decision whether or not women are as capable of divine love as men are.
But as the controversy between you might be too long, it will be well to
postpone it until to-morrow.”
“Nay, until this evening,” said messer Cesare Gonzaga.
“How until this evening?” said my lady Duchess.
Messer Cesare replied:
“Because it is already day;” and he showed her the light that was
beginning to come in through the cracks at the windows.
Then everyone rose to his feet in great surprise, for the discussion did
not seem to have lasted longer than usual; but by reason of having been
begun much later, and by its pleasantness, it had so beguiled the
company that they had not perceived the flight of hours; nor was there
anyone who felt the heaviness of sleep upon his eyes, which nearly
always happens when the accustomed hour of sleep is passed in watching.
The windows having then been opened on that side of the palace which
looks towards the lofty crest of Mount Catria,[486] they saw that a
beautiful dawn of rosy hue was already born in the east, and that all
the stars had vanished save Venus, sweet mistress of the sky, who holds
the bonds of night and day; from which there seemed to breathe a gentle
wind that filled the air with crisp coolness and began to waken sweet
choruses of joyous birds in the murmuring forests of the hills hard by.
So, having reverently taken leave of my lady Duchess, they all started
towards their chambers without light of torches, that of day being
enough for them; and as they were about to quit the room, my lord
Prefect turned to my lady Duchess, and said:
“My Lady, to finish the controversy between my lord Gaspar and my lord
Magnifico, we will come with our judge this evening earlier than we did
yesterday.”
My lady Emilia replied:
“On condition that if my lord Gaspar wishes to accuse women and put some
fresh imputation upon them, as is his wont, he shall also give bond to
sustain his charge, for I account him a shifty disputant.”
NOTES
VXORI DILECTISSIMAE
OPERIS ADIVTRICI
[Illustration:
BALDESAR CASTIGLIONE
COUNT OF NOVILLARA
1478-1529
]
Reduced from Anderson’s photograph (no.2955) of the anonymous portrait
in the Corsini Gallery at Rome. This may possibly be a copy of a
second portrait that Raphael is said to have painted of Castiglione,
in 1519.
PRELIMINARY NOTES
Baldesar Castiglione was born on his father’s estate of Casatico in the
Mantuan territory, 6 December 1478. Michelangelo was his senior by four
years; Leo X by three years; Titian by one year; Giorgione and Cesare
Borgia were born in the year of his birth, while his friend Raphael and
also Luther were his juniors by five years.
His surname is said to be derived from the little town at which
Bonaparte defeated the Austrians near Mantua in 1796, and which is by
some supposed to have taken its name from _Castrum Stiliconis_, Camp of
Stilico, a Roman general of the 4th century. One Tealdo Castiglione was
Archbishop of Milan as early as 1074, from which time the family is
often and honourably mentioned in the annals of northern Italy.
Baldesar’s parents were Count Cristoforo Castiglione, a
soldier-courtier, and Luigia Gonzaga, a near kinswoman of the Marquess
of Mantua. The boy studied at Milan,—learning Latin from Giorgio Merula
and Greek from Demetrios Chalcondylas, an erudite Athenian who had fled
from Byzantium about 1447, and of whom another pupil wrote: “It seems to
me that in him are figured all the wisdom, the civility and the elegance
of those ancients who are so famous and so illustrious. Merely seeing
him, you fancy you are looking on Plato; far more when you hear him
speak.”
Having spent some time at the splendid court of Ludovico Sforza at
Milan, Castiglione lost his father in 1499, and (the Sforzas being
expelled the same year) he returned to Mantua and entered the service of
his natural lord, the Marquess Gianfrancesco Gonzaga; he accompanied
this prince to Milan to witness the entry of Louis XII of France, and
afterwards on an expedition to aid the French in their vain effort to
hold the kingdom of Naples against the Aragonese. When Gonzaga abandoned
the French cause (after being defeated by Ferdinand the Catholic’s
“Great Captain,” Consalvo de Cordova, near the Garigliano in 1503),
Castiglione obtained leave to go to Rome, and there met Duke Guidobaldo
di Montefeltro, who had come to pay homage to the newly elected Pope
Julius II. He entered the duke’s service, and soon became one of the
brightest ornaments of that brilliant company of statesmen, prelates,
scholars, poets, wits and ladies, known as the Court of Urbino.
