Petrarch's work can be divided into three main periods.

The first period (1318-1333) - years of study. Petrarch's earliest poem was written in Latin, but in the 1920s he was much more preoccupied with modern vernacular poets than Cicero and Virgil. In Montpellier he became acquainted with the lyrics of the Provençal troubadours; in Bologna - with the poetry of a new sweet style. The young Petrarch avoided the “Divine Comedy”, but Dante the lyricist had a serious influence on him. In Petrarch’s interests in the literary heritage of poets who wrote in the vernacular, problems of form - poetics, style and poetic language - came to the fore. That is why the epigones of the new sweet style and the Provençal troubadours turned out to be closest to him. But Petrarch himself did not strive for canonization and formalization of existing norms of language and style, but for their reform.

The second period in the life and work of Petrarch (1333-1353) is the period of creative maturity. At this time, his worldview finally took shape and the main literary works were created in Latin: the heroic poem “Africa” (1339-1341), the historical and biographical work “Devirisillustribus” (“On Famous People”, 1338-1358), “Epistolaemetricae” ( “Poetic Epistles”, 1350-52), twelve eclogues “Bucolicumcarmen” (“Bucolic Song”, 1346-48), dialogized confession “Secretum” (“Secret”, 1342-43), treatises “Devitasolitaria” (“On the solitary life ", 1346) and "Deotioreligioso" ("On monastic leisure", 1347), the unfinished historical work "Rerummemorandumlibri" ("On memorable things and events", 1343-45) and a polemical work aimed at protecting poetry from attacks from representatives “mechanical arts” - “Invectiva centramedicumquedum” (“Invectiva against a certain doctor in four books”, 1352-53). The second period also includes most of the poems later included in the “Book of Songs”, most often called “Canzoniere”, but entitled by Petrarch himself in Latin: “Rerumvulgariumfragmenta” .

The second period in Petrarch's life and work began with years of wandering. In 1333, Francesco Petrarch made a long journey through Northern France, Flanders and Germany. This was no ordinary trip. Unlike medieval pilgrims to holy places and Florentine merchants who traveled on business for their firms, Petrarch, traveling around Europe, did not pursue any practical goal. During his years of wandering, Petrarch seemed to rediscover the lyrical value of nature for the inner world of man, and from that time on, nature entered the world of European poetry as its integral and important part.

Traveling around Europe, Petrarch established contacts with scientists, examined monastery libraries in search of forgotten manuscripts of ancient authors and studied monuments of the former greatness of Rome.

In 1337, Francesco Petrarch settled near Avignon, in Vaucluse, where, intermittently, he lived until 1353, implementing that humanistic ideal of a solitary life in the bosom of beautiful idyllic nature, which he substantiated in “The Hidden” and the analysis of which forms the main content treatises “On Solitary Life” and “On Monastic Leisure”. But his ideal of loneliness was always very far from hermitism. Unlike the anchorite monks, Petrarch in Vaucluse did not so much save his soul for eternal life, throwing away everything mortal and earthly from himself, but rather cultivated his human individuality. Petrarch worked a lot and hard in Vaucluse. Subsequently, he said: “Almost all the works I published were either written, started, or conceived there.” But even more than poetry, science occupied him at this time. The sciences that Francesco Petrarch studied at Vaucluse were the sciences of antiquity. In this Petrarch had predecessors such as Albertino Mussato and Dante's poetic correspondent Giovanni del Virgilio. In comparison with them, Petrarch took a new step forward not so much in the study of antiquity, but in the development of European culture and, above all, the national literature of Italy. But this step forward - a step from pre-Renaissance to the Renaissance, due to a change in the general concepts of nature, history and man, was accompanied by such a broad and truly scientific penetration into the world of classical antiquity, which was not yet available to either Brunetto Latini, or Mussato, or Giovanni del Virgilio , not even Dante himself.

Petrarch turned out to be a born philologist. He was the first to study the works of ancient Roman poets, comparing various lists and drawing on data from related sciences. In the second period of his work, Petrarch simultaneously laid the foundations of both classical philology, which from that time on became the foundation of European education for a long time, and historical criticism, which, relying on the philological interpretation of the text, paved the way for philosophical rationalism.

But Petrarch was not only a philologist. His appeal to antiquity was a manifestation of the poet's aversion to modernity. Summing up his life in his “Letter to Posterity,” Francesco Petrarch stated: “With the greatest zeal I devoted myself, among many other things, to the study of antiquity, for the time in which I lived was always so disliked to me that if I had not prevented it my attachment to my loved ones, I would always wish to be born in any other century, and in order to forget this one, I constantly tried to live with my soul in other centuries.” .

Petrarch's conflict with the world around him was deep and historically significant. It reflected the change of eras. That is why this conflict did not become tragic either for Petrarch himself or for the ideal he defended. His scientific and literary activities already in the 30s joined the cultural life of Italy and received wide support from the very society from which the “Vaucluse hermit” seemed to be moving away with all his might. In April 1341, Petrarch was crowned with laurels on the Capitol. He perceived this somewhat theatrical act, and, apparently, largely inspired by himself, not just as public recognition of his talents, but as the consecration of the literary tradition. Having separated antiquity from modernity, Francesco Petrarch at the same time continued to consider the Italians of his time as direct descendants of the ancient Romans. In the revival of the traditions of ancient Rome, he saw a natural return to the popular principles of the great Italian secular culture, forgotten during the reign of “barbarism.” All of Petrarch's activities in the second period of his life and work were aimed at helping the people of Italy to know themselves, getting to know their great past. It was this idea that formed the basis of “Africa”, “On Famous Men” and his other Latin works of the second period. Almost all the works he wrote in the classical Latin of the ancients had current overtones. Petrarchan classicism was, therefore, one of the manifestations of the new, national consciousness of the first great humanist of the European Renaissance.

