O Tempo Bono: Troubled Seas, and Troubled Hearts in 15th-Century Neapolitan Music and Poetry
Tavola Strozzi, view of the city of Naples in Italy from the sea, c. 1470. (Alfonso V of Aragon naval victory on John of Anjou). Museo di San Martino, Naples, Italy. Attributed to Francesco Rosselli.
O tempo bono is a strambotto written by the Neapolitan humanist poet Francesco Galeota. An anonymous musical setting survives in the songbook Montecassino 871, one of the most important musical sources of sacred and secular international repertoire performed at the Aragonese court of Naples in the second half of the fifteenth century.
O tempo bono, Montecassino, Biblioteca dell'Abbazia, MS 871, p. 421.
Although in the songbook only the first two lines of the poem are copied, the complete poem can be retrieved from three different literary sources:
Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. Lat. 10656 (copied twice, in folios 113r–113v and 121r, respectively);
Modena, Biblioteca Estense e Universitaria, It. 1168 = α.M.7.32, f. 67r;
Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli Vittorio Emanuele III, Ms. XVII.1 (two different versions, poetically opposed: “O tempo bono, chi me t’ha levato” f. 45v; and “O tempo buono, et come si tornato” f. 86v).
In MS XVII.1, Galeota’s strambotto O tempo bono e chi me t’ha levato is followed (f. 86v) by another version, O tempo buono et come si tornato.
Additionally, a religious contrafactum by Feo Belcari, “O Jesu buono, come m’hai lassato”, is also extant in the print Laude composte da più persone spirituali, Firenze, 1495. At the end of the print, the indication “cantasi come O tempo buono” appears, implying that the melody was familiar to contemporary performers.
O Jesu buono, from Laude facte & composte da piu persone spirituali, Firenze, 1495.
Rhyme and Meter
The poem is a Sicilian strambotto in ottava form (eight lines), composed of hendecasyllabic verses, with the rhyme scheme:
AB AB AB AB (considering the original B rhyme in “-ia”: solia, havia, via, mia).
Modena, Biblioteca Estense e Universitaria, It. 1168=α.M.7.32, f. 67r.
In the musical source, however, the rhyme scheme appears as:
AB AB AC AC (solea, havea, via, mia).
The original rhyme scheme can be reconstructed from the literary copies preserved in Modena and Naples, where it reads solia and havia instead of solea and havea.
Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. Lat. 10656, f. 121r.
Textual Variants
When the sources are compared, numerous textual variants emerge. Through collation, many unclear passages can be clarified, allowing for a more convincing reading of the text. The variants found in the manuscripts suggest Castilian influence, which may indicate a Castilian or Aragonese copyist: como / come, que / che, laxato / lassato, dolze / dolce.
The copyist of the Vatican manuscript employs some abbreviations. Most of them are easily readable, but in verse 6 he writes “intra” with an abbreviation mark on top. Some scholars read this as “intrare”. But when collated with the Modena and Naples sources, it becomes clear that it stands for “in terra”.
Modena, Biblioteca Estense e Universitaria, It. 1168=α.M.7.32, f. 67r.
In the verse 8 in the Vatican manuscript (first copy, f.113v) it reads “et mo luce ad altro la lenterna mia”. In the other Vatican copy (f.121r), as well as in the Modena and Naples sources, “mo” is omitted: “et luce ad altro”, which restores the hendecasyllabic meter of the verse.
Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. Lat. 10656, f.113v.
Maritime Metaphor
The Italian word tempo can mean both “time” and “weather,” and this semantic ambiguity supports a metaphorical nautical reading of the poem.
Further evidence for this interpretation can be found in the opposition between “tempo chiaro” (“clear weather”) and “tempo turbato” (“stormy weather”), as well as in the opposition between “fortuna” and “bonanza”, which also are semantically ambivalent: they may refer either to sailing conditions or to circumstances of life (and love).
