Il mito di Ganimede attraverso i millenni. Dal greco arcaico al bilinguismo medievale all’italiano contemporaneo

This monograph addresses several gaps in current research on the myth of Ganymede by presenting a comprehensive review of Greek and Latin sources alongside a systematic study of Italian literature. It also offers a comparative analysis of iconography and the contributions of other literatures in the Romance and Germanic languages. Ganymede first appears in the Iliad as a remarkably beautiful youth, the son of Tros, whose myth brings renown to the Trojans through its extraordinary narrative. Over the millennia, he has come to exemplify a human attaining both immortality and eternal youth by ascending to the heavens because of his beauty. Various Greek sources, numerous Latin adaptations, and modern reinterpretations consistently depict Ganymede as cupbearer and lover of Zeus on Olympus. However, he also undergoes euhemeristic and allegorical reinterpretations, including an association with the constellation Aquarius from the Hellenistic period. Following an examination of Greek and Latin sources – from Homer to Plato, and from Virgil to Ovid – the book places particular emphasis on Latin Medieval literature, the transformative vision in Dante’s Commedia, and the wide-ranging treatments of the myth by authors such as Petrarch and Boccaccio. A pivotal shift occurs during the Renaissance marked by the Italian, Latin, and Greek interpretations of Poliziano and the reworkings found in the chivalric epics of Boiardo and Ariosto. An in-depth examination is devoted to the “Ganimede rapito”, a poem in fifty octaves attributed, in its only manuscript transmission, to a youthful Torquato Tasso. Finally, the monograph explores some original interpretations of the myth from the Baroque period to the Twentieth century, discussing authors such as Marino, Alfieri, Saba, and Gadda, and concludes by examining the myth’s enduring presence in contemporary culture, as evidenced in marketing, the visual arts, and poetry.