Ossian, Omero e il bardo morlacco. Su Giulio Bajamonti e la scoperta degli antichi slavi

The essay "Il morlacchismo di Omero" (1797), written in Italian by Giulio Bajamonti, is the first contribution to the romantic Croatian literature. At the light of Vico’s "Scienza nuova" (1744), Bajamonti introduces Homer’s paradigm to demonstrate that the way of life of the Vlach (i.e. Morlack), who inhabited the interior of Dalmatia, shows close analogies with the heroes of the Iliad. Like Homer and the Highland bards of the Ossian’s poems (Macpherson), the Vlach sings the ancient epic verses accompanied by a gusle. Following this paradigm Bajamonti recognizes in the Vlach’s poetry the authentic national spirit of the South Slavic people. The article analyses: the passage from the exotic Vlach, as a model of the primitive group or the bon sauvage of the Enlightenment (abbé Fortis), to the incorrupted Slavic people different from the Dalmatians devoted to the Italian culture; Bajamonti’s friendship with Ðuro Ferić, Michael Denis and Melchiorre Cesarotti, translators of the ancient Slavic songs, Homer and Ossian, in the floating context of the Bardendichtung and primitivism; Bajamonti’s romantic point of view, who, as Herder, rejects also any classicistic misinterpretation of the people’s poetry ; Bajamonti’s aim in establishing the confrontation with the ancient Greek without Ossian, and the reason why he substitutes the Gaelic bard with his own Vlach.