HILARIUS CANTIUNCULA AND HIS BOOK OFPOEMS
DENNIS E. RHODES
T H E present brief investigation arose out ofthe discovery of
an unfortunate error in theBritish Museum's Short-title Catalogue
of Italian Books 1463-1600 (1958), where onpage 327 we read the
following entry:
Hilarius, a writer of Latin verse in Germany. Cantiunculae
hendecasyllaborum liber. ApudP. Petramsanctam: [Gualtiero Scotto:]
Venetijs, 1555. 8°. i i4O9.aa.43(i).
It was not reahzed at the time that in fact Cantiuncula is the
author's surname, not partofthe title ofthe book. He was Hilarius
Cantiuncula, in the vernacular Hilaire Chansonnette,whom nowadays
we should look upon rather as a Frenchman than a German. His
fatherwas Claude Chansonnette (1497 ?-1549), a native of Metz,
bilingual in French and German,ŵ ho gained a reputation as a
professor of law, mainly at Basle, where many of his lettersare
still preserved.' He became Rector ofthe University at a very early
age. Claude wasmarried in 1525, and Hilaire, the first-born of a
family of at least three sons and onedaughter, must therefore have
been born about 1526 or a little later. His father wasa constant
traveller in many parts of Europe, and sent his son to study in
Erfurt atidFreiburg-im-Breisgau. At the latter university, where he
matriculated on 23 October1548, Hilarius was taught by the great
Professor of Greek, Johann Hartung (1505-79), towhom he afterwards
addressed a poem. But shortly the young Hilarius, as restless as
hisfather, was off again, this time to Italy, where he seems to
have matriculated at Paduasoon after i August 1550.- By 15 March
1555, when he came to write the preface to theonly volume of poems
which he ever lived to publish, he was still in Padua, which
accountsfor three facts: that he addressed it to two young brothers
of noble stock, friends of hisfrom Styria, Joannes Fridericus and
Ferdinandus Hofmann, who were also studying inPadua; that the
volume contains an introductory poem by Francesco Robortello of
Udine(1516-67), soon to gain a considerable reputation as poet,
orator, and critic; and finallythat the book was published in
Venice. The poems in it are addressed to a wide audienceof his
friends, consisting of young aristocrats and others from as far
apart as Innsbruck,Salzburg, Styria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and
Nuremberg. Two poems are addressed,no doubt for the sake of local
diplomacy, to Vincentius Dioedus, the Prefect of Padua,and
Augustinus Valerius, Patrician of Venice. Two close relatives of
Hilarius to whomother poems are addressed were his late brother,
Joannes Jacobus (who must have died
22
very young) and his brother-in-law. Baron Bolgangus (i.e.
Wolfgang) a Saurau. Anotherdistinguished scholar for whom Hilarius
wrote two poems was Petrus Lotichius Secundus(1528-60) who was in
Padua for medical research at this time: one of these poems
wasaddressed to the Muses, on the second book of elegies by
Lotichius. When we look at thelittle book of poems entitled Petri
Lotichii Secundi Carminum lihellus, printed at Bolognain 1556 (of
which a copy was presented to the British Library only recently),
we find thatLotichius in his turn wrote two poems to Hilarius
Cantiuncula, one of them entitled 'Depeste Patauina, & obitu
Danielis Stibari'.^
Hilarius had also struck up an intimate friendship with
Basilius, only son of BonifaciusAmerbach, of the illustrious
printer-publisher-humanist family of Basle. Hilarius him-self has
been described as 'un aimable jeune homme, ardent, enthousiaste,
peut etre unpeu leger\ and this seems a just assessment of his
character.^ Certainly for a young mannot yet 30 years of age, he
was not lacking in friends. His book, Hendecasyllahorum Ither^was
published in 1555 by Plinio Pietrasanta, a well-known publisher of
Venice (mostactive in the years 1553-7) ^^^ *̂ he device on the
title-page is that ofthe printer GualtieroScoto (active 1550 5).̂
He never lived to write another book, but at least the reputation
ofa few of these poems lingered on into the seventeenth century,
when they were reprintedin Delitiae poet arum Germanorum kuius
superiortsque aevi illustrium, collected by A. F. G. G.(i.e. Janus
Gruterus, 'Antwerpiensis Filius Gualteri Gruteri') and published at
Frankfurtin 1612. Soon after the publication of his poems at Venice
in 1555, Hilarius Cantiunculaonce more left Padua for Germany, and
it must have been shortly before 25 August 1556,by which time he
may have reached his thirtieth birthday, that he was drowned ina
swimming accident in the Rhine.^
1 See A. Rivier, Claude Chansonnette, jurisconsultemessin, et
ses lettres inedites (Bruxelles, 1880);E. P. Bremer, 'Claude
Chansonette aus Metz,I497(?)-I55o', jfahrhuch der Gesellschaft
furlothringische Geschtchte, Jahrg. 5, Hft. i (Metz,1893), and the
various volumes ofthe Amerhach-korrespondenz (Basel, 1942- ).
Larousse'sDictionary is wildly inaccurate in stating thatClaude
died in 1560.
2 I can find no mention of him in Acta graduumacademicorum ah
anno 133S ad annum i^^^o(Padova, 1971), but this volume is
difficult to use,having no index. The entries in it end on 31
Dec.
1550.3 On the plague in Padua in 1555 see (among other
works) Ludovicus Pasinus, De pestilentia Patauinaanno 7555
(Patauii, 1556). The noted scholarDaniel Stibarus, native of
Wurzburg, died on7 Aug. 1555.
4 Rivier, op. cit., p. 82 n. 3.5 Rivier's remark (ibid., p. 22
n. 3) that the book of
poems was published at Venice in 1655 is, ofcourse, a misprint
for 1555.
6 For the best account of Hilarius see the excellentedition of
the Amerhachkorrespondenz, Bd. VI(Basel, 1967), 235-7. He is
frequently mentionedin his father's many letters to the
Amerbachfamily, from which it is clear that he had beensomething of
a problem child.
