436 ROMANCE LITERATURE 



And this admiration brought forth a study that took all forms 

 permitted by the capacity of the times. Nor was this study restricted 

 to the greatest authors. Thanks to them, even the lesser, indeed the 

 least of writers, were studied, especially after Tuscany had set up its 

 ancient language as the standard tongue. 



At the end of the eighteenth century Italy knew her remote past 

 as well as her near past. I cannot indulge in details; but in order to 

 measure the work done, it suffices to recall that Italy had already 

 produced the Storia of Tiraboschi, an exposition of ordered and ascer- 

 tained facts that can hardly be surpassed. Nor did Italy stop here. 

 Having in the beginning a knowledge, later regained, that other 

 kindred people had forestalled her in the vulgar tongues, and that 

 their example urged her on, she glanced beyond her boundaries. 

 The De Vulgari Eloquentia is filled with the conception of the unity of 

 the Romance nations in literature as well as in language. And in the 

 second half of the sixteenth century the Eloquentia was worthily 

 matched by the sketch of the history of Roman poetry with which 

 Giovan Maria Barbieri intended to preface a treatise on the Art of 

 Rhyming. 1 The most important place, next to the Italian, is here 

 held by the Provencal lyric; and to this all care was always, and by 

 the nature of things had to be, particularly turned. Do not let us 

 exaggerate the result of this care. No real tradition of Provencal 

 doctrine was ever established. Every scholar had, so to speak, to begin 

 anew. The fact is nevertheless noteworthy enough ; and the Trouba- 

 dours owed to this Italian care the preservation of many and many 

 leaves in their laurel wreaths, and owed to it also that these leaves 

 kept more or less green. 2 



In Spain the national spirit was never lulled, and remained ever 

 faithful to certain ancient ideals. The name of the Cid particularly 

 has never ceased to make all Spanish hearts beat. They certainly 

 beat, even in the fifteenth century, when a new art more refined and 

 less spontaneous, the acquaintance with Italian models, and human- 

 istic studies, made them look down contemptuously on those "ro- 



1 Unluckily this work stopped here; and this first book was published, as is well 

 known, more than two hundred years later by Tiraboschi, under the title, perhaps 

 somewhat exceptionable, Dell' origine dclla poesia rimnta. Modena, 1790. 



The harsh words that on this subject burst from the irritated lips of Logrand 

 d'Aussy in his introduction to the Fabliaux, Paris, 1779, p. iv, do not sound dis- 

 agreeable to Italian ears: " D'un autre cote les Troubadours Provenoaux ont laisse 

 apres <>ux, jo ne sais trop pourquoi, tine renommee. qui a ebloui tout le monde: 

 non qu'on se soit laisse abuser par les eloges prodigues dans le temps a ces tristes 

 Chansonniers, ou qu'on ait 6t6 seduit parlours Uuvrages; mais 1'Italie dont ils 

 furent les maitres, et ou les introduisit 1'arh'nite du langago, s'est plu & immor- 

 taliser leur memoiro; et telle fut 1'origine do leur grande et trop heureuse for- 

 tune. La reconnaissance de deux ou trois Ecrivains colobres les a satire's de 1'oubli. 

 On les a cru de grands hommes parce que Petrarque et le Dante les chant erent; et 

 aujourd'hui que pen de gens sont en 6tat, ou pltitot que personne ne conceit 1'idee 

 de verifier ces panogyriqiies trompetirs, adopt eg sur parole, 1'opinion de leur 

 merite proYatit tellemont, memo parmi les gens instruits, qu'il n'en est aucun qui 

 ne les croie les peres de toute notre Litterature moderne." 



