[102] "Camillo, as you are certainly a gentleman, thereto clerk-like experienced, which no less adorns our gentry than our parents' noble names, in whose success we are gentle. ..." Polixenes' remark in the second scene of The Winter's Tale aptly summarizes the most significant change experienced by early modern nobles: their transformation from a wide-ranging assortment of rural magnates and squires into an educated, more urban ruling class. The phrase "a gentleman, thereto clerk-like experienced" presumes an identification between noble birth and formal education scarcely conceivable during the Middle Ages. Prior to the "educational revolution" of the early modern era, clerks and knights hailed from distinct social backgrounds. With few exceptions, relations between the two orders were rarely characterized by admixture, much less equality. When such integration did occur, it was limited to the higher reaches of the church hierarchy, and to exceptional religious orders like the Benedictines. And while in clerical depictions of the "three orders" the sacred enjoyed precedence, in the more profane sphere of reality learning consistently deferred to chivalry. ⁽¹⁾

[103] The transformation was neither abrupt nor uniform. After all, few subsequent aristocracies could boast the artistic refinement and opulent display of the late medieval Burgundian court. Meanwhile, on the other side of the "revolutionary" divide, affable boors like Squire Western chased foxes and damned the court well into the modern era. Yet these apparent exceptions merely confirmed the rule of the profound change experienced by this "nobility in search of a definition." ⁽²⁾Significantly, the case of the Burgundian court differed sharply from that of future generations of aristocrats. Its extensive patronage of art and highly stylized existence issued, not from the formal education characteristic of later centuries; rather, they were the product of a singular aesthetic ethos whose roots lay well outside the academy. Similarly, the vitality of Fielding's congenial rustic squire was made possible by a political structure in which substantial power and prestige accrued to the country as well as to the cities and the court in London. By and large, this configuration proved unique to England and certain areas of eastern Europe. ⁽³⁾ In the rest of the continent, centralization of government and domestication of the rural nobility proceeded apace. The persistent strength of the seigneurial regime throughout the later years of the old regime scarcely concealed the forging of new power relations among aristocracy, cities, and the central government. The nobility's successful adaptation to changing political and economic circumstances found sustenance in a broadened conception of elite identity--one that rested upon novel justifications of aristocratic privilege.

[104] That the essence of nobility was a loosely defined ideal of "virtue" was a concept with deep roots in classical and Scholastic thought. Both Stoic and later neo-Aristotelian writings singled out virtus as the leading characteristic of the aristocracy--a choice that accorded well with depictions of chivalry in medieval imaginative literature. ⁽⁴⁾ However, during the later Middle Ages and Renaissance this formulation changed significantly, as humanists and lawyers argued for the acquisition of virtue through study of the liberal arts. The case for the "nobility of letters" had not lacked intellectual precursors among classical authors or medieval jurists. Nevertheless, writers, academics, and liberal professionals pressed it with unprecedented vigor beginning in the early fifteenth century. From their efforts a novel definition of nobility emerged--one that placed less emphasis upon lineage and racial descent in favor of a broader vision of "virtue" as a product of education, not of birth. ⁽⁵⁾

The new definition of virtus first appeared in the city-states of the early Italian Renaissance. Florentine humanists in particular discussed the essence of nobility in numerous writings. Texts like the Disputation of Nobility, written around 1420 by Buonaccorso da Montemagno the Younger, and the 1440 dialogue of the same title by Poggio Bracciolini directly addressed the problem of aristocratic identity. ⁽⁶⁾ The work by Buonaccorso--a professor of jurisprudence at the University of Florence and a member of the circle of Leonardo Bruni--explicitly defined [105] nobility as virtue acquired through learning. It also sought to demonstrate the superior merit of the "self-made" commoner who had risen in society through his own efforts and innate capabilities. This intensely personal vision of nobility, which shone forth in adages like "whosoever has not attained distinction should blame himself," was also propounded by Poggio a generation later. His dialogue opened with a survey of views from both ancient and contemporary writers. Poggio concluded that, given the absence of uniform criteria within descriptions of nobles in Antiquity and his own era, personal virtue should be regarded the exclusive hallmark of the aristocratic spirit. The most famous passage of the treatise argued that "true nobility" was the "splendor proceeding from virtue, which illumines those possessing it regardless of their social extraction." ⁽⁷⁾

A similar view of nobilitas informed the protracted discussions among Florentine intellectuals concerning the relative nobility of law versus medicine--the famed disputa delle arti. The most representative contribution to this debate was Coluccio Salutati's On the Nobility of Law and Medicine, written around 1399 and published by Girolamo Giganti in 1542. In the opening chapter Coluccio affirmed that "true nobility is not a matter of ancestors or of lineage, but rather resides solely in virtue." The author went on to note that the first nobles among the Israelites were those chosen upon Moses' advice among "learned and wise men . . . excelling through their knowledge and virtue." ⁽⁸⁾ This brief but significant passage sums up prevailing attitudes toward the aristocracy among many early Florentine humanists. Their dialogues and treatises not only defined nobility as virtus. The humanists' true innovation was to argue that virtue could best be acquired through "learning," that is, education in humane letters and the liberal arts.

