The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy

In other respects also, the ‘Galateo’ is a graceful and intelligent guide to good manners—a school of tact and delicacy. Even now it may be read with no small profit by people of all classes, and the politeness of European nations is not likely to outgrow its precepts. So far as tact is an affair of the heart, it has been inborn in some men from the dawn of civilization, and acquired through force of will by others; but the Italian first recognised it as a universal social duty and a mark of culture and education. And Italy itself had altered much in the course of two centuries. We feel at their close that the time for practical jokes between friends and acquaintances—for ‘burle’ and ‘beffe’ (p. 155 (#x8_x_8_i4) sqq.)—was over in good society,[856 - The diminution of the ‘burla’ is evident from the instances in the Cortigiano, l. ii. fol. 96. The Florence practical jokes kept their ground tenaciously. See, for evidence, the tales of Lasca (Ant. Franc. Grazini, b. 1503, d. 1582), which appeared at Florence in 1750.] that the people had emerged from the walls of the cities and had learned a cosmopolitan politeness and consideration. We shall speak later on of the intercourse of society in the narrower sense.

Outward life, indeed, in the fifteenth and the early part of the sixteenth centuries was polished and ennobled as among no other people in the world. A countless number of those small things and great things which combine to make up what we mean by comfort, we know to have first appeared in Italy. In the well-paved streets of the Italian cities,[857 - For Milan, see Bandello, parte i. nov. 9. There were more than sixty carriages with four, and numberless others with two, horses, many of them carved and richly gilt and with silken tops. Comp. ibid. nov. 4. Ariosto, Sat. iii. 127.] driving was universal, while elsewhere in Europe walking or riding was the customs, and at all events no one drove for amusement. We read in the novelists of soft, elastic beds, of costly carpets and bedroom furniture, of which we hear nothing in other countries.[858 - Bandello, parte i. nov. 3, iii. 42, iv. 25.] We often hear especially of the abundance and beauty of the linen. Much of all this is drawn within the sphere of art. We note with admiration the thousand ways in which art ennobles luxury, not only adorning the massive sideboard or the light brackets with noble vases and clothing the walls with the moving splendour of tapestry, and covering the toilet-table with numberless graceful trifles, but absorbing whole branches of mechanical work—especially carpentering—into its province. All western Europe, as soon as its wealth enabled it to do so, set to work in the same way at the close of the Middle Ages. But its efforts produced either childish and fantastic toy-work, or were bound by the chains of a narrow and purely Gothic art, while the Renaissance moved freely, entering into the spirit of every task it undertook and working for a far larger circle of patrons and admirers than the northern artist. The rapid victory of Italian decorative art over northern in the course of the sixteenth century is due partly to this fact, though partly the result of wider and more general causes.

CHAPTER III.

LANGUAGE AS THE BASIS OF SOCIAL INTERCOURSE

THE higher forms of social intercourse, which here meet us as a work of art—as a conscious product and one of the highest products of national life—have no more important foundation and condition than language.

In the most flourishing period of the Middle Ages, the nobility of Western Europe had sought to establish a ‘courtly’ speech for social intercourse as well as for poetry. In Italy, too, where the dialects differed so greatly from one another, we find in the thirteenth century a so-called ‘Curiale,’ which was common to the courts and to the poets. It is of decisive importance for Italy that the attempt was there seriously and deliberately made to turn this into the language of literature and society. The introduction to the ‘Cento Novelle Antiche,’ which were put into their present shape before 1300, avow this object openly. Language is here considered apart from its uses in poetry; its highest function is clear, simple, intelligent utterance in short speeches, epigrams, and answers. This faculty was admired in Italy, as nowhere else but among the Greeks and Arabians: ‘how many in the course of a long life have scarcely produced a single “bel parlare.” ’

But the matter was rendered more difficult by the diversity of the aspects under which it was considered. The writings of Dante transport us into the midst of the struggle. His work on ‘the Italian language’[859 - De Vulgari Eloquio, ed. Corbinelli, Parisiis, 1577. According to Boccaccio, Vita di Dante, p. 77, it was written shortly before his death. He mentions in the Convito the rapid and striking changes which took place during his lifetime in the Italian language.] is not only of the utmost importance for the subject itself, but is also the first complete treatise on any modern language. His method and results belong to the history of linguistic science, in which they will always hold a high place. We must here content ourselves with the remark that long before the appearance of this book the subject must have been one of daily and pressing importance, that the various dialects of Italy had long been the objects of eager study and dispute, and that the birth of the one classical language was not accomplished without many throes.[860 - See on this subject the investigations of Lionardo Aretino (Epist. ed. Mehus. ii. 62 sqq. lib. vi. 10) and Poggio (Historiae disceptativae convivales tres, in the Opp. fol. 14 sqq.), whether in earlier times the language of the people and of scholars was the same. Lionardo maintains the negative; Poggio expressly maintains the affirmative against his predecessor. See also the detailed argument of L. B. Alberti in the introduction to Della Famiglia, book iii., on the necessity of Italian for social intercourse.]

Nothing certainly contributed so much to this end as the great poem of Dante. The Tuscan dialect became the basis of the new national speech.[861 - The gradual progress which this dialect made in literature and social intercourse could be tabulated without difficulty by a native scholar. It could be shown to what extent in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the various dialects kept their places, wholly or partly, in correspondence, in official documents, in historical works, and in literature generally. The relations between the dialects and a more or less impure Latin, which served as the official language, would also be discussed. The modes of speech and pronunciation in the different cities of Italy are noticed in Landi, Forcianae Quaestiones, fol. 7 a. Of the former he says: ‘Hetrusci vero quanquam caeteris excellant, effugere tamen non possunt, quin et ipsi ridiculi sint, aut saltem quin se mutuo lacerent;’ as regards pronunciation, the Sienese, Lucchese, and Florentines are specially praised; but of the Florentines it is said: ‘Plus (jucunditatis) haberet si voces non ingurgitaret aut non ita palato lingua jungeretur.’] If this assertion may seem to some to go too far, as foreigners we may be excused, in a matter on which much difference of opinion prevails, for following the general belief.

