, as we shall see, was altogether
different. Nevertheless it was distinctly lyric and secular and was
therefore as near the spirit of the popular music of the time as any new
attempt could well approach. It had, too, in embryonic form all that
apparatus for the enchantment of the sense and the beguilement of the
intellect which in the following century was the chief attraction of a
lyric drama, partly opera, partly spectacle and partly ballet.

[Footnote 12: George Hogarth, in his "Memoirs of the Musical
Drama," London, 1838, declares that this "Orfeo" was sung
throughout, but he offers no ground for his assertion, which must
be taken as a mere conjecture based on the character of the text.
Dr. Burney, in his "General History of Music," makes a similar
assertion, but does not support it.]

CHAPTER V

Poliziano's "Favola Di Orfeo"

In the year 1472 the Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga, who had stayed long in
Bologna, returned to Mantua. He was received with jubilant celebrations.
There were banquets, processions and public rejoicings. It would have
been quite unusual if there had been no festival play of some kind. It
is uncertain whether Poliziano's "Orfeo" was written for this occasion,
but there seems to be a fair amount of reason for believing that it was.
At any rate it could not have been produced later than 1483, for we know
it was made in honor of this Cardinal and that he died in that year.

If the "Orfeo" was played in 1472 it must have been written when its
author was no more than eighteen years of age. But even at that age he
was already famous. He was born in Montepulciano on July 14, 1454. The
family name was Ambrogini, but from the Latinized name of his native
town turned into Italian he constructed the title of Poliziano, by which
he was afterward known. At the age of ten he was sent to Florence, then
governed by Lorenzo de Medici. He studied under the famous Greeks
Argyropoulos and Kallistos and the equally famous Italians, Landino and
Ficino.[13] Gifted with precocious talent, he wrote at the age of
sixteen, astonishing epigrams in Latin and Greek. At seventeen he began
to translate the "Iliad" into Latin hexameters, and his success with the
second book attracted the attention of Lorenzo himself. Poliziano was
now known as the "Homeric youth." It was not long before he was hailed
the king of Italian scholars and the literary genius of his time. When
he was but thirty he be