In 1353, Francesco Petrarch finally left Vaucluse. He had dreamed about this for a long time. In May of the same year, Petrarch moved across the Alps. From the height of the pass, his homeland opened up before him. He greeted her enthusiastically and excitedly:

Hello, sacred land, beloved of the Lord, hello,

The land is a stronghold for the good and a thunderstorm for the evil and arrogant,

A land that has eclipsed noble countries with its nobility,

The land where the land is most fertile and most pleasing to the eye,

Washed by the double sea, the famous glorious mountains,

A house respected by all, where the sword, the law, and the saints

The Muses live together, abundant in men and gold,

A land where nature and art have always appeared

The highest mercy, making you a mentor of the world.

Now I eagerly strive for you after a long separation,

Your resident forever, for you give joyful

To a weary life a shelter, you will also give the land to which

My body will be buried. At you, O Italy, again

Full of joy, I look from the heights of the wooded Ghibenna.

The darkness of the clouds is behind, the breath touches your face

Clear skies, and again a stream of gentle air

Accepted me. I recognize and greet my native land:

Hello, beauty of the universe, glorious fatherland, hello!

(Poetic messages, III, 24, translation by S. Osherov)

The third and final period began in the life and work of Francesco Petrarch. Apparently it can be called Italian. In 1351, the Florentine commune sent Giovanni Boccaccio to Petrarch with an official message. Petrarch was invited to return to the city from which his parents had been expelled, and to head the university department created especially for him. The message that Boccaccio brought also reported that the government of Florence was ready to return to the poet the property that had once been confiscated from his father. This was an unprecedented act. Only thirty years have passed since Dante died in exile, but during these thirty years a new era began. The government of Florence wanted to be at the level of the times. Calling Petrarch a writer who “raised to life long-dormant poetry,” the gonfaloniere and priors wrote: “We are not Caesars or patrons of the arts, however, we also value the glory of a man, the only one not only in our city, but in the whole world, like no other centuries have not seen, and future ones will not see; for we know how rare, worthy of worship and glory the name of the poet is.”

Francesco Petrarca pretended to be flattered. Responding to the Florentine government, he wrote: “I am amazed that in our age, which we considered so deprived of every good, there were so many people inspired by the love of popular or, better said, public freedom.” However, returning to Italy in 1353, Petrarch, to the great indignation of his friends and most of all Boccaccio, settled not in democratic Florence, but in Milan, which at that time was despotically ruled by Archbishop Giovanni Visconti. This was the most powerful of the then Italian sovereigns and the most terrible enemy of the Florentines. It turned out that Petrarch understood freedom completely differently from how most of his contemporaries understood it.

Petrarch, as always, insisted that true freedom is the freedom of creativity, that there has never been a person more internally independent than him, and that he accepted Giovanni Visconti’s invitation “only on the condition that his freedom and peace remain inviolable.” He insisted that he was forced to settle in Milan, first of all, by the “humaneness” of the archbishop and, justifying himself to Boccaccio, who bitterly reproached him for his friendship with Visconti, reminded him of some long-ago conversation, during which they both decided that “with the current the state of affairs in Italy and in Europe, Milan is the most suitable and most peaceful place” for Petrarch and for his literary pursuits.

Petrarch lived in Milan until 1361. Then he settled in Venice, a city which, according to him, was at that time “the only abode of freedom, peace and justice, the only refuge of virtue, the only safe harbor where, fleeing from the storms of tyranny and war raging everywhere, everyone rushed their ships thirsty for a good life." Francesco Petrarch spent six years in Venice and left it, offended by some young Averroist philosophers, whom he later ridiculed in the philosophical and polemical treatise “On the Ignorance of His Own and Many Others.”

The last years of Petrarch's life were spent in Padua, where he was the guest of Francesco da Carrara. and in Arqua, on the Euganean hills. There, “in a small beautiful villa surrounded by an olive grove and a vineyard,” he lived “far from noise, turmoil and worries, constantly reading, praising God and maintaining, despite illness, complete peace of mind.”

Francesco Petrarca was aware of the significance of what he had done and therefore understood the exclusivity of his place in history. “I stand at the turn of two eras,” he once said, “and I immediately look into both the past and the future.”

The future didn't scare him. He did not know the doubts of the aging Boccaccio, and when he advised him to give up literary activity, rest, retire and give way to youth, he was sincerely amazed. "ABOUT! - Petrarch exclaimed, - how different our opinions are here. You think that I have already written everything, or at least a lot; It seems to me that I haven’t written anything. However, even if it were true that I had written a lot, what better way to encourage those following me to do what I did than to continue writing? An example has a stronger impact than a word... Here it is appropriate to recall the words of Seneca from a letter to Lucilius: “there is always,” he says, “enough remains to be done, and even someone who is born a thousand years after us will have the opportunity to add something.” - what about what we have done?

The first European humanist Petrarch never tired of awakening minds and reviving a new culture and new life in Italy - even when he was finally convinced that his calls for humanity met a response only from a very small part of his contemporary society. The Italians seemed to do everything to “look like barbarians.” This upset him, but did not drive him into despair and did not deprive him of his strength. “There is no thing,” he wrote to Boccaccio, “that would be lighter than a pen and would bring more joy: other pleasures pass and, while giving pleasure, cause harm, but a pen, when you hold it in your hand, pleases, when you put it aside, it brings satisfaction, because it turns out to be useful not only to those to whom it is directly addressed, but also to many other people located far away, and sometimes also to those who will be born many centuries later.”

He always thought about the world of new culture, in the name of which he lived, worked, loved, wrote poetry, and did not sacrifice his freedom.

Shortly before his death, Petrarch said: “I want death to come to me while I am reading or writing.” They say that the poet-philologist’s wish came true. He fell asleep quietly, bending over the manuscript. This happened on the night of July 18-19, 1374.

Francesco Petrarch is an Italian poet of the 14th century who became the founder of early humanism. Considered a mentor by the writer-monk Barlaam of Calabria, he played a major role in the Italian Proto-Renaissance and became a cult poet of the Middle Ages.

Francesco Petrarch was born in Arezzo on July 20, 1304. His father was Pietro di Ser Parenzo, a Florentine lawyer who was expelled from Florence at the same time as Dante for supporting the “white” party. Parenzo had the nickname “Petracco” - probably because of this, the poet’s pseudonym was subsequently formed. The Parenzo family moved from one city in Tuscany to another, and when Francesco was nine years old, they settled in Avignon, France. Subsequently, Petrarch's mother moved to the neighboring city of Carpentras.

In Avignon, the boy began to attend school, studied Latin and began to become interested in works of Roman literature. In 1319, Francesco graduated from school, after which his father advised him to study law. Although jurisprudence was not close to Francesco, the guy fulfilled his father’s wishes by entering Montpellier, and soon the University of Bologna. In 1326, Petrarch’s father died, and the young man himself finally realized that classical writers were much more interesting to him than legislative acts.

The only inheritance that Francesco received after his father's death was the manuscript of Virgil's works. Partly due to the difficult financial situation, partly due to the desire for spiritual enlightenment, after graduating from university, Petrarch decided to accept the priesthood. The Italian settled at the papal court in Avignon and became close to representatives of the authoritative Colonna family (Giacomo Colonna is a friend from his university days).

In 1327, Francesco first saw Laura de Nove, whose unrequited love for whom prompted him to write poetry, considered the pinnacle of excellence in the field of Italian sonnets.

Creation

Petrarch's greatest popularity came from his poetic works written in Italian. The vast majority is dedicated to Laura de Nov (although her full name is still a mystery, and Laura de Nov is only the most suitable candidate for the role of Petrarch's muse). The poet himself only reports about his beloved that her name is Laura, whom he first saw on April 6, 1327 in the church of Santa Chiara, and that on April 6, 1348, this woman died. After Laura's death, Francesco sang of this love for ten years.

The collection of canzonas and sonnets dedicated to Laura is called “II Canzoniere” or “Rime Sparse”. The collection consists of two parts. Although most of the works included in it describe Petrarch’s love for Laura, there was also room in “Canzoniere” for several poems of other content: religious and political. Even before the beginning of the seventeenth century, this collection was reprinted two hundred times. Reviews of the sonnets contained in “Canzoniere” were written by poets and scholars from different countries, recognizing the undeniable significance of Francesco’s works for the development of Italian and world literature.

It is noteworthy that Petrarch himself did not take his Italian poetic works seriously. Although it was the poems that ensured success with the public, and initially Petrarch wrote exclusively for himself and perceived them as trifles and trifles that helped him ease his soul. But their sincerity and spontaneity appealed to the taste of the world community, and as a result, these works influenced both Petrarch’s contemporaries and the writers of subsequent generations.

Petrarch’s Italian-language poem entitled “Triumphs” is also widely known, in which his philosophy of life was expressed. In it, the author, with the help of allegories, talks about a chain of victories: love defeats man, chastity - love, death - chastity, glory - death, time - glory, and, finally, eternity defeats time.

Francesco's Italian sonnets, canzones, and madrigals influenced not only poetry, but also music. Composers of the 14th (while the Renaissance lasted) and then the 19th centuries used these poems as the basis for their musical works. For example, he wrote “Sonnets of Petrarch” for piano under the deep impression of the poet’s poems dedicated to Laura.

Books in Latin

Francesco's significant works written in Latin include the following books:

• Autobiography “Epistola ad posteros” in the format of a letter to future generations. In this work, Petrarch sets out the story of his life from the outside (talks about the key events that happened along his life path).

• Autobiography "De contempu mundi", which translates as "On contempt for the world." The author wrote this work in the format of a dialogue with St. Augustine. The poet's second autobiography tells not so much about the external manifestations of his life story, but about his internal development, the struggle between personal desires and ascetic morality, and so on. The dialogue with Augustine turns into a kind of duel between the humanistic and religious-ascetic worldviews, in which humanism still wins.

• Invective (angry accusatory speeches) towards representatives of the cultural, political, religious spheres. Petrarch was one of the first creative figures capable of looking at the statements, teachings and beliefs of our time from a critical point of view. Thus, his invective against the doctor, who considered science more important than eloquence and poetry, is widely known. Francesco also spoke out against a number of French prelates (representatives of the highest Catholic clergy), against the Averroists (followers of the popular philosophical teaching of the 13th century), Roman scientists of yesteryear, and so on.

• “Letters without an Address” are works in which the author boldly criticizes the depraved morals of 14th-century Rome. Petrarch was a deeply devout Catholic throughout his life, but he did not feel reverence for the highest clergy, whose behavior he considered unacceptable, and did not hesitate to openly criticize them. “Letters without an address” are addressed either to fictitious characters or to real people. Francesco borrowed ideas for writing works in this format from Cicero and Seneca.
• "Africa" ​​is an epic poem dedicated to the exploits of Scipio. It also contains prayers and penitential psalms.

Personal life

The love of Petrarch's life was Laura, whose identity has not yet been established for certain. After meeting this girl, the poet, for three years spent in Avignon, hoped to catch her chance glance in the church. In 1330, the poet moved to Lombe, and seven years later he bought an estate in Vaucluse to live near Laura. Having taken holy orders, Petrarch did not have the right to marry, but he did not shy away from carnal relations with other women. The story goes that Petrarch had two illegitimate children.

Laura herself, apparently, was a married woman, a faithful wife and mother of eleven children. The last time the poet saw his beloved was on September 27, 1347, and in 1348 the woman died.

The exact cause of death is unknown, but historians believe that it could have been the plague, which killed a large part of the population of Avignon in 1348. In addition, Laura could have died due to exhaustion due to frequent childbirth and tuberculosis. It is unknown whether Petrarch spoke about feelings, and whether Laura knew about his existence.

The poets note that if Laura had become Francesco’s legal wife, he would hardly have written so many heartfelt sonnets in her honor. For example, Byron spoke about this, as did the Soviet poet Igor Guberman. In their opinion, it was the remoteness of his beloved, the inability to be with her, that allowed Petrarch to write works that had a huge impact on all world literature.

