Carmina: general characteristics

The Carmina were written by  Ariosto at an early age. He composed these works principally in the period from 1494 to 1503 and they were never collected systematically. The only composition in Latin worthy of note ascribable to a subsequent phase is the De vellere aureo, written in 1509. Ludovico also composed some epigrams and some epitaphs. The task of recomposing Ariosto’s works in Latin is owed to Giovan Battista Pigna, who, in 1553, in Venice, at Valgrisi’s, published a selection of sixty seven of Ariosto’s compositions in Latin, together with some works of his own, always in Latin. Ludovico’s attempts at Latin poetry should be linked to the Padanian humanist tradition  that had reached its apex in Ferrara with the research conducted by  Boiardo and Tito Vespasiano Strozzi into the Latin language. In these compositions we find a variety of themes, tied to contemporary events, freely schematised on the basis of works by Catullus, Horace and Ovid, with the reproposal  of topical situations such as invective against the old procuress. Many of these works address exponents of the cultural elite or persons Ludovico had a close relationship with, such as  Alberto Pio da Carpi, to whom he dedicates an ode on the return of the master Gregorio Elladio from France, or such as Ercole Strozzi, to whom he addresses an elegy on the death of  Michele Marullo. Some works contain references to specific historical events of that time, such as the ode to his cousin Pandolfo, in which reference is made to Charles VIII’s decent into Italy, or such as the epithalamium for the marriage of Lucrezia Borgia and Alfonso d’Este. There are lastly works for traditional occasions such as the epicedium dedicated to Alberto Pio da Carpi for the violent death of his mother Caterina, poisoned by a maid.