1 For an introduction to Landino's life and works, see Frank J. Fata, “Landino on Dante,” Diss. Johns Hopkins 1966, pp. 2-27; Arthur Field, “The Beginning of the Philosophical Renaissance in Florence, 1454-1469,” Diss. University of Michigan 1980, pp. 200-207; Garin, E., Testi inediti e rari di Cristoforo Landino e Francesco Filelfo (Florence, 1949), pp. 3—11 Google Scholar; Bandini, A.M., Specimen literaturae florentinae sacculi XV, 2 vols. (Florence, 1747-51)Google Scholar; and Perosa, Alessandro, “Una fonte secentesca dello Specimen del Bandini in un codice della Biblioteca Marucelliana,” Bibiiofilia, 42 (1940), 229-56Google Scholar. On the Platonic Academy, see Kristeller, Paul O., “The Platonic Academy of Florence,” in Renaissance Thought II (New York, 1965), pp. 89–101 Google Scholar; Robb, Nesca A., Neoplatonism of the Italian Renaissance (London, 1935)Google Scholar; and della Torre, A., Storia dell' accademia platonica di Firenze (Florence, 1902)Google Scholar.

2 For a discussion of the problems raised in dating the dialogue, see Lohe, Peter, “Die Datierung der ‘Disputationes Camaldulenses’ des Cristoforo Landino,” Rinascimento, 9 (1969), 291-99Google Scholar and the introduction to Lohe's critical edition of the Disputationes Camaldulenses (Florence, 1980), pp. xxx-xxxiii. An alternative approach is taken by Cardini, Roberto in La critica del Landino (Florence, 1973), p. 152 Google Scholar, n. 37.

3 A11 citations of the Disputationes are from Lohe's critical edition; this reference is found on p. n o . We should note that Landino's interest in the ethical content of poetry has its roots in the medieval accessus ad auctores tradition, which began the study of a classical poem with an introductory analysis of the work and its author. The last section of this analysis considered which part of philosophy the poem should be placed under (“cui parti philosophiae supponatur“), and the answer generally given was “ethics. 3Arnulf of Orleans, for example, does this with the Metamorphoses, which “is to be placed under ethics, since it teaches us to scorn those temporal things which are transitory and inconstant, a teaching which is relevant to morality” (“ethice supponitur quia docet nos ista temporalia que transitoria et mutabilia, contempnere, quod pertinet ad moralitatem,” as quoted by Ghisalberti, Fausto in “Arnolfo d'Orléans, un cultore di Ovidio nel secolo XII,” Memorie del Reale Istituto Lombardo, 24 [1932], 181)Google Scholar. On the accessus ad auctores, see Quain, Edwin A., , S.J., “The Medieval Accessus ad Auctores,” Traditio, 3 (1945), 215-64CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ghisalberti, Fausto, “Mediaeval Biographies of Ovid,” JWCI, 9 (1946), 10–59 Google Scholar; and Accessus ad Auctores, ed. Huygens, R. B. C. (Berchem-Brussels, 1954)Google Scholar.

4 Information on the courses that Landino gave at the Studium may be found in Cardini, La critica del Landino, pp. 16-17 and Lentzen, Manfred, “Zum gegenwärtigen Stand der Landino Forschung,” Wolfenbütteler Renaissance Mitteilungen, 5 (1981), 93–94 Google Scholar. The 1462-63 commentary was identified by Arthur Field and announced in “A Manuscript of Cristoforo Landino's First Lectures on Virgil, 1462-63,” RQ, 31 (1978), 17-20; 1 was able to examine this manuscript in the fall of 1981, after studying Landino's other work on Virgil, and feel confident that Field's attribution is correct. Cardini, , La critica del Landino, pp. 312-26Google Scholar has published the preface to the year's lectures, “Clarissimi viri Christophori Landini praefatio in Virgilio habita in gymnasio Florentino, 1462.“

5 References to the 1488 commentary are to Vergilius cum commentariis quinque (Venice, 1493).

6 Landino's Dante commentary was first printed in Florence, 1481: Comento di Christophoro Landino Fiorentino sopra la Comedia di Danthe Alighieri Poeta Florentine (Hain Nr. 5946). I have referred to the Venice, 1536 edition: Cantica del divino poeta Danthe Alighieri fiorentino. See also Landino's, “Prolusione dantesca,” in Scritti criticl e teorici, ed, Cardini, Roberto (Rome, 1974), 1, 45–55 Google Scholar; the same speech is edited by Manfred Lentzen, who feels that it is Landino's inaugural lecture in the Florentine Studium (“Cristoforo Landinos Antrittsvorlesung im Studio Fiorentino,” Romanische Forschungen, 81 [1969], 60-88).

