who "non sapeano che si chiamare" called her Beatrice,
what did they call her who "sapean che si ebiamare"?
Clearly the poet wants to make it plain at the outset
that Beatrice was not his lady's baptismal name.

This is corroborated by another fact. The poet re-
lates at length the trouble which he took to prevent
the secret of his love from escaping. How then could
be have brought himself both in the lifetime of his
lady and immediately after her death to trumpet forth
his secret? Only by admitting such irrational con-
duct can we escape from admitting that Beatrice was
only a fictitious and assumed name, and that the name
which she bore in real life may have been any but
this.

Folco Portinari was a neighbor of Dante's parents;
their houses were fifty paces apart. One would ex-
pect that the children, being of about the same age,
would have seen each other frequently. Yet Dante
says expressly that be never saw Beatrice until the end
of his ninth year. Boccaccio feels this difficulty and
gets out of it by remarking, "I do not think it can
really have been the first time, but for the first time
after she was capable of kindling the flame of love."
Boccaccio may, of course, believe if he pleases that a
child of eight years old is capable of kindling such a
flame, but we prefer to take Dante's words in their
literal sense, inferring from them that the girl whom
Dante saw cannot have been his neighbor Beatrice
Portinari.

With still greater preciseness he further assures us
that he heard the voice of his Beatrice for the first time
when as a maiden of about eighteen years she first sa-
luted him. Therewith Boccaccio's whole idyl appears

-325-