MANUSCRIPT CULTURE IN

RENAISSANCE ITALY

BRIAN RICHARDSON

CAMBRIDGE
UNIVERSITY PRESS
 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town,
Singapore, Sáo Paulo, Delhi, Mexico City

Cambridge University Press Contents

The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK

Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York

www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521888479

© Brian Richardson 2oo9 List of illustrations

Preface
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception List of abbreviations
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
LIB
o reproduction of any part may take place without the written
850`.9003 I The contexts and characteristics of manuscript circulation
permission of Cambridge University Press.
RIC I The functions of manuscript circulation and

First published 2009 the drawbacks of print 1

2 Authors and the scribal medium 14
catalogue record for tbis publication is available from the British Library 3 Social transmission and author publication ió
4 Social transmission and user publication 34
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data 5 Social transmission and networks 44
Richardson, Brian (Brian F.) 6 Public availability 53
Manuscript culture in Renaissance Italy / Brian Richardson.
P. cm. 2 Handwriting and the work of copyists 59
ISBN 978-0-521-88847-9 (hardback) I Varieties of script and the teaching of handwriting 59
I. Italian literature—r5th century—Criticism, Textual. 2. Italian literature- 2 `Professional' scribes 68
16th century—Criticism, Textual. 3. Transmission of texts—Italy—History—To r5oo.
3 Authors' use of scribes 79
4. Transmission of texts—Italy—History-16th century. 5. Manuscripts,
Renaissance—Italy. 6. Authors and readers—Italy—History-15th century. 3 The manuscript circulation of lyric and burlesque poetry 95
7. Authors and readers—Italy—History-16th century. I. Title. I Sending occasional verse: Caro and Tasso 95
PQ4075.R53 2009 2 Exchanges and responses
850.9'003—dc22 2009031402 99
3 Current affairs 114
ISBN 978-0-521-88847-9 Hardback 4 Burlesque and licentious verse 126
5 Collecting verse in manuscript 131
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or
accuracy of URLs for external or third-parry internet websites referred to in
4 The manuscript circulation of prose 153
this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, I Current affairs, history and politics 153
or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Information regarding prices, travel 2 Religious debates and prophecy 169
timetables, and other factual information given in this work is correct at 3 Literary disputes 191
the time of first printing but Cambridge University Press does not guarantee
the accuracy of such information thereafter.

v
A Contents

5 Authors and their readers: dedications and other paratexts 198

1 Addresses to readers in manuscript 199
2 Addresses to readers from manuscript to print z16
6 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse 226
Illustrations
i Performing and listening 22 7
z The performance of manuscript verse 240
3 Orality and manuscript verse 254

Conclusion 259

Bibliography 269 1 Agnolo Bronzino, Portrait of Laura Battiferri, c. í56o.

General index 310 Florence, Palazzo Vecchio, Loeser Collection. © Photo Scala,
Florence, 1990. 138
2 Giovan Battista Moroni, Portrait of Giovanni Bressani, 1562.
Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland. 139
3 A sonnet by Francesco Maria Molza, c. 1535• Venice, Biblioteca
Nazionale Marciana, MS It. IX 144 (6866), fol. 12`. 140
4 The final page of a manuscript containing a vernacular
translation of Cicero, De amicitia, with a collection of
sententiae from classical and Christian sources. © British
Library Board. All Rights Reserved. MS Add. 16553, fol. 52`. 141
5 The dedicatory letter, addressed by Niccolò Maria d'Este to
Duke Ercole d'Este, of a copy of Gian Giacomo Bertolotti's
vernacular translation of the Tablet of Cebes. © British
Library Board. All Rights Reserved. MS Add. 22331, fol. Z r . 142
6 Niccol6 Machiavelli's comedy Clizia, transcribed by
Ludovico degli Arrighi. Colchester, Colchester and
Ipswich Museum Service, MS 1932.225B, fois. 1°-21. 1 43
7 The dedicatory letter of Niccolò Machiavelli's Il principe.
Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, MS It. 11 77
(5038), fol. 2`. 144
8 Biagio Buonaccorsi's letter of transmission, addressed to
Pandolfo Bellacci, accompanying one of his manuscripts
of Machiavelli's Rprincipe. Florence, Biblioteca Medicea
Laurenziana, MS XLIV 32, fol. f. 145
9 Torquato Tasso's dialogue Il Nzfo, overo del piacere,
transcribed by Giulio Mosti. Ferrara, Biblioteca Comunale
Ariostea, MS Cl. II 357, fol. 89`. 146

Vii
viii List of illustrations
io Francesco Marcaldi's Narratione del stato della regina di Scotia.
Reproduced by courtesy of the University Librarian and
Director, The John Rylands University Library, The
University of Manchester. MS Italian 6, fols. 7"-8`.
u The Beneficio di Cristo in the only surviving sixteenth-century
manuscript copy. Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana,
MS 1785, fol. i8°.
12 The prophecy `Li obscuri versi che qui insieme ordisco',
with glosses. Paris, Bibliothèque Mazarine, MS 3898, fol. I01'.
13 The Latin version of Niccolò Valori's life of Lorenzo de'
Medici. Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana,
MS LXI 3, fol. 3'
14 Woodcut of an entertainer performing verse while playing
the lira da braccio. From Luigi Pulci, Morgante maggiore
(Florence: [Antonio Tubini], for Piero Pacini,
22 January 1500/1), fol. Der.
15 A four-part setting by Marchetto Cara of a strambotto
by Serafino Aquilano. © British Library Board.
All Rights Reserved. MS Egerton 3051, fol. W.
147 Preface
148
149
This book is intended as a contribution to the history of the circulation of
150 texts in Renaissance Italy. It is based on the premiss that this history is,
or should be, an integral part of the study of literature itself, not merely a
complement to it. If one is to understand fully the nature and the influ-
ence of texts, it is necessary to know who their authors were addressing,
151 how these authors expected their works to reach readers and the ways in
which these works were in fact received, both during their first diffusion
and in the longer term.
152 The central topic of the book is manuscript culture: that is, the activ-
ities and values associated with the circulation of handwritten texts.
Manuscript culture in early modern England has been the subject of
important new work since the i99os, including the seminal writings of the
late Harold Love, of Arthur Marotti and of Henry Woudhuysen. In early
modern Italian studies, the situation is somewhat different. Scholars have
produced excellent work on the traditions of specific texts in manuscript
and on some professional scribes, and I have relied greatly on information
drawn from their research. But relatively little attention has been paid to
(`-,,,manuscript circulation as a distinctive part of a wider. system of textual
communication, used sometimes on its own, some in conjunction— '-
with circulation through print and the spoken or sung word. There has
been a pervasive tendency to assume that, after the introduction of the
printing press to Italy in the 146os, publishing became synonymous with
printing: any text that remained in manuscript is all too easily described
as unpublished or `inedito', as if to have a text printed was the only way
to make it available to the public. And the copying of Italian manuscripts
in the sixteenth century — whether by authors, by scribes or by other users
of texts — has been documented and studied less fully than that of the
earlier period. For instance, the series of catalogues of Manoscritti datati
Xkalia, very useful for the fifteenth century, takes 31 December 150o as
its cut-off point for almost all libraries. The result has been an obscuring,
ix
x Preface
or even masking, of a set of social and intellectual practices that played
a significant linking role in the histories of Renaissance literature and of
the Renaissance book.
This book has a wide scope in terms of chronology, geography and the
types of literature and copying covered, while giving particular attention
to certain aspects of manuscript culture. It spans the fifteenth and the
sixteenth centuries, so that both continuities and diversities of practice
can be traced between the years before and after the arrival of printing.
However, I am concerned especially with the latter period, when manu-
scripts were no longer the sole means of written communication but, in
some cases and where a choice was possible, became an alternative to
print. Examples have been drawn from throughout the Italian peninsula,
even if those from the northern half predominate, and I attempt to take
account of the diverse contexts encountered in different states at differ-
ent moments. I have concentrated particularly on the diffusion of works
newly or recently composed, though some mention is made of the circu-
lation of older texts, including a few from before the fifteenth century. I
study both the transmission of these texts `outwards', by their authors and
other owners, and their reception by readers. The scribal culture studied
embraces writing by all people, not simply by professional scribes. The
texts considered are literary in a broad sense: they include works of the
imagination but also those concerning history, politics and religion. On
the other hand, this is not a general survey of all the uses of manuscript,
which would have accorded more space to everyday needs such as corre-
spondence, drafts and official and private record-keeping or, at the other
extreme, the production of de luxe manuscripts for personal or family
use. The majority of works discussed are written in the vernacular, but
works in Latin are treated alongside them; I do not perceive any major
distinctions in the nature of the transmission of texts in the two lan-
guages. Transcriptions in Greek, however, constitute a specialized sector
in terms of both production and readership, and they are discussed only
briefly in Chapter z Section a.
Chapter i provides an introduction to the nature of the manuscript cul-
ture of the Italian Renaissance. It assesses the reasons for which it con-
tinued to flourish and considers some of the factors that differentiated it
from print publication. It then considers how texts were circulated within
society, either by their authors or by their users, sometimes within very
close circles, sometimes within wider ones. Finally, it examines the public
posting of certain kinds of text. In Chapter a, I turn to the practicalities of
scribal culture, asking which kinds of handwriting were in use during the
Preface xi
period and how they were taught, and what help was available from paid
scribes if a fair copy of a text were needed. The next pair of chapters deals
with the use of manuscripts in circulating those genres of literature in
which it was most important. Chapter 3 looks at how handwritten poetry,
especially lyric poetry, was sent from authors to readers, sometimes invit-
ing or provoking responses in kind, and at how some readers made per-
sonal collections of verse in manuscript. Chapter 4, on prose, covers works
concerned chiefly with a variety of topics of actuality: current affairs, reli-
gious controversies, prophecies of impending renewal and literary debates.
In all these chapters, manuscript culture is considered mainly in its
own right as a context for the circulation of literature. However, in order
to define its boundaries and its specificities, it also needs to be studied
in relation to the two other modes of circulation that were available in
the sixteenth century: to the oldest of all, oral performance, and to the
newcomer, the printed word. These three forms of communication can
be seen as standing in a triangular relationship. Texts were first created
in handwritten or sometimes in vocal form, but could then move freely
into another medium. Further, one form of transmission could be used
simultaneously with another. Thus a manuscript text might continue to
be circulated in handwritten form alone, but it could be passed into print,
sometimes immediately, sometimes after an interval. At that point, manu-
script circulation might cease or at any rate diminish, but from print a
text sometimes found its way back into manuscript. Printed books, espe-
cially early ones, might be completed, corrected or decorated by hand.
Manuscript and printed texts could be read aloud or, in the case of verse,
sung. Equally, performed texts could be transcribed by the pen and per-
haps subsequently printed.
In the last two chapters I therefore go on to consider aspects of the
borders of manuscript culture with print and orality. Chapter 5 focuses
mainly on the paratexts used by authors to address their manuscript
works to their readers — to dedicatees in the first instance yet also, expli-
citly or implicitly, to a wider public; it then asks how far there was con-
tinuity of practice in the paratexts of print publication. Although this
chapter deals with just one point of comparison between manuscript and
print, it suggests the general importance of not seeing the two systems as
isolated from each other. Not only did printing not bring about a sudden
or complete break with some of the uses of manuscript, but scribal cul-
ture influenced print publication in many respects, including the central
activity with which this book is concerned, the social circulation of litera-
ture: both manuscript and print were used as means of self-fashioning, of
xii Preface
shaping one's social and intellectual identity. Chapter 6 turns to the links
between manuscript texts and oral performance. After considering some
factors that encouraged a culture of performance throughout our period,
I study evidence for the reading aloud or singing of verse in manuscript,
and the role that handwriting might play in recording and circulating Abbreviations
texts that had their genesis in performance.
Transcriptions from primary sources are moderately conservative: most
abbreviations have been expanded, u and v are distinguished, accentu-
ation has been regularized and punctuation has sometimes been modern-
ized. Translations are mine unless indicated otherwise.
ASF Archivio di Stato, Florence
Like some of the texts discussed in the chapters that follow, sections of ASI Archivio storico italiano
this book have been circulated among friends (though not in manuscript) BAM Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan
for their comments. Orality has also played its part in the gestation of the BAV Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City
book, in the form of discussions of some of its subject-matter, whether BCAB Biblioteca Comunale dell'Archiginnasio, Bologna
informally or following seminar papers. I am extremely grateful to all BCR Biblioteca dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei e
those who have provided help of one sort or another. The first person I Corsiniana, Rome
would have wished to thank individually is the late Conor Fahy: the idea BEM Biblioteca Estense Universitaria, Modena
for the book germinated and grew with the help of his promptings and BHR Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance
suggestions for reading, often drawn from recondite sources. For their Bibl. Biblioteca
careful scrutiny of drafts of chapters, I am grateful to two anonymous BL British Library, London
readers for Cambridge University Press; to Richard Andrews, Guyda BLF Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence
Armstrong, Rhiannon Daniels, Filippo de Vivo, Laura Nuvoloni and BMCV Biblioteca del Museo Correr, Venice
Richard Rastall; and especially to Simon Gilson and Helena Sanson, who BMV Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, Venice
generously shouldered the heaviest burden. Information and suggestions BNCF Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Florence
were also kindly offered by a number of colleagues including Jonathan BNN Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III, Naples
Alexander, Lilian Armstrong, Giliola Barbero, Margaret Bent, Warren BNP Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris
Boutcher, Abigail Brundin, Peter Burke, Colin Burrow, Stefano Cracolici, BPP Biblioteca Palatina, Parma
Cristina Dondi, Thomas Earle, Iain Fenlon, Neil Harris, Anthony BRF Biblioteca Riccardiana, Florence
Hobson, Dilwyn Knox, David McKitterick, Ian Maclean, Ian Moxon, BTM Biblioteca Trivùlziana, Milan
Erika Milburn, Angela Nuovo, Dorit Raines and Phil Withington. Linda DBI Dizionario biografico degli Italiani (Rome: Istituto
Bree and Maartje Scheltens of Cambridge University Press have given della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1960—)
admirable guidance and advice. GSLI Giornale storico della letteratura italiana
The book would not have been written without the very generous IMU Italia medioevale e umanistica
support of the Leverhulme Trust, which awarded me a Major Research IS Italian Studies
Fellowship in 2005-8. I am also most grateful to All Souls College, JRM John Rylands University Library, Manchester
Oxford, for a Visiting Fellowship that provided exceptionally rich LB La Bibliofilia
opportunities for research during a term in 2oo7.
As ever, I owe a great debt to Catherine, Sophie, Alice and Laura for
their support throughout the project.
xiv List of abbreviations
MdP Mediceo del Principato
NAL National Art Library, London CHAPTER I
ONB Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna
RSI Rivista storica italiana The contexts and characteristics of
SFI Studi di filologia italiana
SPCT Studi e problemi di critica testuale manuscript circulation

The Renaissance married strong continuity with technical innovation in

transmitting its texts in writing. In the 146os, printing with moveable
metal type was introduced into Italy from Germany but, while the spread
of the new art in the following decades certainly transformed the ways in
which some works were circulated, it did not take over all the functions
of the quill pen. As was natural, handwriting retained its importance in
sending short texts such as letters or compositions that were related to spe-
cific occasions and destined to be read by no more than a few people. Yet
manuscript transmission in the late Quattrocento and Cinquecento was
not restricted to purposes such as these. It continued to flourish in some
other contexts, often valued for the characteristics that differentiated it
from print. Some authors wanted at least some of their major works to be
read in manuscript; a few even showed a marked aversion to the idea of
having works printed, while allowing them to be copied by hand. Readers
would still have expected to receive many works in handwritten form and
to play their own part in the further scribal circulation of these works.
The next chapter will show that plenty of copyists were available,
throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, to assist authors and
readers in the process of diffusion, and Chapters 3 and 4 will look in
more detail at specific genres that lent themselves particularly well to the
use of manuscript. But before going further, we need some introductory
explanation for the persistence of scribal circulation in Renaissance Italy
alongside, but at times in preference to, a culture based on print, and we
need a general outline of the roles that were played in its operation by
authors and readers, both as individuals and within social groupings.

THE FUNCTIONS OF MANUSCRIPT CIRCULATION

AND THE DRAWBACKS OF PRINT

A fundamental quality of manuscript circulation was that it created and

fostered a sense of close communication and solidarity among those with
I
 2 The contexts of manuscript circulation z The functions of manuscript circulation 3

similar interests and tastes. As Harold Love put it in his ground-breaking was in a position of social power, he or she might expect to be given the
study of the phenomenon in seventeenth-century England, `scribal pub- honour of having first sight of an author's works. Federico Gonzaga, mar-
lication served to define communities of the like-minded'.' To send a text quis of Mantua, wrote to Pietro Aretino in 1525 demanding to see his
that was written out by hand, perhaps in a one-off copy made by oneself works before anyone else:
or on one's behalf by a scribe who would often have to be paid for this ser-
Ma recordative, che le cose vostre male se potriano tener ascose; et quando sono
vice, already indicated a special appreciation of those being addressed, and
publicate per tutta Roma, et quasi per tutta Italia, non ce delettano tanto, non
it also allowed one to be quite specific about one's intended first reader or perché non siano quelle medesime quando sono publicate che prima, ma perché
set of readers. Authors, as will be seen, could in this way explicitly try to la novità commenda tutte le cose, et aggiunge precio alle cose preciose.4
control the extent to which a work was allowed to circulate. Even if they (But remember that your writings would be hard to keep hidden; and when they
did not do so, receiving and owning material that was not widely avail- are published throughout Rome, and almost throughout Italy, they do not give us
able conferred on the select reader a sense of privilege and exclusiveness, such pleasure, not because they are not the same when they are published as before,
sometimes of intimacy. This sense became more acute in an age when but because novelty commends all things, and adds value to valuable things.)
printed books were being produced in editions of hundreds or even a few
When in 1573 Torquato Tasso sent a sonnet to Leonora d'Este, sister of
thousands and were available, more cheaply than manuscripts, to anyone
the duke of Ferrara, he recalled `ch'io le promisi di mandarle tutto ciò che
who could afford them. Just as scribal circulation excluded the many, so
mi venisse fatto di nuovo' (that I promised to send you everything new I
jr__w_as mor_e_st_rongly inclusive of the few who did have access to a text. In
happened to do) .5
Love's words, it had the function of `bonding groups of like-minded indi-
When an author's chosen first reader of a handwritten text was another
viduals into a community, sect or political faction, with the exchange of
writer, a bond of reciprocity between them could be forged in two ways.
texts in manuscript serving to nourish a shared set of values and to enrich
First, an author could request comments from the receiver and, if he or
personal allegiances'.' This function worked right across the spectrum of
she wished, incorporate any suggested changes in the text before it cir-
social classes, but the exclusiveness of scribal culture meant that it contin-
culated further. Sonnets, in particular, were often sent with invitations
ued to be appreciated especially in elite circles. The social status associated
to propose improvements. This was often a matter of politeness or mod-
with some manuscript books is reflected in the number of contemporary
esty, as when Veronica Gambara sent to Pietro Bembo, on 19 September
portraits of females and males holding them when printed books could
1536, a poem on the death of his partner Morosina: `Ella si degnarà darmi
equally well have been used. Two examples are Andrea del Sarto's paint-
aviso del ricever del sonetto, et correggerlo per sua cortesia' (Please let me
ing from the mid-1520s of a young woman with a Petrarch, now in the
know you have received the sonnet, and be kind enough to correct it).
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, and Bronzino's portrait of Laura Battiferri
When Bembo replied on 16 October he welcomed her sonnet but added:
(see Figure 1).3
`Quanto al correggerlo, che V. S. mi dice, Dio mi guardi di pensare a ciò'
Manuscript transmission was thus particularly well suited for use by
t those who wished to win favour in some way. They could provide a text
(As for correcting it, as you mention, God forbid me from thinking of it).'
But younger writers could gain much benefit from their interaction with
initially for select readers even if it then became more widely available,
more experienced poets, receiving suggestions for improvement or simply
thereby conferring a sense of privilege on the first recipients. If a reader
a confirmation that a poem could `go forth'. Thus, for example, Bembo
suggested corrections to three sonnets of Giovanni Della Casa in a letter
Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, P. 33. In what follows I am much indebted to Love's to Carlo Gualteruzzi in about 1543; on the other hand, Torquato Tasso
book and to other excellent surveys of manuscript transmission, mainly concerning early modern
England, especially Saunders, `From manuscript to print'; Marotti, Manuscript, Print, and the wrote to Angelo Grillo in 1585 to say that he had read Grillo's fine sonnet
English Renaissance Lyric; Woudhuysen, Sir Philip Sidney; Beal, In Praise of Scribes; Ezell, Social
Authorship and the Advent of Print, pp. z1-44; Anon., 'In praise of manuscripts; McKitterick,
Print, Manuscript and the Search far Order; Bristol and Marotti, `Introduction'; McKenzie, 4 Letter of 7 June 1525, in Baschet, `Documents inédirs', 127; Baschet's text has `precise'.

`Speech — manuscript — print'. For Spain, see Bouza, Corre mamucrito. (Here and throughout, s T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 16, 3 September 11
5731 (I, 47-8).
footnotes contain short references only; full details can be found in the Bibliography.) e Lettere da diversi re, Book I1, no. 22; Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,791 (III, 673-4). On Gambara's modest
Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, P. 177. 3 For a survey, see Macola, Sguardi escritture. seeking of corrections, see too Dilemmi, "'Ne videatur strepere anser"', pp. 31-2.
4 The contexts of manuscript circulation
`e mi pare the possa uscire senza pericolo' (and I think it can go out
without danger)? Second, receivers of handwritten works could respond
to the gift by offering a work of their own. The phenomenon of reply
poems will be considered in Chapter 3 Section 2.
The exclusiveness of scribal circulation and its relative freedom from
control also made it appropriate for, among other works, those that were
exploratory, confidential or outside the mainstream of received opinion.
As has just been seen, an author might want to test the waters by seek-
ing a few readers' reactions or might feel that the work was not yet in its
final state. A desire to maintain confidentiality may help to explain the
use of manuscript for works on alchemy dedicated to Duke Cosimo I
de' Medici in Florence.' Some scribal texts might be `ideologically
charged' or `oppositional', in Love's terms.9 In Chapters 3 and 4 we shall
see instances of the manuscript dissemination of texts that were scurril-
ous, politically partisan, heretical or heterodox. In this respect, an add-
itional, practical advantage of using manuscript was that it could help
texts to remain `under the radar', evading censorship or rebuke, when
print was formally policed by the state and the church. Manuscripts
were certainly subject to censorship, as recommended by the Jesuit writer
Antonio Possevino and as advocated by the Inquisition, but there was no
system to control their production.-
The circulation of freshly composed texts in one or a small number of
manuscript copies was a speedy process. It could thus, in some circum-
stances, confer a sense of immediacy, of up-to-dateness — that `novitY
prized by Federico Gonzaga — with which print could not compete on
equal terms." Privileged readers eagerly awaited handwritten copies of
the latest compositions, sometimes sending their requests to authors or
to those in contact with them. Cosimo di Palla Rucellai and the scholar
Pier Vettori, for instance, wrote from Florence around 1538-40 to ask,
respectively, Benedetto Varchi in Padua and Mattio Franzesi in Rome
for literary novelties Cdelle compositions the escon fuora', compositions
being published, in Vettori's words), in particular for verses by the fash-
ionable Modenese writer Francesco Maria Molza. Varchi, too, did not
7 Bembo, Lettere, no. 2,385 (IV, 457-8); T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 389, 14 June 1585 (II, 382-3). On the
terminology of publication, see Section 3 below.
a Perifano, L'Alchimie à la cour. On the scribal and printed circulation of such texts in the first half
of the Cinquecento, see Thorndike, A History, V, 532-49; Perifano, `Giovan Battista Nazari', 241.
9 Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 177, 184-91.
'° L. Balsamo, Antonio Possevino, p. 68; Fragnito, Proibito capire, P. 42 n. 35 (`libri et scritti'), p. 270
n. 29. On occult manuscripts, see Barbierato, Nella stanza dei circoli.
11 Woudhuysen, Sir Philip Sidney, p. 14.
z The functions of manuscript circulation 5
wish to be the last to see Molza's mythological narrative poem La ninfa
tiherina, completed in 1538.12 The quality of freshness was especially valu-
able for occasional texts and in general for any composition relating to
current affairs and topical issues. After an author had given a text out
to its initial readers, he or she could follow this up by sending them
revisions or variants in a subsequent letter. Poets, in particular, liked to
do this with their sonnets. Thus in 1581 Torquato Tasso sent to Curzio
Ardizio (a gentleman from Pesaro at the court of Mantua) a sonnet to be
presented to the young Ranuccio Farnese, future duke of Parma, then
sent the same sonnet with variants that Ardizio might choose to incor-
porate after consultation with others, reminded Ardizio that he could
send this and two other sonnets to Ranuccio when he wished, and finally
asked Ardizio to incorporate a revised first tercet, to copy the poem and
send it to Ranuccio. 13
When a text in manuscript was being presented to someone of high
social status, who might also be the dedicatee, care was likely to be taken
over the artefact itself, in order to enhance its aesthetic appeal, and also
its material worth, though the latter was of course not supposed to be
realizable by the recipient. The giving of manuscripts as gifts presented
particularly good opportunities for producers of texts to strengthen
their personal relationships with others and, through a process of self-
fashioning, to influence the ways in which they and the works contained
in their manuscripts were perceived by readers, especially by those subsets
of the wider public to whom they would have first addressed their works:
actual and potential patrons, their peer group, those with shared interests
who were potential supporters of their cause. Such gifts would rarely be
rejected, though a manuscript of verse by Antonio Brucioli was refused by
Vittoria Farnese because of its heterodox content.'4 As Chapter 2 Section 3
will show, the author might have the text written out by a professional
scribe. The physical support might be more expensive than usual, larger-
size paper (giving more spacious margins) or vellum; the text might be
adorned with illuminations or other decorations (see Figures 5, 6, 8, 13); a
fine binding could be commissioned. There was occasional straining after
novel effects, such as text written in gold on black vellum in a context of
mourning (a collection of verse written in memory of Orsino Lanfredini,
killed in a brawl in 1488) and text written in silver and gold on purple
" Vianello, Illetterato, pp. 24-5, z8.
0 Le rime, no. 812,
T. Tasso, Le lettere, nos. 173, 174, 178, 18z, all from 1581 (1, 139-41, 144-
PP• 8o6-7-
14 Barbieri, `Tre schede', 717-19.
 6 The contexts of manuscript circulation
vellum.~5 In presentation copies, the decorations might include — in an
illuminated initial or in an independent illustration — an image of the
author, reminding the recipient of the author's human existence. The
author could be depicted presenting a copy of the work to a dedicatee
who is sometimes enthroned on a raised dais; but members of a court
can be represented as onlookers, so that this gift-giving is seen as a semi-
public act, not just a transaction between two people (see Figure 13).16
Printed copies were of course also presented to individuals, and they
too could be made unique through their decoration and binding; but
an expensively produced manuscript would always be a more flatter-
ing gift. Where gift copies were concerned, the pen was still mightier
than the press. Armando Petrucci has suggested that a product typical of
the late Quattrocento and Cinquecento was the `libro letterario mano-
scritto di lusso' (the de luxe literary manuscript book), often containing
a contemporary text in the vernacular rather than in Latin, and serving
as a dedication or gift copy. It is significant that these manuscripts were
still commissioned, at what must have been considerable expense, pre-
cisely when the use of print was expanding and that, as Petrucci notes,
they could be produced just before the first printed edition. Bembo, for
instance, presented a manuscript copy, now lost, of his dialogue on the
literary vernacular, the Prose della volgar lingua, to the dedicatee, Pope
Clement VII, by 18 January 1525, only a few months before he had the
work printed in Venice.17
Donors of works in manuscript would naturally hope to receive
other gifts or favours in return. When Aretino sent to Duke Cosimo I
de' Medici, soon after 8 November 1555, a sonnet on the recent death of
the Milanese general Gian Giacomo dei Medici (`L'estinto Marignan
Dio, de gli eroi'), he asked in his accompanying letter, with characteristic
effrontery, for thirty scudi to pay his rent for six months." The attraction
that might be exercised by possessing a unique copy of a new work by a
renowned author was illustrated in an unusual way when in 1585 Torquato
11 BL, MS Add. 22805 (see Wardrop, The Script, pp. 37-8 and pl. 41 and Weiss, `In obitu'); BAV,
MS Vat. Lat. 10377 (Wardrop, The Script, pp. 43-4 and pl. 46).
i6 Other examples include BAY, MS Vat. Lat. 227, Antonio da Rho presenting his Dialogi in
Lactantium to Eugenius IV (M. Miglio, `Dedicate al pontefice', p. 84, pl. 54); BNP, MS Lat.
4586, Gerolamo Mangiaria presenting a work to Galeazzo Maria Sforza (Lubkin, A Renaissance
Court, after p. 213). See, too, Tarquini, Simbologia del potere.
Petrucci, 'Copisti e libri', pp. 516—z5; Bembo, Lettere, no. 513 to Federico Fregoso, A January 1525
(II, 235-6). For examples of presentation manuscripts used by Italians in England, see Carlson,
English Humanist Books, pp. 20—S9.
i' Larivaille (ed.), Lettere di, a, su Pietro Aretino, pt I, no. 8 (p. 19).
z The functions of manuscript circulation 7
Tasso offered to compose encomiastic sonnets in order to open doors for
his nephew Antonino Sersale, who was trying to make a court career in
Mantua: B se i miei sonetti posson giovarvi perc'abbiate da vestire, ne
farò a chi vi pare' (and if my sonnets can help to get you clothes to wear, I
will write some to whoever you wish).19
Dedication or presentation copies head the list in Petrucci's clas-
sification of the functions of early modern manuscripts and in that of
Donatella Nebbiai. However, their analyses show that the typology of
these manuscripts covered a wide range of both contents and material
quality. For Petrucci, the manuscripts of continental western Europe in
this period contain two further main categories of texts, each one cor-
responding to a more plainly produced artefact: works whose printing
and sale were forbidden, and various types of works produced on the
margins of official written culture, such as commedia dell árte scenarios,
collections of recipes or popular verse." Some scenarios survive from the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but only one collection was printed
because their use was specialized and confidential.21 Although some
culinary recipe books were of high quality, others were decidedly less
so. Manuscripts of recipes for medicines, cosmetic and products used
in domestic tasks were compiled for personal use.22 Another category
of manuscript that had an everyday, practical function and thus tended
to be produced more cheaply was schoolbooks.23 Andrea da Barberino's
prose romance Le storie nerbonesi was copied several times in Florence in
the early sixteenth century by readers from different social classes .24
The scribal medium had a flexibility that allowed those who commis-
sioned manuscripts or who were involved in the transmission process
to customize them according to their personal requirements. Wealthy
families had texts for their private use — in particular, devotional texts
such as Books of Hours — copied and decorated by fine scribes and
illuminators .25 Anyone transcribing a work or having it transcribed could
g T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 384, 6 June 1585 (II, 377-8).
1O Petrucci, `Introduzione', pp. xxxvii—xxxviii. Nebbiai, `Per una valutazione', using a sample of 73
manuscripts, adds: manuscripts destined for printing; personal copies and writings destined for
limited circles (including works on an Index of prohibited books); miscellanies; `popular' works;
monastic and religious works; and erudite works produced in academies.
" Andrews, Scripts and Scenarios, pp. 195-6.
Laurioux, `I libri di cucina' and Scully, The Neapolitan Recipe Collection (examples of manuscript
cookbooks); Cavallo, `Health, beauty and hygiene', pp. 175-6 (domestic recipe books).
For Florence, see Black, Humanism and Education, pp. 386-425•
4 Allaire, Andrea da Barberino, p. 126 and `A fifteenth-century Florentine community'.
See e.g. Harthan, Books of Hours, pp. 74-7,138-41,154-7, 16z-8; R. Watson, `Manual of dynastic
history?'
8 The contexts of manuscript circulation
deliberately modify or add to it so that the revised version would suit
their own purposes or tastes. In one manuscript of Niccolò Machiavelli's
Rprincipe, a scribe shifted the viewpoint of some sections of the treatise
to a later date and outside Florence by making interpolations hostile to
Pope Leo X and favourable to the Sienese." Also probably Sienese is a
partial rewriting of the Stanze that the Venetian Pietro Bembo composed
in Urbino; this incongruously introduces references to Tuscany and `[l]
alma et gloriosa Siena' (bountiful and glorious Siena).27 Similar sophis-
tications are found in the tradition of Venetian chronicles that endured
into the sixteenth century and beyond: their authors, scribes and read-
ers altered, abbreviated and added to earlier chronicles in order to suit
their own aims and interests.2$ One of the copies of Biagio Buonaccorsi's
Diario dall ánno 1498 all'anno 1512 (to which we shall return in Chapter 4
Section 1) interpolates denunciations of prelates and of the sack of Prato
in 1512.29 Buonaccorsi, a close colleague of Machiavelli's in the Florentine
chancery between 1498 and their loss of office in 1512, was also a scribe, and
he introduced some stylistic `improvements' into the text of Machiavelli's
capitoli when he transcribed them together as a unitary work, drawing on
his own tastes as a poet; even someone close to the author evidently felt
free to do this30 Machiavelli himself read an anonymous short poem in
Rome in April 1526 and reworked its ending in his own epigram `Sappi
ch'io non son Argo'. This version has survived in a copy jotted down by
Varchi on the endpaper of one of his manuscripts.3' In cookbooks, recipes
were reworked to suit local tastes32
Shorter texts could be rearranged or newly combined in personalized
anthologies. In the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, for
example, the Florentine scribes Bartolomeo Fonzio and Francesco
Baroncini were in the habit of collecting texts into codices made up of
independent gatherings (sets of sheets folded into leaves, also called fas-
cicles or quires), bound together only provisionally so that their ordering
could subsequently be altered.33 We shall see examples of the practice of
BAV, MS Urb. Lat. 975: see Inglese in N. Machiavelli, De principatibus, pp. 54-5. 57-62. The
transcription was made at some point after the battle of Pavia, 24 February '52 5.
" Gnocchi in Bembo, Stanze, pp. xlix-1.
2' Cari le, `Aspetti della cronachistica' and La cronachistica; Cochrane, Historians and Historiography,
PP• 62-74•
BNCF, MS Magl. XXV 634; see Niccolini in Buonaccorsi, Diario, pp. 12, 31-2.
° On Buonaccorsi's `improvements', see Inglese in N. Machiavelli, Capitoli, P. 17z and Trovato,
Con ogni diligenza corretto, pp. 311-16.
3' Scarpa, `Argo, Clemente VII e Pasquino'. 31 Laurioux, `I libri di cucina', 55-7•
33 Caroti and Zamponi, Lo scrittoio, p. 18; Polcri, `Una sconosciuta corrispondenza', 49.
z The functions of manuscript circulation 9
collecting verse in Chapter 3 Section 5. In various ways, then, as Michael
Bristol and Arthur Marotti have written, in manuscript communication
the roles of reader and producer were fused: it was a participatory process,
`the whole envlrönmënt being one in which texts are malleable and social
rather than fixed and possessively individualistic'. 34
One reflection of the enduring strength of scribal culture is the presence
of manuscripts, in some cases ones containing contemporary works in
Latin and the vernacular, as a not inconsiderable proportion of the con-
tents of libraries in the sixteenth century. The inventory of the library of
Isabella d'Este, drawn up after her death in 1539, specifies that 66 out of
133 books were manuscript, but that proportion is unusually high. Marino
Zorzi's survey of Venetian libraries shows, for instance, that in 1526 there
were 12 manuscripts among the 155 books of the patrician Antonio Pesaro,
including a Dante, `uno libro trata de cose antique' (a book about ancient
matters), writings by Frontinus (author of works on stratagems and aque-
ducts), a work on `come el re die governar el suo popullo' (how a king
must rule his people) and Marco Polo. In 156o, 19 manuscripts figured
among the 240 volumes of the surgeon Giorgio de Agaris. The manu-
scripts of Leonardo Donà (doge 16o6-1z) included somf works that were
probably inherited, but recent authors such as Giulio Camillo, Francesco
Guicciardini and Francesco Robortello were also represented. The scholar
Battista Egnazio owned at least 73 Greek manuscripts as well as many
Latin ones, and there were several Greek works among the 40 or so manu-
scripts out of 800 volumes in the library of Matteo Calergi on his death
in 1572. In the largest libraries, those with over volumes, Zorzi esti-
woo
mates that between 10 and 20 per cent of the holdings were handwritten.
The partial inventory of Pietro Bembo's library in Rome drawn up in
1545 includes 33 manuscripts in the section devoted to them, a few others
among the 126 books listed as `Editi' (published) and at least 10 among the
vernacular books. A catalogue made in 1604 of Gian Vincenzo Pinelli's
collection in Padua lists 6,428 printed books and 738 manuscripts. Later
in the Seicento, the library of Carlo Strozzi of Florence included nearly
2,500 manuscripts, mainly of historical texts, some copied by Strozzi him-
self, some copied for him, others purchased second-hand.35
—
3 Bristol and Marotti, `Introduction', p. 5.
Luzio and Renier, La coltura, pp. 173-7 (Isabella); Zorzi, `La circolazione', u8-19 (Pesaro), 125
(Agaris), 131 (Donà), 133-4 (Calergi), 137-8 (Egnazio), 149 (large libraries); Danzi, La biblioteca,
PP. 117-318 (Bembo); Nuovo, `Dispersione', pp. 47-8 (Pinelli); Callard, `Conservazione'
(Strozzi).
10 The contexts of manuscript circulation
To summarize so far: the handwritten medium was a rapid and
convenient means of transmission as long as not too many copies were
required; it was well able to reinforce existing social bonds and to help to
create new ones in a process of community fashioning, since it fostered
exclusiveness; in comparison with print, it could give writers greater free-
dom to express their views or imaginings, and it was more immediate and
direct; it eluded the apparent finality and fixity of print by permitting
authors to continue working on their texts; and, for readers, it offered
opportunities to influence the ways in which texts were set down. One
can add that some might have preferred scribal to printed texts because
these could be perceived as having a stronger `presence', in the sense of
being closer to what Love calls `an assumed source of validation in the
movement of the author's fingers'.36 Some users of manuscripts may sim-
ply have had an aesthetic preference for the handwritten page. This is
one possible explanation for the fairly common phenomenon of texts
copied by hand from printed books; a well-known example is the vellum
manuscript of Matteo Maria Boiardo's chivalric romance, the Orlando
innamorato, that is based on the edition printed in Scandiano in 1495. But
some such copies must have been made because no further printed texts
were available for purchase 37
The printing press soon became much more powerful than the pen, in
quantitative terms, as a means of circulating texts. Although in a very few
cases printed editions were produced for coteries (see the Conclusion),
normally print publication was `strong', in Love's terms, involving the
production of a large number of copies, whereas manuscript publication
was `weak', involving often no more than `a surrender of control over the
future use of the manuscript [ ... ] in a context where there was some prac-
tical likelihood of the text entering public channels of communication'.0
Presses also produced copies more swiftly than was possible in the scribal
medium, and these copies were generally made for sale to unknown read-
ers who could reside in different states. At the same time, as has been
seen, the use of print publication did not mean that authors could no
36 Love, 7be Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 141-8 (P. 145)-
37 The Boiardo manuscript is BTM, Triv. 1094; see Harris, Bibliografia dell' 'Orlando Innamorato;
II, 55-8, with further examples, and Tissoni Benvenuti in Boiardo, L'Inamoramento de Orlando,
I, lxvi—lxxi. On a partial copy of a prohibited heterodox printed work, the Sommario della Sacra
Scrittura, see Peyronel Rambaldi, Dai Paesi Bassi, PP. 397-9 and Pl. 5. On the general topic, see
Reeve, `Manuscripts copied from printed books'; De la Mare, `Script and manuscripts', P. 4o6
and `New research', P. 453; McKitterick, Print, Manuscript and the Search for Order, pp. 47-8.
3' Love, the Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 36-41 (p. 40). On the transition from the market
for manuscripts to that for printed books, see Bonifati, Dal libro manoscritto.
z The functions of manuscript circulation 11
longer present gift copies and dedicate works. Nevertheless, the qualities
of manuscript transmission that have been outlined could give it certain
advantages over the process of print publication, from the viewpoints of
both writers and readers of all classes.
Of course, some authors wrote works specifically for print and did
not intend them to be disseminated scribally. However, in deciding
whether or not to publish in print, authors would have had to bear
in mind three aspects of this younger medium that might discourage
them from using it. First, print seemed to demand a greater degree of
polish in the use of the Italian language. Just as manuscript transmis-
sion allowed a greater freedom of content, so it was felt to allow more
latitude in all aspects of linguistic usage, from punctuation and spelling
to morphology, syntax and lexis. This feeling became stronger in the
course of the Cinquecento once grammars of the vernacular began to
appear in print, in particular Fortunio's Regolegrammaticali della volgar
lingua of 1516 and Bembo's Prose Bella volgar lingua of 1525. Ludovico
Ariosto, for instance, undertook a wholesale linguistic revision of his
epic Orlando furioso for its third edition, completed in Ferrara on
1 October 1532. During the period in which he was preparing this pub-
lication, on 18 March 1532, he sent the four comedies in verse that he
had composed thus far to Federico Gonzaga, but expressly asked that
they should not be printed:
Quella suplico the sia contenta di non lasciarle andare in modo the sieno stam-
pate un'altra volta, ché, oltre the non credo the le stampassino più corrette
c'habbian fatto l'altre volte, io ci cognosco dentro de li errori circa la lingua che,
per trovarmi hora occupato in altro, non ho havuto tempo di correggierli; et
ancho the le ha trascritte non ci ha usato quella diligentia c'havria possuto.39
(I beg you, please, not to let them go further so that they are printed again, for
apart from the fact that I do not believe they would be printed more correctly
than on previous occasions, I recognize in them errors concerning language
that, because I am now busy with something else, I have not had time to correct;
further, the person who transcribed them was not as diligent as he might have
been.)
As well as having practical concerns about the accuracy of the work of
printers (two comedies, in their original prose versions, had been printed
without his knowledge in about 1509) and of his scribe, Ariosto now felt
that any works of his that were to be printed should first be polished
39 Ariosto, Lettere, no. 199 (P. 469). On the printing and revision of the Furioso, see Fahy, L' `Orlando
furioso' del 1S32.
 I2 The contexts of manuscript circulation
linguistically, and his involvement in the printing of the Furioso prevented
him from revising his comedies in the same way.
A second source of misgivings on the part of authors was the ambiguous
social and cultural status of printing. While some printers, such as Aldo
Manuzio, strove hard to raise this status by linking their editions with
elite readers and high standards of scholarship, there were those who
looked askance at the upstart medium. The operation of the press required
a good deal of brawn and thus had plebeian connotations, in contrast
with the sedate, studious and silent work of the scribe. For theologians,
printing was a manual not a liberal profession.40 Success in print publi-
cation demanded large and risky investments and mercantile know-how;
as a recent study has shown, it was these qualities above all that ensured
the dominance of the Giolito dynasty in mid-sixteenth-century Venetian
publishing.41 These associations could be abhorrent to idealistic men of
letters. After commercial pressures obliged Aldo to reduce his output of
Greek printed books, Janus Lascaris accused him of being motivated by
`lo guadagno, loquale senza dubio è indecente cosa the sia prima prop-
osito ad homo docto' (gain, which it is undoubtedly indecent for a learned
man to put first).42
There were other senses, too, in which printing was too closely asso-
ciated with the power of money. The medium, it seemed, now made it
possible for authors simply to purchase their fame by going into print,
and for readers to buy texts that would previously have been dearer and
in many cases not obtainable by them at all. Some thus saw the press as
ushering in a lowering of standards on the part of writers, coupled with
an expansion of the reading and writing public that threatened the status
of men of letters as an elite.43 In contrast, the ethos of manuscript circula-
tion, with its ostensible eschewal of the mercenary, can be compared with
Jwhat Pierre Bourdieu wrote of cultural production that is aimed at other
producers of cultural goods, where `the economy of practices is based,
as in a generalized game of "loser wins", on a systematic inversion of the
1 fundamental principles of all ordinary economies'. Scribal circulation
40 Romani, Il Syntagma', pp. 52-4. In the early seventeenth century Paul Laymann, a German
Jesuit, declared that operating a printing press was servile work (`librorum impressio servile opus
est') and thus prohibited on feast days. Writing (`scriptio') and copying (`transcriptio'), on the
other hand, were liberal activities (related to the `ars grammatica', grammar) and thus permitted;
the same judgement applied to printers composing a forme (`de typographis characteres ordi-
nantibus'). Laymannus, 7heologia moralis, pp. 693-4; Cavagna, La tipografica professione, P. 40.
4' Nuovo and Coppens, I Giolito e la stampa.
42 Letter of 24 December 1501, in Nolhac, `Les Correspondants', 271.
43 Richardson, `The debates on printing', 145-8, 151-2.
z The functions of manuscript circulation 13
could still lead to practical gains, but it would do so indirectly, through
a disinterested, anti-economic approach. This process would involve the
building up of what Bourdieu terms symbolic capital, understood as `eco-
nomic or political capital that is disavowed, misrecognized and thereby
recognized, hence legitimate, a "credit" which, under certain conditions,
and always in the long run, guarantees "economic" profits'.44
A third reason for hesitation over the use of print on some occasions
was the practical difficulties that it could involve for authors. They would
often have had to pay printing costs, acting in effect as their own publish-
ers. They might find someone else to take on this role, but the financial
risk might be considered too great; thus when Isabella d'Este wanted a
Latin poem by Marco Girolamo Vida to be printed in Venice in 1519,
there was a general reluctance to subsidize an edition `per essere auctor
novus et opus novum' (since the author and the work are new).41 A profit
might follow in the longer term, but the short-term financial attractions
that manuscript had for a publisher have been effectively summarized by
D. F. McKenzie:
Manuscripts were economically competitive because printing requires high initial
investment in typesetting and a low unit cost which is achieved only by having
a large number of copies. Anything under a hundred is hardly economical.
Manuscript production, however, like binding, was in part a bespoke trade:
one-off or several copies could be done on demand; the market was almost self-
defining; there was no problem of keeping type standing; and no problem of
unsold stocks.46
Authors also complained sometimes that printing and editing were car-
ried out too hurriedly, with profit being put before accuracy. They had
accused and continued to accuse scribes of introducing errors, but print-
ing exacerbated the problem of faulty texts 47 Furthermore, in the course
of the sixteenth century authors were obliged to go through a potentially
lengthy and costly process of obtaining approval for printing from church
and state.48 Printed versions of texts might have to differ from hand-
written ones. For instance, in the printed edition (1S72) of the Dialogo
de' giuochi the nelle vegghie sanesi si usano di fare of Girolamo Bargagli,
two games that appear in a manuscript version were in one case substi-
tuted and in the other omitted; and anticlerical passages of his Pellegrina,
44 Bourdieu, The Field of Cultural Production, pp. 39, 75. 41 Luzio and Renier,
La coltura, p. 154•
q6 McKenzie, 'Speech —Manuscript —Print', p. 245•
47 Rizzo, Illessico filologico, pp. 197-8; Richardson, `The debates on printing', 148-51.
4' Richardson, Printing, Writers and Readers, pp. 43-6 (censorship), 77-80 (attitudes of writers to
printing).
14 The contexts of manuscript circulation
composed and sent in manuscript to Cardinal Ferdinando de' Medici in
1567-8, were censored by Girolamo's brother Scipione before the com-
edy was first performed and printed in 1589, two years after the author's
death.49
2 AUTHORS AND THE SCRIBAL MEDIUM
It is not surprising, then, to find that even in the sixteenth century there
were a few authors who did not wish anyone to print their works, prefer-
ring these to circulate in manuscript, and then sometimes only within a
limited circle, so that it could be hard for outsiders to read them. One such
predominantly `scribal' author was Sperone Speroni. He sent a copy of
his Dialogo dell ámore from his native Padua to circulate in Venice among
friends including two of the persons who acted as speakers in the work,
Niccolò Grazia (Grassi) and Bernardo Tasso, father of Torquato, as well
as Benedetto Ramberti. One of Speroni's dialogues was sent as a gift to
Ferrante Sanseverino, prince of Salerno. In the case of the poem `Sopra
Roma', written for Pius IV, Speroni sought to counter the instability of the
manuscript text by sending his master copy to a certain Guidone in 1562,
`acciocché [ ... ] voi con questo emendiate gli errori di quelle copie the vanno
attorno' (so that with this you can emend the errors of the copies going
around). However, those outside the author's immediate circle were not so
fortunate. In order to read Speroni's Dialogo della lingua, Battista Strozzi
in Florence was obliged in 1537 to ask Varchi to request it from the author
in Padua `con quella diligentia the voi solete servire gli amici' (with your
usual diligence in serving your friends). Strozzi had to renew the request a
few months later. Speroni's attitude to the press was certainly not entirely
negative in principle: he himself contributed to the genre of discourses in
praise of print, claiming, for instance, that the invention ensured that a
work could be read in the same form in Rome and in India, and that a
printed work cost a hundred times less than a handwritten one. However,
he was wary of sending his own works to the press. When his Dialogi were
printed in Venice in 1542, they appeared without his agreement, as the edi-
tor, Daniele Barbaro, had to admit in his dedicatory letter. $0
49 Riccò, Giuoco e teatro, pp. 12-13, 61 n. 1o9 and Binazzi, `Le veglie', 70-5 (Dialogo de'giuocbi);
Cerreta in Bargagli, La pellegrina, pp. 40-2.
jO On the Dialogo dell'amore, see Speroni, Opere, V, 7-9 (letters III to Ramberti and IV to Aretino);
Aretino, Lettere, no. 139, 6 June 1537 (I, 209-11); B. Tasso, Delle lettere, I, no. 70 (pp. 138-9).
Bernardo Tasso's undated letter on behalf of Sanseverino, thanking Speroni for a dialogue, is in
Delle lettere, I, no. 218 (p. 443)• Sopra Roma' is in Speroni, Opere, IV 341-9. On `il Guidone',
z Authors and the scribal medium 15
Some elite poets showed similar attitudes, since they could afford to
disdain the profits or other benefits that might accrue from printing. Della
Casa, the major lyric poet of the generation after Bembo's and author of
important prose works such as Il Galateo, saw his five capitoli and some
lyric verse appear in printed anthologies during his lifetime (1503-56),
but he circulated his writings only through the medium of manuscript,
sparingly and to intimate friends. When Gualteruzzi offered in 1548 to
make `un volume Bello et giusto' (a fine and correct [printed] volume) of
Della Casa's verse together with that of the recently deceased Bembo, the
younger poet replied that he could not believe that Gualteruzzi was advis-
ing him to have his vernacular writings printed and asked him to wait
until they were `più et migliori' (more and better). 5' Molza was similarly
reluctant to have some of his verse printed. Michelangelo had a collection
of his own verse transcribed in 1546 with the help of Luigi Del Riccio and
Donato Giannotti, but it is not certain that this canzoniere was intended
for the press, and in any event only a handful of his many poems were
printed during his lifetime52 Another poet who normally sent out his
compositions in manuscript was the Neapolitan Luigi Tansillo. He pre-
ferred to communicate his works directly to patrons such as Dan Gonzalo
Fernández de Córdoba, third duke of Sessa, and don Pedro de Toledo,
viceroy of Naples. The sole collection of Tansillo's verse printed with his
permission was one concerning a military exploit, the Sonetti per la presa
dAfrica of 1551; but he claimed that the rushed printing operation was
forced on him, and commented in the dedication that `Dare a le stampe
le mie cose sempre mi parve duro, quando haveva da farlo et tempo et 7
agio' (Giving my works to the press always seemed hard to me, [even]
when I had time and leisure to do so). Not until the 156os and then only
briefly did Tansillo take steps towards producing a printed collection of
his works, which had unfortunately been placed on Pope Paul IV's Index
in I559.53
who acted for a time as Speroni's administrator in Padua while Speroni was in Rome, see Pozzi
in Trattatisti del Cinquecento, p. 8o9 n. 5; I have not been able to ascertain his full name. On the
Dialogo della lingua, see Plaisance, L'Accademia, P. 36 and Vianello, Illetterato, pp. 28-9 (quota-
tion from a letter of 27 October 1537). The Discorso in lode della stampa is in Speroni, Opere, III,
447-54. On the 1542 printing and Speroni's attitude towards printing, see Sorella in Montecchi
and Sorella, `I nuovi modi', pp. 669-73.
" Moroni (ed.), Corrispondenza, no. 352, 22 September 1 548 (PP. 517-19); no. 353, 29 September
1 548 (pp. 519-2o). See, too, Fedi, La memoria della poesia, pp. 201-49; Dilemmi, `Giovanni della
Casa'; Barbarisi, `Ancora sul testo', pp. 2 54-9•
Fedi, La memoria della poesia, pp. 26 4-30 5•
9 Toscano, Letterati corti accademie, pp. 1
45-82 (PP. 153, 157-9; quotation from p. 159); Milburn,
Luigi Tansillo, pp. u-13, 73-84•

16 The contexts of manuscript circulation
The man whose first name gave to Della Casa the title of his treatise on
social relations, Galeazzo Florimonte, bishop of Aquino, was the author
of a discussion of Aristotle's Ethics, part of which first found its way into
print during his lifetime, but only by accident. In 1554, the Venetian press
of Plinio Pietrasanta produced an edition of the Ragionamenti di m. A.
Nifo all'illustrissimo principe di Salerno sopra la filosofia morale dAristotile
that contained the first and last of a set of four dialogues that were com-
posed not, as the title suggested, by Nifo but by Florimonte. However,
it was only at the end of the fourth dialogue that Florimonte revealed
his authorship, and then very modestly, by presenting himself simply as
a narrator. The dedication of the Venetian edition, written by Girolamo
Ruscelli, made it clear that the dialogues were entering print without any
consultation with their author. Ruscelli explained that he was using a
manuscript copy whose owner was planning to have the work printed
without acknowledging its author; another manuscript, then in Bologna,
did however attribute the work to Florimonte (fol. air-v). Most of the
many writings of another bishop, Ludovico Beccadelli, were circulated
during his lifetime (1501-72) in manuscript alone. For example, he dif-
fused both the first and second redactions of his life of Petrarch in copies
written out for him by scribes and then corrected by himself and by his
secretary, Antonio Giganti of Fossombrone.54
In a curious paragraph in Nico16 Franco's dialogue about booksellers,
the eighth of his Dialogi piacevoli printed in 1539, the speaker Sannio,
who represents Franco himself, ridicules, by proposing it as serious
advice to a would-be bookseller, the idea that bookshops should stock
all the works written by leading authors. He cites as examples some
contemporary scholarly authors whose works had only been printed in
rare cases: Lazzaro Bonamico, Benedetto Lampridio, Celio Calcagnini,
Trifon Gabriele, Giulio Camillo, Ubaldino Bandinelli, Claudio Tolomei,
Romolo Amaseo, Biagio Pallai (Blosius Palladius), Gabriele Cesano and
Paolo Giovio up to his history of the Turks (1531) 55 All of these men were
known to dislike print publication; their works could thus hardly be
regularly available in bookshops. Franco's point appears to be that being
printed was not the sole gauge of quality.
Carefully managed scribal publication was especially important for the
two major elite women poets who emerged in the first half of the fifteenth
century, Veronica Gambara and Vittoria Colonna, since it allowed them
11 Frasso, Studi, pp. 3-22.
55 N. Franco, Dialogi piacevoli, pp. 297-9; Speciale, `Nicolò Franco', 181-3.
k
1
a Authors and the scribal medium 17
to circulate their writings without incurring any social dishonour. Both
went through moments in which they seriously considered entreaties from
men to allow their verse to go to the press, but in the end neither yielded.
Gambara wrote as follows to Aretino on 26 August 1536:
A quanto poi mi scrivete, essortandomi a contentarmi che se imprima le passate
mie composizioni, e che le mandi, dico che troppo mi doleria che così aperta-
mente si vedessero le mie sciocchezze, e vi prego che facciate ogni opera per viet-
arlo; e lo dico di core, e benché voi le lodate, temo l'affezzion non ve inganni [ ... ]
Pur non si possendo (che pur lo vorrei), vi supplico che amorevolmente vogliate
consigliarmi e aiutarmi, e soccorrere, co '1 saper vostro infinito, al mio quasi
niente. Aspettarò l'ultimo vostro aviso, e poi, sotto l'ombra di voi, vi mandarò la
scielta de le men triste5'
(As for what you write, urging me to allow my past compositions to be printed
and to send them [to you], I have to say that it would grieve me greatly for
my follies to be seen so openly, and I beg you to do everythin g to prevent it.
I say this from my heart, and though you praise them, I fear you are deceived
by your affection [ ... ] Yet if this is not possible, as I would wish, I beg you
to be kind enough to advise me, help me and support my almost inexist-
ent knowledge with yours which is infinite. I shall await your final advice
and then, under your protection, shall send you a selection of the least bad
[compositions].)
Nothing came of Gambara's apparently genuinely reluctant proposal.
Colonna wished to disseminate her own poems both singly and gathered
together, as in the cases of the manuscript collections that she sent as gifts
(see Chapter 3 Section 5). However, this diffusion had to be carried out
under strictly controlled conditions, and she never gave approval to the
printing of her verse. In late 1538 Bembo wrote to Gualteruzzi in Rome
to say that he had encouraged her to let him arrange for the printing of a ä
collection in Venice, and mentioned that alternatively Gualteruzzi might
want to have this done in Rome. For a short while Colonna was swayed
by Bembo's authority and agreed to give Gualteruzzi an exemplar of her
verse to be printed in Rome. But very soon she changed her mind about
providing this copy, to Bembo's frustration.57
" Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro Aretino, Book I no. 198 (I, 19i-2).
51 Albonico, `La poesia del Cinquecento', pp. 717-21. For Bembo's proposals for a Venetian or
Roman edition and Colonna's reactions, see Lettere, no. 1,967, 8 November 1538 (IV, 140-2), no.
1,989, 7 December 1538 (IV, 157-8) and no. 11991, 11 December 1538 (IV, 159), all to Gualteruzzi;
Dionisotti, `Appunti sul Bembo', pp. 274-7. On the scribal diffusion of individual poems or
small groups of poems by Colonna, to readers such as Tansillo, Ariosto and Bembo, see Toscano,
Letterati corti accademie, pp. 85-120. On the use of manuscript and the extent of the use of print
by Gambara, Colonna and later women poets, see Cox, Women's Writing, especially pp. 64-75,
80-91.
18 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Later in the Cinquecento, Barbara Torelli became the first woman
known to have written a secular play, the Partenia, dating from 1587 or
earlier. It belonged to the only dramatic genre that would at that time
have been considered acceptable for female writers of her aristocratic
class, the pastoral. This, too, remained in manuscript. Although only one
handwritten copy is now known, the Partenia was evidently read (and
maybe privately performed) widely enough in courtly circles for it to win
widespread praise from Torelli's contemporaries, and not only in her own
city of Parma."
With these examples from the sixteenth century it is interesting to com-
pare one from a very different context in the following century. Galileo's
dedication, addressed to the Count of Noailles, of the first edition of his
last work, the Discorsi e dimostrazioni matematiche (Leiden: appresso gli
Elsevirii,1638), fols. *2r—*3`, reveals that he had resolved `di non esporre in
publico, mai più, alcuna Belle mie fatiche' (not to set out any of my works
ever again in public) and had decided instead, in order that they should
not remain completely buried, `di lasciarne copia manuscritta, in luogo
conspicuo, al meno à molti intelligenti, delle materie da me trattate' (to
leave in a conspicuous place, at least to many cognoscenti, a manuscript
copy of the subjects dealt with by me). His first step was to hand a copy
to the count, who would share it with friends in France. Galileo was pre-
paring to send other copies to Germany, Flanders, England, Spain and
perhaps elsewhere in Italy; only then did he receive news that the Elzevirs
were preparing his text for printing, not at his instance but doubtless — he
concluded — as a result of the count's desire to spread the author's fame
beyond narrow confines. 59
As will be seen in following chapters, many Cinquecento authors, male
and also (as the century progressed) female, struck a balance between the
use of manuscript and print for the diffusion of their works. However,
even those who had some of their works printed could retain some hesi-
tation about using the press for other works. Three of Machiavelli's works
were printed during his lifetime — the first Decennale (a poem in terza
rima on Florentine history from 1494 to 1504), the comedy Mandragola
and the Arte Bella guerra — but it is arguable that only the Arte was written
f, Sampson, "`Drammatica secreta"'.
51 A similar account is given in the life of Galileo written by Vincenzio Viviani in 1654: `per
dimostrar gratitudine alla natura, voleva comunicar manuscritte quelle [opere] che gli restavano
a varii personaggi a lui ben affetti et intelligenti delle materie in esse trattate' (to show his grati-
tude to nature, he wanted to communicate his remaining works in manuscript to various persons
who were dear to him and had an understanding of their subject-matter). Galilei, Le opere, XIX,
62i-2.
z Authors and the scribal medium 19
with the intention of using print as its primary means of dissemination.
Here Machiavelli wrote in a more august manner and on more conven-
tional subject-matter, in comparison with his major prose works of the
previous years, Il principe and the Discorsi, intended for a more select
readership. Even so, the Arte had a preliminary circulation in manuscript
(as the Decennale certainly did and as Mandragola may have done), and
there is no evidence that the author himself saw the first edition through
the press in 1521.60 Ariosto, we saw earlier, embraced the use of the press
for the Orlando furioso but not for his comedies. He did not collect either
his vernacular verse (including the lyric poetry and the Satire) or his Latin
verse for print publication; however, these poems entered the channels
of scribal diffusion, and the collected versions of Satire were diffused in
manuscript before the poet's death .61
Another author who was selective in his use of print was Annibal Caro.
He had his mock-commentary on a poem in praise of figs by Molza, the
Commento di serAgresto da Ficaruolo sopra la prima facata del padre Siceo,
printed in 1539, but told Varchi that printing had been forced upon him
by the very success of the poem in manuscript. Molza, he recounted, had
a copy that was appropriated for two nights by Molza's son Camillo and
Marcello de la Gazzaia, and this pair had a copy made that Camillo took
to Lombardy without Caro's or Molza's knowledge. Caro got the original
back from Molza and gave it to Mattio Franzesi to have another copy
made for Varchi. However, he then heard that Camillo had given another
copy to Pietro Carnesecchi, who `dipoi n'avea ripiena Modena' (had
then filled Modena with it). Against his will, Caro claimed, he had been
obliged to have the commentary printed from a copy corrected by him,
rather than let someone else print it in an imperfect state (`abbozzato').12
Caro had recourse to manuscript, as well as to print, in setting forth his
case in his dispute with Lodovico Castelvetro (see Chapter 4 Section 3).
In Caro's last years, there were desultory plans for printing collections of
his other works. He wrote in 1558 to claim to Girolamo Ruscelli (who had
presumably asked to edit Caro's lyric poetry) that he had never thought of
publishing (dar fuora) his verses in print, as could be seen from the way
they were circulating `dispersi e lacerati' (scattered and torn); the reason
was that he had written few poems and did not seek honour. However,
this negligence was bringing Caro shame and so, at the request of Guido
6o See Masi's `Nota al testo' in N. Machiavelli, L'arte della guerra, PP. 313-95 (p• 37 6); Richardson,
`Print or pen?', 52-6 and `The scribal publication'.
6i Segre, `Storia testuale', pp. 316-17. For Ariosto's lyrics, see also Chapter 3 Section 5-
" Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 107 to Varchi, 17 July 1539 (I, 151-3), §2.
20 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Lollio, acting as the agent of the printer Paolo Manuzio in Rome, he
had collected both his lyrics and `those few letters' of which he had kept
copies. But he said he wanted to know no more about the process: io non
ne voglio sapere altro'.63 Discussions dragged on for several years. In 1565
Caro reported that Manuzio had still not been able to print either the
poems or the letters, and nothing had appeared by the time of his death
in the following year. 64 Caro could surely have seen these projects through
if he had wished, if necessary with another printer; yet he did not do so,
perhaps partly as a result of an affected pose of modesty, but also because
he seemed, in the end, to think the effort not worthwhile. On the other
hand, he remained a consistent user of manuscript in order to diffuse his
lyric poetry to friends and others (see Chapter 3 Section I).
3 SOCIAL TRANSMISSION AND AUTHOR PUBLICATION
In looking at the reasons for the persistence of scribal diffusion and at
examples of authors' preference for it, we have begun to see how it was
used to transmit texts from person to person. We can now construct a
more systematic overview of the transmission of texts by individuals. This
process can be divided into two broad categories: on the one hand, trans-
mission of a text by or on behalf of its author; on the other, transmission
by or originating from an owner of a text other than its author. Within
each of these categories, we can distinguish, too, between two kinds of
transmission: that which built on or sought to create social bonds, either
`vertically' with those of higher standing or `horizontally' with one's
equals — here termed social transmission; and transmission that was more
publicly orientated. The rest of this chapter reflects a situation in which
publication was above all a social rather than a commercial or impersonal
activity. We have noted that scribal circulation could build up symbolic
capital, in Bourdieu's terminology; it could also constitute an import-
ant way of creating social capital, defined by Robert Putnam as `social
63
Ibid., no. 528, 30 June 1558 (II, 292-5), gu. On Manuzio's proposed edition of Caro's letters,
planned since at least 1555, see Greco in Caro, Lettere familiari, I, xvii—xxi. Caro asked Bernardo
Spina to tear up his letters because `questi furbi librari scampano ogni scempiezza' (these cunning
booksellers print every foolish thing): Lettere familiari, no. 251, to September 1545 (1, 342-3), g1•
Lollio, a friend of Caro's, may have translated Cicero's Epistole famigliari (1545) for Manuzio:
ibid., I, 293 n. 2, and II, 33.
64 Ibid., no. 661 to Varchi, 20 June 1562 (III, 1o9 -1z); no. 662 to Lorenzo Guidetti, same date
(III, 112-13); no. 663 to Varchi, 5 July 1562 (III, 113-14); no. 675 to Laura Battiferri, 16 October
156z (III, 129-31); no. 677 to Felice Gualtieri, 15 November 1562 (III, 140-1); no. 687 to Varchi,
20 February 1563 (III, 152); no. 773 to [Varchi], 14 September 1465 (III, 248-50).
3 Social transmission and author publication 21
networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from
them'. Furthermore, scribal circulation could foster both of the types of
social capital distinguished by Putnam: that which is bonding, tending to
create an exclusive group identity, and that which is bridging, tending to
reach out and include others.15
The handing over of a work by the author might not constitute pub-
lication: he or she might explicitly prohibit or restrict further circulation
beyond its initial recipient or recipients. Although (as was seen in Section
1 above) Bembo presented his Prose della volgar lingua in a manuscript to
Pope Clement VII, he wanted to publish the work through the edition
eventually printed in Venice in September 1525; he therefore asked Iacopo
Sadoleto in May to beg Clement `di non lasciar uscir fuori né a mano
altrui, quel libro della Fiorentina lingua che io diedi a Sua Sant., fin tanto
che egli non esca impresso' (not to allow to go forth or into anyone else's
hands that book on the Florentine language that I gave to His Holiness,
until it comes out in print)." Bembo would in any case have wanted to
control the material form in which his work circulated; but he could also
have been anxious about possible plagiarism, since it would have been
easier for someone to deny this offence if a work had not been printed,
and Bembo was already concerned that Giovan Francesco Fortunio had
stolen ideas from a draft of the Prose .67
In 1550 Tansillo sent a collection of his Rime to don Gonzalo Fernández
de Córdoba with strict instructions to keep an earlier promise to show
none of them to anyone. This was not, he said, through any vanity on
his part, but because of the errors that would creep in when they were
copied:
Vorrei, che [ ... ] Ella, dovunque sarà, non mi attenesse meno di quel che ivi me
promise. Il che fu di non dare alcuna di queste mie rime a persona che fusse;
et di romper ogni legame di cortesia con gli altri, più tosto che mancar con
meco. Desidero io questo, non perché le tenga in tanta stima, che mi sdegni di
darle altrui [...] Ma per basse che elle siano, mi grava fieramente vederle andar
maltrattate, sì come aviene quando da più elle sono scritte."
(I would like you [...1, wherever you are, to observe no less closely what you
promised me [in Naples]: not to give any of these poems of mine to anybody
at all, and to break all bonds of courtesy with others rather than let me down.
I desire this, not because I hold them in such esteem that I do not deign to give
" Putnam, Bowling Alone, pp. 19, 22. 66 Bembo, Lettere, no. 533, 24 May 1525 (II, 255-6).
67 Ibid., no. 973
to Bernardo Tasso, 27 May 1529 (III, 43-4)•
" Toscano, Letterati corti accademie, p. 147; Milburn, Luigi Tansillo, pp. 6o-6. The collection is in
the first part of Madrid, Bibl. del Institute, de Valencia de Don Juan, MS 26.IV.26.

