1. See A. J. Vanderjagt, Qui sa vertu anoblist (1981). The manuscript (Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale MS. 9278-9280) used by Vanderjagt for his edition contains Jean Miélot's French version of Buonaccorso da Montemagno's De nobilitate and of Aurispa's rendering of Lucian's "Comparatio Hannibalis, Scipionis et Alexandri" before Minos from Lucian's Dialogues of the Dead. See Lucian, Loeb Classical Library (8 vols.) vol. 7, trans. M. D. Macleod (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: W. Heinemann, 1961): 142-155. Keen (235) draws upon the same text from MS. 10497, f. 120v, of the Bibliothèque Royale of Brussels, allegedly containing a French version of a text by a Buonsignori da Siena—a mistaken identification. I am deeply thankful to P. O. Kristeller for calling my attention to Vanderjagt's work. Kristeller's Iter Italicum 3 (London: Warburg Institute; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1983): 99, which gives MS. 10493-10497 ( Catalogue p. 210) as Misc. 15th century, containing only Bonaccorsus's de nobilitate in French, probably in Jean Miélot's version, is to be integrated with the information in Vanderjagt, who gives the full text of Miélot's free version of Aurispa's rendering from Lucian, collated with Aurispa's version, and another French translation (pp. 175-180) from the perhaps unique MS. 76 f. 26 of the Koninglijke Bibliotheek of The Hague, based on a slightly different version of Aurispa's text.

Livy 35.14 reported the tradition of a dialogue between Scipio and Hannibal. Asked by Scipio who was the greatest general, Hannibal responded by rating Alexander as first, Pyrrhus as second, and himself as third. When asked what, then, if he had vanquished Scipio, Hannibal answered that he would then have rated himself above all other generals. In Lucian's version, Scipio intervenes marginally at the end of the dialogue and Minos gives him second place between Alexander and Hannibal. Nowhere in the ancient texts is there any mention of the superiority of acting for the sake of the country rather than for personal glory. [BACK]

2. The development of civic humanism as presented by Hans Baron and Eugenio Garin bears reconsideration in terms of the documents on moral attitudes toward duties of statesmanship and service to state and society. By Baron see, especially, his seminal The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance; Civic Humanism and Republican Liberty in an Age of Classicism and Tyranny [1955], rev. 1 vol. ed. with an epilogue (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966). Of Garin's numerous relevant works it shall suffice to mention L'Umanesimo Italiano. Filosofia e vita civile nel Rinascimento (Bari: Laterza, 1965). On the philosophical connections between humanistic schools and medieval thought, including the pedagogical aspects of the rhetorical tradition, see Paul O. Kristeller's fundamental studies, for example his Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964) and Renaissance Thought and Its Sources, ed. Michael Mooney (New York: Columbia University Press, 1979). [BACK]

3. See Vanderjagt 158 f., and 159 and 171 for following quotes. At variance with the spirit and letter of Lucian's text, Aurispa's Minos decrees that while Scipio was at least the others' equal in military prowess, he was definitely superior in love of country and all moral virtues: "itaque cum disciplina militari rebusque bellicis aut hische equalem aut prestanciorem sciamus, (patrie) pietate vero ceterisque animi virtutibus maxime hos superasse, te preferendum censeo." In Miélot Scipio deserves first place because he never exceeded the bounds of "prouesse chevalereuse," that is, never transgressed military discipline, and excelled "en toute aultre vertu." Since "vray honneur doit estre acquis par vertu nous jugons Scipion qui jamais ne saillis hors des lices de prouesse chevalereuse et meismement en toute aultre virtu as eu renommee pardessus tous ceulx de ton temps que tu ailles premier." Besides, he never indulged in cruel destruction of human beings simply for his own glory. [BACK]

4. A. Grafton and L. Jardine (1986) emphasize this aspect of humanistic paideia, even while pointing out that the extant documents of teaching and philological activity fail to show a balance between grammatical and rhetorical concerns on the one hand and moral ones on the other, since in the practice of the schoolroom most humanistic teaching seemed to reduce itself to painstaking grammatical and rhetorical explication de texte, as if even the great Erasmus assumed that philologically correct reading was sufficient to make a good Christian. [BACK]

5. Jaeger (1987): esp. 601-608. [BACK]

6. Jaeger (1987): 605: "This points up the fundamentally irrational nature of an education based on the formation of character. It relies on the personal moral authority of the teacher, and reasoning—certainly critical, independent thought—can become an offense against him, can diminish his authority. The old learning made the masters into an image of God, and the student's goal was to fashion himself in that image. Disputation and reasoning are fundamentally at odds with this goal. Awe and reverence are appropriate to it." [BACK]

7. As already noted, this is the assumption in A. Grafton and L. Jardine (1986) with regard to both Italian and northern humanists, including Erasmus: see, for example, pp. 27, 83-98. See also their assessment of Ramus's impact on the turn toward practical social goals. [BACK]

