Info for those playing Machinations: Den of Lions

When the houses arrive at the Villa dei Leoni in November 1501, nearly everyone through the door will be a courtier of one kind or another. The cardinal’s secretary, the physician at the bedside, the poet with a folder of verses, and the lady who carries letters between houses all belong to the same world. This post offers a short guide to that world, so you can step into it with confidence.

The Word Itself

A courtier was a person who attended the court of a prince, which meant a monarch, a ruler of the noble class, or another powerful figure. The court was the center of government and also the prince’s home, so political and social life were woven together. Princes often expected their most important nobles to spend much of the year in attendance.

Courtiers were not all noble. The court also held clergy, soldiers, clerks, secretaries, and agents and middlemen of every sort with regular business there. Even if your character has no title, you may still belong at the villa as fully as anyone.

The Great Chain of Being

One of the strongest ideas carried over from the classical world was the Great Chain of Being. Its central premise was that everything in the universe had a place in a divinely planned order, pictured as a chain stretching upward, with each link ranked above or below the next.

Courtiers worked to rise along that chain by attaching themselves to someone above them. Through that bond a courtier could advance, gain power and authority, grow wealthy, help raise their own family to nobility, and serve society. How to do all this well was a matter of lively debate. Three writers give us three quite different answers.

Three Models of the Courtier

Castiglione and the well-rounded gentleman

Baldassare Castiglione wrote The Book of the Courtier, published in 1528. It records a conversation among courtiers of the Duke and Duchess of Urbino about what makes a good courtier, and it became the standard guide to being a Renaissance gentleman. In 1501 Castiglione was in his early twenties and had just entered the service of the Gonzaga of Mantua, so his ideal grew out of the very world you will be playing in.

His courtier is well educated and well rounded: skilled in arms and in war, and just as able to dance, sing, and play an instrument. He also makes a point of doing all of it with ease, a quality Castiglione called sprezzatura. What sets his courtier apart from those in other books is the duty of honest counsel. A good courtier tells his lord when an act is ignoble, in order to save the lord from himself. Thomas Hoby’s English translation of 1561 puts it this way:

“The final end of a Courtier, where to al his good condicions and honest qualities tende, is to beecome an Instructer and Teacher of his Prince or Lorde, inclininge him to vertuous practises: and to be francke and free with him, after he is once in favour in matters touching his honour and estimation, alwayes putting him in minde to folow vertue and to flee vice, opening unto him the commodities of the one and inconveniences of the other: and to shut his eares against flatterers, whiche are the first beeginninge of self leekinge and all ignorance”.  – From Hoby’s A BREEF REHERSALL OF THE CHIEFE CONDITIONS AND QUALITIES IN A COURTIER)

Machiavelli and the practical prince

Niccolò Machiavelli wrote The Prince in 1513, though it was not published until 1532. In 1501 he was a young secretary in the Florentine government, still a year or two from his famous meetings with Cesare Borgia. Some call him a founder of modern political science. His book concerns the behavior of the prince more than the courtier, though its methods would serve a courtier just as well. His guiding idea is that results matter, and that a ruler must sometimes be hard to keep order.

“It is much safer to be feared than loved, because love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails.” – From The Prince

“How we live is so different from how we ought to live that he who studies what ought to be done rather than what is done will learn the way to his downfall rather than to his preservation.” – From The Prince

Christine de Pizan and the courtier who governs

Christine de Pizan wrote The Treasure of the City of Ladies, also called the Book of Three Virtues, in 1405. It is the earliest of the three, and a character in 1501 could well know it. Her subject is the women of courtly life in France, from the princess down to the peasant. For the upper nobility, her advice agrees closely with Castiglione’s ideal court lady.

Her baronesses and the women who manage estates are given the same duties as men. While her husband serves the king, the baroness must defend her lands and people, dispense justice, and see to the daily affairs of the estate.

“The man or the woman in whom resides greater virtue is the higher; neither the loftiness nor the lowliness of a person lies in the body according to the sex, but in the perfection of conduct and virtues.”  ― Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies

“If it were customary to send little girls to school and teach them the same subjects as are taught to boys, they would learn just as fully and would understand the subtleties of all arts and sciences.”  ― Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies

Bringing This to the Villa

Castiglione gives the most detailed picture of the courtier’s skills, habits, and manners, and Hoby’s translation offers a handy list of qualities to cultivate and faults to avoid. Pizan’s work supports applying that picture equally to women and men, which is how we will use it in the game. It gives a well-rounded, well-educated figure and a blueprint for behavior that a court would accept.

A note on timing: Castiglione’s and Machiavelli’s books were not yet written in 1501, though the ideas in them were already in the air. Pizan’s book was already a century old. Your character can hold any of these attitudes without having read a page.

A few questions to try on your character before the weekend:

• Whom do you serve, and what do you hope to gain from standing near them?
• When your lord is wrong, do you say so, flatter, or stay silent?
• Do you lean toward Castiglione’s grace, Machiavelli’s realism, or Pizan’s capable steward?
• What is your finest accomplishment, and how would you display it without appearing to try?

Further reading

Each of these is available free online except where noted.

• The Book of the Courtier, in Sir Thomas Hoby’s 1561 translation: http://www.luminarium.org/renascence-editions/courtier/courtier.html
• The Prince, by Niccolò Machiavelli: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1232/pg1232.txt
• The Treasure of the City of Ladies, by Christine de Pizan: a French edition is at https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/26608/pg26608.txt, and a paperback translation is available from Penguin Classics.
• Plutarch, Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/674/pg674.txt
• The Decameron, by Giovanni Boccaccio: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/23700/pg23700.txt
• The Heptameron, by Margaret, Queen of Navarre: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/28858/pg28858.txt (written later in the sixteenth century, and a lively picture of courtly conversation)
• The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/4028/pg4028.txt (also a later work, with a vivid account of life among Italian patrons)

Come ready to serve, advise, and scheme in good company. We look forward to seeing which kind of courtier you become.

By Gigi Coulson, MS