Throughout his life, Petrarch fostered an idealised image of Italy. (1) From the very beginnings of his literary career, he saw Italy as ‘il bel paese’, (2) a single cultural and historical entity endowed with a profoundly religious character, and viewed it as a patria (fatherland) inhabited by a people united by an unseen, common bond. It was, moreover, the historic seat of the Empire, and the true rerum caput, (3) a perspective that gained importance following Petrarch’s renewed interest in the renovatio Romani Imperii after the revolution of Cola di Rienzo and the rising prominence of the Emperor Charles IV.
Yet precisely because Petrarch was so attached to an idealised image of Italy as a single cultural and historical entity, he was also deeply troubled by the political condition of the peninsula. A patchwork quilt of different states, fourteenth-century Italy was rent asunder by internecine warfare. In the Spirito gentil, written – in all probability – on October 15, 1337, he lamented the fact that Italy seemed to be ‘vecchia, oziosa et lenta’ (‘old, idle, and slow’), and depicted the personified peninsula as a sorrowful woman with ‘trecce sparte’ (‘unkempt tresses’) who had been lulled into a ‘pigro sonno’ (‘sluggish sleep’). (4) ‘Bears, wolves, lions, eagles, and snakes’ – vivid evocations of the heraldic symbols used by Italy’s great families – tormented pitiable Italy and spread suffering throughout the land. (5)
It was, however, a matter of particular sorrow for Petrarch that the divisions which afflicted Italy left it pray to the oppressive intervention of foreign barbarians. A metrical epistle addressed to Enea Tolomei in 1331 or 1332 points to the fact that Italy, once the mistress of the world, was now a pray to those people who had previously been its slaves, and resembled a pilotless ship tossed about on turbulent seas. (6) Despite the beauty and virtue of the Italians, their patria was ravaged by avaricious barbarians intent on plunder. In the canzone Italia mia (1344–1345), Petrarch linked the presence of barbarians in Italy with the ‘voglie divise’ (‘divided wills’) of the peninsula’s warring lords, (7) and observed that in waging war for trivial causes, they were seeking love and loyalty in the venal hearts of those who were Italy’s natural enemies. (8) Paid mercenaries, whose loyalty was always questionable, ravaged the land, and spilt Italian blood with impunity. (9)
Petrarch had no higher aspiration than that peace would come to still the hearts of the belligerents who tormented il bel paese. At the conclusion of the Italia mia, for example, he prayed that, moved by compassion for their people and love for the patria, the Italian lords would make peace and be united once more. (10) In later years, with his passion for the renovatio Romani Imperii at its height, Petrarch invoked the idea of Italy as the home of Empire to encourage the emperor to restore peace to his shattered land. In a letter written to Charles IV on February 24, 1350, for example, Petrarch declared that there was no task more sacred, or more serious than the emperor’s duty to restore peace to a fractured Italy. (11)
This conception of Italy found expression in Petrarch’s diplomatic writings during the Venetian-Genoese War. He appealed to a notion of Italy as a single cultural entity that, united, was the queen of the earth, (12) and castigated the two maritime republics for engaging in what amounted to ‘an Italic and civil war’. (13) Expressing his fears for Italy to Andrea Dandolo, Doge of Venice in 1351, he drew attention to the fact that the two warring participants were both Italian, (14) and that only Italian blood could flow from the wounds inflicted. (15) This could benefit only Italy’s enemies:
“...doubtless, wounded by our own hands, we shall perish; plundered by our own hands, we shall lose both our renown and our dominion of the seas, gained with so much labour; in such a way, we shall not lose that consolation for ills that we have often had at other times; for our enemies will be able to rejoice in our calamities, but will be able to take less pride in themselves... and alas, ... no longer in Thebes, but throughout Italy, fraternal lines of battle are being marshalled, a lamentable spectacle for friends, a joyful one for enemies. But what is the end of a war when, whether you are victorious or defeated – for the game of fortune is uncertain – it is necessary that one of the two lights ... other darkened?” (16)As in the Italia mia, Petrarch attributed the conflict to trivial causes, and drew particular attention both to the incomprehensible role played by intemperate anger and the spur that had been provided by greed. It was only an absurd, fleeting rage that had driven Venice to spill Italian blood and to attempt to destroy Genoa, a city which would be among the first to take up arms in common cause in the event of a foreign attack. (17)
