Aristotelismus und Petrarkismus in der Accademia Fiorentina des Cinquecento: Das Beispiel von G.B. Gellis Interpretation zu Petrarca, Canzoniere No. 78

This article analyses the specific interrelation between Aristotelianism and Petrarchism in literary exegesis as it was pursued by the Accademia Fiorentina in the sixteenth century. It exemplarily concentrates on G.B. Gelli’s public interpretation of Petrarch’s sonnet Quando giunse a Simon l’alto concetto (Rerum vulgarium fragmenta no. 78), a text written, according to Gelli, on a philosophical basis which is to be considered as strictly Aristotelian. Gelli’s philosophical exegesis is much more sophisticated and ambitious than previous interpretations of this lyrical piece of Petrarch’s. When constructing an Aristotelian horizon of philosophical reference, which serves as lead text to the interpretation proper, Gelli on the whole delineates, despite some didactic simplification, a coherent picture of Aristotelian doctrine regarding the creation of natural and artificial things. As far as Pe­trarch’s sonnet is concerned with the origin of works of art, Gelli’s exegesis manages to stay remarkably close to the literary text. However, when in the last lines of the sonnet the speaker’s strong sexual longing for his beloved Laura breaks through, Gelli is forced to abandon Aristotelianism (which is, in his view, oriented towards an empirical interpretation of reality and a description of human life based on sense perception) in favour of the dogmatic and metaphysical Platonism of Marsilio Ficino’s theory of love. By using Ficinian theorems, Gelli wants to ethically domesticate Petrarch’s text and to avoid the risk of having Petrarch make morally precarious statements. This is consonant with the Medici’s official politics for which norms of social and cultural decorum (as reflected in the Academy’s statutes) had a binding character.