184 / 298
Horst Steinke
184
peramento e definitivo annullamento della lingua appartenente alle epoche
precedenti ([…] it is being expressly stated that this does not constitute over-
coming and definitive termination of the language belonging to the preceding
eras)». Similarly, Botturi: «Ora, per Vico, il passaggio all’età della ragione rifles-
sa non significa l’abbandono delle sorgenti mitiche della “
humanitas
” (socialità
e cultura) […] (Now, for Vico, the passage to the age of reflective reason does
not mean the abandonment of the mythical currents of “humanity” (social life
and culture) […])» (Id.,
Ermeneutica del mito ed esperienza etica in Giambattista Vico,
cit.,
p. 292). Outside of Vico studies, the concurrent existence of a spectrum
of mentalities in ancient Greece is explored in P. Veyne,
Did the Greeks Believe
in Their Myths? An Essay on the Constitutive Imagination
, trans. by P. Wissing, Chi-
cago, University of Chicago Press, 1988.
385
As stated by M. Donzelli: «Dunque, ogni epoca storica contiene i carat-
teri di tutte le altre, ma, d’altra parte, ogni epoca storica ha i suoi caratteri pre-
dominanti chi gli conferiscono un’identità complessa e costantemente
in fieri
(Thus, every historical era contains features of all the others, but, on the other
hand, every historical era possesses its predominant characeristics which con-
fer on it a complex identity that is constanctly
evolving
)» (Id.,
Razionalità e ricerca
della phronesis nella Scienza nuova di G. B. Vico
, in
Razionalità e modernità in Vico
,
cit., pp. 97-108, p. 108; italics original).
386
«L’elemento “poetico” però rimane sempre contenuto nelle forme di
linguaggio successive, sebbene in misura minore rispetto alle prime fasi
dell’evoluzione della lingua. È vero che la poesia è una fase provvisoria, ma
non scompare senza lasciare tracce di sé (The “poetic” element, however, al-
ways is retained in the successive forms of language, although to a lesser extent
compared to the first phases of language evolution. It is true that poetic language
is a provisional phase, but it does not disappear without leaving traces of itself)»
(R. M. Zagarella,
Le tre “spezie”
di lingue nella Scienza nuova di Vico
, cit., p. 35).
Hösle even cites Vico’s (philosophical) language itself as a throwback to
“poetic” rhetoric: «Doch auch in Vicos Zeit gibt es einen Denker, dessen Phi-
losophie in poetischer Sprache abgefasst ist – ich meine natürlich Vico selbst.
Sollte sich Vico dessen nicht bewusst gewesen sein? (But in Vico’s time, too,
there exists a thinker whose philosophy is expressed in poetic language – I am
referring, of course, to Vico himself. Would Vico not have been aware of this
fact?)» (Id.,
Einleitung
, cit., p. CXCIV). Vico’s decision to write
Scienza nuova
in
Italian rather than Latin is indicative, also, of his endeavor to express “poetic
wisdom” in “poetic language” even at the surface level.
387
For a more detailed discussion, see my article
Hintikka and Vico: An
Update on Contemporary Logic
, in «NVS», III, 1985, pp. 147-155. That this pro-
cess leads to anything but trivial consequences is indicated by C. Muscelli: «Un