Čechy v dějinách italské kultury by Arturo CroniaReview by: R. R. BettsThe Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 26, No. 66 (Nov., 1947), pp. 279-282Published by: the Modern Humanities Research Association and University College London, School ofSlavonic and East European StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4203933 .

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REVIEWS. 279

of structure. In view of this we have to agree with Baron P. Uslar that it is impossible to explain the meaning of Caucasian forms and usage in terms of Aryan grammar. This last, according to Meshchaninov, is based on the recognition of person, which has become the focus of grammatical logic, the active subject to a finite verb. In this nominative order too each part of the sentence has its own grammatical indices, which may be shared, where formal concord prevails, by primaries and secondaries alike (e.g. Russ. bol'shaya ryba, "big fish," where the adjective has acquired the generic ending of its noun). The " terminal" nominative order is inevitably illustrated in this book by Russian, but Russian, compared to the " analytical " West European languages, is distinctly " backward." The appeal to Meillet and his characterisation of Aryan syntax, in which Russian syntax is included, will not disguise the disparity from the "evaluating " linguist, and this offers a cogent argument against the "progressive " attitude.

Meshchaninov's well-digested material is presented in a plain, sober style, which, however, is not altogether free from cliches. Several printer's errors in words from the rarer languages have been observed and listed by the author himself, but ti brenhin for Modern Welsh ty brenin (king's house) and 'pyov for Humbolt's 8pyov (p. 2I) require correction. There is also a great deal of possibly inevitable reiteration, which might be removed in a subsequent edition.

W. K. MATTHEWS.

Cechy v dejindch italske kultury. By Arturo Cronia; Prague, I936.

THE years between the two wars witnessed a widespread interest in Slavonic studies on the part of most of the countries of western Europe. The nations which had been earlier almost unknown to Frenchmen, Englishmen and Italians became the subject of study and interest. The story of the growth of Slavonic studies in London and Paris is already well known. This book helps to complete the picture by giving an account of the cultural relations between the peoples of Italy and Czechoslovakia.

It is the work of one of the most eminent Italian slavists, professor Arturo Cronia. He, with Wolfgang Giusti and Ettore Lo Gatto, have transformed Slavonic studies in Italy from superficial and amateur dilettantism into a well-organised scientific school which, especially in the fields of literary criticism and comparative aesthetics, has made of Italian slavistics an important part of the work being done in the West in making known the achievements and problems of East European culture.

Professor Cronia's book professes to be an account of " Bohemia in the history of Italian culture: the harvest of a thousand years." It

REVIEWS. 279

of structure. In view of this we have to agree with Baron P. Uslar that it is impossible to explain the meaning of Caucasian forms and usage in terms of Aryan grammar. This last, according to Meshchaninov, is based on the recognition of person, which has become the focus of grammatical logic, the active subject to a finite verb. In this nominative order too each part of the sentence has its own grammatical indices, which may be shared, where formal concord prevails, by primaries and secondaries alike (e.g. Russ. bol'shaya ryba, "big fish," where the adjective has acquired the generic ending of its noun). The " terminal" nominative order is inevitably illustrated in this book by Russian, but Russian, compared to the " analytical " West European languages, is distinctly " backward." The appeal to Meillet and his characterisation of Aryan syntax, in which Russian syntax is included, will not disguise the disparity from the "evaluating " linguist, and this offers a cogent argument against the "progressive " attitude.

Meshchaninov's well-digested material is presented in a plain, sober style, which, however, is not altogether free from cliches. Several printer's errors in words from the rarer languages have been observed and listed by the author himself, but ti brenhin for Modern Welsh ty brenin (king's house) and 'pyov for Humbolt's 8pyov (p. 2I) require correction. There is also a great deal of possibly inevitable reiteration, which might be removed in a subsequent edition.

W. K. MATTHEWS.

Cechy v dejindch italske kultury. By Arturo Cronia; Prague, I936.

THE years between the two wars witnessed a widespread interest in Slavonic studies on the part of most of the countries of western Europe. The nations which had been earlier almost unknown to Frenchmen, Englishmen and Italians became the subject of study and interest. The story of the growth of Slavonic studies in London and Paris is already well known. This book helps to complete the picture by giving an account of the cultural relations between the peoples of Italy and Czechoslovakia.

It is the work of one of the most eminent Italian slavists, professor Arturo Cronia. He, with Wolfgang Giusti and Ettore Lo Gatto, have transformed Slavonic studies in Italy from superficial and amateur dilettantism into a well-organised scientific school which, especially in the fields of literary criticism and comparative aesthetics, has made of Italian slavistics an important part of the work being done in the West in making known the achievements and problems of East European culture.