The motivation for the war was all the more incomprehensible to Petrarch given that such unrestrained malice had led Venice to seek assistance from mercenary, perfidious foreigners, (18) and had caused Italians to be subjected to violence committed by barbarians. Evoking the wording of the Italia mia, Petrarch asked:
“Is the help of barbarian kings therefore sought so that Italians may be overthrown by Italians? Whence should unhappy Italy hope for help if it is insufficient that a mother who should be cherished is torn apart by her sons in their struggle, unless, on top of it all, they stir up public matricide with foreigners? ... The beginnings of our many miseries flowed from when, with an unworthy hatred for our own affairs (whence it came I know not), we were seized by an admiration for external matters, and esteemed Italian loyalty less than barbarian perfidy for a long time because of a pestiferous attitude. We, who seek the loyalty we despair of in our own brothers in venal souls, are mad! The effect of which is that we have most justly fallen into those calamities which we now lament ineffectively and too late, after we opened with the keys of spite, avarice and pride the Alps and the seas – with which Nature defended up rather than with walls – and the gates of the barricades interposed and barred by God, to the Cimbrians, the Huns, the Pannonians, the Gauls, the Teutons, and the Spaniards.” (19)Rather than tearing the ‘beautiful body of Italy to pieces’ with the aid of barbarian allies, it would, Petrarch argued, be far better if Venice and Genoa were to bury their differences. (20) Public duty dictated that even while armed, Venice must love concord and appreciate that there was ‘no greater triumph and no better spoils’ than peace. (21) Indeed, in writing to the Doge and Council of Genoa on November 1, 1352, Petrarch urged the city to bring the war to a conclusion, and thereby prove that it had fought fellow Italians ‘not out of hatred or ambition, but in the name of peace’. (22)
At peace, not only would the ‘two lights of Italy’ be joined in prosperity, (23) but Italy itself would be able to turn its attentions to more laudable ends. Writing to the Doge and Council of Genoa nine months after the battle of the Bosphorus, Petrarch urged the victorious city to put away its weapons and join with Venice in crushing the maritime power of Byzantium (‘that infamous empire, that seat of errors’) (24) and in freeing the Holy Land:
“But, O now, if ... inspired by heaven, you would begin to remember that you are Italians, ... could be friends... and that you fought not because of capital offences but ... for glory and power, then with your minds having been excited, you will turn from this Italian and civil war to foreign ones; you will turn your vengeful weapons against disloyal instigators, and once they have been driven from the sea in chains (which could be done in a moment), you will present a spectacle to the world and a most joyful thing to posterity in soon undertaking a pious expedition to liberate the Holy Land, and in happily demonstrating your loyalty to Jesus Christ.” (25)So too, Petrarch urged Genoa to pursue their attacks on Pedro IV of Aragon with redoubled strength. The entry of Aragon into the conflict transformed the war into a struggle against foreign aggressors. ‘Devote your energy to this, I pray, o courageous man’, Petrarch wrote, ‘carry this out; this is a pious, just, holy, and in no way Italian war; I wish you to employ your military skill and spirit to the full in this, to pursue the charge; in this way, the principal root of your ills must be cut out with axes’. (26) It was imperative that the Genoese punish ‘an insolent king contemptuous of treaties and pledges’, and to ‘compel the barbarians to recognise that they have stupidly undertaken an unworthy and nefarious war against justice...’ (27)
In his letters and appeals to Italy, Petrarch stresses that war between Italians was to be frowned upon, since it constituted a civil war that can only lead to Italians shedding the blood of their fellow brother Italians. He instead encouraged Italians to take up arms against foreign barbarians, the schismatic Byzantines and the Saracens.
