Words of Conversion: Poetry and Religious Identity in Early Modern Italy
In: Journal of Religion in EuropeSearch for other papers by Matteo Soranzo in
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The essay examines three cases of poets (Baptista Mantuanus, Giles of Viterbo, Jacopo Sannazaro) who wrote texts about conversion in early modern Italy. Its goal is to illustrate the evolution of conversion before the Reformation and to explore the role of poetic writing in the construction of religious identities. More precisely, the essay investigates how members of mendicant orders used a so-called ‘language of experiential knowledge’ to define their religious identity and defend the knowledge claims of their order against competing options. In doing so, the essay brings forth an original hypothesis concerning the target and motives of the condemnation of poetry at the Fifth Lateran Council, while further contributing to the current debate on religious pluralism and European identity.
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3)
John Monfasani, “Aristotelians, Platonists, and the Missing Ockhamists: Philosophical Liberty in Pre-Reformation Italy,” Renaissance Quarterly 46.2 (1993), 247–276, here 267; Paul O. Kristeller, “The Theory of Immortality of the Soul,” Journal of the History of Ideas 1 (1940), 299–319, here 317; Giovanni Di Napoli, L’immortalità dell’anima nel Rinascimento (Turin: Società Editrice Internazionale, 1963), 222–223.
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6)
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11)
Arthur D. Nock, The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1933), 6–7, 134. For a recent reassessment of Nock’s indebtedness to psychology of religion, see Zeba A. Crook, Reconceptualizing Conversion: Patronage, Loyalty, and Conversion in the Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2004), 24–26.
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12)
Lewis Rambo, Understanding Religious Conversion (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1993), 63–64.
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13)
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25)
Baptista Mantuanus, De Sacris Diebus Carmelitae Opus Aureum (Milan: Francesco Minizio Calvo, 1540), 28: “Dumque soporatum corpus sine luce iaceret/ mens fuit ad superos trans ignea sidera miris/ rapta modis, ubi consiliis interfuit aulae/ illius aeternae, totum quae temperat orbem/ illic intuitus triados mysteria, et omnes/ coelituum populos et quo deus ordine tantam/ terrarum ac coeli molem regit, atque futuri/ tempori eventus, et quae cognoscere, non est/ fas humanae animae, dum fert mortalia membra.”
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27)
Baptista Mantuanus, De Dionysii Aeropagitae Conversione, Vita et Agone (Milan: Pietro Martire Mantegazza, 1506), A viii, r-v (PI, I: 419–426; 431–435): “Nocte tamen cum solus adest Dionysius, intrat/ In freta lata magis, longeque a littore puppem/ Ire sinens ignota aliis secat aequora nautis./ Namque docebat uti flamis (PI flammis) coelestibus olim/ Arserat, ut prostratus humi iam lumine captus/ Audierat procul ex alto resonantia miris/ Verba modis, instar tonitru quo nigra dehiscunt/ Nubila, quod fracto iaculatur fulmina coelo. […]Ut mens rapta super coeli septemplicis astra,/ Astra super duodena, super glacialia tecta,/ Quae subiecta ferunt ingenti corpora motu,/ Et super elysios ubi coelum immobile campos/ Audierat nostro quae sit fari ore nefandum.”
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28)
Vladimir Zabughin, Un beato poeta (Battista Spagnoli, Il Mantovano): Discorso letto in Arcadia il 4 febbraio 1917 in occasione del quarto centenario della morte del b. Battista Mantovano, Priore generale dei Carmelitani (Roma: Edizioni Carmelitane, 1917), 149.
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35)
Paul O. Kristeller, Le Thomisme e la Pensée Italienne de la Renaissance (Montréal: Institut d’études médiévales; Paris: Vrin, 1967), 129–135.
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45)
Giles, Sententiae, 110–2; Anna Maria Voci-Roth, “Marsilio Ficino ed Egidio da Viterbo,” in: Gian Carlo Garfagnini (ed.), Marsilio Ficino e il ritorno di Platone. Studi e documenti (Florence: Olschki, 1986), vol. 2, 477–508, here 479; O’Malley, Giles of Viterbo, 24–28.
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46)
Giles, Sententiae, 46–47; Daniel Nodes, “A Hydra in the Gardens of Adonis: Literary Allusions and the Language of Humanism in Egidio da Viterbo,” Renaissance Quarterly 57.2 (2004), 494–517, here 502, 512; O’Malley, Giles of Viterbo, 55–58.
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47)
Giles, Sententiae, 47–48, 74–75; Daniel Nodes, “Introduction,” The Commentary on the Sentences of Petrus Lombardus (Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2010), 1–24, here 14; Massa, I fondamenti metafisici, 9.
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51)
Kocku von Stuckrad, “Discursive Study of Religion: From States of the Mind to Communication and Action,” Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 15.3 (2003), 255–271, here 260–262.
-
53)
Marc Deramaix, “La genèse du “ De partu Virginis “ de Jacopo Sannazaro et trois églogues inédites de Giles de Viterbe,” Mélanges de l’Ecole Française de Rome: Moyen Âge 102.1 (1990), 212–276, here 223–242.
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56)
Deramaix, “La genèse,” 260–262, 153–163; 168–170: “ Quos cecinit venere dies, iam desinit aetas/ ferrea, florere incipiunt meliore metallo/ saecula, splendescit virtus et vivitur aurum./ Dicite foelices foelicia saecula musae!/ Dic, Maro, dic mecum, genuit quem Mantua cygnum,/ extremo ut modulans obeuntis funere saecli/ foelici caneres foelicia saecula musa./ Ac tantum taceas magnos procedere menses/ nec Typhys neve Argo adeat ne rursus Achilles/ Pergama, cumeum neque enim sic carmen, at illa/ sunt Samii portenta, piae non dicta sibyllae. […] Cresce puer, dantem puerum te iura videbunt/ turba senum caelique viam atque arcana docentem/ dogmata, non ullis maiorum cognita saeclis.”
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57)
Clare O’Reilly, “‘Without Councils We Cannot Be Saved’: Giles of Viterbo Addressed the Fifth Lateran Council,” Augustiniana 27 (1977), 166–204.
-
61)
Matteo Soranzo, “Giovanni Gioviano Pontano (1429–1503) on Astrology and Poetic Authority,” Aries 11.1 (2011), 26–34.
-
71)
Dana Anderson, Identity’s Strategy: Rhetorical Selves in Conversion (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2007), 55–56, 74.
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Words of Conversion: Poetry and Religious Identity in Early Modern Italy
In: Journal of Religion in EuropeSearch for other papers by Matteo Soranzo in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
The essay examines three cases of poets (Baptista Mantuanus, Giles of Viterbo, Jacopo Sannazaro) who wrote texts about conversion in early modern Italy. Its goal is to illustrate the evolution of conversion before the Reformation and to explore the role of poetic writing in the construction of religious identities. More precisely, the essay investigates how members of mendicant orders used a so-called ‘language of experiential knowledge’ to define their religious identity and defend the knowledge claims of their order against competing options. In doing so, the essay brings forth an original hypothesis concerning the target and motives of the condemnation of poetry at the Fifth Lateran Council, while further contributing to the current debate on religious pluralism and European identity.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 863 | 84 | 9 |
| Full Text Views | 158 | 3 | 2 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 76 | 7 | 5 |
