Bonaventura Pistofilo, secretary to the Duke of Ferrara, a patron of literature, and a poet. To him Ariosto addresses one of his satires.
Pietro Martire d’Anghiari, or d’Anghiera, was a celebrated traveller and historian. Here, however, I suppose Ariosto spoke of Girolamo Angeriano, whom, Giovio says, “Amatoria judiciis hominum famae commendata celebrum fecerunt.”
Pietr’ Antonio and Jacopo Acciajuòli are highly praised by Giraldi; Jacopo more particularly, whose Latin verses were also the subject of Calcagnini’s encomiums. They were of a Florentine family, but had settled at Ferrara.
Annibal Malaguzzi, from Reggio in Lombardy, where the family still exists, was Ariosto’s first cousin, since Daria, sister of Valerio Malaguzzi, was the poet’s mother. He was an intimate friend of Ariosto, who addressed to him the satire, “Poi che Annibale intendere vuoi come;” and the other, “Da tuttigli altri amici, Annibal, odo.”
Of this Adoardo I know nothing. ↩
Vittor Fausto succeeded Musuro as professor of Greek, and was, moreover, famous for having invented a ship of a large size, properly a galley called quinquereme, of which a description may be found in a letter of Bembo to Barrusio, May 29th, 1529.
Angiolo Tancredi was professor at the university of Padua, and an intimate friend of Francesco Negro, also a professor there, who afterwards went to the court of the Cardinal d’Este, to whom the Furioso is dedicated. ↩
“Egeus, king of Athens, being on his travels entertained at the house of Pittoeus, in Trezene, had an intrigue with Etra, his daughter, and when he departed, left with her his sandals and sword, charging her, if she should be brought to bed of a boy, to send him to Athens with these tokens. She was afterwards delivered of Theseus, who, being grown up, took the sword and sandals deposited with Etra by his father, and went to Athens, where he found all the city in confusion by the machinations of Medea, who, at the arrival of Theseus, made him suspected by Egeus, and persuaded the king to destroy him at a banquet by poison; but fortunately, as the youth reached out his hand to receive the cup, Egeus perceived his sword, and, embracing him, acknowledged him for his son.”
Hoole.
Mr. Panizzi seems to be of opinion that Ariosto considered Mongrana as the same as Risa or Reggio. Mongrana, or Reggio, then was the house of Rogero, and Clermont the house of Bradamant. ↩
Ariosto, with the romantic writers in general, whenever the siege of Troy is alluded to in his poem, gives the story a partial turn in favour of the Trojans, from whose great hero Rogero is said to derive his origin. In book XXXIV he makes St. John impute the account given by Homer of the Grecian, heroes and heroines to the venality of the poet. He always speaks of the death of Hector as brought about by treachery. To this we may observe, that our great countryman, Shakespeare, whose materials are often drawn from popular stories, particularly from an old storybook of the siege of Troy, has, in his Troilus and Cressida, represented the characters of the Trojans superior to the Greeks, and has made Achilles kill Hector at an unfair advantage. ↩
Ariosto here alludes to a story of Helen told by Herodotus, that Paris, returning with Helen from Troy, was received by Proteus, king of Egypt, who afterwards sending away Paris, detained Helen with all her treasure at his court; and Ariosto here relates that she was ransomed by Menelaus for this tent, which he gave to Proteus. ↩
Leonora of Arragon, daughter of Ferdinando king of Naples, to whom the poet here gives the title of queen, married to duke Hercules I, by whom she had Hippolito, of Este, Ariosto’s patron, whose birth is here celebrated. ↩
Beatrice, sister of Leonora, and wife of the great Matteo Corvino, king of Hungary, being without children, sent for young Hippolito from his parents, who, arriving in Hungary, was received by the king with every mark of esteem and affection. He afterwards made him archbishop of Strigonia, before he was eight years of age. Ludovico Sforza, called Il Moro, the duke of Milan, who had married Beatrice, the sister of Hippolito, hearing of his great virtues, procured for him the bishopric of Milan; after which, being very young, he was created cardinal, and take to assist him in the government. ↩
Tommaso Fusco, first tutor to Hippolito, and afterwards his private secretary. Coelio Calcagnino dedicated to him his translation of Lucian. ↩
Ludovico Sforza, duke of Milan, deposed by Louis XII. ↩
In the old poem of Aspramonte is a description of the bridal bed of Rogero and Gallicella, the father and mother of Rogero, from which, possibly, Ariosto might take his hint for the pavilion and bed here described. See Aspramonte, c. X. ↩
Gryphon and Aquilant. ↩
Rodomont. ↩
Bradamant. ↩
Vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras.
Virgil, Aeneid XI 831.
“In her last sigh her struggling soul expires,
And, murm’ring with disdain, to Stygian
