Dante Alighieri

Source

• Born: 1265
• Birthplace: Florence, Italy
• Died: September 1321 (Malaria)
• Best Known As: The author of The Divine Comedy

An exiled and wandering figure during his writing lifetime, Dante is now considered Italy's greatest poet -- so much a literary giant that he is generally known by his first name alone. The Divine Comedy, by far his most famous work, is the story of a journey through Hell, Purgatory and finally Paradise. (The journey through Hell is often referred to independently as "Dante's Inferno.") In the poem the first two stages are guided by the Roman poet Virgil, and the final visit to Paradise is led by a woman named Beatrice -- a girl Dante met briefly when he was nine and whom he idolized the rest of his life. The Divine Comedy is the source of many famous classical images, inspiring works by William Blake and others, and is famous for its inscription on the gates of Hell: "All hope abandon, ye who enter here."

Dante named his work La commedia, or The Comedy. After his death others added "Divine" to make it La divina commedia.

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(b Florence, May-June 1265; d Ravenna, 14 Sept 1321). Italian poet. In the 1280s he led the development of a new style of vernacular poetry; this culminated in his Divine Comedy. Also a philosopher and politician, he became one of the six Priors of the Florentine republic in 1300, but was exiled soon after. No contemporary settings of his poems survive; a few 16th-century madrigalists set them (e.g. Luzzaschi, Marenzio) but it was not until the Romantic period that composers were inspired by his poetry, particularly by the Francesca da Rimini episode (Rossini, Verdi, Liszt, Tchaikovsky).

The Italian poet Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) wrote "The Divine Comedy," the greatest poetic composition of the Christian Middle Ages and the first masterpiece of world literature written in a modern European vernacular.

Dante lived in a restless age of political conflict between popes and emperors and of strife within the Italian city-states, particularly Florence, which was torn between rival factions. Spiritually and culturally too, there were signs of change. With the diffusion of Aristotle's physical and metaphysical works, there came the need for harmonizing his philosophy with the truth of Christianity, and Dante's mind was attracted to philosophical speculation. In Italy, Giotto, who had freed himself from the Byzantine tradition, was reshaping the art of painting, while the Tuscan poets were beginning to experiment with new forms of expression. Dante may be considered the greatest and last medieval poet, at least in Italy, where barely a generation later the first humanists were to spring up.

Dante was born in Florence, the son of Bellincione d'Alighiero. His family descended, he tells us, from "the noble seed" of the Roman founders of Florence and was noble also by virtue of honors bestowed on it later. His great-grandfather Cacciaguida had been knighted by Emperor Conrad III and died about 1147 while fighting in the Second Crusade. As was usual for the minor nobility, Dante's family was Guelph, in opposition to the Ghibelline party of the feudal nobility which strove to dominate the communes under the protection of the emperor.

Although his family was reduced to modest circumstances, Dante was able to live as a gentleman and to pursue his studies. It is probable that he attended the Franciscan school of Sta Croce and the Dominican school of S. Maria Novella in Florence, where he gained the knowledge of Thomistic doctrine and of the mysticism that was to become the foundation of his philosophical culture. It is known from his own testimony that in order to perfect his literary style he also studied with Brunetto Latini, the Florentine poet and master of rhetoric. Perhaps encouraged by Brunetto in his pursuit of learning, Dante traveled to Bologna, where he probably attended the well-known schools of rhetoric.

A famous portrait of the young Dante done by Giotto hangs in the Palazzo del Podestà in Florence. We also have the following description of him left us by the author Giovanni Boccaccio: "Our poet was of medium height, and his face was long and his nose aquiline and his jaws were big, and his lower lip stood out in such a way that it somewhat protruded beyond the upper one; his shoulders were somewhat curved, and his eyes large rather than small and of brown color, and his hair and beard were curled and black, and he was always melancholy and pensive."

Dante does not write of his family or marriage, but before 1283 his father died, and soon afterward, in accordance with his father's previous arrangements, he married the gentlewoman Gemma di Manetto Donati. They had several children, of whom two sons, Jacopo and Pietro, and a daughter, Antonia, are known.

Lyric Poetry

Dante began early in life to compose poetry, an art, he tells us, which he taught himself as a young man (Vita nuova, III, 9). Through his love lyrics he became known to other poets of Florence, and most important to him was his friendship with Guido Cavalcanti, which resulted from an exchange of sonnets.

Both Dante and Guido were concerned with the effects of love on the mind, particularly from a philosophical point of view; only Dante, however, began gradually to develop the idea that love could become the means of spiritual perfection. And while Guido was more interested in natural philosophy, Dante assiduously cultivated his knowledge of the Latin poets, particularly Virgil, whom he later called his guide and authority in the art of poetry.

During his youth Dante had known a young and noble Florentine woman whose grace and beauty so impressed him that in his poetry she became the idealized Beatrice, the "bringer of blessings," who seemed "a creature come from heaven to earth, A miracle manifest in reality" (Vita nuova, XXVI). She is believed to have been Bice, the daughter of Folco Portinari, and later the wife of Simone dei Bardi. Dante had seen her for the first time when both were in their ninth year; he had named her in a ballad among the 60 fairest women of Florence. But it was only later that Beatrice became the guide of his thoughts and emotions "toward that ideal perfection which is the goal of every noble mind," and the praise of her virtue and grace became the subject of his poetry.

