente, la necessità di stabilire rapporti più

intimi e sicuri tra i gruppi dirigenti e la massa popolare-nazionale,”407

the following

question should be tackled: Does Dante‟s arduous search for an illustrious vernacular

language imply an articulation of the relationships between ruling and non-ruling groups?

Did Dante, having been defeated by political struggles, attempt to re-organize his idea of

the ideal vernacular through a class-centered view of language or through an ideal inter-

classist language?

It is difficult to provide one brief answer to this question, for Dante‟s worldview

cannot be simply absorbed into a series of sociological schemes. In what follows I

attempt to sketch a way to tackle these questions.

3. Geography, Society, and the Ethical Court

The first book of Dve is designed along 13 main issues, which can be outlined as

follows: 1. What is the topic of the treatise and why it is useful? 2. What do vernacular

language and grammar mean? 3. Who needs language and who does not? 4. What is

language? 5. Who is the first speaker and what did he say in his first speech? 6. To whom

Dante‟s Politics.” In Michelangelo Picone, Theodore Cachey Jr., and Margherita Mesirca, eds. Le

culture di Dante: Studi in onore di Robert Hollander. Firenze: Cesati, 2003. 215-241. In Gramsci

studies Peter Ives has argued that Gramsci‟s notion of hegemony can be seen as a form of diversity-in-

unity. See Peter Ives. Gramsci‟s Politics of Language. Toronto: U Toronto P, 2004. 84. 407 Q 29, §3. 2345-6.

166

did the first speaker speak? 7. Which language did the first speaker use? 8. Why are there

numerous languages? 9. How are languages geographically distributed? 10. How many

vernacular languages are there in Italy? 11. Which one is the most illustrious? 12. What is

an illustrious vernacular and why is it necessary? 13. What is the plan of the treatise?

As it is clear from this list of issues, no extended discussion is given to the

question of how Dante‟s language is related to a class-centered perspective. Nonetheless,

in reading Dante‟s treatise closely, one can find helpful elements to tackle the question.

As is known, Dante‟s judgments of the fourteen vernaculars of Italy are varied: Tuscan

and Roman idioms are rejected because they are a “tristiloquium” and “turpiloquium;”

the vernacular idioms of the Marchigiani, Spoletini, Milanesi, and Bergamaschi, are

ridiculed by poets; those of the Friulani and Istriani, along with the mountain and

countryside people do not sound well as urban vernaculars; Sardinians are placed into a

paradoxical situation, for they do not really speak a vernacular but imitate Latin grammar

as apes imitate humans; the Apulians are rejected because they speak rough idioms close

to Roman and Marchigiano. The only two idioms to receive a favorable evaluation from

Dante are Bolognese and Sicilian, but they are rejected because not corresponding to

what he was hunting.408

Dante‟s view on the Sicilian vernacular idiom, i.e. the closest to the illustrious

vernacular the poet is hunting, is particular helpful in dealing with the relationship

between language and class in Dante.409

Dante himself admits that what he was searching

408 For a discussion of the political implications of Dante‟s structuring of Italian vernaculars into inferior

and superior with a particular focus on his treatment of Sardinian see Selenu Ideas. Un sentiero

gramsciano verso la lingua sarda. Sassari: EDES, forthcoming. 409 Dve I.xii.2. “Et primo de siciliano examinemus ingenium: nam videtur sicilianum vulgare sibi famam

pre aliis asciscere, eo quod quicquid poetantur Ytali sicilianum vocatur, et eo quod perplures doctores

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was not the idiom spoken by the “mediocris” inhabitants of the island.410

In other words, the ideal vernacular language was not the idiom of low classes. It

was rather modeled on the language of courtly poetry, which Dante, in dealing with the

Apulian vernacular, also refers as “polita” (refined) and rich in “vocabula curialora”

(courtly words).411

The courtly aspect of the illustrious language refers not only to an

aesthetic dimension but is also the product of the ethical-political habitus expressed in the

courts, as Dante‟s appreciation of the Sicilian court and Frederick the Second makes

clear.412

If Dante‟s worldview is never directed to the lower-middle classes

(“mediocribus”), neither does it favor of the aristocratic families (among which Farinata

indigenas invenimus graviter cecinisse [...]” English translation: “First let us turn our attention to the

language of Sicily, since the Sicilian vernacular seems to hold itself in higher regard than any other, first

because all poetry written by Italians is called „Sicilian,‟ and then because we do indeed find that many

learned natives of that island have written serious poetry […]” 410 Dve I.xii.6. “Et dicimus quod, si vulgare sicilianum accipere volumus secundum quod prodit a terrigenis

mediocribus, ex ore quorum iudicium eliciendu videtur, prelationis honore minime dignum est, quia non

sinde quondam tempore profertur [...].” English Trans.: “So I say that, if by Sicilian vernacular we

mean what is spoken by the average inhabitants of the island – and they should clearly be our standard

of comparison – then this is far from worthy of the honour of heading the list, because it cannot be

pronounced without a certain drawl […]” 411 See Dve I.xii.8. 412 Dve I.xii.3-4: “Sed hec fama trinacrie terre, si recte signum ad quod tendit inspiciamus, videtur tantu in

obproprium ytalorum principum remansisse, qui non heroic more sed plebeio secuntur superbiam.

Siquidem illustres heroes, Fredericus Cesar et benegnitus eius Manfredus, nobilitatem ac rectitudinem

sue forme pandentes, dones fortuna permisit, humana secuti sunt, brutalia dedignantes. Propter quod

corde nobiles atque gratiarum dotati inherere tantorum principum maiestati conati sunt, ita ut eorum

tempore quicquid excellentes animi Latinorum enitebantur primitus in tantorum coronatorum aula

prodibat; et quia regale solium erat Sicilia, factum est ut quicquid nostril predecessors vulgariter

prolerunt, sicilianum vocetur: quod quidem retinemus et nos, nec posteri nostril permutare valebunt.”

