Brunetto Latini y la reconstrucción del ethos republicano

Abstract

This article introduces the portrait of a key figure of political humanism. Brunetto Latini developed in a lay intellectual environment, influenced by the consolidation of the autonomous political sphere of the city. The gradual opening of power to a large spectrum of citizens led to a change in the daily practice of politics. The Florentine bourgeoisie, as a source of an unprecedented economic growth, brought new rules to the political game and sought to legitimate them before the leading European political actors. Brunetto Latini took part in this process by providing a theoretical corpus to the fragile Florentine republic, thus setting the ethical and practical bases of the vivere civile. His encyclopaedic work is nurtured from the many intellectual traditions with which he was in contact, and demonstrates an unusual interest in the ancient thinkers. He wrote in romance languages and is known to be the first to popularize Aristotle’s Nicomaquean Ethics and Cicero’s De Inventione. The Florentine memory remembers him as the master of a whole generation. Among his students, we may highlight Dante Alighieri, who dedicated a Canto from the Inferno to his master.