Claudia Tardelli

The main objective of this edition of a fourteenth-century commentary on Dante’s Commedia, as with all the other Dante commentaries published in the last two decades,  including those that belong to the “Edizione Nazionale dei Commenti Danteschi”,  is to provide a reliable and accurate text, expurgated of errors, equipped with an apparatus which critically justifies the editor’s textual choices, and furnished with an apparatus fontium.
In the case of Francesco da Buti’s commentary, the present edition diverges significantly from the nineteenth-century text, edited in Pisa in 1858-62 by Crescentino Giannini. Giannini’s edition is based on MSS Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana 1006 = R1 (Inferno), 1007 = R2 (Purgatorio), 1008 = R3 (Paradiso), all of which have been dated to the first half of the fifteenth century. Errors were corrected on the basis of MS Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Banco Rari 39 = M (Commedia), whose readings however are noted in the apparatus in a non-systematic manner. Furthermore, the MSS chosen by Giannini were transcribed by the respective scribae into a language that does not reflect the original Pisan dialect of the author. In particular, R1 is written in Florentine vernacular, R3 presents numerous oscillations between Pisan and Florentine, and only R2 transmits a consistently Pisan text. In addition, as generally occurs in older editions, the MSS tradition is not examined, and the choice of MSS is neither critically supported with textual evidence nor confirmed philologically.
The present edition also offers new insights into the evolution of the text by making the final version of the commentary – which has never been formerly edited or published – accessible for the first time since its original composition (1394-96).
The apparatus fontium accompanying the present edition fills a longstanding gap in our knowledge of Buti’s intellectual background, his scholarly resources, and his modus operandi.  The commentator drew on classical, Medieval-Latin, and patristic authors, as well as on the contemporary exegetical tradition on Dante’s Commedia. In order better to understand the ways in which Buti utilised his sources, it is important to identify as many of these as possible. In fact, one feature of the commentary that continues to require further investigation concerns the relationship between Buti’s commentary and the preceding and contemporary exegetical tradition on Dante’s Commedia, as well as his relationship to classical, Medieval-Latin and patristic sources. Building on the apparatus fontium of my new edition, scholars can now assess this vital aspect of the commentary, thereby allowing them to evaluate Buti’s work with particular regard to the historical and cultural context in which it was composed.
A new edition of the text of the Inferno based on MS Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale “Vittorio Emanuele III”, XIII C 1 (= N), together with an apparatus fontium, has recently been prepared (Tardelli 2010-11). My current purpose is to complete this new edition by editing the glosses to Purgatorio and Paradiso, so that Buti’s important work can be read in a modern and philologically accurate edition.

This article has four main aims. First, it confirms that Francesco da Buti’s
commentary, the most extensive as well as one of the more important
vernacular exegetical works on Dante’s poem, circulated in two authorial
redactions, released in 1394 and 1396 respectively. Second, it focuses on
the interpretation of Paradiso XXVII, 136–38, one of the most debated
passages in the entire poem, as it appears in Buti’s 1396 revised gloss, so
far only accessible in manuscript form. Third, it provides a case study of
the relationship between Dante’s early readers and Boethian material on
Circe. In addressing these topics, the paper pinpoints the complexity of
uncovering sources within the tradition of Dante commentary, given the
extent of compilation, and the dangers of viewing similarity in expository
technique as evidence of borrowing. Finally, it shows the importance of
studies of the manuscript tradition and of work on critical editions of Dante
commentaries.

This article aims to provide an introduction to a better understanding of the relationship between the extant manuscript tradition of the revised draft of Buti’s commentary on the Paradiso (1396), so far only accessible in manuscript form. In so doing, broader methodological reflections on how a long prose text can be critically edited, despite the fact that the constitutio textus cannot be arrived at in a mechanical way, are also offered. In addition, the paper provides a detailed analysis of some of the many interventions and improvements found in the 1396 edition, compared with that of 1394, by also focusing on the borrowings that Buti makes from his predecessors (e.g. Iacomo della Lana). All the same, the study also highlights the dangers of viewing similarity in expository technique as evidence of borrowing; thus Buti’s originalities are also underlined, such as in the references to Dante’s Convivio and Boccaccio’s De Montibus, and in the "vernacularization" of a passage from the Mythographi Vaticani, so as to clarify the multi-layered combination of approaches that is peculiar to Buti’s exegetical practice.

The article explores the ways in which Francesco da Buti provided his audience with Aristotelian material on meteorology in his Dante Commentary. The article has three principal aims: to provide a case study of Buti’s relationship with Aristotle’s 'Meteorologica'; to assess Buti’s indebtedness to earlier sources; and to highlight some unknown features of Cristoforo Landino’s indebtedness to Buti. More generally, the study discloses the complexity of investigating sources in Dante commentary. It does this by illustrating, through a case study, the extent of the compilation and the nature of the commentary tradition, as well as the dangers of viewing similarity in expository technique as evidence of borrowing.