English Trans.: “But this fame enjoyed by the Trinacrian isle, if we carefully consider the end to which

it leads, seems rather to survive only as a reproof to the princes of Italy, who are so puffed up with pride that they live in a plebeian, not a heroic, fashion. Indeed, those illustrious heroes, the Emperor Frederick

and his worthy son Manfred, knew how to reveal the nobility and integrity that were in their hearts; and,

as long as fortune allowed, they lived in a manner befitting men, despising the bestial life. On this

account, all who were noble of heart and rich in graces strove to attach themselves to the majesty of

such worthy princes, so that, in their day, all that the most gifted individuals in Italy brought forth first

came to light in the court of these two great monarchs. And since Sicily was the seat of the imperial

throne, it came about that whatever our predecessors wrote in the vernacular was called „Sicilian.‟ This

term is still in use today, and posterity will be able to do nothing to change it.”

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and Cavalcante are good examples) nor the newborn bourgeois social groups composed

of notaries, bankers, and merchants.413

In this respect, the view of Dante as the poet of the

medieval Italian bourgeoisie is not compelling.414

Dante‟s judgments are indeed harshly

addressed against the old elites and the newborn bourgeois classes. Many instances

provide evidence. One can recall: Dante‟s criticism against the transformation of

literature into a commodity in the Convivio; his invectives against European kings in Par.

18, Pope Boniface VIII in Inf. 19 and Purg. 20, the “greedy wolves” who led the Church

as in Par. 27;415

or his scorn for the “mala segnoria” of Charles I of Anjou that generated

in Sicilian popular classes a spirit of violence during the Vespers.416

Yet, as I have recalled in the previous chapter, in dealing with the reasons why

there are multiple languages on the earth, Dante refers to the divine punishment of ruling

classes accountable for projecting the Tower of Babel and indicates the overturning of the

social hierarchy through a parallel between language and labor distribution.

Therefore, it is misleading to represent Dante‟s political and linguistic view as

413 For Dante‟s political view under a social perspective see John Najemy. “Florence.” In Richard Lansing,

ed. Encyclopedia Dantesca. New York: Routledge, 2000 and A History of Florence. Oxford: Blackwell,

2006; Justin Steinberg. Accounting for Dante: Urban Readers and Writers in Late Medieval Italy. Notre

Dame: U of Notre Dame P, 2007. Albert R. Ascoli. Dante and the Making of a Modern Author.

Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 2008. See also Aldo Vallone. “Lineamenti di Dante medievale.” In Studi su

Dante medievale. Firenze: Olschki, 1965. 11-20. 414 In his preface to the Italian Edition of the Communist Manifesto dated 1893 and translated by Antonio

Labriola, Engles whished that “Come l‟Italia borghese medievale ebbe il suo poeta in Dante, speriamo

che anche l‟Italia proletaria abbia il suo nuovo poeta.” In the same respect, I also find Pasolini‟s attempt to attach Dante to a specific class-centered language not compelling. According to Pasolini, the

enlargement of Dante‟s linguistic spectrum is related to Dante‟s decision to write the Comedy in the

“lingua della borghesia comunale fiorentina.” Pier Paolo Pasolini. “La volontà di Dante a essere poeta.”

In Empirismo eretico. Milano: Garzanti, 2000. 104. 415 “Non fu la sposa di Cristo allevata / del sangue mio, di Lin, di quel di Cleto, / per essere ad acquisto

d‟oro usata; / ma, per acquisto d‟oro usata; / ma per, acquisto d‟esto viver lieto, / e Sisto e Pio e Calisto

e Urbano / sparser lo sangue dopo molto fleto. / [...] In vesta di pastor lupi rapaci / si veggion di qua su

per tutti i paschi: / o difesa di Dio, perchè pur giaci?” Par. 27.40-45 and 55-57. 416 Par. 8.73. “se mala segnoria, che sempre accora / li popoli suggetti, non avesse / mosso Palermo a

gridar: “Mora, mora!”

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simply the expression of one social group. More than the belonging to a specific class,

Dante judges the behaviors of ruling groups and individuals by through what he

considered a just ethical agency. In other words, behind Dante‟s evaluations and

judgments there is always an ethical-political position.

What Dante attempted to propose in Dve was a type of language able to transcend

the divisions produced by municipal divisive forces. At the time of De vulgari

eloquentia, Dante was conscious that the type of vernacular language he was hunting was

not a stable object to find in a specific place. In fact, it is conceived as a scent spread

through the Italian territory.417

Given the absence of a central court – an institution that we can parallel with

Bartoli and Gramsci‟s notion of “irradiation center”418

– this language was expression of

those who had to move from one royal court to the other. Dante identifies these hosting

places as “humble asylums.”419

Therefore, in the historical period in which Dante was writing his works, the

vernacular language is a pilgrim like the poet in exile. Yet, the political direction he tries

to indicate in his treatise traces a way to produce a common language of Italy to be

spread by a central court (Dve I.xviii). This language is described as illustre, curiale,

aulica, and cardinale.420

Given the dispersive and exilic nature of the vernacular idioms

417 Dve I.xvi.4-5. 418 See Q 29. 419 Dve I.xviii.3: “Et hinc est quod in regiis omnibus conversantes semper illustri vulgari locuntur; hinc

etiam est quod nostrum illustre velut acola peregrinatur et in humilibus ospitatur asilis, cum aula

vacemus.” Emphasis mine. English Trans.: “So this is why those who frequent any royal court always

speak an illustrious vernacular; it is also why our illustrious vernacular wanders around like a homeless

stranger, finding hospitality in more humble homes – because we have no court.” 420 As Gramsci would highlight, to produce a common language means to stimulate a new intellectual

order, a new philosophy. In this respect, the fact that Dante was writing the linguistic treatise of the De

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and the absence of a central court, what characterizes for Dante the unity of the illustrious

vernacular language was a “gratiosum lumen rationis.”421

In light of the parallel between linguistic dispersion and exilic condition, it is

worth to point out that Dante imagined his hunt for the illustrious vernacular as tied to the

search for the glory of the language, to which he refers both in Dve I.vii and Purg. 11.

