Cangrande—“The Great Dog”—was the very “beau-ideal” of a despot; as splendid in his person and mind as in his disposition and his victories, his is one of the most striking figures of the Middle Ages. As Boccaccio says of him, he was “one of the most noted and magnificent lords known in Italy since the time of Frederick II,” and the Guelph historian Villani styles him “the greatest tyrant and the richest and most powerful prince that has been in Lombardy since Ezzelino da Romano”; whilst Petrarch styles Cangrande “the consoler of the houseless and the afflicted,” in commemoration of Cangrande’s kindness to Dante when the latter was exiled from Florence, as well as of the hospitable treatment accorded to other unfortunates by the generosity of “The Dog.” Among these guests of Cangrande were included many of his prisoners of war, such as Giacomo da Carraraam and Albertino da Mussato, whom he treated with all the courtesy and consideration shown by him to his voluntary guests, such as Dante himself and Spinetta Malaspina.
In spite, however, of Dante’s very real gratitude to Cangrande, there grew up a coldness between them which seems to have been mainly brought about by Dante’s unsociable and critical temperament. It was no less experienced a judge of men and of the society of his time than Petrarch who writes of Dante and his relations with Cangrande:
“When banished from his country he (Dante) resided at the court of Cangrande, where the afflicted universally found consolation and an asylum. He was at first held in much honour by the Dog (dal Cane), but afterwards he by degrees fell out of favour, and day by day pleased less that lord. Actors and parasites of every description used to be collected together at the same banquet; one of these, most impudent in his words and in his obscene gestures, obtained much importance and favour with many. The Dog, suspecting that Dante disliked this, called the man before him, and, having greatly praised him to our poet, said: ‘I wonder how it is that this silly fellow should know how to please all, and that thou canst not, who art said to be so wise.’ Dante answered: ‘Thou wouldst not wonder if thou knewest that friendship is founded on similarity of habits and disposition.’ It is also related that at his table, which was indiscriminately hospitable, where buffoons sat down with Dante, and where jests passed which must have been repulsive to every person of refinement, but disgraceful when uttered by the superior in rank to his inferior, a boy was once concealed under the table, who, collecting the bones that were thrown there by the guests, according to the custom of those times, heaped them up at Dante’s feet. When the tables were removed, the great heap appearing, the Dog pretended to show great astonishment and said, ‘Certainly Dante is a great devourer of meat.’ To which Dante readily replied, ‘My Lord, if I were the Dog, you would not see so many bones’—‘Se fosse io il Can non si vedrebbe tante osse,’—meaning that, if he had been Cangrande, he would have had fewer and choicer companions at his table.