Angelo Poliziano

Politian

 orig. Angelo Poliziano or Angelo Ambrogini

(born July 14, 1454, Montepulciano, Tuscany—died Sept. 28/29, 1494, Florence) Italian poet and humanist. He demonstrated his poetic abilities early and became a friend and protégé of Lorenzo de' Medici. One of the foremost classical scholars of the Renaissance, he produced between 1473 and 1478 Latin and Greek verses that are among the best examples of humanist poetry. He was also, with Lorenzo, a leader in the revaluation of literature in Italian. His vernacular works include Stanzas Begun for the Tournament of the Magnificent Giuliano de' Medici (1475–78), a masterpiece in ottava rima, and the drama Orfeo (1480).

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Poliziano, Angelo 

(real surname Ambrogini). Born July 14, 1454, in Montepulciano; died Sept, 28 or 29, 1494, in Florence. Italian humanist poet and philologist.

Poliziano’s Stanzas About A Tournament (1478; published in 1518), an unfinished narrative poem in octaves, contains the embodiment of the Renaissance ideal of the complete man. He wrote several elegies in Latin and elevated the genres of Tuscan folk poetry— rispetti, baílate, May songs—to the level of the best Renaissance love lyrics. He is the author of the historical work Notes on the Pazzi Conspiracy (1478). The Story of Orpheus (staged 1480), a play in verse, is the first example of secular Renaissance drama in the national language.

WORKS

Tuttle le poesie italiane. [Milan, 1952.]
Rime. [Rome, 1965.]

REFERENCES

Dzhivelegov, A. K. “Orfei’ v literature i na stsene.” In Politsiano, A.: Skazanie ob Orfee. Moscow-Leningrad, 1933.
De Sankcis, F. Istoriia ital’ianskoi literatury, vol. 1. Moscow, 1963.
Lo Cascio, R. Poliziano. [Palermo, 1970.]

R. I. KHLODOVSKH