Renaissance in Italy Volume IV Part 18

_Sonetti del Burchiello, del Bellincioni, e d'altri_, 1757, Londra, p.

125. See, too, the whole sonnet _Son medico in volgar_.

[314] Gargani, _op. cit._ p. 23, extract from the _Catasto_, 1427: "Domenicho di Giovanni barbiere non ha nulla."

[315] The parallel between these pa.s.sages of Burchiello's life and Filelfo's at the same period is singular. See _Revival of Learning_, p. 275.

[316] Gargani, _op. cit._ p. 90.

[317] The best edition bears the date Londra, 1757.

[318] The edition cited above includes _Sonetti alla Burchiellesca_ by a variety of writers. The strange book called _Pataffio_, which used to be ascribed to Brunetto Latini, seems born of similar conditions.

[319] Florentines themselves take this view, as is proved by the following sentence from Capponi: "e pure qui obbligo di registrare anche il Burchiello, barbiere di nome rimasto famoso, perche fece d'un certo suo gergo poesia forse arguta ma triviale; oscura oggi, ma popolare nei tempi suoi e che ebbe inclusive imitatori" (_Storia della Rep. di Firenze_, ii. 176).

[320] See the Sonnet quoted in Note 59 to Mazzuch.e.l.li's Life of Berni, _Scrittori d'Italia_, vol. iv.

[321] The _Ballata_ or _Canzone a Ballo_, as its name implies, was a poem intended to be sung during the dance. A musician played the lute while young women executed the movements of the Carola (so beautifully depicted by Benozzo Gozzoli in his Pisan frescoes), alone or in the company of young men, singing the words of the song. The _Ballata_ consisted of lyric stanzas with a recurrent couplet. It is difficult to distinguish the _Ballate_ from the _Canzonette d'Amore_.

[322] See Carducci, _Cantilene e Ballate_ (Pisa, 1871), pp. 82, 83.

[323] _Ibid._ pp. 171-173.

[324] _Ibid._ pp. 214-217.

[325] A volume of ancient _Canzoni a Ballo_ was published at Florence in 1562, by Sermatelli, and again in 1568.

[326] _Le Rime di Messer A. Poliziano_, pp. 295, 346.

[327] See _Laude Spirituali di Feo Belcari e di Altri_, Firenze, 1863.

The hymn _Crocifisso a capo chino_, for example, has this heading: "Cantasi come--Una donna d'amor fino," which was by no means a moral song (_ib._ p. 16). D'Ancona in his _Poesia Pop. It._ pp. 431-436, has extracted the t.i.tles of these profane songs, some of which are to be found in the _Canzoni a Ballo_ (Firenze, 1568), and _Canti Carnascialeschi_ (Cosmopoli, 1750), while the majority are lost.

[328] The books which I have consulted on this branch of vernacular poetry are (1) Tommaseo, _Canti popolari toscani, corsi, illirici e greci_, Venezia, 1841. (2) Tigri, _Canti popolari toscani_, Firenze, 1869. (3) Pitre, _Canti popolari siciliani_, and _Studi di poesia popolare_, Palermo, 1870-1872. (4) D'Ancona, _La Poesia popolare italiana_, Livorno, 1878. (5) Rubieri, _Storia della poesia popolare italiana_, Firenze, 1877. Also numerous collections of local songs, of which a good list is furnished in D'Ancona's work just cited. Bolza's edition of Comasque poetry, Dal Medico's of Venetian, Ferraro's of _Canti Monferrini_ (district of Montferrat), Vigo's of Sicilian, together with Imbriani's of Southern and Marcoaldo's of Central dialects, deserve to be specially cited. The literature in question is already voluminous, and bids fair to receive considerable additions.

[329] I take this example at random from Blessig's _Romische Ritornelle_ (Leipzig, 1860), p. 48:

Flower of Pomegranate tree!

Your name, O my fair one, is written in heaven; My name it is writ on the waves of the sea.

[330] The term _Villotta_ or _Vilota_ is special, I believe, to Venice and the Friuli. D'Ancona identifies it with _Rispetto_, Rubieri with _Stornello_. But it has the character of a quatrain, and seems therefore more properly to belong to the former.

[331] Tigri, p. 123. Translated by me thus:

Ah, when will dawn that blissful day When I shall softly mount your stair, Your brothers meet me on the way, And one by one I greet them there!

When comes the day, my staff, my strength, To call your mother mine at length?

When will the day come, love of mine, I shall be yours and you be mine!

[332] Pitre, vol. i. p. 185. Translated by me thus, with an alteration in the last couplet:

When thou wert born, O beaming star!

Three holy angels flew to earth; The three kings from the East afar Brought gold and jewels of great worth; Three eagles on wings light as air Bore the news East and West and North.

O jewel fair, O jewel rare, So glad was heaven to greet thy birth.