Literature and poetry probably lost more than they gained by the contentious purism which was long prevalent in Italy, and which marred the freshness and vigour of many an able writer. Others, again, who felt themselves masters of this magnificent language, were tempted to rely upon its harmony and flow, apart from the thought which it expressed. A very insignificant melody, played upon such an instrument, can produce a very great effect. But however this may be, it is certain that socially the language had great value. It was, as it were, the crown of a noble and dignified behaviour, and compelled the gentleman, both in his ordinary bearing and in exceptional moments to observe external propriety. No doubt this classical garment, like the language of Attic society, served to drape much that was foul and malicious; but it was also the adequate expression of all that is noblest and most refined. But politically and nationally it was of supreme importance, serving as an ideal home for the educated classes in all the states of the divided peninsula.[862 - It is so felt to be by Dante, De Vulgari Eloquio.] Nor was it the special property of the nobles or of any one class, but the poorest and humblest might learn it if they would. Even now—and perhaps more than ever—in those parts of Italy where, as a rule, the most unintelligible dialect prevails, the stranger is often astonished at hearing pure and well-spoken Italian from the mouths of peasants or artisans, and looks in vain for anything analogous in France or in Germany, where even the educated classes retain traces of a provincial speech. There are certainly a larger number of people able to read in Italy than we should be led to expect from the condition of many parts of the country—as for instance, the States of the Church—in other respects; but what is of more importance is the general and undisputed respect for pure language and pronunciation as something precious and sacred. One part of the country after another came to adopt the classical dialect officially. Venice, Milan, and Naples did so at the noontime of Italian literature, and partly through its influences. It was not till the present century that Piedmont became of its own free will a genuine Italian province by sharing in this chief treasure of the people—pure speech.[863 - Tuscan, it is true, was read and written long before this in Piedmont—but very little reading and writing was done at all.] The dialects were from the beginning of the sixteenth century purposely left to deal with a certain class of subjects, serious as well as comic,[864 - The place, too, of the dialect in the usage of daily life was clearly understood. Gioviano Pontano ventured especially to warn the prince of Naples against the use of it (Jov. Pontan. De Principe). The last Bourbons were notoriously less scrupulous in this respect. For the way in which a Milanese Cardinal, who wished to retain his native dialect in Rome was ridiculed, see Bandello, parte ii. nov. 31.] and the style which was thus developed proved equal to all its tasks. Among other nations a conscious separation of this kind did not occur till a much later period.

The opinion of educated people as to the social value of language, is fully set forth in the ‘Cortigiano.’[865 - Bald. Castiglione, Il Cortigiano, l. i. fol. 27 sqq. Throughout the dialogue we are able to gather the personal opinion of the writer. The opposition to Petrarch and Boccaccio is very curious (Dante is not once mentioned). We read that Politian, Lorenzo de’ Medici, and others were also Tuscans, and as worthy of imitation as they, ‘e forse di non minor dottrina e guidizio.’] There were then persons, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, who purposely kept to the antiquated expressions of Dante and the other Tuscan writers of his time, simply because they were old. Our author forbids the use of them altogether in speech, and is unwilling to permit them even in writing, which he considers a form of speech. Upon this follows the admission that the best style of speech is that which most resembles good writing. We can clearly recognise the author’s feeling that people who have anything of importance to say must shape their own speech, and that language is something flexible and changing because it is something living. It is allowable to make use of any expression, however ornate, as long as it is used by the people; nor are non-Tuscan words, or even French and Spanish words forbidden, if custom has once applied them to definite purposes.[866 - There was a limit, however, to this. The satirists introduce bits of Spanish, and Folengo (under the pseudonym Limerno Pitocco, in his Orlandino) of French, but only by way of ridicule. It is an exceptional fact that a street in Milan, which at the time of the French (1500 to 1512, 1515 to 1522) was called Rue Belle, now bears the name Rugabella. The long Spanish rule has left almost no traces on the language, and but rarely the name of some governor in streets and public buildings. It was not till the eighteenth century that, together with French modes of thought, many French words and phrases found their way into Italian. The purism of our century is still busy in removing them.] Thus care and intelligence will produce a language, which, if not the pure old Tuscan, is still Italian, rich in flowers and fruit like a well-kept garden. It belongs to the completeness of the ‘Cortigiano’ that his wit, his polished manners, and his poetry, must be clothed in this perfect dress.

When style and language had once become the property of a living society, all the efforts of purists and archaists failed to secure their end. Tuscany itself was rich in writers and talkers of the first order, who ignored and ridiculed these endeavours. Ridicule in abundance awaited the foreign scholar who explained to the Tuscans how little they understood their own language.[867 - Firenzuola, Opera, i. in the preface to the discourse on female beauty, and ii. in the Ragionamenti which precede the novels.] The life and influence of a writer like Macchiavelli was enough to sweep away all these cobwebs. His vigorous thoughts, his clear and simple mode of expression wore a form which had any merit but that of the ‘Trecentisti.’ And on the other hand there were too many North Italians, Romans, and Neapolitans, who were thankful if the demand for purity of style in literature and conversation was not pressed too far. They repudiated, indeed, the forms and idioms of their dialect; and Bandello, with what a foreigner might suspect to be false modesty, is never tired of declaring: ‘I have no style; I do not write like a Florentine, but like a barbarian; I am not ambitious of giving new graces to my language; I am a Lombard, and from the Ligurian border into the bargain.’[868 - Bandello, parte i. Proemio, and nov. 1 and 2. Another Lombard, the before-mentioned Teofilo Folengo in his Orlandino, treats the whole matter with ridicule.] But the claims of the purists were most successfully met by the express renunciation of the higher qualities of style, and the adoption of a vigorous, popular language in their stead. Few could hope to rival Pietro Bembo who, though born in Venice, nevertheless wrote the purest Tuscan, which to him was a foreign language, or the Neapolitan Sannazaro, who did the same. But the essential point was that language, whether spoken or written, was held to be an object of respect. As long as this feeling was prevalent, the fanaticism of the purists—their linguistic congresses and the rest of it[869 - Such a congress appears to have been held at Bologna at the end of 1531 under the presidency of Bembo. See the letter of Claud. Tolomai, in Firenzuola, Opere, vol. ii. append. p. 231 sqq. But this was not so much a matter of purism, but rather the old quarrel between Lombards and Tuscans.]—did little harm. Their bad influence was not felt till much later, when the original power of Italian literature relaxed, and yielded to other and far worse influences. At last it became possible for the Accademia della Crusca to treat Italian like a dead language. But this association proved so helpless that it could not even hinder the invasion of Gallicism in the eighteenth century.

This language—loved, tended, and trained to every use—now served as the basis of social intercourse. In northern countries, the nobles and the princes passed their leisure either in solitude, or in hunting, fighting, drinking, and the like; the burghers in games and bodily exercises, with a mixture of literary or festive amusement. In Italy there existed a neutral ground, where people of every origin, if they had the needful talent and culture, spent their time in conversation and the polished interchange of jest and earnest. As eating and drinking formed a small part of such entertainments,[870 - Luigi Cornaro complains about 1550 (at the beginning of his Trattato della Vita Sobria) that latterly Spanish ceremonies and compliments, Lutheranism and gluttony had been gaining ground in Italy. With moderation in respect to the entertainment offered to guests, the freedom and ease of social intercourse disappeared.] it was not difficult to keep at a distance those who sought society for these objects. If we are to take the writers of dialogues literally, the loftiest problems of human existence were not excluded from the conversation of thinking men, and the production of noble thoughts was not, as was commonly the case in the North, the work of solitude, but of society. But we must here limit ourselves to the less serious side of social intercourse—to the side which existed only for the sake of amusement.

CHAPTER IV.