When the young Beatrice died on June 8, 1290, Dante was overcome with grief but found consolation in thoughts of her glory in heaven. Although another woman succeeded briefly in winning Dante's love through her compassion, the memory of Beatrice soon aroused in him feelings of remorse and renewed his fidelity to her. He was prompted to gather from among all his poems those which had been written in her honor or had some bearing on his love for her. This plan resulted in the small volume of poetry and prose, the Vita nuova (New Life), in which he copied from his "book of memory" only those past experiences belonging to his "new life" - a life made new through Beatrice. It follows Dante's own youthful life through three movements or stages in love, in which Beatrice's religious and spiritual significance becomes increasingly clear. At the same time it traces his poetic development from an early phase reminiscent of the Cavalcantian manner to a foreshadowing of The Divine Comedy. In the last prose chapter, which tells of a "miraculous vision," the poet speaks of the major work that he intends to write and the important role Beatrice will have in it: "If it be the wish of Him in whom all things flourish that my life continue for a few years, I hope to write of her that which has never been written of any other lady."

The Vita nuova, written between 1292 and 1294, is one of the first important examples of Italian literary prose. Its 31 poems, most of them sonnets symmetrically grouped around three canzoni, are only a small selection of Dante's lyric production. He wrote many other lyrics inspired by Beatrice which are not included in the Vita nuova; in addition there are verses written to other women and poems composed at different times in his life, representing a variety of forms and stylistic experiences.

Political Activities

Dante's literary interests did not isolate him from the events of his times. On the contrary, he was involved in the political life of Florence and deeply concerned about the state of Europe as a whole. In 1289 he had fought with the Florentine cavalry at the battle of Campaldino. In 1295 he inscribed himself in the guild of physicians and pharmacists (membership in a guild being a precondition for holding public office in Florence). He became a member of the people's council and served in various other capacities. For 2 months in 1300 he was one of the six priors of Florence, and in 1301 he was a member of the Council of the One Hundred.

In October 1301 Dante was sent in a delegation from the commune to Pope Boniface VIII, whose policies he openly opposed as constituting a threat to Florentine independence. During his absence the Blacks (one of the two opposing factions within the Guelph party) gained control of Florence. In the resulting banishment of the Whites, Dante was sentenced to exile in absentia (January 1302). Despite various attempts to regain admission to Florence - at first in an alliance of other exiles whose company he soon abandoned and later through his writing - he was never to enter his native city again.

Dante led the life of an exile, taking refuge first with Bartolommeo della Scala in Verona, and after a time of travel - to Bologna, through northern Italy, possibly also to Paris between 1307 and 1309 - with Can Grande della Scala in Verona (1314). During this time his highest hopes were placed in Emperor Henry VII, who descended into Italy in 1310 to restore justice and order among the cities and to reunite church and state. When Henry VII, whose efforts proved fruitless, died in Siena in 1313, Dante lost every hope of restoring himself to an honorable position in Florence.

Minor Works

During these years of wandering Dante's studies were not interrupted. Indeed, he had hoped that in acquiring fame as a poet and philosopher he might also regain the favor of his fellow citizens. His study of Boethius and Cicero in Florence had already widened his philosophical horizons. After 1290 he had turned to the study of philosophy with such fervor that "in a short time, perhaps 30 months" he had begun "to be so keenly aware of her sweetness that the love of her drove away and destroyed every other thought." He read so much, it seems, that his eyes were weakened.

Two uncompleted treatises, De vulgari eloquentia (1303-1304) and the Convivio (1304-1307), belong to the early period of exile. At the same time, about 1306, he probably began to compose The Divine Comedy.

In De vulgari eloquentia, a theoretical treatise in Latin on the Italian vernacular, Dante intended to treat of all aspects of the spoken language, from the highest poetic expression to the most humble familiar speech. The first book is devoted to a discussion of dialects and the principles of poetic composition in the vulgar tongue; the second book treats specifically of the "illustrious" vulgar tongue used by certain excellent poets and declares that this noble form of expression is suitable only for the most elevated subjects, such as love, virtue, and war, and must be used in the form of the canzone.

The Convivio was intended to consist of 15 chapters: an introduction and 14 canzoni, with prose commentaries in Italian; but only 4 chapters were completed. The canzoni, which are the "meat" of the philosophical banquet while the prose commentaries are the "bread," appear to be written to a beautiful woman. But the prose commentaries interpret these poems as an allegorical exaltation of philosophy, inspired by the love of wisdom. Dante wished to glorify philosophy as the "mistress of his mind" and to treat subjects of moral philosophy, such as love and virtue. The Convivio is in a sense a connecting link between the Vita nuova and The Divine Comedy. Thus in the latter work reason in the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom becomes man's sole guide on earth, except for the intervention of Divine Grace, in his striving for virtue and God. In the Convivio Dante also defends the use of the vernacular as a suitable medium for ethical and scientific subjects, as well as amorous ones.

The Latin treatise De monarchia, of uncertain date but possibly attributable to the time of Henry VII's descent into Italy (1310-1313), is a statement of Dante's political theories. At the same time it is intended as a practical guide toward the restoration of peace in Europe under a temporal monarch in Rome, whose authority proceeds directly from God.

During his exile Dante also wrote various Latin epistles and letters of political nature to Italian prices and cardinals. Belonging to a late period are two Latin eclogues and the scientific essay Quaestio de aqua et terra (1320). Il fiore, a long sonnet sequence, is of doubtful attribution.

