C. M. Pyle
Columbia University, Co-Chair, University Seminar in the Renaissance, Co-Chair, University Seminar in the Renaissance
Development of Scientific Methodologies in Europe of the 15th and early 16th Centuries, considering Philology and History as Sciences, in the broad sense (history as a historical or evolutionary science). -- Intellectual and Cultural Historian-- Co-Chair, Columbia University Seminar in the RenaissancePh.D. Columbia University
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at the Making of the Humanities conference in Somerville College, the University of
Oxford, in September 2017 (and, with various participants, in other venues). The article offers an overview of the development of books and libraries, primarily in the Western world, with emphasis on the physical book—including the supports on which texts are written—within the library. The library as a locus of scholarly communication with present and past authors and its cataloguing and delivery systems are discussed. The conclusion returns to the role of the library as related to questions of ephemerality and the preservation of knowledge.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PRESENTAZIONE DI PAOLO BONGRANI IX
PREFACE XIII
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS XVII
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS XIX
PART I
Introduction
Chapter I
Literary and Intellectual Currents in the Sforza Court (1450-1535) 3
PART II: Pier Candida Deccmbrio and Lombard Humanism
Chapter II
Pier Candido Decembrio and Rome: His Hand and the Vatican
iManuscript of his Treatise on Natural History (MS Urb. lat. 276) 31
Chapter III
Harvard M S Richardson 23: A 'Pendant' to Vatican M S Urb. lat.
2 7 6 and a Significant Exemplar for P.C. Decembrio's Opuscula
Historica 45
PART III: Court and Culture in Quattrocento Milan
Chapter IV
Towards the Biography of Caspar A m b r o g i o Visconti 59
Appendix I: Contemporary and Near-Contemporary H o m o n y m s
Appendix II: Letter and Epigram by Giovanni II Tolentino Addressed to Gaspare Visconti
Chapter V
Neoplatonic Currents and Gaspare Visconti's Pragmentum (MS
Triv. 1093) 83
Appendix: Gaspare Visconti's Vragmentum
Chapter VI
Per la biografia di Baldassare Taccone 95
Appendice: Lettere di Giovanni II Tolentino a Baldassare
Taccone, con qualche epigramma (edizione del 1512)
Chapter VII
Una relazione sconosciuta delle n o z z e di Isabella d'Aragona con
Giangaleazzo Sforza nel febbraio 1489: Giovanni II Tolentino a
Baldassare Taccone 127
PART IV: Theater as Minor in Northern Italian Culture
Chapter VIII
T h e Birth of Vernacular Comedy: Gaspare Visconti's Pasithea. . 139
Appendix: Comparison of Visconti's Pasithea with the Cantare di
Pirramo e Tishe
Chapter IX
Il neoplatonismo e le favole mitologiche del tardo Quattrocento settentrionale: per un'iconologia del teatro 151
Chapter X
Three Renaissance W o m e n ' s Soliloquies Written by M e n 183
Appendix I: From Giraldi Cinzio's Orbecche, II, 4
Appendix II: From Agrippa, De nobilitate et praecellentia foeminei sexus
PART V: Conclusion: Milan and Beyond
Chapter XI
Democritus and Heracleitus: A n Excursus on the Cover of this Book 203
INDICES
INDEX OF NAMES 2 2 5
INDEX OF MYTHOLOGICAL AND FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 241
INDEX OF MANUSCRIPTS 2 4 5
at the Making of the Humanities conference in Somerville College, the University of
Oxford, in September 2017 (and, with various participants, in other venues). The article offers an overview of the development of books and libraries, primarily in the Western world, with emphasis on the physical book—including the supports on which texts are written—within the library. The library as a locus of scholarly communication with present and past authors and its cataloguing and delivery systems are discussed. The conclusion returns to the role of the library as related to questions of ephemerality and the preservation of knowledge.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PRESENTAZIONE DI PAOLO BONGRANI IX
PREFACE XIII
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS XVII
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS XIX
PART I
Introduction
Chapter I
Literary and Intellectual Currents in the Sforza Court (1450-1535) 3
PART II: Pier Candida Deccmbrio and Lombard Humanism
Chapter II
Pier Candido Decembrio and Rome: His Hand and the Vatican
iManuscript of his Treatise on Natural History (MS Urb. lat. 276) 31
Chapter III
Harvard M S Richardson 23: A 'Pendant' to Vatican M S Urb. lat.
