Bertoldi, Giovanni da Serravalle

BERTOLDI, GIOVANNI da SERRAVALLE. - Franciscan Dante scholar, b. at Serravalle (Republic of San Marino) ca. 1350, d. at Fano in 1445. As a young man he heard the Commedia expounded, perhaps at Bologna, by the Ghibelline Benvenuto da Imola, whom he always remembered with affection. In 1390 at Rome he expounded, as a lecturer in theology, the Book of Sentences in the schools of the Apostolic Palace; five years later we find him at Florence as a lecturer at S. Croce and regent of studies, then as a pilgrim in the Holy Land (1398). During the Western Schism he remained faithful to Pope Gregory XII, who appointed him bishop of Fermo. He was also present at the Council of Constance; on that occasion he made known his Latin work of translation and commentary on the Commedia, which he composed in order to extend, to the whole Christian world, the reading and understanding of the three canticles. In 1419 he was transferred to the episcopal see of Fano, where he remained until his death. Foscolo suspected that B. "compiled the churches that were supplied to him"; his work, on the other hand, has various new and original aspects, even while drawing freely and extensively on the reading of Benvenuto da Imola "not only for persons and facts close to Dante, but also for matters of common erudition" (M. Barbi).

Giovanni Fallani