The Sausage-Seller Suddenly Speaks Vernacular: The First Italian Translation of Aristophanes’ Knights

In 1545 two Italian physicians published in Venice the first vernacular translation of the eleven Aristophanic comedies. But, in spite of what they write in the prefatory letter addressed to Camillo Gambara, Pietro and Bartolomeo Rositini did not know Greek very well (or, at least, their knowledge of the ancient language was surely not enough for them to understand and translate such a difficult poet), and so they made extensive use of the first complete version of Aristophanes in a language other than Greek – namely, Andrea Divo’s Latin translation, first published in 1538 in Venice. Through a detailed analysis of the first Italian translation of Aristophanes’ Knights, this essay will show not only the undeniable debt of the Rositini brothers toward their predecessor, but also the creativity and imagination displayed by the two amateur translators, especially through the frequent use of comic words or expressions taken from the Venetian vernacular.