Teofilo Folengo | |
|---|---|
 Portrait of Teofilo Folengo byRomanino | |
| Born | Girolamo Folengo (1491-11-08)8 November 1491 |
| Died | 9 December 1544(1544-12-09) (aged 53) Campese,Republic of Venice |
| Resting place | Chiesa della Santa Croce (Campese) |
| Other names | Merlino Coccajo Merlinus Cocaius |
| Occupations |
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| Parent(s) | Federico Folengo and Paola Folengo (née Ghisi) |
| Writing career | |
| Language | Italian,Latin |
| Genre |
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| Literary movement | Italian Renaissance |
| Notable works | Opus macaronicum Baldus Orlandino |
Teofilo FolengoOSB (Italian pronunciation:[teˌɔːfilofoˈleŋɡo]; 8 November 1491 – 9 December 1544), who wrote under the pseudonym ofMerlino Coccajo[a] orMerlinus Cocaius in Latin, was one of the principal Italianmacaronic poets.
Folengo was born of noble parentage at Cipada nearMantua, Italy.[1]
From his infancy he showed great vivacity of mind, and a remarkable cleverness in making verses. At the age of sixteen he entered the monastery of Sant'Eufemia nearBrescia, and eighteen months afterwards he became a professed member of theBenedictine order.
For a few years his life as a monk seems to have been tolerably regular, and he is said to have produced a considerable quantity ofLatin verse, written, not unsuccessfully, in theVirgilian style.
About the year 1516 he forsook the monastic life for the society of a well-born young woman named Girolama Dieda, with whom he wandered about the country for several years, often suffering great poverty, having no other means of support than his talent for writing.[1]
Later in his life Folengo decided to return to the Church. After four years of penance in which he lived as ahermit, he was re-admitted to the order in 1534.
In 1538 he was sent toSicily nearPalermo, together with many others monks from Mantua. He spent in Sicily some of his later years, under the patronage ofFerrante Gonzaga, who served the emperorCharles V as Viceroy of Sicily (1535–1546).
He appears to have been based at the abbey of San Martino delle Scale (Monreale). In 1543 he retired to the Santa Croce monastery ofCampese, nearBassano; and there he died on 9 December 1544.[1]
His first work, under the Latin pseudonym Merlinus Cocaius, was the macaronic narrative poemBaldo (1517), which relates the adventures of a fictitious hero named Baldo ("Baldus"), a descendant of French royalty and something of a juvenile delinquent who encounters imprisonment; battles with local authorities, pirates, shepherds, witches, and demons; and a journey to the underworld.
Throughout his adventures Baldo is accompanied by various companions, among them a giant, a centaur, a magician, and his best friend Cingar, a trickster.Baldo blended Latin with various Italian dialects in hexameter verse.[citation needed]
Though frequently censured, it soon attained a wide popularity, and within a very few years passed through several editions and was later expanded by Folengo.[1][b]
Folengo's next work wasOrlandino, an Italian poem of eightcantos, written in rhymed octaves. It appeared in 1526, and bore on the title-page the new pseudonym ofLimerno Pitocco (Merlin the Beggar)da Mantova.
In the same year, wearied with a life of dissipation, Folengo returned to his ecclesiastical roots; and shortly afterwards wrote hisCaos del tri per uno, in which, partly in prose, partly in verse, sometimes in Latin, sometimes in Italian, and sometimes in macaronic, he gives a veiled account of the vicissitudes of the life he had lived under his various names.[1]
We next find him about the year 1533 writing in rhymed octaves a life of Christ entitledL'Umanità del Figliuolo di Dio; and he is known to have composed, still later, another religious poem upon the creation, fall and restoration of man, besides a few tragedies. Folengo wrote also asacra rappresentazione, theAtto della Pinta, which was repeatedly staged.
These, however, have never been published.[1]
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Folengo, Teofilo".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 598–599.