7 Bibliographical information on the Disputationes Camaldulenscs may be found in the introduction to Lohe's edition, pp. xvi-xvii, xxiv-xxix. On Bishop Shirwood and his copy of the Disputationes, see Allen, P. S., “Bishop Shirwood of Durham and His Library,” EHR, 25 (1910), 445-56CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 Virgilio nell'arte e nella cultura europea, the catalogue of an exhibition held at Rome's Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, 24 September to 24 November 19X1, ed. Marcello Fagiolo (Rome, 1981), pp. 161-71.

9 Information on Landino's published commentary may be found in Giuliano Mambelli, Gli annali delle edizioni virgiliane (Florence, 1954), pp. 30-40. The editions entered under numbers 56 and 71 may also have contained Landino's commentary.

10 Allen, Don Cameron, Mysteriously Meant: The Rediscovery of Pagan Symbolism and Allegorical Interpretation in the Renaissance (Baltimore, 1970), pp. 142-54Google Scholar; Wolf, Eugen, “Die allegorische Vergilerklärung des Cristoforo Landino,” Neue Jahrbücher für das klassische Altertum, Geschichte, unddeutsche Literatur und für Pädagogik, 43 (1919), 453-79Google Scholar; Field, Arthur, “Beginning of the Philosophical Renaissance,” pp. 207 Google Scholar, 234-36; Müller-Bochat, Eberhard, Leon Battista Alberti und die Vergil-Deutung der Disputationes Camaldulenses. Zur allegorischen Dichter-Erklarung bei Cristoforo Landino, Schriften und Vortrage des Petrarca-Instituts Koln, 21 (Krefeld, 1968), p. 13 Google Scholar; Murrin, Michael, The Allegorical Epic: Essays in Its Rise and Decline (Chicago, 1980), pp. 28–34 Google Scholar; Cardini, Roberto, La critica del Landino, pp. 39–65 Google Scholar, 94-100, 106-12; Frank Fata, “Landino on Dante,” pp. 29-61; Lentzen, Manfred, Studien zur Danle-Exegese Cristoforo Landinos, Studi italiani, 12 (Cologne, 1971), pp. 137-51Google Scholar; Müller-Bochat, Eberhard, “Der allegorische Aneas und die Auslegung des danteschen Jenseits im 14. Jahrhundert,” Deutsches Dante-Jahrbuch, 44/45 (1967), 59–81 Google Scholar; Barbi, Michele, Delia fortuna di Dante nel secolo XVI (Pisa, 1890), pp. 150-79Google Scholar; and Zabughin, Vladimiro, Vergilio nel Rinascimento italiano da Dante a Torquato Tasso (Bologna, 1921-23), 1,194-202Google Scholar.

11 Cardini, , La critica del Landino, pp. 16–17 Google Scholar and Field, “Beginning of the Philosophical Renaissance,” p. 205.

12 Sigs. AA6-AA7.

13 Quod autem petis, id et multo divinius est et magis in obscuro latet et a nullo, quod ego quidem sciam, hactenus sua serie patefactum, quod neque grammaticus neque rhetor noverit, sed sit ex intimis philosophiae arcanis eruendum. Vis enim nosse, quid per sua ilia aenigmata de Aeneae erroribus deque eius hominis in Italiam profectione sibi Maro voluerit” (pp. 117-18). The translation and all those that follow are my own.