The glory of language for Dante has a transformative potential, given that it can help the

poet to transcend the exilic conditions of poverty and eradication in which he was living.

In the terms of Dve, the metaphor of the panther is suggestive in this sense. Like the

sweet scent produced by the panther, the sweet style of the illustrious vernacular

generates the glory of the language, one that might direct the will beyond exilic

dispersion: “Quantum vero suos familiares gloriosos efficiat, nos ipsi novimus, qui huius

dulcedine glorie nostrum exilium postergamus.”422

Therefore, the “gratiosum lumen rationis” embedded in the illustrious language is

imagined in Dve I.xvii.4-5 as a general principle able to transform people‟s will and

social belonging.

Quod autem exaltatum sit potestate, videtur. Et quid maioris potestatis est quam

quod humana corda versare potest, ita ut nolentem volentem et volentem nolentem

faciat, velut ipsum et fecit et facit? Quod qutem honore sublimet, in promptu est.

Nonne domestici sui reges, marchiones, comites, et magnates quoslibet fama

vincunt? Minime hoc probatione indiget.423

vulgari eloquentia in parallel with his philosophical treatise of the Convivio seems significant.

421 On the expression “gratiosum lumen rationis” see A. P. D‟Entreves. Dante as a Political Thinker.

Oxford: Clarendon, 1952. 76-97. 422 Dve I.xvii.6: “And I myself have known how greatly it increases the glory of those who serve it, I who,

for the sake of that glory‟s swetness, have the experience of exile behind me.” 423 Dve I.xvii.4-5: “That it is exalted in power is plain. And what greater power could there be than that

which can melt the hearts of human beings, so as to make the unwilling willing and the willing

unwilling, as it is has done and still does? That it raises to honour is readily apparent. Does not the fame

of its devotees exceed that of any king, marquis, count or warlord? There is no need to prove this. And I

myself have known how greatly it increases glory of those who serve it, I who, for the sake of that

glory‟s sweetness, have the experience of exile behind.”

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As particularly the Comedy will factually demonstrate, Dante‟s elevation of the

vernacular as a powerfully expressive language of poetry does not exclude vulgar

linguistic elements.424

On the contrary, as Pasolini remarked, “l‟allargamento linguistico

di Dante, dovuto allo spostamento del suo punto di vista in alto – l‟universalismo

teologico medioevale – non è solo un allargamento dell‟orizzonte lessicale e espressivo:

ma, insieme, anche sociale.”425

4. Illustrious Vernacular, Poetic Justice, and Poetry of Praxis

As we have seen, according to Q 29, §7, in the period of the Communes,

intellectuals and, in the most evident way, Dante‟s Dve elevated „the fact into theory.‟

From this standpoint, it is worth reading Dante‟s treatise closely. In this respect, Dve

I.xvi-xix is particularly relevant, since in this part of the treatise Dante shifts from the

description of linguistic facts to the theorization of his ideal language.

In Dante‟s hunt for an illustrious vernacular language we can recognize at least

two modes of inquiry. The first aims to empirically report and judge the diverse

vernacular idioms of Italy, while the second aims at constructing an ideal concept of

language through which measuring and selecting the elements to be incorporated in the

language Dante was looking for. These two modes are not separate and independent;

rather, they are complementary and interdependent.

After the empirical search for an illustrious vernacular in chapters xi-xv fails,

Dante in the following sections (xvi-xix) provides a theory of the illustrious vernacular

424 Here I am intentionally using the term „vulgar‟ in its ambivalent sense of coarse and popular. 425

Pasolini. “La volontà di Dante a essere poeta.” In Empirismo eretico. Milano: Garzanti, 2000. 104.

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language. Actually, although, in the structure of the treatise, the mapping of the

vernacular idioms of Italy precedes the theorization of a concept of illustrious language,

one could wonder to what extent Dante‟s mapping and selection of the Italian vernacular

idioms derives from a preliminary conceptualization of an ideal vernacular.one. In other

words, how could Dante distinguish good and bad vernacular forms, without having

already an ideal model through which measuring and comparing the diverse vernacular

idioms?

This question leads to a breakup of the linearity of the textual structure and allows

us to have a better view on the rhetorical strategy Dante uses to present his arguments in

the first book of his treatise. In Dve I.xvi-xix, Dante establishes his authority on the

theory of the illustrious vernacular by employing different strategies, the first of which

was to declare the failure of his previous empirical search and, consequently, to claim that

a theory of the illustrious vernacular would help the hunter to catch his prey (Dve I, xvi,

1). Yet, through his first attempt to hunt the illustrious vernacular language in chapters xi-

xv, Dante has already begun to persuade his readers that he had acquired such an

extended knowledge of the linguistic matter to be able to define, select, and reject the

fourteen vernacular idioms of Italy.

After acquiring this authoritative position, Dante can now direct his strategy to

catch the panther and move from an empirical investigation to the theory of the illustrious

vernacular language. It is important to emphasize the specific rhetorical strategy Dante

employs when he claims that a theory of language is needed, since the preliminary

empirical search through the Italian forest had failed. This strategy, in my view, aims at

persuading the reader that theory comes after the observation of reality, which is difficult

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to believe from a logical perspective.

