be taken relatively and not absolutely. This is made clear by Convivio, l. 5: 47 ff., where Dante asserts that 'in the ancient writings of the Latin comedies and tragedies which cannot be changed we see the same speech that we have to-day.' The Latinity of the present work would have made Cicero's hair stand on end. Compare Convivio, I. 5: 50-52n.
CHAPTER X
[Declining to decide the question which of the three languages of oïl, oc, and sì merits the preference, Dante, after stating (he claims which each of them might urge, confines himself to the vernacular Italian and enumerates the principal dialects of Italy, classified with reference to their position west or east of the Apennines, and refers to the numerous subordinate variations of speech.]
Our language being now spoken under three forms (as has been said above), we feel, when comparing it with itself, according to the three forms that it has assumed, such great hesitation and timidity in placing [its different forms] in the balances, that we dare not, in our comparison, give the preference to any of them, except in so far a we find that the founders of grammar have taken sic as the adverb of affirmation, which seems to confer [10] a kind of precedence on the Italians, who say sì. For each of the three divisions [of language] defends its pretensions by copious evidence. That of oïl, then, alleges on its behalf that because of its being an easier and pleasanter vernacular language, whatever has been translated into or composed in vernacular prose belongs to