14 “Tertium [genus theologiae] vero iccirco civile appellant, quia inde ad bene beatcque vivendum praecepta promantur. Consuevere igitur poetae, quibus nihil doctius reperias, haec omnia ita confundere atque in unum conmiscere, ut Optimo quodam temperamento eodem tempore et aures summa voluptatc demulceant ct mentem recondita doctrina alant ac nos ad rectum atque honestum et ad ipsum summum bonum deducant” (Disputationes Camaldulenses, p. 167). Landino is referring here to Varro's division of theology into mythical, physical, and civic, a distinction preserved in Augustine, Civ. Dei 6.5 and presented in turn by Boccaccio, Genealogie deorum gentilium libri, ed. Vincenzo Romano (Bari, 1951), II, 767-68. See also the “Prolusione dantesca,” where Landino concludes that in poetry countless rules and examples for speaking well and for acting well are found (ed. Cardini, Roberto, in La critica del Landino, p. 368 Google Scholar).

15 “Nam quemadmodum in chamaldulensibus philosophi interpretis munus obivimus, sic in his commentariis grammatici rhetorisque vices praestabimus” (fol. 112). The preference of the humanist commentary for grammatical and rhetorical material has been stressed by IJsewijn, Jozef, “Laurentius Vallas sprachliche Kommentare,” in Der Kommentar in der Renaissance, ed. Buck, August and Herding, Otto, Kommission fur Humanismusforschung, Mitteilung, 1 (Boppard, 1975)Google Scholar. IJsewijn argues that Valla freed the commentary of moralizing tendencies, although some later humanists were less rigid than he in preserving the distinction (p. 97).

16 '“Quod autem ad bene beateque vivendum pertinet, quis non videat omnia quibus vita humana recte instituatur, praecepta ab hoc poeta veluti ex adorandis philosophiae scatebris promi facile ac percipi posse? … Maronis poema omne humanae vitae genus exprimit, ut nullus hominum ordo, nulla aetas, nullus sexus sit, nulla denique conditio, quae ab eo sua officia non integre addiscat. Qua obsecro ille acrimonia, quo verborum flumine, metum, ignaviam, luxuriam, incontinentiam, impietatem, perfidiam, ac omnia iniustitiae genera reliquaque vitia insectatur, vexat? Quibus contra laudibus, quibus praemiis invictam animi magnitudinem, et pro patria, pro parentibus, pro cognatis amicisque consideratam periculorum susceptionem, religionem in deum, pietatem in maiores, charitatcm in omnes prosequitur?” (“Christophori Landini Florentini de peculiari Publii Virgilii Maronis laude, honesta praefatio,” in Virgil's Opera [Venice, 1544; reprint New York, 1976], fols. i-ii of the “Praenotamenta.“) See also the “Praefatio in Virgilio,” in La critica del Landino, ed. Cardini, Roberto, pp. 324-26Google Scholar: “Indeed, if you set forth [Virgil] for yourselves to imitate as a standard and model of life, you will perceive that nothing will be lacking from those things which are associated with living a happy and blessed life“(“Quem [Maronem] quidem si vobis tamquam normam exemplarque vitae ad imitandum proposueritis, nihil ex iis quae ad bene beateque vivendum pertinent vobis defuturum sentietis“). Landino makes the same point in a recently discovered oration on Virgil from the 1460s, which is edited by Arthur Field in “An Inaugural Oration by Cristoforo Landino in Praise of Virgil (From Codex ‘2,’ Casa Cavalli, Ravenna),” Rinascimento, 2nd ser., 21 (1981), 243.

17 The text appears in Fulgentius’ Opera, ed. Helm, Rudolfus (Leipzig, 1898), pp. 81–107 Google Scholar. The Expositio was commonly available through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (see Sabbadini, Remigio, Le scoperte dei codici latini e greci ne’ sccoli XIV e XV [Florence, 1914 Google Scholar; rpt. Florence, 1967], II, 224-25), and it played an influential role in shaping Petrarch's approach to Virgil (Pierre de Nolhac, “Virgile chez Pétrarque,” Studi medievali, NS 5 [1932], 222-23).