THE HIGHER FORMS OF SOCIETY

THIS society, at all events at the beginning of the sixteenth century, was a matter of art; and had, and rested on, tacit or avowed rules of good sense and propriety, which are the exact reverse of all mere etiquette. In less polished circles, where society took the form of a permanent corporation, we meet with a system of formal rules and a prescribed mode of entrance, as was the case with those wild sets of Florentine artists of whom Vasari tells us that they were capable of giving representations of the best comedies of the day.[871 - Vasari, xii. p. 9 and 11, Vita di Rustici. For the School for Scandal of needy artists, see xi. 216 sqq., Vita d’Aristotile. Macchiavelli’s Capitoli for a circle of pleasure-seekers (Opere minori, p. 407) are a ludicrous caricature of these social statutes. The well-known description of the evening meeting of artists in Rome in Benvenuto Cellini, i. cap. 30 is incomparable.] In the easier intercourse of society it was not unusual to select some distinguished lady as president, whose word was law for the evening. Everybody knows the introduction to Boccaccio’s ‘Decameron,’ and looks on the presidency of Pampinea as a graceful fiction. That it was so in this particular case is a matter of course; but the fiction was nevertheless based on a practice which often occurred in reality. Firenzuola, who nearly two centuries later (1523) prefaces his collection of tales in a similar manner, with express reference to Boccaccio, comes assuredly nearer to the truth when he puts into the mouth of the queen of the society a formal speech on the mode of spending the hours during the stay which the company proposed to make in the country. The day was to begin with a stroll among the hills passed in philosophical talk; then followed breakfast,[872 - Which must have been taken about 10 or 11 o’clock. See Bandello, parte ii. nov. 10.] with music and singing, after which came the recitation, in some cool, shady spot, of a new poem, the subject of which had been given the night before; in the evening the whole party walked to a spring of water where they all sat down and each one told a tale; last of all came supper and lively conversation ‘of such a kind that the women might listen to it without shame and the men might not seem to be speaking under the influence of wine.’ Bandello, in the introductions and dedications to single novels, does not give us, it is true, such inaugural discourses as this, since the circles before which the stories are told are represented as already formed; but he gives us to understand in other ways how rich, how manifold, and how charming the conditions of society must have been. Some readers may be of opinion that no good was to be got from a world which was willing to be amused by such immoral literature. It would be juster to wonder at the secure foundations of a society which, notwithstanding these tales, still observed the rules of order and decency, and which knew how to vary such pastimes with serious and solid discussion. The need of noble forms of social intercourse was felt to be stronger than all others. To convince ourselves of it, we are not obliged to take as our standard the idealised society which Castiglione depicts as discussing the loftiest sentiments and aims of human life at the court of Guidobaldo of Urbino, and Pietro Bembo at the castle of Asolo. The society described by Bandello, with all the frivolities which may be laid to its charge, enables us to form the best notion of the easy and polished dignity, of the urbane kindliness, of the intellectual freedom, of the wit and the graceful dilettantism which distinguished these circles. A significant proof of the value of such circles lies in the fact that the women who were the centres of them could become famous and illustrious without in any way compromising their reputation. Among the patronesses of Bandello, for example, Isabella Gonzaga (born an Este, p. 44) was talked of unfavourably not through any fault of her own, but on account of the too free-lived young ladies who filled her court.[873 - Prato, Arch. Stor. iii. p. 309, calls the ladies ‘alquante ministre di Venere.’] Giulia Gonzaga Colonna, Ippolita Sforza married to a Bentivoglio, Bianca Rangona, Cecilia Gallerana, Camilla Scarampa, and others were either altogether irreproachable, or their social fame threw into the shade whatever they may have done amiss. The most famous woman of Italia, Vittoria Colonna[874 - Biographical information and some of her letters in A. v. Reumont’s Briefe heiliger und gottesfürchtiger Italiener. Freiburg (1877) p. 22 sqq.] (b. 1490, d. 1547), the friend of Castiglione and Michelangelo, enjoyed the reputation of a saint. It is hard to give such a picture of the unconstrained intercourse of these circles in the city, at the baths, or in the country, as will furnish literal proof of the superiority of Italy in this respect over the rest of Europe. But let us read Bandello,[875 - Important passages: parte i. nov. 1, 3, 21, 30, 44; ii. 10, 34, 55; iii. 17, &c.] and then ask ourselves if anything of the same kind would have been then possible, say, in France, before this kind of society was there introduced by people like himself. No doubt the supreme achievements of the human mind were then produced independently of the helps of the drawing-room. Yet it would be unjust to rate the influence of the latter on art and poetry too low, if only for the reason that society helped to shape that which existed in no other country—a widespread interest in artistic production and an intelligent and critical public opinion. And apart from this, society of the kind we have described was in itself a natural flower of that life and culture which then was purely Italian, and which since then has extended to the rest of Europe.

In Florence society was powerfully affected by literature and politics. Lorenzo the Magnificent was supreme over his circle, not, as we might be led to believe, through the princely position which he occupied, but rather through the wonderful tact he displayed in giving perfect freedom of action to the many and varied natures which surrounded him.[876 - Comp. Lorenzo Magn. dei Med., Poesie, i. 204 (the Symposium); 291 (the Hawking-Party). Roscoe, Vita di Lorenzo, iii. p. 140, and append. 17 to 19.] We see how gently he dealt with his great tutor Politian, and how the sovereignty of the poet and scholar was reconciled, though not without difficulty, with the inevitable reserve prescribed by the approaching change in the position of the house of Medici and by consideration for the sensitiveness of the wife. In return for the treatment he received, Politian became the herald and the living symbol of Medicean glory. Lorenzo, after the fashion of a true Medici, delighted in giving an outward and artistic expression to his social amusements. In his brilliant improvisation—the Hawking Party—he gives us a humorous description of his comrades, and in the Symposium a burlesque of them, but in both cases in such a manner that we clearly feel his capacity for more serious companionship.[877 - The title ‘Simposio’ is inaccurate; it should be called, ‘The return from the Vintage.’ Lorenzo, in a parody of Dante’s Hell, gives an amusing account of his meeting in the Via Faenza all his good friends coming back from the country more or less tipsy. There is a most comical picture in the eighth chapter of Piovanno Arlotto, who sets out in search of his lost thirst, armed with dry meat, a herring, a piece of cheese, a sausage, and four sardines, ‘e tutte si cocevan nel sudore.’] Of this intercourse his correspondence and the records of his literary and philosophical conversation give ample proof. Some of the social unions which were afterwards formed in Florence were in part political clubs, though not without a certain poetical and philosophical character also. Of this kind was the so-called Platonic Academy which met after Lorenzo’s death in the gardens of the Ruccellai.[878 - On Cosimo Ruccellai as centre of this circle at the beginning of the sixteenth century, see Macchiavelli, Arte della Guerra, l. i.]

At the courts of the princes, society naturally depended on the character of the ruler. After the beginning of the sixteenth century they became few in number, and these few soon lost their importance. Rome, however, possessed in the unique court of Leo X. a society to which the history of the world offers no parallel.

CHAPTER V.

THE PERFECT MAN OF SOCIETY

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, and was regarded by the civilisation 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. The inner impulse which inspired him was directed, though our author does not acknowledge the fact, not to the service of the prince, but to his own perfection. One instance will make this clear.[879 - Il Cortigiano, l. ii. fol. 53. See above pp. 121, 139.] In time of war the courtier refuses even useful and perilous tasks, if they are not beautiful and dignified in themselves, such as for instance the capture of a herd of cattle; what urges him to take part in war is not duty, but ‘l’onore.’ The moral relation to the prince, as prescribed in the fourth book, is singularly free and independent. The theory of well-bred love-making, set forth in the third book, is full of delicate psychological observation, which perhaps would be more in place in a treatise on human nature generally; and the magnificent praise of ideal love, which occurs at the end of the fourth book, and which rises to a lyrical elevation of feeling, has no connection whatever with the special object of the work. Yet here, as in the ‘Asolani’ of Bembo, the culture of the time shows itself in the delicacy with which this sentiment is represented and analysed. It is true that these writers are not in all cases to be taken literally; but that the discourses they give us were actually frequent in good society, cannot be doubted, and that it was no affectation, but genuine passion, which appeared in this dress, we shall see further on.

