The first volume of this edition, dedicated to his benefactor Roscoe, contains a dissertation on Italian Romantic Poetry, with analyses of the “Teseide” of Boccaccio, the “Morgante” of Luigi Pulci, and the “Mambriano” of Francesco Bello, besides other Italian romantic epics. The second volume is prefaced by a memoir of Bojardo, with an essay making him full amends for the long usurpation of his fame by his adaptor Berni. It also contains a life of Ariosto.
The corrupt text of the “Orlando Innamorato” is restored, with great acumen (from a collation of rare editions, principally contributed by the Right Hon. Thomas Grenville and Earl Spencer), and, as well as that of the “Furioso” (published later on, 1834), is accompanied by long and learned notes in English, “from an idea that they would prove more acceptable to the English reader, who will gladly excuse any errors, when he reflects that, had I not preferred his language, he would not have enjoyed the beautiful translations by Lady Dacre; W. S. Rose, Esq., and W. Sotheby, Esq., which adorn this introductory essay.”
The first part is well worthy the consideration of such as are curious in tracing the windings of the stream of civilization from its fountain head. In this, with great ingenuity, the author describes the passions and incidents of the most remarkable period in the history of mediæval times—the age of chivalry—which institution he attributes to Celtic sources. Chivalry raised Europe from its barbarous condition. Every institution, indeed, is of lowly origin. Love, naturally a brutal appetite, only becomes refined by emulation among men, advancing knowledge, and civilization. Panizzi (p. 29) tells us that the Italians were indebted to the popular songs sung in the north for their long prose romances, giving, as an example of the most popular and inspiriting of these songs, the Lays of Roland and Charlemagne, sung by Taillefer, the Norman standard-bearer who led the charge at the battle of Hastings. “If,” Panizzi continues, at p. 34, “the original destination of poetry were in every nation of the world to celebrate the glorious actions of heroes, one of the provinces of England, possessing one of the most ancient languages extant, would seem to have surpassed all other countries in the application of the art. All the chivalrous fictions, since spread throughout Europe, appear to have had their birth in Wales.... So famous were their lays in France, that the French trouvères were accustomed to cite the British originals as vouchers for the truth of their stories, while some of them were translated by Marie de France. A glance at these translations will show the lays to be of British origin.”
To this ingenious theory it is difficult, without considerable further inquiry, to give so unqualified an assent as the Editor of Bojardo appears to have done. The subject, however, opens up a field of discussion far too wide to be entered into in this biography.
Besides Panizzi’s valuable notes, his work is further embellished with a selection from Lady Dacre’s translations from Petrarch. The peculiar skill with which this most elegant authoress could transfer to her own language the graces of her Italian original will be best presented to the reader by an example of her art:—
And Forisene was in her heart aware,
That love of her was Oliver’s sole care.
And because Love not willingly excuses
One who is loved, and loveth not again;
(For tyrannous were deem’d the rule he uses,