• Equivalent to the proverb, “Do in Rome as the Romans do.” ↩
• Giampolo, or Ciampolo, say all the commentators; but nothing more is known of him than his name, and what he tells us here of his history. ↩
• It is not very clear which King Thibault is here meant, but it is probably King Thibault IV , the crusader and poet, born 1201, died 1253. His poems have been published by Lévêque de la Ravallière, under the title of “ Les Poésies du Roi de Navarre ”; and in one of his songs (Chanson 53) he makes a clerk address him as the Bons Rois Thiebaut . Dante cites him two or three times in his Volgari Eloquio , and may have taken this expression from his song, as he does afterwards. Canto XXVIII 135, lo Re joves , the Re Giovarje , or Young King, from the songs of Bertrand de Born. ↩
• A Latian, that is to say, an Italian. ↩
• This Frate Gomita was a Sardinian in the employ of Nino de’ Visconti, judge in the jurisdiction of Gallura, the “gentle Judge Nino” of Purgatorio VIII 53. The frauds and peculations of the Friar brought him finally to the gallows. Gallura is the northeastern jurisdiction of the island. ↩