18 Expositio Virgilianae continentiae, pp. 93-94 on the Cyclops; on Palinurus and Misenus, ibid., pp. 95-96.

19 “Maxima … exemplaet excogitationcs aggredicndi honesta et fugiendi illicita,” The Commentary on the First Six Books of the Aeneid Commonly Attributed to Bernardus Silvestris, ed. Ward, Julian and Jones, Elizabeth Frances (Lincoln, Neb., 1977), pp. 2–3 Google Scholar. Though the evidence regarding authorship of the commentary is inconclusive, the Joneses consider the attribution to Bernardus suspect; see the introduction to their edition of the text, pp. ix-xi. Allen, , Mysteriously Meant, pp. 139-40Google Scholar and note 21 indicates that the commentary was known to Landino but was not printed in the Renaissance. It was also known to Salutati, whose De laboribus Herculis was an important source of allegorical material for the Disputationes ( Lentzen, , Studien zur Dante-Exegese, pp. 149-50Google Scholar). Padoan, Giorgio, “Tradizione e fortuna del commento all’ ‘Eneida’ di Bernardo Silvestre,” Italia medioevale e umanistica, 3 (1960), 234-36Google Scholar argues that the impact of Bernardus’ work is greater than his detractors might think, and the survey of manuscripts made for the Jones edition shows that the commentary remained fairly popular through the fifteenth century.

20 See below, pp. 543-44. The types of the descensus ad inferos are treated at length in the Disputationes, pp. 212-19; Bernardus’ treatment appears on p. 30 of his Commentary.

21 This letter may be found in Petrarch's Opera quae extant omnia (Basel, 1581), pp. 786-89. On Petrarch's approach to Virgil in general, see Pierre de Nolhac, Pétrarque el I'Humanisme, 2nd ed. (Paris, 1907), pp. 140-61.

22 “Ait [Vergilius] enim sc canere arma quo ad virtutes bellicas et activas, nam bellandi pugnandiquc instrumenta sunt arma. Et virum quo ad virtutes urbanas intellcctivasque in quibus sapientia tenet et prudentia principatum… . Itaque in primis sex aeneidos libris contemplatio maxime et consultatio locum habet. In secundis autem libris sex actionis est laus” (Epistolarum Francisci Philelphi libri sedecim [Paris, 1513], fols. 5-5^v).

23 We know from a letter to Bartolomeo Scala that Ficino read the Disputationes at some point: “I have read the Disputationes Camaldulenses of Cristoforo Landino; in these books he penetrates the utmost recesses of Virgil” (“Legi quaestiones Christophori Landini Camaldulenses: in iis libris Maronis adyta penetrat“; quoted by Lentzen in his Studien zur Dante-Exegese, pp. 153-54, n. 48). Likewise, Landino describes his pleasure at the opportunity to examine a work of Ficino's: “You will easily perceive, therefore, of what sort these things are and how much they should be esteemed, from that as yet unpolished book which our Marsilio is preparing but has not yet published. But when I had tarried at his house in Figline, I chanced upon that book, opened it, and read through a number of passages with the greatest pleasure” (“Haec igitur et qualia sint et quanti facienda, facile ex eo libro percipies, quern nondum expolitum in manibus hie noster Marsilius habet ncc adhuc edidit. Verum ego, cum apud ipsum in Fighinensi divertissem, casu in cum incidens aperui locosque quosdam summa cum voluptate percurri“; Disputationes Camaldulenses, p. 260).

24 “Propterea fingitur Aeneas ob Junonem perturbatione vexatus, id est, ob studium imperandi” (Marsilio Ficino: The ‘Philebus’ Commentary, ed. and trans. Allen, Michael J. B. [Berkeley, 1975], p. 449 Google Scholar, cited by Lentzen, , Studien zur Dante-Exegese, p. 153 Google Scholar). The dating of this work is difficult to establish precisely, but Landino does refer explicitly to Ficino's Philebus commentary in the Disputationes Camaldulenses (p. 68), as Allen, (The ‘Philebus’ Commentary, p. 10 Google Scholar) and Kristeller, P. O. (Supplementum Ficinianum [Florence, 1937], I Google Scholar, CXXII) note.

25 Francisci Philelphi de morali disciplina libri quinque (Venice, 1552), fol. 66. Aeneas at this point encourages his troops in a cause he considers hopeless: “the one salvation for the conquered is to hope for no salvation” (“Una salus victis nullam sperare salutem“).

