The Book of the Courtier
The pontificates of Alexander and Julius had exhausted Italy with wars,
and the Christian world, weary of their scandalous violence, hailed with
relief the accession of the cultivated and seemingly gentle young
prelate, Giovanni de’ Medici. Of his reign,—so brilliant in art and
letters, so disastrous to the Church,—it is enough to say that the key
is found in the famous phrase with which, on his elevation to the Chair
of St. Peter, he greeted his brother Giuliano: “Let us enjoy the Papacy,
since God hath given it us.” To him the immortality of the soul was an
open topic for debate, while he regarded sound Latinity and a ready
tongue as more important than true doctrine and pure living. Sincerely
zealous for the diffusion of liberal knowledge, he was extravagantly
munificent to artists, scholars and authors. Like all his family, after
the first Cosimo, he was a poor financier, and on his sudden death he
was found to have pawned the very jewels of his tiara. His reckless
expenditure led to the sale of indulgences, and thus in no small degree
to the progress of the Reformation.
Enlarged from a part of Alinari’s photograph (no. 14351) of the marble
tomb sculptures, now in the Certosa di Pavia near Milan, by
Cristoforo Solari, known as _il Gobbo_, (died 1540).
Note 301 page 153. BIAGINO CRIVELLO was one of Duke Ludovico Sforza’s
captains, and is mentioned (July 1500) in a list of Sforza adherents who
had rebelled against Louis XII, and whose possessions were declared
forfeit. The list speaks of him as keeping himself at Mantua and in
Venetian territory, and as owning no attachable property in the
Milanese. In April of the same year an ineffectual demand had been made
upon the Marquess of Mantua for the surrender of Crivello and other
chiefs of the Sforza party.
Note 302 page 153. THE DUKE, i.e., Ludovico Sforza, “Il Moro,” (born
1451; died 1508), was the fourth son of the Francesco Sforza whom Duke
Federico of Urbino had helped to become Duke of Milan (and whose father,
a peasant condottiere, Muzio Attendolo, became known as Sforza by reason
of great personal strength),—and of Bianca Maria, a daughter of the last
Visconti duke of Milan. Early noted for his physical and mental
qualities, Ludovico read and wrote Latin fluently, had a tenacious
memory, and was a ready speaker. He was tall and of strongly marked
features. Unlike his horrible brother Galeazzo Maria, he shunned
bloodshed. Banished from Milan after his brother’s assassination in
1476, he returned in triumph in 1479, and assumed the guardianship of
his nephew Giangaleazzo, for whom he chose as bride his sister’s child,
Isabella (see note 396), daughter of Alfonso II of Naples. Having first
sought the hand of Isabella d’Este (see note 397),—who was already
betrothed to the Marquess of Mantua,—in 1491 he married her younger
sister Beatrice (see note 398), whose influence is by some said to have
led him to aggravate the humiliation of his young nephew and niece, the
rightful duke and duchess. Being threatened by the latter’s father, the
King of Naples, Ludovico invited Charles VIII to enter Italy (1494) and
assert the Angevine claim to Naples. His unhappy nephew died the same
year, not without suspicion of having been poisoned by the uncle’s
order, who thereupon assumed the title as well as the despotic power of
duke. Becoming alarmed at the rapid success of the French in Italy, he
joined the league formed against them, and was afterwards punished for
his treachery by being expelled from Milan by Louis XII and carried to
France. It is said that at the time of his capture, the only favour he
asked was to be allowed the use of a volume of Dante. He died a prisoner
in the Castle of Loches, where, after a vain effort to escape, he was
confined in an underground dungeon. At the height of his prosperity his
revenues exceeded those of any Italian state except Venice. Policy and
also his natural taste for intellectual pleasures led him to copy the
Medici in their patronage of art and letters. He aspired to make his
capital a modern Athens, and sought to attract men of fame and talent
from far and wide. Both Leonardo da Vinci and the architect Bramante
were in his pay.
Note 303 page 153. Cervia is a little town on the Adriatic (between
Ravenna and Rimini). A Dominican, Tommaso Cattanei, was bishop of the
diocese from 1486 to 1509. The pope referred to in the text was Julius
II.
Note 304 page 155. ‘Montefiore Inn’ was a proverbial expression for a
bad hostelry. The rustic inns of Italy at this period were usually
wretched and for the most part kept by Germans.
Note 305 page 156. One ANDREA CASTILLO was secretary to Leo X, and died
in 1545.
Note 306 page 156. Cian identifies this CARDINAL BORGIA as the Francesco
(born 1441; died 1511) who was raised to the purple by Alexander VI, and
s’ known as a schismatic.
Note 307 page 156. The modern form of _ballatore_ is _ballerino_.
Although the distinction is not free from doubt, there seems to be
reason for believing that _danzare_ was the term applied to the more
stately forms of dance, while _ballare_ was reserved for more animated
movements. See note 147.
Note 308 page 157. The Bergamasque was and still is regarded as the
rudest and most rustic of the Italian dialects.
Note 309 page 157. Except as applied to a small Tuscan stream or torrent
(flowing near Acquapendente and Orvieto, and finally tributary to the
Tiber), the name Paglia does not occur in modern Italian geography. In
his autobiography, Cellini mentions crossing the little stream on his
first journey from Siena to Rome. Later in the 16th century, Montaigne
records (in his diary of a trip into Italy) having spent the night at
“_La Paille_” (Italian, _Paglia_), and describes it as “a small village
of five or six houses at the foot of several barren and ill-favoured
mountains.”
Note 310 page 157. They seem to have been playing _primero_ (the modern
_primiera_), a game much in vogue at this time.