In 1315 Dante twice refused pardons offered him by the citizens of Florence under humiliating conditions. He and his children were consequently condemned to death as rebels. He spent his last years in Tuscany, in Verona, and finally in Ravenna. There, under the patronage of Guido da Polenta and joined by his children (possibly also his wife), Dante was greatly esteemed and spent a happy and peaceful period until his death on Sept. 13 or 14, 1321.

The Divine Comedy

The original title of Dante's masterpiece, which he completed shortly before his death, was Commedia; the epithet Divina was added by posterity. The purpose of this work, as Dante writes in his letter to Can Grande, is "to remove those living in this life from the state of misery and lead them to the state of felicity." The Commedia is divided into three parts: Inferno (Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory), and Paradiso (Heaven). The second and third sections contain 33 cantos apiece; the Inferno has 34, since its opening canto is an introduction to the entire work. The measure throughout the poem is terza rima, consisting of lines in sets of 3, rhyming aba, bcb, cdc, and so on.

The main action of the literal narrative centers on Dante's journey to God through the agency of Beatrice; the moral or allegorical meaning that Dante wishes the reader to keep in mind is that God will do for everyman what he has done for one man, if everyman is willing to make this journey. Dante constructs an allegory of a double journey: his experience in the supernatural world points to the journey of everyman through this life. The poet finds himself in a dark wood (sin); he tries to escape by climbing a mountain illuminated by the sun (God). Impeded by the sudden appearance of three beasts, which symbolize the major divisions of sin in the Inferno, he is about to be driven back when Virgil (human reason) appears, sent to his aid by Beatrice. Virgil becomes Dante's guide through Hell, in a descent which is the first stage in his ascent to God in humility. The pilgrim learns all there is to know about sin and confronts the very foundation of sin, which is pride, personified in Lucifer frozen at the very center of the universe. Only now is he spiritually prepared to begin his ascent through the realm of purification.

The mountain of the Purgatorio is a place of repentance, regeneration, and conversion. The penitents endure severe punishments, but all are pilgrims directed to God, in an atmosphere of love, hope, and an eager willingness in suffering. On the mountain's summit Beatrice (divine revelation) comes to take Virgil's place as Dante's guide - for the final ascent to God, human reason is insufficient.

The Paradiso depicts souls contemplating God; they are in a state of perfect happiness in the knowledge of His divine truths. The dominant image in this realm is light. God is light, and the pilgrim's goal from the start was to reach the light. His spiritual growth toward the attainment of this end is the main theme of the entire poem.

Further Reading

For an understanding of how little scholars know of Dante's life, see Michele Barbi, Life of Dante, edited and translated by Paul Ruggiers (1954). Recommended as important guides to the study of Dante are Charles A. Dinsmore, Aids to the Study of Dante (1903); Umberto Cosmo, A Handbook to Dante Studies (trans. 1947); and Thornes G. Bergin, Dante (1965). A variety of critical approaches to Dante are offered in Bernard Stambler, Dante's Other World: The Purgatorio as Guide to the Divine Comedy (1957); Charles S. Singleton, Dante Studies I and II (1958); Irma Brandeis, The Ladder of Vision: A Study of Dante's Comedy (1960); Mark Musa, Essays on Dante (1964); Jefferson B. Fletcher, Dante (1965); and Francis Fergusson, Dante (1966).

(1265-1321) Italian poet and philosopher, born in Florence. Very little is known for certain about his life. From 1295 he took an active part in local politics, which led to his exile. Having wandered for a time, spending part of it in Verona, he finally settled in Ravenna, where he died.

On the death of Beatrice Portinari with whom he was secretly in love, he turned to philosophy (c.1290) of the Thomist variety. He differs from Thomas Aquinas in not conceding even indirect power to the papacy. Secular and ecclesiastical authorities are separate and independent; neither has a right to interfere in the other's affairs. Dante regarded peace as paramount in any civilized social system and this he believed could only be achieved by a ‘universal monarchy’ along the lines of the Roman Empire, which he regarded as ordained by divine providence. This theory is developed in De Monarchia, written probably around the time of the visit of the Emperor Henry VII to Italy (1310-13). His theory has its origin in St Augustine's City of God. According to Dante a universal monarch could create a humana civilitas which would unify all peoples of all faiths, which the papacy could not do. This in itself could ensure peace. But added to that is the fact that ‘The monarch has nought that he can desire, for his jurisdiction is bounded by the ocean alone, which is not the case with other princes, since their principalities are bounded by others’. He would also be an ideal court of appeal since he has nothing to gain, ‘whence it follows that the monarch may be the purest subject of justice among mortals’. De Monarchia was publicly burnt in Bologna and remained on the index of prohibited books until the nineteenth century. Was this simply because of its content or was it possibly because in another book Dante put Pope Boniface VIII in hell?

— Cyril Barrett

For more information on Dante (Alighieri), visit Britannica.com.

(1265-1321) Italian poet and philosopher. Born in Florence, Dante sought the consolations of philosophy after the death in 1290 of his beloved Beatrice Portinari, who was the wife of the painter Simone de Bardi. Active in the political life of Florence, Dante was sent to Rome as an envoy to the papal court in 1301, and while absent was condemned to exile. He never returned to Florence, but died an honoured guest of Guido da Polenta, the ruler of Ravenna.

