[512] Alfraganus, as we saw, gives the daily movement of the sun eastward in the zodiac as about 59 minutes of arc. (A degree contains 60 minutes).
[513] Purg. xxv. 2, 3.
[514] Inf. xi. 113; Purg. i. 21, xix. 4-6.
[515] Inf. i. 38-40.
[516] Par. i. 38, 39.
[517] “That part.”
[518] “Those stars.”
[519] Par. x. 7-33.
[520] Par. xxvii. 86, 87.
[521] Purg. i. 21.
[522] Purg. xxvii. 95.
[523] “The Lion’s breast.” Par. xxi. 14.
[524] “The Lion’s Heart.”
[525] “Beneath the breast.”
[526] Cf. Purg. xxxii. 56, 57, where the sun is spoken of as under another star.
[527] “To his Lion has come.” Par. xvi. 37, 38.
[528] “Sometimes by Saturn.”
[529] “With a better course and better star.” Par. i. 40.
[530] “Rises upon mortals.” Par. i. 37.
[531] Inf. x. 100-105.
[532] Conv. IV. xxiii. 96-98.
[533] Moore, Studies in Dante iii. p. 146.
[535] V. N. xliii. 1-11.
[536] Exactly at midday, moreover, according to one system then in vogue, though it seems to have been more usual to begin the day at sunrise.
[537] “A thousand two hundred and one, added to sixty-six.”
[538] “Midway in the journey of our life.”
[539] “The highest point,” the “summit.”
[540] “Until the summit of my life.” Conv. I. iii. 24, 25.
[541] “Youth.”
[542] “Is in truth the summit of our life.”
[543] Farinata alludes to the two Guelf banishments of 1248 and 1260. Inf. x. 42-50.
[544] Conv. I. iii. 22-24; Inf. xxiii. 94, 95, etc.
[545] V. N. ii. 1-15.
[546] V. N. xxx. 4-13.
[547] Purg. xxx. 124, 125; Cf. Conv. IV. xxiv. 11-13.
[548] Imbriani: Quando nacque Dante? and Che Dante probabilissimamente nacque nei MCCCLXVII.
[549] Purg. ii. 91-103.
[550] For this point and a full discussion of the date, especially from the astronomical data, see Angelitti’s Sulla Data del Viaggio Dantesco, and Sull’ anno della Visione Dantesca, and Moore’s “The Date assumed by Dante for the Vision of the ‘Divina Commedia,’” Studies in Dante III.
[551] “This hundredth year.” Par. ix. 40.
[552] Purg. viii. 74.
[553] Par. xvii. 80, 81.
[555] Toynbee’s Dante Dictionary, under “Cavalcanti.”
[556] Moore, Studies in Dante III. p. 146.
[557] “The Astronomy of Dante,” in Studies III., and Time References in the Divina Commedia.
[558] Note on Purg. i. 19-21 in the “Temple” edition of Dante.
[559] Par. Lost vii. 375-378.
[561] Preface to Almanach Dantis Aligherii, Boffito and Melzi d’ Eril.
[562] It is important to observe that this suits the description of the “Lion’s breast” better than the 20th and 21st degrees (Almanach positions for 1301), if Dante, as usual in the Divina Commedia, identifies the constellation with the sign.
[563] The middle of March.
[564] This was written in 1910.
[566] Conv. II. iii. 8-14.
[567] Par. x. 1-12.
[568] Inf. iv. 131.
[569] Conv. III. v. 54-56.
[570] Conv. III. v. 29-52. See Part I. of this book Pythagoras and his Followers, and Plato, for a description of their astronomical systems.
[572] “And that outside the latter there was no other.” Conv. II. iii. 24, 25.
[573] “This entirely mistaken opinion of his.” Ibid. 28.
[574] “According to Ptolemy and according to Christian Truth, nine is the number of the moving heavens.” V. N. xxx. 16-18.
[575] “Roughly speaking.” Conv. II. iii. 36-48.
[576] “All bodies.” Ep. x. 445.
[577] “These vast bodies.” Par. viii. 99.
[578] “Material circles” (here compared with the Angels, who are purely spiritual). Par. xxviii. 64.
[579] “The greatest body.” Par. xxx. 39.
[580] Purg. iii. 29, 30.
[581] “This rounded ether.” Par. xxii. 132.
[582] Par. xxiii. 112-117.
[583] Conv. II. iv. 1-13.
[584] Conv. II. iii. 52-65.
[585] Conv. II. iv. 13-16, 30-32. See also Ep. x. 448-452.
[586] “And Aristotle also, to one who rightly understands him, seems to mean the same thing, in his first book of The Heaven and the Earth.” Conv. II. iv. 32-34.
[588] The Convivio of Dante, “Temple” Edition, note on II. iv.
[589] “Firm and fixed and not moveable, from any point of view.” Conv. II. iv. 50, 51.
[590] Conv. II. iv. 68-75.
[591] Conv. II. iv. 78-104.
[592] “That circle of hers which makes her appear as evening and morning star, according to the two different periods.” Conv. II. ii. 3-5.
[593] “Third epicycle.”