8. L. Martines (1979): 204. See an extended treatment of this matter in his The Social World of the Florentine Humanists (1963) and Lawyers and Statecraft in Renaissance Florence (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1968). More recently still, see the statistical studies by Roberto Antonelli, Simonetta Bianchini, and Christian Bec in A. Asor Rosa, ed., Letteratua Italiana 2 (1983): 171-267. [BACK]

9. See Werner L. Gundersheimer, Ferrara (1973): 129-131, for the first label, and Benjamin Kohl, "Political Attitudes of North Italian Humanists in the Late Trecento," Studies in Medieval Culture 4 (1974): 418-427, for the second. "Subdital" refers to the rule of princes being praised as beneficial to the subjects, subditi. [BACK]

10. John M. McManamon, Funeral Oratory and the Cultural Ideals of Italian Humanism (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989): 88-91. [BACK]

11. Cf. J. H. Hexter, Reappraisals in History (1979): "The Education of the Aristocracy in the Renaissance," 69. [BACK]

12. The mental structures—what the "new historicists" like to call the "consciousness"—of the man of the Renaissance also comprise a new perception of physical space. If humanism was tied to the high bourgeoisie, often in alliance with the old or new nobility whenever this retained substantial power, the typical field of action and constant frame of reference was the space of the city, together with the political structures of the city-state. The visual image of such consciousness shines through the artistic works that formed the striking outer shell of the new society. That shell could not fail to impress domestic as well as foreign observers, certainly no less so than ancient Rome had attracted, awed, and conquered the barbarian invaders.

Dealing with the way painting incorporated the background of the new cityscapes in the representation of space, Samuel Y. Edgerton, The Renaissance Rediscovery of Linear Perspective (New York: Basic Books, 1975), as cited and paraphrased by L. Martines (1979): 275, relates linear perspective to the idea of "God's geometrically ordered universe" and concludes: "the commitment to linear perspective moved from a sense of having discerned the nature of God's mastery and was at the same time an effort to imitate His grand design.

Men would be gods." In this way of reading, the "realistic" control of nature achieved through the self-assurance of the new political masters would be a key to the humanistic art of the Quattrocento. (See L. Martines [1979], chaps. 11-13, on the representation of life and art in Quattrocento Italy from this "new historical" perspective.) If Renaissance culture can be reconsidered from this angle, some critical questions may come to mind. Since the artists, holding no personal power, were far from being self-assured and in control of nature, how could they express, as their own, perceptions that presumably belonged to their patrons? How could their master-patrons communicate to them and even impose on them feelings that were only half-conscious? Hence, did the ideal forms and motifs issue from the consumers or from the producers of the artistic representations? In other words, to what extent did the artistic forms reflect or, instead, create ideas and ideology? [BACK]

13. See texts in Poggius Bracciolini, Opera omnia, 4 tomes (Torino, 1964-1969): 1: 1-31; 390-419; and 64-83 for the De nobilitate (see below). [BACK]

14. See the Epistola in Mehus's ed. (1753): Part 1, p. 5. [BACK]

15. "Istam  . . . stoicam virtutem  . . ., nudam, egentem, et pene molestam, quae non ingreditur civitates, sed deserta videtur et solitaria,  . . . neque in hominum coetum et communem usum prodibit." P. Bracciolini, Opera 1 (1964): 64-83 at 81 f. [BACK]

16. Besides the text in Bracciolini, Opera omnia (Torino, 1964-1969), see Chiensi's response in Bracciolini's 1657 edition. [BACK]

17. See, also, his De oboedientia (1470-1484) on the relationship between moral duties and public obligations toward the powerful; De fortitudine (1481); five treatises on the virtues pertaining to the management of wealth: De liberalitate, De beneficentia (both 1493), De splendore (perhaps 1493), De conviventia (perhaps 1493, containing a lively sketch of contemporary courtly mores), and De magnificentia (probably after 1494); and De magnanimitate (1499), followed by its counterpart De immanitate (1501, on public cruelty). Pontano's philosophical foundations were mostly Aristotelian. See Cesare Vasoli, "G. Pontano," in Letteratura Italiana: I Minori 1 (Milano: Marzorati, 1961): 597-624, esp. 607 f. [BACK]

18. De sermone libri tres, eds. Sergio Lupi and A. Risicato (Lugano: Thesaurus Mundi, 1954). Cf. A. Asor Rosa, ed., Letteratura Italiana 3.1 (1984): 65-67. [BACK]

19. Leonardo da Vinci lent his genial services to Ludovico Sforza by designing the splendid tournament of 1491 for the double wedding of Ludovico with Beatrice d'Este and Duke Alfonso d'Este with Anna Sforza in Milan. On the elaborate preparations for Giuliano's tournament see R. M. Ruggieri, L'umanesimo cavalleresco italiano da Dante al Pulci (Roma, 1962): chap. 6, "Spirito e forme epico-cavalleresche nella Giostra del Poliziano," 135-162, and chap. 7, "Letterati poeti e pittori intorno alla giostra di Giuliano de' Medici," 163-198. [BACK]

20. Aeneae Silvii de curialium miseriis epistola (1928): 31: 54. We shall remember that in this 1444 tractate, written in the form of a letter to Johann von Eich and first published in 1473, the eminent Italian humanist and future pope borrowed Peter of Blois's phrase, miseriae curialium. The text is also available in Der Briefwechsel des Eneas Silvius Piccolomini, ed. R. Wolkan, 4 vols.