Dante does not imagine this search for theory as an ascent to a transcendent

realm. Rather he imagines it as a moment of action in which he grabs the hunting

weapons (“venabula nostra”426

) to continue his hunt for the panther. The hunting

weapons to which Dante refers, arguably, are related to the “solerti studio” indicated a

few lines earlier. Indeed, in re-arming himself, the poet engages specifically logical

reasoning – a point that confirms that his hunt consists of a rational investigation

(“rationabilius investigemus”427

) as highlighted in the preceding paragraph (Dve I.xvi.1).

Resumentes igitur venabula nostra, dicimus quod in omni genere rerum unum

esse oportet quo generis illius omnia comparentur et ponderentur, et a quo

omnium aliorum mensuram accipiamus: sicut in numero cuncta mensurantur uno,

et plura vel pauciora dicuntur secundum quod distant ab uno vel ei propinquant, et

sicut in coloribus omnes albo mensurantur – nam visibiles magis et minus

dicuntur secundum quod accedunt vel recedunt ab albo.428

In this passage, Dante engages in analogical reasoning. The language he is

hunting is considered analogous to the color white and the number one. They are

respectively standards of measurement for balancing other colors and other numbers.429

Likewise, the illustrious vernacular language should be the unit of measurement for other

vernacular forms.430

Dante‟s parallel co-ordinating the illustrious vernacular, the color

426 Dante took the term “venabula” and “irretiamus” (Dve I.xvi.1) from Aeneid 4.131, “retia rara, plagae,

lato venabula ferro.” 427 Dve I.xvi.1. 428 Dve I.xvi.2. This excerpt constitutes the textual bridge connecting Dante‟s admission of the failure of the

previous empirical search (Dve I.xvi.1) to the definition of the concept of an illustrious vernacular

language (Dve I.xvi.2ff). English Trans.: “Accordingly, I take up my equipment once more for the hunt,

and state that in any kind of thing there needs to be one instance with which all others can be compared,

against which they can be weighed, and from which we derive the standard by which all others are

measured. Thus, in arithmetic, all numbers are measured by comparison with the nuber one, and are

deemed larger or smaller according to their relative distance from or closeness to that number. Likewise

with colours, all are measured against white, and held to be brighter or darker as they approach or

recede from that colour.” 429 The notion of “balance” is also tied to the root of the verb “ago” – the etymological root for hegemony. 430

On the notion of illustrious vernacular as a measure, see also Daniela Boccassini. Il volo della mente.

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white, and the number one helps us to reflect on the ethical-political value of his search

for an illustrious vernacular. Indeed, Dante employs a similar parallel in De Monarchia,

when he defines his view about justice.

Ad evidentiam subassumpte sciendum quod iustitia, de se et in propria natura

considerata, est quedam rectitude sive regula obliquum hinc ind abiciens: et sic

non recipit magis et minus, quemadmodum albedo in suo abstracto considerata.431

In this passage, Dante conceives justice as a rule and rectitude, to which one

cannot subtract or add anything, similarly to the color white considered abstractly. As the

Comedy will clarify, the color white is an effect of the light irradiated by the sum

goodness of God, “che non ha fine e sé con sé misura” (Par. 19). Only sins can obscure

this light and disjoint its unity:

Solo il peccato è quel che la disfranca,

e falla dissimile al sommo bene;

per che del lume suo poco s‟imbianca.432

In this respect, Dante‟s contention in Conv. I.xiii.12 that the vernacular language

or culture “sarà luce nuova, sole nuovo, lo quale surgerà là dove l‟usato tramonterà, e

darà lume a coloro che sono in tenebre e in oscuritade, per lo usato sole che a loro non

luce” seems to be poignant. It indeed indicates that the vernacular is not only a means of

communication for Dante but a transformative means able to bring light on those who are

obscured by the decline of the “usato sole,” arguably the Latin language. The light-sun

metaphor as applied to the vernacular language/culture is coherent with the idea of an

„illustrious vernacular‟ embodying a „gratiosum lumen rationis.‟

Ravenna: Longo, 2003. 340. Boccassini interprets Dve I.xvi as if implying a “de-ontologizzazione della

pantera-vernacolare illustre, la quale non è in realtà un „essere‟ bensì una misura dell‟essere, un

dinamico manifestarsi e trapassare del „divino‟ nel linguaggio.” 431 Mon. I.xi.3. English trans.: “one must be aware that Justice, considered in herself and in her own nature,

is a certain rectitude or rule avoiding any deviation to either side, and, that, thus, she accepts nothing

more and nothing less, just as does whiteness, considered in the abstract.”

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Now, as is known, rectitude is exactly what Dante, in the second book of Dve,

considers to be the subject of his own poetry, which he mastered better than any other

poet in Italy.433

Dante‟s self-awareness of being an authority for ethical poetry, i.e. a type

of poetry aimed at directing the human will toward virtue and justice is particularly

relevant for our search on the ethical-political significance of his linguistic and poetic

project. Indeed, as implied in Dve I.ii.1-8, his search for poetic excellence bears a sense

of poetic justice434

aimed at directing the readers‟ will. This is why we might see Dante‟s

poetic work as a poetry of praxis, in which poetry and theory are directed toward the goal

432 Par. 7.78-80. See also Conv. III.ii.5-6. 433 Dve II.ii.1-8. “Postquam non omnes versificantes sed tantum excellentissimos illustre uti vulgare debere

astruximus, consequens est atruere atrum utrum omnia ipso tractanda sin taut non; et si non omnia, que

ipso digna sunt segregatim ostendere. […] Unde cum hoc quod dicimus illustre sit optimum aliorum

vulgarium, consequens est ut sola optima digna sint ipso tractari, que quidem tractandorum dignissima

nuncupamus. […] Quare hec tria, salus videlicet, venus et virtus, apparent esse illa magnolia que sint

maxime pertractanda, hoc est ea que maxime sunt ad ista, ut armorum probitas, amoris accensio et

directio voluntatis. Circa que sola, si bene recolimus, illustres viros invenimus vulgariter poetasse,

scilicet Bertramum de Bornio arma, Arnaldum Danielem armorem, Gerardum de Bornello rectitudinem;