2 7 6 and a Significant Exemplar for P.C. Decembrio's Opuscula
Historica 45
PART III: Court and Culture in Quattrocento Milan
Chapter IV
Towards the Biography of Caspar A m b r o g i o Visconti 59
Appendix I: Contemporary and Near-Contemporary H o m o n y m s
Appendix II: Letter and Epigram by Giovanni II Tolentino Addressed to Gaspare Visconti
Chapter V
Neoplatonic Currents and Gaspare Visconti's Pragmentum (MS
Triv. 1093) 83
Appendix: Gaspare Visconti's Vragmentum
Chapter VI
Per la biografia di Baldassare Taccone 95
Appendice: Lettere di Giovanni II Tolentino a Baldassare
Taccone, con qualche epigramma (edizione del 1512)
Chapter VII
Una relazione sconosciuta delle n o z z e di Isabella d'Aragona con
Giangaleazzo Sforza nel febbraio 1489: Giovanni II Tolentino a
Baldassare Taccone 127
PART IV: Theater as Minor in Northern Italian Culture
Chapter VIII
T h e Birth of Vernacular Comedy: Gaspare Visconti's Pasithea. . 139
Appendix: Comparison of Visconti's Pasithea with the Cantare di
Pirramo e Tishe
Chapter IX
Il neoplatonismo e le favole mitologiche del tardo Quattrocento settentrionale: per un'iconologia del teatro 151
Chapter X
Three Renaissance W o m e n ' s Soliloquies Written by M e n 183
Appendix I: From Giraldi Cinzio's Orbecche, II, 4
Appendix II: From Agrippa, De nobilitate et praecellentia foeminei sexus
PART V: Conclusion: Milan and Beyond
Chapter XI
Democritus and Heracleitus: A n Excursus on the Cover of this Book 203
INDICES
INDEX OF NAMES 2 2 5
INDEX OF MYTHOLOGICAL AND FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 241
INDEX OF MANUSCRIPTS 2 4 5
Six favole mitologiche (or favole pastorali) are considered: Angelo Poliziano's Orfeo (Mantua, 1480), the anonymous and undated Orphei tragoedia; La favola di Orfeo e Aristeo; Niccolò da Correggio’s Cefalo (Ferrara, 1487); Baldassare Taccone's Danae (Milan, 1496), and Gaspare Visconti’s Pasithea (Milan, here dated circa 1493-1497).
These plays contain certain common elements: mythological themes, pastoral scenes, elements from classical comedy, presence of music; but the proportions of these components vary considerably among the plays. The plays are situated in their historical and cultural context. Critical biographies of the four known authors are presented, that of Taccone being the first biography of this poet available, and that of Visconti achieving to a large extent the separation of the poet from his eleven contemporary or near-contemporary namesakes. Visconti's Pasithea, unpublished to date [1976], appears in a diplomatic transcription as Appendix I to the thesis. A critical bibliography of the life and works of Correggio in manuscript and printed sources forms Appendix II. A third Appendix lists the manuscripts containing the plays considered here.
The dating of the Orfeo at Carnival, 1480, on the basis of previous historical work is discussed, and the carnival occasion, if not the year, is seen to be lent support by internal textual evidence. The Orpheus theme in Italian literature from Dante to Politian is presented, and the theme is examined in detail in Politian's works, especially two of the SyIvae, Manto and Nutriciа. Politian's knowledge of music thaory and especially of theater history is discussed, with special reference to Politian's Preface to the Andria of Terence, which is the first known modern treatise on comedy, and the first modern work to make use of Aristotle's Poetics.
In Chapters 3, 4, and 5, the content, form, and staging of the plays are analyzed, and the role of music is stressed. Politian's major sources for the Orfeo are presented, and the form is found to be a composite of dramatic eclogue, sacra rappresentazione, a suggestion of Latin comedy, а Latin ode to the patron, Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga, and а dithyramb.
A recent hypothesis proposing M. M. Boiardo as author of the Orphei tragoedia is discussed. Six principal divergences from the Orfeo, on which this play is modeled, are considered (notably the division into five acts, found in the next four plays studied). The Favola di Orfeo e Aristeo, of which acts II and III are a reworking of the Orfeo, and which incorporates Vergil's tale of Aristaeus, is found to be of a more popularesque character than the other plays considered.
The Cefalo, the theme of which was also used in а rappresentazione in Bologna in 1475, the Danae, known for Leonardo da Vinci's staging, and the Pasithea, here found to contain abundant elements of classical comedy, are analyzed in relation to the Orfeo and to each other.
The works here considered are seen to have been court entertainments, exhibiting nonetheless effects of the humanistic studies of the fifteenth Century. The development of the role of music, and of the staging of the plays is discussed, as is an evident bifurcation of genre, toward commedia erudita on the one hand, and toward opera and the grandi spettacoli on the other. The thematic relationship between the "favole mitologiche" and the first operas one hundred years later is brought into relief, and decisive textual links between them established.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER I HISTORICAL [AND BIOGRAPHICAL]
INTRODUCTION 1
CHAPTER II THE ORPHEUS THEME 47
Illustration The Orpheus Myth According to Vergil and
Ovid 90
CHAPTER III POLITIAN'S ORFEO 94
CHAPTER IV THE ORPHEI TRAGOEDIA AND THE FAVOLA DI ORFEO E ARISTEO 133
CHAPTER V THE CEFALO, THE DANAE, AND THE
PASITHEA 160
CHAPTER VI CONCLUSION 198
APPENDIX I THE PASITHEA OF GASPARE VISCONTI 207
APPENDIX II A CRITICAL BIBLIOGRAPHY' OF THE
WORKS OF N. da CORREGGIO 262
Part I: Printed Editions of Correggio's Works 262
Part II: Collation of Manuscripts Listed by Tissoni
Benvenuti and Kristeller 275
Part III: Manuscript Catalogues Consulted 303
BIBLIOGRAPHY TO APPENDIX II: WORKS OTHER THAN CATALOGUES 329
APPENDIX III: MANUSCRIPTS CONTAINING THE PLAYS
CONSIDERED 332
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE WORKS CITED IN THE TEXT
OF THE THESIS 334