Professor Cronia's book professes to be an account of " Bohemia in the history of Italian culture: the harvest of a thousand years." It

This content downloaded from 195.34.79.54 on Wed, 18 Jun 2014 02:17:44 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

280 THE SLAVONIC REVIEW.

is both more and less than that. On the one hand professor Cronia has not been able to avoid saying a good bit about the bigger subject of Italian influence on Czech culture; on the other, he does not in fact tell us much of how Bohemia has influenced Italian culture, because, I suspect, that influence has been small. But what he has done is very valuable: he has given an account of every reference he has been able to find made by Italian writers to the Czechs and Slovaks and to their culture from the visit of the Apostles of the Slavs to Rome in 867 to the publication of Mussolini's Enciclopedia Italiana.

The dynamics of history have made it inevitable that the traffic of ideas between Bohemia and Italy should be largely one way. Italy had lived out one civilisation before the western Slavs appeared above the horizon of history. In the Middle Ages Italy was able to give to Bohemia the spiritual inspiration and genius for organisation of the Roman Church, and when the Czechs revolted from Romanism they were still the debtors of Italy for the humanism of the Renascence and the flowering of baroque in Czech architecture, literature and painting.

Professor Cronia rightly makes much of the visit of Cyril and Methodius to Rome as the event which first established contact between the two countries. But one suspects that the Romans welcomed the apostles, not so much because of their work in Great Moravia, but because Cyril brought with him the relics of St. Clement of Rome which he had earlier collected in the Crimea. So, too, it is with the Italian hagiographers, Gumpold, Laurentius of Monte Cassino and Canaparius, who wrote laudatory lives of the early Czech saints, Wenceslas and Vojtech-Adalbert. Their interest is catholic, not national; to their Italian biographers the saints are glorious exemplars of the Church universal; with their Czechish or Slavonic significance they are hardly concerned.

The Czechs next impinged on Italian history as the allies of the Holy Roman Emperors, particularly of Henry IV and Frederick Barbarossa, during the conflict with the Papacy in the IIth and I2th centuries. Czech princes and bishops and knights came to perform in Lombardy and Apulia the feudal obligation to assist the emperors in their " Rome journeys." There is no doubt that the Czechs became well known to Italians in the I2th century; their courage and ferocity at the sieges of Milan, Crema and Naples ensured that. They were celebrated in both the text and the pictures of the De rebus Siculis carmen of Petrus de Ebulo. But what contribution they made to Italian culture by their participation in the wars of Frederick I and Henry VI professor Cronia does not make clear. Indeed, the three Czechs of all those who took part in these Italian expeditions who might conceivably have had some cultural weight, Daniel I, bishop of Prague, prince Depold and the chronicler Vincencius, professor Cronia does not mention. I fear that all his learned references cannot conceal the truth that while in the Middle Ages the influence of Italian culture on Bohemia and Moravia

This content downloaded from 195.34.79.54 on Wed, 18 Jun 2014 02:17:44 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

REVIEWS. 281

was extensive and profound, that of Bohemia on Italian culture was negligible.

This is true even of the later Middle Ages, when the influence of St. Clara on St. Anne of Bohemia, of Petrarch on Charles IV and of the university of Bologna on that of Prague far outweighs the slight interest which Italians showed in Bohemian affairs, even though it is true that Poggio's famous letter about the constancy of Jerome of Prague at the stake and A.neas Sylvius's Historia Bohemiae do witness to the fact that the Czechs had made themselves known to the world.

Of the relations between Czech and Italian culture during the period of the submergence of the Czech nation between I620 and I790 not even the industry of professor Cronia has much to reveal, except to emphasise the greatness of Italian influence in fertilising baroque art in Bohemia and Moravia, and the popularity of St. John of Nepomuk in Italian hagiology. It is not until the Italian Risorgimento and the Czech Obrozeni made the two countries partners in a joint enterprise, -that of moderating or terminating the Habsburg tyranny under which they both suffered, that there is any substantial evidence of an effective sympathy. Italian political prisoners in the Spilberk at Brno and Czechoslovak soldiers fighting and dying unwillingly for the Austrians in Lombardy awakened Italian men of letters to the fact of Bohemian nationality and cultural achievement. Mazzini got to know and to appreciate the work not only of Mickiewicz and Krasinsky but also he read and admired in Bowring's Cheskian Anthology some of the writings of Kollar. In the latter half of the century the Italian liberals discovered Hus and were swift to build him up as a champion of integrity, truth and national independence. Italian Husitism bore strange fruit: not only Erizzo's Giovanni Hus il riformatore boemo (I878), and an operatic melodrama of hopeless love (Giovanni Hus, dramma storico, libretto by Zanandini, music by Tessaro), but also Giovanni Hus il veredico, a not unskilful appreciation of Hus as a precursor of liberalism and a champion of truth from the pen of the still undegenerate Mussolini (I913).

The first of the modern Italians to appreciate Czech literature at first hand and to convey something of its spirit to the Italians was Emilio Teza, who in a series of articles and translations, written between I866 and I9Io, afforded to his compatriots the material for building up an ever-increasing interest in Czech poetry. From his time onwards pro- fessor Cronia is able to adduce names and writings of scores of Italian men of letters, historians, philologists, compendiarists, encyclopedists and journalists who have in the last fifty years made Czechoslovak literature better known and appreciated in Italy. Gradually their work has become more scientific and accurate, more appreciative of the ethos of the Czechoslovak spirit, especially as since 1918 it has been less dependent on German or French translations.

