Franciscae meae laudes e la poetria nova di Charles Baudelaire

This study examines Franciscae meae laudes by Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867), the only poem in Les Fleurs du Mal not written in French. It is in fact a Latin poem of 33 octosyllabic lines, inspired by late medieval hymns. After reconstructing the circumstances that led the author to compose the piece, the analysis focuses on its metre, emphasising how it presupposes the Latin pronunciation used in France at the time. This is followed by a detailed examination of the poem, with particular attention to the language employed by the poet and the medieval Latin poetic models that influenced him; in this section, several errors made by earlier scholars are also corrected. The study concludes with two appendices. The first discusses a parody of Franciscae meae laudes in macaronic Latin, anonymously published in the journal Figaro on 4 June 1857, and also corrects past interpretative errors. The second examines Jean Richepin’s (1849-1926) In honorem Baldelarii novempedalis prosa, published in 1896, which was heavily inspired by Franciscae meae laudes.