Cynum Pistoiensem amorem, amicum eius rectitudinem. […] Arma vero nullum latium adhuc invenio

poetasse.” Emphases mine. English Trans.: “Now that I have explained that not all poets, but only the very best of them, should use the illustrious vernacular, it becomes necessary to establish whether or not

it can be used to discuss all subjects; and, if not, to show separately which subjects are worthy of it. […]

So since the vernacular I call illustrious is the best of all vernaculars, it follows that only the best

subjects are worthy to be discussed in it, and those, of the subjects that can be discussed, are those ones

we call most worthy. […] So these three things, well-being, love, and virtue, appear to be those most

important subjects that are to be treated in the loftiest style; or at least this is true of the themes most

closely associated with them, prowess in arms, ardour in love, and control of one‟s own will. On these

themes alone, if I remember rightly, we find that illustrious individuals have written poetry in the

vernacular: Bertran de Born on arms, Arnaut Daniel on love, Giraut de Borneil on integrity; Cino da

Pistoia on love, his friend on integrity. […] As for arms, I find that no Italian has yet treated them in

poetry.” 434 The notion of “poetic justice” was also used by John Freccero in “Infernal Irony: The Gates of Hell.”

Dante: The Poetics of Conversion. 105: “I would like to suggest rather that the punishments are a clear

example of what was later to be called „poetical justice,‟ with all of the irony that the phrase implies.”

Yet, we can also assert the opposite that the use of “irony” in specific contexts can enact forms of

“poetic justice.” For a political evaluation of irony and sarcasm see Gramsci. Q 26, §5. 2301. “Il

„sarcasmo‟ (come nel piano letterario ristretto dell‟educazione dei piccoli gruppi, l‟„ironia‟) appare

pertanto come la componente letteraria di una serie di esigenze teoriche e pratiche che superficialmente

possono apparire come insanabilmente contraddittorie; il suo elemento essenziale è la „passionalità‟ che

diventa criterio della potenza stilistica individuale (della sincerità, della profonda convinzione in

opposto al pappagallismo e al meccani<ci>smo).” For a theoretical discussion of the notion of poetic

justice see also Martha C. Nussbaum. Poetic Justice: The Literary Imagination and Public Life. Boston:

Beacon, 1995.

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of “enlighten” (lucidare) the understanding of the vulgares gentes in order to re-direct

their wills toward a collective sense of civil concord.435

In this respect, the fictional construction of the figure of Beatrice as an

embodiment of virtue and source of freedom is pivotal. Indeed, as Virgil makes clear in

Inf. 2.105, Beatrice was the person that allowed Dante to emerge from the “volgare

schiera.”436

Coherently, in Par. 31, Dante depicts Beatrice as the woman who saved and

435 The notion of “poetry of praxis” is at odds with Aristotle‟s distinction between “praxis” and “poiesis.”

Evidence that Dante did not espouse a radical distinction between praxis and poetry is provided by the

metaphor of the “fabbro” used to refer to his own poetic labor and the verb “fabbricare” to refer to the

labor-action needed to produce language. In addition, Mon. I.ii.5 provides evidence that political

theorization is for Dante a moment of both agency (praxis) and making (poiesis). In this respect, Dante

enacts a nexus among praxis, poiesis, and theory. As Gramsci pointed out in Q8, §199, one should

“research, study, and critique the various forms in which the concept of the unity of theory and praxis

has been presented in the history of ideas. „Intellectus speculativus extensione fit practicus‟ [by St.

Thomas]: theory by simple extension becomes practice – an affirmation of the necessary connection

between the order of ideas and the order of facts that is found in Artistotelian philosophy and in

scholasticism. Likewise, the other aphorism [on science (by Leibniz) that is quoted as]: „quo magis speculative magis practica.‟ Vico‟s proposition „verum ipsum factum,‟ which Croce develops in the

idealistic sense, namely that knowing is doing and that one knows that which one does (…). Historical

materialism is certainly indebted to this concept (as originally found in Hegel and not in its Crocean

derivation).” On recent engagement of Vico‟s views see Timothy Brennan. Wars of Position: The

Cultural Politics of Left and Right. New York: Columbia, 2006. For Aristotle‟s distinction between

“praxis” and “poiesis” see Franco Volpi. “The Rehabilitation of Practical Philosophy and Neo-

Aristotelianism.” In Robert Bartlett and Susan D. Collins, eds. Action and Contemplation: Studies in the

Moral and Political Thought of Aristotle. Albany, NY: State U of New York P, 1999. 3-25. 436 As I have already remarked in the third chapter, the category of “volgare” does not simply relate to

notions of literacy, linguistic division, labor distribution, or power relations, entails a complex ethical-

political worldview in which notions of individual will, free choice, and vice are interdependently at

stake. What Dante‟s view of the “volgare gente” suggests (if we also follow Convivio) is that people are or become “vulgar” – in the ethical-political sense I have pointed out in the third chapter – when they

are led by sins and vices, in particular by avarice and greed (cupidigia). Dante‟s love for Beatrice made

him able to overcome the “vulgare schiera,” by liberating the poet from the servitude of vices. Dante

uses the term “volgare” only once in the Comedy and very rarely in his other poems. The quasi-absence

of the term in his poems may be a semiotic trace that points to the work of de-vulgarization Dante

attempted to enact through his poetic labor. Indeed, for Dante, only poetry could harmonize and re-

organize the confused and disaggregated linguistic world of the diverse Italian vernacular idioms.