Dante's principal conventional philosophical work is the Convivio, or Banquet (1304-8), intended as a series of fourteen treatises of which only four are complete. De Monarchia (c. 1313) contains Dante's political theory. But it is his masterpiece, the Divina Commedia, begun possibly as early as 1307, and finished just before his death, that is universally acknowledged as the literary embodiment of the moral, religious, and philosophical ideals of the late 13th and early 14th centuries. The poem divides into three parts. In the first, the Inferno, Dante visits the circles of Hell, with their increasingly wicked moral transgressors (the scale goes from apathy, which is scarcely damned at all, to the basest treachery). The punishments do not increase in severity in step with the faults, but represent the kind of retribution or loss that a particular vice bringsófor example, the lovers Paolo and Francesca are ceaselessly whirled in a storm. In the Purgatorio the poet encounters the repentant sinners who await redemption, and in the last circle of this, the earthly paradise, he is reunited with the dead Beatrice, who in the Paradiso introduces him to the ascending circles of beauty and light, culminating in the vision of God. In the heaven of the sun (light) Dante encounters the souls of twelve wise men, who are Albert the Great, Aquinas, the Venerable Bede, Boethius, Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite, Gratian, Isidore of Sevile, Peter Lombard, Paul Orose, Richard of SaintVictor, Siger of Brabant, and Solomon. Perhaps surprisingly, given that it is Augustine's equation of light with spiritual excellence that infuses the whole poem, it is Aquinas, who thought that light could only be predicated metaphorically of spiritual substances, who guides him at this point. In accordance with Dante's Christianized Neoplatonism, the heaven of the sun is above the heaven of the moon, where live those who could not quite keep their vows of chastity, above the heaven of Mercury, where there are those who tried to acquire glory by good deeds, and of Venus, where dwell those who loved intensely in their lives. But it is below the heaven of Mars (reserved for martyrs), of Jupiter (just and wise princes), Saturn (contemplatives and mystics), of the fixed stars (saints, Apostles, and the blessed), and well below the Crystalline heaven, or primum mobile, where Dante encounters the angelic hierarchies, and finally the Empyrean, where, losing Beatrice, he is able with the help of the Virgin Mary and St Bernard to direct his gaze at the point source of light, the love which moves the sun and the stars, God himself.

The structure of the poem is that of a moral allegory of fall and redemption. If Dante's immediate philosophical ancestors are Aquinas and Augustine, it is also clear that the poem fuses themes from Plato, Neoplatonism, and the Islamic tradition, especially that of Avicenna. See also beauty, love.

Life

Born into a Guelph family (see Guelphs and Ghibellines) of decayed nobility, Dante moved in patrician society. He was a member of the Florentine cavalry that routed the Ghibellines at Campaldino in 1289. The next year, after the death (1290) of Beatrice, the woman he loved, he plunged into intense study of classical philosophy and Provençal poetry. This woman, thought to have been Beatrice Portinari, was Dante's acknowledged source of spiritual inspiration.

Dante married Gemma Donati, had three children, and was active (1295–1300) as councilman, elector, and prior of Florence. In the complex politics of Florence, he found himself increasingly opposed to the temporal power of Pope Boniface VIII, and he eventually allied himself with the White Guelphs. After the victory of the Black Guelphs he was dispossessed and banished (1302). Exile made Dante a citizen of all Italy; he served various princes, but supported Holy Roman Emperor Henry VII as the potential savior of a united Italy. He died at the court of Guido da Polenta in Ravenna, where he is buried.

Works

Dante's reputation as the outstanding figure of Italian letters rests mainly on the Divine Comedy, a long vernacular poem in 100 cantos (more than 14,000 lines) composed during his exile. Dante entitled it Commedia; the adjective Divina was added in the 16th cent. It recounts the tale of the poet's journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, and is divided accordingly into three parts. In Hell and Purgatory Dante is guided by Vergil, through Heaven, by Beatrice, for whom the poem is a memorial. The work is written in terza rima, a complex verse form in pentameter, with interlocking triads rhyming aba, bcb, cdc, etc.

A magnificent synthesis of the medieval outlook, the Divine Comedy pictures a changeless universe ordered by God; its allegorical theme is the gradual revelation of God to the pilgrim. It is also a religious dialogue on the gradations of earthly sin and piety as well as on such topics as predestination and classical philosophy. The symbolism is complex yet highly rational; the verse is musical; and the entire work is one of great imagination. Through his masterpiece Dante established Tuscan as the literary language of Italy, surpassed all previous Italian writers, and gave rise to a vast literature.

Dante's works also include La vita nuova [the new life] (written c.1292), a collection of prose and lyrics celebrating Beatrice and illustrating his idealistic concept of love; the Convivio (c.1304), an encyclopedic allegory praising both love and science; De monarchia, a treatise on the need for kingly dominance in secular affairs; and De vulgare eloquentia, on rules for the Italian vernacular. In addition, he wrote numerous lyrics, eclogues, and epistles.

Bibliography

There are numerous translations of the Divine Comedy, including those by M. B. Anderson (1921), J. D. Sinclair (3 vol., 1939–46), D. Sayers (3 vol., 1963), R. Pinsky (of the Inferno, 1994), R. M. Durling (Vol. I–II, 1996–2003), and R. and J. Hollander (3 vol., 2000–2007). See biographies by M. Barbi (tr. 1954), P. J. Toynbee (ed. by C. S. Singleton, 1965), and R. W. B. Lewis (2001); studies by J. A. Symonds (1899, repr. 1973), B. Croce (1922, repr. 1973), C. S. Singleton (2 vol., 1954, 1958), E. Auerbach (tr. 1961), T. G. Bergin (1967 and 1969), W. Anderson (1989), and M. Caesar (1989); K. Foster and P. Boyde, ed., Cambridge Readings in Dante's Comedy (1982).