(Wien: Hölder, 1909-1918): 1: 453-487; in an Italian version by G. Paparelli (Lanciano: Carabba, 1943) and in a German version in Enea Silvio Piccolomini, Briefe, Dichtungen, trans. Max Mell (München: Winkler, 1966): 152-193. Sergio Bertelli, Le corti italiane (1985): 7, states that it echoed Lucian's De mercede conductis potentium familiaribus and dealt with paid courtiers and the topos of their extreme corruption and maliciousness, as Tommaso Garzoni da Bagnacavallo would later do in his 1587 Piazza universale di tutte le professioni del mondo, dedicated to Alfonso d'Este. But Bertelli does not trace this topos further back to the medieval Church reformers' anticourt tradition, thus giving an example of the limited historical horizon that derives from the established way of dealing with such matters only within defined historical periods. [BACK]

21. The term occurs repeatedly in a description of Ferrara's Belriguardo palace that is part of Giovanni Sabbadino degli Arienti's De triumphis religionis, a text from the last years of the century published in Werner L. Gundersheimer, Art and Life at the Court of Ercole I d'Este (Genève: Droz, 1972). See Eugenio Battisti in A. Prosperi, ed., La Corte e il Cortegiano 2: Un modello europeo (1980): 263 f., note. [BACK]

22. "Est enim in curiis principum vitiosum litteras nosse et probri loco ducitur appellari disertus"; "atria regum et aulici tumultus, in quibus nec requies nec bonarum artium exercitatio nec virtutis amor aliquis regnat, sed avaritia tantum, libido, crudelitas, crapula, invidia et ambitio dominatur." Ed. Wolkan: 1: 484 f. and 487. [BACK]

23. John F. D'Amico (1983): 120-123 on these biographies as a genre, with ample bibliography. [BACK]

24. D'Amico (1983): 117 f. On the activities of the papal chancery within the Curia, see Thomas Frenz, Die Kanzlei der Päpste der Hochrenaissance (1471-1527) (Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1986). The important study by Paolo Prodi, II sovrano pontefice (Bologna: II Mulino, 1982), proposes to see the Renaissance Roman court, starting with Nicholas V, as the prototype of the absolutist state. [BACK]

25. D'Amico (1983) for a detailed survey of clerical courts in Rome and employment of humanists in them. [BACK]

26. D'Amico (1983): 13 f. [BACK]

27. On the complex story of the De cardinalatu and its closeness to Castiglione, as well as on the literary demography of clerics versus laymen in the Italian Cinquecento literary world, see the magisterial Carlo Dionisotti, Gli umanisti e il volgare fra Quattro e Cinquecento (Firenze: F. Le Monnier, 1968), and idem, "Chierici e laici" (1960) in his Geografia (1976): 66-71. Dionisotti (1968): 76, declares Cortesi's book "the first and foremost document of a rhetoric of the vernacular," and deals at length (pp. 52-77) with the section "de sermone." See, also, D'Amico (1983): 49-53, 78-80, 162-164, 227-239, and A. Quondam, "La 'forma del vivere,'" in A. Prosperi, ed., La Corte e il Cortegiano 2 (1980): 32-37.

Other Cinquecento treatises in the same genre, of which Cortesi's is the major exemplar, were due to the pens of Girolamo Manfredi, Fabio Albergati, Girolamo Botero, and Girolamo Piatti, S.J. (see References). [BACK]

28. D'Amico (1983): 46-50. See the partial translation in Kathleen Weil- Garris and John F. D'Amico, The Renaissance Cardinal's Ideal Palace: A Chapter from Cortesi's De Cardinalatu ([Rome]: Edizioni dell'Elefante, American Academy in Rome, [1980]). On high ecclesiastical ceremonial see the work of Cortesi's younger contemporary, Agostino Patrizi Piccolomini (ca. 1435-1496), Sacrarum caeremoniarum sive rituum ecclesiasticorum S. Rom. Ecclesiae, postrema editio (Venetiis: luntae, 1582); [idem,] L'oeuvre de Patrizi Piccolomini ou le Cérimonial papal de la première Renaissance, ed. Marc Dykmans, 2 vols. (Cittè del Vaticano: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1980-1982). [BACK]

