Florence, 1300-1301. Compagni, Villani (and their readers) in Santa Trìnita and «cacciare con molta offensione» (If 6, 66)

The essay examines the accounts about the “white biennium” 1300-1301 provided by Dino Compagni and Giovanni Villani, as well as by their readers and modern interpreters (Leonardo Bruni, Niccolò Machiavelli and Scipione Ammirato up to Isidoro Del Lungo and Robert Davidsohn). The scrutiny and the comparison with other minor chronicles of the 14th century (see «Reti Medievali - Rivista», 17 [2016], 2, 113-151) leads to a new interpretation of these witnesses, which explains the evasiveness in the account by Dino Compagni and provides not only a new reading of the overall sense of this historical phase but also of the specific sense of Dante’s reference to these facts in the canto VI of the Inferno.