Includes index

Early folk literature and minstrelsy -- St. Francis of Assisi -- Frederick the Second and his circle -- Poetry of the latter half of the thirteenth century -- Prose of the latter half of the thirteenth century -- Dante in Florence -- Dante in exile -- The Divine comedy -- Contemporaries of Dante -- Petrarch -- Boccaccio -- Contemporaries of Petrarch and Boccaccio -- Writers of the late fourteenth century -- The militant humanists -- Lorenzo de'Medici -- Florentine humanists -- Luigi Pulci and other Florentine writers -- Neopolitan, Ferrarese, and other writers -- Bembo -- Ariosto -- Michelangelo and other poets -- Machiavelli and Guicciardini -- Castiglione and other prose writers -- Comedy and tragedy -- Poetry of the mid-sixteenth century -- Prose of the mid-sixteenth century -- The pastoral play and the Commedia dell'Arte -- Torquato Tasso -- Giordano Bruno -- The drama in the late sixteenth century -- Marino and other poets -- Campanella -- Galileo and other prose writers -- Early opera -- A stagnant interval -- Metastasio and other Arcadians -- Vico -- Goldoni and Carlo Gozzi -- Parini and other writers -- Alfieri -- Foscolo and other writers -- Manzoni -- Leopardi -- Contemporaries of Manzoni and Leopardi -- Mazzini -- Contemporaries of Mazzini -- Carducci and other poets -- De Sanctis, Verga, and other writers -- Pascoli and other poets -- Fogazzaro and other writers -- Writers of the twentieth century.