United States or American Samoa ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Aldus was correcting proofs and thought his visitor was one of those inquisitive people by whom he used to be pestered. When he turned out to be Erasmus, he welcomed him cordially and procured him board and lodging in the house of his father-in-law, Andrea Asolani. Fully eight months did Erasmus live there, in the environment which, in future, was to be his true element: the printing-office.
But we are at the very top of things, garlanded about, as it were, with a narrow line of houses, some palatial, such as you would be glad to see in London, and above all towers the old dwelling of Queen Cornaro, who was forced to exchange her Kingdom of Cyprus for this pretty but petty dominion where she kept state in a mimic Court, with Bembo, afterwards Cardinal, for her secretary who has commemorated the fact in his 'Asolani' or dialogues inspired by the place: and I do assure you that, after some experience of beautiful sights in Italy and elsewhere I know nothing comparable to the view from the Queen's tower and palace, still perfect in every respect.
Though the Florentine craft never attained the reputation of the Venetian Aldi and Asolani, the Giunti of Rome, the Soncini of Fano, the Stephani of Paris, and Froben of Basel, it had the name, for a time at least, of being one of the most accurate of all presses. To Lorenzo it owed this celebrity.
Bembo, who was in love with the beautiful duchess, constantly sang her praises, and, August 1, 1504, he dedicated to her his dialogue on love, the Asolani, in a letter in which he celebrated her virtues.
Yet Bembo's Asolani, Castiglione's panegyric of Platonic Love, and much of the lyrical poetry in vogue warn us to be cautious. The old romantic sentiment expressed by the Florentines of the thirteenth century still survived to some extent, adding a sort of dignity in form at least to these affections.
His friend Aldo first spent some time in Ferrara at the court of Ercole, and subsequently went to the Pio at Carpi; finally he settled in Venice, where he printed the Asolani in the year 1505 and dedicated it to Lucretia.
The "Cortegiano" of Castiglione, Bembo's "Asolani," the "Camaldolese Discourses" of Landino could have been addressed only to social oligarchies standing on a basis of polite culture.
In that reposeful kingdom, which could in miniature offer to Caterina's courtiers all the pomp and charm without the drawbacks of sovereignty, Pietro Bembo wrote for "Madonna Lucretia Estense Borgia Duchessa illustrissima di Ferrara," and caused to be printed by Aldus Manutius, the leaflets which, under the title Gli Asolani, ne' quali si ragiona d' amore, soon became a famous book in Italy.
His thoughts on this subject are set forth by himself in the third book of the 'Asolani, and indirectly by Castiglione, who puts in his mouth the splendid speech with which the fourth book of the 'Cortigiano' concludes.
Nor was the later story forgotten of Queen Caterina Cornaro, whose palace-tower overlooks Asolo, and whose secretary, Cardinal Bembo, wrote gli Asolani, from which came the suggestion for the title of Browning's forthcoming volume.
Word Of The Day