Chapter III: Dante’s Latin Works

1. _The “De Vulgari Eloquentia”_

In the first treatise of the _Convivio_ (i. 5), Dante announces his intention of making a book upon _Volgare Eloquenza_, artistic utterance in the vernacular. Like the _Convivio_, the _De Vulgari Eloquentia_ remains incomplete; only two books, instead of four, were written, and of these the second is not finished. In the first book the poet seeks the highest form of the vernacular, a perfect and imperial Italian language, to rule in unity and concord over all the dialects, as the Roman Empire over all the nations; in the second book he was proceeding to show how this illustrious vulgar tongue should be used for the art of poetry. Villani’s description of the work applies only to the first book: “Here, in strong and ornate Latin, and with fair reasons, he reproves all the dialects of Italy”; Boccaccio’s mainly to the second: “A little book in Latin prose, in which he intended to give instruction, to whoso would receive it, concerning composition in rhyme.”[19]