2021: 700th anniversary of Dante Alighieri’s death

Sergio Mattarella, the President of Italy, inaugurated celebrations in Ravenna. Liguria Food answers the call, as Liguria (from east to west) features among Italy’s so called “luoghi danteschi” places linked to the Poet’s life and works, a mix of history and legend. Geo-historians have researched the subject, even though hypothesis is the keyword.

 Dante was one of the greatest Italian poets

Lerici features in Purgatory III, vv. 49-51, the verticality of Ligurian coasts as an expression of hostile settings, and a hint to repentance for the believer. …

Luni is in Paradise XX, 73, a dead town emptied by malaria, burial of the port and feudal fights – it is no coincidence that in 1204 the bishop’s palace was moved to Sarzana.

 

During his troublesome vicissitudes, Dante arrived in the Sarzanese in October 1306 (6th-10th) to settle peace agreements between the Malaspina household (Spino Secco, dried thorn branch) and the Bishop Count of Luni, a protegé of the Fieschi from Lavagna. Then, after a Mass, he left to Castelnuovo Magra. It is said that Dante, during his escape from Florence, began the composition of the Divine Comedy in 1306 at Moroello Malaspina’s imposing (and splendid) fortress of Fosdinovo (from his small bedroom he enjoyed the sight of the steep flanks of the Apuan Alps).

 

The Fontanabuona Valley appears in Purgatory XIX, through the words of the shadow of Pope Adriano V, a member of the Fieschi family (Ottobono).

Noli, the thriving maritime republic with a Guelph bias, was probably visited by Dante – on his way to France - in 1306, and is cited in Purgatory IV, vv. 25-27…

 

My English abstract of the article as published on LiguriaFood

 

Luisa Puppo

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