SOURCE: Kisacky, Julia M. “Magic and Enchanted Armaments: Moral Considerations in Boiardo and Ariosto.” Forum Italicum 30, no. 2 (fall 1996): 253-73.

In the following essay, Kisacky considers the significance of magic in a chivalric context in Boiardo's Orlando Innamorato and Ariosto's Orlando furioso.

The distinction between magic and enchanted weapons helps to illuminate the poets' treatment of knights' use of magic. While magic weapons per se traditionally bring dishonor to their user, enchanted weapons do not. Both Boiardo and Ariosto depart from tradition by allowing knights unreproved use of magic; however, the texts reveal persisting reservations. Boiardo dexterously avoids the moral question in the cases of Balisarda (by surreptitiously disenchanting the originally magic sword) and the magic lance (by the characters' ignorance of its power). Ariosto's condemnation of the shield and the harquebus for traditional reasons contrasts with other occasions where he approves of the use of magic; in the...