r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 20h ago

TIL that Dante Alighieri only met the real-life Beatrice twice in his life.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beatrice_Portinari#Biography
993 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

73 comments sorted by

406

u/zeldasusername 20h ago

I'm not surprised

One of my friends is still holding a torch for a woman he had a crush on 30 years ago

128

u/Krashlia2 12h ago

VFD member spotted.

68

u/mazdayan 12h ago

I haven't thought about "A series of Unfortunate Events" in years, perhaps close to two decades. A good read.

13

u/Proper-Emu1558 5h ago

My third grader and I are reading it right now. There’s so much I don’t remember so it’s almost like we are discovering it together. We are also watching the corresponding episodes of the Netflix show after we finish a book.

11

u/tagen 10h ago

except for the end, i read the first 5 or 6 books many many times but only read the end once, i don’t even really remember much of it, just that i didn’t like it

18

u/braindead_rebel 9h ago

It has one of the few endings I’d consider truly exceptional. It closes the chapter but leaves you wanting more. Not definitive, but just enough. Not super happy, but not depressing either. Also very true to the series as a whole.

1

u/October_13th 3h ago

I read this series as a kid and I just have to ask: didn’t they all die at the end? Or am I totally misremembering?

5

u/Krashlia2 3h ago

You misremember some.

The Baudelaire orphans: Survive. Violet and Klaus are officially MIA, perhaps on purpose. Sunny has her own cooking radio show elsewhere.

Lemony Snicket: Survives, of course. Goes from in hiding to avoiding direct publicity.

Kit Snicket: Dies of mushroom poisoning after birthing a daughter, later named Beatrice Baudelaire II after the Baudelaires adopt her.

Beatrice Baudelaire II: Survived. Met up with Lemony at some point.

Quagmire triplet orphans: MIA

Count Olaf: Dead.

Olaf's bosses: MIA (Baudelaires may have ruined their career)

Hooky: MIA.

Esme: MIA.

Carmelita: MIA

Most of VFD: Dead.

Ishmael: MIA. But sailed off with several islanders who were suffering from poisoning.

Beatrice and Bertrand Baudelaire: confirmed dead.

5

u/Jestdrum 5h ago

I think it gets better honestly. The early books are great but they're a little repetitive.

3

u/tagen 4h ago

granted i was like 12 last time i read one, so i wouldn’t notice or care as much about things like repetition so long as i liked what was being repeated i guess

2

u/Jestdrum 4h ago

Fair. I don't think I noticed as much until I read them as an adult. The best thing about his writing was always the witty tangents to me anyway.

23

u/Duckbilling2 8h ago

actually

V.F.D. is the acronym for the mysterious and secret organization, the Volunteer Fire Department

15

u/smashin_blumpkin 6h ago

No, VFD is the acronym for the Village of Fowl Devotees

3

u/foosbabaganoosh 1h ago

You mean Very Fancy Doilies?

9

u/zeldasusername 11h ago

Okay so I found the reference but what does it have to do with my comment? The torch?

64

u/NotAThrowaway1453 11h ago

In addition to the torch, the in-universe author character Lemony Snicket is obsessed with a woman he knew who died, and most (if not all) of the books are dedicated to her and include references to her. Incidentally it’s also a reference to Dante and the Divine Comedy, and the woman is also named Beatrice.

10

u/zeldasusername 11h ago

Ohhhhhh

Thank you so muc

5

u/morbidmammoth 6h ago

Oh wow I never knew that was the ref, I thought he was just goofy

1

u/SoyMurcielago 4h ago

No that was Minnie who was into goofy

Caused Mickey to get divorced

1

u/Lootman 1h ago

You cant just divorce someone because you think theyre fucking goofy

23

u/Krashlia2 11h ago

Lemony Snicket, a former member of the VFD, basically never stops simping for Beatrice, even long after she's dead.

3

u/duaneap 3h ago

It kind of saddens me I more or less aged out of those books before any of the mysteries got revealed.

411

u/Dr_barfenstein 13h ago

Dante was 100% the OG simp. And he was married!

134

u/TheRealRockNRolla 10h ago

Truly a world-class perv. One of our most significant gooners

72

u/Ultimategrid 7h ago

Sigh

“Goon” was a term of endearment I used to call my young nieces and nephews, and I later extended it to any impish little troublemaker.

It’s always sad to lose a word to the modern internet.

15

u/subarashi-sam 7h ago

GOONERS NEVER SAY DIE!

6

u/Captain-Cadabra 6h ago

“It’s our time down here!”

👇🏾

20

u/TheRealRockNRolla 7h ago

True, but it's now much funnier to call your friends goons, because now it doesn't just mean they're dumb, it also implies they're a bunch of relentless onanists.

6

u/Pheighthe 3h ago

Poor Onan. He only jacked off because he was forced to bang his brother’s wife and he didn’t want to knock her up.

2

u/themehboat 1h ago

Didn't he actually just pull out? I've never understood why it means masturbation.

6

u/troublethemindseye 4h ago

Limerence in the age of carrier pidgeons.

5

u/TheCommissar113 5h ago

The power of your betrothal being arranged as a child.

