Among them are Secretum (" My Secret Book "), an intensely personal, guilt-ridden imaginary dialogue with Augustine of Hippo ; De Viris Illustribus (" On Famous Men "), a series of moral biographies ; Rerum Memorandarum Libri, an incomplete treatise on the cardinal virtues ; De Otio Religiosorum (" On Religious Leisure ") and De Vita Solitaria (" On the Solitary Life "), which praise the contemplative life ; De Remediis Utriusque Fortunae (" Remedies for Fortune Fair and Foul "), a self-help book which remained popular for hundreds of years ; Itinerarium (" Petrarch's Guide to the Holy Land "); a number of invectives against opponents such as doctors, scholastics, and the French ; the Carmen Bucolicum, a collection of 12 pastoral poems ; and the unfinished epic Africa.

The conception of a " rebirth " of Classical Latin learning is first credited to an Italian poet Petrarch, the father of Humanism, a term that was not coined until the 19th century, but the conception of a rebirth has been in common use since Petrarch's time.

Petrarch's younger brother was born in Incisa in Val d ' Arno in 1307.

Petrarch's response was to turn from the outer world of nature to the inner world of " soul ":

Francesca married Francescuolo da Brossano ( who was later named executor of Petrarch's will ) that same year.

The will mentions neither the property in Arquà nor his library ; Petrarch's library of notable manuscripts was already promised to Venice, in exchange for the Palazzo Molina.

While Petrarch's poetry was set to music frequently after his death, especially by Italian madrigal composers of the Renaissance in the 16th century, only one musical setting composed during Petrarch's lifetime survives.

In November, 2003, it was announced that pathological anatomists would be exhuming Petrarch's body from his casket in Arquà Petrarca, in order to verify 19th-century reports that he had stood 1. 83 meters ( about six feet ), which would have been tall for his period.

When the tomb was opened, the skull was discovered in fragments and a DNA test revealed that the skull was not Petrarch's, prompting calls for the return of Petrarch's skull.

The researchers are fairly certain that the body in the tomb is Petrarch's due to the fact that the skeleton bears evidence of injuries mentioned by Petrarch in his writings, including a kick from a donkey when he was 42.

This custom, first revived in Padua for Albertino Mussato, was followed by Petrarch's own crowning ceremony in the audience hall of the medieval senatorial palazzo on the Campidoglio on the 8th of April 1341.

Secretum was not circulated until some time after Petrarch's death, and was probably meant to be a means of self-examination more than a work to be published and read by others.

Petrarch's turn towards religion in his later life was inspired in part by Augustine's Confessions, and Petrarch imitates Augustine's style of self-examination and harsh self criticism in Secretum.

Boccaccio himself even says this work was inspired and modeled on Petrarch's De Viris Illustribus.

The Vestal Tuccia was celebrated in Pliny the Elder's Natural History ( 28: 12 ) and Petrarch's Triumph of Chastity.

What distinguishes the Sicilian School from the troubadours, however, is the introduction of a kinder, gentler type of woman than that found in their French models ; one who was nearer to Dante's madonnas and Petrarch's Laura, though much less characterised psychologically.

Their poetry was music to the eye, not to the ear, and their legacy is also apparent in Dante and Petrarch's lyrics.

Petrarch's Virgil ( title page ) ( c. 1336 ) Illuminated manuscript by Simone Martini, 29 x 20 cm Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan.

The Liège manuscript is lost and so is Petrarch's copy, but Petrarch's copy " can be shown to be behind all but one of the later manuscripts " and preserve Petrarch's marginal annotations.

Finally, Petrarch's enjambment creates longer semantic units by connecting one line to the following.

* Dante Alighieri is exiled from Florence by the Black Guelphs, as is Petrarch's father ( see Guelphs and Ghibellines ).

It plays this role in Petrarch's Triumph of Chastity, and on the reverse of Piero della Francesca's portrait of Battista Strozzi, paired with that of her husband Federico da Montefeltro ( painted c 1472-74 ), Bianca's triumphal car is drawn by a pair of unicorns.

His edition of Petrarch's Italian Poems, published by Aldus in 1501, and the Terzerime, which Aldus published in 1502, were also influential.

The name " Louise " may have been coined by Clément Marot when, in 1542, seeking a French equivalent of Petrarch's praise of " Laura ", he proposed to the Lyonnais circle that they " louer Louise " ( praise Louise ).

Delage-Toriel also notes that the names of Laura and Flora, possibly refer to well-known High Renaissance portraits of women by Titian and Giorgione, both evoking the Italian sonneteer Petrarch's unconsummated obsession with a woman named Laura.

He did not undertake further missions for Florence until 1365, and traveled to Naples and then on to Padua and Venice, where he met up with Petrarch in grand style at Palazzo Molina, Petrarch's residence as well as the place of Petrarch's library.

There is little definite information in Petrarch's work concerning Laura, except that she is lovely to look at, fair-haired, with a modest, dignified bearing.

Petrarch's tomb at Arquà Petrarca

Moreover, Petrarch's own sonnets almost never had a rhyming couplet at the end as this would suggest logical deduction instead of the intended rational correlation of the form.

Petrarch even offered to purchase Boccaccio's library, so that it would become part of Petrarch's library.

In the 16th century, Pietro Bembo created the model for the modern Italian language based on Petrarch's works, as well as those of Giovanni Boccaccio, and, to a lesser extent, Dante Alighieri.

Petrarch's sonnets were admired and imitated throughout Europe during the Renaissance and became a model for lyrical poetry.

Scholars note that Petrarch's letter to Dionigi displays a strikingly " modern " attitude of aesthetic gratification in the grandeur of the scenery and is still often cited in books and journals devoted to the sport of mountaineering.

The later part of Petrarch's life he spent in journeying through northern Italy as an international scholar and poet-diplomat.

In 1362, shortly after the birth of a daughter, Eletta ( same name as Petrarch's mother ), they joined Petrarch in Venice to flee the plague then ravaging parts of Europe.

Petrarch's will ( dated April 4, 1370 ) leaves 50 florins to Boccaccio " to buy a warm winter dressing gown "; various legacies ( a horse, a silver cup, a lute, a Madonna ) to his brother and his friends ; his house in Vaucluse to its caretaker ; for his soul, and for the poor ; and the bulk of his estate to his son-in-law, Francescuolo da Brossano, who is to give half of it to " the person to whom, as he knows, I wish it to go "; presumably his daughter, Francesca, Brossano's wife.

Petrarch's is a world apart from Dante and his Divina Commedia.

In contrast, Petrarch's thought and style are relatively uniform throughout his life – he spent much of it revising the songs and sonnets of the Canzoniere rather than moving to new subjects or poetry.

The strong moral and political convictions which had inspired Dante belong to the Middle Ages and the libertarian spirit of the commune ; Petrarch's moral dilemmas, his refusal to take a stand in politics, his reclusive life point to a different direction, or time.

The vast majority ( 317 ) of Petrarch's 366 poems collected in the Canzoniere ( dedicated to Laura ) were sonnets, and the Petrarchan sonnet still bears his name.

Petrarch's influence is evident in the works of Serafino Ciminelli from Aquila ( 1466-1500 ) and in the works of Marin Držić ( 1508-1567 ) from Dubrovnik.