Sacre rappresentazioni
The texts in my 1983 volume, Nuovo corpus di sacre rappresentazioni fiorentine edite e inedite tratte da manoscritti coevi o ricontrollate su di essi (Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua) were digitised by the Biblioteca italiana. Concetto del Popolo has suggested some very apposite emendations in “Restauri testuali per sacre rappresentazioni,” Giornale italiano di filologia 55 (2003), pp. 171–197, that should be taken into consideration in reading these texts.
In the course of preparing a new study, Making a Play for God: The Sacre Rappresentazioni of Renaissance Florence (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, forthcoming 2021), I have revised a those plays and added new ones, and occasionally translations. The plays are listed in alphabetical order by title keyword.
Feo Belcari, La rapresentazione d’Abram quando volse fare sacrificio di Isac, Italian and English parallel text.
Feo Belcari, The Representation of the Annunciation to Our Lady the Virgin Mary by the Angel Gabriel, translation of Rappresentazione quando la Nostra Donna Vergine Maria fu annunziata dall’Angelo Gabriello.
Protodrama of the Ascension, before 1420.
Feo Belcari, Play of the Ascension, translation of Rappresentazione dell’Ascensione.
Bernardo Pulci, The Play of Barlaam and Josaphat, translation of La rappresentazione di Barlaam e Josafat.
La rappresentazione di san Bernardo, d’uno signore che facea rubare le strade.
The Play of the Virgin Martyr Saint Christina, translation of La rappresentazione di Santa Cristina virgine e martire.
The Play of a Miracle of the Body of Christ, translation of La rappresentazione di uno miracolo del Corpo di Cristo.
La creazione: Una rappresentazione quando Iddio fece il mondo e l’uomo e ogni cosa creata.
La rappresentazione della reina Ester, with parallel translation, The Play of Queen Esther, and links to cassoni of the story of Esther.
La rappresentazione di San Giovanni Battista quando fu decollato. And also an English translation by Adrian Maroya, The Sacred Action of Saint John the Baptist’s Beheading.
La rappresentazione di Josef, di Jacob e de’ fratelli, beginning “A laude de l’immenso eterno Dio.”
La rappresentazione quando Gesù resucitò Lazero.
The Play of St Lawrence, English translation of La rappresentazione di san Lorenzo.
La rappresentazione della festa de’ Magi, beginning “O divote persone.”
La rappresentazione di Moisè e Faraone re d’Egitto.
La divota rappresentazione e festa della Natività di Nostro Signore Gesù Cristo, beginning “Oda ciascun fedel quel che contiene.”
The Play of the Nativity, English translation of La rappresentazione della Natività, beginning “A laude e gloria dello etterno Dio.”
La rappresentazione della Natività di Nostro Signore Gesù Cristo, also called La festa di Ottaviano.
The Play of the Angel Raphael and Tobit. Translation of La festa dell’Angiolo Raffaello e di Tobbia.
Bernardo Cungi, Rappresentazione d’un miracolo del Sagramento, with parallel translation Play of a Miracle of the Sacrament.
La rappresentazione di Salamone.
Feo Belcari, Play of the descent of the Holy Ghost on the Day of Pentecost. English translation of Rappresentazione dello avvenimento dello Spirito Santo il dì della Pentecoste.
The Play of the Miracle of the Holy Spirit. English translation of La festa miracolo dello Spirito Santo.
La festa di Susanna. And also an English translation, The Play of Susanna.
Castellano Castellani, La rappresentazione di san Venanzio, Italian and English parallel text.
Piero di Mariano Muzi, La festa del Vitello sagginato. And also an English translation, The play of the Fatted Calf.
Confraternity Statutes
Capitoli e costituzioni della Compagnia della Purificazione della Vergine Maria e di San Zanobi, Florence 1444–1742. Drafted by Piero di Mariano Muzi, guardiano of the Purification company in 1444, approved by Archbishop Antoninus in 1448 and amended in 1478, 1739, 1740 and 1742.
Other Festivities
Frederick III’s visit to Florence in 1451–1452
Unpublished paper: Quasi insalutato ospite: Frederick III, Leonora of Portugal and their Cassoni. 2008, 2016
This essay was to have been published in a collection based on the conference, The Triumph of Marriage: Painted Cassoni of the Renaissance, held at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston on 7 November 2008. Publication has now been abandoned. I am publishing the essay in this forum because it contains the research to which Cristelle Baskins refers in her catalogue essay “The Triumph of Marriage: Frederick III and Leonora of Portugal, 1452,” in Cristelle Baskins and Alan Chong, with Virginia Brilliant, The Triumph of Marriage: Painted Cassoni of the Renaissance. Exh. cat. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art 2008–2009, Boston 2008, pp. 47-65.
The Visit to Florence in 1459 of Giangaleazzo Sforza and Pope Pius II Piccolomini
Le terze rime in lode di Cosimo: edition of BNCF, Magliabechi VII.1121, published in “Le onoranze fiorentine del 1459: poema anonimo,” ed. Nerida Newbigin. Letteratura italiana antica 12 (2011): 17–135.
Translation of Le onoranze fiorentine del 1459
Descriptions of the St John the Baptist festa
Zanobi Perini, description of San Giovanni celebrations, 1407, translation
Goro di Stagio Dati, description of San Giovanni Battista celebrations, c. 1420
Agostino di Portico, description of San Giovanni Battista edifici
Undated, but after 1451, when Agostino di Portico di Romagna was already abbot of San Zeno in Siena, and before 1454, when the format of the procession was changed
Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Ital. f. 3, ff. 286v–290r.
Translated from Daniela Delcorno Branca, “Un camaldolese alla festa di San Giovanni: la processione del Battista descritta da Agostino di Portico,” Lettere italiane 55 (2003): 1–25.
Matteo Palmieri, description of reformed procession, 1454
Calcio fiorentino
Giovanni Frescobaldi, La palla al calcio, 1470
Text and translation of a description of a fifteen-a-side game of football,played in Piazza Santo Spirito. Some time around 1470, Giovanni Frescobaldi, a Florentine canterino or ‘tabloid poet’, composed for the fans his account of a memorable football match played in Piazza Santo Spirito in Florence. Houses on three sides, the church and steps at the fourth, made the square a natural stadium. Each team consisted of fifteen strapping young men, the boys from Frescobaldi’s own Santo Spirito quarter versus the lads from the Prato Ognissanti on other side of the river (now the called the Cascine).