The word fortuna, while primarily meaning “luck” or “fate”, is closely connected in Romance languages to maritime imagery. In some Mediterranean languages, the root went through a semantic shift, particularly in the context of navigation, where the success or misfortune of a voyage depended on the weather. Experiencing misfortune at sea meant encountering a storm; thus, (mis)fortune became metaphorically associated with tempestuous seas:
In Italian, fortunale stands for a violent storm at sea.
In Romanian, furtună means “storm”, reflecting a development from Latin fortuna.
In French, fortune de mer refers to damage or events, like shipwreck, caused by rough sea conditions.
In Greek, fourtoúna, likely borrowed from Romance languages, refers to a sea storm.
Tavola Strozzi, view of the city of Naples in Italy from the sea, 1470. Attributed to Francesco Rosselli.
In the Naples source, it reads bonaccia instead of bonaza/bonanza. Derived from Medieval Latin bonacia (bonus “good” + malacia “dead calm,” from Greek malakia “softness”), bonaccia in Italian denotes a tranquil state of the sea and is often used figuratively to signify peace or quiet. It is also the historical root of the word bonanza, which within this semantic field signifies calm seas and favorable weather, reinforcing the nautical opposition: storm versus calm.
Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli Vittorio Emanuele III, Ms. XVII.1, f. 45v.
The line “lassato in terra senza vista et sensa via” (“left on land without sight and without a path”) further clarifies the maritime metaphor, evoking a sense of being stranded.
The final line, “e luce ad altro la lanterna mia”, returns to this symbolic register: the poet’s guiding light (or harbor light) now shines for another.
In Italian poetry, the topos of the “ship of love” is well-established, as seen in the influential sonnet Passa la nave mia colma d’oblio by Petrarch.
Translation
The word tempo carries two meanings, referring simultaneously to “time” and “weather,” while fortuna and bonanza carry both figurative and maritime senses. Rendering these terms with dual readings (“time/weather”, “misfortune/storm, and “good fortune/calm seas”) serves only to highlight the poem’s metaphorical structure, in which the emotional turbulence of love mirrors the unpredictable conditions of navigation, a nuance that is largely lost in English translation:
O tempo bono, e chi me t’ha levato
O good time/weather, who has taken you from me
ch’io non te tengo più come solia?
that I no longer have you as I once did?
O tempo chiaro, e come si turbato,
O clear time/weather, how you have turned so troubled
che fai fortuna a chi bonanza havia.
bringing misfortune/storm to one who once had good luck/calm seas.
O dolce tempo, e como m’hai lassato
O sweet time/weather, how you have left me
in terra senza vista e senza via.
on land without sight and without a path.
Felice tempo, tu tende si andato
Happy time/weather, you have thus departed
et luce ad altro la lanterna mia.
and my lantern/harbor light now shines for another.
I have prepared a modern edition of O tempo bono (MS Montecassino 871, p. 421). The edition includes semi-diplomatic transcriptions of the text from the sources, accompanied by an apparatus collating the textual variants in each verse.
References:
Beltran Pepió, V. (2024). Músicos, letristas y poetas: canto, paráfrasis y glosa en la Edad de Oro. A propósito de «Tiempo bueno, tiempo bueno». Boletín de Literatura Oral, 7.
Bronzini, G. B. (1982). Serventesi, barzellette e strambotti del Quattrocento dal codice Vat. Lat. 10656 II: Note filologiche. Lares, 48(2), 213–247.
Elmi, E. G. (2019). Singing lyric among local aristocratic networks in the Aragonese-ruled Kingdom of Naples: Aesthetic and political meaning in the written records of an oral practice (Doctoral dissertation, Indiana University).
The Musical Manuscript Montecassino 871: A Neapolitan repertory of sacred and secular music of the late fifteenth century. (1978). United Kingdom: Clarendon Press.
Wilson, B. M. (2009). Singing poetry in Renaissance Florence: The "cantasi come" tradition (1375–1550). Italy: Olschki.
