Thursday, December 13, 2012

Shepherd on Poggio; Nobility as a social Position

Dr William Shepherd wrote a nineteenth century biography, The Life of Poggio Bracciolini, and in it quotes extensively from Poggio's letters.

Here's a nice article about the easy relations between William Shepherd of the nineteenth century and a book of letters of Poggio Bracciolini de Duccio of the fifteenth century, by a twentieth century scholar who got to to see the manuscript.

After a treatise On Avarice c. 1430, and subsequent letters upset with him from Observant Brothers of the Franciscan sect who wished to set up their own houses, Poggio also received criticism from the famous book collector, Niccolo Niccoli of Florence. Shepherd reports Poggio replied to him cordially,

"... first stating the facts of the case, and then protesting that he was no enemy either to religion or its professors-
"on the contrary," says he, "I make a point of behaving with the utmost reverence to those eclesiastics who adorn their religion with virtuous conduct. But," proceeded he, "I have been so often deceived, so frequently disappointed in the good opinion which I had conceived of men, that I know not whom or what to believe. There are so many wicked people, who conceal their vices by the sanctity of their looks, and the humility of their apparel, that confidence is in a manner destroyed. In the pontifical court [where Poggio long worked] we have too many opportunities of becoming acquainted with iniquitous transaction, in which people in general are ignorant. I am not however surprised," says he in the conclusion of his letter, "that these friars should complain of their being prevented from establishing themselves in such a pleasant district [near Florence]. The excellence of our wine is a powerful allurement, both to strangers and to our countrymen. Plato, who was no Christian, chose for the site of his academy an unhealthy spot, in order that the mind might gain strength by the infirmity of the body. But these pretended followers of Christ act upon a different system. They select pleasant and voluptuous places -- they seek not solitude, but society -- they do not wish to promote the cultivation of the mind, but the pampering of the corporeal appetites.""  p. 164

Again, Poggio was the pope's secretary during almost the entire first half of the 1400's. You get a real sense here that he calls them like he sees them. I am just beginning to look at this role in the papal entourage and it might offer a lot to my view into the church and its influence and powers throughout Europe in this period of great change. It would be good to have something to set alongside Johann Burchard's look at the Borgia Court as well as the office of the captain-general of the pope.

Poggio and Niccolo Niccoli would search out and trade ancient manuscripts in this period and were both familiar as friends of the de'Medici, both pater patriae Cosimo and Lorenzo his brother. Many a conversation we are assured was shared by these gentlemen of public and private stature at a time that would be looked back with a great deal of ... fondness by self-styled elite cultures and royal courts all over Europe for the duration of the next century. This extended to the very act of trading and the gifting of books.

Still, even these figures that later generations would exalt were not considered nobles in the ordinary understanding of that time. For one thing, they worked for a living. Cosimo and Lorenzo were bankers, one of the most generally detested occupations one could have. Poggio and Niccolo were secretaries, book hunters. Their legacy was what they could make for themselves not what they inherited or choose to add to or spend. But it seems they were well acquainted with those as options for others. 
In a noble, royal or merely patrician family, there were several defining kinds of comparisons, first of all between children. First born and later born. female and male, legitimate and illegitimate, fit for hunting or jousting or marrying but not studies. Part of or cut out. All too often a family could have too many heirs and not enough inheritances to hand around. It was a continual, centuries long, age-old traditional set of cultures that in fact had grown up with so many monasteries and convents: that some of these noble-born children might go into service for the church in some capacity. And there were many several such houses that spread in successive waves over centuries.
But these then in whatever capacity were members of the church and also a member of a noble family, possibly. The vast majority were not.
So this was not where nobility came from. Nobility could be conferred or granted as could knighthood, by royalty, but who knew who else might grant that? The pope?

Words we might associate today with nobility, like dignity, character, even grand notions of leadership might run a close parallel to their use of the word 'nobility'. But what they meant first was just the fact of it. Noble meant bloodlines to them like royalty is understood by us today. Like the House of Windsor in Britain. There are many noble families and members in Britain today. The first season in the hit pbs show Downton Abbey gives a clear view of some of that still remaining in the early 20th century. Yes the Brits still have nobility. The French do not on purpose. The US does not expressly, yet politicians and very wealthy often claim a kind of nobility, if only in the extra degree of respect they retain in their person as office holders. They often get extra security, handlers, secretaries and so on. We call it executive privileges, sometimes, when we have to call it something. 

Privilege in today's world means earned benefit, yet even that in entrepreneurial circles is turned into an aspiration, a goal to be achieved. An executive is still understood as being chief decider. Why wouldn't an executive want privileges especially if they feel or are told that they are earned benefits? But like a mercenary in those days, CEO's are more often these days to work under contract, at the behest of shareholders. In those days a mercenary captain did not need to be noble - as they understood it, from the bloodline - though it certainly helped getting your name out there. It was to become rarer in the 1500's and yet was very common, even expected in the 1400's. The chief example of an upstart leader, in the 1400's, Francesco Sforza was partly famous because he did not come from a noble line. He built his reputation on deeds, through acts of merit and good decisions.

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