22 The contexts of manuscript circulation
them to others [...] But, however unworthy they are, it grieves me greatly to see
them circulate badly treated, as happens when they are written out by several
people.)
A more common reason for such a restriction was that the writer
considered that the work might yet be revised, in which case the
receiver's views on it would often be sought. Bembo wrote in 1510 to one
of the speakers in his recently composed dialogue De Urbini ducibus, the
papal secretary Sigismondo dei Conti of Foligno, to ask for comments
on the work, a copy of which had been taken to Conti by another of the
speakers, Sadoleto. Until this had been done, Bembo said, `Nolo exeat,
in lucemque prodeat' (I do not want it to go out and go forth into the
light of day).'9 In the event, the work was not printed until 153o. As we
saw earlier, it was in keeping with the reciprocating nature of scribal cul-
ture to ask a receiver of a text to respond with suggestions for improve-
ment, and not just with praise. Bernardo Tasso sent his Epitalamio, on
the marriage in 1531 of Federico Gonzaga, duke of Mantua, for com-
ment both to Giovan Francesco Valerio (Valier), the Venetian patrician
who had revised Castiglione's Libro del cortegiano for the press, and to
Girolamo Molino, and he promised Valerio that he would take heed of
his remarks (`avvertimenti'). The first canto of Tasso's chivalric romance
Amadigi went to Speroni and Molino for revision, and Caro was asked
for his judgement on two sonnets on the death of Maria d'Aragona.70
When Giovan Battista Giraldi sent his collection of short stories, the
Hecatommithi (Hundred Tales), to Bartolomeo Cavalcanti in 1560,
Cavalcanti praised the seventy tales written so far, but urged Giraldi not
to publish them Cmandarli fuori') unless he added thirty or altered the
title?' The final version, with its full complement of stories, was printed
in 1565.
Cases where an author permitted, or at least did not forbid, the dif-
fusion of a work can be grouped under the heading of what Love calls
author publication, occurring `when the production and distribution of
copies takes place under the author's personal direction' and including
69 Bembo, Lettere, no. 302, 25 November tyro (II, 45-6). Federico Fregoso also saw the work in
manuscript: Lettere, no. 294, 1 January 1510 (II, 37-8). See, too, D'Ettorre, `Latinità e volgar
lingua', 339-40.
71 B. Tasso, Delle lettere, I, no. 45 to Valerio (pp. 98-9); no. 47 to Molino (pp. tot—z); no. 82 to
Speroni (pp. 167-71); no. 205 to Caro (pp. 416-18). All are undated. See, too, Ordine, `Giovan
Francesco Valier', p. 232 n. 26. The Epitalamio is in Gotha, Landesbibliothek, MS Cod. II 107:
Meroni, Mostra, p. 66.
71 Cavalcanti, Lettere, no. 296, 3 May 1560 (pp. 311-13).
~
3 Social transmission and author publication 23
the making available of a single copy.72 Within this category, there was a
decidedly broad range of attitudes on the part of Italian authors, from a
mere passive tolerance of others reading a text, or an indirect suggestion
that it should be given wider circulation after the initial act of transmis-
sion, to the creation or commissioning of dedication and gift copies, and
even to the public display of texts.
An example from the former end of the spectrum is that of Lucrezia
Tornabuoni de' Medici, mother of Lorenzo it Magnifico. A member of
the elite who was also a woman needed to be particular careful about the
diffusion of her verse, and those in her circle would have been aware of
this. After Tornabuoni had lent some of her verse compositions in manu-
script to Agnolo Poliziano in 1479, he wrote to her that the poems had
been read by the women of the Medici household in Fiesole. Lorenzo's
daughter, also called Lucrezia, learned them by heart and may therefore
have recited them later to others:
Io vi rimando per Tommaso quelle vostre laude e sonetti e ternarii che mi
prestasti quando fui costà. Presonne quelle donne un piacere estremo; e madonna
Lucrezia, o vero Lucrezia, aveva apparato a mente tutta la Lucrezia, e di molti
sonetti?'
(I am returning to you through Tommaso those laude, sonnets and terze rime
that you lent me when I was there [in Careggi]. Those women took great delight
in them; and madonna Lucrezia, or rather [just] Lucrezia, had learned by heart
all Lucrezia, and many sonnets.)
However, while Tornabuoni will have assumed that members of the
household were going to read her verse, she could count on their discre-
tion in not allowing it to go further. A letter written to her in the follow-
ing month by the poet Bernardo Bellincioni shows that a manuscript of
hers was available for reading to certain others but was nevertheless closely
guarded: Reverendissima tamquam matre, io ho fatto a sicurtà del vostro
libro: come di ogni altra simile vostra opera ell'è piaciuta assai a chi l'à
desiderata vedere' (My lady, revered as a mother, I have safeguarded your
book: as with every other similar work of yours, it gave great pleasure
to those who wished to see it). It is significant that, when Tornabuoni's
works were copied for circulation beyond an immediate circle of family
and friends, they no longer bore her name.74
" Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 47-72 (P• 47)-
71 Poliziano, Prose volgari inedite,
letter XXV, 18 July 1479 (p. 72).
71 Pezzarossa, I poemetti sacri, pp. 40 (Bellincioni's letter of 22 August 1479) and 60 (on the
anthology of verse in BRF, MS zß16). See also p. 58 on two elegant manuscripts of Tornabuoni's
verse that, Pezzarossa concludes, must have been intended to remain among her intimates,
 24 The contexts of manuscript circulation
An author might restrict diffusion of a text, stopping short of publication
proper, if he or she expected to revise it or felt it was imperfect. The case
of Ariosto's comedies, mentioned in Section 1 above, has already given us
an example of such an embargo. Bembo explained carefully to Lucrezia
Borgia, in a letter of 1503 accompanying a gift of two sonnets and a can-
zoncina, why he did not want her to publish poems sent by him on any
occasion:
Piaccia a V. S. di non lasciare che i detti versi eschino delle mani sue, né simil-
mente altro che io le mandi fatto di nuovo per lo innanzi, perciò che suole a me
rade volte avenire che io quella forma lasci nelle mie rime invecchiare, che la loro
nella primiera scrittura 75
(Please do not allow these poems to leave your hands, and similarly with
anything else newly written that I may send you in future, since I •rarely let my
poems grow old in their original form.)
In another case Bembo allowed a recipient to show a poem (with its treas-
ured variants) written for that person, in other words to let others read
it, but not to publish it in written form by providing a copy or by letting
others copy it: `Ho lasciato riposare il sonetto di V. S. alquanto. Poscia
l'ho racconcio come vederete. Se '1 vorrete mostrare ad alcuni, nol lasci-
ate uscire per ancora' (I have let your sonnet rest a while. Then I mended
it as you will see. If you wish to show it to others, do not let it go forth
for now)7' He used mostrare (to show) or lasciare vedere (to allow to see)
when sending first drafts of sonnets in other cases, once contrasting mos-
trare with dare l'essempio, giving the exemplar for copying. 77 Bellisario
Bulgarini of Siena noted, in the letter of I January 1576/7 with which he
sent his Alcune considerazioni on Giacopo Mazzoni's defence of Dante
to Orazio Capponi (see Chapter 4 Section 3), his unpolished style and
the possibility that he might change his views in the light of Capponi's
response; he therefore insisted that only Capponi was to see the work. This
may well have been true in the first instance, but by 1579 another scholar,
BNCF, Magi. VII 338 and VII iiS9. On the status of texts such as these, `delicately balanced
between the public and the private', see Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 43-4.
75 Bembo, Lettere, no. 151, 3 June 1503 (
1, 144-5).
j1 Ibid., no. 615 to an unidentified correspondent, c.1525 (11, 312)•
77 Mostrare is used in Bembo, Lettere, no. 718 to Bernardo Cappello, 13 November 1526 (II, 388)
and is contrasted with dare l'essempio in no. 2,117 to Elisabetta Querini, 13 September 1539 (IV,
256-7), where, as a newly appointed cardinal, Bembo was discreetly restricting circulation of
a poem on the death of his mistress. Lasciare vedere is used in no. 149 to Carlo Gualteruzzi,
22 January 1531 (III, 213-14). Melanchthon used exbibere and distribuere, terms related to the lan-
guage of publication, to refer to the showing and distributing of the eucharist to communicants:
MacCulloch, Reformation, p. 2z8.
3 Social transmission and author publication 25
Alessandro Carriero, was able to obtain a copy in Siena and Bulgarini had
sent a copy to Mazzoni.7'
At least two works sent to the Gonzaga family were not to go any
further for the time being. In 1514, Gian Giorgio Trissino did not wish
Isabella d'Este to let anyone have a copy of a work in her praise (prob-
ably the Ritratti) for at least a year. It is clear from a letter sent by her son
Federico to Bernardo Tasso in 1532 that Tasso had sent his epithalamium
on the duke's marriage with an embargo on circulation until it was pub-
lished (in print) as part of the second book of his Amori (1534)•79
Vida responded in 1520 to a request from his native city of Cremona
to provide a copy of his De arte poetica, for the benefit of young people,
by saying that he had completed the work but had decided not to publish
(vulgare) it yet because of the difficulty of the subject-matter. Yet he did
not wish to deny a copy of the three books of his work to Cremona as
long as they were consulted only by his fellow-citizens and could not find
their way into print. He therefore wrote:
Hac tamen lege hos libros vobis credimus, ut apud vos in quopiam loco, aut
publico, aut privato serventur, quo tamen civibus nostris aditus sit; ne, si forte
in exterorum manus furto sublati devenerint, iniussu meo librariorum avaritia
in vulgus venales prodeant; qua re, medius fidius, nihil mihi molestius accidere
I)
posset.8o
(I entrust these books to you, however, on this condition, that they should be
kept with you in any place, either public or private, but one to which our citizens
have access; lest, if by chance the books were to be stolen and fall into the hands
of outsiders, they should be published for sale without my command through
the avarice of booksellers. Nothing more troublesome, most certainly, could
happen to me than this.)
Within a few years Vida relented, and his art of poetry was printed, as
part of an elegant collection of his works, by Ludovico degli Arrighi in
Rome in 1527.
Annibal Caro sent sonnets to Varchi in 1538 for advice but for his eyes
only: `Sarà con questa un altro mio sonetto. Mandoveli tutti, perché fa for
bisogno di qualche vostra sferzata. Castigateli senza alcun rispetto, e non
gli mandate fuori' (Another sonnet of mine will be with this [letter]. I
7H Bulgarini, Alcune considerazioni, fols. A4 P4v—Q4`. Bulgarini included his letter of transmission
in this edition (fol. Bi-), to support his case that Carriero had plagiarized his views. The manu-
script diffusion of Bulgarini's work is confirmed by the transcription of an earlier version of the
letter to Capponi and the conclusion of the work in BNCF, MS Magl. VII Io28, fols. 28`-29`.
71 Luzio and Renier, La coltura, pp. 128 (Tasso), 178-9 (Trissino); B. Tasso, Rime, I, 241-8.
,Vida, Poemata omnia, ILI, iv.
z6 The contexts of manuscript circulation
am sending them all to you, because they need some whipping from you.
Correct them without any hesitation, and do not send them forth)." Some
years later Caro promised to send a copy of his translation of Longus to
Antonio Elio, secretary of Pope Marcellus II, but again with a ban on
further circulation: `Farò ancor rescrivere gli Amori Pastorali tradotti, e
manderolli in man vostra, perché li riteniate poi, non essendo bene che
vadino attorno così imperfetti' (I shall also have my translation of the
Pastoral Loves [of Daphnis and Chloe] copied out, and shall send them to
you, for you then to keep, since it is not right that they should go around
in such an imperfect state).12
The Florentine scholar Girolamo Mei showed a degree of caution when
he sent the fourth book of his treatise De modis musicis antiquorum from
Rome to Pier Vettori in Florence in 1573, after copying it, himself because
of a shortage of competent scribes. Vettori, Mei said, should pass it on to
a few friends, and others could read it, but he insisted that nobody could
make a copy without his knowledge. In due course, however, the whole
work was read and copied among Mei's acquaintances in Florence and
Rome. 63
A more ambiguous case, lying around the middle of the spectrum of
author publication, is that of the diffusion of Torquato Tasso's dialogue Il
Nifo, overo del piacere (Figure 9). This was a reworking of R Gonzaga, overo
del piacere onesto, and Tasso would have been anxious about its reception
not only because it centred on a contemporary political topic (whether
Ferrante Sanseverino should accept an ambassadorship to the emperor
Charles V on behalf of the Neapolitans in revolt), but also because one of
the texts cited in the dialogue expressed anti-Medicean views. In í58z or
1583 the author wrote to Ercole Coccapani in Ferrara as follows:
Vostra Signoria mi farà cosa gratissima se pregherà il signor duca di Ferrara in
mio nome, che si contenti di leggere la prima parte di questo dialogo con quegli
occhi amorevoli, co' quali altre volte gli è piaciuto di favorir me e le mie cose: e
gli dica, che mi sarà grato che '1 mostri ad alcuni di questi suoi gentiluomini, i
quali hanno maggior gusto di sì fatte cose; perciochè io non vorrei che molto si
divolgasse.
(I would be very grateful if you could ask the duke of Ferrara [Alfonso 11] on
my behalf if he would be willing to read the first part of this dialogue with that
loving gaze with which he has been kind enough to favour me and my writings
Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 26, 4 January 1538 0, 524•
Ibid., no. 414, 6 April 1554 (II, 162-5), §4. See also Chapter 4 Section 3 on Caro's distinction
between sending sonnets around freely in Florence but showing them more selectively in Rome.
83 Mei, Letters, pp. 30-1; Restani, L'itinerario; Mei, De modis, pp. xv—xxxv.
3 Social transmission and authorpublication 27
on other occasions: and tell him that I will be pleased for him to show it to some
of these gentlemen of his, who have better taste in such things; since I would not
wish it to be widely diffused.)
In spite of this last comment, Tasso went on to give further instructions
that would in practice have rendered the dialogue highly liable to further
scribal circulation. The duke, he said, could send the work to Naples.
Coccapani was to have two copies made by `messer Agostino' (perhaps
Argenti) or Febo (Bonnà). One of these copies was to be sent to Scipione
Gonzaga, who was to send it to the imperial court and to show it secre-
tamente' in Rome and Mantua. The other was to go to Filippo d'Este,
who was to `show' the work to `alcuni pochi' (some few people) in Turin
before sending it to Spain.84
In many other cases no explicit restriction was set on the further diffu-
sion of a text. When Bembo felt that a poem could be published, he could
signal this to its receiver, not of course by openly advocating its wider
circulation, but by indicating modestly that the receiver could do as he
or she liked with it, using a phrase such as `De' quali [sonetti] ne farete it
piacer vostro' (You can do what you wish with these [sonnets]) or `potrete
poscia dargli [i sonetti] a chi vi piacerà' (you can then give [the sonnets]
to anyone you wish).85 One can assume that those who received a text
that came without a restriction would then often pass it on to others; an
advantage of doing so would have been that such an act of sharing could
in due course be rewarded with a reciprocal gift.
Probably the most frequent object of scribal publication was the single
poem, usually a sonnet, or a small number of poems, enclosed with a let-
ter (and mentioned in the text of the letter, even if the enclosure has now
been lost), or sent in the form of a letter, or incorporated within the body
of the letter itself. The correspondence of sixteenth-century authors pro-
vides many instances of this practice. We have come across several cases
already, and we shall encounter others later, but the procedure can be illus-
trated at this point with examples concerning Aretino and Bandello. All
of the poems are preserved on sheets that, to judge by the traces of fold-
ing, were originally sent as letters or within an accompanying letter. The
first case is that ofAretino's canzone exhorting Charles V and François I to
" T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 231 (II, 231-2, and see pp. 3 and 228 on the manuscript diffusion of Il
Gonzaga); Solerti, Vita, I, 362, 366-7; Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 26-7, 38o-1. Filippo, mar-
quis of San Martino in Rio, was a cousin of the duke of Ferrara and son-in-law of the late Duke
Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy.
Bembo, Lettere, no. 904 to Vettor Soran2o, 26 September 1528 (II, 539-4o) and no. 999 to the
same, 11 July 1529 (III, 67).
28 The contexts of manuscript circulation
peace, copied by him on a bifolium, probably in 1524, when the poem was
also printed by Arrighi in Rome.86 In BMV, MS It. IX 144 (6866), each of
the rectos of Us. 75-6 contains a sonnet sent by Aretino to Beccadelli in
late 1553 or 1554, towards the end of his period as papal nuncio in Venice;
the verso of the second sheet is inscribed Al Reverendissimo Legato
Mio Padrone etc.' The first sonnet is addressed to Beccadelli himself and
begins `Cittadin d'ogni e6, de gli anni agente'. The second, beginning
`Burgos, di gratie et di vertuti inserto', is one of those by Aretino in praise
of Cardinal Francisco de Mendoza, bishop of Burgos.87 Another example
is a loose sheet containing a sonnet composed and copied by Bandello,
sent to Claudio Rangone probably in 1526.88 On the other hand, in 1553
Bandello sent his sonnet on the death of the physician and poet Girolamo
Fracastoro to Giulio Cesare Scaligero on the same sheet as an explanatory
letter. 89
If the primary recipient of a manuscript text was in another city, the
author would quite commonly send the text through an intermediary
rather than an ordinary carrier, especially if the recipient was of high
social rank. In 1491, for instance, two Florentine authors, Mariano
Gualtieri and Andrea Cambini, gave to Aldovrandino Guidoni, the
Ferrarese ambassador in their city, works to be sent on to Duke Ercole
d'Este. An expensively bound volume of verse by Gualtieri, `coperto de
brasilio rosso dalmaschino' (covered in red leather in the Islamic style,
or covered in red damask), is recorded as being in the Estense library in
1495. Cambini's work was probably his translation (with some updat-
ings) of Flavio Biondo's Historiarum ab inclinatione Romani imperii
decades, commissioned when he was in Ferrara in 1482-39° When a text
ac Now Livorno, Bibl. Labronica, Autografoteca Bastogi, P 9o, inserto 1221; see Marini, `Un
documento'.
17
Aretino sent the sonnets to other recipients: see Lettere, VI, respectively no. 112 to Antonio
Anselmi, 1552 (p. 117) and no. 299 to Ferrante Martina, November 1553 (p. 278), with a request
to present it to the cardinal in Aretino's name. In the printed version the first sonnet begins
`Patrizio d'ogm etá, non che assistente'.
88 BEM, Autografoteca Campori, `Bandello'. See Danzi, `Per 1'edizione',1o9,112, with a reproduc-
tion opposite p. 112; the sonnet begins `Qual luoco havrai, magnanimo Signore' (Bandello, Rime,
no. 193, PP. 245, 322).
89 Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek, MS B P G 44. See Crespo, `Il Bandello e lo Scaligero', with a
reproduction ; the sonnet begins `Lassa, pur tosto l'alma gloria mia' ( Bandello, Rime, no. 232, pp.
293, 323)• For examples of verse by Grazzini sent out in this way, now in BNCF, MSS Magi. VII
490 and 491, see Verzone in Grazzini, Le rime burlesche, pp. lxiii—Ixvii.
9O Cappelli, `Lettere', 3o9; Berton i, La Biblioteca Estense, P. 246, no. 311 in the inventory; Giansan te,
Andrea Cambini'. BLF, MS Ashb. 541 is probably Cambini's draft; BNCF, MS II III 59 is a
sixteenth-century copy. On the Islamic style of binding, see Hobson, Humanists and Bookbinders,
PP. 33-59• Gualtieri also sent vellum copies of a Trionfo in two cantos to Giovanni II Bentivoglio
(Frati, `I Bentivoglio', 15-16; Bologna, Bibl. Universitaria, MS 591: Mazzatinti and others,
3 Social transmission and author publication 29
was transmitted in this way, the go-between was often resident in or near
the same city as the recipient; he or she could thus act as a surrogate pre-
senter of the gift, and would have been able to choose the most oppor-
tune manner and moment to carry out this role. Veronica Gambara
in Correggio sent to Bembo in Padua the sonnet on the death of his
mistress Morosina, mentioned in Section i above, via Pietro Aretino in
Venice. Later, when Bembo was in Rome, she asked him to transmit a
sonnet to Pope Paul III and another to Bernardo Cappello, in reply to a
sonnet from this poet?' If Bembo used someone else to present a work
of his, he ostensibly left the intermediary to decide whether or not it was
worth doing so; here too a show of modesty about one's writing was an
important part of the publication procedure.9' Bernardo Tasso assured
Galeazzo Florimonte that he was honoured to have been asked to pre-
sent Florimonte's Ragionamenti, the dialogue mentioned in Section 2
above, to his master Ferrante Sanseverino 93 The dedicatory letter of one
of Tansillo's collections of verse addressed to the duke of Sessa mentions
that its `portatore' (bearer) was one Giovan Ramirez94 In the second
half of the Cinquecento, Laura Battiferri sent her sonnets to others, and
received those of others, via Florentine intermediaries including Varchi
and his friend Lelio Bonsi95
Inventari, XIX, 35-6) and of a poem De re militari to Iacopo IV d'Appiano (NAL, MS~
L/13461í957 (KRP.A.2o)).
9' On the Morosina sonnet, see Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro Aretino, Book I no. r99,
19 September 1536 (I, 192-3); Lettere do diversi re, Book II, nos, 19 and 22, Gambara to Bembo,
1 November and 19 September 1S36, and Bembo's replies, Lettere, nos. 1,791 and 1,804, 16 October
and 14 November (III, 673-4, 683). On the sonnets to the pope and Cappello, see Bembo, Lettere,
no. z,219 to Gambara, 7 December 1540 (IV, 332), where Bembo says he will present it `in tempo
che egli il leggerà più d'una volta' (at such a time that he will read it more than once), and no.
2,369 to the same, 24 January 1543 (IV, 445)-
With a letter to Gualteruzzi of 3o August 1536 Bembo sent a revised second tercet of a sonnet
(Rime, CXXXIX), to be presented to Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, if Gualteruzzi wished to give
either version: Lettere, no. 1,776 (III, 663).
91 B. Tasso, Delle lettere, I, no. 73 (PP. 142-4). 94 Milburn, Luigi Tansillo, P. 37.
91 Lettere di Laura Battiferri Ammannati, no. II, to February 1555 (PP. 15-17), sending a sonnet to
Lucrezia Soderini; no. IV, 14 November 1556, receiving sonnets from Varchi and Bonsi (pp. 20-3);
no. V, 3o December 1556, sending various compositions to Varchi (pp. 23-5); no. VI, 9 June 1 557,
mentioning that she had failed to receive a `sonetto morale' of Varchi from Benvenuto (Cellini?)
but that she had received others via Bonsi (pp. 25-9); no. VII, 6 August 1557, on the receipt of
various sonnets and epitaphs by Varchi (pp. 29-34); no. VIII, 9 November 1557, mentioning
receipt of a sonnet by Varchi and sending a sonnet of hers for Leonora Cibo (pp. 34-7); no. IX,
1t December 1557, on the circulation of sonnets of hers in the Spanish court and her receiving
from Varchi a sonnet exchange between Serafino Razzi and himself (pp. 38-41); no. XI, 21 June
t561, sending a sonnet for Lucia Bertana of Modena (pp. 45-6); no. XII, 1 March 156z, sending
a sonnet for Laura Terracini (pp. 46-7); no. XIII, 15 March 1562, on the receipt of two sonnets
from a certain Marco (pp. 48-9); no. XIV, 26 March 1562, sending a reply sonnet and mention-
ing her reading of sonnets exchanged between Varchi and Lionardo Salviati (pp. 49-50). Bonsi, a
30 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Torquato Tasso regularly used go-betweens to pass poems or dialogues
to high-ranking recipients. For example, he sent to the young Ferrante
Gonzaga, son of Cesare, lord of Guastalla, a sonnet on his voyage to
Spain (probably `Nave, ch'a' lidi avventurosi iberi') via Count Giustiniano
Masdoni, who was to address it to the members of the Accademia degli
Innominati in Parma so that they could send it to Ferrante 9' Antonio
Costantini, a Maceratese who was the secretary of Camillo Albizzi,
Florentine ambassador in Ferrara, was asked by Tasso at various times to
present verse and prose works with accompanying letters to Guglielmo
Gonzaga, duke of Mantua, to Ferrante Gonzaga and to Cardinal Cinzio
Passeri Aldobrandini, nephew of Pope Clement VIII.97 In 1589 Tasso
wrote from Rome to tell Costantini that he had written a canzone for
the wedding of the duke of Bracciano and had intended to send it to
Costantini while he was in Florence so that he could present it to the
duke. Since Costantini was now in Mantua, Tasso asked him instead to
present it by letter. Costantini, however, did not simply send the poem
direct to the duke. He wrote to Belisario Vinta, secretary of the grand
duke of Tuscany, asking him to present it on the poet's behalf.
Perché, se questa canzone sarà presentata per mano di Vostra Signoria, non senza
usare quelle parole che sogliono fare i doni cari, questo sarà carissimo; e la sua
presenza avrà molto maggior virtù in muover la cortesia di cotesto signore, che
quante parole io avessi potuto spendere91
(Because, if this canzone is presented by your hand, not omitting those words
that make gifts dear, this one will be most dear; and your presenting it will have
much greater power to inspire the courtesy of this lord than all the words I could
spend.)
Similarly, a letter from Tasso himself to Marcello Donati, to whom his
scribe Giulio Mosti had taken a canzone from Ferrara to Mantua for pres-
entation to the duke of Mantua, Vincenzio Gonzaga, in celebration of
his recent wedding, reminded Donati that the author's good intentions
would be worthless unless the poem were presented with the right words:
Mando al signor principe una canzona per lo signor Giulio Mosti che se ne viene
a Mantova, la qual vorrei che gli fosse appresentata da Vostra Signoria con quelle
member of the Accademia fiorentina, was chosen by Varchi as the narrator of his Hercolano: see
Varchi, L'Hercolano, II, 492 n, u.
96 T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 193 to Masdoni, 6 December [1581] (II, 165-6); Solerti, Vita, I, 356-7-
97 T. Tasso, Le lettere, nos. 53o and 531, 4 July 1586 (II, 554-5); nos. 1,492 and 1,493, 3o and 31 May
1594 (V, 171-2); no. 1,504, 20 August 1594 (V, 181-2); nos. 1,523 and 1,525, 6 and 25 January 1595
(V, 196-7), all to Costantini, on whom see Solerti, Vita, I, 477.
1, T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 1,131 to Costantini, 1 June 1589 (IV, 2o2-4), and IV, 145-6.
3 Social transmission and author publication 31
parole che gli posson fare il poema altrettanto grato, quanto la volontà con la
quale l'ho composta99
(I am sending to the prince a canzone via Giulio Mosti who is leaving for
Mantua. I would like this to be presented to the prince by you with those words
that can make the poem as welcome to him as the goodwill with which I com-
posed it.)
We have already begun to see that a number of expressions were used to
signify permission to publish when an author wished a work to circulate.
These terms, which derived from classical and medieval Latin anteced-
ents, were usually interchangeable between scribal and print publication.
The term pub(b)licare tended to be preferred for the medium of print,'°°
but on one occasion it clearly refers to manuscript. Girolamo, count of
Porcia, wrote from Rome in 1585:
Qui questa settimana passata il signor Pietro Magno ha finito un suo libretto De
consilio, in lingua latina assai buona à mio credere, il quale non si stamperà ma si
publicherà però co' suoi amici, doppo haverne data una copia al signor Duca di
Parma, al quale è dedicato.'°'
(Here last week Pietro Magno finished a short work of his, De consilio, in very
good Latin in my view. It will not be printed but will be published among
his friends, after having presented a copy to the duke of Parma, to whom it is
dedicated.)
Various metaphors were used for the concept of publication. One group
centred around the idea of going forth or going around: in Latin, exire (to
go out),"' prodire in manus hominum (to go forth into men's hands);103 in
the vernacular, andare fuora or fuori,'o4 uscire or uscire fuori (to go out),105
lasciare uscire (to let go out),'°6 lasciare uscire di mano (to let go out of
99 Ibid., no. 289, 21 June 1584 (11, 277-8); Le rime, no. 945, PP. 939-43•
'°° The instance of publicare in the letter by Federico Gonzaga cited above (see n. 4) is generic, but
the verb refers to print publication in e.g. Bembo, Lettere, no: 671 to Iacopo Sannazaro, 24 April
1526 (11, 354: the search for suitable paper suggests print), and no. 712 to Marco Antonio Michiel,
18 October 1526 (11, 384); Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 107 to Varchi, 17 July 1539 (I, 151-3), §3;
Daniele Barbaro's dedicatory letter to the 1542 edition of Speroni's Dialogi, in Speroni, Opere, I,
xxvi. Caro uses divulgare in letter no. 94 to Pietro Carnesecchi, 2 May 1539 (1, 136-7), §3. On the
terminology see also Bourgain, `La Naissance officielle'; Rizzo, R lessico filologico, pp. 319-22.
O1 Letter to Gian Vincenzo Pinelli of 14 September 1585 in BAM, MS S 1o5 sup. no. 1oz. I am grate-
ful to Angelo Nuovo for this reference. In the event, the work, concerning decision-making, was
printed in Rome in 1587.
`°' E.g. Bembo, Lettere, no. 149 to Iacopo Sadoleto, 27 March 1503 (1, 142-3). This and the follow-
ing selective examples concern manuscript, print or publication in general.
'03
Ibid., no. 1,657 to Paul III, 13 January 1535 (111, 565-6).
104 E.g. Fachard, Biagio Buonaccorsi, p. 147 (1509).
'°5 E.g. Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 455 (11, 210 -11), §2.
106 E.g. Bembo, Lettere, no. 883 to Giovan Francesco Bini, 21 May 1528 (II, 520-1).
32 The contexts of manuscript circulation
one's hands),'°7 uscire in pubblico (to go out in public),'°$ venire fuora (to
come out),'19 andare attorno (to go around)."° Other groups used the con-
cepts of giving out — in Latin, edere;"' in the vernacular, most frequently
dare fuora or fuori"' — or sending forth — mandare fuora or fuori (to send
out),"3 mandare attorno (to send around),114 mandare alla buona ventura
(to send on their merry way; literally, to their good fortune)."5 All these
metaphors could be linked to that of sending into the light of day: in
Latin, in lucem edere, in lucem prodere;"' in the vernacular, dare a (or in)
luce, far venir in luce, in luci dimostrare, mandare a (or in) luce, mettere in
luce.'7 Pierfrancesco Giambullari talked of works going out into the light
(uscire in luce) in the dedication of the autograph manuscript of his gram-
mar, the Regole della lingua fiorentina, that he presented to the young
Francesco de' Medici in 1548 (BNCF, MS Magl. IV 8)."' The abundance
of such terms highlights both the strong awareness of the concept of pub-
lication and yet the indirectness with which authors needed to mention it,
in order to stay within the bounds of decorum in their relationships with
others.
So far we have been looking at transmission originated by the
author; but author publication could also result from a request made
to an author for a copy of his or her work. One such request (though
we do not know if it was ever granted) was made by Isabella d'Este, an
indefatigable collector of contemporary literature as well as of antiqui-
ties, works of art, fine clothes and so on. She determined in May 1492
Ibid., no. 747 to Alessandro de' Pazzi, 1 March 1527 (II, 411-12).
'°" Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 550 to Daniele Bianchi, 13 January 1559 (II, 318), §1-
..9 Bembo, Lettere, no. 2,271 to Giovanni Battista Ramusio, 1 September 1541 (IV,
37 2)-
- Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 414, 6 April
1554 (II, 162-5), §4•
"' E.g. Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,733 to Molza, 24 December 1S36 (III, 632-3).
"' E.g. Berni, Poesie eprose, p. 2o5.
"' E.g. Bandello, Tutte le opere, II, 1238. Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc divided a list of books
by Onofrio Panvinio into `stampati' (printed), `libri usciti fuora ma non stampati' (books pub-
lished but not printed), `libri finiti ma non mandati fuora' (books finished but not published),
'libri parte abbozzati, parte mezzi finiti, parte finiti ma non riveduti' (books either in draft, or
half-finished, or finished but not revised): Carpentras, Bibliothèque Inguimbertine, MS Peiresc
1769, Us. 341"-342`, and see Nuovo, 'Testimoni postumi', P. 325.
"a Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 677 to Felice Gualtieri, 15 November 1562 (III, 140-1), §3.
"f Bembo, Lettere, no. 194 to Lucrezia Borgia, z2 September 1504 (I, 180-0.
"b E.g. ibid., no. 302 to Sigismondo de' Conti, 25 November 1510 (II, 45-6).
Calmeta, Prose e lettere, P. 51; Bembo, Lettere, no. 712 to Marco Antonio Michiel, 18 October
1526 (II, 384); no. 1,991 to Gualteruzzi, it December 1538 (IV, 1S9); no. 2,478 to don Lorenzo
Massolo, 20 May 1545 (IV, 528); Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 534 to Camillo Palliotto, c. 1558 (II,
299), §t; no. 661 to Varchi, 20 June 1562 (III, 1o9-12), §9; Grazzini in Romei and others (eds.),
Ludi esegetici, p. 107; Cassago in Albonico, Il ruginoso stile, p. 99.
Giambullari, Regole, pp. XX-xxi, 3.
3 Social transmission and author publication 33
to add some poems by Antonio Vinciguerra to her stock of verse. She
therefore wrote to ask Giorgio Brognolo, the Mantuan ambassador in
Venice, to approach the poet on her behalf, with an assurance that she
would abide by any conditions (for instance, restrictions on further
circulation) that Vinciguerra set:
Havendo nui principiato a fare uno recolecto de capitoli et sonetti morali, et
sapendo quanto excelentemente ha dicto et dice in rima messer Antonio
Vinciguerra, secretario di quella serenissima Signoria, vogliamo the cum la solita
dextreza vostra vediati de havere da lui qualche coca bona, offerendone anchora
nui a li beneplaciti suoi paratissime."9
(Since we have begun to make a collection of capitoli and moral sonnets, and
since we know how excellently Antonio Vinciguerra, Venetian secretary, has
written and writes in verse, we wish you with your usual skill to obtain from
him some good writings, while we for our part are very prepared to meet with
[the terms of] his consent.)
Even a marchioness had to be circumspect when approaching an author
in this way.
Many other such cases concern requests that came to authors, dir-
ectly or indirectly, from other writers. Pietro Bembo inevitably received
requests to provide copies of his verse, as when Giraldi wrote to ask for
his latest sonnets in 1529, or when in the following year Francesco della
Torre asked for a sonnet of Gambara's and Bembo's reply to her."O Bembo
also tried to get hold of writings by others. He asked a messer Lorenzo
(Lenzi) to allow him to see the sonnet that Varchi had written on hear-
ing from Mattio Franzesi the information, which fortunately turned out
to be false, that Benvenuto Cellini was dead. Bembo requested his sec-
retary Cola Bruno to obtain from Varchi a copy of his lecture, given in
the Accademia degli Infiammati of Padua, on Bembo's own sonnet `A
questa fredda tema' (Rime, XXX).— In the same year Lodovico Dolce
asked Varchi directly for the Latin verses on Bembo's sonnet `Se la più
dura quercia, the l'alpe aggia' (Rime, CV) that the Florentine had recently
recited in the Accademia fiorentina.12z Similar approaches to authors were
made by Giovanni Antonio Serone to Berardino Rota in 1551, and by
"9 Luzio and Renier, La coltura, pp. 185-6; Beffa, Antonio Vinciguerra, P. 71.
1O Lettere da diversi re, Book III, no. 39,12 February 1529; Bembo, Lettere, no. í,o99, to Della Torre,
31 May 1530 (III, 143-4). See also Chapter 3 Section 2 on this exchange of sonnets.
Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,730 to Varchi, 28 November 1S35 (III, 629); no. 2,209, 3o August 1540 (IV,
324). For the sonnet, see Cellini, Vita, I, 84, in his Opere, pp. z56-9. For Varchi's lecture, not
given until 12 September 1S40, see his Opere, II, 562-8, Samuels, 'Benedetto Varchi', 619 and
Vianello, R letterato, P. 73.
"' Letter of 24 December 1540, cit. in Vianello, R letterato, pp. 177-80.
34 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Alfonso Cambi Importuni to Caro in 1559, seeking a copy of an exchange
of sonnets between Caro and the late Della Casa that had led to an
argument among various gentlemen in Naples on the correct text and its
sense.123 Girolamo Muzio wrote to Ruscelli around 1551 that he had given
away all copies of his rime in response to requests for them: `se pur le ho
racomandate alle carte, le ho poi donate a chi me le ha domandate, senza
serbarne alcuna memoria' (even if I wrote them down, I then gave them
to whoever asked for them, without keeping any record ).124
4 SOCIAL TRANSMISSION AND USER PUBLICATION
In Love's taxonomy of scribal publication, non-commercial diffusion of
a text owned by someone other than the author is termed user publica-
tion.12f This category can also be applied to Renaissance Italy, though it
is helpful to distinguish between two roles within it, that of the owner-
publisher responsible for providing a text for use by someone else, and
that of the receiver who copied a text or had it copied for his or her own
use, sometimes in a collection.
User publication was fostered by a strong culture of sharing books. The
regularity with which manuscripts could be borrowed and lent is apparent
from some Florentine libri di ricordi. The Vallombrosan monk Giovanni di
Baldassarre made detailed records between 1396 and 1400 of many books
that he obtained from or passed to others, sometimes specifying that they
were due to be copied.12' Francesco Castellani's borrowings and loans in
1448-6o included Latin and vernacular works; the poet Luigi Pulci bor-
rowed from him a Virgil and the Doctrinale of Alexandre de Villedieu to
study metrics.127 The books borrowed between 1475 and 1482 by Bernardo
Machiavelli were mainly printed (`in forma'), but some were manuscript, and
he lent two handwritten legal tomes.121 Other evidence of borrowing con-
cerns manuscripts as diverse as those of the Estense and Medicean libraries
in the Quattrocento and the texts of plays to be performed in convents.l29
"3 Rota, Rime, p. xxxi; Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 554 to Cambi, 1 March 1559 (II, 322-4); Longhi,
`Un esperimento'.
"4 Muzio, Lettere, p. 181.
125
Love, 7be Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 47, 79-83•
i1 Brentano-Keller, `Il libretto'; Lanza, Polemiche, pp. 6o-9.
F. Castellani, Ricordanze, e.g. I, 111; II, 48, 52, 63, 70 (Pulci), 71, too.
ie B. Machiavelli, Libro di ricordi, pp. 116, 123; Atkinson, Debts, Dowries, Donkeys, pp. 137-48,
167-71.
-9 Bertoni, Guarino da Verona, pp. 176-81; Piccolomini, `Ricerche'; Weaver, Convent Theatre,
PP. 71-3•
4 Social transmission and user publication 35
Another reflection of the sharing of books is the presence of ownership
notes that refer in one way or another to the reading of books by others.
Some owners added a formula such as `et amicorum', though this
also implied a restriction: of my friends (and no others). Domenico di
Benedetto Arrighi wrote an ownership note ending `e degli amici mia'
on a collection of verse that he copied in Florence in 1507-8 (in BLF, MS
Antinori 158); on the following page he wrote a sonnet addressing any
friend to whom he lent the manuscript and blaming its incorrections on
his source. When Arrighi was visiting Pistoia in 1508, he allowed Pirro di
Iacopo Forteguerri to add a ballata. And having been a receiver of texts,
Arrighi duly became their owner-publisher when he lent them for some-
one else to copy in BNCF, MS Magl. VII 735. 130 Others added reminders
that borrowers should return the books to them. A copy of Machiavelli's
Il principe, BRF, MS 2603, is inscribed: `questo libro e di marcho di tinoro
bellaccj chillachattassi lorenda per carita' (This book belongs to Marco
di Tinoro Bellacci. Anyone who borrows it please return it)."' A similar
request was written by Giovanni di Piero di Benvenuto Olivieri under the
date 1535 in his copy of the Diario by Buonaccorsi (BNCF, MS 11111 300,
fol. l'): `chi l'achatta si ricordi di renderlo senza li sia richiesto, altrimenti
non li sarà più prestato' (let anyone who borrows it remember to return it
without being asked to do so, otherwise it will not be lent to him again).
A note in another copy of the Diario (Florence, Bibl. Marucelliana, MS C
io, fol. Il) shows that the owner knew borrowers might normally wish to
make their own copy but that he prohibited this because he did not wish
anyone else to print the work:
Questo libro è di Bartolomeo Marucelli, fiorentino, et priegho a chiunque per-
sona ad chi io to presto non mello chopia perché non volevo farlo stampare,
io non vorrei altri to facessi stampare lui perché mi farebbe gran torto a farmi
questa ischortesia.132
(This book belongs to Bartolomeo Marucelli of Florence. I ask anyone to whom
I lend it not to copy it because I did not want to have it printed; I would not like
someone else to have it printed because he would do me a great wrong with this
discourtesy.)
As in this last case, diffusion of the most limited sort could consist in
an owner's `showing' a text to others rather than allowing it to be cop-
ied, in line with the distinction mentioned above in the context of author
M Blackburn, `Two "carnival songs"', 125-6 (on the copy); Zanato, `Sulla tradizione', pp. 451-9;
Prizer, `Wives and courtesans' and `Reading carnival', 2 34-5•
"' Marcelli in N. Machiavelli, Il principe, P. 337. "' Niccolini in Buonaccorsi, Diaria, pp. 12-14.
36 The contexts of manuscript circulation
publication. Bernardo Tasso, we saw earlier, was one of those to whom
Speroni sent his Dialogo dell ámore, and he wrote from Naples to tell
the author: `ho mostrato a molti letterati, e giudiciosi uomini il vostro
Dialogo' (I have shown your Dialogue to many men of letters and good
judgement). He would not have wished Speroni to think that he had gone
any further than permitting sight of it, especially as he went on to ask
Speroni to send him the first book of his Dialogo della retorica.X 33
Copying was, however, frequently carried out by or on behalf of an
owner for the benefit of another person, thus ensuring a continuing circu-
lation of texts after their initial publication. Lucrezia Borgia provided for
Bembo a capitolo by a certain Antonio, no doubt her secretary Tebaldeo.134
Isabella d'Este received texts from authors and from agents such as Iacopo
D'Atri, secretary to Francesco Gonzaga, who for instance passed her a
`capitolo sive canto de un divortio' composed by Vincenzo Calmeta.135 In
1502 the marchioness of Cotrone, Eleonora Del Balzo, sent to Isabella
her own sister-in-law's copy of `un librecto de sonecti' by the Neapolitan
poet Ioan Francesco Caracciolo.136 Laura Battiferri, we saw in Section 3
above, sent her poems out to others, and with one of her letters to Varchi
she enclosed a madrigal by Giovan Battista Strozzi that was circulating in
Florence and `che fa maravigliare tutta Fiorenza delle sue bellezze' (which
is making all Florence marvel at its beauties).137
Men with literary interests regularly passed on works they had
received. One of Molza's Latin elegies dedicated to Benedetto Accolti was
sent, together with a letter from Accolti to Pope Paul III, by Bartolomeo
Cavalcanti to Pier Vettori, as a gift that might excuse Cavalcanti for a
long silence.138 Some stanzas by Molza were sent to Bembo from Florence
by Ugolino Martelli, who asked forgiveness `dell'essere scritte rozza-
mente, et molto più del non esser molto corrette, conciò sia che l'essempio
donde io l'ho cavate fusse scorrettissimo' (for their being roughly writ-
ten, and even more for their not being very correct, though the exemplar
from which I derived them was very incorrect).139 We know from a letter
B. Tasso, Delle lettere, I, no. 70 (PP. 138-9)- Three further `books' of this dialogue were planned
(see Speroni, Opere, I, xxvii) but did not materialize.
'34 Bembo, Lettere, no. 194 to Lucrezia Borgia, 22 September 1504 (I, 180-1).
'3S Calmeta, Prose e lettere, p. xlii (the work was sent on I July 15o6).
0, Luzio and Renier, La coltura, p. z6r n. S4; Santagata, La lirica aragonese, P. 71.
'37 Lettere di Laura Battiferri Ammannati, no. IX (pp. 38-41). On the manuscript circulation of
Strozzi's poetic output, see Bianconi and Vassalli, `Circolazione letteraria' and Albonico, `La
poesia del Cinquecento', pp. 715-16.
`38
Cavalcanti, Lettere, no. 92, io February 154112 (p. 124)•
19 Lettere da diversi re, Book III, no. 36, 26 March 1546. Molza had died in 1 544-
4 Social transmission and user publication 37
of Girolamo Muzio that Renato Trivulzio sent him a copy of Claudio
Tolomei's dialogue on language, K Cesano, for comment in 1541- 140
As Torquato Tasso produced the cantos of his Gerusalemme liberata,
Diomede Borghesi in Ferrara tried to obtain correct copies and send them
to Marcello Donati at the Mantuan court:
ío la farò al presente partecipe de' due libri del Tasso più desiderati da lui [sic]:
e certo saranno tali, che benché ne vadano forse dattorno delle altre copie,
niuna ve n'avrà che sia così purgata, nè così corretta [...] Sforzerommi di far
sì, che quando che sia essa abbia la maggior parte de' libri del poema del Tasso
nell'ottima forma. `4'
(I will share with you forthwith the two cantos of Tasso that you desire most;
and they will certainly be such that, although other copies are perhaps going
around, there will be none that is so faultless and so correct [ ... ] I shall endeav-
our to let you have, in due course, most of the cantos of Tasso's poem in the best
form.)
Tasso's other works could naturally circulate further in manuscript after
their original presentation. A sonnet that he had sent to Ferrante Gonzaga
in 1582 was requested from the dedicatee by Curzio Ardizio, who accom-
panied his request with a number of sonnets by other writers. Two son-
nets on the anniversary of the coronation of Pope Clement VIII, written
in the last year of the poet's life, were sent from Rome to Padua by Pietro
di Notes. The dialogue R Messaggiero reached Vincenzio Gonzaga in
December 1583, in a text provided by Scipione Gonzaga, who had himself
had it from the author. Vincenzio noted that he had already received the
work in a different redaction.1Q2.
A case that illustrates the speed with which texts could be circulated
scribally among enthusiastic owners and receivers — though we must
make allowance for poetic licence in its narration — is that of the diffu-
sion of some spiritual sonnets by Antonfrancesco Grazzini in Florence on
Easter Monday in 1538. The poet recounted in a tailed sonnet addressed to
Bartolomeo Bettini how a friend of his had shown these compositions to
others who were waiting in the cathedral to hear a sermon by Bernardino
Ochino, and how the friend had attributed them to Vittoria Colonna.
(In a tailed sonnet, the normal fourteen lines are followed by one or more
1QOTolomei, Il Cesano, pp. 13-14; Albonico, Il ruginoso stile, pp. 128-30.
4' Letter of Borghesi to Donati, z9 June 1580, in Solerti, Vita, II, 145-6; see, too, Solerti, Irta, I,
329 and Borgheli's letter of 21 October 1580, ibid., II, 452•
'41 Letters of Ardizio, 22 August 1582, of Notes to Vincenzo Pinelli, 15 March 1595, and of Duke
Vincenzio to Scipione Gonzaga, 23 December 1583, in Solerti, Vita, II, 187, 353-5, 453-4• The
sonnets sent by Notes were T. Tasso, Le rime, nos. 1,582 and 1,583; see also Solerti, Vita, I, 8oz.
38 The contexts of manuscript circulation
three-line codas made up of a settenario and two hendecasyllables.) The
news spread like wildfire, several people gathered round, `a man of author-
ity' took the sonnets in his hand and praised them highly. Grazzini's
friend provided a copy for those who requested one; less than three days
later `ne furon più di mille copie fuora' (l. 47; more than a thousand copies
were out).'43
Among gifts of manuscript poems were collections of varying sizes. A
miscellany mentioned earlier, BMV, It. IX 144 (6866), containing mater-
ial owned by Beccadelli, includes two originally independent gatherings
that appear to have been sent as presents. The first is a bifolium, fols. 12
and 13, that contains a letter sent, as the address on the last verso shows,
Al Reverendissimo mio Signor, it Vescovo di Fano, a Padova', that is, to
Cosmo Gheri (1513-37, bishop from 24 January 1S30). Its principal con-
tent, written on fols. I2°-13r in an elegant hand, no doubt that of a pro-
fessional scribe, is an exchange of sonnets between Luigi Alamanni and
Veronica Gambara to which we shall return in Chapter 3 Section 2. On
the first recto (Figure 3) the sender added in his own hand a sonnet writ-
ten by Molza during the illness of Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici.'44 This
is followed by a note asking for Gheri's opinion on the sonnet and for
clarification of a passage in Della Casa's sonnet on jealousy. The next
gathering, fols. 14-17, contains seven sonnets by Vittoria Colonna with
this note on the first page, probably in the hand that wrote Molza's son-
net: `Se havete veduti questi prima, siano per non mandati; nè restate già
però, havendo cosa alcuna da quella Divinità, di mandarnela. Questi son
per ricordo. II vostro Scip. B: (If you have already seen these, consider
them not sent; but if you have anything by that divine poet, do not fail
to send it to us. These are a memento. Your Scip[ione] B[ianchini]).'45
These gatherings are examples of what Love terms `separates', short
manuscripts written as independent units, which in these cases contain
linked groups of closely related items rather than a single text.146
Another manuscript in the Marciana, It. IX 154 (6752), provides an
example of a rather more substantial collection created as a gift. It consists
of a single gathering, originally of twenty leaves; the leaf after fol. 4 has
been cut out.147 A large initial N on fol. it and another large O on fol. 19°
13 Grazzini, Le rime burlesche, sonnet LXXIV, pp. 6o—z; Plaisance, L Accademia, pp. 281-2.
'4+ Molza, Poesie, sonnet CXLI, P. 423. 145 Dionisotti, `Monumenti Beccadelli', pp. 252-3.
'46 Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, p. 13.
'47 Castoldi, Per il testo critica, pp. 88-9; Strada, 'Carte di passaggio', pp. 8-13, 34, 39. The missing
leaf may have contained Bembo's sonnet `Crin d'oro crespo e d'ambra tersa e pura' (Rime, V),
which, as Strada notes (p. to), forms a pair with the sonnet on fol. 4" and is linked with the
4 Social transmission and user publication 39
(containing a sketch of a bearded man) may refer to the intended recipient
of the manuscript. It contains poems written by authors active in the early
sixteenth century: Bembo, Cesare Gonzaga, Vincenzo Querini, Pietro
Barignano, Niccolò Tiepolo, Iacopo Sannazaro, Tommaso Giustiniani
and Girolamo Verità. A note on fol. 2r explains how the gift arose out of a
conversation in a bookshop and how a much larger collection would have
been offered if the main source manuscript had not been temporarily
u navailable to the sender (a northern Italian, probably Venetian):
Strano forse potrà apparere ch'io non v'habbi così pienamente servito di man-
darvi quelle compositione che hieri vi promissi senza fallo. Ma (perché hora il
libro non si trova presso a me, com'io stimava) desidero che per hora siate di
questa piccola loro parte contento iscusandomi: ché se più si haremo a trovar
insieme dal libraro (com'io stimo), vegli recerò io stesso più volentieri nelle vos-
tre mani: ché ad ad [sic] altri non gli oserei fidar.
(It may perhaps appear strange that I have not obliged you as fully by sending
you those compositions that I promised you yesterday without fail. But (since
the book is not now with me, as I thought it was) please be content with this
small part of them, excusing me; for if we meet again at the bookseller's (as I
expect), I shall be more happy to put them myself into your hands, for I would
not dare to entrust them to others.)
The original conversation could have taken place by chance, but it is
plausible that bookshops served, among other things, as places where
manuscript texts and information about them were exchanged.
A gift might include an author's own work together with that of
another: combining author publication with user publication had just
the kind of flexibility that manuscript culture encouraged. In 1531,
Claudio Tolomei wanted to send Vittoria Colonna some writing of his
own but, not having a completed work to hand, sent her instead the tra-
gedy Tullia by Lodovico Martelli with the addition of a chorus supplied
by himself where it was lacking in the original.14' Girolamo della Rovere
received from Bernardo Tasso in 1556 some stanzas by Giraldi with
Tasso's reply to them, together with an ode written by Tasso in response
to a letter in which Giraldi urged him to publish his chivalric romance
Amadigi.'49
sonnet by Querini that follows on fol. 5 The excision might be linked with Giustiniani's later
censorship of his own amorous verse, for which see Gnocchi, `Tommaso Giustiniani', 288.
"' Finazzi, `Due manoscritti', 145-6.
'a" B. Tasso, Lettere inedite, no. 22, 14 July 1556 (pp. 134-6). See, too, Tasso's letter and Giraldi's
reply of 12 June 1556 in B. Tasso, Delle lettere, II, no. 71 (pp. 192-200). The ode is no. XLVII in
his Rime, II, 373-4-
40 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Some of the gifts of texts that we have just been considering may well
have been made in response to approaches from would-be recipients,
and there is also explicit evidence of such requests. Bembo told Filippo
Beroaldo the younger in 15o6 that he had shown to some people in Vicenza
the humanist's letter and Latin poem on the recent discovery of the statue
of Laocoön, and had left the texts there as the readers requested.150 In the
following year, it was Bembo's turn to ask for some texts, new sonnets
by Marco Cavallo that he wanted Bernardo Bibbiena to send him.~5' A
request from Angelo Colocci in 1529 led to Girolamo Tasti transcribing
for him, within the body of a letter, a capitolo by Giovanni Pico della
Mirandola entitled `Vita quieta'.'52 When interested readers wanted poems
by Vittoria Colonna, they might approach others who were known to pos-
sess copies: Francesco della Torre sought poems of hers from Gualteruzzi
in 154o and the priest Giovanni Francesco Fattucci asked Michelangelo
for some in 1550-1.'53 When the artist-poet was asked in 1551 what poems
by her he possessed, he explained how he had acquired them, how he
kept them, how he lent them and how lending had led to `leakage' of the
poems into the medium of print:
Io ò un Librecto in carta pecora, che la mi donò circa dieci anni sono, nel quale è
cento tre sonecti, senza quegli che mi mandò poi da Viterbo in carta bambagina,
che son quaranta, i quali feci legare nel medesimo Librecto e in quel tempo gli
prestai a molte persone, in modo che per tucto ci sono in istampa.154
(I have a small book in vellum that she gave me about ten years ago, in which are
a hundred and three sonnets, not counting those she sent me later from Viterbo
on paper, of which there are forty, and which I had bound in the same small
book, and at that time I lent them to many people, so that they are in print
everywhere.)
Another case, concerning manuscript circulation that preceded a
planned publication in print, illustrates how a copy might be made by the
receiver of the text, using an exemplar lent to him or her. In January 1533
Bembo was approached by Giovan Francesco Bini, a poet born in Florence
who was then working for the court of Clement VII, and who was acting
on the pope's behalf. Sadoleto's dialogue on the education of children,
De liberis recte instituendis, had been sent to Bembo in manuscript. and
's° Bembo, Lettere, no. 232 to Beroaldo, 3 May 1506 (I, 220-1).
"I Ibid., nos. z65 and 270, 13 November and 16 December 1507 (I, 26o, 264-5)•
151 BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 7182, fois. 497'-500`: see Fanelli, Ricerche, pp. 144-53•
Bullock, A hitherto unexplored manuscript', 46-9.
=sa Buonarroti, Ll carteggio, no. 1,16o to his nephew Leonardo, 7 March 1551 (IV, 361-2). On the col-
lection sent to Michelangelo in about 1S40, see Chapter 3 Section 5.
4 Social transmission and user publication 41
was going to be printed in Venice later in the year, but the pope wanted
Bembo to send his exemplar so that Bini, then in Bologna, could copy it
out; otherwise Bembo was to send another copy. If Bembo obliged, Bini
assured him, he would please Clement and `molte persone dotte qui di
corte' (many learned persons here in the court) who wanted to see the
work. A few weeks later, Bini wrote again to say that it had not been
possible to complete the transcription, and so he would take the work to
Rome with him and send it back to Bembo from there.",
Receivers who copied texts for themselves often assembled them into
collections. The contents of these might be linked in theme or in genre,
as in the spiritually improving texts transcribed in later Quattrocento
Florence by Benedetta Niccoli and Margherita Soderini, the epigrams
and other works gathered together in Rome in the early Cinquecento
by Colocci, or in the many collections of vernacular lyric poetry, a few
of which will be discussed in Chapter 3 Section 5.'5' But collected texts
might also range more or less widely across different, even disparate, top-
ics and text-types, constituting, in Love's terms, either a compilation, `a
single manuscript with heterogeneous contents', or an aggregation, 'joined
together from a variety of pre-existing manuscripts'.157 A few examples of
each of these two categories will illustrate how different are the collections
concerned and how varied their contents can be. This diversity reflects the
interests of individuals or a closely linked group of people, and it would of
course have appeared extraordinary in a printed book, destined for a high
number of unknown readers.
MS Canon. It. 36 in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, consists of vii +
169 leaves, of which 134 contain writing, all of it in the hand of a noble
Venetian; he (it seems unlikely that this was a woman) mentions twice
that his late father was a former captain of Padua (fols. 82', 841-"' Various
li
aspects of the manuscript indicate a systematic approach on his part. He
reveals the date and place of conception of the collection in the running
headline that he inscribed across all its written pages from fol. Ir onwards:
`Jesus 1520 Venetiis'. The contents tend to fall into sections assigned to sep-
arate verse forms, the main ones being sonnets, capitoli, canzoni, eclogues,
madrigals and frottole, but some other material is included in the sonnet
'ss Lettere da diversi re, Book V, nos. 14 and 15 from Bini, 27 January and 9 March 1
533•
ßç6 On Soderini's zibaldone, see Zafarana, `Per la storia religiosa', 1,o18-19; on this and Niccoli's col-
lection, see L. Miglio, "'A mulieribus"', pp. 251-4. On Colocci's collection in BAV, MS Vat. Lat.
3353, see Fanelli, Ricerche, pp. 87-8.
s~ Love, the Culture and Commerce of Texts, p. 13.
sg The modern pencil numbering is used. See Mortara, Catalogo, cols. 42-5. On the pasquinades,
see, too, Percopo, `Di Anton Lelio Romano', 77-8; Gnoli, La Roma di Leo X, pp. 309-29.
42 The contexts of manuscript circulation
section, and the final section (fols. i471-16z°) contains a short story, some
verse (including stanzas for recitation) and two `lettere d'amore'. The
presence of leaves left blank between most sections suggests that the com-
piler intended to add compositions over a period of time, and the heading
`Taola' (table) on fol. iiir shows that he intended, in due course, to draw
up a list of contents. Some of his material was drawn from contacts in
the Veneto: for instance, there are sonnets (mostly unattributed) by two
Venetians, Bembo and Antonio Brocardo, and by Bernardino Daniello
of Lucca, who studied in Venice in the 15205 with Trifon Gabriele. All
three of these feature in the section of canzoni, along with Veri6 from
Verona but also Ariosto from Ferrara and Molza from Modena. Daniello
reappears, with the Venetian Andrea Navagero and others, among the
authors of capitoli, and as the author of eleven madrigals. The compiler
also had a direct or indirect link with the papal court in Rome: from
fol. 22° he includes some material relating to the conclave that led to the
election of Pope Adrian VI on 9 January 1522, both verse (such as a dia-
logue in terza rima between Rome and the statue of Pasquino) and infor-
mation on the cardinals and the votes cast for them.
A more complex compilation from the Veneto is BMV, MS It. XI 66
(6730), which has been studied in particular for its texts by Aretino and
the actor-playwright Ruzante. The manuscript now contains, accord-
ing to Romei's computation, 39 gatherings and 387 leaves, but one of
the earlier numberings shows that there were once at least 554 leaves.
The paper used in the various sections is of different origins. Several
hands, though with one predominating, transcribed texts over a fairly
long period, probably from around 1508 to the mid-1S30s. Spaces origin-
ally left blank were sometimes used to add compositions at a later stage.
The 673 literary and historical items copied are very diverse; some are
by mainstream contemporary authors such as Bembo and Sannazaro,
but they often reflect an interest in popular and plurilingual literature
of the Veneto.159
The owner of the compilation that is now BL, MS Harl. 3462 was Gian
Giacomo Calandra, secretary of Francesco Gonzaga in Mantua. The per-
son who assembled the collection, quite possibly Calandra himself, drew
on contacts with men of letters and on state papers in order to assemble,
at some time between about 1517 and Calandra's death in 1543, a miscel-
lany of historical and literary texts in Latin and Italian, including verses
'19 Cristofari, Il codice Marciano It. XI, 66; Padoan and Zampieri, `Radiografia'; Romei (ed.), Scritti
di Pietro Aretino.
4 Social transmission and user publication 43
by Giovanni Aurelio Augurelli, Vincenzo Calmeta, Sabha da Castiglione,
Filippo Beroaldo, Sannazaro, Bembo and another secretary of Francesco's,
Iacopo D'Atri. Although the documents are written in varying hands, the
compiler saw the collection as a unit, writing the heading for each text
and drawing up an index of contents (fols. 1r-3r). '6O
The Florentine scribe and poet Biagio Buonaccorsi put together
a substantial compilation, BLF, MS XC sup. 39, containing Latin
speeches, letters, poems and other material connected with ancient and
contemporary Florentine history and with contemporary Florentine
scholarship. Buonaccorsi copied the first and third sections, fols. 1-59
and 146-75, and he clearly organized the transcription of the second
section, fols. 60-103 (104-45 are blank), since he handed over to
another scribe in the middle of a gathering. Internal evidence indicates
that transcription began during his period of once in the Florentine
chancery (1498-1512), and variations in the style of writing suggest
there were intervals between the copying of the sections. Over one-
third of the works in the manuscript were composed by the human-
ist Marcello Virgilio d'Andrea, head of the chancery from 1498 until
his death in 1521; other texts will have been provided by Marcello or
obtained through the chancery."'
Examples of aggregations are found among the collections put
together by one of the leading information-gatherers of his time, the
great Venetian diarist Marin Sanudo (1466-1536). His habit, as described
by Neil Harris, `was to write on loose-leaf folds and gatherings of paper,
made up singly according to the scale of the item to be copied and only
assembled or bound together at a later phase'. One of Sanudo's verse mis-
cellanies, for instance, BMV, MS It. IX 369 (7203), is made up of twenty-
eight originally independent gatherings that were copied mainly by him
over several years.16' A Florentine example, BNCF, MS Magi. VII 115,
contains poetic works by Agnolo Bronzino. It brings together what was
originally a set of separate manuscripts, each containing a single work
and consisting in all but one case of a single gathering. These were used
by the author as master copies for the further diffusion of his writings.'63
In the early seventeenth century, Cardinal Federico Borromeo reflected
,6o
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts, III, 28-9; Weiss, `The castle of Gaillon'; Calmeta, Prose
e lettere, pp. 47-56; Pecoraro, Per la storia, p. 81.
6i Richardson, A manuscript'; Fachard, Biagio Buonaccorsi, pp. 162-4.
6i Harris, `Marin Sanudo', 101-4 (quotation from P. 10 3); Chiòrholi in Berni, Poesie e prose, P. 384.
X63 Petrucci Nardelli in Bronzino, Rime in burla, pp. 444-67; see, too, Tanturli, `Formazione d'un
codice'.
44 The contexts of manuscript circulation
that gathering manuscript works together in a single volume helped to
preserve them from loss.'6 4
5 SOCIAL TRANSMISSION AND NETWORKS
The non-commercial distribution of manuscript texts was usually
initiated, as has been seen, by communication between individuals whose
relationships could range from friendship to that between aspiring cli-
ent and potential patron. Thereafter, texts could circulate further among
those who already had a common bond arising out of shared interests and
concerns. The cohesion and sense of identity of these people would be
enhanced by the exchange of texts that were not generally available. Some
groupings of this sort are termed `scribal communities' by Love.",Section
3 above has already provided examples of two types of community in
Renaissance Italy: the household, in the case of Lucrezia Tornabuoni,
and courts, in the case of Torquato Tasso's Il Nifo. However, in the lat-
ter instance Tasso proposed to send his dialogue from court to court by
using a chain of contacts throughout Italy and then to Spain. Here it is
appropriate to use the term `network' usefully proposed by Jason Scott-
Warren in order to describe more heterogeneous groupings of users of
texts."' Tasso wished, in effect, to use a network of separate yet intercon-
nected communities, each of which could give rise to further dissemin-
ation to other groups. We can consider other instances of networks that
fall in three further categories, though the distinction between them can
only be approximate: informal groupings of friends; gatherings of people
with shared cultural or ideological interests, meeting in private houses or
gardens; and formally constituted academies. Together, these five types
of scribal groupings cover a wide spectrum from tightly knit, pre-existing
communities to more open-ended networks through which texts might
be diffused in unplanned ways and might even end up unexpectedly in a
printing house.
The role of Annibal Caro, based in Rome, as a provider and recipient
of texts by others illustrates well the circulation of contemporary writings
between friends and acquaintances with similar literary tastes. He told
Varchi in 1536 that he was thinking of giving some of the Florentine's
sonnets to Gualteruzzi (and the same letter mentions that three sonnets
'I Barbero, `Dagli antichi scartocci rinvolti', 256-7.
bf Love, Die Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 179-84.
cs Scott-Warren, `Reconstructing manuscript networks'.
S Social transmission and networks 45
of Caro's addressed to Vittoria Colonna had been forwarded to Varchi
by Mattio Franzesi). In 1539 Caro's friend Giovanni Guidiccioni of Lucca
sent him a collection of his sonnets with a dedicatory letter that invited
Caro to give them more polish than the author could (BPP, MS Parmense
344, which contains corrections in Caro's hand). According to Caro, at
this point Guidiccioni, who was bishop of Fossombrone and had been
named papal legate in the Romagna, still did not wish him to `show' these
poems to anyone. However, soon after Guidiccioni's death on 26 July 1541,
Caro sent a `libro' (book) of the poet's sonnets, doubtless a copy of the
same ones, to another Lucchese, Bartolomeo ®rsucci. Another instance
suggests that Caro could give much wider diffusion to sonnets received
by him. A letter of 1548 from Claudio Tolomei shows how sonnets of
Aretino, to whom he was writing from Padua, reached Caro through at
least two intermediaries and were then likely to be shown to Cardinal
Alessandro Farnese (whose secretary Caro had recently become) and then
throughout Rome:
Ricevei li due vostri Sonetti per via di M. Girolamo Soperchio; li quali mi son
piaciuti, e mi son parsi pieni di spirito e di grandezza, e degni veramente del
vostro divino intelletto. Io gli ho mandati a Roma a M. Annibal Caro, per-
sona costumata e ben dotta. Egli ne illustrarà non sol se stesso, ma la casa de
l'Illustrissimo Farnese, e tutta Roma insieme.167
(I received your two sonnets through Girolamo Superchio; I liked them and
thought them full of spirit and greatness, truly worthy of your divine intellect.
I sent them to Rome to Annibal Caro, a person of good manners and learning.
With them he will bring honour not only to himself, but to the household of the
most illustrious [Alessandro] Farnese, and at the same time the whole of Rome.)
The letter demonstrates, too, even after we have allowed for Tolomei's
flattery of Aretino, how honour could be derived from the provision of a
handwritten text.
In the very early years of the sixteenth century, a small group of
Venetian patricians, calling themselves the Compagnia degli Amici
(Company of Friends), sealed their relationship by drawing up a set of
laws. The first members were Vincenzo Querini, Tommaso Giustiniani,
Niccol6 Tiepolo and Bembo, but the original laws, written out by Bembo,
envisaged and indeed hoped for the admission of other men and women.
When a new member was accepted, all the existing members had to send
"I Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 13 to Varchi, August 1536 (I, 34-6), g4; no. u9 to Varchi, 5 December
1539 (I, 165-6), 43; no. 170 to Orsucci, 31 August 1541 (I, 238-9), g4; Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere
scritte a Pietro Aretino, 22 September 1548, Book II, no. 147 (II, 1S7); Guidiccioni, Rime, pp.
lxxxvii—cxxvii, 3.
46 The contexts of manuscript circulation
a token of pleasure, `e con lettre particolari di sua mano, e con qualche
sonetto o canzona o altre guise di latini e poetici componimenti' (both
with personal letters in their own hand, and with some sonnets or canzoni
or other sorts of Latin and poetic compositions), though women were
excused from the latter task if they had no experience of writing poetry.
Members could pass their works to one another without fear of unwanted
wider circulation since, according to the last rule written by Bembo, no
literary verse or prose work that was diffused among them (nessuna fatica
di lettre, the in poema o altrimenti in opera leggitima di prosa si dis-
tenda per alcuno della compagnia') could be presented or dedicated to
a non-member without the express consent of all. According to the ori-
ginal laws, members had to share everything among themselves: `sieno tra
essi tutte le cose communi'. `Cole' probably had here the specific sense of
`writings', in other words everything they wrote. To remove any ambigu-
ity, Giustiniani clarified, in some notes added in his hand, that members
did indeed have to share the formal fruits of their studies:
Né se sia alcuno the veruna o sua inventione o da altri intesa cosa di legitima
dignità, possi tenere a li compagni nascosa, et siano di ciascaduno i studii, le
anotationi, le expositioni di qualunche sorte a tutti cos! comune the a nesuno
niente si nascondi.
(Nor may anyone hide from his companions any invention of his or anything
understood by others to be of legitimate dignity; and let all studies, notes,
explanations of any sort be sufficiently common to all that nothing is hidden
from anyone.)
It has been suggested that this company also read and commented on
the vernacular verse of an outsider, Augurelli.i68 In Chapter 3 Section 2
we shall see how poems by its members did, in fact, circulate not only
between them but also further afield.
A number of literary groups met in houses or gardens in Rome in the
late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; some were loosely termed `acad-
emies' but they did not have formal regulations and were often short-
lived, depending as they did on the generosity of an individual patron.119
The emphasis of their activities was on conviviality, on discussion and, as
Chapter 6 will show, on the recitation or improvisation of texts. However,
`69 Bembo, Prose e rime, pp. 699-703 (quotations from pp. 703, 700); Gnocchi, Tommaso
Giustiniani' (quotation from p. 280; on Augurelli, see p. 282 n. 16).
`69 Gnoli, La Roma di Leon X, pp. 136-63; Chambers, `The earlier "academies"', pp. 10 —u; D'Amico,
Renaissance Humanism, pp. 89-112.
S Social transmission and networks 47
some of the members' writings were made available in handwritten form,
from where they might later find their way into print.
To the group of authors, such as Serafino Aquilano and Calmeta, who
met at the house of Paolo Cortesi in Rome can be linked two manu-
script collections of rispetti (eight-line poems), one of them dedicated
to Elisabetta Gonzaga by Filippo Schiafenato of Milan.170 Humanists
from the papal curia composed Latin poems for the celebration by
Johannes Goritz, from 1512 onwards, of the feast of Sant' Anna (26
July), and affixed them near the altar dedicated to her in the church of
Sant' Agostino. Later in the day, the poems were displayed in Goritz's
garden, probably in a second copy. Most of these verses were gathered
into manuscript collections, of which two survive: BCR, MS Niccol6
Rossi 207, written by a German under the name of Caius Silvanus,
with corrections by Giano Vitale of Palermo, and BAV, MS Vat. Lat.
2754, written by Vitale, with corrections by Fabio Vigile of Spoleto. A
selection was also put together by Biagio Pallai and printed in Rome
by Arrighi in 1524 under the title of Coryciana; the first eight poems of
the first book are `de editione' (about publication), requesting Goritz to
allow them to be printed. A few poems are extant only in other manu-
scripts and printed editions.17'
In the following decade, a Roman `academy' known as the Vignaiuoli
was made up of a group of writers with a taste for burlesque poetry who
met informally at the house of Uberto Strozzi after his return to the
city in late 1532 or in 1533• The poets included Francesco Berni, Molza,
Della Casa, Giovanni Mauro d'Arcano, Agnolo Firenzuola and Giovan
Francesco Bini. Contemporary accounts suggest that their activities cen-
tred on entertainment and performance, including improvisation, but
there was at least one attempt to transcribe some of their texts for the
benefit of others. One of the fringe members was probably Nino Sernini
of Cortona. He was in Rome in 1533 as an agent of the Gonzaga, and
was charged with the task of obtaining as many of Berni's works as pos-
sible for Ferrante Gonzaga, brother of Duke Federico and one of the
captains of Charles V. This was difficult, since the poet was reluctant to
— BAV, MS Urb. Lat. 729 (copied by Schiafenato) and BNCF, MS II X S4: see Delcorno Branca,
`Da Poliziano a Serafino', pp. 436-42 and Calitti, Fra lirica e narrativa, pp. 72-80; on the Vatican
MS, U. Motta, Castiglione e il mito di Urbino, pp. 135-6; for the contents of the Florentine MS,
Mazzatinti and others, Inventari, XII, 44-6.
D'Amico, Renaissance Humanism, pp. 108-9; Gaisser, The rise and fall'; Ijsewijn in Coryciana,
PP. 17-28; Sodano, `Intorno ai "Coryciana"', on the underlying polemics; U. Motta, Castiglione
e il mito di Urbino, pp. 331-83.
48 The contexts of manuscript circulation
disseminate them and even to commit them to writing, but Sernini did
manage to send one of Berni's capitoli to Giovanni Mahona, the duke's
secretary.172
Another Roman literary association of the 1S30s was the Accademia
della Virtù, founded by Claudio Tolomei, initially under the patronage
of Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici, who died in 1535• Its members included
Vignaiuoli poets such as Molza, Caro and Bini, the author Luca Contile
and the writing-master Giovanbattista Palatino. The academy met twice
weekly to discuss a theme announced in advance, and each week's meetings
were presided over by a new `king'.173 His reign ended with a dinner that,
as Caro described in a letter, gave rise to the composition of light-hearted
works such as Caro's own eulogy of large noses, the Nasea, addressed to
the prominently nosed Giovan Francesco Lione when the latter was king.
In one case at least, Caro recounted, the works were to be sent to Padua for
Mattio Franzesi (who was in the city in early 1538) and for Varchi:
[O]gni settimana sedeva un re, quale avea una cena, e ognuno l'avea a presentar
d'una stravaganza e d'una composizione, che a gara tanto l'uno dell'altro e gli re
e i vassalli hanno fatto cose che dànno che dire a tutta Roma. Io ho fatto certe
pappolate che Fabio Segni manderà a messer Mattio, perché non ho tempo a
copiare, farogli aver l'altre cose de gli altri, e manderannovisi.X74
(Each week there officiated a king, who held a dinner, and everyone had to pre-
sent him with an unusual work and a composition; in competition with each
other both the kings and their subjects have composed writings that are getting
all Rome talking. I have composed some pieces of nonsense that Fabio Segni
will send to Mattio, because I don't have time to copy. I will get him the other
writings by the others, and they'll be sent to you.)
In Florence, the gardens of the Rucellai family, the Orti Oricellari,
were a meeting-place for discussions during the lifetime of Bernardo
Rucellai and for some years after his death in 1514. Machiavelli entered
this circle by around 1516-7, and manuscript copies of some of his works
will have circulated among its members. Filippo Nerli asked Zanobi
Buondelmonti to send him the Arte della guerra in 152o and wanted
Machiavelli to send his comedy Clizia in 1525 and the first two books
U~ Virgili, Francesco Berni, pp. 442-7, including information on Sernini, extracts from whose let-
ters are given in Campori (ed.), Lettere, pp. 45=7; Maylender, Storia delle Accademie, V, 466-7;
Longhi, Lusus, pp. 43-4; Romei, Da Leone X, pp. 205-42.
Maylender, Storia delle Accademie, V, 478-8o; Hobson, Apollo and Pegasus, pp. 39-4o; Longhi,
Lusus, pp. 46-8.
171 Caro, Lettere familiari, nos. 39-4o bis to Varchi, to March 1538 (I, 70-2), §9; on Franzesi see,
too, no. 31 to Paolo Manuzio, 24 January 1538 (I, 61).
S Social transmission and networks 49
of the Istorie fiorentine in 152,6.175 A scribe working for this group may
have been the Francesco Baroncini who finished copying Machiavelli's
Vita di Castruccio Castracani on 28 October 152o, not long after the work
was composed.17' Baroncini, an old man by then, had worked in the
Florentine book trade as a stationer (cartolaio).177 The Petrarchizing verse
of young Florentine poets associated with the Orti (Bernardo's grandson
Cosimo Rucellai, Luigi Alamanni, Francesco Guidetti) was circulated in
manuscripts together with that of poets from other states, such as Bembo,
Sannazaro and the Vicentine author Giovan Giorgio Trissino, who was
closely linked with Bernardo's son Giovanni and who visited Florence;
and the Orti circle must have played some part in this diffusion.i78
There would naturally have been many other meeting-places in which
encounters of a more casual nature triggered off the circulation of hand-
written texts. Varchi, for instance, recounted how a discussion took place
in the house of the courtesan Tullia d'Aragona in Florence concerning
the defects of the poetic style of Girolamo Muzio, one of her lovers and a
non-Florentine, and how Muzio then composed and sent to Tullia a son-
net responding to the criticisms levelled at him.179
The more formally organized academies that began to develop in
Italy from the third decade of the sixteenth century were, like the gath-
erings described above, characterized by a combination of oral culture,
in which the lecture and discussion played leading roles, and of written
culture. Some academies promoted the printing of works, but their rou-
tine business often involved the provision of handwritten texts for ini-
tial scrutiny or subsequent discussion, and this process could easily have
formed the starting-point for the scribal dissemination of texts both
among members and beyond. The first academy to have elaborate rules,
the Accademia degli Intronati of Siena, founded between 1525 and 1527,
had six censors to whom compositions by the members were submitted
"I N. Machiavelli, Lettere, Nerli to Machiavelli, 17 November 1520 (pp. 514—r5), 22 February 1525
(pp• 540-0, 1 November 152,6 (pp. 619-20).
"' BNCF, MS Palatino 537. See Tommasini, La vita egli scritti, II, 1,o26-8; N. Machiavelli, La vita
di Castruccio Castracani, pp. 46, 51 and P. 50 fig. 4.
'77 Bausi, `Machiavelli e la tradizione culturale', pp. 103-4; Richardson, `The scribal publication',
P. 178-
i71 For manuscripts of Trissino's verse, see Mazzoleni, `L'ultimo manoscritto'; Albonico, `La poesia
del Cinquecento', pp. 697-8. On Trissino and Florence, see Trovato in N. Machiavelli, Discorso,
pp. xxxiii—xxxv. For the probable part played by the Orti group in the diffusion of the first
redaction of Bembo's Stanze, see Gnocchi's edition of this work, p. lxxxviii. On the Orti,
see Gilbert, `Bernardo Rucellai'; Albertini, Firenze dalla repubblica al principato, pp. 67-85;
Dionisotti, Machiavellerie, pp. 138-53•
171 Varchi, L'Hercolano, II, 672; Zanrè, Cultural Non-Conformity, p. 147.
50 The contexts of manuscript circulation
for possible correction before being read aloud (in whole or in part) to
the membership. The works then passed into the custody of a chancellor.
The Accademia degli Infiammati of Padua, founded on 6 June 1S4o, had
a similar system, with three censors and a secretary who had the same
function as the Sienese chancellor.'$°
The Infiammati did not survive beyond 1542, but their influence lived
on in the structures adopted by the Accademia fiorentina when it emerged
from the Accademia degli Umidi in February 1541. Here the texts of pub-
lic lectures were submitted to censors (their number was increased from
two to four in 1542) three days before the Sunday on which they were
to be delivered in Santa Maria Novella, and works to be read aloud in
the academy were deposited in a locked urn so that the censors could
scrutinize them beforehand and correct their language and content if
necessary."' The regulations that set out the reform of 1547 envisaged that
works approved as worthy by the censors would be transcribed in a book
of records; they could then be `sent out', presumably in manuscript, but
not necessarily printed:
Le cose scritte al predetto libro si possano mandar fuori col nome dell'autore o
senza esso, come più piacerà a lui. Ma non si possano già stampare, se non in
quella maniera the si dirà nel capitolo delle cose da ire a stampa.i8z
(The works transcribed in the aforesaid book may be sent out with or without
the author's name, as he prefers. But they may not be printed, except as provided
for in the section below on works to be sent to the press.)
The Accademia degli Alterati, a small private body founded in Florence
in 1569, similarly had censors who checked works submitted by its mem-
bers before they were made available to other academicians. This was the
case, for instance, with Scipione Ammirato's dialogue Il Dedalione, o ver
del poeta (dated 156o in BNCF, MS Magl. VII 12), which was proposed
for discussion in 1571, shortly after the author had joined the academy.
Works were also selected for discussion by drawing them from an urn by
lot. These texts appear to have been handwritten in most cases, though a
few discussions were based on recently printed editions. Contributions to
debate were sometimes improvised by the Alterati, but could also be read
from a text.i83
Samuels, `Benedetto Varchi', 604-12; see, too, Vianello, Illetterato, pp. 47-91. On the `scrittore'
who recorded narrations for the Sienese Congrega dei Rozzi, see Binazzi, `Le veglie', 70.
Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 94-5. "1 Ibid., pp. 187, 229-31.
'83 Weinberg, `Argomenti di discussione'; Weinberg (ed.), Trattati, II, 477-512; Plaisance,
L'Accademia, pp. 393-404-
5 Social transmission and networks 51
Members of academies could circulate texts to each other in less formal
ways. In Siena, a city that continued to have a strong scribal culture in
the second half of the Cinquecento, descriptions of the games played at
the entertainments of academies such as the Intronati, the Accesi, the
Cortigiani Ferraiuoli and the Travagliati were diffused in manuscript.
Girolamo Bargagli's Dialogo de' giuochi was itself circulated in this way
before being printed in Siena in 1572.184 When in 1581 Orazio Ariosti,
based in Ferrara, became a member of the Accademia degli Innominati
of Parma, the secretary, Eugenio Visdomini, wrote to him to explain that
the academy expected new `absent' members to send some composition
of theirs. Visdomini also asked for a composition on the theme of the
happiness of man, and told Ariosti that he would welcome writings
from two other Ferrarese authors, Battista Guarini and `poor' Torquato
Tasso. In 1583 Ariosti decided to send to his fellow-academicians his tra-
gedy La Sidonia. In his dedicatory letter, he asked for their comments
on its defects so that, if possible, he could correct them before further
publication.i85 Academies could also form a pole of attraction for works
sent to them in manuscript by non-members. Poems in praise of Duke
Cosimo de' Medici and his family were addressed by Molza and Tullia
d'Aragona to members of the Umidi in Florence.i8' In June 1575 the
Alterati received some comedies from Argisto Giuffredi of Palermo, with
a request for their opinion.i87
Lectures delivered in these academies could be circulated scribally out-
side their cities of origin. We saw in Section 4 above that Bembo tried to
obtain from Varchi a copy of the lecture he had given to the Infiammati
in September 1540 on one of Bembo's sonnets. By early November this
lecture had been sent from Padua to Rome, where Fabrizio Strozzi showed
it to others, and to Florence, where Francesco del Garbo praised it.i88
After Varchi's return to Florence in early 1543, his controversial lessons on
Purgatorio XXV, given to the Accademia fiorentina, were not only read
(and mocked) in his own city but reached Iacopo Bonfadio in Padua by
November.i89
IN Riccò, Giuoco e teatro, pp. 12-13, 24-9, 60-3, 66-7, 75-6, 16 3-7 42-
* Letter of Visdomini, 27 April 1581, in Solerti, Vita, II, 156-7; Ariosti, La Sidonia, pp. 15—r9;
Denarosi, L'Accademia degli Innominati, pp. 272-3, 313-16.
'"6 Plaisance, L'Accademia, p. 98; Bausi, `Le rime di e per Tullia d'Aragona', pp. 275-6.
'"' Weinberg, Argomenti di discussione letteraria', 182; Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 402-3. See also
Chapter 3 Section 1 on Ardizio and the Accademia degli Invaghiti in Mantua.
iP' Plaisance, L'Accademia, p. 52.
Andreoni, —Sangue perfetto—, 141-2, 161-2, 18o-1; Novo libro di lettere, no. XVI, Bonfadio to
Fortunato Martinengo, 24 November 1 543 (p• 30•
52 The contexts of manuscript circulation
On 7 February 1541, Alessandro Piccolomini sent the lecture he had
given the previous day, on a sonnet by Laudomia Forteguerri, to Leone
Orsini, bishop of Fréjus, who had been the first principe of the Infiammati
but was then in Rome. Piccolomini discovered later that this Lettura was
then printed in Bologna in July of the same year by Bartolomeo Bonardi
and Marcantonio da Carpi. He wrote to Varchi on 20 August 1541 that
this was 'cosa [ ... ] molto discara e maravigliosa' (something most unwel-
come and surprising). As for how the printers had obtained the text,
Piccolomini reported that, according to Celso Sozzini, the source could
have been Orsini, and his account shows that in any case the text trav-
elled some distance before reaching Bologna: '[Sozzini] sa di certo che
[la lettura] è venuta d'Ancona, dove forse è andata di Roma; dice forse,
perché già prima di Febraro ricercandomi Mons. Orsini di voler vederla,
gliela mandai' (Sozzini knows for certain that it came from Ancona,
to where it perhaps went from Rome; he says perhaps, because since
Monsignor Orsini was asking me already before February and saying he
wanted to see it, I sent it to him).'90 Marcantonio put his side of the case
in a letter of 25 June, prefixed to his edition and addressed 'Alli studi-
osi delle cose toscane' (To students of Tuscan writings). The Lettura, he
wrote, had come into his hands by good fortune 'di verso Roma' (from
towards Rome). He did not want to repeat his mistake of the previous
year, when he had obtained Piccolomini's Dialogo de la bella creanza de le
donne only to see it then printed so negligently by others. He continued
with a warning that all texts published scribally were fair game for the
hawks of the printing industry:
Nè penso per haverla publicata di meritarne riprensione da l'autor suo, perché se
non volea che si stampasse in alcun luogo, non dovea lasciarsela uscir dalle mani.
Basta che quel ch'io fò, come si vede, non lo fò à mal fine alcuno.
(Nor do I think I deserve any rebuke from its author for having published it,
because if he did not want it to be printed anywhere, he should not have let it
out of his hands. The fact is that, as you see, I am doing what I am doing with-
out any wrongful intent.)
Another set of examples that shows the unpredictability of the paths
taken by scribally transmitted texts as they moved through open-ended
networks is that of musical settings of lyric verse. It was not unusual
'9O Cerreta, Alessandro Piccolomini, pp. 30, 33, 272-3 (punctuation altered slightly); Vianello,
Il letterato, pp. 73, 76. The sonnet was one of six addressed to two women (one to Alda
Torella Lunata, the other five to Margaret of Austria); see Piéjus, `Les Poétesses siennoises',
PP- 319-22.
6 Public availability 53
for poems to reach composers in handwritten form even if they had no
personal connection with the author. The provenance of the settings of
several of Torquato Tasso's lyric poems that were first printed together
with a musical setting, rather than on their own, shows that his poems
were diffused in manuscript over much of northern and central Italy, and
that one of his madrigals travelled as far south as Bari. The same phenom-
enon is seen in the case of several other poets .'9'
6 PUBLIC AVAILABILITY
Whereas scribal circulation within networks was inevitably select in
nature, a few manuscript texts entered a somewhat wider public domain
in ways that did not depend on personal relationships and that might be
commercially based.
The most open way of disseminating texts was to post them
in places where anyone could read them. Niccoli cites the case of a
Genoese poem on a historical topic, dated 1467, that was apparently
displayed to all so that it could be copied as well as read: its last two
I
lines are 'Chi me leze me Lassa stare azi6 the possa essere exemplata'
(Whoever reads me, leave me where I am so that I can be copied). She
suggests that in the case of cantastorie (performers of narrative poems)
the sale of printed copies made this kind of publication redundant.'9z
For shorter works, however, the tradition of affixing texts — presumably
manuscript in most cases — to doors, wall, statues and so on persisted.
Paper could be stuck to a non-wooden surface with flour glue or even
chewed bread.193 Such writings were sometimes official and celebratory,
but more often oppositional, denigratory and posted clandestinely.
Guidiccioni described, in a speech delivered to the nobles of Lucca
following a popular uprising of 1531, how posted messages allowed the
common people to express their grievances: 'Non avete voi diligente-
mente essaminato quel the importino quegli scrittarini e quelle lettere,
the alcuna volta s'attaccano e si leggono per le mura? Niente altro sig-
nificano, se non the it populo con voce muta grida contra quei the
governano' (Have you not carefully examined the meaning of those
'9' Prizer, `Local repertories', pp. 353, 37o and `Una "virtù molto conveniente"', 26-30 (Castiglione);
Bianconi and Vassalli, 'Circolazione letteraria'; Vassalli, 'II Tasso in musica'; Vela, `Poesia in
musica'; Assenza, `La trasmissione', 208-9. On settings of Tansillo, see Milburn, Luigi Tansillo,
PP. 16-17.
'9a
Niccoli, Prophecy and People, pp. 16-17.
'91 Clue was used in Bologna in 1583 (Evangelisti, —Libelli famosi"', p. 181), bread in Rome in 1602
(Dooley, The Social History of Skepticism, pp. 20-1).
54 The contexts of manuscript circulation
short writings and letters that are sometimes attached and read around
the city walls? They mean only that the common people are crying out
silently against those in power.)194
Sanudo had access to a considerable amount of material that had been
displayed publicly in Venice or elsewhere in Italy. He recorded in April
i5o7, for instance, some Latin verses, `messi in varij lochi di Roma' (dis-
played in various places in Rome), celebrating the pope, Julius II, on the
occasion of his entry into the city after the campaign against Bologna.
A case from his own city on 3 June 1533 bore a strong similarity to
contemporary ones in Lucca:
In questa matina in palazo sopra una colona in corte fu posta una poliza, la qual
diceva mal di la nobiltà, dolendosi di la carestia, dicendo it popolo si leverà e vi
castigherà; la qual fo lecta da molti e tolta zuso per Zuan Agnolo capitanio del
Conseio di X e portada a li Cai, i quali erano levadi.195
(This morning in the [ducal] palace a leaflet was placed on a column in the
courtyard, speaking ill of the nobility, complaining about the shortage of food
and saying the people will rise up and punish you. It was read by many and
taken down by Zuan Agnolo, captain of the Council of Ten, and taken to the
Heads [of the Council], who had risen.)
In this way, the display of writings in a certain place could set off, as it
was doubtless intended to do, user publication through the normal, more
exclusive scribal channels, as well as leading sometimes to publication in
print.
Institutional libraries and private owners could offer a more limited kind
of access to manuscript texts by making them available for consultation
and perhaps for copying. Vida envisaged something along these lines for
his De arte poetica (see Section 3 above). Montaigne commented on his
visit to the Vatican library in 1581: `Je la vis sans nulle difficulté; chacun la
voit einsin, et en extrait ce qu'il veut; et est ouverte quasi tous les matins'
(I saw [the library] without difficulty; everyone sees it in this way and gets
from it what he wants; and it is open almost every morning). 196 Noble fam-
ilies and collectors such as Pinelli allowed select visitors to consult their
holdings. Institutional libraries might even lend their manuscripts, just
as individuals did. This could be done reluctantly, as in the case of the
Malatestiana in Cesena, and it led to some losses from the Marciana in
Venice.197 In 1521 Pietro Corradi borrowed Joachim of Fiore's commentary
"I Guidiccioni, Orazione, p. 133.
195 Sanudo, I diarii, VII, 63-5; LVIII, 247. On Sanudo see, too, Chapter 3 Section 3.
X96 Journal de voyage, I, 236-7. 07 Ortalli, `Malatestiana e dintorni', pp. 140-2.
6 Public availability 55
on the Apocalypse from the library of a convent in Todi, pledging to pay
four gold ducats if he did not return it within a year; the intention was to
have it transcribed.~9'
When Paolo Aproino heard in Venice in 1635 of a plan to print the
Discorsi e dimostrazioni matematiche of his former teacher, Galileo — the
work that, as was seen in Section 2 above, the mathematician himself
wanted to distribute selectively in manuscript — he proposed to the work's
editor, Fulgenzio Micanzio, that transcripts should instead be deposited
in libraries where the work could be freely copied by interested readers. At
the same time, this kind of diffusion would, Aproino felt, make the work
appreciated all the more by cognoscenti. In wishing to spread Galileo's
work among the select few, he was thus confirming the prestige and
exclusiveness of manuscript circulation:
Le settimane passate, quando esso M.° Fulgentio mi mostrò de i suoi fogli, [ ... ]
mi communicò insieme la intentione delo stamparli [ ... ] [E]t il dì dietro andai a
posta a dirgli che, per circonspettione di qualche stravaganza che potesse avve-
nire, io stimava meglio che ne fussero messe tre o 4 copie in librarie publiche
et libere, come sarebe una qui, una in Francia, in Germania, o in Fiandra, con
qualche letera annessa che testificasse del tempo, e poi si lasciasse tuorne copia
da chi ne volesse: perchè in ogni modo le persone che attendono a questi stu-
dii sono pochi di numero, et in qualità che non hanno da far conto sopra un
poco di fatica o di spesa maggiore che va nei manuscripi; e con questa scarsezza,
che è solo di apparenza, la dottrina si venirebe a ricevere con maggior avidità et
reputatione; chè quanto a certa sorte d'huomini che entrano a empire il numero
dell'universale, credo che sii da desiderare più tosto, per tutti li rispetti, che si
fatte cose non arrivino nele for mani.'99
(In the past weeks, when Fulgenzio showed me some of his sheets, he told me at
the same time of the intention to print them [ ... ] And the following day I went
with the purpose of telling him that, out of caution over something unusual that
might arise, I thought it would be better if three or four copies were placed in
public and free libraries, for example one here, one in France, in Germany or in
Flanders, with some letter attached attesting to the times, and then let anyone
who wanted take a copy; because in any case those engaged in such studies are
few in number, and of the sort not to be concerned with a little extra labour or
expense on manuscripts. And with this only apparent limitation, the learning
would come to be received with greater eagerness and renown; for as for a cer-
tain sort of people who make up the general public, I think it is preferable in all
respects that such things do not reach their hands.)
'9B Rusconi, Profezia e profeti, pp. nq-2o, 223. The vellum copy of Cicero, De offuüs, `scritto di let-
tera', that Bernardo Machiavelli returned to the convent of Santa Croce in Florence in 1475 may
have been manuscript (Libro di ricordi, p. 11).
'99 Aproino to Galileo, 13 March 1635, in Galilei, Le opere, XVI, 231-3; Torrini, `paratesto', p. 214.
 56 The contexts of manuscript circulation
Although Aproino's plan came to nothing, it was evidently based on the
practice of using libraries to display works that were not in print.
The compilation by Buonaccorsi mentioned in Section 4 above could
have been undertaken for his own use. But it may have been intended to
be sold, or Buonaccorsi could have decided to sell it later in his life, when
money was short. He recorded in his diary in 1516 that he sold a book
`scriptovi suso tra di mia mano et di altri più cose latine, tucte bellissime:
vale el meno lire quattordici' (written in my hand and that of others,
various things in Latin, all very fine, worth at least fourteen lire).200 This
might be the manuscript in the Laurenziana, in which one other scribe
was involved, since `di altri' could mean `of another' as well as `of others'.
In any case, Buonaccorsi's record suggests that miscellanies were market-
able, and it is one of several that show that, as we shall see in more detail
in Chapter 2 Section 2, Buonaccorsi was paid for manuscripts that he had
copied (in at least this one case in collaboration with another) as part of
a commercial operation. Whenever Buonaccorsi produced these copies,
either in order to sell them ready-made or in response to orders placed
by people other than the author, he was engaging not in social transmis-
sion but in entrepreneurial publication, the third of Love's main modes
of scribal publication. In Italy as in seventeenth-century England, this
`took place when manuscripts were produced and circulated for gain by
a scribe or stationer' and was used only for texts `for which there was a
strong public demand and for which no competition was expected from
the press'."'
What further evidence is there for entrepreneurial activity among
Italian scribes and booksellers, leaving aside the copying of texts at the
direct request of someone else (which will be described in Chapter 2
Sections 2 and 3), and in general for a market for new or second-hand
manuscripts, purchasable from them or from other sources?
Certain kinds of manuscripts, at least, were available on the open
market. A customer who bought a manuscript of a Venetian chron-
icle recorded his transaction as follows: `Questa cronica è di io Andrea
Contarini fo de m[iser] Marco, la qual compri da m[aistr]o Fran[cesc]o
scrittor, sta in la cale delle stagnade a S. Salvador, the vende libri costàme
L. i à oro, fo a dì 18 avosto 1481' (This chronicle belongs to me, Andrea
— Richardson, A manuscript', p. 595; Martelli, `preistoria (medicea)', p. 380; Fachard, Biagio
Buonaccorsi, p. lto.
"I Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, pp. 47, 73-9 (pp. 73, 74
6 Public availability 57
Contarini, son of the late Marco. I bought it from master Francesco the
scribe who works in calle Belle Stagnade near San Salvatore and sells
books. It cost me one gold lira on 18 August 1480.202 The chronicle was pre-
sumably copied by Francesco himself, and in any case it is very likely that
such bookseller-scribes would have produced manuscripts as part of their
stock in trade. In 1496, an inventory of the books stocked by a Florentine
stationer, Salvestro di Zanobi di Mariano, included a good proportion of
manuscripts, 8o titles out of 221, even if there were never more than two
copies of a handwritten work.203 In 1579 the bookseller Stefano Bindoni
appeared before a Venetian body that had jurisdiction over printing, the
Esecutori contro la bestemmia, accused by the scribe Antonio Maffei of
having asked him to copy the Ragionamenti of Aretino, an author whose
works were prohibited by the Roman Index of 1564. Bindoni claimed that
he merely wished to copy this for some friends, but he may have been try-
ing to commission copies to be sold in his bookshop.204
There was naturally a trade in second-hand manuscripts. A vellum
copy of Juvenal's Satires completed in 1467 was bought in Bologna for
iz bolognini in 1494.205 A manuscript of Egidio of Viterbo's Historia vig-
inti saeculorum that had originally been dedicated to Pope Leo X was said
to have been bought at a stall in Rome.2O' It was stated in Siena in 1560
by a certain Paolo Cataldi that among some heterodox books bought by
him `in piaza a buon mercato' (in the piazza cheaply) were manuscripts
obtained from a friar called Cipriano.207 Manuscripts could also be pur-
chased at auction. The printed and handwritten books of a canon lawyer
were offered for sale in this way, along with his other goods, in Padua in
1484-7, though most of the manuscripts, which formed 38 per cent of the
library, found no takers.zo'
In the course of the sixteenth century, a limited organized market
emerged for ready-written copies of political guidebooks and newsletters,
as will be seen in Chapter 4 Section 1, and these were generated by organ-
9
ized scribal activity. The Venetian Council of Ten (responsible for state
security) noted in 1572 that `Sono mold di questa cit6 the fanno publica
"' BL, MS King's 148, fol. 15': see Carile, Aspetti della cronachistica', p. 82 n. 5 and La cronachistica,
PP. 38-43. The note in this manuscript might have been copied from its exemplar. The street
mentioned is probably the modern Calle dei Stagneri.
'°' Bec, Les Livres des florentins, P. 330.
-4 Menis, `Stefano Bindoni'; Bujanda, Index de Rome, pp. 647-9.
BL, MS Add. 17413; A. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts, no. 186.
Reeves, `Cardinal Egidio', p. 99 n. 38. '°7 Marchetti, Gruppi ereticali, pp. 213-14.
Skemer, `Book auctions' (p. 130 for the proportion of manuscripts, P. 137 for the failure to sell
all of them).
58 The contexts of manuscript circulation
professione di scriver nuove, per it the sono salariati da diversi, et essi
tengono banchetti, case et scrittori a tal effetto' (There are many in this
city who are professional writers of news, for which they are salaried by
various people. They have stalls, houses and writers for this purpose).'°
In the sixteenth century, Italian booksellers' inventories do not usually
include handwritten books, though it could be that they were not always
distinguished from printed ones.2 o It may be significant that Nicolò
Franco's dialogue on bookselling, mentioned earlier, does not allude to
the sale or availability of manuscripts. But booksellers may have made
texts available for copying by their clients. In 1448 the Florentine stationer
Vespasiano da Bisticci (c. 1422-98), whose shop was near the Palazzo del
Bargello, lent some speeches by Cicero to Francesco Castellani, presumably
for a fee.'" A minor incident in a literary controversy of •1584-5 points
to a similar practice. On one side in the dispute was Camillo Pellegrini,
who had praised Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata over Ariosto's Orlando furi-
oso; on the other was the Accademia della Crusca of Florence, supporting
Ariosto. In a private letter to the preacher Agostino da Eboli, Pellegrini
offered to make peace with the Florentines. One of the founders of the
Crusca, Bastian de' Rossi, wrote to tell Pellegrini that his letter `[n]ella
bottega qua d'un libraio si tiene a mostra' (is on display in the shop of a
bookseller here [in Florence]). Rossi then proceeded to write out a copy of
this text, whose substantial accuracy was confirmed in Pellegrini's reply."'
On the whole, though, it appears that the trade in manuscripts, whether
produced `on spec' or second-hand, was a relatively marginal activity, and
this tends to confirm both the exclusiveness of scribal circulation that was
stressed at the outset and its primarily social nature.
'1 Preto, I servizi segreti, p. 89; Infelise, Prima dei giornali, p. 1o.
A Veronese bookshop inventory of 1586 includes many volumes described as `codices' (Carpanè,
`Libri, librai, tipografi', P. 234), but the term probably refers in all cases to printed books.
° F. Castellani, Ricordanze, I, 111.
Letters of Rossi and Pellegrini, 2 and 22 November 1585: see Solerti, Vita, I, 433-5, 11, 231-5.
Martin Porter cites the case of Thomas Hill who, in late sixteenth-century England, advertised
his translation of a work on metoposcopy as being available in a similar way: `if any be desirous
to enioy a private Copy of this, let them resort unto maister Barkers shop' (Windows of the Soul,
P, 95)-
CHAPTER 2
Handwriting and the work of copyists
The circulation of literature through the handwritten word was, we
have seen, as varied in nature as it was important during the Italian
Renaissance. This chapter takes a closer look at some aspects of the pro-
cess of writing texts by hand. It sets out first to describe the main forms
of handwriting that were used in various contexts, and the teaching of
handwriting. It goes on to consider the work of scribes, particularly paid
scribes, and the use that authors made of their assistance in transcribing
and diffusing the written word.
I VARIETIES OF SCRIPT AND THE TEACHING
OF HANDWRITING
The terminology used to describe styles of script has varied considerably
from the Renaissance onwards. Here I shall adopt the two broad categor-
ies distinguished by Albinia de la Mare in her survey of Quattrocento
Florentine scribes: gothic and humanistic.'
During the Italian Renaissance the use of the family of gothic scripts
was in steady decline, especially for the circulation of literary texts. By the
sixteenth century the most formal gothic book hand, known as `rotunda'
(round), was restricted mainly to liturgical books and official documents.'
Still widely used in the first half of the Quattrocento was the semigothic
hand of the kind used by Petrarch; among characteristic letters are a round
`a', `d' with the ascender sloping to the left, `g' with an open loop and `r'
sometimes shaped like `2' (Figure 4) 3 A cursive (more rapidly written)
version of gothic was the mercantile hand, `mercantesca'. Its distinctive
De la Mare, 'New research', pp. 395-6.
For some liturgical manuscripts, see De la Mare, `New research', pp. 475-6. For examples of
official documents, see Marcon, `Ornato di penna', 132-5 and Jemolo (ed.), Catalogo, I, 126-7, no.
115 and pl. CCI.
3 Cencetti, Lineamenti, pp. 232-5, 255-7•
59
 6o Handwriting and the work of copyists
features, though they are not all found in individual hands, include the
ascenders of `d', `l' and `b' looping anticlockwise; `ch', `gh' and `gl' written
together as ligatures; `h' written with the right-hand part curving below
the line and sometimes with the bottom of the ascender not quite touch-
ing the line; and, less frequently, `di' written as a ligature, with the `i'
dropping below the line. Features of mercantile script are occasionally
found in hands used for vernacular literary texts in the fifteenth century4
and even in the sixteenth (Figure 7) but, as its name suggests, it appears
mainly in everyday practical writing such as account books or business
correspondence.
The new systems of writing that gradually ousted gothic scripts in the
circulation of literature, and indeed in other kinds of writing, were the
two humanistic scripts that were developed in Florence from just before
1400. The formal variety of the script, introduced by Poggio Bracciolini
and Niccol6 Niccoli, was sometimes known as `lettera antica' because
the script, as well as the layout and decoration of the manuscripts,
imitated eleventh- and twelfth-century manuscripts in Carolingian
script. `Formata' is another term applied to it. Its letter-shapes are essen-
tially those of modern roman type, other than the upright `s', like an `f'
without the cross-stroke. As the term `humanistic' suggests, this script
was used especially for classical, humanistic or patristic texts in Latin,
but it was extended to the vernacular when the text was considered to
merit the time and care involved (Figures 5, 13, 15). In the 142os Niccoli
also developed a humanistic cursive, sloping slightly to the right. Scripts
of this kind have had the most varied nomenclature: other descrip-
tions include italic or italic chancery, chancery cursive, `cancelleresca
all'antica' (old-style chancery) and `corsiva all'antica' (old-style cursive) .5
They were hybrid, on the one hand retaining features of the `lettera
antica' such as upright `d' (rather than gothic uncial `d') and roman `r',
on the other hand including cursive features, in particular `a', long `s'
and `f' both descending below the line, and round rather than long final
`s' in Latin. Ullman thus describes it as `a humanistic cursive, with a
sprinkling of Gothic' or `an admixture of cursive Gothic with formal
humanistic script'.6 Niccoli's humanistic cursive was originally intended
for use in private study, but its combination of elegance and relative
rapidity led to its also being adopted widely as a book hand for Latin
4 De la Marc, `New research', 395 n. r.
fImportant surveys of the introduction, development and spread of humanistic hands include
Ullman, The Origin; Wardrop, The Script; Casamassima, `Lettere antiche' and `Literulae latinae';
De la Mare, The Handwriting; Zamponi, `La scrittura umanistica'.
s Ullman, The Origin, pp. 6o, 96. See, too, De la Mare, The Handwriting, P. 51.
z Varieties of script and the teaching of handwriting 61
and the vernacular, both by professional scribes and by men of letters,
in Tuscany, in the Veneto and elsewhere in Italy. It was introduced into
the copying of documents in public offices; in the Florentine chancery,
its use spread gradually from the late 1420s? Examples of its varieties are
seen in Figures 1-3, 6, 8, 11 and 12.
As humanistic cursive scripts became more common in the world
of learning and of the well educated, so the use of the formal human-
istic book hand became restricted, by the sixteenth century, to special-
ist scribes! The humanistic cursive also gained some ground in other
contexts. In a notebook used to record accounts with a grocer called
Maddalena in Rome between 1523 and 1537, a handwriting based on this
variety was used by 39 out of io2 writers, though only 8 used it at a good
level. A `mercantesca' was used by 62 others, of whom 25 wrote it in an
orthodox manner. (The one remaining hand was not Italian.)9 Mercantile
scripts continued to be described in writing-books (see below), but they
tended to be used in specialized contexts. One was that of notarial docu-
ments: a sample of these from Verona shows the use of mercantile hands,
throughout the sixteenth century, in 22 per cent of cases.'° Naturally,
these scripts were also used in accounting. Domenico Manzoni, a former
teacher of mathematics from Oderzo near Venice, noted in a publication
of 1564 that merchants used `la cancelleresca' (humanistic cursive) in their
correspondence, `come più vaga a leggersi, et più commune a ciascuno'
(as [the hand] most beautiful to read and most widespread), but `la mer-
cantile' in their book-keeping because it was much harder to counterfeit
or alter." This comment suggests that mercantile script was more person-
alized, but also that it was becoming rarer. Petrucci has suggested that
among the semiliterate the mercantile script had been replaced by about
156o by a basic elementary script belonging to the system of humanistic
cursive, while retaining a few mercantile features.12
In the second half of the Cinquecento there developed a rounder, more
flowing version of the humanistic cursive termed by Cencetti `bastarda
italiana'.'3 This hand had curved ascenders and descenders ending in a
swelling or loop (Figures 9 and 1o).
Herde, `Die Schrift'; Black, Benedetto Accolti, pp. 155-7.
" An example is Pierantonio Sallando's copy of the Novellino and early vernacular verse, commis-
sioned in 1523, now BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 5214. On this scribe see Wardrop, `Pierantonio Sallando';
Mercati, Saggi, I, 43-5: Petrucci, `Copisti e libri', p. 522. Another example is BNCF, MS Nuovi
Acquisti rogo, attributed to Arrighi, illustrated in Casamassima, Trattati, pl. A.
9 Petrucci,
`Scrittura, alfabetismo', 166-78.
° Clement, `Sixteenth-century Italian writing books', 408.
" Petrucci, `Scrittura, alfabetismo', 195 n. 40. " Ibid., 177-8, 195-6.
Cencetti, Lineamenti, pp. 272-3.
 62 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Within these general categories, with their different cultural connotations,
the hands of individual writers, especially those who were not professional
copyists, were varied and often hybrid in nature. Both mercantile and
humanistic cursive forms are present in the hands of Niccol6 Michelozzi,
secretary to the Medici in the second half of the fifteenth century, and of
Pietro Aretino in the first half of the sixteenth.'4 A writer might alternate
between forms within the same document, using for example both the
humanistic `r' and the `2'-shaped gothic variety, or both the upright and the
uncial V. Writers, or those who commissioned copying, could also choose
between scripts according to the primary function of the document being
prepared. If, for instance, this document was intended to make a good
impression on someone else, then one would prefer an elegant, calligraphic
book hand, which might require a highly trained (and better, paid) scribe.
On the other hand, an informal cursive, quicker to write, would suffice if
the document was to be read by oneself or within one's immediate circle.'S
As a work was diffused in varying contexts, it might be written in different
scripts according to the training of the scribes and to the contexts of copy-
ing; a case in point is that of the manuscripts of Machiavelli's R principe,
discussed in Chapter 4 Section i.
Learning to write followed the learning of the rudiments of reading as
the second stage of elementary education, for those who received one. For
some children, especially girls, this education was given in the home, by
parents or other relatives, or by private tutors in families that could afford
them. Young employees probably received basic instruction in writing in
`scuole di bottega' (shop schools).' The minority of boys who attended
a school were taught to write by elementary teachers, known sometimes
in the fifteenth century as `maestri di leggere et scrivere' (reading and
writing masters). These men tended to have a lower level of culture than
those teaching a more advanced syllabus: they used vernacular rather
than Latin for their letters and petitions and submitted their tax returns
" L. Miglio, — Perché ho charestia"', p. 198 and fig. 39; Marini, `Un documento', 97; see, too,
Supino, `La scrittura', pp. 226-7.
Thus for example the hand of Poliziano varied, according to the context, from an elegant human-
istic cursive to rapidly written notes in a barely legible cursive, even while he was copying the
same work: Supino, `La scrittura', pp. 235, 238. Gentile identifies three different `realizations' of
the hand of the Florentine scribe Luca Fabiani and two of that of Antonio Sinibaldi (`Note sullo
"scrittoio"', pp. 375-94, 394-7)• Arrighi's hand becomes more informal (perhaps under time
pressure) in his transcription of Machiavelli's Chzia: Corrigan, `An unrecorded manuscript', 75.
Giambullari switched to a less formal hand in the concluding leaves of his anthology of lyric
verse, BNCF, MS Magl. VII 371, fols. 140"-6". Giraldi used three hands in his verse miscellany:
Messina, `Rime del XVI secolo', 109-10.
Petrucci, `Scrittura, alfabetismo', 188.
i Varieties of script and the teaching of handwriting 63
in mercantile script.'? In the sixteenth century, elementary school teachers
often taught reading and writing together with basic numeracy. When
one of them, Paolo Cataldi, was accused of heterodoxy a couple of years
after his arrival in Siena from Bologna in the summer of 1558, he declared
that he taught writing and arithmetic in school and as a private tutor.i8
From the records of the professions of faith that the 258 teachers working
in Venice in 1587 were obliged to make, we see that 66 of them taught
`scrivere' to their pupils, usually as part of a tripartite syllabus of `leggere,
scrivere e abbaco' (reading, writing and commercial mathematics). Their
pupils began their classes at ages between 5 and 10, with 7 as the norm,
and ended them by the age of 12. Each master had from about 14 to about
120 pupils. One, Flaminio Cecchetti, offered `grammatica, scriver, copiar
scritture', but `grammatica' (Latin) was normally offered on its own, as
the second stage of education."
One teacher, at least, appears to have offered a crash course in writing.
When Piero de'_ Medici was learning to write in Pistoia, aged six and a
half, his tutor, Poliziano, wrote on 26 August 1478 to the boy's father,
Lorenzo it Magnifico, that he was expecting such a teacher to provide
extra help for the boy: `Io attendo a Piero, e sollecitolo a scrivere; et in
pochi dì credo the vi scriverà, the Voi vi maraviglierete: ché abbiamo qua
un maestro, the in quindici dì insegna a scrivere, e fa maraviglie in questo
mestiero' (I am looking after Piero, and encouraging him to write; and
in a few days I think he will write to you, and you will be amazed; for
we have here a master who in a fortnight teaches how to write, and does
wonders in this profession). On 20 September Poliziano reported that
Piero was continuing to learn to write `e fassi un buono scrittore' (and
is becoming a good writer); indeed, next day the distinguished tutor was
able to enclose a letter composed and copied by the boy.20
Naturally, pupils began by imitating a model of the script to be learned,
starting with individual letters and progressing to passages whose content
would be appropriate to the style of writing concerned: more literary for
humanistic script, more practical for mercantile. Enea Silvio Piccolomini
observed in his treatise on the education of children (Tractatus de liberorum
17 Black, Humanism and Education, pp. 34-6. For an outline, see too Grendler, Schooling,
PP. 323-9•
', `Io so' scrittore e insegno a scrivere e d'albacho [ ... ] E tengho scola publica d'albaco e scrivere. E
ancora so' ito a insegnare in più case a diversi gentilomini' (I am a scribe and teach writing and
arithmetic. And I give public classes in arithmetic and writing. And I have also gone to teach
various gentlemen in several households): Marchetti, Gruppi ereticali, p. 213.
11 Baldo, Alunni, maestri e scuole, pp. 15, 43-81.
" Poliziano, Prose volgari inedite, letters XII, pp. 59-60, XVIII, pp. 64-5, XIX, p. 65.
 64 Handwriting and the work of copyists
educatione, 1450) that there were two systems of writing, `alter modernus,
alter antiquus' (one modern, the other ancient), in other words gothic and
humanistic, but that `Quemcunque modum segui puer voluit, in eo nec-
essarium est, exemplum Bari sibi pulcherrimum atque emendatissimum'
(whichever manner of writing the boy wishes to follow, he must be given
a very fair and correct exemplar).21 As Piccolomini implies, a choice would
normally be made, but some pupils will have wished to learn different
scripts so that they could use them in different contexts. A series of shorter
and longer texts in upright and cursive hands was copied out as exercises
in a small book by the fifteen-year-old Girolamo Moreschi in the sem-
inary of Cremona in 1597 (NAL, MS Lh870889 (86.EE.92)). For those
wishing to acquire professional writing skills, Tommaso Garzoni claimed
in his encyclopedia of trades and professions, printed in 1585,, there was no
shortage of expert masters available to teach `questa professione da pochi
bezzi' (this twopenny profession).22 Some expert scribes trained others
to use their scripts: in the mid-fifteenth century, for instance, Giovanni
Marco Cinico declared himself the `discipulus' (pupil) of Pietro Strozzi
of Florence in several of his colophons, and Antonio Sinibaldi probably
taught Alessandro da Verrazzano.23
In the Cinquecento some enterprising teachers and scribes took advan-
tage of the printing press in order to make resources available for learn-
ing and teaching handwriting skills outside schools. The first provider of
such material, at a relatively basic level, was the Venetian scribe Giovanni
Antonio Tagliente. Teaching writing was not the main purpose of his Libro
maistrevole (Book of instruction) of 1524. He, in collaboration with his son
Pietro, was setting out primarily to provide a manual that could be used
to teach reading to one's son or daughter or friend; indeed, he claimed on
fol. a2`-°, with this book `etiam le donne grandi, et piccole' (even adult and
young women) could learn to read without passing through the normal
curriculum of tavola (the `hornbook' containing letters of the alphabet,
syllables and some common Latin prayers), saltero (the `psalter', a booklet
with the same basic material and a higher number of Latin prayers) and
donato (an elementary Latin grammar). However, learning to imitate the
scripts used in the printing of the book would have been a by-product
of Tagliente's method, and indeed he mentions how necessary it is for
For Piccolomini, see Garin (ed.), 11 pensiero pedagogico, pp. 198-295 (pp. 272-4). For the distinc-
tion between `modern' and `ancient' letters, see Casamassima, `Litterae gothicae' and `Lettere
antiche'.
' Garzoni, La piazza universale, I, 309-
" De la Mare, `Messer Piero Strozzi', pp. 55-6 and `New research', p. 473-
i Varieties of script and the teaching of handwriting 65
`[li] poveri bisognosi' (poor needy people) to learn the noble skill `del
saper leggere, et scrivere, li loro bisogni' (of being able to read and write
their business, fol. E31. All but one of the twenty sheets of this quarto
volume are printed in italic script, which by implication is the first one
to learn, but one page at the end (fol. E49 provides a woodcut illustration
of Venetian mercantile script and of Florentine `lettera bastarda', a hybrid
of humanistic cursive and mercantile. Tagliente's comment on the latter
illustrates the practice of copying models: `La quale volendola imparare tu
imparerai prima a fare tutte le lettere de lo sotto schritto alphabeto ad una
per una tanto che l'averai imparate a fare et poi schriverai questa mostra la
qual sera per tuo essemplo' (If you wish to learn [this letter], you will first
learn to make all the letters of the alphabet that follows one by one until
you have learned to make them and then you will write this sample [the
alphabet below] which will be your exemplar).
Around the middle of the century, and still in Venice, Domenico
Manzoni produced a number of works to be used for teaching outside
the classroom or for self-teaching. One, printed in 1546, was a Libretto
molto utile per imparar a leggere, scrivere, et abaco. Con alcuni fondamenti
della dottrina christiana, intended for use by parents in teaching their own
children (fol. Rai°). After providing alphabets and prayers that would have
been used in learning to read, and an explanation of five basic punctu-
ation marks (fols. 1'a2`-1a7`), Manzoni turned to handwriting (`Dello scri-
vere', fols. 'a7'—ai). On four pages printed from woodcuts, he set out as
many minuscule and capital alphabets in a certain script together with an
appropriate short text written in that hand: one in the `littera canceller-
esca', with a Latin moral sentence warning against `luxuria' (extravagant
living) from the Christian author Lactantius; one in the `littera merchan-
tesca', with a business text; one in the `littera bastarda', also with a prac-
tical text; and another in `cancelleresca', with extracts from two letters in
the vernacular, to a lady and to a gentleman. The selection of the sample
texts reflects the contexts in which such scripts would be used. Four years
later Manzoni produced a manual with the same aims and using similar
methods, La vera et principal ricchezza de giovani, che desiderano imparar
ben legere, scrivere, et abaco. Con alcuni fondamenti della dottrina chris-
tiana. The scripts illustrated are, in order, the mercantile, the `bastarda'
and the humanistic cursive (fols. A8`—a1`). Manzoni announced that he
had gone to the not inconsiderable expense of having cut and cast a font
of `mercatantesca tonda veneziana' (round Venetian mercantile) modelled
on the hand of Francesco Alunno, a scribe working in Venice (fol. A1°).
The treatise on arithmetic begins in an italic font, but its last section
66 Handwriting and the work of copyists
(fols. D8`—E6`) is printed in this mercantile font, and Manzoni used it
again in a handbook on arithmetic and book-keeping, La brieve risolu-
tione di Aritmetica (1553).Z4
Specimen books of scripts could still be handwritten in the Cinquecento.
Examples are one written by Giovanbattista Palatino on vellum c. 1541
(Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Canon. It. 196); one written by Francesco
Moro c. 1560-70, also on vellum and very ornate (NAL, MS L11485/1946
(KRP.A.42)); and a simpler one written by Salvatore Gagliardelli on
paper in 158o for Girolamo Sommai (NAL, MS L/2879/1947 (86.SS.55))-
However, from the second decade of the century onwards there was a
remarkable flourishing of printed manuals describing the technical arts of
calligraphy and demonstrating — now through woodcut specimens — how
the varieties of humanistic and gothic (including mercantile), scripts were
formed. Their authors include Sigismondo Fanti, Ludovico degli Arrighi,
Tagliente, Ugo da Carpi, Eustachio Celebrino, Giovanbattista Verini,
Palatino, Vespasiano Amphiareo, Ferdinando Ruano, Augustino da Siena
(a Carthusian monk), Giovan Francesco Cresci, Giulio Antonio Ercolani,
Marcello Scalzini and Gagliardelli. Most of these men were professional
scribes, writing masters or both, and the list includes some of the leading
calligraphers of the period.z$ These manuals were aimed predominantly at
writers who would put their skills into practice in some professional con-
text, for instance as secretaries, clerks or book-keepers. The Piedmontese
author Annibal Guasco claims he taught chancery script to his daugh-
ter Lavinia between the ages of six and eleven (she was born in 1574) by
using examples from one of Cresci's books. Annibal says that he could
not form any of the characters himself, but his long-term aspiration was
that Lavinia might be appointed secretary to her mistress, the infanta
Caterina Michaela of Austria.26 Although the main emphasis of the man-
uals was on humanistic cursive and mercantile hands, some of the scripts
described would have been useful only to those who wrote in highly spe-
cialized contexts: for example, the hands to be used by those in the papal
chancery who copied papal bulls or the official letters known as briefs. A
few of the hands were, one suspects, just self-advertising displays of vir-
tuosity. Such interest in the more specialized aspects of calligraphy was
~4 Lucchi, Teggere', pp. 115-17. For Alunno, see Piscini, `Francesco Del Bailo'; Morison, Early
Italian Writing-Books, pp. 83-8; Barker, The Glory ofthe Art of Writing.
Surveys include Casamassima, Trattati; Osley, Luminario; Petrucci, `Scrittura, alfabetismo',
188-91; Morison, Early Italian Writing-Books.
2-6
See Guasco, Discourse to Lady Lavinia, pp. 18-21, 51—z, and p. 76 on his promise to provide
Lavinia with manuals on composing letters and writing correctly.
z Varieties of script and the teaching of handwriting 67
encouraged, paradoxically, by the opportunities offered by the printing
press, but also more generally, it has been suggested, by the inroads that
printing had made into book production: this process tended to make
handwriting a more individualistic activity with a more consciously aes-
thetic aim .27
Elegant copying in official contexts was important enough for some
states to make provision for the teaching of writing at a high level. Training
was provided for those preparing to work in the Venetian chancery. In
144.3 the Maggior Consiglio (Great Council) decreed that the state should
employ a dozen boys aged about twelve, with an annual salary of ten duc-
ats, in order to carry out various tasks in the chancery; they were also to
be educated in, among other things, `bene scribere' (writing well), and the
best pupils would be selected to become notaries in the doge's chancery.
Their numbers rose to sixteen, but a few of the boys were proving to be
inadequately trained; in 1446, therefore, the Senate decided that some-
one should be appointed to teach and select them, thus in effect forming
a professional chancery school, the beginnings of the humanistic Scuola
di San Marco. In 14.91 Tagliente proposed that he should be employed
to teach the young men in the chancery and others to write `el scrivere
cancellaresco con le sue rason' (chancery writing with its norms) and any
other sort of writing, `si antiqua, cancelleresca, mercadantesca, moderna
overo bastarda etc.' (formal and cursive humanistic, mercantile, gothic or
the `bastarda'). His proposal was rejected, but a year later he was given
a sinecure that left him free to teach. In 152-4. Tagliente could claim to
have been employed by the doge `per insegnar a scriver alli gioveni de la
Cancelleria' (to teach the chancery youths to write) for thirty-two years.
His impact on the style of handwriting in the chancery is indeed seen in
official registers from this period.21
In the Florentine chancery, Bastiano Foresi, who worked there from
1453 to 14.65, wrote out a formulary of sample letters, titles and salutations
that had a secondary function as a model of humanistic cursive script.29 In
Bologna, Pierantonio Sallando was appointed to teach the art of writing
in the university (where he had previously taught Latin) after settling in
the city in 14.89, and is last recorded in this employment in 1539-4o. A cer-
tain Francesco Salandi seems to have taken over this role regularly from
See for example Wardrop, The Script of Humanism, P. 46; Casamassima, Trattati, p. 9.
i8 Lazzarini, Scritti, pp. 64-70; Grendler, Schooling, pp. 6z-3. On Tagliente's influence on the
scribe Alberto Maffei, see Marcon, `Ornato di penna', 142-3.
~9 Black, Benedetto Accolti, pp. 156-7. On Foresi see, too, De la Mare, `New research', App. I,
no. 1o6, and pp. 594. 599.
 68 Handwriting and the work of copyists
1540, presumably as the successor of Pierantonio, who may have been his
father. The skill may have run in the family: a Francesco Maria Salandi
was called as an expert witness in handwriting in a Bolognese trial of
1582. Another distinguished scribe, Girolamo Pagliarolo, was paid by the
commune of Bologna to teach calligraphy and illumination between 1507
and 1514.30 In short, many sources of training in handwriting for general
or special purposes were available throughout the Renaissance, and the
skills of penmanship learned in contexts such as the chancery or trade
were easily transferable to the production of books.
2 PROFESSIONAL' SCRIBES
Most of the copying involved in the circulation of texts in, manuscript
during the Renaissance was carried out by people who were not writ-
ing for financial gain. Many instances of transcription described in other
chapters fall under this heading, whether those copying were authors or
users of texts. Throughout the period, however, a certain amount of copy-
ing was carried out by `professionals', if we can use this term to include
both a few whose main profession was that of scribe and a majority of
semiprofessionals who copied occasionally for payment or other kinds of
personal gain, or in connection with their main profession or vocation.
Such men, and sometimes women, could play an important part in the
social diffusion of literature, because they were called upon frequently by
authors (as will be seen in Section 3 below) and other users of handwrit-
ten texts for tasks ranging from the production of a copy to be presented
to someone of high rank to the making of a fair copy to be sent, in a rela-
tively informal way, to a friend.
In order to contextualize the activities of professional copyists in the
Quattrocento, we can use some surveys of scribes of all kinds. From two
studies carried out by Petrucci, using sources such as the colophons of
manuscripts (of which only a minority, of course, were signed by their
transcribers), a clear distinction emerges between two areas of activity. On
the one hand, of a sample of 318 scribes who were copying manuscripts
that contained vernacular texts or that did not have a high commercial
value, the great majority were amateurs, writing for themselves or their
immediate circles and based in their own cities. When they give motives
for their writing, they cite for example the pleasure or consolation of
3° Wardrop, `Pierantonio Sallando', 9-1o, u n. t, 16-18. On F. M. Salandi, see Evangelisti, Accepto
calamo', 26o n. 2o.
2 Professional'scribes 69
t hemselves and other unspecified readers (`per piacere', `per consolatione a
me e a chi to legierà'), or recreation (`per mio spasso'). Only 36 were pro-
fessional scribes or declared they were working on behalf of others; they
included 3 notaries, 3 librarians, a schoolteacher and 6 prisoners (who may
have had little choice in the matter; some could have been debtors, trying
to pay off what they owed). On the other hand, of about 400 scribes in
Petrucci's sample who were copying texts in Latin or using vellum as a
support, the great majority were professional.' Another survey of scribes
reflects the strength of this activity among Tuscans and in Florence, and
shows that copyists were writing both for themselves and for others.32
Scribes in Rome, often employed in the households of prelates, were not
badly off, but their occupation was not high on the social scale; copying
often appears to have been temporary work, undertaken while waiting for
something better to turn up33
Most often, it appears, scribes in the fifteenth century would be
employed directly by or on behalf of the person who intended to use
the text, rather than by a commercial middleman such as a bookseller.
Members of the court of Ferrara under Duke Borso d'Este (1450-71) and
his successor Ercole I (1471-1505) had vernacular and Latin texts copied by
scribes such as Andrea da le Vieze, Vitaliano Trotti, Niccol6 dei Passini,
Niccol6 Mascarino and Alvise Rossetti. Andrea, who was also an illu-
minator, oversaw the work of other scribes. To judge from court accounts,
they were paid ad hoc rather than being salaried, and payment could
be made through a stationer, a court official or Andrea 34 In 1488 Ercole
arranged for a team of scribes to copy, for Lorenzo de' Medici, Niccol6
Leoniceno's vernacular translation of the work of the Greek historian Dio
Cassius, `in lettera corsiva'. Ercole gave strict instructions, however, that
Lorenzo had to promise not to publish the work (he uses mettere fuori
and dar fuori) or allow it to be printed35
Ferrarese ambassadors in Florence arranged copying there on behalf of
the Estensi. In 1468, Borso ordered A gold ducats to be sent to Niccol6
Roberti to pay for a vernacular translation of one decade of Livy's history
on behalf of Alberto d'Este, the duke's half-brother. Presumably Roberti
" Petrucci, `Pouvoir de l'écriture', 825-8. On writing in prison see, too, Cursi, Il Decameron',
pp. io5—u. The aristocrat Giovan Francesco di Montefalcione copied poetic texts in BNN,
MS XIII G 37 after his imprisonment in Naples in 1489: Corti in De Jennaro, Rime e lettere,
pp. clxxxvii, 163.
Nucci and Signorini, `Un censimento'; Signorini, `Copisti', 62-5.
Caldelli, Copisti a Roma, pp. 149-50.
34 Bertoni, La Biblioteca Estense, pp. 35-40. 45 and `Notizie'.
75 Cappelli, `Lettere', 304-5•
70 Handwriting and the work of copyists
was to have the text copied in Florence, since we find him writing to
Alberto on 2 March 147o about the transcription of the third and fourth
decades. His letter gives an idea of the negotiations and costs involved in
this sort of commission:
La terza deca ho fatto cominciare ad uno buon scrittore, che dice che mai non
cesserà che le leverà tutte due, ciò è la terza e la quarta [...1 Io do bolognini
quaranta del quinterno al scrittore e dodici ne costa la carta, che son cinquanta e
due. Mi è detto che tra lo inminiare, legare e copiare che venirà circa uno ducato
al quinterno. Ho cercato tutti li scrittori che scrivono, ed assotigliato quanto mi
è stato possibile, a pena l'ho ridotto a quel segno, perché stava duro che voleva al
quinterno uno fiorino di suggello, che son quaranta e cinque bolognini ad oro,
che vengono presso a quaranta sei a moneta.
(I have had the third decade begun by a good scribe, who says he will not stop
until he has finished off both, i.e. the third and the fourth [ ... ] I am paying the
scribe 4o bolognini a gathering, and the paper costs 12, which makes 52. 1 have
been told that illumination, binding and copying will come to about one ducat
a gathering. I have tried all the scribes that are writing, and cut costs as far as I
can. It was hard to get him down to that price, because he insisted that for each
gathering he wanted a sealed florin, which is worth 45 gold bolognini or nearly
46 in cash.)
Roberti had been assured by others that the scribe was competent and
experienced in such works. Eight days later he told Alberto that he was
still awaiting instructions and that the scribe was continuing his copy-
ing. This was an expensive undertaking, out of the reach of all but the
wealthiest. Seventy florins a year was more than enough, it was reckoned
in a contemporary collection of stories and sayings, for a couple and three
or four children to live `civilemente' (decently)36 In 1475 another Ferrarese
ambassador in Florence, Niccolò Bendidio, offered to have Landino's
translation of Pliny copied for Borso's successor, Ercole, by the same
copyist who had been paid Zoo ducats by the king of Naples to transcribe
the translation; the rate would be about 8 lire (equivalent to 1.4 florins in
that year) for writing each gathering (`quinterno') and for the paper 37
Of the scribes working in Milan for the Sforza and their court, Pagano
da Rho (Paganus Raudensis) signed manuscripts between 1456 and 1466,
g6 Bertoni, La Biblioteca Estense, pp. 258-9, Cappelli, `Lettere', 2,50-1, and De la Mare, `New
research', P. 419. On the fiorino di suggello, worth less than the gold florin, see Goldthwaite
and Mandich, Studi, pp. 31-3, 52-4. For the figure of 70 florins, see Motti e facezie del Piovano
Arlotto, p. 174. For further examples of the prices of manuscripts, see below on Buonaccorsi and
Richardson, Printing, Writers and Readers, pp. 113-14.
37 Barbato, Appunti sul testo del Plinio', 122-3. The manuscripts containing the original transcrip-
tion are described in De Marinis, La biblioteca napoletana, II, 130-1. For the exchange rate, see
Goldthwaite, The Building of Renaissance Florence, p. 43o.
a Professional'scribes 71
an anonymous copyist produced manuscripts datable to 1450-77 or later,
the poet Tommaso Curte signed five manuscripts between 147z and
1487, copied mostly for members of the Sforza family, and an anonym-
ous copyist, possibly Filippo Conte (de Comite), worked from the later
Quattrocento until at least 1509.3$ Scribes working for the Aragonese
court of Naples either had a regular salary or were paid for each piece of
work.39
Another but, it appears, much less common type of arrangement was
professional copying organized by a bookseller or stationer. The most
famous fifteenth-century example is that of Vespasiano da Bisticci.¢O His
activity as a bookseller, specializing in classical texts, can be traced from
the 1440s (with the earliest dated sale in 1442) to the late 147os. Among
the clients who commissioned copying through Vespasiano were not only
wealthy Florentine collectors but many high-ranking men from outside
the city and even outside Italy. Vespasiano also had humanistic works cop-
ied for purchase `off the shelf' by casual customers; for instance, a batch
was sent to his agent in Naples in about 1457.4' The scribes employed by
Vespasiano (as freelances, working on their own premises rather than in
his shop) included Gherardo di Giovanni del Ciriagio, Piero di Benedetto
Strozzi and Niccolò di Antonio Ricci. Some other booksellers in Florence
(such as Zanobi di Mariano), and no doubt in other cities, also acted as
middlemen in this way, but it must be remembered that Vespasiano was
an exception: even in Florence, no other stationer produced new books on
the scale that he did.¢7
A few of these scribes considered copying texts to be their principal
profession. In Florence, for example, Niccol6 Fonzio was described as
`scriptor' (writer) in 1477, and Antonio Sinibaldi wrote in his return for
the catasto (tax census) of 1480 that `lo exercitio mio è solo di scrivere a
pretio' (my business is only writing for payment).43 Those for whom copy-
ing was their main professional activity might need to travel in search
of commissions or a more permanent post. Giovan Marco Cinico, from
Parma, worked mainly in Naples and also appears in Florentine records
for 146o-1 and 1463.44 Sinibaldi, from Carmignano near Prato, worked in
3" De la Mare, `Script and manuscripts'. 39 De Marinis, La biblioteca napoletana, I, 42.
° De la Mare, `New research', pp. 4o1-6, `Vespasiano da Bisticci e i copisti fiorentini' and
`Vespasiano da Bisticci as producer'; Cursi, `Ghinozzo di Tommaso Allegretti', 242-4. On pro-
fessional scribes in the Quattrocento, see too Cursi, 'Fare scrivere il Boccaccio'.
De la Mare, `New research', P. 404 and `Vespasiano da Bisticci as producer', pp. 176, zoi—z.
De la Mare, `New research', pp. 4o6-8.
;' Ibid., pp. 46o-1; Petrucci, `Copisti e libri manoscritti', p. 507-
41 De Marinis, La Biblioteca napoletana, I, 4z-51; De la Mare, 'New research', p. 439 and App. I,
no. 30.
72 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Florence but also spent periods in the Neapolitan court, employed at first
with an annual salary and then paid per manuscript.45 In Rome, there is
no evidence of scribes occupying the same workshop, but they did some-
times share out work on the same manuscript.46 A number of non-Italian
scribes came to work in the peninsula, particularly in the second half of
the century and in Rome.47 In De la Mare's census of 1o6 humanistic
scribes active in Florence in the second half of the fifteenth century, of
whom 71 have names or at least initials, there are 7 known foreigners; one
may have been a student seeking to make ends meet.41 Foreign scribes in
the Ferrara of Ercole d'Este included a Janes de Francia and a Bernardo
d'Alamagna.49
Copying texts, whether for payment or voluntarily, was most often a
part-time activity, carried out alongside other occupations. ,Of the iden-
tifiable scribes in De la Mare's census, eleven were notaries" In both
Florence and Milan, chancery employees, some of them also notaries,
copied literary texts51 Felice Feliciano of Verona combined his scribal
craft with bookbinding51 In the only known Roman contract for writ-
ing, a medical student undertook to copy a law manuscript, receiving
three ducats as a down payment S3 The scribes who sometimes worked
professionally might also write out texts (generally in a more informal
version of their cursive hand) for use by themselves or their families, as
in the cases of the Florentines Giorgio Antonio Vespucci and Bartolomeo
Fonzio 54 Another important category of people who copied in conjunc-
tion with their other duties is made up of members of the clergy. De la
Mare's list includes seven Italian priests and three religious, and three
foreign clerics (two priests and a friar). Some of their manuscripts are,
as one would expect, liturgical, but not all of them were carried out for
their own community or church55 Individual nuns in the Veronese con-
vent of Santo Spirito copied St Augustine's De civitate Dei in 1472 and a
45 Ullman, The Origin, pp. 118-23; De la Mare, `New research', P. 46o and App. I, no. 6.
;6 Caldelli, Copisti a Roma, pp. 92-3. 47 Ibid., pp. 25-32.
41 De la Mare, `New research', pp. 417-18; Petrucci, `Pouvoir de l'écriture', 827, with further
examples of mobility among Italian scribes.
41 Bertoni, La Biblioteca Estense, pp. 38-9. 5° De la Mare, `New research', pp. 417-18.
5 ' Examples from Florence are Bastiano Foresi, mentioned above, and Luca Fabiani, on whom
see De la Mare, `New research', P. 465 and App. I, no. 42; Gentile, `Note sullo "scrittoio"',
PP. 361-97. For an anonymous Milanese example, see De la Mare, `Script and manuscripts',
PP. 4o6-7.
Hobson, Humanists and Bookbinders, pp. 3-5. 59 Caldelli, Copisti a Roma, P. 20.
S4 De la Mare, `New research', pp. 417-18, 444-8•
55 Ibid., pp. 4
17, 475-6. Liturgical manuscripts, which lie outside the scope of this study, continued
to be produced in some numbers after 1475; see for example Baroffio (ed.), Iter liturgicum.
2 Professional'scribes 73
collection of saints' lives in 1484. In the convent of Clarissans in Perugia,
four nuns shared between themselves in 1512 the task of copying a Libro di
vita by fra Gabriele da Perugia56 The Benedictine convent of Le Murate
in Florence was well known for the scribal activity of its nuns, some of
it carried out on commission alongside other money-making activities.
When rebuilding was carried out there after a fire in 1471, ten small writ-
ing cubicles were created, but these did not prove sufficient, and by the
end of the sixteenth century the number of cubicles had risen to twenty-
six. Only a minority of the nuns, of whom there were between 15o and
200, would have been writing at one time, but copying was clearly an
important activity for a significant number of them57
How far did the activities of professional scribes alter from the late fif-
teenth to the sixteenth century, as the impact of printing on book produc-
tion began to be felt? Vespasiano da Bisticci handed over his stationer's
shop probably in 1478 and declared in his catasto return for 148o that `Non
va più affare nulla' (Business is no good any more); but having manu-
scripts copied had in any case been a speculative sideline in comparison
with his regular trade in stationery.5$ Sinibaldi lamented in his return for
the same catasto that his business `è ridocto per mezo della stampa in
modo the apena ne tragho it vestito' (has been reduced because of print-
ing so that it barely pays for my clothing) and that writing `è exercitio
infermissimo' (is a very insecure profession). He was undoubtedly reflect-
ing a real difficulty; however, a declaration made for taxation purposes
needs to be taken with a pinch of salt, and one notes that Sinibaldi car-
ried on his work to at least 149959 Scribes and music scribes in Florence
were numerous enough in the late fifteenth century to have had carnival
songs written about their profession, with the double entendres (about dip-
ping pens in inkwells and so on) that are to be expected in this genre.6o
In the Cinquecento, men continued to earn a living, or at least to sup-
plement their income, with scribal work in a broad sense, which would
have included copying literary texts at the request of authors or would-be
56 L. Miglio, "`A mulieribus"', pp. 262-3 and pls. 4b and 5c (Verona), P. 239 (Perugia).
57 Lowe, Nuns' Chronicles, pp. 151 (numbers), 288-99 (copying). On copying by nuns, see too
Plebani, Il `genere' dei libri, pp. 170 -1; Weaver, Convent Theatre, pp. 27-8, 34-6; Delcorno
Branca, `II Giardino novello'.
e De la Mare, `New research', pp. 402 and n. 51 (with information on other financial problems in
the family), 413-14.
19 De Marinis, La biblioteca napoletana, I, 52-5; Ullman, The Origin, pp. u9-2i; De la Mare, 'New
research', P. 46o; Petrucci, `Copisti e libri manoscritti', p. 507.
60 `Canzona degli scrittori', in Singleton (ed.), Canti carnascialeschi, pp. 94-5 (derived from printed
editions of the 148os), and `Per scriptores' and the fragment on music scribes in Singleton (ed.),
Nuovi canti carnascialeschi, pp. 119, 134.
_PPP_
74 Handwriting and the work of copyists
owners. A census compiled in Rome in late 1526 or early 1527, before the
Sack that took place in May, reveals a good number of scribes, concen-
trated mainly in the Parione district (bordering on the Campo dei Fiori),
the heart of the city's book trade. Out of a total population that can be
estimated at just over 55,000, the Parione had 6,319 inhabitants, and here
28 heads of household declared themselves to be copyists of one sort or
another. Most of them, 22 in all, are recorded as `copista' (one of them
French), 4 as `scriptor apostolico', 2 as `scriptor' or `escriptor' (one of them
German).' The terms used, copista and scrittore, seem to be synonymous.
Public scribes or scriveners also had thriving businesses in Venice.6Z
What kinds of work did these scribes undertake? We can begin by con-
sidering three specialized kinds of copying. The first is that of calligraphic
copying, which would have been linked with the work of illuminators
and fine bookbinders. Historians of script have noted that in the sixteenth
century there was a greater concentration of this kind of work on prod-
ucts such as choir books for churches and religious houses, or de luxe cop-
ies for presentation, for bibliophile collectors or to mark special occasions
(including Books of Hours, charters and congratulatory addresses), but
that expert scribes continued to be employed to copy texts that were not
in print.6 3 Those whose activity extended from the fifteenth century into
the third decade of the sixteenth include Sigismondo Sigismondi of Carpi,
and Sallando and Pagliarolo in Bologna.6 4 The leading calligraphic scribe
of the second and third decades of the Cinquecento was Ludovico degli
Arrighi, a native of Vicenza who reached eminence in Rome as a copyist,
a writing master and later as a printer, before probably being killed in the
Sack of 1527. A number of surviving presentation manuscripts were com-
missioned from Arrighi between about i5io and the mid-1520s. Others
were copied by scribes who wrote in a humanistic cursive hand close to
his, such as the Spaniard Genesius de la Barrera, and who were therefore
working in his environment and probably in collaboration with him.65
Gnoli, 'Descriptio urbis', pp. 454-66; Cherubini, 'Note', 218.
6xDe Vivo, Information and Communication, pp. 6o, 108, 12 3-5.
See, as well as n. 25 above, Wardrop, `Pierantonio Saltando', 7; De la Mare, 'Script and manu-
scripts', p. 399 and 'New research', pp. 413-15, 466, with particular reference respectively to
Bologna, Milan and Florence; Petrucci, 'Copisti e libri manoscritti', pp. 516-25. For a survey
of manuscript and printed dedication copies in the circle of Lorenzo de' Medici, see Fubini and
others, `Opere di dedica'.
'4 For Sigismondi see Bertoni, La Biblioteca Estense, p. 264, Cockerell, 'Signed manuscripts' and
De la Mare, 'New research', pp. 473-4 and App. I, no. 66; for Saltando and Pagtiarolo, see nn.
8 and 3o above.
Casamassima, `Ludovico degli Arrighi; Ruysschaert, 'Le Copiste Genesius'; Petrucci, 'Copisti e
libri manoscritti', pp. 520-1.
z Professio na/ 'se ribes 75
Among distinguished scribes working in Rome later in the century were
Francesco da Monterchi, who copied for the Farnese family, Ferdinando
Ruano (another Spaniard) and Giovan Francesco Cresci of Milan. The ci
last two were among those who held the post of `scriptor Latinus', a scribe
permanently attached to the Vatican library, being appointed respectively
in 1541 and 1556.« They also, we saw, composed writing-books, and the
number of such volumes published in print-suggests that there was a con-
siderable readership of people wishing to learn penmanship at a skilled
level for professional purposes of one sort or another.
In other specialized sectors professional scribes continued to play an
important role. One was that of manuscripts with musical notation
(Figure 15). These were used by many of those involved in music as pro-
fessionals or amateurs, partly because until 1540 the printing of music
was technically difficult; it has been suggested that manuscripts rather
than print helped to diffuse a new type of music, the madrigal, during
the 152os and 1530s.67 Ercole d'Este doubtless had a professional scribe in
mind when in 1490 he lent to his daughter Isabella a manuscript song-
book in order to have it copied by someone else:
Visto el desiderio the tenete the vi vogliamo prestare per qualche giorno el
libro nostro de le canzone, acciò ve ne potiati fare iranscrivere alchune et ve
mandamo per questo nostro correro a posta ditto libro. Vedeti mo de fare tran-
scrivere quello the vi piace, et poi mandaticelo salvamente.
(Seeing the wish you have for us to lend you for several days our book of songs so
that you can have some of them copied, we are sending it to you with our rider.
Have whatever you like copied and then send it back to us safely.)6a
There was also a considerable amount of copying of texts in Greek.
Nicolas Barker has identified three reasons for the large quantity of sur-
viving manuscripts copied by Greek scribes: since the Turkish conquest of
Constantinople in 1453 there was an abundance of Greek exiles in Italy,
and especially in Venice, `with only one skill, the ability to write Greek, to
earn their livelihood'; the market for Greek books was strong, as interest
" See, on Francesco, Wardrop, 'Pierantonio Sallando', 24, Casamassima, Trattati, P. 75 and
Morison, Early Italian Writing-Books, pp. 86-8, 123; on Ruano and Cresci, Wardrop, 'The
Vatican scriptors', Casamassima, Trattati, pp. 63-74 and Morison, Early Italian Writing-Books,
pp. 9z —u1. On the Vatican 'scriptors' of Latin, Greek and Hebrew see Agati, Giovanni Onorio,
PP. 25, 29.
ej Fenlon and Haar, the Italian Madrigal, p. 84; Fenlon, Tetrarch, Petrarchism', pp. 136-8. On
the Florentine musician and scribe Giovanpiero Masaconi, see Fenlon and Haar, The Italian
Madrigal, pp. 32-4, 123-30; Canguilhem, 'Lorenzo Corsini's "libri di canzone"', especially
Pp. t3-2o.
6" Prizer, 'Una "virtù molto convenience"', 15 (Prizer's translation).
76 Handwriting and the work of copyists
in Greek literature, both classical and post-classical, gathered pace, but
it was scattered, and this favoured scribal rather than print circulation;
and printing Greek, like printing music, presented many technical dif-
ficulties.'9 Those who commissioned Greek manuscripts included Pietro
Bembo, Guillaume Pellicier and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza?° Baldesar
Castiglione, then in Mantua, had some Greek texts copied in Rome in
1523, using as his agent there a Mantuan merchant, Benedetto Adelardo
Da Porto 71
The services of Greek scribes were, however, not always easy to obtain.
In 1488, Lorenzo de' Medici offered to send one to Ferrara to make a
copy of a manuscript of Dio Cassius that its owner, Battista Guarino,
refused to send to Florence; presumably this was easier than finding such
a scribe in Ferrara?z It was probably to Greek scribes that a great collector
of, manuscripts, Cardinal Niccol6 Ridolfi, was referring when he wrote
to Giovan Giorgio Trissino on 4 January 1525: `Di scrittori se non ce n'è,
patientia. Non di meno se vi capitasse qualch'uno secondo it bisogno nos-
tro, vi piacerà insieme con m[esse]r Laschari intertenirlo a nostro nome, et
venendo li calami ci saranno carissimi' (If there aren't any scribes, never
mind. Neverthless, if you were to find one of the sort we need, please
engage him together with [the Greek scholar Janus] Lascaris on our
behalf, and when the pens arrive we shall be very pleased). One inventory
put the number of Greek manuscripts in Ridolfi's library at 618, alongside
a mere 127 in Latin?3
A letter of Annibal Caro, dated 31 August 1561, tells us something of the
problems of finding Greek scribes in Rome, outside those employed by
the Vatican library. He was responding to an enquiry about copying three
Greek texts for Guidobaldo II della Rovere, duke of Urbino. `Scrittori ci
sono pochi', he wrote, `e quelli la più parte servono a la libraria sopradetta,
e non è for lecito a scriver per altri' (There are few copyists, and most
of them are in the service of the above-mentioned [Vatican] library, and
they are not allowed to copy for others). He had managed to find three
potential scribes and enclosed a `mostra' (sample) of the writing of two of
them, to show `la forma de la lettera' (the appearance of the script) and the
amount of writing on the page, so that a price could be calculated. One of
69 Barker, Aldus Manutius, p. 12; see, too, pp. ii-2o for a survey of these Greek scribes, and Zorzi,
`La circolazione', 164.
jO See for example Irigoin, `Les Ambassadeurs à Venise' (pp. 404-5 on Pellicier and Hurtado de
Mendoza); Palau, `Les Copistes de Guillaume Pellicier'; Hobson, Renaissance Book Collecting,
PP- 72-84-
7'Rebecchini, `Further evidence'; U. Motta, Castiglione e il mito di Urbino, pp. 405-7-
7= Cappelli, `Lettere', 246-7, 304. '3 Ridolfi, `La bibliotecá, 176-7.
2 Professional'scribes 77
the samples was written by the young daughter of a Greek scribe judged
by Caro to be the best of the day, Giovanni Onorio, a native of Maglie,
in a Greek-speaking area of Puglia, who was the first `scriptor' in Greek in
the Vatican between 1535 and 1563. Giovanni's own commitments to papal
work prevented him, according to Caro, from taking on other tasks:
`Non puo scriver esso proprio perché è occupato da Nostro Signore' (he
himself cannot copy because he is employed by the Holy Father); how-
ever, he would correct what his daughter transcribed. The second sample
was written by a dependant of Giovanni: the papal scribe evidently took
advantage of his position and reputation to subcontract commissions to
others. Caro suggested giving one text to each of the three scribes, `per far
presto' (to speed things up). However, he reiterated, `qui è carestia di chi
scriva' (there is a shortage of scribes here). The charges proposed by the
scribes were calculated according to a certain number of pages for one
scudo (roughly equivalent to a florin or ducat). For this amount Giovanni
Onorio offered only ten pages, which Caro thought might be raised to
twelve. The cheapest rate, twenty pages per scudo, was offered by a third
scribe, perhaps Emanuele Provataris, whose `lettera' (script) was not so
`formatd (formal). Onorio's salary in the Vatican was between 7z and
96 scudi a year, a respectable sum; other `scriptors' earned less, between
48 and 6o scudi. In spite of what Caro claimed about Onorio's working
exclusively for the pope, towards the end of his life Onorio copied at some
point for Cardinal Alessandro Farnese (as well as for his grandfather
Paul III) and for Cardinal Nicco16 Ridolfi 74
Much of the work of copying texts would have been less specialized.
However, we are at present not well informed on scribes who carried out
routine work. When studying scribes in the fifteenth century, scholars
have tended to give their attention to the most elegant scribes and to some
cities at the expense of others, such as Venice; for the sixteenth century,
we so far know even less. Although we can name some professional scrit-
tori, there must have been many others, often obscure figures, who copied
manuscripts as a part-time activity or as part of another job. In Venice,
for example, one `Jacomo servidor de chasa Celsi' (Jacomo servant of the
Celsi household) and Don Amadio Valier, canon regular of the monastery
on the island of Santo Spirito, wrote out local chronicles, and Francesco
Hieronimiani of Udine, a tutor in the Venetian household of Bernardo
~1 Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 637 (III, 8o-2). On Giovanni Onorio, see Agati, Giovanni Onorio
(pp. 30-1 on the salaries, pp. 6o-2 on Provataris and Giovanni's unnamed daughter, pp. 192-8
on the Farnese manuscripts, pp. 210-13 on Ridolfi). In 1566 Lodovico Moggio was paid 2 giuli
(about o.2 scudi) per large folio page (not in Greek) in the Vatican library: Bertolotri, `Varietà'
(1878), P. 26.
78 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Morosini, was ordered in 1588 to copy out some books of magic in his
humanistic cursive?,
Someone who must have been a fairly typical part-time copyist working
in Florence around the early Cinquecento is Biagio Buonaccorsi, already
mentioned in Chapter I. Buonaccorsi no doubt copied some works for his
own pleasure, but he also sold his copies, at least after 1512. His Libro di
ricordi details some of the payments he received. In 1516 and again in 1520
he records sales of various manuscripts copied by him (perhaps in some
cases on commission) to the brothers Pandolfo and Tinorino Bellacci, to
their father Marco Bellacci, and to the bibliophile Giovanni Gaddi. The
authors of the works concerned are not all identified, but they include
the philosopher Marsilio Ficino (uncle of the first of Buonaccorsi's four
wives, Alessandra), Filippo Beroaldo, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola
and Machiavelli. The lowest price that Buonaccorsi noted was 7 soldi for
some works of Beroaldo. Machiavelli's Arte della guerra, in folio, cost a
great deal more. One copy cost one florin (worth 140 soldi) and 15 grossi
(silver coins worth 7 soldi each), thus equivalent to 245 soldi, though
Buonaccorsi received only two fiorini larghi (broad or large florins, which
from 1471 had become a money of account with a value at that point
of about three-quarters of the gold florin). Another Arte della guerra,
that must have been more costly to prepare, sold for 3 fiorini larghi and
15 grossi. Buonaccorsi records having sold Machiavelli's Il principe for
2 fiorini larghi. He also presented a manuscript of IZ principe as a gift
to Pandolfo Bellacci (Figure 8). Transcription, without the extra cost of
binding, was charged to the client at either 35 soldi or 5 grossi per gather-
ing, and payment was made direct to the scribe, without passing via a
bookseller. Income from sales such as these, and favours given in return
for gifts, would have represented important resources for him. One term
of comparison for the commercial value of these manuscripts is the sal-
aries paid to Buonaccorsi and his chancery colleagues: his basic chancery
salary on appointment in 1498 was 48 gold florins a year, the first chan-
cellor's was 330 sealed florins and Machiavelli's, as second chancellor, was
192 sealed florins. Buonaccorsi's manuscripts were by no means cheap,
then, if one considers that his hand is elegant and pleasant to read, but
not calligraphic when compared for instance to that of Arrighi?6
