The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch. Франческо Петрарка

способом.

      1

      Before the publication of De Sade's "Mémoires pour la vie de Petrarque" the report was that Petrarch first saw Laura at Vaucluse. The truth of their first meeting in the church of St. Clara depends on the authenticity of the famous note on the M.S. Virgil of Petrarch, which is now in the Ambrosian Library at Milan.

      2

      Petrarch, in his dialogue with St. Augustine, states that he was older than Laura by a few years.

1

Before the publication of De Sade's "Mémoires pour la vie de Petrarque" the report was that Petrarch first saw Laura at Vaucluse. The truth of their first meeting in the church of St. Clara depends on the authenticity of the famous note on the M.S. Virgil of Petrarch, which is now in the Ambrosian Library at Milan.

2

Petrarch, in his dialogue with St. Augustine, states that he was older than Laura by a few years.

3

"The Floral games were instituted in France in 1324. They were founded by Clementina Isaure, Countess of Toulouse, and annually celebrated in the month of May. The Countess published an edict, which assembled all the poets of France, in artificial arbours, dressed with flowers; and he that produced the best poem was rewared with a violet of gold. There were, likewise, inferior prizes of flowers made in silver. In the meantime, the conquerors were crowned with natural chaplets of their own respective flowers. During the ceremony degrees were also conferred. He who had won a prize three times was pronounced a doctor 'en gaye science,' the name of the poetry of the Provençal Troubadours. This institution, however fantastic, soon became common, through the whole of France."—Warton's History of English Poetry, vol i. p 467.

4

I have transferred the following anecdote from Levati's Viaggi di Petrarea (vol. i. p. 119 et seq.). It behoves me to confess, however, that I recollect no allusion to it in any of Petrarch's letters, and I have found many things in Levati's book which make me distrust his authority.

5

Quest' anima gentil che si disparte.—Sonnet xxiii.

6

Dated 21st December. 1335.

7

Guido Sette of Luni, in the Genoese territory, studied law together with Petrarch; but took to it with better liking. He devoted himself to the business of the bar at Avignon with much reputation. But the legal and clerical professions were then often united; for Guido rose in the church to be an archbishop. He died in 1368, renowned as a church luminary.

8

Canzoni 8, 9, and 10.

9

Valery, in his "Travels in Italy" gives the following note respecting out poet. I quote from the edition of the work published at Brussels in 1835:—"Petrarque rapporte dans ses lettres latines que le laurier du Capitole lui avait attiré une multitude d'envieux; que le jour de son couronnement, au lieu d'eau odorante qu'il était d'usage de répandre dans ces solennités, il reçut sur la tête une eau corrosive, qui le rendit chauve le reste de sa vie. Son historien Dolce raconte même qu'une vieille lui jetta son pot de chambre rempli d'une acre urine, gardée, peut-être, pour cela depuis sept semaines."

10

Sonnet cxcvi.

11

Translation.—In the twenty-fifth year of his age, after a short though happy existence, our John departed this life in the year of Christ 1361, on the 10th of July, or rather on the 9th, at the midhour between Friday and Saturday. Sent into the world to my mortification and suffering, he was to me in life the cause of deep and unceasing solicitude, and in death of poignant grief. The news reached me on the evening of the 13th of the same month that he had fallen at Milan, in the general mortality caused by that unwonted scourge which at last discovered and visited so fearfully this hitherto exempted city. On the 8th of August, the same year, a servant of mine returning from Milan brought me a rumour (which on the 18th of the same fatal month was confirmed by a servant of Dominus Theatinus) of the death of my Socrates, my companion, my best of brothers, at Babylon (Avignon, I mean) in the month of May. I have lost my comrade and the solace of my life! Receive, Christ Jesus, these two, and the five that remain, into thy eternal habitations!

12

Petrarch's words are: "civi servare suo;" but he takes the liberty of considering Charles as—adoptively—Italian, though that Prince was born at Prague.