26 Secretum, in Prose, ed. G. Martellotti and E. Carrara, La letteratura italiana, storia e testi, 7 (Milan and Naples, n.d.), pp. 122-24; cf. Sen. 4.4. This allegorical interpretation was popular among the early humanists; see also Il comento di Giovanni Boccaccio sopra la commedia, ed. Milanesi, Gaetano (Florence, 1863), pp. 249-50Google Scholar, and Filelfo's De morali disciplina, fol. 5.

27 avaritia, De, in Prosatori latini del Quattrocento, ed. Garin, Eugenio, La letteratura italiana, storia e testi, 13 (Milan and Naples, n.d.), pp. 254-56Google Scholar.

28 “Legant et perlegant, que sint in Eneida ad patientiam laborum emergentium cxhortationes Enee ad socios, quis ardor illi pulchre per vulnera mortis pro salute patrie fuerit, que erga patrem pietas, quem humeris per ardentes undique domos et ruentia templa, perque medios hostes et mille volantia tela devexit in tutum, que in Achemenidem hostcm dementia, quod robur animi ad illudendas frangendasque amoris petulci catenas, que iustitia atque munificentia circa amicos et exteros in exhibendis muneribus bene meritis, ludis in anniversario Anchisis patris apud Acestem peractis, que prudenrTa, quanta circumspcctio in descensu ad Inferos, que genitoris ad eum suasiones ad gloriam, que eius in iungendis amicitiis solertia, quam grandis comitas fidesque in conservandis susccptis, quam pie in Pallantis amici morte lacrime, que eius ad filium persepe monita” (11, 727-28).

29 The educational treatises of Vergerio, Bruni, Vegio, Aeneas Sylvius, and Battista Guarino formed the foundation for the practice of great teachers like Guarino da Verona and Vittorino da Feltrc, a practice which emphasized character development. As Lodovico Carbone writes, “For not only correct grammar, but also good character was learned from Guarino… . All his reading selections, examples, and precepts were related to living a good and happy life” (“Nee enim solum recta litteratura, sed boni etiam mores a Guaryno discebantur… . Omncs eius lectiones, omnia documenta, omnia praecepta ad bene beateque vivendum referebantur“; in Lodovici Carbonis … oratio habita in funere praestantissimi oratoris et poetae Guaryni Veronensis, in Bertoni, Giulio, Guarino da Verona fra letterati e cortigiani a Ferarra [1429-60] [Geneva, 1921], p. 168)Google Scholar.

30 Maffeo Vegio, De educatione liberorum et eorum claris moribus, ed. M. W. Fanning and A. S. Sullivan, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Latin, 1, fasc. 1-2 (Washington, DC, 1933-36), pp. 87-88.

32 These letters may be found in the Epistolario, 1,298-307, 321-29, 111,285-308, IV, 170-240, with additional commentary in Ullman, B. L., “Observations on Novati's Edition of Salutati's Letters,” in Studies in the Italian Renaissance (Rome, 1955), pp. 215 Google Scholar-16, 232, 237.