Moreover, the association of “volgare” and “schiera” in Inf. 2.105 covers an oxymoron: “volgare” refers

to the status of “dispersion,” “disaggregation” embedded in the Latin term “vulgus,” while “schiera”

refers to a form of unified aggregate of people similar to that of the troop or the beehive. The oxymoron

offers a fine image of the way Dante, through the love of Beatrice, sought to become a singularity, i.e. an exception, the out-standing intellectual who was able to emerge (uscì) from the “volgare schiera.”

The fact that almost at the end of his journey, Dante recalls this view of Beatrice and his own laborious

efforts to transcend the homologation of the vulgar multitude is particularly significant. This allows us

to think that what Dante narrates in the second canto of the Inferno not only expresses Dante‟s

distinction from preceding courtly poetry in the vernacular. Actually, as a mnemonic trace, this verse

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liberated him from his sins:

Tu m‟hai di servo tratto a libertate

per tutte quelle vie, per tutt‟i modi

che di ciò fare avei la potestate.437

Therefore, the ethical dimension Beatrice incorporates in the narrative of the

Comedy as well as the stylistic exemplarity of the “maestro and autore” Virgil are the

major means Dante-the author employs to imagine the „de-vulgarization of his own self,‟

and, potentially, of the vulgar people(s).438

Now, as we have seen, rectitude is what Dante in the Dve had recognized as the

main feature of his own poetry. The term “rectitude” is also connected to that of justice

and both of them are for Dante units of measurement though which judging human

agency and desires. This unit of measurement for Dante cannot be multiple: it is a unity

through which the multiplicity of the real could be harmonized. As Justinian will say in

Par. 6,

nel commensurar di nostri gaggi

col merto è parte di nostra letizia,

perchè non li vedem minor nè maggi.

Quindi, addolcisce la viva giustizia

in noi l‟affetto sì, che non si puote

torcer già mai ad alcuna nequizia.

also prefigures the poet‟s hope for salvation as also expressed, for instance, in Par. 31.79-90: “O donna

in cui la mia speranza vige, / e che soffristi per la mia salute / in inferno lasciar le tue vestige, / di tante

cose quant‟i‟ ho vedute, / dal tuo podere e dalla tua bontate / riconosco la grazia e la virtute. [...]” 437 Emphasis mine. Here the notion of “fare” is of particular force and, I suggest, should be inter-textualized

with Mon. I.ii.5 in which it is said: “Est ergo sciendum quod quedam sunt que, nostre potestati minime

subiacentia, speculari tantummodo possumus, operari autem non: velut mathematica, physica et divina;

quedam vero sunt que, nostre potestati subiacentia, non solum speculari sed etiam operari possumus: et

in his non operatio propter speculationem, sed hec propter illam assummitur, quoniam in talibus

operatio est finis.” English Trans.: “For it must be noted that there are certain things (such as

mathematics, the sciences and divinity) which are outside human control, and about which we can only theorize, but which we cannot affect by our actions; and then there are certain things which are without

our control, where we can not only theorize but also act, and in these action is not for the sake of theory,

but theorizing is for the sake of taking action, since in these the objective is to take action.” 438 It is important to emphasize the prophetic nature of Dante‟s vision. Dante saw in his own destiny a

Messianic moment rich with effects for the humanity to come.

178

Diverse voci fanno dolci note;

così diversi scanni in nostra vita

rendon dolce armonia tra queste rote.439

The ideological cluster including notions of unity, measure, justice, joy,

sweetness, unity in diversity, and harmony is, I argue, the nexus between Dante‟s ethical-

political and linguistic views. Dante‟s use of the term „note‟ seems to embody this nexus.

Indeed, he also uses it to refer to the linguistic elements of his own Commedia, when in

Inf. 16.127-130, behaving as both a judge and a witness, he swears to his readers that he

is telling the truth: “ma qui tacer nol posso; e per le note / di questa comedìa, lettor, ti

giuro, / s‟elle non sien di lunga grazia vote, ch‟i‟ vidi per quell‟aere grosso e scuro /

venire notando una figura in suso.”

In addition, Dante‟s uses of the term “note” might be placed in inter-textual

relationship with the contrast between God‟s and Dante‟s „notare‟ to the Nimrodian idiom

„ch‟a nullo è noto.‟ In this sense, Dante‟s poetic labor of “noting” aims at expressing and

elaborating the unity through which comparing and measuring the diverse Italian

vernacular idioms.

5. Dante‟s Poetic Imperialism: a Project for a Future Cultural Hegemony?

The Emperor is for Dante a unit of measurement, a bearer of justice, the only

power/authority that can restore peace and bring concordia among dispersed and

conflicting powers.440

He is a “cavalcatore”441

of the human will and his office is to lead

439 Par. 6.117-126. 440 If we look closely to Dante‟s political treatise, De Monarchia, we find that the notion of unit of

measurement (mensura) is crucial. See, for instance, Mon. III.xi.1. “Summunt etenim sibi principium de

decimo Prime phylosophie dicentes: omnia que sunt unius generis reducuntur ad unum, quod est

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the human will toward a new direction of peace and concordia.

For Dante, bearing justice on earth, i.e. the imperative expressed in the heaven of

Jupiter by the eagle of souls (“Diligite Iustitiam… Qui Iudicatis Terram…” Par. 19),

means not only to apply a law over the political parties, but also to lead the human will

toward a new direction of concordia. The scene of the eagle, presented in Par. 19,

perfectly exemplifies the sense of concordia meant as a form of unity in diversity. As

Ronald Martinez highlights, “the „just and pious eagle‟ […] displays the basis of polity in

the concord of wills […] most vividly in its speech, which expresses with the

grammatical singular a conceptual plurality („both I and mine… we and ours‟).”442

Under a linguistic perspective, Dante‟s use of the verb “arbitrare” in his linguistic

treatise brings evidence to the fact that the notion of “arbitrating power” is also helpful to

let intersect Dante‟s political and linguistic theorizations.

