ABSTRACT
Giving an account of Kierkegaard’s relation to the famous humanist writer and philosopher Franscesco Petrarch (Petrarca) merely with regard to the references the former makes to the latter, appears to be a rather limited business. One can only find a handful of places where the father of existentialism refers to the father of humanism, and in many of those references his name is merely mentioned along with other writers or figures. Of all Kierkegaard’s main writings, Stages on Life’s Way is the primary, not to say the sole, important location where the poet’s name is mentioned. In the last part of Father Taciturnus’ psychological experiment “Guilty/ Not-Guilty” some allusions to Petrarch and his writings come to the fore and even one of his poems is partly quoted. While the connection of these references to the Quidam figure may not be accidental, still they seem to appear only in the margin.
