2. G. Perticari, Opere, vol. 3, Lugo: Melandri, p. 427.
3. Acroama (plural acroamata), was a play or a musical piece or a rhetorical declamation. That Ariosto and Tasso were sung in Italy is reported also by Voltaire, Dictionnaire philosophique, art. “Langues,” tome 5, p. 100.
Z 4318
1. Courier, Collection complète, p. 306.
Z 4319
1. Leopardi puts various parts of the review together in a different format.
Z 4320
1. The term (meaning “revisers”) had been inaugurated, as a calque from Greek, by Wolf. Leopardi will use it in the following pages of the Zibaldone. See R. Tesi, “Un grecismo leopardiano,” in Dal greco all’italiano. Studi sugli europeismi lessicali d’origine greca dal Rinascimento ad oggi, Firenze: Le Lettere, 1994, pp. 257–66.
Z 4322
1. Benjamin Constant was mentioned in the preceding article. Leopardi will read his De la religion considérée dans sa source in the fall of 1828: see Z 4405–406.
2. See Z 4320 and note.
3. G. F. Nott is the author of a Dissertation on the State of English Poetry Before the Sixteenth Century. Leopardi had met him in Florence.
Z 4323
1. In his “Discorso secondo intorno alla lingua,” Antologia, tome 89, May 1828, p. 86.
Z 4324
1. See Plato, Phaedrus 274e–278e. Pacella notes that the reference to Plato’s Theaetetus seems less pertinent (see, however, 196ff. on memory).
Z 4326
1. A few days later Leopardi adds a sentence on Z 4330.
2. See Z 1449–50.
Z 4327
1. In contrast to Müller, who had in his turn elaborated the thesis of his teacher Wolf, Leopardi insists on the narrative continuity of the poems, rejecting the idea of a purely convivial improvisation which was only later given form.
2. Leopardi quotes a review of Theodosii Alexandrini Grammatica, ed. by Karl Wilhelm Göttling, Leipzig 1822.
Z 4328
1. Homer, Odyssey 1, 325ff.; 8, 62ff.; 17, 261–63, 518ff.
2. Courier, Collection complète, p. 307. See Z 4318.
Z 4329
1. Note that in 1827 Leopardi had published his Operette morali, from which he had hoped for greater success.
Z 4330
1. In the summer of 1828 Leopardi was reading Niebuhr’s Römische Geschichte in an English translation from which he will later quote extensively.
2. See Z 4193–94.
3. A review of A. Valatour’s Choix méthodique des Histoires variées d’Elien, Paris 1824. The Parian Marble was discovered in 1627: it records events in Greek history down to the third century BCE.
Z 4331
1. The Misses Busdraghi were Leopardi’s landladies in Florence.
2. Depping reviews De quelques usages des Habitans de la Moldavie et de l’Idiome Moldave, the unpublished chapter 2 of a work by Alexandre-Maurice Blanc de la Nautte, Comte d’Hauterive, included in the second ed. of the Tableau historique, géographique et politique de la Moldavie et de la Valachie by William Wilkinson, translated into French by Alexandre Dezos de La Roquette, Paris 1824 (first ed. 1821). The first English ed. is W. Wilkinson, An Account of the Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, London 1820. All emphases are in the original text. Leopardi comments with a “(sic)” on the misprints, among which mai for mais, meaning “more” in Moldavian (i.e., Romanian). This review confirms Leopardi’s own views on Vulgar Latin; see Z 42, note 3.
Z 4335
1. In this parenthesis Leopardi paraphrases as well as quoting other passages of the same article.
2. Homer, Iliad 1, 106.
3. Knight died on 12 April 1824.
Z 4336
1. All the quotations in this thought are taken from the review quoted in the preceding thought, pp. 13–14.
2. Leopardi found these rustic words in a chapter of Giovanni Rosini’s novel La monaca di Monza, the ms. of which he read in Pisa.
3. Leopardi copies the reference, adding the name of Richard Dawes. See his Miscellanea critica, first ed. Oxford 1781.
4. That is, Jahrbücher der Literatur, published in Vienna, vol. 26, April–May–June 1824; the Fauriel notice is included in the volume’s supplement (with separate page numbers) Anzeige-Blatt für Wissenschaft und Kunst, no. XXVI, pp. 51–52. Claude-Charles Fauriel’s extensive collection of modern Greek folk songs, prefaced by a meticulous essay on the subject, was published in two volumes as Chants populaires de la Grèce moderne, Paris: Firmin Didot, Père et Fils, 1824, 1825. Fauriel, a confidant of Mme. de Staël and of Mme. de Condorcet, was also a close friend of Alessandro Manzoni, with whom he exchanged ideas on history and historical fiction.
