The want was supplied by representations of the comedies of Plautus and Terence, frequent both in and out of Rome, which for the actors were an incomparable exercise in Latin as the language of daily life. A few years later, in the pontificate of Paul II, the learned Cardinal of Teano (probably Niccoló Forteguerra of Pistoia) became famous for his critical labors in this branch of scholarship. He set to work upon the most defective plays of Plautus, which were destitute even of a list of the characters, and went carefully through the whole remains of this author, chiefly with an eye to the language. Possibly it was he who gave the first impulse for the public representations of these plays. Afterwards Pomponius Laetus took up the same subject, and acted as producer when Plautus was put on the stage in the houses of great churchmen. That these representations became less in common after 1520, is mentioned by Giovio, as we have seen, among the causes of the decline of eloquence.
We may mention, in conclusion, the analogy between Ciceronianism in literature and the revival of Vitruvius by the architects in the sphere of art. And here, too, the law holds good which prevails elsewhere in the history of the Renaissance, that each artistic movement is preceded by a corresponding movement in the general culture of the age. In this case, the interval is not more than about twenty years, if we reckon from Cardinal Adrian of Corneto (1505) to the first avowed Vitruvians.
The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy
by Jacob Burckhardt
Part Three: The Revival of Antiquity
Chapter 9 - Antiquity as the Common Source: 1 2 3
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