Studiare arabo nel Rinascimento: sei prospettive

The study and knowledge of the Arabic language in Europe during the centuries of pre-modern and early-modern era could be motivated by very different reasons, depending on the environments, the aims, and the available tools. By identifying the main values embodied by Arabic for people in the Latin West who aimed at its mastery, and by recognizing the potential transmitters of such competence, this contribution aims at showing the very relevant, but still little recognized, position of Arabic in the making of the Humanistic enterprise. A special role is assigned to the production of multilingual versions of the Psalter – the only book of the Scriptures that was shared by all three monotheistic religions – as a possible symbol of a philosophical idea of "concordia".