A HITHERTO UNEXPLORED MANUSCRIPT OF 100 POEMS BY VITTORIA COLONNA IN THE BIBLIOTECA NAZIONALE CENTRALE, FLORENCE

Abstract

Those who have had occasion to deal with the poetry of Vittoria Colonna, Marchioness of Pescara (1492–1547) are well aware of the unsatisfactory nature of the texts at present available to scholars. At least forty-two manuscripts of her poems exist in the Italian archives, yet only a very few of these have been thoroughly examined and collated, with the result that no satisfactory critical edition of the Rime is so far to be found. The most recent critical edition remains that of Pietro Ercole Visconti and dates from as far back as 1840; it is based on the collation of three manuscripts, although in his introduction he does make vague references to others, and does not take into account material from any other source. Since that date valuable work has been done on the Colonna manuscript tradition by the distinguished scholars Domenico Tordi and Enrico Carusi, and it is the immediate purpose of this study to take up the story where they left off and to identify what would seem to be one manuscript of particular interest and importance in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale in Florence and bearing the reference number II.IX.30.