The names Barbi, Casini, D'Ancona, Flamini, Melodia, Scherillo, without further reference, indicate the annotations by these scholars to the passages in question in their editions of the Vita Nuova; similarly, Cochin, Norton, Rossetti, refer to the translations by these authors. "Moore" refers to the Oxford Dante.

NOTES

I, 1. — libro. It is natural to speak of the memory or the mind as a book in which the intellect records what one wishes to remember. D. frequently uses mente in the sense of memory. Cf. Inf. II, 8; Par. XVII, 91; XXIII, 54. The Vita Nuova itself, small in proportion to the libro de la memoria, is called libello here, as in XII, XXV, XXVIII (where this proemio is referred to), and in Conv. II, 2; for it contains only the sentenzia, the significant part, of the poet's memories; it is not a complete account of his early life, nor a collection of all his poems, but a selection of such material as concerns his 'new' life; cf. the end of II and V, and Introduction.

3. — Incipit vita nova, The New Life begins.

4.- parole, continuing the metaphor of the 'book,' means here, as frequently, the poems composed at various times and the remembrances connected with them. In Hamlet, act I, sc. 5, Shakespeare says:

Remember thee?

Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee?
Yea, from the table of my memory

I'll wipe away all trivial fond records,

All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,

That youth and observation copied there;

And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain ...

II, 1. — Nove. With the word nine, whose significance will appear later, D. begins his narrative. In many editions this chapter is numbered as the first, and I is called proemio.

2. - cielo de la luce, the heaven of the sun, which gives light to the world. According to the Ptolemaic astronomy, the Earth, the center of the universe, is surrounded by nine concentric spheres or heavens. In each of the first seven is fixed one of the planets, which revolves with it; the planets, counting outward from the earth, being the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. The eighth heaven is that of the fixed stars,

the ninth the crystalline primo mobile, which imparts its motion to the others (la spera che più larga gira, XLI); and outside of all is the motionless tenth heaven, the Empyrean. With this passage cf. D.'s sonnet (Barbi no. CXI; Moore no. 36) beginning: Io sono stato con Amore insieme Da la circulazion del Sol mia nona.

D. often indicates a year's time by referring to the annual motion of the sun; cf. Inf. VI, 68; Par. XXVI, 119–23; etc.

3.-girazione. The sun, as D. explains in Conv. II, 3 and 14; III, 5, has two motions: one, imparted to it by the primo mobile, is its daily rotation around the earth; the other, proper to it, is a motion away from and toward the pole. In combination these two motions appear to form a sort of spiral course, which is completed and returns to its starting point in a year's time. For purposes of astronomical calculation, the apparent motion of the sun serves as well as the actual motion of the earth in its daily rotation on its axis and its yearly journey around the sun. For further discussion of the matter see the note by F. Angelitti in Scherillo's edition of the V.N.

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4. — gloriosa donna, implying that while he writes these words, the prose, she is in glory in the eternal life; cf. XXXI, 60; gloriare, XXVIII; Conv. II, 8: là dove quella gloriosa donna vive. - de la mia mente implies that she rules his mind or his memory; not, as some have thought, that she existed only in his imagination. fu chiamata. . . The general meaning of this puzzling phrase is, she was called Beatrice by many who did not know what to call her; that is, they did not know her name, but nevertheless applied it to her on account of the effect she produced on them. Thus che is an interrogative pronoun and si a reflexive used expletively (cf. Barbi, Flamini, Melodia). In XIII, 14, D. says that 'names are the consequences of things,' the name results from the character or effect of the thing. Others read si, and make non . . che mean 'only': did not know how to call her except so. Bertoni, Prosa della V.N., pp. 18-21, takes chiamare as a relic of Lat. imperfect subjunctive, clamarent, and che in the sense of 'why': did not know why they should call so.

7.- cielo stellato, the eighth heaven, that of the fixed stars (see note above), which, as D. twice states in Conv. (II, 6, 15),

was believed to move from west to east one degree in 100 years; it would therefore move one-twelfth part of a degree in eight years and four months. This apparent motion of the stars with respect to the earth is now known as the Precession of the Equinoxes; it is in fact somewhat less slow than D. indicates, covering a degree in about 71 years.