Professor Cronia may not have succeeded in doing what the title of his book suggests, that is, in giving an account of Bohemian influence on

This content downloaded from 195.34.79.54 on Wed, 18 Jun 2014 02:17:44 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

282 THE SLAVONIC REVIEW.

Italian culture; but he has done something more in keeping with the facts, something equally valuable: he has given us a conspectus of the knowledge of Bohemia and the Czechs which the Italians have had during a thousand years.

There are appended to the book some twenty pages of a summary in Italian. I feel that this and other similar works of international interest would become deservedly much better known were they either to be written in French or English, or at least provided with a summary in one or the other of those languages.

R. R. BETTS. London.

Kultura Polska a Niemiecka-Polish and German Culture (Native elements and German influences in the structure and civilisation of medieval Poland). By Marian Friedberg; Publications of the Western Institute, Poznani, I946, 2 volumes, pp. 3Io and 363.

THIS work deals with the relations of Poland and Germany in the Middle Ages, in two parts. All questions relating to the structure of the Polish State and the community are discussed in five sections in Vol. I. All cultural developments are the subject of four sections in Vol. II. It is not possible for one man to give a competent opinion on all parts of the book, since it is really a synthesis of Polish history in which the work of many specialists has been used, archaeologists as well as historians, Polish and German, from Lelewel and Roepell to the monographs of the last quarter of a century. Until similar specialists have criticised their own sections only a general review can be given. It is a satisfactory book. Its divisions are simple and logical-a complete revolution from the old chronological account of princes and wars. The first volume deals with the genesis of the Polish State, the Piasts and their relations with the Empire, the knighthood of Poland, colonisation under German law and Polish towns. In each chapter the author's method is the same. He gives the facts based on a critical investigation of all the documents. Where there is a difference of opinion, e.g. between German and Polish historians, he gives all sides of the problem and draws his own con- clusions; and it is this latter part of each section which gives originality and vitality to the work. Thus the views of recent German historians such as Kehr, Brackmann and Sappok are given fitting prominence. The bibliography at the end is not too long, but includes all works that matter, from Lelewel to Tymieniecki, Z. Wojciechowski and the great History of Silesia edited by Kutrzeba.

To show the author's method one might turn to the controversial questions rising from the conversion of the Poles to Christianity. He puts these problems at once in historical perspective by making two comments. Firstly, that the German Church was still young in the Ioth century and had not itself the resources to convert great masses

282 THE SLAVONIC REVIEW.

Italian culture; but he has done something more in keeping with the facts, something equally valuable: he has given us a conspectus of the knowledge of Bohemia and the Czechs which the Italians have had during a thousand years.

There are appended to the book some twenty pages of a summary in Italian. I feel that this and other similar works of international interest would become deservedly much better known were they either to be written in French or English, or at least provided with a summary in one or the other of those languages.

R. R. BETTS. London.

Kultura Polska a Niemiecka-Polish and German Culture (Native elements and German influences in the structure and civilisation of medieval Poland). By Marian Friedberg; Publications of the Western Institute, Poznani, I946, 2 volumes, pp. 3Io and 363.

THIS work deals with the relations of Poland and Germany in the Middle Ages, in two parts. All questions relating to the structure of the Polish State and the community are discussed in five sections in Vol. I. All cultural developments are the subject of four sections in Vol. II. It is not possible for one man to give a competent opinion on all parts of the book, since it is really a synthesis of Polish history in which the work of many specialists has been used, archaeologists as well as historians, Polish and German, from Lelewel and Roepell to the monographs of the last quarter of a century. Until similar specialists have criticised their own sections only a general review can be given. It is a satisfactory book. Its divisions are simple and logical-a complete revolution from the old chronological account of princes and wars. The first volume deals with the genesis of the Polish State, the Piasts and their relations with the Empire, the knighthood of Poland, colonisation under German law and Polish towns. In each chapter the author's method is the same. He gives the facts based on a critical investigation of all the documents. Where there is a difference of opinion, e.g. between German and Polish historians, he gives all sides of the problem and draws his own con- clusions; and it is this latter part of each section which gives originality and vitality to the work. Thus the views of recent German historians such as Kehr, Brackmann and Sappok are given fitting prominence. The bibliography at the end is not too long, but includes all works that matter, from Lelewel to Tymieniecki, Z. Wojciechowski and the great History of Silesia edited by Kutrzeba.

To show the author's method one might turn to the controversial questions rising from the conversion of the Poles to Christianity. He puts these problems at once in historical perspective by making two comments. Firstly, that the German Church was still young in the Ioth century and had not itself the resources to convert great masses

This content downloaded from 195.34.79.54 on Wed, 18 Jun 2014 02:17:44 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions