Por uma Imitazione delle cose antiche: recepção e tradução de Tito Lívio em Maquiavel.

Abstract

This dissertation appraises the effects of Machiavelli’s reading of Livy’s work, in his Discorsi sopra la prima deca di Tito Livio, observing the ways whereby he translated the happenings of livian Rome in order to render them into objects of imitation (imitazione) in the 16th century. The study is characterized by the laying together of the works of both writers, an exercise which made possible the exam of livian themes as appropriated by Machiavelli. A mapping has been drawn of the context of Florence during the Renaissance, as well as of the reception that greco-roman writers had therein, mainly as it regards the social cultural conditions which contributed to Machiavelli’s access to Livy’s work. Thenceforward, the emphasis lay, on one part, on Machiavelli’s notions of history and politics, and, on the other hand, on livian/ classical themes therein circumscribed: laws, conflicts, religion, virtue, fortune, among others. At the end of the study, it was possible to ascertain the action of historicity in Livy’s work, seeing the transformation wraught on it by Machiavelli, who, in rewriting them, produced a work in which he presents a series of “new” and “modern” arguments, but arguments which have their bases in roman antiquity.