Un poema epico neolatino su Ivan Mazepa

Abstract

A Neo-Latin Poem on Ivan Mazepa

The author publishes for the first time, translates into Italian, and analyzes a Neo-Latin poem devoted to the Ukrainian hetman Ivan Mazepa, which celebrates the conquest of a few Turkish fortresses along the Dnipro (1695). A peculiar feature of this poem is that, on the one side, it is one of the few, or even the only epic poem devoted to the Ukrainian hetman, while on the other it is modeled, at least partly, on Virgil’s Aeneid. The poem, however, also shows some features of the panegyric genre. The author points out the many linguistic-literary and historical reminiscences, especially those of Latin epic authors and Roman history, but also of the panegyric discourse elaborated by the Latin-Polish rhetorical tradition. Through these reminiscences, the author of the poem aspires to insert the history of Ukraine-Hetmanščyna into the European Latinitas by underlining the glorious deeds of its hetman Ivan Mazepa, whose fundamental contribution to the antemurale christianitatis and to Russian history only recently has begun to be assessed in an objective and unprejudiced manner.