few years to be gathered into the incomparable record of his New Life. It is the face of Dante in the Maytime of youthful hope, in that serene season of promise and of joy, which was so soon to reach its foreordained close in the death of her who had made life new and beautiful for him, and to the love and honor of whom he dedicated his soul and gave all his future years. It is the same face with that of the mask; but the one is the face of a youth, "with all triumphant splendor on his brow," the other of a man, burdened with "the dust and injury of age." The forms and features are alike, but as to the later face,

That time of year thou mayst in it behold

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,

Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

The face of the youth is grave, as with the shadow of distant sorrow; the face of the man is solemn, as of one who had gone

Per tutti i cerchi del dolente regno.

The one is the young poet of Florence, the other the supreme poet of the world,1—

Che al divino dall' umano,

All' eterno dal tempo era venuto.

1 "In 1864, in view of the approaching celebration in Florence of the sixth centenary of Dante's birth, the Minister of Public Instruction commissioned Gaetano Milanesi and Luigi Passerini to report upon the most authentic portrait of the poet, as it was proposed to have a medallion executed in commemoration of the centenary. Milanesi and Passerini communicated the results of their investigations to the Minister in a letter which was published in the Giornale del Centenario for 20th July, 1864. After stating their doubts with regard to the Bargello portrait, and disposing of the claims of two other portraits contained in MSS. preserved in Florence, they go on to say: 'Very precious on the other hand is the portrait prefixed to Codex 1040 in the Riccardi Library, which contains the minor poems of Dante,

together with those of Messer Bindi Bonichi, and which appears from the arms and initials to have belonged to Paolo di Jacopo Giannotti, who was born in 1430. This portrait, which is about half the size of life, is in water-color, and represents the poet with his characteristic features at the age of rather more than forty. It is free from the exaggeration of later artists, who, by giving undue prominence to the nose and under lip and chin, make Dante's profile resemble that of a hideous old woman. In our opinion this portrait is to be preferred to any other, especially for the purposes of a medallion.' 1

"Cavalcaselle, among other authorities, declined to accept these conclusions. Checcacci, on the contrary, who carefully compared the Riccardi portrait with a very exact copy of that in the Bargello, asserted that if the difference of age be taken into consideration, the two resemble each other 'like two drops of water': 'The Bargello portrait lacks the wrinkles of the other, while the coloring is more fresh, and the prominence of the lower lip is less marked, but the nose, which does not change with advancing years, is identical, as are the shape and color of the eyes, and the shape of the skull, which may be distinguished in both portraits.' He added further that the sculptor Dupré was greatly struck with the Riccardi portrait, which he considered might be the work of Giotto himself, and that he availed himself of it for the medallion which he was commissioned to execute in commemoration of the centenary." (Toynbee.)

The portrait in the Santa Maria Novella which Prof. Chiappelli has recently asserted to be of Dante, while interesting, throws no new light on the appearance of the poet, as it was painted after 1350, much later than the so-called Giotto portrait. (D)

1 This portrait is reproduced as the frontispiece of this book.

CHAPTER IV

THE VITA NUOVA

I

LYRICAL POETRY BEFORE DANTE 1

It was in southern France that the intellectual life of Europe first awoke. In that land of fertile soil and fair skies a new sense of the joy of living began to stir in men's hearts after the cheerless night of the Dark Ages. They saw that the world was good to dwell in and that existence had its zest. Especially did they become aware of the shapeliness of the human form, and discarding the loose sacks which monkish prejudice had designed to conceal it, they modeled their apparel to reveal its grace. With the throwing off of the ascetic ideals, woman was ele vated from the degrading position she had held, and by a natural reaction became the object of chivalrous devotion. The awakening of nobler love, and the growing pleasure in life and its beauty, produced inevitably a fresh outburst of song. The ballad singers gave place to the troubadours. Many of these were men of talent, culture, and high birth, who easily compelled their flexible and rhythmic language to express in melodious strains their knightly passions. Their songs may seem to us vapid after the chill of so many centuries, and they are undoubtedly lacking in that vividness that so often reveals genius in the ruder ages.

1 For much of the material used in this short account I am indebted to Gaspary's Italian Literature to the Death of Dante, trans. by H. Oelsner, a book of great value. (D.)