Laura de Sade tra leggenda e identificazione storica: la testimonianza inedita di un biografo di Petrarca

The historical identity of Laura has always been a matter of discussion among Petrarch's scholars. Vellutello was the first (1525) mentioning the question, by talking of an "invecchiata opinione" which wants Laura as member of the Sade family of Avignon. To that opinion Vellutello opposed instead the hypothesis Laura was descending from Henry de Chiabau, seigneur of Cabrieres. The Sade-hypothesis was however die hard, being drawn on again, with a more relevant lot of arguments and justifications, by the Abbé Jacques-François-Paul-Aldonce de Sade, best known as the uncle of Marquis de Sade. During the 19th and 20th century such opinion was constantly and persistently opposed as legendary by the official critics, with the exception of rare cases. The discovery of the autograph of Luigi Peruzzi and of the complete draft of his Petrarch's biography - which mentions in several points the belonging of Laura to the "famiglia de' Salsi" (de Sade) - gives an authoritative precedent (between 1470 and 1475) to Vellutello's account.