In 1504 he took part, under Duke Guidobaldo, in the papal siege of
Cesena against the Venetians. The next year he attended the duke on a
diplomatic visit to Rome. In 1506 he was sent to the court of Henry VII
of England to receive the insignia of the Order of the Garter on the
duke’s behalf. As appears from a letter to his mother, he returned to
Urbino as early as 5 March 1507, notwithstanding his mention of himself
in The Courtier as still absent in England at the date (8-11 March) of
the dialogues he professes to report at second hand. In the same year he
was sent on a mission to Louis XII at Milan.
On Guidobaldo’s death in 1508, Castiglione continued in the service of
the new duke, Francesco Maria della Rovere (“my lord Prefect” of THE
COURTIER), who appointed him governor of Gubbio. In the following year
he served in his master’s campaign against the Venetians, and contracted
a dangerous illness, during which he was tenderly nursed by the dowager
duchess, Elisabetta Gonzaga. In 1511 he accompanied the duke to Rome on
the occasion of the latter’s trial for the murder of Cardinal Alidosi,
and was active in Francesco Maria’s successful defence. In 1513 the duke
created him Count of Novillara and gave him an estate of that name,
which however he soon lost through the Medici usurpation of the duchy,
and never regained. At the death of Julius II, Castiglione was
ambassador to the sacred college, and continued in that office during
nearly the whole of Leo X's pontificate. His numerous letters show the
variety and importance of the diplomatic business in which he was
engaged.
Several plans for his marriage came to nothing, and on one occasion,
when the lady’s father hesitated, the suitor broke off negotiations,
saying: “The wife that I am to take, be she who she may, I desire that
she should be given to me with as good will as I take her withal,—yea,
if she were the daughter of a king.”
Pope Leo having in 1516 basely deprived Francesco Maria of the Duchy of
Urbino, Castiglione accepted an invitation to Mantua and there married
Ippolita, daughter of Count Guido Torello di Montechiarugolo and
Francesca Bentivoglio, a daughter of the former ruler of Bologna. This
union proved exceptionally happy and was blessed by three children: a
son Camillo, a daughter Anna, and a second daughter Ippolita, at whose
birth the young mother lost her life in 1520. His son attained the age
of eighty years, and is said to have been the true embodiment of the
qualities described in THE COURTIER.
Castiglione resided alternately at Mantua and at Rome, where he served
as Mantuan ambassador, and where his learning, wit, taste, gentle
disposition and integrity earned for him an almost unique eminence at
the papal court.
In 1524 he was sent by Pope Clement VII as ambassador to the Emperor
Charles V (who was waging war against the French in Italy), but while
his counsel and high qualities were appreciated, he was too honest a man
to cope with the tortuous politics of the time, and proved unable to
avert the capture and sack of Rome (1527) or the imprisonment of the
pope. These catastrophes, together with a malicious and easily disproved
charge of treason brought against him, preyed upon his health, and
despite the many honours conferred upon him by Charles, he failed to
rally, and finally died at Toledo, 7 February 1529, without again seeing
his native land. His body was afterwards brought to Italy and buried in
the church of the Madonna delle Grazie near Mantua, where his tomb was
erected from designs by his young friend Giulio Romano.
Besides THE COURTIER, his writings comprise: _Tirsi_, an eclogue of
fifty-five stanzas in _ottava rima_, written and recited at the court of
Urbino for the carnival of 1506; a prologue and epilogue for his friend
Bibbiena’s _Calandra_; a few Italian lyrics of moderate merit; and some
better Latin elegies and epigrams; nearly all composed during his
embassy at Rome. A large number of his letters also have been preserved.
[Illustration:
CASTIGLIONE'S TOMB
CHURCH OF THE MADONNA DELLE GRAZIE NEAR MANTUA
]
Reduced from a water-colour drawing made by the architect Patricolo and
the painter Zanetti from the monument designed by Giulio Pippi,
better known as Giulio Romano, (1492-1546). The water-mark of the
paper on which this volume is printed is copied from a drawing, by
Zanetti, of Castiglione’s arms as they appear in the upper left-hand
panel of the monument.
