Vile e gentile. La nobiltà in Dante tra generazione e predestinazione

This study is dedicated to the thematization of the base/gentle contrast, which is crucial to Dante’s definition of nobility. By highlighting the remarkable theoretical and poetic coherence of these concepts, the paper reconstructs their implications – both theological and philosophical (primarily related to the natural phenomenon of generation) – and infers that those who are predestined are equated with the noble and “well-born”. Nobility, then, is a fact of nature – but a nature interpreted as a divine creation i.e. as an instrument of the creator’s will that always predisposes the good birth of those it wants to save.