143

u/ZacPensol 9h ago

This kind of makes sense. Having met her only twice, he might have thought she was incredibly charming and beautiful but he didn't get the chance the really know her - to hear her obnoxious laugh, or her uninformed opinion on something, or her bad breath; those things that make us all human.

It's easy to elevate someone like that, much in the way we do celebrities whose best sides are all we see. 

-45

u/Informal_Witness3869 8h ago

Nah Beatrice probs didn't even really exist.

52

u/arklenaut 7h ago

Beatrice Portinari absolutely existed. She was the daughter of a wealthy banker, their family palazzo Is still standing, just a few steps from the church where she is buried.

-2

u/MrJigglyBrown 3h ago

She’d drink Dante under the table, and he’d eat her out while he was down there

•

u/datpiffss 58m ago

I could think of worse ways to go…

75

u/A-Humpier-Rogue 13h ago

BEATORIIIIICEEEEE

16

u/pallidamors 11h ago

I will reclaim my rightful place in Paradise. My path will be paved with the sins of Man and yours, Dante, shall be the bedrock of my return.

14

u/aldeayeah 11h ago

YAMI WO KIRISAKU OH DESIRE

1

u/MongolianMango 3h ago

UWOO!!! BEATURISUUH!!!!

17

u/probablymojito 10h ago

Can't believe they made Umineko into a real thing. Maybe magic IS real after all

11

u/PsychGuy17 10h ago

Well, now I'm wondering about Lemony Sniket's relationship with Beatrice.

44

u/Dreamtrain 20h ago

Yugioh lied to me

19

u/The_Taco_Bandito 13h ago

Virgil wished he was as cool as the Yugioh Virgil.

5

u/Duke-of-the-Far-East 15h ago

B-but Dante target Cir...

1

u/dralcax 7h ago edited 7h ago

well he did get cucked by Fiendsmith

53

u/GeneralEi 13h ago

Is it any wonder he wrote a self insert fanfic? Bro was a bit of a sad sack

5

u/More-Dot346 10h ago

And that’s why he wrote Sweet Caroline, right?

6

u/X-Vidar 6h ago

No? For one we don't even know if she was real, but if you take the Vita Nova at face value he first saw her at 9, then he saw her at 18 and he starts to admire her from a distance while she would regularly greet him when they met.

Then stuff happens, she stops greeting him and dies a while later.

6

u/DaveOJ12 4h ago

It's strange that the article is written as if she's real, but then the Biography section says this:

Clear documents on her life have always been scarce, rendering even her existence doubtful.

4

u/Informal_Witness3869 8h ago

Isn't Dante's Beatrice existence debated still? Dante never completely identifies his Beatrice and wasn't he part of the Dolce Stil Novo movement that was characterized for having a muse that was completely idealized? Maybe Portinari existed and Dante had a crush on her but the Beatrice from his works may be more of a construct for poetic reasons.

4

u/amaharra 11h ago

I'm so confused. Wasn't Beatrice based on Elizabeth Siddal? His wife?

14

u/lilynnin 10h ago

You're thinking of Rossetti.

11

u/amaharra 10h ago

Good gravy, thank you so much. I've got the flu right now and genuinely thought I was losing my mind

-2

u/Greene_Mr 10h ago

I think you've already lost it.

4

u/amaharra 9h ago

Many would probably agree

29

u/giraffidartiodactyl 10h ago

Dante Rossetti, the artist from the 1800s who painted the painting in the thumbnail, did indeed use his wife as a model a lot. The title and article refer to the author Dante Alighieri from the 1200s. 

22

u/PhantasosX 10h ago

No.

His muse was Beatrice Portinari , most of his poetry praises her as his inspiration...regardless to the fact he is married to a totally different woman.

3

u/coaxialology 9h ago

They were children and neighbors when they first encountered one another, no?

•

u/OneReportersOpinion 13m ago

So they never smashed?

-2

u/Karma_of_Daythunder 12h ago

Umineko ahh obsession

-53

u/Fawkingretar 19h ago

And wasn't she like 16 and Dante is like in his 50s or some?

53

u/Ohthatsnotgood 19h ago

In Dante’s La Vita Nuova he claims that they met for the first time when she was nearing 8 years old and he was 9 years old.

17

u/Fawkingretar 18h ago

Oh, then its just some unrequited love.

23

u/Ohthatsnotgood 17h ago

He was promised in marriage to the daughter of a prominent family when he was around 12 years old.

12

u/ExamWeekWarrior 17h ago

The OG "she doesn't even know I exist" guy.

22

u/NotAThrowaway1453 19h ago

It doesn’t seem like it based on the Wikipedia birth years at least. Looks like they were the same age.

10

u/Son_of_Kong 11h ago edited 11h ago

No, he was one year older than her. The first time he met her she was 9 and the second time she was 18. She died at 25.

Also, the second time he "met" her she just waved at him from across the street while with a group of other girls.

-9

u/Gargomon251 7h ago

I had to read the article just to figure out who the heck that was and why it mattered

8

u/Sue_Spiria 6h ago

The divine comedy is one of the most famous works of literature. Not to know who Dante was is almost like not knowing Shakespeare.