His fine character is reflected in that of his Courtier, who (as Symonds
says) “is, with one or two points of immaterial difference, a modern
gentleman, such as all men of education at the present day would wish to
be.” It may perhaps aid the reader to realize the time in which the
author lived, to recall that when Castiglione was born, printing had
been practised in Italy for thirteen years, that the earliest Greek
grammar had been printed two years, that America was discovered when he
was a boy, that the Reformation began when he was in the prime of life,
and that the Lutherans were first called Protestants in the year of his
death.
The first (Aldine) edition of THE COURTIER was issued thirteen years
after the death of Teob_aldo_ Manucci, the illustrious founder of the
press that continued to bear his name, and consisted of one thousand and
thirty-one copies, of which thirty were on large paper and one on
vellum. It is a small folio of one hundred and twenty-two leaves, the
type-page measuring almost precisely nine and one-quarter inches by five
and one-eighth inches. In its ordinary form the book can hardly be
called rare, as in 1895 the present translator secured a good copy from
Leipsic for forty-five francs.
The earliest Spanish translator, BOSCAN, (born at Barcelona about 1493;
died in France about 1542), was of gentle birth. Early becoming a
soldier, he served with credit in Charles V's Italian campaigns, and
thus acquired familiarity with the language and literature of Italy. He
is said to have known Castiglione personally. Having been for some time
tutor to the young prince who was later known as the Duke of Alva, he
married and devoted the rest of his short life to letters. As a writer
he is best known as the founder of the Italian poetical school in Spain.
Ticknor says that Boscan’s version of THE COURTIER hardly professes to
be literal, but that perhaps nothing in Castilian prose of an earlier
date is written in so classical and finished a style. It has been often
reprinted (as recently as 1873), and was found useful by the present
translator in doubtful passages.
The earliest French translator, COLIN, (died 1547), was a native of
Auxerre and enjoyed the favour of Francis I, whom he served as reader
and almoner, and who bestowed upon him the abbotship of St. Ambrose at
Tours, as well as other ecclesiastical offices. In his prosperity he
showed much kindness to his less fortunate brother authors, but he was
too free of speech to be permanently successful as a courtier, and lost
his preferments. His translation of THE COURTIER, which some writers
erroneously ascribe to Jean Chaperon, is little esteemed, was soon
issued with corrections by another hand, and then followed by another
French version. He translated also parts of Homer and Ovid, and composed
original verse in Latin and French. For an account of Castiglione’s
influence upon French literature and of his many French imitators,
consult Pietro Toldo’s “Le Courtisan dans la littérature française et
ses rapports avec l'œuvre du Castiglione,” (Archiv für das Studium der
Neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen, C. iv, pp. 75 and 313, and C. v, p.
60).
The earliest English translator, HOBY, (born 1530; died 1566), was the
son of William and Katherine (Forden) Hoby of Herefordshire. Having
studied at Cambridge, he visited France, Italy and other foreign
countries. In 1565-6 he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth and sent as
ambassador to France, where he soon died, leaving several children and a
widow. This lady was the third of Sir Anthony Cooke’s five learned
daughters, of whom the eldest married Sir William Cecil (afterwards Lord
Burleigh), while the second became the mother of Francis Bacon, Lord
Verulam. Interesting details of Hoby’s life and of the manners of the
time are given in his unpublished diary, preserved in the British
Museum. His version of THE COURTIER was carefully made, and although
rough to our ears and occasionally obscure, it became very popular and
was several times republished. A beautiful reprint of the original
edition has recently been issued (1900), in a scholarly introduction to
which Professor Walter Raleigh traces the influence of the book upon
Elizabethan writers. THE COURTIER, and especially Hoby’s translation of
it, are the subject of a very interesting study by Mary Augusta Scott,
Ph.D., printed in the Publications of the Modern Language Association of
America, vol. xvi (1901), no. 4. In 1570 Roger Ascham wrote in his
“Schoolmaster:” “To join learning with comely exercises, Count Baldesar
Castiglione in his book CORTEGIANO doth trimly teach: which book,
advisedly read and diligently followed but one year at home in England,
would do a young gentleman more good, I wis, than three years’ travel
abroad in Italy. And I marvel this book is not more read in the Court
than it is, seeing it is so well translated into English by a worthy
gentleman, Sir Thomas Hobbie, who was many ways well furnished with
learning, and very expert in knowledge of divers tongues.”
