Libro dei Sette Savj (A)

From The Seven Sages of Rome
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The Italian text titled Il Libro dei Sette Savj, edited by Alessandro d'Ancona (1864), adheres closely to the standard Version A story pattern. Unlike the two other Italian Version A redactions (the Italian Prose A and Storia favolosa di Stefano) this version maintains all fifteen expected stories, in the order in which the appear in most French Version A manuscripts - unsurprising, given that the presumed source material for this text is a French A text.

The dating of this version is currently unclear. In the description given in Runte, Wikeley, Farrell (1984), the authors suggest that d'Ancona 'ascribes the text he edited... to the end of the 13th century' (p. 128). As far as I can discover, d'Ancona situates the text in the 'buon secolo della lingua', the golden age of Italian vernacular literature between c. 1220-1350 (vii), but does not offer a specific date. Some online catalogues (e.g., Arlima) suggest a fifteenth century date for this text, which corresponds with the date for Florence Biblioteca nazionale centrale, Palatino 680 - the supplemental text d'Ancona used as an appendix; however, the catalogue for Florence Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana is not currently available, and thus further confirmation would be welcome.

Language & Composition



Date of Composition
1250 - 1500


Modern Scholarship & Editions

Modern research literature


Pattern of Embedded Stories in This Version