75 BNP, MS It. 319 and BMCV, MS Cicogna 296; see Carile, La cronachistica, pp. 56-7, 132-3
(chronicles). Barbierato, Nella stanza dei circoli, P. 203 (Hieronimiani).
76 Martelli, `Preistoria (medicea)', 377-83; Fachard, Biagio Buonaccorsi, especially pp. 12, 158-65,
210—u, 215. On the fiorino largo, see Goldthwaite and Mandich, Studi sulla moneta fiorentina,
PP- 30, 35-6, 54-7, 99. For the chancellors' salaries, see Ridolfi, Vita di Niccolò Machiavelli,
3 Authors' use of scribes 79
Two manuscripts of one of Buonaccorsi's own works, his record of
events between 1498 and 1512, provide further examples of the employ-
ment of several scribes working in coordination. In one, BLF, MS LXII
23, five scribes used similar but far from identical humanistic cursives. The
manuscript contains 104 leaves of which the first and last two are blank.
The margins were ruled in the same way throughout. The text was divided
into five units that corresponded to gatherings to be copied rather than to
chronological sections of Buonaccorsi's narrative. Scribe I took on the first
and third units, fols. 2r-49° and 66r-771, amounting to well over half the
text. However, on fol. 15v he handed over in mid-page to a second scribe,
who wrote just two leaves before handing back to the first scribe after five
lines of fol. 17v. These two were thus working in sequence. Scribes 3, 4 and
5, working separately but probably contemporaneously, each took on a sec-
tion of between Io and 16 leaves (fols. 5or-65" 78r-87 88r-102"). Scribe 4
found himself short of space on his final page and had to cram in 37 lines
instead of his usual 28-30. The other manuscript, BNCF, MS Magl. XXV
279, of 149 leaves, was also copied by five scribes. Scribe I wrote fols. Ir-39r
(39"-48° are blank), scribe 2 fols. 49r-72°, scribe 3 fols. 73'-82v, scribe 4 fols.
83r-98" and I25r-49°, while scribe 5 wrote fols. 99r—I13v and 115'-24' (fol. 114
is blank even though the same scribe was continuing). Again, each of the
humanistic cursives used has distinctive features (and each scribe presents
his headline, if he uses one, in a different way), the units copied are of
varying sizes and correspond rigidly to gatherings, and there is some mis-
calculation of the space needed for each section of text — but this time too
much space is allocated. Those who commissioned these manuscripts from
teams of scribes would have gained time, then, but they did not always
have uniformity of presentation as a priority.
3 AUTHORS' USE OF SCRIBES
Many authors made their own copies of their works, and some even
wrote their presentation manuscripts. Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti, a
notary and secretary to Andrea Bentivoglio (a distant relation of the lord
of Bologna, Giovanni II Bentivoglio) until the latter's death in 1491, was
a very active copier of his works, often for members of the Bentivoglio
and Este families. He transcribed the De civica salute for Andrea's father
I, 33. A contemporary of Buonaccorsi, Francesco da Meleto (whom we shall meet again in
Chapter 4 Section 2), was employed as a clerk or scrivener to keep the records of the Servites of
the Santissima Annunziata in Florence from 1508, and his annual salary rose to 24 broad florins:
Dall'Aglio, `L'altra faccia'.
80 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Lorenzo (BCAB, MS B1444) and, while Andrea was still alive, he put
together an anthology of verse by himself and other members of Andrea's
circle (Bologna, Bibl. Universitaria, MS 165). He made two vellum cop-
ies of his Hymeneus Bentivolus (BPP, MS Parmense 1294; BCAB, MS
B46o2), an account of the wedding in 1487 of Giovanni II's eldest son
Annibale and Lucrezia d'Este that seems to have formed part of a publi-
city campaign conducted in manuscript and intended to raise the status
of the Bentivoglio. Sabadino wrote a vellum copy of his Novelle porretane
(BNCF, MS Palatino 503) that became one of six of his manuscripts owned
by Ercole d'Este. Two autograph manuscripts are known of his collection
of biographies of famous women, Gynevera de le Clare donne, dedicated to
Ginevra Sforza, wife of Giovanni II (Bologna, Archivio di Stato, Codici
miniati 46, and BPP, MS Parmense 1295). Both have Bentivoglio coats of
arms and must have been presented to members of that family. Sabadino
sent a third copy written by himself, now lost, to Isabella d'Este with a
letter of 1492. Gynevera circulated further: it was plagiarized in a work by
Iacopo Filippo Foresti, printed in 1497. In this year Sabadino copied his
De triumphis religionis for its dedicatee, Ercole d'Este (BAV, MS Rossiano
176). Sabadino twice wrote out the letter describing the `Zardin Viola'
constructed by Annibale Bentivoglio, sending it first to Isabella in r5o1
(Treviso, Bibl. Comunale, MS Miscell. 43, no. 3) and then to Annibale
with an added note of presentation (Piacenza, Bibl. Comunale Passerini
Landi, Fondo Comunale, MS 202). In 1501 he dispatched two copies of
a Quoloquium ad Ferrariam urbem, celebrating the marriage of Alfonso
d'Este and Lucrezia Borgia, one for the duke via his secretary Tebaldo dei
Tebaldi and another for the duchess; BCAB, MS B46O3 may be the lat-
ter copy. He also transcribed at least one of the sonnets by his son Ercole
Arienti that he disseminated to Isabella and Ippolito d'Este as owner-
publisher.7
A manuscript of Machiavelli's first Decennale (1504), written in his flu-
ent, humanistic cursive hand (Florence, Bibl. del Seminario Arcivescovile
Maggiore, MS C VI 27), was probably presented by him to Roberto
Acciaiuoli ' A poetic manuscript that was copied by its author for presen-
tation to no less a figure than Pope Clement VII is BAV, Vat. Lat. 10377,
7' For these and other manuscripts written by Sabadino, see Minutelli, Ea miraculosa aqua',
PP. 217-30. See, too, Sabadino, Gynevera, pp. xl—lvii; Chandler, 'A Renaissance news correspond-
ent', 160, 163 n. 3 and `Appunti', 346-9; Gundersheimer (ed.), Art and Life; C. James (ed.), Zlre
Letters, no. 47 (Gynevera), 8z (the `epistoletta'), 83 (the Quoloquium), 16z (Ercole's sonnet); Vecchi
Galli, 'Il ms. 165; Basile, "`Delizie" bentivoleschè (the Zardin Wind); Campioni and others, `Due
manoscritti' and Bortoletti, `Danza poesia e musica' (the De Hymeneo and Quoloquium).
Scarpa, 'L'autografo', 154-5.
3 Authors' use of scribes 81
containing Latin verse by Evangelista Maddaleni Capodiferro 79 Matteo
Bandello copied his translation of Euripides' Hecuba for Marguerite de
Navarre, sister of François I (1539). For Marguerite de France, the king's
daughter, he transcribed his canzone in her praise together with a selection
of his other poems, and sent the resulting collection to her with a dedi-
cation dated z May 1544•$° Antonfrancesco Doni was not only an author,
composer, editor and printer but produced accomplished presentation
manuscripts of his own works. He copied out a group of compositions
that he sent to Cosimo I in 1543: a motet, a canzone of his own for the
duke's singers and two sonnets also for singing." In Chapter 4 Section i
we shall meet Francesco Marcaldi, who wrote out many presentation
copies of his historical writings.
Evidently, then, presentation copies written by authors were still highly
appreciated because of the sense of `presence' (as described in Chapter i
Section i) that they could be felt to possess. However, for these manu-
scripts and indeed in general, the delegation of copying to an amanuensis
was practised regularly during the Renaissance, and is part of a wider
phenomenon of people writing in place of others, voluntarily or for pay-
ment, in some cases because the person for whom the text was being writ-
ten was illiterate or semiliterate, or felt that the transcriber had a better
hand or a more polished style."
The term `segretario' or `segretario' could apply in some cases to a person
employed to transcribe texts on a regular basis, but one needs to distin-
guish this kind of secretary, who was principally a scribe, from the secre-
tary who was the personal assistant and letter-writer of a person of high
social, political or ecclesiastical rank, or a secretary to a council of gov-
ernment. The title pages of some editions of writing-books indicated that
they were intended for use by `secretaries', among others.'3 Gagliardelli's
79
Wardrop, 76e Script, PP- 43-4. pl. 46.
"° On the manuscript of Hecuba, now BAV, MS Reg. Lat. 1395, and on that of the Rime, now
Turin, Bibl. Universitaria, MS N VII 71 (damaged by fire), see Danzi, `Per l'edizione', 107-9,113;
Bandello, Rime, pp. 3-4. 319-21, 324, 325-6; Fedi, La memoria della poesia, pp. 165-7. Bandello
also sent individual sonnets copied in his own hand: see Chapter 1 Section 3. For the example of
Giambullari, see Chapter 1 n. 118.
Haar, 77ye Science and Art, p. 272. Other examples include BAV, MS Patetta 364 (see Doni, Le
nuove pitture) and BL, MS Add. 33790 (La lumiera).
" See for example Petrucci, 'Scrittura, alfabetismo', 181-3, `Pouvoir de 1'6criture', 834-8 and
`Scrivere per gli altri'; L. Miglio, "'Perché ho charestia"'.
Palatino's Cornpendio del gran volume de l'arte del bene et leggiadramente scrivere tutte le sorti
di lettere et caratteri (1566), which contained material useful 'ad ogni gran SECRETARIO' (to
every great secretary); Cresci's 11 perfetto cancellaresco corsivo 1...1 copioso d ogni maniera di lettere
appartenenti d Secretarii [ ... ] con un' breve discorso circa l'honore, ter utile, che apporta al Secretario
lo scriuer'bene (1599); Scalzini's Llsecretario (first published in 1581); Lodovico Curione, 11 teatro
delle eancelleresche corsive per Secretari et altre maniere di lettere (1593): see Casamassima, Trattati,
82 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Soprascritte di lettere (1583) explained how to address documents to
recipients of all social levels, from the pope down to widows, and pro-
vided illustrations in what he termed a `lettera corsiva graziosa', similar
to the `bastarda italiana'. However, among the duties of the loftier sort
of secretaries, copying texts ranked very low or might not figure at all, as
is evident from the many treatises on their profession printed in the later
sixteenth century that prefer to concentrate on the composition of letters
rather than on their mere transcription, and from the growing distinc-
tion between mere scribes and the higher calling of secretaries.'4 Torquato
Tasso wrote that the secretary's aim was a relatively significant one: `inter-
pretar l'animo, e significar i concetti del Padrone' (to interpret his Master's
mind and express his concepts).S5 The man who in 1564 inaugurated the
self-help genre of handbooks for secretaries, Francesco Sansovino, men-
tioned penmanship only briefly: the secretary should have a `bellissima .
mano nella Cancelleresca, laquale è così detta perché s'usa e si conviene
a Cancellieri cioè Secretarii, come quella ch'è for propria. Dell'altre ne
sappia la parte sua, ma più tosto a pompa ch'a use di lui' (a very beautiful
chancery hand, so called because it is used by and befits chancellors, i.e.
secretaries, as proper to them. Of other hands he should know his share,
but for show rather than for his own use).86 Later works in this genre
play down or omit this aspect of the secretary's work. They did recognize
that letters had to be drafted and then transcribed: Battista Guarini, for
example, included among the secretary's duties making a rough version
of a letter and `porre al netto quella minuta' (making a fair copy of that
draft). But Angelo Ingegneri wrote that this copying `in miglior forma,
e più bel carattere' (in better form and fairer hand), for signature by the
master, might also be done by an assistant. According to Ingegneri, for a
secretary `scrivere' (writing) meant not forming characters more or less
well but expressing concepts in a fitting manner.87
Leaving aside, then, the type of secretary that Sansovino and his suc-
cessors had in mind, we find that authors preparing their works for dif-
fusion, and then publishing them, often sought the assistance of a writer
who might be employed regularly as a secretary in a less exalted sense of
PP. 74, 76, 89-90, 93, 95, 96, and figs. LXVI, LXXIV, LXXX. To these one can add Giulio
Antonio Ercolani's Lo scrittor utile, et brieue segretario (Bologna: Alessandro Benacci, 1574)•
s4
See Quondam, `Dal "formulario" al "formulario"', pp. 120-50. Several well-known men
of letters became secretaries to persons of authority; examples are Mario Equicola, Ludovico
Beccadelli, Benedetto Varchi, Annibal Caro, Giambattista Giraldi and Bernardo Tasso. On the
profession, see Fiorato, `Grandeur et servitude' (pp. 148-50 on the downgrading of scribes) and
Biow, Doctors, Ambassadors, Secretaries, pp. 155-96.
', T. Tasso, Il secretario, fol. B3 B6 Sansovino, Del segretario, fol. A51.
17 Guarini, Il segretario, fols. H2'—H3'; Ingegneri, Del buon segretario, fols. Bt,, L3—.
3 Authors' use of scribes 83
the term, or who might be employed occasionally as an amanuensis — the
normal contemporary term was `scriptor' or `scrittore' — or who might
simply assist the author out of friendship, without payment. The pri-
mary task of these writers was to produce a fair copy from the authors'
papers. Authors generally checked the transcription, with varying degrees
of care, adding corrections if necessary. On balance, it was worthwhile for
them to go through this process. It saved time; it helped to protect their
work against loss; it created a clearly legible text, from which, if the work
were circulated further, it would be easier to make faithful copies; and it
could be desirable if an author prized elegance above `presence' in the gift
manuscript.
In Quattrocento Florence, Marsilio Ficino was an assiduous user of
both scribal and print publication for his works. He himself wrote out one
copy of his Commentarium in Convivium (De amore), composed in 1468-9
(BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 7705), apparently as a special favour for Giovanni di
Niccolò Cavalcanti, described in the dedicatory text as `amic[us] unic[us]'. i
But he employed several scribes, some apparently engaged for specific
commissions, others living in his house. Their output includes draft ver-
sions and presentation copies of his texts. The poet and scribe Tommaso
Baldinotti of Pistoia made two copies of Ficino's works that were owned
by Bernardo Bembo, who was in Florence in 1478-9; one is dedicated to
the Venetian. Among the main copyists used from the late 147os to the
1490s was Luca Fabiani, also known as Luca Ficini, who joined the chan-
cery probably late in 1491. Three other copies of the Commentarium in
Convivium intended by Ficino for presentation to friends (and containing
personal letters of transmission to them) were made by scribes. One, cop-
ied by Francesco Ugolini, was sent to Janus Pannonius (ONB, MS Lat.
2472). Two others were transcribed by a certain Rutilio, one (MS Vat.
Lat. 2929) for the humanist and bishop Giovanni Antonio Campano,
the other (BAV, MS Chig. E IV 122) to be presented by Campano to
Cardinal Francesco Piccolomini. A further copy made for Ficino and
written on vellum, BLF, MS Strozz. 98, was described by Kristeller as
the philosopher's file copy, apparently used for circulation among friends
such as Antonio Ivani of Sarzana, who returned it after adding a note of
thanks in his own hand." The copying of presentation manuscripts was
an expensive business, and Ficino was fortunate that his friend Filippo
Valori paid for some of these commissions, as well as being one of the
it
xa Kristeller, 'Some original letters', pp. 17-19, 31-2; Gentile, 'Per la storia' and 'Note sullo "scrio-
toio"', pp. 355-8; De la Marc, 'New research', App. I no. zz (Ugolini). See, too, Rizzo, Il lessico
filologico, pp. 195-7. For the term 'letter of transmission', see Chapter 5 Section r.
 84 Handwriting and the work of copyists
financers of the printing of his works. However, one of Ficino's scribes
was his cousin and pupil Sebastiano Salvini, who helped him, as Salvini
pointed out in two colophons, for the sake of friendship.89
The humanist Bartolomeo Fonzio was, we have seen, an occasional
professional scribe, and he copied his own De poetice on vellum for pres-
entation to Lorenzo de' Medici (BNP, MS Lat. 7879, with illuminated
margins and initials) and his Vita Pauli Ghiacceti (BNCF, MS Nuovi
Acquisti 98o). Yet he too had works written out by scribes, includ-
ing his younger brother Niccolò. The dedication copy of his Explanatio
in Persium poetam for Lorenzo de' Medici (BLF, MS LIV 23) has been
attributed to the scribe of the Bodmer Cassiodorus90 Poliziano used
professional scribes in Florence, such as Neri Rinuccini, to copy out his
scholarly works, then corrected them himself. He also used dictation to
scribes, as in the case of his translation of Herodian from Greek to Latin,
commissioned by Pope Innocent VIII in 1484, which was written down
by pupils of his. When in Venice in 1491, he had texts copied for himself
by two scribes, one of them the poet Antonio Vinciguerra 9`
In Milan in the 1490s, Gasparo Visconti made intensive use of scribes
when preparing and then publishing his lyric verse. After he had com-
posed his poems, he used four copyists to write them out in a personal
fair copy. He then made minor corrections as a basis for a further tran-
scription. The first scribe wrote out the first section of this manuscript,
Us. 1`41`, which was prepared in order to serve as the source for a tran-
scription of a canzoniere for Beatrice d'Este, the young wife of Duke
Ludovico. The presentation copy was written in 1495-6, evidently by a
professional scribe, on vellum in a formal humanistic script, using silver
ink for the text and gold for the initial letters and rubrics (the colours are
reversed for the final sonnet). All four hands are present in the second
part of Visconti's original manuscript, fols. 44`-134`, which became a
more informal depository for his poems as they were composed. After the
duchess's death in childbirth in 1497, Visconti was asked to create a new
canzoniere by Bianca Maria Sforza, the duke's niece and the wife since
1494 of the emperor Maximilian I, and he decided to modify the original
s~ Kristeller, `Sebastiano Salvini'; De la Mare, 'New research', pp. 464-6 and App. I no. 9; Gentile,
'Note sullo "scrittoio"'. Fabiani, a notary, drew up legal documents for Buonaccorsi (Fachard,
PP- 175, 198, 2o5), witnessed Machiavelli's first will in November 1511 and is mentioned several
times in Machiavelli's correspondence.
9'Caroti and Zamponi, Lo scrittoio di Bartolomeo Fonzio, pp. 29, 77, 90, 99 and pls. 33, 36; De la
Mare, `New research', App. I, nos. 7, 49, 74-
" Supino, `La scrittura', pp. 233-5; Beffa, Antonio Vinciguerra, pp. 102-5. On Rinuccini, see too
De la Mare, 'New research', pp. 471-2, 597, App. I, no. 55.
3 Authors' use of scribes 85
collection by adding new poems and revising or removing some of the
earlier ones. A copy of this collection was commissioned for presentation
to the dedicatee, again to the highest specifications, using vellum and
the `antiqua' script, with illuminated initial letters92 To Ludovico Sforza,
Visconti presented a vellum manuscript of his Romanzo di Paolo e Daria,
a poem in ottava rima, written in humanistic cursive and with trompe-
1 wil miniatures 93
Matteo Maria Boiardo, count of Scandiano, could afford to employ
scribes to make fair copies of his drafts. He responded with alacrity
and generosity to Isabella d'Este's desire to see the latest part of his
Inamoramento de Orlando in 1491: `subito to faró transcrivere et ge to
remetterò' (I will have it transcribed immediately and send it to you). The
only copy he had was his original and, he admitted, his own handwriting
would be difficult to read 94 It has been suggested that the most import-
ant manuscript of Boiardo's collection of lyric verse, BL, MS Egerton
1999 (L with its corrections L.), came from a scriptorium controlled by
the author. His scribes may have resided for certain periods in his home
and worked under his supervision. Some at least were calligraphers, with
elegant humanistic cursive hands. They may have included Guglielmo
Bagarotto and the notary Marco de' Ferrari, the second of whom
Boiardo called his `cancellero' (chancellor) 95 Castiglione, too, used a ser-
ies of `cancellieri' to transcribe his letters and successive drafts of his
Libro del cortegiano, though at times their help was not available to him.
Of the surviving partial or full witnesses for the phases of elaboration of
the Cortegiano, only the first notes and sketches are autograph; as many
as four amanuenses were employed for the penultimate manuscript
redaction of 1520 -1.9'
Galeotto Del Carretto, from Casale Monferrato, sent a copious hand-
written supply of his poetry to Isabella d'Este and Francesco Gonzaga
in Mantua between 1495 and 1516. Most of them were short examples of
the barzelletta (a variety of the ballata, made up of octosyllabic lines and
Bongrani in Visconti, I canzonieri, pp. xi—xii, xix—xxv, xxix—xci. The manuscripts mentioned are
BTM, MSS 1093 (Visconti's copy) and 2157 (the manuscript for Beatrice); ONB, MS set. n. 2621
(the manuscript for Bianca Maria). The presentation manuscripts are also described in Pellegrin,
La BibliotNque des Visconti, pp. 381, 407•
~} Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Kupferstichkabinett 78 C 27; see Renier, `L'esemplare di dedica';
Pellegrin, La Bibliothèque des Visconti, pp. 356-7; Brand is (ed.), Zimelien, pp. 201-2, 215.
11 Boiardo, Opere volgari, letters 86 and 87, pp. 238-9; Harris, Bibliografia dell' `Orlando
Innamorato', II, 41-3.
11 Mengaldo in Boiardo, Opere volgari, pp. 3
25-7, 345-5o; Guerrinï, 'Scrivere in casa Boiardo',
449-61.
16 Vetrugno, `Sulle lettere aurografe', 68-71; Quondam, `Questo povero Cortegiano', pp. 91-9.
86 Handwriting and the work of copyists
intended for musical accompaniment, `belzeretta' in Del Carretto's
form); but there were some more substantial compositions, comedies in
verse or capitoli. The poems naturally needed to be `in bona forma' (in
a fair copy). On one occasion he planned to make at least part of the
copy in his own hand, saying that he would send Isabella a new comedy
`tutta volta ch'io l'habbi transcritta in bona forma, che non ho se non
l'originale, et cominciarò de mia mano a scriverla, et poi sùbito la man-
darò a quella' (as soon as I have made a fair copy, since I have only the
original, and I will start to write it in my own hand, and will then send
it straight away to your excellency).97 Most often, it seems, he had the
text written by a scribe. On 2 January 1498 he sent to Isabella two barzel-
lette, a strambotto and his Comedia de Timon greco. The comedy was cop-
ied by an inexperienced scribe, however, and Del Carretto did not have
enough time to check the text before it went to Mantua. Less than two
weeks later, he wrote to the marchioness again: `A li di passati mandai a
la S. V. per uno mio famiglio una mia comedia de Timon, et perché non
ebbi tempo de rivederla per haverla fatta trascrivere da uno novo scrip-
tore, trascorrendo poi l'exempio mio originale che ho appresso di me, ho
trovato uno errore' (A few days ago I sent your ladyship by one of my
servants a comedy of mine about Timon. Because I did not have time
to check it, through having had it copied by a new scribe, I have found
an error when subsequently going over my original exemplar that I have
here). He asked Isabella to have the mistake corrected, and her manu-
script (BEM, MS Campori Appendice 311) shows that she did so. In the
letter of 2 January he added that `Se havesse havuto tempo glie ne have-
ria mandata una altra mia intitulata già a la Ill.ma quondam Madama
vostra sorella, ma non l'ho possuto far transcrivere; una altra volta io
gliela mandarti' (If I had had time I would have sent you another [com-
edy] of mine formerly dedicated to your illustrious late sister [Beatrice],
but I have not been able to have it copied; I will send it to you on another
occasion). This second work was not despatched until November of
that year. It went together with two other poems including a barzelletta
which, Del Carretto added, was `scritta de mia mano' (written in my
hand), a comment that perhaps suggests that this was unusual .9' It was
for Isabella, too, that Niccolò da Correggio promised to have a poem,
" Turba, `Galeotto Del Carretto', letter XXXI, 17 December 1499 (pp. 121-2).
9' Turba, `Galeotto Del Carretto', letters XV, z January 1498 (P. 108); XVI, 14 January 1498 (p. 109);
XX, 24 November 1498 (pp. 111-12). The manuscript of Tirnon is listed among Isabella's books:
Luzio and Renier, La coltura, P. 273, no. 13. On Del Carretto's letters and the poems and plays
sent to Isabella, see Minutelli, `Poesia e teatro'.
3 Authors' use of scribes 87
perhaps the Tabula Psiches et Cupidinis, copied in i49i: `le stanzie ch'io
componea sono ultimate e intitulate alla Signoria Vostra. Le facio tra-
scrivere, e fornite le adrizarò ne le mane de Quella tomo Li promisi' (the
stanzas I was composing are finished and dedicated to your ladyship.
I am having them transcribed, and when they are finished I will send
them to your hands as I promised you) .99
As Del Carretto's case shows, using a scribe might hold up the send-
ing of a composition. On 4 January 1501 Pietro Bembo sent a letter to
his lover Maria Savorgnan with three `sister' compositions, and added
that `Altre cose vi mandereï ancora se a me non mancasse il tempo di
farle trascrivere' (I would send you other things, too, if I did not lack
the time to have them copied).'°° In 1502 Vincenzo Calmeta wished to
send to Isabella d'Este his commentary, dedicated to the marchioness,
on Petrarch's canzone `Mai non vo' più cantar com'io soleva'. But she
would have to wait a little longer, he wrote to tell her: `Me doglio fin a
l'anima che io no aveva avuto tempo de farla rescrivere in bona forma,
ma per el primo messo la mandarò a tua Eccellenza' (I am deeply sorry
that I had not had time to have it rewritten in a fair copy, but I will send
it to your excellency by the first messenger). The transcription was still
not ready a week later."' Another delay was experienced by the courtier
Lelio Manfredi when in 1515 he was sending instalments of his transla-
tion of the Catalan chivalric prose romance Tirante il Bianco to Isabella's
young son Federico Gonzaga; the reason, he explained, was that `non ho
scriptor veloce' (I do not have a fast scribe).102 In smaller towns it might
be impossible to find a suitable scribe. An example, though it concerns
copying on behalf of a reader rather than an author, is that of Federico
Fregoso, in Gubbio in 1536, who had received from Pietro Bembo the
second part of Iacopo Sadoleto's De laudibus philosophiae but could not
get a copy made for himself, as he explained to Bembo: `Io non l'ho
anchora possuto fare trascrivere per non havere insin qui trovato huomo,
che mi sappia in questo commodamente servire, tanto è privo questo
nostro paese d'ogni buona sorte di artefici' (1 have not yet been able io
have it transcribed because so far I have not found anyone who can serve
me conveniently in this, so devoid is this town of ours of any good kind
of craftsmen).'01
11 Correggio, Opere, pp. 499-500. '°° Bembo, Lettere, no. r23 (I, u7).
'°' Letters of 28 October and 5 November 15o2, in Calmeta, Prose e lettere, pp. 87, 89.
Kolsky, Courts and Courtiers, XI, p. 51. Manfredi intended to have this work printed on its com-
pletion in 152o, but it circulated only in manuscript during his lifetime (ibid., p. 58).
Lettere da diversi re, Book IV, nos. 5 and 6, 25 April and 6 July 1536 (quotation from the first
letter). The De laudibus was first printed in 1538 in Lyon.
88 Handwriting and the work of copyists
Throughout the Cinquecento, scribes continued to be in demand from
authors of vernacular works for one reason or another, even if problems
might arise in the process of diffusion. Guidotto Prestinari had most of
his poems copied by a scribe in a humanistic cursive hand, adding his own
corrections and headings (Bergamo, Bibl. dell'Accademia Carrara, MS
Cartella X z). He had the same scribe make vellum presentation copies
of two capitoli addressed to Domenico Contarini, podestà of Bergamo in
15o2 (BMCV, MS Cicogna 642(4) and 642(5)), and of another addressed
to Pietro Donato, in which the poet sees the spirit of Pietro's uncle
Ludovico in a vision (BL, MS Add. zr99i).- When, early in 1535, Antonio
Minturno sent his Latin translation of Plutarch's Septem sapientium con-
vivium (Dinner of the Seven Wise Men) and his own poem Mercurius
to Miguel Mai, imperial ambassador in Rome, he had a transcript made
before (in all probability) making corrections in a hand that imitated that
of the scribe.105 Authors were among those who, as mentioned in the pre-
vious section, commissioned presentation manuscripts from the renowned
Arrighi in Rome. Ludovico di Varthema had a copy of his Itinerario (an
account of his travels to India and beyond) made by Arrighi in 15io as a
gift for Vittoria Colonna, prior to its printing in December of that year
in Rome at Arrighi's expense.io' In 1525, Arrighi wrote a relatively plain
copy of the first giornata of Firenzuola's Ragionamenti that was probably
intended for the dedicatee, Caterina Cibo.107 It was perhaps Machiavelli
who, around the same time, arranged for his comedy Clizia to be tran-
scribed by Arrighi and illuminated in Florence (Figure 6).'e'
Francesco Guicciardini used a secretary from around his mid-forties to
copy out some of his writings, including later versions of the great Storia
d'Italia.'09 Giovanni Della Casa relied on the help of his secretary Erasmo
Gemini. Carlo Gualteruzzi alluded jokingly to Gemini's role when he
complained to the poet in 1545 that a canzone of his had not yet arrived
in Rome: had Gemini, he asked, become a `pigro scrittore' (lazy writer)
since he had accompanied his master to Venice? 110 Pietro Aretino turned
in 1553 to Antonio Anselmi, a former secretary of Bembo whose portrait
°+ Dilemmi, `Le rime', 189-99, 203, zo5 and `Postilla'.
°5 Madrid, Bibl. National, MS 18659.28; see Carrai, `Minturno traduttore', 234, 237.
°6
BNCF, MS Landau Finaly 9; see Casamassima, 'Ludovico degli Arrighi'.
'°7 BCR, MS Corsiniano 44 E 23; see Ragni in Firenzuola, Le novelle, pp. 372-6.
"' Corrigan, An unrecorded manuscript'; Ridolfi, Studi sulle commedie, pp. 135-8, 152.
'°9 Rostagno, `La Storia d'Italia', p. cxix; Ridolfi, `Genesi', pp. 182-3.
"° Moroni (ed.), Corrispondenza, no. 47, 31 January 1545 (pp• 102-4). For Gemini's hand, see
Barbarisi, Ancora sul testo', pp. '263-4-
3 Authors' use of scribes 89
was painted by Titian, with a request for him to add value to a sonnet by
copying it out:
Sì che la mano vostra faccian copia, accioché nel di voi carattero di perle ri-
splenda ne la maniera che si vede risplendere il mandato a Roma l'altr'ieri. E vero
che la vertù non ha bisogno d'ornamento alcuno, per esser da se stessa formosa;
il che non si può dire alla mia."'
(I would thus like your hand to make a copy of it, so that in your pearl-like
script it may shine in the same way as the one sent to Rome the day before yes-
terday. It is true that virtue needs no ornament, since it is beautiful in itself; that
cannot be said of mine.)
Caro, Molza and Varchi had works transcribed by Mattio Franzesi,
whom Caro described in 1538 as `bello scrittore' (a fine writer). Caro was
also helped by Giovanni Antonio Fineo, a member of the Farnese house-
hold who copied his verses and letters, and on at least one occasion by
his nephew Lepido Caro."' Sperone Speroni was assisted by men from
his own social circles: he refers to a copy of his Dialogo dell'amore writ-
ten in the hand of Niccolò Grazia, one of the speakers in the work, and
towards the end of the author's life Alvise Mocenigo made copies of one
of Speroni's dialogues on Virgil and of his Dialogo dell'istoria." 3 Bernardo
Tasso tried twice, in 1552 and 1557, to find himself a boy aged between
fifteen and eighteen to act as his servant and to write for him: the youth,
he specified, should have `buona penna' (a good pen) or `buon carattere di
lettera' (well-formed script).' 4 Battista Guarini had his play Il pastor fido
copied for transmission to Alfonso II d'Este in 1584, but his covering letter
to the duke lamented the errors that had been introduced: `Mando i quat-
tro atti della mia favola a V. A. et questi poco corretti per colpa di copisti
poco intendenti' (I am sending the four acts of my fable to your highness,
and these not very correct, through the fault of ignorant copyists).115
It was, however, perhaps a happy accident that Camillo Porzio had
to have another copy made of part of a historical work, because it gave
"' Aretino, Lettere, VI, no. 2S3 to Anselmi, March 1S53 (p. 232). Frasso, Appunti e proposte', identi-
fies BPP, MS Parmense 1636 as in Anselmi's hand.
" Caro, Lettere familiari: on Franzesi, no. 31 to Paolo Manuzio, 24 January 1538 (I, 61); no. 107 to
Varchi, 17 July 1539 (I, 151-3), 42 (see, too, FOà, `Mattio Franzesi'); on Fineo, III, zig n. z; on
Lepido Caro, no. 765 to Fulvio Orsini, 9 June 1565 (III, 240, g1, and no. 767 to the same, 30 June
1565 (III, 244), §1.
"' Speroni, Opere, V, xlvi—xlvii, and Mocenigo's letters to Speroni on pp. 364-5. 378-9, 381.
Mocenigo was one of the executors of Speroni's will: see Speroni, Lettere familiari, I, 5o.
"4 B. Tasso, Delle lettere, II, no. 8 to Giacopo Gigh, 17 August 1552 (pp. 63-5) and nos. 92 and 96 to
Giacopo Maria Campanazzi, i and 27 March 1557 (pp- 246-8, 254-5).
"' Campori (ed.), Lettere, pp. 193-4-
 90 Handwriting and the work of copyists
him the opportunity to show how much his writings were in demand,
and among readers of the highest rank. He wrote from Naples in 1570 to
Alberico Cibo, prince of Massa in Tuscany, to say that the grand duke
of Tuscany, Cosimo I de' Medici, had been slow to return Porzio's writ-
ings; hence, he said, `io sono stato forzato, per poter mandare a V. Ecc. il
principio del secondo libro de la mia Italia, che S. Alt. tiene, farlo copiare
da uno originale non molto corretto, che si ritrova appresso di me' (I have
been obliged, in order to be able to send your excellency the beginning of
the second book of my [history of] Italy, which his highness [Cosimo] has,
to have it copied from a not very correct original in my possession). ,6
Federico Borromeo's secretary Giovanni Maria Vercelloni was just one
of the cardinal's scribal collaborators. He recounted that he transcribed
Borromeo's works roughly from dictation, then wrote out a fair copy that
the cardinal corrected. Since many corrections in Borromeo's manuscripts
are in Vercelloni's hand, these too were probably dictated to him as he
read the fair copy back to the author.117 All or most of the writing was
done by a scribe, then, and orality played a major part in the process.
Torquato Tasso's copying of his works is witnessed by the surviving
autograph manuscripts and by references in his letters. For instance, in 1575
he sent his own transcriptions of sections of his epic poem Gerusalemme
liberata for comment to friends in Rome, Scipione Gonzaga and the
Ferrarese gentleman Luca Scalabrini. An autograph manuscript of the
dialogue R Padre di famiglia (in Udine, Bibl. Arcivescovile, MS Io7) was
probably destined for Gonzaga. However, Tasso disliked the task of copy-
ing and delegated it when he could. In 1575 Gonzaga took on the task
of making transcriptions of autograph drafts of the Liberata; these were
then sent to the poet and the second of them, Ferrara, Bibl. Comunale
Ariostea, MS Cl. 11 474 (Fr), was revised by Tasso in his own hand. In
March Tasso wrote to Gonzaga, anxious as ever, to say that he feared
that the cantos had been lost en route; he regretted not only the loss of
some corrections of which he had not kept a copy, but also the waste of `la
fatica del trascrivere' (the labour of copying). In the following year, Tasso
intended to enlist help in sending canto XV of the Liberata to Gonzaga:
`Io ne farò cavar una copia, e '1 rimanderò a Vostra Signoria co '1 principio
del decimo quarto' (I will have a copy taken and will send it to you with
the start of canto XIV). In 1586 he acknowledged to Antonio Costantini
.6
Ibid., pp. z88-9.
", Barbero, `Dagli antichi scartocci rinvolti', 258 and `I copisti e i manoscritti', pp. 356-6o. The
second essay gives an overview of Borromeo's scribal assistants.
3 Authors' use of scribes 91
that a treatise on secretaries in his own handwriting was hard to read and
he complained of the stress of copying: `È scritto di mia mano, che vuol
dire, male scritto; laonde dubito che Vostra Signoria a pena potrà intend-
erlo: ma io non posso scrivere in modo alcuno più d'uno o due fogli di
carta; tanti vapori mi vanno in su la testa' (It is written in my own hand,
which means badly written; hence I fear that you will scarcely be able to
understand it: but I am completely unable to write more than one or two
sheets of paper, so many vapours rise into my head).i'
Tasso's correspondence allows us to catch several glimpses of his use,
or intended use, of scribes, and to identify some of them. In Ferrara,
Giulio Mosti, nephew of the prior of Sant'Anna, the Ferrarese hospital
where Tasso was confined from 1579 to 1586, copied at least four of the
author's dialogues along with other works (Figure 9). Mosti wanted no
doubt to help Tasso and to assist in the diffusion of these works among
the author's close friends, but he was also in a position to act with a cer-
tain independence and perhaps used his position of privileged access to
these sought-after texts in order to gain favour with others. Mosti sent
to the Mantuan courtier Marcello Donati in 158o a small composition
(`composizioncella') of Tasso's that had come into his hands about a week
previously, assuring Donati that `s'ïo avessi alcuna rima nuova ne farei
parte a Messer Curzio [Gonzaga], ma avendole mandato quindici giorni
sono quanto mi trovava, che furno tre fogli pieni, non ho altro al pre-
sente, essendo il poeta in altro umore che nel comporre' (if I had any new
poem I would share it with Curzio, but since I sent you a fortnight ago all
I had, which was three full sheets, I have nothing else at present, the poet
not being in the composing mood). Two months later, Mosti apologized
to Donati for not being able to send him any writings to his taste, espe-
cially the dialogue Il Messaggiero. On I July 1581, however, he sent two
new sonnets that he asked Donati to share with Curzio Gonzaga."9 To
Curzio Ardizio, also based in Mantua, Tasso wrote in 1582 that he had
written many sonnets in recent days, `i quali non le manderò io; perché
la fatica del riscrivere m'e grave oltramodo, e la cortesia de gli amici miei
devrebbe sgravarmene: ma se gli vuole, potrà facilmente averli dal signor
Giulio' (which I will not send you myself; because the labour of rewriting
"A T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 20 to Gonzaga, 18 March 1 575 (1, 55-7); no. 34 to Scalabrini, io June
1575 (I, 9i-2); no. 52 to Gonzaga, ii February 1576 (I, 127-9); no. 672 to Costantini, 31 October
1586 (III, 71-2). On the Udine manuscript, see Raimondi in T. Tasso, Dialoghi, I, 111-13. On
Gonzaga's transcriptions, see Poma, Stuoli sul testo, pp. 1-31.
119 Letters of Mosti to Donaci, S June and it August 1580, 1 July 1581, in Solerti, Vita, II, 145, 146-7,
i59-6o; see, too, his letter of u March 1581, pp. 155-6. See Raimondi, `Giulio Mosti'.
92 Handwriting and the work of copyists
is unduly wearisome for me, and the courtesy of my friends should relieve
me of it; but if you want them, you can get them easily from Giulio). In
this year Mosti acted as the first transmitter to Ardizio of a sonnet in
praise of Isabella Pallavicini, which Tasso then asked Ardizio to present to
the lady with an accompaniment of suitable words, and of another sonnet
for Ferrante Gonzaga.120
When a work was to be sent out or presented as a gift, Tasso might
turn for transcriptions to Scalabrini in Rome or Costantini in Ferrara. In
1585, for instance, he sent a sonnet to Scalabrini, asking for it to be copied
out and presented, together with another, to Carlo di Guisa. Providing
Costantini with a canzone in praise of Leonora Gonzaga de' Medici, duch-
ess of Mantua, in August 1586, he said that, if Costantini judged it worthy,
he would like it to be sent out to Tuscany and Rome `ben ricopiata da
miglior mano' (well copied by a better hand). Tasso made his request more
explicit in October when he sent Costantini another canzone for the duch-
ess: if his friend were to send it to Tuscany or elsewhere, `sia contenta di
ricopiarla in miglior lettera, acciochè sia letta più volentieri' (please copy it
out in a better script, so that it may be read more willingly). For Tasso as
for Aretino, the script added value to the literary gift. He had no hesitation
in assuming that both Costantini and Scalabrini would write out copies of
Il re Torrismondo for presentation during the period before the tragedy was
printed in September 1587. On 14 December 1586 he sent Costantini an
autograph copy full of corrections (probably BL, MS Add. 23778) with a
reminder that he expected to receive the fair copy of it that Costantini had
promised, for presentation to the duchess. Scipione Gonzaga in Rome had
asked him for a copy, and Tasso assumed that Scalabrini, who was famil-
iar with Tasso's script and corrections, would provide this, by Christmas
if possible, so that Gonzaga could read it aloud 'a qualche amico e signor
mio' (to some friends and masters of mine). Costantini's dedication copy
did not arrive as promptly as the poet expected, which led him to express
some impatience, but he duly received it early in January 1587 and wrote
to thank Costantini warmly for the contribution that his copying would
make to the reception of the work:
ringrazio Vostra Signoria quanto merita questa bellissima e graziosissima lettera,
con la quale sarà aggradita la tragedia più che non merita per se stessa, o altret-
tanto; e mi dubito che più dilettaranno queste belle miniature e figurine, che
così leggiadramente ornano il libro, che l'opera istessa.
"' T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 2o6 to Ardizio, [1582] (II, 197-9); letter to Ardizio, 2 January 1582, in
Solerti, Vita, II, 2,5 (concerning T. Tasso, Le rime, nos. 798-800, pp. 792-4, and no. 802, p. 796);
Le lettere, no. 198 to Ardizio, [15821 (11, 172-3)-
3 Authors' use of scribes 93
(I thank you as fully as this most beautiful and graceful script deserves; with it
the tragedy will be appreciated more than it deserves in itself, or equally; and I
fear that these beautiful illuminations and little figures that adorn the book so
prettily will give more delight than the work itself.)
Costantini also had to take on the copying that had been asked of
Scalabrini, and Tasso lamented to him on 15 January that if the tragedy
had been sent to Rome, the poet might have received some favourable
responses from there. It was not until April that Costantini's second copy
reached that city, sent by Francesco Gonzaga."'
In 1595, in the last months of his life, Tasso sent some verses intended
for Ferrante Gonzaga, prince of Bozzolo, to Costantini with a request
and some flattery: `Non ho potuto ricopiarli: però prego Vostra Signoria
riscriverli di sua mano, la quale può far che paiano belle ancora le brutte
composizioni' (I have not been able to copy them out myself: I there-
fore ask you to rewrite them in your hand, which can make even ugly
compositions seem beautiful). Like Mosti, Costantini could use his access
to Tasso's verse for his own ends. When the scholar Roberto Titi sent
him twelve sonnets, Costantini replied: 'in ricompensa avrete qui inclusi
due sonetti del Tasso, che appunto iersera all'avemaria uscirono di sotto f~
il martello' (in return you will find enclosed two sonnets by Tasso, which
were hammered out just yesterday evening at the angelus).122
Tasso tried to get various other scribes outside Ferrara to assist in the
diffusion of his works. When he wanted to send a sonnet to the prince
of Mantua, Vincenzio Gonzaga, in 1584, he sent the original to the
Benedictine monk Angelo Grillo in Brescia with a request to send it on.
However, the state of this copy meant that the poem had to be copied
out again, as Grillo told the prince: `Non si manda l'originale del Tasso
per essere di scabroso carattere e racconcio e depennato in molti luoghi'
(Tasso's original is not being sent since it is in a rough hand and corrected
and crossed out in many places). In February 1585 Tasso sent Grillo his
dialogue La Cavaletta, overo de la poesia toscana, saying that Grillo could
ask don Basilio Zaniboni to have it copied, 'e torre a me questa fatica,
11 ' T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 590 to Scalabrini, 1585 (II, 599); no. 6o8 to Costantini, 2 August 1586 (III,
1t); no. 662 to Costantini, to October 1586 (III, 63-4); no. 707 to Costantini, 14 December 1586
(III, 97-8); no. 708 to Scalabrini, same date (III, 98-9); no. 777 to Costantini, z8 December
1586 (III, 116-17); no. 731 to Costantini, 29 December 1586 (III, u9-2o); no. 748 to Costantini,
15 January 1587 (III, 130-2); no. 790 to Scipione Gonzaga, April 1587 (III, 179-81); no. 792
to Scipione Gonzaga, 4 April 1587 (111, 181-2); no. Sot to Maurizio Cataneo, April 1587 (III,
188-9). On the story of the text, see Martignone, 'Per l'edizione critica' and in T. Tasso, Il re
Torrismondo, pp. xxix—xli.
T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 1,523 to Costantini, 6 January 1595 (V, 196); letter of Costantini,
17 February 1586, in Solerri, Vitd, 11, 246-7.
94 Handwriting and the work of copyists
the mi par grave molto più di quella del comporre' (and save me this
labour, which seems to me much heavier than that of composition). In
the following month he said that he had `la prima copia' (the original) of
another dialogue that Grillo wanted and that he could get a copy made.
In April 1585 Tasso asked one of his nephews, Alessandro Sersale, to write
out an unnamed dialogue for him in Rome and return the original and
the copy to him in Ferrara. Two months later he asked Alessandro's elder
brother Antonino in Mantua to arrange for the transcription of what
must have been the presentation copy of the dialogue Il Ghirlinzone,
overo l epitafao, which contains a funeral oration in memory of the sister
of the duchess of Mantua, with its dedication to the duchess; Tasso would
then send money to pay the scribe. Shortly afterwards he wrote to Grillo
to ask for help in having this dialogue copied, because he wanted to send
it to Grillo himself, to the imperial court, to Mantua and to one of his
nephews. Tasso begged his old friend and former teacher Giovan Angelo
Papio to copy out Il Costante, overo de la clemenza, which in 1589 he was
intending to present to `qualche principe secolare' (some temporal ruler),
thus allowing him to move on from Rome; the dialogue was presented in
the event, still in manuscript, to the grand duke of Tuscany, Ferdinando I
de' Medici.123
In April 1593 Tasso told Francesco Panigarola, bishop of Asti, that
he would send copies of some works not yet in print, including the
Gerusalemme conquistata, Le lagrime di Gesù Cristo and Le lagrime di
Maria Vergine, `s'io potessi pagare it copista' (if I could pay the copyist),
and he suggested that one of his wealthier friends might wish to provide
this service to the author and this satisfaction to the would-be reader. 124
Tasso had his tongue in his cheek for once, because all these works were
about to be printed; but this and his other allusions to the services of copy-
ists provide further evidence that a body of scribes continued to be avail-
able, both to authors and to other users, throughout the Cinquecento,
and that these men constituted a solid infrastructure for the operation of
scribal culture.
Letter of Grillo, r9 December 1584, in Solerti, Vita, II, 208; T. Tasso, Le lettere, respectively no.
341 to Grillo, 22 February 1585 (II, 324-8); no. 354 to Grillo, 23 March 1585 (II, 358-9); no. 361 to
Alessandro Sersale, 12 April 1585 (II, 363); no. 384 to Antonino Sersale, 6 June 1585 (11, 377-8);
no. 388 to Grillo, 9 June 1585 (II, 38o—r); no. 1,178 to Papio, 15 October 1589 (IV, 25o—r), and see
Solerti, Vita, I, 641, 663. No manuscripts of Il Ghirlinzone or La Cavaletta survive today; also
lost is the copy of Il Costante presented to Ferdinando.
'~4 T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 1,452 to Francesco Panigarola, io April 1593 (V, 145-6)-
CHAPTER 3
The manuscript circulation of lyric and
burlesque poetry
The next two chapters will look in more detail at how specific types
of texts were circulated, through the modes of diffusion outlined in
Chapter I and with or without the assistance of the scribes considered in
Chapter 2. Circulation of these texts in print will also be mentioned when
relevant, since we need to remember that scribal diffusion forms only part
of the wider picture of the circulation of literature during our period. It
is fitting to begin, in this chapter, with the cases of lyric and burlesque
verse in the vernacular and Latin. Since such poetry often had immedi-
ate topical relevance or was concerned with relationships of various sorts
between individuals, these are the genres that were most regularly trans-
mitted scribally; their diffusion in print, if it occurred at all, often took
place later, outside the contexts in which the poems had originally been
intended to be read.
I SENDING OCCASIONAL VERSE: CARO AND TASSO
In the lyric verse of Petrarch, the predominant subject is the varied
emotions that are inspired by the poet's love for a single woman. From
time to time, the poems concerning Laura are interspersed with others
that describe Petrarch's concerns about Italian politics and the papacy,
or that relate to his friendships with male contemporaries; but these lat-
ter poems, however memorable they are, form a small minority. In the
sixteenth century, lyric poets, even if they can be considered Petrarchist
in many respects, usually gave less attention to emotions arising from
love for individuals and more to social relationships, expressing praise or
admiration of a non-amorous sort; and they wrote more occasional verse,
expressing their joy or sadness or exhorting action in relation to public
or private events. In order to provide a focus for an examination of some
aspects of the scribal transmission of encomiastic and occasional verse,
we can begin by considering some of the references to it that are found
95
96 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
in the correspondence of two poets writing in central and northern Italy
between the mid and the late Cinquecento.
The letters of Annibal Caro can suggest, not surprisingly, that writing
celebratory verse could be a chore and that the composition of such poems
could have ulterior motives. He celebrated the marriage of Vittoria Farnese
to Guidobaldo II Bella Rovere, duke of Urbino, with a sonnet (`Vinto avea
'1 mondo, e vinto avea se stessa'), which he sent to the duchess in a letter
Of 1547. Two years later he had occasion to remind the duchess that he had
had it presented to her by Antonio Allegretti, a Florentine friend of his:
he now wanted to seek her favour in a legal case concerning Allegretti.
In 1552, Caro was involved in transmitting to Vittoria a sonnet by Laura
Battiferri, born in Urbino in 1523. This time the chain of transmission was
a more complex one. Battiferri needed help concerning the recovery of
her dowry from her first marriage. In order to support her case, she had
written a sonnet in praise of the duchess (perhaps `Là verso 1 Appennino,
ove '1 Metauro') and had passed it to Caro. He now wrote to Claudio
Tolomei, in Pesaro, asking him to use this sonnet in order to smooth the
way with the duke and duchess (`Degnatevi con questo fare una spianata
innanzi a l'Eccellenze loro').'
Caro's renown in his later years brought him all too frequent requests
to provide his own occasional verse for others. `[O]gnuno the mi guarda
in vino vuol sonetti da me, come s'io gli gittasse in petrelle' (Everyone
who looks at me wants sonnets from me as if I made them at the drop of
a hat), he lamented in 1559 to a law professor, Bernardo Bergonzi. Around
this time Caro refused a request from Giovanni Battista Grimaldi to
provide a composition, adding: `E vorrei volentieri levare it nome de
l'altre mie cose the vanno attorno per liberarmi una volta a fatto di
questo affanno, the me ne viene' (I would like to remove my name from
the other works of mine that are circulating, to free myself once and
for all from the torment that I get from it). The poet's irritation was
also evident when, in 1560, he told his nephew Giovanni Battista Caro
that he had received a request from a member of the Gradenigo fam-
ily for a sonnet `in morte di una sua non so chi' (on the death of some
female relative of his). There is something affected in Caro's allusions to
the price to be paid for his own fame, but he did not grumble when he
sent out other poems from Rome to mark recent deaths. Three sonnets
' Caro, Lettere familiari, nos. 303 and 346 to Vittoria Farnese, 5 July 1547 (I1, 35-6),12 May 1549 (II,
78); on Battiferri's sonnet, no. 376 to Tolomei, 27 February 1552 (II, 112-13), g2. The sonnet is in
Battiferri degli Ammannati, Rprimo libro, no. IX, p. 41; on her dowry, see Kirkham in Battiferra
degli Ammannati, Laura Battiferra, p. 25.
z Sending occasional verse. Caro and Tasso 97
on Guidiccioni were sent by him to Luigi Alamanni in France in 1541
(beginning `Guidiccion, to se' morto? to the solo', `Questo al buon
Guidiccion solenne e sacro' and `La pietà vostra, Anton mio caro, è tale',
the last being a reply to a sonnet by Allegretti that he also included). In
1543 he sent to Ranuccio Farnese in Venice, at the request of Ranuccio's
mother, the duchess of Parma, a small collection of sonnets by various
writers on the death of Faustina Mancini Attavanti (the woman for
whom Molza wrote La ninfa tiberina), including one by Caro himself
(`O d'umana beltà caduchi fiori!'). A sonnet of his on Varchi's recent
death was sent to Battiferri in 1566, with a request for her to pass a copy
of it straight away to Pietro della Stufa.2
Torquato Tasso was perhaps the most prolific and enthusiastic writer
of occasional lyric verse of the Renaissance. Modern editions of his Rime
d encomio o d occasione contain 1,133 poems divided into four books, and
the two other categories of his lyrics, love poetry and spiritual poetry,
also contain poems that can be considered encomiastic.3 For Tasso, it was
part and parcel of his life as a courtier to send out verse of celebration,
condolence, well-wishing, praise and so on, or to compose such verse on
behalf of others; and of course the task had added importance when he
wanted favours, as he often did, from those in positions of power. Tasso
tried to ensure, in one way or another, that the poems were seen not only
by those to whom they were primarily directed, so that their scribal dis-
semination did not simply consist in a personal communication but also
led to a wider process of advertising their contents and the poet's skill
and devotion. In a letter of 1576 he describes his uncertainty over whether
two sonnets concerning, respectively, the all too invitingly kissable lower
lip of Leonora Sanvitale and the crown-like hair of Barbara Sanvitale (Le
rime, nos. 549 and 550) are fine enough to be sent to their subjects; he has
read them aloud to one of the Fucci brothers, Ercole or Maddalb, who
seemed to dislike them. Yet, he adds, `credo the ce ne Sian molte copie
per to mondo a quest'ora, uscite, cred'io, per arte magica' (I believe there
are many copies out there at present, having gone forth apparently by
magic).¢
Caro, Lettere familiari: on the complaint to Bergonzi, no. 546, 1 January 1559 (II, 313-14), §1; on
Grimaldi's request, no. 547, January 1559 (11, 314-15), S3 (see, too, Hobson, Apollo and Pegasus,
pp. 62 and 211); on Gradenigo's request, no. 604, 23 August 1560 (III, 41-3), g5; on the obitu-
ary sonnets, no. 169 to Alamanni, 23 August 1541 (I, 236-8), g6; no. 2,1z to Ranuccio Farnese,
15 December 1543 (I, 289); no. 783 to Battiferri, 12 January 1566 (III, 263).
For the editions of Angelo Solerti, Bruno Maier and Bruno Basile see T. Tasso, Le rime, II,
t967-70-
4 T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 55 to Scalabrini, 28 February 115761 (I, 133), and see Solerti, Vita, I, 2z1-2.
98 The manuscript circulation of poetry
In 1581 and 1582 Tasso promoted the diffusion in Mantua of three
sonnets in praise of Ranuccio Farnese and his father Alessandro, future
duke of Parma (Le rime, nos. 812-1}), After sending the first sonnet to
Curzio Ardizio in Mantua, Tasso suggested some variants, and invited his
friend to consult Marcello Donati and other members of the Accademia
degli Invaghiti about whether Ardizio should incorporate the changes.
Similarly, in the following year Tasso asked Ardizio to seek the advice of
members of the academy about some alterations that he was thinking of
making in a trio of sonnets on Ferrante Gonzaga's forthcoming voyage to
Spain (nos. 798-800), before Ardizio sent the poems to their recipient in
Spain. (Here one should also note how the collaborative nature of scribal
culture allowed a privileged first reader to arbitrate on the reading that
was to be transmitted further.) When Tasso sent to Maurizio Cataneo in
1583 two sonnets on the birth of a grandson of Cardinal Girolamo Albano
(nos. 869 and 870), he asked Cataneo to show them to the cardinal `ed a
cotesti altri signori' (and to these other masters) in Rome. Two years later,
Cataneo was again asked to act as a provider of a poem to someone other
than its primary recipient: Tasso requested him to show to don Duarte,
brother of Ranuccio Farnese, a sonnet in praise of Alessandro Guarnelli,
translator of the Aeneid (no. 1,254). Poems by Tasso and others in cele-
bration of Cesare d'Este's wedding to Virginia de' Medici in Florence
in 1586 were printed in Ferrara in the same year, but Tasso also sent his
own poems (a canzone and two sonnets, nos. 1,263-5) in manuscript from
Ferrara to the Medicean court in Florence. Through Camillo Albizzi,
the Florentine ambassador in his city, he sent the two sonnets to Cesare
with an invitation to show them to the bride's half-brother, Grand Duke
Francesco, and to her brothers.5
Tasso had a mental map of the networks of scribal diffusion into
which his encomiastic verse was passed, and he had confidence in their
effectiveness. In Chapter 2 Section 3 we noted that on 2 August 1586 he
asked for Costantini's help as a scribe in order to send out copies of a
canzone in praise of the duchess of Mantua, Leonora Gonzaga. Five days
later he wrote to tell Costantini that he had since written another can-
zone in praise of Leonora (Le rime, no. 6o8), `la quale le manderò com'io
abbia ricuperata la copia, se fra tanto non le sarà mandata dal padre don
I T. Tasso, Le lettere, nos. 173-8 and 182 to Ardizio, [1581] (II, 138-45, 146-9); letter of Tasso to
Ardizio, z January 1582, in Solerti, Vita, II, 25; Le lettere, no, 232 to Cataneo, 4 February 1583 (I1,
zz6); no. 459 to Cataneo, [31 December 15851 (11, 484-5); no. 469 to Cesare d'Este, 20 February
1586, and nos. 470 (same date) and 472 [1586] to Albizzi (II, 495. 496, 50o, and see Solerti, Vita,
1,470-3).
2 Exchanges and responses 99
Angelo Grillo, o per altra strada' (which I shall send you once I get the
copy back, unless meanwhile it has been sent to you by Fr Angelo Grillo
or through some other route). In the following year he sent to Costantini
a madrigal in praise of Leonora's dark eyes, but said that another, on the
light-coloured eyes of Margherita d'Este, duchess of Ferrara, would per-
haps be shown to him by fra Giacomo Moro, the poet's confessor; other-
wise Tasso would send it himself (nos. 1,354-5)• Tasso could on occasion
save himself the trouble of sending copies of poems by directing individ-
uals to others from whom they might obtain them. Marcello Donati, in
Mantua, was told that Tasso was not sending him a recently composed
canzone on the death of Leonora's sister Barbara, the previous duchess of
Ferrara, since he had already sent it to Grillo, who would have had it pre-
sented to Leonora or to her secretary Cesare Galvani. Donati could ask
Galvani for a copy and, if he thought the poem worthy, show it to Duke
Guglielmo. Tasso suggested to Orazio Feltro, who was helping him in his
lawsuit over his mother's dowry, that he could obtain many sonnets in
Naples, recently dispatched by Tasso to that city, from the poet's relative
Alessandro Grassi.
2 EXCHANGES AND RESPONSES
Many scribally circulated poems were replies of one sort or another.
In considering them, we can distinguish between exchanges of texts
addressed directly by one poet to one or more others, whether in a spirit
of friendship or in one of hostility, and responses occasioned either by a
poem that was not addressed to an individual or by something else that
had been written or said by another person.
If one received a poem in manuscript as a token of friendship, one was
expected to reciprocate in some way. The response might take the form of
a material gift or a favour, or at least a letter of thanks. But if the recipi-
ent had any pretensions to literary skill, and especially if the text of the
poem explicitly addressed or named that person, then the etiquette of
scribal culture meant that he or she had to consider responding in kind,
with another poem. The history of such poetic exchanges between indi-
viduals in the Italian vernacular, most commonly using the sonnet, was
a long and well-established one, going back to the Sicilian School in the
a T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 610 to Cosrantini, 7 August
1586 (III, 13); no. 779 to Costantini, 17 March
1587 (III, 170); no. 347 to Donati, 6 March 1585 (II, 35o—r), and see no. 344 to Leonora, 11585101,
348-9); no. 1,197 to Feltro, 9 December 1589 (IV, z68, and see Solerti, Vita, I, 646).
I00 The manuscript circulation of poetry
thirteenth century.? The same applied to verses in Latin. For instance,
Bembo appears to be referring to poems in this language when he wrote
to Giulio Tomarozzo from Urbino: `Mitto ad to eos meos versiculos, quos
ad urbem cum essem, abs teque tuos illos politissimos elegos accepissem,
tibi receperam me missurum' (I am sending you those little verses of mine
that I had undertaken to send you when I was in Rome and received those
most polished elegies of yours).' From the first decades of the Cinquecento
the vernacular capitolo in terza rimy could also be directed to an individ-
ual known to the author, as in the cases of the three main capitoli of
Machiavelli and the Satire of Ariosto.9 Because of its length, a capitolo
did not usually elicit a response in kind, but an exception was Berni's
poem in praise of Michelangelo, sent in 1534 from Florence to Sebastian
del Piombo in Rome. Michelangelo himself addressed a capitolo to Berni
in return, written as if it came from Sebastiano. Berni's poem included
messages of greeting to others in Rome, and Michelangelo, at the start of
his reply, recounted how Berni's verses were shown to Pope Clement VII,
Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici and his secretary Molza.'o
Girolamo Ruscelli devoted the thirteenth and last chapter of his Del
modo di comporre in versi (1559, fols. n2,'—n4°) to the topic of how to write
reply poems. The sonnet, he said, was the most common form; also used
were the madrigal and even, for some brave spirits, longer forms includ-
ing ottava and terza rima, though here one was not expected to use
the same rhymes. For sonnet replies, the Petrarchan norm was to keep
the same rhyme sounds in the same order, but not to use the same rhyme
words except in a different sense; he called this `per le rime'. Modern writ-
ers, he went on, had introduced a new way of making risposte, reusing the
rhyme words of the proposta; this he termed `per le desinenze' (with the
same endings) or `con le voci stesse' (with the same words). This technique,
he felt, was good if carried out well, with the words in the same order and
with the same meaning. He outlined four other kinds of reply: using the
same rhyme sounds or the same rhyme words but in a different order;
using alternately lines with the rhyme sounds and the rhyme words of
7 See for example Picone, `La tenzone de amore'. On the medieval period, see also Gorni, `Le
forme primarie', pp. 476-9; Bausi and Martelli, La metrica italiana, pp. 57-9; Giunta, Due saggi
and Versi a un destinatario.
a Bembo, Lettere, no. 259, 29 August 1507 (I, 2
53-4)•
9 Dionisotti, Machiavellerie, p. 98; Longhi, Lusus, pp. Az—zog. One of Machiavelli's capitoli, on
Fortune, replied to a letter (in prose) of Giovan Battista Soderini: Martelli, `I "Ghiribizzi"';
Dionisotti, Machiavellerie, pp. 71-8.
° Corni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 599-6o1 (Michelangelo), 799-803 (Berni);
Longhi, `Le rime di Francesco Berni', 277-8 and Lusus, pp. 197-9.
z Exchanges and responses IOI
the original, in either order; and respecting neither `rime' nor `desinenze',
though this last method normally indicated `soverchia poverty (excessive
poverty).
Some poets, such as Torquato Tasso, wrote responses in verse with
apparent willingness. Caro, on the other hand, from a fairly early point in
his career, sometimes declined to reply. In 1542 the only excuse he offered
to Giovan Francesco Stella for not being able to respond to a sonnet `come
si suole, con un altro mio' (as is usual, with another of my own) was
lack of inspiration: the Muses had divorced him. He might claim that he
was simply too busy as a result of his work as a secretary to members of
the Farnese family. When Luigi Tansillo sent him a sonnet, Caro said he
could not reply because he was `tra tamburi', in other words among sol-
diers' drums on one of his journeys on behalf of Pier Luigi Farnese. Caro
thanked Luca Contile for a sonnet but, pleading lack of time, said he
could only reciprocate with a sonnet written a few days previously. Caro's
other occupations in 1551 provided his justification for not responding in
verse to a sonnet of Ferrante Carrafa, though he also claimed to be `ora
in tutto alien da questa pratica' (now completely averse to this practice).
Similarly, in about 1557 he told an unidentified member of an academy in
Bologna that he could not respond in verse to a sonnet because `sono ora
molto lontano da questa professione' (I am now very remote from this
profession). The world-weary tone is rather disingenuous, since, as we shall
see in Chapter 4 Section 3, this letter was written in the period in which
he was mobilizing support for himself in his dispute with Castelvetro."
Scribal exchanges of poems were, for any writer, an important means
of entering into literary dialogue with other poets and of gaining recog-
nition from them. They were especially important for the women who,
from a position of relative isolation, were seeking acceptance into the cir-
cles of lyric poets in the course of the Cinquecento. The first to make con-
tact, in 1504, was Veronica Gambara, and the person she addressed was
Pietro Bembo. He knew her father and had known her by reputation for
two years, but they had not yet met. In the sonnet `Non t'ammirar, s'a to
non visto mai', Gambara asked Bembo not to be surprised at her sending
`queste mie carte' (these papers of mine): his virtues compelled everyone's
admiration and had led her to reveal how much she loved and honoured
" Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 182 to Stella, 17 August 1542 (I, 256-7), §z; no. 222 to Tansillo, 15 June
1544 (I, 300-2), §4 (the letter also mentions Caro's having seen a canzone of Tansillo's in Rome
at some earlier date, §1); no. 241 to Contile, c. 1545 (1, 333), §2; no. 371 to Carrafa, 5 July 1551 (II,
103-4), §3; no. 474 to a Bolognese academician, c. 1557 (1I, 232-3), §2. Tansillo's sonnet has not
survived: Milburn, Luigi Tansillo, p. 56.
102 The manuscript circulation of poetry
him. Bembo's reply, `Certo ben mi poss'io dir pago omai', points to his
love poetry and his Asolani, all as yet unprinted, as having earned him his
reputation. His sonnet was accompanied by a generous letter in which he
invited her to let him see more of her verse if he ever visited her in Brescia.
In 153o another sonnet sent to him by Gambara, A Fardente disio the
ognor m'accende', sheds interesting light on Bembo's image as a source
of spiritual guidance; we know from the evidence of his library that he
took a close interest in religion and in Church reform. Bembo replied
with a sonnet about the reawakening of his long-standing love for her,
`Quel dolce suon, per cui chiaro s'intende'. A further sonnet of his, `O
d'ogni mio penser ultimo segno', written probably in 1532, picks up from
the sonnet of 1504 the theme of Gambara's beauty, still unseen by Bembo.
This striking use of poetic memory, based (as Dionisotti notes in his com-
mentary) on an affection that spanned many years, shows how important
a part their initial reading of each other's work in manuscript played in
their social relationship.-
In an exchange of sonnets with Luigi Alamanni, Gambara supplied
the risposta to the male poet's proposta. Alamanni wrote as follows:
Non mi fu certo il ciel di tanto amico
ch'io vi vedessi anchor, donna gradita,
ma il contemplar vostra virtù infinita
non mi può torre il mio dentin nemico.
Di lei parlo ad ogn'hor, di lei notrico
quegli honesti pensier cha miglior vita
ne dimostran la strada ch'è smarrita
da chi schernisse il buon costume antico.
Deh, quante volte già m'ha detto e dice
il gran vostro Rangon: `Questa è colei
ch'è de la nostra età lume e phenice!
Così gratia e poter le dian gli dèi
di far Correggio suo ricco e felice
come degna saria di mille Orphei.'
(Heaven was certainly not so kind as to allow me to see you again, fair lady, but
my adverse destiny cannot stop me contemplating your infinite virtue. I speak
of it at all times, I nourish those honourable thoughts of it that show us the way
(lost by whoever scorned the good customs of old) to a better life. Ah, how often
`° Gambara, Le rime, no. 15, pp. 71-2, and no. 36, pp. 95-6; Bembo, Rime, LXIII, LXIV and
CXXIII, in Prose e rime, pp. 56o—z, 607-8; Bembo, Lettere, no. 193, u September 1504 (I,
179-8o) and no. 1,072, 1 April 1530 (111, 122), both to Gambara. See, too, Dilemmi, "Ne videatur
strepere"', and Gorni, `Veronica e le altre', pp. 38-9. On the early circulation of Rime, CXXIII,
see Richardson, `From scribal publication', 685-6.
a Exchanges and responses 103
your great Rangone has said and says: `This is she who is the light and phoenix
of our age! May the gods give her grace and power to make her Correggio rich
and fortunate, just as she would be worthy of a thousand Orpheuses.')
Gambara's reply uses all but one of Alamanni's rhyme words in a
different order, and outdoes the proposta in skill, adding a Petrarchan
allusion to the flight of the phoenix (Canzoniere, 185. I2-14):
Pentito forse il ciel, fiero nemico
di questa grave mia noiosa vita,
mercé de la virtù vostra infinita
cangiate voglie, hor mi si mostra amico.
L'alto vostro valor, pari a l'antico,
vostre rime leggiadre, alma gradita,
tal forza han data a la virtù smarrita
che di dolci pensier hor mi notrico.
Duolmi sol ch'io non sia (sappian gli dèi)
qual il mio gran Rangon ha detto e dice,
degno ben lui di più di mille Orphei.
Ma, lodandomi voi, qual la phenice,
ricca di eterno honor volando andrei
sovra quante fur mai lieta e felice.']
(Perhaps heaven — fierce enemy of this grievous and troublesome life of mine —
has repented; having changed its will thanks to your infinite virtue, it now
shows me a friendly face. Esteemed soul, your lofty worth, equal to that of old,
[and] your lovely verse have given such strength to my lost virtue that I now
nourish myself with sweet thoughts. I am sorry only that I am not (let the gods
take note) the person that my great Rangon has said and says; it is he that is
worthy of more than a thousand Orpheuses. But, if you praise me, I would fly,
like the phoenix, rich in eternal honour, above all other women, happy and
contented.)
Many of Vittoria Colonna's early poems, it has been observed by
Vecce, are epistolary in nature, being addressed to her soldier husband,
Francesco Ferdinando d'Avalos, marquis of Pescara, during his absences
or in consolation for the loss of a friend. Four poems by Avalos, now lost,
were addressed to Colonna on the occasion of the imprisonment of him-
self and her father Fabrizio after the Battle of Ravenna in April 1512, and
they may have been replies to poems of hers, including the Pistola [ ... ] ne
la rotta di Ravenna. This letter in the form of a capitolo appears to have
Alamanni's sonnet (not mentioned in Hauvette, Un exilé) and Gambara's response (Rime, no. 67, p.
168) are in BMV, MS It. IX 144 (6866), fols. 1z"-13'. Rangone is probably Claudio (]'1537), praised by
Alamanni in his Selve I.1 (Opere toscane, II, fol, a7'), rather than his cousin Guido, another condot-
tiere in the service of the French. On both, see Picot, Les Italiens, pp. 26-8. See, too, chapter 1 n. 88.
104 The manuscript circulation of poetry
had a very limited diffusion in manuscript, but it found its way into print
in Fabrizio Luna's Vocabulario of 1536, together with two of Colonna's
sonnets, provided perhaps by Paolo Giovio.14 Giovio was one of the first to
act as an intermediary between Colonna and Bembo: on one day in early
April 1530 the Venetian received the same sonnet of Colonna, addressed
to him, from both Giovio and Vettor Soranzo. At the end of May Bembo
was able to send his reply through the mediation of Giovio, and also to
send it to Flaminio Tomarozzo and Carlo Gualteruzzi in Rome, with
a request to give it to Soranzo as well.15 Bembo's exchanges with both
Gambara and Colonna, and his poetic correspondence in general, were
sufficiently important for him to include five sonnets addressed to him
by others (Benedetto Morosini, Gambara, Trissino, Colonna and Molza),
together with the first line of his reply, as an appendix to the second
printed edition of his Rime (1535), fols. F7`—F8°. Three sonnets exchanged
between Gambara and Colonna reached him with a letter from Marcello
Palone in Rome in 1532. These were probably Gambara's `Mentre da vaghi
e giovenil penseri' and `O de la nostra etade unica gloria', and just one
of Colonna's replies, either `Lasciar non posso i miei saldi penseri' or `Di
novo it Cielo de l'antica gloria'.`s
Laura Battiferri devoted a considerable proportion of her poetic activ-
ity to exchanges of sonnets. Her literary corpus includes 371 sonnets by
her and 117 sent to her by 47 correspondents." When Battiferri came to
collect her verse for the first time in her Primo libro dell opere toscane,
printed in í56o, she included 41 sonnets by male correspondents along-
side 146 by herself. In the manuscript that she prepared as copy-text
(BNCF, Magl. VII 778), she left blank pages in readiness for the replies to
her proposte that she hoped would be forthcoming. Pairs of sonnets were
laid out on facing pages in the manuscript and on the same page in the
printed edition, which is in quarto format. If, in the end, a reply sonnet
was not received, Battiferri instructed the printer to place two proposte
'1 Vecce, 'Vittoria Colonna', pp. 2,16-18; Colonna, Rime, A2: 1, pp. 53-6-
Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,077 to Giovio, 7 April 1530 (III, 125-6); no. 1,078, to Soranzo, 9 April 1530
(III, 126); no. 1,093 to Gualteruzzi, undated (III, 139); no. 1,094 to Giovio, 29 May 153 0 (111, 140);
no. 1,097 to [Tomarozzo] and Gualteruzzi, 30 May 1530 (III, 141-3); no. 1,104 to Gualteruzzi, to
June 1530 (III, 146-7). The poems exchanged were probably Colonna's sonnet Ahi quanto fu at
mio Sol contrario il fato!', lamenting the fact that Bembo had not helped to immortalize her late
husband (Rime, Ar: 71, P. 38), and Bembo's `Cingi le costei tempie de l'amato' (Rinse, CXXV, in
Prose e rime, p. 609).
Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,385 to Palone, 5 July 1532 (III, 352-3); Gambara, Le rime, nos. 41 and 42,
PP. 102-4; Colonna, Rime, At: 65, P. 35 and E13, P. 209.
" Kirkham in Battiferra degli Ammannati, Laura Battiferra, p. 69.
a Exchanges and responses 105
on the same page." Clearly she generated some of these exchanges in
order to have them printed, but a number of them date from several
years earlier, so that scribal and print culture intersect in the volume.
In 1552 Caro proposed some emendations to a sonnet of hers (`Caro, se
'1 basso stile e '1 gran desio'), describing himself with a hint of irony as
her `mastro , and sent a sonnet in return (`Laura, si voi mi sete e lauro e
Clio').'9 Battiferri initiated an exchange with Varchi in 1556. But not all
the exchanges were begun by her; in the same year she received a sonnet
from Lelio Bonsi (`Quando, da lungo e grave sonno desta') to which
she wrote a reply (Anima bella, the leggera e presta') in spite of ini-
tial hesitation due to `i rispetti the mi bisognano avere in questo paese'
(the concerns I must have in this city), in other words considerations of
social decorum.2" Battiferri continued her exchanges after the edition of
1560. In March 1562, for instance, she sent to Varchi, for his comment,
a sonnet that she had prepared in reply to one from Laura Terracina.
A fortnight later she was telling Varchi of the problems that she would
have in replying to a sonnet `per la difficultà delle sue rime' (because of
the difficulties of its rhymes), but she sent him the sonnet in question,
written for Mario Colonna, shortly afterwards .2' Ludovico Beccadelli
had written to her a sonnet of praise after the printing of the Primo
libro, and when he visited Florence in 1563 she sent him a letter includ-
ing a sonnet of her own.22
Battiferri was involved in poetic exchanges with the artist and poet
Agnolo Bronzino, whose own canzoniere similarly contains many corres-
pondence poems. She replied to sonnets from Bronzino on the death of
Jacopo Pontormo in 1556 and on the death of Luca Martini in 1561 (also
the subject of one of her exchanges with Varchi). She started an exchange
of sonnets with Bronzino on his portrait of her (Figure 1), which also
led to a poetic correspondence between the painter and Antonfrancesco
Grazzini.23
* Kirkham, `Laura Battiferra degli Ammannati's First Book'.
'° Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 382, 6 August 155z (II, 119-20), j3; Battiferri degli Ammannati,
Ll primo libro, no. LXXXII a—b, pp. 86-7 (exchange with Varchi); no. CXIX a—b, pp. 132-4
(exchange with Bonsi).
° Lettere di Laura Battiferri Ammannati, no. IV, 14 November 1556 (pp. 20-3); Battiferri degli
Ammannati, 11 primo libro, no. LXXXV a—b, pp. 89-90.
Lettere di Laura Battiferri Ammannati, no. XII, 1 March 1562 (pp. 46-7); no. XIII, 15 March 1562
(pp. 48-9); no. XIV, 26 March 156z (pp. 49-50); Battiferra degli Ammannati, Laura Battiferra,
PP. 302-4•
" Battiferra degli Ammannati, Laura Battiferra, pp. 37, 280-2.
` Battiferri degli Ammannati, Ll primo libro, nos. C—CII a—b, pp. 108-12 (Pontormo); Battiferra
degli Ammannati, Laura Battiferra, pp. 268-70 (Martini), z94-6 (the portrait); Sonetti diAngiolo
 io6 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
In 1583 Torquato Tasso helped to encourage the young Margherit a
Sarrocchi, who was born in Naples about 156o but then moved to Rome,
replying to two sonnets from her with two of his own on his desire to
turn from mortal to spiritual concerns. Later Sarrocchi was to take Tasso's
Gerusalemme liberata as a model for her epic poem, La Scanderbeide. At
some point she must have sent Tasso some of her epic verse, perhaps an
early sample of La Scanderbeide, because in another sonnet he praises a
heroic poem of hers.24
Throughout our period, scribal exchanges of sonnets could involve
more than two poets. In 1478-9, for instance, Lorenzo de' Medici's son-
net `Se tra li altri sospir' the escon di fore' led to a discussion of Love and
Fortune in three further sonnets, written probably at Lorenzo's request,
by Poliziano, Pandolfo Collenuccio and Girolamo Benivieni.25 The read-
ing of a pair of Bembo's sonnets on a woman's physical beauty and graces
and their effects on him as lover (`Crin d'oro crespo e d'ambra tersa e pura'
and `Moderati desiri, immenso ardore') led the Venetian Compagnia degli
Amid, mentioned in Chapter 1 Section 5, to take up the theme of the first
sonnet and develop it in a spirit of friendly rivalry. Niccolò Tiepolo con-
tributed three sonnets and Vincenzo Querini responded to the first of
these with one of his own. The chain of participation then extended to
the city of Ferrara, where a sonnet was composed by Ludovico Ariosto in
response to Tiepolo's third. The common starting-point for all the son-
nets appears to have been, as Gnocchi has suggested, a passage of Bembo's
Asolani, Il. zz, a work that was circulating, still in manuscript, in the
1 court of Ferrara in 1503.26 Several years later, however, Francesco Berni
f
parodied Bembo's verses in his own sonnet `Chiome d'argento fine, irte e
r attorte'.27
An unusual case in which one poem generated many others, includ-
ing some by women, is that of the reception of the sonnet inspired by
Alessandro Piccolomini's visit to Petrarch's tomb in Arquà in 1540. This
poem was itself a response to one of Petrarch I since it begins with the
s,
first line of sonnet 187, `Giunto Alessandro a la famosa tomba'; but whereas
Allori, pp. 3 (Grazzini), 6 (Battiferri); Parker, Branzino, pp. 63-5 (Martini and Pontormo), 96-103
(the portrait); Macola, Sguardi escritture, pp. 76-85, 172-6.
" Tasso's replies are Le rime, nos. 904 and 9o5, pp. 899—got; see, too, T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 250 to
Maurizio Cataneo, 24 August 1583 (II, 240-2). The third sonnet, Le rime, no. 1,607, P. 1,846, is
addressed to Sarrocchi under her married name of Biraghi; she was married by 1588.
" Poliziano, Rime, pp. 123-4,
2 40-1.
i6 Gnocchi, `Tommaso Giustiniani', 282-93. Bembo's sonnets are Rime, V and VI, in Prose e rime,
pp. 5io—u. Ariosto's sonnet was not printed until 1547•
Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 848-9.
a Exchanges and responses 107
Petrarch was writing of Alexander the Great's visit to the tomb of Achilles,
Piccolomini was writing of his own homage to his poetic model. The son-
net circulated rapidly in Padua, where Piccolomini was then based, and
in his native Siena, and in both cities it inspired further sonnets. Among
the Sienese reply sonnets were five by women: Virginia di Matteo Salvi,
Eufrasia Marzi, Camilla Petroni de' Piccolomini, Girolama Piccolomini
de' Biringucci and Virginia di Achille Salvi. In a letter to Aretino of 31 May
1541, Piccolomini describes how `più gioveni Gentilomini Senesi' (several
young Sienese gentlemen) had been inspired to participate by the example
of academicians in Padua: `però the avendo loro avuto a le mani non so
venticinque o trenta Sonetti fatti in Padova da diversi Signori Infiammati
sopra le medesime Rime, volsero essi ancora far prova di aggiongervene a
Bard (because, when they received perhaps twenty-five or thirty sonnets
written in Padua by various members of the Infiammati following the
same rhyme words, they too wanted to try to add to them, in a competi-
tive spirit). The sonnets written by the Infiammati included an internal
exchange between Emanuele Grimaldi and Varchi: Grimaldi urged the
Florentine to add his poetic voice, and Varchi replied that, although he
was unable to reach the level of Piccolomini's sonnet, he would pay hom-
age himself to Petrarch's remains. Piccolomini sent all these sonnets to
Aretino together with his reply sonnets to each of the five women, in
which he returned the praise that they had bestowed on him." In this
instance texts were diffused within a network of communities, although
it was a transitory one, created by a common interest in Petrarch and
Petrarchism.
In late 1540 or 1541, an exchange of sonnets in Florence led to the com-
position of further sonnets and letters. The series began when Agnolo
Firenzuola addressed to members of the Accademia degli Umidi in
Florence a mock-serious exhortation to show respect to the letter K, in the
form of a sonnet, `Kandidi ingegni, a cui dat'& di sopra'. Firenzuola had
briefly mentioned the K in his Discacciamento de le nuove lettere (1524) as
superfluous to the vernacular alphabet; his true aim in the sonnet was, it
seems, to poke fun at the plans for spelling reform (excluding the use of
K) that were being prepared by Pierfrancesco Giambullari and Cosimo
Bartoli. When one of the Umidi, Michelangelo Vivaldi, responded with
a sonnet defending the banishment of K, Firenzuola sent a further son-
net in the same vein, using the same relatively difficult rhyme words.
` Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro Aretino, Book II no. 116 (II,130-1); Cerreta, `La Tombai de'
and Alessandro Piccolomini, pp. 32-4, 239-48; Piéjus, `Les Poétesses siennoises', pp. 317-19.
rob The manuscript circulation of poetry
Readers of the initial sonnet were probably expected to perceive obscene
double meanings in it; certainly, by the end of the exchange the language
was explicitly crude. Others joined in the game. An anonymous sonnet
defending the Y was addressed to the Umidi. Grazzini, one of the lead-
ing lights of this academy, wrote to its other members a `Lettera sopra it
K sbandito' (Letter on the banished K) and sent to Giovanni Mazzuoli,
known as to Stradino, at whose house the academy was born, another
defence of K in the form of a letter including a tailed sonnet `da recitarsi'
(to be recited). The letter, dated 6 August 1541, was written by Grazzini
but purported to come from Pietro Aretino in Venice, where K had at
one point sought refuge. Grazzini's letters and sonnet made an indirect
protest against the authoritarian tendencies of the still new regime of
Duke Cosimo by presenting K as a rebel in exile, banished along with
other letters; the debate about spelling conducted in these manuscript
exchanges was thus a thinly veiled means of conducting a debate on pol-
itical reform.29
So far we have been considering sonnet exchanges conducted in an
amicable manner, even if, as in the last case, they had a polemical under-
current. But exchanges could sometimes be vituperative. Manuscript
provided an effective medium for the initial (and sometimes the only)
circulation of such poems: it allowed them to reach the precise audi-
ence at which they were aimed — not only the opponent but also any
supporters of the two sides — and to do so as swiftly as possible. The
notorious dispute of 1473-6 between two members of the Medici circle,
Luigi Pulci and Matteo Franco, was waged primarily through contin-
ual exchanges of insulting tailed sonnets between the two men. Pulci
recounted in a letter to Lorenzo of February 1473 how some of the son-
nets were brought to him by relatives of his. But the poems also refer
to members of their wider readership, such as Poliziano. Tommaso
Baldinotti acted as both editor and owner-publisher of the sonnets, col-
lecting them and transcribing them at least three times from his own
master copy"
The poetic correspondence in which the Venetian courtesan Veronica
Franco was involved was in some cases conducted in a spirit of friendship.
To Bartolomeo Zacco of Padua she sent two sonnets: one in response to a
'9Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 102-3 and Antonfrancesco Grazzmi, pp. 94-6, 104-7; Zanrè, —Che
vuol dire?"' For Firenzuolds comments on k, see Richardson (ed.), Trattati sull'ortografia,
k.11
p. 19.
° Pulci, Morgante e Lettere, letter XXXVI, pp. 99t-2. For the dispute, see Pulci and Franco, Il
`Libro dei sonetti'. Decaria and Zaccarello, `Il ritrovato "Codice Dolci"'.
z Exchanges and responses log
sonnet he had addressed to her on the death of his young daughter Daria,
and a second on her gratitude for his beneficial moral influence and for
the tributes he had paid her with his pen. These verses were included in a
small manuscript canzoniere by Zacco31 One of her letters refers to another
poetic correspondence, apparently initiated by her with two sonnets con-
taining difficult rhyme sounds or rhyme words. She thanks an unidenti-
fied person for four sonnets `fatti con obligo cosi stretto di rime' (written
with such a tight requirement of rhymes). She responded with a reciprocal
display of virtuosity: `invio due sonetti fatti per l'istesse rime dei quattro
vostri, e cos! n'avr6 fatto quattro anch'io' (I am sending two sonnets writ-
ten with the same rhymes as your four, and so I too shall have written
four)32
However, most of Franco's poetic correspondence was conducted in the
form of epistolary capitoli, some of them used to defend herself against
the harsh treatment meted out to her by men. Her Terze rime, printed in
1575 when she was in her late twenties, include twenty-five capitoli, and
the first fourteen are a collection of seven pairs of proposte and risposte,
initiated sometimes by her, sometimes by another writer. The identities
of the other poets are normally concealed in the printed edition, though
one of the very few surviving copies does name the author of the first
capitolo as Marco Venier. Poems XV—XXV are all addressed by Franco
to men as lovers or friends. Capitolo XXIII asks for advice from an expert
in duelling and honour, because she had been `da un certo uomo indis-
creto provocata' (provoked by a certain indiscreet man). She was prob-
ably referring here to one or more poems about her, written in Venetian
dialect, that Maffio Venier (who came from another branch of the fam-
ily) had circulated in manuscript. In one capitolo, beginning `Franca,
credéme, che, per san Maffio', he wonders why people pay so much for
her but he still asks for her love. The second, however, beginning `An, fia,
comuodo? a the muodo zioghémo?', describes her ugliness, and a tailed
sonnet, beginning `Veronica, ver unica puttand, enumerates her physical
and other defects. To this sonnet Franco responded with her dignified
capitolo `D'ardito cavalier non è prodezza' (XVI). She laments her oppon-
ent's lack of chivalry and challenges him to prepare for a duel that will be
conducted scribally:
BMV, MS It. IX 14 (6988), fors. 76°-77' and 82°; the manuscript is written in two alternating
hands, one a fairly neat humanistic cursive (possibly that of a secretary), the other larger and
less elegant (possibly Zacco's). See Cicogna, Delle inscrizioni veneziane, V, 423-4; Stampa and
Franco, Rime, pp. 359-60, 384: V. Franco, Rime, sonnets XIII and XIV (pp. 177-8).
" V. Franco, Lettere, no. VI, pp. 16—t7.
iio The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
Apparecchiate pur l'inchiostro e '1 foglio,
e fatemi saper senz'altro indugio
quali armi per combatter in man toglio 33 (11. 193-5)
(Prepare ink and paper, and let me know without further delay which arms I
should take up in combat.)
Poetic responses could occasionally entail a deliberate shift of regis-
ter or context, even a turning of the original on its head. A famous
thirteenth-century precedent is Cenne da la ChitarraIs sequence of sonnets
containing complaints about the months of the year, which was based on
but contrasted with Folgore da San Gimignano's sequence on the pleas-
ures of the months34 Two of Francesco Berni's sonnets made unexpected
and irreverent uses of models that were circulating in manuscript. One of
them reworked a sonnet of Castiglione, `Cesare mio, qui •sono ove it mar
bagna'. Writing to his cousin Cesare Gonzaga in 1503 from Gaeta, during
the war between the French and the Spanish for control of the Kingdom
of Naples, Castiglione had evoked the Virgilian associations of the region
and then contrasted the violence of warfare that surrounded him with the
sweet thoughts of love engraved within his heart. Berni's `Divizio mio, io
son dove it mar bagna' was composed twenty years later when the poet
had been sent away from Rome in order to carry out duties at the abbey
of San Giovanni in Venere, near Chieti, on behalf of Angelo Dovizi, to
whom the sonnet was addressed. One of the reasons for which Berni had
been removed from Rome was his passion for an adolescent boy, about
whose illness he had recently written and incautiously circulated two Latin
elegies. Angelo was a nephew of Cardinal Bernardo Dovizi, and it must
have been this friend of Castiglione's, one of the speakers in Il libro del
cortegiano, who had provided Berni with the original sonnet. Berni imi-
tates its opening, follows its structure and uses the same rhyme words.
But the tone soon changes, making the original seem affected and preten-
tious in contrast. Berni introduces crude terms — such as `culo' (arse), used
twice — and inveighs bitterly against the ignorance of the local population
and his primitive surroundings, using an eclectic blend of allusions to the
language of Petrarch, on the one hand, and of popular expressions typ-
ical of writers such as Burchiello on the other. Further, while readers of
Castiglione's sonnet would have assumed his love was heterosexual, the
first readers of Berni's sonnet would have known that, when he described
'j Quotations are from V. Franco, Rime. Venier's poems are edited, from BMV, MS It. IX 217
(7061), in Dazzi (ed.), Il libro chiuso, pp. 23-33, 37-40, and M. Venier, Poesie diverse, pp. ro2-8,
196-ziz.
74 Contini (ed.), Poeti del Duecento, II, 405-19, 422-34.
z Exchanges and responses III
in the concluding tercet his fiercely erotic desire for someone in Ronne, he
was yearning in his semi-exile for the young male with whom he was in
love.35
In 1527 Berni targeted the way in which Bembo had recently washed
his hands of the crisis that was looming over Italy. In the sonnet `Mentre
navi e cavalli e schiere armate', written in 1526 or in early 1527, before
the Sack of Rome in May, Bembo supported the military campaign of
Clement VII against the imperial army, but expressed his own prefer-
ence for achieving personal fame among posterity; he was thus avoid-
ing any contact with the `vulgo' (common herd), attending instead to
his studies and seeking God's favour. Bembo's praise of the contempla-
tive life does, to be fair, echo the interest he had shown in the hermitic
life in earlier years, but the poem could only appear self-centred, all the
more so because of its timing, which could hardly have been worse. It
was addressed to the papal datary, Giovanni Matteo Giberti, bishop of
Verona, who had played a major part in determining the pope's disas-
trous foreign policy. Berni was doubtless able to read the sonnet as a
member of Giberti's circle: he deputized on occasions for the bishop's
secretary, Giovan Battista Sanga, and did so in 1526. Berni and those
around him in Rome would have known that one of Bembo's motives
for writing the sonnet was a practical and somewhat sordid one: Bembo
hoped to enlist Giberti's help in his quest for some ecclesiastical ben-
efices. After the Sack, Berni attacked the stance of Bembo's sonnet with
a savage parody, `Né navi né cavalli o schiere armate'. Again following
the pattern and some of the phrasing of the original, including its rhyme
words, he lamented the plight of Italy and Rome: neither military force
nor the expenditure of money could now save them. Like Cenne before
him, Berni then turned the description of pleasure in his model into one
of complaint. He too hid himself from the crowd, but he was spending
his hours unprofitably, surrounded by misery, in depressed contempla-
tion of his own plight.36
A sonnet by Della Casa and a reply from Caro poked fun at the style
that their friend Varchi had displayed in the volume of his Sonetti that
had been printed twice in 1555 In their exchange, each tried to outdo
Varchi in writing as badly as possible, while turning Varchi's praise of
(homosexual) love into a warning about its effects. Their sonnets were
11 Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 422.-3 (Castiglione), 809-10 (Berni); Longhi,
'Le rime di Francesco Berni', 28o-1; Toscan, Terni, rMaborateur'.
,e Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 176 (Bembo; see Bembo, Rime, CXIII, in
Prose e rime, pp. 599-600, for the later version of the sonnet), 82.5 (Berni).
112 The manuscript circulation of poetry
intended as a private joke, but their existence was known in Naples by
1558, when Caro was asked for and provided a copy, on condition that the
poem was not `given out' as his.37
One handwritten adaptation of a tailed sonnet by the Venetian poet
Andrea Calmo is so close to the original that it has been termed a poetic
contrafactum. The original sonnet is an attack on a male poetaster; the
manuscript version, jotted down on a flyleaf of a printed copy of a work by
Calmo, makes masculine forms feminine and introduces some changes of
phrasing, while keeping almost all of Calmo's rhyme-words, so that, with
very little effort, the poem is converted into a denunciation of the shame-
lessness of a certain Lucrezia3$
Sonnets of praise and vituperation were used in two controversies
concerning attacks on literary or linguistic orthodoxy. In 1531 a flurry
of fierce poetic exchanges in Padua and Venice centred on the young
Venetian poet Antonio Brocardo. Its origin is obscure, but an undated
letter of Bernardo Tasso in Padua to Giovan Francesco Valerio suggests
that it may have arisen from a mistaken interpretation of a sonnet by
Tasso: this was read as a veiled attack on Bembo that had been written
with the encouragement of Brocardo. A sonnet, said Tasso, had then
been `pubblicato' (in other words published scribally) against Brocardo
and himself, and this had infuriated Brocardo. While Tasso was eager
to pacify Bembo, Brocardo appears to have levelled some criticisms
against Bembo, allegedly declaring his superiority to his fellow Venetian
and saying that he could point to errors of his, presumably grammatical
ones. Various people in the two cities then came to Bembo's defence,
among them Pietro Aretino. Aretino's involvement must in turn have
led to some written attacks on him. The first dated evidence for them
is an agitated letter, addressed to him from Padua in July, in which
Tasso denies that certain people, among them Brocardo, have criticized
Aretino. The criticisms were contained in a sonnet whose author, not
named here, had been identified and to whom a reply had been sent,
and in three or four further sonnets. One of these, seemingly written
in the hand of Luigi Querini, was entitled `Il Brocardo contra Pietro
Aretino', but Querini, said Tasso, was sure that Aretino would know
that Querini was not really responsible. On 23 August Querini himself
wrote from Padua to tell Aretino that Giovanni Tiepolo had recently
asked him to send to Aretino a copy of the sonnets written in the past
37 Longhi, `Un esperimento'. 3A Lazzerini, `Un "contrafactum" calmiano'.
2 Exchanges and responses 113
few days; Querini was sending some of them with this letter and would
try to obtain the rest later.39
Just six days later Giovanni Brevio reported to Aretino that Brocardo
was dead and that most people attributed his demise to the effect of the
sonnets written against him. On ig September Querini told Aretino
that he had shown sonnets on Brocardo's death to Beatrice Pio (wife of
Bembo's Paduan friend Gasparro degli Obizzi), who had praised them.
On the 23rd Querini returned the sonnets `per it Broccardo' (for Brocardo)
to Aretino. Other sonnets against Brocardo, Querini reported, had been
lent by him to Leonardo Malaspina, who had taken them to Rome.
`Vedrò quanto più presto potrò di averne copia da cui gli ha,' Querini
continued, `e l'invier6 a V. S.' (I will see to getting a copy as soon as I can
from someone who has them and I will send it to you). Aretino himself
boasted in 1537 of his `sonetto the ammazz6 it Broccardo', and in the
previous year Bembo was reported to have recalled this literary assassin-
ation. However, at some point Aretino wrote four sonnets in praise of the
dead Brocardo, and he sent them to Brevio in a letter of 1537. Whatever
the real connection between Brocardo's death and Aretino's sonnets, one
must note how effectively the scribally based campaign was mounted and
how swiftly the poems could be diffused from one reader to another. 411
After Bembo's Latin Brevi were printed in 1536, Aretino again came to
his defence with a sonnet mocking Ubaldino Baldinelli (`Un fiorentin
plebeo, detto Ubaldino') for having dared to criticize Bembo's writing.4'
Another collective scribal campaign intended to defend one person and
to denigrate another was mounted in Florence in 1563. In the previous
December, Garzia de' Medici had died, and in the following month
39 B. Tasso, Delle lettere, I, no. 36 to Valerio (pp. 85-6); Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro
Aretino, Book I no. 87 from B. Tasso, 2r July 1531 (I, 103); no. 90 from Luigi Quirini, 23 August
1531 (I, 105).
10 Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro Aretino, Book I no. 94 from Brevio, 29 August 1531 (I,
tog-9); no. 92 from Quirini, t9 September 1531 (I, 107); no. 91 from Quirini, 23 September S3
1 1
(I, w5-6); no. 304 from Varchi, 9 October 1536 (I, 293); Aretino, Lettere, no. 126 to Francesco da
l'Arme, 15 May 1537 (I, 194-5); no. 264 to Brevio, 2 December 1537 (I, 363-6); Cian, Un decennio,
PP- 178-9; Virgili, Francesco Berni, pp. 228-38; Saletti, 'Un sodalizio poetico'; Romei, `Pietro
Aretino tra Bembo e Brocardo'. Aretino's sonnets in praise of Brocardo could possibly be those
mentioned by Querini in September 1531, but it would have been strange for Querini to be deal-
ing at the same time with sonnets both for and against Brocardo.
4~ Trucchi (ed.), Poesie italiane inedite, III, 211. On Bembo's reaction to Baldinelli's criticisms, see
his Lettere, no. 1,827 to Sadoleto, 9 February 1537 (IV, 22); no. 1,830 to Baldinelli, 26 February
1537 (IV, 25-6); nos. 1,831 and 1,834 to Gualteruzzi, 7 March and 3 April 1537 (IV, 26-7, 28-30).
Baldinelli is probably the Ubaldino described as seeming learned by dint of hard work in
Aretino's letter to Cardinal Benedetto Accolti of 29 September 1537: Aretino, Lettere, no. 178,
29 September 1537 (I, 260-2).
114 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
the second of Lionardo Salviati's consolatory orations on the loss of this
young son of Duke Cosimo was printed in Florence. Jacopo Corbinelli, a
Florentine then in voluntary exile in France, obtained a copy of the book
and annotated it with malicious remarks that disparaged the ideas and
style of Salviati and Varchi, and were also disrespectful of the Medici.
Corbinelli must have sent this annotated copy to Florence — another case
of intersection between scribal and printed transmission. The marginalia
caused outrage in Salviati's strongly pro-Medicean circle. Salviati him-
self drafted a hostile letter addressed to Corbinelli (it is not clear if this
was ever sent), but his friends also rallied to his cause by writing a series
of poems that supported him, praised Don Garzia and accused the rebel
of immorality, heresy, ingratitude and disloyalty. The main contribu-
tor was Varchi, with no fewer than twenty-five sonnets and two Latin
epigrams; in addition, Grazzini wrote three tailed sonnets, Gherardo
Spini wrote another and an anonymous poet composed a normal son-
net. Salviati termed this collection the `Corbi' (Crows), since the poems
played on their victim's surname. In 1564 he prepared a dedication of
them addressed to Caro, though it seems unlikely that he sent them. The
making of the collection was followed by further exchanges of sonnets
between Varchi and Salviati, in which the latter showed his admiration
for the older scholar and thanked him for his support.42
3 CURRENT AFFAIRS
Verses that commented on those in power or on public events were often
circulated scribally especially when they came from an oppositional or par-
tisan viewpoint. They form part of the vigorous tradition of `libelli famosi',
defamatory writings whose diffusion, as we shall see from examples drawn
from several Italian cities up to the 1580s, could begin with the posting of
copies in a public place, ideally a site belonging to the person or persons
who were being attacked.43 Texts could be posted under cover of darkness,
as if on a military raid, and could also be distributed directly to key read-
ers. However, the examples in this section need to be treated with some
caution. First, some texts were circulated in print (and probably orally) as
well as in manuscript; an example is a lament on the French occupation of
Milan in the late 149os couched in three- or four-line stanzas ending with
a= P. Brown, `Manoscritti e stampe', 540 (on the dedication to Caro), `Jacopo Corbinelli' and
Lionardo Salviati, pp. 31-9; Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 315-18. The copy of the Orazione anno-
tated by Corbinelli is now Ferrara, Bibl. Comunale Ariostea, Misc. Est. 343.2.
43 Burke, `Insult and blasphemy'; Niccoli, Rinascimento anticlericale, especially pp. 79-48-
3 Current affairs 115
words or phrases of the Pater Noster.44 Second, some testimonies of circu-
lation probably refer to manuscript but might conceivably relate to print.
Third, a few of the texts concerned were or may have been in prose; but
it is convenient to mention them here, since they are closely related to the
many examples that we know to have been in verse.
In Florence, the propaganda war between supporters and opponents of
fra Girolamo Savonarola in the 1490s was conducted in part through the
circulation of manuscript texts, as well as in print and from the pulpit. We
shall return to this topic in Chapter 4 Section z, but we can note here that
the tactics used by both sides included the writing and posting of verses
that were presumably handwritten. The historian Filippo Nerli described
how `erano da ogni parte fatti sonetti e appiccati ne' luoghi pubblici
cartelli d'infamia contro all'una e all'altra parte' (sonnets were written on
each side and defamatory writings were attached in public places against
both parties). Francesco Cei was one of the poets who wrote against the
friar and his followerS.45 A certain Girolamo Muzi used a combination
of personal transmission and public display. He instructed Giovanni da
Dicomano to take to Florence four copies of a frottola attacking the friar,
two of them intended for individuals, two to be posted in public places:
Vade Florentiam, et de his quattuor exemplis curabis [ ... ] ita et taliter cum
effectu, quod unum exemplum huius frottole perveniat ad manus fratris Ieronimi
de Ferrara, et unum ad domum Ieronimi de Villanis relinques, et unum pone
affissum ostio ecclesie Sancte Marie Floris de Florentia, et unum in Foro novo,
sive in plateae, sive in palatio Dominorum.
(Go to Florence, and of these four copies you will see to it that one copy of this
frottola comes into the hands of fra Girolamo of Ferrara, and you will leave one at
the house of Girolamo Villani, and you will post one on the door of the cathedral,
and one in the Mercato Nuovo, or in the Piazza or in the Palazzo della Signoria.)
The poem called on the Florentines to realize they had been duped by the
friar, as its opening shows:
O popolo ingrato,
tu ne vai preso alle grida
e drieto a una guida
piena d'ipocresia.
(Ungrateful people, you have been taken in by shouting, following a guide full
of hypocrisy.)
11 Novati, `Una poesia politica' and `La parodia sacra', pp. 217-19. Other such poems include a
parody of the Te Deum lamenting the downfall of Lodovico Sforza (recorded by Sanudo in 14 1~
I diarii, III, 136-7) and a manuscript version of the Pater Noster from about 150c), asking God ro
protect Venice ('La parodia sacra', pp. 221, 223-5).
i5 Mutini, `Francesco Cei'; the passage from Nerli is cited on P. 327.
116 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
The displaying of poems such as this would surely also have been intended
to lead to their being read aloud to bystanders or to their being learned
for recitation or singing; they were not just for reading silently. Muzi's
action was treated as a very serious offence: he was fined the large sum of
6o florins.46
Partisans of the exiled Medici family also distributed propaganda leaf-
lets, as Sanudo noted in Venice, though his information on their con-
tents and the medium of diffusion is rather sketchy. In February 1498
`certe polize' (certain leaflets) were found in Florence containing two
verses telling the citizens that they should call in the `medici' (doctors) if
they wanted their illness healed. Two months later Sanudo learned that
`boletini' (leaflets) had been found giving the same message in Latin (`Si
vis republicam salvam fore, reddite Medicos infirmis': If you want the
republic to survive, give the Medici/doctors back to the sick), and that
further `polize' had urged the Florentines to cut off the heads of Paolo
Antonio Soderini and Francesco Valori, leading supporters of Savonarola,
if they wanted to regain their honour. Leaflets bearing the Medici coat of
arms were distributed one night in October. In the following February,
Sanudo heard that `per Fiorenza è stà trova polize Palle, guerra, guerra,
guerra' (throughout Florence there have been found leaflets [saying] `balls
[the Medici emblem], war, war, war').47 From these cases it appears that
verse was the favoured medium for short propaganda messages, because
of its memorability, but that some were in prose. While print may well
have been used, for instance for the leaflets with the Medici arms, short
texts could have been handwritten. In 1503 a subversive poem attacked
Florence's ally Louis XII: Piero Gualterotti, the gonfalonier of justice
(head of state), invited views from senior citizens at a meeting on 3 August
on what was to be done about a sonnet that had been found, written `in
vergogna del Re di Francia' (to shame the king of France). In the discus-
sion, all were agreed in recommending that the author should be identi-
fied and punished. Soon after the Medici were exiled again in 1527, several
sonnets in their support were posted in Bibbiena, and one of them was
sent on to the government in Florence, for information.48
4 ' Ferrara, `Due sonerti', 135 n. 3; Ridolfi, Vita di Girolamo Savonarola, If, 178-9; Martines, Scourge
and Fire, p. 158. Ferrara discusses other cases of anti-Savonarolan verse. The frottola as a verse
form was characterized by lines of varying length that rhymed in groups of two or sometimes
more. The more sophisticated frottola ofAretino mentioned below has the scheme ab(b,)C cd(d)
+, Sanudo, I diarii, I, 871, 943; II, 11-12, 411-12-
48 Martines, Strong Words, p. 232. For the discussion of 1503, see Fachard (ed.), Consulte e pratiche,
1,42.6-7.
3 Current affairs 117
The posting of Latin or vernacular satirical verse in Rome had taken
place before the Cinquecento, but during this century an important site
associated with this activity was an ancient statue nicknamed Pasquino,
which Cardinal Oliviero Carafa had placed in 15o1 at the corner of
Palazzo Orsini, near Piazza Navona. A Latin verse prophecy concerning
Pope Alexander VI was affixed to it as early as August of that year. Latin
or vernacular poems came to be attached regularly to Pasquino on the
feast of St Mark, 25 April, when he would be dressed up to represent a
specific persona, such as Janus, Saturn or Jupiter. Verse appeared here also
on the occasion of conclaves to elect a new pope. Initially these pasquin-
ades (pasquinate or pasquilli) were humorous but mild in nature, written
by students or scholars; however, some of them gradually took on the
satirical nature of `libelli famosi'. In due course the term pasquinade was
applied to defamatory poems that did not have a direct connection with
the statue or even with Rome, and the vernacular was used increasingly,
so that the poems could reach a wider public.49 The diffusion of all types
of pasquinades could be scribal. From 1509 onwards some were collected
and printed in Rome, but only the milder ones were selected for this
kind of publication. Sanudo, particularly interested in the more scathing
ones, owned a small manuscript collection of anticlerical Latin pasquin-
ades, written in a humanistic cursive hand, to which he added the title
`Carmina 1518 ad Pasquillum non impressa' (Poems to Pasquino, 1518, not
printed; BMV, MS Lat. XII 211 (4179), fols. 129`-31,). Angelo Germanello,
agent of the Gonzaga in Rome, wrote after St Mark's day in 1525: `Mando
a V. S. li versi the furno posti a mastro Pasquino, li quali sono stampati,
benché ne furno facti molto più, e ne fo portati quasi un mezzo sacco al
Datario, ma li mordaci non sono dati fuora' (I am sending to you the
verses that were placed on master Pasquino, which are printed, although
many more were written, and almost half a bagful of them was taken to
the Datary [Giberti], but the biting ones have not been published)30
Such verse was naturally anonymous, but we know that an important
author of some earlier pasquinades was the Roman poet Antonio Lelli
(Lelio). A handful can be attributed to Aretino with certainty, but he may
well have written others, including some of the particularly rich crop of
49 Among the many studies of pasquinades, their antecedents and their circulation are Gnoli,
La Roma di Leo X, pp. 164-84, 3oo-8; Luzio, `Pietro Aretino e Pasquino; Toscan, `Du c6t6 de
Pasquin'; M. Firpo, `Pasquinate romane; Niccoli, Rinascimento anticlericale, especially pp. 37-48
(see p. 38 for the prophecy of 15o1); Damianaki and others (eds.), Far mormore. On manuscript
and printed collections, see Marucci and others (eds.), Pasquinate romane, pp. 969—i,001. The
tradition continues today: Platt, "`Shattered visages"'
" Scarpa, `Argo, Clemente VII e Pasquino', 26o,
118 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
pasquinades written about the conclave that followed the death of Leo X
on i December 1521 and led to the election of Adrian VI on 9 January
1522 51 Aretino also used the persona of Pasquino in 1527 (though by then
he was no longer in Rome) in his vendetta against Giberti. He suspected
the bishop of being responsible for an assault on him that had taken place
in Rome on 28 July 1525 and left him scarred from dagger-blows. After the
Sack of Rome, when Aretino had moved to Venice, he seized the oppor-
tunity to write a frottola, `Pax vobis, brigata', in which Pasquino recounted
`chi mand6 Roma a Sacco e quando e come' (1. 12, who sacked Rome and
when and how). Aretino sent this poem to Federico Gonzaga, his former
master, on 7 July 1527, together with a canzone on the plight of the city.
The frottola was circulated in Rome in December 1527, in an edition (of
which no copy survives) printed perhaps in Siena, as Girolamo Barbolani
of Montacuto recounted in a letter to its author. Francesco Berni came
to the defence of Giberti and the pope with a tailed sonnet addressed
to Aretino, `Tu ne dirai e farai tante e tante', predicting that one day his
enemy would be finished off by a more effective dagger or drowned by
Giberti in a cesspit s2
Berni had himself used the statue of Pasquino in 1527, before the
Sack. His sonnet XLI, `Pu6 far it ciel per6, papa Chimenti', is said in the
printed edition of 1555 to have been composed at the request of Giberti,
who wanted to persuade Clement VII to take certain measures for the
defence of Rome. It was evidently conceived as a pasquinade and attached
briefly to the statue, because the printed introduction continues: `et spic-
cato subito da Pasquino senza the altri to vedesse, [Giberti] to mostrò
alla Santità Sua, acciò per fuggire it biasimo del vulgo si risolvesse a pro-
vedere allo instante pericolo' (and after it was detached immediately from
Pasquino without others seeing it, [Giberti] showed it to His Holiness so
that, to avoid reproach from the common people, he would decide to take
action about the imminent danger ).53
ç ' Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 92 3-4, 933-4, 944-5; Percopo, `Di Anton
Lelio Romano' (mainly on ten tailed sonnets from the papacy of Leo X, 1513-21, in BAM, MS
C 112 inf, fols. log-u6", in the hand of Franciscus Malagugius (Magaluzzi?), whose father, the
late Giacomo, had written lots. 1-107 in a calligraphic hand: see Grignani, `Badoer, Filenio,
Pizio', pp. 90—z); Gnoli, La Roma di Leo X, pp. 309-29; Romei, Da Leone X, pp. 23-44; Marucci,
`L'Aretino e Pasquino'.
5= Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere reritte a Pietro Aretino, Book I no. 399, 5 December 1527 (I, 371-2); Luzio,
Pietro Aretina nei primi suoi anni, pp. 14-18, 64-71; Romei (ed.), Scritti di Pietro Aretino, pp.
77-83, 159-78; Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 829-32 (Berni), 934. 946-5o
(Aretino).
f3 Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 823-4•
3 Current affairs
~airs 119
Those based in Rome might try to obtain and send out groups of
pasquinades as gifts. The poems could evidently be hard to get hold of
after they had first been displayed. When Castiglione was asked to pro-
vide some by Federico Gonzaga in early April 1521, he replied that the
custom was that they would not be available until 2 May; but, since he
was writing a week after St Mark's day, he was probably referring to a
printed collection. As for those of past years, he went on, `non saprei dove
trovarne uno, perché ordinariamente fanno come foco di paglia, e scritti e
dati fora non se riveggon piú' (I wouldn't know where to find one, because
usually they blaze up and are gone; once they are written and published,
they aren't seen again). Later in that year, Sanudo summarized a letter of
i8 December, sent from Rome to Giustiniano Contarini, that also illus-
trates the problems involved in obtaining copies:
Mi è s6 promesso certe cosse di nostro reverendo mastro Pasquino, the ve ne
farò participe. Subito the Sono atachate, sono stachate, ita the non se ne può
haver copia; ma state sopra di me the dil tutto sarete benissimo raguagliato.
(I have been promised some writings of our reverend master Pasquino, which I
will share with you. As soon as they are attached, they are detached, so that one
can't get a copy of them; but count on me to keep you very well informed.)
The verses were in fact sent to Contarini shortly afterwards, on the 25th.
Aretino promised Federico Gonzaga in 1525 that he would send to him in
Mantua `tutto quello the Pasquino ragiona' (everything Pasquino says).
When the statue was dressed as Argus in 1526, Germanello got hold of
some poems, but did not send them on to the Gonzaga because they were
too biting. Sanudo, however, copied some of them into BMV, MS It. IX
369 (7203), fols. 16i'-177". In 1535, Berni, in Florence, thanked Gualteruzzi
for sending him some pasquinades, though he did not find that year's
quality very high 54
Pasquino played a leading role in a substantial compilation of prose
and verse on account of which Nicolò Franco was arrested by the Roman
Inquisition in September 1568, repeatedly interrogated and tortured,
and finally hanged on 11 March 1570. As Roberto Bruni has pointed
out, Franco's gradual exclusion from the mainstream of Italian culture
meant that, after 1547, he was obliged to circulate his writings mainly in
14 Luzio, 'Pietro Aretino e Pasquino', 679 (Castiglione); Sanudo, I diarii, XXXII, 275, 302 (1521);
Baschet, `Documents inédits', 125-6 (Aretino; this letter includes a tailed sonnet on a statue of
Jupiter in the garden of Cardinal Francesco Armellini, beginning 'I miracoli al mondo furno
sette'); Scarpa, `Argo, Clemente VII e Pasquino', 26o (Germanello), 262-3 (Sanudo and Argus);
Berni, Poesie e prose, letter no. XLVI, 7 May 1535 (PP. 365-6)
12o The manuscript circulation of poetry
manuscript. It was his excessive outspokenness in this medium that led
to his downfall. The trial records published by Angelo Mercati show that
Franco was accused of having put together and diffused a work attacking
Pope Paul IV, who had died in 1559, and members of the pope's family,
the Carafa, some of whose deeds were certainly brutal and evil. By the
time Franco was arrested his work contravened a ban on `libelli famosi',
proclaimed in 1564 on the order of Pius IV, that threatened punishment
of anyone who wrote, copied, owned, recited or attached such writings, or
who found them attached and did not immediately take them down and
hand them in to the governor of Rome. The inquisitors trying Franco had
before them a bound manuscript containing 288 leaves, together with some
inserted, unnumbered leaves, entitled Commento sopra la vita et costumi di
Gio. Pietro Caraffa the fu Paulo Quarto chiamato, et sopra •le qualità de
tutti i suoi et di coloro the con lui governaro it pontificato (Commentary on
the life and conduct of Giovanni Pietro Carafa known as Paul IV, and on
the nature of all his family and those who ran the pontificate with him).
Only part of the work now survives, a dialogue between Pasquino and
Marforio, another Roman `speaking statue', concerning Cardinal Carlo
Carafa (BAV, MS Ottob. Lat. 2684, fols. 346—S701. The whole was in
two parts: a prose section (from which came the dialogue) composed by
Franco, and pasquinades and other poems by himself and several other
writers, some well known, such as Caro, Della Casa and Tansillo ss
Franco admitted that the manuscript produced as evidence was written
in his hand and that the work had been composed soon after the death
of Paul IV. But the inquisitors had to satisfy themselves that others had
seen the work and that Franco had been responsible for its publication.
He claimed repeatedly that he never wanted the work diffused, read by
others or printed, and that he was unaware of the ban on `libelli famosi'.
However, in the course of his endless and agonizing interrogations and
from the evidence of others called to testify, it gradually emerged that
some or all of the text had indeed been seen by several people. A certain
Dolce Gacciola had copied half the book before tearing it up because
it was being shown to others by Aurelio Grimaldi. Two men who, like
Franco, came from Benevento, Antonio Soricio and Ranieri Mansella, saw
a `schizzo' (sketch) of part of the work. But it was above all in one location,
the house of Cardinal Giovanni Morone, that a copy was passed from
ss Mercati, I costituti (pp. 19-20 for the proclamation against `libelli famosi'); R. Bruni, `Per una
bibliografia', 84-6 (Franco's use of scribal diffusion), 95-6 (the Commento); M. Firpo, `Pasquinate
romane', pp. 604-5 (che Commento); Niccoli, Rinascimento anticlericale, pp. 158-73; Pignatti,
"Quel libro—.
3 Current affairs 121
hand to hand and read by several people. Morone had been imprisoned
and tried on suspicion of heresy during the papacy of Paul IV, and Franco
had been in his service from í56o to 1568. That the Commento was avail-
able to members of the household was stated, for instance, by Sallustio
Viscanti, a priest who worked as a proof-corrector for Paolo Manuzio in
Rome and who claimed: `Ho visto poi di molti the per casa dicevano the
messer Nicolò mostrava questo libro e se ne parlava' (I later saw many
people who were saying around the house that Nicol6 was showing this
book and it was being talked about). It was for this act of scribal publi-
cation that Franco was condemned to death. According to contemporary
accounts, a notice was affixed to his chest when he was hanged, stating
that he was being executed for having written `libelli famosi' against illus-
trious people 5G
In Venice, Marin Sanudo received and noted in his diaries, over
the years, several poems relating to or commenting on topical matters.
Examples from the first two printed volumes illustrate the nature of these
texts and, in some cases, the circumstances in which they reached him.
A letter from Mantua provided him with a Latin epigram by Antonio
Tebaldeo that was placed in the church of San Francesco in that city
at a mass said for the recently deceased Ferdinand II, king of Naples,
in November 1496, `scripto a lettere antique' (written in old-style script:
presumably, that is, in capital letters in the manner of an inscription).
Most poems transcribed by Sanudo were ones that attacked political
opponents, including the Venetians themselves. His source texts may
well have been handwritten, though some may have been printed and
he may have heard others recited. In September 1497 he copied a sonnet
addressed to the Florentines, lamenting the shocking recent execution
of five pro-Medicean conspirators, one aged 73. This was probably com-
posed by a Florentine, since it describes Florence as a `lieto et grato nido'
(happy and welcome nest). He recorded in February 1498 a tailed sonnet
about the madness of some Florentines in Venice who had spent lavishly
on a joust; their money, the poem said, could have been put to better use
in the campaign to recover Pisa, whose efforts to remain independent
of Florence were of course being supported by Venice. On 17 July of the
same year, Sanudo wrote, the Venetian ambassador in Rome had sent a
poem consisting of ten Latin elegiac couplets that urged the Orsini and
e Mercati, I costituti, pp. 35-9 (the testimony of Viscanti), io9-10 (the manuscript of the Commento
and Gacciola's role), 116 (one of Franco's repeated claims that he did not want the work diffused),
138-9 (Soricio), 142-4 (Mansella), 149-5o (the copy in Moron's house); Bongi, Annali, I, 19
(accounts of Franco's execution).
122 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
Colonna families, now united, to assassinate Pope Alexander VI; it had
been found affixed `in su una collona nel palazo dil papa' (on a column
in the pope's palace). Sanudo recorded the reading out in the Venetian
senate, on 27 July, of three linked tailed sonnets on attitudes to Venice's
ambitions in respect of Pisa and Puglia; these had been sent from
Bologna by a Venetian secretary, Antonio Vinciguerra. The first had
been composed in Florence; the first reply (using the same rhyme words)
was by Vinciguerra himself, the second (using the same rhyme sounds)
came from Venice. During 1499 Sanudo transcribed a barzelletta from
Florence that displayed a defiant attitude towards the state's enemies, in
particular Venice, a tailed sonnet that exhorted friars to take up arms
against the infidel Turk instead of indulging in idleness, lust and glut-
tony, and a Latin epigram — sent to Venice by the rectors of Brescia and
read aloud to the senate — that was hostile to Lodovico Sforza, whose
duchy of Milan was under threat, and supportive of the powers opposed
to him, France and Venice 57
We have seen that in later years Sanudo collected pasquinades sent to
him from Rome. He also found material akin to this in his own city.
He noted that some defamatory verses attacking a Venetian captain were
recited by children and written on walls in 1499. On a column in Rialto,
in late November 1505, there appeared a `poliza' attacking the regime: it
contained a painting of St Mark, Venice and the doge, Leonardo Loredan,
with a dialogue (the short extract transcribed by Sanudo is in crudely
written settenari) in which Venice complained to St Mark that the city
was starving under its tyrannical ruler. On 29 November 1532 Sanudo
complained about the public posting in Rialto of poems that were subse-
quently copied down by many. He now deemed this a new practice and
ascribed it to imitation of the Roman pasquinades:
In questa tera è sta principiato a far cose che non laudo, et è che volendo imitar
quelo si fa a Roma a Pasquino in Rialto sopra colone vien la note posti vari son-
eti et capitoli. Prima fu posto contra Piero Aretino el qual in versi et prosa dice
volentiera mal di signori et altri, et cussì io li vidi li versi et molti li copiorono.
Etiam questa matina vidi su colone soneti posti in disprecio di alcune cortesane;
ancora in l'ospedaletto di San Marco dove leze in humanità con stipendio pub-
lico prè Batista Egnazio homo dottissimo greco et latin, sopra la sua cariega,
Sanudo, I diaríi, I, 385 (Tebaldeo), 759 (the executions), 874 (the joust), 1,o16-17 (Pope
Alexander), 1,o2o -1 (the three sonnets); II, 663-4 (the barzelletta), 867-8 (friars), 1,198 (the
anti-Sforza epigram). Some of these examples, together with others, are signalled by Martines,
Strong Words, P. 251. On the epigram against the pope, see too Niccoli, Rinascimento anticleri-
cale, pp. 6, 13-14•
3 Current affairs 123
fo Posti alcuni soneti di mala natura, el qual si dolse a li Cai di X et non fo fato
alcuna provisione etc.
(In this city people have started to do things of which I do not approve: wanting
to imitate what is done in Rome to Pasquino, various sonnets and capitoli are
placed during the night on columns in Rialto. First there was a posting against
Pietro Aretino, who likes to speak ill of lords and others in verse and prose,
and so I saw the verses and many copied them. Also this morning I saw on col-
umns sonnets placed in contempt of some courtesans. Further, in the Hospital
of San Marco, where the priest Battista Egnazio, a man very learned in Greek
and Latin, is employed by the state to teach humanities, some unpleasant son-
nets were posted on his [professorial] chair. He complained to the Heads of the
Council of Ten and no measure was taken etc.)
In spite of his disapproval, Sanudo himself transcribed a capitolo and
a tailed sonnet against Aretino, together with another tailed sonnet,
all placed on columns in Rialto, in BMV, MS It. IX 369 (7203), fols.
214`-16` 217158
Another diarist who noted topical poems that came his way was
Tommaso di Silvestro, parish priest and notary in Orvieto. In July 1503 he
copied out ten sonnets concerning the recent deaths of the brothers and
mercenary captains Paolo and Vitellozzo Vitelli and attacking the Borgia,
and in 1510 he recorded three sonnets that had been fixed above the high
altar at the funeral of another military captain, Nicola Orsini, count of
Pitigliano59
A campaign of mockery in the years 1512-13 used the posting in Mantua
of verses that were probably manuscript, in conjunction with the circula-
tion of printed texts. The main victim was Mario Equicola, then the tutor
of Isabella d'Este in Mantua, and the attacks were launched by Tebaldeo
and by humanists in Rome. From an unidentified press, perhaps in
Rome, came an Epistola in sex linguis, dated z1 November 1512, written in
Equicola's name and addressed to Giovanni Muzzarelli, which included a
parody of Equicola's stilted and Latinizing language. The epistolary tactic
was used again a year later. In October 1513 a genuine letter by Equicola,
S' Sanudo, I diarii, III, 5 (1499), VI, 258-6o, 264 (1505) and LVII, 288 (1532); Luzio, Pietro Aretino
nei primi suoi anni, pp. uo—u; Niccoli, Rinascimento anticlericale, pp. 43-4. The person first sus-
pected of having posted the `poliza' in 15o5 was a Paduan bookbinder called Alberto, perhaps the
man about whose prices Andrea Navagero complained in 1515: Mazzucco, `Legature rinascimen-
tali', p. 136. Egnazio taught at the Scuola di San Marco and held lessons in the Spedale di San
Marco, of which he held the benefice: see Mioni, `Giovanni Battista Cipelli', p. 699. The capitolo
against Aretino is in Quarti, Quattro secoli, I, 29. Another example of the scurrilous verse written
against him is in Romei (ed.), Scritti di Pietro Aretino, p. 15T On `posted words' in Venice, see
de Vivo, Information and Communication, pp. 136-41, 194-7•
59 Diaria di Ser Tommaso, pp. 213-17, 423-4.
124 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
written in the vernacular on a literary topic, was stolen and printed, again
perhaps in Rome, with the addition of some sentences that portrayed him
as arrogant, and of some macaronic verses insulting him and a certain
Isabella, one of the marchioness Isabella's maidservants. No copy of this
second printing is known, but the marchioness herself was apparently
depicted as believing misguidedly that Equicola was the best living writer
of the vernacular. To make matters worse, on the following 1 November,
as the marchioness wrote, `furono affixi in piu loci di questa cita alcuni
sonetti in magior vituperio anchora di Mario et di Isabella the non è la
macharonea' (some sonnets, yet more insulting to Mario and [the maid-
servant] Isabella than the macaronic verses, were posted in several places
in this city). After some investigations, the marchioness discovered that
the sonnets had been sent by Tebaldeo, then in Bologna, •through one
of her own courtiers, Giulio Oldoino, who was promptly sacked. These
verses were, it seems, handwritten, and it was their appearance, on top of
that of the doctored letter, that led an enraged marchioness and her hus-
band Francesco to write a series of missives complaining about Tebaldeo's
behaviour. As the marquis put it in his letter to the poet of 5 November,
`non haveti havuto rispetto ad prorumpere in ogni ville persecutione con-
tra esso Mario sino ad havere fatto stampare libelli famosi et attacare son-
etti in diversi loci di questa nostra città in vergogna et carico suo' (you did
not hesitate to burst forth with all manner of base persecutions against
Mario, even having defamatory writings printed and attaching sonnets in
various places in this city of ours, shaming and accusing him).°
Defamatory verses, probably handwritten, were posted in other Italian
cities, for a variety of motives. When Giovanni Bentivoglio was driven out
of Bologna by Julius II in November 15o6, copies were displayed of a four-
line Latin epigram on the ruler's deservedly ill fortune. However, verses
attacking the pope's rule were posted in the following year. A reward was
offered for information on their author, and a certain Ercole Ugolotti or
Golotto was arrested and hanged for writing and disseminating these
`scriptarini' (short writings). A twenty-five-line poem, whose syntax and
versification are somewhat uncertain, was addressed to the whole people,
as in the case of Muzi's anti-Savonarolan frottola. It begins:
Populo de Bologna
animoso e gagliardo
adesso è tempo di liberarte
6o Cian, `Una baruffa letteraria' (quotations from pp. 396 and 392); Dionisotti, Gli umunistz e il
volgare, pp. 111-3o; Kolsky, Mario Equicola, pp. 137-9.
3 Current affairs 125
de le man de' prieti crudeli e dispietade
e chop li toi signori Bentivogli
che te davano tanta felicitade
quanto domandare li saprai
lo zorno de san Petronio li vedrai.'
(People of Bologna spirited and brave, it is now time to free yourself from the
cruel and merciless hands of the priests, and with your Bentivoglio lords who
gave you such happiness, as much as you can ask them, you will see them on
St Petronius's day.)
In Siena, sonnets were used in 1558 by `heretics' to discredit Jesuit
priests. The priests were unable to obtain a copy of the verses, which
appeared one night in September, but they heard that they were accused
of being `buggiardi, sodomiti, adulteri, adulatori, spioni, expilatori de le
povere vedove' (liars, sodomites, adulterers, flatterers, spies, plunderers of
poor widows).'2
Anticlerical leaflets sometimes contained a satirical cartoon. One that
survives has a sketch of two friars, one large and bearded and the other
younger and clean-shaven, with a text serving as caption and commentary
underneath. Its distribution in four handwritten copies in Faenza in the
1580s led to a trial held in Bologna. The text, as reproduced by a notary, is
set out in capital letters as prose, but is made up of seven verse-like lines
marked by the use of assonance and rhyme:
Questo è il re de bugironi fra Girolamo dei frati deto Moscone. Questo è il
fraticel suo Bardassone. Ale done costui non dà impazzo perché al se tien sempre
qualche ragazo infame vituperoso porcazzo
Se non ti lievi vedrai pegio13
(This is the king of sodomites, Brother Girolamo of the friars called Moscone.
This is his little friar Bardassone. He doesn't bother women because he always has
some boy, infamous, shameful pig. If you don't clear off, worse will happen.)
As was stressed at the start of this section, it is possible that some of the
cases described concern printed texts, but this seems unlikely in view of
6' Gozzadini, Memorie per la vita, P. 214 n. r; Frati, `I Bentivoglio', 2,9-31; Martines, Strong Words,
P. 233; Niccoli, Rinascimento anticlericale, P. 43•
The subject-matter of the sonnets, as described, has some resemblance to that of De la Papeida,
a violently antipapal poem in blank hendecasyllables. This appears in Cambridge, Trinity
College, MS R.3.53, Us. 79-95, following and in the same hand as the Cinquanta odi spiritu-
ali of Marcantonio Cinuzzi (see Chapter 4 Section 2), though it is not explicitly attributed to
him. See Marchetti, Gruppi ereticali, pp. 161-3; on Cinuzzi's verse see too p. 131, and Marchetti,
`Marcantonio Cinuzzi'. However, it seems unlikely that Cinuzzi wrote the sonnets.
6, Evangelisti, "`Libelli famosi"', 231 and fig. 1, and Accepto calamo', 2.67-8 and fig. 5; Niccoli,
Rinascimento anticlericale, pp. log—io and fig. i8.
126 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
the limited scale of their initial distribution. More ambiguous is Sanudo's
record of a plot of 1528. When Giberti arrived in his diocese of Verona,
the bishop was to have been the victim of an attack both physical and ver-
bal: enemies of his reforms planned to kill him with an explosion in the
cathedral and also disseminated `alcune polizze de libelli infamatorii con-
tra quel reverendo episcopo' (some leaflets of defamatory writings against
that reverend bishop). As with some of the Florentine leaflets mentioned
earlier, the diarist does not comment on the medium and on whether
the texts were in verse or in prose.64 In another instance, however, where
the texts were apparently distributed in separate cities, the probability is
that the medium used was print, though manuscript cannot be excluded.
Some `scrite' (writings) attached to columns in Modena on 2 February
1524 mocked astrologers' prediction of a universal flood in that year. To
judge by the description of their contents, these may well have been the
three tailed sonnets that are also mentioned in a chronicle of Cremona,
some distance away.65
4 BURLESQUE AND LICENTIOUS VERSE
Burlesque capitoli lent themselves naturally to scribal circulation (and also,
as will be seen in Chapter 6, to oral performance): they were often epistolary
in nature, as in the case of the exchange between Berni and Michelangelo
mentioned in Section 2 above, their tone is conversational and some are full
of sexual double entendres. just one of the capitoli of the leading exponent of
this genre, Francesco Berni, In lode della primiera (in praise of the card game
primiera), was printed before the author's death in 1535. Only in 1537 and
1538 did others appear in print, in the Venetian collections of Curzio Nav6.
Sanudo copied four of Berni's capitoli and a sonnet, together with verses of
other authors, in BMV, MS Ital. IX 369 (7203). The manuscript circulation
of Berni's vernacular works was given renewed impetus after they had been
placed (with his Latin works) on the Roman Index of Prohibited Books of
1559, and it continued as late as the eighteenth century.
66
Berni's friend Giovan Francesco Bini, who was born in Florence but lived
most of his life in Rome, published his capitoli scribally by sending them to
his acquaintances. His Capitolo dell'orto (on his beloved garden in Rome),
64
Sanudo, 1 diarii, XLVII, 144; Prosperi, Tra evangelismo e controriforma, pp. 153-4. For Aretino's
tailed sonnet of 1529 attacking `il vescovo bastardo di Verona', see Romei (ed.), Scritti di Pietro
Aretino, pp. 138-41.
65
Niccoli, Prophecy and People, pp. 163-6.
66
Berni, Poesie e prose, pp. 382-7; Albonico, `La poesia del Cinquecento', pp. 739-4o; Gorni and
others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, pp. 664-5; Bujanda, Index de Rome, pp. 271, 2 74-
4 Burlesque and licentious verse 127
for instance, was addressed to the poet Gandolfo Porrino in 1535. One of
the others to whom Bini sent his verse was Marcantonio Flaminio, who
wrote to the poet from Sessa in 1538, shortly after he had left the service of
Giberti, to thank him for his Capitolo secondo dell orto, datable to 1537 and
addressed to Cardinal Alessandro Farnese. Flaminio acknowledged that his
duty (il dover') was to reply `per le rime', but his Muses had fled. A year
later he told Bini that he had read his Pelatina, a capitolo now lost. Flaminio
was closely linked in these years to the movement for reform within the
Catholic church, so he seems to have been at least partly in earnest in a letter
of 19 February 1541 when he contrasted the way he spent his own time —
reading St Paul, for example — with Bini's composition of `tante parole
otiose' (so many idle words). But he did at least encourage Bini to reply to
him in verse: `vi ricordo che, volendo voi scrivere parole otiose, le mettiate
in rima' (I remind you that, if you want to write idle words, you should put
them in rhyme). Bini duly responded with the capitolo beginning `Certo è
the '1 mio padron esser più parco', sent to Flaminio significantly on the last
day of carnival, 8 March. Flaminio's letter of acknowledgement, written four
days later, again seems forgiving of Bini .67
Mattio Franzesi, another of the Tuscans working in the service of
churchmen in the papal curia, saw only two of his capitoli printed before
he died between 1551 and 1555• He published them by despatching them
to friends in Rome, during his absences from the city, and to others in
Florence, in particular Benedetto Busini. When Franzesi travelled on
horseback from Rome to Padua in 1538, he addressed four capitoli to
friends at different stages of his journey. In the third, sent to Caro, he
enquired after the scribal circulation of a poem by Porrino on Sebastiano
del Piombo's portrait of Giulia Gonzaga:
Messer Gandolfo ha fattone ancor grazia
di mostrarvi le Stanze sue divine,
ch'io non potei veder per mia disgrazia? (11. io—ia)"
(Has Gandolfo yet done you the favour of showing his divine stanzas, which alas
I have not yet been able to see?)
In Florence, the verse of Grazzini circulated principally in manu-
script, and the poet himself did much to promote this diffusion. Several
6'
Flaminio, Lettere, no. 18, 25 November 1S38 (p. 61; see too no. t9, 15 December 1538 (p. 62));
no. 25, it September 1539 (PP. 84-5); no. 34, 19 February 1541 (pp. 103-4); no. 35, 12 March 1541
(pp. 1o5-6); Longhi, Lusus, pp. 46-51. The Capitolo dell'orto is in Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti
del Cinquecento, pp. 955-63-
61
Longhi, Lusus, pp. 51-3. The poem to Caro is in Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento,
PP. 970-5. See too Foà, `Mattia Franzesi'.
128 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
sixteenth-century manuscripts are devoted entirely to his poetry or include
it alongside that of others, and in both categories are manuscripts written
entirely in his hand, for example the fair copy BNCF, MS Magi. VII 1240.
Grazzini also used to write his poems on single leaves, bifolia or other
small units in order to distribute them to others in Florence, and some of
these autograph compositions later found their way into aggregations of
different-sized components such as BNCF, MS Magi. VII 490 (135 leaves
in all, mostly autograph) and 491 (just 8 leaves, autograph). In the former
manuscript, most components were occasional verses, probably sent as
letters, as their original folding shows. The first two, for example, contain
respectively a canzone on the death of the physician Baccio Rontini with
a dedicatory letter to the deceased's friend Pandolfo Martelli (fols. 1-4,
the last blank) and two compositions in ottava rima, one, addressed to
Ridolfo Bardi and mocking a current vogue for beards with shaved chins,
the other on a law banning prostitutes from driving in coaches (fols. 6-17,
the last five blank). Few of Grazzini's poetic works were printed in the
Cinquecento, even though he himself collaborated with the Giunti press
in producing editions of his comedies and of verse by others.19
One of Grazzini's poems forms the last part of a loosely connected tril-
ogy of mock-heroic poems that commented on the cultural environment
in Florence in 1547-8. The first to appear was La Gigantea of Girolamo
Amelonghi, who belonged neither to Grazzini's closest friends nor to
their opponents in the Accademia fiorentina. The poem, dedicated on
15 April 1547 to Alfonso de' Pazzi, recounts how the giants, who represent
the Umidi, set out to defeat the gods of Mount Olympus. Amelonghi
also presented a copy to Duke Cosimo. The narrative celebrates burlesque
themes such as madness, the grotesque and the obscene, but Amelonghi
also takes side-swipes at the orthographical and linguistic eccentricities of
Giambullari and his closest associates in the academy, the group known
as the Aramei, including Giovan Battista Gelli. Michelangelo Serafini's
La Nanea is a continuation of La Gigantea, composed in April—May
of the same year, in which the dwarves, representing the Aramei, ally
themselves with the gods and drive the giants from Olympus. Serafini
presented it to an unknown person and then, in 1548, wrote out another
copy for Mazzuoli. The third poem in the sequence was Grazzini's La
guerra dei mostri, begun in May 1548 but left incomplete. It recounts the
defeat of the gods by the monsters, whose leaders appear to represent
e, Verzone in Grazzini, Le rime burlesche, pp. ix—lxxxiv; Plaisance, Anton,rrancesco Grazzini,
PP- 242-3•
4 Burlesque and licentious verse 129
members of the Accademia fiorentina such as Giambullari and Varchi.
All three poems, alluding as they did to such contentious topics and
to the personal characteristics of fellow-citizens, were circulated at first
cautiously, in manuscript; La Gigantea and La Nanea were not printed
until 1566 and La guerra dei mostri not until 1584. Pazzi's own copious
poetic output was likewise destined for scribal circulation. Its wide range
included Petrarchan love poetry, religious verse, carnival songs and above
all burlesque capitoli and sonnets addressed to other Florentines. Many
of these sonnets attack Varchi in a one-sided correspondence, but Pazzi
seems to have written them with tongue in cheek rather than out of genu-
ine hostility?°
Licentious verse tended to be read covertly among a restricted public
and was thus often first circulated in manuscript, even if it was then given
wider diffusion in print. Aretino's descriptions of sixteen erotic positions,
the Sonetti sopra i XVI modi , were first printed by 1527, but appear to have
been written and then read by others in either 1524 or 1525?' Aretino played
a part in the dissemination of two poems concerning prostitutes written
(perhaps with some help from Aretino) by a member of the Venetian aris-
tocracy, Lorenzo Venier (father of Maffio), whom Aretino described as his
`creato' (protégé). The first is La puttana errante. In four cantos contain-
ing 185 stanzas, it relates in a mock-heroic manner a journey undertaken
not by a knight errant but by a prostitute, identifiable as Elena Ballerina.
She ventures forth from Venice to Rome, where among other exploits
she satisfies the lusts of the Spanish and German armies that are sack-
ing the city, and then goes on to Naples before returning home. Aretino,
whose inspiration is invoked at the start of the poem (I. 3-5), mentions in
a capitolo sent to Federico Gonzaga in 1530 that he was enclosing a copy of
La puttana, almost certainly in manuscript. The poem then found its way
into print: single copies survive of three sixteenth-century editions in four
cantos, and there are accounts of an earlier printed version in three cantos.
None of these is datable. In 1536 Aretino received a second request from
7° Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 176-81 (Amelonghi and Pazzi), 181-2 (Serafini), 182-4 (Grazzini),
22 4-5 (Amelonghi's letter of transmission to Cosimo I); Zanrè, Cultural Non-Conformity,
pp. 68-70 (Grazzini), 87-110 (Amelonghi), 111-39 (Pazzi); A. Castellani, Nuovi canti carnascia-
lescbi. In 1557, two years after Pazzi's death, Amelonghi compiled a manuscript collection of
Pazzi's poems, now BRF, MS 2907, and dedicated it to Duke Cosimo; see Zanrè, Cultural Non-
Conformity, p. 91. La Nanea is in Crimi and Spila (eds.), Nanerie, pp. 139—z78; on the textual
tradition (including the censorship of religious references in the 1566 edition), see pp. 159-76,
180-1.
Aquilecchia in Aretino, Poesie varie, pp. 13-15, 292-4; Reynolds, Renaissance Humanism,
PP. 125-7-
130 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
the Veronese writer Girolamo Veri6, via Giovanni Alessandro Zanchi,
for a copy both of La puttana and of the corrected version of another
poem by Venier, R trentuno delta Zaffetta, which describes how the pros-
titute Angela del Moro, known as La Zaffetta, was punished in 1531 by
being raped by eighty men in Chioggia because she had had the temerity
to prevent her lover from entering her house. Since the works were evi-
dently so hard to come by, it is possible that Verità expected to receive
them in manuscript?'
We encountered earlier, in Section 2, the Venetian dialect verse of
Maffio Venier, which circulated only scribally during his short life
(1550-86). His canzone entitled La Strazzosa, a passionate expression of
his desire for a woman living in squalor but of `infinita bellezza in mille
strazze' (1. 30, infinite beauty in a thousand rags), was copied in a particu-
larly high number of manuscripts, some dating from as late as the nine-
teenth century, even though the poem was first printed in 158873 MafFio's
uncle Domenico Venier constructed a `libro' or collection of dialect verses
by himself and Benedetto Corner, concerning their sexual relations with
an apparently insatiable Elena Artusi. They are addressed mainly to each
other, to Artusi herself or to the god of love?4
In Tansillo's youthful poem Il vendemmiatore, the grape-harvester of
the title uses double entendres to invite women to give themselves to the
pleasures of love while young enough to do so. Tansillo intended the work
to be read in manuscript. He acknowledged in the dedicatory letter (to
Iacopo Carafa, dated I October 1532) that it would be better to hide his
text away, and he later claimed that he meant it to be read in the Kingdom
of Naples rather than on the Tiber and the Arno. However, Il vendem-
miatore was certainly not kept hidden and it seems to have been diffused
quickly and widely in manuscript; it could well have been to this poem
that Ariosto (who died in June 1533) was referring when, as Giano Pelusio
reported, he praised Tansillo's vernacular verse. After its initial scribal cir-
culation, the poem was printed without Tansillo's consent, apparently in
a now unknown Neapolitan edition of 1534, then in editions from 1537
onwards. But as in the case of Berni's texts, the poem was again circulated
- L. Venier, La puttana errante (pp. 93-6 on the early printed editions); Procaccioli (ed.), Lettere
scritte a Pietro Aretino, Book I no. 288 from Zanchi, 26 March 1536 (I, 28o); Luzio, Pietro Aretino
nei primi suoi anni, pp. 45-7, 115-32; Rosenthal, 7be Honest Courtesan, pp. 37-9; Frantz, Festum
voluptatis, pp. 100-1.
Dazzi (ed.), Il fiore, I, i95-40o; Nordio, — La Strazzosa" ; Padoan (ed.), 'MafFio Venier: tre
liriche'; Toso, 'Edizioni cinquecentesche'.
74 BL, MS Add. 12197, in a neat hand with some corrections perhaps by Venier; see Feldman, City
Culture, p. ior.
S Collecting verse in manuscript 131
in manuscript after Tansillo's works had been put on the Roman Index of
. 75
1559 The textual tradition of Giovan Battista Marino's erotic narrative
poems, not printed until the mid-eighteenth century, shows signs of free
rewriting by their readers 71
Although this chapter centres on verse, it is worth mentioning here two
bawdy prose works. One is Caro's Commento di ser Agresto da Ficaruolo
which, it was seen in Chapter I Section z, had a brief success in manu-
script before the author had it printed in 1539. The other is the dialogue
La cazzaria, written by Antonio Vignali of Siena probably in late 1525
or 1526. As the title suggests, the main topic is the penis and its activ-
ities, but Vignali also discusses the Tuscan language and presents, in
the last part of the work, an allegory of recent Sienese political events
in which factions are represented by the male and female genitalia, the
buttocks and the testicles (respectively `Cazzi', `Potte', `Cull', `Coglioni').
After Vignali had left his city in voluntary exile in 153o, his phallocen-
tric, homoerotic and misogynistic work was printed at least three times
during the Cinquecento, on the first occasion apparently in Naples. One
mid-century manuscript survives, however, and it was probably for this
medium that Vignali composed his dialogue, in order to entertain like-
minded members of the exclusively male Accademia degli Intronati,
which he had helped to found 77
5 COLLECTING VERSE IN MANUSCRIPT
Even if in most cases short poems such as sonnets circulated at first as
independent units, they tended to coalesce into manuscript collections
together with other poems or, as Chapter I Section 4 showed, into more
heterogeneous compilations.
Authors who brought their own poems together were likely to organ-
ize them according to certain principles and to intend the collection for
presentation. Ludovico Ariosto, for example, transmitted a minority of his
lyrics as individual compositions, in the normal course of his social rela-
tions, but he also commissioned a manuscript, now BAV, MS Rossiano
633, in which he gathered forty-eight poems. This was doubtless intended
~s Tansillo, L'egloga e i poemetti, pp. xxxiv—lviii, cxxxii—cxxxviii, 47-84; Albonico, 'La poesia del
Cinquecento', P. 73o; Bujanda, Index de Rome, pp. z66, 304•
?6 Marino, La lira, III, 22 9-30, 287-8.
71 On Caro's mock-commentary, see Frantz, Festum voluptatis, pp. 33-8. On Vignali's work, see
Stoppelli in Vignali, La cazzaria, pp. 153-62; Moulton in Vignali, La cazzaria: 7be Book of the
Prick, pp. 1-70 (pp. 46-7 on the manuscript copy); Frantz, Festum voluptatis, pp. 38-42.
132 The manuscript circulation of poetry
as a gift copy, since it was professionally copied and illuminated, but the
incompleteness of the decoration shows that it was never presented. In the
process of selection, Ariosto omitted or revised poems that were too closely
linked to specific occasions?' Bembo put together in 1538-9 a selection of
twenty-one poems as part of his campaign to win a cardinal's hat, intend-
ing to display both his allegiance to the family of Pope Paul III and his
moral suitability for elevation to the purple. The first two sonnets were
addressed to his protector, the pope's nephew Cardinal Alessandro Farnese;
then, in a superficially Petrarchan manner, a group of sonnets on a living
woman were followed by others concerning the death of his beloved and
two penitential sonnets addressed to God. This mini-canzoniere is found
in two vellum manuscripts, BCR, MS Rossi ioz, owned by Cardinal
Farnese, and BAV, Urb. Lat. 788, intended in all likelihood for, the pope?
Another vellum manuscript of almost all Bembo's lyric verse (176 poems),
NAL, MS L/1347/1957 (KRP.A.19), written between 1543 and 1545, could
well have been commissioned as another gift for Cardinal Farnese.",
Vittoria Colonna created two collections intended respectively as gifts
for Marguerite of Angoulême, queen of Navarre and sister of François I,
and for Michelangelo. These were very much ad personam collections. The
one sent at the request of the queen in 1540 or 1541 combined amorous
and spiritual verse, as scholars have shown, and gave prominence to the
`female' themes of the role of the Virgin Mary and of motherhood. On the
other hand, the 103 sonnets sent to Michelangelo, probably in 1540, were
solely spiritual in nature and put more emphasis on the `masculine' theme
of the figure of Christ. The manuscript for Michelangelo was copied by a
professional scribe working under Colonna's instructions."
In another, more unusual case, a collection of verse intended as a gift
contained works by several Florentine poets and was commissioned by
or on behalf of the woman who was the object of their affections, Tullia
d'Aragona. In 1547 she was advised to support her plea to be excused from
wearing a veil marked with a yellow sign, which denoted a woman's sta-
tus as a prostitute, by putting together a selection of poems addressed
to her by male admirers. The resulting collection of twenty-two sonnets
by Muzio, Varchi and others, with a dedicatory letter to the duchess of
~e Bozzetti, `Notizie sulle Rime'; Vela, `Gli studi di Cesare Bozzetti'.
9 Ghirlanda, 'La raccolta Farnese'. ` Gnocchi, 'Un manoscritto', 230-1.
t' The collection for Marguerite of Angoul6me has been identified with BLF, MS Ashb. 1153,
containing 102 poems and simply bound; see Brundin, 'Vittoria Colonna and the Virgin Mary'.
On the collection for Michelangelo, in BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 11539, see Vecce, 'Vittoria Colonna',
PP. 214-15 and 'Petrarca, Vittoria, Michelangelo'; Brundin, 'Vittoria Colonna and the poetry of
reform'; Scarpati, 'Le rime spirituali'; Colonna, Sonnets for Michelangelo.
S Collecting verse in manuscript 133
Florence written by Varchi on Tullia's behalf, is found in BNCF, MS
Magl. VII 1185, fols. 308`-18r."
Readers of verse frequently put together collections by more than one
author for personal use, as a source of pleasure or of inspiration for their
own verse. A very high number of these survive. Such collections might
be made at a particular moment, but persons who belonged to one or
more networks of publication could build up their own miscellanies of
poems that came their way over a longer period of time. Collections dif-
fered greatly from one another in their length (ranging from a handful of
poems to a very substantial volume), in the nature of their contents and
in their purposes. Within them, great verse could rub shoulders with the
mediocre. The copying hand might be amateur — that of the collector — or
it might be that of a professional working for the collector. In some cases
a single hand has transcribed the contents; in others, more than one hand
is involved, though the scribes might be working in a coordinated way.
Some examples will demonstrate this variety.
Between the 1470s and the first half of the Cinquecento, a few schol-
ars compiled anthologies of early Italian verse, partly in order to chart
its development. The best known is the Raccolta Aragonese, created in
1476 by Poliziano as a gift to Federico d'Aragona, son of King Ferdinand
of Naples, from Lorenzo de' Medici, who wished to magnify both the
cultural and the political prestige of Tuscany. The original manuscript,
copied by a professional scribe, perhaps Neri di Filippo Rinuccini, was
lost at some point after March 1513, when it was on loan to Isabella
d'Este; but copies were made, and from their evidence the collection
has been shown to contain nearly 500 poems and some prose texts, by
authors ranging from Giacomo da Lentini and Guittone dArezzo in the
Duecento to Lorenzo himself. It had a forerunner in a collection made
around 1470, destined for presentation to Alfonso d'Aragona, duke of
Calabria.83 Among Bembo's collections of early verse were one made
for him by Pierantonio Sallando in 1523 and a manuscript, now lost,
which in its turn was used by the Florentine abate Lorenzo Bartolini
as one of the main sources for the anthology of early verse that he put
together, probably in Padua in 1529.84 BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3213 was put
" Bongi, Annali, I, 184-5; Bausi, 'Le rime di e per Tullia d'Aragona% P. 280; Zanrè, Cultural
Non-Conformity, p. 152.
" Barbi, Studi, pp. 215-326; De Robertis, Editi e rari, pp. 50-65 and 'Lorenzo aragonese'. On
Rinuccini, see De la Marc, 'New research', App. I, no. 55•
14 On Bembo's collections of early verse, see Tavosanis, La prima stesura, pp. 28-40, 85-100. On
Sallando's manuscript, see Chapter z n. 8. On Bartolini's collection, now Florence, Accademia
della Crusca, MS S3, see Barbi, La Raccolta Bartoliniana and Studi, pp. 119-214.
134 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry
together, using the Raccolta Aragonese and a further source, under the
direction of Antonio Lelli with the help of other scribes. To each author
was assigned a separate gathering, at the start of which Lelli wrote the
poet's name and the first line of the first poem to be transcribed. He
then passed the work over to his collaborators, but also did some tran-
scription himself.85
In other Cinquecento collections, earlier verse is combined with a
majority of compositions by contemporary poets. In BMV, MS It. IX io9
(6743), for instance, four sonnets by Petrarch's contemporary Buonaccorso
da Montemagno the Elder accompany poems by Petrarchists of the first
half of the sixteenth century, mostly from the circle of Bembo: Vincenzo
Querini, Bernardo Cappello and so on. Copying is shared by three or
four hands; they alternate between each other over 38 leaves, though fols.
25 and z8 and some rectos and versos are left blank, presumably so that
other poems could be added. Pen-and-ink drawings are added here and
there. The collection was perhaps initiated by an aspiring poet: on fols.
39-44, written by the person with whose hand the collection begins, is
a list of nouns found in the poems with the adjectives used to qualify
them.B6 In BMV, MS It. IX 213 (6881), fols. 15-72, a single compiler with
a neat upright hand appears to have been at work over a period of time,
since there are differences in the size of the hand and of the ink used. The
last poem is dated 1516. He or she provides a small selection of verse by
Dante, Cino da Pistoia and other early poets, but concentrates on Venetian
Petrarchists such as Vincenzo Querini and Niccol6 Delfino. Sannazaro is
represented, and the transcriber noted that a canzone of his had not been
printed (fol. 301-8 7 In Florence, the young Pierfrancesco Giambullari
transcribed his own compilation of `Sonetti, canzoni, et madriali, di varii
autori, in lingua tosca, segnati de' nomi loro' in BNCF, MS Magl. VII
371. He too included some earlier verse, using as his source the anthology
of Sonetti e canzoni printed in Florence in 1527, alongside verse by con-
temporary Petrarchists. Some of these were from his own city — Cosimo
Rucellai and others associated with the Orti Oricellari — but the majority
came from other regions of Italy: Bembo, Sannazaro, Trissino, Molza,
Colonna (drawing on the printed Rime of 1538) and others. Giambullari
included 37 of his own poems under the pseudonym of `P. Lari'."
15 Barbi, Studi, pp. 269-88; Frasso and Graffigna, 'Da Petrarca a Pasquino'.
'6 Strada, `Carte di passaggio', pp. 27, 33
-4, 38-9-
e7 De Robertis, `Censimento [...i: IV', 48o—r; Castoldi, Per il testo critico, pp. 9t-2; Strada, `Carte
di passaggio', pp. 3. 27. 35, 40-1.
aa De Robertis, `Censimento [...1: I', 204-5; Rabitti, `Vittoria Colonna', 138-46.
S Collecting verse in manuscript 135
When Domenico Arrighi put together the collection of carnival songs,
strambotti and other verse mentioned in Chapter 1 Section 4, his sources
included two groups of texts that had come to Florence from Rome in
music manuscripts. One was provided by Maria, mistress of Bianchino
da Pisa, soldier and henchman of Cesare Borgia; she, Arrighi noted, also
sang these songs. Some ballate came from a songbook sent from Rome to
Lionarda, wife of the composer Baccio (Bartolomeo) degli Organi.89
Arrighi transcribed his manuscript over a couple of years, but some
compilations of verse by contemporary poets were accumulated during
a longer period. From about 1535 to about 1576, Giovan Battista Giraldi
put together for himself a very substantial collection of verse, 314 com-
positions, using manuscript rather than printed sources, and adding to
it most intensively in the 156os. His own hand varies from formal to cur-
sive in manner, and from time to time other hands appear: one is that
of Bernardo Tasso, another perhaps that of an amanuensis. The nucleus
of the collection was formed by poets from central Italy, and to these
he added poets from northern states.90 BMV, MS It. IX 307 (7564), also
from the mid-sixteenth century, was written probably by one hand, but
it changes in nature over the main section (fols. 1-115) and different inks
and quills are used. The collection opens with a sonnet of Trissino on the
meeting of Pope Paul III and Emperor Charles V in Lucca (1541), and
continues with a variety of Petrarchist verse. There is no apparent unity,
though a section is devoted to Vincenzo Querini and other Venetian
members of the Compagnia degli Amid, and there are clusters of sonnets
on the deaths of Colonna (fol. 72rl, Bembo (fols. 89-9S") and Trifon
Gabriele (fols. 100`— IO2°).
Contemporary compilations could be selected and ordered in a more
deliberate way, sometimes implicitly suggesting connections between verse
from different states. For example, BNP, MS It. 1543, compiled in Milan
around 1495-6 and copied by a single scribe using a humanistic cursive
hand, sets out primarily to represent the poetry (mainly vernacular) of the
court of Ludovico Sforza in the early i49os; it therefore contains verse by
Donato Bramante, Bernardo Bellincioni, Paolo Taegio, Lancino Curti and
so on. But the compiler links this verse with that of the foremost recent or
living poets of Medicean Florence and other states. The collection opens
with a Florentine section that includes poems of Lorenzo de' Medici and
Poliziano's Stanze per la giostra. On fols. 105'-112° a selection of Bembo's
" Zanato, `Sulla tradizione', pp. 486, 487; Prizer, `Wives and courtesans'.
° Messina, 'Rime del XVI secolo'. The manuscript was privately owned in 1955.
 1

