Renaissance Florence in the Rhetoric of Two Popular Preachers

The preaching of the Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola and the period of his dominance (1494-1498) are a well-known chapter in the history of Renaissance Florence. Comparatively less research has been done on Savonarola's predecessors, the Dominican Giovanni Dominici and the Franciscan Bernardino da Siena whose sermons, as they appear in Tuscan reports (reportationes) by anonymous listeners of their preaching, are an invaluable source for the period. The reportationes are unique in that they transmit in full the actual preaching event and are not merely a doctrinal summary composed by the preacher. Many of these sermons are still in manuscript form, especially those of Dominici, whose sermons have never before been studied in detail and remain unpublished till now.

Dominici and Bernardino were active in Florence at a time when broad legal, social and cultural changes were taking place. This study examines the preachers' response to these changes, the alternatives they offered and their attempts to direct the life of the laity. The author focuses on their opinions on secular and ecclesiastical politics, education and humanism, morality and the family, and the economy and usury (including the role of the Jews). These preachers had widespread impact on the spiritual and daily lives of their listeners, particularly women, on political developments and on legislation against fringe groups such as Jews, homosexuals and prostitutes.

The study includes an edition of ten sermons by Dominici from MS Ricc. 1301 wich were delivered in Santa Maria Novella between 1400 and 1406.