Vincenzo Colli

He was initially secretary to Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, whom he celebrated in his Triumphi. He later served as commissioner for Cesare Borgia and was also a favored poet of Elisabetta Gonzaga, Duchess of Urbino, to whom he dedicated the now-lost Nove libri della volgar poesia. However, he suffered persecution from her brother, Francesco II Gonzaga, Marquess of Mantua, who bore him a fierce hatred.

• Name — Vincenzo Colli • Born — c. 1460–1465 • Birthplace — Chios, Genoese jurisdiction • Died — August 1508 • Place of death — Rome, Papal States • Occupation — Poet, literary critic • Era — Renaissance • Notable Works — Triumphi

Vincenzo's life remains largely obscure, and it is possible to reconstruct it only through brief allusions and what he relates about himself in his surviving works and letters.

The copyist of a manuscript containing some of his works provides some biographical details, based on what Vincenzo himself had written in his lost work Amorosa Peregrinazione: his ancestors were Insubri and he belonged to a noble family from Vigevano. His father was a great traveler and, having arrived in Chios, then under Genoese jurisdiction, he was entrusted with the administration of justice there. He married a noblewoman from the island, with whom he had Vincenzo and, it seems, another son. At the age of two, the child was taken by his parents to Castel Nuovo Scrivia, where he completed his early studies. Vincenzo declares in his prose written after 1500 that he is forty years old, so his date of birth is fixed around 1460 or shortly after. The prose cannot be dated before 1500, as they contain numerous references to the fall of Ludovico il Moro and to his service with Cesare Borgia, which Vincenzo speaks of as events now past. In the two-year period 1490–1491, he was in Rome, where he studied at the Academy of Paolo Cortese and became friends with the wandering poet Serafino Aquilano. It is presumed that it was during these years that he adopted the nickname Calmeta, influenced by the homonymous character in Boccaccio's Filocolo.

• Illustration — The court of Ludovico il Moro by Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale. On the left is Duchess Beatrice d'Este, to whom a courtier, perhaps her secretary, whispers something. After completing his studies, and still being young, he went to Milan at an unspecified date, but certainly before 1494, to the court of Ludovico il Moro, where he became secretary to Duchess Beatrice d'Este. It should be noted, however, that it is Vincenzo himself who uses this term in his works, while there is no concrete evidence of his actual activities during his stay in Milan, as if he had never been there. It also appears that in honour of the duchess he composed a series of poems that have not survived, but he certainly became part of the renowned circle of poets gathered around her, which he himself described with these words:Vincenzo Calmeta, Vita di Serafino Aquilano

