Petrarch and Boccaccio
Pioneiros do Humanismo italiano na Coleção Gulbenkian
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Date
- Closed on Tuesday
Location
Calouste Gulbenkian MuseumPricing
- 10,00 €
Included in the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum admission ticket
In this epistolary quote, Francesco Petrarch expresses to Giovanni Boccaccio his pleasure at receiving in Venice a copy of the Iliad, which the latter sent to him in 1366: ‘…Homer’s arrival brought joy to all the Latins and Greeks in the library…’ (Rerum senilium libri, VI, 2). Eleven years earlier, Boccaccio had given Petrarch a Latin manuscript copy of Saint Augustine’s Expositions on the Psalms, which we can tell from an inscription in the first volume.
These gifts and the exchange of correspondence demonstrate that both Italian writers contributed to the birth of humanist culture in the late Middle Ages, by recovering authors of Greek and Roman Antiquity, as well as the legacy of early Christian tradition, through a (re)reading of the Church Fathers. This Humanism, which fuelled the Renaissance in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, was the starting point for a fresh examination of the relationship between humankind and God, a question that permeated the Modern Era.
In celebration of World Book and Copyright Day on 23 April – as well as marking 720 years since Petrarch’s birth and 650 since his death – the Museum has organised a display around these two writers. It includes the books of their authorship acquired by Calouste Gulbenkian, who was also motivated by the rich bindings and illustrations.
![Bedford Master or assistant, ‘Giovanni Boccaccio presenting his book to Joanna, Queen of Naples’, fol. 5r. Giovanni Boccaccio, ‘Des Cleres et Nobles Femmes’, French translation by Laurent de Premierfait (?). Paris, c. 1410-15. Manuscript on parchment. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-01-7.jpg)
![Francesco d’Antonio del Chierico, ‘Apollo and Daphne’, fol. 11r. Francesco Petrarca , ‘Rerum Vulgarium Fragmenta (RVF), Triumphi’. Florence, c. 1468-70. Manuscript on parchment. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-02-3.jpg)
![Francesco Petrarca, ‘[Opera] Librorum Francisci Petrarche Impressorum Annotatio’. Venetiis [Veneza]: Andree Torresani de Asula per Simonem de Luere, 1501. Parisian morocco binding, c. 1550. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-03-1.jpg)
![Francesco Petrarca, ‘Il Petrarcha con l’espositione di M. Gio. Andrea Gesualdo…’. Venetia: Appresso Alessandro Griffio, 1581. Illustrated with woodcuts. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-04-1.jpg)
![Giovanni Boccaccio, ‘Il Decamerone di M. Giovanni Boccaccio’. Londra [Paris]: [Prault], 1757-1761, tomo II (‘Giornata terza, novella prima’). Illustration designed by Hubert-François Gravelot and etched by Nöel Le Mire. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-05-1.jpg)
![Giovanni Boccaccio, ‘Le Decameron de Jean Boccace’. French translation (1545) by Antoine-Jean Le Maçon. Londres [Paris]: [Prault], 1757-1761, tome II (‘Quatrième journée’). Illustration designed by François Boucher and etched by Jean-Jacques Flipart. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-06-1.jpg)
![Jean de La Fontaine, ‘Contes et nouvelles en vers, par M. de La Fontaine’. À Amsterdam [Paris]: [s.n.], 1762, [2 volumes], tome I. Illustrated with designs by Charles Eisen and Pierre-Philippe Choffard, etched by Choffard and other engravers. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-07-1.jpg)
![Jacques Aliamet, after Jean-Honoré Fragonard. Galant scene published as illustration of the tale ‘A Femme Avare, Galant Escroc’, from ‘Contes et nouvelles en vers’, par Jean de La Fontaine. Paris: De l' Imprimerie de P. Didot l' Aîné, 1795, tome premier. France, 18th century. Etching on paper. Calouste Gulbenkian Museum.](https://cdn.gulbenkian.pt/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2024/06/boccaccio-08-1.jpg)
Presented in two of the Museum’s display cases, this exhibition provides an opportunity to reflect on how the works of Petrarch and Boccaccio were regarded and illustrated during two historical periods: the Renaissance, a time of transition from the illuminated manuscript to the printed book; and the eighteenth-century, marked by imagery of licentiousness and the fête galante.