Note 311 page 158. Loreto is a small hill town near Ancona, and is
celebrated for its pilgrimage shrine of the Sacred House (_Santa Casa_),
which was reputed to have been the veritable dwelling of the Virgin,
miraculously transported by angels from Nazareth, and set down in Italy
in 1294. In 1511 and again in 1524 Castiglione wrote to his mother that
he was preparing to go to Our Lady of Loreto in fulfilment of a vow. The
name was said to be derived from that of the widow upon whose land the
house was deposited by the angels.
Note 312 page 158. Acquapendente is the name of a small town sixty-seven
miles north-west of Rome.
Note 313 page 159. MONSIGNOR OF SAN PIETRO AD VINCULA was the title of
Cardinal Galeatto della Rovere; see note 189.
Note 314 page 159. MONSIGNOR OF ARAGON was the title of Cardinal
Ludovico of Aragon, (born 1474), a natural son of Ferdinand I of Naples,
and a half-brother of Alfonso II (see note 31) and Federico III of
Naples (see note 401). He was not elevated to the purple until 1519;
Castiglione’s mention of him as a cardinal in dialogues supposed to take
place twelve years earlier, doubtless arose from a natural confusion
between the time when and the time of which they were written.
Note 315 page 159. ‘The _Banchi_’ (Banks) was the name of a street in
Rome well known in the 15th and 16th centuries. Containing the offices
of the papal Curia and magistrates, it became a preferred neighbourhood,
and was enriched with fine buildings, among which was the counting-house
of Julius II’s finance minister, Agostino Chigi, the greatest banker of
his day.
Note 316 page 159. ‘The Chancery’ (_Cancelleria_) was a palace designed
about 1500 by Bramante for Cardinal Riario, but at this time used for
public offices and as the residence of Cardinal Galeotto della Rovere,
who had enlarged and embellished the building. It was not far from the
Banks.
Note 317 page 159. San Celso was the name of a street and church near
the Banks. The saint (Celsus) whose memory is thus perpetuated was born
at what is now Cimiez, near Nice, suffered martyrdom at Rome under Nero,
and was finally put to death (together with his master, St. Nazarius) at
Milan in the year 69.
Note 318 page 160. CESARE BECCADELLO is regarded by Cian as possibly
identical with a certain Bolognese, who was the son of Domenico Maria
Beccadello, married Landomia Fasanini, and was living at the papal court
as late as 1559. The Spanish annotator Fabié suggests that he was the
father (1502) of the author Ludovico Beccadello, who was a follower of
Bembo and wrote biographies of Petrarch and others.
Note 319 page 161. These are characters occurring in the third, sixth
and ninth tales of the Eighth Day, and in the fifth tale of the Ninth
Day.
Note 320 page 161. This knavish student seems to be identical with a
certain CAIO CALORIA PONZIO, who was born at Messina. Of his life little
more is known than that he studied law at Padua between 1479 and 1488,
and, after residing two years at Venice, returned to Sicily. For an
account of a short poem by him in praise of Venice, and of his dialect
comedy dedicated to the Marquess of Mantua, see Vittorio Rossi’s _Caio
Caloria Ponzio, e la poesia volgare letteraria di Sicilia nel Secolo
XV_, reprinted (Palermo, 1893) from the _Archivio Storico Siciliano_, N.
S., A., xviii.
Note 321 page 161. The only belfry at Padua answering to this
description is said to be that of San Giacomo.
Note 322 page 162. GONNELLA. This name was borne by two famous jesters
employed by the d’Este family. The one here referred to was probably the
later of the two, who lived at the courts of Dukes Niccolò III and
Borso, was the son of a Florentine glover Bernardo Gonnella, and married
one Checca Lapi. The next buffoon referred to was probably LUDOVICO
MELIOLO, who acted as steward to the court of Mantua about 1500, and was
a brother of the goldsmith and sculptor Bartolommeo Meliolo (1448-1514).
He was called “the father of jests.”
Note 323 page 163. This is an instance of the use of the word _calunnia_
(rendered ‘imputation’) in its primitive sense of malicious accusation
without reference to truth or falsity.
Note 324 page 164. These characters occur in the sixth tale of the Third
Day, and in the seventh and eighth tales of the Seventh Day of
Boccaccio’s “Decameron.”
Note 325 page 164. The queen here mentioned is of course Isabella the
Catholic; see note 391.
Note 326 page 164. Fabié says that this COUNTESS OF CASTAGNETA was
Brazaida de Almada, daughter of a Portuguese cavalier Juan Baez de
Almada and Violante de Castro (of the same nation). She was a
lady-in-waiting to Queen Isabella, and her husband Don Garci Fernandez
Manrique (third Count of Castagneta and first Marquess of Aguilar) took
part in the conquest of Granada.
Note 327 page 167. If unconvinced by the “Decameron,” readers of the
_Corbaccio_ will surely be persuaded of the justice of this opinion.
Note 328 page 167. According to one form of the legend of Orpheus, his
grief at the final loss of his wife Eurydice, when his lyre had all but
enabled him to recover her from Hades, led him to treat contemptuously
the Thracian women, who avenged the insult by tearing him in pieces
under the excitement of their Bacchanalian orgies.
Note 329 page 167. ‘Braccesque leave’ (_una licentia bracciesca_ in the
Aldine folio of 1528, and _una licentia Bracciesca_ in the more
correctly printed Aldine folio of 1545) is a phrase derived from the
name of Braccio Fortebracci, a captain who was famous for his violence
to friend and foe, and whose followers were called Bracceschi. To give a
man Braccesque leave meant to dismiss him with blows.
Note 330 page 169. Although in this and a few other passages,