31 Epistolario di Coluccio Salutati, ed. Novati, Francesco (Rome, 1891 Google Scholar-191 1), 1,304.

33 Invective contra medicum, in Opere latine, ed. Bufano, Antonietta (Turin, 1975)Google Scholar, IL908.

34 The examples of Virgil criticism cited for each genre are by no means the only ones available. Although an interest in moral philosophy is inherent in Italian humanism from its decisive beginnings with Petrarch, this interest did not necessarily result in sophisticated, technically innovative philosophical speculation. Georg Voigt approaches this point rather pejoratively when he writes, “was sic [the humanists] Philosophiren nennen, ist nicht viel mehr als die Wiederholung und Variation der klassischen Gemeinplatze uber die Unbestimmtheit und Unabwendbarkeit des Todes und über die Hinfälligkeit alles Irdischen, über Tugend und Laster, fiber das Glück und hochste Gut, iiber Jugend und Alter, Freundschaft und Dankbarkeit, Reichtum und Gcnugsamkeit, Stolz und Demuth, Ruhm und Beschcidenheit und dergleichen mehr. Oft tritt es deutlich hervor, dass der Autor philosophische Florilegien besass und sich aus ihnen unterrichtete, was Terentius oder Virgilius, Cicero oder Boethius, Horatius oder Augustinus über dieses oder jenes Thema gesagt” (Die Wiederbelebung des classischen Alterthums, oder das erste Jahrhundert der Humanismus, ed. Max Lehnerdt, 3rd ed. [Berlin, 1893], 11,454). This passage has ramifications that do not concern us now for the history of philosophy, but by making Virgil a source for non-technical moral philosophizing, it also has implications for literary criticism. Current scholarship on Landino, unfortunately, has done little to develop these implications. The introduction to Thomas H. Stahel's translation of Books III and IV of the Disputationes (“Cristoforo Landino's Allegorization of the Aeneid: Books III and IV of the Camaldolese Disputations,” Diss. Johns Hopkins 1968, pp. 15-21), Eugen Wolfs general article on the dialogue (“Die allegorische Vergilerklärung,” pp. 470-72), and Lentzen's study of Landino on Dante (Studien zur Dante-Exegese, pp. 148-51) list a few of the most basic humanistic texts containing moral allegories of the Aeneid. Each of these secondary works, however, has its focus elsewhere, so that the scope of Landino's source study and its importance for his allegorizations have remained essentially unexamined.

35 See above, notes 17 and 19.

36 “Divinus enim Plato, cum virtutes de vita et moribus easdem quas ceteri posuisset, ita ad postremum illas divcrsis sive ordimbus sive generibus distinguit, ut alia quadam ratione ab iis illas coli ostendat, qui coetus ac civitates adamant, alia ab iis, qui omnem mortalitatem dediscere cupicntes ct humanarum rerum otio mod ad sola divina cognoscenda eriguntur, alia postremo ab iis, qui ab omni iam contagione expiati in solis divinis versantur. Primas igitur civilcs dixit, secundas purgatorias ac tcrtias animi iam purgati… . Est autem omnibus his ordinibus hoc commune, ut virtute duce cuncta ad boni rectique normam dirigant” (Dispulationes Camaldulenses, pp. 153- 54). One of Landino's sources for the gradation of virtues is Macrobius, Com. in scmn. Scip. 1.8.5-13; see Murrin, Michael, The Allegorical Epic, p. 221 Google Scholar, n. 67. Macrobius also includes a fourth gradation, which exists in the mind of God itself and from which all the others descend in order (1.8.10). Since this kind of virtue is restricted to the mind of God, there is little reason for Landino to refer to it in his application of Macrobius’ schema to Aeneas'journey. In “An Inaugural Oration,” p. 239, n. 1, Field notes that Landino's discussion of the gradations of virtue also parallels that of Porphyry's De occasionibus sive causis ad intelligibilia nos ducentibus, which is taken from Plotinus, Erin. 1,2 (“De virtutibus“), and that Landino used this doctrine of the virtues in his 1462-63 commentary. Although Landino often echoed Ficino, we should note that Ficino's work on Porphyry and Plotinus is later than the Disputationes; see Kristeller, SupplementumFicinianum, I, CXXVI-CXXVIII, CXXXV, CLVII-CLIX.

37 “Et per questo tutto allegoricamente dimostra [Virgilio] die giunto Enea in Italia cio e alia contemplatione prima investiga la natura di vitii, di poi si purga da quelli, et purgato puo contemplare le cose dove consiste la beatitudine” (fol. 16^v).

38 For an opposing view of the relative importance of the active and contemplative lives in Landino's thought, see Field, “The Beginning of the Philosophical Renaissance,” pp. 207, 234-36.

39 The clearest explanation of this point may be found in the Commentary to Dante's Commedia, fol. 6. As we shall see, these moral underpinnings play a crucial role in the Disputationes as well.

40 In order to avoid overburdening the notes, references to Landino's Disputationes Camaldulenses will be included in the text from this point on.

41 Petrarch, Sen. 4.4 and Secretum, pp. 180-82; Salutati, De laboribus Herculis, ed. B. L. Ullman (Zurich, 1951), 1,252; and Boccaccio, Genealogie, 1,304.