Of the first German translator, LORENZ KRATZER, little more is known
than that he was an officer of customs at Burckhausen, in Bavaria, from
1565 to 1588, and that he speaks of having devoted to letters the ample
leisure which his duties permitted. Although said to be meritorious, his
work can hardly have gained wide currency, as both Noyse (whose German
translation of THE COURTIER was published at Dilingen in 1593) and a
third German translator (whose version was issued at Frankfort in 1684
under the initials “J. C. L. L. J.”) seem to have regarded themselves
each as the earliest in the field.
The first Latin translator, TURLER, (born 1550; died 1602), was a
_Doctor Juris_, and became burgomaster of his native town of Lössnitz,
near Leipsic. Besides THE COURTIER, he translated several of
Machiavelli’s works into Latin.
NOTES TO THE DEDICATORY LETTER
Note 1 page 1. Dom MIGUEL DE SILVA, (born about 1490; died 1556), was
the second son of Diego de Silva and Maria de Ayola, Count and Countess
of Portalegre, a province of central Portugal. Having studied at the
universities of Paris, Siena and Bologna, he was soon called to the
court of Emanuel of Portugal, held various ecclesiastical posts, and was
made Bishop of Viseu in the Province of Beira. As ambassador to Popes
Leo X, Adrian VI and Clement VII, he paid long visits to Rome, where his
friendship with Castiglione probably began. During the twenty years that
followed 1521 he served John III of Portugal as _Escribano de la
Puridad_; then, having been made a cardinal by Paul III, he spent the
remainder of his life in the papal service, died in Rome, and was buried
in the church of Santa Maria in Trastevere. Eminent as a prelate and a
diplomatist, he also enjoyed no small repute as an author and an elegant
Latinist.
Note 2 page 1. GUIDOBALDO DI MONTEFELTRO, Duke of Urbino, (born 1472;
died 1508), was the only son of Duke Federico di Montefeltro and
Battista Sforza, an accomplished niece of the first Sforza duke of
Milan. Precocious as a child, he was elaborately yet judiciously
educated, and much of the praise bestowed upon him in THE COURTIER is
shown by contemporary evidence to have been just. On his father’s death
in 1482, both he and his State were confided to his cousin Ubaldini (see
note 273), who seems to have been loyal to the trust, although next heir
to the duchy. From records that have survived, Dennistoun extracts some
details of the young duke’s court: “To all persons composing the ducal
household, unexceptionable manners were indispensable. In those of
higher rank there were further required competent talents and learning,
a grave deportment, and fluency of speech. The servants must be of
steady habits and respectable character; regular in all private
transactions; of good address, modest and graceful; willing and neat
handed in their service. There is likewise inculcated the most
scrupulous personal cleanliness, especially of the hands, with
particular injunctions as to frequent ablutions, and extraordinary
precautions against the unpleasant effects of hot weather on their
persons and clothing; in case of need, medical treatment is enjoined to
correct the breath. Those who wore livery had two suits a year,
generally of fustian, though to some silk doublets were given for summer
use.”
In 1489 Guidobaldo married Elisabetta Gonzaga, a sister of the Marquess
of Mantua. All hopes, however, of an heir were soon abandoned,
apparently owing to the young duke’s physical infirmities, which were
increased by over exercise and in time unfitted him for all active
occupations. Nevertheless he was able to take part in the vain
resistance to Charles VIII's invasion of Italy, and later in the
expulsion of the French from the kingdom of Naples. While fighting in
the service of Pope Alexander VI in 1497, he was taken prisoner and
forced to pay a ransom of 30,000 ducats, a sum then equivalent to about
twice that number of modern pounds sterling, and raised only at the
sacrifice of his duchess’s jewels. In 1501 he aided rather than opposed
Louis XII's invasion of Naples.
In 1502 the pope’s son Cesare Borgia treacherously seized the Duchy of
Urbino. To spare his people bloodshed and ruin, Guidobaldo fled in
disguise to his brother-in-law at Mantua, and after a vain appeal to
Louis XII, found an honourable asylum at Venice. In the same year he
regained his dominions for a short time, but was again forced to take
flight. On the death of Alexander VI (August 1503), Cesare’s power
crumbled, Guidobaldo easily recovered his duchy, and his position was
soon assured by the election of Julius II, who was not only his personal
friend, but also the brother of his sister Giovanna’s husband. In 1504
he formally adopted as his heir this sister’s son, Francesco Maria della
Rovere, and (as we have seen) took into his service the future author of
THE COURTIER. His learning, amiability and munificence attracted choice
spirits to his court, which came to be regarded as the first in Italy.
