Giordano da Pisa e il suo pubblico. Modelli e comportamenti

The production of Giordano da Pisa (1260-1310) offers an excellent example for assessing the relationship between a Dominican preacher and his lay audience. Indeed, his preaching presents simultaneously all the features that make it possible to regard it as a document of how the preacher and the public may have influenced each other: Giordano’s sermons are public and directed to the populum, delivered in the squares and churches of Florence and Pisa; they are in the vernacular, transmitted under the form of reportationes; and finally they are extraordinarily abundant. This paper illustrates how the friar proposes a social model and individual behaviours in the relationship between the ideal world and reality.