Death

Even during Petrarch's lifetime, his literary works were appreciated by the public, and as a result he received invitations to the coronation with a laurel wreath from Naples, Paris and Rome (almost simultaneously). The poet chose Rome, where he was crowned with a laurel wreath on the Capitol on Easter 1341. Until 1353, he lived on his estate in Vaucluse, periodically leaving it for travel or preaching missions.

Leaving this place forever in the early 1350s, Francesco decided to settle in Milan, although he was offered a job at the department in Florence. Having settled at the Visconti court, he began carrying out diplomatic missions.

Subsequently, the poet wanted to return to his native Avignon, but tense relations with authoritative Italian families prevented him from doing so. As a result, he moved to Venice and settled near the family of his illegitimate daughter.

But here Petrarch did not stay long: he regularly traveled to various Italian cities, and in the last months of his life he ended up in the small village of Arqua. There the poet died on the night of July 18-19, 1374, when he had only one day to live before his 70th birthday. The story goes that Francesco passed away at the table, sitting over his biography work with a pen in his hand. He was buried in the local cemetery.

Bibliography

• Book of Songs
• Triumphs
• About contempt for the world
• Book about famous men
• Letter to descendants
• Letters without an address
• Bucolic songs
• Penitential Psalms

Francesco Petrarch (1304-1374) - Italian poet of the Proto-Renaissance era.

Childhood and youth

Francesco was born on July 20, 1304 in the city of Arezzo, located near Florence in the Italian region of Tuscany.

His father, Pietro di Ser Parenzo dell Incesi, nicknamed Petracco, had previously lived in Florence and worked as a lawyer. Due to his political convictions, he belonged to the “white” party, for which he was expelled from the city along with the thinker and theologian Dante. Pietro and his wife wandered around the Tuscan cities for a long time. During their endless wanderings, their son was born, and when Francesco was nine years old, his parents reached France and finally settled in the southeastern commune of Avignon.

Here, in Avignon, the boy went to school, where he learned Latin and became especially interested in ancient Roman literature, working hard to study the works of Cicero. His first poetic attempts date back to this time; the young lyricist gradually began to develop his own style. During his studies, Francesco decided to change his surname from Parenzo to Petrarca, which became famous.

In 1319 he graduated from school. The father wished that his son would continue the dynasty of lawyers and study law. The young man went to study in the large French city of Montpellier. From there he returned to his homeland - Italy, where he continued to receive his education at the oldest European educational institution - the University of Bologna.

Church rank

In 1326, Francesco's father died. Now the young man was able to admit to himself that he was not at all interested in jurisprudence; he studied this science solely at the insistence of his father. He was more fascinated by literature, he read the works of classical writers.

After graduating from university, Petrarch never began practicing law. But he had to live on something, since after his father’s death he did not receive any inheritance, except for the manuscript of Virgil’s works. The young man returned to Avignon (the residence of the popes was located here in French captivity) and took holy orders. Having received a junior ecclesiastical rank, he settled at the papal court. Junior ranks had the right to enjoy the benefits of rank without performing church duties.

Laura

On April 6, 1327, an event occurred that changed Francesco’s life. He remembered this sunny April day until his last hour. In the small church of St. Clare, located on the outskirts of Avignon, a service was going on (it was Good Friday). He saw a young woman, Laura de Noves.

Francesco is a young, but already quite famous and recognized poet at the papal court. Laura was three years older than him (she was 26, he was 23), married, and by that time she had given birth to her husband several children (in total she had eleven sons and daughters). Her blond hair and huge eyes, shining with kindness, charmed Petrarch. It seemed to him that Laura embodied absolute femininity and spiritual purity.

Francesco loved Laura with all his heart. This woman became his muse, inspiration, he dedicated all his poems to her. Miraculously, he described the moment when he first saw her eyes. For the poet, nothing could change his attitude towards this woman: neither her figure, which had deteriorated from numerous births, nor her hair that had turned gray and had lost its former beauty, nor the deep wrinkles that distorted her beautiful face. He loved his Laura even as she was, having lost her beauty from care and age. She still remained an unfulfilled dream for the poet, because love was unrequited.

Many times he saw her at church services, met her on the streets of Avignon when she walked arm in arm with her husband. Francesco stopped at these moments and could not take his eyes off Laura. In all the years that he had known her, they had not managed to utter a single word. But every time he froze at the sight of his beloved woman, she gave him a tender and warm look. And then he rushed home. The inspired poet worked all night without going to bed. Poems flowed from Petrarch like a stormy river.

Mature years

While studying at the university, Francesco had a friend, Giacomo Colonna, who belonged to a powerful and ancient Italian family that played a significant role in the history of medieval Rome. Petrarch became very close to this family clan, and they later helped him in promoting his literary career.

In 1331, Giacomo invited Petrarch to Bologna. The poet arrived by invitation and was hired as a secretary by Giacomo’s brother, Cardinal Giovanni Colonna. This departure from Avignon was most likely associated with unrequited love for Laura. The poet was tormented by the fact that he had the opportunity only occasionally to see his beloved, but he could not speak to her or touch her.

Cardinal Giovanni Colonna treated Francesco very well; he saw him more as a son than as a servant. The poet lived quietly in Bologna and created. He began studying the classical literature of Rome and the works of the fathers of Christianity. Petrarch traveled a lot of time.

In 1335, Francesco moved to the south of France and settled in the secluded town of Vaucluse. Here he wrote his poetic works, the main inspiration of which was still Laura.

Near the town of Vaucluse there is Mount Ventoux (1912 m above sea level). The first conqueror of this peak was Petrarch and his brother; this event occurred on April 26, 1336. There is unspecified information that before this day the French philosopher Jean Buridan had already visited the summit. However, Petrarch's ascent was officially registered.