29. D'Amico (1983): 57 f. [BACK]

30. D'Amico (1983): chap. 4, "The Roman Academies," 89-112. [BACK]

31. Calmeta, Prose e lettere edite e inedite (con appendice di altri inediti), ed. Cecil Grayson (Bologna: Commissione per i Testi di Lingua, 1959): 60-77 for the Vita del facondo poeta vulgare Serafino Aquilano. D'Amico (1983): 102-107. Calmeta's biography was for the first time incorporated into the edition of Serafino's works in the Opere del facundissimo Seraphino Aquilano (Venice, 1505). [BACK]

32. See Stephen D. Kolsky, "The Courtier as Critic: Vincenzo Calmeta's Vita del facondo poeta vulgare Serafino Aquilano," Italica 67 (1990): 161-172 at 162. [BACK]

33. Zini's tractate was published in Johannes Mattaeus Giberti, Opera nunc primum collecta, eds. P. and G. Ballerini (Hostiliae: A. Carattonius, 1740). See Prosperi in A. Prosperi, ed. (1980): 88-90. On Contarini see Elizabeth G. Gleason's study in Ellery Salk, ed., Culture, Society and Religion in Early Modern Europe: Essays by the Students and Colleagues of William J. Bouwsma (special issue of Historical Reflections/Reflexions Historiques 15.1, 1988). [BACK]

34. Christian Bec in A. Asor Rosa, ed., Letteratura Italiana 2 (1983): 297, reiterates Gino Benzoni's conclusion that after 1550 the continued strength of the Venetian bourgeoisie vis-à-vis other areas of Italy, including Florence, was responsible for the preservation of the humanistic values in Venice while they were being lost elsewhere. There may be a connection between this predicament and the bourgeois realism to be observed in Contarini's and Zini's critiques of ecclesiastical extravagance. See Benzoni, Gli affanni della cultura. Intellettuali e potere nell'ltalia della Controriforma e barocca (Milano: Feltrinelli, 1978): 33. [BACK]

35. On Castiglione's central role within the general context of the idea of nobility and the gentleman, see the excellent general study by Claudio Donati, L'idea di nobiltà in Italia (1988). An elegant early study of courtliness and conduct, of rather difficult access, is Salvatore Battaglia, "La letteratura del comportamento e l'idea del cortigiano" (1937) in his Mitografia del personaggio (Milano: Rizzoli, 1968): 85-96, at 91, on the court as the locus for an élite to develop all its potential of civilized refinement—we could say its supreme entelechy. On the same theme, Giovanni Getto, Letteratura e critica nel tempo (Milano: Marzorati, 1968): "La corte estense luogo d'incontro di una civiltà letteraria," [1953], 219-240; Giorgio Bàrberi Squarotti, L'onore in corte. Dal Castiglione al Tasso (Milano: Angeli, 1986); and Marcello Verdenelli, La teatralità della scrittura: Castiglione, Parini, Leopardi, Campana, Pavese (Ravenna: Longo, 1989): 23-43. [BACK]

36. For an excellent survey of Renaissance historiography from the point of view of understanding the role of the court, from Burckhardt and De Sanctis through Croce to Antonio Gramsci and Federico Chabod, see Carlo Ossola, "'Rinascimento' e 'Risorgimento': La corte tra due miti storiografici," first in C. Mozzarelli and G. Olmi, eds., La corte nella cultura e nella storiografia. Immagini e posizioni tra Otto e Novecento (Roma, 1983): 205-236, then in C. Ossola, Dal 'cortegiano' all' 'uomo di mondo' (Torino: Einaudi, 1987): 155-181. [BACK]

37. "Questa nostra fatica, se pur mai sarà di tanto favor degna che da nobili cavalieri e valorose donne meriti esser veduta  . . . " (3.1). [BACK]

38. Jaeger: 153 f., 160, and 147-149. [BACK]

39. Also, "liberissimo e onestissimo commerzio," "onestissimi costumi," "modestia e grandezza" (1.4), all referring to the effect on the courtiers of the Duchess's imposing presence. [BACK]

40. Elias, The Court Society 231 f. [BACK]

41. "Ritrovandosi il cortegiano nella scaramuzza o fatto d'arme o battaglia di terra  . . ., dee discretamente procurar di appartarsi dalla moltitudine e quelle cose segnalate ed ardite che ha da fare, farle con minor compagnia che pode al conspetto de tutti i più nobili ed estimati omini che siano nell'esercito, e massimamente alla presenzia  . . . del suo re o di quel signore a cui serve" (whenever the courtier chances to be engaged in a skirmish or an action or a battle in the field, . . . he should discreetly withdraw from the crowd, and do the outstanding and daring things that he has to do in as small a company as possible and in the sight of all the noblest and most respected men in the army, and especially  . . . his king or the prince he is serving. C. Singleton's trans.) See Michael West (1988): 654, for the military connotations of this passage. [BACK]