42 Petrarch, , Rerum memorandarum libri, ed. Billanovich, Giuseppe, Edizione nazionalc delle opere di Francesco Petrarca, vol. 5, pt. Ia (Florence, 1943), p. 141 Google Scholar; De sui ipsius et multorum ignorantia, in Opere latine, ed. Antonietta Bufano, 11,1112-14; and Invective contra medicum, 11,952. See also the Genealogie, 1,149.

43 Silvestris, Bernardus, Commentary, pp. 9–10 Google Scholar, and Ficino, Marsilio, Commentaire sur le banquet de Platon, ed. Marcel, R. (Paris, 1956), pp. 153-55Google Scholar. Ficino's Symposium commentary was completed in 1469, although a number of minor additions were made later; see the introduction to Marcel's edition, pp. 11-41; James A. Devereux, S.J., , “The Textual History of Ficino's De amore,” RQ, 28 (1975), 173-74Google Scholar; and Kristeller, , Supplementum Ficinianum, I, CXXIII–CXV Google Scholar. As Gentile, S. notes (“Per la storia del testo del ‘Commentarium in Convivium’ di Marsilio Ficino,” Rinascimento, 21 (1981), 17)Google Scholar, Landino cites Ficino's commentary on Plato's Symposium in Book IV of the Disputationes (p. 214). The doctrine of the two Venuses was popular among the Florentine Neoplatonists; see Wind, Edgar, Pagan Mysteries in the Renaissance (New Haven, 1958), pp. 100-28Google Scholar.

44 “Non illud [vitium| tamen, quo inde rapimus, unde minime convenit,—id enim nobis Thracia designavit—vcrum aliud, quod tunc patratur, cum ex iis, quae iam peperimus, minime illis subvenimus, quibus ius naturaque ac humanae societatis vinculum subveniendum postulat.“

45 On Scylla, see Boccaccio, Genealogie, 11,494; on Polyphemus, ibid., II, 501 ( Fulgentius, cf., Expositio Virgilianae continentiae, pp. 93–94)Google Scholar; on Palinurus, see Salutati, , Epistolario, II, 230-31Google Scholar; on the “know thyself oracle, see Macrobius, Com. in somn. Scip. 1.9.3; o n the Thracian episode, see Boccaccio, Il comento, 1,182.

46 Fulgentius, , Mythologiarum libri III (Basel, 1570)Google Scholar, fol. 124; Silvestris, Bernardus, Commentary, pp. 74–75 Google Scholar; Boccaccio, Genealogie, 0,529-30; Salutati, De laboribus Herculis, 1,237-38; Poggio, De avaritia, pp. 254-56. Poggio's treatise appears in two manuscripts exhibited at the Laurentian library from October 1980 to January 1981 and described in the catalogue to that exhibition, Poggio Bracciolini nel VI centenario delta nascita: codici e document! fiorentini, ed. Fubini, Riccardo and Caroti, Stefano (Florence, 1980)Google Scholar. Item 29 includes the De avaritia in a series of texts typical of ecclesiastical moralizing, a series that was formed by Giovanni Dominici, generally no friend to humanism. Item 30 includes the same treatise among a collection of Bruni's works (p. 11). Item 29 is especially interesting because it suggests that the humanistic moral commentary to Virgil may have been reaching even those who did not share Landino's humanist inclinations.

47 “Huiuscemodi igitur portum subeunt, qui suprema diu sectati ac postremo ditficultate deterriti se in vitam socialem conferunt, in qua civilibus virtutibus exculti cum versentur laudem non mcdiocrem reportant. Longc tamen ab ea divinitate, quam quaerimus, absunt.“

48 Fulgentius, , Mythologiae, fol. 129 Google Scholar; Boccaccio, Genealogie, 11,438.

49 “ Propterea fingitur Aeneas ob Junonem perturbationc vexatus, id est, ob studium imperandi, eademque ratione agitatur Ulixes” (The ‘Philebus’ Commentary, ed. Allen, M. J. B., p. 10)Google Scholar. In another consideration of the goddesses Minerva, Juno, and Venus and what they stand for, Ficino gives a more precise definition of juno's realm: “Under the title of'political power,’ we consider to be included authority in government, civic and military alike, the abundance of wealth and the distinction of glory, and the talent associated with business” (“Sub appellatione potentiae authoritatem in gubernatione civili pariter atque militari, divitiarumque affluentiam et splendorem gloriae, negotiosamque virtutem comprehendi putamus“; Epistulae, in Opera omnia, ed. Sancipriano, M. [Basel, 1576 Google Scholar; rpt. Turin, 1959], vol. II, fol. 919).

