Pier della Vigna

Akash Kumar (Columbia University)

Ed. by Jo Ann Cavallo, Columbia University
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.6.1: Italian Writing and Culture, 453-present.
Vol. editors: Carla Bregman (Independent Scholar - North America), Jo Ann Cavallo (Columbia University)

Dates

Born c. 1190
Died 1249

Places

Born in Italy
Active in Italy

Activities

Primary

Diplomat
Jurist
Poet

Resources

della Vigna's Works

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Though a key figure in the court of Frederick II and a noted poet, jurist, letter writer, and rhetorician, Pier della Vigna is probably best known through Dante’s imagining of him as a tree in the forest of suicides in

Inferno

13. His poetic output is minor, consisting of a mere five lyric compositions attributed to him (and even those are not with the unanimous approval of scholars), but his figure looms large as an interlocutor in a key poetic exchange with Iacopo Mostacci and Giacomo da Lentini on the nature of love. Far more weighty, perhaps, is his Latin output of more than 200 texts, consisting of public and private letters, imperial decrees, and rhetorical compositions. The remarkable arc of his career as a notary who rose to the heights of power to become the emperor’s…

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1492 words

Citation: Kumar, Akash. "Pier della Vigna". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 20 January 2014 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=13232, accessed 25 November 2024.]