42. "Oltre alla bontà, il vero e principal ornamento dell'animo in ciascuno penso io che siano Ie lettere, benché i Franzesi solamente conoscano la nobiltà delle arme e tutto il resto nulla estimino; di modo che non solamente non apprezzano Ie lettere, ma le aborriscono, e tutti e litterati tengon per vilissimi omini; e pare loro dir gran villania a chi si sia, quando lo chiamano clero " (1.42). The discussion of French attitudes on the education of the nobility continues through the following chapter, and Giuliano de' Medici expresses his conviction that once Francis I becomes king, he will change this situation by encouraging literary endeavors even at court. [BACK]

43. Vittorio Cian (commentary to his edition of the Cortegiano [1947]: 112) recalled Flavio Biondo's De litteris et armis comparatione, Filelfo, Cristoforo Lanfranchini's Tractatus seu quaestio utrum praeferendus sit miles an doctor (Brixiae: Angelus Britannicus, 1497), Muzio's II gentilhuomo, De Ferraris's De dignitate disciplinarum, and other texts. [BACK]

44. "Oltre alla bontà, il vero e principal ornamento dell'animo in ciascuno penso io che siano Ie lettere"—something which, he says, the French are not prepared to recognize (beginning of 1.42); "voglio che nelle lettere sia più che mediocremente erudito, almeno in questi studi che chiamano d'umanità; e non solamente della lingua latina, ma ancor della greca abbia cognizione, . . . nei poeti e non meno negli oratori ed istorici ed ancor esercitato nel scriver in versi e prosa, massimamente in questa nostra lingua vulgare" (beginning of 1.44). [BACK]

45. "Uno amante non povero né sozzo né disorrevole ngrave;e vile . . . Questo vero quando in lui sia prudenza, modestia, sofferenza e virtù . . . ; (persona) studiosa di buone arti, litterata e ornata di molte virtù . . . . Destro, robusto della persona, animoso, ardito, mansueto e riposato; tacito, modesto, motteggioso e giocoso quanto e dove bisognava; lui eloquente, dotto e liberale, amorevole, pietoso e vergognoso, astuto, pratico, e sopra tutto fidelissimo; lui in ogni gentilezza prestantissimo, schermire, cavalcare, lanciare, saettare e a qual vuoi simile cosa adattissimo et destrissimo; lui in musica, in lettere, in pittura, in scultura, e in ogni buona e nobile arte peritissimo, e in queste anche e in molte altre lode a quale si sia primo era non secondo." Ecatonfilea in L. B. Alberti, Opere volgari, ed. Cecil Grayson, 3 vols. (Bari: Laterza, 1960-1973): 3; (1973): 199-219 at 204 f. Here and hereafter I give my translation of Alberti. [BACK]

46. "Di statura mediocre, commodamente agiato de' beni della fortuna, nobile d'animo e di sangue, letterato, musico, . . . prudente, legiadro, animoso, pratico, astuto, grato, amorevole, affabile, piacevole e dolce." Text in Trattati d'amore del Cinquecento, ed. Zonta (1912): 164. See Vallone (1955): 55. [BACK]

47. Saccone (1983): 58-61. Castiglione 1.26 speaks of the concealed art of the orator who is trying to "dupe" the jury: "la qual se fosse stata conosciuta, ariì dato dubbio negli animi del populo di non dover esser da quella ingannati." He does refer to the paraphernalia of the courtier's intellectual and social refinement as "pleasurable enticement" ( questo velo di piacere, illecebre ) in order to "beguile the prince with salutary deception," "ingannarlo con inganno salutifero" (4.9-4.10). [BACK]

48. "Pare che farle bene non sia altro che porgersi con molta modestia giunta con leggiadria e aria signorile, tale ch'elle molto dilettino a chi ti mira. Queste sono 'l cavalcare, 'l danzare, l'andar per via e simili. Ma vi bisogna soprattutto moderare i gesti e la fronte, i moti e la figura di tutta la persona con accuratissimo riguardo, e con arte molto castigata al tutto, che nulla ivi paia fatto con escogitato artificio; ma creda chi le vede che questa laude in te sia dono innato dalla natura." L. B. Alberti, Opere volgari  . . . inedite  . . . , ed. A. Bonucci, 5 vols. (Firenze: Tipografia Galileiana, 1843-1849): 3; (1845): 72 f. [BACK]

49. "Avendo io gigrave;a più volte pensato meco onde nasca questa grazia, trovo una regula universalissima,  . . . fuggir quanto più si po  . . . la affettazione; e, per dir forse una nova parola, usar in ogni cosa una certa sprezzatura, che nasconda l'arte, e dimostri ciò che si fa e dice, venir fatto senza fatica e quasi senza pensarvi. Da questo credo io che derivi assai la grazia: perché delle cose rare e ben fatte ognun sa la difficultà, onde in esse la facilità genera grandissima maraviglia. Però si po dir quella esser vera arte, che non appare esser arte; nè più in altro si ha da poner studio che nel nasconderla . . .. E ricordomi io già aver letto esser stati antichi oratori eccellentissimi, i quali  . . . sforzavansi di far credere ad ognuno sé non aver notizia alcuna di lettere; e dissimulando il sapere  . . ." (1.26; translation mine).