[594] Conv. II. xv. 132-155.
[595] “That one which sweeps the whole of the rest of the universe along with it.” Par. xxviii. 70, 71.
[596] Toynbee, “Dante’s Obligations to Alfraganus in Vita Nuova and Convivio,” in Romania xxiv. 95.
[597] Conv. II. xv. 108-118.
[598] “The first star.” Par. ii. 30.
[599] “The second realm.” Par. v. 93.
[600] “The third heaven.” Par. viii. 37.
[601] “The fourth family.” Par. x. 49.
[602] “The fifth threshold.” Par. xviii. 28.
[603] “More lofty.” Par. xiv. 85.
[604] “Sixth star.” Par. xviii. 68, 69.
[605] “The seventh splendour.” Par. xxi. 13.
[606] “The eighth sphere.” Par. ii. 64.
[607] “The swiftest heaven.” Par. xxvii. 99.
[608] “The greatest body.” Par. xxx. 39. Compare V. N. xlii. 47. “Oltre la spera che più larga gira,” (“beyond the sphere which has the largest circle).”
[609] “The heaven of pure light.” Par. xxx. 39.
[610] “The last sphere.” Par. xxii. 62.
[612] “This is the sovereign edifice of the world, in which all the world is enclosed, and beyond which is naught; and it exists not in space, but received form only in the Primal Mind, which the Greeks call Protonoe.” See also Ep. x. 442-447.
[613] “Last sphere.”
[614] “The first heaven.” Purg. xxx. 1.
[615] “The first circle.” Par. iv. 34.
[616] “First heaven.” Qu. iv. 7.
[617] Par. vii. 130-132 compared with 67, 68. See also Par. i. 64 and 76.
[618] Ep. x. 435-437.
[620] Par. vii. 124-143. Compare with Plato’s account of the creation of living beings (Part I., Plato).
[621] Par. i. 115, 117; De Mon. I. xv. 38-41; and III. vii. 30, 31, etc.
[622] Par. i. 92, 130-134.
[623] “This earth, together with the sea, is the centre of heaven.” (Conv. III. v. 63-65.)
[624] “It is agreed among learned men that earth and water together form a globe.” (El. Ast. iii.).
[625] Qu. xviii. 28-54. This may be compared with Par. xxix. 13-18.
[626] Qu. xv. 10, 11.
[629] “Or nearly.” Qu. xix. 61-63.
[630] Compare with Conv. II. vii. 88-100, where the poet says that the influence from each sphere comes on the rays of the planet in that sphere, also De Mon. III. iv. 139, 140.
[631] “Nor does it avail anything to say that that declination could not take place because of approaching nearer the earth through eccentricity; for if this elevating virtue were in the moon, since agents act the more powerfully the nearer they are, she would elevate there rather than here.” Qu. xx. 65-71.
[632] Note on this passage in “Temple” Dante.
[633] Studies in Dante, ii. p. 339.
[634] Nearest Earth.
[635] Qu. vii. 4, 6, and xxiii. 52.
[636] “Orbis” and “sphæra” are used indifferently by Alfraganus to indicate the celestial spheres: thus, in ch. xii. he says “Orbes, qui stellarum omnes motus complectantur, numero esse octo,” and on the next page, “unamquamque harum sphærarum octo.”
[637] “The upper and lower apsides of the eccentrics of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars, have a certain declination from the zodiac, the former to the north, the latter to the south, the amount always remaining constant: and it is just the same with the moon.” El. Ast. xviii. par. 6.
[638] In the edition of Golius ch. vii. par. 5, the position of greatest distance is called the perigee, of least the apogee, but this mistake is corrected in the next paragraph.
[639] “The moon’s declination in the zodiac from the equator towards the south pole is as great as towards the north.” Qu. xx. 61-63.
[640] The deferent was the equator of her orb or sphere.
[641] Ristoro also defines apogee and perigee (“auge” and “opposito d’auge”) as effects of movements on an epicycle, and says that the deferent is “declined” from the ecliptic (“declinato della via del sole,”) part being north and part south, but he does not say whether its perigee is north or south. Comp. del Mondo. I. xii. xiv., and III. vii.
[642] For a thorough discussion of this question see Moore’s Studies in Dante ii. pp. 303-374.
[643] “The foundation of your elements.” Par. xxix. 51.
[644] “Rises highest towards heaven out of the sea.” Purg. iii. 15.
[645] “Dry vapour.”
[646] “Exhalations from the water.”
[647] “Behind [i.e. following] the heat.”
[648] Purg. xxviii. 97-99 and xxi. 52-53. The gate is meant by “i tre gradi” (“the three steps”), and “ove si serra” (“where it is locked”). See Purg. ix. 76, 106-108.
[650] Scartazzini takes the passage as referring to Eden only, and interprets that all the air here is moving evenly and noiselessly unless it meets with any obstacle such as this forest, when a murmuring sound results.
[651] Purg. ix. 30-33.
[652] Par. i. 76-81.
[653] Par. xxi. 58-63.
[654] Hymn on the Nativity.
[655] Merchant of Venice.
[657] Conv. IV. viii. 51-64.