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Sappi ch'i' son Italia che ti parlo, Di Lusimburgo ignominioso Carlo! |
After detailing the woes which have befallen her in consequence of her abandonment by the imperial master, Italy addresses herself to God:
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Tu dunque, Giove, perchè 'l santo uccello ... Da questo Carlo quarto Imperador non togli e dalle mani Degli altri lurchi moderni germani, Che d'aquila un allocco n'hanno fatto? |
The Italian Ghibellines had, indeed, good reason to complain that German gluttons, Cæsars in naught but name, who only thought of making money by their sale of fiefs and honors, had changed the eagle of the Empire into an obscene night-flying bird of prey. The same spirit is breathed in Fazio's ode on Rome.[162] He portrays the former mistress of the world as a lady clad in weeds of mourning, "ancient, august and honorable, but poor and needy as her habit showed, prudent in speech and of great puissance." She bids the poet rouse his fellow-countrymen from their sleep of sloth and drunkenness, to reassert the majesty of the empire owed to Italy and Rome:
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O figliuol mio, da quanta crudel guerra Tutti insieme verremo a dolce pace, Se Italia soggiace A un solo Re che al mio voler consente! |
This is the last echo of the De Monarchiâ. The great imperial idea, so destructive to Italian confederation, so dazzling to patriots of Dante's fiber, expires amid the wailings of minstrels who cry for the impossible, and haunt the Courts of petty Lombard princes.
In another set of Canzoni we listen to Guelf and Ghibelline recriminations, rising from the burghs of Tuscany. The hero of these poems is Gian Galeazzo Visconti, rightly recognized by the Guelfs of Florence as a venomous and selfish tyrant, foolishly belauded by the Ghibellines of Siena as the vindicator of imperial principles. The Emperors have abandoned Italy; the Popes are at Avignon. The factions which their quarrels generated, agitate their people still, but on a narrower basis. Sacchetti slings invectives against the maladetta serpe, aspro tiranno con amaro fele, who shall be throttled by the Church and Florence, leagued to crush the Lombard despots.[163] Saviozzo da Siena addresses the same Visconti as novella monarchia, giusto signore, clemente padre, insigne, virtuoso. By his means the dolce vedovella, Rome or Italy, shall at last find peace.[164] This Duke of Milan, it will be remembered, had already ordered the crown of Italy from his Court-jeweler, and was advancing on his road of conquest, barred only by Florence, when the Plague cut short his career in 1402. The poet of Siena exhorts him to take courage for his task, in lines that are not deficient in a certain fire of inspiration:
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Tu vedi in ciel la fiammeggiante aurora, Le stelle tue propizie e rutilanti, E' segni tutti quanti Ora disposti alla tua degna spada. |
In another strophe he refers to the Italian crown:
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Ecco qui Italia che ti chiama padre, Che per te spera omai di trionfare, E di sè incoronare Le tue benigne e preziose chiome. |