136 The manuscript circulation ofpoetry 5 Collecting verse in manuscript 137

early Petrarchist verse appears, and this is followed by verse by Sannazaro,
Panfilo Sasso, Tebaldeo, Benivieni and others. To judge from an annota-
tion on fol. 48" that mentions Terracina and the date i September 1497,
the manuscript was later taken to the Kingdom of Naples. Probably while
it was passing through Tuscany, a copy was made of its contents without
the Latin verse, now BNCF, MS 111175.9' This illustrates the practice of
deriving compilations from other compilations, as well as building them
up in an eclectic way from more than one manuscript or printed source.
A further example is the copying of two manuscripts, BLF, MS Ashb. 564
and BAM, MS A 8 sup., from a common source. But regional variation
could creep in during this process. the former manuscript has a Tuscan
linguistic patina, the latter a Lombard one9z
The collection in BEM, MS Campori 187 also brings together courtly
verse written in northern Italy and Florence in the late fifteenth and early
sixteenth centuries. In the opening position is not one of the earlier poets,
such as Lorenzo de' Medici or Bartolomeo Fonzio, but Bembo, with his
Stanze of 1507; this recent composition, not printed until 1522, was evi-
dently the most prized text 93 On the other hand, in BMV, MS It. IX
2o2 (6755-6) Bembo's verse is placed at the conclusion of the main sec-
tion, fols. 1-147. This manuscript is made up of nineteen gatherings (the
third and fourth, Us. 41-87, are now bound separately) written by two
scribes; the second takes over from the fifth gathering (fol. 88). Both use
a humanistic cursive hand but the second hand is smaller. What is now
the first gathering provides an index of the opening words of each com-
position. The collection opens in the second gathering with a substantial
collection of Sannazaro's verse, proceeds with Petrarchists mainly from
the Veneto — particular prominence is given to Veri6 — and concludes
with a substantial selection of verse by Bembo. Elena Strada has suggested
(p. 26) that this arrangement, with Bembo as its culminating point,
might indicate that, at the time the collection was completed, probably
in the 153os, he was seen as the master of the genre94 However, the initial
project probably consisted of the first four gatherings only, containing
Sannazaro and Verità. All these gatherings have, on their opening recto,
the monogram of the collector, made up of the initials OLF, and they end
with some blank leaves. The section written by the second scribe contains
mainly Venetian poets (the exceptions include Guidiccioni and Amanio),
and may have been added subsequently, to form an aggregation. At a still
later stage, three further gatherings were added in the hand of different
scribes.
A particularly carefully organized collection is that of BMV, MS It.
IX 6z2 (10703). This was conceived as a unit and commissioned from a
professional scribe; he uses a small cursive hand. The collector belonged
to a Venetian patrician family, the Calbo, whose coat of arms appears on
fol. z1. The initial letter of the majority of the poems is traced in coloured
ink, alternating between red, dark red, green and blue. The collection
falls into five clearly defined sections, each devoted to one poet whose
name and social status were noted in the first four cases: Bembo, `Nobele
Venetiano'; Verità, `Gentilhomo Veronese'; Vincenzo Querini, `Nobile
Venetiano'; Sannazaro, `Gentilhomo Napolitano'. The fifth poet, not
identified, is possibly Marco Piacentini, a Venetian 95 Scribal compilations
such as these last two clearly had a high personal value to their owners;
but more importantly from the point of view of the development of
Italian literature, the many collections like them must have played a cru-
cial part in consolidating and disseminating the developing Petrarchism
of the early Cinquecento, since printed anthologies of lyric verse began to
appear only in 1545•
91 Castoldi, Per il testo critico, pp. 94-5; Strada, `Carte di passaggio', pp. 13-18, 35-6, 40; Gnocchi
in Bembo, Stanze, p. I.

9' Dionisotti, `Fortuna del Petrarca', 1o8; Marri, `Lingua e dialetto', pp. 255-70; Canova, `Paolo
Taegio', 118; Vecce in Bramante, Sonetti, pp. 13, 111-13; Calitti, Fra lirica e narrativa, pp. 81-7;
Zanato, `Indagini'.
91 On the Laurenziana MS, see Danzi, 'Il Raffaello del Molza' and Gnocchi in Bembo, Stanze,
pp. xxxi—xxxiii; on the Ambrosiana MS, see ibid., pp. xxxiv—xxxv.
93 Leonardi, `II codice Campori 187; Gnocchi in Bembo, Stanze, pp. xxxviii—A.
9J Castoldi, Per il testo critico, pp. 89-9o; Strada, `Carte di passaggio', pp. 24-7. 34-5, 39-40-
 Figure i Agnolo Bronzino, Portrait of Laura Battiferri, c. 156o. Florence, Palazzo
Vecchio, Loeser Collection. © Photo Scala, Florence, 199o.
The manuscript held by the poet Battiferri shows two sonnets by Petrarch addressed to Figure 2 Giovan Battista Moroni, Portrait of Giovanni Bressani, 1562. Edinburgh,
his Laura (Canzoniere, 64 and 240), as if transcribed in a miscellany. National Gallery of Scotland.
Bressani, a prolific Latin, Italian and dialect poet from Bergamo whose verse was not
printed during his lifetime (1490-156o), holds a quill pen with which he is writing a
poem in terza rima. The sheet on the table has three stanzas in ottava rima; the words
at the end draw attention to Bressani's manuscripts by stating that `This painting
represents well the image of my body, but that of my spirit is represented by my many
writings', with the date 1562. Beside the books and letters on the table are an ornamental
inkstand in the form of a foot (with an inscription stating that Moroni painted Bressani
without having seen him) and a sander, used to sprinkle sand on wet ink.

138 139
 -h. :x~

I an'.1 nvra'tno y rwnt ; - P ~•~ w~oLc

wt~+Ay t i belfa eF~~YGt1tfC

/ (4" ivnl'CI W, -101 a ~t?Lft ,a y ds,st+.ft.

4J j
/ -9Í<at ' x ltn.~1QI+A.lI .INfM ~csY61t
~V .y.tii~+b.ry+n ki,

c{r r; ~uwc~>+olrt
~ S..r•. ~z
J~ijµq~ji PE.-ti 5 rrb , g,~.ti,ifd_u,r~+t! '.D:Vl7Lf! .iss„0o ,—
,
~ O 1r~ (~gvra rl o y s a fFU t f Li.~~t?Y
tr r»t.+2. t~ h
r
~ F(
/ r0 t-
_ l r
1k. ..-~e.1 111f3;4
111f
~t'd v.'~^ti~ 'd 4`~rrs ät 0