Quare, omnibus presentis capituli ad iudicium comparentibus, arbitramur nec

romandiolum ne suum oppositum, ut dictum est, nec venetianum esse illud quod

mensura omnium que sub illo genere sunt; sed omnes homines sunt unius generis: ergo debent reduce

ad unum, tanquam ad mensuram omnium eorum.” “Attingendo il principio dal decimo libro della Prima

filosofia, essi dicono: tutte le cose che appartengonoa uno stesso genere si riconducono a una, la quale è

misura di tutte quelle che sono comprese sotto quel genere; ma tutti gli uomini appartengono a uno

stesso genere; dunque debbono ricondursi ad uno come a misura di tutti.” As we have seen, this notion

is also pivotal in Dante‟s linguistic treatise. See Dve I.xvi. The notion of “measure” in the late Middle

Ages is a complex notion. It underpins a series of concepts from Aristotle‟s view on justice and virtue as

proportion (analogia), which later was re-conceived by Saint Augustine and Thomas as the ground of

being, for God is the measure of human beings. Moreover, it is a poetic notion used to refer to courtly

wisdom typical of the troubadoric tradition. See Jacques Wettstein. “Mezura:” L‟idéal des troubadours. Son essence et ses aspects. Genève: Slatkine Reprints, 1974. 21 : “La forme de la courtoisie, c‟est la

sagesse. Or, ce qui fait le fond de la sagesse, la norme à laquelle se conforment tous les aspects de la

conduite du sage, c‟est ce que les philosophes er les moralistes s‟accordent à appeler la „mesure.‟” See

also Ronald Martinez. “La sacra fame dell‟oro (Purgatorio 22, 41) tra Virgilio e Stazio: dal testo

all‟interpretazione.” Letture classensi 18 (1989): 177-185. 441 Conv. IV.ix.10. This image of human will as a horse – also used in the context of love poetry in Dante‟s

times. See for instance Francesco da Barberino. I documenti d‟amore. Regula XLIIJ. Dante also applies

the metaphor of the knight and the horse to the poet and the volgare illustre: only the best poets should

use the volgare illustre, just as the best horses should be reserved for the best knights. On this point, see

Robert Durling. “The Audience(s) of the De vulgari eloquentia and the Petrose.” In Dante Studies 110

(1992): 28. 442 Ronald Martinez. “The Paradiso and the Monarchia.” In Dante. The Divine Comedy: Paradiso. Ed.

Robert Durling and Ronald Martinez. Oxford: Oxford UP, forthcoming. Emphasis mine.

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querimus vulgare illustre.443

If we formalize Dante‟s argument in this passage, we obtain exactly what Gramsci

asserts about Caesarism. In a situation of conflict between A and B, C is the arbitrating

power, needed to bring A and B out of their vicious opposition.

The authoritative function incorporated by Dante is not only to impose a rule from

above detached from factual examples, but also to arbitrate among linguistic conflicts and

lead toward a form of linguistic concordia discors. This arbitration leads to equate the

diverse idioms into a common sphere, that is, the sphere of the inferior vulgar languages.

But Dante is careful to make sure that we understand that his judgments are not

motivated by a municipal love for his own city of Florence. His judgments are balanced

through the use of reason: “rationi magis quam sensui spatula nostri iudicii podiamus.”444

In this respect, the poet acts out as a judge, an “arbiter of the diverse,” and an

“equable” agent.445

As Martha Nussbaum emphasized, the notion of poet-judge as

“equable man” rests in “a tradition of thought about legal and judicial reasoning that

stretches directly back to Aristotle, who developed a normative conception of equitable

judgment to take place of an excessively simple or reductive reliance on abstract general

principle.”446

In referring to Dante, we should point out that, in judging the diverse idioms,

Dante deprives them of their own authority and sovereignty and stabilizes his new

443 Dve I.xiv.8. Emphasis mine. “Così a tutti i volgari che fanno la loro comparsa in giudizio in questo

capitolo noi rilasciamo questa sentenza arbitrale, che nè il romagnolo, nè il dialetto che gli si oppone

nei modi che si son detti, nè il veneziano rappresentano il volgare illustre che cerchiamo.” The English

translation proposes “I pronounce the following verdict” for “arbitramur.” Verdict does not provide us

with the same sense of agency Dante expresses with the verb “to arbitrate.” 444 Dve I.vi.3. 445 I borrow these expressions from Martha Nussbaum‟s study on poetic justice, which draws heavily on

Walt Whitman‟s view of the poet-judge. See Martha Nussbaum. Poetic Justice. 80.

181

authority among/upon them. In other words, in describing the vernacular idioms of Italy

he equates them as non-illustrious languages, Dante both marks his „equitable judgment‟

and aims at establishing his own leadership among the diverse and dispersed vulgares

gentes. By drawing a linguistic map of Italy and judging all the fourteen vernacular

idioms to be equally inferior languages with respect to the illustrious one, Dante

dispossesses the linguistic autonomy of each particular idiom and aims at asserting his

own arbitrating authority over them.447

Thus, at a micro-logical level, through the general

strategy of arbitration, authority is displaced and renewed.

In this context, the illustrious language works as a balance, a unit of measurement

that can help the poet to establish an equitable judgment and the concordia discors

among the scattered and confused speeches of the scattered vulgar people(s) inhabiting

Italy. As pointed out in Monarchia I.xvi.4-5, “est enim concordia uniformis motus

plurium voluntatum.”

In my view, in Dante‟s dream for concordia resounds the notion of common

consent used in Dve I.vii to distinguish the notion of „vulgare‟ from that of „gramatica.‟

As we have seen in the third chapter, the vernacular idioms are unstable because they are

continuously affected by the diverse arbitration of individual wills (singulari arbitri).