There has been much discussion on the precise meaning of Castiglione's grazia, with attempts to stress the novelty of his use of the term. But it is pertinent to remember that in Cicero gratiosus meant gracious, graceful, and agreeable, and was used in medieval portraits of idealized knightly characters, as we saw in Lambert of Ardres's portrait of Arnold of Guines (see my chap. 3). [BACK]

50. "Ponga ogni studio e diligenzia di passar in ogni cosa un poco più avanti che gli altri, di modo che sempre tra tutti sia per eccellente conosciuto" (1.21). [BACK]

51. "Motus et habitudo venusta simplicitate compta atque amena, quae statum magis sapiat dulcem et quietem quam agitationem . . . . Sint in viro motus firmiores et status celeri palaestra admodum ornati." Paragraphs 44 f. of book 2. See Cecil Grayson's edition (Bari: Laterza, 1975): 78 f. On these classical principles and the polemic concerning Raphael and Michelangelo see Robert J. Clements, "Michelangelo on Effort and Rapidity in Art," Journal of the Wartburg and Courtauld Institutes 17 (1954): 301-310, and Michelangelo's Theory of Art (New York: New York University Press, 1961): 55-66. On Castiglione's relationship to art theory see Fritz Ertl, Castigliones Beziehungen und Verhältnis zu den bildenden Künsten (Nürnberg: Stadtmission Nürnberg, 1933). Also Eugenio Battisti, "Lo stile cortigiano," in A. Prosperi, ed. (1980): 255-271 at 255 f. [BACK]

52. A. R. Jones in Armstrong and Tennenhouse, eds. (1988): 46 f., for a feminist evaluation of the female role in Nifo's tractate. [BACK]

53. Curtius (1963): 178 f. [BACK]

54. Eduardo Saccone, " Grazia, sprezzatura, affettazione in the Courtier " (1983), and "The Portrait of the Courtier in Castiglione" (1987), has called attention to Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. [BACK]

55. 1.26, trans. Singleton (1959): 42. Jaeger (1987): 587 f. [BACK]

56. "Temperanzia  . . ., ché quando un animo è concorde di questa armonia, per mezzo della ragione poi facilmente riceve la vera fortezza" (4.17-4.18); "prudenzia, bontà, fortezza e temperanzia d'animo" (1.41). "Dolcezza," too: "la dolcezza ed eccellenzia de' stili" (1.44). "La prudenzia, la magnanimità, la continenzia e molte altre [virtù]" are equally desirable in women (3.4). "La temperantia, la fortezza" (4.4); "la bontà  . . . accompagnata con la prontezza d'ingegno e piacevolezza e con la prudentia e notizia di lettere e di tante altre cose"; "quanto onore ed utile nasca a lui ed alli suoi dalla giustizia, dalla liberalità, dalla magnanimità, dalla mansuetudine e dall'altre virtù che si convengono a bon principe" (4.5). There is a natural progression among the virtues, since temperance provides a harmonious foundation for the other virtues, justice, on a higher level still, makes them all operative, and magnanimity enhances them all; in this happy chain "la liberalità, la magnificenzia, la cupidità d'onore, la mansuetudine, la piacevolezza, la affabilità, e molte altre" (4.18) are also linked. Once again a similar list at 4.9 and 4.22, adding "continenzia, sapienzia, religione e clemenzia." In book 3, dealing with the woman-courtier, we find the famous eulogy of Isabel of Castille, praised as "chiaro esempio di vera bontà, di grandezza d'animo, di prudenzia, di religione, d'onestà, di cortesia, di liberalità, in somma d'ogni virtù," and also, most pertinent in a political figure, "il maraviglioso giudicio ch'ella ebbe in conoscere ed elegere i ministri atti a quelli offici nei quali intendeva d'adoperarli" (the marvelous judgment in recognizing and choosing the most competent ministers for affairs of state—3.35). [BACK]

57. A. Scaglione, ed., The Emergence of National Languages (Ravenna: Longo,1983). [BACK]

58. C. Dionisotti, Gli umanisti e il volgare fra Quattro e Cinquecento (1968). [BACK]

59. Calmeta, Prose e lettere edite e inedite, ed. C. Grayson (1959). [BACK]

60. See Maria Luisa Doglio, "Le Instituzioni di Mario Equicola: dall 'institutio principis alia formazione del segretario," Giornale Storico della Letteratura Italiana 159 (1982): 505-535. [BACK]

