[Malatesti’s academic lecture on Triumphus Amoris II.184-87]

200x137 mm; II + 575 + I fols. (numbered 1-286, 247²-286², 287-535).

paper; seventeenth-century cursive hand; single lines or small sections of Petrarch’s poems set either on left or in central columns, with prose text of lecture distributed across the page beneath either every single line or section of text.

‘Lezione fatta nell’Accademia degl’APATISTI il di 6 di Maggio 1637’ (fol. 156r)

fols. 156r-176r: Malatesti’s academic lecture on Triumphus Amoris II.184-87 (‘Lezione fatta nell’Accademia degl’APATISTI il di 6 di Maggio 1637’; <inc> Grande ardire e stato veramente il mio Vener[abi]le Priore, e Gentiliss[i]mi Uditori, conoscendomi privo di tutte quelle scienze, che son necessarie a chi vuol discorrere p[er]l’Accademie a lasciarmi p[er]suadere a montare su questa Cattedra; <exp> Molte altre cose ci sarebbon da dire sopra q[ues]ta materia, ma no[n] essendo io abile a farlo cercherò di lasciar la lezione seguente ap[er]sona che possa suplire a i miei mancanti e qu[el]la sara il Sig[no]re N.N.’);
 
fol. 176r: colophon: Fine;
 
Other contents:
 
The ms. is Malatesti’s zibaldone, and includes a selection of hundreds of poems and a few prose texts in draft, with many erasures, corrections, interlinear and marginal insertions. Both the prose texts, such as the ‘Ambasceria a un Principe del Carnevale’ (fols. 90r-93r), and the poems share a frivolous and facetious tone. The poetry section includes: forty-nine out of the fifty sonnets that make up his celebrated collection of erotic poems, La Tina; correspondence sonnets with other authors; compositions linked to academic happenings, such as the death of a member.