Among outward accomplishments, the so-called knightly exercises were expected in thorough perfection from the courtier, and besides these much that could only exist at courts highly organised and based on personal emulation, such as were not to be found out of Italy. Other points obviously rest on an abstract notion of individual perfection. The courtier must be at home in all noble sports, among them running, leaping, swimming, and wrestling; he must, above all things, be a good dancer and, as a matter of course, an accomplished rider. He must be master of several languages; at all events of Latin and Italian; he must be familiar with literature and have some knowledge of the fine arts. In music a certain practical skill was expected of him, which he was bound, nevertheless, to keep as secret as possible. All this is not to be taken too seriously, except what relates to the use of arms. The mutual interaction of these gifts and accomplishments results in the perfect man, in whom no one quality usurps the place of the rest.

So much is certain, that in the sixteenth century the Italians had all Europe for their pupils both theoretically and practically in every noble bodily exercise and in the habits and manners of good society. Their instructions and their illustrated books on riding, fencing, and dancing served as the model to other countries. Gymnastics as an art, apart both from military training and from mere amusement, was probably first taught by Vittorino da Feltre (p. 213 (#x9_x_9_i29)) and after his time became essential to a complete education.[880 - Caelius Calcagninus (Opere, p. 514) describes the education of a young Italian of position about the year 1506, in the funeral speech on Antonio Costabili: first, ‘artes liberales et ingenuae disciplinae; tum adolescentia in iis exercitationibus acta, quæ ad rem militarem corpus et animum praemuniunt. Nunc gymnastae (i.e. the teachers of gymnastics) operam dare, luctari, excurrere, natare, equitare, venari, aucupari, ad palum et apud lanistam ictus inferre aut declinare, caesim punctimve hostem ferire, hastam vibrare, sub armis hyemen juxta et aestatem traducere, lanceis occursare, veri ac communis Martis simulacra imitari.’ Cardanus (De prop. Vita, c. 7) names among his gymnastic exercises the springing on to a wooden horse. Comp. Rabelais, Gargantua, i. 23, 24, for education in general, and 35 for gymnastic art. Even for the philologists, Marsilius Ficinus (Epist. iv. 171 Galeotto) requires gymnastics, and Maffeo Vegio (De Puerorum Educatione, lib. iii. c. 5) for boys.] The important fact is that they were taught systematically, though what exercises were most in favour, and whether they resembled those now in use, we are unable to say. But we may infer, not only from the general character of the people, but from positive evidence which has been left for us, that not only strength and skill, but grace of movement was one of the main objects of physical training. It is enough to remind the reader of the great Frederick of Urbino (p. 44 (#x5_x_5_i5)) directing the evening games of the young people committed to his care.

The games and contests of the popular classes did not differ essentially from those which prevailed elsewhere in Europe. In the maritime cities boat-racing was among the number, and the Venetian regattas were famous at an early period.[881 - Sansovino, Venezia, fol. 172 sqq. They are said to have arisen through the rowing out to the Lido, where the practice with the crossbow took place. The great regatta on the feast of St. Paul was prescribed by law from 1315 onwards. In early times there was much riding in Venice, before the streets were paved and the level wooden bridges turned into arched stone ones. Petrarch (Epist. Seniles, iv. 4) describes a brilliant tournament held in 1364 on the square of St. Mark, and the Doge Steno, about the year 1400, had as fine a stable as any prince in Italy. But riding in the neighbourhood of the square was prohibited as a rule after the year 1291. At a later time the Venetians naturally had the name of bad riders. See Ariosto, Sat. v. 208.] The classical game of Italy was and is the ball; and this was probably played at the time of the Renaissance with more zeal and brilliancy than elsewhere. But on this point no distinct evidence is forthcoming.

A few words on music will not be out of place in this part of our work.[882 - See on this subject: Ueber den Einfluss der Renaissance auf die Entwickelung der Musik, by Bernhard Loos, Basel, 1875, which, however, hardly offers for this period more than is given here. On Dante’s position with regard to music, and on the music to Petrarch’s and Boccaccio’s poems, see Trucchi, Poesie Ital. inedite, ii. p. 139. See also Poesie Musicali dei Secoli XIV., XV. e XVI. tratte da vari codici per cura di Antonio Cappelli, Bologna, 1868. For the theorists of the fourteenth century, Filippo Villani, Vite, p. 46, and Scardeonius, De urb. Pativ. antiq. in Graev. Thesaur, vi. iii. col. 297. A full account of the music at the court of Frederick of Urbino, is to be found in Vespes. Fior. p. 122. For the children’s chapel (ten children 6 to 8 years old whom F. had educated in his house, and who were taught singing), at the court of Hercules I., see Diario Ferrarese, in Murat. xxiv. col. 359. Out of Italy it was still hardly allowable for persons of consequence to be musicians; at the Flemish court of the young Charles V. a serious dispute took place on the subject. See Hubert. Leod. De Vita Frid. II. Palat. l. iii. Henry VIII. of England is an exception, and also the German Emperor Maximilian, who favoured music as well as all other arts. Joh. Cuspinian, in his life of the Emperor, calls him ‘Musices singularis amator’ and adds, ‘Quod vel hinc maxime patet, quod nostra aetate musicorum principes omnes, in omni genere musices omnibusque instrumentis in ejus curia, veluti in fertilissimo agro succreverant. Scriberem catalogum musicorum quos novi, nisi magnitudinem operis vererer.’ In consequence of this, music was much cultivated at the University of Vienna. The presence of the musical young Duke Francesco Sforza of Milan contributed to this result. See Aschbach, Gesch. der Wiener Universität (1877), vol. ii. 79 sqq.A remarkable and comprehensive passage on music is to be found, where we should not expect it, in the Maccaroneide, Phant. xx. It is a comic description of a quartette, from which we see that Spanish and French songs were often sung, that music already had its enemies (1520), and that the chapel of Leo X. and the still earlier composer, Josquin des Près, whose principal works are mentioned, were the chief subjects of enthusiasm in the musical world of that time. The same writer (Folengo) displays in his Orlandino (iii. 23 &c.), published under the name Limerno Pitocco, a musical fanaticism of a thoroughly modern sort.Barth. Facius, De Vir. Ill. p. 12, praises Leonardus Justinianus as a composer, who produced love-songs in his youth, and religious pieces in his old age. J. A. Campanus (Epist. i. 4, ed. Mencken) extols the musician Zacarus at Teramo and says of him, ‘Inventa pro oraculis habentur.’ Thomas of Forli ‘musicien du pape’ in Burchardi Diarium, ed. Leibnitz, pp. 62 sqq.] Musical composition down to the year 1500 was chiefly in the hands of the Flemish school, whose originality and artistic dexterity were greatly admired. Side by side with this, there nevertheless existed an Italian school, which probably stood nearer to our present taste. Half a century later came Palestrina, whose genius still works powerfully among us. We learn among other facts that he was a great innovator; but whether he or others took the decisive part in shaping the musical language of the modern world lies beyond the judgment of the unprofessional critic. Leaving on one side the history of musical composition, we shall confine ourselves to the position which music held in the social life of the day.