Pope Julius was splendidly entertained there on his way both to and from
his Bologna campaign, and the Courtier dialogues are represented as
taking place immediately after his departure for Rome in March 1507.
Long an invalid, Guidobaldo became more and more a martyr to his gout,
which was aggravated by a season of exceptional drought and cold and
brought him final relief from suffering in April 1508. His fame rests,
not upon his military and political achievements, but upon the beauty of
his character, the variety of his intellectual accomplishments, the
patience with which he endured reverses, illness and forced inaction,
and upon the culture and refinement that characterized his court.
Note 3 page 1. FRANCESCO MARIA DELLA ROVERE, Duke of Urbino, (born 1490;
died 1538), was the son of Giovanni della Rovere and Duke Guidobaldo’s
sister Giovanna di Montefeltro. Giovanni was a nephew of Pope Sixtus IV
(who had made him Prefect of Rome), and a younger brother of Cardinal
Giuliano della Rovere, afterwards Pope Julius II.
On his father’s death in 1501, Francesco was brought to the court of his
uncle Guidobaldo, who secured for him a renewal of the Prefecture and
superintended his education. In THE COURTIER he appears as “my lord
Prefect.” During the Borgian usurpation of the duchy, he found refuge at
the court of Louis XII; and soon after the fall of the Borgias and his
uncle Julius II's accession, he was adopted as Guidobaldo’s heir, while
through the mediation of Castiglione a marriage was arranged for him
with Eleanora, daughter to the Marquess of Mantua and niece to the
Duchess of Urbino. He now resided chiefly with his uncle, acquainting
himself with his future subjects and duties. Although he possessed many
of the good qualities ascribed to him in THE COURTIER, his temper was
ungovernable, and before reaching the age of eighteen he slew one of the
members of the court, who was accused of seducing his sister.
Having become duke in 1508, he was married on Christmas Eve of that
year. In the following spring he commanded the papal forces in the
League of Cambray, and despite the obstacles put in his way by his
colleague Cardinal Alidosi (see note 268), he soon reduced the Romagna
towns, the recovery of which from Venice was Julius II's chief object in
forming the league. In a later campaign against the French, Bologna was
lost to the Church (1511) through the treachery of Alidosi, who craftily
contrived to have the blame fall upon Francesco, and was murdered by the
latter at Ravenna. After a long trial before six cardinals, in which
ample proof of the dead man’s treason was presented, and an eloquent
appeal made by Beroaldo (see note 235),—the young duke was acquitted and
restored to the pope’s favour.
Although both Francesco and his predecessor had generously befriended
the Medici during their exile from Florence (1494-1512), Leo X (Giovanni
de' Medici) seized his duchy in 1516, to bestow it on a nephew, Lorenzo
de' Medici. It is needless to speak here of Francesco’s restoration in
1521, of his failure to relieve Pope Clement VII when Rome was sacked in
1527, or of his later life.
While small in person, Francesco was active and well formed. His manners
were gentle and his character forgiving, in spite of his fiery temper.
Strict in religious observances and an enemy to blasphemous language, he
was also creditably intolerant of those outrages upon womanly honour
with which war was then fraught. He was famous chiefly as a soldier, and
by so competent a judge as the Emperor Charles V was regarded as master
of the military science of his day.
Note 4 page 1. This disclaimer of careful authorship is not to be taken
too literally. At least a draft of Books I-III seems to have been made
at Urbino between April 1508 and May 1509, while Book IV was probably
written at Rome in the earlier part of the interval between September
1513 and March 1516. Castiglione apparently continued to revise his work
until 1518, when he sent his MS. to Bembo. See Silvestro Marcello’s
pamphlet, “La Cronologia del Cortegiano di Baldesar Castiglione.” Pisa,
1895.
Note 5 page 1. As has been seen, Castiglione resided at the Spanish
court from 1524 until his death in 1529.