Jousting with Verse: The Poetics of Friendship in Duecento Comuni

Abstract

Despite the divisive factionalism that riled Italian comuni in the late Duecento, the language of friendship dominated the vernacular poetry circulating in late medieval urban centers, particularly in tenzoni. In these disputatious exchange poems, vernacular authors frequently referred to one another as “amico,” no matter what relationship they may have had with their interlocutors. The usage of the language of “amicizia” in these exchanges defies conventional praises of friendship, which would conceive of friendship as an unambiguous moral good. Instead, the ambivalent language of friendship in tenzoni reflects both the anxiety of duplicitous speech that plagued urban life and a hope for the salvation of the comune from partisan conflict. These tenzoni collectively propose a model of friendly antagonism, which, in its engagement even across ideological lines, strives to convert dispute from violent partisanship into a competitive joust in the game of honor.