A fact most characteristic of the Renaissance and of Italy is the specialisation of the orchestra, the search for new instruments and modes of sound, and, in close connection with this tendency, the formation of a class of ‘virtuosi,’ who devoted their whole attention to particular instruments or particular branches of music.

Of the more complex instruments, which were perfected and widely diffused at a very early period, we find not only the organ, but a corresponding string-instrument, the ‘gravicembalo’ or ‘clavicembalo.’ Fragments of these, dating from the beginning of the fourteenth century, have come down to our own days, adorned with paintings from the hands of the greatest masters. Among other instruments the first place was held by the violin, which even then conferred great celebrity on the successful player. At the court of Leo X., who, when cardinal, had filled his house with singers and musicians, and who enjoyed the reputation of a critic and performer, the Jew Giovan Maria and Jacopo Sansecondo were among the most famous. The former received from Leo the title of count and a small town;[883 - Leonis Vita anonyma, in Roscoe, ed. Bossi, xii. p. 171. May he not be the violinist in the Palazzo Sciarra? A certain Giovan Maria da Corneto is praised in the Orlandino (Milan, 1584, iii. 27).] the latter has been taken to be the Apollo in the Parnassus of Raphael. In the course of the sixteenth century, celebrities in every branch of music appeared in abundance, and Lomazzo (about the year 1580) names the then most distinguished masters of the art of singing, of the organ, the lute, the lyre, the ‘viola da gamba,’ the harp, the cithern, the horn, and the trumpet, and wishes that their portraits might be painted on the instruments themselves.[884 - Lomazzo, Trattato dell’Arte della Pittura, &c. p. 347. The text, however, does not bear out the last statement, which perhaps rests on a misunderstanding of the final sentence, ‘Et insieme vi si possono gratiosamente rappresentar convitti et simili abbellimenti, che il pittore leggendo i poeti e gli historici può trovare copiosamente et anco essendo ingenioso et ricco d’invenzione può per se stesso imaginare?’ Speaking of the lyre, he mentions Lionardo da Vinci and Alfonso (Duke?) of Ferrara. The author includes in his work all the celebrities of the age, among them several Jews. The most complete list of the famous musicians of the sixteenth century, divided into an earlier and a later generation, is to be found in Rabelais, in the ‘New Prologue’ to the fourth book. A virtuoso, the blind Francesco of Florence (d. 1390), was crowned at Venice with a wreath of laurel by the King of Cyprus.] Such many-sided comparative criticism would have been impossible anywhere but in Italy, although the same instruments were to be found in other countries.

The number and variety of these instruments is shown by the fact that collections of them were now made from curiosity. In Venice, which was one of the most musical cities of Italy,[885 - Sansovino, Venezia, fol. 138. The same people naturally collected books of music. Sansovino’s words are, ‘è vera cosa che la musica ha la sua propria sede in questa città.’] there were several such collections, and when a sufficient number of performers happened to be on the spot, a concert was at once improvised. In one of these museums there were a large number of instruments, made after ancient pictures and descriptions, but we are not told if anybody could play them, or how they sounded. It must not be forgotten that such instruments were often beautifully decorated, and could be arranged in a manner pleasing to the eye. We thus meet with them in collections of other rarities and works of art.

The players, apart from the professional performers, were either single amateurs, or whole orchestras of them, organised into a corporate Academy.[886 - The ‘Academia de’ Filarmonici’ at Verona is mentioned by Vasari, xi. 133, in the life of Sanmichele. Lorenzo Magnifico was in 1480 already the centre of a School of Harmony consisting of fifteen members, among them the famous organist and organ-builder Squarcialupi. See Delecluze, Florence et ses Vicissitudes, vol. ii. p. 256, and Reumont, L. d. M. i. 177 sqq., ii. 471-473. Marsilio Ficino took part in these exercises and gives in his letters (Epist. i. 73, iii. 52, v. 15) remarkable rules as to music. Lorenzo seems to have transmitted his passion for music to his son Leo X. His eldest son Pietro was also musical.] Many artists in other branches were at home in music, and often masters of the art. People of position were averse to wind-instruments, for the same reason[887 - Il Cortigiano, fol. 56, comp. fol. 41.] which made them distasteful to Alcibiades and Pallas Athene. In good society singing, either alone or accompanied with the violin, was usual; but quartettes of string-instruments were also common,[888 - Quatro viole da arco’—a high and, except in Italy, rare achievement for amateurs.] and the ‘clavicembalo’ was liked on account of its varied effects. In singing the solo only was permitted, ‘for a single voice is heard, enjoyed, and judged far better.’ In other words, as singing, notwithstanding all conventional modesty, is an exhibition of the individual man of society, it is better that each should be seen and heard separately. The tender feelings produced in the fair listeners are taken for granted, and elderly people are therefore recommended to abstain from such forms of art, even though they excel in them. It was held important that the effect of the song should be enhanced by the impression made on the sight. We hear nothing however of the treatment in these circles of musical composition as an independent branch of art. On the other hand it happened sometimes that the subject of the song was some terrible event which had befallen the singer himself.[889 - Bandello, parte i. nov. 26. The song of Antonio Bologna in the House of Ippolita Bentivoglio. Comp. iii. 26. In these delicate days, this would be called a profanation of the holiest feelings. (Comp. the last song of Britannicus, Tacit. Annal. xiii. 15.) Recitations accompanied by the lute or ‘viola’ are not easy to distinguish, in the accounts left us, from singing properly so-called.]

This dilettantism, which pervaded the middle as well as the upper classes, was in Italy both more widely spread and more genuinely artistic than in any other country of Europe. Wherever we meet with a description of social intercourse, there music and singing are always and expressly mentioned. Hundreds of portraits show us men and women, often several together, playing or holding some musical instrument, and the angelic concerts represented in the ecclesiastical pictures prove how familiar the painters were with the living effects of music. We read of the lute-player Antonio Rota, at Padua (d. 1549), who became a rich man by his lessons, and published a handbook to the practice of the lute.[890 - Scardeonius, l. c.]

At a time when there was no opera to concentrate and monopolise musical talent, this general cultivation of the art must have been something wonderfully varied, intelligent, and original. It is another question how much we should find to satisfy us in these forms of music, could they now be reproduced for us.

CHAPTER VI.

