‘L'arte in prattica’: Reconstructing Orazio Toscanella's language ideology

Abstract This paper examines the dynamics which led to the formation of Italian by reconstructing the language ideology of the teacher and polygraph Orazio Toscanella, i.e. one of those cultural mediators who, in the sixteenth‐century Venetian printing market, were actively involved in the promotion of the vernacular. Looking for traces of Toscanella’s language ideology through a range of paratextual materials (title‐pages, prefatory letters), we reconstruct his ideas on the vernacular. These reveal an eclecticism which is not entirely coherent, but which can be understood in light of this polygraph’s pedagogical objectives, and of his pressing need to respond to the market’s requirements. By focusing on Toscanella’s translation of Vives’ Exercitatio , published in 1568 under the title Flores Italici , we then compare the ideas conveyed in the paratexts with the author’s linguistic usage in the text: we thus show that Toscanella’s eclectic ideas on language and his need to accommodate the market’s requirements also shaped the type of vernacular he proposed to his readers. This focus on Toscanella’s paratextual production allows us to investigate the way in which the ‘high’ vernacular model was re‐elaborated and disseminated to a broad audience, and the extent to which such re‐elaboration was influenced by commercial concerns.