Dante and His Circle: Education, Script and Image

In this book, Julia Bolton Holloway makes use of primary materials in documents, manuscripts and stone monuments in Florence, to place Dante's literary career in its rich context, discussing the encyclopaedic multicultural education in classical literature, law, ethics, rhetoric, diplomacy, poetry, music and cosmology Brunetto Latino gave to Guido Cavalcante, Dante Alighieri and Francesco da Barberino, using Arabic methods he had learned at the Court of Alfonso X el Sabio in Spain in 1260, continuing this practice in exile in France with 'Li Livres dou Tresor', next dictating his 'Rettorica', 'Tesoretto' and 'Tesoro' in Italian to his students, in the 1280s-90s, following the Sicilian Vespers, the manuscripts of their circle later coming to be re-edited, illustrated and published by Dante's fellow student, Francesco da Barberino, who survived them all, dying of plague in 1348, and who likewise copied Alfonsine methods for producing the 'Danti del Cento' manuscripts of the 'Commedia'. The book is profusely illustrated, discusses Dante's Doubleness and his Decolonialism, and each chapter provides Study Questions for further research.