[106] The most influential discussion of nobilitas to issue from the Italian Renaissance was Baldesar Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier, finished around 1516 and published by Manutius in 1528. Set against the background of the decline of the civic nobility's power following the French invasion of 1494, this treatise sought to resolve the aristocracy's crisis of confidence by proposing a new social role of public spectacle and display. While earlier briefs for the nobility of letters read as apologia for the aristocratic pretensions of liberally educated civic elites, Castiglione urged the humanistic education of the established court aristocracy. He also argued for a remarkably self-conscious manipulation of letters and comportment by the ruling class as a whole. In his view, education, manners, and demeanor not only distinguished nobles from commoners, but also lent renewed justification to the social hierarchy inherited from the past. Every detail of aristocratic life was thus to be governed as if nobles were actors in a spectacle whose audience was society at large. Learning, grace, refinement--these were the badges of distinction to be worn by the aristocracy. While older arguments for the nobility of letters provided the necessary foundations for this imposing edifice of studied display, his new definition of nobility superseded the original humanist program by strengthening the role of formal knowledge and manners as conscious instruments of social separation. As the pursuit of "humane letters" gradually emerged as a central element in the aristocracy's own self-consciousness, theatrical presentation of the new learning began to dominate the face shown by the nobility to the rest of society.

The remarkable popularity of Castiglione's book throughout early modern Europe ensured that there would be no retreat from the path explored in his novel formulation of aristocratic intent. The flood of treatises written in imitation of The Book of the Courtier partook of a common attempt to adapt arguments for the nobility of letters to the needs of established aristocracies as well as urban oligarchies. Sixteenth-century Italy in particular saw a host of elaborations on the themes propounded by the [107] Florentine humanists and Castiglione. These usually took the form of courtesy books, the best-known of which was Giovanni Delia Casa's Galateo, first published in Venice in 1558. The shift in the meaning of virtus away from ideals of medieval chivalry toward new standards of learning and behavior was nowhere made more apparent than in the preamble to this widely read text:

We wish to be courteous, agreeable, and good-mannered in our conversations and dealings with others.  If this is not virtue, it not far removed from it.  For though generosity, loyalty, and moral courage are without doubt nobler and more praiseworthy qualities than charm and courtesy, nevertheles polite habits and a correct mannor of speech and behavior may benefit those who possess them no less than a noble spirit and a stout heart benefit others...

The new vision of gentility which took as its point of departure the nobility of learning also found expression in the hackneyed debate over arms versus letters. Perhaps the most influential treatise on this subject was Girolamo Muzio's The Gentleman (1571). ⁽¹⁰⁾ After subjecting the reader to the habitual review of classical and contemporary definitions of nobility, Muzio opted in the end for the ultimate superiority of letters. In the words of Marino Berengo,

[108] The figure of the noble versed in letters and law, whose birth served above all to guarantee a virtuous education, came to dominate the public vision of this author who for many years served in the ranks of the Spanish administration, a body singularly mindful of class distinctions and so little disposed to forget the noble or common status determined by birth. ... ⁽¹¹⁾

The nobility of letters also found defenders outside the realm of humanist discourse and social commentary. Not surprisingly, jurists numbered themselves among the best-known proponents of this theme. Particularly influential were the Commentaries on Nobility published in 1543 by André Tiraqueau, a renowned legal scholar and magistrate of the Parlement of Paris. ⁽¹³⁾ An even more famous defense of the acquisition of noble virtue through the study of letters was Charles Loyseau's Treatise on the Orders (1610). This distinguished barrister's advocacy of the noblesse de robe's claim to gentle rank placed overriding emphasis on the power of education to confer virtue. "If at times children's characters happen to conform to those of their parents," he argued, "this is not the result of descent, which plays no part in character, but rather of education and upbringing." ⁽¹⁴⁾

[109] Castile also made important contributions to this genre of apologetic literature. The influential thirteenth-century law code known as the Siete Partidas enshrined the juridical tradition assigning the origins of nobility to "lineage" and "knowledge." The power of learning to bestow nobility found ample resonance in later writings as well. One representative text was the oft-cited legal treatise by the Salamancan jurist Andrés Mendo, On Academic Law (1665), which contained an exhaustive discussion of the noble rights and privileges enjoyed by holders of university degrees throughout Europe. ⁽¹⁵⁾Other authors, like Alonso Núñez de Castro, Diego de Saavedra Fajardo, Juan de Zabaleta, and Cristóbal Suárez de Figueroa, elaborated at length on the theme of the nobleza de letras. ⁽¹⁶⁾ One of the most famous of these treatises was the Discourses on the Nobility of Spain, published in 1622 by D. Bernabé Moreno de Vargas, an urban hidalgo from Extremadura. Moreno's pithy phrase "letters and arms confer nobility, valor and wealth conserve it" underscores the extent to which this doctrine had become part of the common currency of political and legal thought in early modern Spain. ⁽¹⁷⁾