THE POSITION OF WOMEN

TO understand the higher forms of social intercourse at this period, we must keep before our minds the fact that women stood on a footing of perfect equality with men.[891 - For biographies of women, see above, p. 147 and note 1. Comp. the excellent work of Attilio Hortis: Le Donne Famose, descritte da Giovanni Boccacci. Trieste, 1877.] We must not suffer ourselves to be misled by the sophistical and often malicious talk about the assumed inferiority of the female sex, which we meet with now and then in the dialogues of this time,[892 - E.g. in Castiglione, Il Cortigiano. In the same strain Francesco Barbaro, De Re Uxoria; Poggio, An Seni sit Uxor ducenda, in which much evil is said of women; the ridicule of Codro Urceo, especially his remarkable discourse, An Uxor sit ducenda (Opera, 1506, fol. xviii.-xxi.), and the sarcasms of many of the epigrammatists. Marcellus Palingenius, (vol. i. 304) recommends celibacy in various passages, lib. iv. 275 sqq., v. 466-585; as a means of subduing disobedient wives he recommends to married people,‘Tu verbera misceTergaque nunc duro resonent pulsata bacillo.’Italian writers on the woman’s side are Benedetto da Cesena, De Honore Mulierum, Venice, 1500, Dardano, La defesa della Donna, Ven. 1554, Per Donne Romane. ed. Manfredi, Bol. 1575. The defence of, or attack on, women, supported by instances of famous or infamous women down to the time of the writer, was also treated by the Jews, partly in Italian and partly in Hebrew; and in connection with an earlier Jewish literature dating from the thirteenth century, we may mention Abr. Sarteano and Eliah Gennazzano, the latter of whom defended the former against the attacks of Abigdor (for their MS. poems about year 1500, comp. Steinschneider, Hebr. Bibliogr. vi. 48).] nor by such satires as the third of Ariosto,[893 - Addressed to Annibale Maleguccio, sometimes numbered as the 5th or the 6th.] who treats woman as a dangerous grown-up child, whom a man must learn how to manage, in spite of the great gulf between them. There is, indeed, a certain amount of truth in what he says. Just because the educated woman was on a level with the man, that communion of mind and heart which comes from the sense of mutual dependence and completion, could not be developed in marriage at this time, as it has been developed later in the cultivated society of the North.

The education given to women in the upper classes was essentially the same as that given to men. The Italian, at the time of the Renaissance, felt no scruple in putting sons and daughters alike under the same course of literary and even philological instruction (p. 222 (#x9_x_9_i43)). Indeed, looking at this ancient culture as the chief treasure of life, he was glad that his girls should have a share in it. We have seen what perfection was attained by the daughters of princely houses in writing and speaking Latin (p. 234 (#x10_x_10_i9)).[894 - When the Hungarian Queen Beatrice, a Neapolitan princess, came to Vienna in 1485, she was addressed in Latin, and ‘arrexit diligentissime aures domina regina saepe, cum placide audierat, subridendo.’ Aschbach, o. c. vol. ii. 10 note.] Many others must at least have been able to read it, in order to follow the conversation of the day, which turned largely on classical subjects. An active interest was taken by many in Italian poetry, in which, whether prepared or improvised, a large number of Italian women, from the time of the Venetian Cassandra Fedele onwards (about the close of the fifteenth century), made themselves famous.[895 - The share taken by women in the plastic arts was insignificant. The learned Isotta Nogarola deserves a word of mention. On her intercourse with Guarino, see Rosmini, ii. 67 sqq.; with Pius II. see Voigt, iii. 515 sqq.] One, indeed, Vittoria Colonna, may be called immortal. If any proof were needed of the assertion made above, it would be found in the manly tone of this poetry. Even the love-sonnets and religious poems are so precise and definite in their character, and so far removed from the tender twilight of sentiment, and from all the dilettantism which we commonly find in the poetry of women, that we should not hesitate to attribute them to male authors, if we had not clear external evidence to prove the contrary.

For, with education, the individuality of women in the upper classes was developed in the same way as that of men. Till the time of the Reformation, the personality of women out of Italy, even of the highest rank, comes forward but little. Exceptions like Isabella of Bavaria, Margaret of Anjou, and Isabella of Castille, are the forced result of very unusual circumstances. In Italy, throughout the whole of the fifteenth century, the wives of the rulers, and still more those of the Condottieri, have nearly all a distinct, recognisable personality, and take their share of notoriety and glory. To these came gradually to be added a crowd of famous women of the most varied kind (i. p. 147, note 1); among them those whose distinction consisted in the fact that their beauty, disposition, education, virtue, and piety, combined to render them harmonious human beings.[896 - It is from this point of view that we must judge of the life of Allessandra de’ Bardi in Vespasiano Fiorentino (Mai, Spicileg. rom. i. p. 593 sqq.) The author, by the way, is a great ‘laudator temporis acti,’ and it must not be forgotten that nearly a hundred years before what he calls the good old time, Boccaccio wrote the Decameron. On the culture and education of the Italian women of that day, comp. the numerous facts quoted in Gregorovius, Lucrezia Borgia. There is a catalogue of the books possessed by Lucrezia in 1502 and 3 (Gregorovius, ed. 3, i. 310, ii. 167), which may be considered characteristic of the Italian women of the period. We there find a Breviary; a little book with the seven psalms and some prayers; a parchment book with gold miniature, called De Coppelle alla Spagnola; the printed letters of Catherine of Siena; the printed epistles and gospels in Italian; a religious book in Spanish; a MS. collection of Spanish odes, with the proverbs of Domenico Lopez; a printed book, called Aquila Volante; the Mirror of Faith printed in Italian; an Italian printed book called The Supplement of Chronicles; a printed Dante, with commentary; an Italian book on philosophy; the legends of the saints in Italian; an old book De Ventura; a Donatus; a Life of Christ in Spanish; a MS. Petrarch, on duodecimo parchment. A second catalogue of the year 1516 contains no secular books whatever.] There was no question of ‘woman’s rights’ or female emancipation, simply because the thing itself was a matter of course. The educated woman, no less than the man, strove naturally after a characteristic and complete individuality. The same intellectual and emotional development which perfected the man, was demanded for the perfection of the woman. Active literary work, nevertheless, was not expected from her, and if she were a poet, some powerful utterance of feeling, rather than the confidences of the novel or the diary, was looked for. These women had no thought of the public;[897 - Ant. Galateo, Epist. 3, to the young Bona Sforza, the future wife of Sigismund of Poland: ‘Incipe aliquid de viro sapere, quoniam ad imperandum viris nata es.... Ita fac, ut sapientibus viris placeas, ut te prudentes et graves viri admirentur, et vulgi et muliercularum studia et judicia despicias,’ &c. A remarkable letter in other respects also (Mai. Spicileg. Rom. viii. p. 532).] their function was to influence distinguished men, and to moderate male impulse and caprice.

The highest praise which could then be given to the great Italian women was that they had the mind and the courage of men. We have only to observe the thoroughly manly bearing of most of the women in the heroic poems, especially those of Bojardo and Ariosto, to convince ourselves that we have before us the ideal of the time. The title ‘virago,’ which is an equivocal compliment in the present day, then implied nothing but praise. It was borne in all its glory by Caterina Sforza, wife and afterwards widow of Giroloma Riario, whose hereditary possession, Forli, she gallantly defended first against his murderers, and then against Cæsar Borgia. Though finally vanquished, she retained the admiration of her countrymen and the title ‘prima donna d’Italia.’[898 - She is so called in the Chron. Venetum, in Muratori, xxiv. col. 121 sqq. (in the account of her heroic defence, ibid. col. 121 she is called a virago). Comp. Infessura in Eccard, Scriptt. ii. col. 1981, and Arch. Stor. append. ii. p. 250, and Gregorovius, vii. 437 note 1.] This heroic vein can be detected in many of the women of the Renaissance, though none found the same opportunity of showing their heroism to the world. In Isabella Gonzaga this type is clearly recognisable, and not less in Clarice, of the House of Medici, the wife of Filippo Strozzi.[899 - Contemporary historians speak of her more than womanly intellect and eloquence. Comp. Ranke’s Filippo Strozzi, in Historisch-biographische Studien, p. 371 note 2.]