Dante Alighieri

Dante Aligheri
Born:	14 May 1265(1265--) Florence
Died:	13 November 1321
Occupation:	Statesman, Poet, language theorist
Nationality:	Italy

"Dante" redirects here. For other uses, see Dante (disambiguation).

Dante Alighieri, or simply Dante, (May 14/June 13 1265 – September 13/14^[1], 1321) was an Italian poet from Florence. His central work, the Commedia (The Divine Comedy), is considered the greatest literary work composed in the Italian language and a masterpiece of world literature. In Italian he is known as "the Supreme Poet" (il Sommo Poeta).

Life

Dante in a fresco series of famous men by Andrea del Castagno, ca. 1450 (Uffizi Gallery).

Dante Alighieri was born in 1265, between May 14 and June 13, under the name "Durante Alighieri."

Dante Alighieri, painted by Giotto in the chapel of the Bargello palace in Florence. This oldest portrait of Dante was painted during his lifetime before his exile from his native city.

He was born into the prominent Alighieri family of Florence, with loyalties to the Guelphs, a political alliance that supported the Papacy, involved in complex opposition to the Ghibellines, who were backed by the Holy Roman Emperor.

These factions fashioned their names after those of opposing factions of German Imperial politics, centered around the noble families the Welfs (Guelfs or Guelphs) and Waiblingen (Ghibellines), but adapting their meaning to the Italian political arena. After the defeat of the Ghibellines by the Guelphs in 1289, the Guelphs themselves were divided into White Guelphs, who were wary of Papal influence, and Black Guelphs who continued to support the Papacy. Dante (a White Guelph) pretended that his family descended from the ancient Romans (Inferno, XV, 76), but the earliest relative he can mention by name is Cacciaguida degli Elisei (Paradiso, XV, 135), of no earlier than about 1100.

He fought in the front rank of the Guelph cavalry at the battle of Campaldino (June 11, 1289). This victory brought forth a reformation of the Florentine constitution. To take any part in public life, one had to be enrolled in one of “the arts”. So Dante entered the guild of physicians and apothecaries. In following years, his name is frequently found recorded as speaking or voting in the various councils of the republic.

Dante's father, Alighiero de Bellincione, was a White Guelph who suffered no reprisals after the Ghibellines won the Battle of Montaperti. This suggests that Alighiero or his family enjoyed some protective prestige and status.

The poet's mother was Bella degli Abati. She died when Dante was 7 years old, and Alighiero soon married again, to Lapa di Chiarissimo Cialuffi. (It is uncertain whether he really married her, as widowers had social limitations in these matters.) This woman definitely bore two children, Dante's brother Francesco and sister Tana (Gaetana).

When Dante was 12, in 1277, he was promised in marriage to Gemma di Manetto Donati, daughter of Messer Manetto Donati. Contracting marriages at this early age was quite common, and involved a formal ceremony, including contracts signed before a notary. Dante had already fallen in love with another girl, Beatrice Portinari (known also as Bice). Years after Dante's marriage to Gemma he met Beatrice again. He had become interested in writing verse, and although he wrote several sonnets to Beatrice, he never mentioned his wife Gemma in any of his poems.

Dante had several children with Gemma. As often happens with significant figures, many people subsequently claimed to be Dante's offspring; however, it is likely that Jacopo, Pietro, Giovanni, Gabrielle Alighieri, and Antonia were truly his children. Antonia became a nun with the name of Sister Beatrice.

A portrait of Dante, from a fresco in Palazzo dei Giudici, Florence.

Education and poetry

Not much is known about Dante's education, and it is presumed he studied at home. It is known that he studied Tuscan poetry, at a time when the Sicilian School (Scuola poetica siciliana), a cultural group from Sicily, was becoming known in Tuscany. His interests brought him to discover the Occitan poetry of the troubadours and the Latin poetry of classical antiquity (with a particular devotion to Virgil).

During the "Secoli Bui" (Dark Ages), Italy had become a mosaic of small states, so Sicily was as far (culturally and politically) from Tuscany as Occitania was: the regions did not share a language, culture, or easy communications. Nevertheless, we can assume that Dante was a keen up-to-date intellectual with international interests.

At 18, Dante met Guido Cavalcanti, Lapo Gianni, Cino da Pistoia, and soon after Brunetto Latini; together they became the leaders of Dolce Stil Novo ("The Sweet New Style"). Brunetto later received a special mention in the Divine Comedy (Inferno, XV, 28), for what he had taught Dante. Nor speaking less on that account, I go With Ser Brunetto, and I ask who are His most known and most eminent companions. Some fifty poetical components by Dante are known (the so-called Rime, rhymes), others being included in the later Vita Nuova and Convivio. Other studies are reported, or deduced from Vita Nuova or the Comedy, regarding painting and music.

