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Dante. The testimony of the plurality of the Italian territory
In conversation with the scholar and Dante scholar Valentina Petaros Jeromela from Koper, who illustrates the importance of her volume, published by the National League of Trieste on the occasion of the seven hundredth anniversary of the death of the Father of the Italian language
Literature is made up of travel stories, because we do not only travel through space, but also through time: all of man's life can be considered a journey and can be compared to an uninterrupted series of stages and encounters, together with other travel companions.
The Divine Comedy represents not only a literary work but also a journey: spiritual, through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise; but above all geographical, through medieval Italy. It goes from Sicily, to Tuscany, to Romagna: the Dantesque places intertwine with the exile of the Poet, with his nature as an exile par excellence.
Therefore, Dante's journey through the three canticles is the metaphor, the allegory of man's journey through life that has happiness as its purpose and goal. There is no happiness if not in the conquest of the true image of oneself, if not in terms of a personal realization of man of those needs, of those original and ineradicable aspirations by which human nature is marked from its origin.
The Supreme Poet and Istria
But what was Dante's presence in the lands overlooking the Adriatic Sea? What traces did he leave in Istria? The Supreme Poet and his connection with Istria is one of the elements analyzed in the volume "Dante and the legends in Istria - How was the myth of Dante, Poet of the unredeemed lands born?", by Valentina Petaros Jeromela.
The book, published by the National League of Trieste on the seventh centenary of his death, illustrates with a wealth of sources and language the presence or not of “Dante” in the lands of the Adriatic, with a special emphasis on myths and legends. From the cave of Tolmino, to Dante's rock in Duino, to the Codices of Isola: proceeding from legend to historical reality, through a geography of toponyms and bibliographies, of tercets and grammatical analyses.
The author of the volume, born in Koper, graduated (2003) in Modern Literature, Philology major with a focus on Dante, explains to us to what extent the Supreme Poet is present in the Istrian peninsula, but also why it is important to study Dante from an early age and what influence the Father of the Italian language has on our identity.
Bibliographic research
How did the idea for the book «Dante and the Legends in Istria» come about?
“The idea of Dante and the legends is the result of the fact that at every conference or congress I attend, Dante's presence in Istria is glossed over. Duino and Tolmino are always mentioned, but these passages are often not explored in depth. Over the years, I have collected a considerable amount of information. The bibliography is, however, quite substantial; I tried to recover all the writings that tell and bear witness to a legend of Dante. Then I organized them and published them, as part of the 130th anniversary of the National League of Trieste, thanks to this association”.
What research did you do to write this work?
“I must point out that I have not done any archival research. To follow Dante you have to do some bibliographical research and review some sources. It involves analyzing published texts. As for archival materials, there are the 'Codici isolani', which is a work I did previously. I made the connection of the Ughi and the Besenghi of Isola d'Istria and probably thanks to them, who brought two copies of the Divine Comedy to Isola from Florence, the two Codices with the commentary by Benvenuto da Imola were born”.
What was the "Dantesque" presence in the Adriatic lands?
“The translations of Dante into the Croatian language are much older than the Slovenian ones, which are very recent. The translations of the Divine Comedy into Slovenian have determined the presence of Dante in our territory because through this challenge of translation languages expand and improve. In order to perceive and accept the meaning and significance of the Divine Comedy, one must have a well-developed cultural substratum. Thus, the Slovenian language has also found its own form that is a little more autonomous than German and Croatian.”
«A matter of feeling»
Dante and Istria. What links the Supreme to this ancient land?
“Dante is linked to Istria because of the legends that brought him to our territory, leaving room for imagination, truth and myth. They are all connected. Having Dante as a reference in literature means aspiring to the maximum because after 700 years we are still studying him. It is therefore something truly enormous that cannot be absorbed completely. If a language wants to welcome him, if a people takes him as a reference, it is not a political thing, but a matter of feeling”.
Myths and legends about Dante in Istria are probably numerous. How reliable are they?
“They are as reliable as one wants to believe. I tried to explain Dante with Dante on the one hand, that is, using references in the Divine Comedy. On the other hand, I then went to look for literature to support Dante's indications. An example is Lake Cerkniško jezero: we went on a trip to look for this lake in order to understand what Dante might have seen. I took a photo that actually looks a bit like the passage of the Dark Forest, then the lake that freezes so much that not even the devil can break it”.
The exile par excellence
Explain to us the figure of Dante the exile and the term "Poet of the unredeemed lands".
“Dante, when he was expelled from Florence, suffered. He is not like the exiles who, once they left, found another life and never returned. Dante is the exile par excellence, but an exile who wanted to return home. That is why he then became part of the unredeemed lands. Not in the irredentist sense of the term. At a certain point, while remaining at home, we found ourselves in another State and had to accept another culture, another language. If Dante had lived, he would have had the same fate. But he did not want to stay anywhere else, he wandered waiting to be able to return home”.
Can exiles and those who remained identify with the character of the Father of the Italian language?
“I think we have already done it. If Dante is that wanderer and vagabond a bit like the exiles, we are instead what remains of Italy. He saw the limit of the Belpaese at Pola and Carnaro. Perhaps he had already guessed the Wilson line. We live in the image of the person who lost his homeland for his political ideas. Here we must understand Italy in Dante's time, not today's, because to say so immediately opens the diaspora between the right and the left, which is not what Dante is. It is necessary to see the character who wanted to remain himself in an adverse environment”.
In your opinion, why is Dante important to our identity?
“It is important because it represents the multiplicity of the Italian territory. In fact, in Dante's time Latin was spoken. He chose the language of the people to be understood and understood by everyone. We speak two or three languages at home. Dante wrote 'De vulgari eloquentia', he united and analyzed them, explaining that we speak in a violent and unmusical way. This is our destiny: to coexist with the multiplicity of cultures of the fragmented Italy of 1200-1300. We have a State, but we belong culturally to another territory. I see Dante in this light because, despite everything, he wrote his most important work in the vernacular, not in Latin, risking not being considered a genius. In fact, he did not receive the laurel because he did not write in Latin. For us it is not always easy to be Italian. Every morning you have to remind your neighbor that you speak Italian because everyone speaks either Slovenian or Croatian. The history of Venice and our territories has fallen into oblivion. Dante's idea was that of a common language throughout Italy. I see it this way, we must remember our history, identity and nationality".
What is the historical-cultural dimension of your volume?
“I analyzed the publications first hand, it took me years to recover them. I managed to have and use Kandler's letters precisely to move Dante to Istria and San Servolo. If someone doesn't like how I set out the discussion, they still have a vision of the bibliography that I used, thanks to which they can make another version of my text. The bibliography is therefore very rich. Not all the texts are accessible, but it is an analysis. As a philologist I arranged the writings in order, I examined them citing the sources to give my idea of what the Dante passage could have been”.
Why is it important and necessary to study Dante?
“By reading the Divine Comedy you learn not only the Italian language, but also the history and complexity of Dante's work through its sources and you approach the millenary Italian culture even in a non-Italian context. For Italians in Italy, Dante is a figure close to us on a daily basis, if nothing else, thanks to the monuments. For us, however, it is different: Dante is perhaps still that element so often seen as political, since he is identified as too Italian, which instead is right. By reading the Supreme Poet we know that Venice existed because he mentions it and we are in 2021, while the work was written in 1300. We therefore review our identity through a work that is 700 years old. A priceless thing that few peoples can do. This is why I do 'Dante for everyone' in the schools of Slovenia. It is right that children learn about the myth of Dante and the Divine Comedy as that story (because we have reduced it to a story for the little ones) where he encounters characters and situations that are also dangerous, but he does it to teach. This has also become my mission”.
Understanding the messages of the Supreme Poet
In addition to having a degree in Modern Literature, in 2005 she obtained a Master's degree in Archival Sciences at the State Archives of Trieste. In 2007 she was awarded the prestigious title of "cultore della materia filologia italiana" and taught Italian philology at the University of Trieste. As a freelance archivist she collaborated with the Dalmatian Society of National History for the FiDA and SIDA Projects. The first indexed the holdings of the State or Regional archives of Slovenia and Croatia according to the ISAD (General International standard archival description) standards - while the second indexed those of the non-State archives of the Venetian era in the former Venetian territories. She is the author of numerous scientific essays and articles and, in addition to being president of the Dante Alighieri Society - Capodistria Committee and organizing numerous thematic exhibitions, she edited a Slovenian translation of the Divine Comedy.
“The translation was a work that lasted many years. The first translation was the Divine Comedy in Slovenian only with commentary (the publication of the work was made possible thanks to the contribution of the Università Popolare di Trieste) because the previous translator had concentrated on researching the vulgate of the Comedy. He simplified the text of the work forgetting the context, which is very substantial. You have to know how to make it more accessible to everyone, not by lightening the Divine Comedy, but by enriching it with a commentary. This is what Debevec did, who kept the text; a Dantesque poem in the Slovenian translation and next to it the most difficult passages. A huge job! He also looked for Slovenian legends that could resemble those that Dante cites, or even Dantesque places that the poet mentions and that could be found in Slovenia. An example that I always cite is Lake Bled. He transformed it into the entrance to the city of Dite. It is one of his most beautiful passages. It is necessary to be able to receive these messages. As for thematic exhibitions, the presentation of the book 'Dante's Divine Comedy in Debevec's translation' was accompanied by an exhibition by the Centro Italiano Filatelia Tematica (CIFT). In fact, on the occasion of the seven hundredth anniversary of the death of the Supreme Poet, the Capodistria Committee of the Dante Alighieri Society issued a personalized stamp with the image of the painter and patriot from Ravenna Runcaldier around the mid-nineteenth century. The issue was part of a larger event that included the traveling exhibition 'The Divine Comedy through thematic philately', hosted last March in the spaces of the Community of Italians 'Santorio Santorio' in Capodistria, thanks to the support of the CAN of Capodistria and its president, Fulvio Richter. We were supposed to have two other events, but they were postponed due to the pandemic”.
Any projects in the pipeline?
“I found some similarities between the Dante Codices of Isola d'Istria and a codice written in Chiavari. Most likely they date back to the same scriptorium. In Chiavari they are very willing to collaborate. However, we need to find someone here in Capodistria. In addition, I have a contract with Cambridge Scholars Publishing to publish all my texts in English, but now the problem is the funds needed to make the translation into English”.
Kristina Blagoni
Source: The Voice of the People – 01/01/2022
