Appunti sulla fisionomia del Cavalca – autore

Abstract

An analysis of the technical terminology used by Domenico Cavalca with respect to his activity of translating Latin texts in vernacular language demonstrates that the Preacher friar’s linguistic choices are extremely well pondered. Indeed, the author’s voice emerges in characteristic wordings such as ›tutto dì veggiamo‹ and ›per esperienza veggiamo‹, which refer to a concrete factual experience and hence to the everyday reality of his audience. The use of this kind of expression, which presents ties to the period’s scientific and rhetoric literature, and which appears also in Dante’s and Boccaccio’s prose, is particularly frequent in Cavalca’s last work, the
›Esposizione del Credo‹. In fact, this treatise proves to be of crucial importance for his self-constitution as a Dominican author.