When he was nine years old he met Beatrice Portinari, daughter of Folco Portinari, with whom he fell in love "at first sight", and apparently without even having spoken to her. He saw her frequently after age 18, often exchanging greetings in the street, but he never knew her well—he effectively set the example for the so-called "courtly love". It is hard now to understand what this love actually comprised, but something extremely important for Italian culture was happening. It was in the name of this love that Dante gave his imprint to the Stil Novo and would lead poets and writers to discover the themes of Love (Amore), which had never been so emphasized before. Love for Beatrice (as in a different manner Petrarch would show for his Laura) would apparently be the reason for poetry and for living, together with political passions. In many of his poems, she is depicted as semi-divine, watching over him constantly.

When Beatrice died in 1290, Dante tried to find a refuge in Latin literature. The Convivio reveals that he had read Boethius's De consolatione philosophiae and Cicero's De amicitia.

He then dedicated himself to philosophical studies at religious schools like the Dominican one in Santa Maria Novella. He took part in the disputes that the two principal mendicant orders (Franciscan and Dominican) publicly or indirectly held in Florence, the former explaining the doctrine of the mystics and of San Bonaventura, the latter presenting Saint Thomas Aquinas' theories.

This "excessive" passion for philosophy would later be criticized by the character Beatrice, in Purgatorio, the second book of the Comedy.

Statue of Dante at the Uffizi, Florence.

Florence and politics

Dante, like most Florentines of his day, became embroiled in the Guelph-Ghibelline conflict. He fought in the battle of Campaldino (June 11, 1289), with Florentine Guelph knights against Arezzo Ghibellines, then in 1294 he was among those knights who escorted Carlo Martello d'Anjou (son of Charles of Anjou) while he was in Florence.

To further his political career, he became a doctor and a pharmacist; he did not intend to take up those professions, but a law issued in 1295 required that nobles who wanted to assume public office had to be enrolled in one of the Corporazioni delle Arti e dei Mestieri, so Dante obtained quick admission to the apothecaries' guild. The profession he chose was not entirely inapt, since at the time books were sold from apothecaries' shops. As a politician, he accomplished little of relevance, but he held various offices over a number of years in a city undergoing some political agitation.

After defeating the Ghibellines, the Guelphs divided into two factions: the White Guelphs (Guelfi Bianchi)—Dante's party, led by Vieri dei Cerchi—and the Black Guelphs (Guelfi Neri), led by Corso Donati. Although initially the split was along family lines, it became an ideological difference based on opposing views of the role the papacy should have in Florentine affairs, with the Blacks supporting the Pope and the Whites wanting more freedom from Rome's control. Initially the Whites won and kicked out the Blacks.

In response Pope Boniface VIII was planning a military occupation of Florence. In 1301, Charles de Valois, brother of Philip the Fair king of France, was expected to visit Florence because the Pope had appointed him peacemaker for Tuscany. But the city's government had already treated the Pope's ambassadors badly a few weeks before, seeking independence from papal influences. It was thought wise to consider the hypothesis that Charles de Valois could eventually have received other unofficial orders. So the council sent a delegation to Rome, in order to ascertain the Pope's intentions. Dante was part of this delegation.

Exile and death

Statue of Dante in the Piazza di Santa Croce in Florence.

Boniface quickly sent away the other representatives and asked Dante alone to remain in Rome. At the same time (November 1, 1301), Charles de Valois was entering Florence with Black Guelphs, who in the next six days destroyed much of the city and killed many of their enemies. A new government was installed of Black Guelphs, and Messer Cante dei Gabrielli di Gubbio was appointed Podestà of Florence. Dante was condemned to exile for two years, and to pay a large fine. The poet was still in Rome, where the Pope had "suggested" he stay, and was therefore considered an absconder. He did not pay the fine, in part because he believed he was not guilty, and in part because all his assets in Florence had been seized by the Black Guelphs. He was condemned to perpetual exile, and if he returned to Florence without paying the fine, he could be burned at the stake.

Statue of Dante in the Piazza Dante in Naples.

The poet took part in several attempts by the White Guelphs to regain the power they had lost, but these failed due to treachery. Dante, bitter at the treatment he had received at the hands of his enemies, also grew disgusted with the infighting and ineffectiveness of his erstwhile allies, and vowed to become a party of one. At this point, he began sketching the foundations for the Divine Comedy, a work in 100 cantos, divided into three books of thirty-three cantos each, with a single introductory canto.

He went to Verona as a guest of Bartolomeo della Scala, then moved to Sarzana (Liguria). After this, he is supposed to have lived for some time in Lucca with Madame Gentucca, who made his stay comfortable (and was later gratefully mentioned in Purgatorio, XXIV, 37). Some speculative sources say that he was also in Paris between 1308 and 1310. Other sources, even less trustworthy, take him to Oxford.

In 1310 Henry VII of Luxembourg, King of the Romans (Germany), marched with 5,000 troops into Italy. Dante saw in him a new Charlemagne who would restore the former glory of the office of the Holy Roman Emperor, and also re-take Florence from the Black Guelphs; he wrote to him and to several Italian princes public letters inciting them to destroy the Black Guelphs. Mixing religion and private concerns, he invoked the worst anger of God against his town, suggesting several particular targets that coincided with his personal enemies. It was during this period that he wrote the first two books of the Divine Comedy.

In Florence, Baldo d'Aguglione pardoned most of the White Guelphs in exile and allowed them to come back; however, Dante had gone beyond the pale in his violent letters to Arrigo (Henry VII), and he was not recalled.