50 Petrarch, , De remediis utriusque fortunae (Cremona, 1492)Google Scholar, sig. ilr (cf. Liber sine nomine, in Petrarcas ‘Buck ohne Namen’ und die päpstliche Kurie, ed. Paul Piur [Halle/ Saale, 1925], p. 185); Filelfo, De morali disciplina, fol. 41; Vegio, , De educatione, pp. 87–88 Google Scholar; Boccaccio, Genealogie, 11,722-23 (cf. Petrarch, Sen. 4.4); and Salutati, Epistolario, 111,233, 235-

51 “Quae cum dicit Maro, divina paenc sapientia vitam socialem depingit. In qua cum ita quidem excelso animo versentur, ut humana contemnentes ex hoc primo virtutum generc paulo post in cas venturi sint, quas purgatorias appellant, atque inde ad illas tandem, quae sunt animi purgati, pervenire contendant, tamen illecebris rerum terrcnarum ita molliuntur, ut caelestium, quas sibi solas proposuerant, paene obliviscantur. Libido enim imperandi Aencam Didoni coniungere, id autem est virum excellentcm regno praeficere cupit.“

52 “Nam praecipitatio ilia animorum a supremo caelo in haec corpora ad inferos descensus esse a Platone creditur. Christiani vcro scelestorum animas e suis corporibus ad inferos trahi admonent. Dicimus itidem viventes homines, cum in vitia labuntur, ad inferos ruere. Sunt quoque qui credant magicis artibus et carminibus fieri veluti descensus quidam, ut inde evocari animae possint. Verum praeter hos quattuor descensus quintus qui est non videtur omittendus: nam et ad inferos tendimus, cum lumen rationis nostrae ac industnam in mali ac omnium vitiorum naturam speculandam deicimus.“

53 On the Sibyl, see Bernardus Silvestris, Commentary, p. 31. On the golden bough, see Fulgentius, , Expositio Virgilianae continentiae, p. 96 Google Scholar; Silvestris, Bernardus, Commentary, p. 58 Google Scholar; and Salutati, De laboribus Herculis, I, 11 and II, 573-77. Misenus is interpreted as temporal glory in Fulgentius, Expositio Virgilianae continentiae, pp. 95-96, and Bernardus Silvestris, Commentary, p. 60. Charon as free will is presented in great detail in both Salutati's De laboribus Herculis, 11,556-57, 563-69, and in the Disputationes, so that Charon is old because nothing is older than the spirit endowed with free choice; his two eyes show that the will is free to incline toward either reason or passion; his garment is filthy because it stands for the body, which clothes the soul, and so forth. Cerberus’ barking is allegorized in the De laboribus Herculis, 11,539-40. Representative treatments of the Great Sinners may be found in Fulgentius, Expositio Virgilianae continentiae, pp. 99-101; Macrobius, Com. insomn. Scip. 1.10.12-15; Silvestris, Bernardus, Commentary, pp. 108-12Google Scholar; and Boccaccio, Genealogie, 1,44-46, 154-57, 262, and 11,467— 68, 667 and Il comento, 1,94-96. On Virgil's Elysian Fields, see Boccaccio, Genealogie, 1.78-79, and Salutati, De laboribus Herculis, 11,443, 533—34, and De seculo etreligione, ed. Ullman, B. L. (Florence, 1957), p. 74 Google Scholar.

54 Bernardus Silvestris, Commentary, p. 30 presents four of the five descensus ad inferos, with the descent by magic omitted; Salutati's discussion may be found in De laboribus Herculis, pp. 600-01.

55 “Heroicae enim virtutes opus sunt si quis hanc speculandi difficultatem tolerare vult,” fol. 219^V.