Toynbee "Comedìa"

Libri titulus est: 'Incipit Comedia Dantis Alagherii florentini natione, non moribus.' . . . Et est comedia genus quoddam poetice narrationis ab omnibus aliis differens. Differt ergo a tragedia in materia per hoc, quod tragedia in principio est admirabilis et quieta, in fine seu exitu est fetida et horribilis, . . . ut patet per Senecam in suis tragediis. Comedia vero inchoat asperitatem alicuius rei, sed eius materia prospere terminatur, ut patet per Terentium in suis comediis . . . Similiter differunt in modo loquendi: elate et sublime tragedia; comedia vero remisse et humiliter.... Et per hoc patet quod Comedia dicitur presens opus. Nam si ad materiam respiciamus, a principio horribilis et fetida est, quia Infernus, in fine prospera, desiderabilis et grata, quia Paradisus; ad modum loquendi, remissus est modus et humilis, quia locutio vulgaris in qua et muliercule communicant. (Epist. xiii. 28-31.)

The title Divina Commedia is subsequent to D.; it appears in some of the oldest MSS. and in Boccaccio's Vita di Dante. The first printed edition bearing this title is the Venice one of 1555; in a previous edition, with the commentary of Landino (Firenze, 1481), the epithet 'divino' is applied to D. himself, but not to the poem. In the earliest printed editions (Foligno, 1472; Jesi, 1472) the title is simply La Comedia di D. A. Aldus entitled his first edition (1502) Le terze rime di D.; his second he calls simply Dante. The title Divina Commedia perhaps had its origin in D.'s own description of the poem as lo sacrato poema, [Par. xxiii. 62]; il poema sacro, [Par. xxv. 1]. [See P. Rajna, 'L' epiteto "Divina" dato alla "Commedia" di Dante', BSDI, xxii (1915), 107-115, 255 ff.]

The form of the poem is triple, the three divisions corresponding with the three realms of the next world, Hell, Purgatory, Paradise. Each division or cantica contains thirty-three cantos (with an introductory one to the first cantica), perhaps with a reference to the years of Christ's life upon earth, while the triple form of verse ('terza rima') may be regarded as symbolical of the Trinity. The opening canto of the Inferno forms an introduction to the whole poem, which thus contains 100 cantos, the square of the perfect number ten (V.N. xxix. 1; Conv. II. xiv. 3). These contain in all 14,233 lines, viz. 4,720 in the Inferno, 4,755 in the Purgatorio, and 4,758 in the Paradiso. The average length of each canto is 142.33 lines; the longest being Purg. xxxii, with 160 lines, the shortest, Inf. vi and Inf. xi, with 115 lines. D. himself applies the term canzone ([Inf. xx. 3]) or cantica ([Purg. xxxiii. 140]) to the three main divisions of the poem, and canto ([Inf. xx. 2]; [Par. v. 139]) to the subdivisions. [Inferno_2: Purgatorio_2: Paradiso_2.]

D. places the date of the action of the poem in the Jubilee year 1300. Thus he describes the Journey as having taken place Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita (Inf. i. 1), i.e. in his thirty fifth year, the days of our life, according to the Psalmist, being 'three-score years and ten' ({Ps. lxxxix. 10}), and D. having been born in 1265. Further, he says ([Inf. xxi. 112]) that Christ's descent into Hell took place 1266 years ago, which, with the addition of the thirty-four years from Christ's Incarnation, gives the date 1300.

The dates of the completion of the several parts of the poem have been calculated from internal evidence by several writers, but with widely different results, some scholars holding that D. began the actual composition only after the death of Henry VII (Aug. 1313), others maintaining that the composition was begun about 1307, that the Inferno and Purgatorio were finished before the death of the emperor or but shortly afterwards, and that only the Paradiso was written in the later years. Unfortunately, some of the internal evidence cited by both groups of scholars has been called into serious doubt--i.e. the reference to the date of Clement V's death ([Inf. xix. 76-87]) and other 'prophecies' in the poem--leaving the whole question still open to debate. [For a review of the several opinions and bibliography, see A. Vallone, Studi sulla 'Divina Commedia' (Firenze, 1955), pp.3-18; G. Petrocchi, 'Intorno alla pubblicazione dell'Inferno e del Purgatorio', Convivium, vi (1957), 652-669; C. Hardie, MLR, lv (1960), 369; and U. Cosmo, Guida a Dante (Torino, 1947), pp. 150-151.]

Between 500 and 600 MSS. of the D.C. are known to exist, none claiming to be earlier than 1335 or 1336, i.e. none earlier than fourteen or fifteen years after D.'s death. There are between 300 and 400 printed editions. The earliest are dated 1472, in which year three editions were published, viz. at Foligno, at Mantua, and at Jesi. The first Florentine edition appeared, with the commentary of Landino, in 1481. Two editions were printed in the next century by Aldus, the first in 1502, the second in 1515; in the former (and in another book printed in the same year) the Aldine anchor began to be used for the first time, but it does not appear in all copies.