De Casibus Virorum Illustrium

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From an edition of Giovanni Boccaccio's "De Casibus Virorum Illustrium" (Paris, 1467)
From an edition of Giovanni Boccaccio's
"De Casibus Virorum Illustrium" (Paris, 1467)

De Casibus Virorum Illustribus ( "On the Fates of Famous Men" ) is a work of 56 biographies in Latin prose composed by the Florentine figure Giovanni Boccaccio of Certaldo about moral stories of the falls of famous men like his work of 106 biographies On Famous Women.

Contents

[edit] Overview

De Casibus is an encyclopedia of historical biography and a part of the classical tradition of historiography. It deals with the fortunes and calamities of famous people starting with the biblical Adam, going to mythological and ancient people, then to people of Boccaccio's fourteenth century time period.[1] The work was so successful it was referred to as the De Casibus tradition[2] because it influenced many other famous authors like Geoffrey Chaucer, John Lydgate, and Laurent de Premierfait.[3] De Casibus also inspired character figures in works like The Canterbury Tales,[4] The Monk's Tale, [5] Fall of Princes (c. 1438), Des Cas de nobles hommes et femmes (c. 1409),[6] Caida de principles (fifteenth century Spanish collection), and A Mirror for Magistrates (sixteenth century German collection by Jacob Ziegler).[7]

[edit] Development

Boccaccio wrote the core of his work from about 1355 to 1360 with revisions and modifications up to 1374. For almost four hundred years this work was the better known of his material. The forceful written periodic Latin work was far more widely read then the now famous vernacular Tuscan/Italian tales of Decameron.[8] The Renaissance period saw the secular biography development which was spearheaded partly by the success of this work being a stimulus and driving force of the new biography-moral genre.

[edit] Purpose

Boccaccio's perspective focuses on the disastro awaiting all who are too favored by luck and on the inevitable catastrophes awaiting those with great fortune.[9] He offers a moral commentary on overcoming misfortune by adhering to virtue through a moral God's world. Here the monastic chronicle tradition combines with the classical ideas of Senecan tragedy.

[edit] Content

De casibus stems from the tradition of exemplary literature works about famous people. It showed with the lives of these people that it was not only biographies but snapshots of their moral virtues.[10] Boccaccio relates biographies of famous people that were at the hights of happiness and fell to misfortune when they least expected it. This sad event is sometimes referred to as a "de casibus tragedy" after this work. William Shakespeare created characters based on this phenomenon as did Christopher Marlowe.[11]

[edit] Lives recounted

In order, directly translated from Latin edition.[12]

[edit] Book One

[edit] Book Two

[edit] Book Three

[edit] Book Four

[edit] Book Five

  • Seleucus and Anthiocus, Kings of Asia and Syria
  • Marcus Attilus Regulus
  • Syphace, King of Numidia
  • Anthiocus the Greater, King of Asia and Syria
  • Hannibal, leader of Carthage
  • Prusia, King of Bithynia
  • Perseus, King of Macedonia
  • Pseudo-Philip of Macedonia
  • Alexander Bala, King of Syria
  • Demetrius, King of Syria
  • Alxander Zebenna, King of Syria
  • Jugurtha, King of the Numidians

[edit] Book Six

[edit] Book Seven

[edit] Book Eight

[edit] See also

[edit] References

[edit] Primary sources

  • Des cas des nobles hommes et femmes translated from Boccaccio's De Casibus Virorum Illustribus by Laurent de Premierfait (1400) [13] [14] [15]

[edit] Secondary sources

  • Tutte le Opere de Giovanni Boccaccio ed., Vittore Branca (Verona: Arnoldo Mondadori, 1964)
  • The Fates of Illustrious Men, trans. Louis Brewer Hall (New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing, 1965)
  • Miscellanea di Studi e Ricerche sul Quattrecento francese, ed., F. Simone (Turin: Giappichelli, 1966)
  • Des cas des nobles hommes et femmes ed., Patricia May Gathercole, Chapel Hill - University of North Carolina (1968)

[edit] Related references

  • Christine de Pizan, Livre de la Cite des claris mulierbus (1405)
  • Egan, Margarita trans. The Vidas of the Troubadours, New York, Garland (1984)
  • Johnville, Jean de Vie de saint Louis, ed., Noel L. Corbert. Sherbrook Naoman (1977)
  • Richards, Earl Jeffery trans. The Book of the City of Ladies, New York, Persea (1982)
  • Lalande, Denis, ed., Le livre des fais du bon messiere Jehan le Maingre, dit Bouciquaut Geneva: Droz (1985)

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ History of Tragedy
  2. ^ Narrative, Authority, and Power: The Medieval Exemplum and the Chaucerian by Larry Scanlon, p. 119, Cambridge University Press (1994), ISBN 0521044251
  3. ^ Coates, Alan A Catalogue of Books Printed in the Fifteenth Century Now in the Bodleian, pp. 596-617, Bodleian Library, Oxford University Press (2005), ISBN 0199513732
  4. ^ Chaucer's influences
  5. ^ JSTOR: The Mediaeval Setting of Chaucer's Monk's Tale
  6. ^ The Literary Encyclopedia
  7. ^ Vittorio Zaccaria, Introduzione, in Giovanni Boccaccio's De Casibus Virorum Illustrium volume 9 of Tutte le opere di Giovanni Boccaccio under guidance of Pier Giorgio Ricci and Vittorio Zaccaria, ed. Vittore Branca, 12 volumes I Classici Mondadori (Milan:Arnoldo Mondadori editor, 1983)
  8. ^ Louis Brewer Hall, "Introduction," De casibus illustrium virorum (Gainesville: Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, 1962), v.
  9. ^ De casibus virorum illustrium (work by Boccaccio) -- Britannica
  10. ^ Medieval France: An Encyclopedia By William W. Kibler, p. 129, Routledge Publisher (1995), Paris, ISBN 0824044444
  11. ^ Medieval tragedy
  12. ^ Giovanni Boccaccio, Tutte le opere Vol. 9: De casibus virorum illustrium ed. trans. V. Zaccarria (La Scuola: Mondadori, 1983).
  13. ^ Laurent de Premierfait: The Translator of Boccaccio's De Casibus Virorum Illustrium
  14. ^ The Manuscripts of Laurent de Premierfait's 'Du Cas des Nobles' (Boccaccio's 'De Casibus Virorum Illustrium')
  15. ^ The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism - Cambridge University