The Cardinal’s Palace as an Instrument: How to be a Healthy, Well-tempered Man of Letters at the Turn of the Fifteenth Century
(2014) Annual Meeting of the Renaissance Society of America — Location: New York
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- Abstract
- In 1510, the well-known humanist Paolo Cortesi (1471-1510) addressed the cardinals of the Roman Church in his De Cardinalatù. Divided into three books, this treatise discusses the cardinal as an individual, as the head of a family, and as a public figure. The treatise has a didactic agenda, trying to redefine and educate the cardinal as a well-tempered intellectual and ecclesiastical member of high society. By describing proper norms of behaviour, the De Cardinalatù is part of the literary tradition of the Specula Principis. However, in contrast to contemporary guides of conduct, Cortesi does not write a letter to a young prince, nor does he write a dialogue between gentlemen. He writes a treatise, in which he uses scientific knowledge to organize in a structured way every aspect of a cardinal’s life. He organises this knowledge in several books, and chapters. Throughout the second book, several indications on the architecture and use of the cardinal’s palace can be found. This architecture and use is not motivated through court ritual. Rather, as a true encyclopaedic enterprise, Cortesi argues his recommendations from a scientific point, putting the human body and its functioning at the centre. By focusing on the palace’s architecture and use against the background of this scientific knowledge, this paper tries to open new ways of interpreting the cardinal’s palace, and more specific its apartment at the end of the fifteenth century. The paper shows how Cortesi puts the apartment forth as an instrument to maintain the cardinals’ health, and allow him to become a well-tempered intellectual and ecclesiastical member of high society. As such, Cortesi’s didactic agenda becomes paramount. By using scientific knowledge based on the human body, he creates a new and homogenized identity for the cardinalship. The cardinal is able to perform this identity on a daily basis, thanks to the architecture of the apartment.
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De Raedt, N. (2014). The Cardinal’s Palace as an Instrument: How to be a Healthy, Well-tempered Man of Letters at the Turn of the Fifteenth Century. Annual Meeting of the Renaissance Society of America, New York. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/103895