Page:The Book of the Courtier.djvu/545

 NOTES TO THE FIRST BOOK OF THE COURTIER surname was MASSIMO, and that he was taken ill in the campaign of 1510 against the Venetians and retired to Mantua. Thither Castiglione sent a letter to his mother, warmly recommending Roberto to her hospitality, and saying that he loved the man like a brother. Note 49, page 12. Bernardo Accolti, (born about 1465; died 1535), was generally known as the UNICO Aretino, from the name of his birthplace (Arezzo) and in compliment to his 'unique' faculty for extemporising verse. His father Benedetto was a jurist, and the author of a dull Latin history of the First Crusade, from which Tasso is believed to have drawn material for the Gerusalemme Liberata. His poetical celebrity commended him to the court of Urbino, where (as at Rome and in other places) he was in the habit of recit- ing his verses to vast audiences of rich and poor alike. W^hen an exhibition by him was announced, guards had to be set to restrain the crowds that rushed to secure places, the shops were closed, and the streets emptied. His life was a kind of lucrative poetic vagabondage: thus we find him flourishing, caressed and applauded, at the courts of Urbino, Mantua, Naples, and especially at that of Leo X, who bestowed many offices upon him, of which, however, his wealth (acquired by his recitations) rendered him independent, enabling him to in- dulge in a life of literary ease. His elder brother Pietro became a cardinal, bought Raphael's house, and is said to have had a hand in drafting the papal bull against Luther in 1520. He was an early patron of his notorious fellow-townsman Pietro Aretino. Such of his verse as has survived is so bald and stilted as to excite no little wonderment at the esteem which he enjoyed among his contemporaries. In The Courtier he poses as the senti- mental and afflicted lover, the "slayer" of duchesses and other noble ladies, who (according to his own account) kept flocking in his train, but who more probably were often making sport of him. Note 50, page 12. Giancristoforo Romano, (born about 1465; died 1512), was the son of Isaia di Pippo of Pisa and the pupil of Paolo Romano. Per- haps best known as a sculptor, he possessed skill also as a goldsmith, medallist, architect and crystal carver, cultivated music and wrote verse. During the last years of the Sforza power at Milan, he accompanied the duke's wife, Beatrice d'Este, from place to place, and is now identified as the author of her portrait bust in the Louvre. He executed also at least two portrait medals of her sister Isabella d'Este, acted as adviser and agent of the Gonza- gas in the purchase of art objects, worked at Venice, Cremona, Rome and Naples; and is known to have been at Urbino about the time of the Courtier dialogues. In a long letter written by him to Bembo in 1510, he describes the court of Urbino as "a true temple of chastity, decorum and pudicity." In 1512 he was directing architect at Loreto (see note 311), where he died in May, bequeathing his collection of medals and antiques to a hospital, for the pur- pose of having three masses said weekly for the repose of his soul. Note 51, page 12. Of Pietro Monte little more is known than that he was 333