Sources:
(1) Natalia Costa-Zalessow, The Personification of Italy From Dante Through the Trecento, Italica 68 no. 3 (1991), pp. 316-31
(2) Petrarch, Rerum vulgarium fragmenta 146.13
(3) Petrarch, Epistolae familiares XV.5, 6-7
(4) Petrarch, RVF. 53.7-28
(5) Ibid., lines 71-6
(6) Petrarch, Epistolae metricae I.3
(7) Petrarch, RVF. 128.55-6
(8) Ibid., 23-7, 33-8
(9) Petrarch, RVF, 128.65-70
(10) Ibid., 81-86
(11) Petrarch, Fam. X.1, 13: « [P]rofecto autem ex omnibus optimis ac sanctissimis curis tuis, nulla gravior quam ut Italicum orbem tranquilla pace componans ».
(12) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 4
(13) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.5, 14
(14) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 17
(15) Petrarch, RVF. 128.1-3
(16) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 5, 15
(17) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 17-18
(18) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.5, 11
(19) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 28, 30–31: « Ergo ne ab italis ad Italos evertendos barbarorum regum poscuntur auxilia? Unde infelix opem speret Italia, siparum est quod certatim a filiis mater colenda discerpitur, nisiad publicum insuper parricidium alienigene concitentur? ... Atqui multarum hinc miseriarum fluxere primordia, dum indigno et nescio unde prodeunte fastidio nostrarum rerum, in admirationem rapimur externarum, et iampridem consuetudine pestífera italicam fidem barbarice perfidie posthabemus. Insani, qui in venalibus animis fidem querimus quam in propriis fratribus desperamus. Quo effectum est ut iure optimo in has calamitates, inciderimus quas iam sero et inefficaciter lamentamur, postquam Alpes ac maria, quibus, non menibus, natura vallaverat, et interiectas obseratasque divino munere claustrorum valvas, livoris avaritie superbieque clavibus aperiendas duximus Cimbris Hunnis Pannoniis Gallis Theutonis et Hispanis ».
(20) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 29
(21) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 11: « ...ita tame nut armatus pacem cogites, pacem ames atque ita persuasum habeas nullos te triumphos clariores, nulla optimora patrie spolia referre posse quam pacem ».
(22) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.5, 15: « ostendite nunc cuntis mortalibus non vos cum Italis pro odio aut cupiditate ulla sed pro pace certasse... »
(23) Petrarch, Fam. XI.8, 34-5: « ...hoc unum in finem coram duorum populorum ducibus affusus et lacrimosus obsecro: infesta manibus arma proicite, date dextras, miscite oscula, animis animos signis signa coniungite. Sic navigantibus occeanus et Eunixi maris ostia patebunt nullusque regum aut populorum nisi venerabundus occurret; sic vos Scitha, sic Britannus Aferque permetuet; sic Egiptum sic tirium litus et armenium, sic formidatos olim Cilicium sinus et Rhodon quondam pelagi potentem, sic sicanios montes et maris monstra trinacrii, sic infames antiquis et novis latrociniis Baleares, sic denique Fotunatas Insulas Orchadasque famosamque sed incognitam Thilen et omnem australem atque yperboream plagam securus vester nauta transiliet... »
(24) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.5, 12: « et infame illud imperium sedemque illam errorum ».
(25) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.5, 13–14: « Sedo adhuc si... celitus inspirati, utrique ceperitis meminisse vos Italos et fuisse amicos et esse posse vobisque non de capitalibus offensis sed ... sumptum de gloria et superioritate certamen; atque ita repente, concitatis animis, ab hoc italico et sotiali bello ad externa conversi, adversus infidos instigatores ultricia simul arma vertatis, et illis ferro laqueo pelago absumptis, quod momento temporis fieri potest, mox expeditionem piam ad liberationem Terre Sancte atque obsequium Iesu Christi feliciter assumentes... »
(26) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.6, 1: « Hic precor incumbite, viri fortes; hoc agite; hoc pium hoc iustum hoc sanctum hoc minime italicum bellum est; hic rei militaris artificium atque animos exercere, hic vos impetum sequi cupio; hinc enim prima malorum radix vestris extirpanda securibus... »
(27) Petrarch, Fam. XIV.6, 7: « Hic est, inquam, ille rex insolens, federum contemptor ac fidei ... Etvos simul et rempublicam vindicate, ethos barbaros agnoscere cogite se amenter adversus iustitiam et armatos viros bellum indignum ac nefarium suscepisse ».
