Numerology and Allegory in Boccaccio's Caccia di Diana
Boccaccio's first work, the Caccia di Diana, is generally considered a playful allegory of ‘courtly’ love. Although the poem's literal content cannot be reconciled with its allegedly amorous message, critics have cited the discrepancy as a characteristic example of the youthful author'...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Cambridge University Press
1978
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| In: |
Traditio
Year: 1978, Volume: 34, Pages: 303-329 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (JSTOR) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Boccaccio's first work, the Caccia di Diana, is generally considered a playful allegory of ‘courtly’ love. Although the poem's literal content cannot be reconciled with its allegedly amorous message, critics have cited the discrepancy as a characteristic example of the youthful author's failure to appreciate the importance of narrative unity. There is, however, reason to believe that we have been mistaken both in our understanding of the Caccia's meaning and in our evaluation of its artistic merit. Like Dante's Commedia, Vita nuova, and lost sirventese, Boccaccio's primary models for this early narrative, it is, in fact, a carefully planned numerical composition. The symbolic implications of the numbers hidden in the text suggest, moreover, that Diana's hunt and the miraculous triumph of her rival, Venus, form a fictional veil designed to conceal an emblematic victory of virtue over vice and an allegory of conversion from bestial lust to Christian love. |
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| ISSN: | 2166-5508 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Traditio
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1017/S0362152900016159 |