L'influenza di Omero sulla lingua poetica delle Stanze di Poliziano

The present article aims to investigate how the passionate study of Homer affected the vernacular production of Angelo Poliziano, doubtlessly the most important humanist poet of his age. Some di-rect quotations are pointed out, but the analysis focuses mainly on the complex relationship between Homer and his Latin imitators, from Vergil to Statius, often taking advantage of the comparison with Poliziano’s translation of the Iliad in Latin hexameters. This last resource helps to a large extent in picturing the high degree of awareness shown by Poliziano towards Homer’s formulaic style, of-ten misinterpreted by his contemporaries. Through an accurate study of some passages of the Stanze it is shown that, even though some phrases do not perfectly match the Homeric diction, they serve the same narrative function as some common formulas. Allusions of this kind are somehow different from simple erudite quotations, and refer to a deeper level of intertextuality, aimed at characterising the text in a peculiarly aulic way, percieved as truly epic especially by learned poets and scholars of the time. Finally, such a study may shed some light on the first steps of the gradual reception of Greek poetry into Italian literature starting from the 15th century.