Francesco Petrarch (1304-74), the first poet of the Italian Renaissance, wrote most of his works in Latin. It would have been impossible for Petrarch to believe that posterity would revere him not for his Latin epic poetry, which is largely forgotten, but rather for his love poetry celebrating Laura and written in Tuscan, his native tongue. During his lifetime, Italy was filled with numerous dialects (as it still is), Tuscan but one of them. The primacy of Tuscan developed long after Petrarch’s death. Although the great medieval poet Dante wrote his masterpiece in Tuscan, no other Italian poet before Petrarch was famous for using the vernacular. Latin
Handbook to Life in Renaissance Europe
Reigned supreme during the 15th century as it had for more than a dozen centuries, the language of the Catholic Church and of the courts.
Valla considered Latin as the civilizing force of the Western world: “For this language introduced... all peoples to all the arts which are called liberal; it taught the best laws, prepared the way for all wisdom; and finally, made it possible for them no longer to be called barbarians” (Ross and McLaughlin 1968, p. 131). In describing the effect of Latin on the vernacular languages of people conquered by Rome, Valla wrote (in Latin, of course): “They recognized. . . that the Latin language had both strengthened and adorned their own, as the later discovery of wine did not drive out the use of water, or silk expel wool and linen, or gold the other metals, but added to these other blessings” (Ross and McLaughlin 1968, p. 132). Valla and his learned contemporaries believed that Latin was preferable to the vernacular, the “gold” versus the base metals of everyday vernacular speech. Many humanists did not accept the linguistic richness of native tongues or understand that after Latin had indeed “strengthened and adorned” the vernacular languages of Europe, they would surpass Latin itself. If literature had been restricted to the circle of the upper class, Latin might have prevailed indefinitely. As it was, Latin dominated the universities, science, law, and the church until the 19th century. For literature, however, the printing press took the works of Renaissance writers not only to the middle class, many of whom knew only rudimentary Latin, but also to people in remote areas where only the priest truly understood Latin. Largely because of the proliferation of inexpensive printed books, literature in the vernacular increased in popularity over the course of the 16th century. Even for deluxe printings of Latin works in the early 16th century destined for only a few aristocratic patrons, texts in the vernacular were sometimes printed beside the main Latin text. The dedication or preface could also be in the vernacular, making the book a more personal statement from the editor or author to the book’s intended audience.
World History