61. "Il modo di descrivere loro amore fu nuovo e diverso da quello degli antichi latini; questi senza respetto, senza reverenzia, senza timore di infamar sua donna apertamente scrivevano  . . . dove il desio li spingea. Provenzali gentilmente con dissimulazione nascondevano ogni lascivia de affetti . . .. Disio di onorare più che altro mostravano, dicendo: 'Amore vuol castità.'" End of book 5, p. 181v of 1526 edition. [BACK]

62. P. O. Kristeller, The Philosophy of Marsilio Ficino (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943; rpt. Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1964): 285. [BACK]

63. G. Ferroni, " Sprezzatura e simulazione," in C. Ossola, ed., La Corte e il Cortegiano 1 (1980): 119-147, and A. Quondam, "La 'forma del vivere': Schede per l'analisi del discorso cortigiano," in A. Prosperi, ed., La Corte e il Cortegiano 2 (1980): 15-68, especially 17-19. [BACK]

64. The issue was first raised by Burckhardt, who held that the chief motive of all the courtier's actions was not—although the author dissimulates this—the service of the prince, but rather the attainment of his own perfection as a human being: "It was for this society—or rather for his own sake—that the 'cortigiano,' as described to us by Castiglione, educated himself. He was the ideal man of society [der gesellschaftliche Idealmensch], and was regarded by the civilization of that age as its choicest flower; and the court existed for him far rather than he for the court. Indeed, such a man would have been out of place at any court, since he himself possessed all the gifts and the bearing of an accomplished ruler, and because his calm supremacy in all things, both outward and spiritual, implied a too independent nature [ein zu selbstständiges Wesen]." The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, trans. S. G. C. Middlemore (Vienna: Phaidon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1937): part 5, "Society and Festivals," chap. 5, "The perfect man of society," 200 (same text also New York: Harper & Row, 1958, 2: 382; 282 f. of It. ed.; German original ed. Werner Kaegi, Berlin-Leipzig: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart, 1930, 2: 277).

For recent examples of scholarly reading of Castiglione's courtier as an independent agent dedicated to the cult of the self, being so idealized as to have no appreciable bearing on political or moral realities, see Joseph A. Mazzeo, Renaissance and Revolution: The Remaking of European Thought (New York: Pantheon, 1965): 137, and Wayne A. Rebhorn, "Ottaviano's Interruptions: Book IV and the Problem of Unity in Il libro del Cortegiano," Modern Language Notes 87 (1972): 37-59. For a contrary opinion, cf. E. Saccone, " Grazia, sprezzatura, affettazione in the Courtier " (1983) and "The Portrait of the Courtier in Castiglione" (1987). The thesis of the moral purpose of the Cortegiano as basic element of unity among its four books finds a precedent as far back as Vittorio Cian: see Cian's note as quoted in Carlo Cordié's edition (pp. 291 f.). Lawrence V. Ryan, "Book IV of Castiglione's Courtier: Climax or Afterthought?," Studies in the Renaissance 19 (1972): 156-179, examines the two alternatives, while F. Whigham (1984): 107 and 200, n. 104, finds the question rather moot. An informed discussion of such matters must be based on the manuscript tradition: on this basis Ghino Ghinassi has shown in the second redaction (1521) a rapprochement to an ecclesiastical-imperial line (it is in 1521 that Castiglione became an ecclesiastic) which postulated the court and the courtier as a point of harmonization for humanistic desiderata. Cf. Ghinassi, ed., La seconda redazione del Cortegiano di Baldassarre Castiglione (Firenze: G. C. Sansoni, 1968), and a discussion of this philological vantage point in G. Ferroni, " Sprezzatura e simulazione," in C. Ossola, ed., La corte e il Cortegiano (1980): 119-121. Also, on Castiglione's rapprochement to ecclesiastical circles, José Guidi, "Baldassar Castiglione et le pouvoir politique: du gentilhomme de cour au nonce pontifical," in André Rochon, ed., Les écrivains et le pouvoir en Italie à l'époque de la Renaissance (première série) (Paris: Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, Centre de recherche sur la Renaissance italienne, 1973): 243-278. In a dense review of V. Cian, Un illustre nunzio pontificio (1951), C. Dionisotti, Giornale Storico della Letteratura Italiana 129 (1952): 31-57 at 41, underlined this supposed frattura ("fracture"), but identified it with a moral situation that characterizes a large area of the early Cinquecento. [BACK]

