Dante Alighieri, much more than the author of “The Divine Comedy”

The poet is mentioned Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), and the first thing you think of is The Divine Comedy, but it was much more than that for the Italian culture and language. Today, Italy commemorates the 700 years of his death, which occurred on the night of September 13 to 14, 1321.

Why is he considered the father of the Italian language?

Yes OK Dante He also wrote in Latin, he leaned for the Italian language, since he defended Italian unity, which was due to the fact that after the fall of the Roman Empire, a dozen small states had emerged – thus Sicily was culturally distant from Tuscany and, in turn, from Provence.

At The Convivio – Work written by Dante during exile, between 1304 and 1307 – he justifies why he wrote his poetry in Italian and not in Latin, considered as a cultivated discourse. I wanted everyone to understand that. And among the Italian dialects, he opted for Tuscan, which greatly influenced the evolution of the Italian language. This shows that he cared little about being called vulgar (vulgar language) in Italian.

Its success contributed to other authors of the Middle Ages, such as Petrarch and Boccaccio, they also wrote in dialect, thus laying the foundations of modern Italian.

The entity responsible for disseminating the Italian language and culture throughout the world is called Dante Alighieri Company. Italy is also considering the creation of the Italian language museum in Florence, the birthplace of the poet.

Dante’s political side

Although his work shows an obvious religious bias, he promoted the separation of church and state. His political thought reflected this in Of the monarchy (1310), which was written in Latin. Dante He was very involved in the political life of Florence. In 1300, he was elected prior, one of the nine members of the local government, for a period of two months. This accusation was the cause of his misfortune.

In reality The Divine Comedy has a deep influence in the political life of Dante, who saw power struggles from the start, as the Florence in which he was born and raised was a city that grew very quickly, it was the largest and richest in Italy, but was continually involved in bloody battles between supporters of the emperor and those of the Dad. Dante took advantage of writing THEa Divine Comedy settle scores with many of his enemies, including the Pope Bonifacio XIII, for whom he reserved a place in Hell.

Dante, in exile

At that time, Italian cities were constantly on the brink of civil war between the Guelphs, near the Dad and the Ghibellines, in favor of Holy Roman Empire. In 1302, he was exiled from Florence by the Black Guelphs, because he was a member of the White Guelph party, and condemned, in absentia, since he had to leave Florence after the coming to power of a new regime which persecuted Italy. old ruling class. , by a judge, who ordered that Dante and his allies were burned alive in case they tried to return to Florence. This sentence was later commuted to beheading.

The origin of Dante

Dante Alighieri, baptized, in fact, Pendant by Alighiero degli Alighieri, was born into a family in Florence, whose real name was Alaghieri, favorable to the Guelph party. His father, Alighiero of Bellincione, was a White Guelph who, however, did not endure Ghibelline revenge after his victory at the Battle of Montaperti. This greeting brought a certain prestige to the family. The mother of Dante, time Bella degli abati, died when the poet was between five and six years old. Coming from a wealthy family, Dante he never had to work for a living.

While her name was While, he was known for his hypocoristic Dante. He was also baptized “the supreme poet” (in Italian, the supreme poet), and his first biography was written by Giovanni Boccace (1313-1375), in the Distinguished Treatise by Dante.

While studying in his hometown he was a disciple of Brunet Latini, who makes an appearance on song XV of the Hell, and was a friend of the poet Cavalcanti.

The loves of Dante

When he was twelve he got engaged to Gem, daughter of Messer Manetto Donati, whom he married in 1291. The marriages negotiated at such early ages were then frequent, and important ceremonies were organized to celebrate them, requiring official acts signed before a notary. Dante had several children with Gem: Jacopo, Pietro and Antonia.

However, his best known love is that of his muse, Beatriz, with whom, however, the contact was rather short-lived. References mention that he met Beatriz Portinari, daughter of Portinari Folk, when he was 9 years old and she was one younger, and he fell in love at first sight, even without having spoken to her. The relationship between the two has never been close, and although after the age of 18 Dante he saw her frequently, the most important contact they had was the exchange of greetings in the street.

When Beatriz died in 1290, Dante he tried to take refuge in Latin literature. Then he devoted himself to philosophical studies in religious schools, such as Santa Maria Novella. His poem “New life», From 1292, mentions Beatriz for the first time.

Como Shakespeare

British poet TS Eliot considered that between Dante and Shakespeare they divided the modern world and that there was no “third man”. Jorge Luis Borges, for his part, considered The Divine Comedy as “the best book that literature has produced”.

In popular culture

As is often the case with works and characters of such magnitude, they tend to feed the imagination for new productions, tributes and mentions. Among the painters we can mention the Italian painter of the Renaissance Sandro Botticelli, to the Spanish painter Salvador Dali, a William Blake and Gustave Doré. In music, he inspired composers Tchaikovsky and Liszt.

The creators of the saga X Men and the writer And brown they drank of its waters for their own creations. The Divine Comedy also contributed to the creation of a popular video game, Dante’s Hell, and Bret Easton Ellis begins his famous novel American psychopath with the start of the third song by Hell: “You who enter here, give up all hope.”

The kiss, the famous sculpture of Auguste Rodin, This represents Paulo and Francesca, the adulterous lovers who Dante found in the second circle of Hell.

With information from AFP.

KEEP READING