He was sincerely devoted to his lady, if not directly in love with her, as evidenced by various clues, and especially by the incredible grief expressed later in his most famous work, the Triumphi. This is a poem in five cantos inspired by Petrarch and Dante, which Vincenzo composed to give vent to the grief caused by her premature death at the beginning of 1497. The poem is steeped in strongly amorous language, and only two characters appear: Beatrice, in the role of the angelic woman, and Vincenzo, who takes the place of Dante and Petrarch as the lost poet in need of guidance and comfort from his lady. The central theme of the work is thus love for the woman who, following the tradition of the Dolce Stil Novo, leads the poet to salvation. In this case too, according to Rossella Guberti's interpretation, it is a purely spiritual love, not a physical one, according to a philosophical-religious vision: Beatrice is a guide for the poet's lost senses. According to Claudia Berra, Vincenzo's feeling always remains more on the path of devotion than of true love. Passionate love would be absent, "replaced by the secretary's veneration for his lady". On the other hand, some verses of an epicedium by the humanist Pier Francesco Giustolo, perhaps composed in 1501 and dedicated to Vincenzo Calmeta, seem to lead to a different interpretation, as well as demonstrate the central role Beatrice had in the life and poetry of her secretary: It is the lament for a young poet recently deceased, who was a pupil of Vincenzo. The scene takes place in the otherworldly wood, where the boy delights the souls of the dead with the songs Vincenzo taught him, and where Beatrice appears unexpectedly, who can be none other than the Duchess Beatrice d'Este herself, already dead for years. From this, it is understood that Vincenzo had continued to write poems in her memory, which he taught to his pupil. Recognizing them, Beatrice takes the deceased boy by the hand and asks him about Vincenzo's well-being, saying she forgives him for his "curis secundis", plausibly translatable as "subsequent loves", entertained after the duchess's death. Subsequently, in a later edition of the epicedium, Vincenzo's name was removed, while Beatrice's underwent various substitutions: first, an attempt was made to transform it into that of an anonymous Lycore; after this attempt failed, the name Beatrix was changed to Hermosine, a mysterious woman loved by Angelo Colocci. It was a veritable "literary theft" perpetrated by Colocci against Calmeta, substituting his own name as the fictitious dedicatee in Giustolo's epicedium, probably after his death in 1508. This was the version that went to print. It was presumably composed by Giustolo in Fano in 1501 and sent to Naples to Calmeta, who was then in the service of the Valentino. The true names of the protagonists were only rediscovered in the second half of the 20th century by Augusto Campana. Several sonnets attributed, with greater or lesser certainty, to Calmeta have been found in various manuscripts, dated approximately to the last years of the 15th century, and others to the early years of the following century. The love sonnets all speak of an unhappy love, unrequited and unattainable. For example, sonnet VII contained in manuscript Par. It. 1543, where he laments not being able to vent "el martir mio tanto atroce" (my so atrocious martyrdom) by revealing his desire to everyone, as it would be a serious threat to the honour of the dedicatee (kept anonymous), the reason why he chose to suffer and keep his love silent: "cussì l'un via a me, l'altra ad te noce, unde pel meglio mi consumo e taccio, e cerco cun mio damno conservarte, perché in te sta de me la meglior parte". Another speaks of the beauty and cruelty of the beloved, who does not reciprocate him. In a metrical epistle (also of uncertain attribution), he speaks instead of a love finally reciprocated: a "licito amor" (lawful love) of which "l'oneste accoglienze siano il frutto" (honest welcomes be the fruit), but specifies that it is a woman of low social standing, whom he indeed cannot marry. As for the Triumphi, they begin with the poet (Vincenzo) lamenting the premature death of "his dear companion", Duchess Beatrice, and even expressing himself with these poignant words: Triumphi (I, 10–24) He does nothing but rail against cruel Fate and weave praises for the deceased, who is the "bright light to my dark intellect" and the "true phoenix of my ardent heart", and even invokes Death to make him die as soon as possible and grant him rest beside her "chaste bones": Triumphi (I, 43–60) • Illustration — Cenotaph of Ludovico il Moro and Beatrice d'Este, old print. He then moves on to a deeper meditation on human misery, on Fortune and God: Triumphi (II, 121–138) In the midst of this, Beatrice herself intervenes, appearing to console him and draw him out of his "past error": The poet, moved and bewildered, then addresses her with this invocation:

According to Vincenzo himself, the poem was composed not in Milan but in Rome; thus he writes at the end of the preface: "therefore I, who had placed all my hope in her and dedicated my service to her until death, and finding myself in Rome for certain of my affairs and unaware of such an event, after her sudden and untimely death was announced to me, I began to deplore it so bitterly." It is not at all clear when exactly he went to Rome or why, a reason he deliberately omits to explain. Simone Albonico, however, expresses surprise that Vincenzo had left the court at such a delicate moment in his lady's life as her third pregnancy, whose tragic outcome indeed caused her death.

Perhaps he had already met Duke Cesare Borgia at that time, but he did not immediately enter his service. It is assumed there was a temporary return to Milan because he himself, in his "Vita di Serafino Aquilano", taking further occasion to remember his duchess, wrote that due to her death, "everything went to ruin and precipice, and the court turned from a happy Paradise into a dark Hell, so that every virtuous person was forced to take another path, and I among others, seeing such high hope interrupted, and having also other new opportunities, I returned to Rome." • Illustration — Certosa di Pavia: the tombstone of Beatrice d'Este in a woodcut by Giuseppe Barberis. He is recorded in Mantua with the Gonzaga from May to September 1498. Around that time, he left for France in the retinue of Cesare Borgia as his secretary and returned to Italy with the French troops between August and September 1499. However, Borgia's political projects were distasteful to him, which explains his intervention with Louis XII in favour of Caterina Sforza. Vincenzo showed sincere concern for the woman's fate and wrote to her with advice on how to prevent the papal plan, also promising to come to her aid. He nonetheless followed Cesare in his expedition to Forlì and then to Rome. Here he was a witness to the first attempted assassination of Alfonso of Bisceglie, which he reported to Duchess Elisabetta Gonzaga. There is no further news of him until 1502, but it is presumed that he continued to follow Borgia in all his travels, thus in Romagna and Naples. He was certainly in Imola in October–December 1502. He probably also witnessed the dramatic massacre of Senigallia. In January 1503, Borgia sent him as commissioner to Fermo, but he held this post for only a few months, as he was replaced by Giacomo Nardino in May. Vincenzo must have seized the opportunity to separate himself from Borgia's service, whose star was now in decline, and whose favour he no longer enjoyed as before. Already in September 1503, he is found in the service of Ercole Pio Carpi, in Ferrara, where he met Pietro Bembo.

• Illustration — Raphael, Portrait of Elisabetta Gonzaga, 1504. At the beginning of 1504, he settled at the court of Urbino, where he remained, it seems, almost until his death. In March 1507, he appears in the company of the gentlemen of the prefect of Rome, Francesco Maria della Rovere. Despite continuing his correspondence with Isabella d'Este, to whom he sent an epistle on vernacular elegies in 1504, he was never able to return to Mantua due to the fierce hatred borne by the Marquess Francesco II Gonzaga, for reasons unknown. The latter begged his sister Elisabetta not to mention Vincenzo to him even by mistake, saying: "I could not feel nor receive greater displeasure than seeing myself asked by Your Lordship in favour of Vincentio Calmetta, whom I cannot hear named without great distress and much annoyance, for reasons I do not wish to love him [...] and be certain that to your first [letter] I did not respond solely because of the hatred I bear that Vincentio." He schemed to make him lose the favour of his brother, Cardinal Sigismondo Gonzaga, who, although wishing to keep him in his service, was forced to renounce it. To him, Francesco wrote, as he had for his sister, a harsh reproach: "Concerning Calmetta, I cannot but feel somewhat resentful, that a person so hated by us as Calmetta is, should be caressed and well-regarded by those who should love me and hate those I hate, and not hold them in such high account." According to Alessandro Luzio, already before 1502 Vincenzo was parading the favour granted to him by Isabella d'Este, Francesco's wife. According to Stephen Kolsky, the marquess's hatred did not stem from jealousy but, on the contrary, from a defence of his wife and sister, who would have been slandered by Vincenzo: following the Ferrara celebrations for the wedding of Lucrezia Borgia to Alfonso d'Este, a letter was circulated, originating from the Roman Academy and addressed precisely to the two women, in which the Marchioness Isabella was described as greedy, slovenly, and though no longer young, dressed in a way to appear a young girl. It was said that the author was Vincenzo himself, but he had repeatedly declared that it was not his custom to "lacerare" (slander) others, and Mario Equicola himself considered Mario Bonaventura as the author, who would have wanted to frame Vincenzo. Moreover, it would be inexplicable how, despite her brother's hatred, Elisabetta Gonzaga always reserved her most sincere and passionate friendship for Vincenzo, nor how Isabella was on excellent terms with Calmeta as late as 1504. This preference would have even caused Elisabetta a quarrel with Francesco, who denied her his hospitality. According to Cecil Grayson, however, the marquess became angry not because of the alleged offences to his wife, but because of those directed at his mistress Teodora Suardi, perhaps also by highlighting the contrast between the first and the second. Certainly, from this, one can understand "how much interest Elisabetta must have had in him", if for his sake she even risked coming into conflict with her beloved brother, as indeed happened. In fact, "the relationship between Calmeta and Elisabetta lasted unchanged for several years", until his death. Pietro Bembo, who at the time held Vincenzo in high esteem (having been praised by him in some of his works), wrote from Urbino to his brother Bartolomeo in January 1507 that Vincenzo was going to Venice to print some of his works and therefore recommended honouring him suitably by hosting him in their house, specifying that "he [Vincenzo] has been here for some time with Mad. Duchessa [Elisabetta], and has received much honour from her." In a scene narrated in Baldassarre Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier (set in 1507 but written several years later), "the irreproachable Elisabetta, who chose to be a widow in life to the impotent Guidobaldo", appears in public with an S letter on her forehead, the meaning of which her courtiers question: "perhaps she hides in the emblem that adorns her forehead a secret desire regarding the long-awaited, impossible motherhood. Or perhaps a secret bond of love." In the work, it is said that Unico Aretino responds to the challenge with the impromptu composition of a sonnet, Per segno del mio amor nel fronte porto, which indicates the mainly amorous meaning of that S on the forehead, which then varies according to different situations. In fact, this sonnet, attributed by Castiglione to Aretino, was already printed in 1502 under the name of Vincenzo Calmeta. "A striking feature of his life was the great favour he enjoyed with the leading women of the time: Beatrice, Elisabetta, and along with them also the sister of one and sister-in-law of the other, Isabella Gonzaga; noble countenances, among which it produces a singular effect to see the grim face of Cesare Borgia protrude."

During this period, Vincenzo intensively devoted himself to deepening his studies on the courtly language, elaborating his theory and proving himself, in the now-lost Nove libri della volgare poesia, in the "Annotazioni e iudìci", and in the well-known "Vita di Serafino Aquilano" published in Bologna in 1504, to be one of the most valid critics of the time. These books caused him the aversion and enmity of Pietro Bembo, with whom he was initially on good terms, and who disparaged him in his Prose della volgar lingua. "Probably Bembo, who made no secret of his intentions to deal organically with the vernacular language, must have felt a piqued spite in knowing that Calmeta was treading the same path that he alone and first wanted to tread." It seems that Bembo accused Vincenzo of having taken advantage of his good faith to steal the idea, and perhaps also part of the content, of his Prose, although it is impossible to say to what extent the accusation was founded. Lodovico Castelvetro, who knew Vincenzo well because he had read his works, stated that Pietro Bembo in the Prose had put in Vincenzo's mouth an opinion on the vernacular language different from that which he had expressed in his books on vernacular poetry, that is, that Bembo had committed a falsification to his detriment, although here too it is impossible to judge the validity of the accusation. Vincenzo finally died in Rome in August 1508.

Nothing is known of Vincenzo's physical appearance. Francesco Oriolo calls him "cruccioso in vista", that is, sullen-looking. His irascible temperament, arrogant in some respects, is also confirmed within the Prose della volgar lingua by Pietro Bembo, his enemy: here Vincenzo is described as, following a lively literary discussion, "all sullen and hot [angry]" separating from the company. In a composition bearing his name, but of uncertain attribution, he describes himself as an army captain, who, for love, does not dedicate himself to dances and games but to jousts and tournaments, and who even in battle draws courage from the thought of his beloved woman. He was certainly a restless soul, whose constant melancholy is much reflected in his poems. Vincenzo himself declared his intention to remain faithful to virtue at all costs, but his spirit sometimes inclined towards pride. In Baldassarre Castiglione's work, The Book of the Courtier, at the declaration of Federico Fregoso that the best way to obtain favours is to deserve them, Vincenzo objects that experience teaches the opposite, that is, only the presumptuous are favoured by princes, not the modest, and cites the Spanish and French as examples. By presumption, however, he means boldness, that is, the daring to ask for favours from princes and to make oneself noticed, without waiting to be spontaneously favoured by them by virtue of one's own good merits, which in his opinion happens very rarely. In his prose, he indeed professes modesty when he asks the reader whether he is not perhaps right to be indignant at certain rude courtiers or "vain women, or other rash ignoramuses, who, for knowing how to match two endings, or a strambotto on the lute", believe themselves equal to Dante and Petrarch, while he, "poor man of forty years of age, who has spent all my time in this profession, does not yet think he has reached the thousandth part of what I know", that is, the excellence of the great Italian luminaries, such as Dante and Petrarch. "And if these people say to me that I am presumptuous, I will answer that they are much more presumptuous, who dare to judge me, who have undertaken to weigh the whole world."

Calmeta went down in history as "a courtier dear to women, superficial and charlatanesque: an occasional rhymer, who could then enjoy a certain fame, but for whom, after that age, almost no words of contempt were enough." Pretentious little poet was how the historian Alessandro Luzio scornfully defined him. In truth, he reveals a profound soul, an inquiring eye into society and the crisis of his time: "all his criticism [...] focuses on the revelation of the vices, exaggerations, frivolities, weaknesses of his time, of the living. [...] he judges and sends off some of the most conspicuous figures of his era without regard for persons or the simulated reserves of courtly society." On the other hand, in contemporary criticism, Vincenzo's verses were generally highly esteemed and he was considered an excellent poet: Cassio da Narni says "crowned here too was Calmetta | and his sweet style delighted all". Galeotto del Carretto calls him "Calmeta the distinguished, among all the good laureate poets"; Burchiello calls him "eloquent Calmetta" and "Calmetta with his ready rhymes". Giovanni Filoteo Achillini names him, in some verses, "[...] the excellent Calmeta, who greatly disturbs the misguided Filefo". Gaspare Visconti regretted with a friend not having received Vincenzo's poems, as he had hoped, telling him: "I am more grieved for having been deprived of that sweetness which is always tasted in his most delicate style." Among the detractors, Lelio Manfredi calls him an enemy of Burchiello and "full of smoke and pomp" ("nor could this windbag be better defined," the editor Francesco Flamini disdainfully comments), and perhaps a verse by Pistoia, which reads: "Vincenzo has a style appreciated only by himself," refers to him, while the poet Filippo Oriolo left us this memory: His writings, as Cecil Grayson wrote, "reveal a robust and vigorous personality, concerned [...] with many aspects of his age, beyond that of courtly literature". His person gave rise to a verb, coined by Pietro Bembo: calmeteggiare, meaning "to exalt oneself", or otherwise "to play the charlatan, especially in matters of language".

• Compendio dell'Ars Amandi: vernacular translation in terza rima of Ovid's work, composed between 1494 and 1497, almost reluctantly, at the request of Ludovico il Moro. In it, Vincenzo seems to want to emulate Dante in the Vita Nuova when he announces the intention to compose the Divine Comedy for his beloved, as he writes: "Elsewhere I hope to show my intellect, raising to flight an immortal phoenix that will be a high subject for my low style." This is certainly Duchess Beatrice. • Triumphi: a poem in memory of Beatrice d'Este; • Vita di Serafino Aquilano, composed in 1504: a short biographical writing in memory of his dear friend and fellow poet Serafino Aquilano, in which he once again takes the opportunity to recall lost time and praise the late Duchess Beatrice, as well as the late King Ferrandino and Elisabetta Gonzaga; • Annotazioni e iudìci; • S'egli è lecito giudicare i vivi o no: defence of the poet against those who accuse him of judging the living with presumption. "And if these people say to me that I am presumptuous, I will answer that they are much more presumptuous, who dare to judge me, who have undertaken to weigh the whole world." • S'egli è possibile essere buon poeta volgare senza aver lettere latine: poetry is an innate gift, infused by "divine fury", which therefore does not depend on man's intellect, but which must nevertheless be aided by study and letters. "I do not deny that the poet must first have the vein from his mother's womb [...] but I say, if he is not aided by accident, he will be like a robe of richest brocade made by an inept tailor, in which the artifice will be more blamed than the material praised." Therefore, anyone who wants to be an elegant poet must not be completely ignorant of Latin. "And so you others who have elevated intellects, and who desire to produce some fruit in the poetic faculty, be willing to sweat over learning, fleeing the bestial persuasion of some ignoramuses, who, for knowing how to match four rhymes together, dressed in a bestial smoke, having recited their trifles to some barbarian or woman, would not exchange their ignorance for Petrarch's excellence." • Dell'antichità del buccolico verso e che circonstanze all'egloga si convengono; • La poesia del Tebaldeo: judgment on the poetics of Antonio Tebaldeo; • Qual stile tra' volgari poeti sia da imitare; • Cecilia Gallerani e Giulia Farnese: biography, comparison, and judgment (favourable to both) on the two famous mistresses of Ludovico il Moro and Rodrigo Borgia, among the most beautiful women in Italy. • Per molti essempi che cosa sia servare il decoro; • Della ostentazione; • Littera di Vincenzo Calmeta scritta all'Illustrissima Madama Marchesa nostra: epistle on chapters, epistles, and elegies addressed to Isabella d'Este;

• Nove libri della volgare poesia: dedicated to Elisabetta Gonzaga, they were the exposition of his theory on language; • Amoroso Pellegrinaggio: a prosimetrum in three books, never finished; • The epitome della inclinazione dello Imperio infino al tempo di Sisto IIII sopra la varietà d'Italia, dove poi incomincia istoria della varietà della fortuna de' tempo suoi in XII libri distinta: a historical work in twelve books covering the years from 1453, the conquest of Constantinople, to 1502, with the descent of Louis XII into Italy, narrating all the main events and their protagonists. The twelfth book constituted a sort of survey of the most famous women of Italy, including Bona of Savoy, Eleonora d'Aragona, Isabella d'Aragona, Beatrice d'Este, Isabella d'Este, Elisabetta Gonzaga, Lucrezia Borgia, Caterina Sforza, Sancia of Aragon, and many others. An irreparable loss for our knowledge of the historical period. • A comedy composed in Urbino in 1504, on an unknown theme. • A commentary on Petrarch's canzone "Mai non vo' più cantar". • Modo di aver cognizione quali arme dimostrino antica nobiltà e quali no. • Come nel crescer gli anni e nelle mutazioni dell'età degli uomini si mutano gli stili. • Epistola delle perturbazioni d'Italia.