Literary works

Francesco's lyrical works were very popular; such literary fame, in addition to the patronage of Cardinal Colonna, allowed the poet to collect a certain amount of money and purchase a house on the Sorgue River in 1337. Here, at the source of the river, Vaucluse - the Solitary Valley - was located. Petrarch adored this place. In the sea of ​​everyday storms, his small house in this quiet place served the poet as a haven, where he enjoyed the opportunity to be alone and wander through natural spaces. He hid here from the bustle and noise of cities, which tired his creative nature.

Francesco got up very early and went out to contemplate the rural valleys: green lawns, coastal reeds, rocky cliffs. He loved to go into the forests, for which the locals gave him the nickname Silvan in honor of the mythical forest character. Petrarch not only led a similar lifestyle, but also resembled Silvanus in clothing. The poet wore simple peasant attire - a rough woolen cloak with a hood. He ate modestly: fish caught in Sorg and roasted on a spit, bread and nuts.

His poetic works were appreciated, and at the same time three cities invited Francesco to be crowned with a laurel wreath - Paris, Rome and Naples.

He came to Rome, where on the Capitoline Hill on April 8, 1341, on Easter, the poet was crowned with a laurel wreath. Europe recognized his unsurpassed poetic gift and deep knowledge of ancient literature. The birth of modern poetry began with Petrarch, and his “Book of Songs” is recognized as an example of literary creativity of the highest standard. And this day, April 8, 1341, is called by many researchers of literary heritage the beginning of the Renaissance.

The best works of Petrarch that have survived to our times:

• the epic poem about Scipio, who defeated Hannibal - “Africa”;
• the book “On Glorious Men”, it collected biographies of outstanding ancient personalities;
• the confessional book “My Secret”, it is built in the form of dialogues between Petrarch and Saint Augustine before the court of Truth;
• treatise “On Memorable Events”;
• "Psalms of Repentance";
• poem "Triumph of Love";
• poem "The Triumph of Chastity";
• collection of poems “Without Address”;
• "Bucolic Songs";
• prose treatises “On Solitary Life” and “On Monastic Leisure.”

After presenting the wreath, Petrarch spent about a year in Rome, where he lived at the court of the Parma tyrant Azzo di Correggio. In the spring of 1342, the poet returned to Vaucluse.

Laura's death

The great poet’s beloved died on the same day he saw her for the first time, April 6. It was 1348, and the plague was raging in Europe. No one was ever able to find out whether Laura was happy in her marriage. Did she guess about the ardent love of the poet, who never dared to tell her about his feelings?

Petrarch experienced the death of Laura painfully and for a long time. At night he sat in a closed room and, under dim candles, sang his beautiful muse in sonnets. They wrote:

• "Poems on the Death of Donna Laura";
• "Triumph of Glory";
• "The Triumph of Death"

After her death, Francesco lived for another 26 years, and all this time he never ceased to love Laura with reverence and enthusiasm. Over the years, he dedicated about four hundred poems to her, which were later collected in Petrarch’s most famous work, “The Book of Songs.”

Last years of life and death

Francesco dreamed of reviving the greatness of Ancient Rome. He became interested in the adventurous policies of Cola di Rienzi and began preaching about the restoration of the Roman Republic. Thus, he spoiled his relationship with Cardinal Colonna and left France.

The poet made a long (almost four years) trip to Italy, during which he made many acquaintances. Among his new friends was the Italian lyricist and writer Giovanni Boccaccio.

Petrarch was offered a chair in Florence, but he refused. Francesco settled at the court of the aristocratic Visconti family in Milan. He carried out several diplomatic missions, and in 1361 he left Milan. The poet wanted to move to Avignon or Prague, but these attempts were unsuccessful, and he stayed in Venice with his illegitimate daughter.

Despite his crazy platonic love, Petrarch had many passionate physical relationships with women. Some of them had illegitimate children from the poet. In 1337 his son Giovanni was born, and in 1343 his beloved daughter Francesca was born. She looked after her father until his death.

The poet's last years were spent in the small Italian town of Padua. He was patronized by the local ruler Francesco da Carrara. Petrarch had his own house, where he lived quietly with his beloved daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren. The only thing that marred his old age was bouts of fever.
Petrarch died on July 19, 1374; he had only one day to live until his 70th birthday. He was discovered in the morning, sitting dead at his desk with a pen in his hand. This is probably how true poets die: writing their last lines on paper for posterity.

In honor of the great Italian Petrarch, a crater on the planet Mercury was named, and an asteroid discovered by the German astronomer Max Wolf in 1901 was named after his only and unfulfilled dream - Laura.

FRANCESCO PETRARCA
(1304-1374)

The Renaissance era in the minds of our contemporaries is usually associated with the names of Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, Michelangelo, Durer, Bruegel, Rabelais, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Boccaccio, Erasmus of Rotterdam, Montaigne. But Europe, perhaps first, owes its cultural revival to the great Italian, Francesco Petrarch. He was the first outstanding humanist, poet, who managed to see the integrity of the flow of thoughts that preceded the Renaissance, and combine them in a poetic synthesis, which became the program of subsequent European generations.

Petrarch is the founder of modern modern poetry, a man who decided in the darkness of the Middle Ages to ignite the flame of not so much divine as earthly, human feeling.

Francesco Petrarca was born in the town of Arezzo in the family of a notary who, together with Dante, was expelled from Florence in 1302 for belonging to the snow-white Guelph party. In 1312, the family moved to the city of Avignon in the south of France, where the pope's residence was located at that time. From the age of five or six, Petrarch was already studying grammar, rhetoric and logic.