r r r ~• - t y~~;
.r'n.Ft~ta'i?
~~~• il°~~
~ t.I wlct y~u cluu~tM1tfi ~ tr7D 1-[ -.1 rJlnn" s~r- k
. ~
,h f I t 12.,+, /~ww,K
a ,c lEPN zh~t~c+,t,.At , v
77 ,,• fi - f,~.r~,iC
~{.~:.1 -o~sxa ,-~'< < bryn2 ~.1j7..
t z

,~,ffrr• f -xns -'~BY~u~M'P.~t'~F+ U~frt1 2,414(1• Pf tHi,rf ~~rtt

az ' .?'ftc n

•~ fín,es'Jfr7x*ti:rsí nnx . Ftt.r il/Yre.l~ 4a• ~r.ritrutr/Y

"jm.ut t (ôhYív -,t~~uh+~•~Jrf~v~s~jr+urtoe~rx~X
w., *'t rJ jx ,t v2 U ~Aa r~s: jerit; brr fy r isé~ ~ '
1v.tlrreJa t!~e >t~n x>~~~~~.x ;--».<4{.:~

Figure 3 A sonnet by Francesco Maria Molza, c. 1535• Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale

Marciana, MS It. IX 144 (6866), fol. ff. 210 x 158 mm.
The bifolium, made up by fols. 12 and 13, was originally sent as a letter to Cosmo Gheri
(1513-37), whose name and whereabouts are given on fol. 13'; folding is visible. Molza's
sonnet concerns an illness of Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici, presumably his fatal illness
of early August 1535. A note at the end asks Gheri to respond with his views on it, and
to send his opinion on the interpretation and correct reading of a passage in a sonnet on
jealousy by Giovanni Della Casa that was also circulating in manuscript.
Figure 4 The final page of a manuscript containing a vernacular translation of Cicero,
De amicitia, with a collection of sententiae (wise sayings) from classical and Christian
sources. © British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. MS Add. 16553, fol. 5z
230 x 167 mm.
The manuscript is written in semigothic script, with a round `a', `d' with the ascender
sloping to the left, 'g' with an open loop and `r' shaped like `z' (`r' is also represented by
an abbreviation sign above the preceding letter). This page has the concluding sententiae
and the scribe's colophon, which reads, in translation: 'May he who wrote [this] write
[and] live always with the Lord [and] live for ever in heaven with Christ faithfully. On
20 October in the year of Our Lord Jesus Christ 1480.'

140 141
 P~[ fXXiriifiN..
,J flf.
c ICXMÌfF.
'1"Rf,lXndf . .
N itaX(a+.
']sirra fit m.'
F u~iiubm.~mXr.
S aomna.
D eng
L1 uXr{+✓:
'g'vßrKru: .~-
xm.mJa »ta1"Ti.au+s

Figure 6 Niccolò Machiavelli's comedy Clizia, transcribed by Ludovico degli Arrighi.

Figure S The dedicatory letter, addressed by Niccolò Maria d'Este to Duke Ercole I
d'Este (1431-1505), of a copy of Gian Giacomo Bertolotti's vernacular translation (1498)
of the Tablet of Cebes. © British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. MS Add. 22331,
fol. 2'. 200 x 133 mm.
This vellum presentation manuscript is written in a formal humanistic hand. The
heading is written in lines of alternating red and blue ink. The border and the gold
initial letter have a white vine-stem decoration (`bianchi girari') on a blue, red and green
background.
Colchester, Colchester and Ipswich Museum Service, MS 1932.225B, fols. C-2'.
230 x 145 mm.
A paper presentation copy commissioned in about 1525 to mark the marriage of Lorenzo
di Piero Ridolfi to Maria di Filippo Strozzi. Arrighi's elegant humanistic cursive script
has the same upright `d', `g' with a closed loop and roman `r' as formal humanistic
script, but includes cursive features such as round 'a', long `f' and long as well as short
`s'. The verso has the end of the opening canzona, the title and the list of characters.
The recto has the start of the prologue. Its ornate border, by the Florentine illuminator
Boccardino il Vecchio (Giuliano Boccardi), includes the combined arms of the spouses,
with the Ridolfi arms on the left, and a cameo bust of an old man flanked by the letters
`A i'. Boccardino's use of initials with such busts needs to be studied systematically, but
A i' here might refer to the `Ateniese innamorato' described in the text alongside.

142 143
 S moict~~:tarlMstf - m
/~{
q •f ` ^ 'i
q

VtDtll c 4i1..~' cü~l1'dep pp,~ r

y~"
~ ~[2" f..T.~C

-~P c+eyt; ro
-1~ f~ ,~
e•s>r,1&nis.Ei1 ~,~î
rg?1,,4r!~l :a~7i7y0
R~' •~,.
rze a:i.:Fs %A
Ar -_
1u rz~~j
.k v. MP '
YLTD ~lüE,y~C: ✓•.rt~~. ~ <+,.ita$,~.~'. .
nn
F4.üá1b..
í4-r P- i C'D7D ~

i:,
1
ii
`'10ifiPft7iQ'—ki)~ d'11 I-"*
, 192 ~s,Aa`rt4'►ta9t ` a.
((~
:ry%a C071[~NWS~I ~ -

j atA°:1•J{ tiN~ ` vI
'.sl
r _rd.ti
~ .:.
C jna~l~.~/, "
((11
jj
I 9L1Csu Ld1riuA ~:-Caét..; ^,DEt.f n .':t
1: 'á,ä:,s:'Ÿ:^, f~~i)a
S
~ f"~O'•.;^► ~.
ís
e~ tsnrf~6

Ç,Ot4 ~.:' n~üß'+'~ ~ •a.. g~4'~"`69!dlt~~ Rú..á7

F

{-e~ á}- ~~.

/~ ~} . ~. .
~' beOY~imC~ 'CP$~14/;j fndrfi~t. W

Figure 8 Biagio Buonaccorsi's letter of transmission, addressed to Pandolfo Bellacci,

accompanying one of his manuscripts of Machiavelli's Rprincipe. Florence, Biblioteca
Figure 7 The dedicatory letter (not later than 1519) of Niccolò Machiavelli's Il principe. Medicea Laurenziana, MS XLIV 32, fol. I`. 165 x x15 mm.
Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, MS It. 1177 (5038), fol. z`. 2,10 x 138 mm. The relatively modest decorations in this paper presentation copy include the
The hand shows features of mercantile script including the ascenders of `d', `l' and `b' Bellacci arms.
looping anticlockwise; `ch', `gh' and `gl' written together as ligatures, as in `Nicholaus',
line 1, `veghono', line 7, `farsegli', line 5 (but `gl' is also written in separate letters in
`Sogliono', line 3); `h' with the right-hand part curving below the line; `di' written as a
ligature, as in `medicis', line z. Minuscule `g' is sometimes written in the shape of `6', as
in `magnifico', line 1.

144 145
 l'n.crarga.- .,x, !tr1 ^a.,
i !''

Fr..w., f" - ' • ' . /

.4'f.rh:l '::i:1 "`tIa •; I.
{ClSt
t:rr -,r
? i,USP •i:~T'!i;41~: :..

/.

Figure io Francesco Marcaldi's Narratione delstato della regina di Scotia. Reproduced

by courtesy of the University Librarian and Director, The John Rylands University
Library, The University of Manchester. MS Italian 6, fols. 7`'-8`. 205 x 140 mm.
One of many copies of an account of the life of Mary, Queen of Scots published by
Marcaldi between 1579 and 1586. His hand is of the `bastarda italiand variety, with an
.7rt `g .GUP `h' similar to that of the `mercantesca' hand. The verso has the end of an undated letter
of transmission addressed to Antonio Piasentino; the Narratione begins on the recto.

Figure g Torquato 'l'asso's dialogue Il Nifo, overo del piacere, transcribed by Giulio
Mosti. Ferrara, Biblioteca Comunale Ariostea, MS Cl. 11 357, fol. 89`. 300 x 210 mm.
Mosti, nephew of the prior of the hospital in Ferrara where Tasso was confined from 1579
to 1586, copied several works for the author. His neat hand is of the `bastarda italiand
variety, but with the ascender of the `h' touching the line. The copy is signed at the end,
on fol. 114`: `Di me Giulio Mosti'. It is prefaced by a dedicatory letter from Tasso to
Ferrante Gonzaga, lord of Guastalla, dated 24 October 1581. At the start of the dialogue,
shown here, one of the speakers, Agostino Nifo, wonders what the other, Cesare Gonzaga,
is hiding ostentatiously under his cloak and asks if it is a poem (in manuscript) by an
author such as Angelo Di Costanzo, Berardino Rota, Bernardo Tasso or Luigi Tansillo
(all linked with Naples, where the dialogue is set). Gonzaga reveals that he has speeches
by two courtiers of Ferrante Sanseverino, Vincenzo Martelli and Bernardo Tasso, on the
question of whether Sanseverino should go as ambassador to the emperor Charles V.

146 147
 C
~!~x»+ome~r~cnar ~
I .41,1 fi~.~~+~~ ;»~'V r
- ~. i

:írn. ~~:',`:7 • 4
33
~r v C~ idî'cIA ~! }~ohYJj prndze~ri'r •J' pYPf

/
lcf-rtÌií(t',srdu • fm
i!- `.ü R+R(NNhW d~!'~.y(p
(

~~ ~t1 ~17~eto árahtí. .

P~Ssiratúfir,:;~1.' ~ . <srutn

. '-1t1~(r,~rr3~ 1,1 ,. -: 9ts?+

bl.' (d?'7 ". , '~N;P>( fMljrif'!!:ff4,• . ,

~+
/{NR h1Àf# 'rs~' ~[
}} !!
• ~
. (^ ji'r.ift+Ib77.!~. eM:-,.,,:~!r` ,r
~^
inR~;a ',... 3tF rv:.is.';f,7f.,:' ; ....

ïtsy 0 CI J.?r:,{
,

P 11. , ,
PUt. (1~°'^ _,_

Figure ii The Beneficio di Cristo in the only surviving sixteenth-century manuscript
COPY (1541-2). Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, MS 1785, fol. Y8v. 214 x 146 mm.
The Benefieio circulated in manuscript before it was printed in 1543. This copy forms
part of a small collection of texts on justification by faith written in an elegant
humanistic cursive hand and owned by Pierfrancesco Riccio of Florence.
Figure 12 The prophecy `Li obscuri versi the qui insieme ordisco'. Paris, Bibliothèque
Mazarine, MS 3898, fol. tot'. 202 x 146 mm.
Latin glosses relate this passage of the frottola to Venice's brief loss of mainland
territories to neighbouring states after the victory of the forces of the League of Cambrai
at the battle of Agnadello in May 1509: the recovery of the Polesine di Rovigo and of
control over the River Po by Alfonso d'Este, duke of Ferrara (lines 5-8; the `white eagle'
of line 2 is seen as referring to his coat of arms), and the recovery of Asola, Lonato and
Peschiera by Francesco Gonzaga, marquis of Mantua (lines 9—i2). The abbreviation `.i.'
stands for `id est'.

148 149
 ~`~.~/'.~.~. .~ .~~~L~.f
1tUM■~~rwwww.. w!!-
~~wwww r1l~III!!~ilia1 ~~ai~►, _...- -
ww
~M~wrl~•
% a'
-Un K 1~w~
t a. .,. ._~~ ~.~~~ ,~:'e•t~. ,+6 s - '.:a-- r I ♦' ,.%
w~~ i,lr

-7
1*
~;, y,.. ~ , t~. ,~ • ~ ~ `t
`~ ~ -~`~,-' ~.~~ • '~ t ~~ .~.r-.i' \*~)
/t
~~
\• yF i ~
I.
~ -~ , ~•~..,`~,
,~,_~ ~V ~~ ~
11 ^~ t ~,}\
~ '
~
CA
-s t
~-
~,. ~. ` ~~, ,-~..r^ ~ V ~.~ i
~~ f ~
~~
Yt tt .r, ~\ x.(tluttcrn >tl illtlllt lá.
~~
i t( ll: d~ -tttxz
t
tt!~ü
. ut 1- YN~. ._.
~

;uc+?~, di,urrarr.:lu.r'^n_-x,x :tj.n,i

S ~ \ , ,r``. ..~ _ .~ir"`~-'f• ~.~~~i ~
• ..- .:+, !x.7L,Y:ltY'' (lnP (-i`t1r1(ti:~'+1_~~.

Figure 14 Woodcut of an entertainer performing verse while playing the lira da

braccio. From Luigi Pulci, Morgante maggiore (Florence: [Antonio Tubini], for Piero
Pacini, 22 January 150011), fol. D2`.

Figure 13 The Latin version of Niccolò Valori's life of Lorenzo de' Medici. Florence,
Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, MS LXI 3, fol. 3`. 237 x 155 mm.
On the opening page of Valori's biography in this vellum manuscript (dating from
between 1517 and 1521), miniatures by Monte di Giovanni del Fora (144$-153 213) in the
illuminated border include a portrait of the author offering his work to Pope Leo X in
the presence of a group of clerics and against a view of Florence (looking past Palazzo
Medici towards the Cathedral and Palazzo della Signoria), a profile portrait of Lorenzo
and the arms of Pope Leo surrounded by laurel branches. (Garzelli, `Le immagini',
PP- 301-2.)

150 151

artlanjo all acl„w monrmcfrnta
-t>un ,»onr c{olec in <ire .4rs
É'frnxa te tic.ne-f:.s%n Y1auentYt
I,r taaYlo aE , ;.ir}do nr~clri
Figure rs A four-part setting by Marchetto Cara of a strambotto by Serafino Aquilano.
© British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. MS Egerton 3051, fol. 19'. 176 x 127 mm.
This vellum manuscript, written probably in Florence in the early Cinquecento,
contains settings of strambotti, including nine by Serafino, and barzellette. Among the
composers are Cara and Bartolomeo Tromboncino. The manuscript gives the cantus and
tenor parts on verso pages (as shown), the altus and bossus on the facing rectos. In other
manuscripts, the text of this strambotto begins `Se ben el fin de la mia vita sento'. The
composer is not identified here, but is named in other copies. (La Face Bianconi and
Rossi, Le rimedi Serafino Aquilano, pp. 56, 123-4, 214-17.)
152
CHAPTER 4
The manuscript circulation ofprose
The works with which this chapter is concerned are in general longer,
often much longer, than those discussed in Chapter 3. Even though the
copying of such texts by hand demanded more time, and hence more
money if one was paying for the transcription, there were still several
reasons for which they could be circulated in manuscript rather than in
print. These reasons are strikingly similar to those noted in the context
of lyric poetry, in spite of the differences of scale and content: the works
might be destined for a specific community of readers; they might have
topical relevance; they might be written in response to another scribally
published work; and their content might_ be more appropriate to confi-
dential or clandestine diffusion.
I CURRENT AFFAIRS, HISTORY AND POLITICS
In looking at Sanudo's ability to glean fresh information about Venice
and other parts of Italy (Chapter I Section 5 and Chapter 3 Section 3),
we have already begun to see how manuscript texts concerning current
events were circulated within and between cities. Sanudo's Venice was
one of the European centres best placed to gather texts that had been
posted or distributed for propaganda purposes, transcripts or reports of
speeches, letters by prominent political figures and news reports!
A characteristically Venetian genre that was diffused almost entirely
in manuscript until near the end of the Cinquecento was the relazione, a
broadly based report that the city's ambassadors were required to provide
on the nature and organization of a foreign state on returning from their
mission. A law of 1296 required merely an oral account, but from 1425
this had to be written too, and in 1524 the Senate decided that relazioni,
For an overview, see Burke, `Early modern Venice'. On the transcription of speeches made in
Venetian councils (`renghe'), see de Vivo, Information and Communication, pp. 56-7.
153
154 The manuscript circulation ofprose
as well as reports by the state's administrators, should be filed within a
fortnight of their spoken delivery;
in un libro tenuto secreto ne la cancelleria nostra, dechiarando che debano esser
tenuti dui libri a simile servizio deputati: in uno de li qual se abbi a notar le
relazion de tutti rettori e sindici, ne l'altro veramente quelle de li baili, provedi-
tori e ambassadori, acciò se ne abbi perpetua memoria di quelle e insieme se pos-
sano sempre instruir cum el lezer ditte relazion quelli che per tempora Barano al
governo del Stato nostro.'
(in a book kept secret in our chancery; two books must be kept for this purpose,
in one of which are to be recorded the reports of all rectors and syndics, and in
the other those of governors, proveditors and ambassadors, so that the reports
are kept in perpetual memory and future rulers of our state can learn by reading
them)
Neither of the two books has survived, but the existence of full copies of
relazioni written after 1524 (very few are extant from before that year) shows
both that this law was generally if not always observed, and that some of
the texts could be circulated quite widely — notwithstanding their supposed
confidentiality — by means of authorial, entrepreneurial and user publi-
cation. Two sources that could have been used for this diffusion are the
Senate registers and any copies that found their way to the archive that each
ambassador's family would have possessed.3 Sanudo was able to transcribe
some reports in his diaries.¢ If we take as examples the series of relazioni
from the Cinquecento on England, Germany and Ferrara, we see that
reports copied frequently were those on England by Daniel Barbaro (1551),
Giacomo Soranzo (1554) and Giovanni Michiel (1557); those on Germany by
Vincenzo Querini (í5o7), Niccolò Tiepolo (1532), Marino Giustinian (1541),
Bernardo Navagero (1546), Lorenzo Contarini (1548), Marino Cavalli (1551),
Federico Badoer (1557), Paolo Tiepolo (1557) and Tommaso Contarini (1596);
and that on Ferrara by Emilio Maria Manolesso (1575) 5
In Rome, and possibly in Venice and other cities, there was an organ-
ized production of these reports. When Leonardo Donâ served as
Cit. in Segarizzi (ed.), Relazioni, I, 284; see, too, L. Firpo and Pedani-Fabris (eds.), Relazioni, I,
v—vii.
3 Queller, `The development'; de Vivo, `Le armi', pp. r9t-2 and, on relazioni in general, Information
and Communication, pp. 57-70.
4 For instance, the reports from Germany of Francesco Corner (1521) and Niccolò Tiepolo (1532):
I diarii, XXX, 321-41, LVI, 32o-56 (the latter is a long `summario').
í L. Firpo and Pedani-Fabris (eds.), Relazioni, I, xv—xvii (England) and II, vi—vii, xiii—xiv, xvii,
xviii, xxi—xviii, xxv—xxvi, xxxviii (Germany); Segarizzi (ed.), Relazioni, I, 294-5 (Ferrara).
Sixteenth-century copies of Querini's report are in BMV MS It. VII 873 (8504), fols. ro6-123°
and BMCV, Misc. Correr LII/zz21; seventeenth-century ones are in BMV, MS It. VII 580 (8956),
Us. 208`-273° and BMCV, Archivio Morosini-Grimani, 408, pp. 77-115-
i Current affairs, history and politics 155
Venetian ambassador in Rome towards the end of the century, he made
a list of several relazioni, such as that of Cavalli just mentioned, that
had been bought by a secretary at the price of 15 paoli for loo leaves.6
It was only at a relatively late stage that some were printed. In 1589, a
number of ambassadors' reports were included in the anthology of pol-
itical writings, concerning the states of Italy, Europe, Turkey and Persia,
that was published under the title of Thesoro politico, with a false imprint
(`nell'Academia italiana di Colonia') but in Paris. This anthology and its
successors with the same title were themselves more complete versions of
the manuscript collections of political documentation that were available
in chanceries for consultation and copying, and that have survived in
large numbers. 7
An individual who profited from the market for political, economic
and military information was Francesco Marcaldi. He moved between
many cities from Turin, Milan and Venice in the north to Tuscany, Rome
and Naples. His cursive hand (Figure io) remained fluent and neat except
in his last years. He could therefore have been a secretary in the house-
hold of some prestigious figure, though he does not mention a master.
Over many years Marcaldi issued accounts of Italian and foreign states
in gift manuscripts addressed to individuals from whom he would have
expected some recompense. They are of similar small size, in a range from
about 175 x 135 mm to 225 x 165 mm, with gilt fore-edges. He generally
had them bound in limp vellum with two red silk ties, but a few cop-
ies to prestigious recipients were bound in dark brown leather with gold
tooling. Some copies contain his letters of transmission but are not in
his hand, and these demonstrate that his recipients could act as owner-
publishers of his works.'
Marcaldi began by appropriating a Discrittione Belle cose di Cipro com-
posed in 1562 by a Venetian, Ascanio Savorgnano. This was copied to the
same pattern, fifteen lines per page, and sent out to over twenty recipi-
ents between 1571 and 1575, just before and after Venice lost the island
to the Turks.9 Marcaldi could issue copies at quite an intense rhythm,
as is seen from a sequence of four, each made up of around 56 leaves,
Baschet, La Diplomatie, pp. 51-2; de Vivo, Information and Communication, p. 6o. The paolo was
a small silver coin.
I J. Balsamo, `Les Origines'; Testa, Alcune riflessioni' and `Did Giovanni Maria Manelli publish
the 7hesoro Politico?'
R
Avetta, `Per Francesco Marcaldi', identifies some manuscripts of works distributed by him.
Savorgnano, Discrittione. Savorgnano's original text, which includes an extra passage on troops
near the end, is in Reinhard, Vollständige Geschichte, II, Beitragen, 33-53•
156 The manuscript circulation of prose
that are dated Venice 1, 1o, 20 and 2-5 November 1S7320 A few years later
Marcaldi compiled a Narrazione del stato della regina di Scozia, narrat-
ing the life of Mary Queen of Scots from her birth in 1542 up to 1578
from a pro-Catholic standpoint and ending with a brief account of the
current state of Scotland." In this case, too, well over twenty presenta-
tions were made, dating from 1579 to 1586. Starting with this work,
Marcaldi 's manuscripts used the pattern of twelves lines per page. After
the evident success of his first two enterprises, he went on to transcribe
seven further compositions, though he issued them to far fewer people:
a Narrazione dell'imperio e stato della casa ottomana (published between
1588 and 1S9o); a Narrazione dello stato della Repubblica di Genova (1589);
a Narrazione delle cose di Spagna (1589-94); a Narrazione delle cose più
importanti della Repubblica Veneziana (1589-96); a Narrazione delle
cose più importanti del regno di Napoli in a longer and a shorter version
(1589-96); a Narrazione delle cose più importanti del Gran Duca di Toscana
(1593-5); and a Narrazione delle cose più importanti del Duca di Ferrara
(1S97).`Z His accounts of states contain information on lands, resources,
expenditure and military defences similar to that contained in relazioni,
and he no doubt used these as sources, though he does specify that some
information on Venice and Naples, such as the miracles that occur in the
latter city, was derived from his own experience. He maintains a consist-
ently complimentary stance, but to his credit his account of the Spanish
kingdom deplores the conditions in which slaves were kept in the Indies.
Marcaldi presented at least four of these writings — those on Mary
Stuart, Venice, Naples and Ferrara — to Cardinal Federico Borromeo.
Several exemplars of the description of Cyprus exist with a letter to Grand
Duke Francesco de' Medici. Lay recipients of high status include the mer-
chant Alessandro Buonvisi, the soldier Adriano Baglioni, the diplomats
Giovanni Battista Doria, Giovanni Battista Crivelli and Matteo Zane,
the courtier Lotario Conti and a former soldier turned man of letters,
Ferrante Carafa. Marcaldi must have produced at least some copies specu-
latively, adding his letter of transmission in a second phase: it is contained
in a separate gathering, and some manuscripts have a letter that has no
'° The respective recipients are Antonio Salviati, Roberto de' Rizzi, Cosmo Cini and Alessandro
Bonvisi; see Kristeller, Iterltalicum, IV, r4Sb, 232b, 234b, z82b-3a; V, 597b-8a.
" Ferrato (ed.), Due narrazioni storiche, pp. 3-16; Giglio Tos (ed.), La prima storia di Maria
Stuarda.
Three of these have modern editions: Ferrato (ed.), Due narrazioni storiche (on Spain, pp. ii —t9,
and the Ottoman state, pp. 21-8); Isola (ed.), Narrazione dello stato della Repubblica di Genova.
Extracts from the description of Naples, provided for the grand duke of Tuscany by an agent in
Naples, are in Palermo (ed.), `Narrazioni ', pp. 247-9.
r Current affairs, history and politics 157
date or is dated only to a year (rather than to a specific day), or that does
not name a recipient, or in which the recipient's name is added in a differ-
ent ink.'3 The letters follow a very stereotyped pattern and unfortunately
reveal nothing about the man himself. In them, Marcaldi outlines the
work, says he knows the recipient will be interested in it,-sends it humbly
as a sign of his affection and with his good wishes.
Handwritten texts provided much of the information that young
Venetian patricians needed in order to find out which posts in public life
were available at a particular moment, what the advantages or otherwise
of these posts were and how one might best go about finding support
for election to them. Three types of manuscript were consulted by those
seeking political office: the libro d oro, containing up-to-date information
on the patriciate including births and marriages; the zuccheta, a summary
list of the various magistracies and council posts with details of the terms
of office and any remuneration; and the consegio or brogietto that gave the
latest ballot results and identified the electors. Towards the end of the
Cinquecento, the first two types were produced in a pocket format that
was conveniently portable while lobbying was in progress. The manu-
scripts were copied either by the patricians themselves, from copies owned
by friends, or by professional copyists. Some of these copyists were bal-
lotini, the boys who carried the ballot urns and had access to inside infor-
mation, but they probably also collaborated with the scribes who worked
under the portico leading from the main entrance of the Ducal Palace
to the Scala dei Giganti on the opposite side of the main courtyard. The
similarities in format and presentation between copies of the zuccheta
indicate that they were being produced for sale ready-made.~4
During the second half of the sixteenth century, in response to a rap-
idly accelerating demand for information about current affairs in Europe
and neighbouring states, manuscript avvisi — compilations of news pro-
duced serially by professional news-gatherers — began to appear, par-
ticularly in Rome and Venice. They emerged from the genre of letters
addressed by one person to another or to a state. Examples from the late
Quattrocento and early Cinquecento are those of Benedetto Dei, one
of which apparently circulated in Cortona in over twenty copies, and of
Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti.15 Like these antecedents, avvisi were
usually created for specific readers. Ambassadors might attach them to,
E.g. BL, MS Add. 27546 (the Ottoman state); BTM, MS Triv. ii99 (Spain); BAM, MS Z 114 sup.
(Naples). BTM, MS Triv. 1193 (Cyprus) has no letter of transmission.
" Raines, `Office seeking'.
`f Chandler, A Renaissance news correspondent'; C. James (ed.), The Letters, pp. 39-72 (p. 46).
158 The manuscript circulation ofprose
or incorporate them into, the regular despatches that they sent to their
states. Within the collection that is now BAV, MSS Urb. Lat. 1038-1112,
covering the years 1554-1648, some avvisi were addressed from Venice to
Ulrich Fugger in Augsburg, while others were sent to the chancery of the
duke of Urbino from his agent in Rome, having been bought from a pro-
fessional supplier of news. The avvisi were provided at regular weekly or
twice-weekly intervals, thanks to improvements in postal services between
cities." However, a sketch of a cripple selling `nove e avvisi' (news and
newsletters) in the streets of Rome suggests that these documents were
also available to the general public.'?
One compiler of avvisi was Francesco Maria Vialardi. Born in Vercelli
about 154o and well educated, he became a political informer, providing
dispatches on current affairs or opinions on specific issues for ruling fam-
ilies such as the Gonzaga of Mantua and the Medici of Florence. In 1569
he said that he wrote letters and avvisi almost daily. Vialardi was care-
ful, however, to distinguish his writings from those of the mere novellanti
who provided gossip. Some of his essays were circulated in handwritten
copies, as in the cases of a discourse on Spanish policy in Flanders and an
account of the state of the grand duke of Tuscany written in 1603.' 8
The success of handwritten avvisi must have been due in part to the
difficulty of controlling them. Because of their subversive capacity to dif-
fuse news and opinions unfavourable to those in positions of political or
religious power, there were a number of attempts to limit their impact
and to control their content, though never to repress them entirely. In
Venice, when the Council of Ten learned that, during a lawsuit being
heard in 1567-8, there had been mention of `[gli] avisi delle novità del
mondo, et spetialmente di quelle de' Turchi' (newsletters about inter-
national affairs and especially about those of the Turks), which someone
was receiving and reading in the street, it was decreed that there should
be no further public discussion of such things. The Council had to take
more decisive action in 1572, the year after the victory against the Turks
at Lepanto, when they decided that nobody in future should dare `striver
nuove di qualsivoglia sorte, anco di quelle the si ragionano per le piazze,
per mandarle fuori' (to write news of any kind for publication, including
what is discussed in the piazzas), under pain of five years in the galleys or
i6 Ancel, `Étude critique', 115-23; Delumeau, Vie économigue et sociale, I, 25-7, 36; Infelise, Prima
dei giornali, pp. 10—iz, ro6. On newsletters, see too Dooley, The Social History of Skepticism,
pp• 9-44; de Vivo, Information and Communication, pp. 80-4, 183-7•
Delumeau, Vie économique etsociale, I, 29 and pl. I.
" L. Firpo, `In margine al processo' (pp. 355-6 on copies of Vialardi's works).
i Current affairs, history and politics 159
ten years' exile, unless it was carried out by ambassadors, secretaries and
agents of rulers, in others words by those for whom it was recognized to
be strictly necessary. In 1588 the punishment was increased to the cutting
off of the offender's right hand, but it was never carried out.`
Similar measures were taken in Rome in the same period. Following
the ban on `libelli famosi' of 1564 (see Chapter 3 Section 3), Pius V issued
a broader Constitutio contra scribentes exemplantes, & dictantes monita
vulgo dicta gli avisi, et ritorni, printed in 1572, that forbade the scribal cir-
culation of defamatory writings and prophecies:
Nemo [...1 audeat, nec praesumat libellos famosos, nec literas monitorum vulgo
appellatas lettere di Avisi, continentes convicia, iniurias, vel famae et honoris
alicuius laesionem, nec aliquam scripturam in qua de futuris successibus dis-
seratur, [ ... I componere, dictate, scribere, exemplari, retinere, nec ad aliquem
transmittere.
(Let nobody dare or presume to compose, dictate, write, copy, keep or transmit
to anyone libellous writings or letters of advice, called in the vernacular `lettere
di avisi', containing abuse, insults or personal attacks on anyone's reputation and
honour, or any writing that discusses future events.)
Further edicts against producers and owners of libellous newsletters were
printed in Rome in 1586 and 1600 (and one of 1586 forbade libellous
graffiti in inns and prisons). An edict was printed in Rome in 1590 telling
preachers not to:
ragionare et discorrere d'avvisi, reporti et nove the da diverse parti si scrivono et
si confingono secondo i capricci de gl'huomini et particolarmente de i rumori di
Francia, cose the non appartengono né alla pace della conscienza, né alla corret-
tione de vitii.
(talk of and discuss newsletters, reports and news that are being written and
fabricated in various places, according to the whims of men, and particularly
about the rumours of France; these are matters that belong neither to peace of
conscience nor to the correction of vices.)
In this case, the papacy was evidently anxious about coverage of the
savagery that surrounded the accession of a Protestant king, Henri IV.
From 16o2, any newsletter had to be authorized by the governor of Rome.
Two men, a certain Luperzio and Annibale Cappello, described as `capo di
una setta di gazzettieri' (head of a sect of gazette-makers), were executed
in 1581 and 1587 respectively because they had diffused unwelcome or con-
fidential information. But while such attempts at censorship of attacks
Cozzi, Repubblica di Venezia, pp. 166-7 (the ruling of 1567-8); Preto, I servizi segreti, pp. 89-90
(the same ruling and the law of 1572); Infelise, Prima dei giornali, pp. 154-7-
16o The manuscript circulation of prose
on rulers and the papacy doubtless encouraged caution about what was
written, they did not prevent avvisi in general from appearing and indeed
from flourishing. Even when printed newspapers began to appear in
other Italian cities in the years around 1640, handwritten newsletters had
sufficient advantages to survive for several decades. -
Akin to news reports were the narrations of two tragic events of the late
Cinquecento that had an abundant scribal circulation from the following
century onwards. An account of the murder by Carlo Gesualdo of his
wife Maria d'Avalos and her lover Fabrizio Carafa in 1590 was included
in a compilation of stories that appears to have been initiated in the mid-
seventeenth century and then expanded. In its many manuscript copies
it went under titles such as La veritd svelata a' principi, ovvero Successi
diversi tragici ed amorosi occorsi in Napoli ed altrove a'Napoletani and was
attributed to Silvio and Ascanio Corona, though these names were prob-
ably pseudonyms, adopted because the tales were intended to criticize
the nobility. This vein of criticism, together with the gory subject-matter,
would have been a reason to avoid print.2' In 1599 the noblewoman
Beatrice Cenci, her brother and her stepmother were executed in Rome
for the murder of her father Francesco, who had imprisoned the two
women in a remote fortress. An anonymous account of their executions,
the Relatione della morte di Giacomo e Beatrice Cenci e di Lucrezia Petronia
Cenci Toro madrigna, parricidi, written perhaps some years later, exists in
many manuscript copies or paraphrases .22
Some historical works of primarily local interest were diffused initially
or only within scribal communities that were defined by citizenship or
membership of a religious order. These writings would have been of less
interest outside the locations in which they originated, and their circula-
tion was consequently more restricted geographically than that of most
other scribally diffused genres.
The composition and copying of chronicles of Venice and of Venetian
institutions flourished thanks to a vigorous scribal tradition that benefited
both individual families and religious houses, and it is witnessed by a
very high number of manuscripts dating from the fourteenth century to
Infelise, Prima dei giornali, pp. vi, 81, 84-5 (the survival of handwritten newletters and the
first printed ones), 144 (the warning to preachers), 155-5 (repressive measures and their limited
effects).
" Parenti, Ascanio e Silvio Corona'; Watkins, Gesualdo, P. 7.
Ricci, Beatrice Cenci, II, 293-7; Caiani, `Beatrice Cenci'. The BL, for example, has a copy from
the seventeenth century, MS Add. 12037, and another from the eighteenth, MS Add. 31868;
the copy in JRM, MS Ital. 27, fols. 7491-64`, forms part of a miscellany that includes several
accounts of deaths.
1 Current affairs, history and politics 161
the eighteenth. The author of a history of the Benedictine convent on the
island of San Servolo noted in 1543 that such histories were customary
for noble families, congregations, monasteries and confraternities. The
genre of convent chronicles, destined primarily for reading by or aloud
to nuns, offered a unique opportunity for women in this period to write
historical prose both in Venice and in other Italian cities." As was seen
in Chapter i Section 4 and Chapter 2 Section 2, chronicles could be
transcribed by both professional and non-specialist scribes. The histor-
ical works of Marin Sanudo, printed only in modern times, circulated
to some extent in manuscript. He claimed in a letter of 1495 that his
work De origine, situ et magistratibus urbis Venetie was `da tutti exti-
mata per la grande cognitione di questa Terra the ivi è' (esteemed by
all for the great knowledge of this city that it contains). It was used by
Francesco Sansovino in his Venetia citt,a nobilissima et singolare (first edi-
tion Venice, 1581) and survives in a copy made in 1587 by the patrician
Giovanni Tiepolo, then aged about seventeen, who says that he derived
it from an earlier copy made by Piero Contarini.2¢ Sanudo's account of
the French invasion of 1494 was transcribed at least once (in the sole sur-
viving copy, BNP, MS It. 1422), and it was plagiarized by Marco Guazzo
in his Historie [ ... I ove se contengono la venuta et partita dItalia di Carlo
Ottavo Re di Franza, printed in 1547.~5
Biagio Buonaccorsi, the Florentine scribe mentioned in earlier chapters,
compiled an account of events during his period of office in the chancery,
the Diario dall ánno r498 all ánno 1512. Before it was printed in Florence in
1568, it enjoyed an abundant dissemination in manuscript within the city.
Seventeen copies date from the sixteenth century. At least two were owned
by members of patrician families, in one case Francesco Guicciardini, in
the other Giovanni di Pier Filippo Pandolfini. Guicciardini inserted some
lines in his own hand in order to fill a gap left in Buonaccorsi's account
of December 1498, and he used the Diario as a source for his own Storia
dItalia. Two copies were owned by Varchi.26 Some of the diffusion of
this work must have been organized professionally. Several copies are
in elegant, probably professional hands. One has been attributed to the
Lowe, Nuns' Chronicles, pp. 6 (San Servolo), 52 (women historians). On the social function of the
genre, see Raines, `Social debate'.
'4 Tiepolo's copy of this work and other material from Sanudo is in BMCV, MSS Cicogna 969
and 970. See Caracciolo Aric6, `Marin Sanudo il Giovane', 419-25, and Sanudo, De origine,
PP. xvii—xxii, 3-4,155-6- On Sanudo as historiographer, see Cozzi, `Marin Sanudo'.
See Fulin in Sanudo, La spedizione di Carlo VIII, pp. 3-13.
s Niccolini in Buonaccorsi, Diario, pp. xxi—xxiv, 6-7, 40, 234 (Guicciardini), io—ii (Pandolfini),
6, 9—to (Varchi).
162 The manuscript circulation of prose
scribe Antonio d'Orazio dAntonio da Sangallo (1551-1639), whose library
included many manuscripts, the majority of historical interest.27 As was
seen in Chapter 2 Section 2, two further copies were made by scribes
working in teams.
When Giovan Battista Gelli, a Florentine shoemaker, had completed
his short treatise Dell origine di Firenze between 1542 and 1544, he sent a
copy (BNCF, MS Magl. XXV 25) to its dedicatee Duke Cosimo. Using
the spurious theories of Annio (Giovanni Nanni) of Viterbo, the work
claimed that Tuscany was the first area colonized after the Flood by
Noah, who had brought the Aramaic language there, and it seems to
have been written at Cosimo's request, in order to enhance the prestige
of Tuscan civilization and to support his status and policies. However,
although there is no evidence that Dell origine was printed, Gelli envis-
aged its being disseminated to some extent among other readers, includ-
ing those who did not favour his own idiosyncratic views. In his letter of
dedication in the manuscript, he wrote that he preferred not to give his
name and left it to Cosimo to reveal his identity if he wished (`nè le ho
voluto sopra mettere it nome mio rimettendomene in tutto a V. Ex"`),
asking the duke to consider those who would despise him because of his
humble trade. In case his name happened to come to the ears of others in
some way, Gelli said he had backed up his case by citing all his historical
sources, so that Cosimo's authority should not be diminished (fol. 3'-v)-
The myth of Noah influenced a Dialogo in defensione della lingua toschana,
composed between 1541 and 1547, in which Sand Marmochino sought to
prove that Tuscan was derived from Hebrew (BNCF, MS Magl. XXVIII
2o). He dedicated his work to Cosimo but also intended it for wider read-
ing: his proem addressed to the duke (fol. i'-°) shows he hoped it would
resolve the dispute between the `Latini', who considered Tuscan a corrupt
form of Latin, and members of the Accademia fiorentina who favoured a
Hebrew origm.21
One reader who was hostile to Gelli's theories, though not because
of the author's social class, was Vincenzio Borghini. In a letter of 1579
addressed to Baccio Valori he recalled seeing the work at the time of
its composition and laughing at it. He thought it had been printed in
Florence, and later he had searched for it among stationers (`ne ho cerco a
questi cartolai'). However, he searched in vain, and there is no independent
17 ASF, Carte Strozziane, ser. II, LXXIX bis; see Niccolini in Buonaccorsi, Diario, pp. 3-4.
On Sangallo, see Biagiarelli, Antonio d'Orazio da Sangallo' and Tanturli, `Un nuovo
manoscritto'.
~R Plaisance, L'Accademia, p. z41 n. 18; Saracco, `Un'apologia'.
i Current affairs, history and politics 163
evidence that such an edition existed. It seems, then, that the discreet
scribal publication of Dell origine, in this one copy, was intended to test
reactions in the court and in academic circles, before its theories were
taken over by Pierfrancesco Giambullari and expanded in his dialogue R
Gello.29 Later, in 1566-7, Girolamo Mei's treatise on the foundation and
early history of Florence was circulated scribally, as was the subsequent
correspondence in which Borghini tried to persuade Mei of his errors."
In western Tuscany, the state of Lucca was hostile to the printing
of works concerning its history: through a combination of prudence
and resignation to its fate as a relatively small player on the Italian and
European political scene, it preferred not to have its affairs discussed by
other Italians 3' Various copies were made of the Storie antiche della Valle
di Camaiore written in 1528 by Bianco Bianchi and of annalistic histor-
ies of Lucca made later in the century, and the revolt of the Straccioni
(silk-weavers) in 1531-2 was recorded in several manuscript accounts. The
surveyor Giuseppe Civitali compiled a history of the city from its origins
to 1572, starting it by 1558 and using public and private records. The auto-
graph manuscript was copied in 16zo by Daniello De' Nobili, who had to
piece together a work that he described as `lacera, e dispersa per le mani di
varie persone' (tattered and scattered in the possession of various people).
It was then copied widely in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,
but always within the households of Lucca's ruling class32
After the death of Francesco Guicciardini in 154o, his relatives oversaw
a limited dissemination of manuscripts of his Storia d'Italia among select
contemporaries. Up to at least 1555, parts of the Storia were copied in the
Guicciardini household. Copies of individual books were, for instance,
sent on loan to Cardinal Niccolò Ridolfi and perhaps read aloud to him
and others by Donato Giannotti33 Varchi's history of Florence circulated
in manuscript until the eighteenth century.34
Writings concerned with politics and related matters found a natural
medium in manuscript: they were often addressed to a specific readership
9 De Gaetano assumes Dell'origine was printed (Giambattista Gelli, pp. 40-5). For Borghini's letter
and the suggestion that Borghini's memory was at fault, see D'Alessandro in Gelli, Dell'origine,
PP. 63-4, 67-9. See, too, Plaisance, L'Accademia, pp. 158-64; on Borghini, Cipriani, Il mito
etrusco, pp. 83-4 and Belloni and Drusi, Vincenzio Borgbini, pp. 156-7.
j, Moyer, `Historians and antiquarians'. " Bongi in Sercambi, Le croniche, I, vii—ix.
Carocci, `La rivolta'; Berengo, Nobili e mercanti, pp. zz, 272.-7; Malanima, `Giuseppe Civitali'.
Rostagno, `La Storia d'Italia', pp. cxl—cxliv, on BNCF, MS II III 6o-3; Ridolfi, `Fortune della
"Storia d'Italia—, pp. 211-15.
11 Varchi, Storia fiorentina, I, iv—vii. In the first phase the work was written out by Varchi with the
help of Lelio Bonsi, Galeotto Giugni, Giovan Battista Fei, Piero Stufa and Alessandro del Serra.
164 The manuscript circulation of prose
and were concerned to some extent with local issues, and they might
contain practical counsel that the author considered should be heeded
urgently. For example, during Bernardo Bembo's appointments as podestà
(governor) of cities of the Venetian terra ferma, at least two authors
presented him with manuscript works of advice. When he was sent to
Ravenna (1482-3), he took the lawyer Alessandro Maggi with him as a
legal official. Maggi took the opportunity to present to Bembo (prob-
ably copying it out in his own hand) a treatise on undertaking a magis-
tracy, De obeundo magistratu, that he had already presented to Cristoforo
Ferro 35 Later, in Bergamo (1489-9o), Bembo sought advice from Pietro
Barozzi, bishop of Padua and a fellow-Venetian, and Barozzi sent him
a treatise on removing civic strife, De factionibus extinguendis et civibus
in gratiam pristinam revocandis continendisque. The presentation copy is
written on vellum and has an illuminated initial at the start of each of
the three books. At first the scribe attempted to imitate the humanistic
cursive of Bartolomeo Sanvito, an influential Paduan scribe patronized by
Bembo, but his hand gradually returned to using letter forms belonging
to the gothic cursive tradition 31 However, neither of these works appears
to have been disseminated beyond its dedicatee.
Niccol6 Machiavelli, it was mentioned in Chapter 1 Section 2, habitu-
ally published his works in the scribal medium and made only limited use
of print. We saw that in the process of author publication he made fair
copies for presentation to others (Chapter z Section 2). He also probably
used the services of professional or semiprofessional scribes. It is likely,
for instance, that he commissioned a copy of the first Decennale, BLF,
MS XLIV 41, for presentation to Alamanno Salviati, the work's initial
dedicatee.37 Buonaccorsi transcribed a number of Machiavelli's prose and
verse works; copies of Il principe and Arte della guerra were made for his
own benefit, as was seen in Chapter z Section 3, but it is very possible
that he also worked on the author's behalf.3' In the case of Rprincipe, the
combined efforts of author and scribes, in particular Buonaccorsi, were
Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, pp. 162-3. The letter of transmission to Bembo appears in BMV,
MS Lat. V 8z (2874), which is apparently in Maggi's hand but (since it is an undecorated paper
copy) not necessarily the copy presented to Bembo. The copy presented to Ferro was probably
BMCV, MS Cicogna 1346, on vellum.
e BL, MS Royal 12 C.VII. On this manuscript see Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, pp. 195-6 and 340;
on the work, see Gaeta, Il vescovo Pietro Barozzi and King, Venetian Humanism, pp. 150-7. I am
grateful to Laura Nuvoloni for comments on the script.
Tommasini, La vita e gli scritti, 1I, 1,042-3; Gerber, Nicrolò Machiavelli, I, 8o-1 and fats. 33;
Scarpa, `L'autografo', 156-7.
B Buonaccorsi transcribed two poems of Machiavelli in a lyric anthology (BLF, MS XL1 33, fols.
6-37) that Martelli dated first to shortly before 1494 (Preistoria (medicea)') and then, less
I Current affairs, history and politics 165
most effective in ensuring that the work was disseminated among and
even beyond those to whom Machiavelli wanted to transmit his bold,
often shocking ideas. Of the extant manuscripts (and some are likely to
have been lost), several appear, on the basis of evidence such as handwrit-
ing, to date from before the first printed editions of 1S3z.39 Three of these
were transcribed by Buonaccorsi.40 The anonymous scribe of Carpentras,
Bibliothèque Inguimbertine, MS 303 (which has the siglum A) must have
been working for or with the knowledge of Machiavelli: this person also
wrote out the manuscript of the Arte della guerra now in Verona (Bibl.
Civica, MS 511), and here Machiavelli himself added in his own hand the
headings for books II-VII and the diagrams of troop dispositions that
follow book VII (fols. 169-181).4'
Copies of Il principe were also made outside Florence. One now in
the Vatican library, MS Barb. Lat. 5093 (B), was copied on vellum in
Rome, perhaps around 1522-3, in the fine humanistic cursive hand of the
Spanish scribe Genesius de la Barrera, who was a disciple of Arrighi and
very probably working on his behal£42 The humanistic cursive hand of
Charlecote Park, MS L z (W) is also related to Arrighi's.43 These two
manuscripts may result from the user publication of the treatise. The
scribe of manuscript G (Gotha, Forschungs- and Landesbibliothek, chart.
B 70) introduced some linguistic traits from northern Italy, more spe-
cifically from Emilia Romagna, and he could well have been working in
this area. This manuscript then came into the hands of Teofilo Mochi, a
notary active in Siena in 1483-1530, who added corrections to it and used
it to correct a transcription that he had made himself, BCR, MS Cors. 43
B 35 (C). He also took the opportunity to alter Machiavelli's description
plausibly, to after 1514 (in N. Machiavelli, Il principe, pp. 483-7). He copied all Machiavelli's
capitoli in another anthology of contemporary verse, BAV, MS Barb. Lat. 3945•
~s The strongest candidates are MSS A, B, C, D, G, K, L, M, R R, U and W, using the sigla of
the critical editions of Inglese (N. Machiavelli, De principati.bus, pp. 37-56) and Martelli and
Martelli (N. Machiavelli, Il principe, pp. 325-39). I am unconvinced by Martelli's argument that
the initial circulation of what Machiavelli wrote in 1513 was very limited and not promoted by
the author; see most recently his edition of the work, pp. 9-49, 339-507.
1° BLF, MS XLIV 32 (L), BNP, MS It. 709 (P) and BRF, MS 26o3 (R). Buonaccorsi copied at least
one other that he sold to Giovanni Caddi: Fachard, Biagio Buonaccorsi, p. 215.
1' Masi in N. Machiavelli, L'arte della guerra, pp. 321-4; Marcelli in N. Machiavelli, Il principe, pp.
325-9• Martelli argues that, although this scribe had a poor understanding of some aspects of the
text of II principe (see especially ibid., pp. 349-50, he nevertheless preserved some original readings.
4 ' Ruysschaert, `Le Copiste Genesius'; Marcelli in N. Machiavelli, Il principe, pp. 329-31.
e) For a facsimile, see N. Machiavelli, 11 principe, with an Essay.
Gerber, Niccolb Machiavelli,
reproduces extracts from MSS A (fats. 14), B (fats. 1 and r7), C (fats. 7), E (facs. 16), G (facs. 4),
L (facs. 5), M (facs. 15), P (facs. 3) and R (facs. z).
166 The manuscript circulation ofprose
of Pandolfo Petrucci, a recent unofficial ruler of his city, from the neutral
`Principe' to `tiranno' (chapter zz). The same change was made in another
Sienese copy, BAV, MS Urb. Lat. 975 (U), along with various interpola-
tions favourable to Siena. Mochi decided at some point (not necessarily
at the outset) to use his manuscript as copy text for a printed edition,
since the third of three preliminary leaves includes a letter addressed `a li
lettori' (to readers). This manuscript came to stand, then, on the border-
line between scribal and print publication. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek—
Preußischer Kulturbesitz, MS 309 (K) — copied, from a lost source itself
derived from one of Buonaccorsi's manuscripts, by a team of five scribes
whose linguistic habits point towards a common Venetian origin — was
probably also intended to be used as copy text for an edition that did not
come to fruition.44
Further evidence of the effectiveness of the scribal circulation of Il
principe, particularly within Tuscany, is provided by traces of its influence
on works composed before the posthumous printed editions. The return
of the Medici from exile to Florence in the late summer of 1512, still as
the state's unofficial rulers, and the election of Giovanni de' Medici as
Leo X some six months later were followed by a debate about the govern-
ment of the city and its state. Machiavelli's treatise was of great inter-
est in this context, even though it did not address the question directly.
Strong indications that Il principe was being read and used by members
of Florentine patrician families by at least 1516 can be found in essays and
letters on Florentine matters by Francesco Guicciardini, his brother-in-
law Lodovico Alamanni and his nephew Niccolò Guicciardini. The work
was also used extensively by Agostino Nifo in his De regnandi peritia,
printed in Naples in 1523. Two Florentine writers who seem to take issue
with Machiavelli's doctrines, although they do not mention him explic-
itly, are Antonio Brucioli, in his dialogues on moral philosophy printed
in 152,6, and Luigi Alamanni, younger half-brother of Lodovico, who in
his second Satira, written between 1524 and 1527, sarcastically attacks an
unnamed `aureo libro moral' (golden book of morality) that advised wise
men to keep their promises only when it suited them.45
44 Quaglio, 'Indicazioni sulla fortuna', 403-12-
45 Albertini, Firenze dalla repubblica al príncipato, pp. 31-6, 365-90; Inglese in N. Machiavelli,
De principatibus, pp. 14-16, 18-22,; Dionisotti, Machiavellerie, pp. 124-34, 151-3, 193-226;
Richardson, `7he Prince and its early Italian readers; on Nifo, Anglo, Machiavelli: The First
Century, pp. 42-84. Evidence of early reading of the Capitolo dell'ingratitudine, composed prob-
ably in í5o8 or a little later, comes from Lodovico Alamanni's quotation from it in a letter of í5r8
to Francesco Guicciardini: Jodogne, 'Una citazione'.
i Current affairs, history and politics 167
Machiavelli's historical works had a much more limited circulation in
manuscript, but copies, at least some of them made by professional scribes,
were nevertheless made available to his friends and probably to friends of
these friends. On 2,9 August 152o he sent a copy of his Vita di Castruccio
Castracani, an account of the life of the soldier who ruled Lucca in the
early fourteenth century, to the two young Florentine patricians to whom
the work is dedicated, Zanobi Buondelmonti and Luigi Alamanni.46 Two
months later, on 28 October, the scribe Francesco Baroncini finished his
transcription of the Vita, now BNCF, MS Palatino S37. As was mentioned
in Chapter 1 Section 5, Baroncini may have been working on behalf of the
group that met in the Ord Oricellari, which included Buondelmonti and
Alamanni, rather than for the author. One other extant manuscript, BLF,
MS XLIV 40 (which must have been copied from another that, like the
archetype, has now been lost), predates the first printed edition of 1S32; to
judge by its carefully formed humanistic cursive hand and by some of its
linguistic forms, it is the work of a professional scribe who was perhaps
not Florentine.47
As well as some autograph fragments, four manuscripts of the Istorie
fiorentine are extant, one of them (BLF, MS XLIV 37) incomplete. BLF,
MS XLIV 34, elegantly written on paper and illuminated, is a high-status
copy, but some gaps in the first few pages and some errors suggest that it is
not the one presented by Machiavelli to Pope Clement VII in late May or
early June 1525. Another copy, BLF, MS Pal. 163, was transcribed to serve
as the source for the Florentine edition of 1532. However, Plinio Carli's
reconstruction of the stemma suggests that at least four more copies of
this substantial work, apart from the original, were written out before the
printed editions and are now lost. Some transcription seems to have taken
place within the author's own circles. BNCF, MS II 111 64 was written by
a certain Lodovico Buonaccorsi for Paolo Vettori, brother of Machiavelli's
friend Francesco, who was at that time serving as captain of the papal
galleys.4$ This scribe could be the Lodovico di Niccolò Buonaccorsi who
wrote to Machiavelli on 30 October 1503 to ask for help concerning his
brother Guglielmo.49
46 See Buondelmonti's reply of 6 September i5zo, in N. Machiavelli, La vita di Castruccio
Castracani, pp. 16-17.
11 On the two extant early manuscripts see N. Machiavelli, La vita di Castruccio Castracani,
PP. 45-51, with illustrations in figs. r and 4-
4' N. Machiavelli, Istorie fiorentine, pp. ix—xci. On BLF, MS XLIV 34, see Tommasini, La vita egli
scritti, II, I,032-3.
49 N. Machiavelli, Lettere, p. 169. Carli (in N. Machiavelli, Atorie fiorentine, p. xxv) suggests that
Lodovico was a brother of Biagio Buonaccorsi.
168 The manuscript circulation of prose
Donato Giannotti, a friend of Machiavelli from among the younger
members of the Orti Oricellari group and one of his successors in the
chancery, was among those who read the Istorie in its autograph manu-
script, and he allowed this to be seen by a distinguished Venetian visitor
to Florence. He wrote in a letter of 1533:
La historia del Machiavello fu stampato fidelmente, et io il so che l'havevo letta
molto innanzi, et al m.`° mescer Marco Foscari [feci] vedere il proprio originale
cioè quella che haveva scritta il Machiavello di sua propria mano, et la lesse
tuttaJ°
(Machiavelli's history was printed faithfully [in 15321, and I know because I had
read it long before. I showed to his magnificence Marco Foscari the original, the
history written by Machiavelli in his own hand, and he read it all.)
Giannotti took an active part, up to a point, in the scribal diffusion of his
own political essays. During his lifetime his Della repubblica de' Viniziani,
substantially completed by November 1526, was his sole work printed, but
only from 1540 onwards and, he claimed, because of the encouragement of
his patron, Niccolò Ridolfi, and of Pietro Bembo51 In 1527, according to
a contemporary, draft versions of this work were circulated by Giannotti:
`spesso andava in volta il Libro del Giannotto del Ritratto del Governo
Veneziano; che se bene non era perfetto, nondimeno lo mostrava a questo
e a quello' (Giannotti's Portrait of the Venetian Government often went
around, because even if it was not finished, he still showed it to this per-
son and that). Guicciardini transcribed excerpts, probably in 1527-9-"
Giannotti sent a copy of his Discorso sopra il fermare il governo di Firenze,
written in 1527 for Niccolò Capponi, to Zanobi Bartolini in 1530 with a
request to present it to Pope Clement VII. At least three of the several
surviving manuscripts are sixteenth-century.53
Giannotti apparently tried to prevent others from seeing his major work,
the Della repubblica fiorentina, composed after his exile in 1530, but it never-
theless circulated widely: fifteen of the thirty-five extant manuscripts,
other than the autograph, have been dated to the sixteenth century and
50 Letter of 30 June 1533 to Marcantonio Michieli, in Ferrai, `Lettere inedite', 1570-83 (quotation
from P. 1,5820; see, too, Ridolfi, `Sommario', pp. 62-5. Foscari will have seen the work when he
was Venetian ambassador to Florence in 1527-8.
5' Ridolfi, `Sommario', pp. 115-16.
51 Busini, Lettere a Benedetto Varchi, P. 30; Ridolfi, `Sommario', P. 84; Gilbert, `The date'; Starn,
Donato Giannotti, p. zz. Contarini's De magistratibus et republica Venetorum must have circu-
lated before its printing in 1543: Sadoleto told Reginald Pole in a letter of 1534 that he wished to
have a copy of it (Gilbert, `The date', 174).
53 Albertini, Firenze dalla repubblica al principato, p. 151; Starn, Donato Giannotti, pp. 22-4, 32-3;
Bisaccia, La Repubblica fiorentina', p. 191.
2 Religious debates and prophecy 169
a further three from either the sixteenth or the seventeenth34 Giannotti
envisaged having the work printed only if he were declared a rebel fol-
lowing the defeat of the anti-Medicean forces at Montemurlo in 1537. He
wrote to Varchi in that year after recovering his own copy, presumably
lent to someone else: `Ho riavuto la mia Repubblica [ ... ]; e vi impegno la
fede mia, the se sono fatto ribello, the la stamperò aggiungendovi dell'altre
core' (I have got my Repubblica back; and I give my word that, if I am
declared a rebel, I will print it, adding other things). In 1538 he told Varchi
that he wanted to have another copy made for the dedicatee, Cardinal
Niccolò Ridolfi, and that he was planning to send a copy to Varchi 55
The Venetians diffused manuscript texts for propaganda purposes
outside and within their state at the beginning of the period, from 16o6
to 16o7, in which an interdict was placed on the city by Pope Paul V
following a dispute between church and state over issues of jurisdiction.
The papal nuncio in France, Maffeo Barberini, complained of the `scrit-
ture varie sparse in questo Regno dall'arteficio de Venetiani' (various writ-
ings scattered around this kingdom by the doings of the Venetians). For
his part, Piero Priuli, Venetian ambassador in France, sent back to Venice
tracts in Latin written by French authors in support of his own state's
cause, and these circulated in handwritten form for a few months in 16o6
before being printed. An example is a Consultatio by Jacques Leschassier,
eventually printed in Padua in Italian translation. The work was origin-
ally composed in response to a letter from a Venetian gentleman, senza
intentione per6, the si publichi' (without intending it to be published,
however), but in the awareness that the recipient might choose to `farne
parte à gli amici' (share it with friends) 56
2 RELIGIOUS DEBATES AND PROPHECY
In the diffusion in Italy of opinions — orthodox, heterodox and hereti-
cal — concerning religion, manuscripts were on the whole subordinate to
the printing presses of the peninsula and of neighbouring countries. They
also created less concern within the papal curia than did printed texts.
Yet their role could be significant. In the case of opinions that contested
54 Bisaccia, La Repubblica fiorentina', pp. 19z-3; Silvano in Giannotti, Republica fiorentina,
pp. 53-67•
55 Ridolfi, `Sommario', p. 10 7-
1, [Leschassier], Consulta, fol. H3°; de Vivo, `Le armi', pp. 196-7; see, too, pp. 197-200 on the oral
publication of information concerning the conflict with Rome. On the interaction of printed
and manuscript propaganda during the Venetian interdict and later, see de Vivo, `Paolo Sarpi',
43,44-5.
170 The manuscript circulation of prose
the authority of the Church of Rome, one likely attraction of the scribal
medium was that the clandestine production and circulation of manu-
scripts were very difficult to police; another was its ability to target well-
disposed readers and to create bonds between them.
In Chapter 3 Section 3 we saw that the conflict between the Florentine
supporters of the Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola, the Piagnoni,
and their opponents was waged partly in verse. Both sides also set out
their cases in a number of prose works and, although most were issued in
print, a full picture of how these exchanges were disseminated must also
take into account the role of manuscript.
Paolo Orlandini, a Camaldolese monk, supported Savonarola's views
in a manuscript dialogue written in 1496, the Concordatio seu composi-
tio quaedam super quibusdam Scripturae Sacrae locis. In 1497 the fri-
ars of Savonarola's convent of San Marco diffused an Apologeticum that
defended their opposition to a decree of Pope Alexander VI. This was
printed in the same year but also circulated in manuscripts presumably
written within the convent. One copy of a first version, in humanistic
cursive, was the one read and used by an enemy, fra Giovanni Caroli (to
whom we shall return shortly), while another copy, in formal humanistic
script, was modified by Savonarola for the use of the general public. After
the friar's execution in 1498, works in his defence were circulated scrib-
ally by Piagnoni from within the Dominican order. Giovanni da Pescia,
of San Marco, sent in May i5oo a letter to fellow-friars together with a
`ragione' or treatise in which he argued that Savonarola had not recanted;
`fatela copiare a tutto Firenze', he urged the friars, `et mostratela a chi la
vuol vedere' (have it copied for all Florence and show it to anyone who
wants to see it). In about 1516, two pro-Savonarolan tracts were issued in
manuscript by friars of San Marco: a Defensio against charges of heresy
by Zaccaria di Lunigiana and an Opusculum [ ...I in defensionem fratris
Hieronymi Savonarolae by Luca Bettini. In 1519, fra Benedetto Luschino
composed a dialogue attacking Savonarola's opponents, 1Vlnera diligentis;
one of the speakers is the Venetian nobleman Gasparo Contarini. Lucca
was the main source of a number of sermons and devotional treatises
composed in 1530-48 by Savonarolan friars and addressed to nuns57
11 Polizzotto, 7be Elect Nation, pp. 76-7 (the printed version of the Apologeticum), 149-50
(Orlandini, SNCF, MS Magl. XL 45), 18o-2 (Giovanni da Pescia, BNCF, MS Magl. XXXV
116, 2o5 and 19o); 295-8 (Zaccaria di Lunigiana, BNCF, MS Conv. Soppr. J 1 46, fois. 1-18 and
BRF, MS 2053, fols. 50-8; Bettini, BRF, MS 2053, fois. 1-21); 242, 29o-1, 2.93-5 (Luschino,
BNCF, Magl. XXXIV 7, a copy corrected by the author, and BRF, MS 2985); 409-12 (sermons
and treatises). On the manuscripts of the Apologeticum, see Verde in Savonarola, Lettere e scritti
apologetici, pp. 332-3, 418-29. BRF, MS 2053, a collection of writings on Savonarola made in the
z Religious debates and prophecy 171
The greatest scribal contribution to the Piagnoni's cause came,
however, from the diffusion of biographies of Savonarola. That by
Giovanfrancesco Pico, which exists in three versions written between
152o and 1533, circulated widely. An anonymous Vita latina (formerly
attributed to fra Pacifico Burlamacchi), probably composed by May
1527, survives in only one manuscript, but there are many copies of its
vernacular version. Polizzotto writes that `There was scarcely a religious
foundation in central Italy which did not boast one or both' of these
accounts, the dissemination of which was promoted by the friars of San
Marco. There is a profusion of revised versions with the local variations
characteristic of scribal circulation. Different versions exist, too, of two
biographies written later in the century by fra Marco di Francesco della
Casa and fra Serafino Razzi"
'Tile manuscript medium was used in similar fashion by some of
Savonarola's opponents. Significantly, it was chosen by his most outspoken
critic in Florence during his lifetime, Giovanni Caroli, also a Dominican
but from the Conventual branch of the order, based in the convent of
Santa Maria Novella. He used it even for tracts that he completed in 1497,
when the pamphlet war was at its most intense, and that responded to
works by Piagnoni or by Savonarola himself that had recently appeared in
print, such as his Della veritd delta doctrina di fra Girolamo, which coun-
tered Domenico Benivieni's Tractato [ ... ] in defensione et probations Bella
doctrina et prophetie predicate da frate Hieronymo (1496), and his Contra
lohannis Nesii Oraculum de novo seculo, which attacked Nesi's edition of
149759 The General of the Camaldolese order, Pietro Dolfin, was initially
a supporter of Savonarola, but denounced him in a Dialogus of 1498. In
1516 the theologian Paolo Giustiniani (formerly Tommaso Giustiniani,
before he joined the Camaldolese order) asked Dolfin for a manuscript
copy of this when he was collecting evidence on the friar on behalf of
the Synod of Florence. Dolfin's accompanying letter gives an insight into
his work's circulation and his attempts to control access to it nearly two
decades after its composition:
Unum oro: ut cures, ne [opusculum nostrum] pereat, aut ab aliquo intercipiatur.
Siquidem alia duo exemplaria, ex quibus alterum Petro Soderino, vexillifero
152os by Luca Bettini, is discussed in Giorgetti, `Fra Luca Bettini' and Gilbert, `Contarini on
Savonarola'.
í8
Polizzotto, 7he Elect Nation, pp. 324-5. 439-40 (quotation from P. 325). JRM, MS Ital. 13 includes
the Burlamacchi' life in a substantial compilation of documents relating to the friar.
9 Polizzotto, The Elect Nation, pp. 54, 59
-79. 93-4; see, too, Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence,
PP. 234-9 and Martines, Scourge and Fire, pp. 158,159-6o.
172 The manuscript circulation ofprose
olim Florentino, alterum Antonio Putio canonico commodata, hactenus mihi
restituta non cunt. Et erant ilia manu mea conscripta. Si tua opera vel unum ex
its rediret ad me, essem tibi obligatus. Ostendes libellum, quibus ipse volueris,
modo illum legendum nequaquam eis permittas, qui cunt ex parte Hieronymi,
de saecularibus loquor, ne eo perlecto scandalizentur.60
(I ask you only to take care that our little work should not perish or be taken
away by anyone, since two other copies have not been returned to me, one given
to Piero Soderini, former gonfalonier of Florence, the other to canon Antonio
Pucci. These were written in my hand. I would be obliged to you if you could
help me get at least one of them back. You will show the book to whoever you
wish, but do not allow the followers of Girolamo — I mean the laypeople — to
read it at all, in case they are led astray by it.)
Giustiniani also received a handwritten defence of Savonarola's innocence
from Contarini, the Copia di un consigho facto sopra le cose del Reverendo
padre fra Hieronimo Savonarola .61 Cosimo Favilla, one of the Servite fri-
ars of SS. Annunziata, neighbours but enemies of the Dominicans of
San Marco, presented to Clement VII in 1526 a manuscript treatise, the
Flagellum pseudoprophetarum, which attacked Savonarola and his follow-
ers, the latest of whom was allegedly Martin Luther." But some of the
strongest supporters of the friar also condemned Luther, and one of them,
Giovanfrancesco Pico, did so in his Dialogus de adoratione of 1524, dedi-
cated in manuscript to Clement VII.63
As these last two examples show, the concerns of participants in the
debate about Savonarola could overlap with those of sixteenth-century
writers on more general questions of religion. Several of their works, too,
were circulated in manuscript. They are very varied in nature, ranging
as they do from anticlerical writings with no overt doctrinal content to
proposals for reform and discussions of doctrine coming from those both
within and outside the Catholic church, and also, as will be seen at the
end of this section, to prophecies of change and renewal.
From early in the century, it was noted in Chapter 3 Section 3, verse
that criticized the behaviour of the clergy was circulated scribally. There
is similar evidence concerning anticlerical prose. Transcribed in Sanudo's
diaries, for instance, are two letters to popes that presumably reached him
6°
Schnitzer, Peter Delfin, Letter LX, 12 September 1516 (p. 36o); see, too, pp. 271-85 and 365-99,
and Polizzotto, Ybe Elect Nation, p. 96.
Gilbert, `Contarini on Savonarola'; see, too, Giorgetti, `Fra' Luca Bettini', 213-14; Fragnito,
Gasparo Contarini, pp. 131-7; Polizzotto, The Elect Nation, pp. 294-5. 11íe original document is
lost; a copy in BRF, MS 2053 is the source of two copies in the BNCF.
62 BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3636; see Polizzotto, The Elect Nation, pp.
332-3.
63 BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3735, fols. u°-14; see Polizzotto, The Elect Nation, pp. 165-6.
a Religious debates and prophecy 173
in manuscript, in the first case probably from Rome, in the second from
within the Venetian state. The first letter, in Latin, supposedly written
by Lucifer and offering ironic praise for Alexander VI's help in leading
souls to damnation, belongs to a long-standing tradition of letters from
the devil, but no Italian printed edition is known. The other, in the ver-
nacular, is an attack on Julius II purporting to be written by St John the
Evangelist on behalf of Christ.64 An Evangehum Pasquilli, a Latin par-
ody of the Gospels that satirized the pope and his curia, was diffused in
manuscript in 1518, reaching Modena and Germany.65
Two Camaldolese hermits, Paolo Giustiniani and Pietro (formerly
Vincenzo) Querini, drew up in 1513 proposals for the reform of the
Church, the Libellus ad Leonem X, hoping they would be discussed dur-
ing the Fifth Lateran Council." Although the council probably did not
consider the Libellus, echoes of it are found in Gasparo Contarini's trea-
tise De officio episcopi, written in 1517 for Pietro Lippomano, recently
appointed bishop of Bergamo at the age of thirteen, and in the Consilium
de emendanda ecclesia drawn up by Contarini and others in 1537.6 7 Only
one of Contarini's works was printed before his death in 1542 (this was
the first book of De immortalitate animae, printed anonymously in 1518),
but the De officio episcopi and others circulated in manuscript.C8 A copy of
a short treatise on the divine origin of papal power, De potestate pontificis,
originally dedicated to Niccolb Tiepolo in 1534, was owned by Girolamo
Aleandro, papal nuncio to Venice.69 Contarini's Epistola de iustificatione, a
defence of the agreement on justification (the attainment of righteousness),
faith and works reached at the Regensburg Colloquy in 1541, was sent to
Rome and diffused from there with the help of Pietro Bembo, who made
some copies of the letter and sent it out to various senior churchmen?° In
1542, Contarini wrote a Catachesis sine Christiana instructio at the request
of Giovanni Morone, bishop of Modena, where heterodox ideas were
spreading. This was printed in Florence in the following year, but in 1542-
'4 Sanudo, I diarii, IV, 220 -1 (letter dated 1 January i5m), IX, 567-70 (letter dated 26 December
15o9 and recorded in February 1510); Niccoli, Rinascimento antirlericale, pp. 60-4, 86-8.
6, Niccoli,
Rinascimento anticlericale, pp. 111-14-
" Jedin, A History of the Council of Trent, I, 128-3o; Gilbert, `Cristianesimo, umanesimo'; Bowd,
Reform before the Reformation, pp. 136-65. The manuscript from which it was published in
Mittarelli and Costadoni, Annales Camaldulenses, IX, toll. 612-719, is not extant.
6
Fragnito, Gasparo Contarini, pp. 137,141-5.
6A On manuscripts of the De officio and the state of Contarini's works on his death, see ibid.,
PP- 82-4, 308-9-
BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3922, Us. 229-33; see Gaeta, `Sul "De potestate pontificis"'.
Bembo, Lettere, no. 2,253 to Contarini, 25 June 1541 (IV, 359). On the letter, see Concilium
Tridentinum, XII, 314-22 and Gleason, Gasparo Contarini, pp. 229-35•
174 The manuscript circulation ofprose
Contarini sent copies to like-minded members of the secular and regular
clergy such as Morone, Reginald Pole and Gregorio Cortese, and the text
was circulated among the heterodox group in Modena 7`
The Dominican fra Battista da Crema was a rigorous spiritual guide to,
among others, Antonio Maria Zaccaria, considered to be the founder of
the Barnabites (Clerics Regular of St Paul). Battista's writings found their
way into print, but only gradually, and manuscript copies of them retained
their importance. The printing of his Via de aperta veritd in Venice in
1523 took place at the initiative of an Augustinian friar, Girolamo Regino.
But Regino was probably acting without Battista's involvement: there are
lacunae in his edition and the author lamented its inaccuracy in later edi-
tions7 2 In 1531 the publisher Gotardo da Ponte had two of Battista's works
printed in Milan, an Opera utilissima de la cognitione et vittoria de si stesso
and a Philosophia divina. However, a linked work, Lo specchio interiore,
composed by 1531 for the twelve governesses of the hospital for incurables
in Venice, was circulated at first scribally among select followers, doubt-
less because it was feared that its doctrinal content would meet with papal
disapproval. The Specchio was printed only posthumously, first in abbrevi-
ated form and anonymously in the late 1530s, then in full in 1540, with
linguistic revisions, still without the author's name on the title page73
Battista's manuscripts were evidently valued for their sense of the
friar's `presence', in a way that printed copies could never have been. In
June 1552, the Holy Office condemned books by him to be burned and
made a point of asking the Barnabite fathers to hand over the autograph
manuscripts (`li originali delli scritti et opere'). They still possessed many
of these, as is shown by a list contained in a reply from the provost of
the order74 Both the aura and the community-fashioning role of these
texts are apparent, too, from a letter written by Marco Antonio Pagani in
Verona in the autumn of 1552, after he had left the Barnabites, to Paola
Antonia Negri, whose order, the Angelics of St Paul, had been expelled
from the Venetian state in 1551. Pagani explained that he had put in a
safe place (`in bon loco in salvo') a copy of the Barnabite constitutions,
7' M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo inquisitoriale, III, 44-70, 146-8, i9o—zz1; M. Firpo, Tra
alumbrados, pp. 139-4o; Gleason, Gasparo Contarini, pp. 284-91. On heterodoxy in Modena, see
too Dalmas, Dante nella crisi religiosa, pp. 1S3-222.
71 Bonora, I conflitti, p. 11o.
73 Premoli, Fra' Battista da Crema, pp. tot, 1o8, 111-14; Pezzella, `Battista Carioni'; Zarri, `Note
su diffusione', pp. 142-3 (see, too, Zarri's comments on the scribal circulation, within religious
communities, of works by Serafino Aceti that, it was feared, might be suspected of Pelagianism);
Bonora, I conflitti, pp. 132-3, 151-2.
71 Premoli, Storia dei Barnabiti, pp. 112, 118, 507—u; Bonora, I conflitti, pp. 527-8-
2 Religious debates and prophecy 175
probably those drawn up by Battista, and that he wanted to receive, in
order to copy and preserve them, her letters, a defence of Battista and the
allegations made against Negri and the Angelics, because he feared that
her possessions would be searched and destroyed. He went on:
Però ben sarà the anche presso di me ne sia una copia perché non ho altra copia
et a qualche tempo ne sarà bisogno, così anche dico di ogni libro del p. f. Batta
S.10 the presso a voi si trova scritto a mano perché così saranno sicuri et certo
molto piú sicuri fuori di quel monastero 7i
(Thus it will be good if there is a copy with me too, because I have no other copy
and some time one will be needed. The same goes for any book of the above-
mentioned reverend fra Battista that you have in manuscript, because in this
way they will be safe and certainly much safer outside that monastery.)
From the mid-1530s there took shape in several states of Italy a loosely
constituted and heterogeneous movement of men and women, cler-
ics and lay people, often but not exclusively from the social elite, who
shared a concern with the renewal and reorganization of the Church
and some of whose doctrines were influenced by those of reformers such
as Luther. They are now generally known as the Spirituali, a term that
they used themselves and that derived from their focus on matters of
the spirit and on the attainment of salvation by the individual76 The
expression and the sharing of their ideas and sympathies in writing
did not lend themselves naturally to print, especially once their works
became a matter of concern for the Roman Inquisition, established by
Pope Paul III in 1542•
Among the early leaders of the Spirituali was Juan de Valdés, a Spanish
layman who had left his country in 1530 in order to escape accusations of
Lutheranism made by the Spanish Inquisition. By the time of his death
in 1541, only one of his works had been printed (the Didlogo de doctrina
christiana, in Spain, 1529), yet his doctrines, based on close study of the
Bible and a Lutheran belief in justification by faith alone rather than
through good works, had had, and continued to have, a decisive influence
within Italian religious thought as a result of the scribal transmission of
his works as well as of the oral diffusion of his ideas, through sermons
and discussions77 The spread of his influence depended in large measure
on copying carried out by and on behalf of a network of admirers that
was built up in Naples after he reached there in 1535•
7s Premoli, Storia dei Barnabiti, pp. 126 n. 1, 515-16.
76 For a recent discussion, see Russell, Giulia Gonzaga, pp. 44-56.
11 On the edition of the Diálogo, see Cione, Juan de Valdés, p. 117, no. ro.
176 The manuscript circulation of prose
One of the followers of Valdés, Mario Galeota, organized the copying of
his works in Naples in the late 1530s. A witness statement made in 1548 by a
scribe, Giusto Seriato of Brescia, reveals that he was employed by Galeota
first to teach his children to write (`scrivere le prime lictere') and then to
copy certain books. These included Valdés's Preguntas and Considerazioni
(perhaps an early version of the work printed in 155o as the Cento e dieci
divine considerazioni), both in Spanish, which Galeota /hid away if any-
one visited the house. They had been provided by a deb out young widow,
Giulia Gonzaga, second cousin by marriage of Vittoria~Colonna. Gonzaga
had recently become a devoted disciple of Valdés, and she must have been
the prime mover of this operation. Seriato said he and Galeota went to
Calabria to carry out this transcription, and he recalled being paid 7 or
8 ducats for his work. After their return to Naples, Galeota took on a
Spaniard, Juan de Micro, who had a good hand but could not write `la
lictera cancelleresca' (humanistic cursive); Seriato was probably asked to
teach this to him. Galeota returned to Calabria with his new scribe, this
time to copy `tre o quactro libri sopra li evangelii' (three or four books
on the Gospels) in Spanish, no doubt commentaries by Valdés, which
Galeota `mostrava' (used to show) to various people. Galeota now under-
took a third journey to Calabria, this time so that Seriato could transcribe
a book of prayers in Italian. The books copied by Seriato and de Miero
were bound with the help of a certain Basilio from Bergamo who worked
in a printing house, and Seriato thought that Galeota and a colleague
wished to persuade Basilio to let them have these works printed (doubtless
clandestinely). Further, after the flight to Protestant Geneva, in 1542, of
the Sienese friar Bernardino Ochino, another admirer of Valdés, Galeota
had his copies of writings by the apostate taken to Calabria and copied
by Juan de Miero. In a trial of 1566, a witness declared that a scribe called
Ambrogio de Apuzzo had been copying out writings of Valdés on the New
Testament during the author's lifetime or shortly afterwards. Two of the
fruits of the transcription of the substantial commentary on St Matthew,
completed by around 1539, are a manuscript of the Spanish original, ONB,
MS 11629, and one of an Italian version, Turin, Bibl. Nazionale, MS R V 21.
The first of these appears to be the source of the translation and, although
their cursive scripts are different in style, it has been suggested that both
manuscripts may stem from the same source of production 78
7" Lopez, Il movimento valdesiano, pp. 27-50, 137-42; Ossola and Cavallarin in Valdés, Lo evan-
gelio, especially pp. 21-5, 95-1o9; M. Firpo, Tra alumbrados, pp. 20-1. On Gonzaga, see Zaggia,
Tra Mantova e la Sicilia, I, 218-21 and Russell, Giulia Gonzaga.
a Religious debates and prophecy 177
Even if the scribal reproduction of the writings of Valdés was to some
extenr a second choice, it proved nonetheless, and perhaps in part precisely
because of its covert nature, to be an effective means of creating initial
contacts with like-minded Christians outside Naples. In Siena, by early
1S38, Bartolomeo Carli Piccolomini composed what is probably an imita-
tion of Valdés's Alfabeto cristiano, itself written in Spanish around 1536 for
the instruction of Giulia Gonzaga, in the form of a dialogue with her 79
In this case Valdés's work could have been transmitted by Ochino, who
preached in Naples in 1536.
But the most important role in the chain of user publication was
played by Marcantonio Flaminio, who travelled to Naples from Verona
in 1538. In the first place, Flaminio took copies of writings by Valdés to
Viterbo: Cardinal Reginald Pole was appointed governor of this city in
1541, and his house became a meeting-place for figures such as Flaminio,
Pietro Carnesecchi and Alvise Priuli. In the same year Vittoria Colonna
came to live in Viterbo, in the convent of Santa Caterina, in order to be
close to her friend Pole. All of these Spirituali were in correspondence
with Giulia Gonzaga; she continued to send to Flaminio copies of writ-
ings by the Spanish exile, and was custodian of these writings after their
author's death.$° In 1542-3, Flaminio was a supplier, perhaps the only sup-
plier, of manuscripts of works by Valdés owned by Giovanni Morone,
who became one of the leaders of the Spirituali together with Pole. From
Flaminio came a commentary on the Psalms in Spanish, and another
work that Morone thought was by Valdés and of which he instructed his
`cancelliere', Girolamo Rovelli of Milan, to make a copy. Flaminio may
also have provided Valdés's Preguntas and a catechism by him that was
later found among Morone's papers."
Other admirers of the Spaniard played similar linking roles.
Carnesecchi sent in 1544 a `quinternetto' (small gathering) that probably
contained a work of Valdés to Giovan Battista Scotti, a silk merchant of
Bologna; he asked Scotti to make a copy and return the original to him. 12
71 Belladonna, `Pontanus', 377; M. Firpo, Tra alumbrados, pp. 39-43•
Firpo, Tra alumbrados, pp. 13, 137-8, r55-84; Russell, Giulia Gonzaga, pp. 170-2.
M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo inquisitoriale, II, 463-4 (commentary on Psalms and
Preguntas), 57o n. 29 (Rovelli), 571-3 (work copied by Rovelli); II, 568-7o and III, 145 (catech-
ism); M. Firpo, Tra alumbrados, pp. 142-3, 174 and Inquisizione romana, pp. 58-9, 137-9. Ossola
suggests that the work copied by Rovelli, entitled Una efficacissima confirmationedella verità della
fede cbristiana, could have been part of the commentary on St Matthew: Valdés, Lo evangelic,
P. 24 n. 26.
" Letter of Carnesecchi, 3o April 1544, in M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Rprocesso inquisitoriale, II,
1,107-9; M. Firpo, Inquisizione romana, P. 171. See, too, M. Firpo, Tra alumbrados, p. 110 n. Soo
bis. Similarly, in 1544 Priuli asked Morone to remind Pole of his promise to have copied and
 178 The manuscript circulation of prose
Scotti had contacts with the heterodox group in Modena and with the
Viterbo circle, and his deposition of í56o to the Inquisition confirmed
that he had owned `libri scritti a mano' (handwritten books) composed
by Valdés, one of them the Cento e dieci divine considerazioni. 81 The first
edition of this work (Basel, 1550) was based on a manuscript provided for
the editor, Celio Secondo Curione, by Pier Paolo Vergerio, while the two
Genevan editions (1556-7) of Valdés's Spanish commentaries on St Paul
were derived ultimately from an authorial holograph given by Gonzaga
or Flaminio to Vergerio, passed then to the circle in Viterbo, from Pole
probably to his colleague Juan Morillo, and finally to Juan Pérez de
Pineda, who took them to Switzerland and had them printed. 84 In Siena,
an unknown follower of Valdés copied into an anthoóiogy a number of his
works, including a letter on movements of the spirit that is not otherwise
known."
The Spirituali were instrumental in the initial diffusion of what
became one of the most widely read of all heterodox texts, the Beneficio
di Cristo. The title refers to the redeeming gift that the grace of God gave
to Christians through the crucifixion of Christ, and the work, in which
the influence of Valdés (as well as that of Luther and Calvin) is evident,
1
centres on the concept of justification by faith alone. The first version
was written by the Benedictine monk Benedetto Fontanini of Mantua,
in 1540 or before, perhaps as early as 1537, at San Nico16 l'Arena in Sicily.
It was then augmented and polished by Flaminio, perhaps in 1541-2 in
Viterbo.11 The first phase of diffusion took place in manuscript and tar-
geted key sympathizers of the Spirituali. Ludovico Beccadelli saw it in
1541, the year in which he accompanied Contarini to Regensburg before
returning to Rome. Pietro Carnesecchi gave it `a qualche amico' (to
some friends). One was Guido Giannetti, in the autumn of 1541; another
was Pole's chaplain Apollonio Merenda, to whom he also gave Valdés's
sent to Morone an unidentified work by Pole consisting of twenty gatherings (`quinterni'), and
suggested he should do the same for Vittoria Colonna: M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo
inquisitoriale, II, 460 n. 38; M. Firpo, Inquisizione romana, pp. 153-4•
83 M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), I processi inquisitoriah di Pietro Carnesecchi, I, 140; M. Firpo,
Inquisizione roman, p. S9 n. 76.
84 M. Firpo, Tra alumbrarlor, pp, 106-7, 109-10. On the roles of Flaminio and others, see too
Ossola in Valdés, Lo evangelic, pp, 13-16.
15 Siena, Bibl. Comunale, MS G VIII z8; see Marchetti, `Un'epistola inedita'. The influence of
Valdés in Lucca, where Peter Martyr Vermigli had been based in 1541-z, is seen in the scribally
published story of the alleged `conversion' of the conspirator Pietro Fatinelli on the eve of his
execution in 1S43: Berengo, Nobili e mercanti, pp. 438-4o and Adorni-Braccesi, `Una città infetta',
PP• 145-61.
86 Ginzburg and Prosperi, Gioebidi pazienza; Benedetto da Mantova, Il beneficio, pp. 445, 453, 456,
46o, 464, 481-96.
a Religious debates and prophecy 179
Preguntas. A transcription that Carnesecchi left in Florence in 1542 passed
into the papers of Pierfrancesco Riccio, a secretary of Duke Cosimo, as
part of a small collection of texts on justification, written in an elegant
humanistic cursive, probably that of a professional scribe, and including
Contarini's letter of 1541, a short treatise by Sadoleto of the same year and
part of a treatise by Valdés (BRF, MS 1785, Us. I r-551, with the Beneficio
on fols. 18"-55r: Figure u). Cosimo Bartoli was able to paraphrase pas-
sages of the Beneficio in a lecture given to the Accademia fiorentina in
December 1542. Another copy of the work was sent around early August
1542 to Bologna, where Niccolò Bargellesi transcribed it and showed it to
Contarini. In Modena, Morone (who visited Viterbo in September 1542)
owned a manuscript, provided by Flaminio. A further copy was sent in
1542 by an unknown person to lacopo Pellegrini in Verona, and he give it
to his bishop, Giberti. Ambrogio Caterino Politi wrote a critique based on
an early handwritten version; this attack was in turn circulating in manu-
script in 1542 (it was not printed until 1544) and Flaminio incorporated
responses to it into his text.'?
The second phase in the Italian reception of the Beneficio was initi-
ated by its printing in Venice by Bernardino Bindoni in 1543, and contin-
ued with other editions produced in Venice and probably in Modena."
It is a tribute to the effectiveness of the Inquisition's campaign against
the work that just one copy of the first edition has survived today, but
in the 1540s the Beneficio must have been very widely sold and read in
print. Morone played an active part in organizing the distribution of cop-
ies in Modena. Pier Paolo Vergerio, commenting scornfully on the inclu-
sion of the Beneficio in the Venetian Index of 1549, asked why, if it was
an evil book, it had been allowed to circulate so widely; 40,000 copies,
he claimed, had been printed and sold in Venice alone.8 9 Even one-tenth
of this doubtless inflated figure would still represent an unusually large
circulation for the period. From a quantitative point of view, then, the
two phases of circulation took place on completely different scales. Yet
,, Ginzburg and Prosperi, Giochi di pazienza, P. 39 (Politi); Benedetto da Mantova, Il
beneficio,
PP- 435 (Beccadelli), 499-504 (Riccio's manuscript); M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo
inquisitoriale, II, 546, 751 (Morone), 794-5 (Pellegrini), VI, 224 (Bargellesi), 267 (Morone), 270-1
(Merenda); Marcatto in Flaminio, Apologia, pp. 7 (Giannetti), 12-14; Dalmas, Dante
nella crisi
religiosa, pp. 55-68 (Bartoli). Sadoleto's treatise is in Concilium Tridentinum, XII, 322-5,
Valdés's
in his Obras completar, I, 886-9i.
88
Benedetto da Mantova, Il beneficio, pp. 11, 12 (reproductions of the title pages of 1543 and 1546),
497-8, 504-6.
'9
M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo inquísítoráale, II,
407-8, 544-6, 716; Benedetto da
Mantova, Il beneficio, pp. 444, 497-8.
ISO The manuscript circulation of prose
the initial manuscript circulation of the Beneficio among the leaders of
the Italian reform movement, like that of works by Vald6s, had a dis-
tinct character and importance. First, it was qualitatively different: its
elite nature is suggested by the refined presentation of the Riccardiana
manuscript, which contrasts strongly with the workaday typography of
the Venetian editions of 1543 onwards and which seems appropriate for an
exclusive scribal community. Second, it must have played a crucial part,
in this period of uncertainty, in forming the thought of leading Spirituali
and in creating a sense of common purpose.
Other Benedictines from the Cassinese Congregation made use of
scribal diffusion in these years as they engaged in debates about doctrine.
Don Isidoro Chiari composed in Rome in 1536-7 an Adhortatio ad con-
cordiam, addressed to Protestants, that was read in manuscript at least by
his fellow monk Gregorio Cortese and by Contarini before being printed
in 15409° A group of writings on free will that were circulated scribally
included lost works by Chiari and Prospero da Reggio, the De libero
arbitrio by Gregorio Bornato, which survives only in a printed version
of 1571, probably heavily corrected because of suspicions of heresy, and a
lost dialogue by Luciano degli Ottoni that he circulated at the Council of
Trent in 1545 and that was also deemed heretical9' Here scribal diffusion
may have been a way of testing the waters, of seeing whether a work might
be doctrinally acceptable in print (perhaps after some modification) or
whether it had no hope of passing muster. On the other hand, a treatise on
justification by Don Giovanni Evangelista da Aversa, which sets out the
doctrines traditionally taught by the Congregation, survives in its original
form. It was dedicated to Giovanna d'Aragona, duchess of Tagliacozzo
and sister-in-law of Vittoria Colonna, and arose out of her request for
advice, probably following a reading of the Beneficio. The treatise was also
addressed to unspecified `altri' (others), and these two kinds of readership
may be reflected in the two surviving manuscripts, one (BAY, MS Ottob.
Lat. 896, fols. 1`-39`) probably presented to the duchess, the other (Rome,
Bibl. Alessandrina, MS 90 II A, fols. 410-55) a later and fuller ver-
sion copied in a less graceful hand. The author, abbot of a Neapolitan
monastery, had certainly read Fontanini's work: he attacks it, although
9° Collett, Italian Benedictine Scholars, pp. 1o2-1r; Zaggia, Tra Mantova e la Sicilia, II, 501-2.
Collett, Italian Benedictine Scholars,
9' Ginzburg and Prosperi, `Le due redazioni', pp. 166-7;
Mantova e la Sicilia, Il, 520
pp. 92 (Chiari), 114-17 (Bornato), 12o, 186-8 (Ottoni); Zaggia, Tra
(Ottoni), 557 (Prospero). Galeazzo Florimonte, a friend of Flaminio who, however, condemned
Marcello
the Beneficio at the Council of Trent in 1546, sent his treatise on free will to Cardinal
Cervini in 1545, and another on Contarini's doctrine of double justification (both imputed and
356.
imparted) to Ludovico Beccadelli in 1561: Pignatti, `Galeazzo Florimonte', P.
z Religious debates andprophecy 181
he never names it. Both he and the duchess may have read the Beneficio
in manuscript, since its printed text includes a chapter in which Flaminio
may be responding to Don Giovanni Evangelista's treatise.91
When Benedetto Fontanini was at San Nicol6 l'Arena, the commu-
nity included a younger monk, Giorgio Rioli, known from his island of
origin as Giorgio Siculo, who was to become another thorn in the flesh
of the Inquisition. The story of this doomed but inspirational visionary
has been pieced together in excellent studies by Carlo Ginzburg and
in particular Adriano Prosperi. Don Giorgio's ideas were transmitted
partly orally, through preaching and discussion, partly in documents
that were transcribed or printed both during his lifetime and even after
he was hanged for heresy in Ferrara in 1551. Prosperi has distinguished
two circuits for the reading of his works: print was used for whatever
was compatible with orthodox doctrine, manuscript for the private trans-
mission of his true heretical message. Since Don Giorgio apparently had
a low level of education, fellow-monks helped to diffuse his writings by
clothing them in forms that were more widely readable. In a deposition
Of 1570, the Ferrarese humanist Nascimbene Nascimbeni declared that
Ottoni translated from the vernacular into Latin two works considered
heretical, a treatise De iustificatione and a book known as the Libro grande
(more fully, Della verith christiana et dottrina applicata rivellata dal nostro
signor Giesù Christo al servo suo Giorgio Siculo), and that Fontanini, who
rejoined Rioli at the abbey of San Benedetto Po in 1546, translated his
books from Sicilian `in buona lingua italiand (into good Italian). Ottoni
played a part in the dissemination of his translation of De iustificatione by
sending a presentation manuscript (Besançon, Bibliothèque Municipale,
MS 230) to Cardinal Cristoforo Madruzzo in 1546, not long after he had
circulated his own work on this topic at Trento. But there is also evidence
for the scribal publication of Don Giorgio's works, no doubt usually in
humbler formats, among followers from all walks of life, both clerics and
laypeople. According to Nascimbeni, `libri et scritture' by him (books
and writings, the latter presumably handwritten) were owned during
the author's lifetime by another monk, Antonio da Bozzolo, and some
9,- Collett, Italian Benedictine Scholars, pp. 188-91;
Prosperi, L'eresia del Libro Grande, pp. 53-8 (on
relations between the abbot and Flaminio); Zaggia, Tra Mantova e la Sicilia, II, 556-7. Two
works composed by Teofilo Folengo in Sicily around 1539-40 circulated in manuscript alone:
the Atto della Pinta, a sacred play, and Lit Palermitana, a sacred narrative on Biblical themes in
terza rima intended for the Benedictine community. The Hagiomachia, a collection of saints'
lives in Latin hexameters, might also belong to this period. See Folengo, Atto della Pinta and La
Palermitana; Zaggia, Tra Mantova e la Sicilia, III, 830-9, 883-96 (Palermitana), 897-914
della Pinta), 915-16 (Hagiomachia).
(Atto
1$2 The manuscript circulation of prose
`scritture' were seen by a group of four including Pietro Giudici and the
physician Francesco Severi, executed as heretical followers of Giorgio
Siculo respectively in 1568 and 1570-"
Severi himself testified that he read the De iustificatione in manuscript
and in the vernacular before meeting its author in Ferrara around 1548.
But his testimony is particularly interesting on the subject of how the
Libro grande was made available for reading. This is the work with which
the Inquisition was most concerned: it was said to deny the existence
of Purgatory and the divine presence in the consecrated host and wine.
No copy of it is known today, but it existed in at least two manuscript
versions, one fuller than the other as a result of additions made by Don
Giorgio in response to an interlocutor, and in a Latin version, printed
around 1566 after further expansion by the monk's followers. A copy of
the Libro was first given to Severi, on behalf of the author, by an inter-
mediary, none other than Fontanini. This copy had to be returned to
Don Giorgio, but it was returned to Severi with instructions to pass it on
to Marco Antonio Florio. This other member of the sect kept the Libro
hidden in his house and lent it, according to Severi, `a pezzo a pezzo, cioè
tre o quattro quinterni per volta, restituendogli però io di volta in volta
quelli the havevo veduti, sino a the io to hebbi visto, et transcorso tutto'
(bit by bit, that is, three or four gatherings at a time, but I gave him back
whenever I could those I had seen, until I had seen and gone through it
all). Severi also recalled that Florio read parts of the Libro aloud to him,
once when he was ill `due o tre carte per volta' (two or three leaves at a
time), and again in a church at the hour of matins during Holy Week.
Prosperi observes that the text had acquired a ritual function and per-
haps a healing one, and suggests that the stages of reading may have
corresponded to a gradual doctrinal initiation. Yet such secrecy did not
mean that the Libro grande was not read over a wide area. Another figure
involved in its distribution was a certain Francesco Guidi, a Corsican
who fought against the Huguenots in France: he confessed to having
copied `quasdam scriptural' (some writings) of Giorgio Siculo and was
said to have given them to be copied by others. In Spain, the Libro was
read to the theologian and poet Luis de León from a manuscript, in
Italian, by his friend Benito Arias Montano, who could have obtained
1i Ginzburg, `Due note' (Nascimbeni); Benedetto da Mantova, 11 beneficio, pp. 462-3, 485;
Prosperi,'Opere inedite' (pp. 140-1 on the two circuits) and especially L'eresia del Libro Grande;
Seidel Menchi, `Giorgio Siculo'- Zaggia, Tra Mantova e la Sicilia, III, 753-82. Copies of only two
printed works of Don Giorgio are extant: an Epistola addressed to the citizens of Riva di Trento
and an Espositione on St Paul, both printed in Bologna in í55o.
2 Religious debates and prophecy 183
the book when he attended the Council of Trent as part of a Spanish
delegation in 1562.94
Heterodox doctrines were diffused in manuscript, rather than in print,
by another Sicilian, a well-educated Franciscan friar known first as Lisia
Fileno and later, when he fled from Italy to the Grisons, as Camillo
Renato, but whose real name was Paolo Ricci. His preferred form for cir-
culating his ideas on paper appears to have been that of short handwritten
texts, usually in Latin. His only known vernacular text is a brief Trattato
del battesimo e della santa cena addressed to Agostino Mainardi; the sole
extant copy (in Bern, Stadtbibliothek, MS A 93 13) was made by two
scribes, probably from the original. This may have been the treatise read
by Achille Vizzani in Bologna, in the house of Lelio Sozzini, in 1546-7.
A holograph copy of a lost work asking `Num papae baptismus sit bonus'
(Whether the pope's baptism is good) is mentioned in a letter of 1551 from
Filippo Gallicio to the pastors of the church of Chiavenna. In the follow-
ing year, Renato was briefly imprisoned in Bergamo, accused of spreading
false opinions concerning matters of faith, and letters written by the rec-
tors of this city show he had left `scritture et trattati di sua mano' (writ-
ings and treatises in his hand) in the houses in which he had stayed .9S
When Morone's study was searched by agents of the Roman Inquisition
on 31 May 1557, among the suspect texts that were found, together with
those thought to be by Valdés, were three manuscript works by Federico
Fregoso, who had been created cardinal in 1539 and died in 1541. Under
interrogation, Morone denied knowledge of who had copied Fregoso's
treatises on grace and free will and on faith and works. A third trea-
tise, Della vita christiana, which unlike the other two is not extant, was
in the hand of Girolamo Rovelli, and Morone may have had this copy
made from a holograph brought to him in 1542. An exchange of letters
Of 1543 between Eleonora Gonzaga della Rovere, duchess of Urbino, and
her ambassador in Venice, Gian Giacomo Leonardi, tells us that she pos-
sessed a copy of a work by Fregoso on free will, presumably the first of
these three treatises, that she had lent it to Trissino, and that further cop-
ies were or had been in various hands, including those of Camillo Caula
and the Venetian patrician Marco Antonio da Mula .9' Manuscript was,
" Prosperi, `Opere inedite', 142 (reading the Libro grande in stages) and Leresia del Libro Grande,
PP. 270-2 (Severi's evidence), 362-3 (Guidi's copying), 382-5 (the Spaniards).
es Renato, Opere, pp. 249-52 (Bergamo; quotation from p. 250), 2.78-9 (Vizzani),
Z91-7 (the Trattato),
28o-Z (Gallicio); see, too, Rotondò, 'Per la storia', 107-36.
6 M. Firpo and Marcatto (eds.), Il processo inquisitoriale, II, 566-7, 57o—i and III, 145 and
M. Firpo, Inquisizione romana, pp. 57-8 (Morone); Seidel Menchi, Erasmo in Italia, pp. 165-6
(the exchange of letters).
 The manuscript circulation ofprose
184
in fact, the main medium for the diffusion of Fregoso's writings: only one
of his works was definitely printed, a Trattato della oratione produced in
Venice by Gabriel Giolito in 1542 and 1543• But very few copies of it sur-
vive, and this treatise too must have come to be seen as heterodox .97
Fregoso was one of the aristocratic members of the circle of Pietro
Bembo. Another friend of Bembo's who was linked with the Spirituali was
the Venetian patrician Vettor Soranzo. He became bishop of Bergamo,
acting at first as Bembo's proxy in 1544, and in 1548 was the subject of
`libelli famosi' affixed in the city, accusing him of heresy. In an earlier
period, we saw in Chapter 3 Section z, Soranzo was one of those to whom
Bembo sent and from whom he received lyric poems, but he was also a
scribal receiver of heterodox works. In 1551 the Roman Inquisition seized
manuscripts, including writings by Luther and Bucer, that Soranzo had
copied or had had copied by scribes such as the priest Parisotto (Gian
Pietro) Faceti .9'
In many of the examples considered so far, manuscripts containing
works on religion were produced for the social elite. In other cases, too,
both orthodox and heterodox writers openly addressed their works to lead-
ing figures. Enrico Boccella, a Lucchese lawyer, dedicated to Charles V
his Lutheranorum conclusionum [ ... ] impugnatio in which he attacked
Luther but sought a measure of conciliation with his views ,9 Bernardino
Ochino had a copy of his Dialogi Bette made by Tullio Crispoldi at the
request of Duke Federico Gonzaga in 1539, the year before the first com-
plete printed edition, carried out in Venice.` ' Vergerio preferred to address
his writings only to highly placed persons; in 1543, for instance, he sent
from Capodistria to Marguerite of Angoul6me three edifying tales, one of
them about the conversion of two young Jewish sisters seized by grace.`°'
Carlo Grassi, a member of the curia during the papacy of Julius III
(1550-5), dedicated to the pontiff a vellum manuscript of his De ecclesia ab
haeresibus liberanda, bound in white doeskin and copied probably by the
papal scriptor Ruano.'°Z This expensively produced gift must have helped
97 Bongi, Annali, I, 34-5, 50•
91 M. Firpo and Pagano, I processi inquisitoriali di Vittore Soranzo, I, 122 n. zi (the `libelli'),
Ixxvii—lxxviii, 399-408 (the manuscripts); Simoncelli, `Inquisizione romana'; Adorni-Braccesi,
'Tra "Valdesianesimo" e Riforma'; Dalmas, Dante nella crisi religiosa, pp. 229-37.
99 Prosperi, `Enrico Boccella'; Adorni-Braccesi, `Una città infetta', pp. 79-83.
Nicolini, Bernardino Ocbino, p. 6z; Rozzo in Ochino, I Dialogi sette, P. 23; Zaggia, Tra Mantova
e la Sicilia, I, 242.
Novo libro di lettere, no. LIX, 15 December 1543 (pp. 131-2); Schutte, Pier Paolo Vergerio,
PP. 165-8.
° J. Alexander and De la Mare, Be Italian Manuscripts, no. 61 (pp. 166-7) and pl. LXXVIII;
Tabacchi, 'Carlo Grassi' (which doubts the existence of this work).
z Religious debates and prophecy 185
Grassi's career, which culminated with a cardinalate in 1570. One can add
that a verse work by a Sienese supporter of reform, Marcantonio Cinuzzi's
Cinquanta ode spirituali, was presented to the dedicatee, Duke Cosimo I
de' Medici, by an intermediary in February 1561. A note of acknowledge-
ment for the Ode, evidently originating from Cosimo, is copied by the
scribe of Cambridge, Trinity College, MS 8.3.53 (James no. 625) on fol. 2":
`Le habbiamo ricevute molto voluntieri come molto belle e leggiadre, e in
forma di nuova poesia apresso di noi, per haverne poche, e dele migliori
no, e per nostro amore ce le goderelno' (We have been pleased to receive
these, as they are very beautiful and pretty, and in a poetic form new to
us, of which we have few [odes] and not the best. We shall enjoy them
for the sake of our love). The Ode were also circulated scribally by at least
one of their readers. Girolamo Bargagli sent them to Giuseppe Franchi in
Geneva, together with a letter of 8 November 1561 that shows that they had
been read in Siena and that invited Franchi to show them to friends, make
his own copy of some poems and then send them to Fausto Sozzini in
Lyon. A printed edition was planned (Cinuzzi asked the duke for permis-
sion for this on 16 October) but was not carried out.1Oj
We know far less about readers outside the elite. It is of course to be
expected that they would have made less use of books of any sort, because
they were less literate and less well off; and any manuscripts used by them
would probably have had a relatively low material value and would have
been less carefully preserved, so that they would have been more likely
to perish, just as many `popular' printed books have done. However, we
can consider here two examples of evidence that manuscripts of religious
works were read and made by at least some of the members of the middle
and lower classes who were interested in the new doctrines.
The first source is the trials held in the 156os in Modena of members
of a congregation of `fratelli' that consisted mainly of lay artisans and
merchants, together with some well-to-do citizens. The cohesion of these
`brothers' depended partly on the exchange of printed heterodox books
(some of them imported from Geneva and France) which they lent and
sold to each other. But occasionally, because of the difficulty of obtain-
ing such books, members had to make their own transcriptions from
them. Martino Savera, who was tried in 1568, had written out some sec-
tions of the Beneficio di Cristo from an exemplar provided by Giacomo
°3 M. R. James, The Western Manuscripts, II, 121-2; Marchetti, `Notizie', 82 and `Marcantonio
Cinuzzi', pp. 652-3. The dedication to Cosimo I is dated 1 February 156o; this may well be
Florentine style, i.e. 1561.
186 The manuscript circulation ofprose
Cavazza, at whose house meetings and readings were held. In the same
year, Francesco Caldano declared that he had copied a Lutheran work for
himself, but had later burned it.1°4
Second, the two main works of the heretical Venetian Franciscan friar
Bartolomeo Fonzio circulated widely in manuscript outside the elite. A
first version of his Fidei et doctrinae ratio, an account in Latin of the
tenets of his faith, was written in Rome in 1537-41, and he completed
it in prison, probably during his last days. Copies circulated widely in
the Veneto. A partial transcription of the first version belonged to a
certain Francesco, a Neapolitan priest who travelled through the cities
of the Venetian state, and it was found by the Inquisition in 1566 in the
house of Massimo Massimi, an engineer involved in land reclamation.
Fonzio's Cathechismo in dialogue form was written in the vernacular in
1546-7 expressly for children and was also widely diffused: it was, for
instance, read and copied by artisans and peasants during the period
(1551-8) that he spent as a teacher in Cittadella, near Padua. Teofilo
Panarelli, a physician who became leader of a Venetian conventicle that
received Protestant literature, testified in 1571, the year before his own
execution, that he had given a copy of this Cathechismo to a Venetian
goldsmith in exchange for a Beneficio di Cristo. One measure of the res-
onance of Fonzio's doctrines among all classes, even though they were
spread entirely through the handwritten word or by word of mouth, is
the last-minute decision taken in 156z by the Venetian authorities to
execute him by drowning under cover of night, the normal sentence for
heretics, since a furore could have been caused by the original sentence
that he should be strangled in prison and his body burned in Piazza San
Marco .`05
Calls for renewal in the Church, together with the extremely precarious and
changeable political and military situation of the peninsula in the decades
after the French invasion of 1494, helped to maintain the interest in proph-
ecies that had been so vigorous during the Middle Ages. The tradition of
these prophecies (or pseudo-prophecies, since some were written after the
event) goes back to the twelfth-century Cistercian abbot Joachim of Fiore
and to the pseudo-Joachimite writings of the thirteenth century. They usu-
ally feature a saviour or saviours in the form of one or more Angelic Pastors
— Bianco, `La comunità di "fratelli"', 651, 652.
°5 Olivieri, `Il "Cathechismo"' (p. 340 n. 3 and
1 P. 359 n. 17 on Massimi, pp. 347-8 on Cittadella);
Grendler, The Roman Inquisition, pp. 104-5 (Panarelli).
z Religious debates andprophecy 187
(who might be a pope or a more humble individual), or a secular ruler such
as a Last World Emperor or a Second Charlemagne. One or a combination
of these would overcome the Antichrist, purge the Church, conquer the
Infidel, convert the Jews and restore peace to the world. Such visions of an