66. "Essendo il male contrario al bene e 'l bene al male, è quasi necessario che per la opposizione e per un certo contrapeso I'un sostenga e fortifichi l'altro, e mancando o crescendo l'uno, così manchi o cresca l'altro perché niuno contrario è senza l'altro suo contrario. Chi non sa che al mondo non saria la giustizia, se non fossero le ingiurie? la magnanimità se non fossero li pusillanimi?  . . . la verità se non fosse la bugia? Però ben dice Socrate, appresso Platone, maravigliarsi che Esopo non abbia fatto un apologo, nel quale finga Dio, poiché non avea mai potuto unire il piacere e 'l dispiacere insieme, avergli attaccati con la estremità di modo che 'l principio dell'uno sia il fin dell'altro; poiché vedemo niuno piacer poterci mai esser grato, se 'l dispiacere non gli precede.  . . . Però, essendo le virtù state al mondo concesse per grazia e don della natura, subito i vicii, per quella concatenata contrarietà, necessariamente le furono compagni; di modo che sempre, crescendo o mancando l'uno, forza è che così l'altro cresca o manchi." 2.2, Cordié ed.: 95 f. (emphasis and trans. mine). Jaeger: 82 and C. Ossola (1987): 68 f. [BACK]

67. See, for example, Corrado Rosso's numerous studies on the subject, principally Moralisti del "bonheur" (Pisa: Goliardica, 2d ed. 1977) and Il serpente e la sirena: dalla paura del dolore alla paura della felicità (Napoli: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane, 1972). [BACK]

68. This aspect of "play" has a rather different, more historical focus than we find in some recent interpretations that derive from Huizinga's notion of homo ludens. See, for example, Thomas M. Greene, "The Cortegiano and the Choice of a Game" in Hanning and Rosand (1983): 1-15, and Robert W. Hanning, "Castiglione's Verbal Portrait: Structures and Strategies," ibid.: 131-141, especially 137. [BACK]

69. "Gentiluomini sono chiamati quelli che oziosi vivono dei proventi delle loro possessioni abbondantemente, senza avere alcuna cura o di coltivare o di alcun'altra fatica a vivere. Questi tali sono perniciosi in ogni repubblica; ma più perniciosi sono quelli che, oltre alle predette fortune, comandano a castella, ed hanno sudditi che obbediscono loro. Di queste due sorti d'uomini ne sono pieni il regno di Napoli, Terra di Roma, la Romagna e la Lombardia . . . . Colui che vuole fare dove sono assai gentiluomini una repubblica, non la può fare, se prima non gli spegne tutti." Vice versa, the prince who wants to found a principality in a region of democratic tradition cannot succeed "se non trae di quella equalità molti d'animo ambizioso ed inquieto, e quelli fa gentiluomini in fatto e non in nome, donando loro castella e possessioni, e dando loro favore di sustanzie e d'uomini, acciò che posto in mezzo di loro, mediante quelli mantenga la sua potenza, e gli altri siano costretti a sopportare quel giogo che la forza, e non altro mai, può far loro sopportare." In other words, a de facto feudal order, synonymous with power without equality, is necessary to govern when the people are not free.

See C. Donati, L'idea di nobiltà in Italia (1988): 29-36 on Machiavelli and Guicciardini on nobility. I shall cite the texts from Machiavelli, Tutte le opere, ed. Mario Martelli (Firenze: Sansoni, 1971). [BACK]

70. Andrea Battistini, "I manuali di retorica dei Gesuiti," in Gian Paolo Brizzi, ed., La "Ratio studiorum": Modelli culturali e pratiche educative dei Gesuiti in Italia tra Cinque e Seicento (Roma: Bulzoni, 1981): 77-120 at 80 on the hardship of classical education in Jesuit schools as a rite of passage, a heroic test that qualified for noble leadership in society. I must add that the crucial, repeated tests of the Jesuit novice and priest, the Spiritual Exercises, were in their way an extension of the ordeal of the "vigil" as part of the dubbing ceremonial. [BACK]

71. Cf. Brizzi, "Educare il principe, formare le élites: I Gesuiti e Ranuccio I Farnese," in Gian Paolo Brizzi, Alessandro D'Alessandro, and Alessandra Del Fante, Università, Principe, Gesuiti. La politica farnesiana dell'istruzione a Parma e Piacenza (1545-1622), Centro Studi "Europa delle Corti" / Biblioteca del Cinquecento (Roma: Bulzoni, 1980): 135-211 at 154: "non solo nella pietà et nelle lettere,  . . . ma in quelli altri esercitij proprij de Nobili, et necessarij a Cavaglieri," etc. [BACK]

72. Ezio Raimondi, Politica e commedia (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1972): 266, on the particular motif of astuzia in Machiavelli. Raimondi also relates Machiavelli to Cicero's ethical ideas. For a recent reexamination, Wayne A. Rebhorn, Foxes and Lions: Machiavelli's Confidence Men (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988). [BACK]

73. "renuntiaranno alla republica e faranno professione all'ordine suo et mai più poi potranno pretendere al grado civile o alla benivolentia del populo." Prosperi in A. Prosperi, ed. (1980): 83 f. [BACK]