The main aim of this preparatory study to the new critical edition of Francesco da Buti’s commento (1385–96) is to investigate the manuscript tradition of the Purgatorio. These Prolegomena thus mainly provide an introduction to a better understanding of the relationships between the extand manuscript tradition, and attempt to offer broader methodological reflections on how a long prose text can be critically edited, despite the fact that the constitutio textus cannot be arrived at in a mechanical way, due to the presence of numerous contaminations and interpolations. The study therefore highlights why it seems appropriate to base the edition on a single authoritative manuscript. A general introduction on the figure of Francesco da Buti and on the circumstances of composition is also given, together with some of the more relevant information regarding the most authoritative manuscripts containing the commento in its entirety.

""In this essay, the word ‘sternulegio’, which defines one of the fourteen subdivisions of divination in Buti's glossa on Inferno 20, is recognised and explained. This word describes the practice of divination through sneezing and has not been classified in any historical dictionaries of Italian to date.
Furthermore, the source of  Buti's taxonomy of practices of divination, which had attracted the curiosity of many scholars, such as Robert Hollander, who considered it «stranger than most» [R. HOLLANDER, The Tragedy of Divination in ‘Inferno’ XX, in Studies in Dante (Ravenna: Longo, 1980): 131-218, in part. p. 162, n. 77], is identified in a passage of the ‘Esposizione del simbolo degli apostoli’ by Domenico Cavalca. Finally, the necessity of pursuing further studies in order to better assess Buti's dependency on Cavalca is explored.""

The seminar will mainly focus on the interpretation of Paradiso 27.136–38, “a widely debated tercet, one of the most vexed passages in the entire poem”, as it appears in Francesco da Buti’s newly discovered passage transmitted in the revised version of his commentary (1394–96), so far only accessible in manuscript form. Buti’s reading, which identifies “la bella figlia” with Circe, seems to validate the modern interpretation of the passage, that which was allegedly firstly proposed by Carmine Galanti in the nineteenth century, and later followed by Michele Barbi and by the vast majority of commentators. More broadly, Buti’s indebtedness to earlier sources – such as Pietro Alighieri’s Comentum – will be highlighted, together with the importance of providing new reliable editions of Dante commentaries.

This paper aims to investigate the reception of Aristotle in fifteenth century commentaries on Dante’s Comedy. Aristotle played a key role in the interpretation of Dante throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: unsurprisingly, given that Dante considered him the main ancient philosophical authority. Aristotle was employed by commentators of the Comedy as a source through which to explain Dante’s text. By turning to the Aristotelian corpus, commentators contributed to their dissemination among a broad class of readers. In particular, my paper will investigate whether or not commentators employed the Florentine vernacularization of Aristotle’s Metereologica, the Metaura volgare, to illuminate Dante’s understanding of cosmography and meteorology. In conclusion, my aim is to show that the majority of fourteenth and fifteenth centuries commentators probably not have had direct access to the Metaura despite frequently naming it.

As a preliminary study of my current doctoral research at Cambridge, my paper aims to present some results of the study of Buti’s commentary with particular regard to the historical and cultural context in which he composed this work.
A few peculiar examples of how this exegetical work extends to classical, medieval-latin and patristic authors will be illustrated, considering the fact that Buti is also the author of grammatical and rhetorical studies.
Other examples of how Buti’s comment had been performed will be given by showing the nature of the relationships between this commentary and the preceding exegetical tradition on Dante’s Commedia, with particular regard to his most contemporary predecessor Benvenuto da Imola (1320? - 1388), whom he never names.

Si presenteranno alcuni risultati dello studio della tradizione del testo del Commento di Francesco da Buti all’Inferno di Dante. In particolare ci si soffermerà sul testo del ms. Napoletano XIII C 1, che è stato scelto e poi adottato come base per la nuova edizione del Commento. Si spiegheranno le motivazioni per cui è sembrato opportuno compiere tale scelta e si presenteranno brani inediti del Commento butiano, tramandati da questo e da altri due soli testimoni della tradizione che, per il Commento al solo Inferno, ammonta a 14 testimonianze dirette. L’instabilità più volte riscontrata nella tradizione manoscritta fornirà inoltre interessanti esempi della fenomenologia della copia nell’ambito di un genere, il commento appunto, sentito più che mai come patrimonio della collettività degli eruditi e perciò soggetto a molteplici e svariati interventi e soprattutto a interpolazioni.