Brunetto Latini

Brunetto Latini ((Florence ~ 1220 - 1294) was notary, Philosophe and Chancelier of the republic florentine.

Brunetto Latini is a key character of the humanistic political thought of the Moyen-âge " central". It evolves/moves in a laic intellectual medium whose rise must with the consolidation of an autonomous political arena within the city. The progressive opening of the capacity to a wide spectrum citizens ends in a change in practice political daily. The middle-class florentine, artifice of an economic growth without precedents, lays down new rules of the political game and intends to legitimate them in front of the political main actors of medieval Europe. Brunetto Latini intervenes in this process while bringing a theoretical corpus to the fragile republic florentine, which establishes the ethical and practical bases vivere civil .

Political activity

In the year 1254 appear the first signatures of the notary “Ser Brunectus Bonacorsi Latinus” in the principal diplomatic documents florentins of the time, such as the peace treaty with His or the part guelfe of Arezzo.

With the approach of the war between His gibeline allied with Manfred I {{er}} of Sicily and the Florence guelfe, Brunetto Latini is charged by the council with the anziani with establishing an embassy near the king Alphonse X of Castille. The diplomatic mediation leading to nothing, on the way of the return Brunetto Latini learns that Florence lost the Bataille of Montaperti, delivered the September 4th 1260. The Florentin diplomat thus sees himself condemned to the exile and settles in France.

He remains with Montpellier, Arras and Bar-sur-Aube. Certain historians think that it gives conferences to the Sorbonne. During six years Brunetto Latini devotes itself to the study. It reads Cicéron, Aristote, Salluste, Martin de Braga, Vincent of Beauvais and the Romance of the Rose of Guillaume de Lorris. The study does not prevent it being organized with the community of florentins guelfes exiled in France and from establishing contacts with Charles of Anjou in order to prepare the return to Florence. It dedicates to him Li books dou treasure , an encyclopedia of three volumes written in Picard which compiles about all knowledge that the time could acquire thanks to the first hearths of studia humanitatis in Italy of north, with Chartres, Tolède or in Sicily. It exposes to it especially the bases of the republican political theory florentine. He writes an allegorical and didactic poem, the Tesoretto which summarizes knowledge of the school of Chartres through its accidental rise towards beyond. He writes also a treaty of rhetoric, Rettorica , which translates and comments on amply the De Inventione of Cicéron.

In 1266, the pressure of Guelfes (in particular those of the powerful bankers florentins) bears its fruits. The victory of Charles of Anjou with Benevento “releases” Florence who sees her again restored democratic institutions. Brunetto Latini undertakes an intense political activity to it, named protonotaire of the house angevine in Tuscany. Starting from 1272, its signature seems that of the chancellor of Florence. The historian Demetrio Marzi reminds it like the first of the large chancellors florentins such as Coluccio Salutati, Leonardo Bruni or Niccolò Machiavelli. He follows a broad policy of conciliation by signing peace with Genoa, Lucques and Pisa while taking his distances with the despotism of Charles of Anjou. This last indeed causes fears as for its capacity growing in Europe. It establishes intense diplomatic contacts with the Couronne of Aragon and the historian Julia Bolton-Holloway thinks it among those which were at the origin of the Palerman insurrection of the Vêpres of the March 31st 1282.

The last years of Brunetto Latini are probably devoted to teaching. Dante Alighieri dedicates song to him XV of the Hell of the Divine comedy and pays a vibrating homage has that which he recognizes, at the sides of Virgile, like its Master. He also teaches with the poet and friend of Dante, Guido Cavalcanti. The historian Giovanni Villani wrote at the thirteenth century that Brunetto Latini was one “… large philosopher, and was a notorious Master in rhetoric, so much as regards the good diction than of the good writing. And it was that which Maria the Tulle rhetoric (ndt: Cicéron), and made the good and useful book called Trésor and Tesoretto, which is the Key of the Treasury, and other books of philosophy, on the defects and the virtues, and he was chancellor of our city. It was a fashionable person, but we had mentioned before that he was the initiator and the Master of the instruction of Florentins, he made them experts of the art of good speak and to control our republic well according to the policy.”

Political thought

Brunetto Latini is the large Florentin popularizer who offers to the plebs, the access to the knowledge hitherto reserved for a jealous elite. It is the first to popularize the Éthique in Nicomaque of Aristote, the De Inventione and three orations of Cicéron. These translations are not innocent, they form the republican engagement of which he is the principal ideologist with Florence. Brunetto Latini works out in Li books dou treasure a laic philosophy which places the language like privileged place of the political action. Thus, taking again the theory of Cicéron, Brunetto the Rhétorique, the science of saying well considers, like civil science. The operation of the city thus depends on the way in which the citizens make use of the word. An unwise use of the word too often causes the civil discord, while a careful and conciliating use makes it possible to act in the political arena without having to resort to violence. The vulgar one, which will become in particular thanks to the impulse of its Dante disciple, an at the same time philosophical, poetic and political language, must make it possible to create social cohesion necessary to civil peace.

Texts on line

Latini, Brunetto, and P. Chabaille. '' Li books dou treasure, new Documentation on the French history. First series, political History. '' Paris: Imperial printing works, 1863.
it '' Tesoretto ''
it '' Favolello ''
the '' Rettorica ''

Bibliography recommended

Bolton-Holloway, Julia. Twice-told bruise: Brunetto Latino and Dante Alighieri. New York: Peter Lang, 1993.
Imbach, Ruedi. Dante, philosophy and the laic ones, Initiations with medieval philosophy; 1 . Freiburg, Paris: University editions; Editions of the Stag, 1996.
Jauss, Hans Robert. Alterità E modernità beyond will letteratura medieval. 1a. ED. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1989.
Latini, Brunetto. " The Small Treasury. It Tesoretto" , translated from Italian, presented and annotated by Bertrand Levergeois, bilingual edition, Paris, Michel de Maule 1997.
Pézard, Andre. Dante under the rain of fire. Hell, song XV. of medieval philosophy. No 40. : pp. 468. Paris, 1950.
Skinner, Quentin. The foundations off modern political thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Close, 1978.
Sundby, Thor. Brunetto Latinos levnet og skrifter: I and tillaeg: Philippi Gualteri Moralium dogma, Albertani Brixiensis Ars loquendi and tacendi, Versio islandica C.XXVI Moralium dogmatis. København, 1869.
Wieruszowski, Helene. Politics and culture in medieval Spain and Italy, Storia E Letteratura: Raccolta di studi E testi; 121. Roma: Edizioni di storia E will letteratura, 1971.

See too

Ethical of the discussion
Its letter in the name of Florentins on the judgment and the execution of Tesauro Beccaria

----

Random links: