Jacopo Alighieri was an Italian poet, the son of Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri

Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...

, whom he followed in his exile. Jacopo's most famous work is his sixty-chapter Dottrinale.

Biography

Born in 1289 in Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

, Jacopo was the son of Dante Alighieri and his wife, Gemma di Manetto Donati.

He was exiled from Florence with his father and brothers Giovanni and Pietro in 1315. He subsequently traveled to Ravenna

Ravenna

Ravenna is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy and the second largest comune in Italy by land area, although, at , it is little more than half the size of the largest comune, Rome...

, where may have lived with his father. Dante died in 1321, and Jacopo sent a copy of the Divine Comedy to Guido da Polenta, the lord of the city. In 1325, he returned to Florence, where he took minor orders

Minor orders

The minor orders are the lowest ranks in the Christian clergy. The most recognized minor orders are porter, lector, exorcist, and acolyte. In the Latin rite Catholic Church, the minor orders were in most cases replaced by "instituted" ministries of lector and acolyte, though communities that use...

, making it possible for him to become a canon

Canon (priest)

A canon is a priest or minister who is a member of certain bodies of the Christian clergy subject to an ecclesiastical rule ....

 in Verona

Verona

Verona ; German Bern, Dietrichsbern or Welschbern) is a city in the Veneto, northern Italy, with approx. 265,000 inhabitants and one of the seven chef-lieus of the region. It is the second largest city municipality in the region and the third of North-Eastern Italy. The metropolitan area of Verona...

. At home, he took charge of his family's financial affairs; in 1343, he was able to retake possession of his father's confiscated property.

He died in 1348.

Works

• The Dottrinale has 60 chapters in seven-syllable rhyming couplets; each chapter consists of ten stanzas. It treats matters of astronomy and astrology, faith, the virtues of the Church and the State, love and hate, family, human beauty, and free will. The work is inspired by ancient authors, and sometimes imitates Dante. Divided into two sections, the Dottrinale first deals with the physical order, and then the moral.
• The Commento is virtually a terzina-by-terzina commentary of the text of the Inferno, which is the first of the three parts of the Divine Comedy. [Dante's poem is in terza rima
  Terza rima
  Terza rima is a rhyming verse stanza form that consists of an interlocking three-line rhyme scheme. It was first used by the Italian poet Dante Alighieri.-Form:Terza rima is a three-line stanza using chain rhyme in the pattern A-B-A, B-C-B, C-D-C, D-E-D...
  
  , the form he created as the poem's poetic vehicle. The form's three-line stanzas are called terzinas.] Jacopo was one of the very first to write a work of this kind. By 1340, less than two decades after Dante's death, six major commentaries were enlightening, guiding, and informing the work's ever-larger readership. (See Hollander's "Dante and his commentators" in The Cambridge Companion to Dante). The Commento accompanied the copies of the Comedy sent to Guido da Polenta.

External links

• Chiose alla cantica dell'Inferno (Florence, 1848)
• Il dottrinale di Jacopo Alighieri (Città di Castello, 1895)
• Jacopo's Inferno commentary, on the Dartmouth Dante Project site