Tra le fonti del De vita solitaria: Petrarca e la Historia orientalis di Giacomo di Vitry

Among the many sources used by Petrarch in chapter 2.9 of his De vita solitaria, dealing with Peter the Hermit and his role in the history of the crusades, there are Church Fathers and French-language texts. A 13th-century latin text, the Historia orientalis of Jacques de Vitry, is particularly relevant, albeit never explicitly cited, especially for data on Muhammad. The identification of this source makes it possible a better understanding and contextualization of the information available to Petrarch on the remote eastern population of the Brahmans, which he keenly treated in De vita solitaria, 2.11.