Editing Coluccio Salutati (section)

==Works==
Composed of hundreds of letters, Coluccio’s Epistolary <ref>Epistolario di Coluccio Salutati, ed. Novati, Francesco, 1859-1915</ref><ref>Political Writings. Coluccio Salutati. Ed. Stefano U. Baldassarri. Transl. Rolf Bagemihl. The I Tatti Renaissance Library 64</ref> deals with a wide array of subjects. Structurally, the collection is divided into two strands: private letters, addressed to friends and acquaintances, and public letters, written in the name of the Republic of Florence. Stylistically, Coluccio’s epistolary stands out for its departure from the medieval letter-writing style, which was dense with the rhetoric of the ars dictandi, making way instead for a tone of cordial and stoic serenity inspired by Cicero’s ''Letters to Friends'' (''Epistulae ad familiares'') and the lexical repertoire of other classical authors, thus producing what has been defined as a form of mixed Latin.

Among his more explicitly philosophical writings, the ''De seculo et religione'' <ref>Tina Marshall, Coluccio Salutati: On the World and Religious Life. The I Tatti Renaissance Library, 62</ref> is a key text in which Salutati defends the compatibility of active civic life with Christian religious devotion. Against the view that moral life necessitated withdrawal from worldly affairs, he argued that public engagement, when guided by virtue, was not only permissible but ennobling. A related concern animates his ''De tyranno'' <ref>Political Writings. Coluccio Salutati. Ed. Stefano U. Baldassarri. Trans. Rolf Bagemihl. The I Tatti Renaissance Library 64</ref>, a political treatise that denounces despotism and upholds liberty as a central civic and moral value. Drawing on classical sources and Christian ethics alike, Salutati here anticipates the political philosophy of later Renaissance republicans.

His unfinished ''De laboribus Herculis'' <ref>ed. B.L. Ullman, 1951 </ref> represents an ambitious allegorical-philosophical project interpreting the mythological labors of Hercules as symbolic of the soul’s journey toward virtue. Inspired by Stoic and Neoplatonic moral traditions, this treatise reflects his desire to reconcile classical moral philosophy with Christian thought, portraying Hercules not simply as a hero of brute strength, but as a paradigm of ethical struggle and spiritual progress.

In his ''Tractatus ex epistola ad Lucilium prima'', Salutati offers a meditation on time, virtue, and human failure, drawing inspiration from the first of Seneca’s Epistulae ad Lucilium. This moral-philosophical treatise explores how much of human life is lost through vice, idleness, or misplaced effort, and exemplifies Salutati’s concern with the ethical use of time and the cultivation of the moral life in a civic context.<ref>ed. by Teresa De Robertis, Silvia Fiaschi, Giovanni Martellucci, Giuliano Tanturli e Stefano Zamponi, Mandragora, Firenze, 2010. English translation by Jan Urlings, 2025</ref>

''De fato et fortuna'' (On Fate and Fortune) (1396-1397)<ref>Critical edition: Concetta Bianca, Firenze : Olschki, 1985</ref><ref>Translated in English by Jan Urlings ''On Fate and Fortune'', 2025</ref> is divided into five tractates; the treatise sets forth the argument of free will and the relationship that exists between it and the events that can hinder its designs. Salutati heavily relies on Augustine's ''De civitate Dei'', which he regards as foundational.<ref>Sam Urlings, Coluccio Salutati and Augustine’s City of God, Lysa Publishers, Ghent, 2023</ref>  He develops the doctrine of coefficiency,<ref>Charles Trinkaus, In Our Image and Likeness. Humanity and Divinity in Italian Humanist Thought, vol. 1, Chicago 1970, p. 83</ref> proposing that divine providence and free will operate collaboratively rather than being mutually exclusive. Expounding upon Augustine's concept of fortuitous causes, Salutati argues that fortune exists but is ultimately subordinate to God's will. Moreover, Augustine's rejection of astrological determinism influences Salutati's critique of astrologers like Cecco d'Ascoli and geomancers. ''De fato et fortuna'' represents Salutati's synthesis of Augustinian theology with his humanist concerns, offering a nuanced discussion of fate, fortune, and free will that resonates with the political and ethical challenges of his era.

Salutati also engaged in polemics, most notably in his ''Invectivae'' <ref>Invectiva Lini Colucci Salutati, Reip. Flor. A secretis in Antonium Luschum Vicentinum de eadem republica male sentientem.</ref><ref>Political Writings. Coluccio Salutati. Ed. Stefano U. Baldassarri. Trans. Rolf Bagemihl. The I Tatti Renaissance Library 64</ref>, where he employed his rhetorical skill in defense of Florence against external and ecclesiastical adversaries, including the Antipope Clement VII. These works, deeply political yet stylistically humanist, reflect his belief in the power of eloquence to uphold republican liberty and to resist corruption. Other works include ''De verecundia'' (1390) and ''De nobilitate legum et medicine'' (1399).