Therefore, in Dante‟s attempt to establish a new doctrine of language and

446 Ibid. 447 To understand Dante‟s hope of emanating authority over the vulgares gentes it is worth to highlight the

point made by Walt Withman that the poet “judges not as the judge judges but as the sun falling round a

helpless thing.” See Nussbaum. Poetic Justice. 80. Indeed, as implied in Justinian‟s reply to the pilgrim

in Par. 6.111-117, the divine judgment is like the emanation of the rays coming from the “picciola

stella” of the true love. Under the linguistic perspective of the Dve, the illustrious vernacular language

emanates around the disaggregated Italy as a “gratiosus lumen rationis.” Both justice and the illustrious

vernacular, for the poet-judge Dante are emanations of grace and love, the love that Par. 33 will finally

recognize (re-viewing Aristotle‟s Metaphysics under a Christian horizon) as the driving force that

moves the entire cosmos.

182

eloquence, temporality is a key dimension. Indeed, the notion of linguistic mutability,

which, both in Dve and Par. 26, for Dante characterizes all vernacular languages, induces

his readers to accept as normal the fact that the diverse vernacular idioms are not stable

and eternal but that they can be transformed in the same manner of human behavior and

customs. This general meta-linguistic principle not only represents a universal theory of

the vernacular, but also works as an operative idea apt to generate the theoretical

condition of possibility needed to justify Dante‟s labor in transforming a variety of

vernacular forms into a new, unifying, illustrious language.

As we know from both Conv. I.xiii.6, Dante had conceived two poetic elements as

linguistic stabilizers and harmonizers, the number of syllables and the musical rhythms of

rhymes.448

In this respect, poetry is the mode of production through which harmony and

stability is created among diverse linguistic elements.449

Thus, Dante‟s work aimed

precisely at providing stability to the vernacular language, which is an unstable and

variable idiom if compared to the “gramatica” – produced through the common consent

of various ancient people(s). If so, Dante seems to be aware that besides the

harmonization and stabilization of the vernacular through poetry, he had to search for a

448

Conv. I.xiii.6. “Ciascuna cosa studia naturalmente a la sua conservazione: onde, se lo volgare per sè

studiare potesse, studierebbe a quella; e quella sarebbe, acconciare sè a più stabilitade, e più stabilitade

non potrebbe avere che in legar sè con numero e con rime. E questo medesimo studio è stato mio, sì

some tanto è palese che non dimanda testimonianza.” Emphasis mine. 449 In this respect, etymology helps us to reinforce the link between ethics and poetry in Dante. Indeed, as

Harald Weinrich remarked, there is a linguistic link between the ethical term “temperanza” and the noun

“tempus” as musical rhythm. “In prossimità fonetica di tempus non troviamo soltanto il verbo temptare

con il senso somatico indicato, ma anche il verbo temperare. [...] L‟uso del verbo temperare ha

conservato soprattutto significati astratti relazionati alla virtù cardinale della temperanza. Ma il senso

primitivo di questo verbo è più concreto, più corporeo e ci guida, una volta di più, verso il campo della ritmica e della metrica (qui con una sfumatura particolare di musica). Troviamo nei dizionari

attestazioni di questo verbo come „acuta cum gravibus temperans‟ (Cicerone) o „Musam temperare,‟

comporre un poema, una canzone (Orazio). La temperanza viene dunque, tramite i piaceri

dell‟armonia, da un ritmo musicale.” Harald Weinrich. Il polso del tempo. Ed. Federico Bertoni.

Firenze: La Nuova Italia, 1999. 12. Emphasis mine.

183

common consent in order to „validate‟ his linguistic project. One might hypothesize that

the project of the Comedy aims at reaching this common consent among the „moderni.‟450

In this sense, the prophetic imagination Dante injects through the uses of future

tenses in the textual structure of his works is particularly significant.451

All these future

tenses are not simply aimed to convey an absolute Truth, but work as vectors in the form

of language, through which Dante attempts to lead his readers to imagine a horizon of

expectations in which he himself as a poet and, thus, his poetry and his language have

finally achieved glory, fame, prestige, i.e. a cultural hegemony.

From this perspective, imperialism is an ideological vector that Dante requires for

dealing with the historical present (i.e. his own modern times). In turn, cultural

hegemony, or, with a pre-modern term, “glory”452

is what Dante aimed for in order to

make his voice “vital nutrition” and redirect the dispersed vulgares gentes toward

concordia.

450 I am using the term in the way Dante did in Dve I.vii.7-8. 451 Among the numerous expressions of prophetic future tenses one can recall Rusticucci‟s address “se la

fama dopo te luca” (Inf. 16.64-68); Cacciaguida‟s verses, “…coscienza fusca / o della propria o

dell‟altrui vergogna / pur sentirà la tua parola brusca... / Chè se la voce tua sarà molesta, / nel primo

gusto, vital nutrimento / lascerà poi, quando sarà digesta... / Questo tuo grido farà come vento” (Par.

17.124-125); or the “caccerà” in Inf. 1 and the one in Purg. 11; or the “sarà luce nuova, sole nuovo...” in

Convivio. Dante‟s message is metaphorized as “parola brusca,” “voce,” and “grido.” Although Dante‟s

works, on first being heard, would seem harsh, upon being assimilated, they would nourish his audience

with sound teaching. 452 Dante refers to “glory” in numerous contexts, for dealing with the glory of the language in Purg. 11, the

ethical-political glory to which the eagle refers in Par. 19.13-15 (“per esser giusto e pio / son io qui

essaltato a quella gloria / che non si lascia vincere a disio”), and the spiritual one in Par. 27, which

follows Dante‟s encounter with Adam.

184

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