The reference to Dante and Petrarch

Foscolo, faced with so much wealth of genius (Machiavelli, Michelangelo, Galileo) can only raise an ecstatic hymn in front of the beauty of Florence, where so many geniuses were born or raised.

Obviously the immediate reference is to Dante Alighieri, who however did not die in Florence, but in exile, in Ravenna, in 1321.

Foscolo was unable to see this monument - which is a cenotaph, that is, a bodyless tomb, a memory - because it it was made only in 1819: however the poetic inspiration to the first father of the Italian language is clear.

Francesco Petrarca, a Florentine father, also considered the second father of our language, is also remembered.

Compared to Greek poetry, classical, "naked", Petrarca's poetry, extremely refined, is chastely covered by a white veil.

Petrarch is buried in Arquà, in the Euganean Hills, where the poet died in 1374.