Z 4337
1. The spelling of the name of this scholar (mentioned here and further on, on Z 4338, 4399) varies in time and in the journals across Europe from Vuk (or Vouk or Wuk) Stephanowitsch to Stefanovich, Karatzich to Karadzich to Karadshitch, etc. We standardize the spelling.
Z 4338
1. See the note above. A review of this work also appeared in The Westminster Review in July 1826, pp. 23–39. We standardize the spelling of the title.
Z 4339
1. That is, the Faroe Islands. Leopardi writes Faeroeiscke instead of Faeroeiske. Note that he points out (in parentheses) the incongruities, in the review, between the spellings Foeroeer and Faeroeer, marking them accurately each time.
Z 4340
1. See Z 4193–94.
Z 4341
1. Leopardi copies from the Bulletin Universel (tome 4, 1825, art. 238, pp. 230–43) excerpts from the French translation of an article published in 1824 in the Siberian journal Sibirski Vesnick, “Sur l’origine des Buriates ou Bratski” [“On the origin of the Buriats or Bratski”] (this quotation from p. 242). The article, historically imprecise, follows an old unreliable Mongol and Tibetan tradition in attributing the invention of the Mongol alphabet to the monk called by the translator “Bogdo-Khotokhtou-Tchoïdja-Bandida,” by which name he probably refers to Sakya Pandita (1182–1252). In fact the invention of the “Square Script,” at the time of Khubilai Sechen Khan (ruled 1259–94), grandson of Genghis Khan, is due to Sakya’s nephew, known as Phagpa (1235–80), who is recalled at the end of the quotation on Z 4342, where he is, however, wrongly attributed to the time of Khaisan-Kulug Khan (ruled 1307–11), when the alphabet was perfected by a monk called “Tchoïdja-Ostyr” in the article, that is Choki Oser (Chos kyi ’Od-zer). Half a century before the invention of the “Square Script” the Mongols adopted the Uyghur alphabet, to which the article refers also by its Chinese name “ouvouitsk,” that is wewuzi. Cf. L. Petech, Central Tibet and the Mongols, Rome: IsIAO, 1990.
2. Leopardi cites from the review of a grammar of the Japanese language dating from the seventeenth century: Élémens de la grammaire japonaise, par le P. Rodriguez, Paris 1825 (in Bulletin Universel, tome 4, 1825, pp. 172–75).
Z 4342
1. Another passage from the article quoted on Z 4341 (see note 1).
2. Jean-Antoine Letronne, of the Institut académique Royale des Inscriptions et belles-lettres.
Z 4343
1. In the edition by Claude Saumaise and Abraham van Berkel of Stephanus of Byzantium, Leiden 1688.
2. After having known indirectly about Wolf and critical interpretations of his work for many years (see Z 3976 and note 1), Leopardi finally read him with great enthusiasm, tracing his Vichian antecedents (see Z 4395). He intended to write a “Discourse on Homer” (see Z 4435) but never did. The Prolegomena, from which Leopardi will quote extensively in the following pages, are given here in the translation by A. Grafton, G. W. Most, and J.E.G. Zetzel, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton U.P., 1988 (with minor alterations). The pages in parentheses are those of the 1795 edition, in Latin, quoted by Leopardi.
Z 4345
1. See Z 4400.
2. The 69th Olympiad took place in 504–500 BCE.
Z 4346
1. Leopardi adds the name of Xenophon, with the reference t
o Wolf, in a later addition, so that it seems that “the latter” refers to Xenophon, not to Plato, to whom, as he knows very well, the Hipparchus used to be attributed (and still is by some scholars).
2. Plato, Hipparchus 228b.
3. See Theophrastus, p. 316 (where Koraes explains that he has hastily translated λέγɛιν as “chanter” instead of “réciter”) and Casaubon, Animadversiones, bk. 15, ch. 4, p. 565.
Z 4347
1. See also Z 4388, where Leopardi, following on from this thought, suggests an alternative: two kinds of poetry and literature, “one for the knowledgeable, the other for ordinary people.”
Z 4348
1. The reference to Horace, Epistulae 2, 1, 93 explains Wolf’s expression, an echo of “Sub nutrice puella,” l. 99.
2. See Z 4249–50.
Z 4349
1. Ricordano Malispini and Dino Compagni.
Z 4350
1. We know from Boccaccio that Dante had started to write the Comedy in Latin.
Z 4351
1. Courier, Collection complète, p. 309.
Z 4352
1. Emphasis is Leopardi’s.
2. See Barthélemy, Viaggio d’Anacarsi, Introduction, tome 1, pp. 285–86, who quotes Plutarch, Life of Cimon (Pacella).
3. The content of this parenthesis is also taken from Wolf, § 24, p. CII.
4. Wolf writes Scaldros, but Leopardi thinks it should be Scaldos; hence his “sic.” These were the warrior poets at the Norwegian court between the ninth and the fourteenth centuries.
Z 4353
1. The essay by William Thornton, “On Teaching the Surd, or Deaf and Consequently Dumb, to Speak,” was published in 1793, pp. 310–19.
Z 4354
1. Virgil, Bucolics 2, 65; Georgics 1, 281; Aeneid 5, 261.
2. There follows a ms. marginal addition.
3. The following parenthesis is a ms. interlinear addition.
4. See Pliny, Naturalis historia 35, 102–103.
Z 4355
1. Wolf, § 34.
2. Wolf, § 49.
3. Wolf, § 34. The sentence after the reference is added at the bottom of the page. Leopardi later accepts Wolf’s idea that the diaskeuasts came very soon after Peisistratus.
Z 4356
1. Homeric Hymns 5, 293; 9, 9; 18, 11.
2. The following sentence is a ms. marginal addition.
3. See Z 2186 and note 1.
4. See Z 2978–79.
5. That is, Ariosto’s Orlando furioso.
Z 4357
1. See Z 4234–35, which confirms on a more solid, historical basis what Leopardi had already affirmed on Z 245.
2. See Z 1449 and note.
Z 4358
1. An allusion to Horace, Ars poetica 361 (Pacella).
2. The emphasis is Leopardi’s, as is the “etc.,” signaling that at this point he is skipping a portion of Wolf’s text.
3. Plato, Gorgias 463ff., Sophista 267ff.
Z 4359
1. See Horace, Ars poetica 34.
2. Wolf, p. XCVI.
Z 4360
1. The following sentence (as the date shows) is added the day after with an insertion sign.
2. That is, Willem Bilderdijk.
Z 4361
1. On the spelling of this name see note to Z 4337.
2. The journal referred to is the Göttingische gelehrte Anzeigen.
3. The title in Russian is Syn otečestva.
4. This review comes from no. 281 of the Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung, November 1825.
Z 4362
1. Here Leopardi adds the exact reference.
2. This is a scientific report written by Silvestre de Sacy of the Institut Royal de France.
Z 4363
1. Moralia 80d. The work is also known with the Latin title Quomodo quis suos in virtute sentiat profectus [How a Man Can Become Aware of His Progress in Virtue].
2. Leopardi evidently has doubts about the Greek accents of this word. However, he transcribes it incorrectly, writing ήί instead of ίά. Later on he transcribes the same word again incorrectly, putting the accent on the iota instead of the alpha (Pacella).
3. Plutarch Table-Talk (Moralia 739a). In the scansion by syllables that follows, the accents and breathings are produced as they appear in the ms.
Z 4364
1. Now known as the House of the Tragic Poet.
2. The title of the article from the Wiener Zeitschrift is “Recent Discoveries at Pompeii.”
Z 4365
1. The first two volumes of Gabriele Rossetti’s Commento analitico were published in 1826–27.
Z 4368
1. It is difficult to say who Leopardi has in mind here. The conclusion would have certainly pleased Chateaubriand, who also thought that the accelerated pace of modernity had led to the loss of memory and of individuals in favor of the “mass” and the “species”: see Mémoires d’outre-tombe bk. 43, ch. 14 (Paris: Gallimard, 1997, vol. 2, p. 2966), a passage written in 1840. See also Z 4270 and note 3.
2. In Ménage Leopardi could read passages of Machiavelli’s Vita di Castruccio taken from Laertius.
3. Phaedrus, Fabulae 3, 5. We translate “asse,” a Roman bronze or copper coin, with “penny.”
4. Francesco Forti and Pietro Capei wrote for Antologia. As on Z 4289, a rare case of an entry which records a conversation.
Z 4370
1. The review of Remarks on the supposed Dionysius Longinus, with an attempt to restore the Treatise on Sublimity to its original state, London 1826, appeared first in Monthly Review (vol. 2, July 1826, p. 326).
Z 4371
1. Leopardi probably knew the spelling Ctesylle.
2. See Z 4153, 4193.
Z 4372
1. That is, his prose anthology published in 1827. See F. Guicciardini, Della istoria d’Italia, Freiburg 1775–76 (= LL), vol. 1, bk. 5, pp. 478ff.; and F. Giambullari, Istoria dell’Europa dal 800 al 912, Brescia 1827 (= LL), bk. 1, ch. 11. The “Great Captain” is Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, commander of the Spanish forces occupying Barletta in 1503.
2. Leopardi alludes to Dante, Purgatorio 24, 52–54. He substitutes Natura for Dante’s Amore. For the statement that follows see Z 3941–42.
Z 4373
1. For the thesis of the common origin of all languages see Z 1263–83.
Z 4374
1. Contrary to his usual practice, Leopardi does not give the whole passage; he omits some of it and modifies it to ensure that the sense is clear. The review, signed C. F., that is Champollion Figeac, deals with De optima latini lexici condendi ratione, by Ernst F. Kärcher, Karlsruhe 1826.
2. The emphasis is Leopardi’s.
Z 4375
1. The review had been originally published in Beck’s Allgemeine Repertorium (see Z 4362).
2. On the impossible project of a universal language see Z 936–37, 3253–54.
Z 4377
1. See Z 4293.
2. See Z 1967–69, 2869–75, 3055–57.
Z 4378
1. Unusually, Leopardi summarizes an article without quoting it word for word, except for a few phrases which he has in parentheses. The reviewed essay is “Quelques mots sur St.-Cyrille et St.-Méthodius, inventeurs de l’alphabet slavon” [“Some words on St. Cyril and St. Methodius, inventors of the Slavonic alphabet”] by M. P. Pogodin, and published in the Russian journal Severnyi Arkhiv 22 February 1826.
2. Leopardi discusses here a passage in Bulletin Universel, 10, 1828, art. 273, p. 253.
3. Leopardi reproduces some pages from the Discourse on the text and the different opinions prevalent about the history and the critical emendation of the Commedia of Dante by Foscolo (Lugano 1827 = LL).
Z 4379
1. Leopardi reproduces here part of § 15 (vol. 1, pp. 31–32); in parenthesis is a note on p. 32, where Foscolo mentions the edition of Homer by Payne Knight, published in London in 1820 (but his Prolegomena, cited below, had been published in a limited edition of fifty copies in 1808, and then in the Clas
sical Journal in 1813).
2. Virgil, Aeneid 12, 657–58.
Z 4380
1. Having just read of the “positive stoicism of Payne Knight,” Leopardi would have expected here stoico (stoic) rather than storico (historian), hence his “sic” (Pacella).
2. § 16 of Foscolo’s Discorso starts here, vol. 1, pp. 32–34.
3. Foscolo quotes from Knight, “Prolegomena in Homerum,” published in the Classical Journal, vol. 8, no. 15, Sept. 1813, pp. 33–79 (which include §§ LIX–CLII), here p. 78.
Z 4381
1. § 17 of Foscolo’s Discorso starts here, vol. 1, p. 34.
Z 4382
1. Leopardi quotes from a different section of Foscolo’s Discorso, starting from § 150, vol. 2, pp. 131–322.
2. Leopardi thinks that the reference here may be to Foscolo’s review of Pindemonte’s translation of the Odyssey (in Annali di scienze e lettere, 1810, vol. 2, pp. 25–78), but in fact it is to his History of the Aeolic Digamma (Opere, Florence: Le Monnier, 1978, vol. 12, pp. 134–245). The article was published by the Quarterly Review in July 1822 (dated April) and was, at least in intention, a review of Granville Penn’s An Examination of the Primary Argument of the Iliad (see Z 4362–63); Penn did not take kindly to Foscolo changing his title.
3. Virgil, Georgics 3, 3.
4. Leopardi quotes the whole § 201 of Foscolo’s Discorso, vol. 2, pp. 276–79.
5. Foscolo is referring to the edition of Inferno produced by the Crusca, which he describes as having effectively taken on the status of Vulgate.
6. Foscolo cites L. Salviati’s Degli avvertimenti della lingua, vol. 1, Milan: Classici Italiani, 1809, p. 14 (it is in fact bk. 1). The Naples 1712 ed. is cited by Leopardi on Z 1660.
Z 4383
1. The famous manuscript of the Decameron copied by Francesco d’Amaretto Mannelli, held by the Laurenziana Library in Florence.
2. Aristarchus of Samothrace (c. 215–c. 143 BCE), head of the Alexandrian library, produced the first critical edition of Homer, which here Foscolo calls the Vulgate.
Z 4385
1. Leopardi quotes the whole § 202 of Foscolo’s Discorso, vol. 2, pp. 279–81.
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