Life and Times of Dante Alighieri
Historical Context of the Divine Comedy
In order to understand Dante's masterpiece, we need to understand the context in which it was written, amongst the tumultuous politics of 14th century Florence.
The Divine Comedy is generally considered the greatest work in the Italian language and a masterpiece of world literature. Despite its timeless appeal and otherworldly themes, the Comedy is very much a commentary on the particular political situation within Florence, Italy, and Europe as a whole.
Life in Florence
At the time of Dante's birth in 1265, Florence was a powerful, self-governing city-state at the height of an economic and demographic boom that was to increase the population to 100 000, a megacity by contemporary standards. Under the influence of increased trade, wealth and immigration came a variety of social ills that transformed the previous "golden age" of sobriety, peace, and justice into a period of political turmoil.
Between 1250 and 1293 Florence was plagued with factional struggles for power, which led to successive reforms in the constitution, whereby older "noble" families were excluded by government. Political participation became limited to those created and administered wealth-- the members of the major guilds, chief among them the merchants who had control of the wool trade
Guelphs and Ghibellines
Although he was born into the minor nobility, Dante joined the guild of physicians and apothecaries in 1295, serving as one of the six Priors of the city for two months in 1300. Eighteen months later, following a political coup, Dante was banished on pain of death.
Between 1308 and 1313, Dante's hopes of returning to Florence were strengthened with the election of the Count of Luxembourg as the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VII. Although his family had loyalties to the Guelph party, with its traditional Florentine support of the Papacy, Dante aligned himself with the opposing imperial party, the Ghibellines, who supported rule by the Holy Roman Emperor. Dante wrote open letters urging the Cardinals and Florentines to accept Henry, but his hopes were quashed by military defeats and Henry's death in 1313.
For the last twenty years of his life, Dante remained in exile in various courts throughout Italy. He finally settled in Ravenna from about 1318 until his death in September 1321, at the age of 56.
Politics in The Divine Comedy
Although in exile, Dante could not escape Florence in his memory and imagination. The Divine Comedy was written shortly before his death, then entitled "The Comedy of Dante Alighieri from Florence." Despite being a philosophical and religious journey through the circles of Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, the poem is also very much concerned with its own earthly time period.
Amongst the vignettes of life in the late medieval Italian city state is commentary on the state of Florentine and European politics. Dante criticizes European rulers, including Henry II in England and Ottocar IV in Bohemia, and celebrates the "Nine Worthies" of the past, including Judas Maccabeus and Charlemagne. Dante also condemns the Popes of his day for their participation in politics and assumption of supreme temporal power in Europe.
Such criticism reflects Dante's vision and belief that Rome was meant to be the seat of God's "Vicars" on earth. Drawing on Virgil's Aeneid to celebrate the conquests of the Roman people which led to the reign of Augustus, who brought peace to the empire in preparation for the birth of Jesus, Dante argued in his earlier writing, Monarchia (c. 1313-1318), that God intended there to be one supreme ruler, a "mon-arch," being the Emperor, and not the Pope.
1. Bradbury, Malcolm (General Editor). The Atlas of Literature. London: Prospero Books, 2001.