apocalyptic future were also, of course, reflections, even if distorted ones,
of the present from which the prophet was gazing and of his or her propa-
gandistic concerns; for instance, the Second Charlemagne could be iden-
tified with the French king Charles VIII or later with the Holy Roman
Emperor Charles V. In the late fifteenth and the sixteenth centuries, older
prophecies were read or updated, and new ones were announced, some-
times in sermons such as those of Savonarola."' Franciscans were especially
active in this field, perhaps not wanting to be outdone by the Dominicans.
The scribal circulation of prophecies continued to flourish, sometimes in
advance of printed diffusion. We can consider a few instances of collecting
by readers, then cases of scribal publication by authors and others. (Some
prophecies were in verse, but it is convenient to consider them in this sec-
tion together with prophecies in prose.)
Tommaso di Silvestro, the priest mentioned in Chapter 3 Section 3,
noted in his diary some prophecies that came his way in Orvieto. In July
1509, not long after the defeat of the Venetians at Agnadello, he recorded
some prophetic lines of Latin verse relating to the Serenissima that had
been brought from Rome by one Erasmo Fascioli. He had, pinned up
in his room, a copy made in 14.95 of the thirteenth-century Latin verses
beginning `Gallorum levitas Germanos iustificabit', but `Me se strascia-
vano per volerle ognuno legiare' (They were getting tattered because every-
one wanted to read them). In October 1509, therefore, he transcribed
them in his diary. Tommaso himself clearly did not have prophetic gifts:
he commented that the verses had not yet come to pass, since `la Chiesa
de Dio non stecte mai in tanta prosperity (God's Church has never pros-
pered so). In December, after recounting some miracles, he recorded a
long poem consisting of the Latin phrases of the Pater Noster alternat-
ing with four-line stanzas in the vernacular that gave predictions for the
events of 1500-9, leading up to the reign of a Roman pastor who would
pacify the world. He made no comment except to say that this was `sig-
nificativo de quello the deve essere, secondo le prophetie' (meaningful of
what is to come to pass, according to prophecies).'°?
0ó For a rich survey, see Reeves, The Influence of Prophecy; for an overview, see her `The medieval
heritage'. On Savonarola as prophet, see especially Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence.
Diario di Ser Tommaso, pp. 404, 410, 415-17. For political poems on this pattern, see the start
of Chapter 3 Section 3 and de Vivo, Infòrmation and Communication, pp. 142-56. On the
188 The manuscript circulation of prose
A collection of prophecies, now represented by BNCF, MS Magi. VII
1o8i and Magl. XXV 344, was made by Luca di Antonio Bernardi of
San Gimignano, who ended his career as a teacher of Latin grammar in
Florence between 1485 and 1498. He had begun to transcribe prophecies
probably in 1442, and after an interval he took up he activity again in
1494-7."' This was a period of crisis not only in Potence but in the whole
peninsula, and in 1496 Vittore Trevisan, abb of the Benedictine mon-
astery of San Cipriano on Murano in the V676tian lagoon, had some pro-
phetic texts in Latin and the vernacular added to an anthology compiled
by Andrea Garzoni in 1469 (BMV, MS Lat,l III 177 (2.176)).109
The prophecies now in Paris, Bibliothèque Mazarine, MS__3828 were
formerly part of a larger collection: the first leaf is'1umbered 57."° e around 1482, but it was only about twenty years later that the predic-
neat main hand appears to be that of the priest Alessandro Falcon, who
records on fol. 137' the earthquake of 26 March 1511, noting with forebod-
ing that a similar event in 1347 was followed by the onset of the Black
Death."' Some of the texts that he copied had already been printed,
others had been circulating exclusively in manuscript. In some cases he
related predictions to events in his own lifetime. For instance, he added
glosses on a prophecy attributed to St Bridget (fols. 58'-61') and to one
attributed to Joachim (fols. io6'-112") that identify figures in the texts
with contemporary persons or peoples. On fol. 1oi' the glosses link a pas-
sage of a frottola with events following the defeat of Venice at Agnadello
in May 1509 by the forces of the League of Cambrai, described as `the
present league' (Figure 12). The evidence suggests, then, that most of the
texts were copied in 1509-11. On fols. 128-" and 138' are prophecies dat-
ing from around the 1520s, written in a less calligraphic and more sloping
hand that might belong to the same person at a later date. The whole
manuscript is another testimony of the use of prophecies to try to chart a
course through a reader's own troubled times, and also, more generally, of
the way in which scribal culture allowed a user to mould a collection of
texts to his own specifications.
This kind of compiling persisted: from the last two decades of the cen-
tury, when five popes were elected to office in quick succession, come
three collections (BNF, MSS It. 227, 627 and 661) compiled in Italy,
`Gallorum levitar' prophecy, see Reeves, The Influence of Prophecy, P. 312; Rusconi, Profezia e
profeti, pp. 168, 194.
Tognetti, Te fortune', 296-301; Rusconi, Profezia e profeti, pp. 163-5.
'°9 Rusconi, Profèzia e profeti, pp. 169-71; Reeves, the Influence of Prophecy, pp. 343-6, 538-9.
"° Rusconi, Profezia e profeti, pp. 192-6.
"' Sanudo made the same connection: I diarii, XII, 79-85-
2 Religious debates and prophecy 189
though in one case by a French visitor, Jean Picard. Again, the sources
included printed editions as well as other manuscripts."' However, not
everyone took such things seriously. An eclectic Venetian compilation
mentioned in Chapter i Section 4 (BMV, MS It. XI 66 (6730)) includes
two prophecies but also a satire on prophecy, couched in a parody of
obscure language."3
Among new prophecies, the most famous and widely read in the first
half of the Cinquecento — always in manuscript — was the Apocalypsis
nova. This was written, originally in Latin, in the name of Amadeo, a
Spanish knight who came to Italy around 1453, became a Franciscan and
founded his own stricter congregation, the Amadeites. He died in Milan
tions attributed to him appeared. The work is in two parts. In the first,
the friar receives revelations from the archangel Gabriel in the course of
eight raptus (ecstasies); Gabriel foretells the advent of a new pastor and the
chastisement of Italy, promoting (surprisingly in a text ostensibly written A)
by a rpaniard) the role of the French and the elect status of Florence. A,JC3
The second part contains predictigns,:_concerning themes mentioned r'
in the Gospels. It is highly probable that, at least in its surviving form,
the Apocalypsis nova was heavily reworked by the Bosnian Franciscan
Juraj Dragisk, who had spent a period in Florence before the exile of
the Medici in 1494 and became known as Giorgio Benigno Salviati. The
work was later translated into the vernacular by the priest Paolo Angelo,
himself a producer of prophecies. It was copied very frequently (about
sixty manuscripts survive) and was updated over the years with the addi-
tion of references to popes after Alexander VI. According to Guillaume
Postel, writing in 1565, `Le livre dudict Amodeus espagnol se trouve en la
famille ou postérité de la plus grand part des cardinaulx et de beaucoup
de Romains qui iusques au temps du Pape Farnèse ont vescu' (The book
of this Spaniard Amadeus is found in the household or descendants of
most cardinals and of many Romans who lived up to the time of the
Farnese pope [Paul III, 1534-491)•114
Florence and its state were certainly not short of prophets in the
post-Savonarolan years. The written circulation of their apocalyptic mes-
sages took place in manuscript, at least initially, though none appears
to be have been anything like as widely read as the Apocalypsis nova. A
" Rusconi, Profezia e profèti, pp. 196-9.
"i Cristofari, Ii codice Marciano It. XI, 66, pp. 2.4 (no. 115). 34 (no. 200), 37 (no. 22.9).
" Morisi Guerra, Apocalypsis nova, `the Apocalypsis nova' and `Il profetismo'; Vasoli, `Giorgio
Benigno Salviati'; Secret, `Guillaume Postel', 392 (Postel) and `Paulus Angelus'.
Igo The manuscript circulation of prose
Piagnone calling himself Albertus the Carthusian of Trento recounted a
vision that he claimed had been revealed to him in 1436, but that evidently
dated from 1503-4. After `foretelling' the events of the previous decade,
Albertus predicted for Italy a strange combination of torments and bless-
ings. His prophecy survives in at least four sixteenth-century manuscripts,
in Latin or in the vernacular, in a full or an abbreviated form. One of
these (BNCF, MS Capponi Iz1, fols. i-1o, written in a good humanistic
cursive) ends with the declaration that the priest Giovanni di Miglio cop-
ied the work in December 1512. If Giovanni was not the author, he may
at least have updated the vision somewhat: it refers to another prophecy
that the Dominican friar Silvestro da Marradi made in 1505, one of what
Polizzotto calls `a staggering number of prophecies circulating in manu-
script from among Piagnoni groups in the city, some of which undoubt-
edly originated from San Marco'."' In BNCF, MS Conv. Soppr. J X 5, the
shorter form of the Apocalypsis nova written in a first hand (fols. Ir—I25")
is followed by material in a second hand: the Albertus prophecy (fols.
1zC-81), a sermon of 15o8 in which an Amadeite, Antonio da Cremona,
,prophesied tribulations for Florence, and two documents relating to the
friar's defence of his preaching (fols. I28 32`'). These last seven leaves
were copied by Marcello Vernacci, a Florentine, or were derived from his
transcription."'
During Advent in 1513, another Amadeite, fra Francesco da
Montepulciano, preached in Florence, foretelling apocalyptic chastise-
ments of Florence and Rome for their sinful ways. His last sermon, of
18 December, had an especially terrifying effect on many Florentines,
and versions of it survive in several manuscripts as well as in three much
later printed editions. Its content seemed so seditious to the Medicean
party that at least some of the `parole formate' (exact words) of the ser-
mon was sent to Cardinal Giulio de' Medici in Rome by the 22nd.117 A
lay prophet or pseudo-prophet writing in Florence in the Savonarolan
vein was Francesco da Meleto: his main works appeared in print, but
he dedicated a manuscript commentary on Psalm 2 to Piero Soderini,
4 The
"f Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence, pp. 338- 2, 346-7 and `The apocalypse'; Polizzotto,
Elect Nation, p. 2o2; Jungi6, `Savonarolan prophecy', 2 54•
Tognetti, `Un episodio'; Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence, pp. 342-4; Polizzotto, 71íe Elect
Nation, pp. zoo-2.
117 Tognetti, `Note sul profetismo', 143-7; Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence, pp. 348-9; Polizzotto,
The Elect Nation, pp. 266-72 (quotation from p. 272 n. 146). One of the printed editions is an
Silent
anthology of Profetie certissime stupende et admirabili printed in Venice C. 1540 (Rhodes,
Printers, p. 272); the other two, of this sermon alone, were printed in Florence by Bartolomeo
Sermartelli in 1S90 and 1591.
3 Literary disputes 191
gonfalonier between 150z and i512, and he said he travelled to Rome in
order to present his Quadrivium temporum prophetarum to Pope Leo X
(presumably in about April 1514) before it was printed in Florence. Also
handwritten was a denunciation of Francesco's prophecies as heretical, the
Expugnatio Miletana, written by Paolo Orlandini in 1516 and sent by him
to Paolo Giustiniani."'
Outside Florence there was a similar, though probably less intense,
circulation of prophecies in manuscript. A pseudo-Joachimite prophecy
in verse attributed to Leonardo Giustinian of Venice was reworked with
updatings, foretelling events that were to take place by the 1470s, then the
1480s, then 1520."9 Sanudo recorded in 1523-4 some of the Latin prognos-
tications of the hermit Bernardino da Parenzo, who was then in Venice
or Vicenza. When Bernardino was in Rome in 1525, he sent more pre-
dictions in letters to Isabella d'Este. She forwarded to Castiglione one
that appeared to have foretold the French defeat at the battle of Pavia in
that year, and the courtier was duly impressed. She also sent a number
of Bernardino's short prophecies to her son Federico.1 ' In Rome, Pietro
Galatino, an Observant Franciscan from Puglia, was an avid collector of
prophecies and circulated his own predictions of the imminent renewal
of the church. He was particularly influenced by the Apocalypsis nova and
must have been in touch with Amadeite circles. Pietro had an expensive
copy of his lengthy Commentaria in Apocalypsim made for eventual pres-
entation to Charles V. he believed the emperor to have been chosen to aid
the Angelic Pope, who came to be identified as none other than Pietro
himself. He also addressed in manuscript his Libellus brevissimus de re
publica christiana to Leo X shortly before the pope's death, and his De
ecclesia instituta to Paul III.11,
3 LITERARY DISPUTES
'Ihe rapidity with which one or a small number of manuscript copies
could be generated and transmitted to a specific audience meant that
scribal culture could play a part, sometimes a major part in comparison
"' Bongi, `Francesco da Meleto'; Vasoli, `La profezia'; Weinstein, Savonarola and Florence, pp. 353-7,
368-71; Morisi Guerra, `La profezia'; Polizzotto, The Elect Nation, pp. 292-5 (Orlandini);
Dall'Aglio, `L'altra faccia'.
"I Edo, Officio de Nostra Donna, pp. 24-5•
"' Sanudo, I diarii, XXXV, 67-9, XXXVII, 5; M. P. Billanovich, `Una miniera', 212-17.
Reeves, The Influence of Prophecy, pp. 234-8, 366-7, 442-6; Rusconi, Profezia e profeti,
pp. 265-94; Leftley, `Beyond Joachim of Fiore'. On a poem of the peasant prophet Bartolomeo
da Petroio, known as Brandano, see Tognetti, `Sul "romito"', 39.
192 The manuscript circulation ofprose
with print, in the conduct of some sixteenth-century debates on works of
vernacular literature.
The protracted arguments on the merits and demerits of Ariosto's
Orlando furioso and later of Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata were conducted
mainly in print, but a few contributions were read in manuscript, at least
in the first instance. Filippo Sassetti wrote a Discorso against Ariosto
(BNCF, MS Magl. IX 125, fols. 189`-2o4°) in about 1575-6. Another
Florentine, Giovanni Bardi, delivered a lecture in defence of the poet to
the Accademia degli Alterati in 1583, and this is recorded in BNCF, MS
Magl. VI 168, fols. 50r-75°. In the same manuscript (fols. 28-46) and in
BLF, MS Ashb. 558 is found another defence of the Purioso by Francesco
Patrizi, read to the Alterati in 1585 and dedicated to Bardi. Both Patrizi's
defence and another by Orazio Ariosti, the poet's grandnephew; were then
printed as one of the ancillary works in the Apologia del Sig. Torquato Tasso
that first appeared in Ferrara in 1585. The editor of this collection, Giovan
Battista Licini, explained in a letter `Al lettore' (fols. j'3145°) that he had
gathered together various works concerning the dispute, `sì le stampate,
come le non stampate allhora' (fol. í3 both those printed and those not
then printed). An anonymous Latin discussion that sought a reconcili-
ation between the supporters and opponents of Ariosto is found in BAY,
MS Vat. Lat. 6528.122
Sperone Speroni's tragedy Canace, begun early in 15421, circulated
initially in manuscript. He submitted it first to fellow-members of the
Paduan academy of the Infiammati, and it was then, in his words, `man-
data per tutta Italia' (sent all over Italy). A copy of an early version was
used, without the author's knowledge, for the very incorrect first printed
edition of 1546. Speroni himself wrote out a fair copy and gave it, probably
in 1543-4, to Giovanni Antonio Clario, who edited the play when it was
printed for a second time later in 1546.1~3 The circulation of the tragedy
provoked a Giudizio di una tragedia di Canace e Macareo which criticized
its subject-matter and style; this was issued anonymously but was almost
certainly written, as Christina Roaf has shown, by the Ferrarese tragedian
Giovan Battista Giraldi. The first printing of 1550 stated that the Giudizio
had been circulating in manuscript, and for as many as five or six years,
though Roaf considers that the length of time may have been shorter. 124
Weinberg, A History of Literary Criticism, II, 973-8 (Sassetti), 978-80 (the Latin work), 985-7
(Bardi), 997-1,004 (Patrizi and Ariosti); Sberlati, Il genere, pp. z59-69 (the Apologia), 7 71-7
(Patrizi).
113Roaf in Speroni, Canace, pp, xiii—xv, Ixxviii—lxxxiv, and Speroni's own account, p. M.
-4
Ibid., pp. xxiv—xxix, xxxiii—xxxvii, lxxiv—lxxv, cv—cxi.
3 Literary disputes 193
Speroni set about responding to his unknown critic in an Apologia,
which remained unfinished, and in six `lezioni' (lectures) delivered to the
Accademia degli Elevati of Padua in December 1558. Speroni claimed that
he did not bother to write the first three down, but that `copie infinite'
were made, of which he knew there were a hundred in Rome. Giraldi
answered, in his turn, in a Latin letter dated 27 December 1558. Although
this was addressed to Speroni, it was sent initially to the `prince' of the
Elevati with a request that he should refer it to all members of the acad-
emy. These exchanges brought an end to the involvement of the two main
participants, and Speroni did not reply when in 1581 he received, for com-
ment, a defence of the Canace from Felice Paciotto of Pesaro. Two further
contributions were printed in Padua in 1590.1 Before then, opinions were
issued in the first instance scribally, or orally then scribally, with only the
Giudizio finding its way into print during the Cinquecento; yet this did
not prevent the dispute having some resonance outside the cities of the
two main participants.
Manuscript played an occasional role in other discussions on drama.
In 1589 Muzio Manfredi received from Giulio Poiana in Vicenza three
giudizi by Angelo Ingegneri concerning manuscript tragedies, one on
Vincenzo Giusti's Alessio, two on Livio Pagello's Heraclea. Manfredi
copied out these `judgements' in BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 8745, scrupulously
reproducing Ingegneri's spelling and punctuation.126 He was particularly
interested in these texts because Ingegneri had also written a critique of
Manfredi's own manuscript tragedy Semiramis, and several of Manfredi's
Lettere brevissime, dated 1591, refer to his preparation of a response. A short
giudizio on Battista Guarini's Pastor fido, composed by Giovanfrancesco
Alberti (BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 6528, fols. 108-9), was sent to Siena in about
1595; however, the discussions on this pastoral play were conducted chiefly
in print.IZ 7
One of the fiercest literary polemics of the sixteenth century, that between
Annibal Caro and Lodovico Castelvetro, had its origins and some of its con-
tinuation in the circulation of manuscripts, although both sides soon sought
wider publicity through the printing press. The polemic was conducted
mostly in prose, with occasional contributions in verse. Its two main figures
had naturally contrasting personalities and opinions, the one conformist and
the other rebellious. The casus belli was an encomiastic canzone on the royal
house of France, `Venite all'ombra de' gran gigli d'oro', composed by Caro
"S Ibid., pp. xv—xvi, xxxix—xli, Ixxxviii—cv, cxi—cxv, and Giraldi's request to the prince, P. 277.
6 Weinberg, A History ofLiterary Criticism, II, 937-8, ís321. "' Ibid., II, í,o89-9o.
194 The manuscript circulation ofprose
in Rome between 1553 and early 1554 at the request of Cardinal Alessandro
Farnese, who was eager for French support for his family's claims to con-
trol Parma and Piacenza. When the poem was circulated in Rome, a copy
was sent by Aurelio Bellincini to his fellow-citizen Castelvetro in Modena,
with a request for his opinion of it. Castelvetro responded with a Parere
(Opinion) and a Dichiarazione (Annotation) in which he criticized Caro's
linguistic usage. Later in 1554, an anonymous Commento on Caro's poem
was printed by Giolito in Venice, but not at Caro's initiative. The diffusion
of Castelvetro's initial comments in Rome (by Bellincini) and elsewhere
led, according to Caro's letters, to an outburst of attacks on the Modenese
scholar. In April 1555 Caro told Varchi, in Florence, that:
Gli è stato risposto da alcuni miei amici per le rime, [...1 e gli sono fatti molti
componimenti contra, latini e volgari, in Roma, in Bologna e in altri luoghi. Ma
la più parte si tengono per farli stampare, e ne vorrei it vostro giudizio.
(Some friends of mine have replied to him in the same tone, [ ... ] and many
compositions against him have been written, in Latin and in the vernacular, in
Rome, Bologna and other places. But most of them are being kept to have them
printed, and I would like your judgement on them.)
Although this letter and others of May and September show that at this
point Caro intended to circulate these anti-Castelvetro works in print,
he foresaw that it might not be possible to prevent scribal circulation of
verses attacking Castelvetro and wrote to Giovanni Ferretti in September
1555 that he did at least wish people to know that he disapproved of it,
especially when the poems touched on topics other than Castelvetro.
Meanwhile, Castelvetro had read the Commento in manuscript and
replied in June—July 1555 with four writings of his own that were also cir-
culated in manuscript.12$
Caro's eventual riposte to Castelvetro was the Apologia degli Accademici
di Banchi di Roma. This contained, as well as Castelvetro's Parere and
Dichiarazione, a series of writings in prose and verse that purported to
have been written on Caro's behalf by `academicians' of the Banchi,
the area in which the papal curia had its offices. One component of the
Apologia that led, as we shall see, to specific scribal responses on both
sides of the dispute was ten tailed sonnets in the manner of Burchiello,
the Mattaccini (Clowns). Two of the other texts were written in the name
"' Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 431 to Varchi, 1g April 1555 (II, 181-3), 9g8-10; no. 434 to Varchi,
17 May 1555 (II, 187-91); no. 442 to Ferretti, 14 September 1555 (II, 197-8). On the dispute,
see especially Ferroni, `Il modello cortigiano'; Garavelli, `Prime scintille'; Lo Re, — Venice
all'ombra"'.
3 Literary disputes 195
of Pasquino. Caro, as part of his armoury, evidently wanted to use a
burlesque manner characteristic of some of the scribal and oral culture of
Rome and Florence. In spite of what he had said about wanting to use the
many Latin and vernacular compositions of others, only one real person
apart from Castelvetro and Caro was named as the author of texts in the
Apologia: Lucia Bertana of Modena, two of whose letters to Caro were
included at the end, together with some letters of Caro's to her, Varchi
and Ferretti. Caro's plans for printing the Apologia did not come to frui-
tion until 1558, when he commissioned an edition from Seth Viotto in
Parma. He claimed in a letter of August of that year that he had been
forced to `[darla] fuori a mio dispetto' (publish it against my will), but
he supervised printing closely. In March he had told Varchi that he had
decided to have it done in Parma `per esservi sopra io medesimo' (so that I
am in charge of it myself). A provision of very good type had been made
and the `tiratore' (puller) of the press was ready. Some variants in copies
of the edition reveal Caro's involvement in checking proofs.129
The Apologia led in turn to further writings for and against Caro.
Castelvetro's reply, the Ragione di alcune cose segnate nella canzone di
Annibal Caro `Venite all ombra de'gran gigli d oro , was printed in Modena
by the end of 1559. But other contributions to the polemic were still
being diffused in handwritten form. In support of Caro, two sequences
of tailed sonnets in the manner of the Mattaccini were composed: one
by Agnolo Bronzino, of fourteen Salterelli (Squibs), and the other by the
Sienese writer Lattanzio Benucci, of ten sonnets called La civetta (The
Owl, named after one of the components of Castelvetro's emblem). In
October 1559 Caro wrote to thank unnamed members of the Accademia
Bocchiana in Bologna for their support. He welcomed their judgement
on Castelvetro's Ragione. From one of them he had received a sonnet
`a la castelvetresca' (in the style of Castelvetro) and had circulated it in
Rome, where it caused much amusement. Two reply sonnets were written
using the same rhymes, and Caro duly sent these back to Bologna with
a request that they should be shared with other members of his academy
and their author, who he thought was Cesare Odone. In 1560 Caro sent
three burlesque sonnets attacking Castelvetro to his nephew Giovanni
Battista Caro, making a distinction between free circulation in one city
and restricted circulation in another: the sonnets were to be sent on to
", Caro, Lettere familiari, no. 509 to Varchi, 8 March 1558 (II, 27o-2); no. 531 to Antonio Elio,
8 August 1558 (II, 296-7); no. 574, 21 October 1559 (III, 7-9); no. S75, same date (III, 9-1o);
no. 604 to Giovanni Battista Caro, 23 August 156o (III, 41-3), %3-4; Sorella, L'autore sotto il
torchio, pp. 69-70 (variants in the 1558 edition). The Apologia is in Caro's Opere, pp. 83-328.
196 The manuscript circulation of prose
Varchi in Florence, where they could be `mandati a torno' (sent around),
whereas in Rome they were only to be shown `a qualche amico o padrone'
(to some friends or masters) without giving a copy, because Caro did not
want to be widely regarded as concerned with such frivolous matters.
These three sonnets may be ones that Caro himself wrote `a la castel-
vetresca' and circulated only in manuscript. The opening quatrain of the
first sonnet gives a sense of how he was trying to mock the Modenese's
technical language:
Pensante, e ripensante al guastamento
de l'uso de la nostra parlatura,
the reca it Barbagianni in iscrittura,
sento de i sentimenti mancamento.
(Thinking and thinking again about the ruination of the usage'of our speech
that the Owl brings about in writing, I feel my feelings fainting.)
Giovanni Maria Barbieri of Modena sprang to Castelvetro's defence by
replying to this trio of sonnets with a series of nine sonnets, three for
each of Caro's, and hence called the Treperuno (Three for one). In Caro's
sequence, each sonnet uses the same rhyme sounds; Barbieri follows these
sounds and indeed uses the same fourteen rhyme words in all nine son-
nets, while naturally avoiding the deliberately clumsy, polysyllabic nouns
used by Caro. Barbieri appears to have chosen a restricted scribal circula-
tion for these sonnets, by giving just one copy to Castelvetro. Both Caro's
and Barbieri's publication of their sonnets shows how scribal diffusion
could be used in much more subtle ways than diffusion in print.~30
A Discorso nel quale si dimostra la imperfettione della Commedia di
Dante was circulated widely in handwritten copies from 1572; it was not
printed until 1608. Its author went under the name of Ridolfo Castravilla,
though his first name could vary. He has not been convincingly iden-
tified; suggestions have included Lionardo Salviati and Castelvetro. His
starting-point was a remark made by the character Borghini in Varchi's
dialogue L'Hercolano, printed in 1570, that Dante might be considered not
simply Homer's equal but even his superior. Castravilla argued instead
that the Commedia failed to meet the criteria for narrative verse laid down
by Aristotle. The Discorso set off a long-running series of defences of and
further attacks on Dante, in which many of the salvos were fired off in
fj, Bronzino, Rime in burla, pp. 204-17, 418-26, 489-90 and I salterelli dellAbbrucia; Jacomuzzi,
`Nota in margine' (Benucci's sonnets, published from BAV, MS Chigiano I VIII 296, fols.
3W-21'); E. Watson, Achille Bocchi, p. 62; Valdrighi and others (eds.), Alcune lettere, pp. xii—xiii,
57-70 (Caro and Barbieri).
3 Literary disputes 197
manuscript, although some of them found their way into print and a few
began their diffusion in that medium.-
Rebuttals of Castravilla's thesis came initially, of course, from Florence.
Discussions in 1573 by the Accademia degli Alterati led to manuscript
responses such as those of Filippo Sassetti. An anonymous `Monsignore',
perhaps Antonio Altoviti, archbishop of Florence, wrote a defence of
Dante, now lost, on which Borghini commented in a letter. Jacopo
Mazzoni of Cesena read a copy of the Discorso sent to him in that city
from Florence, and replied in 1572 with a Discorso in difesa Bella Comedia
printed in his absence and under a pseudonym in Bologna. The Florentine
Orazio Capponi sent a copy of Mazzoni's Discorso to Bellisario Bulgarini
in Siena, and from there Bulgarini sent Capponi his Alcune consider-
azioni on Mazzoni's Discorso (see Chapter i Section 3). His intervention
led to a secondary dispute which originated from readings of his text in
manuscript. Capponi sent Bulgarini a reply, also handwritten, dated 1577.
Bulgarmi's response to Capponi, dated 1579, had an initial scribal cir-
culation (generating Lelio Marretti's manuscript Avertimenti) before its
printing in 1585. The Considerazioni were read in manuscript in Siena, in
1579, by Alessandro Carriero of Padua, whom Bulgarini then accused of
stealing his ideas for use in Carriero's Breve et ingenioso discorso, printed
in 1582. Bulgarini claimed that it was only Carriero's intervention that
led him reluctantly to have his Considerazioni printed in 1583. Speroni
responded from Padua with two discourses on Dante that remained in
manuscript: at least one reached Siena, since Bulgarini replied in his turn
with an Antidiscorso, printed eventually in 1616. Castravilla's Discorso also
reached Perugia, where it was used by Filippo Massini, a member of the
Accademia degli Insensati, in 1582. 'Ibis dispute illustrates once more
not just the persistence of scribal culture in preference to or at least in
advance of print, but also its effectiveness in diffusing texts, both within
the scribal communities of one cultural centre and outwards to those of
other cities and states.
Barbi, Della fortuna, pp. 36-76; Vallone, Aspetti dell'esegesi, pp. S9-112, 129-70; Weinberg,
Argomenti di discussione', 178-9, 182 and A History of Literary Criticism, II, 829-76; Ardissino,
Appunti di critica dantesca'; Gigante, Esperienze, pp. 9-45-

CHAPTER 5 diffuser of the text and addressed to an individual who is usually named,
Authors and their readers: dedications and
other paratexts
Earlier chapters have shown that the initial diffusion of works in manu-
script in our period was generated in the context of social relationships or
within looser groupings of the like-minded, and that it usually depended
on gift-giving or exchange rather than on a commercial transaction. The
process normally called for the close and practical involvement of the ori-
ginal author or of another person responsible for the circulation of a work,
such as a compiler of a collection, a translator, or a relative or friend of the
author. Those who first diffused texts, it was noted, could devote consid-
erable care to the production of copies, in order to ensure that their mater-
ial form helped to make a good impression on those key readers to whom
they were offered as gifts. This chapter is concerned with another aspect
of the winning of goodwill, examples of which have already been men-
tioned in passing: the practice of sending texts to their first readers with
an accompanying address. Documents such as these, lying on the fringes
of the text proper, are what Gérard Genette has termed paratexts, the
set of texts and usages that, as he shows in his brilliant analysis, `is what
enables a text to become a book and to be offered as such to its readers
and, more generally, to the public'.` Here we shall focus on one group of
paratexts that is particularly relevant in the highly social world of manu-
script culture: addresses to readers in the second person singular and plu-
ral, chiefly authorial but occasionally written by others — allographic, in
Genette's terminology.
The use of these texts goes back, of course, to classical and medieval
times. In the Renaissance, they could take the form of a dedicatory letter,
Genette, Paratexts, p. 1. The sections of his book that are especially relevant to what follows are
Chartier,
PP- 117-43 and 161-293, though few Renaissance examples are discussed. Also useful are
`Princely patronage' and Brugnolo and Benedetti, `La dedica'. Paoli, Ad Ercole Musagete' sur-
veys printed dedications. Printed dedications in England shared some of the strategies of Italian
ones: see Bennett's three volumes on English Books e'r Readers, respectively pp. 40-53; 5-10, 30-55;
23-39.
198
i Addresses to readers in manuscript 199
a preface or proem, or sometimes verses such as a sonnet, written by the
or to all readers, or to a category of readers (such as women or schol-
ars) that might, however, be an imagined rather than a real readership.
Invocations to patrons and other readers could also be integrated into the
main body of the text, rather than being paratextual, for instance into
the opening lines of long poems or the initial sonnet of a collection of
lyric verse. Preliminary addresses to readers were written partly for rhet-
orical effect, but they are a valuable source of information for manuscript
culture because they belong to the processes of author publication and
sometimes of user publication, being intended to guide the transmission
of texts from authors or owners to a readership that might be known and
perhaps very limited, yet might often be broader and to some extent, if
not mostly, unknown. These addresses can tell us more about the first
phases of scribal diffusion, the relationship between the provider of the
text and its early or envisaged readers, and the potential roles of these
readers, whether as secondary diffusers of the text, as its protectors, or as
guarantors of its quality.
This chapter will therefore begin by discussing the use in manuscripts
of addresses first to single and then to multiple readers. The second sec-
tion will explore an aspect of the unstable borders between scribal and
print publication. These paratexts are among the features originating in
manuscripts that came to have a strong influence on the diffusion of texts
in print; how far, then, were their characteristics specific to scribal culture
and how far were they adopted or adapted in the new context of printing?
The examples used in the chapter are inevitably only a small selection
from a vast range, but they are intended to be representative of the broad
tendencies of the period.
I ADDRESSES TO READERS IN MANUSCRIPT
In considering addresses to an individual, one can distinguish in principle
between paratexts that dedicate a work to that person and those that sim-
ply present a single copy of that work. Kristeller proposes for these categor-
ies the respective terms `dedicatory letters' and `letters of transmission'.2
' Kristeller, `Some original letters', pp. 15-16. Genette, likewise, distinguishes between dedication
and inscription (paratexts, p. 127; `dédicace d'oeuvre et dédicace d'exemplaire': Seuils, p. 127).
The former might be said to belong to Genette's `peritext', elements located within the same
volume, rather than to the spatially distant `epitext' (paratexts, pp. 4-5); but, as will be seen, this
distinction can be problematic in scribal culture.

200 Authors and their readers
Again in principle, a dedicatory letter would be present not only in the
presentation copy but also in any manuscripts transcribed from it. This is
the case, for example, with Leonardo Bruni's Dialogi ad Petrum Paulum
Histrum, widely diffused in the Quattrocento in Florence and northern
Italy: all thirty-eight extant manuscripts have the proem addressed to Pier
Paolo Vergerio.3 On the other hand, a letter of transmission would remain
specific to one manuscript, as in the cases of two vellum gift copies sent
to Bernardo Bembo by Ficino and Landino respectively, each containing
works of theirs.4
In practice, however, it is not always easy to allocate these letters to one
category or the other — something that can pose a problem for modern
editors, who may too readily set a mere letter of transmission at the head
of the text. Nor would the distinction always have been clear when texts
were published between the Trecento and the Cinquecento. Dedicatory
letters were not necessarily included when further copies of texts were
made, and therefore did not always have as wide an influence as the author
intended. On the other hand, letters intended to be simply copy-specific
might be reproduced in further copies as long as they formed part of a
presentation copy. Boccaccio's letter to Mainardo Cavalcanti, composed
in 1373 for the second redaction of the De casibus virorum illustrium, was
transcribed in copies derived from the manuscript that had been sent to
and then circulated by Mainardo. But it was not originally found in all
copies of this redaction, probably because Boccaccio circulated his own
master exemplar without the dedication. On the other hand, the paratext
was added to some copies of the first redaction, to which of course it did
not belong .5 There was some inconsistency of practice, too, in the case
of the Commentarium in Convivium of Ficino mentioned in Chapter z
Section 3. Two manuscripts have the author's letter to Giovanni Cavalcanti,
using the verb `dedicate'. One of these is Ficino's autograph copy, clearly
intended for Cavalcanti, but the other is what Kristeller calls the file copy,
which Ficino lent to friends. Ficino's letter to Janus Pannonius, using the
synonym `dicare', and a concluding letter from him to Giovanni Antonio
Campano are each found in single manuscripts, yet a letter from Ficino
to Francesco Piccolomini appears in two manuscripts. Scholars disagree
3 L. Bruni, Dialogi, PP. 235-6•
4 Leiden, Un iversiceitsbiblio cheek, MS Lat. Bibl. Publ. 16oa, contains Ficino's De raptu Pauli
and Quid sit lumen copied by Tommaso Baldinorti: Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, Pp. 138-9,
332; De la Marc, `New research', App. I, no. 70. BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3366 contains Landino's
Xandra copied by Niccol6 Sesti: Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, PP. 139, 335-6; De la Mare, `New
research', App. I, no. 54•
Zaccaria, `Le due redazioni', 21-6.
1~
r Addresses to readers in manuscript 201
about whether these texts imply successive dedications of the work or are
copy-specific, or whether the work was in any case most closely connected
with Lorenzo de' Medici.' The letter with which Machiavelli dedicated ,[/
Principe to Lorenzo it Magnifico's grandson is present in all early manu-
scripts (as in Figure 7) except one, the Charlecote, but it is not certain
that Machiavelli ever presented the work to him. Manuscripts contain-
ing authors' letters of transmission to one person could retain letters of
dedication to another: this is the case with Vespasiano da Bisticci's Libro
Belle lodi delle donne in BRF, MS 2293, which has the original `Proemio'
addressed to Maria Pandolfini followed by a dedication to her daugh-
ter Maddalena, and with Varthema's Itinerario in BNCF, MS Landau
Finaly 9, in which a letter of transmission to the young Vittoria Colonna
precedes the earlier dedication to her mother Agnesina da Montefeltro 7
Lucia Bertolini's study of the scribal publication of works by Leon
Battista Alberti has shown that they circulated both with and without
addresses to readers that might originally have been copy-specific or that
might refer to the whole work. These paratexts seem to be present espe-
cially when Alberti published a work solely through a dedicatee rather
than also independently of him or her, and when this dedicatee then
made the copy available to others, acting as owner-publisher. In some
cases a letter of dedication or presentation is found in all or most extant
manuscripts of a work: all fifteen copies of the Elementa picture in Latin
dedicated to Teodoro Gaza (who had requested its translation from the
vernacular), all thirteen copies of the Ex luilis rerum mathematicarum
dedicated to Meliaduso d'Este, all but one of the thirteen copies of the
Apologi centum dedicated to Francesco Marescalchi, fourteen of the twenty-
one copies of the De pictura in Latin dedicated to Giovan Francesco
Gonzaga (the remaining seven may contain an earlier redaction). The
address to Francesco d'Altobianco Alberti at the start of book III of
Della famiglia, proemial in function, is present in all but one of the thir-
teen manuscripts that contain this book. All twenty-one manuscripts
of the dialogue Deiphira have Alberti's prologue addressed to lovers; all
seventeen of Della famiglia have the prologue to the entire work, addressed
to the young Alberti. But where dedicatory texts are occasional in nature
and may indeed have been added to a work already published by Alberti,
they can be retained in only a minority of manuscripts. Just four of the
e Kristeller,
Supplementum ftcinianum, I, 87-9 (the texts of the letters) and `Some original letters',
P. 15; Gentile, `Per la storia'.
' Vespasiano da Bisticci, Illibro delle lodi delle donne, pp. xeiv-xevi, 10-13; Casamassima, `Ludovico
degli Arrighi', 1z4-5; Barbara Agosti in Ragionieri (ed.), Vittoria Colonna, pp. 56-7.
Z02 Authors and their readers
eleven complete or partial copies of his vernacular discourse to young
women on love, the Ecatonfilea, have the letter to Nerozzo Alberti, and in
one of these it was added at a later stage. the text addressing the vernacu-
lar De pictures to Filippo Brunelleschi, present in only one of three copies,
must be a letter of transmission added nearly a year after the work was
composed! Copy-specific letters were sent by Alberti with both the Latin
and the vernacular versions of the Uxoria. The Latin letter recounts how
he was responding to a request from an unnamed person who had asked
Alberti to send any new intercenali to him and to other friends before,
anyone else; Alberti was doing so in the knowledge that his work would
not be passed into his detractors' hands unless it had been emended .9 His
Apologi centum provided an imaginative twist to the often stereotypical
address to a reader: the dedication to Marescalchi of these brief fable-
like anecdotes is followed by an exchange of letters between himself and
an ancient reader who was the most renowned writer of fables, Aesop.
Alberti asks for Aesop's opinion of what he had written, and the Greek
writer gives his approval but warns that Alberti will meet with envy."
What readership was intended, implicitly as well as explicitly, for scribal
paratexts addressed to one person? When letters of transmission were in
a physically separate document, like the letter to Pandolfo Malatesta that
Petrarch sent together with a copy of his Canzoniere in 1373, they formed
part of what Genette calls the confidential epitext." In Chapters i and 3,
we saw the importance of these covering letters when single poems were
sent out by authors such as Bembo or Torquato Tasso. They were clearly
significant in the first stage of publication, in the context of an author's
personal relations with others: they were used, among other things, to
maintain a pose of modesty, to invite others to correct and improve their
works and to control the further diffusion of the work. However, letters
independent of the text did not normally serve to present it to a wider
readership.
When paratextual letters were integrated into manuscripts of works, they
might be genuinely private documents, intended for one pair of eyes only,
as when Tansillo sent a canzoniere to the duke of Sessa in 1550 (see Chapter 1
Section 3). We have seen, though, that manuscripts could easily become
available to a public wider than their initial recipients. Since authors would
have anticipated this, it is reasonable to assume that - unless, like Tansillo,
s Bertolini, `Come "pubblicava" l'Alberti'.
Alberti, Opere volgari, II, 302-5, 448-9; Cardini, `Uxoria', pp. 2 69-70-
` Alberti, Apologhi, p. 46.
" Santagata, I frammenti, pp. 283-7 (Petrarch); Genette, Paratexts, pp. 371-86.
i Addresses to readers in manuscript 203
they prohibited further diffusion - their addresses to named individuals in
the second person singular might well also be consciously performed for a
plural and often unknown readership.- This envisaging of other future read-
ers was usually only implicit, though not always. Alberti, for instance, told
the dedicatee of the first book of his Intercenales, Paolo Toscanelli, about his
desire that `qui legerint nos' (those who will have read me) should find his
work entertaining." But in any case, dedications to individuals normally
imply an unspoken second person plural: that is, what an author is say-
ing directly to and about a dedicatee is also being communicated to others
who are reading, as it were, over the author's shoulder. In looking at what
these paratexts have to say, we must bear in mind that they were habitually
used by authors to address single and multiple readers simultaneously, in a
complex process of self-fashioning. What roles were played by these dedica-
tions, then, in the eyes of both the dedicatees themselves and of other read-
ers? We can consider firstly how authors depict dedicatees and their own
relationship to them, and secondly the benefits that these depictions might
bring.
A scribal author would generally wish above all to portray the dedi-
catee as worthy of admiration. He or she was represented as the ideal
person to whom the work could be given; sometimes the author even
claimed that there had been a selection process. Compliments might be
paid in a low-key way. In the dedication just mentioned, Tansillo avoided
a pose of humility and went no further than making passing references
to the duke's humanity, modesty and goodness. But across our period
there was a natural tendency to excessive praise. As Mario Biagioli has
plausibly suggested, in the etiquette of letter-writing, flattery offered a
means by which clients could test the possibility of establishing, continu-
ing or reviving relationships with patrons. If the flattery was rebuffed, it
meant that the client was accepted as an intimate.14 In Paolo Cortesi's
dedication to Lorenzo de' Medici of his dialogue De hominibus doctis,
composed around i4go-i, he lavished praise on the Florentine as an out-
standing patron of learning and as a statesman, endowed moreover with
poetic and other talents.'S In the same period Giovanni Sabadino gave
a fulsome account, at the start of his Gynevera de le clare donne, of the
virtues and accomplishments of Ginevra Sforza, her husband and each
of their eleven surviving children, asserting that Ginevra deserved to be
" See, too, Genette, Paratexts, pp. 134-5•
" Alberti, Intercenales, p. 2; see, too, `qui nostra lectitarint' (those who will have read our works
often), p. 224-
14
Biagioli, Galileo, Courtier, pp. 27-8. " Cortesi, De hominibusdottis, pp. 2-6.
204 Authors and their readers
placed above all the famous women whose lives he was going to recount.
Equally cloying, though at least briefer, is his eulogy of the virtues of
Ercole d'Este in the De triumphis religionis of 1497.16 Firenzuola sent the
first giornata of his Ragionamenti to Caterina Cibo in 15z5 with the claim
that she was `di virth fregiata copra tutte le altre' (adorned with virtues
above all other women) and had `benignità e gentileza di animo, the con
voi nata insieme con gli anni vostri è cresciuta sempre' (inborn kindness
and courtesy of spirit that has grown throughout your years).17 Cellini,
dedicating his two technical treatises to Francesco de' Medici in 1565,
assured the son of Cosimo I, still in his early twenties, that he should find
the texts most pleasant because he delighted in such things `più d'ogni
altro gran principe' (more than any other great prince)." A eulogy pitched
at a particularly inflated level is Gasparo Visconti's description of Beatrice
d'Este, in the preface-dedication of his canzoniere, as the fourth Grace,
the tenth Muse and the only phoenix of their age. After Beatrice's death,
Visconti used this preface in the collection put together for Bianca Maria
Sforza (see Chapter 2 Section 3), and precisely the same description thus
came to apply to her.19
Authors could state their allegiance and devotion to their dedicatee,
especially in a courtly context. Visconti assured his two successive dedi-
catees of his `servitute e fede' (allegiance and fidelity) to them. Niccol6 da
Correggio sent his Tabula Psiches et Cupidinis to Isabella d'Este as a sign of
his `fede et observanzia' (fidelity and obedience) to her precepts. Similarly,
Sabadino hoped Ginevra Sforza would enjoy reading his Gynevera while
recalling `la mia observantia verso la tua excellentia et gloria del muli-
ebre nome' (my respect for your excellence and [for you as a] glory of the
name of women). Girolamo Amelonghi offered his Gigantea to Cosimo
de' Medici as a token of his `servitùi% so that the rays shining forth from
the duke would raise him to a state where he could sing the duke's praises
in a loftier voice."' Analogous to these declarations was one made in
,e Sabadino, Gynevera, pp. 1-9 (p. 2); Gundersheimer (ed.), Art and Life, pp. 29-31.
17
Firenzuola, Le novelle, p. 12.
x1 BMV, MS It. IV 44 (5134), fol. 1'; Cellini, I trattati, pp. xii—xvi, 3-4 and Opere, pp. 621—z. The
Marciana manuscript, written in a calligraphic humanistic cursive hand and bound in dark
brown leather with gold tooling, could be the presentation copy. Cellini subsequently had the
work revised linguistically for a printed edition of 1568 that he dedicated to Francesco's brother
Ferdinando.
~1 Visconti, I canzonieri, pp. 4-7 (p. 7).
° Ibid., p. 7; Correggio, Opere, P. 50 (the presentation manuscript, BAV, MS Reg. Lat. 1601, and
the two other extant manuscripts include his epistle: ibid., pp. 499-500, 512-13); Sabadino,
Gynevera, p. 8; BNCF, MS Magi. VII 678, fol. 1'-° (Amelonghi); see too Plaisance, L'Accademia,
pp. 224-5.
1 Addresses to readers in manuscript 205
the context of a gift sent for reasons of diplomacy: when the Raccolta
Aragonese was sent to Federico d'Aragona by Lorenzo de' Medici (see
Chapter 3 Section 5), the dedicatory letter, written in Lorenzo's name by
its editor, Poliziano, represented the collection as `un ricordo e pegno del
mio amore in verso di lei singulare' (a reminder and pledge of my singular
love for you).21
Dedications of works in the Renaissance have affinities with the presta-
tions studied by Marcel Mauss, `in theory voluntary, disinterested and
spontaneous, but [.. e] in fact obligatory and interested'.-' The gift of the
text was apparently made freely; authors did not generally suggest that
they had any specific obligation to dedicate it to the recipient. However,
authors often express a general indebtedness. Pietro Edo (Capretto) did so
when he offered his Amores to a certain Bartolomeo Pavino, at some point
in the second half of the Quattrocento, as a `tenuissimo dono' (trifling
gift) in order to show gratitude for Ii diuturni benifizi da me rezevuti' (the
lasting benefits I have received).23 Sabadino informed Ginevra that the
Gynevera had been composed because he did not want to be `ingrato' for
the esteem she had always shown him .24 Likewise, Machiavelli, dedicat-
ing his Discorsi sopra la prima decor di Tito Livio to Zanobi Buondelmonti
and Cosimo Rucellai at some point before November 1519, told his young
friends that by addressing the work to them he was showing `qualche grat-
itudine de' beneficii ricevuti' (some gratitude for benefits received).~5 (This
dedication is, unusually, placed at the end of the work.) Lorenzo Martelli
dedicated his late son Lodovico's tragedy Tullia to Francesco Maria della
Rovere, duke of Urbino, probably in 1529-30, recalling that his obliga-
tions as a former servant of the duke's were enduring, but making it clear
that he was sending the tragedy because of a recent voluntary promise to
dedicate to the duke a collection of all Lodovico's works.z6
It was not uncommon, too, for authors to express a debt for the very
existence of the work, or at least of the manuscript that contained it; and
it was here that they came nearest to identifying the dedicatee as co-
creator or even as only begetter of what was being read. This sense of the
close involvement of author and first readers was, it was seen in Chapter 1,
a key feature of manuscript culture. To portray oneself as responding to
' Contini (ed.), Letteratura italiana del Quattrocento, pp. 129-33 (p. 131). The letter to Federico is
1
present in only one of the three main manuscripts representing the original collection: Barbi,
Studi, pp. 228-9.
Mauss, The Gift, p. 1. " Edo, Il rimedio amoroso, P. 70. " Sabadino, Gynevera, p. x.
Machiavelli, Discorsi, p. 790.
6 BAV, MS Rossiano 918, fOls. V-2', cit. in Finazzi, `Due manoscritti', 164.
zo6 Authors and their readers
a suggestion or request was a way of paying tribute to the dedicatee for
their encouragement of literary activities, and at the same time a way of
displaying modesty. An author might state that the work was being sent,
and perhaps had come into being, solely at the request of the dedicatee or
of another person. The Pistoiese poet Antonio Forteguerri gathered a col-
lection of verse in about 1489, he informed Persio Falconcini, only because
he had been `riscaldato più e più volte dalla Prestanzia tua, di mandate in
luce queste mie ben the infime e basse rime' (urged repeatedly by your
excellency to publish these poems of mine, worthless and lowly though
they are).=' Landino sent his Latin verse to Bernardo Bembo because he
could not deny the Venetian's request; Correggio told Isabella d'Este
that he was sending his Tabula at her command; Visconti referred, in
his dedicatory sonnet to Bianca Maria Sforza, to her request for `qualche
mia cosa nova' (some new work of mine)." The theme of the recipient as
enlightened cultural patron is given particular emphasis in the dedica-
tion of the Raccolta Aragonese: here Federico d'Aragona is seen as the
person responsible, through his interest, for the recovery of many vener-
able Tuscan poets of the past, and in the conclusion the poets represented
in the anthology thank him for restoring them to life. Machiavelli told
Buondelmonti and Rucellai, apropos of the Discorsi, that `mi avete for-
zato a scrivere quello the io mai per me medesimo non arei scritto' (you
have forced me to write what I never would have written on my own).29
Self-deprecation, or a semblance of it, is also commonly evident in ref-
erences to the apparent unworthiness of the gift, sometimes contrasted
with the standing of the dedicatee. The author could add a comment ask-
ing forgiveness for this inadequacy and even turning it to his advantage
by drawing attention to the dedicatee's generosity of spirit. If Visconti's
`vacillante stile' (unsteady style) offended Beatrice (or Bianca Maria),
he said, she should consider the affection of the donor rather than `la
quantità del dono' (the amount of the gift). Bandello asked Marguerite
de France in 1544 to accept his unworthy verses, put together only at the
request of another, with her admired humanity. He offered his Hecuba to
Marguerite de Navarre in similar terms3°
Others adopted a more original approach. Correggio simply told
Isabella d'Este that there was no point in asking forgiveness for the many
errors of his Tabula. Machiavelli admitted immediately that R principe
17 Flamini, Il canzoniere inedito, p. 1 3-
2' Landino, Carmina omnia, pp. 190 —i; Correggio, Opere, P. 49; Visconti, I canzonieri, P. 3-
'9 Machiavelli, Discorsi, p. 790.
'° Bandello, Rime, pp. 3-4 and Tutte le opere, II, 1,138.
r Addresses to readers in manuscript 207
was apparently unworthy in comparison with the fine objects normally
presented to princes. But he implied that what he had to offer — the fruits
of his many years of experience and reading — was actually more precious,
and he was therefore confident that Lorenzo de' Medici would accept it
with humanity.3' Tansillo asked the duke of Sessa to accept his canzoniere
iu 1546 not just because of the poet's goodwill but also because of the nov-
elty of what he was doing, since this was the first time he had `given' his
compositions. Sending another collection in 1550, for the duke personally,
Tansillo was able to allude to the intimacy of their relationship and to
the recipient's generosity: the duke would forgive errors that others would
not.3' A similar line had been taken by Matteo Cassago in 1535 when he
offered a collection of verse to the parents of the boy he had been tutoring:
he admitted his writing was less polished than that of Petrarch and `[il]
moderno Bembo', but was sure they would deign to read it in their leisure
hours out of the love they bore him.33 Perhaps he was hinting, too, that
his verse might provide more relaxation than that of the master poets. In
1577, Laura Terracina, then in her late fifties, feared that the `viva vena'
(living vein) of her inspiration might have dried up in her ninth collection
of verse; but, she sought to reassure Cardinal Ferdinando de' Medici, she
had now put all her efforts into poems praising high-ranking laypeople,
popes and cardinals, and she hoped he would receive the resulting poems
kindly34
The gift of the text, it has been suggested above, could be far from
disinterested. Addressing a work explicitly to a dedicatee could confer
benefits of two interconnected kinds, to the writer and to the work itself.
Writers would have hoped to consolidate their social relationships and sta-
tus and perhaps also to obtain personal reward from the dedicatee. Three
generations of the Valori family offered copies of Niccol6 Valori's life of
Lorenzo it Magnifico in order to win favour from the Medici family,
with each dedication drawing on tactics described above. The Vita appears
to have been composed originally in the vernacular. A reworked Latin ver-
sion was presented by Nicco16 to Leo X, Lorenzo's son, between 157 and
1521, following a period of imprisonment in connection with the Boscoli
conspiracy. In the dedication of his sumptuously decorated vellum manu-
script (BLF, MS LXI 3: Figure 13), Nicco16 claimed that he had decided
to publish (`in lucem edere') the life only at the request of Luigi de' Rossi.
Adding an allusion to Christ's teaching — he was `bringing to light' what
" Machiavelli, Deprincipatibus, pp. 181-3. " Milburn, Luigi Tansillo, pp. 37, 6o.
31 Albonico, 11 ruginoso stile, pp. 98 -1o0. 34 Montella, Una poetessa, p. 47.
PPW_
Z08 Authors and their readers
had been hidden under a bushel — he thus affirmed, albeit vaguely, that
his devotion to the Medici was long-standing. At about the same time,
Niccol6's son Filippo dedicated a copy of the vernacular redaction to Leo's
sister, Lucrezia Salviati, praising her `singular' virtues and `a testimonio et
pegno della mia devotione' (as a testimony and pledge of my devotion;
BRF, MS 2-S99, fol. 2 -). But the Valori needed to reconcile themselves
with the Medici once again after Filippo was executed as a rebel in 1537•
Three decades later, in 1567, his son Baccio offered the same vernacular
version to Cosimo I, the man responsible for his father's death, stressin g.
that he owed everything to the goodness of the duke (BLF, MS LXI 18) .35
The Valori's desire to win favour was not made explicit, but in other
cases an author's aspirations could come to the surface. Cortesi told
Lorenzo it Magnifico outright that, if he had gone beyond the bounds of
modesty in dedicating his dialogue to him, he had done so in the hope
of entering into Lorenzo's affection (`amor')3' Raffaele Brandolini offered
his treatise De musica et poetica to Lorenzo's son Giovanni, newly elected
Leo X, on condition that, if he thought the work worthy, `me nunc, dum
maxime potes, destitutum minime patiaris' (you will not leave me desti-
tute now you are so powerful).37 Machiavelli provided the first of many
carefully calculated shocks for readers of Il principe in the first sentence of
his dedication when he talked openly of the process of `acquistare grazia'
(winning favour) through gift-giving, though his ultimate aim, as has
just been seen, was to set his gift apart from (and above) those normally
offered to princes. He returned to his theme at the end of the letter by
implying that it was in the power of the young Lorenzo to remedy the
author's ill fortune.
As for benefits to the work, the dedicator intended its association with
the chosen recipient to confer authority on it in the eyes of other readers.
The authority function of the dedicatee was occasionally stated openly.
Marsilio Ficino's letter of transmission of his Commentarium in Convivium
to Janus Pannonius described how the recipient's prestige would help to
diffuse the work in his own lands: `Dabit preterea scriptis nostris fidem
auctoritas tua non mediocrem [ ... ] Amor in me tuus mea commendabit
tibi, et auctoritas tua Pannons ipsa laudabit' (Moreover, your author-
ity will give our writings no small credibility [ ... ] Your love for me will
commend what is mine to you, and your authority will praise it to the
35 Valori, Vita di Lorenzo; Martelli, `Le due redazioni'; Pesrnan Cooper, `Political survival'; Fubini,
`Lorenzo de' Medici'.
36 Cortesi, De hominibus doctis, p. 6. 3l Brandolini, On Music and Poetry, pp. 4-5•
i• z Addresses to readers in manuscript 209
Pannonians)" Paolo Cortesi wanted his writings to be honoured above
all by the authority of Lorenzo de' Medici's name (`mea scripta auctoritate
tui potissimum nominis celebrari').39 Giambullari evoked the authority of
Francesco de' Medici when he presented his Regole della lingua fiorentina
to him, even though Francesco would have been only seven years old if,
as is likely, the gift was made in 1548. At the same time Giambullari gave
a reminder of his personal devotion to the illustrious House of Medici, in
whose service he had grown old, and he linked his work with the cultural
policies of Duke Cosimo, the dedicatee's father, by pointing out that the
study of Florentine was principally the task of the Accademia fiorentina
that came into being on the same day as Francesco.40
Even if the term `authority' was not mentioned, a dedication bestowed
it on the work in various ways. The most obvious message, though not a
logical one, was that the work was worthy because it was being offered
to a person perceived as having prestige. As Girolamo Carbone put it
when dedicating the posthumous printed edition of the Amori of Ioan
Francesco Caracciolo (Naples: per Ioanne Antonio de Caneto, 1506) to
Prospero Colonna, Ii votivi doni tanto de più prezo se reputano quanto
the ad più famosi et venerandi tempii sono dedicati' (fol. Al votive
offerings are all the more highly valued when dedicated to more fam-
ous and venerable temples). A frequent signifier of status was social rank.
Dedicatees were sometimes peers and friends of the author but usually of
higher standing, sometimes very high indeed. Occasionally, though, their
qualities could be explicitly distinguished from their rank, even if this
was in fact lofty. When Machiavelli dedicated his Discorsi to the young
aristocrats Buondelmonti and Rucellai, he made a remarkable critique of
the normal practice of writers, from which (he stressed) he was departing,
perhaps reacting against the misplaced hopes that at one point had led
him to address the dedicatory letter of Il principe to a Medici. Machiavelli
wrote that, whereas others always directed their works to `some prince',
so blinded by ambition and greed that they praised his non-existent vir-
tues, he instead had chosen not those who were princes but those who
deserved to be, not those who could shower him with honours but those
who would do so if they were able.4'
In any case, the social status of dedicatees was not enough to jus-
tify their selection as bestowers of authority. They had to be portrayed
as possessing exemplary personal qualities; hence the praise lavished
3a
Kristeller, Supplementum ficinianum, I, 88. 39 Cortesi, De bomiuibus doctis, p. 6.
'° Giambullari, Regole, pp. xx—xxi, 4. 41 Machiavelli, Discorsi, pp. 790-1.
210 Authors and their readers
on them. Among these qualities it was helpful to include an interest
in the subject-matter of the work. If authors often pointed out that
dedicatees would find a work fitting to their tastes, they must have done
so not in order to remind them of their interests, but firstly to depict
them as cultured (perhaps with more than a touch of flattery in some
cases) and secondly to suggest to others that the work would meet the
standards of, and be appreciated by, a particularly discerning reader.
Thus Minturno considered it appropriate to send Miguel Mai his trans-
lation of Plutarch's Septem sapientium convivium because the Spaniard
was `sapientia praeditu[s]' (endowed with wisdom), and Cinuzzi pointed
out to Cosimo de' Medici that the duke would welcome the subject-
matter of his Cinquanta ode because he was `d'animo religiosissimo'
(most religious in spirit).42 Just as Cellini portrayed Francesco de' Medici
as a connoisseur of the arts, so Niccol6 Maria d'Este had felt it fitting to
dedicate to his uncle Ercole I a copy (Figure 5) of a translation, composed
in 1498 by the physician Gian Giacomo Bertolotti, of the Tablet of Cebes,
a dialogue containing a description of an allegorical painting: not only
did the duke like reading morally improving texts, according to Niccolò
Maria, but he had already had a painting of Psyche made (the cycle of
Cupid and Psyche recently created at Belriguardo), and the Tablet would
provide a good subject for a representation of human life `con suttile, e
secreto misterio' (with subtle and secret mystery).43 Brandolini, present-
ing the De musica et poetica, stressed Giovanni de' Medici's expertise in
the humanities and in particular his mastery of the art of music .44
A dedicatee's authority was invoked, usually implicitly, if he or she
was asked to protect the work, once it had passed to other readers,
by acting as a kind of shield or deterrent against the adverse criticism
that was sometimes anticipated, at least ostensibly. When authors
made this request, they were again representing the dedicatees' pres-
tige as superior to their own. Giovanni Muzzarelli, a young follower
of Bembo, found a dedicatee who, he wrote, would be able to forestall
criticism altogether. He sent what is probably an autograph manuscript
of his Amorosa opra to Elisabetta Gonzaga between 1505 and 1511 with a
dedication in which he explained at length that he had previously held
4~ Carrai, `Minturno traduttore', 233-4; Cambridge, Trinity College, MS R.3.53, fol. 2— (Cinuzzi).
43 BL, MS Add. 22331, fois. 2`3`. BMV, MS Lat. XIV 123 (4662), fols. 76`-83°, contains Bertoletti's
transcription of 1514 from a copy made in 1498. On the cycle, see Gundersheimer (ed.), Art and
Life, pp. 62-5; Shepherd, `Giovanni Sabadino', 30-1-
44 Brandolini, On Music and Poetry, p. 6, in the dedicatory text written before Giovanni's election
as Leo X.
1' z Addresses to readers in manuscript 211
back from publishing his work (`far uscir al conspetto degli uomini',
to send it out in the presence of men) because in his times writers were
liable to receive a critical mauling. He foresaw many accusations, some
of them contradictory: his writing would be considered too crude or
too affected; he would be condemned for using Tuscan rather than
another form of the vernacular, or for including a few small non-
Tuscan words, or simply for using the vernacular rather than Latin.
He had resolved his dilemma by choosing to dedicate the work to the
duchess. Thus on the one hand, it would not perish; on the other, since
he was sure she would judge it kindly, her widespread `autorità' meant
that it would please everyone.41 Firenzuola told Caterina Cibo in 1525
that he had wondered under whose name his Ragionamenti `dovessero
sperimentare it rigoroso giudizio de' moderni censori' (should experi-
ence the rigorous judgement of modern critics), and had decided that
nobody was better suited than her: `perciò the donna sete, gli difend-
erete dai morsi di coloro the con nimico dente mordere gli volessero,
essendo di donne la maggior parte' (because you are a woman, you
will defend them from those who might wish to savage them, most
of these being women). If her judgement approved these first discus-
sions, he would publish (`dar fuori') the remaining five.46 Marguerite
de Navarre received Bandello's Hecuba together with a letter that
complained at length about the biting tongues of ignorant critics. The
translation was being sent as a messenger to secure the way for other
works of Bandello, and the queen was to act as its impenetrable shield
and trusted guide.47
Although Firenzuola expected most of his critics to be female, both
he and Bandello perhaps felt that men would be deterred from criticism
because it would be unchivalrous for them to attack writing associated
with a woman. But of course authors also sought the protection of males.
Giambullari wanted the authority of Francesco de' Medici to protect him
against any detractors who spoke evil of his Regole.4' Biagio Buonaccorsi,
as owner-publisher of Machiavelli's Il principe (Figure 8), told Pandolfo
Bellacci to prepare to defend the work fiercely (`preparati acerrimo
defensore').49
It was noted in Chapter 1 Section i that receivers of texts in scribal
culture could be invited to alter a text before diffusing it further. Such
4s Muzzarelli, Amorosa opra, pp. 3-7. Another probably autograph manuscript contains no dedica-
tion: Arbizzoni, `Un nuovo manoscritto'.
Firenzuola, Le novelle, pp. 12-13. 47 Bandello, Tutte le opere, II, 1,236-8.
B Giambullari, Regole, p. 4. 41 BLF, MS XLIV. 3z, fol. i-.
Zia Authors and their readers
invitations were also extended to some dedicatees. Authors would only
rarely have expected them to be taken up; rather, for them the suggestion
had above all the double function of expressing modesty by yet another
means and of implying that the circulated text bore the dedicatee's seal
of approval. Alberti asked Nerozzo and Francesco Alberti to improve his
Ecatonfilea; `emendata meno dispiacerà a chi la legga' (once emended,
readers will dislike it less). There are similar requests in other works of
his50 An invitation might unusually be accepted if the recipient were a
more experienced writer: Guidiccioni's dedicatory letter of the collection
of verse that, as we saw in Chapter i Section 5, he sent to Caro in 1539
stated that he did not doubt that his sonnets would receive `più carezze,
più ornamenti e più lunga vita' (more affection, more adornment and a
longer life) in Caro's care than they would in his, and Caro•duly emended
them5' But it is very unlikely that, for instance, the member of the Sforza
family to whom Antonio Cornazzano sent a copy of his work on the
art of dance — probably Duke Galeazzo Maria — heeded the poet's plea,
`Emendami to son, se scritto ho male' (Emend me, you alone, if I have
written badly) 52
Invitations to correct were particularly popular in Neapolitan dedi-
cations. The collection of lyric verse by Giovanni Aloisio, composed by
147o-1, is preceded by a letter to the Barone di Muro in ONB, MS 3220*,
probably the dedication copy. The poems, writes Aloisio at the outset,
have been put together at the baron's request and are to be polished by
him. Later he is more specific about the baron's role as editor and pub-
lisher of the text on his behalf. `te priego vogli primo, ovunche to pare,
con la toa docta lima examinarlo et emendarlo. Emendato the sia, se ve
parrà puplicarlo, porrà forsi con dilecto più securo in altrui mane per-
venire' (I ask you to be the first to examine and emend it, wherever you
wish, with your learned polishing. Once it is emended, if you wish to
publish it, it can perhaps come into others' hands with a surer pleasure)53
When Pietro Jacopo De Jennaro decided in 1486 to offer a collection of
his poems to Giovanni Tommaso Moncada, count of Aterno, he wrote
that he had decided to dedicate them as they stood: he was incapable of
1, Opere volgari, III, 197. Alberti also invited corrections from Brunelleschi for the vernacular De
picmra (ibid., III, 8) and from Toscanelli and Bruni for the Intercenales (pp. 4, 86).
" Guidiccioni, Rime, p. lxxxviii.
Mazzi, `II °libro', 7; Bruni and Zancani, Antonio Cornazwno, pp. 31-3. The only surviving
manuscript, BAV, Capponiano 203, begins with the verses in terza rima with which Cornazzano
presented this copy, followed by the sonnet with which he had originally dedicated the work to
Ippolica Sforza.
S3 Sanragata, La lirica aragonese, pp. 1-23, 174-81 (p. 177).
P Addresses to readers in manuscript 213
polishing them himself and he therefore placed his hope in Moncada's
sublimely wise correction (`sperando al corregimento de la tua sublime
sagacità') 54
The sole extant manuscript containing a collection of Benedetto
Cariteo's verse, written on vellum and owned or at least prepared
for the future King Ferrante II by early 1495, opens with a prologue
addressed to Cola d'Alagno and contains a political canzone that has
its own prologue to Don Alfonso d'Avalos, marquis of Pescara. Both
these prefatory texts refer to a process of correction by the dedicatee.
The general prologue tells D'Alagno that Cariteo is giving the poems
desired by him `non perché io mi persuada che siano degne di uscire
in luce, ma perché, del tuo delicatissimo ingegno correcte et emendate,
possano andare per ogni loco, senza paura de li invidi' (not because
I believe they are worthy of publication, but so that, once corrected
and emended by your fine intelligence, they can go anywhere, without
fear of the envious). Don Al ónso alone was to correct the canzone; `[e]
t di poi che li haverai data forma, ti prego vogli darla come cosa tua,
si cognoscerai sia degna di tanto honore' (and once you have given it
form, I ask you to give it as your own, if you consider it worthy of such
an honour) 55
Iacopo Sannazaro's dedication to Cassandra Marchese of a collection
of youthful poems (`queste mie vane e giovenili fatiche [ ... ] finalmente in
picciolo fascio raccolte'; these vain and youthful labours of mine, finally
gathered in a small bundle) appears at the end of the posthumous edition
of his Sonetti et canzoni (Naples: per Ioanne Sultzbach, 1530), but must
derive from a manuscript source: it relates only to the second part of this
edition. The letter probably dates from soon after the poet's return from
France to Naples in 1504. Sannazaro here asks Cassandra to take on an
editorial role by discarding poems that are worse than mediocre, then in
effect to publish the others scribally, though (with a nod to the proem of
the Decameron) only to women readers: `acciò che da tal principio le studi-
ose donne assecurate, non si sdegnino leggere quelle che accettate saranno
da la ingeniosa e gran Cassandra' (so that, reassured by such a beginning,
studious women do not disdain to read those that have been accepted
11De Jennaro, Rime e lettere, pp. 43-4.
" Cariteo, Le rime, I, Ivii—lix, II, 459-62. The editor P&copo's source here is the undated Venetian
edition of Manfrino Bon. Uis was derived from the Neapolitan edition of 1506, itself based on
a source close to the surviving manuscript: Concini, `II codice De Marinis', pp. 17-18; Mmossi,
`Il primo canzoniere'.
214 Authors and their readers
by the clever and great Cassandra). In spite of this encouragement, the
dedicatee does not seem to have given wide circulation to the gift 56
Another Neapolitan example comes from outside the context of lyric
verse. Minturno's letter of dedication to Mai, mentioned above, asks
the Spaniard not to publish his work unless he has corrected the texts:
`vehementer to rogo ne exeat aut ita corrigas ut audeat exire' (I earnestly
beg you that it should not go forth, or that you should correct it so that it
dares to go forth)57
So far we have been considering aspects of dedicatory paratexts that
exploit the relationship between the dedicatee on the one hand and the
author and the work on the other. While the portrayal of this relation-
ship could, as has been suggested, be intended to influence indirectly the
reading of the work by others, these addresses may also seek to influence
reading in an overt manner. They can fulfil the more general purposes of
proems or prefaces, which are, as Genette states, to show why and how a
text should be reads' In particular, they can explain the nature and pur-
pose of the work and justify choices of subject-matter or language, thus
dealing in advance with possible criticisms and directing the reader (not
only the dedicatee, of course) towards a certain way of approaching the
work.
These prefatory functions sometimes dominate dedications. Poliziano's
letter to Federico d'Aragona is devoted mainly to an account of the origin
of his work on the Raccolta and a subtly nuanced appraisal of the qual-
ities of the poets represented in it. Visconti, in presenting his canzonieri
to their successive dedicatees, justifies his writing about love. Correggio
explains to Isabella the origins of his Tabula: how it arose out of impro-
visation in which he used the story of Cupid and Psyche to persuade lovers
to `live a quiet life', how the verses were then copied down by others while
he improvised them but how, deprived of his musical accompaniment,
they seemed like a woman whose ugliness had previously been concealed
by ornament59 In the `prefazione' of the Republica fiorentina, Giannotti
considers at some length the transition from tyranny to republic before
explaining why it is appropriate for him to address his treatise to Cardinal
56 Sannazaro, Opere volgari, P. 135, For the context, see Dionisotti, Appunti sulle rime', 176-8;
Santagata, La lirica aragonese, pp. 302-3, 329, 336. On Sannazaro's limited use of print, see the
Conclusion.
57 Carrai, `Minturno traduttore', 234.
a Paratexts, pp. 196-236. Trovato notes an early use of the term prefazione in the manuscript
dedication, c. 1479, of Giovanni Brancati's translation of Pliny's Natural History: Con ogni dili-
genza corretto, p. 25.
59 Correggio, Opere, pp. 49-50-
i Addresses to readers in manuscript 215
Niccolò Ridolfi.'o Giulia Bigolina's letter to Bartolomeo Salvatico,
dedicatee of her Urania, written in about 1556-8, explains in detail the
genesis of her work, the only surviving prose romance by a female author
of the Italian Renaissance.'
Prefaces, unlike dedications, did not usually speak to readers in the
manner of a letter. But they were sometimes addressed explicitly to all
readers or to a category of readers through the use of the second person
plural or with an introductory `To the reader' formula. Two of Alberti's
Intercenales have general proems that at one point address readers in the
vocative, in one case as `invidi' (envious, book 8), in the other as `studi-
osi' (learned, book Io).11 Addresses of this kind are occasionally found in
sixteenth-century scribal publication. Muzzarelli added a brief note Allo
lettore' at the end of his Amorosa opra in order to explain why he had
not mentioned his beloved by name.'3 Domenico Venier and Benedetto
Corner address three sonnets `a i lettori' at the start of the collection men-
tioned in Chapter 3 Section 4, describing what is in store for readers (fols.
1'-2°), and Venier asks them in a concluding sonnet what they thought of
the book (fol. 207r). In the dedication manuscript of Giambullari's Regole
della lingua fiorentina, after the letter to Francesco de' Medici, there is
a short letter Al lettore benigno' (To the kind reader), using the second
person singular, in which the author justifies his close use of Thomas
Linacre's Latin grammar.6 4 This was a point that needed to be made out-
side a dedication addressed to a young boy, but it could have been made
within the body of the text. A much longer address is found in one of the
collections of short stories by Pietro Fortini, Le giornate delle novelle dei
novizi, written in Siena probably in the 1540s and 1550s. Here the dedica-
tion to Faustina Braccioni, which describes the work apologetically as a
`mal composto libro', is followed by a letter Al lettore' in which Fortini
discusses at some length his readers' possible reactions. He defends him-
self against the accusation of rashness in writing in the genre of the
Decameron; his justification is his compassion for young people who
spend their time in `veglie' (the traditional oral entertainments of Sienese
society) and telling stories. Fortini seems to contradict the spirit of his
gift of the work to Braccioni by declaring that he wants it to be dedicated
not to `qualche idolo' (some idol) who will defend it against criticism but
6o
Giannotti, Republica fiorentina, pp. 69-72.
6'
Bigolina, Urania, pp. 71-83, and see p. 27 for the suggestion that BTM, MS Triv. 88 is probably
the autograph presentation copy.
62 Alberti, Intercenales, pp. 532, 6o6.
6, Muzzarelli, Amorosa opra, pp. 97-8.
'1
Giambullari, Regole, p. 5.
2,16 Authors and their readers
to anyone who will do so.65 Both Giambullari and Fortini evidently felt,
though for different reasons, that a letter of dedication was not the proper
place to state their position to readers in general. However, addresses to
readers in general are rare in scribal publication, and instances such as
those just noted from the 1540s or i55os seem influenced by the practice of
printed editions .61
2 ADDRESSES TO READERS FROM MANUSCRIPT
TO PRINT
Throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, as we have seen, dedi-
cations to individuals provided authors with their main opportunity to
speak to those who read their works in manuscript, and their practices did
not change significantly. Only rarely were manuscript prefaces or prefa-
tory notes used to address openly the generality of readers. The main other
kinds of paratexts used in scribal culture were titles, names of authors
and, for certain kinds of works, commentaries and glosses. In print, how-
ever, the number and nature of paratexts developed in response to new
needs. Printed editions were generally aimed at wider publics and were
the result of a significant commercial investment. In an effort to attract
and engage a multiplicity of readers, the range of printed paratexts grew
considerably and came to include a higher proportion of non-authorial
texts. To what extent, though, did the use of printing bring about an evo-
lution within printed addresses to readers?
When authors published their works in print during the Renaissance,
they frequently addressed individual readers in ways very similar to those
just described — a confirmation, if one were needed, that dedicatory para-
texts could be used as open letters to the public at large. One kind of
evidence that points to a continuity of approach is that of transfers of a
dedicatory letter from one medium to the other: in such cases changes
are usually minimal. Sabadino's dedication of his collection of short stor-
ies, Le Porretane, addressed to Duke Ercole I d'Este, is found both in the
autograph manuscript (BNCF, MS Palatino 503) and in the first edition,
printed in Bologna by Enrico de Colonia. The relationship between the
65
'Ihe letter to Braccioni is signed by Fortini in Siena, Bibl. Comunale degli Intronati, MS I VII
19-19,. See Fortini, Legiornate, pp. io—ii.
66
An only apparent exception is the `Epistola dell'autore de' libro exortatoria alli devoti lectori
della presente opera' (JRM, MS Ital. 7, fol. 5`1 in Le giornate, composed by Lorenzo Violi, a
follower of Savonarola, around 1538-40. Violi probably intended his work for print: Garfagnini
in Violi, Le giornate, p. xxxvii.
a Addresses to readers from manuscript to print 217
two texts is not straightforward. The edition is dated 1483 but was probably
produced between 1492 and 1498, and the manuscript has authorial correc-
tions made after the printing. Both could depend on a common source, or
the manuscript text might be derived from the printed one. It is notable,
though, that there are very few and merely minor differences between the
two versions.67 The original manuscript letter dedicating Bembo's Stanze
to Ottaviano Fregoso, dated 1507, is almost identical to that printed in
his Rime of 153o; Bembo made only a small number of formal and lexical
changes.68
The complex story of the evolution of Castiglione's I1 libro del corte-
giano also contains some elements of continuity in the author's addresses
to a single reader as the work moved from manuscript to print. Castiglione
circulated versions of his masterpiece in manuscript within his circle for a
number of years from at least 1518 (and probably earlier, since in a work of
that year Ludovico Ariosto referred to him as the `formator del cortigiano')
up to the period in which he organized its first printing, carried out in
Venice in 1528. His surviving preparatory manuscripts consist of some
sketches dating from 1513-15, one incomplete redaction of 1514-15, a com-
plete one of 1515-16, another finished by 152o-1 and the manuscript sent for
printing in 1527. Throughout these phases, Castiglione used proemial reflec-
tions in his authorial voice to introduce his dialogue. At first, he offered one
proem before a dialogue conceived as a single unit, then separate proems for
the books into which it was subsequently divided. These introductory pas-
sages were integral to the text rather than distinct from it and paratextual.
In some of them, the author addressed another courtier, Alfonso Ariosto,
Ludovico's second cousin, using the second-person singular voi. (In the
redaction of 1514-15, the name of the person addressed is missing through
the loss of a leaf.) From the first complete redaction onwards, the headings
of individual books are, in the majority of cases, followed by `a In. Alfonso
Ariosto'. Thus, although there is no dedicatory letter in any of the manu-
script versions, Castiglione selected a single courtier friend as the initial
reader to whom he was directing his work .69
In September 1518 Castiglione expressed an inclination to publish his
Cortegiano in print: he wrote to Sadoleto that friends were forcing him
against his will to `lasciarlo andare' (let it go), and to Bembo that he was
urged by many to `darlo fuori' (give it out). From the second complete
6, Stoppelli in Sabadino, Novelle porretane, pp, xxxv—xxxviii; Basile in Sabadino, Le porretane,
PP. 593-6o7, 613.
68 Bembo, Stanze, pp. 3-4. " Quondam, `Questo povero Cortegiano', pp.
57-73. 471-525•
218 Authors and their readers
redaction of 1520-1, then, Castiglione's versions were drafted with print
publication in mind. Nevertheless, almost all the proemial material pre-
sent in the version of 1515-16 was retained in this second redaction. Some
changes were made within it: for example, Castiglione now stated that he
was writing at the suggestion of Alfonso alone, rather than in response to a
request made by Alfonso on behalf of the French king. But the alterations
were introduced because of changed political circumstances or for reasons
of balance, rather than because of Castiglione's intention to publish in
print. In the printed edition of 1528, he added an opening dedication,
prefatory in nature, to the Portuguese bishop and diplomat Miguel da
Silva. Alfonso had died in 1525, and Castiglione could then have decided
no longer to address himself to his friend. Instead, and in spite of the add-
ition of the dedication, he kept to his original intention, in the manner of
scribal publication. The heading of each of the four books is followed by
`a Messer Alphonso Ariosto', and the introductions to the first and third
books retain the second-person address to him?°
However, in printed editions the use of second-person paratexts does
alter in some respects, not surprisingly in view of their capacity to reach
a much wider readership. In authorial dedications, one can find a justifi-
cation of the use of print publication, and the sense of needing to guard
the work against possible criticisms can be particularly strong. Girolamo
Britonio told Vittoria Colonna in the dedication of his Gelosia del sole
(Naples: Sigismondo Mayr, 1519, fols. A2°—A3) that he would have waited
longer before sending this lyric collection to her, but his hand had been
forced by unauthorized and inaccurate scribal circulation: `gran parte di
lei essendo contra mia voluntà di fuori, et incorrettamente molte rime
leggendonosi, in simil guisa a voi mi parve inviarla' (since most of it had
been published against my will, and many poems were being read incor-
rectly, I decided to send it to you in this form). Protected by her reputa-
tion, however, the work would not attract `malivolo giuditio' (malicious
criticism)?'
Castiglione's dedication of the Cortegiano to Silva says nothing about
the dedicatee and does not ask him to play any role in the publication of
the book sent to him, though of course Silva's name alone would have
added its own authority to the volume and would have indicated the pro-
file of an ideal reader.7Z On the other hand, the dedication includes an
Ibid., pp. 471-5251 U. Motta, Castiglione e il mito di Urbino, pp. 297-330. 38 5-443•
71 Britonio may previously have dedicated some of his verse to Colonna in manuscript•. Grippo, `La
Gelosia del sole', 12 n. 30.
J2 U. Motta, Castiglione e il mito, pp. 299 -300.
i
1
a Addresses to readers from manuscript to print 219
account of how Castiglione had had to hasten into print without as much
revision as he would have wished, because Colonna had had a copy made
of the manuscript he had lent her and this had fallen into the hands of
many men in Naples who wished to have it printed. Castiglione provides,
too, an extensive defence against comments from critics who must have
read the work in manuscript. He rebuts above all the reproof that his lan-
guage did not imitate Tuscan, which by 1528 had become the standard in
most printed books.
Bernardo Tasso showed no anxiety about the use of print when pub-
lishing his lyric poems, the Amori, but he did feel it necessary to provide
a justification of his poetic technique. As well as dedicating each book
to a noblewoman in conventional terms, when books I and II appeared
together in Venice in 1534 he added a prefatory letter addressed to the
man he was serving as secretary, Ferrante Sanseverino, and in this letter
he provided a detailed defence against anticipated attacks on his poetry
and its language. Tasso evidently did not feel that this rather technical
discourse belonged in his dedication of book II to Sanseverino's wife,
Isabella Villamarina. Only at the end of the letter to Sanseverino did
Tasso touch on a traditional dedicatory theme by alluding to his debt to
his master.
One function of the recipient of second-person-singular paratexts that
could no longer be invoked in print was the editorial one: authors' requests
that dedicatees should improve the text before circulating it were specific
to manuscript culture. As the character Eugenio observes in Giovanni
Fratta's dialogue Della dedicatione de' libri (Venice: Giorgio Angelieri,
i59o), by the end of the Cinquecento authors rarely gave texts absolutely,
but instead retained the power to correct and have them printed and
reprinted as they wished (fol. 1331. Both of the prologues in which Cariteo
(as mentioned in Section i) invited a dedicatee to correct his verses were
retained in the first printing of his Rime in 1506, but this edition was
probably not produced under the poet's control. When a collection was
prepared for printing in 1509, Cariteo, or the editor Pietro Summonte on
his behalf, decided that these dedications were inappropriate in the new
medium. Indeed, in printed editions it became not uncommon to invite
corrections from all readers73
In view of the more open nature of printed paratexts, it was prudent
for an author to verify the response of a potential dedicatee in advance
of publication. Nicolò Liburnio sent the fourth of his Selvette to Isabella
71
Richardson, Print Culture, pp. 25-6.
220 Authors and their readers
d'Este in 1512 in order to see if she would respond favourably to it before
he had all seven printed; she did so, and the edition of May 1513 was duly
dedicated to her.74 Duke Francesco I de' Medici was responding to a
prior request when he wrote to the theologian Alessandro Maranta in
1581 to express his appreciation of the writer's labours and to say that his
dedicatory letter needed no emendation 7S Maranta's enquiry must have
concerned his Panspermion, printed in that year in Venice by Francesco
Ziletti. After the doctor Vincenzo Buondi had dedicated a `Christian and
pious' translation of his to Francesco's father Cosimo without first obtain-
ing his permission, he wrote to the duke in 1564 to ask pardon for his
presumption?' It would have been especially important to check the reac-
tions of potential dedicatees when publications were religious in nature.
The principal innovation in printed authorial paratexts lay, however,
not in addresses to single readers but, from an early stage, in the increased
use of prefaces overtly directed to readers in general. These readers were
sometimes described in a way that indicated they were well disposed or
right-minded. A favourite term was `studiosi', whose sense hovers between
`learned' and `devoted'. Such paratexts had the same functions as other
prefaces or proems but were characterized by their use of the second
person plural, as in a letter. They thus tended to be distinct from the
main body of the work, more clearly so than a normal preface 77 As a
few examples will show, they were generally more technical in nature
than dedications, covering points of methodology and language, and
they could be plainly factual, though some made open use of persuasive
argumentation in order to win readers over.
At the start of his vernacular translation of the Legenda aurea by Iacopo
da Varazze, printed in Venice by Jenson in 1475-6, Nicol' Malermi
inserted a letter A tutte le devote et catholice christiane persone' (fol. [1]1°;
To all devout and catholic Christians). He wrote to them just as he might
have done to a dedicatee: he wished to bring them pleasure, he offered
this account of saints' lives as a `dono' (gift), he had been spurred on by
his love for them and by the exhortations of friends. Yet the readership
he envisaged was extremely broad, including `li posteri nostri, et tutti li
altri in diverse parti de l'Italia sitibundi de le optime sancte historie' (pos-
terity and all others throughout Italy thirsting for the best holy stories).
- Luzio and Renier, La coltura, pp. 172-5. 75 ASF, MdP, 2S7, fols. 5.
15.
76 Ibid., 503a, fo1.1,191.
77 this development is in line with Genette's cautious suggestion that separate prefaces, as opposed
to ones incorporated in the text, appear by the mid-sixteenth century and in the printed book:
Paratexts, pp. 16 3-70-
2 Addresses to readers from manuscript to print aai
Even more elaborate, and necessarily so, was Giovan Francesco Fortunio's
address to his readers in his Regole grammaticali delta volgar lingua, the
first vernacular grammar to be printed in Italy (Ancona: Bernardino
Guerralda, 1516). Fortunio was an independent spirit who, for both cul-
tural and political reasons, was at odds with the Veneto in which he had
spent his formative years and who was now working in a neighbouring
state. Not surprisingly, he chose not to dedicate his work. Instead, he
prefaced his grammar with a letter Agli studiosi Bella regolata volgar lin-
gua', in other words to students (and supporters) of a vernacular governed
by rules such as those he was providing, based on Trecento Tuscan. Since
this approach to the vernacular was relatively new and controversial,
Fortunio spent only a few words describing the genesis of his work before
responding in more detail to actual and future critics of his aims and
methods. His procedure was to win over his readers by addressing them
in positive terms as `sincerissimi lettori miei' and `della volgar lingua stu-
diosi' and implying that all those seriously concerned with the vernacular
were on his side; his opponents were excluded from his discourse, alluded
to only in the third person 7'
Some authors published works with both a dedication and a letter to
readers, using the latter to set out more technical points, as Bernardo
Tasso did in the letter to Sanseverino mentioned above. Francesco Alunno
offered his dictionary La fabrica del mondo (Venice: Nicolò Bascarini,
1548) to Cosimo I, explaining in a letter (fols. +ar —+3') that, if works were
usually dedicated to those who were to defend them with their author-
ity, the duke was the best recipient of this work on language. But there
follows a letter of the author Alli saggi, et giudiciosi lettori' (To the wise
and judicious readers, fols. +4"—+ 5r) that asks them, too, to defend his
work against any malicious criticism. Like Malermi, Alunno was making
his gift to all: `questo dono, ch'io faccio hoggi al mondo' (this gift that I
make to the world today).
The first and last of the opening paratexts of Alunno's edition are
anonymous sonnets that invite readers to gaze with wonder on the ver-
bal edifice created by him. These illustrate another practice characteristic
of print rather than of manuscript culture: verses by one or more other
writers in praise of the work, placed at the start or sometimes at the end
of the volume, and similar in function to the laudatory quotations that
nowadays can be placed on a book's covers and elsewhere in order to help
market a work.
78 Fortunio, Regole, pp. 3-11.
0p11_
222 Authors and their readers
A sign that, by the first half of the Cinquecento, authors and readers
were all too familiar with the practices described above is Berni's mock-
ery of them in one of only two of his works printed during his lifetime,
the Capitolo del gioco della primiera with his own commentary (Rome:
Francesco Minizio Calvo, 1526). His dedicatory letter, addressed to a
fictitious person and signed with a fictitious name, pokes fun at the
conventions of the genre. Like Britonio and others, Berni claimed that
he had been forced into print, but his alleged motive was simply to
avoid the drudgery of scribal publication following requests from many
people: `avendoghel'a dare, mi bisognava o scriverlo o farlo scrivere' (if
I was to give [the Capitolo] to them, I needed either to copy it out or
to have it copied). He had decided to dedicate the work to `qualche
buon compagno' (some good fellow) rather than to a patron, but then
he made the same demands on this person that he might have made
on a patron, asking him to defend the text with his `autoritY, which
of course was non-existent. This sham dedication is followed by a capi-
tolo signed by a fictitious Nigi Sermollini offering praise that is at once
hyperbolic and naive: the finest book he has ever seen, even though he
has seen a few. Then comes a tailed sonnet in which yet another ficti-
tious figure addresses the reader and reprises the practical stance that
the dedicatory letter had adopted on the subject of manuscript publica-
tion. The author of the commentary is not ambitious, the sonnet says,
but he was being bothered by people asking him to give or lend a copy
of the work and then not returning it, and he has therefore ordered it
to be printed; those who wanted it so much are now urged to go to the
bookshop and buy a copy 79
The transition from manuscript to print gave rise not only to these
developments in the roles of authors but also, it seems, to two strikingly
new species of paratext: dedications and addresses to readers that were
not written by authors.$° They usually but not always present works by
authors no longer alive and are signed by editors or by printer-publishers,
though it is unlikely that many of the latter would have written these
texts themselves. An early and well-known series of such dedications is
that written by Giovanni Andrea Bussi during his collaboration as edi-
tor with the printers Conrad Sweynheim and Arnold Pannartz in Rome
between 1468 and 1472. Almost all Bussi's letters offer the edition to one
71 Romei and others (eds.), Ludi esegetici, pp. a9-35 (quotations from p. 29).
81 The letter to readers byTeofilo Mochi in his transcription ofllprincipe (BCR, MS Cors. 43•B•35,
fol. 3'; see Machiavelli, De principatibus, pp. 39-40) was clearly intended for print; this kind of
paratext was not possible in scribal culture.
a Addresses to readers from manuscript to print 223
person, usually Pope Paul II." Nevertheless, he sets out to inform all
readers of his editorial practice, describing some of the difficulties he has
encountered and acknowledging the help of others. His desire to address
a wide audience through the dedicatee is evident in the dedication of
the second volume of the letters of St Jerome (1468 and í47o), where he
begins with a `tu' addressed to the pope but ends with a plural `vos' that
embraces his `amantissimi atque optatissimi lectionum comites et castae
latinitatis studiosi' (most loving and dear companions in reading and stu-
dents of pure Latinity). Elsewhere, Bussi uses the pope as an intermedi-
ary: at the conclusion of his dedication of Virgil (two editions, 1469 and
1471), he entreats all `studiosi', through the pope, to welcome his labours,
and he invites them to receive his Lactantius (1470) from his dedicatee."
The novelty of what Bussi and contemporaries such as Giovanni Antonio
Campano were doing — providing what were in effect prefaces in the form
of dedications of the works of others — was condemned in 147o by Bussi's
leading critic, Niccol6 Perotti, who claimed to have excised this `deform-
ity' from almost all the editions he bought.83
Editors and publishers of printed vernacular texts, especially those of
canonical authors such as Petrarch and Boccaccio, regularly described
and justified their approach in letters addressed to the reader. A case that
fits into Genette's category of apocryphal authorial paratexts84 is the let-
ter of `messer Giovanni Boccaccio al lectore' that prefaced the Decameron
printed in Florence in 1516 by Filippo Giunta. Sometimes the reader
envisaged was given a more precise physiognomy. The Giuntine Corbaccio
of the same year had a preface directed `A gli amatori della lingua toscana'
(To lovers of the Tuscan language); the Venetian Decameron of 1516 was
addressed by its editor Alle gentili et valorose donne' (To gentle and wor-
thy women), while in that of 1525 the bookseller-publisher Nico16 Garanta
recommended the edition A gli candidi lettori' (To sincere readers). A
letter signed by Bernardo Giunta identified ideal readers of the anthol-
ogy of Sonetti e canzoni di diversi antichi autori toscani (1527) in terms of
8, The fourth epistle, placed (significantly) at the end of the edition e, Caesar (1469), neither names
nor addresses a recipient. In view of what Bussi says about the haste with which this edition
was produced, he probably did not wish to dedicate it. In the second edition of Virgil (1471),
Bussi retains the original letter to Paul but addresses it to the humanist Pomponio Leto, presum-
ably after the pope's death on 26 July. The last edition (1471-7) is dedicated to Paul's successor
Sixtus IV. See Bussi, Prefazioni, pp. 28-9, 41-3, 70-84. For a preface of Bussi's not dedicated
to a pope, see Davies, `Juan de Carvajal', 2or—i5. On the dedications of Giovanni Filippo De
Lignamine, see Farenga, `II sistema delle dediche'.
L
Bussi, Prefazioni, pp. 5-11. 41-3, 48-
'1 Monfasani, `The first call', 25-6; Trovato, Con ogni diligenza corretto, p. 26.
'4 Genette, Paratexts, pp. 179-80-
224 Authors and their readers z Addresses to readers from manuscript to print 225

age, tastes and perhaps social class, addressing them as `gli suoi nobiliss. explicitly addressed to a plural readership grew in number in print, but
gioveni amatori de le toscane rime' (his most noble young lovers of Tuscan they drew on the traditions of scribal paratexts: in these too, as we have
verse). The text of the letter addresses young Florentine citizens (`Gooveni seen, writers presenting their works to individuals in acts of author
è cari Cittadini miei', fol. AAi'-"), seen as the rightful and legitimate heirs publication could still implicitly address themselves to the wider reader-
of Petrarch (`giusti è legitimi heredi di quello', fol. AAZ°). Implicitly, the ship that they could legitimately expect to reach through the secondary
author was excluding or at least downgrading readers from other states, processes of user publication.
who did not have Petrarch in their DNA.
Aldo Manuzio sometimes referred openly to the functions of his dedi-
cations to individuals. In the letter to Guidobaldo da Montefeltro that
accompanied a collection of astronomical texts printed by him in 1499,
he reflected on the conventional use of the `praefatio' as a shield and on
dedications as a means of conferring authority. He stated in the letter
offering his Lucan (1502) to Marcantonio Morosini that he had decided
to dedicate all his books to learned friends with a letter outlining their
subject-matter (`tanquam eorum argumentum').'5 But he always had a
wide readership in mind. His first dedication, to Alberto Pio (1495), opens
by mentioning all contemporaries and goes on to outline his plans, as
a printer, to benefit all `studiosi'. There are similar references to serving
`studiosi' in other dedications to individuals." Even more significantly,
Aldo's editions, especially the earlier ones printed between 1495 and 1501,
are characterized by his prominent use of paratexts — in Latin, Greek or
the vernacular — in which he addresses, indeed reaches out to, readers
in the plural, designating them variously with terms such as `studiosi',
`studiosi bonarum litterarum' (students of good literature), `adolescent[es]
studios[i]', teachers of literature, friends, the friendly reader, dearest reader
or simply the reader.
Aldo's dedications and prefaces, which had a strong influence over
those of other editions of classical and vernacular texts, reflect a clear
sense of a broad community or public of readers, transcending the
boundaries of scribal networks — a `literary republic' as he called it in
1502.87 This sense of shared interests was undoubtedly able to develop
more fully in the context of print. However, notwithstanding these and
other developments, the second-person paratexts of the younger medium
had deep affinities with those of manuscript publication. Dedicatory
letters continued to be used in order to confer authority on texts as
well as to seek personal benefits for the persons offering them. Prefaces

Ar
Aldo Manuzio editore, pp. 26-7 (and cf. p. 82), 59.
Ibid., pp. 6-7 (Pio), and similarly e.g. pp. 9 (Battista Guarini), 31 (Girolamo Donato), 107
(Andrea Navagero).
87 Ibid., pp. 61, 63, 69; see, too, Waquet, `Qu'est-ce que la République des Lettres?'
OW
CHAPTER 6
Orality, manuscript and the circulation
of verse
This chapter considers the interaction of manuscript culture with oral
culture — and, to a lesser extent, of both with print. The transmission of
literary texts in Renaissance society was dominated by the written word;
many texts were not intended to be heard by listeners and would never or
rarely have been diffused vocally. None the less, the voice still had a per-
vasive, valued and occasionally even essential role to play in the social cir-
culation of some kinds of literature, and it could be used in conjunction
with the pen, sometimes preceding it, more often following its use and
based on it. Of course, one would expect orality to be involved in trans-
mitting texts that were inherently related to performance, such as political
and forensic orations, academic lectures, sermons and plays. Such works
were designed to be delivered or deliverable before an audience that had
gathered to listen to them, although not all of them were actually per-
formed or were not performed as written; some plays, for instance, were
probably composed in the expectation that they would be read aloud in
private rather than staged.' Leaving aside such genres, though, we find
that other types of literary text could still be diffused viva voce for one
reason or another. The opening section of this chapter will contextualize
the discussion by considering some general factors that encouraged and
facilitated a culture of performing texts, whether manuscript or printed,
to one or more persons, as opposed to providing them in writing so that
they could be read silently. (`Performance' will be used in a broad sense
of rendering a text aloud, whether casually or in the context of a more
formal event.) We shall then focus more closely on the interface between
orality and manuscript in the transmission of verse, looking at the prac-
tice of performing poetry in speech or song and at the complementary
roles played in its diffusion by performed and handwritten texts.2
Barish, `The problem of closet drama; Sampson, "`Drammatica secreta"', pp. 107-8-
For some further examples and discussion, see Richardson, "Recitato e cantato"'.
226
z Performing and listening 227
I PERFORMING AND LISTENING
Why might someone have wished to transmit a written text through the
spoken voice? The motives for reading a text aloud to others might have
been eminently practical. It is the quickest way of communicating a text
to a gathering of people, and it costs nothing. Listeners might not have
been able to read the text for themselves, maybe because their level of lit-
eracy was not high enough, because their eyesight was poor or because
the text had to be translated from a language they did not understand. As
for the person reading aloud, he or she might not wish to lend the written
text, perhaps in order to maintain confidentiality. A less prosaic reason for
which reading aloud was preferred by both reader and listener might be
that it created a bond between them during the moment of performance.
And a listener, then as now, might wish to hear how a text was interpreted
by its author, by a friend, by an expert performer and so on. If the text
was performed by its creator, the sense of authorial presence, as outlined
in Chapter I Section I, would have been at its strongest.
The reading aloud of religious works in the mid to later sixteenth cen-
tury probably involved more than one of these considerations. In a Holy
Office trial that took place in Venice in 1548, Franceschina, the wife of
a silk weaver, was said to have had her husband's apprentice read to her
and her husband from the Bible (presumably in translation) on Sunday
mornings. It is possible that the couple was illiterate, but husband and
wife may have preferred to share the experience of hearing the text. In the
same year, a witness recounted that a jeweller, maestro Girolamo, read to
a turner and his son from a book in his shop; he was unable to say what
the book was about because they were careful not to let others see it .3
Records of another Venetian trial suggest that the cobbler Nicol6 dalle
Monache of Conegliano invited passers-by to enter his shop and hear
him read from an unnamed book in 1549; he no doubt wished to spread
an unorthodox religious message. There is other evidence of the reading
aloud of `heretical' books in artisans' workshops, private houses and even
churches.4 In one case at least, the listeners might have found it diffi-
