''Arcadia'' is a pastoral poem written around 1480 by

Jacopo Sannazaro Jacopo Sannazaro (; 28 July 1458 – 6 August 1530) was an Italian poet, humanist and epigrammist from Naples. He wrote easily in Latin, in Italian and in Neapolitan, but is best remembered for his humanist classic '' Arcadia'', a masterwork ...

and published in 1504 in

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

. Sannazaro's ''Arcadia'' influenced the literature of the 16th and 17th centuries (e.g.,

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

Philip Sidney Philip, also Phillip, is a male given name, derived from the Greek language, Greek (''Philippos'', lit. "horse-loving" or "fond of horses"), from a compound of (''philos'', "dear", "loved", "loving") and (''hippos'', "horse"). Prominent Philip ...

Marguerite de Navarre Marguerite de Navarre (french: Marguerite d'Angoulême, ''Marguerite d'Alençon''; 11 April 149221 December 1549), also known as Marguerite of Angoulême and Margaret of Navarre, was a princess of France, Duchess of Alençon and Berry, and Queen ...

Jorge de Montemayor ( es, Jorge de Montemayor) (1520? – 26 February 1561) was a Portuguese novelist and poet, who wrote almost exclusively in Spanish. His most famous work is a pastoral prose romance, the ''Diana'' (1559). Biography He was born at Montemor- ...

, Garcilaso de la Vega and

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

Form

''Arcadia'' by Sannazaro could be considered a

prosimetrum A ''prosimetrum'' (plural ''prosimetra'') is a poetic composition which exploits a combination of prose (''prosa'') and verse (''metrum'');Braund, Susanna. Prosimetrum. In Cancil, Hubert, and Helmuth Schneider, eds. ''Brill's New Pauly''. Brill O ...

– a combination of prose and verse. The alternation of prose and verse is consistent, but each varies considerably. Many portions of the prose are merely descriptive. Others sections, especially in the second half of the poem, are more narrative. Like the prose, the poetry is varied with a number of different poetical forms, including

frottola The frottola (; plural frottole) was the predominant type of Italian popular secular song of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century. It was the most important and widespread predecessor to the madrigal. The peak of activity in composition ...

barzelletta ''Barzelletta'' (''lit.'' "jest") was a popular verse form used by ''frottola'' composers in Italy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. It is generally trochaic, with eight syllables per line. The ''barzelletta'' consists of two sections: a ' ...

madrigal A madrigal is a form of secular vocal music most typical of the Renaissance (15th–16th c.) and early Baroque (1600–1750) periods, although revisited by some later European composers. The polyphonic madrigal is unaccompanied, and the number o ...

, and

canzona The canzona is an Italian musical form derived from the Franco-Flemish and Parisian chansons, and during Giovanni Gabrieli's lifetime was frequently spelled canzona, though both earlier and later the singular was spelled either canzon or canzone ...

. Because of the pastoral subject and the sections in prose, Arcadia could also be considered an example of the Pastoral novel genre. Sannazaro can be considered the founder of this literary genre, another well known example is ''

L'Astrée ''L'Astrée'' is a pastoral novel by Honoré d'Urfé, published between 1607 and 1627. Possibly the single most influential work of 17th-century French literature, ''L'Astrée'' has been called the "novel of novels", partly for its immense leng ...

'' by Honoré d'Urfé.

Publication history

The publication history of ''Arcadia'' has two phases. The first follows the tradition of manuscripts consisting of an introduction ("proemio") and ten units in prose and verse. Initially this literary collection was called ''Aeglogarum liber Arcadium inscriptus'' then Sannazaro decided to change the name to ''Libro pastorale nominato (intitulato) Arcadio''. Some years later Sannazaro modified the whole ''Arcadia'' again. The title became simply ''Arcadia'' and now consisted of a dedication, an introduction, twelve units of prose and verse, and an epilogue (''A la Zampogna'' – To the bagpipes). Three

eclogues The ''Eclogues'' (; ), also called the ''Bucolics'', is the first of the three major works of the Latin poet Virgil. Background Taking as his generic model the Greek bucolic poetry of Theocritus, Virgil created a Roman version partly by offer ...

(I, II and VI) were probably composed before Sannazaro planned to write ''Arcadia''. They were modified and added to the Pastoral Novel. The first version of ''Arcadia'' with introduction and the ten units of prose and verse was completed towards the end of 1484. A flawed version was published in

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...

in 1501 without the approval of the author. The same edition was reprinted by Bernardino da Vercelli in 1502. The second edition was completed by Sannazaro around 1495. This last version was published by

Pietro Summonte Pietro Summonte (1463–1526) was an Italian Renaissance humanist of Naples, a member of the learned circle of friends in the Ciceronian manner that constituted Pontano's Accademia Pontaniana. Summonte's care in preserving his correspondence o ...

, who was a humanist and member of the

Accademia Pontaniana The Accademia Pontaniana was the first academy in the modern sense, as a learned society for scholars and humanists and guided by a formal statute. Patronized by Alfonso V of Aragon, it was founded by the poet Antonio Beccadelli in Naples during ...

, in

in 1504.

Style

The early fame of Arcadia in Italy was due to its linguistic merits. What made this literary work so original was Sannazaro's decision to write in the

Italian language Italian (''italiano'' or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Together with Sardinian, Italian is the least divergent language from Latin. Spoken by about 85 m ...

instead of in a regional dialect or in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

, which was extremely popular in the 15th and 16th centuries. Its style created a completely artificial literary idiom, unspoken by either Florentines or Neapolitans. The language used in ''Arcadia'' seems to blend

Giovanni Boccaccio Giovanni Boccaccio (, , ; 16 June 1313 – 21 December 1375) was an Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and an important Renaissance humanist. Born in the town of Certaldo, he became so well known as a writer that he was somet ...

's prose and

Petrarch Francesco Petrarca (; 20 July 1304 – 18/19 July 1374), commonly anglicized as Petrarch (), was a scholar and poet of early Renaissance Italy, and one of the earliest humanists. Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited w ...

's poetry.

Reception

When ''Arcadia'' was printed in the 16th century, it became a bestseller. In Italy alone more than 66 editions were printed. Inspired in part by classical authors who described the pastoral world (

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: t ...

Theocritus Theocritus (; grc-gre, Θεόκριτος, ''Theokritos''; born c. 300 BC, died after 260 BC) was a Greek poet from Sicily and the creator of Ancient Greek pastoral poetry. Life Little is known of Theocritus beyond what can be inferred from hi ...

Ovid Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...

Tibullus Albius Tibullus ( BC19 BC) was a Latin poet and writer of elegies. His first and second books of poetry are extant; many other texts attributed to him are of questionable origins. Little is known about the life of Tibullus. There are only a fe ...

), and in part by

's ''Ameto'', Sannazaro wrote a literary work that can be considered the first production of the European

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

. Later audiences grew impatient and hostile. Modern readers tend to consider the text confused and frustrating.William J. Kennedy, Jacopo Sannazaro and the uses of Pastoral, p.104 But towards the end of the 17th century, the

Academy An academy ( Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy ...

, founded in Rome, was named after the Pastoral novel.

References

{{reflist

External links

Arcadia Venetia 1524
from Bayerische StaatsBibliothek
Arcadia web
PDF; 350 kB). Laterza, Bari 196
Ekphrasis and the Feminine in Sannazaro's Arcadia
1504 books 15th-century poems Renaissance literature