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[Castelvetro’s commentary on RVF 1-4]

Overview

Current Location

Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana
Milan
Italy

Shelfmark
D 332 Inf.
Date
second half of the sixteenth century
Mode of exegesis
Related to Petrarch's

RVF 1-4

Description

Physical Description: Format

315x235 mm. (350x240 mm.); I + 222 + I fols.

Physical Description: Textblock

paper; sixteenth-century hands by various hands; prose text.

Title Page

<inc> Voj che ascoltate. erano gia sparsi per diuersi luoghi e persone i sonetti del p[etrarca] (fol. 184r)

Internal Description

fols. 184r-187r: [Lodovico Castelvetro’s] observations on RVF 1-4 (<inc> Voj che ascoltate. erano gia sparsi per diuersi luoghi e persone i sonetti del p[etrarca] di maniera che non si sapeua quali fossero i suoi, et quali i migliori. la onde essendo stato richiesto da certo signiore di Romagna che douesse mettere insieme quelli che a lui pareuano i migliorj; <exp> La fortuna et la Natura, la fortuna fa le sue cose alla uentura, ma la Natura le fa co[n] ragione. dice dunque il P[etrarca] che la natura si ringratia. il luogo per che ha prodotto cosi bella donna, Talche, è del uerso solo. Onde si bella Donna al mondo nacque. E onde si puo riferire alla Natura et à luogo, ma piu mi piace che si dica del luogo);
 
Other contents:
 
The ms. includes several dozens of Latin and Italian writings (letters, observations, booklets, treatises, etc.), dealing with heterogenous topics. The more represented fields of study are geometry: observations on the compass (fols. 73r-74v); geometrical observation (‘Geometrica methodo’: fols. 124r-125v); [Gian Vincenzo Pinelli’s] Latin prose on geometrical elements: fols. 171r-1721r; geography: Pinelli’s autograph notes on Pietro Medina’s book Libro de grandezas y cosas memorables de España (fols. 11r-12r); comparison between France and Italy (fols. 32r-33v), literature: notes on arrangement of arguments in orations (‘Della disp[osizio]ne delle parti dell’orazioni’: fols. 29r-30v); evaluation of Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (‘Giuditio sul poema di Lodouico Ariosto’: fols. 126r-129r); philological observations (‘Di filologia’: fols. 131r-136r) and philosophical ones: excerpts from Pseudo-Aristotle’s works: fol. 76r-76v; Paolo Gradi’s critical observations against Denis Lambin’s interpretation of Aristotle: fols. 116r-119v; Molineo’s letter on the word καναβοσ used by Aristotle: fol. 169r-169v.
 
For a detailed list of incipits and authors, see Ceruti or the links to Manus and to the Ambrosiana online catalogue.

Material Copy

Location

Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana
Milan
Italy

Shelfmark
D 332 Inf.
Copy seen by
Lorenzo
Sacchini
Notes

The commentary on RVF 1-4 concentrates on clarifying the literal meaning of the sonnets, and attentively examines single lines or words of Petrarch’s poems with a strong focus on linguistic issues (e.g. the discussion of the word ‘onde’ in RVF 1.2 draws upon Pietro Bembo’s Prose, and examines its use in Latin and in Italian). The likely attribution to Castelvetro derives from the attribution to him of a shorter version of this writing in ms. I 204 Inf. also housed in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana of Milan. The current work is unpublished.

Bibliography

Ceruti
 
***
 
Gigliucci 2007, 122