Women of this stamp could listen to novels like those of Bandello, without social intercourse suffering from it. The ruling genius of society was not, as now, womanhood, or the respect for certain presuppositions, mysteries, and susceptibilities, but the consciousness of energy, of beauty, and of a social state full of danger and opportunity. And for this reason we find, side by side with the most measured and polished social forms, something our age would call immodesty,[900 - And rightly so, sometimes. How ladies should behave while such tales are telling, we learn from Cortigiano, l. iii. fol. 107. That the ladies who were present at his dialogues must have known how to conduct themselves in case of need, is shown by the strong passage, l. ii. fol. 100. What is said of the ‘Donna di Palazzo’—the counterpart of the Cortigiano—that she should neither avoid frivolous company nor use unbecoming language, is not decisive, since she was far more the servant of the princess than the Cortigiano of the prince. See Bandello, i. nov. 44. Bianca d’Este tells the terrible love-story of her ancestor, Niccolò of Ferrara, and Parisina. The tales put into the mouths of the women in the Decameron may also serve as instances of this indelicacy. For Bandello, see above, p. 145; and Landau, Beitr. z. Gesch. der Ital. Nov. Vienna, 1875, p. 102. note 32.] forgetting that by which it was corrected and counterbalanced—the powerful characters of the women who were exposed to it.

That in all the dialogues and treatises together we can find no absolute evidence on these points is only natural, however freely the nature of love and the position and capacities of women were discussed.

What seems to have been wanting in this society were the young girls,[901 - Sansovino, Venezia, fol. 152 sqq. How highly the travelled Italians valued the freer intercourse with girls in England and the Netherlands is shown by Bandello, ii. nov. 44, and iv. nov. 27. For the Venetian women and the Italian women generally, see the work of Yriarte, pp. 50 sqq.] who, even when not brought up in the monasteries, were still carefully kept away from it. It is not easy to say whether their absence was the cause of the greater freedom of conversation, or whether they were removed on account of it.

Even the intercourse with courtesans seems to have assumed a more elevated character, reminding us of the position of the Hetairae in Classical Athens. The famous Roman courtesan Imperia was a woman of intelligence and culture, had learned from a certain Domenico Campana the art of making sonnets, and was not without musical accomplishments.[902 - Paul. Jov. De Rom. Piscibus, cap. 5; Bandello, parte iii. nov. 42. Aretino, in the Ragionamento del Zoppino, p. 327, says of a courtesan: ‘She knows by heart all Petrarch and Boccaccio, and many beautiful verses of Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and a thousand other authors.’] The beautiful Isabella de Luna, of Spanish extraction, who was reckoned amusing company, seems to have been an odd compound of a kind heart with a shockingly foul tongue, which latter sometimes brought her into trouble.[903 - Bandello, ii. 51, iv. 16.] At Milan, Bandello knew the majestic Caterina di San Celso,[904 - Bandello, iv. 8.] who played and sang and recited superbly. It is clear from all we read on the subject that the distinguished people who visited these women, and from time to time lived with them, demanded from them a considerable degree of intelligence and instruction, and that the famous courtesans were treated with no slight respect and consideration. Even when relations with them were broken off, their good opinion was still desired,[905 - For a characteristic instance of this, see Giraldi, Hecatomithi, vi nov. 7.] which shows that departed passion had left permanent traces behind. But on the whole this intellectual intercourse is not worth mentioning by the side of that sanctioned by the recognised forms of social life, and the traces which it has left in poetry and literature are for the most part of a scandalous nature. We may well be astonished that among the 6,800 persons of this class, who were to be found in Rome in 1490[906 - Infessura, in Eccard, Scriptores, ii. col. 1997. The public women only, not the kept women, are meant. The number, compared with the population of Rome, is certainly enormous, perhaps owing to some clerical error. According to Giraldi, vi. 7, Venice was exceptionally rich ‘di quella sorte di donne che cortigiane son dette;’ see also the epigram of Pasquinus (Gregor. viii. 279, note 2); but Rome did not stand behind Venice (Giraldi, Introduz. nov. 2). Comp. the notice of the ‘meretrices’ in Rome (1480) who met in a church and were robbed of their jewels and ornaments, Murat. xxii. 342 sqq., and the account in Burchardi, Diarium, ed. Leibnitz, pp. 75-77, &c. Landi (Commentario, fol. 76) mentions Rome, Naples, and Venice as the chief seats of the ‘cortigiane;’ ibid. 286, the fame of the women of Chiavenna is to be understood ironically. The Quaestiones Forcianae, fol. 9, of the same author give most interesting information on love and love’s delights, and the style and position of women in the different cities of Italy. On the other hand, Egnatius (De Exemp. III. Vir. Ven. fol. 212 b sqq.) praises the chastity of the Venetian women, and says that the prostitutes come every year from Germany. Corn. Agr. de van. Scientiae, cap. 63 (Opp. ed. Lugd. ii. 158) says: ‘Vidi ego nuper atque legi sub titulo “Cortosanæ” Italica lingua editum et Venetiis typis excusum de arte meretricia dialogum, utriusque Veneris omnium flagitiosissimum et dignissimum, qui ipse cum autore suo ardeat.’ Ambr. Traversari (Epist. viii. 2 sqq.) calls the beloved of Niccolò Niccoli ‘foemina fidelissima.’ In the Lettere dei Principi, i. 108 (report of Negro, Sept. 1, 1522) the ‘donne Greche’ are described as ‘fonte di ogni cortesia et amorevolezza.’ A great authority, esp. for Siena, is the Hermaphroditus of Panormitanus. The enumeration of the ‘lenae lupaeque’ in Florence (ii. 37) is hardly fictitious; the line there occurs:‘Annaque Theutonico tibi si dabit obvia cantu.’]—that is, before the appearance of syphilis—scarcely a single woman seems to have been remarkable for any higher gifts. These whom we have mentioned all belong to the period which immediately followed. The mode of life, the morals and the philosophy of the public women, who with all their sensuality and greed were not always incapable of deeper passions, as well as the hypocrisy and devilish malice shown by some in their later years, are best set forth by Giraldi, in the novels which form the introduction to the ‘Hecatommithi.’ Pietro Aretino, in his ‘Ragionamenti,’ gives us rather a picture of his own depraved character than of this unhappy class of women as they really were.

The mistresses of the princes, as has already been pointed out (p. 53 (#x5_x_5_i11)), were sung by poets and painted by artists, and in consequence have been personally familiar to their contemporaries and to posterity. We hardly know more than the name of Alice Perrers and of Clara Dettin, the mistress of Frederick the Victorious, and of Agnes Sorel have only a half-legendary story. With the monarchs of the age of the Renaissance—Francis I. and Henry II.—the case is different.

CHAPTER VII.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY

AFTER treating of the intercourse of society, let us glance for a moment at the domestic life of this period. We are commonly disposed to look on the family life of the Italians at this time as hopelessly ruined by the national immorality, and this side of the question will be more fully discussed in the sequel. For the moment we must content ourselves with pointing out that conjugal infidelity has by no means so disastrous an influence on family life in Italy as in the North, so long at least as certain limits are not overstepped.

