Dai volgarizzamenti agli scrittori: “conversare” nel Convivio di Dante

Abstract

Conversatio / communicatio in Middle Ages

means not a linguistic, but a moral condivision. By developing

this concept of conversazione, in the third book of

the Convivio, Dante reveals to the reader the real essence

of Aristotelian knowledge: the Wisdom beloved by Solomon

in the Bible. In Aristotelian terms, he says, Love is

the «form» of the relationship between man and Knowledge

because Wisdom loves the one who loves her (III

xi). Thus, the desire for knowledge quoted by Dante at the

beginning of the Convivio is not a mechanic impulse leading

to an actualization of human potential, because the

essence of Science revealed in the third treatise is the personal,

mutual relationship between the knowing subject

and the object known. This radically new essence of Science

proposed by Dante is based upon the Love-

Knowledge conceived by Saint Paul in I Cor 13, 12.