At the insistence of his father, Francesco first studied law in Montpellier, then in Bologna, but he disliked it, preferring legal sciences, studies in old literature, and was seriously interested in classical poets. The father did not approve of his son’s hobby and somehow even threw the works of Cicero, Virgil and other traditional creators into the fire. In 1318, Francesco's mother dies. In 1320, his father sent Petrarch to Bologna, a famous center for the study of Roman law. The young man liked the cheerfulness and splendor of Bologna. Countless acquaintances had already read the poet’s poems, but the father did not see the future glory of his son in this. But Francesco continued to write in secret, because he felt disgust for jurisprudence. In his youth, the formation of Petrarch's personality takes place: love for freedom, for nature, tranquility, zeal for knowledge, an active, relevant position. With all his heart he hates feudal civil strife, fratricidal wars, and the despotism of rulers. At this time, the young man developed a desire for moral philosophy. The death of his father (1326) immediately changed everything.
Soon becoming a lyric poet, Petrarch did not lose his enthusiasm for traditional antiquity. On the contrary, this enthusiasm grew and grew until it turned into real passion. Petrarch enthusiastically studied the merits of the ancient creators, who opened up a new and beautiful world for him, unlike the world of medieval religious fanaticism, church dogma and ascetic fanaticism. From that time on, ancient culture was no longer seen as a handmaiden of theology. He was the first to see with remarkable clarity what was truly most basic in her: a lively enthusiasm for man and the world around him; in his hands traditional antiquity became the battle banner of Renaissance humanism.

Petrarch's burning love for the old world was unchanged. He wrote in the language of traditional Rome; with rare enthusiasm he sought out and studied ancient manuscripts and rejoiced if he managed to find some lost meaning in the work of Cicero or Quintilian. He had a unique library of traditional texts. His mind-blowing erudition evoked well-deserved respect and ecstasy among his contemporaries. He based his poem “Africa,” written in imitation of Virgil’s “Aeneid,” on the actions of the ancient Roman leader Scipio Africanus the Elder. He considered Cicero and Virgil to be the greatest writers in the world, and their works to be unsurpassed standards of literary excellence. Petrarch became so close to the old world, entered into it so much that this world ceased to be old, dead. He always felt his living breath, heard his voice.

Prominent Roman writers became his close friends and mentors. He respectfully called Cicero dad, and Virgil - brother. He wrote friendly letters to them all, as if they lived with him. He even admitted that memoirs about the ancients and their deeds arouse in him a “beautiful feeling of joy,” while only the contemplation of his contemporaries causes disgust.
But based on similar confessions, there is no need to imagine Petrarch as such a pedant that he lost all connection with reality. After all, the ancient creators taught him how to write, how to live. In them he found answers to pressing questions that worried him. So, carried away by the greatness of Old Rome, he at the same time bitterly complained about the political chaos in contemporary Italy. Like Dante, he considered political fragmentation to be a state disaster, which gave rise to endless strife and internecine wars, but he did not know, and could not, in the historical criteria of that time, indicate the paths that led the country to municipal unity. Therefore, Petrarch either warmly welcomed the anti-feudal uprising in Rome in 1347, led by the people's tribune Cola di Rienzi, who appointed a republic in Rome and declared the political unification of Italy, then pinned his hopes on Popes Benedict XII and Clement VI, then on the Neapolitan King Robert Anjou, then to the ruler Charles IV. His political standards were not clear and consistent. There was a lot of gullibility and utopianism in them, but one thing does not cause hesitation - Petrarch’s sincere love for his homeland, the desire to see it strengthened and refreshed, worthy of its former Roman greatness. In the famous canzone “My Italy” he poured out his patriotic feelings with great passion.

Petrarch had an inquisitive spirit, which in the Middle Ages was looked upon as one of the most serious sins. He traveled to a number of states, visited Rome and Paris, Germany and Flanders, everywhere he carefully studied the character of people, enjoyed contemplating unfamiliar places and associated what he saw with what was perfectly clear to him. The range of his interests is very wide: he is a philologist and historian, ethnographer, geographer, philosopher and moralist. Everything that has to do with a person, his mind, his actions, his culture attracts the close attention of Petrarch. The book “About Famous Guys” contains biographies of famous Romans from Romulus to Caesar, also Alexander the Great and Hannibal. With an abundance of historical anecdotes, expressions and witticisms taken from Cicero. The treatise “On Remedies for Happiness and Unhappiness” concerns a wide variety of current situations and takes the reader through all levels of the social ladders of that time. By the way, in this treatise, Petrarch challenged centuries-old feudal ideas, according to which real nobility lies in authoritative origin, in “blue blood.”

If in the Middle Ages the path from man, and all other paths, necessarily led to God, then in Petrarch all paths lead to man. With all this, a person for Petrarch is first himself. And he analyzes, weighs, evaluates his actions and internal motivations. The Church sought humility and wisdom from people, glorifying those who denied themselves in the name of God. Petrarch dared to look into himself and was filled with pride for the man. In himself, he found the inexhaustible riches of the human brain and spirit. The son of a moderate notary, noble nobles, crowned princes and princes of the church spoke to him as an equal. His glory was the glory of Italy. But the Middle Ages showed stubborn resistance to the pressure of humanism. It approached Petrarch in the forms of statues, painting and architecture, persistently reminded him of himself from church and institute departments, and sometimes it resonated resoundingly within himself. Then it began to seem to the outstanding humanist, an exalted fan of pagan antiquity, that he was following a sinful and unsafe method. A medieval ascetic came to life in him, who saw earthly temptations with detachment.

He put aside the works of Virgil and Cicero in order to delve into the Bible and the writings of the church fathers. These internal contradictions of Petrarch were rooted in the deepest contradictions of that transitional time; with him they were only more sharply expressed. With all this, he cautiously followed his “internal disorder” and even tried to put it in the book “On Contempt for the World” (1343), this interesting confession of an exciting soul.
A significant role in the fate of Petrarch is not much acquaintance with the Colonna family. After the death of his father, he was left without funds. The decision to take holy orders made Petrarch the chaplain of the home church of the Avignon cardinal Giovanni Colonna. Petrarch had the opportunity to engage in creativity.

