Early Years of Dante Alighieri - World of Biography

LIFE & EVENTS

A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE Dante Alighieri

The historical period that Dante lived in was the Middle Ages. This century saw the death of the traditional Medieval Culture, a culture formed by the influence of the Church, the Roman classical tradition and the German populace. Politically speaking, there were two auctoritates in Europe during the 13^th and 14^th centuries : the Emperor and the Pope. The former represented temporal earthly power, the latter the religious spiritual power.

In Italy, the country was divided into different town councils. There were two main political parties : the Guelfi and the Ghibellini. The Guelfi were in favor of the Pope while the Ghibellini favored the Emperor. At the beginning of the 14^th century, the Guelfi led most of the councils in Italy. In Florence, the Guelfi party split into two factions : the whites (bianchi, in favor of the Emperor) and the blacks (neri, in favor of the Pope). Dante was a white Guelfi. The years around 1300 were the ones in which political fights between the bianchi and neri became more dramatic and bloody.

EARLY YEARS

Dante Alighieri (his real name was Durante) was born in Florence, the son of Alighiero di Bellincione Alighieri, a notary belonging to an ancient but decadent Guelf family. Dante’s own statement in the Paradiso that he was born when the sun was in Gemini, fixes his birthday between 18^th May and 17^th June. There is not much known about his mother except that her name was Bella and she was Alighiero’s first wife. Dante Alighieri

Little is known about Dante’s childhood except what he has revealed. His mother died when he was a child and his father died before he reached manhood. A few months after the poet’s birth, the victory of Charles of Anjou over King Manfred at Benevento ended the power of the empire in Italy. It placed a French dynasty upon the throne of Naples and secured the predominance of the Guelfs in Tuscany. Dante thus grew up amidst the triumphs of the Florentine democracy.

Dante belonged to a typical middle-class family in an atmosphere that was conducive to learning and encouraging to young poets. His first studies were mainly in rhetoric, grammar, philosophy, literature and theology. He was strongly influenced by Brunetto Latini – a Florentine philosopher and rhetorician.

Latini also appears as an important figure in La Divina Commedia. Dante was unusually well-educated for his time, having studied the fundamentals of Dominican Aristotelian scholasticism and Franciscan Platonic mysticism. In his youth, he was a Stilnovo poet and had many friends among the other members of the Stilnovo Poetical School (especially Guido Cavalcanti).

Dante displayed an early predilection for writing poetry. He found his inspiration in his idealized love for a young girl. He was only nine years old, when he first saw her and fell in love, although she was unaware of his passion. In his Vita Nuova, he relates how he first set eyes on "the glorious lady of his heart, Beatrice." Dante never gives the slightest clue to her family name. But to Boccaccio, we owe the generally accepted fact that she was the daughter of Folco Portinari. Nine years later, he met her again, by which time she was already married to Simone de’Bardi. Describing the occasion, Dante wrote, "Passing through a street she turned her eyes towards the spot, where I stood greatly abashed and with ineffable courtesy, she saluted me most modestly."

Dante Alighieri Neither Beatrice’s marriage nor the poet’s own subsequent marriage interfered with his pure and Platonic devotion to her. Dante’s love for her was symbolic and mystical and it was destined to remain that way, for within seven years she had died of the plague.

Dante’s first book Vita Nuova was dedicated to the Florentine poet, Guido Cavalcanti, whom he calls "the first of my friends." It ends with a promise to Beatrice that he would write, "What has never before been written of any woman." Although Dante’s relationship with Beatrice never left the spiritual plane; their brief encounter was undoubtedly the most significant event in his boyhood and youth.

Dante’s adoration and idolization of Beatrice did not interfere with his marriage to Gemma Donati, who bore him three children. Beatrice had become for him a being transcending humanity, but there were times when he needed the companionship of somebody less ethereal, times when he needed to be more down-to-earth. At such moments he turned to his wife Gemma, or enjoyed extra-marital affairs. After the death of Beatrice, Dante began studying philosophy and theology in depth, also attending cultural associations, which provided lessons on Aristotle and St Thomas.