Renaissance writer Giovanni Boccaccio writes in The Early Lives of Dante,

… And she delivered of a son, whom by common consent with his father, they called by the name Dante [the Giver]; and rightly so, because, as will be seen in the sequel, the issue was most perfectly consonant with this name. This was that Dante of whom is the present discourse. This was that Dante granted by the special grace of God to our age. This was the Dante, who was first to open the way for the return of the Muses, banished from Italy. ‘Twas he that brought under the rule of due numbers every beauty of the vernacular speech. ‘Twas he who may be truly said to have brought back dead poesy to life. The which things, when duly considered, will show that he could not rightly have borne any name but Dante.