[333] Dalmedico, _Canti Ven._ p. 69:

Many there are who when they hear me sing, Cry: There goes one whose joy runs o'er in song!

But I pray G.o.d to give me succoring; For when I sing, 'tis then I grieve full strong.

[334] For instance, _Rispetti_ in the valley of the Po are called _Romanelle_. In some parts of Central Italy the _Stornello_ becomes _Mottetto_ or _Raccommandare_. The little Southern lyrics known as _Arii_ and _Ariette_ at Naples and in Sicily, are elsewhere called _Villanelle_ or _Napolitane_ and _Siciliane_. It is clear that in this matter of nomenclature great exact.i.tude cannot be sought.

[335] The proofs adduced by D'Ancona in his _Poesia popolare_, pp.

177-284, seem to me conclusive on this point.

[336] See Pitre, _Studi di Poesia popolare_ (Palermo, Lauriel, 1872), two essays on "I Poeti del Popolo Siciliano," and "Pietro Fullone e le sfide popolari," pp. 81-184. He gives particulars relating to contemporary improvisations. See, too, the Essays by L. Vigo, _Opere_ (Catania, 1870-74), vol. ii.

[337] _Op. cit._ pp. 285, 288-294.

[338] I may refer at large to Tigri's collection, and to my translations of these _Rispetti_ in _Sketches in Italy and Greece_.

[339] Carducci, _Cantilene_, p. 57.

[340] See Rubieri, _Storia della poesia popolare_, pp. 352-356, for a selection of variants.

[341] The terms employed above require some ill.u.s.tration. Poliziano's Canzonet, _La pastorella si leva per tempo_, is a _pasticcio_ composed of fragments from popular songs in vogue at his day. We possess three valuable poems--one by Bronzino, published in 1567; one by Il Cieco Bianchino of Florence, published at Verona in 1629; the third by Il Cieco Britti of Venice, published in the same year--which consist of extracts from popular lyrics united together by the rhymster. Hence their name _incatenatura_. See Rubieri, _op. cit._ pp. 121, 130, 212.

See, too, D'Ancona, _op. cit._ pp. 100-105, 146-172, for the text and copious ill.u.s.trations from contemporary sources of Bronzino's and Il Cieco Bianchino's poems.

[342] _Prose Volgari, etc., di A.A. Poliziano_ (Firenze, Barbera, 1867), p. 74. "Siamo tutti allegri, e facciamo buona cera, e becchiamo per tutta la via di qualche rappresaglia e Canzone di Calen di Maggio, che mi sono parute piu fantastiche qui in Acquapendente, alla Romanesca, vel nota ipsa vel argumento."

[343] See D'Ancona, _op. cit._ pp. 354-420, for copious and interesting notices of the popular press in several Italian towns. The _Avallone_ of Naples, _Cordella_ of Venice, _Marescandoli_ of Florence, _Bertini_ and _Baroni_ of Lucca, _Colomba_ of Bologna, all served the special requirements of the proletariate in town and country. G.B. Verini of Florence made anthologies called _L'Ardor d'Amore_ and _Crudelta d'Amore_ in the sixteenth century, both of which are still reprinted. The same is true of the _Olimpia_ and _Gloria_ of Olimpo degli Alessandri of Sa.s.soferrato. The subordinate t.i.tles commonly used in these popular Golden Treasuries are, "Canzoni di amore," "di gelosia," "di sdegno," "di pace e di partenza." Their cla.s.sification and description appear from the following rubrics: "Mattinate," "Serenate," "Partenze," "Strambotti," "Sdegni,"

"Sonetti," "Villanelle," "Lettere," "Affetti d'Amore," etc.

[344] Upon this point consult Rubieri, _op. cit._ chap. xiv. In Sicily the _Ciure_, says Pitre, is reckoned unfit for an honest woman's mouth.

[345] The South seems richer in this material than the Center. See Pitre's _Canti Pop. Sic._ vol. ii., among the _Leggende e Storie_, especially _La Comare_, _Minni-spartuti_, _Principessa di Carini_, _L'Innamorata del Diavolo_, and some of the bandit songs.

[346] Palermo, Lauriel, 1875.

[347] _Canti Monferrini_ (Torino-Firenze, Loescher, 1870), pp. 1, 6, 14, 26, 28, 34, 42. One of the ballads cited above, _La Sisilia_, is found in Sicily.

[348] _Ibid._ p. 48.

[349] It does not occur in the _Canti Monferrini_.

[350] See my letter to the _Ra.s.segna Settima.n.a.le_, March 9, 1879, on the subject of this ballad. Though I begged Italian students for information respecting similar compositions my letter only elicited a Tuscan version of the _Donna Lombarda_.

[351] _Op. cit._ p. 106.

[352] D'Ancona, _op. cit._ p. 106.