The Book of the Courtier
Baldassare Castiglione's Il Libro del Cortegiano belongs next to Ariosto's Orlando Furioso and Machiavelli's Il Principe of the most important achievements of the Italian literature of the Renaissance.
Introduction
Il Libro del Courtier, the book by Hofmann, created in the period 1508-1516, but was not printed until 1528 in the third version of Aldo Romano, Andrea d' Asolo, Venice. - In a narrative dialogue Castiglione makes the Pietro Bembo friends, Ludovico da Canossa, Bernardo da Bibbiena, Gasparo Pallavicino and many other famous Italian personalities of the early 16th century on four consecutive evenings about the qualities of the ideal courtier ( cortegiano ) and the completed Hoffrau ( donna di palazzo ) discuss. Two women, the Duchess Elisabetta Gonzaga (1471-1526) and her sister Emilia Pia, occupy the chair, where Emilia Pia, the task falls to moderate the discussions. Castiglione staged in his work the ideal of courtly society, their conversation and manners, thus continuing the court of Urbino, a literary monument.
Grazia ( Grace ), Misura ( balance ), ingenio (spirit) and arte ( art ) are always re-emerging core concepts. Doing the following characteristics of the ideal courtier be called leitmotifs:
- Sprezzatura, with which one handles its tasks without visible effort,
- A humorous attitude and quick-witted conversation,
- A stylish, urban living,
- Unconditional sincerity in conversation with the Prince,
- Skill in dealing with women and education in the fine arts.
The text is consciously in the form and content of works of ancient authors like Cicero's De oratore and Plato's Republic. Even at its publication in 1528 the book on the Hofmann was a popular success. It was translated in the 16th century into Spanish, French, Latin and German. Sir Thomas Hoby (1530-1566) created in the wake of Castiglione's Courtier, the treatise on The Courtyer ( 1561) and Łukasz Górnicki ( 1527-1603 ) described the ideal of Polish courtier in Dworzanin polski ( 1566).
The Courtier as Uomo Universale
Castiglione's Courtier is made universal and has versatile skills. The rediscovery of ancient authors as well as " the discovery of the world and of man ," as Jacob Burckhardt put it in his Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy ( 1860 ) with reference to Jules Michelet, led to an almost mission statement liable ideal type of man: the well- educated and constantly perfecting uomo universale, the " universal man."
An example, already saw their contemporaries this idea in Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) and Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) embodies. Human nature is fundamentally dynamic and applied to constant expansion of his given by nature potential, the crossing of borders and the development towards a more educated in courtly environment, perfected in Sports and War People is almost considered a duty of man.
Alberti was a writer, mathematician and architect. He was as proud of his riding skills as to his famous treatise De re aedificatoria ( 1452 ). Leonardo's genius revolutionized even the anatomy and engineering of his time. While Alberti but strove for diversity of his interests and at the same time perfection in every aspect, was Leonardo's vision quite aspect faulty and fragmentary, while at the same time skeptical and deeper.
Just Alberti sought in all his interests pursued by the balance between theory and practice to produce and thereby achieve completeness of his knowledge. Also the Hofmann Castiglione should be harmonious and balanced. So at the same time military efficiency and cultural education is required, courtly grace and wit, audacity and nobleness It assumes that cortegiano. The Hofmann finds its focus in the golden mean, the positive understanding mediocrità.
The Courtier and Principe - Ideal and reality of contemporary farms in Italy
Jacob Burckhardt also correctly questioned whether the Cortegiano the Hofmann and his perfect form at the court thinks or rather courtly man sets up as a binding ideal of all contemporaries: "All things considered, you might need such a person to any court because he himself has talent and appearance of a perfect prince and because its quiet and unaffektierte virtuosity requires a to independent being in all external and spiritual things. "
By the cortegiano reflects the ability of the human potential and universality calls as high moral obligation, thoughts of ancient writers such as Cicero resumed. For the Stoic philosopher, a pure power state and the pure man of power was limited to the level of his animal nature.
Niccolò Machiavelli in his magnum opus Il Principe ( 1513) found, contrary to the Courtier Castiglione its size in just ignoring ethical and moral implications. Both configurations - Machiavelli's Prince and Castiglione's Courtier - represent both ultimately two sides of the same coin, the one hand the possibilities of consummate sophistication of Italian courts is formulated as an ideal in Castiglione and at the same time in Machiavelli, a cynical view of the perversity and moral licentiousness of Italian courts and the power men of the Renaissance unfolded.