"1517.
"Federicus Veteranus, Urbinas Bibliothecarius, ad Rei Memoriam.
Among the minor fry slumbering unknown in the Vatican Library is Urbani of Urbino, who left a few rude elegiac and complimentary ditties in Latin or Italian upon members of the Montefeltrian line, and compiled a confused account of their pedigree. We may also name Antonio Rustico of Florence, whose Panegiricon Comitis Federici, dedicated to him in 1472, contains above seven hundred Italian lines of terza rima, unpolished in style, and in matter a mere tissue of fatiguing verbiage. Scarcely more valuable is Naldio's account of the Volterran campaign of 1572 in Latin verse, to which we have vainly had recourse for new information on that obscure passage of our memoirs.[93]
While enumerating in our [twenty-first chapter] the celebrities of Duke Guidobaldo's court, we mentioned Bernardo Accolti, and endeavoured to explain the inadequacy of his published works to sustain his contemporary reputation, by supposing that his strength lay in extemporé recitation. The high place which his vanity claimed, in assuming "the Unique" as a surname, appears to have been freely accorded by the most able of his contemporaries. Ariosto says of him, not perhaps without a sneer at his notorious conceit,—
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"The cavalier amid that band, whom they So honour, unless dazzled in mine eye By those fair faces, is the shining light Of his Arezzo, and Accolti hight."[94] |
Castiglione assigns him a prominent rank among the Urbino stars, whilst Bembo and Pietro Aretino testify to his merits. We, however, would try these by his surviving works, which, as Roscoe observes, are fatal to his reputation, and which are indeed rather a beacon than a model to succeeding genius. It is, therefore, unnecessary to pause upon them, or to add here to our previous notice of their author and his position at the Montefeltrian court. Nor was Accolti the only poetaster who attained in that polished circle, or in other Italian courtlets, a celebrity from which posterity has withheld its seal. A solution of this success may perhaps be found in the circumstance that many of these owed it either to personal popularity or to their musical accomplishments. Thus Serafino d'Aquila, who either improviséed his verses, or chanted them to his own accompaniment on the lute, was generally preferred to Petrarch. He died at thirty-four, in 1500, after being sought by all the petty sovereigns from Milan to Naples, and ere two generations had passed away his poetry was utterly forgotten. So, too, Agostino Staccoli of Urbino, whose sonnets delighted Duke Federigo, and obtained for him a diplomatic mission to Rome in 1485, has been long consigned to oblivion.
The older comedies of Italy become a subject of interest to us, for one of the earliest was written by Bernardo Bibbiena, a friend of Guidobaldo I.,[95] and was first performed in the palace of Urbino. The revival of the comic drama may be traced to Ferrara; and, though the pieces originally represented there before Duke Ercole I. were translations from Plautus and Terence,[96] Ariosto made several boyish attempts to vary the entertainment by dramatic compositions of his own. This was just before 1500, and to about the same time Tiraboschi ascribes the comedies of Machiavelli. There is thus much probability that these attempts preceded the Calandra of Bibbiena, which has, however, been generally considered the oldest regular comedy in the language. It seems also to have been the first that attracted the notice of his patron Leo X., whose delight in comic performances was excessive; and, although now superseded by pieces more in accordance with the age, it long enjoyed a continued popularity. Giovo celebrates its easy and acute wit, and the talent of its mobile and merry author for scenic representation, which must have greatly tended to ensure its success. It is doubtful in what year it was played at the Vatican in presence of his Holiness, on the visit of Isabella, Marchioness of Mantua, when the decorations painted by Baldassar Peruzzi obtained unbounded applause. But this probably happened after its performance at Urbino, which collateral evidence discovered by Pungileone, has fixed as taking place in the spring of 1513.[*97] This gorgeous entertainment, and the scenery executed for it by Timoteo della Vite and Girolamo Genga, are commemorated in a letter of Castiglione, which throws light upon the manner of such festivities in that mountain metropolis.