The Avignon period" (1327-1337) was fruitful for the poet. It was at this time that he began to intensively study the ancient classics; he is preparing a scientific edition of the recognizable “Decades” of Titus Livy, and in Liege, in the monastery library, he finds two speeches by Cicero “In Defense of the Poet Archius.” And at the end of 1336, at the invitation of the Colonnaya family, he found himself in Rome for the first time, which he loved with all his heart. Petrarch joyfully accepted the honorable title of Roman citizen in 1341, but considered all of Italy his own homeland.
Researchers call the subsequent period in Petrarch’s life “The first stop at Vauclusis” (1337-1341). Petrarch did not adapt to life in Avignon and therefore ended up in Vauclusis. Here he writes many sonnets, the poem “Africa” in Latin, which tells about the heroic past of Italy and about the famous personality of Scipio, is successfully promoted. Here he takes up the treatise “On Outstanding Guys”: in 1343, 23 biographies of ancient figures were written.

In Vauclusis, Petrarch gave birth to a son, Giovanni, who died in his youth. Then his daughter Francesca was born, thanks to whom many of the poet’s drafts and personal belongings were preserved.
The result of all creative efforts was the coronation of Petrarch on the Capitol on April 8, 1341. This was a personal triumph for the poet and an attempt to bring poetry to the level it occupied in ancient Rome. He was awarded a diploma and received the title of master, doctor of poetic arts and history.
It is very interesting that the Neapolitan ruler Robert did not consider it humiliating to ask Petrarch to become his mentor in poetry, but the poet refused such a noble duty. At this coronation, Petrarch pronounced the “Lay”, in which he laid out his awareness of poetry and its tasks.

In the 40s, the formation of a new worldview began. In “My Secret,” the whole complexity of the struggle between the new and the old in the poet’s mind is revealed. December 1343-early 1345 - “Stop at Parma.” The first nine months were a period of creative activity: he continued to work on the poem “Africa”, on sonnets, and finished one of the books of the treatise “On Memorable Deeds”. But when the city was surrounded by the troops of the Marquis Ferrari, Petrarch was forced to flee Parma and return to Vaucluse.

The “2nd stop in Vauclusis” begins, during these years Petrarch wrote the treatise “On the Solitary Life” (1346), “Bucolic Song” (1346-1348), “On Monastic Leisure” (1347).

When Petrarch arrived in Rome in 1350, Boccaccio offered him the position of doctor of poetry and history at the Florence Institute, but the humanist refused, apparently so as not to waste time, since there were new creative plans ahead.

Summer 1351 - May 1353 - 3rd stop in Vauclusis, where Petrarch finishes his works. He is writing 12 new biographies of ancient guys, working on “Triumphs”, where he expressed his opinions about glory, time, love and death in poetic words.

In 1353, Francesco Petrarch returned to Italy and remained there until the end of his life. The “Milanese period” begins (1353 - 1361). The poet took upon himself the responsible responsibility of negotiations with the king. He already had a mature understanding of the need to unite all of Italy.

Somewhere in May 1354, work began on the treatise “On Means Against Every Fate,” which sets out the independent ideological positions of the humanist. This included several dialogues against despotism, in which the Milanese rulers had the opportunity to clarify the means of their own rule. The most fascinating part of these works is the defense of poetry, art, and antiquity from the attacks of the scholastics.

In 1361, Petrarch travels from Milan due to the plague epidemic and ends up in Venice. Throughout the “Venetian period” (until 1368), the poet worked on a collection of “senile letters”. The local philosophers recognized only Aristotle and spread gossip about Petrarch’s lack of education, to which the poet adequately responded in his own treatise “On his own and many others’ lack of education” (1367), where he hotly polemicized with local philosophers.
In recent years (1369-1374), Petrarch was in Arquia, where he was persuaded to move by the ruler of the town, Francesco Carrara, who personally visited the poet, who was bothered by illness.

During the “Paduan period”, Petrarch was in a hurry to finish his works: the treatise “On Famous Guys”, “Triumphs”, “Senile Letters” and the famous “Book of Songs” or “Canzoniere”. “Canzoniere” is divided into two parts: “During the life of Madonna Laura” and “After the death of Madonna Laura.” Not counting 317 sonnets and 29 canzonas, it contains standards of other lyrical genres.
But Petrarch received true fame as the creator of lyrical poems dedicated to the golden-haired Laura (on April 6, 1327, in the church of St. Clare, the poet met his love - a young, very pretty lady who entered world literature under the name Laura. Laura died during an epidemic plague in 1348). The creator himself wrote about this collection as poetic “trifles,” as if he was apologizing that it was written not in traditional Latin, but in everyday Italian. But in fact, Petrarch greatly valued this inspired work, preserved and painstakingly processed it.

This is how the “Book of Songs” appeared, consisting of 317 sonnets, 29 canzonas, also sextins, ballads and madrigals. This book is also a confession of Petrarch, only this time it is a lyrical confession. It reflected the poet’s love for a beautiful married lady who came from a noble Avignon family. She was born around 1307, married in 1325 and died in the terrible year 1348, when the plague raged in almost all European countries. The meeting with Laura filled Petrarch's soul with a great feeling that touched the most tender, most melodic strings of his soul. When Petrarch learned about the untimely death of his beloved, he wrote in a copy of Virgil: “Laura, popular for her virtues and glorified for a long time in my poems, appeared before my eyes for the first time in the years of my early youth, in 1327, on the afternoon of April 6, in the church of St. Clara in Avignon; and in the same town, the same month and on the same day and hour in 1348, this light went out when I was in Verona, not knowing my own fate.”

In fact, “The Book of Songs” is first a picture of Petrarch’s various sincere states. For decades, he glorified the lady who did not utter a single tender word to him. The mirror of love always reflected his difficult inner world. In poetry, Laura is perceived as truly alive: she has a light gait, a gentle voice, and golden hair. Petrarch's innovation lies in the fact that he not only makes the image of his beloved, but also reveals the inner world of his own hero, who loves and suffers. So Petrarch becomes the creator of the newest, psychic lyric poetry, becoming a precious contribution to the treasury of world poetry.

Laura's poetic triumph immediately became the triumph of Petrarch. It is no coincidence that in the “Book of Songs” the name Laura is so tightly intertwined with the word laurel. Over time, even the border separating Laura from the tree of glory is erased; the beautiful lady is transformed into a sign of earthly glory for the poet. She crowns his forehead with a branch of greenish laurel, and in a thousand years people will keep Laura’s singer in their heads.

