OCR Text |
Show DANTE'S BEATRICE. Her Identity Established By a Recent Re-cent Discovery. Every writer of Dante has more or less discussed the existence of Dante's "Beatrice." For a good many she was but a myth: for others she was 'the daughter of . friend of Dante. . Foloe Portinari, whose house in Florence was in the same street as that of Dante's. Longfellow, amongst others, accepted this theory as the true version; for, other writers Beatrice was Dante's own daughter. This has been asserted long ago by two eminent Italian writers, by Domcnico Maria Manni, in his "History" "His-tory" of the Decameron. Boccaccio's i,.,tnl .nn-- and bv Gil'Bpnnp PelH in his "Memorie" of Dante's life. Both have grounded their statements on a document, now unfortunately lost, in which document it was stated that a sum of ten golden florins had been sent to Beatrice at Ravenna by the Oratory of San Michele of Florence, and through Giovanni Boccaccio, who, according ac-cording to this tocument had betaken himself to' Ravenna to hand over the money, never mentioned it in his life of Dante. But it seems that their statement state-ment was well grounded, and that all doubts on it must be forthwith dismissed. dismis-sed. Professor S. Bernico'i, perusing the "Memcroiali" deposited in the archives arch-ives of Ravenna, where' Dante lived the rest of his life, had just found a document in which it is clearly stated that a Beatrice Dante Alighieri truly lived and died as a "sister" in the convent of Santo Stefano degil Olivi of Ravenna. This document is dated Sept. 20, 1S71, fifteen years after Dante's death. It records the gift of three- golden gol-den ducvats given to the convent of Santo Stefano. as universal heir of Sister Sis-ter Beatrice, daughter of the late Dante Alighieri, and formerly sister in the above-mentioned' convent. If this new-version new-version of Beatrice's existence is true, many passages of the poet, we are afraid., must be read over again, and a different construction put on them. ' |