SUL COMMENTO INEDITO A PETRARCA DI GREGORIO ANASTAGI (1536/1539-1601)

This paper provides an in-depth analysis of Gregorio Anastagi’s unpublished commentary on Petrarch’s vernacular literary output (RVF and Triumphi). Entitled I giorni estivi, Anastagi’s exegetical work is preserved in MS. 2451 of the Biblioteca Universitaria in Bologna and MS. B 24 of the Biblioteca Augusta of Perugia. This commentary is an interesting case-study in the general phenomenon of Petrarch’s reception in the Italian Renaissance. The work is structured as a series of annotations, placed below small sections or single lines of Petrarch’s poems, that primarily focus on literary, historic, and philosophical sources. As I intend to argue in this paper, Anastagi’s Giorni estivi is oriented towards a fragmentation and an authorisation of Petrarch’s works: Anastagi’s work lacks any interest in the structures of the RVF or Triumphi and devotes its attention to isolated segments of Petrarch’s poems; it validates the imitation of Petrarch’s lines by the means of an established tradition of literary and philosophical authors.