The domestic life of the Middle Ages was a product of popular morals, or if we prefer to put it otherwise, a result of the inborn tendencies of national life, modified by the varied circumstances which affected them. Chivalry at the time of its splendour left domestic economy untouched. The knight wandered from court to court, and from one battle-field to another. His homage was given systematically to some other woman than his own wife, and things went how they might at home in the castle.[907 - Were these wandering knights really married?] The spirit of the Renaissance first brought order into domestic life, treating it as a work of deliberate contrivance. Intelligent economical views (p. 77 (#x6_x_6_i4)), and a rational style of domestic architecture served to promote this end. But the chief cause of the change was the thoughtful study of all questions relating to social intercourse, to education, to domestic service and organisation.

The most precious document on this subject is the treatise on the management of the home by Agnolo Pandolfini (L. B. Alberti).[908 - Trattato del Governo della Famiglia. See above, p. 132, note 1. Pandolfini died in 1446, L. B. Alberti, by whom the work was really written, in 1472.] He represents a father speaking to his grown-up sons, and initiating them into his method of administration. We are introduced into a large and wealthy household, which if governed with moderation and reasonable economy, promises happiness and prosperity for generations to come. A considerable landed estate, whose produce furnishes the table of the house, and serves as the basis of the family fortune, is combined with some industrial pursuit, such as the weaving of wool or silk. The dwelling is solid and the food good. All that has to do with the plan and arrangement of the house is great, durable, and costly, but the daily life within it is as simple as possible. All other expenses, from the largest in which the family honour is at stake, down to the pocket-money of the younger sons, stand to one another in a rational, not a conventional relation. Nothing is considered of so much importance as education, which the head of the house gives not only to the children, but to the whole household. He first develops his wife from a shy girl, brought up in careful seclusion, to the true woman of the house, capable of commanding and guiding the servants. The sons are brought up without any undue severity,[909 - A thorough history of ‘flogging’ among the Germanic and Latin races treated with some psychological power, would be worth volumes of dispatches and negotiations. (A modest beginning has been made by Lichtenberg, Vermischte Schriften, v. 276-283.) When, and through what influence, did flogging become a daily practice in the German household? Not till after Walther sang: ‘Nieman kan mit gerten kindes zuht beherten.’In Italy beating ceased early; Maffeo Vegio (d. 1458) recommends (De Educ. Liber. lib. i. c. 19) moderation in flogging, but adds: ‘Caedendos magis esse filios quam pestilentissmis blanditiis laetandos.’ At a later time a child of seven was no longer beaten. The little Roland (Orlandino, cap. vii. str. 42) lays down the principle:‘Sol gli asini si ponno bastonare,Se una tal bestia fussi, patirei.’The German humanists of the Renaissance, like Rudolf Agricola and Erasmus, speak decisively against flogging, which the elder schoolmasters regarded as an indispensable means of education. In the biographies of the Fahrenden Schüler at the close of the fifteenth century (Platter’s Lebensbeschriebung, ed. Fechter, Basel, 1840; Butzbach’s Wanderbuch, ed. Becher, Regensburg, 1869) there are gross examples of the corporal punishment of the time.] carefully watched and counselled, and controlled ‘rather by authority than by force.’ And finally the servants are chosen and treated on such principles that they gladly and faithfully hold by the family.

One feature of this book must be referred to, which is by no means peculiar to it, but which it treats with special warmth—the love of the educated Italian for country life.[910 - But the taste was not universal. J. A. Campanus (Epist. iv. 4) writes vigorously against country life. He admits: ‘Ego si rusticus natus non essem, facile tangerer voluptate;’ but since he was born a peasant, ‘quod tibi deliciae, mihi satietas est.’] In northern countries the nobles lived in the country in their castles, and the monks of the higher orders in their well-guarded monasteries, while the wealthiest burghers dwelt from one year’s end to another in the cities. But in Italy, so far as the neighbourhood of certain towns at all events was concerned,[911 - Giovanni Villani, xi. 93, our principal authority for the building of villas before the middle of the fourteenth century. The villas were more beautiful than the town houses, and great exertions were made by the Florentines to have them so, ‘onde erano tenuti matti.’] the security of life and property was so great, and the passion for a country residence was so strong, that men were willing to risk a loss in time of war. Thus arose the villa, the country-house of the well-to-do citizen. This precious inheritance of the old Roman world was thus revived, as soon as the wealth and culture of the people were sufficiently advanced.

One author finds at his villa a peace and happiness, for an account of which the reader must hear him speak himself: ‘While every other possession causes work and danger, fear and disappointment, the villa brings a great and honourable advantage; the villa is always true and kind; if you dwell in it at the right time and with love, it will not only satisfy you, but add reward to reward. In spring the green trees and the song of the birds will make you joyful and hopeful; in autumn a moderate exertion will bring forth fruit a hundredfold; all through the year melancholy will be banished from you. The villa is the spot where good and honest men love to congregate. Nothing secret, nothing treacherous, is done here; all see all; here is no need of judges or witnesses, for all are kindly and peaceably disposed one to another. Hasten hither, and fly away from the pride of the rich, and the dishonour of the bad. O blessed life in the villa, O unknown fortune!’ The economical side of the matter is that one and the same property must, if possible, contain everything—corn, wine, oil, pasture-land and woods, and that in such cases the property was paid for well, since nothing needed then to be got from the market. But the higher enjoyment derived from the villa is shown by some words of the introduction: ‘Round about Florence lie many villas in a transparent atmosphere, amid cheerful scenery, and with a splendid view; there is little fog, and no injurious winds; all is good, and the water pure and healthy. Of the numerous buildings many are like palaces, many like castles, costly and beautiful to behold.’ He is speaking of those unrivalled villas, of which the greater number were sacrificed, though vainly, by the Florentines themselves in the defence of their city in the year 1529.[912 - Trattato del Governo della Famiglia (Torino, 1829), pp. 84, 88.]

In these villas, as in those on the Brenta, on the Lombard hills, at Posilippo and on the Vomero, social life assumed a freer and more rural character than in the palaces within the city. We meet with charming descriptions of the intercourse of the guests, the hunting-parties, and all the open-air pursuits and amusements.[913 - See above, part iv. chap. 2. Petrarch was called ‘Silvanus,’ on the ground of his dislike of the town and love of the country. Epp. Fam. ed. Fracass. ii. 87 sqq. Guarino’s description of a villa to Gianbattista Candrata, in Rosmini, ii. 13 sqq., 157 sqq. Poggio, in a letter to Facius (De Vir. Ill. p. 106): ‘Sum enim deditior senectutis gratia rei rusticæ quam antea.’ See also Poggio, Opp. (1513), p 112 sqq.; and Shepherd-Tonelli, i. 255 and 261. Similarly Maffeo Vegio (De Lib. Educ. vi. 4), and B. Platina at the beginning of his dialogue, ‘De Vera Nobilitate.’ Politian’s descriptions of the country-houses of the Medici in Reumont, Lorenzo, ii. 73, 87. For the Farnesina, see Gregorovius, viii. 114.] But the noblest achievements of poetry and thought are sometimes also dated from these scenes of rural peace.

CHAPTER VIII.