PETRARCH THE MAN 



Of this great love story we know the hero, but who 

 was the heroine ? Are we sure that Laura ever Hved ? 

 Petrarch's own friend, Giacomo Colonna, writing to 

 him in 1336, expressed doubt concerning the reality of 

 such a person; but Petrarch in answer assured him 

 that he would not be so incredulous, were he to see the 

 author's pitiful physical condition. One wonders how 

 far this argument persuaded Giacomo; for Petrarch, 

 in spite of all the mental anguish he undoubtedly 

 suffered in his lifetime, like many nervous invalids was 

 (in appearance, at least) robust. But Giacomo 

 Colonna was not the only one to express misgivings. 

 Even Boccaccio beheved that Laura should be taken 

 allegorically. On the other hand, testimony to the 

 actual existence of such a lady was offered in the four- 

 teenth century by a Florentine, Luigi Peruzzi, who 

 identified her with a certain Lauretta of the house of 

 Salso. In the eighteenth century, the French Abbe de 

 Sade tried to prove that she was really Laura de Noves, 

 wife of Hugues de Sade, and mother of eleven children; 

 that she died in April, 1348, and was buried in the 

 church of the Minorite friars, which, according to 

 Petrarch, was the burial-place of Laura. On the whole, 

 the idea that there was a real Laura is generally 

 accepted; but as to who she was and what part she 

 played in the Canzoniere, opinions differ widely. 

 Grober, in his Von Petrarcd's Laura {Miscellanea di 

 stidi critici in onore di Arturo Graf), shows that Laura 

 was a very common name in France at that time, and 



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