relatively more concentrated.

COMEDY.--Comedy, as a rule very gross in character, enjoyed wide esteem,
especially in the fourteenth century. What were performed under the title
of _Carnival Games_ were generally nothing but _fables_ in
dialogue, domestic scenes, incidents in the market, interludes at the
cross-roads. Here was the vulgar plebeian joy allowing itself full
licence. The literary activity of Germany in the Middle Ages was at least
equal to that of the three literary western nations.




CHAPTER VIII


THE MIDDLE AGES: ITALY

Troubadours of Southern Italy. Neapolitan and Sicilian Poets. Dante,
Petrarch, Boccaccio.


THE TROUBADOURS.--The Italian literature of the Middle Ages is intimately
associated with the literature of the Troubadours in the south of France.
To express the case more definitely, the literature styled "Provencal,"
apart from mere differences of dialect, extended from the Limousine to
the Roman campagna, and French literature existed only in the northern
and central provinces of France, the rest being Provencal-Italian
literature. The Italian Troubadours, by which I mean those born in Italy,
who must at least be cited, are Malaspina, Lanfranc Cicala, Bartolomeo