In 1312, Henry VII assaulted Florence and defeated the Black Guelphs, but there is no evidence that Dante was involved. Some say he refused to participate in the assault on his city by a foreigner; others suggest that his name had become unpleasant for White Guelphs too and that any trace of his passage had carefully been removed. In 1313 Henry VII died, and with him any residual hope for Dante to see Florence again. He returned to Verona, where Cangrande I della Scala allowed him to live in a certain security and, presumably, in a fair amount of prosperity. Cangrande was admitted to Dante's Paradise (Paradiso, XVII, 76).

A recreated death mask of Dante Alighieri (in Palazzo Vecchio, Florence).

The memorial tomb for Dante Alighieri at Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence.

In 1315, Florence was forced by Uguccione della Faggiuola (the military officer controlling the town) to grant an amnesty to people in exile. Dante too was in the list of citizens to be pardoned. But Florence required that, apart from paying a sum of money, these citizens agreed to be treated as public offenders in a religious ceremony. Dante refused this outrageous formula, preferring to remain in exile.

When Uguccione finally defeated Florence, Dante's death sentence was converted into confinement, at the sole condition that he go to Florence to swear that he would never enter the town again. Dante didn't go. His condemnation to death was confirmed and extended to his sons.

Dante still hoped late in life that he might be invited back to Florence on honourable terms. For Dante, exile was nearly a form of death, stripping him of much of his identity. He addresses the pain of exile in Paradiso, XVII (55-60), where Cacciaguida, his great-great-grandfather, warns him what to expect:

. . . Tu lascerai ogne cosa diletta	". . . You shall leave everything you love most:
più caramente; e questo è quello strale	this is the arrow that the bow of exile
che l'arco de lo essilio pria saetta.	shoots first. You are to know the bitter taste
Tu proverai sì come sa di sale	of others' bread, how salty it is, and know
lo pane altrui, e come è duro calle	how hard a path it is for one who goes
lo scendere e 'l salir per l'altrui scale . . .	ascending and descending others' stairs . . ."

As for the hope of returning to Florence, he describes it wistfully, as if he had already accepted its impossibility, (Paradiso, XXV, 1–9):

Se mai continga che 'l poema sacro	If it ever come to pass that the sacred poem
al quale ha posto mano e cielo e terra,	to which both heaven and earth have set their hand
sì che m'ha fatto per molti anni macro,	so as to have made me lean for many years
vinca la crudeltà che fuor mi serra	should overcome the cruelty that bars me
del bello ovile ov'io dormi' agnello,	from the fair sheepfold where I slept as a lamb,
nimico ai lupi che li danno guerra;	an enemy to the wolves that make war on it,
con altra voce omai, con altro vello	with another voice now and other fleece
ritornerò poeta, e in sul fonte	I shall return a poet and at the font
del mio battesmo prenderò 'l cappello . . .	of my baptism take the laurel crown...

His 1780 tomb in Ravenna.

Of course it never happened. Prince Guido Novello da Polenta invited him to Ravenna in 1318, and he accepted. He finished Paradiso, and died in 1321 (at the age of 56) while on the way back to Ravenna from a diplomatic mission in Venice, perhaps of malaria contracted there. Dante was buried in Ravenna at the Church of San Pier Maggiore (later called San Francesco). Bernardo Bembo, praetor of Venice in 1483, took care of his remains by organizing a better tomb.

On the grave, some verses of Bernardo Canaccio, a friend of Dante, dedicated to Florence:

parvi Florentia mater amoris

"Florence, mother of little love"

Eventually, Florence came to regret Dante's exile, and made repeated demands for the return of his remains. The custodians of the body at Ravenna refused to comply, at one point going so far as to conceal the bones in a false wall of the monastery. Nevertheless, in 1829, a tomb was built for him in Florence in the basilica of Santa Croce. That tomb has been empty ever since, with Dante's body still remaining in its tomb in Ravenna, far from the land he loved so dearly. The front of his tomb in Florence reads Onorate l'altissimo poeta - which roughly translates as Honour the most exalted poet. The phrase is a quote from the fourth canto of L'Inferno, depicting Virgil's welcome as he returns among the great ancient poets spending eternity in Limbo. The continuation of the line, L'ombra sua torna, ch'era dipartita (his spirit, which had left us, returns), is poignantly absent from the empty tomb.

Recently, a recreation of Dante's face was made, showing that his features were much more ordinary than once thought.^[2]

Works

Dante, poised between the mountain of purgatory and the city of Florence, displays the famous incipit Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita in a detail of Domenico di Michelino's painting, Florence 1465.

The Divine Comedy describes Dante's journey through Hell (Inferno), Purgatory (Purgatorio), and Paradise (Paradiso), guided first by the Roman epic poet Virgil and then by Beatrice, the subject of his love and another of his works, La Vita Nuova. While the vision of Hell, the Inferno, is vivid for modern readers, the theological niceties presented in the other books require a certain amount of patience and knowledge to appreciate. Purgatorio, the most lyrical and human of the three, also has the most poets in it; Paradiso, the most heavily theological, has the most beautiful and ecstatic mystic passages in which Dante tries to describe what he confesses he is unable to convey (e.g., when Dante looks into the face of God: "all'alta fantasia qui mancò possa" - "at this high moment, ability failed my capacity to describe," Paradiso, XXXIII, 142).

