Castiglione, Baldesar. Il libro del cortegiano. Parma: Maestro Antonio di Viotti, 1530.
Count Baldesar Castiglione was an Italian diplomat and courtier, educated at the humanist school of Giorgio Merula and Demetrius Chalcondyles. He entered the service of the Duke of Urbino in 1507, where he met many distinguished humanists such as Pietro Bembo. He traveled as a diplomat to England, and in 1525 was sent to Spain as papal nuncio to Emperor Charles V.
His famous work Il cortegiano was an important handbook of aristocratic manners during the Renaissance. It was first printed in Venice in 1528 by Aldo Romano and Andrea d'Asola. The edition on display was printed in Parma by Antonio di Viotti in 1530. Viotti had been a minor printer up to this year, when his activities intensified.
Juan Boscán, one of the first poets to use Italian verses in Spanish poetry, translated Il cortegiano into Spanish. It was published in Barcelona in 1534 by Pedro Mompezat. The Durand Collection holds a copy of this translation, printed in Antwerp in 1561 by the widow of Martin Nuncio.
After Boscán's translation, Jacques Colin's French version was printed in Lyon in 1537 by Denys de Harsy. Sir Thomas Hobbes's translation, The Courtyer, was printed in London in 1561 by Wyllyam Seres and exerted enormous influence on English social life in the age of Shakespeare and Philip Sydney.
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