10-II.

- vestita . . . ornata. The adjectives nobilissimo, umile, onesto all modify colore, and sanguigno is in apposition with it. As Flamini remarks, she wore a girdle about her waist and probably a wreath of flowers on her head.

13. spirito. In order to understand D.'s use of the word spirito (spirto, spiritello), it is important to recall the nature and functions of the spiriti in medieval physiology, and to avoid the error (D'Ancona, Melodia, Cochin, etc.) of explaining them as merely symbols or personifications of bodily functions. Of course, when the spiriti are made to speak, they are in a sense personified; but no more so than, for instance, the heart when it is made to speak. It is also true that the word is used by D. and his contemporaries with several different meanings: (1) soul; (2) tendency or inclination, as 'spirit of pity'; (3) spiritual or incorporeal being; (4) physiological spirit, which is the meaning here. (In his sonnet Pegli occhi, Guido Cavalcanti introduces the word with all these and still more meanings.) As pointed out by Flamini in Rassegna Bibliografica della Lett. Ital. XVIII, 168ff. (1910), Dante probably had before him a treatise by Albertus Magnus, De Spiritu et Respiratione; but the same theory is expressed by various other writers, in slightly different forms. An intermediary, a sort of fluid substance, was assumed to exist between the soul and the body, partaking of the nature of both and unable to exist without them; this intermediary substance was supposed to have actual physical existence, and was called spiritus or spirito. By means of it the soul governed the organs of the body. We must distinguish between the power of the soul to rule the body (vis or virtus), and the instruments by which this power is exercised (spiritus). The soul of man is single, but has three forms: vegetative, sensitive, rational; so also the spiritus is single, and has three forms or manifestations: originating in the heart as the 'vital' spirit (spiritus vitalis secundum omnes philosophos a corde oritur, Alb. Mag., l. c.), it becomes 'natural'

in the liver, and ‘animal' (belonging to the mind, anima) in the brain. Dante speaks in Conv. II, 13 of li spiriti umani che sono quasi principalmente vapori del cuore (cf. Purg. XXV), while some other writers make the spirit originate in the liver. What D. calls spiriti sensitivi are not the senses, or personifications of the faculties, but emanations of the spirito animale which act as vehicles of the senses to bear perceptions to the brain, traveling from the organs of sense (as the eyes) along the nerves, the latter being hollow or concave ut in eis discurrat spiritus qui est vehiculum virtutis (Alb. Mag., de Anima). The spirits of sight and of the other senses are actual fluid substances which move freely, sometimes even away from the person to whom they belong; and we hear of spirits of love, etc.

15. — polsi here means arteries, in particular any point on the body where the circulation of the blood may be felt (spiritus vitalis per arterias pulsando per totum corpus dirigitur, Alb. Mag., de Sp. et Resp.); cf. Inf. I, 90; XIII, 63. It is easy to see the idea that D. wishes to convey when he introduces the spiriti: love from now on rules his life; becomes the happiness of his mind and senses, particularly of the sense of sight when he sees B.; and causes some of the bodily functions to be interfered with, so that for instance we may think of him as losing his appetite (in quella parte ove si ministra lo nutrimento nostro, namely the liver, the seat of the spirito naturale).

16-17.- Ecce deus fortior me I, who coming shall rule over me.

Behold a god stronger than

18. — alta camera is one of the three parts into which the brain is divided. For all this, and for abundant references and quotations, see Flamini in Rass. Bibl. XVIII, 168ff.; Labusquette, Les Béatrices, pp. 488-502; Salvadori, La Poesia giovenile

di G. Cavalcanti, Roma, 1895, pp. 62f; and especially G. Vitale, Ricerche intorno all'elemento filosofico nei poeti del “dolce stil nuovo," in Giornale Dantesco XVIII, 162ff. (1910).

21.- Apparuit iam beatitudo vestra, Now has appeared your

26. - Amore segnoreggiò. From now on until after the death of B., love rules D.'s mind and soul with the counsel of the