Dante wrote the Comedy in a new language he called "Italian", based on the regional dialects of Tuscany, Sicilian and some elements of Latin and other regional dialects. By creating a poem of epic structure and philosophic purpose, he established that the Italian language was suitable for the highest sort of expression. In French, Italian is nicknamed la langue de Dante. Publishing in the vernacular language marked Dante as one of the first (among others such as Geoffrey Chaucer and Giovanni Boccaccio) to break from standards of publishing in only Latin or Greek (the languages of clerical liturgy, Roman chronicles and hellenic poetry and epic). This break allowed more literature to be published for a wider audience - setting the stage for greater levels of literacy in the future.

Readers often cannot understand how such a serious work may be called a "comedy". In Dante's time, all serious scholarly works were written in Latin (a tradition that would persist for several hundred years more, until the waning years of the Enlightenment) and works written in any other language were assumed to be comedic in nature. Furthermore, the word "comedy," in the classical sense, refers to works which reflect belief in an ordered universe, in which events not only tended towards a happy or "amusing" ending, but an ending influenced by a Providential will that orders all things to an ultimate good. By this meaning of the word, the progression of Dante's pilgrim from Hell to Paradise is the paradigmatic expression of comedy, since the work begins with the pilgrim's moral confusion and ends with the vision of God.

Dante's other works include the Convivio ("The Banquet")[2], a collection of poems and interpretive commentary; Monarchia,[3] which serves as a monumental political philosophy treatise describing a monarchial global political organization and its relationship to the Roman Catholic Church; De vulgari eloquentia ("On the Eloquence of Vernacular"),^[3] on vernacular literature, partly inspired by the Razos de trobar of Raimon Vidal de Bezaudun; and, La Vita Nuova ("The New Life")[4], the story of his love for Beatrice Portinari, who also served as the ultimate symbol of salvation in the Comedy. The Vita Nuova contains love poems in Tuscan, which was not unprecedented; the vernacular had been used for lyric works before. However, Dante's commentary on his own work is also in the vernacular, instead of the Latin that was almost universally used.

Note: References to Divina Commedia are in the format (book, canto, verse), i.e., (Inferno, XV, 76).

Dante by Erminio Blotta, at Bd. Oroño, Rosario, Argentina.

In popular culture

Main article: Dante and his Divine Comedy in popular culture

Dante and The Divine Comedy have been a source of inspiration for countless artists for almost seven centuries. As one of the best-known and greatest artistic works in the Western tradition, its influence on culture is difficult to overestimate. Some examples are listed in the related article.

References

1. ^ Birth date is listed as "probably at the end of May" by Robert Hollander in "Dante" in Dictionary of the Middle Ages, volume 4.
2. ^ Pullella, Philip. "Dante gets posthumous nose job - 700 years on", Reuters, 11 January 2007. Retrieved on 2007-04-02. 
3. ^ [1]

Published resources

• Gardner, Edmund Garratt (1921). Dante, London, Pub. for the British academy by H. Milford, Oxford University Press. From Internet Archive.
• Scott, John A. Dante's Political Purgatory, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996.
• Whiting, Mary Bradford (1922). Dante the Man and the Poet. Cambridge, England. W. Heffer & Sons, ltd. From Internet Archive.

External links

Wikisource has original works written by or about:

Dante Alighieri

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Dante Alighieri

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Dante Alighieri

• Life And Complete Works By Dante Alighieri - Format HTML
• Danteide, portale di cultura dantesca aggiornato per cura della filologa dantesca Claudia Di Fonzo
• The Divine Comedy on line
• The Divine Comedy: A Study Guide
• "Digital Dante" – A resource page dedicated to Dante and his works.
• The Princeton Dante Project
• The Dartmouth Dante Project
• Danteworlds at UT Austin
• Read Dante Alighieri's works on Read Print – Free books for students, teachers, and the classic enthusiast.
• Henry Holiday's 'Dante and Beatrice'
• "Dante Alighieri on the Web", about his life, time, and (complete) work.
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry
• Società Dantesca Italiana (bilingual site) contains among other info a database of all the earliest manuscripts of Dante's works, with (for some) transcription of the text and page images
• Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
• Dante Alighieri's works: text, concordances and frequency lists
• Dante, The Vision of a Universal Superstate
• LitWeb.net: Dante Alighieri Biography
• "Italian Scientists Give Dante a Makeover", Italian scientists reconstruct Dante's face. CBS News,
• "The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, Illustrated by Donald Newman after Doré", The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, Illustrated by Donald Newman after Doré
• Dante at The Online Library of Liberty

Dante societies around the world

• La Società Dante Alighieri, founded in Italy in 1889, has affiliated chapters throughout the world ("le nostre sedi";partial website directory), including the following:
  • Dante Alighieri Society, Brisbane
  • Dante Alighieri Society, Sydney
  • Dante Alighieri Society of Western Australia
  • Dante Alighieri Society of Massachusetts
  • Dante Alighieri Society of Jersey City
  • Association Dante Alighieri, Comité de Paris
  • Società Dante Alighieri, Comitato di Vienna
  • Società Dante Alighieri, Comitato di Berlino
• The Dante Society of America was founded in 1881 by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton, and others.
• Associazione Centocanti

Persondata
NAME	Alighieri, Dante
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Durante degli Alighieri; Dante
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Italian poet
DATE OF BIRTH	c. 1 June 1265
PLACE OF BIRTH	Florence, Italy
DATE OF DEATH	September 13/14, 1321
PLACE OF DEATH	Between Ravenna and Venice

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