cult to read the text for themselves: Pietro Antonio da Cervia testified in
Modena in 1567 that he read heretical books in the vernacular, including
a translation of Calvin, to the eighteen soldiers who guarded the city gate.
We do not know precisely why in the same city one Pellegrino Civa read
I
Martin, Venice's Hidden Enemies, pp. 83, 173.
4 Rozzo and Seidel Menchi, `Livre et Réforme en Italie', pp. 368-9; see, too, the case of Severi,
mentioned in Chapter 4 Section z.
w-
228 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
to Cataldo Buzzale most of the Tragedia del libero arbitrio by Francesco
Negri, former Benedictine turned Lutheran, the first two editions of
which were printed in Basel in 1546 and in Venice the following years
A shopowner was accused in Venice in 1583 of singing prohibited works
from memory all day long. It was not a mere formality, then, that when
an inquisitor, in 1598, listed those whom the faithful should denounce as
diffusers or receivers of books or writings by heretics, he included those
who listened to them (`Chi [ ... ] ascolta libri, o scritti d'heretici'; `libri'
probably refers primarily to printed books, while `scritti' seems to refer to
manuscript texts). However, orthodox believers also listened to readings,
as in the case of the illiterate nuns in Perugia who listened attentively to
the Scriptures.'
In instances from around the first half of the Cinquecento involving
other kinds of writing, a text could be read aloud to others even when
it could probably just as well have been handed over for silent read-
ing. A letter sent by Maria Savorgnan to Bembo on 20 July i5oo sug-
gested he should give, as his reason for visiting her, a desire to read her
the prose and verse of his manuscript Asolani: `dite, mo the avete ocio,
verete a legere it vostro libro' (say that, now you have the time, you will
come to read your book)? Firenzuola invited Caterina Cibo to read (pri-
vately) or to listen to someone else reading aloud from the manuscript of
his Ragionamenti, as she preferred, and in a later work he claimed that
Pope Clement VII enjoyed the sound of his own voice (`il suono the gli
rendeva la voce sua stessa') when reading this work and another work in
prose for several hours before a distinguished audience! Giannotti read
to Nicolò Dolfin the whole of his manuscript treatise on the Venetian
republic .9 Sometimes the entertainment function of reading was made
explicit. While on a visit to Capodimonte, Claudio Tolomei composed a
pair of speeches in Tuscan for members of the Accademia Bella Virth in
Rome; they were written, he stated in his dedication to Giovanni Battista
Grimaldi of zo March 1544, `solo per essercitar due gioveni nel recitarle, e
per trattener mold virtuosi spiriti ne l'ascoltarle' (just to train two young
men in reciting them and to entertain many virtuous spirits in listening
to them).'° On 1 October of the same year, Lorenzo Pagni used the same
verb trattenere (also one of the key terms in Castiglione's description of the
4Bianco, `La comunità di "fratelli"', 648, 650-1. ' Fragnito, Proibito capire, pp. 270, 281.
7 Savorgnan and Bembo, Carteggio, p. 6. ' Firenzuola, Le novelle, p. 12; Opere, p. 717-
9 Gilbert, `the date', 179-80.
° The Due orazioni in lingua toscana were printed only in 1547, in Parma by Seth Viotti: Hobson,
Apollo and Pegasus, pp. 6o, 115 and fig. 39.
z Performing and listening 229
functions of the courtier) in a letter to Pier Riccio: he recorded that Duke
Cosimo I was unwell with a chill in the villa of Castello near Florence, `et
hora sta a udire to Stradino the legge l'historie per trattenerlo' (and he is
now listening to Stradino [Giovanni Mazzuoli] who is reading histories
to entertain him)."
Texts were not only read aloud from the page: they could be performed
from memory. Developing the ability to memorize was an integral part
of the educational process. It allowed texts to be learned and then recited
freely on a later occasion, and passages from authors or textbooks could
be called to mind for purposes of imitation or quotation. Learning texts
by heart was strongly encouraged by the authors of the foundational
fifteenth-century works on education, who would have recalled that for
Cicero memory was the fourth of the five parts of rhetoric, preceding
the oral delivery of a text (De oratore, 1. 31. 142). Maffeo Vegio wrote in
his De educatione liberorum et eorum claris moribus, completed in 1444,
that a good teacher should accustom his students to memorize texts that
would serve as examples for imitation. Enea Silvio Piccolomini recom-
mended the daily training of a child's memory of illustrious authors in
his Tractatus de liberorum educatione of the same year.12 Niccolò Perotti
asked at the outset of his much-used Latin grammar, the Rudimenta
grammatices, written in 1468, what was the first sign of intelligence in
children; the answer was `memoria'.13 At the start of the sixteenth century,
Aldo Manuzio wrote in his Latin grammar that he wanted teachers to
make pupils concentrate on memorizing only the most learned authors.'¢
Although he did not wish too much time to be spent learning mnemonic
verses about grammar rules, he provided them just as earlier grammars
had done.
The skills of memorization and recitation were brought together by
Alberti in the early 1430s in his dialogue Della famiglia, when the char-
acter Lionardo Alberti says that children should read, recite and mem-
orize works by leading classical Latin prose writers.'5 Battista Guarini,
too, recommended the combining of these practices in his De ordine
docendi et discendi, composed in 1459. For him, reading aloud (`clara
lectio') was a means of understanding a text better — and incidentally,
he claimed, good for the digestion. In particular, Virgil's poems and
" ASF, MdP, 1171, fol. tar.
" Garin (ed.), R pensiero pedagogico, pp. 186 (Vegio), 238 (Piccolomini). On the importance of
memory in medieval education, see Carruthers, The Book of Memory, e.g. P. 156.
Black, Humanism and Education, p. 135. ~4 Aldo Manuzio editore, P. 40.
" Alberti, Opere volgari, I, 71.
230 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
Cicero's letters were to be committed to memory and declaimed so that
students would appreciate the rhythm of verse and acquire an elegant
and fluent prose style.'
Of course, texts outside the curriculum, too, were recited from memory;
nor was the ability to memorize texts restricted to the males who had
attended school. In Chapter 1 Section 3, we saw Poliziano's account of the
young Lucrezia de' Medici learning by heart poems by her grandmother
Lucrezia Tornabuoni. In Venice, the weaver Paolo Gaiano, when accused
of commenting on the wealth of the Church, responded by reciting a son-
net of Petrarch's (no doubt one of the `Babylonian' sonnets, Canzoniere,
136-8) that he had heard when the Church was being criticized during a
conversation in a shop.'?
Torquato Tasso got into trouble as a nineteen-year-old student in
Bologna because of his ability to recite from memory some defamatory
verse that he had very probably composed. He was summoned before
a tribunal in 1564, accused of writing a satirical pasquinade or several
short poems that mocked his fellow-students and some teachers, and
of declaiming them to his friends and others. One witness claimed that
Tasso `ne recitt6 una trenta o quaranta versi a mente' (recited about thirty
or forty lines by heart). When asked how many poems Tasso spoke from
memory, another responded: `non to so, ma al mio credere potevano
essere da 5o o 6o' (I don't know, but in my view they could be 50 or 6o).
However, Tasso was careful not to write down the poems and could con-
fidently deny having composed them, though he admitted reciting them.
No incriminating evidence was found when his rooms were searched; the
transcriptions of snatches of verse in the court records come from the wit-
nesses' recollection of his recitations. Tasso took the wise precaution of
not responding to requests to appear in court."
Raffaele Brandolini pointed to another link between memory and per-
formance in his De musica et poetica. Like his brother Aurelio, Raffaele
improvised Latin verse to his own musical accompaniment on topics
proposed to him by his listeners. The extempore performer, he argued,
needed a good memory in order to develop a train of argument, to cover
" Garin (ed.), Il pensiero pedagogico, pp. 462, 448, 452•
Mackenney, Tradesmen and Traders, P. 184. In her notes on sermons by fra Mariano da Gennazano
made in the 1480s, Margherita Soderini implied that she was working from memory: 'Se ci fusi
manchamento sarebe mio difetto, non arei tenuto bene a mente' (If there were any error it would
be my fault, I would not have remembered well). Zafarana, `Per la storia religiosa', r,o19 n. 6.
R Tasso, Le lettere, no. z to monsignor Cesi, z9 February 1564 (I, 12,9-32, and see I, 301-2);
Solerti,
Vita, I, 85-90, III, 3-15 (PP. 4, 9)-
i Performing and listening 231
a long span of time (his subject might be a historical one) and to include
everything that his audience had requested.'9
What value might be added to words, in the perception of listeners,
when they were heard in performance? A strong reason for using the voice
was that it could bring out the aural potencies of a text, qualities that
were merely latent on the page. This belief was upheld by Leonardo Bruni
in his De studiis et litteris liber, a treatise on women's learning written in
the 142os. Bruni advised that a woman studying Latin literature should
read texts aloud so that she would gain a full sense of their rhythms and
harmonies." Some emphasized the pleasure that listeners could derive
from the performing voice. Descriptions of performances can reveal a
fascination with the qualities of the voice when it transmitted a text to
others, over and above the qualities of the text itself. This is the case with
Poliziano's undated description of the eleven-year-old Fabio Orsini sing-
ing, at a dinner, a heroic ode that the boy had composed in honour of
Piero de' Medici. As soon as they went to table, Poliziano recounted, the
boy, who was the host's son, was ordered to sing, together with expert
musicians, some poems transcribed with musical notation (`notata Musicis
accentiunculis carmina'). The listeners' ears were immediately penetrated
by the sweetest voice and they were touched by a truly divine pleasure.
Poliziano says nothing about the poem itself, but he was especially struck
by the modulations of the voice:
Vox ipsa nec quasi legentis, nec quasi canentis, sed, in qua tamen utrunque
sentires, neutrum discerneres: vatic tamen, prout locus posceret, aut aequalis,
aut inflexa, nunc distinta, nunc perpetua, nunc sublata, nunc deducta, nunc
remissa, nunc contenta, nunc lenta, nunc incitata, semper emendata, semper
clara, semper dulcis.
(His voice was neither like someone reading nor like someone singing, but
such that you heard both, yet neither separately; it was varied, however, as the
words demanded, either even or modulated, now punctuated, now flowing, now
exalted, now subdued, now relaxed, now tense, now slow, now hastening, always
pure, always clear, always sweet.)'
The character Gismondo in Bembo's Asolani stresses not the variety of
the voice but the different perceptions, and hence diverse pleasures, that
the same voice can arouse in different listeners. He describes the delights
to be obtained by lovers from listening to the beloved's voice, from reciting
" Brandolini, On Music and Poetry, pp. 90, 104. " Garin (ed.), Il pensiero pedagogico, p. 15o.
Letter to Pico della Mirandola in Poliziano, Opera, pp. 165-6; translation from Walker, Ticino
and music', p. zo. See, too, Pirrotta and Povoledo, Music and Theatre, pp. 35-6.
232 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
their poems to one another or from hearing women singing, especially
accompanied.22 In Castiglione's Il libro del cortegiano, the character
Bembo is made to echo this sentiment: the courtier, he says, should enjoy
not just visible beauty but also `con l'audito la suavità della voce, il con-
cento delle parole, l'armonia della musica (se musica è la donna amata)'
(with his hearing the sweetness of the voice, the concord of the words, the
harmony of the music (if his beloved lady is a musician))."
These last passages are of course concerned with relations between
lovers, but texts could give special pleasure when performed in speech
or song in other contexts. One example — and others will be seen later —
is Aretino's account of a reading aloud of Speroni's manuscript Dialogo
dell'amore in Venice in 1537. Behind the fulsome description, one can note
how he depicts the act of listening to a text as simultaneously pleasurable
and spellbinding:
il Grazia con la graziosa maniera ha recitato in casa mia graziosissimamente il
vostro Dialogo, a la cui armonia, senza più respirare, due dì, uno doppo l'altro,
stetero appese le caste e dote orecchie del buon Fortunio e le mie, quali esse si
sieno.24
([Niccolò] Grazia with his graceful manner has recited in my house most grace-
fully your Dialogue, on the harmony of which the chaste and learned ears of the
good Fortunio [Spira] and my own, whatever they are worth, hung transfixed
for two consecutive days.)
Some Cinquecento literary theorists analysed the properties of texts that
would have been brought out most fully only in speech or song. Bembo
gave close attention, in the second book of his Prose della volgar lingua,
to the means of creating the two qualities that for him made any writing
beautiful, `gravità' (gravity) and `piacevolezza' (pleasantness). He discusses
in detail three factors that confer these qualities: `suono' (sound), `numero'
(rhythm) and `variazione' (II. 9-18). Analysis of the sound of verse when
pronounced recurs in the Avertimenti nel poetare (1591) of Giulio Cortese
of Naples.15 Cesare Crispolti, in a lecture on the sonnet (Lezione del son-
etto) given in Perugia to the Accademia degli Insensati in about 1592,
discussed the vowel and consonant sounds that produce `piacevolezza'
and `gravità', referring explicitly to Bembo's Prose. He explained that the
sonnet is a lyric poem, `perché simili sorti di componimenti anticamente
- Bembo, Gli asolani, II. 25,1505 text pp. i6z-3, ß3o text pp. 295-6-
,3 Castiglione, Il libro del cortegiano, IV. 62 (p. 528).
z4 Aretino, Lettere, no. 139 to Speroni, 6 June 1537 (I, 209—u).
~5 Weinberg (ed.), Trattati, IV, 177-92.
z Performing and listening 233
si cantavano alla lira, et oggidì ancora molto vagamente si cantano da
alcuni alla viola' (because such kinds of compositions were sung to the
lyre in antiquity, and still nowadays are sung very beautifully by some
to the viola).21 The term `viola' in this period was used fairly loosely with
reference to a number of bowed stringed instruments, including not only
the viol, usually played held downwards, but also the seven-stringed lira
da braccio, held against the left shoulder and designed for chordal playing
(Figure 14).27
Those writing on poetry in ottava rima could give similar attention to
the auditory effect of sequences of lines of verse. Giraldi, in his Discorso
intorno al comporre dei romanzi completed in 159.9, compared two octaves
from Bembo's Stanze of 1507 in respect of the effect they had on the ear.
One, starting `Che giova posseder cittadi e regni' (42), is broken up into
four pairs of hendecasyllables; it was felt to flow like a tranquil and pleas-
ant river, `onde ne piglia l'orecchio gran diletto' (from which the ear takes
great pleasure). The other, starting `Questa novellamente a' padri nostri'
(24), uses enjambment, but Giraldi felt uneasy about its sound: `se ne va
a guisa di torrente [ ... ] con suono piuttosto poco piacevole, che no' (it
goes along like a torrent [ ... ] with a sound that is unpleasant rather than
the Opposite)." When Giraldi wrote of the use of linked stanzas of ottava
rima in narrative poetry in preference to terza rima, he considered the
context of actual recitation or of the recitation that authors could feign
within their written texts. He suggested earlier in the same Discorso that
the eight-line unit was chosen by the first writers of romanzi because it
provided a pause within the larger narrative for both `quello che dice' (the
speaker) and `quello che ascolta' (the listener).29
A decade later, Ruscelli listed the attractions of ottava rima for the writer,
but then slipped seamlessly into a consideration of the benefit of the stanza-
end pause both for a reader (with a mention of the tongue that suggests
someone reading aloud) and for someone listening: `Onde con tanta leggi-
adria così chi legge, come chi ascolta, aspettando, alla guisa che nel suono,
la cadenza della stanza nella sua chiusura, si rasserena tutto quand'ella
viene, prende posa con la lingua, o con l'orecchie et sopra tutto col pensiero'
(Hence with such elegance both reader and listener, waiting, just as with the
sound, for the cadence of the stanza at its close, feels complete calm when it
comes, and finds repose for tongue or ears and above all for thought)30
" Ibid., IV, 193-205; pp. 202-4 on the sounds, quotation from p. 196.
" For example,'vivuola' and `lirá are considered synonymous in Firenzuola, Le novelle, P. 55•
" Giraldi, Scritti critici, pp. 1o9-1o. '' Ibid., p. ioo.
° Ruscelli, Del modo di comporre, chapter 7, fol. i7°.
234 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
Varchi, in his dialogue L'Hercolano, printed posthumously in 1570,
follows Aristotle's Poetics, 1 in identifying the three components of
imitation, in other words of poetry, as rhythm (`numero'), harmony
(`harmonia') and diction (`dizzione' or `sermone'). One can imitate
by speech alone, he says, but anyone who pronounces verses generates
rhythm, through long and short syllables, and harmony, through the
rise and fall of accents. Thus the ideal is a combination of all three
components, a realization of the poem in performance: `onde non si
può nè immaginare ancora cosa alcuna da intelletto nessuno nè più
bella, nè più gioconda, nè più utile the it favellare humano, a massima-
mente nella rappresentazione d'alcuno perfetto poema convenevol-
mente da persone pratiche e intendenti recitato' (so that no intellect
can imagine anything more beautiful, more joyful ormore useful than
human speech, especially in the representation of some perfect poem
when it is recited by people with experience and understanding).31
Varchi seems at first to be referring to spoken recitation alone, but his
example is the sung improvisation of Silvio Antoniano, to which we
shall return.
In considering why texts might be disseminated socially through per-
formance, we have already begun to see that song, as well as speech, could
play an important role in this process. Some fifteenth- and sixteenth-
century writings have more to say on the benefits that music, and in par-
ticular song, could have for performers and listeners alike.
Margaret Bent has underlined the serious attention that humanist
educators of the Quattrocento devoted to the study of music. Pier Paolo
Vergerio recalled in his De ingenuis moribus et liberalibus studiis adu-
lescentiae (1400-2) that the Greeks instructed their children in letters,
wrestling, music and drawing. Socrates wanted youths to be educated
in singing and playing the lyre in order to govern the movements of
the soul by rule and reason. The calming effects of music led Vergerio
to recommend its study: `cum ad remissionem animi, sedandasque pas-
siones plurimum valeat modulationis usus, turn vero ejus disciplinae
cognitio digna est ingenio liberali' (since the use of melody contributes
a very great deal to relaxation of the mind and allaying the passions,
knowledge of its discipline is worthy of the liberal mind). The practice
of music seems to be for Vergerio, Bent observes, `a natural extension
of study of the liberal arts'; nor was his advice simply a following of
Greek precepts, since he excluded most uses of drawing from a liberal
31 Varchi, L'Hercolano, II, 877-8-
i Performing and listening 235
education .32 Both Vegio and Piccolomini were wary of the possible
corrupting effects of music. However, Vegio's De educatione listed music
as one of the four skills to be studied, and Piccolomini argued in his
Tractatus that a moderate knowledge of the right sort of music, taught
by the right sort of people, should form part of a prince's education:
`Plurimum nanque spiritus reficit et ad tolerantiam laboris exhilarat
mentes non immodicus neque lascivus musicorum concentus' (Musical
harmony, if it is neither immoderate not sensual, raises up spirits greatly
and makes minds more tolerant of labour). The biography of Vittorino
da Feltre by Sassolo da Prato defends the discipline of music, and that
by his pupil Francesco da Castiglione affirms that the great educator had
his pupils trained in the practical study of music by suitable teachers 33
It was for the sake of his children (`per li mei pucti') that the Milanese
statesman Cicco Simonetta sent someone to ask Milan's ambassador in
Venice between 1471 and 1475 to have transcribed in a single book all
the canzoni by Leonardo Giustinian and any other fine ones in the cur-
rent repertory, adding: `in doe o tre canzone fati fare le note del canto
per intendere Faere venetiano' (in two or three canzoni have the notes
of the song written to hear the Venetian melody), and asking for a boy
singer-lutenist to be sent too 34
Towards the end of the fifteenth century and in the context of
Neoplatonic philosophy, the influential writings of Marsilio Ficino
showed esteem for the value of music and of song. He saw music as less
important than poetry but as closely connected with it, since both pos-
sessed aural qualities.31 For Ficino, some of the benefits of song were
therapeutic. In the first book of his De vita he recommended `dulcedo
lyrae cantusque' (the sweetness of the lyre and song) as an antidote to
the melancholic humour, citing his personal experience." Ficino wrote
in an undated letter to Antonio Canigiani that song often helped him
find peace of spirit: `Ego autem [ ... ) post theologiae, vel medicinae studia
gravioribus fidibus cantibusque frequenter incumbo, ut caetera sensuum
oblectamenta penitus negligam, molestias animae, corporisque expellam,
mentem ad sublimia Deumque pro viribus erigam' (I [ ... I frequently
dedicate myself to the more serious strings and songs after the study of
Bent, 'Music and the early Veneto humanists', pp, ro5-6. See, too, Garin (ed.), Il pensiero peda-
gogico, pp. 132-4-
33 Garin (ed.), Ilpensieropedugogico, pp. 194 (Vegio), z86-8 (Piccolomini),
0-30, 544 (Vittorino).
34 E. Motta, `Musici alla corte degli Sforza',
553—S; G. Billanovich, `Per l'edizione critica', p. 221;
Rubsamen, 'The Justiniane', p. 173-
35 Kristeller, The Philosophy ofMarsilio Ficino, pp. z65, 308
-9-
1, Ficino, Three Books on Life, I. 10 (pp. 134-5)•
236 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
theology or medicine, in order to neglect the other pleasures of the senses,
to expel the troubles of Soul and body, and to elevate the mind as much
as possible to sublime things and God).37 Ficino also wrote in the third
book of his De vita of the ability of song to link our spirit with the celes-
tial influence.3$ Brandolini, similarly, wrote later that music `non corporis
modo, sed animi etiam morbos sanat' (heals illnesses not only of the body
but also of the spirit).39
Further, Ficino believed that song was a powerful means of transmit-
ting thoughts and emotions. Its effect on man was stronger than anything
perceived through the other senses, because the medium of air, in which
music is transmitted, is of the same kind as the human spirit. Whereas a
text influences the mind alone, a song affects the whole person, spirit and
body as well as mind.¢° In the letter to Canigiani mentioned above, he
wrote of the effects of singing:
nam quum cantus sonusque ex cogitatione mentis, et impetu phantasiae, cord-
isque affectu profiscatur, atque una cum aere facto et temperato, aereum audien-
tis spiritum pulset, qui animae corporisque nodus est, facile phantasiam movet,
afficitque cor et intima mentis penetralia penetrat.
(since song and sound come from the thought of the mind, from the impulse of
the imagination and from the passion of the heart and, together with the broken
and formed air, move the air-like spirit of the listener, which is the bond of Soul
and body, it easily moves the imagination, affects the heart and penetrates the
innermost sanctuary of the mind.)4'
Theorists of music and literature alike could see poetry as naturally linked
with music and enhanced by a sung realization. Brandolini's De musica et
poetica only hints at the interconnections between the two arts: he defends
them separately and restricts himself to saying that they arose together from
the noblest beginnings, that musicians and poets were considered to be the
same in antiquity and that `quam poetica sit musicae consentanea, turn grata
concentus dissimilitudine, turn veto accommodates ad cantum rebus plane
ostendit' (how well poetry goes together with music is shown plainly both
through the agreeable dissimilarity of its concord and the subjects fit for sing-
ing), but regrettably he does not develop these hints about their relationship .42
37 Ficino, Opera omnia, p. 651; translation from Kristeller, The Philosophy ofMarsilio Ficino, P. 308.
3' Ficino, Three Books on Life, III. 21 (pp. 358-9). On Ficino's singing to his `lyra orphica', see
Walker, `Ficino and music', pp. 19 -20.
39 Brandolmi, On Music and Poetry, P. 38.
°O Walker, `Ficino and music', pp. 3—u, 21; Allen, The Platonism ofMarsilio Ficino, pp. 51-5.
s' Ficino, Opera omnia, p. 651; translation from Kristeller, The Philosophy ofMarsilio Ficino, P. 307-
1, Brandolini, On Music and Poetry, pp. 12, 76-7.
i Performing and listening 237
However, Gioseffo Zarlino of Chioggia, in his Istitutioni harmoniche first
printed in 1S58, goes beyond the commonplace that in antiquity music and
poetry were inseparable (II. 6) and delves into the topic much more deeply
than Brandolini had done. He considers `Quali cose nella Musica habbi-
ano possanza da indurre l'huomo in diverse passioni' (II. 7; What things
in music have the power to lead man into different passions). Four things,
Zarlino argues, allowed ancient musicians to create their emotional effects:
1
11Harmonia', `il Numero' (rhythm), `la Narration di alcuna cosa' (the nar-
ration of something) and `la Oratione, overo il Parlare' (speech), together
of course with a well-disposed listener. His analysis is close to Varchi's, but
Zarlino explicitly contrasts singing with recitation. Speech alone can move
us, he says, but music makes its power greater:
Ma se '1 parlare [...] hà possanza di muover gli animi, et di piegarli in diverse
parti, et ciò senza l'Harmonia et senza il Numero, maggiormente haverà forza,
quando sarà congiunto co i Numeri, et co i Suoni musicali, et con le Voci. Et
tal possanza si fa chiaramente manifesta per il suo contrario: perciochè si vede,
che quelle parole muoveno men l'animo, le quali sono proferte senza melodia et
proportione, che quelle, che sono proferte con debiti modi. Però gran forza hà da
se stesso il Parlare, ma molto più hà forza, quando è congiunto all'harmonia, per
la simiglianza che hà questa con noi, et alla potenza dell'Udito.
(But if speech has the power to move spirits and to lead them in different direc-
tions without harmony and rhythm, it will have greater force when combined
with rhythms, musical sounds and voices. This power is demonstrated clearly
through its opposite, since one sees that words uttered without melody and pro-
portion move the spirit less than those uttered in the right ways. Thus speech on
its own has great force, but it has much greater force when joined to harmony,
because of the affinity this has with us, and to the potency of hearing.)
Nor does this apply only to the ancient world, Zarlino writes. In his own
times, too, music arouses different passions, `imperochè alle volte si vede,
che recitandosi alcuna bella, dotta, et elegante Poesia al suono di alcuno
istrumento, gli ascoltanti sono grandemente commossi, et incitati a fare
diverse cose, come ridere, piangere, overo altre cose simili' (II. 9; since
one sees from time to time that, when some beautiful, learned and ele-
gant poem is recited to the sound of some instrument, listeners are greatly
moved and incited to do various things, such as laughing, weeping or
the like). Yet, Zarlino goes on, composers of polyphonic vocal music
must still ensure that the words are clearly heard, in other words by using
block-chordal writing: `se pur molti cantando insieme muoveno l'animo,
non è dubbio, che universalmente con maggior piacere si ascoltano quelle
canzoni, le cui parole sono da i cantori insieme pronunciate, che le dotte
 2-3 8 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
compositioni, nelle quali si odono le parole interrotte da molte parti' (even
though many people singing together move the spirit, there is no doubt
that it is more pleasurable overall to listen to songs of which the words
are pronounced together by the singers, than to learned compositions in
which one hears the words interrupted by many parts). Later in his work,
Zarlino notes a custom of modern composers that, he says, is not to be
criticized, that of creating a consonance between words and music, so
that serious or sad matters are matched with low notes, lofty or happy
matters with high ones (III. 46). The words (`Oratione') come before har-
mony and rhythm, which serve them and must be fitting to their content
(IV. 32) .43
Antonio Minturno, writing in the 156os in his Arte poetica, saw music
and in some cases dance as adornments of lyric poetry. Verses, he says,
have their own harmony, consisting of rhyme; but `Ohre à questa har-
monia, la qual'è delle parole, adorna lei bellissimamente it concento della
Musica, et it ballo, the naturalmente seco ne vanno' (In addition to this
harmony, which belongs to the words, [lyric verse] is most beautifully
embellished by the concord of music and by dance, which go with it nat-
urally). Indeed, Minturno continues, `il canto' is one of the six essential
parts of lyric verse, since this is sung with instrumental accompaniment
in various kinds of public and private festivities, in theatres, churches,
palaces and sometimes in the piazza.44
Torquato Tasso's dialogue La Cavaletta, completed in 1585, uses the
authority of Dante's De vulgari eloquentia to help to establish the nature
of the link between poetry and music, citing Dante's definition of poetry
in Trissino's mistranslation as `una finzione retorica posta in musica> (a
rhetorical fiction set in music; Dante in De vulgari, II. iv. 2 had called it a
`fictio rethorica musicaque poita', a verbal invention composed according
to the rules of rhetoric and music). Music is considered by the poet Orsola
Cavaletti to be `la dolcezza e quasi l'anima de la poesia' (the sweetness
and almost the soul of poetry). Tasso, as a character, is more cautious:
he feels that Dante added music to his definition as an ornament, not as
something essential to poetry. Yet Tasso still sees the two arts as intim-
ately related, because he accepts the etymological links between, on the
one hand, the sonnet, the ballata and the canzone and, on the other hand,
accompaniment by instrumentalists, dancers and singers. The loftiest
43Zarlino, Le istitutioni harmoniche, pp. 67, 71-2, 75, 20 5, 339-40. For later reflections on the links
between poetry and music, see Bianconi, `Il Cinquecento e il Seicento', pp. 319-27-
44 Minturno, L'arte poetica, pp. 176, 178.
i Performing and listening 239
metric form, the epic, has least need of musical accompaniment, though
Orsola points out that she has heard Virgil sung `a la lira'. Tasso concludes
by calling for the canzone to be provided with music as an ornament. This
music should not be soft and effeminate, however; he appeals to the best
contemporary composers to bring music back to the `graviW from which
it has too often strayed.45
Short sections of the two greatest Cinquecento epic poems, Ariosto's
Orlando furioso and Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata, were, in fact, often set
to music, either as single stanzas or in groups of usually no more than F!
three or four stanzas, and Zarlino used musical settings of Ariosto as
evidence for the emotional force of music in his own day as in ancient
times.4' Nor were performances appreciated only by an elite public. Just as
in an earlier period there is evidence for the singing of Dante's Commedia
to listeners who were not learned, so Giovanni Bardi, in his lecture in
defence of Ariosto mentioned in Chapter 4 Section 3, insisted that these
settings of Ariosto were appreciated at all social levels. For those whose
literacy was poor or non-existent, or who did not have easy access to writ-
ten texts, performances such as these could have been a way of gaining a
basic awareness of forms of the literary language.47 Further evidence for
popular appreciation of Ariosto in music comes from a visitor to Italy,
Montaigne. When he was in Empoli on 2 July 1581, he noted as the second
of three reflections on rural life: `La seconda di veder questi contadini it
liuto in mano, e fin alle pastorelle l'Ariosto in bocca. Questo si vede per
tutta Italia' (The second [consideration is] seeing these peasants with their
lute in hand, and even shepherdesses with Ariosto on their lips. This is
seen throughout Italy). Montaigne was no doubt idealizing, but his other
two reflections are plausible ones, concerning people working on Sunday
and cut corn being left untouched in the fields.48
lr
41 T. Tasso, Dialoghi, pp. 640, 653, 665-8; Dance, De vulgari eloquentia, pp. 56-7.
41 The earliest known setting from the
Furioso, by Tromboncino, is the opening of Orlando's
lament on discovering Angelica's love for Medoro, XXIII. 126 in the definitive text, and was li
printed in 1517, only a year after the first edition of the Furioso. See Einstein, `Orlando furioso';
Balsano (ed.), L'Ariosto, la musica, i musicisti; Haar, Essays on Italian Poetry and Music, p. 94
(Tromboncino) and `From "cantimbanco" to court'; Zarlino, Le istitutioni barmonicbe, Part II,
chapter 9, P. 75 (and Cavallini, `Sugli improvvisatori del Cinque-Seicento', 24-5). For settings
from Tasso's Liberata, see too Vassalli, `Il Tasso in musica', pp. 6o-6. One stanza of the Furioso,
the start of Bradamante's declaration of fidelity to Ruggiero (XLIV. 61), was reworked in the
form of a villanella alla napolitana: Cardamone, The Canzone villanesca, I, 211-12.
47 Palisca, Humanism in Italian Renaissance Musical 7710ught, pp. 375-92; Haar, `From "cantim-
banco" to court' (quoting Sardi on pp. 180, 182 and 185). For oral performance of Dante, see
Ahern, `Singing the book'.
1, Montaigne,
journal de voyage, II, 170.
 240 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
A well-judged performance of a text could thus be perceived in the
Renaissance as capable of achieving more than a written text alone, and
of doing so in various ways. It could bring a sense of repose or pleasure in
the individual listener. It could provide an agreeable way of passing the
time in company; it might therefore also have a bonding social effect, just
as some forms of written communication did. It could bring out the full
potential of a text to arouse feelings. But in any context, both spoken and
sung performance could be perceived as adding something to the words
themselves. Nor was this mere theory, as a final practical example sug-
gests. When Maria Savorgnan wanted to express to Bembo how much
she was suffering because of her love for him, she referred to the musical
setting (by Marchetto Cara) of a poem, not just to the words themselves:
`Io poso chantare la chancion the dice Haimè it cor, aimè la testa, el primo
per amore di voi, chè ogni strada mi è chiusa di vedervi, la testa per gli
afanni sustenuti' (I can sing the song that says Alas my heart, alas my
head': the first for love of you, since every way of seeing you is closed to
me, the head for the pains suffered by me).49
2 THE PERFORMANCE OF MANUSCRIPT VERSE
Since the effects of performance were seen as so positive, it is not surprising
that in our period there is much evidence of the oral diffusion of verse,
particularly of shorter texts. This section will survey when and how this
diffusion took place, especially in relation to the use of manuscripts. We
shall see that there were several possibilities: poems might be recited or
sung, to a single listener or a group, either with a text or without one,
and in the latter case either from memory or in the first place improvised,
probably with some degree of premeditation. As in scribal culture, the
initial oral diffusion of a text to a restricted audience could be followed by
a wider publication, in oral or written form or in both.
Courtier poets read, or wished to read, their new verse aloud to
patrons. Antonio Valtellina, secretary of Nicco16 da Correggio, said he
had not sent some of his poems to Francesco Gonzaga, not wanting to
seem presumptuous `et maxime ch'io desiderava recitarle la prima volta'
(and especially because I wanted to recite them first)50 Ariosto recited
passages of the Orlando furioso to Isabella d'Este while he was composing
49Savorgnan and Bembo, Carteggio, p. 21; Pirrotta, Music and Culture, pp. 77-9; Prizer, `Games
of Venus', 9.
° Letter to Enea Furlano, 6 August r499, in Bertolotti, `Varietà' (188o), p. 85.
z The performance of manuscript verse 241
the poem. Even if this activity played no part in the two very pleasant
days that he helped her to spend, as she put it, `cum la naratione de l'opera
che '1 compone' (narrating the work he is composing) in 15o7, he certainly
read her `un poco' (a little) of the Furioso, from his draft manuscript, I
in Ferrara in 1512.5' Bernardo Tasso wrote from Antwerp in 1544 to tell
Ferrante Sanseverino that he had composed fifteen stanzas on the theme
of separation that the prince had requested, but that he wished to deliver
them orally rather than on paper: `Io non ve le mando, desideroso che
s'odano prima dalla voce mia, che vadano in mano degli uomini' (1 am
not sending them to you because I want them to be heard from my voice
before they go into men's hands). Tb is preference may have been related to
his patron's intention that these stanzas should be set to music. (Printed
madrigal collections contain settings of them by Bartolomeo Spontoni,
Alessandro Striggio, Giovanni Tommaso Lambertini, Giovan Leonardo
Primavera, Ippolito Baccusi and Giovanni Battista Gabella.)>z Torquato
Tasso, sending a sonnet to Leonora d'Este in 1573, implied that her court
poets would regularly read their verse to her: `11 sonetto non sarà punto
simile a quei belli che m'imagino che ora l'Eccellenza Vostra sia solita di
udire molto spesso' (The sonnet will certainly not be like those beautiful
ones that I expect your excellency is used to hearing very often)53
Similarly, verse was read to private individuals, sometimes by authors
themselves from their own manuscript copies. Torquato Tasso is said to
have recited his verse regularly to Speroni in Rome in 1575: `ogni sera fino a
due ore di notte andava a leggere certe sue composizioni di poesia al signor
Sperone' (every evening until two hours after nightfall he went to read
certain of his poetic compositions to Sperone) 54 Tasso did not appreciate
the reaction of a listener to two of his sonnets in 1576: `avendoli io detti,
mal mio grado, al Maddalò, li ascoltò con volto severissimo' (when I read
them reluctantly to Maddalò, he listened to them with a very severe face).
He was more reluctant to let Speroni hear some of the Gerusalemme lib-
erata; he told Scalabrini that `S'egli vuol udire i miei ultimi cinque canti,
leggieteglieli; ma io avrei caro che non si curasse d'udirli' (If [Speroni]
1, Catalano, Vita di Ludovico Ariosto, I, 289; II, 78-9 (Isabellás letter of 3 February 1507); Ariosto,
Lettere, no. 12 to Francesco Gonzaga, 14 July 1512 (p. 151)•
B. Tasso, Delle lettere, no. 1S7 (I, 3z5-6), and Rime, II, 18-2,1; Williamson, Bernardo Tasso,
pp• 47-50. In the first line of all but the last stanza, the sixth syllable is stressed; this may be
deliberate, since the same music could have been repeated for each stanza. For the settings, see
Vogel and others, Bibliografia, nos. 201, 1,024, 1.374, 2,275, 2,636, 2,672, 2,676 and 2,680.
53 T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 16, 3 September [1573] (I, 47-8).
sa Letter of Francesco Lazzara in Rome to Giovan Francesco Mussato, 31 December 1575, in Solerti,
Vita, II, 107.
r
242 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
wants to hear my latest five cantos, read them to him; but I would prefer
him not to care about hearing them)51
Verse might be recited to groups of people for purposes of information
or entertainment, in contexts where providing a handwritten copy would
have been an inappropriate or over-lengthy procedure, though such
a copy might be made available later. In February 1503 King Federico
of Naples, exiled in France, asked Sannazaro to recite two sonnets in
the presence of Iacopo D'Atri, Mantuan correspondent in the French
court; the author promised to let Iacopo have a copy of one of them and
of a Latin epigram so that he could send them from Blois to Isabella
d'Este, which Iacopo was able to do three days later, together with some
other sonnets.s' At the court of Urbino, on the last day of carnival in
1507, Bembo gave the first public performance, jointly with Ottaviano
Fregoso, of his own fifty stanzas on the benefits of love, `recitate per
giuoco' (recited in jest), as the full title of the poem put it. When Bembo
wrote to Fregoso two days later to ask him not to show his manuscript
copy of the Stanze to others because he thought they would be misjudged
if detached from their original festive context, he assumed they would be
heard as well as read: `ogniuno, the le sentirà o leggerà, se esse pure si
lasceranno leggere, non saprà the elle siano state dettate in brevissimo
spatio [ ... ], come sanno quelli, the le videro et udirono dettare' (anyone
who hears or reads them, if indeed they prove readable, will not know
that they were composed in a very short time [...]: as is known by those
who saw and heard them recited)57
A more formal context for recitation was the academic lecture on a
poem. A letter of Torquato Tasso to Lelio Tolomei, for example, refers to
both scribal diffusion of verse and its reading in an academy. He mentions
a sonnet by Claudio Tolomei that was sent to Torquato's father but that
`non si legge in istampa' (is not read in print); he sends a sonnet in reply
to one that Lelio had sent him; finally, he thanks Lelio for reading, and
S5 T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. S5 to Scalabrini, z9 February [1576] (I, 133); no. 71 to Scalabrini, 4 May
1576 (I, 174-5). `II Maddal6' was either Ercole or Maddal6 Fucci. Authors might also read their
plays to others: il Pistoia offered to read two acts of his comedy De amicitia to Francesco Gonzaga
in 1499 (D'Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, II, 375); Donato Giannotti wrote in 1544 that he
had read his comedy Il vecchio amoroso to Lorenzo di Filippo Strozzi the elder, and he also gave
Strozzi a copy (Ridolfi, 'Sommario', P. 97 n. 2); Torquato Tasso envisaged the reading aloud of
his tragedy Il re Torrismondo to `qualche amico e signor mio' (some friends and masters of mine),
in a copy to be transcribed by Scalabrini: Le lettere, no. 708 to Scalabrini, 14 December 1586 (I1I,
98-9)•
5e Luzio and Remer, La coltura, pp. 253-5; Dionisotti, `Appunti sulle rime', 167-8; Vecce, Iacopo
Sannazaro, pp. 50, 182-
57 Bembo, Stanze, pp. 3-4; quotation from the manuscript version.
z The performance of manuscript verse 2 43
presumably discussing, another of Torquato's sonnets in the Accademia
dei Filomati, recently founded in Siena51
As well as being recited in these ways, new verse was regularly
performed in song by solo performers or by a small group of singers.
Some metric forms were closely associated with musical performance
and must have been composed primarily with performance in mind,
as `poesia per musica': in particular, the barzelletta, the canzone villa-
nesca, the frottola and the strambotto.19 However, any verse, vernacular
or Latin, could be set to music. Bartolomeo Tromboncino reeled off
to the Venetian senate in 1521 a long list of all the kinds of verse for
which he had composed music: `Canzoni, madrigali, soneti, Capitoli
et stramboti, Versi latine, et ode latine, et vulgar barzelete frotole et
dialogi'."' Sequences of octaves could be sung, as in the cases of Jacques
du Pont's setting of Bembo's Stanze and the many settings of extracts
from Ariosto and Tasso.
Music might of course be composed for a specific piece of verse, but
the most common types of vernacular or Latin verse could also be fitted
to existing settings, what one might call `musica per poesia'. Ottaviano
Petrucci's ten surviving printed books of Frottole contain models to which
various verses could be sung: an `aere de capitoli', an `aer de versi latini',
a `modo de cantar sonetti'. For sonnets, three lines of melody were pro-
vided; these would be repeated four times, with the second line used twice
for the second and third lines of each quatrain. The first two lines of the
melody contain repeated notes that, as Haar points out, would allow for
variations in the stressing of syllables.61
Another means of providing verse for music already composed was to
write a contrafactum, that is, a completely new poem to be set to existing
music. This offered scope for imitation and, through a possible lingering
memory of the earlier text as in an aural palimpsest, for intertextual refer-
ence.12 Especially in Florence, laude and secular songs were frequently sung
to the same tune, indicated by the phrase `Cantasi come [ ... ]' (To be sung
like [ ... ]). Heinrich Isaac probably reused some passages of his mass Salva
nos in his setting of Poliziano's Latin threnody on the death of Lorenzo
5"
T. Tasso, Le lettere, no. 218, 2 October 1582 (11, 2t5—r6)•
59 Prizes, `The frottola', p. 5; Cardamone, The Canzone villanesca; Pirrotta, Music and Culture,
PP- 75-9, 175-97-
Haar, Essays on Italian Poetry andMusie, p. 52.
Pirrotta, Music and Culture, p. 76; Haar, Essays on Italian Poetry and Music, pp. 46, 169-70;
Boorman, Ottaviano Petrucci, pp. 1,076, 1,078.
Van Orden, `La chanson vulgaire', p. 93 (for France); G. Alexander, `The Elizabethan lyric' (for
England).
244 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
de' Medici.63 Niccolò da Correggio, however, envisaged an exchange
between two lyric poems when, in 1504, Isabella d'Este asked him to select
a canzone by Petrarch to be set to music. Correggio replied as follows:
Circa la cantione che Vostra Excellentia mi dimanda ch'io voglia ellegiere del
Petrarcha, perché la vole fargli fare sopra un canto, io ho ellecta una di quelle
che più mi piace, che comincia Sì è debile il filo a cui s'atiene, parendomi che
anche se gli possa componere sopra bene, essendo versi che vanno crescendo
et sminuendo, et aciò che la Excellentia Vostra conosca che la mi piace, gli ne
mando una mia composta a quella imitatione, aciò che facendo fare canto sopra
la petrarchesca, con quello canto medemo potessi anche cantare la mia, se la
non li dispiacerà, et non solo questa, ma anche un'altra de una reconciliatione
d'amore composta a foggia di quella pure del Petrarcha che comincia Chiare
dolci et fresche ague.
(Concerning the canzone by Petrarch that your excellency asks me to choose
because you wish to have it set to song, I have chosen one of my favourites, start-
ing `Sì è debile il filo a cui s'atiene'; it seems to me that one can also compose to
it well, since the verses increase and decrease in length. To show you that I like
it, I am sending you one of my own composed in imitation of it; thus, when you
have a song made for the Petrarchan poem, you could sing mine too, if it does
not displease you, to the same song. [I am sending] not only this one but also
another about a reconciliation in love, composed on the model of the one, also
by Petrarch, beginning `Chiare, fresche e dolci acque'.)
Correggio's two manuscript canzoni in Petrarchan form (beginning
`Quando uno effetto da alcun mal procede' and `Vita a me acerba e
longa') may, of course, have been written a little earlier, and not in order
to be set to music, but it is significant that he envisaged their performance
in this way. Correggio also provides a rare comment on a feature (in this
case, variation between hendecasyllables and settenari) that, for an author,
made one poem more cantabile and suitable for setting than another.64 A
very different request was made by Galeazzo Florimonte in 156o when he
wanted Tansillo to write `un'oda volgare secondo il numero e suono di
quella latina: O gloriosa domina, da cantare all'organo' (a vernacular ode
following the rhythm and sound of the Latin one `O gloriosa domina', to
be sung with the organ).65
" Cattin, 'Le rime del Poliziano', p. 381.
64
Luzio and Renier, `Niccolò da Correggio', 21, pp. 243, 247; Dionisotti, `Nuove rime', 163-5. The
canzoni are in Correggio, Opere, pp. 271-4, 402-3. On Tromboncino's setting of `Sì è debile il
filo' (Canzoniere, 37), printed in Petrucci's seventh book of Frottole (1507), see Pirrotta, `Before
the madrigal', 246-7. It is not certain that this was written for Isabella, since Tromboncino left
Mantua before 1504.
6S
Letter of Florimonte to Orazio Solimele, Tansillo's stepbrother, 7-8 December 1560, in Tansillo,
Poesie liriche, p. lxxxii.
z The performance of manuscript verse 2 45
Those who entertained others by performing verse to music could be
professional singer-instrumentalists. This occupation might be a humble
one, perhaps combined with other activities. A certain Zuanbattista
Sambeni, for example, who was drowned as a heretic in Venice in 1569, was
a dyer and also a street musician: `Io mi son delettato', he declared, `di can-
tar in banco et sonar di lira, et vado in qua et in là, in molte città' (I have
taken pleasure in singing in public and playing the lira, and I go here and
there, to many cities)." His `lira' must have been the bowed lira da braccio,
as depicted in Figure 14. Some public performers could achieve consid-
erable renown. A successful cantastorie (singer of narratives) of the early
Cinquecento was a Florentine named Cristoforo but known as 1 Altissimo.
In Piazza San Martino, a small square near Piazza della Signoria, he per-
formed on a few days each week the ninety-eight cantos of his romance,
the Primo libro de Reali. He travelled to Venice, and Sanudo gave an eye-
witness account of how Cristoforo operated there on io May 1518:
uno fiorentino poeta venuto in questa terra a la Sensa, chiamato lo Altissimo,
[...] montò in cariega facendo adunar gran numero di auditori [...]; il qual recita
versi a l'improvisa, uno sona la lira e lui li recita [ ... ] [M]a judicio meo fu tossa
fata a man e composta a Fiorenza, perchè disse bene. Poi mandò una confetiera
atorno zerchando danaro, e trovò certo numero, dicendo un'altra fiata diria a
l' i mprovisa.67
(a Florentine poet [came] to this city at the Ascension, called the Altissimo; [...]
he got up on a chair, gathering together a large number of listeners [...] He
recites verses extempore. One person plays the lira while he recites them [...] But
in my view it was something he had to hand and composed in Florence, because
he spoke well. Then he sent a plate round looking for money, and he got some,
saying on another occasion he would improvise.)
Professional singers were among those employed to entertain in
courts. Descriptions provided by Cristoforo di Messisbugo, steward to
the Estensi, of the music performed at banquets in Ferrara in 157-9 show
that a lira da braccio player sang `al modo d'Horpheo divinamente'
(divinely in the manner of Orpheus) during the fifteenth course of one
meal, and that `Canzoni, et Madrigali alla pavana' (in the rustic dia-
lect of Padua) were sung by Ruzante with five male and two female
companions during the sixth course of another." One performer who
C6 Martin, Venice's Hidden Enemies, p. 145•
" Sanudo, 1 diarii, XXV, 391; Renier in Strambotti e sonetti, pp. xii—xvii. On the Piazza San
Martino, see Kern, Cosimo de'Medici, pp. 43-54. On oral performance by cantastorie and others,
see Burke, 'Oral culture', 7-8, 12-16.
" Messisbugo, Banchetti, fols. A3°, B3; H. M. Brown, A cook's tour'; Cardamone, The Canzone
villanesca, I, 35-6; Prizer, 'Games of Venus', 35-6.
r 246 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
enjoyed great celebrity in courtly and intellectual circles was Serafino
Aquilano. Calmeta's biography, written shortly after the poet's death in
1500, recounts that Serafino learned early in life to sing Petrarch's son-
nets, canzoni and Trionfi, accompanying himself on the lute. He then
began to compose his own strambotti set to music (and it is likely that
he wrote at least the melodies to which his verse was sung). Serafino,
according to Calmeta, helped to build up his reputation in Rome by
using singing followed closely by publication in writing; this led many
other professional singer-performers (for whom Calmeta uses the eru-
dite term `citaredi', kitharodes) to learn Serafino's tunes and words and
then to spread his verse throughout Italy.19 During Serafino's lifetime,
then, the diffusion of his verse would have taken place through a dual
process of performance, by himself and others, and of manuscript cir-
culation. Only one major printed collection, from Brescia, probably
appeared before the Roman edition dated 1502, but it is likely that this
too was posthumous.
Amateurs, too, sang verse to an instrumental accompaniment. Gentlemen
and gentlewomen often received training in singing and playing and
were expected to have these abilities among their social accomplishments.
Castiglione wanted his ideal courtier to have the skill of `cantare alla viola
per recitare'. 7" Haar suggests that this phrase can be understood as `impro-
vised song or declamatory speech-song over instrumental accompaniment'. 7'
Amateurs could entertain small, select gatherings with songs. The Florentine
priest Baccio Ugolini, skilled in singing to the lira da braccio, performed
at the court of Mantua in 1480 the role of Orfeo in Poliziano's dramatic
poem, not printed until 14947' Isabella d'Este employed musicians such as
Tromboncino to set new verse for her to sing and herself wrote at least one
strambotto that was set to music. After 1514, when Sannazaro had returned
to Naples, Isabella acquired more of his manuscript verse from the marchese
di Bitonto (probably Francesco Acquaviva d'Aragona) by offering new songs
by Cara in exchange. The marquis specifically requested Cara's setting of
Castiglione's sonnet `Cantai mentre nel cor lieto fioria', which he had heard
Isabella sing in Pozzuoli in 1514. This poem had been printed for the first
time together with its setting in 1513, but the oral and manuscript modes of
" Calmeta, Prose e lettere, pp. 57-77 (pp. 62, 64-5). On Serafino as composer, see Pirrotta,
Music and Culture, pp. toi, 10 5, 112; La Face Bianconi and Rossi, Le rime di Serafino Aquilano,
PP• 6-7•
- Castiglione, Il libro del cortegiano, IL 13 (pp. 208-9).
7' Haar, Me Science and Art, pp. 2.5-6; see, too, Lorenzetti, Musica e identità nobiliare, pp. 8 3-90-
7? Pirrotta and Povoledo, Music and 7beatre, pp. 6-7, a3-5, 29-30.
z The performance of manuscript verse X47
diffusion were the important ones in the marquis's case?3 Raffaele Brandolini
mentions his own sung improvisations at the banquets of cardinals?4
Annibal Guasco advised his daughter Lavinia, in his Ragionamento printed
in 1586, to keep up her singing skills when she was at the court of Turin. In
her room, she was to practise singing and also to play instruments; but the
aim of playing was to improve her singing, and her ultimate aim should be
to sing well in company!'
The seventh of the conversations that Doni set on the steps of the cathe-
dral of Florence in I Marmi, printed in 1552-3, may reflect, albeit with
some adjustments for the literary context, actual practices of performing
manuscript texts in this city. It opens with a visitor looking forward to
hearing some verse, since (he says) in this city even prose is written in
verse. He has chosen his spot deliberately: `Ho caro d'esser qua, perché
so certo the a questi Marmi si soleva talvolta cantare all'improvviso su la
lira, e d'ogni sorte rime, the pareva the le piovessin giù da quella cupola'
(I am glad to be here, because I know for sure that on these marble steps
people used sometimes to sing with improvisation to the lira and all sorts
of rhymes, so that it seemed that [the rhymes] were raining down from
that cupola). He is in luck. Five Florentines arrive: a certain Visino, a fish-
erman called Nuto, a cobbler called Varlungo, and two of the founders
of the Accademia fiorentina, Giovanni Mazzuoli and Niccolò Martelli.
This small cross-section of Florentine society has met to exchange poetry
through spoken or sung performance or in handwriting. Visino, who has
71 Luzio and Renier, La coltura, pp. 255-7 (the marchese di Bitonto); Prizes, `Isabella d'Este'
(pp. 14-18 on Isabella's employment of musicians) and `Una "virtù molto conveniente"' (p. 27 on
the sonnet); Gallico, Sopra li fondamenti, pp. 39-44 (the strambotto).
Brandolini, On Music and Poetry, p. to6.
75 `Et havrai tu molte copie di libri da canto in camera; onde potrai cantarne hor uno, hor un'altro;
et à questo modo conservarti una prattica di poterli più sicuramente cantare, quando ti si presen-
tasse il bisogno: ma te ne voglio mostrar io una compagnia, la quale havrai sempre nella camera
ad ogni tua richiesta; cioè la viola da gamba bene accordata, con la quale ti potrai nel canto e nel
suono tutto à un tempo essercitare. E ti gioverà, come ti giovò di qui indietro, cotale strumento
pure assai nel canto. Et oltre alla viola, ottima compagnia ti sarà il clavicordo, strumento molto
più della viola compiuto; col quale potrai nelle sopradette cose da te stessa nel canto aiutarti'
(And in your chamber you will have to hand a great number of songbooks from which you will
be able to select now one song and now another, and in this way keep yourself in practice, so as
to be able to sing them with greater confidence whenever the occasion arises. But I want to show
you one companion you should always keep ready at your service in your chamber, that is to say,
a well-tuned viola da gamba, with which you will be able to practise both your singing and your
playing at the same time, and such an instrument will assist you greatly in your singing, as it did
up to now. And in addition to the viola, your clavichord will be the best of companions to you, a
much more accomplished instrument than the viola, with which you will be able to assist your-
self in the above matters on your own when you are singing). Guasco, Ragionamento, fol. E4`-",
and Discourse, P. 75 (translation slightly modified).
248 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
brought a lira with him, and the two other plebeians recite or sing five
strambotti. Martelli reads out a sonnet that has been sent to him from
Venice (he says he is collecting an anthology of verse and prose to be
printed) and produces a capitolo, addressed to Mazzuoli, that he asks Nuto
to read out. In return, Mazzuoli offers to give him a canzona composed
very recently. Martelli misunderstands him at first: `Non vo' canti', he
says, `ché io non son musico' (I don't want songs because I'm not a musi-
cian). Mazzuoli explains that these are words, those of Iacopo de' Servi,
a man who `disse già all'improviso a papa Lione, the sonava tanto suave-
mente la viola' (once improvised before Pope Leo, [and] who played the
viola so sweetly). 'Ibis manuscript poem is considered a precious posses-
sion: Mazzuoli refuses to explain how he has managed to come by it even
though Servi is so reluctant to let his works circulate. Martelli evidently
reads it on the page, since he admires the handwriting and approves the
absence of new sorts of punctuation. Visino reads aloud (without using
his lira) a capitolo that had arrived from Livorno only two hours previ-
ously. Members of the group then produce a variety of other poems — two
sestine, a sonnet, a ballata and two madrigals — which Doni inserted in his
text, though it is not clear whether they are read aloud .7'
Poets could take a close interest in the writing of music that was to
accompany their verse, and at least some wrote certain types of poetry
expressly to be set to music. This was often the case with manuscript
poems sent to the court of Mantua around the start of the Cinquecento.
Several of the letters addressed by Galeotto Del Carretto to Isabella
d'Este or her husband Francesco Gonzaga concern musical settings, first
by Tromboncino and then, after Tromboncino had left Mantua under
a cloud in 1501, by Cara. The poet reminded the marchioness in 1497
that she had not yet sent him, as she had promised, `alchuni canti de le
mie belzerette fatti per to Tromboncino' (some songs composed from my
barzellette by Tromboncino); he also asks, if possible, for `Lino aiere novo
de capitulo' (a new air for a capitolo). He received the `canti' soon after-
wards. In 1499, Del Carretto wanted Isabellx to have another barzelletta
set by Tromboncino and to have it sent back to him `cum qualche altro
canto novo' (with some other new songs). He sent further poems of his
to Mantua in the following year with a clear desire that the composer-
performer should collaborate in clothing his handwritten verse in music:
`el Tromboncino ha più a caro ad comporle et recitarle poi in canto a la
Ex.tia V. the quella le veda così ignude' (Tromboncino prefers to compose
" Doni, I Marmi, I, ro7-28 (pp. 1o8, 115); Nosow, `The debate on song', 177-9.
2 The performance of manuscript verse 249
them and then recite them in song to your excellency, than for you to see
them naked like this), A sense of collaboration between poet and musi-
cian — each providing something for the other — emerges, too, from a
letter of 1513 to the marquis Francesco in which Del Carretto asked that
Cara should send him some songs in return for the many barzellette and
other compositions that he had sent to the composer. Del Carretto may
have been satisfied, because in 1516 he sent a capitolo `in dialogo de tri
persone' (with three people in dialogue) to which Cara was to give `un
canto'.7 7
Niccol6 da Correggio, as was seen earlier, sent verse to be set to music
in Isabella's court in 1504. In March 1493 he had sent her a silva sung
during the recent carnival. In July of the same year Isabella asked him to
lend her a particular lira da braccio, to be used, as he put it, `in questi suoi
principij de imparare a sonarla' (as you start to learn to play it). Although
Correggio was unable to provide immediately the instrument requested,
he sent Isabella a pastoral eclogue in terza rimy that he described as `uno
capitulo da cantarli drento' (a capitolo to sing with it). A group of four
sonnets, of which only two survive, composed by Correggio `pel liuto
Bella marchesa Isabella' (for the lute of the marchioness Isabella) must
also have been intended to be sung by her.78 Bembo sent ten sonnets and
two strambotti of his to be recited and sung by Isabella in 150579
Members of the Strozzi family of Florence were closely involved in
the setting of contemporary verse to music. Lorenzo di Filippo com-
missioned settings from two Florentine composers, Francesco Corteccia
and Francesco Cei. It was probably he who arranged for the copying and
illumination of MS Basevi 2440 in the Biblioteca del Conservatorio of
Florence, a manuscript of three- or four-part secular settings in which
twenty-six of the fifty-six poems are his own.8o Lorenzo's nephew
'Turba, 'Galeotto Del Carretto', letters X, 14 January 1497 (p. 104); XI, 27 January 1497
(pp. 105-6); XXII, 13 March 1499 (p. 113); XXVIII, 11 November 1499 (pp. 117-18); XXXVII,
13 November 15oo (p. 127); LIX, 30 October 1513 (pP• 145-6); LX, 10 June 1516 (p. 146). All except
no. LIX are addressed to Isabella. At least two and possibly three of Tromboncino's settings sur-
vive in manuscript, print or both: Boorman, Ottaviano Petrucci, pp. 61o, 611, 616.
" Luzio and Renier, 'Niccolò da Correggio', 21, pp. 247-8; Prizer, 'Una "virtù molto conveniente"',
22. A silva consisting of 21 stanzas of ottava rima is in Correggio, Opere, pp. 97-104; the eclogue
is at pp. 339-45; the lute sonnets are at pp. 132-3. On Tromboncino's two settings of Correggio's
'Dialogo de amor' (Opere, pp. 458-6o), see Gallico, `Un "dialogo d'amor"'. In this capitolo, 49
lines long, a lover and Love speak alternate lines. In each version Tromboncino sets a terzina for
a voice (or two alternating voices) with musical accompaniment.
'9 Bembo, Lettere, no. 2o6, I July 1505 (I, 194); Prizer, 'Una "virtù molto conveniente"', 25-6, 49.
D'Accone, `Transitional text forms'; Fenlon and Haar, The Italian Madrigal, pp. 22-5. Lorenzo
was one of the scribes of BLF, MS Ashb. 6o6: Singleton (ed.), Canti carnascialeschi, pp. 461-2;
Prizer, `Reading carnival', 237-9.

250 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
Ruberto Strozzi was asked by his teacher Varchi in 1534 to arrange for one
of Varchi's epigrams to be set to music by Adriano Willaert in Venice.
Ruberto then asked Varchi to write a madrigal according to a certain met-
rical scheme (probably a contrafactum), to be sung by a certain Pulisena,
identifiable as Poissena Pecorina."
The expectation of a sung performance of a poem could dictate its
length. Bernardo Tasso told Ferrante Sanseverino that he had taken the
length of the musical performance into account when composing the
stanzas about separation that, as we saw above, the prince commissioned
from him. He went on to make some comments on how one should write
verse to be sung and on the complementary beauties of music and verse:
Sono quindici, e mi pare che, avendomi voi comandato che io le faccia perché
si cantino, che maggior numero avrebbe causato fastidio, e sazietà. Io ho usato
grandissimo artificio, affine che soddisfacciano al mondo; perché eziandio ch'io
non abbia giudicio di musica, ho almeno giudicio di conoscer quali debbiano
essere le composizioni che si fanno per cantare. Elle son piene di purità, d'affetti
amorosi, di colori, e di figure accomodate all'armonia: di maniera che se, come
v'è piaciuto di far a me fatica di comporle, vi piacerà ancora che miglior maestro
di musica ch'io non son di poesia pigli fatica di far loro un aere novo, e vago,
degno, se non della bellezza loro, almeno del desiderio di Vostra Eccell., spero
che fra l'armonia del canto, e la dolcezza delle parole, ne debba riuscire un non
so che di perfetto, che maravigliosamente ci diletti."
(There are fifteen [stanzas], and I think that, since you commanded me to write
them to be sung, a greater number would have caused weariness and satiety. I
have used the greatest skill so that they please everyone; for although I have no
judgement in music, I do at least have the judgement to know how compositions
written to be sung should be. They are full of purity, of amorous affections, of
colours and of figures suited to harmony. Thus if, just as it pleased you to give
me the task of composing them, it also pleases you that a better master of music
than I am of poetry should undertake to create for them an air that is new and
comely — worthy, if not of their beauty, at least of your excellency's desire — I
hope that between the harmony of the song and the sweetness of the words there
will emerge a certain perfection that may delight us marvellously.)
Some verse conceived from the outset as `poesia per musica' was banal
or even poor in quality, perhaps because authors were writing in order
to be understood immediately by listeners or because they felt that the
music could cover up the shortcomings of the text. A letter of Muzio
Manfredi purporting to have been sent to the musician Claudio Merulo
in 1591 mentions a previous gift of his printed madrigals and other `picciole
"'Agee, `Ruberto Strozzi', 1-3, rr-12; see, too, Fenlon and Haar, The Italian Madrigal, pp. 63-7-
` B. Tasso, Delle lettere, no. 157 (I, 325-6).
Amvmft~:
z The performance of manuscript verse 251
poesie scritte à mano' (little handwritten poems), and then observes that
musicians liked to set the latter kind of poems, short, made of words
rather than ideas, and of words that were delicate and `quasi vane' (almost
empty) rather than noble and expressive.S3 But verse that was performed
was not necessarily just of an `easy listening' kind; it might be high-
quality poetry that could also be appreciated by listeners.
Some of the examples discussed in this chapter have shown that there
could be improvisation or semi-improvisation during performance, whether
in the composition of a verse text or in any musical accompaniment, even
if not every supposedly improvised performance was as unprepared as per-
formers wished the audience to believe. The song of popular entertainers,
Haar suggests, `performed to a strumming accompaniment on an instru-
ment such as the lira da braccio, was not written down but made use of
stock melodic formulas that could [ ... ] be freely varied but must have been
recognizable to listeners as a part of the battery of performance skills that
made these singers enduringly popular'.84 A blind improviser, Francesco da
Firenze, worked in several northern Italian courts in the last three decades
of the Quattrocento, and a document of i47o shows how much Cardinal
Francesco Gonzaga appreciated his talents: `Fuit apud nos, in serviciis nos-
tris per plures dies dilectus familiaris noster Franciscus Antonii de Florentia,
cithare sono versuumque et historiarum multiplicium extemporali enun-
ciatione clarissimus' (In our service for several days was the beloved mem-
ber of our household Francesco d'Antonio of Florence, most renowned for
the sound of his lyre and the extempore performance of verses and many
stories).85 Sanudo mentions singers of this kind working in Venice in 1499:
In questi zorni, uno Hieronimo senese, diceva a l'improvisa su la lira, fu retenuto
per el consejo dei X per sodomito.
(In recent days a certain Girolamo from Siena, who was improvising on the lira,
was arrested by the Council of Ten as a sodomite.)
Et in questa sera sopra la piaza di San Marcho, per uno orbo con la lira, a l' improvise
fu cantato verso la loza di le cosse di Milan e dil partir dil signor Lodovico.86
(And this evening in Piazza San Marco, a blind man with a lira improvised
towards the loggia about the affairs of Milan and the departure of Duke
Lodovico [Sforza].)
Manfredi, Lettere brevissime, fol. DS". This collection of letters was compiled several years after
1S91, and many if not all of them may have been composed specially for the collection; but in this
case there is no reason to suspect that Manfredi did not hold the views expressed.
84 Haar, `From "cantimbanco" to court,
p. i80. "5 Frasso, `Un poeta improvvisatore',
397-
" Sanudo, I diarii, II, 479 (25 February); II, 1,198 (3 September).
252 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
Another of Montaigne's reminiscences of Tuscany in 1581 concerns a
peasant improviser. Her own performance of verse was, it seems, inspired
by a performance of another kind, since her subject-matter reflected what
she had learned from hearing verse read aloud to her:
feci mettere a tavola Divizia. Questa è una povera contadina vicina duo miglia
dei bagni, che non ha, nè il marito, altro modo di vivere che del travaglio di for
proprie mani: brutta, dell'età di 37 anni. La gola gonfiata. Non sa nè scrivere, nè
leggere. Ma nella sua tenera età avendo in casa del pasre un zio che leggeva tut-
tavia in sua presenzia l'Ariosto, et altri poeti, si trovò il suo animo tanto nato alla
poesia, che non solamente fa versi d'una prontezza la più mirabile che si possa,
ma ancora ci mescola le favole antiche, nomi delli Dei, paesi, scienzie, uomini
clari, come se fusse allevata alli studi.87
(I had Divizia seated at table. This is a poor peasant who lives two miles from
the baths [Bagni della Villa, near Lucca]; neither she nor her husband has any
means of livelihood other than manual work. She is ugly, thirty-seven years old,
with a swelling in her throat. She cannot write or read. But in childhood she had
in her father's house an uncle who read Ariosto and other poets continually in
her presence, and she found such a vocation for poetry that not only does she
compose verses with the most marvellous ease, but she also includes in them
ancient fables, names of the gods, countries, sciences, famous men, as if she had
been fully educated.)
Improvisation in both words and music could be part of the perform-
ance repertoire of members of the social and intellectual elites, though
probably of males only. This skill was appreciated in Medicean circles
in the late Quattrocento and early Cinquecento, as is seen for instance
from Brandolini's dialogue. Accounts of performances from later in the
sixteenth century suggest (even allowing for exaggeration) that this art
continued to be practised and valued. Ruscelli asserted that Machiavelli
had a special ability to improvise stanzas in ottava rima (probably sin-
gle strambotti), translating Latin poets while accompanying himself on
the lira. His source was Machiavelli's brother-in-law Francesco del Nero,
whom he had known in Naples. Ruscelli writes of the lines that make up
an octave that:
l'ordine della for testura [...1 è tanto noto, fino al volgo, che ancora
all'improviso si truovan molti, che ne compongono, et ancora perfettamente,
sì come fra molti s'ha memoria di M. Nicolò Macchiavelli, il quale aprendo
qual si voglia poeta Latino, et mettendoselo avanti sopr'una tavola egli
sonando la lira veniva improvisamente cantando, et volgarizando, ò tradu-
cendo quei versi di quel poeta, et facendone stanze d'Ottava Rima, con tanta
"7 Montaigne, Journal de voyage, II, 96.
z The performance of manuscript verse 253
leggiadria di stile, et con tanta agevolezza serbando i veri modi del tradurre,
che il mio M. Francesco del Nero, il quale fu molto suo domestico, mi rac-
contava in Napoli, che egli con molt'altri in Fiorenza fecero ogni pruova per
chiarirsi, che il detto Macchiavelli ciò facesse improvisamente, parendo à cias-
cuno impossibile, che all'improviso egli potesse far quello, che molti dotti, et
di sublime ingegno confessavano, che haverebbono penato à far con qualche
convenevole spatio di tempo."
(the ordering of their rhyme-scheme is so well known, down to the common
people, that one finds many who compose them even while improvising, and
perfect ones at that. Thus many people recall Niccolò Machiavelli, who would
open any Latin poet, put it in front of him on a table and, while playing the
lira, would sing and turn into the vernacular or translate the verses of that poet,
making from them stanzas of ottava rima. He kept to a true translation with
such elegance of style and such ease that my friend Francesco del Nero, who
was very close to him, told me in Naples that he and many others in Florence
tried everything to assure themselves that Machiavelli was doing this extempore,
since everyone thought it impossible that he could improvise what many people
who were learned and of lofty talent admitted they would have struggled to do
in an adequate space of time.)
While there appears to be no corroborating evidence of Machiavelli's
ability as an improviser, it is known that in his last years he wrote verse to
be sung by his mistress, Barbera Salutati.19
Alfonso de' Pazzi, the Florentine poet mentioned in Chapter 3
Section 4, extemporized musical performances of his own works and
favoured improvised rather than composed singing.90 His compatriot
Carlo Lenzoni proposed in his treatise In difesa della lingua fiorentina et
di Dante, printed posthumously in 1556-7, that a practical way of learn-
ing to make prose sonorous and rhythmic and thus pleasing to the ear,
while hiding one's artifice, was to practise singing improvised verses of
five, seven, eight or eleven syllables without rhyme (III. 17, fol. Y4r)
There are independent accounts of the extemporization of the young
Silvio Antoniano, born in 154o and later a cardinal. Ruscelli recounted of
him that when Bona Sforza, queen of Poland, visited Venice in 1556 in the
company of Cardinal Ippolito d'Este:
essendo ancor fanciullo, che sicuramente non arrivava à i 16 anni fu veduto,
et udito alla presenza di Sua Maestà, et più volte in casa del detto Illustriss. et
Reverendiss. suo Signore, et de gl'Illustriss. et Reverendissimi d'Augusta,
et Trivultio, et d'altri personaggi, cantar sopra la lira, ò sopra il liuto, et con
" Ruscelli, Del modo di comporre, chapter 7, fol. k1'-1.
" Fenlon and Haar, The Italian Madrigal, pp. 42-4; Fenlon, Tetrarch, Petrarchism', p. 143•
" Nosow, 'The debate on song'.
254 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
infinita g raria di voce, di volto, et di maniere, facendo stanze d'Ottava Rima
all'improviso sopra qual si voglia soggetto, che gli fosse proposto 9'
(while still a boy, for he was certainly not yet sixteen, he was seen and heard, in
the presence of her majesty, and several times in the houses of the said Cardinal
his master, the Cardinal of Augsburg [Otto Truchsess], Cardinal [Antonio]
Trivulzio and other personages, singing to the lira or lute, and with infinite
grace of voice, countenance and manners, improvising octaves on any subject
proposed to him.)
Antoniano's improvisation is also described by Varchi in L'Hercolano
when he is discussing (as was seen in Section I above) the supreme beauty
of the human voice:
io per me non udii mai cosa (il quale son pur vecchio e n'ho udito qualcuna)
la quale più mi si facesse sentire adentro e più mi paresse maravigliosa che il
cantare in su la lira all'improvviso di messer Silvio Antoniano, quando venne a
Firenze coll'illustrissimo et eccellentissimo principe di Ferrara don Alfonso da
Este, genero del nostro Duca.
(as for me, I never heard anything (even though I am old and have heard a few
things) that moved my inner feelings more and seemed to me more marvellous
than the extempore singing to the lira of Silvio Antoniano when he came to
Florence with the most illustrious and excellent prince of Ferrara, Don Alfonso
d'Este, son-in-law of our duke.)
Varchi assures his interlocutor that Antoniano was genuinely
extemporizing:
egli non canta mai che non voglia che gli sia dato il tema da altri, et io gliele diedi
due volte e amendue, una in terza rima e l'altra in ottava, disse tutto quello che
in sulla materia postagli parve a me che dire non solo si dovesse, ma si potesse,
con graziosissima maniera e modestissima grazia 9'
(he never sings without wanting the topic to be given to him by someone else.
I gave it to him twice and each time, once in terza rima and the other in ottava
rima, he said not just everything necessary but everything possible on the sub-
ject set, with the most graceful manner and the most modest grace.)
3 ORALITY AND MANUSCRIPT VERSE
To a large extent, it must be repeated, the scribal diffusion of literature in
the Italian Renaissance was independent of orality, just as orality could
be independent of the written word. It is clear, though, that some texts,
lyric verse in particular, were not always intended to be circulated, within
9'Varchi, L'Hercolano, II, 878.
" Ruscelli, Del modo di comporre, chapter 7, fol. ki".
3 Orality and manuscript verse 255
Renaissance society, only in writing for the benefit of silent readers. The
skills of performers — tone, pitch and timing, expression and gesture, the
integration of voice and accompaniment — added a dimension that was
absent in written transmission. Much poetry in the Renaissance expected
performance: it was not conceived as something merely to be read alone
at a desk, to be seen and not heard. Authors of both greater and lesser
stature would, at least some of the time, have been writing verse that they
knew could and would have been recited or sung by their first receiv-
ers. Texts also moved in the other direction, from a primarily or initially
oral diffusion to writing. A poem or a fragment of a longer poem could
thus `migrate promiscuously' between speech, manuscript and print in
a `dynamic continuum', to use phrases with which Adam Fox has elo-
quently described the interplay of oral and literate culture in the England
of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 93 Nor was there any inher-
ent conflict between these different media. As D. F. McKenzie observed
in his fine study of speech, manuscript, print and their functions in
seventeenth-century England, texts in different forms tend to work in
complementary, not competitive, ways94
We can now try to assess how far pen and voice might work together
and interact with each other in the diffusion of verse in our period. The
examples seen so far have shown that there could be a considerable degree
of synergy and even of interdependence between orality and the handwrit-
ten word, but that the strength of their relative functions varied greatly.
When oral performance took place, it would not usually have affected
the written forms of texts. However, oral transmission did sometimes
rely on the use of (fallible) memory and it might have involved a certain
amount of deliberate alteration, perhaps to suit a particular audience or
a musical setting. The considerable degree of variation that appears in
the written traditions of certain Renaissance verse texts was, of course,
due in large measure to authorial reworkings or to the errors of copyists.
Tebaldeo, for instance, habitually emended his poetry; for that reason,
he refused to publish it (dar fuori) even in manuscript and said that any-
thing in circulation had been stolen from him95 Francesco Flavio com-
plained of the ignorant transcribers of Serafino Aquilano's texts when
va Fox, Oral and Literate Culture, pp. S, 5o. On the relation between the oral and written traditions
of Elizabethan broadside ballads and Castilian romances, see Chartier, `orality lost'.
McKenzie, `Speech — Manuscript — Print', p. 238. On the interface between orality and print, see
too Burke, `Oral culture'.
', Tebaldeo, Rirne, 1, 145-83, IIh, 21-30 (see also P. 14 n. 6 on the oral tradition), III, 11-35; Prizer,
`Isabella d'Este', it n. 46.
 256 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
he edited them for printing in 1502.6 Some variants, though, may have
been introduced during the preparation, execution or reconstruction of
a performance. This could have been one of the factors that led to a high
number of alternative readings in manuscripts such as those of the verse of
Serafino (as in Figure 15) or of Florentine carnival songs.97 Variants crept
into a group of response poems between an exiled prince and his lady that
may have originated in the circle of the exiled Ferrante Sanseverino. From
1555 to 1610 these poems were read in manuscript and print, but they also
circulated widely in the performed repertoire: Brant6me recalled in his
life of Pedro da Toledo that he had noticed one of the prince's laments
sung `long temps en Italie et en France'.98 It has been suggested that the
version of a sonnet by Andrea Calmo, `Andando un zorno a Lio col mio
famegio', found in BMV, MS It. IX 217 (7o6í), markedly different from
that of the printed tradition, may have its origin in an oral diffusion,
drawing perhaps on a popular song.99 However, if these variations in the
written texts did come about, at least in part, in the context of perform-
ance, the new versions then found their way back into writing.
The role of orality was at its strongest when improvisers performed
what was, or wished to seem to be, a one-off, irreproducible manifestation
of a text. Yet even here the pens of others could supplement a poet's voice.
In the copy that Sanudo made of one of two Latin poems that Aurelio
Brandolini extemporized in Rome, probably in 1485, he recorded how the
written diffusion of the poem originated in a copy made during perform-
ance: `Rogatus a Bernardo Bembo equiti, legato, uti tempora deploraret
nostra, prisca autem lauderet, Petro Bembo, legati ipsius filio, scribente,
lyra sic cecinit' (Asked by Bernardo Bembo, knight and ambassador, to
lament our times and praise the old ones, [Brandolini] sang thus to the
lyre, with the ambassador's son Pietro transcribing).'°° The title page of an
edition of the Altissimo's verse account of the great battle of Ravenna in
1512, printed in Florence not before 1516, suggests that a team of transcrib-
a ers had ensured a transition from voice to manuscripts, which then became
96 Ciminelli, Opere, fols. A2"—A3` (this is the second edition, printed less than a month after the
first).
97 La Face Bianconi and Rossi, Le rime di Serafino Aquilano, pp. 19-22, 36-9; Singleton (ed.),
Canti carnascialeschi, pp. 473-4•
91 Brant6me, (Euvres compl&es, I, 103; Croce, `Isabella Villamarino'; Cardamone, `The Prince of
Salerno' (pp. 81-3, too-2 on the variants). On variation in canzonette later in the century, see
Assenza, `La trasmissione'.
99 Belloni, `Per il testo', 419 n. 2; Mazzinghi, `Le rime', 31-2; Calmo, Le bizzarre [...] rimepescatorie,
t~ PP. t5, r9, 87-8.
` ' Cian, `Per Bernardo Bembo', 78-80; Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, pp. 176-7-
3 Orality and manuscript verse 257
the source of the printed text, a quarto of 14 leaves: La rotta di Ravenna
cantata in S. Martino di Firenze all'improvviso dallAltissimo [ ... ], copiata
dalla viva voce da varie persone, mentre cantava (The rout of Ravenna sung
extempore in Piazza San Martino, Florence, by the Altissimo [ ... ], copied
from his own words by various people while he sang).— An anonymous
editor of the same poet's Primo libro de Reali, writing in Venice in 1534,
told readers that he had found works of the Altissimo:
dalla cui viva voce, nella vaga et inclita città di Firenze, ad uso di improviso son
sute reccitate [ ... ]; in che si contengono principii et continuate historie; sì come
leggendole chiaro et aperto vi fia: da la vaghissima dilettation delle quali astretti
molti amatori di tal virtù in que' tempi che per lui erano cantate in secreto, et in
palese, scrivendo sopra fogli, et pezzi di carta, da quelli furono celermente rac-
colte; et queste con l'altre parti che del proprio autore si sono potute ritrovare,
con molta fatica et spesa (a Dio gratia) insieme ho la maggior quantità ridotte et
connesse.
(by whose own voice they were performed extempore in the fair and renowned
city of Florence [...1; in which [works] are contained beginnings and continua-
tions of stories, as will be clear and apparent when you read them. Enthralled by
the most pleasant enjoyment of them, many lovers of his skill in those times —
for the works were sung by him both in private and openly — collected the works
rapidly, writing on leaves and pieces of paper. Thanks be to God, I have brought
most of these together and linked them with the other sections by the same
author that have been traceable, with much labour and expense.)
The manuscript text, he went on, needed some correction, but only the
author, now deceased, could have carried this out. He therefore asked
readers to have `quella discretione et pietà the a Cosa cantando [sic] come
questa e reccitata si conviene' (that restraint and compassion befitting
something sung like this and recited). In spite of this distinction between
the qualities of performed and written texts, one has to suspect, as did
Renier, that the poet's own papers formed a greater proportion of the
whole than the editor wished his readers to believe.1 O2
Orality could have a less strong function for some members of the
public when, as occasionally happened, authors were reluctant to provide
handwritten copies, doubtless so that they could keep as much control as
possible over the circulation of their creations and prevent some unscru-
pulous person from rushing them into print in order to make a profit.
Iacopo D'Atri had some initial success in obtaining manuscript poems by
Sannazaro for Isabella d'Este in 1503 (see Section 2 above) and thought
"' Renier in Strambotti e sonetti, p. xii n. 2.
`°' Cristoforo Fiorentino, Il primo libro, fol. A2'; Renier in Strambotti e sonetti, pp. xiii—xiv.
258 Orality, manuscript and the circulation of verse
the marchioness would obtain many more if she wrote to him in the right
terms. However, D'Atri added a note of caution: `ancora the dica non
haver cosa alcuna in scripto ma solo in memoria, et mal voluntiera le daga
fuora' (although [Sannazaro] says he has nothing written down but only
in memory, and he gives them out reluctantly)."' In some instances, spo-
ken or sung performance might have constituted the only act of author
publication. Two well-known poets, who preferred to publish some of
their verse to a select public by reciting it from memory, were Francesco
Berni (who may also have wished to protect himself against any criti-
cisms of libel or scurrility) and Tebaldeo. Letters of Nino Sernini from
1533 suggest that Berni kept his capitoli in his mind and was reluctant to
recite at least his capitolo `In lode dell'ago' even before close friends. In
such instances, any handwritten tradition might have to be initiated by
listeners. According to Caro, this capitolo was reconstructed for the post-
humous edition of 1538 mainly from Niccolò Ardinghelli's memory of its
oral performances, though several gaps remained.'04 After the death of
Tebaldeo in 1537, Bembo wrote that his final epigrams and sonnets would
have to be reconstructed as far as was possible `da gli amici suoi, the gli
debbono da lui avere uditi' (from his friends, who must have heard them
from him).' 5
Most commonly, any oral actualization of a text followed a written cir-
culation. When Galeotto Del Carretto sent his poems to Isabella d'Este
to be set to music and eventually performed, the function of orality was
in one sense relatively weak. However, if performance was here undoubt-
edly a secondary form of publication in chronological terms, it might
still have constituted a primary form of publication for some members
of the audience, for whom hearing Del Carretto's might have
barzellette
been their first and perhaps only encounter with these handwritten texts.
Many listeners to Serafino Aquilano's might never have seen
strambotti
them in writing, especially during the poet's lifetime. The same could
often have been true of poetry as diverse as carnival songs and the sung
madrigal repertory. Enjoying a text in performance could then have been
the stimulus to try to obtain a manuscript copy through user publication.
Written diffusion could thus lead to performance, and performance to
written diffusion, in a collaborative continuum between pen and voice.
'°3 Luzio and Renier, La coltura, p. 253•
°4 Caro, Lettere farrúliari, no. 104 to Francesco Cenami, 12 June 1539 (I, 148-9), §2; Campori
(ed.), Lettere, pp. 46-7. the two capitoli are in Gorni and others (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento,
PP. 702-6, 745-55•
t-5 Bembo, Lettere, no. 1,9o9 to Girolamo Negri, 4 January 1538 (IV, 95-6).
Conclusion
The manuscript culture of the Italian Renaissance was, this book has
suggested, marked by a number of features that were distinctive and
typical. Before and after the arrival of print, the diffusion of texts in
manuscript was based on personal contacts and strongly linked with
sociality. Only in certain cases, it seems, were manuscripts produced `on
spec', as new commodities available for purchase from traders. Rather,
scribal diffusion usually originated with gifts of texts made between
social equals or offered to someone of higher standing, such as a patron,
in which case they would often be presented by an intermediary. These
texts varied in length but might be much briefer than those contained
in a normal printed edition, for instance a single sonnet or a strambotto.
Authors or owner-publishers of texts tended to be directly involved in
producing fair copies, writing them themselves or having them written
by secretaries or scribes. Scribal circulation also allowed authors to show
texts in a provisional form. After the initial gift of the text, any fur-
ther diffusion was inherently unpredictable and in any event gradual. It
might be that no more copying took place; this appears to have been the
case, for instance, with the treatise sent by Pietro Barozzi to Bernardo
Bembo (Chapter 4 Section 1), though Bembo is likely to have shown
his copy to others. But often texts went on to be published discontinu-
ously `in editions of one', as Love put it, in the course of the processes
of lending and borrowing, within and between circles of acquaintances,
that were described in Chapter 1 Sections 4 and 5.' Here we saw, too,
how the private nature of manuscript circulation encouraged the com-
pilation of collections of various sorts, inviting new juxtapositions of
texts. Receiving a text could trigger a response to it, as with the verse
exchanges discussed in Chapter 3 Section 2 and some of the prose works
mentioned in Chapter 4.
' Love, The Culture and Commerce of Texts, P. 44•
259
26o Conclusion
However, while some largely consistent features can be perceived
within manuscript culture, it was not uniform in its nature: there were
several variables in its methods and functions. Texts were produced and
transmitted in ways that differed from context to context. At the most
formal level, manuscripts were copied on vellum and decorated by profes-
sionals, and could then be offered together with letters of dedication or
transmission. This could be the practice when texts were given to social
superiors, and could also be the case when members of the elite offered
texts to one another. But between equals texts were usually circulated in a
much more informal `register', so to speak, in copies without pretension,
or through a simple process of lending that might lead to the making of a
personal copy by the borrower.
There were variations, too, in the relative importance of the part
played by manuscripts in the circulation of texts, in comparison with
print and oral performance. After presses became established from the
146os onwards, the use of manuscripts tended to focus on genres linked
in some way to actuality, as was seen in Chapters 3 and 4. Predictably,
in the course of the Cinquecento scribal publication became less impor-
tant in comparison with print, for both authors and readers. For exam-
ple, between the 156os and the 1S9os Torquato Tasso initially sent out
some works in manuscript — ranging in length from individual sonnets
to dialogues — in the context of his social relationships; but by then it was
natural for authors to think of print as their main means of publication in
the longer term, even if, like Tasso, they were far from able to control the
production of every edition that appeared during their lifetimes. As well
as this general trend across the period, we have encountered differences
from the 146os onwards in the extent to which scribal publication was
used by individual authors, and also from text to text by the same author.
On the one hand, a few authors of both poetry and prose wished their
works to be read solely in manuscript. On the other hand, it was very
possible that manuscripts would play no significant part in the transmis-
sion of a work. Once printing was available in Italy, an author might pass
the handwritten archetype directly to the printing house, where it would
serve as copy-text and then be discarded. A few kinds of work existed
primarily or solely in oral form; this was especially the case with improv-
isations, though some texts were written down during performance or
reconstructed after it.
Most kinds of circulation can be placed between these two extremes of
the scale: the use of scribal and other forms of diffusion was often mixed,
either because authors chose to diffuse only certain of their works in
Conclusion 261
manuscript, or because works slid from one medium to another. This can
be seen at the level of the individual work. A piece might well be read for
a while in manuscript, then move into print at a later stage, at the initia-
tive of the author or of someone else. Trissino had his tragedy Sophonisba
transcribed for presentation to Leo X before August 1519, probably by
Ludovico degli Arrighi. Cardinal Giovanni Salviati reported to Trissino
from Rome that the play was then copied hastily, in a single night, and
that the text became ever more inaccurate as further copies were made.
He invited Trissino to take whatever steps he saw fit to remedy the situ-
ation. But Trissino was in no hurry to use printing as a way of establishing
a correct text, and it was not until 1524 that he had the Sophonisba (still
with its original dedication to the late pope) and other works published
at the press that Arrighi had now established in Rome. Five years later,
Trissino made further use of the connections between manuscript and
print production by commissioning editions of his writings from another
scribe turned printer, Bartolomeo Zanetti, working under the pseudonym
of Tolomeo Ianiculo.2 Transmission of a text in different modes could
also be synchronous. In Chapter 1 Section 3 we noted the probable paral-
lel diffusion, in manuscript and print, of Aretino's canzone addressed to
the emperor and to the French king. As regards orality, Chapter 6 showed
that the sending of poems in manuscript was frequently intended to lead
to their performance, and that the process could work in the other direc-
tion when performed texts were transcribed. Manuscript circulation, for
all its distinctiveness, was not necessarily separated from other modes of
publication.
The alternating use of means of publication can be found when one
looks across the works of a single author. The same person might publish
sometimes scribally, sometimes through print, in different circumstances
and for different publics. He or she might in one case attempt to prevent
or limit any diffusion beyond the first recipient, but in another case invite
fuller publication, while keeping within the bounds of modesty. Pietro
Bembo, for instance, circulated his lyric poems scribally for many years,
with or without restrictions on how far afield they could travel, before
finally supervising their printing in 153o and 1535; his Asolani and Prose
A vellum copy attributed to Arrighi's hand is BL, MS Add. 26873, damaged by fire; see Wardrop,
Arrighi revived', pp. 44-5, figs. 9 and to. From Salviati's letter of 8 August 1¢9 (in Trissino, Tutte
le opere, I, xvi—xvii) it emerges that the presentation to Leo took place `many months' previously
and that the cardinal had had the play transcribed for himself because Trissino had not had a
copy made for him. On Ianiculo, see G. Castellani, `Da Tolomeo Ianiculo' and `Da Bartolomeo
Zanetti'.
262 Conclusion
della volgar lingua were intended primarily for print from an early stage;
on the other hand, his Motti, a series of rhyming hendecasyllabic coup-
lets intended to be used and probably recited in the entertainments of
the court of Urbino in about i5o7, were to circulate in manuscript alone.;
Grazzini planned the printing of his comedies but not of his verse or of
his short stories, the Cene.
Further complexities arose because scribal publication was not always
controllable by authors. Even when they wished their works to venture
forth in manuscript only, the journeys of their offspring were threatened
by lurking dangers. Safe transit in manuscript could not be guaranteed
once a text had gone beyond the author's immediate circle. In Chapter i,
for example, we noted how Florimonte's Ragionamenti on Aristotle was
appropriated for printing without his knowledge in 1554 (Section 2),
and we saw how curtly and cynically Marcantonio da Carpi dismissed
Alessandro Piccolomini's complaints about the printing of a lecture of
his in 1541: if the author did not want it printed, he should have kept it in
his own hands (Section 5). We saw, too, that users of texts could transfer
them in the other direction, from print to manuscript (Section 1).
It was not only texts that moved from manuscript to print: since print
publication arose of course out of scribal culture, it also adopted some of
its practices. One characteristic of scribal publication that strongly shaped
the diffusion of printed texts was, as Chapter 5 suggested, the continuing
use of letters that dedicated texts to individuals or that accompanied the
gift of a copy of a work. Thus, just as Bernardo Bembo received handwrit-
ten copies of works by Ficino and Landino together with letters of trans-
mission, as was noted in Chapter 5 Section 1, so the Venetian was one of
several people to whom Ficino sent, with personal letters, a copy of his De
sole et lumine, printed in 1493 and dedicated to Piero de' Medici, and so
Landino sent him a copy of his edition of Dante's Commedia printed in
1481 (BNP, Rés. Yd. 17), again with a personal letter.4 Occasionally, too,
editions were printed in small numbers, intended for a select coterie in a
manner analogous to that of scribal publication. This is likely to have been
the case, for instance, when the translations of Ecclesiastes and of Cicero
made by Damido de Góis were printed by Stefano Nicolini da Sabbio
(Venice, 1538), probably at the instance of G6is3 Scipione Ammirato,
3 On the Motti, see Cian's edition and Gnocchi's introduction.
4 Giannetto, Bernardo Bembo, pp. 138 (Ficino), 139 and 356-7 (Landino). On Ficino's letters, see
Kristeller, Supplementum fzcinianum, I, cxii—cxiii; Landino's letter is published in Ledos, `Lettre
inédite'.
5 Earle in Góis, O livra de Eclesiastes, pp. 45-53; Earle, `Damiáo de G6is's translation', p. 155•
Conclusion 263
dedicating Berardino Rota's Sonetti in morte di S. Portia Capece sua moglie
(Naples: Mattia Cancer, í56o) to Caro, wrote: `ho per hora per ischivar la
fatica del trascrivere fatti imprimere, et fatti imprimere sol cento volumi
per donarne a gli amici et non più, quasi per un saggio' (for now, to avoid
the labour of transcription, I have had them printed, and have had printed
only ioo copies to present some to friends only, as if as a trial).'
Several of the general points made so far are illustrated by the examples
of the two major unitary works of Iacopo Sannazaro, his pastoral Arcadia
and his narrative poem in Latin hexameters on the birth of Christ, De
partu 1Tirginis. The story of their initial circulation demonstrates how an
author might make use of both manuscript and print, and also gives us
an idea of some of the experiences of would-be readers of contemporary
works. Although Sannazaro does not appear to have promoted the scribal
diffusion of the Arcadia very actively, an early version containing ten sec-
tions of prose narrative with an eclogue was copied by the late 148os in
the poet's own city of Naples and, from 1490 onwards, in Venice and per-
haps elsewhere in northern Italy. This Arcadia was appreciated by readers
of high status: the group of manuscripts that emanated from a copy taken
to Venice includes two written on vellum with illuminated initials, and a
copy is listed in the inventory of Isabella d'Este's books. Not surprisingly
in view of its popularity, this redaction soon found its way into print. A
Venetian manuscript was used as copy-text for an unauthorized Venetian
edition of June 1502, which then became the source of four further print-
ings in Venice, Naples and Milan between November 1502 and December
1504. However, before leaving for France in 1501, Sannazaro had expanded
the Arcadia by adding two sections and an epilogue. In February 1503,
when he was informed that the earlier redaction had been printed, one of
the reasons for his great displeasure at the news was that the printed text
was incomplete. Against this background, and while Sannazaro was still
in France (he did not return to Italy until early 1505), Pietro Summonte
in Naples initiated and masterminded another edition, printed by
Sigismondo Mayr in March 1504, using as his copy-text the autograph
original that the author had left in the hands of his brother Marcantonio.
Summonte justified his actions in his dedication to Cardinal Luigi
e Sabbatino, Il modello bembiano,
P. 84; Rota, Rime, p. 675. `Per hora' and `saggio' suggest that in
principle a larger edition was to follow. Simonin, `Poétiques des éditions "à l'essai"', discusses
French cases. Alphonse Delbene, whose family was of Italian origin, had just `two dozen' copies
of his Amedeide, Book I, printed in 1586 (Chambéry: par Claude Pomar): Gorris, 'Sous le signe',
83-5. The Basilicon doron of King James VI of Scotland, first printed in 1599 in seven copies but
also diffused in manuscript, is discussed in Scott-Warren, Sir jobn Harington, pp. 4-18. I am
grateful to Ian Maclean for information on this topic.
264 Conclusion
d'Aragona (fols. Ai°—A2°). Two Venetian editions, he wrote, had been full
of `errori intolerabili' and the work had been printed in an early, uncor-
rected and incomplete form. He was publishing a fuller version of the
Arcadia but, as he admitted, without Sannazaro's approval: `senza altra
sua ordinatione, anzi forse (se io mal non estimo) non senza qualche
offesa del animo suo, quando per aventura it saprà' (without any further
command from him, indeed perhaps (if I am not mistaken) his spirit will
be somewhat offended when he happens to find out). Summonte failed
to add that he had subjected the copy-text to some Tuscanizing linguis-
tic revisions. He continued to revise the work in Mayr's printing house,
introducing stop-press corrections and noting others in his list of errata?
In short, copies of the Arcadia spread throughout Italy with no appar-
ent intervention on the author's part other than his making texts avail-
able (deliberately or not) for copying. Printing played a strong part in its
transmission, but only from i5oz onwards, and not at the author's insti-
gation. Further, the initiatives of the first printers, to which Summonte
responded with his counter-initiative, were a consequence of the success
of the work in a vigorous, pan-Italian manuscript culture.
Sannazaro's De partu Virginis, too, was composed over a long period. In
an elegy written probably in 1512, Girolamo Carbone portrayed the poet
reciting a work on the virgin birth, among others.' This was perhaps the
early redaction of book I alone that is found in four manuscripts, includ-
ing one dated 1513 and another owned by Angelo Colocci. Sannazaro cir-
culated a later version in three books in Rome `per intendere it iudicio de
Ii amici' (to hear his friends' judgement) early in 1521, in a copy made by a
`scrittore' who, he complained, had made errors. Sannazaro himself wrote
the work out twice, in BLF, MSS Ashb. 411 and XXXIV 44, the first of
these his working copy. The readers of the version sent to Rome included
at least Cardinal Egidio da Viterbo, Sadoleto and Tebaldeo, whose com-
ments were passed on to Sannazaro by Antonio Seripando. This consul-
tation process was probably at the origin of further copying in Rome. The
work was also diffused in Naples. A copy passed there to Decio Apranio,
who transcribed the work himself (BNN, MS ex Vind. Lat. 6o, from
7 Renier, `Codici dell'Arcadia' (arguing that Turin, Bibl. Naz., MS N VII 30, was Isabella d'Este's
copy); Luzio and Renier, La coltura, p. 2S3 (on Sannazaro being told of the work's printing);
Mauro, `Le prime edizioni'; Sannazaro, Opere volgari, pp. 415-35 (manuscripts and printed
editions); Villani, Per l'edizione; Charis Marconi, La nascita di una vulgata (Summonte's edi-
tion). One of the Neapolitan copies was made in 1489 by Giovan Francesco di Montefalcione: see
Chapter 2 n. 31. A copy of Venetian origin is in the miscellany BAM, MS C 112 inf. (fols. 4`-65
the transcription is dated 1503), mentioned in Chapter 3 n. 51.
' De Montera, L'Humaniste napolitain, p. 49•
Conclusion 265
which was derived BAV, MS Vat. Lat. 3360) and dictated the text so that
Gerolamo Seripando could transcribe it in 1523 with two collaborators
(BNN, MS ex Vind, Lat. S9). Avellum copy, Verona, Bible Capitolare, MS
CCLXXXIII, was probably made in Naples, using a redaction just prior
to that of the final version? Sannazaro tried to prevent circulation of the
De partu in manuscript beyond his circle of friends. Ludovico Canossa
sent his copy from Venice to Niccolò Tiepolo in Brescia on z June í5z6 ~
under conditions of strict confidence, clearly imposed by the poet:
vi mando it dito libro cometendo la fede mia alla vostra, la quale mia fede non
stimo già sì pocho the facilmente la rimeta all'altrui discretione. Rendomi certo
the V S. non ne prenderà copia nè lassarà it libro in mane de persona the la possi
prendere, et così la supplico the faci.-
(I am sending you this book, joining my promise to yours; and I do not hold
my promise so lightly that I would easily entrust it to another's discretion. I am
certain you will not take a copy or leave the book in the hands of anyone who
might take it, and I beg you to do thus.)
One of the reasons for Sannazaro's caution was that this erudite Latin
poem was a work that he did wish to see in print, as long as the edi-
tion was prepared on his own terms, for an elite readership. A letter of
Leo X, composed by Bembo and dated August 1521, urged him to pub-
lish the work (`Hortamur itaque to iam opus edas', where edere must refer
to printing). As with the Arcadia, an unauthorized edition of a shorter
first redaction appeared in Venice, probably in the early i52os; again
Sannazaro was angered by this, as is shown by the letter to Marcantonio
Michiel in which he protested that `[1]e cose mie non meritano uscire
fore' (my writings do not deserve to be published). In spite of this show
of modesty, the author collaborated in the Neapolitan edition of the De
partu, together with other Latin poems of his, that was printed in 1526 in
folio format (the Arcadia was in the less prestigious quarto). He provided
his working manuscript (BLF, MS Ashb. 411) as copy-text, and the colo-
phon proclaimed the fidelity of the text to this manuscript. The printing,
by Antonio Frezza, took place in the house of Andrea Matteo Acquaviva
and was probably subsidized by him, although a note by Pietro Gravina
also praises Cassandra Marchese for caring for the printing and publish-
ing of the work (`operis [ ... ] imprimendi ac promulgandi') like a midwife.
Sannazaro, De partu Virginis, pp, ix—xliv, lvii—xc (extant manuscripts and their texts), 93 (letter
to Seripando), 98-9 (the `scrittore' and his errors); Monti, `La dedica' (with information on
further manuscripts, p. 629 n. 1).
" Miglioranzi, Lodovico di Canossa, p. 126; see, too, Dionisotti, Machiavellerie, pp. 315-16.
266 Conclusion
This time it was Sannazaro who made stop-press corrections. He based
his verse dedication to Clement VII on shorter versions found in most of
the manuscripts. However, so that a wider public would see the edition
set firmly in a context of humanist erudition and ecclesiastical approval,
it was embellished with several paratexts not present in manuscripts: the
letter of 1521 from Leo X, letters and poems of praise from literary figures
such as Carbone and Tebaldeo, and (in a gathering added at least three
months after printing of the main text had been completed in May) a let-
ter from Clement VII, composed by Sadoleto, that thanked Sannazaro
for the gift of a copy. Bembo, too, received a gift copy. At least three
