From the last quarter of the 18th century, following a lack of empathy shown by French philosophers towards Dante during the Enlightenment, new prose translations of the Divina Commedia made this monument of early Italian literature and its author more widely accessible. It was the generation of romantics that then fostered a more comprehensive understanding of Dante and his work in early 19th-century France.
In parallel with the rediscovery of Dante by illustrious writers, new interest aroused by the production of the Primitives increasingly drew the attention of artists to the Commedia. From John Flaxman to William Blake, Dante's poem went on to enjoy extraordinary success all over Europe.
The story of Paolo and Francesca was immortalized by the most important artists of the time, particularly by Ingres, who from 1814 painted at least seven versions of this celebrated episode of the Commedia, dwelling on the moment in which the two young lovers discovered their passion when reading of the love between Guinevere and Lancelot. In the very years during which Dante became popular in the French capital, the archaeologist Aubin-Louis Millin (1759-1818), on the occasion of a visit to the Royal Library in Naples in 1813, commissioned a series of tracings from the old vignettes in the copy of the Commedia today housed at the Biblioteca Nazionale in Naples (ms. XIII.C.4). The clarity and linearity of these ink drawings represented in the 14th-century manuscript of Naples reminded him in fact of the celebrated prints from the edition of Landino's Comento of 1481, as well as those taken from the drawings of Flaxman.