In Russia, Petrarch was well known already in the 19th century. His exalted fan was the poet K. N. Batyushkov.

The Italian poet was highly regarded by Pushkin, who named Petrarch among the greatest European lyricists in his own sonnet on sonnets. “With her, my lips will acquire the language of Petrarch and love,” he wrote in the first chapter of “Eugene Onegin,” and put a poetic excerpt from Petrarch as the epigraph to Chapter VI of this novel.
Centuries separate us from 14th century Italy. But through the abyss of years, the grateful population of the earth will respectfully carry the name of Petrarch as one of the founders of humanism, a poet who sang not so much divine as the satisfaction of human existence, earthly love for a lovely lady, his ordinary and therefore such the highest thoughts and feelings.

Francesco Petrarca (Italian: Francesco Petrarca). Born July 20, 1304 in Arezzo - died July 19, 1374. Italian poet, head of the older generation of humanists, one of the greatest figures of the Italian Proto-Renaissance, student of Barlaam of Calabria.

Petrarch was born on July 20, 1304 in Arezzo, where his father, the Florentine lawyer Pietro di ser Parenzo (nickname Petracco), who was expelled from Florence - at the same time - for belonging to the “white” party, found refuge. After long wanderings through the small towns of Tuscany, the parents of nine-year-old Francesco moved to Avignon, and then his mother moved to neighboring Carpentras.

In France, Petrarch went to school, learned Latin and developed an interest in Roman literature. After completing his studies (1319), Petrarch, at the request of his father, began to study law, first in Montpellier, and then at the University of Bologna, where he remained until his father’s death (1326). But jurisprudence did not interest Petrarch at all, who became more and more interested in classical writers.

Upon leaving the university, he did not become a lawyer, but was ordained as a priest in order to find a means of living, since he inherited from his father only the manuscript of the works of Virgil. Having settled in Avignon at the papal court, Petrarch entered the clergy and became close to the powerful family of Colonna, one of whose members, Giacomo, was his university friend, and the next year (1327) he saw Laura for the first time, unrequited love for whom was the main source of his poetry and served as one of the reasons for his removal from Avignon to the secluded Vaucluse.

Petrarch is also known for the first officially recorded ascent (with his brother) to the summit of Mont Ventoux, on April 26, 1336, although the peak is known to have been visited before him by Jean Buridan and the ancient inhabitants of the area.

Colonna's patronage and literary fame brought him several church sinecures; he bought a house in the valley of the Sorgi River, where he lived intermittently for 16 years (1337-1353). Meanwhile, Petrarch's letters and literary works made him a celebrity, and he almost simultaneously received an invitation from Paris, Naples and Rome to accept the coronation with a laurel wreath. Petrarch chose Rome and was solemnly crowned with a laurel wreath on the Capitol on Easter 1341 - this day is considered by some researchers to be the beginning of the Renaissance.

If Petrarch's Latin works have more historical significance, then his world fame as a poet is based solely on his Italian poems. Petrarch himself treated them with disdain, as “trifles”, “trinkets”, which he wrote not for the public, but for himself, striving “somehow, not for the sake of glory, to ease a sorrowful heart.” The spontaneity and deep sincerity of Petrarch's Italian poems determined their enormous influence on his contemporaries and later generations.

He calls his beloved Laura and reports about her only that he first saw her in the church of Santa Chiara on April 6, 1327 and that exactly 21 years later she died, after which he sang her praises for another 10 years. A two-part collection of sonnets and canzones dedicated to her (“for the life” and “for the death of Madonna Laura”), traditionally called Il Canzoniere (lit. "Songbook"), or Rime Sparse, or (in Latin) Rerum vulgarium fragmenta- Petrarch's central work in Italian. In addition to depicting love for Laura, “Canzoniere” contains several poems of different content, mainly political and religious. "Canzoniere", which had already gone through about 200 editions before the beginning of the 17th century and was commented on by a whole mass of scientists and poets from L. Marsiglia in the 14th century to Leopardi in the 19th century, determines the significance of Petrarch in the history of Italian and world literature.

In another work in Italian, the poem “Triumphs” (“Trionfi”), the poet allegorizes the victory of love over man, chastity over love, death over chastity, glory over death, time over glory and eternity over time.

Petrarch created a truly artistic form for Italian lyric poetry: poetry for the first time is for him the internal history of individual feeling. This interest in the inner life of man runs like a red thread through the Latin works of Petrarch, which determine his significance as a humanist.

After living for about a year at the court of the Parma tyrant Azzo di Correggio, he returned to Vaucluse again. Dreaming of reviving the greatness of ancient Rome, he began to preach the restoration of the Roman Republic, supporting the adventure of the “tribune” Cola di Rienzi (1347), which spoiled his relationship with Colonna and prompted him to move to Italy. After two long trips to Italy (1344-1345 and 1347-1351), where he established numerous friendships (including with), Petrarch left Vaucluse forever in 1353, when Innocent VI ascended the papal throne, who considered Petrarch a magician, in view his activities.

Having rejected the chair offered to him in Florence, Petrarch settled in Milan at the court of the Visconti; carried out various diplomatic missions and, by the way, was in Prague with Charles IV, whom he visited at his invitation during his stay in Mantua. In 1361, Petrarch left Milan and, after unsuccessful attempts to return to Avignon and move to Prague, settled in Venice (1362-1367), where his illegitimate daughter lived with her husband.

From here he undertook long trips to Italy almost every year. Petrarch spent the last years of his life at the court of Francesco da Kappapa, partly in Padua, partly in the country village of Arqua, where he died on the night of July 18-19, 1374, one day short of his 70th birthday. He was found in the morning at the table with a pen in his hand over the biography of Caesar. At the local cemetery there is a red marble monument erected to the poet by his son-in-law Brossano; the bust was erected in 1667.