vellum copies were produced (BL, G.10031, with the arms and initials
of Vittoria Colonna; JRM, 20931; BNP, Vélins 567). A further edition
printed in Rome in December 1526 by Francesco Minizio Calvo, at the
request of Jean Grolier, must have been approved by Sannazaro since, like
the Neapolitan edition, it was protected by a papal privilege."
In summary, Sannazaro collaborated with printers only towards the
end of his life (he died in 153o) and only for the publication of Latin works
in an extremely refined edition. Although he initially let others read the
Arcadia and the De partu VTirginis through the weakest of the kinds of
author publication outlined in Chapter i Section 3, the reputations of his
two masterpieces were established over a number of years through a proc-
ess of scribal user publication that was particularly lively for the vernacu-
lar work. Eventually, for one motive or another, scribal and print diffusion
became entwined. But even then manuscripts did not lose their impor-
tance. The use of an autograph authorial manuscript was highlighted as
a guarantee of textual accuracy in both the Neapolitan editions of 1504
and 1526. Calvo's edition became in its turn the source of a mid-sixteenth-
century manuscript (ONB, MS Lat. 3316): once again print nourished the
manuscript culture on which it had originally depended. And while print-
ing made both texts more easily obtainable to readers, it did not solve all
their problems. No sixteenth-century edition of the Arcadia contained a
text authorized by Sannazaro, and a copy of the Neapolitan edition of De
partu must have been affordable only by the very wealthy.
Cases such as these underline the need to take account of the
conditions of circulation — both those intended by the provider of
the text and the possibly different circumstances in which circulation
" Sannazaro, De partit Virginis, pp. xtv—lvi, xc—xcii (early editions), 85-6 (letter to Michiel), tog—ro
(Leo's brief); Bembo, Lettere, no. 712 to Michiel, 18 October rs26 (1I, 384); Bianca, 'Andrea
Matteo Acquaviva'.
Conclusion a67
actually took place — when studying the writing and reading of Italian
Renaissance literature, just as in the study of works of art one has to con-
sider their original settings. An author's intentions concerning how and
by whom a text would be read are evident indications of how he or she
perceived the function and nature of that text. There are many instances
of works that were composed with a view to more private, network-based
reading, and perhaps listening, at least in the initial stages of their dif-
fusion. In some cases there was a reciprocal link between the intended
anode of circulation and the style and content of a work: certain works
suggested the use of one medium rather than another, and each medium
could suggest a differently creative manner of writing. In general, scribal
diffusion was associated with writing that targeted a readership that was
restricted and linked at least initially to the author. Such writing could
be very formal in nature (Trissino's Sophonisba or Sannazaro's De partu,
for instance), and in any case authors would always have been aware of
the possibility that their manuscript texts could find their way to the
press without their consent. But the inherently more private nature of
the scribal medium, and its greater immediacy in terms of both space
and time, also permitted a degree of informality or outspokenness that
would have been less appropriate in the more public and impersonal con-
text of print. We noted in Chapter 1 Section 1 that Ariosto considered his
comedies not polished enough for print and that the content of works
might be amended if transferred from pen to press, and in Section 2-
that Machiavelli adopted a more elevated style in his Arte della guerra,
destined for the press. Authors' choices of content and style were never
made entirely freely: in forming and articulating their ideas, they had to
take account of the medium of publication.
The other side of the coin was the manner and extent of the availabil-
ity of a work to readers. Publication in the Renaissance covered a wide
range of practices, and for those who received works of literature, just as
for those who conceived them, the form taken by these works and the
channels through which they travelled — manuscript, print or in some
cases oral performance — had a determining influence on their experi-
ences and thus on the reception history of texts. Works circulated scrib-
ally can in most cases be classified as published, at least in a weak sense,
but genres that might nevertheless be hard to obtain included lyric verse,
pasquinades and texts containing political information or religious opin-
ions. Everything could depend not only on a person's place of residence
but also on social interaction of different kinds, arising from informal
contacts or membership of formal groupings such as academies or courts.
268 Conclusion
The use of manuscript imposed a limitation on the diffusion of a
work, then, in terms of the numbers of copies produced. However, it also
allowed writers more freedom of expression, and the very fact that the
readership was restricted could also help to strengthen a work's impact on
those who did have access to it. These conditions were willingly accepted
by the fashionable poet Serafino Aquilano and by one of his main admir-
ers, Isabella d'Este. When she heard from Serafino that one of her in-laws,
Ludovico Gonzaga, bishop of Mantua, wanted a copy of his Capitolo del
somno, she wrote to Ludovico on 27 May 1498 that:
benché havessi pensato non lo dare molto fora tamen ho voluto exceptuare la
S. V. di questa deliberatione e mandargline la qui inclusa copia tolta dal origi-
nale proprio dil quale privai Seraphino per essere io sola che l'havesse. Prego
bene la S. V. che lo habbia charo nè sia molto facile a compiacerne altri, anzi (se
lo può ,fare) non lo dia ad alcuno perché serei contenta poterlo havere presso me
qualche tempo che '1 non fosse divulgato.
(although I had intended not to publish it widely, nevertheless I have decided
to except you from this decision and to send you the enclosed copy taken from
the original, which I took from Serafino so that I alone would have it. I entreat
you to keep it carefully and not to be too easy in conceding it to others; rather, if
possible, give it to nobody, because I would like to be able to have it with me for
some time before it was made public.)
The marchioness had thus tried at first to claim unique ownership of one
of Serafino's texts, with the author's connivance, by getting him to give
her the original manuscript. She then did her best to preserve her privi-
leged status by preventing the text from going too far beyond the Palazzo
ducale in Mantua. Yet even Isabella was resigned to the wider diffusion
of the capitolo, one day: `[c]redo ben perhò', she added, `che '1 serrà gran
fatica a poterlo tenire che '1 non esca fori' (but I am sure it will be very
hard to keep it from being published).12 In this case as always, the mar-
chioness endeavoured to turn her ownership of scribal texts to the great-
est personal advantage, but she was a shrewd enough user of manuscript
culture to recognize that in the long run even she could not control its
independent powers.
" Cian, Un decennio, P. 233; Luzio and Renier, Mantova e Urbino, p. 93; La Face Bianconi and
Rossi, Le rime di Serafino Aquilano, pp. u—r2. Ludovico promised on 30 May not to diffuse the
poem further: Bertolotti, `Varietà' (1880), P. 84. Isabella mentioned a `capitulo [ ...] dil sogno' (on
the dream); however, Ludovico's reference to a `capitulo del somno' confirms this was the 85-line
poem on sleep found in the collections printed from late 1502 onwards, e.g. Ciminelli, Opere,
fols. G6—G7'.
Bibliography
Adorni-Braccesi, Simonetta, `Tra "Valdesianesimo" e Riforma: i due processi
inquisitoriali di Vittore Soranzo (1550—x558)', BHR, 68 (2oo6), 159-66
`Una città infetta'.- la repubblica di Lucca nella crisi religiosa del Cinquecento
(Florence: Olschki, 1994)
Agati, Maria Luisa, Giovanni Onorio da Maglie copista greco (YS35—r563), Bollettino
dei classici, suppl. 20 (Rome: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, 2oor)
Agee, Richard J., `Ruberto Strozzi and the early madrigal', journal of the
American Musicological Society, 36 (1983), 1-17
Ahern, John, `Singing the book: orality in the reception of Dante's Comedy', in
Amilcare A. Iannucci (ed.), Dante: Contemporary Perspectives (University of
Toronto Press, 1997), 214-39
Alamanni, Luigi, Opere toscane, 2 vols. (Lyon: Sébastien Gryphe, 1532-3)
Alberti, Leon Battista, Apologhi ed elogi, Rosario Contarino (ed.) (Genoa: Costa
& Nolan, 1984)
Intercenales, Franco Bacchelli and Luca D'Ascia (eds.) (Bologna: Pendragon,
2003)
Opere volgari, Cecil Grayson (ed.), 3 vols. (Bari: Laterza, 196o-73)
Albertini, Rudolf von, Firenze dalla repubblica al principato: storia e coscienza
politica (Turin: Einaudi, 1970)
Albonico, Simone, `La poesia del Cinquecento', in Enrico Malato (dir.), Storia
della letteratura italiana, X, 6 93-740
Il ruginoso stile: poeti e poesia in volgare a Milano nella prima metà del
Cinquecento (Milan: Franco Angeli, 199o)
Andrea Comboni, Giorgio Panizza and Claudio Vela (eds.), Per Cesare
Bozzetti: studi di letteratura e filologia italiana (Milan: Fondazione Arnoldo
e Alberto Mondadori, 1996)
Aldo Manuzio editore: dediche, prefazioni, note ai testi, intro. by Carlo Dionisotti,
ed. and trans. by Giovanni Orlandi (Milan: II POlifilO, 1976)
Alexander, Gavin, `The Elizabethan lyric as contrafactum: Robert Sidney's
"French tune" identified', Music and Letters, 84 (2003), 378-402
Alexander, J. J. G. and A. C. De la Marc, The Italian Manuscripts in the Library of
Major) R. Abbey (London: Faber, 1969)
Allaire, Gloria, Andrea da Barberino and the Language of Chivalry (Gainesville:
University Press of Florida, 1997)
269
270 Bibliography
A fifteenth-century Florentine community of readers and the romances of
chivalry', Essays in Medieval Studies, 15 (1998), 1-8
Allen, Michael J. B., The Platonism of Marsilio Ficino: A Study of his Phaedrus
Commentary, its Sources and Genesis (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1984)
Ancel, René, `Étude critique sur quelques recueils d'avvisi', École franfaise de
Rome: Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire, 28 (1908), 115-39
Andreoni, Annalisa, —Sangue perfetto che poi non si beve ...": le lezioni di
Benedetto Varchi sul canto XXV del Purgatorio', Rinascimento, 44 (2004),
139-223
Andrews, Richard, Scripts and Scenarios: The Performance of Comedy in
Renaissance Italy (Cambridge University Press, 1993)
Anglo, Sydney, Machiavelli: The First Century. Studies in Enthusiasm, Hostility,
and Irrelevance (Oxford University Press, 2 00 5)
Anon., `In praise of manuscripts', Book Collector, 49 (1999), 329-48
Arbizzoni, Guido, `Un nuovo manoscritto dell'Amorosa opra di Giovanni
Muzzarelli', Rivista di letteratura italiana, 3 (1985), 117-33
Ardissino, Erminia, Appunti di critica dantesca: la risposta di Vincenzio
Borghini al "Discorso" del Castravilla', GSLI, 180 (2003), 56-85
Aretino, Pietro, Lettere, Paolo Procaccioli (ed.), 6 vols. (Rome: Salerno Editrice,
1997-2002)
Poesie varie, vol. I, Giovanni Aquilecchia and Angelo Romano (eds.) (Rome:
Salerno Editrice, 1992)
Ariosti, Orazio, La Sidonia, Giuseppe Venturini (ed.), Quaderni del Giornale
filologico ferrarese, 5 (Ferrara: [n.pub.], 1985)
Ariosto, Ludovico, Lettere, Angelo Stella (ed.), in Cesare Segre (ed.), Tutte le
opere, vol. III (Milan: Mondadori,1984), 109-56z
Assenza, Concetta, `La trasmissione dei testi poetici per canzonetta negli
ultimi decenni dei secolo XVI', Rivista italiana di musicologia, 26 (1991),
zo5-4o
Atkinson, Catherine, Debts, Dowries, Donkeys. The Diary of Niccolò Machiavelli's
Father, Messer Bernardo, in Quattrocento Florence (Frankfurt a. M.: Peter
Lang, zooz)
Avetta, Adolfo, `Per Francesco Marcaldi', Archivio storico lombardo, znd set., 7
(1890), 159-66
Baldo, Vittorio, Alunni, maestri e scuole in Venezia alla fine del XVI secolo (Como:
New Press, 1976)
Balsamo, Jean, `Les Origines parisiennes du "Tesoro politico", 1589', BHR, 57
(1995), 7—z3
Balsamo, Luigi, Antonio Possevino S.L bibliografo della Controriforma e diffusione
della sua opera in area anglicana (Florence: Olschki, 2006)
Balsano, Maria Antonella (ed.), L'Ariosto, la musica, i musicisti: quattro studi e
sette madrigali ariosteschi (Florence: Olschki, 1981)
Bandello, Matteo, Rime, Massimo Danzi (ed.) (Modena: Panini, 1989)
Bibliography 271
Tutte le opere, Francesco Flora (ed.), znd edn, z vols. (Milan: Mondadori,
1942-3)
Barbarisi, Gennaro, Ancora sul testo del Galateo', in Gennaro Barbarisi and
Claudia Berra (eds.), Per Giovanni Della Casa, 253-70
and Claudia Berra (ids.), Per Giovanni Della Casa: ricerche e contributi
(Bologna: Cisalpino, 1997)
Barbato, Marcello, Appunti sul testo del Plinio toscano di Cristoforo Landino',
Medioevo romanzo, 25 (2001), 122-50, 434-80
Barbero, Giliola, `I copisti e i manoscritti di Federico Borromeo', in Rgesto grafico
tra piacere personale ed identità collettiva: prospettive di ricerca sull'espressione
scritta (Milan: Arigraf, 2007), 353-70
`Dagli antichi scartocci rinvolti alle collezioni agiografiche moderne: storia
del libro e della tradizione in un inedito di Federico Borromeo', LB, 107
(20 05), 253-73
Barbi, Michele, Della fortuna di Dante nel Cinquecento ( Pisa: Nistri, í89o)
La Raccolta Bartoliniana di rime antiche e i codici da essa derivati (Bologna:
Zanichelli, igoo)
Studi sul Canzoniere di Dante (Florence: Sansoni, 1915)
Barbierato, Federico, Nella stanza dei circoli: Clavicula Salamonis e libri di magia
a Venezia nei secoli XVII e XVIII (Milan: Bonnard, zooz)
Barbieri, Edoardo, `Tre schede per Antonio Brucioli e alcuni suoi libri', Aevum,
74 (2000), 709-19
Bargagli, Girolamo, La Pellegrina, Florindo Cerreta (ed.) (Florence: Olschki,
1971)
Barish, Jonas, `The problem of closet drama in the Italian Renaissance', Italica,
71 (1994), 4-31
Barker, Nicolas, Aldus Manutius and the Development of Greek Script and Type
in the Fifteenth Century, znd edn (New York: Fordham University Press,
1992)
The Glory of the Art of Writing.• The Calligraphic Work of Francesco Alunno
(Los Angeles: Cotsen Occasional Press, zoog)
Baroffio, Giacomo (ed.), Iter liturgicum Italicum (Padua: CLEUP, 1999)
Baschet, Armand, La Diplomatie vénitienne: les princes de l'Europe au XVIe siècle
(Paris: Plon, 1862)
`Documents inédits tirés des archives de Mantoue', ASI, 3rd ser., 3 (1866), pt z,
105-30
Basile, Bruno, —Delizie" bentivolesche: il "Zardin Viola" nella descrizione
autografa di Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti', in Bruno Basile (ed.),
Bentivolorum magnificentia, 255-84
(ed.), Bentivolorum magnificentia: principe e cultura a Bologna nel Rinascimento
(Rome: Bulzoni, 1984)
Battiferra degli Ammannati, Laura, Laura Battiferra and her Literary Circle:
An Anthology, ed. and trans. by Victoria Kirkham (University of Chicago
Press, zoo6)
272 Bibliography
Battiferri degli Ammannati, Laura, R primo libro delle opere toscane, Enrico
Maria Guidi (ed.) (Urbino: Accademia Raffaello, 2000)
Bausi, Francesco, `Machiavelli e la tradizione culturale toscana', in Cultura e
scrittura di Machiavelli: Atti del Convegno di Firenze-Pisa 27-3 0 ottobre 1997
(Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1998), pp. 81-1,5
`Le rime di e per Tullia d'Aragona', in Les Femmes &rivains, 275-92
and Mario Martelli, La metrica italiana: teoria e storia (Florence: Le Lettere,
1993)
Beal, Peter, In Praise of Scribes: Manuscripts and their Makers in Seventeenth-
Century England (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998)
Bec, Christian, Les Livres des florentins (1413—i6o8) (Florence: Olschki, 1984)
Beffa, Bruno, Antonio Vinciguerra Cronico, segretario della Serenissima e letterato
(Bern: Herbert Lang; Frankfurt a.M.: Peter Lang, 1975)
Belladonna, Rita, `Pontanus, Machiavelli and a case of religious dissimulation in
early sixteenth-century Siena (Carli's Trattati nove della prudenza)', BHR,
37 (1975), 377-85
Belloni, Gino, `Peril testo delle "Bizzarre rime" di Andrea Calmo', SEI, 36 (1978),
419-31
and Riccardo Drusi, Vincenzio Borghini: filologia e invenzione nella Firenze di
Cosimo I (Florence: Olschki, 2oo2)
Bembo, Pietro, Gli asolani, Giorgio Dilemmi (ed.) (Florence: Accademia della
Crusca, 1991)
Lettere, Ernesto Travi (ed.), 4 vols. (Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lin-
gua, 1987-93)
Motti, Vittorio Cian (ed.), intro. by Alessandro Gnocchi (Milan: Bonnard,
2007)
Prose e rime, Carlo Dionisotti (ed.), 2nd edn (Turin: UTET, 1966)
Stanze, Alessandro Gnocchi (ed.) (Florence: Società Editrice Fiorentina,
2003)
Benedetto da Mantova, Il beneficio di Cristo con le versioni del secolo XVI: docu-
menti e testimonianze, Salvatore Caponetto (ed.) (Florence: Sansoni;
Chicago: Newberry Library, 1972)
Bennett, H. S., English Books & Readers 1475 to 1557 (Cambridge University Press,
1952)
English Books & Readers 1558 to 1603 (Cambridge University Press, 1965)
English Books &Readers í6o3 to 1640 (Cambridge University Press, 1970)
Bent, Margaret, `Music and the early Veneto humanists', Proceedings of the
British Academy, 101 (1999), 101-30
Berengo, Marino, Nobili e mercanti nella Lucca del Cinquecento (Turin: Einaudi,
1965)
Berni, Francesco, Poesie e prose, Ezio Chi6rboli (ed.) (Geneva and Florence:
Olschki, 1934)
Bertolini, Lucia, `Come "pubblicava" l'Alberti: ipotesi preliminari', in
Michelangelo Zaccarello and Lorenzo Tomasin (eds.), Storia della lingua e
Bibliography 273
filologia: per Alfredo Stussi nel suo sessantacinquesimo compleanno (Florence:
Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2004), pp. 219-40
Bertolotti, Antonino, `Varietà archivistiche e bibliografiche', Il bibliofilo, 5 (1878),
26-8; 7 (1880), 84-5
Bertoni, Giulio, La Biblioteca Estense e la coltura ferrarese ai tempi del Duca
Ercole I (1471-1505) (Turin: Loescher, 1903)
Guarino da Verona fra letterati e cortigiani a Ferrara (i429 1460) (Geneva:
Olschki, 1921)
`Notizie sugli amanuensi degli Estensi nel Quattrocento', Archivum romani-
cum, 2 (1918), 29-57
Biagiarelli, Berta Maracchi, Antonio d'Orazio da Sangallo (1551-1639) biblio-
filo', LB, 59 (1957), 147-54
Biagioli, Mario, Galileo, Courtier: The Practice of Science in the Culture of
Absolutism (University of Chicago Press, 1993)
Bianca, Concetta, Andrea Matteo Acquaviva e i libri a stampa', in Caterina
Lavarra (ed.), Territorio e feudalità nel Mezzogiorno rinascimentale.• il ruolo
degli Acquaviva tra XV e XVI secolo. Atti del primo Convegno internazion-
ale di studi su La Casa Acquaviva dAtri e di Conversano, Conversano Atri,
i3—l6-settembre iyyi (Galatina: Congedo, 1995), 39-53
Bianco, Cesare, `La comunità di "fratelli" nel movimento ereticale modenese del
'Soo', RSI, 92 (1980), 621-79
Bianconi, Lorenzo, `Il Cinquecento e il Seicento', in Alberto Asor Rosa (dir.),
Letteratura italiana, vol. VI, Teatro, musica, tradizione dei classici (Turin:
Einaudi, 1986), 319-63
and Antonio Vassalli, `Circolazione letteraria e circolazione musicale del mad-
rigale: il caso G. B. Strozzi', in Paolo Fabbri (ed.), Il madrigale tra Cinque e
Seicento (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1988),123-38
Bigolina, Giulia, Urania, Valeria Finucci (ed.) (Rome: Bulzoni, 2002)
Billanovich, Giuseppe, `Per l'edizione critica delle canzonette di Leonardo
Giustinian', GSLI, 110 (1937), 197-252
Billanovich, Maria Pia, `Una miniera di epigrafi e di antichità: il Chiostro
Maggiore di S. Giustina a Padova', IMU, 12 (1969), 197-293
Binazzi, Cristiana, `Le veglie prima delle "vegghie": le Giornate e le Notti di
Pietro Fortini', Bullettino senese di storia patria, 105 (1998), 63-108
Biow, Douglas, Doctors, Ambassadors, Secretaries: Humanism and Professions in
Renaissance Italy (University of Chicago Press, 2002)
Bisaccia, Giuseppe, La Repubblica fiorentina' di Donato Giannotti (Florence:
Olschki, 1978)
Black, Robert, Benedetto Accolti and the Florentine Renaissance (Cambridge
University Press, 1985)
Humanism and Education in Medieval and Renaissance Italy (Cambridge
University Press, 2001)
Blackburn, Bonnie, `Two "carnival songs" unmasked: a commentary on MS
Florence Magl. XIX. 121', Musica disciplina, 35 (1981), 121-78
 274 Bibliography
Boiardo, Matteo Maria, L'Inamoramento de Orlando, Antonia Tissoni Benvenuti
(ed.), z vols. (Milan and Naples: Ricciardi, 1999)
Opere volgari, Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo (ed.) (Bari: Laterza, 196z)
Bongi, Salvatore, Annali di Gabriel Giolito de' Ferrari da Trino di Monferrato
stampatore in Venezia, z vols. (Rome: Ministero della Pubblica Istruzione,
1890-7)
`Francesco da Meleto: un profeta fiorentino a' tempi del Machiavello', ASI, 5th
ser., 3 (1889),62-70
Bonifati, Giovanni, Dal libro manoscritto al libro stampato: sistemi di mercato a
Bologna e a Firenze agli albori del capitalismo (Turin: Rosenberg & Sellier,
2008)
Bonora, Elena, I conflitti della Controriforma: santità e obbedienza nell esperienza
religiosa dei primi barnabiti (Florence: Le Lettere, 1998)
Boorman, Stanley, Ottaviano Petrucci: Catalogue Raisonne (New York and
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2oo6)
Bortoletti, Francesca, `Danza poesia e musica in fabula: Bologna 1487 —
nozze Bentivoglio-d'Este', Annali Online di Ferrara — Lettere, i (zoo7)
199-2z6 <eprints.unife.it/annali/lettere/2007vo11/bortoletti.pdf> [accessed
zo August 20071
Bourdieu, Pierre, The Field of Cultural Production, Randal Johnson (ed.)
(Cambridge: Polity, 1993)
Bourgain, Pascale, `La naissance officielle de l'œuvre: l'expression métaphorique
de la mise au jour', in Olga Weijers (ed.), Vocabulaire du livre et de l'écriture
au Moyen Age (Turnhout: Brepols, 1989), 19 5-2 05
Bouza, Fernando, Corre manuscrito: una historia cultural del Sigla de Oro
(Madrid: Pons, zoor)
Bowd, Stephen, Reform before the Reformation: Vincenzo Querini and the Religious
Renaissance in Italy (Leiden: Brill, toot)
Bozzetti, Cesare, `Notizie sulle Rime dell'Ariosto', in Studi di filologia e critica
offerti dagli allievi a Lanfranco Caretti, z vols. (Rome: Salerno Editrice,
1985), I, 83 118
Pietro Gibellini and Ennio Sandal (eds.), Veronica Gambara e la poesia del suo
tempo nell'Italia settentrionale (Florence: Olschki, 1989)
Bramante, Donato, Sonetti e altri scritti, Carlo Vecce (ed.) (Rome: Salerno
Editrice, 1995)
Brandis, Tito (ed.), Zimelien: Abendländische Handschriften des Mittelalters aus
den Sammlungen der Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz Berlin (Wiesbaden:
L. Reichert, 1975)
Brandolini, Raffaele, On Music and Poetry (De musica et poetica, 1513), ed. and
trans. by Ann E. Moyer with the assistance of Marc Laureys (Tempe:
Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, zoos)
Brantôme, Pierre de Bourdeille, seigneur de, Œuvres complètes, J. A. C. Buchon
(ed.), z vols. (Paris: Sabe, 1848)
Brentano-Keller, Nelly, `Il libretto di spese e di ricordi di un monaco vallombro-
sano per libri dati o avuti in prestito', LB, 41 (1939), 129-58
Bibliography 2 75
Bristol, Michael D. and Arthur F. Marotti, `Introduction', in Arthur F. Marotti
and Michael D. Bristol (eds.), Print, Manuscript, & Performance: The
Changing Relations of the Media in Early Modern England (Colombus: Ohio
State University Press, z000), 3-29
Bronzino, Agnolo, Rime in burla, Franca Petrucci Nardelli (ed.) (Rome:
Treccani, 1988)
I salterelli del/Ahbrucia sopra i Mattaccini di ser Fedocco, Carla Rossi Bellotto
(ed.) (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1998)
Brown, Howard Mayer, A cook's tour of Ferrara in 1529', Rivista italiana di
musicologia, 10 (1975), z16-4i
Brown, Peter M., `Jacopo Corbinelli and the Florentine "Crows"', IS, 26 (1971),
68-89
Lionardo Salviati: A Critical Biography (Oxford University Press, 1974)
`Manoscritti e stampe delle poesie edite e inedite del cavalier Lionardo
Salviati', GSLI, 146 (1969), 530-52
Brugnolo, Furio and Roberto Benedetti, `La dedica tra medioevo e primo
Rinascimento', in Maria Antonietta Terzoli (ed.), I margini del libro: in-
dagine teorica e storica sui testi di dedica. Atti del Convegno internazionale
di studi, Basilea, 21-23 novembre 2002 (Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2004),
13-54
Brundin, Abigail, `Vittoria Colonna and the poetry of reform', IS, 57 (2002),
61-74 l
`Vittoria Colonna and the Virgin Mary', Modern Language Review, 96 (2o01),
61—Si
Bruni, Leonardo, Dialogi ad Petrum Paulum Histrum, Stefano Ugo Baldassarri
(ed.) (Florence: Olschki, 1994)
Bruni, Roberto L., `Per una bibliografia delle opere di Nicolò Franco', SPCT, 15
(1977), 84-103
and Diego Zancani, Antonio Cornazzano: la tradizione testuale (Florence:
Olschki, 199z)
Bujanda, J. M. de, Index de Rome: 1557 Z559, 1564. Les premiers Index romains et
/'Index du Concile de Trente (Sherbrooke: Centre d'études de la Renaissance,
1990)
Bulgarini, Bellisario, Alcune considerazioni sopra 'l Discorso dell éccellente mescer
Giacopo Mazzoni (Siena: Luca Bonetti, 1583)
Bullock, Alan, A hitherto unexplored manuscript of loo poems by Vittoria
Colonna in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Florence', IS, 21 (1966),
42-56
Buonaccorsi, Biagio, Diario dall ánno 1498 all ánno 1512 e altri scritti, Enrico
Niccolini (ed.) (Rome: Istituto storico per il Medio Evo, 1999)
Buonarroti, Michelangelo, Il carteggio di Michelangelo, ed. postuma di Giovanni
Poggi, Paola Barocchi and Renzo Ristori (eds.), 5 vols. (Florence: Sansoni
and SPES, 1965-83)
Burke, Peter, `Early modern Venice as a centre of information and communi-
cation', in John Martin and Dennis Romano (eds.), Venice Reconsidered:
278 Bibliography
Catalano, Michele, Vita di Ludovico Ariosto ricostruita su nuovi documenti, 2 vols,
(Geneva: Olschki, 1931)
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols. (London:
British Museum, 0o8-12)
Cattin, Giulio, `Le rime del Poliziano nelle fonti musicali', in Miscellanea di studi
in onore di Vittore Branca, I11, 379-96
Cavagna, Anna Giulia, La tipografica professione di Niccolò Capaci (Milan:
Bonnard, 2005)
Cavalcanti, Bartolomeo, Lettere edite e inedite, Christina Roaf (ed.) (Bologna:
Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1967)
Cavallini, Ivano, `Sugli improvvisatori del Cinque-Seicento: persistenze, nuovi
repertori e qualche riconoscimento', Recercare, 1 (1989), 23-40
Cavallo, Sandra, `Health, beauty and hygiene', in Marta Ajmar-Wollheim
and Flora Dennis (eds.), At Home in Renaissance Italy (London: V&A
Publications, zoo6), 174-87
Cellini,'Benvenuto, Opere, Giuseppe Guido Ferrero (ed.) (Turin: UTET, 1971)
I trattati dell'oreficeria e della scultura, Carlo Milanesi (ed.) (Florence: Le
Monnier, 1857)
Cencetti, Giorgio, Lineamenti di storia della scrittura latina, Gemma Guerrini
Ferri (ed.) (Bologna: Pàtron, 1997)
Cerreta, Florindo, Alessandro Piccolomini letterato e filosofo senese del Cinquecento
(Siena: Accademia Senese degli Intronati, 196o)
Cerreta, Florindo V., `La Tombaide: alcune rime inedite sur un pellegrinaggio
petrarchesco ad ArquY, Italica, 35 (1958), 16z-6
Chambers, David S., `The earlier "academies" in Italy', in D. S. Chambers and
F. Quiviger (eds.), Italian Academies of the Sixteenth Century (London:
Warburg Institute, 1995), 1-14
Chandler, S. Bernard, `Appunti su Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti', GSLI, 130
(1953), 346-5o
`A Renaissance news correspondent', Italica, 2.9 (1952), 158-63
Charis Marconi, Augusta, La nascita di una vulgata: l'Arcadia'delr5o4 (Manziana:
Vecchiarelli, 1997)
Chartier, Roger, `Orality lost: text and voice in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries', in Bill Bell, Philip Bennett and Jonquil Bevan (eds.), Across
Boundaries: The Book in Culture and Commerce (New Castle: Oak Knoll
Press, z000), 1-28
`Princely patronage and the economy of dedication', in Forms and Meanings:
Texts, Performances, and Audiences from Codex to Computer (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995), 25-42
Cherubini, Paolo, `Note sul commercio librario a Roma nel '400', Studi romani,
33 (1985), 212-21
Cian, Vittorio, `Una baruffa letteraria alla corte di Mantova (1513): l'Equicola ed
il Tebaldeo', GSLI, 8 (1886), 387-98
Un decennio della vita di M. Pietro Bembo (Turin: Loescher, 1885)
Bibliography 279
`Per Bernardo Bembo: le sue relazioni letterarie, i codici e gli scritti', GSLI, 31
(18 98), 49-81
Cicogna, Emmanuele, Delle inscrizioni veneziane, 6 vols. (Venice: Orlandelli,
18z4-53)
Ciminelli, Serafino de Aquilano, Opere [ ... ] collette per Francesco Flavio (Venice:
Manfredo Bonelli, í502)
Cione, Edmondo, Juan de Valdés: la sua vita e il suo pensiero, 2nd edn (Naples:
Fiorentino, 1963)
Cipriani, Giovanni, Il mito etrusco nel Rinascimento fiorentino (Florence: Olschki,
1980)
Clement, Richard W, `Sixteenth-century Italian writing books and the scribal
reality of Verona', Visible Language, 20 (1986), 393-412
Cochrane, Eric, Historians and Historiography in the Italian Renaissance
(University of Chicago Press, 1981)
Cockerell, Sir Sydney [and James Wardrop], `Signed manuscripts in my collec-
tion: V', Book Collector, 1 (1952), 84-91
Collett, Barry, Italian Benedictine Scholars and the Reformation: The Congregation
of Santa Giustina of Padua (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985)
Colonna, Vittoria, Rime, Alan Bullock (ed.) (Bari: Laterza, i98z)
Sonnets for Michelangelo, Abigail Brundin (ed.) (University of Chicago Press,
2005)
Concilium Tridentinum: diariorum, actorum, epistolarum, tractatuum nova col-
lectio (Freiburg: Herder, 1961—)
Condello, Emma and Giuseppe De Gregorio (eds.), Scribi e colofoni: le sotto-
scrizioni di copisti dalle origini alli vvento della stampa (Spoleto: Centro
italiano di studi sull'Alto Medioevo, 1995)
Contini, Gianfranco, `Il codice De Marinis del Cariteo', in Studi di bibliografia
e di storia in onore di Tammaro De Marinis, 4 vols. (Vatican City: Biblioteca
Apostolica Vaticana, 1964), 11,15-31
(ed.), Letteratura italiana del Quattrocento (Florence: Sansoni,1976)
(ed.), Poeti del Duecento, 2 vols. (Milan and Naples: Ricciardi, i96o)
Correggio, Niccolò da, Opere, Antonia Tissoni Benvenuti (ed.) (Bari: Laterza,
19 69)
Corrigan, Beatrice, An unrecorded manuscript of Machiavelli's "La Clizia"',
LB, 63 (1961), 73-87
Cortesi, Paolo, De hominibus doctis dialogus, Maria Teresa Graziosi (ed.) (Rome:
Bonacci, 1973)
Cox, Virginia, Women's Writing in Italy i400—í65o (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press, 2o08)
Cozzi, Gaetano, `Marin Sanudo il Giovane: dalla cronaca alla storia', in Agostino
Pertusi (ed.), La storiografia veneziana fino al secolo XVI: aspetti e problemi
(Florence: Olschki, 1970), 333-58
Repubblica di Venezia e stati italiani: politica e giustizia dal secolo XVI al secolo
XVIII (Turin: Einaudi, 1982)
280 Bibliography
Crespo, Roberto, `Il Bandello e lo Scaligera "In obitum Fracastorii"', Lettere
italiane, 24 (1972), 341-6
Crimi, Giuseppe and Cristiano Spila (eds.), Nanerie del Rinascimento: `La Nanea'
di Michelangelo Serafini e altri versi di corte e dáccademia (Manziana:
Vecchiarelli, 2oo6)
Cristofari, Maria, Il codice Marciano It. XI, 66 (Padua: CEDAM, 1937)
Cristoforo Fiorentino, Il primo libro de Reali (Venice: Giovanni Antonio
Niccolini da Sabbio, 1534)
Croce, Benedetto, `Isabella Villamarino', in Aneddoti di varia letteratura, 2nd
edn, 4 vols. (Bari: Laterza, 1953-4), 1, 330-8
Cursi, Marco, Il Decameron i scritture, scriventi, lettori. Storia di un testo (Rome:
Viella, 2007)
`Fare scrivere il Boccaccio: codici e copisti "a prezzo" fra Bologna e Firenze
all'inizio del sec. XV', Studi sul Boccaccio, 30 (2002), 321-44
`Ghinozzo di Tommaso Allegretti e altri copisti "a prezzo" di testi volgari
(XIV—XV sec.)', Scrittura e civiltà, 23 (1999), 213-52
D'Accone, Frank A., `Transitional text forms and settings in an early 16th-century
Florentine manuscript', in Lawrence Berman (ed.), Words and Music:
The Scholar's View. A Medley of Problems and Solutions Compiled in honor
of A. Tillman Merritt by Sundry Hands (Cambridge, MA: Department of
Music, Harvard University, 1972), 29-58
Dall'Aglio, Stefano, `l'altra faccia dello pseudoprofeta: Francesco da Meleto
scrivano della SS. Annunziata di Firenze', BHR, 67 (2005), 343-51
Dalmas, Davide, Dante nella crisi religiosa del Cinquecento italiano: da Trifon
Gabriele a Lodovico Castelvetro (Manziana: Vecchiarelli, 2005)
Damianaki, Chrysa, Paolo Procaccioli and Angelo Romano (eds.), Ex mar-
more: pasquini, pasquinisti, pasquinate nell'Europa moderna (Manziana:
Vecchiarelli, 2oo6)
D'Amico, John F., Renaissance Humanism in Papal Rome: Humanists and
Churchmen on the Eve of the Reformation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1983)
D'Ancona, Alessandro, Origini del teatro italiano, 2 vols. (Turin: Loescher, i89i)
Dante Alighieri, De vulgari eloquentia, ed. and trans. by Steven Botterill
(Cambridge University Press, 1996)
Danzi, Massimo, La biblioteca del cardinal Pietro Bembo (Geneva: Droz, 2005)
`Per l'edizione delle Rime di Matteo Bandello: estravaganti inedite e proposte
di attribuzione', SFI, 40 (1982), 107-53
`II Raffaello del Molza e un nuovo codice di rime cinquecentesche', Rivista di
letteratura italiana, 4 (1986), 537-59
Davies, Martin, `Juan de Carvajal and early printing: the 42-line Bible and
the Sweynheym and Pannartz Aquinas', The Library, 6th ser., A (1996),
193-215
Dazzi, Manlio (ed.), Il fiore della lirica veneziana, z vols. (Venice: Neri Pozza,
1956)
(ed.), Il libro chiuso di Mao Venier (La tenzone con Veronica Franco) (Venice:
Neri Pozza, 1956)
Bibliography 281
Decaria, Alessio and Michelangelo Zaccarello, `Il ritrovato "Codice Dolci" e la
costituzione della vulgata dei "Sonetti" di Matteo Franco e Luigi Pulci',
Filologia italiana, 3 (zoo6), Izr 54 -
De Gaetano, Armand L., Giambattista Gelli and the Florentine Academy: The
Rebellion against Latin (Florence: Olschki, 1976)
De Jennaro, Pietro Jacopo, Rime e lettere, Maria Corti (ed.) (Bologna:
Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1956)
De la Mare, Albinia C., The Handwriting of Italian Humanists, vol. I, fast. i
(Oxford: Association Internationale de Bibliophilie, 1973)
`Messer Piero Strozzi, a Florentine priest and scribe', in A.S. Osley (ed.),
Calligraphy and Palaeography, 55-68
`New research on humanistic scribes in Florence', in Annarosa Garzelli (ed.),
Miniatura fiorentina, I, 393-600
`Script and manuscripts in Milan under the Sforzas', in Milano nell etct di
Ludovico il Moro, 399-408
`Vespasiano da Bisticci as producer of classical manuscripts in fifteenth-
century Florence', in Claudine A. Chavannes-Mazel and Margaret
M. Smith (eds.), Medieval Manuscripts of the Latin Classics: Production and
Use (Los Altos Hills, CA: Anderson-Lovelace; London: Red Gull Press,
1996), 167-207
`Vespasiano da Bisticci e i copisti fiorentini di Federico', in Giorgio Cerboni
Baiardi, Giorgio Chittolini and Piero Floriani (eds.), Federico di Montefltro:
lo stato, le arti, la cultura, 3 vols. (Rome: Bulzoni, 1986), La cultura, 81-96
Delcorno Branca, Daniela, `Da Poliziano a Serafino', in Miscellanea di studi in
onore di Vittore Branca, III, 423-50
`I1 Giardino novello: lettere di direzione spirituale del Quattrocento trasmesse
dalle monache del Paradiso', in Gian Mario Anselmi and others (eds.),
Da Dante a Montale: studi di filologia e critica letteraria in onore di Emilio
Pasquini (Bologna: Gedit, 2005), 307-22
Delumeau, Jean, Vie économique et sociale de Rome dans la seconde moitié du XVT
siècle, z vols. (Paris: E. de Boccard, 1957)
De Marinis, Tammaro, La biblioteca napoletana dei re dAragona, 4 vols. (Milan:
Hoepli, 1947-52)
de Montera, Pierre, L'Humaniste napolitain Girolamo Carbone et ses poésies
inédites (Naples: Ricciardi, 1935)
Denarosi, Lucia, L'Accademia degli Innominati di Parma: teorie letterarie e pro-
getti di scrittura (i574—r6o8) (Florence: Società Editrice Fiorentina, 2003)
De Robertis, Domenico, Editi e rari. studi sulla tradizione letteraria tra Tre e
Cinquecento (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1978)
`Censimento dei manoscritti di rime di Dante: I', Studi danteschi, 37 (196o),
141-273
`Censimento dei manoscritti di rime di Dante: IV', Studi danteschi, 40 (1963),
443-98
`Lorenzo aragonese', Rinascimento, 2nd ser., 34 (1994), 3-14
D'Ettorre, Mirella, `Latinità e volgar lingua nel De Urbini ducibus di Pietro
Bembo', Rivista di letteratura italiana, 18 (2000), 337-48
 Bibliography
de Vivo, Filippo, `Le armi dell'ambasciatore: voci e manoscritti a Parigi durante
l'interdetto di Venezia', in Lucia Strappini (ed.), I luoghi dell'immaginario
barocco, 189-2oi
`Paolo Sarpi and the uses of information in seventeenth-century Venice',
Media History, 11 (2005), 37-51
Information and Communication in Venice: Rethinking Early Modern Politics
(Oxford University Press, 2oo7)
Diario di Ser Tommaso di Silvestro, in Ephemerides Urbevetanae del Codice
Vaicano Urbinate 1745 (aa. x482--r5r4), Luigi Fumi (ed.), Rerum italicarum
scriptores, XV, pt 5, vol. z (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1922)
Dilemmi, Giorgio, `Giovanni Della Casa e il "nobil cigno": a gara col Bembo',
in Gennaro Barbarisi and Claudia Berra (eds.), Per Giovanni Della Casa,
93-122
"'Ne videatur strepere anser inter olores": le relazioni della Gambara con il
Bembo', in Cesare Bozzetti and others (eds.), Veronica Gambara e la poesia
del suo tempo, 23-35
`Le rime di Guidotto Prestinari', SFI, 34 (1976), 187-248
`Postilla a "Le rime di Guidotto Prestinari"', SFI, 36 (1978), 367-9
Dionisotti, Carlo, Appunti sul Bembo e su Vittoria Colonna', in Miscellanea
Augusto Campana, 2 vols. (Padua: Antenore, 1981), I, 257-86
Appunti sulle rime del Sannazaro', GSLI, 140 (1963), 161-211
`Fortuna del Petrarca nel Quattrocento', IMU, 17 (1974), 61-113
Machiavellerie (Turin: Einaudi, i98o)
`Monumenti Beccadelli', in Miscellanea Pio Paschini: studi di storia ecclesiastica,
2 vols. (Rome: Facultas theologica Pontificii Athenaei Lateranensis,1948-9),
II, 251-68
`Nuove rime di Niccolò da Correggio', SFI, 17 (1959), 135-88
Gli umanisti e il volgare fra Quattro e Cinquecento (Florence: Le Monnier,
1968)
Doni, Anton Francesco, I Marmi, Ezio Chiòrboli (ed.), 2 vols. (Bari: Laterza,
1928)
Le nuove pitture del Doni fiorentino: libro primo consacrato al mirabil signore
Donno Aloise da Este, illustrissimo et reverendissimo, Sonia Maffei (ed.)
(Naples: La stanza delle scritture; Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica
Vaticana, 2o06)
Dooley, Brendan, The Social History of Skepticism: Experience and Doubt
in Early Modern Culture (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
1999)
Earle, T. F., `Damido de G6is's translation and commentary on Cicero's De senec-
tute', in Martha E. Schaffer and Antonio Cortijo Ocafia (eds.), Medieval
and Renaissance Spain and Portugal- Studies in Honor of Arthur L.-F. Askins
(Woodbridge: Tamesis, zoo6), 144-57
Edo, Pietro, Officio de Nostra Donna, Francesco De Nicola (ed.) (Genoa: Tilgher,
1977)
R rimedio amoroso, Francesco De Nicola (ed.) (Ravenna: Longo,1978)
Bibliography 283
Einstein, Alfred, `Orlando furioso and La Gerusalemme liberata as set to music
during the 16th and 17th centuries', Notes (Music Library Association), 2nd
ser., 8 (1950-1), 623-30
Evangelisti, Claudia, Accepto calamo, manu propria scripsit: prove e perizie
grafiche nella Bologna di fine Cinquecento', Scrittura e civiltà, 19 (1995),
251-75
`"Libelli famosi": processi per scritte infamanti nella Bologna di fine '500',
Annali della Fondazione Luigi Einaudi, 26 (1992), 181-239
Ezell, Margaret J. M., SocialAuthorship and the Advent of Print (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1999)
Fachard, Denis, Biagio Buonaccorsi: sa vie, son temps, son oeuvre (Bologna: Boni,
1976)
(ed.), Consulte e pratiche della Repubblica Fiorentina, x498-15o5 (Geneva: Droz,
1993)
Fahy, Conor, L' `Orlando furioso'del x532: profilo di una edizione (Milan: Vita e
Pensiero, 1989)
Fanelli, Vittorio, Ricerche su Angelo Colocci e sulla Roma cinquecentesca (Vatican
City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1979)
Farenga, Paola, `Il sistema delle dediche nella prima editoria romana del
Quattrocento', in Amedeo Quondam (ed.), Il libro a corte (Rome: Bulzoni,
1994), 57-87
Fedi, Roberto, La memoria della poesia: canzonieri, lirici e libri di rime nel
Rinascimento (Rome: Salerno Editrice, i99o)
Feldman, Martha, City Culture and the Madrigal at Venice (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1995)
Les Femmes écrivains en Italie au Moyen Age et à la Renaissance (Aix-en-Provence:
Université de Provence, 1994)
Fenlon, lain, Tetrarch, Petrarchism and the origins of the Italian madrigal', in Il
Petrarchismo: un modello di poesia per l'Europa, I, 129-44
and James Haar, The Italian Madrigal in the Early Sixteenth Century: Sources
and Interpretation (Cambridge University Press, 1988)
Ferrai, Luigi A., `Lettere inedite di Donato Giannotti', Atti del R. Istituto Veneto
di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, 6th ser., 3 (1884-5), 1,567-96
Ferrara, Mario, `Due sonetti contro il Savonarola', ASI, 8o (1922), 135-55
Ferrato, Pietro (ed.), Due narrazioni storiche del secolo XVI di Francesco Marcaldi
(Mantua: Stabilimento tipografico Mondovì, 1876)
Ferroni, Giulio, `Il modello cortigiano tra "giudizio" ed "eccesso": IApologia del
Caro contro il Castelvetro', in Amedeo Quondam (ed.), Le corti farnesiane
di Parma e Piacenza (Y545--622), 2 vols. (Rome: Bulzoni, 1978), II, 25-62
Ficino, Marsilio, Opera omnia [reprint of Basel, 1576 edn] (Turin: Bottega
d'Erasmo, 1962)
Three Books on Life, ed. and trans. by Carol V. Kaske and John R. Clark
(Binghamton, NY. Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1989)
Finazzi, Maria, `Due manoscritti della "Tullia" di Lodovico Martelli', SFI, S9
(200í), I17-66
284 Bibliography
Fiorato, Adelin Charles, `Grandeur et servitude du sécretaire: du savoir rhétorique
à la collaboration politique>, in Adelin Charles Fiorato (ed.), Culture et
professions en Italie (fin XVI —début XVIIe siècles) (Paris: Publications de la
Sorbonne, 1989), 133-84
Firenzuola, Agnolo, Le novelle, Eugenio Ragni (ed.) (Rome: Salerno Editrice,
1971)
Opere, Delmo Maestri (ed.) (Turin: UTET, 1977)
Firpo, Luigi, `In margine al processo di Giordano Bruno: Francesco Maria
Vialardi', RSI, 68 (1956), 325-64
and Maria Pia Pedani-Fabris (eds.), Relazioni di ambasciatori veneti al Senato
tratte dalle migliori edizioni disponibili e ordinate cronologicamente, 14 vols.
(Turin: Bottega d'Erasmo, 1965-96)
Firpo, Massimo, Inquisizione romana e Controriforma: studi sul cardinal Giovanni
Morone e il suo processo d'eresia (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1992)
`Pasquinate romane del Cinquecento', RSI, 96 (1984), boo —Zr
Tra alumbrados e `spirituali ` studi su Juan de Valdes e il valdesianesimo nella
crisi religiosa del Soo italiano (Florence: Olschki, í99o)
and Dario Marcatto (eds.), I processi inquisitoriali di Pietro Carnesecchi
(1557-1567), 2 vols. (Vatican City: Archivio segreto vaticano, 1998-2000)
and Dario Marcatto (eds.), Il processo inquisitoriale del cardinal Giovanni
Morone, 6 vols. (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per l'età moderna e contem-
poranea, 1981-95)
and Sergio Pagano (eds.), I processi inquisitoriali di V"ttore Soranzo (z550-1558),
2 vols. (Vatican City: Archivio segreto vaticano, 2004)
Flamini,, Francesco, Il canzoniere inedito di Antonio Forteguerri poeta pistoiese
dell'estremo Quattrocento (Pisa: Mariotti, 1893)
Flaminio, Marcantonio, Apologia del `Beneficio di Cristo' e altri scritti inediti,
Dario Marcatto (ed.) (Florence: Olschki, 1996)
Lettere, Alessandro Pastore (ed.) (Rome: Edizioni dell'Ateneo e Bizzarri, 1978)
Foà, S., `Mattio Franzesi', DBI, 50 (1998), 264-6
Folengo, Teofilo, Atto della Pinta: sacra rappresentazione, Maria Di Venuta (ed.)
(Lucca: Pacini Fazzi, 1994)
La Palermitana, Patrizia Sonia De Corso (ed.) (Florence: Olschki, 2oo6)
Fortini, Pietro, Le giornate delle novelle dei novizi, Adriana Mauriello (ed.), 2 vols.
(Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1988)
Fortunio, Giovan Francesco, Regole grammaticali della volgar lingua, Brian
Richardson (ed.) (Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2oo1)
Fox, Adam, Oral and Literate Culture in England i5oo—i7oo (Oxford University
Press, 2000)
Fragnito, Gigliola, Gasparo Contarini: un magistrato veneziano al servizio della
Cristianità (Florence: Olschki, 1988)
Proibito capire: la Chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il
Mulino, 2oo5)
Franco, Niccolò, Dialogi piacevoli, Franco Pignatti (ed.) (Manziana: Vecchiarelli,
zoo3)
Bibliography 285
Franco, Veronica, Lettere, Stefano Bianchi (ed.) (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1998)
Rime, Stefano Bianchi (ed.) (Milan: Mursia, 1995)
Frantz, David O., Festum voluptatis: A Study of Renaissance Erotica (Columbus:
Ohio State University Press, 1989)
Frasso, Giuseppe, Appunti e proposte per la storia nel manoscritto Parmense 1636
della Biblioteca Palatina di Parma', Studi petrarcheschi, 1 (1984), 259-72
`Un poeta improvvisatore nella "familia" del cardinale Francesco Gonzaga:
Francesco Cieco da Firenze', IMU, 20 (1977), 395-400
Studi su i Rerum vulgarium fragmenta'e i `Triumphi', L• Francesco Petrarca e
Ludovico Beccadelli ( Padua: Antenore, 1983)
and Daniela Graffigna, `Da Petrarca a Pasquino', Studi petrarcheschi, n. s.,
5 (1988) , 155-289
Frati, Lodovico, `I Bentivoglio nella poesia contemporanea', GSLI, 45 (19o5),
1-34
Fubini, Riccardo, `Lorenzo de' Medici tra eulogia e storia: la Laurentü Medices
vita di Niccolò Valori', in Tina Matarrese and Cristina Montagnani (eds.),
Il Principe e la storia: Atti del Convegno, Scandiano i8-2o settembre 2oo3
(Novara: Interlinea, 20 05), 439-63
Roberta Manetti and Ida Giovanna Rao, `Opere di dedica', in Anna Lenzuni
(ed.), All ombra del lauro: documenti librari della cultura in età laurenziana.
Firenze, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana 4 maggio 3o giugno 1992 (Florence:
Silvana, 1992), 29-122
Gaeta, Franco, `Sul "De potestate Pontificis" di Gaspare Contarini', Rivista di
storia della chiesa in Italia, 13 (1959), 391-6
Il vescovo Pietro Barozzi e il trattato De factionibus extinguendis' (Venite and
Rome: Istituto per la Collaborazione Culturale, 1958)
Gaisser, Julia Haig, `The rise and fall of Goritz's feasts', Renaissance Quarterly, 48
(1995), 41-57
Galilei, Galileo, Le opere di Galileo Galilei: ristampa della edizione nazionale,
zo vols. (Florence: Barbèra, 1929-39)
Gallico, Claudio, `Un "dialogo d'amore" di Niccolò da Correggio', Studien zur
Musi&issenschaft, 25 (1962), 205-13
Sopra li fondamenti della verità: musica italiana fra XV e XVII secolo (Rome:
Bulzoni, tool)
Gambara, Veronica, Le rime, Alan Bullock (ed.) (Florence: Olschki; Perth:
University of Western Australia Press, 1995)
Garavelli, Enrico, `Prime scintille tra Caro e Castelvetro (1554-55)', in Matteo M.
Pedroni (ed.), Parlar l'idioma soave: studi di filosofia, letteratura e storia della
lingua offerti a Gianni A. Papini (Novara: Interlinea, 2003), 131-45
Garin, Eugenio (ed.), Il pensiero pedagogico dello umanesimo (Florence: Giuntine
and Sansoni, 1958)
Garzelli, Annarosa, `Le immagini, gli autori, i destinatari', in Annarosa Garzelli
(ed.), Miniatura fiorentina, I, 1-391
(ed.), Miniatura fiorentina del Rinascimento 1440-1525. un primo censimento,
2 vols. (Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1985)
286 Bibliography
Garzoni, Tommaso, La piazza universale di tutte le professioni del mondo,
Giovanni Battista Bronzini (ed.), z vols. (Florence: Olschki, 1996)
Gelli, Giambattista, Dell'origine di Firenze, Alessandro d'Alessandro (ed.), Atti e
memorie dellAccademia toscana di scienze e lettere La Colombaria, 44 (1979),
61-122
Genette, Gérard, Paratexts: Thresholds oflnterpretation, trans. by Jane E. Lewin
(Cambridge University Press, 1997)
Seuils (Paris: Seuil, 1987)
Gentile, Sebastiano, `Note sullo "scrittoio" di Marsilio Ficino', in James
Hankins, John Monfasani and Frederick Purnell, Jr (eds.), Supplementum
festivum: Studies in Honor of Paul Oskar Kristeller (Binghamton: Medieval
and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1987), 339-97
`Per la storia del testo del Commentarium in Convivium di Marsilio Ficino',
Rinascimento, 2nd ser., 21 (1981), 3-27
Gerber, A., Niccolò Machiavelli: Die Handschriften, Ausgaben and Übersetzungen
seiner Werke im M and 17 Jahrhundert, 3 vols. and facsimiles (Gotha:
Perthes, 1912-13)
Ghirlanda, Daniele, `La raccolta Farnese: un piccolo canzoniere di Pietro
Bembo', in Il Petrarchismo: un modello di poesia per l'Europa, II, 117-31
Giambullari, Pierfrancesco, Regole della lingua fiorentina, Ilaria Bonomi (ed.)
(Florence: Accademia della Crusca, 1986)
Giannetto, Nella, Bernardo Bembo umanista e politico veneziano (Florence:
Olschki, 1985)
Giannotti, Donato, Republica fiorentina, Giovanni Silvano (ed.) (Geneva: Droz,
1990
Giansante, M., Andrea Cambini', DBI, 17 (1974), 132-4
Gigante, Claudio, Esperienze di filologia cinquecentesca: Salviati, Mazzoni,
Trissino, Costo, Il Bargeo, Tasso (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 2003)
Giglio Tos, Efisio (ed.), La prima storia di Maria Stuarda: da un manoscritto
italiano del secolo XVI esistente nella Biblioteca Nazionale di Parigi (Turin:
Tipografia Subalpina, 1907)
Gilbert, Felix, `Bernardo Rucellai e gli Orti Oricellari', in Machiavelli e il suo
tempo (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1964), 7-58
`Contarini on Savonarola: an unknown document of 1516', Archiv fir
Reformationsgeschichte, 59 (1968), 145-50
`Cristianesimo, umanesimo e la bolla "Apostolici Regiminis" del 1513', RSI, 79
(1967), 976-90
`The date of the composition of Contarini's and Giannotti's books on Venice',
Studies in the Renaissance, 14 (1967), 172-84
Ginzburg, Carlo, `Due note sul profetismo cinquecentesco', RSI, 78 (1966),
184-227
and Adriano Prosperi, `Le due redazioni del "Beneficio di Cristo"', in
Albano Biondi and others, Eresia e riforma nell'Italia del Cinquecento:
Miscellanea I (Florence: Sansoni; Chicago: Newberry Library, 1974),
137-204
Bibliography 287
and Adriano Prosperi, Giochi di pazienza: un seminario sul `Beneficio di Cristo'
(Turin: Einaudi, 1975)
Giorgetti, Alceste, `Fra' Luca Bettini e la sua difesa del Savonarola', ASI, 7th set.,
2 (1919), 164-231
Giraldi, Giambattista Cinzio, Scritti critici, Camillo Guerrieri Crocetti (ed.)
(Milan: Marzorati, 1973)
Giunta, Claudio, Due saggi sulla tenzone (Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2oo2)
Versi a un destinatario: saggio sulla poesia italiana del Medioevo (Bologna: Il
Mulino, zooz)
Gleason, Elisabeth G., Gasparo Contarink Venice, Rome, and Reform (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1993)
Gnocchi, Alessandro, `Un manoscritto delle rime di Pietro Bembo', SFI, 6o
(2002), 217-36
`Tommaso Giustiniani, l'Ariosto e la Compagnia degli amici', SFI, 57 (1999),
2 77-93
Gnoli, Domenico, `Descriptio urbis o censimento della popolazione di Roma
avanti il sacco Borbonico', Archivio della R. Società di Storia Patria, 17
(1894), 375-520
La Roma di Leo X (Milan: Hoepli, 1938)
Góis, Damiáo de, O livro de Eclesiastes: reprodufdo em jac-simile da edifdo de
Stevào Sabio (Veneza, zS38), T. F. Earle (ed.) (Lisbon: Fundaçáo Calouste
Gulbenkian, 2002)
Goldthwaite, Richard A., The Building of Renaissance Florence: An Economic and
Social History (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, i98o)
and Giulio Mandich, Studi sulla moneta fiorentina (secoli XIII—XVI) (Florence:
Olschki, 1994)
Gorni, Guglielmo, `Le forme primarie del testo poetico', in Letteratura italiana,
dir. by Alberto Asor Rosa, vol. III, Le forme del testo, pt I (Turin: Einaudi,
1984), 439-518
`Veronica e le altre: emblemi e cifre onomastiche nelle rime del Bembo', in
Cesare Bozzetti and others (eds.), Veronica Gambara e la poesia del suo
tempo, 37-57
Massimo Danzi and Silvia Longhi (eds.), Poeti del Cinquecento, voi. I, Poeti
lirici, burleschi, satirici e didascalici (Milan: Ricciardi, 2ooi)
Gorris, Rosanna, `Sous le signe des deux Amédée: l Amedeide d'Alphonse Delbene
et le poème dynastique à la tour de Savoie sous Charles-Emmanuel IC1',
Nouvelle revue du seizième siècle, 15 (1997), 73-105
Gozzadini, Giovanni, Memorie per la vita di Giovanni II Bentivoglio (Bologna:
Tipi delle Belle Arti, 1839)
Grazzini, Anton Francesco, Le rime burlesche edite e inedite, Carlo Verzone (ed.)
(Florence: Sansoni, Mz)
Grendler, Paul F., The Roman Inquisition and the Venetian Press, z54o —r6o5
(Princeton University Press, 1977)
Schooling in Renaissance Italy: Literacy and Learning, r3oo—r600 (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989)
288 Bibliography
Grignam, Maria Antonietta, `Badoer, Filenio, Pizio: un trio bucolico a Venezia',
in Studi di filologia e di letteratura italiana offerti a Carlo Dionisotti (Milan
and Naples: Ricciardi, 1973), 77-115
Grippo, Marcella, `La Gelosia del sole di Girolamo Britonio', Critica letteraria, 24
(1996), 5-55
Guarini, Battista, Il segretario (Venice: appresso Ruberto Meietti, 1594)
Guasco, Annibal, Discourse to Lady Lavinia His Daughter, ed. and trans. by
Peggy Osborn (University of Chicago Press, 2003)
Ragionamento a d. Lavinia sua figliuola, della maniera del governarsi ella in
corte (Turin: per Cherede del Bevilacqua, 1586)
Guerrini, Gemma, `Scrivere in casa Boiardo: maestri, copisti, segretari, servi e
autografi', Scrittura e civiltà, 13 (1989), 441-73
Guidiccioni, Giovanni, Orazione ai nobili di Lucca, Carlo Dionisotti (ed.)
(Milan: Adelphi, 1994)
Rime, Emilio Torchio (ed.) (Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua,
2oo6)
Gundersheimer, Werner L. (ed.), Art and Life at the Court of Ercole I d'Este.- The
De triumphis religionis' of Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti (Geneva: Droz,
1972)
Haar, James, Essays on Italian Poetry and Music in the Renaissance, i3So-1600
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986)
`From "cantimbanco" to court: the musical fortunes of Ariosto in Florentine
society', in Massimiliano Rossi and Fiorella Gioffredi Superbi (eds.), L'arme
e gli amori: Ariosto, Tasso and Guarini in Late Renaissance Florence, 2 vols.
(Florence: Olschki, 2004), 11, 179-97
?he Science and Art of Renaissance Music, Paul Corneilson (ed.) (Princeton
University Press, 1998)
Harris, Neil, Bibliografia dell"Orlando Innamorato', 2 vols. (Modena: Panini,
1988-91)
`Marin Sanudo, forerunner of Melzi', LB, 95 (1993), 1-38, 101-45; 96 (x994),
15-42
Harthan, John, Books of Hours and their Owners (London: Thames & Hudson,
1977)
Hauvette, Henri, Un exilé florentin à la tour de France au XVIe siècle: Luigi
Alamanni (1495—ß56). Sa vie et son oeuvre (Paris: Hachette, 1903)
Herde, Peter, `Die Schrift der Florentiner Beh6rden in der Friihrenaissance (ca.
1400-146o): ein Beitrag zur Frage des Obergangs von der gotischen zur
humanistischen Schrift', Archiv fiir Diplomatik, Schriftsgeschichte, Siegel-
und Wappenkunde, 17 (1971), 302-35
Hobson, Anthony, Apollo and Pegasus: An Enquiry into the Formation and
Dispersal of a Renaissance Library (Amsterdam: Van Heusden, 1975)
Humanists and Bookbinders: The Origins and Diffusion of the Humanistic
Bookbinding 1459—IS59 (Cambridge University Press, x989)
Renaissance Book Collecting: Jean Grolier and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, their
Books and Bindings (Cambridge University Press, 1999)
Bibliography 289
Ijsewijn, Iosephus (ed.), Coryciana (Rome: Herder, 1997)
Infelise, Mario, Prima dei giornali: alle origini della pubblica informazione (Rome
and Bari: Laterza, 2oo2)
Ingegneri, Angelo, Del buon segretario libri tre (Rome: presso a Guglielmo
Faciotto, 1594)
Irigoin, Jean, `Les Ambassadeurs à Venise et le commerce des manuscrits grecs
dans les années 1540-1550', in Hans-Georg Beck, Manoussos Manoussacas
and Agostino Pertusi (eds.), Venezia centro di mediazione tra Oriente e
Occidente (secoli XV—XVI). aspetti e problemi, 2 vols. (Florence: Olschki,
1977), 11, 399-415
Isola, I. G. (ed.), Narrazione dello stato della Repubblica di Genova: scrittura del
secolo XVI (Genoa: Gaetano Schenone, 1881)
Jacomuzzi, Stefano, `Nota in margine alla polemica Caro-Castelvetro: i sonetti
de "La Civetta" dì Lattanzio Benucci', Lettere italiane, 28 (1976), 197-204
James, Carolyn (ed.), The Letters of Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti (1487 —I5so)
(Florence: Olschki; Perth: Department of Italian, University of Western
Australia, 2001)
James, Montague Rhodes, The Western Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity
College, Cambridge, 3 vols. (Cambridge University Press, igoo-2)
Jedin, Hubert, A History of the Council of Trent, trans. by Ernest Graf, 2 vols.
(London: Nelson, 1957-61)
Jemolo, Viviana (ed.), Catalogo dei manoscritti in scrittura latina datati o databili
per indicazione d ánno, di luogo o di copista. L Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale
di Roma (Turin: Bottega d'Erasmo, 1971)
Jodogne, Pierre, `Una citazione sconosciuta del capitolo "De la ingratitudine" di
Machiavelli in una lettera di Lodovico Alamanni a Francesco Guicciardini
(t50', SPCT, 26 (1983), 29-34
Jungié, Josephine, `Savonarolan prophecy in Leonardo's Allegory with Wolf and
Eagle', journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 6o (1997), 253-6o
Kent, Dale, Cosimo de'Medici and the Florentine Renaissance: The Patron's (Euvre
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000)
King, Margaret L., Venetian Humanism in an Age of Patrician Dominance
(Princeton University Press, 1986)
Kirkham, Victoria, `Laura Battiferra degli Ammannati's First Book of Poetry:
a Renaissance holograph comes out of hiding', Rinascimento, 2nd set., 36
(1996), 351-91
Kolsky, Stephen, Courts and Courtiers in Renaissance Northern Italy (Aldershot:
Ashgate, 2003)
Mario Equicola: The Real Courtier (Geneva: Droz, 1991)
Kristeller, Paul Oskar, Iter Italicum: A Finding List of Uncatalogued or
Incompletely Catalogued Humanistic Manuscripts of the Renaissance in
Italian and Other Libraries, 6 vols. (Leiden: E. J. Brill; London: Warburg
Institute, 1963-92)
The Philosophy of Marsilio Ticino, trans. by Virginia Conant (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1943)
290 Bibliography
`Sebastiano Salvini, a Florentine humanist and theologian, and a member of
Marsilio Ficino's Platonic Academy', in Sesto Prete (ed.), Didascaliae: Studies
in Honor ofAnselm M. Albareda (New York. B. M. Rosenthal, 1961), 207-43
`Some original letters and autograph manuscripts of Marsilio Ficino', in Studi
di bibliografia e di storia in onore di Tammaro De Marinís, 4 vols. (Vatican
City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1964), III, 5-33
Supplementum ficinianum, 2 vols. (Florence: Olschki, 1937)
La Face Bianconi, Giuseppina and Antonio Rossi, Le rime di Serafino Aquilano
in musica (Florence: Olschki, 1999)
Landino, Cristoforo, Carmina omnia, Alessandro Perosa (ed.) (Florence: Olschki,
1939)
Lanza, Antonio, Polemiche e berte letterarie nella Firenze del primo Rinascimento
(1375-1449), 2nd edn (Rome: Bulzoni, 1989)
Larivaille, Paul (ed.), Lettere di, a, su Pietro Aretina nel Fondo Bongi dell'Archivio
di Stato di Lucca (Paris: Université Paris X — Nanterre, 198o)
Lauriou,x, Bruno, `I libri di cucina italiana alla fine del Medioevo: un nuovo
bilancio', ASI, 154 (1996), 33-58
Laymannus, Paulus, Theologia moralis in quinque libros distributa, 3rd edn
(Antwerp: apud Iohannem Meursium, 1634)
Lazzarini, Vittorio, Scritti di paleografia e diplomatica, 2nd edn (Padua: Antenore,
1969)
Lazzerini, Lucia, `Un "contrafactum" calmiano (addendo viterbese alla tradizione
delle "Bizzarre rime")', SFI, 46 (1988), 253-63
Ledos, Eugène-Gabriel, `Lettre inédite de Cristoforo Landino à Bernardo
Bembo', Bibliothèque de l École des Chartes, 54 (1893), 721-4
Leftley, Sharon A., `Beyond Joachim of Fiore: Pietro Galatino's Commentaria in
Apocalypsim', Franciscan Studies, 55 (1998), 137-67
Leonardi, Laura, `Il codice Campori 187', LB, 85 (1983), 3-25
[Leschassier, Jacques], Consulta di N. Dottore Parigino intorno la controversia tra
la Santità di Paolo Quinto et un Gentilhuomo Venetiano (Padua: appresso
Nicolò Padovano, 1607)
Lettere da diversi re e principi e cardinali e altri uomini dotti a mops. Pietro Bembo
scritte (ristampa anastatica dell'M Sansovino, 156o), Daria Perocco (ed.) (Sala
Bolognese: Forni, 1985)
Lettere di Laura Battiferri Ammannati a Benedetto Varchi (Bologna: Romagnoli,
1879)
Longhi, Silvia, `Un esperimento di scrittura "alla maniera di": i due sonetti
falsi e stravolti di Giovanni della Casa e di Annibal Caro', in Giancarlo
Mazzacurati and Michel Plaisance (eds.), Scritture di scritture: testi, generi,
modelli nel Rinascimento (Rome: Bulzoni, 1987), 525-37
Lusus: il capitolo burlesco nel Cinquecento (Padua: Antenore, 1983)
`Le rime di Francesco Berni: cronologia e strutture del linguaggio burlesco',
SFI, 34 (1976), 2 49-99
Lopez, Pasquale, Il movimento valdesiano a Napoli: Mario Galeota e le sue vicende
col Sant'Uffizio (Naples: Fiorentino, 1976)
Bibliography 291
Lo Re, Salvatore, —Venite all'ombra de' gran gigli d'oro": retroscena politici di
una celebre controversia letteraria (1553-1559), GSLI, 182 (2005), 362-97
Lorenzetti, Stefano, Musica e identità nobiliare nell'Italia del Rinascimento: edu-
cazione, mentalitd, immaginario (Florence: Olschki, 2003)
Love, Harold, The Culture and Commerce of Texts: Scribal Publication in
Seventeenth-Century England (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press,
1998)
Lowe, K.J. P., Nuns' Chronicles and Convent Culture in Renaissance and Counter-
Reformation Italy (Cambridge University Press, 2003)
Lubkin, Gregory, A Renaissance Court: Milan under Galeazza Maria Sforza
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994)
Lucchi, Piero, `Leggere, scrivere e abbaco: l'istruzione elementare agli inizi
dell'età moderna', in Scienze, credenze occulte, livelli di cultura (Florence:
Olschki, 1982), 1o1-19
Luzio, Alessandro, `Pietro Aretino e Pasquind, Nuova antologia, 3rd ser., 28
(1890), 679-708
Pietro Aretino nei primi suoi anni a Venezia e la carte dei Gonzaga (Turin:
Loescher, 1888)
and Rodolfo Renier, La coltura e le relazioni letterarie di Isabella d'Este
Gonzaga, Simone Albonico (ed.) (Milan: Bonnard, 2005)
and Rodolfo Renier, Mantova e Urbino: Isabella d'Este ed Elisabetta Gonzaga
nelle relazioni famigliari e nelle vicende politiche (Turin and Rome: Roux,
18 93)
and Rodolfo Renier, `Niccolò da Correggio', GSLI, 21 (1893), 205-64; 22
(1894), 65-119
MacCulloch, Diarmid, Reformation: Europe's House Divided, r49o—i7oo (London:
Allen Lane, 2003)
Machiavelli, Bernardo, Libro di ricordi, Cesare Olschki (ed.) (Florence: Le
Monnier, 1954)
Machiavelli, Niccolò, Litrte della guerra. Scritti politici minori, Jean-Jacques
Marchand, Denis Fachard and Giorgio Masi (eds.) (Rome: Salerno
Editrice, 2001)
Capitoli, Giorgio Inglese (ed.) (Rome: Bulzoni, 1981)
De principatibus, Giorgio Inglese (ed.) (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il
Medio Evo, 1994)
Discorsi sopra la prima deca di Tito Livio, Francesco Bausi (ed.), z vols. (Rome:
Salerno Editrice, 2oo1)
Discorso intorno alla nostra lingua, Paolo Trovato (ed.) (Padua: Antenore,
1982)
Istorie fiorentine, Plinio Carli (ed.), 2 vols. (Florence: Sansoni, 1927)
Lettere, Franco Gaeta (ed.), in Opere, vol. III (Turin: UTET, 1984)
Il principe, Mario Martelli (ed.) with Nicoletta Marcelli (Rome: Salerno
Editrice, 2oo6)
Il principe, with an Essay on `The Prince' by John Humphreys Whitfield
(Wakefield: S. R. Publishers, 1969)

292 Bibliography
La vita di Castruccio Castracani da Lucca, Riekie Brakkee and Paolo Trovato
(eds.) (Naples: Liguori, 1986)
Mackenney, Richard, Tradesmen and Traders: The World of the Guilds in Venice
and Europe, c.1250—c.165o (London and Sydney: Croom Helm, 1987)
McKenzie, D. F., `Speech — manuscript — print', in Making Meaning: Printers of
the Mind'and Other Essays, Peter D. McDonald and Michael F. Suarez, S.J.
(eds.) (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2oo2), 237-58
McKitterick, David, Print, Manuscript and the Search for Order, 145o-183o
(Cambridge University Press, 2003)
Macola, Novella, Sguardi e scritture: figure con libro nella ritrattistica italiana
della prima meta del Cinquecento (Venice: Istituto veneto di scienze, lettere
ed arti, 2oo7)
Malanima, P., `Giuseppe Civitali', DBI, 26 (1982,), 102-4
Malato, Enrico (dir.), Storia della letteratura italiana, voi. X, La tradizione dei
testi, coordinated by C. Ciociola (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 2oo1)
Manfredi, Muzio, Lettere brevissime (Venice: Roberto Meglietti, í6o6)
Marchetti, Valerio, `Un'epistola inedita di Juan de Valdes sopra i "movimenti
dello spirito"', ASI, 129 (1971), 505-18
Gruppi ereticali senesi del Cinquecento (Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1975)
`Marcantonio Cinuzzi', DBI, 25 (1981), 650-5
`Notizie sulla giovinezza di Fausto Sozzini da un copialettere di Girolamo
Bargagli', BHR, 31 (1969), 67-91
Marcon, Susy, `Ornati di penna e di pennello: appunti su scribi-illuminatori
nella Venezia del maturo umanesimo', LB, 89 (1987), 12,1-44
Marini, Paolo, `Un documento dell'Esortatione de la pace tra l'Imperadore e il Re
di Francia di Pietro Aretino', Filologia e critica, 31 (2oo6), 88-1o5
Marino, Giovan Battista, La lira, Maurizio Slawinski (ed.), 3 vols. (Turin: RES,
2007)
Marotti, Arthur F., Manuscript, Print, and the English Renaissance Lyric (Ithaca,
NY and London: Cornell University Press, 1995)
Marri, Fabio, `Lingua e dialetto nella poesia giocosa ai tempi del Moro', in
Milano nell'età di Ludovico il Moro, I, 231-92,
Martelli, Mario, `Le due redazioni della Laurentii Medicei Vita di Niccolò
Valori', LB, 66 (1964), 235-53
`I "Ghiribizzi" a Giovan Battista Soderini', Rinascimento, 2nd ser., 9 (1969),
14.7-80
`Preistoria (medicea) di Machiavelli', SFI, 2,9 (1971), 377-405
Martignone, Vercingetorice, `Per l'edizione critica del "Torrismondo" di
Torquato Tasso', SFI, 45 (1987), 151-96
Martin, John, Venices Hidden Enemies: Italian Heretics in a Renaissance City
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993)
Martines, Lauro, Scourge and Fire: Savonarola and Renaissance Florence (London:
Cape, zoo6)
Strong Words: Writing & Social Strain in the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, zoos)
7
Bibliography 293
Marucci, Valerio, `L'Aretino e Pasquino', in Pietro Aretino nel cinquecentenario
della nascita, 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1995), I, 67-86
Antonio Marzo and Angelo Romano (eds.), Pasquinate romane del Cinquecento,
2 vols. (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1983)
Mauro, Alfredo, `Le prime edizioni dell' `Arcadia" del Sannazaro', Giornale ital-
iano di filologia, z (1949), 341-51
Mauss, Marcel, The Gift.- Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies,
trans. by Ian Cunnison (London: Cohen and West, 1954)
Maylender, Michele, Storia delle accademie d'Italia, 5 v015. (Bologna: Licinio
Cappelli, 1926-30)
Mazzatinti, Giuseppe and others, Inventari dei manoscritti delle biblioteche
d'Italia (Florence: Olschki, 1950—)
Mazzi, C., `II "Libro dell'arte di danzare" di Antonio Cornazano', LB, 17 (1915),
1-30
Mazzinghi, Paolo, `Le rime di Andrea Calmo fra canzonieri petrarcheschi e testi
musicati', Quaderni veneti, 5 (1987), 21-36
Mazzoleni, Carla, `L'ultimo manoscritto delle "Rime" di Giovan Giorgio Trissino',
in Simone Albonico and others (eds.), Per Cesare Bozzetti, 309-44
Mazzucco, Gabriele, `Legature rinascimentali di edizioni di Aldo Manuzio', in
Susy Marcon and Marino Zorzi (eds.), Aldo Manuzio e l'ambiente veneziano
1494-1515 (Venice: Il Cardo, 1994), 135-79
Mei, Girolamo, De modis, Tsugami Eisuke (ed.) (Tokyo: Keiso Shobo, 1991)
Letters on Ancient and Modern Music to Vincenzo Galilei and Giovanni Bardi,
Claude B. Palisca (ed.), 2nd edn (Rome: American Institute of Musicology,
1977)
Menis, Ilde, `Stefano Bindoni', in Dizionario dei tipografi e degli editori italiani.-
Il Cinquecento, I, Marco Menato, Ennio Sandal and Giuseppina Zappella
(eds.) (Milan: Editrice Bibliografica, 1997), 142-3
Mercati, Angelo, I costituti di Niccolò Franco (1568-157o) dinanzi l'Inquisizione
di Roma, esistenti nell'Archivio segreto vaticano (Vatican City: Biblioteca
Apostolica Vaticana, 1955)
Saggi di storia e letteratura, z vols. (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura,
1951-82)
Meroni, Ubaldo, Mostra dei codici gonzagheschi: la biblioteca dei Gonzaga da
Luigi I ad Isabella. Biblioteca Comunale 18 settembre-10 ottobre (Mantua:
[n. pub.], 1966)
Messina, Michele, `Rime del XVI secolo in un manoscritti autografo di G. B.
Giraldi Cinzio e di B. Tasso', LB, 57 (1955), 108-47
Messisbugo, Cristoforo di, Banchetti, composítioni di vivande, et apparecchio gen-
erale (Ferrara: per Giovanni Buglhat e Antonio Hucher, 1549)
Miglio, Luisa, `"A mulieribus conscriptos arbitror": donne e scrittura', in Emma
Condello and Giuseppe De Gregorio (eds.), Scribi e colofoni, 235-66
— Perché ho charestia di chi scriva": delegati di scrittura in ambiente mediceo',
in Marie-Clotilde Hubert, Emmanuel Poulle and Marc H. Smith (eds.), Le
Statut du scripteur au Moyen Age (Paris: École des Chartes, 2000), 193-215
294 Bibliography
Miglio, Massimo, `Dedicare al pontefice: immagini di "traditio" in codici
del Quattrocento', in Giovanna Lazzi and Paolo Viti (eds.), Immaginare
l;iutore: il ritratto del letterato nella cultura umanistica. Ritratti riccardiani
(Florence: Polistampa, 1998), 81-7
Miglioranzi, Corinna, Lodovico di Canossa: ricerche storiche con documenti inediti
(Città di Castello: Lapi, 1907)
Milano nell'età di Ludovico il Moro, 2 vols. (Milan: Archivio storico civico e
Biblioteca Trivulziana, 1983)
Milburn, Erika, Luigi Tansillo and Lyric Poetry in Sixteenth-Century Naples
(London: MHRA, 2003)
Minturno, Antonio, L'arte poetica (Venice: Giovanni Andrea Valvassori, 1563)
Minutelli, Marzia, Za miraculosa aqua` lettura delle Porretane novelle'(Florence:
Olschki,199o)
`Poesia e teatro di Galeotto Dal Carretto: riflessioni in margine al carteg-
gio con Isabella d'Este', Nuova rivista di letteratura italiana, ~ (2004),
123-78
Mioni, E., `Giovanni Battista Cipelli', DBI, 25 (1981), 698-702
Miscellanea di studi in onore di V ttore Branca, 5 vols. (Florence: Olschki, 1983)
Mittarelli, Giovanni Benedetto and Anselmo Costadoni, Annales Cornaldulenses
ordinis Sancti Benedicti, 9 vols. (Farnborough: Gregg,1970)
Molza, Francesco Maria, Poesie (Milan: Società tipografica de' classici italiani,
1808)
Monfasani, John, `The first call for press censorship: Niccolò Perotti, Giovanni
Andrea Bussi, Antonio Moreto, and the editing of Pliny's Natural History,
Renaissance Quarterly, 41 (1988), 1-31
Montaigne, Michel de, journal de voyage en Italie, Arthur Armaingaud (ed.),
z vols., in (Euvres complètes, 12 vols. (Paris: Conard, 1924-41), VII and VIII
Montecchi, Giorgio and Antonio Sorella, `I nuovi modi della tradizione: la
stampa fra Quattro e Cinquecento', in Enrico Malato (dir.), Storia della
letteratura italiana, X, 633-73
Montella, Luigi, Una poetessa del Rinascimento: Laura Terracina (Salerno: Edisud,
200I)
Monti, Salvatore, `La dedica del De partu Vírginis di Iacopo Sannazaro nelle
vicende della sua genesi', Aevum, 75 (zooi), 629-4o
Morisi Guerra, Anna, Apocalypsis nova: ricerche sull'origine e la formazione del
testo dello pseudo Amaseo (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo,
1970)
`The Apocalypsis nova: a plan for reform', in Marjorie Reeves (ed.), Prophetic
Rome, 27-50
`Il profetismo al tempo di Alessandro VI', in M. Chiabò, S. Maddalo, M.
Miglio and A.M. Oliva (eds.), Roma di fronte all'Europa al tempo di
Alessandro VI: Atti del Convegno (Città del Vaticano-Roma, 1-4 dicembre
1999), 3 vols. (Rome: Roma nel Rinascimento, 2ooi), III, 961-70
`La profezia di un impolitico: la condanna di Francesco da Meleto al sinodo
fiorentino del 1516', Cristianesimo nella storia, zo (1999), 579-93
Bibliography 295
Morison, Stanley, Early Italian Writing-Books: Renaissance to Baroque, Nicolas
Barker (ed.) (Verona: Edizioni Valdonega; London: British Library,
1990)
Moroni, Ornella (ed.), Corrispondenza Giovanni Della Casa—Carlo Gualteruzzi
(1525-1549) (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1986)
Morossi, Paola, `Il primo canzoniere di Cariteo secondo il codice Marocco', SFI,
58 (2000), 173-97
Mortara, Alessandro, Catalogo dei manoscritti italiani che sotto la denominazione
di codici Canonieani italici si conservano nella Biblioteca Bodleiana a Oxford
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1864)
Motta, Emilio, `Musici alla corte degli Sforza: ricerche e documenti milanesi',
Archivio storico lombardo, 2nd ser., 4 (1887), 29-64, 278-340, 514-61
Motta, Uberto, Castiglione e il mito di Urbino: studi sulla elaborazione del
`Cortegiano' (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 2003)
Motti e facezie del Piovano Arlotto, Gianfranco Folena (ed.) (Milan: Ricciardi,
1995)
Moyer, Ann E., `Historians and antiquarians in sixteenth-century Florence',
Journal of the History of Ideas, 64 (2003), 177-93
Mutini, C., `Francesco Cei', DBI, 23 (1979), 327-9
Muzio, Girolamo, Lettere (ristampa anastatica dell ed. Sermartelli, 1S9o), Luciana
Borsetto (ed.) (Bologna: Forni, 1985)
Muzzarelli, Giovanni, Amorosa opra, Emanuela Scarpa (ed.) (Verona: Libreria
Editrice Universitaria, 198z)
Nebbiai, Donatella, `Per una valutazione della produzione manoscritta cinque—
seicentesca', in Alfabetismo e cultura scritta nella storia della società italiana:
Atti del Seminario tenutosi a Perugia illy-3o marzo 2977 (Perugia: Università
degli Studi, 1978), 235-67
Niccol, Ottavia, Prophecy and People in Renaissance Italy, trans. by Lydia
G. Cochrane (Princeton University Press, 199o)
Rinascimento anticlericale: infamia, propaganda e satira in Italia tra Quattro e
Cinquecento (Rome and Bari: Laterza, 2oo5)
Nicolini, Benedetto, Bernardino Ocbino e la Riforma in Italia (Naples: Ricciardi,
1935)
Nolhac, Pierre de, `Les Correspondants de Alde Manuce: matériaux nouveaux
d'histoire littéraire (1483-1514)', Studi e documenti di storia e diritto, 8 (1887),
247-99 and 9 (1888), 203-48
Nordio, Tiziana Agostini, —La Strazzosa', canzone di Maffio Venier: edizione
critica', in Tiziana Agostini Nordio and Valerio Vianello, Contributi rinas-
cimentali: Venezia e Firenze (Padua: Francisci, 1982), 9-131
Nosow, Robert, `The debate on song in the Accademia Fiorentina', Early Music
History, 21 (2002),175-22.1
Novati, Francesco, `La parodia sacra nelle letterature moderne', in Studi critici e
letterari (Turin: Loescher, 1889), 175-310
`Una poesia politica del Cinquecento: il Pater poster dei Lombardi', Giornale
di filologia romanza, 2 (1879),121-52
296 Bibliography
Novo libro di lettere scritte da i più rari auttori e professori della lingua volgare
italiana (ristampa anastatica delle edd. Gherardo, 1544 e 1545), Giacomo
Moro (ed.) (Bologna: Forni, 1987)
Nucci, Anna Rita and Maddalena Signorini, `Un censimento di copisti di opere
in volgare italiano (XIV XV secolo)', Alfabetismo e cultura scritta, n. s., 2
(1989), 79-92
Nuovo, Angela, `Dispersione di una biblioteca privata: la biblioteca di Gian
Vicenzo Pinelli dall'agosto 16oi all'ottobre 1604', in Angela Nuovo (ed.)
Biblioteche private in età moderna e contemporanea (Milan: Bonnard, 2005),
43-54
`Testimoni postumi: la biblioteca di Gian Vincenzo Pinelli tra le carte
di Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc', in Maria Teresa Biagetti (ed.),
L'organizzazione del sapere: studi in onore di Alfredo Serrai (Milan: Bonnard,
2 004), 317-34
and Christian Coppens, I Giolito e la stampa nell'Italia del XVI secolo (Geneva:
Droz, 2005)
Ochino, Bernardino, I Dialogi sette e altri scritti del tempo della fuga dall7talia,
Ugo Rozzo (ed.) (Turin: Claudiana, 1985)
Olivieri, Achille, `II "Cathechismo" e la "Fidei et docirinae ... ratio" di
Bartolomeo Fonzio, eretico veneziano del Cinquecento', Studi veneziani, 9
(1967), 339-452
Ordine, Nuccio, `Giovan Francesco Valier, homme de lettres et espion au service
de François I"', in La Circulation des hommes et des œuvres entre la France
et l'Italie a l'époque de la Renaissance (Paris: Université de la Sorbonne
Nouvelle, 1992), 22 5-45
Ortalli, Gherardo, `Malatestiana e dintorni: la cultura cesenate tra Malatesta
Novello e il Valentino', in Augusto Vasina (ed.), Storia di Cesena, vol. II.2,
Il Medioevo (secoli XIV—XV) (Rimini: Ghigi, 1985), 129-65
Osley, A.S., Luminario: An Introduction to the Italian Writing-Books of the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Nieuwkoop: Miland,1972)
Padoan, Giorgio (ed.), `Maffio Venier: tre liriche', Quaderni veneti, 1 (1985), 7-23
and Adriana Zampieri, `Radiografia di un "corpus" ruzantesco', Lettere ital-
iane, 31 (1979), 473-501
Palau, Annaclara, `Les Copistes de Guillaume Pellicier, évêque de Montpellier
(149o-1567)', Scrittura e civiltà, 10 (1986), 199-237
Palermo, Francesco (ed.), `Narrazioni sulla storia del Regno di Napoli dall'anno
1522 al 1667', ASI, 9 (1846)
Palisca, Claude V, Humanism in Italian Renaissance Musical 7hought (New
Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1985)
Paoli, Marco, Ad Ercole Musagete: il sistema delle dediche nell'editoria italiana
di antico regime', in Marco Santoro and Maria Tavoni (eds.), I dintorni del
testo, I, 149-65
Parenti, G., `Ascanio e Silvio Corona', DBI, 29 (1983), 281-3
Parker, Deborah, Bronzino: Renaissance Painter as Poet (Cambridge University
Press, 2000)
Bibliography 297
Pecoraro, Marco, Per la storia dei carmi del Bembo: una redazione non vulgata
(Venite and Rome: Istituto per la collaborazione culturale, 1959)
Pellegrin, Elisabeth, La Bibliothèque, des Visconti et des Sforza ducs de Milan au
XV' siècle (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1955)
Percopo, Erasmo, `Di Anton Lelio Romano e di alcune pasquinate contro
Leon X', GSLI, 28 (1896), 45-91
Perifano, Alfredo, L'Alchimie à la cour de Côme I` de Médicis: savoirs, culture et
politique (Paris: Champion, 1997)
`Giovan Battista Nazari et Francesco Colonna: la réécriture alchimique de
l'Hypnerotomachia Poliphili', BHR, 66 (2004), 241-59
Pesman Cooper, Roslyn, `Political survival in early sixteenth-century Florence:
the case of Niccolo Valori', in Peter Denley and Caroline Elam (eds.),
Florence and Italy: Renaissance Studies in Honour of Nicolai Rubinstein
(London: Committee for Medieval Studies, Westfield College, 1989),
73-90
Il Petrarchismo: un modello di poesia per l'Europa, 2 vols., vol. I, Loredana Chines
(ed.), vol. II, Floriana Calitti and Roberto Gigliucci (eds.) (Rome: Bulzoni,
2oo6)
Petrucci, Armando, `Copisti e libri manoscritti dopo l'avvento della stampa', in
Emma Condello and Giuseppe De Gregorio (eds.), Scribi e colofoni, 507-25
`Introduzione: per una nuova storia del libro', in Lucien Febvre and Henri-
Jean Martin, La nascita del libro, trans. by Carlo Pischedda, Armando
Petrucci (ed.), 2 vols. (Rome and Bari: Laterza, 1977), I, v—xlviii
`Pouvoir de l'écriture, pouvoir sur l'écriture dans la Renaissance italienne',
Annales ESC, 43 (1988), 823-47
`Scrittura, alfabetismo ed educazione grafica nella Roma del primo
Cinquecento: da un libretto di conti di Maddalena pizzicarola in Trastevere',
Scrittura e civiltà, 2 (1978), 163-207
`Scrivere per gli altri', Scrittura e civiltà, 13 (1989), 475-87
Peyronel Rambaldi, Susanna, Dai Paesi Bassi all'Italia: Il Sommario della Sacra
Scrittura' Un libro proibito nella società italiana del Cinquecento (Florence:
Olschki, 1997)
Pezzarossa, Fulvio, I poemetti sacri di Lucrezia Tornabuoni (Florence: Olschki,
1978)
Pezzella, S., `Battista Carioni', DB], 20 (1977), 115-18
Piccolomini, Enea, `Ricerche intorno alle condizioni e alle vicende della libreria
medicea privata dal 1494 al 1508: Appendice III', ASI, 3rd ser., 21 (1875),
282-91
Picone, Michelangelo, `La tenzone de amore fra Iacopo Mostacci, Pier della Vigna
e il Notaio', in Matteo Pedroni and Antonio Stäuble (eds.), Rgenere `ten-
zone' nelle letterature romanze delle origini (Ravenna: Longo, 1999), 13-31
Picot, Émile, Les Italiens en France au XVIe siècle (Bordeaux: Gounouilhou, i9i8)
Piéjus, Marie-Françoise, `Les Poétesses siennoises entre le jeu et l'écriture', in Les
Femmes écrivains, 315-32
Pignatti, F., `Galeazzo Florimonte', DB], 48 (1997), 354-6
298 Bibliography
Pignatti, Franco, "`Quel libro é com'un'insalata confusa senz'ordine, che non
fu mai trascritto": Niccolò Franco pasquinista', in Chrysa Damianaki and
others (eds.), Ex mormore, 151-79
Pirrotta, Nino, `Before the madrigal', Journal of Musicology, 12 (1994), 237-52
Music and Culture in Italy from the Middle Ages to the Baroque: A Collection of
Essays (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984)
and Elena Povoledo, Music and Theatre from Poliziano to Monteverdi, trans.
by Karen Eales (Cambridge University Press, 1982)
Piscini, A., `Francesco Del Baild, DBI, 36 (1988), 295-7
Plaisance, Michel, L'Accademia e il suo principe: cultura e politica a Firenze al
tempo di Cosimo I e di Francesco de'Medici (Manziana: Vecchiarelli, 2003)
Antonfiancesco Grazzini dit Lasca (r5o5—x584): écrire dans la Florence des Médicis
(Manziana: Vecchiarelli, 2oo5)
Platt, Verity, "'Shattered visages": speaking statues from the ancient world',
Apollo, vol. 158, no. 497 (n. s.) (July 2003), 9-14
Plebani, Tiziana, Il `genere' dei libri: storie e rappresentazioni della lettura al fem-
minile e al maschile tra Medioevo e età moderna (Milan: Franco Angeli,
2001)
Polcri, Alessandro, `Una sconosciuta corrispondenza tra Marsilio Ficino e
Girolamo Pasqualini e il volgarizzamento del De magnificentia e del De
quatuor sectis philosophorum dedicato ad Antonio di Tuccio Manetti',
Interpres, 19 (2000), 45-88
Poliziano, Agnolo, Opera quae quidem extitere hactenus omnia (Basel: apud
Nicolaum Episcopium iuniorem, 1553)
Rime, Daniela Delcorno Branca (ed.) (Venice: Marsilio, 19go)
Poliziano, Angelo Ambrogini, Prose volgari inedite e poesie latine e greche edite e
inedite, Isidoro Del Lungo (ed.) (Florence: Barbera, 1867)
Polizzotto, Lorenzo, The Elect Nation: The Savonarolan Movement in Florence,
1494-1545 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994)
Poma, Luigi, Studi sul testo della Gerusalemme liberata (Bologna: CLUEB, 2oo5)
Porter, Martin, Windows of the Soul: Physiognomy in European Culture 147o-1780
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2005)
Pozzi, Mario (ed.), Trattatisti del Cinquecento, vol. I (Milan and Naples:
Ricciardi, 1978)
Premoli, Orazio, Fra'Battista da Crema secondo documenti inediti: contributo alla
storia religiosa del secolo XVI (Rome: Desclée, igio)
Storia dei Barnabiti nel Cinquecento (Rome: Desclée, 1913)
Preto, Paolo, I servizi segreti di Venezia (Milan: Il Saggiatore, 1994)
Prizer, William F., `The frottola and the unwritten tradition', Studi musicali, 15
(1986), 3-38
`Games of Venus: secular vocal music in the late Quattrocento and early
Cinquecento', Journal of Musicology, 9 (1991), 3-56
`Isabella d'Este and Lucrezia Borgia as patrons of music: the frottola at
Mantua and Ferrara', Journal of the American Musicological Society, 38
(1985), 1-33
Bibliography 299
`Local repertories and the printed book: Antico's third book of frottole
(1513)', in Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings (eds.), Music in
Renaissance Cities and Courts: Studies in Honor of Lewis Lockwood (Warren,
MI: Harmonie Park Press, 1996), 343-71
`Reading carnival: the creation of a Florentine carnival song', Early Music
History, 23 (2004), 185-252
`Una "virtù molto conveniente a madonne": Isabella d'Este as a musician',
Journal of Musicology, 17 (1999), 10-49
`Wives and courtesans: the frottola in Florence', in Colleen Reardon and
Susan Parisi (eds.), Music Observed- Studies in Memory of William C Holmes
(Warren, MI: Harmonie Park Press, 2004), 401-15
Procaccioli, Paolo (ed.), Lettere scritte a Pietro Aretino, 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno
Editrice, 2003-4)
Prosperi, Adriano, `Enrico Boccella', DBI, u (1969), 54-6
L'eresia del Libro Grande: storia di Giorgio Siculo e della sua setta, 2nd edn
(Milan: Feltrinelli, 2001)
`Opere inedite o sconosciute di Giorgio Siculo', LB, 87 (1985), 137-57
Tra evangelismo e controriforma: G. M. Giberti (i495-1543) (Rome: Edizioni di
Storia e Letteratura, 1969)
Pulci, Luigi, Morgante e Lettere, Domenico De Robertis (ed.), znd edn (Florence:
Sansoni, 1984)
and Matteo Franco, Il Zibro dei sonetti', Giulio Dolci (ed.) (Milan: Società
Anonima Editrice Dante Alighieri, 1933)
Putnam, Robert D., Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American
Community (London: Simon and Schuster, 2oo1)
Quaglio, Antonio Enzo, `Indicazioni sulla fortuna editoriale del Machiavelli nel
Veneto', Lettere italiane, 21 (1969), 399-424
Quarti, Guido Antonio, Quattro secoli di vita veneziana nella storia dell'arte e
nella poesia: scritti rari e curiosi dall5oo al igoo, 2 vols. (Milan: Gualdoni,
1941)
Queller, Donald E., `The development of ambassadorial relazioni', in J. R. Hale
(ed.), Renaissance Venice (London: Faber and Faber, 1973), 174-96
Quondam, Amedeo, `Dal "formulario" al "formulario": cento anni di "libri di
lettere"', in Amedeo Quondam (ed.), Le `carte messaggiere: retorica e modelli
di comunicazione epistolare. Per un indice dei libri di lettere del Cinquecento
(Rome: Bulzoni, 1981), 13-156
`Questo povero Cortegiano' Castiglione, il libro, la storia (Rome: Bulzoni,
2000)
Rabitti, Giovanna, `Vittoria Colonna, Bembo e Firenze: un caso di ricezione e
qualche postilla', SPCT, 44 (April 1992), 127-55
Ragionieri, Pina (ed.), Vittoria Colonna e Michelangelo (Florence: Mandragora,
2005)
Raimondi, Ezio, `Giulio Mosti e i dialoghi del Tasso', SFI, 12 (1954), 205-27
Raines, Dorit, `Office seeking, broglio, and the pocket political guidebooks in
Cinquecento and Seicento Venice', Studi veneziani, n. s., zz (1991),137-94
300 Bibliography
`Social debate and harmful publication', in Alfred Messerli and Roger Chartier
(eds.), Scripta volant, verba manent: Schriftkulturen in Europa zwischen 15oo
and igoo (Basel: Schwabe, 2007), 281-311
Rebecchini, Guido, `Further evidence about the books of Baldassarre
Castiglione', journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 63 (2000),
271-6
Reeve, M. D., `Manuscripts copied from printed books', in J. B. Trapp (ed.),
Manuscripts in the Fifty Years after the Invention of Printing (London:
Warburg Institute, 1983), 12-20
Reeves, Marjorie (ed.), Prophetic Rome in the High Renaissance Period.• Essays
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992)
`Cardinal Egidio of Viterbo: a prophetic interpretation of history', in Marjorie
Reeves (ed.), Prophetic Rome, 91-1o9
The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages: A Study in joachimism
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969)
`The medieval heritage', in Marjorie Reeves (ed.), Prophetic Rome, 3-21
Reinhard, Johann Paul, Vollständige Geschichte des Königreichs Cypern, z vols.
(Erlangen and Leipzig: Wolfgang Walther, 1766-8)
Renato, Camillo, Opere: documenti e testimonianze, Antonio Rotondò (ed.)
(Florence: Sansoni; Chicago: Newberry Library, 1968)
Renier, Rodolfo, `Codici dell'Arcadia', GSLI, 11 (1888), 299-301
`L'esemplare di dedica del poemetto "Di Paulo e Daria amanti"', GSLI, 9
(1887), 336-67
(ed.), Strambotti e sonetti dell'Altissimo (Turin: Società Bibliofila, 1886)
Restani, Donatella, L'itinerario di Girolamo Mei dalla poetica' alla musica
(Florence: Olschki, 19go)
Reynolds, Anne, Renaissance Humanism at the Court of Clement VII.• Francesco
Berni's Dialogue against Poets' in Context (New York and London: Garland,
1997)
Rhodes, Dennis E., Silent Printers: Anonymous Printing at Venice in the Sixteenth
Century (London: British Library, 1995)
Ricci, Corrado, Beatrice Cenci, 2 vols. (Milan: Treves, 1923)
Riccio, Laura, Giuoco e teatro nelle veglie di Siena (Rome: Bulzoni, 1993)
Richardson, Brian, The debates on printing in Renaissance Italy', LB, loo
(1998), 135-55
`From scribal publication to print publication: Pietro Bembo's Rime, 1529-1535,
Modern Language Review, 95 (2000), 684-95
A manuscript of Biagio Buonaccorsi', BHR, 36 (1974),,589-6o1
`The Prince and its early Italian readers', in Martin Coyle (ed.), Niccolò
Machiavelli's `The Prince'• New Interdisciplinary Essays (Manchester
University Press, 1995), 18-39
Print Culture in Renaissance Italy: The Editor and the Vernacular Text, 147o z600
(Cambridge University Press, 1994)
`Print or pen? Modes of written publication in sixteenth-century Italy', IS, S9
(2004), 39-64
Bibliography 301
Printing, Writers and Readers in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge University Press,
1999)
"'Recitato e cantato": the oral diffusion of lyric poetry in sixteenth-century
Italy', in Brian Richardson and others (eds.), Theatre, Opera, and
Performance, 67-82
`The scribal publication of Machiavelli's works: "copisti per passione", "copisti
a prezzo"', in Jill Kraye and Laura Lepschy (eds.), Caro Vitto: Essays in
Memory of Vittore Branca, Ae Italianist, 27 (2oo7), Special supplement 2,
174-87
(ed.), Trattati sull'ortografia del volgare 1524-1526 (University of Exeter, 1984)
Simon Gilson and Catherine Keen (eds.), Theatre, Opera, and Performance in
Italy from the Fifteenth Century to the Present: Essays in Honour of Richard
Andrews (Leeds: Society for Italian Studies, 2oo4)
Ridolfi, Roberto, `La biblioteca del cardinale Niccolò Ridolfi (1501-1550)', LB, 31
(1929), 173-93
`Fortune della "Storia d'Italia" guicciardiniana prima della stampa', in
Opuscoli di storia letteraria, 203-17
`Genesi della "Storia d'Italia" guicciardiniana', in Opuscoli di storia letteraria,
175-201
Opuscoli di storia letteraria e di erudizione (Florence: Bibliopolis, 1942)
`Sommario della vita di Donato Giannotti', in Opuscoli di storia letteraria,
55-164
Studi sulle commedie del Machiavelli (Pisa: Nistri-Lischi, 19 68)
Vita di Girolamo Savonarola, 2 vols. (Rome: Belardetti, 1952)
Vita di Niccolò Machiavelli, 4th edn, 2 vols. (Florence: Sansoni, 19 69)
Rizzo, Silvia, Il lessico filologico degli umanisti (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e
Letteratura, 1973)
Romani, V., Il Syntagma de arte typographica' ed altri testi secenteschi sulla tipogra-
fia e l edizione (Manziana: Vecchiarelli, 1988)
Romei, Danilo, Da Leone X a Clemente VII.• scrittori toscani nella Roma dei papati
medicei (1513-1534) (Manziana: Vecchiarelli, 2oo7)
`Pietro Aretino tra Bembo e Brocardo (e Bernardo Tasso)', in Angelo Romano
and Paolo Procaccioli (eds.), Studi sul Rinascimento italiano: Italian
Renaissance Studies. In memoria di Giovanni Aquilecchia (Manziana:
Vecchiarelli, 2005),143-61
(ed.), Scritti di Pietro Aretino nel Codice Marciano It. XI 66 (= 673o) (Florence:
Cesati, 1987)
Michel Plaisance and Franco Pignatti (eds.), Ludi esegetici (Manziana:
Vecchiarelli, 2oo5)
Rosenthal, Margaret F., The Honest Courtesan: Veronica Franco Citizen and
Writer in Sixteenth-Century Venice (University of Chicago Press, 1992)
Rostagno, Enrico, `La Storia d'Italia di Francesco Guicciardini nei manoscritti
originali e nella presente edizione', in Francesco Guicciardini, La Storia
d'Italia sugli originali manoscritti, Alessandro Gherardi (ed.), 4 vols.
(Florence: Sansoni, 1919), I, lxi—clxiii
302 Bibliography
Rota, Berardino, Rime, Luca Milite (ed.) (Parma: Fondazione Pietro Bembo and
Guanda, 2000)
Rotondò, Antonio, `Per la storia dell'eresia a Bologna nel secolo XVI',
Rinascimento, 2nd ser., 2 (1962), 107-54
Rozzo, Ugo and Silvana Seidel Menchi, `Livre et Réforme en Italie', in
Jean-François Gilmont (ed.), La Réforme et le livre: lTurope de l'imprimé
(1517—v.1570) (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1990), 32 7-74
Rubsamen, Walter J., `The Justiniane or Viniziane of the 15th century', Acta
musicologica, 29 (1957), 172-84
Ruscelli, Girolamo, Del modo di comporre in versi nella lingua italiana (Venice:
appresso Giovanni Battista e Melchior Sessa, 1559)
Rusconi, Roberto, Profezia e profeti alla fine del Medioevo (Rome: Viella, 1999)
Russell, Camilla, Giulia Gonzaga and the Religious Controversies of Sixteenth-
Century Italy (Turnhout: Brepols, 2oo6)
Ruysschaert, José, `Le Copiste Genesius de la Barrera et le manuscrit Barberini
d-11 principe" de Machiavelli', in Myron P. Gilmore (ed.), Studies on
Macbiavelli (Florence: Sansoni, 1972), 349-59
Sabadino degli Arienti, Giovanni, Gynevera delle clare donne, Corrado Ricci and
Alberto Bacchi della Lega (eds.) (Bologna: Romagnoli, 1888)
Novelle porretane, Pasquale Stoppelli (ed.) (L'Aquila: Japadre, 1975)
Le porretane, Bruno Basile (ed.) (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1981)
Sabaaino, Pasquale, Il modello bembiano a Napoli nel Cinquecento (Naples:
Ferraro, 1986)
Saletti, Caterina, `Un sodalizio poetico: Bernardo Tasso e Antonio Brocardo', in
Simone Albonico and others (eds.), Per Cesare Bozzetti, 409-24
Sampson, Lisa, -Drammatica secreta": Barbara Torelli's Partenía (c. 1587) and
women in late-sixteenth-century theatre', in Brian Richardson and others
(eds.), Theatre, Opera, and Performance, 99-115
Samuels, Richard S., `Benedetto Varchi, the Accademia degli Infiammati, and
the origins of the Italian academic movement', Renaissance Quarterly, 29
(1976), 599-633
Sannazaro, Iacopo, De partu Virginis, Charles Fantazzi and Alessandro Perosa
(eds.) (Florence: Olsehki, 1988)
Opere volgari, Alfredo Mauro (ed.) (Bari: Laterza, 1961)
Sansovino, Francesco, Del segretario libri quattro (Venice: appresso Francesco
Rampazetto, 1564)
Santagata, Marco, I frammenti dell'anima: storia e racconto nel Canzoniere di
Petrarca (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1993)
La lirica aragonese: studi sulla poesia napoletana del secondo Quattrocento
(Padua: Antenore, 1979)
Santoro, Marco and Maria Gioia Tavoni (eds.), I dintorni del testo: approcci alle
periferie del libro, 2 vols. (Rome, Edizioni dell'Ateneo, 2oo5)
Sanudo, Marin, I diarii di Marino Sanuto, 58 vols. (Venice: Visentini, 1879-1903)
De origine, situ et magistratibus urbis Venetae, ovvero La città di Venetia (1493-
1S3o), Angela Caracciolo Aricò (ed.) (Milan: Cisalpino-La Goliardica,
1980)
Bibliography 303
La spedizione di Carlo VIII in Italia, Rinaldo Fulin (ed.) (Venice: Marco
Visentini, 1873)
Saracco, Lisa, `Un'apologia della hebraica veritas nella Firenze di Cosimo I: il
Dialogo in defensione della lingua thoscana di Santi Marmochino O.P.',
Rivista di storia e letteratura religiosa, 42 (2oo6), 215-46
Saunders, J. W, `From manuscript to print: a note on the circulation of poetic
manuscripts in the sixteenth century', Proceedings of the Leeds Philosophical
and Literary Society, Literary and Historical Section, vol. 6.2, pt 8 (1951),
507-28
Savonarola, Girolamo, Lettere e scritti apologetici, Roberto Ridolfi, Vincenzo
Romano and Armando F. Verde (eds.) (Rome: Belardetti, 1984)
Savorgnan, Maria and Pietro Bembo, Carteggio d ámore 15oo-15o1, Carlo
Dionisotti (ed.) (Florence: Le Monnier, 1950)
Savorgnano, Ascanio, Discrittione delle cose di Cipro, trans. and ed. by H. C. Luke,
Institute of Historical Research, Malta, Bulletin 5 (Malta: Government
Printing Office, 1932)
Sberlati, Francesco, Il genere e la disputa: la poetica tra Ariosto e Tassa (Rome:
Bulzoni, 2oo1)
Scarpa, Emanuela, Argo, Clemente VII e Pasquino in un epigramma del
Machiavelli e in un'antologia del Sanudo', Filologia e critica, 1 (1976),
259-70
`L'autografo del primo "Decennale" di Niccolò Machiavelli', SFI, 51 (1993),
149-80
Scarpati, Claudio, `Le rime spirituali di Vittoria Colonna nel codice Vaticano
donato a Michelangelo', Aevum, 78 (2004), 693-717
Schnitzer, Joseph, Peter Delfin General des Camaldulenserordens, 1444-1525• ein
Beitrag zur Geschichte der Kirchenreform Alexanders WL and Savonarolas
(Munich: Reinhardt, 1926)
Schutte, Anne Jacobson, Pier Paolo Vergerio: The Making of an Italian Reformer
(Geneva: Droz, 1977)
Scott-Warren, Jason, `Reconstructing manuscript networks: the textual transac-
tions of Sir Stephen Powle', in Alexandra Shepard and Phil Withington
(eds.), Communities in Early Modern England- Networks, Place, Rhetoric
(Manchester University Press, 2000), 18-37
Sir John Harington and the Book as Gift (Oxford University Press, 2001)
Scully, Terence, The Neapolitan Recipe Collection (New York, Pierpont Morgan
Library, MS Bühler, 1g): A Critical Edition and English Translation (Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000)
Secret, François, `Guillaume Postel et les courants prophétiques de la
Renaissance', Studi francesi, 1 (1957), 375-95
`Paulus Angelus descendant des empereurs de Byzance et la Prophétie du Pape
Angélique', Rinascimento, n. s., 2 (1962), 211-24
Segarizzi, Arnaldo (ed.), Relazioni degli ambasciatori veneti al Senato, 3 vols.
(Bari: Laterza, 1912-16)
Segre, Cesare, `Storia testuale e linguistica delle Satire', in Cesare Segre (ed.),
Ludovico Ariosto: lingua, stile e tradizione (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1976), 315-30
304 Bibliography
Seidel Menchi, Silvana, Erasmo in Italia r52o—í58o (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri,
1987)
`Giorgio Siculo', RSI, 114 (2002), 577-83
Sercambi, Giovanni, Le croniche di Giovanni Sercambi, lucchese, Salvatore Bongi
(ed.) (Lucca: Giusti, 1892)
Shepherd, Rupert, `Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti, Ercole I d'Este and the
decoration of the Italian Renaissance court', Renaissance Studies, 9 (1995),
IS-57
Signorini, Maddalena, `Copisti di opere volgari (XIV—XV secolo): due percorsi',
Schede umanistiche, n. s., 1 (1991), 59-69
Simoncelli, Paolo, `Inquisizione romana e Riforma in Italia', RSI, ioo (1988),
5-125
Simonin, Michel, `Poétiques des éditions "à l'essai" au XVI' siècle', in L'Encre e,
la lumière: quarante-sept articles (rg76--2000) (Geneva: Droz, 20 04), 7 27-45
Singleton, Charles S. (ed.), Canti carnascialeschi del Rinascimento (Sari: Laterza,
1936)
(ed.), Nuovi canti carnascialeschi del Rinascimento (Modena: Società tipogra-
fica modenese, 1940)
Skemer, Don C., `Book auctions and prices in Quattrocento Padua: selling the
library of Francesco Malaffi da Vicenza, 1484-1487', LB, io8 (zoo6), 113-58
Sodano, Rosanna, `Intorno ai "Coryciana": conflitti politici e letterari in Roma
dagli anni di Leone X a quelli di Clemente VII', GSLI, 178 (2001), 420-50
Solerti, Angelo, Vita di Torquato Tasso, 3 vols. (Turin: Loescher, 1895)
Sonetti di Angiolo Allori detto il Bronzino ed altre rime inedite di più insigni poeti,
Domenico Moreni (ed.) (Florence: Magheri, 1823)
Sorella, Antonio, L'autore sotto il torchio: saggi di tipofzlologia (Pescara: Libreria
dell'Università, zoo4)
Speciale, Emilio, `Nicolò Franco, il libraio e la letteratura', Schifanoia, io (i99i),
175-87
Speroni, Sperone, Canace e Scritti in sua difesa; Giambattista Giraldi Cinzio,
Scritti contro la Canace; Giudizio ed Epistola latina, Christina Roaf (ed.)
(Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1982)
Lettere familiari, Maria Rosa Loi and Mario Pozzi (eds.), vol. I, Lettere alla
figlia Giulia (Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 1993)
Opere [ ... ] tratte da' manoscritti originali, 5 vols. (Venice: Occhi, í74o)
Stampa, Gaspara and Veronica Franco, Rime, Abdelkader Salza (ed.) (Bari:
Laterza, 1913)
Starn, Randolph, Donato Giannotti and his Epistolae` Biblioteca Universitaria
Alessandrina, Rome, MS. ro7 (Geneva: Droz, 1968)
Strada, Elena, `Carte di passaggio: "avanguardie petrarchiste" e tradizione
manoscritta nel Veneto di primo Cinquecento', in Monica Bianco and
Elena Strada (eds.), `I più vaghi e i più soavi fiori- studi sulle antologie di
lirica del Cinquecento (Alessandria: Dell'Orso, 2ooi), 1-41
Strappini, Lucia (ed.), Iluoghi dell'immaginario barocco (Naples: Liguori, 2ooi)
Bibliography 305
Supino, Paola, `La scrittura di Angelo Poliziano', in Vincenzo Fera and Mario
Martelli (eds.), Agnolo Poliziano: poeta, scrittore, filologo (Florence: Le
Lettere, 1998), 22 3-44
Tabacchi, S., `Carlo Grassi', DBI, 58 (2oo2), 601-3
Tansillo, Luigi, L'egloga e i poemetti secondo la genuina lezione dei codici e delle
prime stampe, Francesco Flamini (ed.) (Naples: n. pub., 1893)
Poesie liriche edite ed inedite, Francesco Fiorentino (ed.) (Naples: Morano,
1882)
Tanturli, Giuliano, `Formazione d'un codice e d'un Canzoniere: "Delle rime del
Bronzino pittore libro primo"', SFI, 62 ( 2004), 195-224
`Un nuovo manoscritto della "Vita del Brunelleschi" di Antonio Manetti',
SFI, 51 (1993), 133-47
Tarquini, Stefania, Simbologia del potere: codici di dedica al pontefice nel
Quattrocento (Rome: Roma nel Rinascimento, 2ooi)
Tasso, Bernardo, Delle lettere, 3 vols. (Padua: Giuseppe Comino, 1733-51)
Lettere inedite, Giuseppe Campori (ed.) (Bologna: Commissione per i testi di
lingua, 1968)
Rime, 2 vols., L• I tre libri degli amori, Domenico Chiodo (ed.); II: Libri
quarto e quinto, Salmi e Ode, Vercingetorice Martignone (ed.) (Turin:
RES, 1995)
Tasso, Torquato, Dialoghi, Ezio Raimondi (ed.), 3 vols. (Florence: Sansoni, 1958)
Le lettere, Cesare Guasti (ed.), 5 vols. (Florence: Le Monnier, 1852-5)
Il re Torrismondo, Vercingetorice Martignone (ed.) (Parma: Guanda, 1993)
Le rime, Bruno Basile (ed.), 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1994)
Il secretario (Ferrara: per Vittorio Baldini, 1587)
Tavosanis, Mirko, La prima stesura delle Prose della volgar lingua- fonti e cor-
rezioni (Pisa: ETS, 2oo2)
Tebaldeo, Antonio, Rime, Tania Basile and Jean-Jacques Marchand (eds.), 3 vols.
(Modena: Panini, 1989-92)
Testa, Simone, `Alcune riflessioni sul Thesoro Politico (1589)', BHR, 64 (2002),
679-87
`Did Giovanni Maria Manelli publish the Thesoro Politico (1589)?', Renaissance
Studies, i9 (2005), 380-93
Thorndike, Lynn, A History of Magic and Experimental Science, vols. V and VI,
The Sixteenth Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 1941)
Tognetti, Giampaolo, `Un episodio inedito di repressione della predicazione
postsavonaroliana (Firenze í5o9)', BHR, 24 (1962), igo-9
`Le fortune della pretesa profezia di san Cataldo', Bullettino dell'Istituto storico
italiano per il medio evo, 8o (1968), 273-317
`Note sul profetismo nel Rinascimento e la letteratura relativa', Bullettino
dell'Istituto storico italiano per il medio evo, 82 (1970), 129-57
`Sul "romito" e profeta Brandano da Petroio', RSI, 72 (196o), 20-44
Tolomei, Claudio, Il Cesano, Ornella Castellani Pollidori (ed.) (Florence:
Olschki, 1974)
3o6 Bibliography
Tommasini, Oreste, La vita e gli scritti di Niccolò Machiavelli nella loro relazi-
one col machiavellismo: storia ed esame critico, 2 vols. (Turin: Loescher,
1883-1911)
Torrini, Maurizio, `Paratesto e rivoluzione scientifica', in Marco Santoro and
Maria Tavoni (eds.), I dintorni del testo, I, 207-15
Toscan, Jean, `Berni, réélaborateur d'un sonnet de Castiglione', in Réécritures
L Commentaires, parodies, variations dans la littérature italienne de la
Renaissance (Paris: Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1983),11-39
`Du côté de Pasquin: le poète Francesco Berni et le pape Adrien VI', in Réécritures
IIT Commentaires, parodies, variations dans la littérature italienne de la
Renaissance (Paris: Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1987), 101-72
Toscano, Tobia R., Letterati corti accademie: la letteratura a Napoli nella prima
metà del Cinquecento (Naples: Loffredo, 2000)
Toso, Fiorenzo, `Edizioni cinquecentesche della Strazzosa di Maffio Venier: per
un approccio al tema delle relazioni interdialettali nel periodo rinascimen-
tale', Atti dell'Istituto Veneto di Scienze Lettere ed Arti, Classe di scienze
morali, lettere ed arti, 158 (1999-2000), 121-52
Trissino, Giovan Giorgio, Tutte le opere, 2 vols. (Verona: Vallarsi, 1729)
Trovato, Paolo, Con ogni diligenza corretto: la stampa e le revisioni editoriali dei
testi letterari italiani (i47o—rS7o) (Bologna: II Mulino, 1991)
Trucchi, Francesco (ed.), Poesie italiane inedite di dugento autori dall origine
della lingua infno al secolo decimosettimo raccolte e illustrate, 4 vols. (Prato:
Ranieri Guasti, 1846-7)
Turba, Giuseppe, `Galeotto Del Carretto tra Casale e Mantova', Rinascimento,
and ser., 11 (1971), 95-169
Ullman, B. L., The Origin and Development ofHumanistic Script (Rome: Edizioni
di Storia e Letteratura, 196o)
Valdés, Juan de, Lo evangelio di San Matteo, Carlo Ossola and Anna Maria
Cavallarin (eds.) (Rome: Bulzoni,1985)
Obras completar, vol. 1, Angel Alcalá (ed.) (Madrid: Fundacion Jose Antonio
de Castro, 1997)
Valdrighi, Mario (ed.), Alcune lettere d'illustri Italiani ed Il Treperuno di
Giammaria Barbieri modenese in risposta a tre sonetti di Annibal Caro
(Modena: G. Vincenzi e compagno, 1827)
Vallone, Aldo, Aspetti dell'esegesi dantesca nei secoli XVI e XVII attraverso testi
inediti (Lecce: Milella, 1966)
Valori, Niccolò, Vita di Lorenzo de' Medici, Enrico Niccolini (ed.) (Vicenza:
Accademia Olimpica, 1991)
van Orden, Kate, `La chanson vulgaire and Ronsard's poetry for music', in Jeanice
Brooks, Philip Ford and Gillian Jondorf (eds.), Poetry and Music in the
French Renaissance (Cambridge French Colloquia, 2001), 79-109
Varchi, Benedetto, L'Hercolano, Antonio Sorella (ed.), 2 vols. (Pescara: Libreria
dell'Università, 1995)
Opere, 2 vols. (Trieste: Lloyd Austriaco, 1858-9)
Bibliography 307
Storia fiorentina, Gaetano Milanesi (ed.), 3 vols. (Florence: Le Monnier,
1857-8)
Vasoli, Cesare, `Giorgio Benigno Salviati (Dragigié)', in Marjorie Reeves (ed.),
Prophetic Rome, 121-56
`La profezia di Francesco da Meleto', in Umanesimo e ermeneutica, Archivio di
filosofia, 3 (Padua: Cedam, 1963), 27-80
Vassalli, Antonio, `Il Tasso in musica e la trasmissione dei testi: alcuni esempi',
in Maria Antonella Balsano and Thomas Walker (eds.), Tasso, la musica, i
musicisti (Florence: Olschki, 1988), 45-90
Vecce, Carlo, Iacopo Sannazaro in Francia: scoperte di codici all'inizio del XVI
secolo (Padua: Antenore, 1988)
`Petrarca, Vittoria, Michelangelo', SPCT, 44 (April 1992), 101-25
`Vittoria Colonna: il codice epistolare della poesia femminile', in Les Femmes
écrivains, 213-33
Vecchi Galli, Paola, `Il ms. 165 della Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna (con
inediti di Sabadino degli Arienti)', in Bruno Basile (ed.), Bentivolorum mag-
nificentia, 223-53
Vela, Claudio, `Poesia in musica: rime della Gàmbara e di altri poeti settentri-
onali in tradizione musicale', in Cesare Bozzetti and others (eds.), Veronica
Gam bara e la poesia del suo tempo, 399-414
`Gli studi di Cesare Bozzetti sulle rime dell'Ariosto', in Claudia Berra (ed.),
Fra satire e rime ariostesche (Milan: Cisalpino, 2000), 207-90
Venier, Lorenzo, La puttana errante, Nicola Catelli (ed.) (Milan: Unicopli,
2005)
Venier, Maffio, Poesie diverse, Attilio Carminati (ed.) (Venice: Corbo e Fiori,
2001)
Vespasiano da Bisticci, Il libro delle lodi delle donne, Giuseppe Lombardi (ed.)
(Manziana: Vecchiarelli; Rome: Roma nel Rinascimento, 1999)
Vetrugno, Roberto, `Sulle lettere autografe di Baldassar Castiglione (1497-1524)
(I)', Lingua nostra, 66 (20o5), 65-8o
Vianello, Valerio, Il letterato, l áccademia, il libro: contributi sulla cultura veneta
del Cinquecento, Biblioteca veneta, 6 (Padua: Antenore, 1988)
Vida, Marco Girolamo, Poemata omnia, z vols. (Padua: Cominus,1731)
Vignali, Antonio, La cazzaria, Pasquale Stoppelli (ed.) (Rome: Edizioni
dell'Elefante, 1984)
La cazzaria: 775e Book of the Prick, ed. and trans. by Ian Frederick Moulton
(New York: Routledge, 2003)
Villani, Gianni, Per l édizione dell' Arcadia' del Sannazaro (Rome: Salerno
Editrice, 1989)
Violi, Lorenzo, Le giornate, Gian Carlo Garfagnini (ed.) (Florence: Olschki,
1986)
Virgili, Antonio, Francesco Berni (Florence: Le Monnier, 1881)
Visconti, Gasparo, I canzonieri per Beatrice d'Este e per Bianca Maria Sforza, Paolo
Bongrani (ed.) (Milan: Fondazione Arnoldo e Alberto Mondadori,1979)
308 Bibliography Bibliography 309

Vogel, Emil, Alfred Einstein, François Lesure and Claudio Sartori, Bibliografia Woudhuysen, H. R., Sir Phílip Sidney and the Circulation of Manuscripts
della musica italiana vocale profana pubblicata dal r5oo al 1700, 3 vols. r558-1640 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996)
(Pomezia: Staderini, 1977) Zaccaria, Vittorio, `Le due redazioni del "De casibus"', Studi sul Boccaccio, io
Walker, D. P., Ticino and music', in Spiritual & Demonic Magic: From Ficino (1977-8), 1-26
to Campanella (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, Zafarana, Zelina, `Per la storia religiosa di Firenze nel Quattrocento: una raccolta
2000),3-2 9 privata di prediche', Studi medievali, 3rd ser., 9 (1968), 1,017-113
Waquet, Françoise, `Qu'est-ce que la République des Lettres? Essai de sémantique Zaggia, Massimo, Tra Mantova e la Sicilia nel Cinquecento, 3 vols. (Florence:
historique', Bibliothèque de l École des Chartes, 147 (1989), 473-502 Olschki, 7003)
Wardrop, James, Arrighi revived', Signature, 12 (July 1939), 26-46 Zamponi, Stefano, `La scrittura umanistica', Archiv fiir Diplomatik,
`Pierantonio Sallando and Girolamo Pagliarolo: scribes to Giovanni II Schriftsgeschichte, Siegel- and Wappenkunde, 50 (200 4), 467-504
Bentivoglio', Signature, n. s., 2 (1946), 4-30 Zanaco, Tiziano, `Indagini sulle rime di Pietro Bembo', SFI, 60 (2002), 141-216
The Script of Humanism: Some Aspects of Humanistic Script, r46o—í56o (Oxford: `Sulla tradizione dei testi semi- o pseudo-popolari: le ottave delle "ore estive"',
Clarendon Press, 1963) in La critica del testo: problemi di metodo ed esperienze di lavoro. Atti del
`The Vatican striptors: documents for Ruano and Cresci', Signature, n. s., 5 Convegno di Lecce, 22-26 ottobre, 1984 (Rome: Salerno Editrice, 1985),
(1948), 3-28 451-91
Watkins; Glenn, Gesualdo: The Man and his Music, 2nd edn (Oxford: Clarendon Zanré, Domenico, `"Che k.- vuol dire?": a re-reading of mid-sixteenth-century
Press, 1991) linguistic debates in the Accademia Fiorentina', IS, 53 (1998), 20-37
Watson, Andrew G., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 7oo-1600 Cultural Non-Conformity in Early Modern Florence (Aldershot: Ashgate,
in the Department of Manuscripts, British Library, 2 vols. (London: British 2004)
Museum, 1979) Zarlino, Gioseffo, Le istitutioni harmoniche, Venezia, 1561, intr. by Iain Fenlon
Watson, Elizabeth See, Achille Bocchi and the Emblem Book as Symbolic Form and Paolo Da Col (Bologna: Forni, 1999)
(Cambridge University Press, 1993) Zarri, Gabriella, `Note su diffusione e circolazione di testi devoti (1520-1550)', in
Watson, Rowan, `Manual of dynastic history or devotional aid? Eleanor of Libri, idee e sentimenti religiosi nel Cinquecento italiano (Modena: Panini,
Toledo's Book of Hours', in David S. Areford and Nina A. Rowe (eds.), 1 987),131-54
Excavating the Medieval Image. Manuscripts, Artists, Audiences: Essays in Zorzi, Marino, `La circolazione del libro a Venezia nel Cinquecento: biblioteche
Honor of Sandra Hindman (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), 179-95 private e pubbliche', Ateneo veneto, 177 (1990), 117-89
Weaver, Elissa B., Convent Theatre in Early Modern Italy:- Spiritual Fun and
Learning for Women (Cambridge University Press, 2002)
Weinberg, Bernard, Argomenti di discussione letteraria nell'Accademia degli
Alterati (1S70—i600)', GSLI, 131 (1954), 175-94
A History of Literary Criticism in the Italian Renaissance, 2 vols. (University of
Chicago Press, 1961)
(ed.), Trattati di poetica e retorica del Cinquecento, 4 vols. (Bari: Laterza, 1970-4)
Weinstein, Donald, `The Apocalypse in sixteenth-century Florence: the vision
of Albert of Trent', in Anthony Molho and John A. Tedeschi (eds.),
Renaissance: Studies in Honor of Hans Baron (Florence: Sansoni, 1971),
311-31
Savonarola and Florence: Prophecy and Patriotism in the Renaissance (Princeton
University Press, 1970)
Weiss, Roberto, `The castle of Gaillon in i5o9—io', Journal of the Warburg and
Courtauld Institutes, 16 (1953), 1-12
`In obitu Ursini Lanfredini: a footnote to the literary history of Rome under
Pope Innocent VIII', IMU, 2 (1959), 353-66
Williamson, Edward, Bernardo Tasso (Rome: Edizioni di Scoria e Letteratura,
1951)