CHAPTER II

I The Legends of the Middle Ages were the fruitful source of the Poetry of the Renascence. Greek mythology and Roman mysticism yielded place to the humanistic tenets of Platonism and the heroic narratives of Christianity. Every temple and church and every monument and monastery became the treasury of moral and religious stories. Traditions of the past were the foundation of the histories of the present and these superstructures the forecasts of the future. Venice, by the reason of her unique environment, gathered a…