By the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, arguments for the nobility of letters contributed vitally to a basic consensus on the sources of nobilitas. Of course, many writers continued to champion the hereditary quality of virtue, and thus the superiority of established aristocrats over educated newcomers--a precedence rarely called into question. ⁽¹⁸⁾ Nevertheless, the successful linkage of noble "virtue" with learning and mannered comportment represented a significant ideological gain by upwardly [110] mobile urban elites. It also lent fresh impetus to the older aristocracy's effort to adapt itself to political and social change at the threshold of the modern era.

Early modern Catalan arguments for the redefinition of nobility generally followed patterns laid out in the rest of Europe. In fact, the writer Joan Boscà (Juan Boscán), the most famous honored citizen of Barcelona, translated Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier into Spanish, publishing the first edition in his native city in 1534. ⁽¹⁹⁾ Nevertheless, one is struck by the singular predominance of legal exposition within Catalan commentaries on nobilitas. The most ardent local supporters of the nobility of letters were jurisconsults like Fontanella, Bosch, and Antoni de Vilaplana. ⁽²⁰⁾ Their works drew upon the glosses of medieval canonists, Tiraqueau's treatise on the nobility, and Catalan constitutional traditions. Later generations of jurists even turned to extra-legal texts to uphold belief in the ennobling quality of learning. Representative of this latter tendency were the inaugural addresses delivered by the presidents of the Academy of Jurisprudence, founded in 1777. In these declamations prominent Catalan barristers ransacked a wide variety of lay sources [111] to bolster their contention that letters endowed their possessors with true "nobility of character." ⁽²¹⁾

These legal expositions ostensibly defended the thesis that all forms of learning--most commonly interpreted to mean a university degree--conferred noble privilege. Nevertheless, the lawyers transformed the case for the nobility of letters into a brief for the privileged status of jurisprudence in particular. This narrow outlook was hardly surprising, given the overwhelming predominance in numbers, social prominence, and political and intellectual activism of lawyers in relation to other educated members of the urban elite. Their strongly corporate vision found eloquent depiction in the role jurists played in the canonization in 1601 of Saint Raymond Penyafort. The renowned Dominican numbered among his many qualities the happy coincidence of being a native of Barcelona, the scion of a local noble family, and a noted canon lawyer. Not surprisingly, the city's barristers became fervent devotees of the cult of this model saint, who, in the words of one contemporary, combined the exercise of law with "virtue, letters, and nobility." ⁽²²⁾

There existed, however, a parallel line of reasoning whose advocacy of the nobility of letters found expression in treatises on moral theology. Much of this discourse centered around the question of leisure, long a concern of political commentary on the aristocracy. Classical writers, for instance, had contrasted the otium of the Roman governing class to the negotium (literally "business") burdening the plebs. ⁽²³⁾ Later writers justified both leisure and the rentier existence that supported it as a necessary means to two ends: responsibility for public affairs and, in the[112] private sphere, commitment to humane and divine studies. Conversely, nobles who did not take proper advantage of their leisure to pursue virtus and wisdom were chastised as idle wastrels. ⁽²⁴⁾ This sort of criticism--a predictable wedding of intense moralism to studious apoliticism--loomed prominently in the erudite discussions of Barcelona's noble academy. Its members devoted at least two sessions to weighing the merits of acquired versus hereditary nobility. On July 22, 1700, D. Josep de Rius drew heavily on conventional moralistic emblem literature to support his contention that "virtue," "good works," and "merit" were the true sources of nobility. ⁽²⁵⁾ Some thirty years later, his fellow academician, the Baron of Rocafort, also defended the superiority of acquired over inherited nobilitas. Citing the works of Poggio, Tiraqueau, and numerous theologians and moralists, he argued that "true nobility comes not from lineage, but solely from virtue." Rocafort was no up-and-coming gaudint lawyer; rather, he was a prominent member of the established aristocracy. ⁽²⁶⁾ His arguing such a position demonstrates the inroads moralistic assessments of personal merits had made within the burgeoning genre of upper-class apologetics.

Another representative text was the local theologian Francesch Garau's The Wise Man Instructed in Grace (1688). "Everyone is what he is, not what his parents were"; "it is better to make oneself [noble] than to be born noble"; "no lively spirit is content [113] with what is inherited"; "the greatest heroes founded their own lineage"; "let no one be discouraged, as each can 'make' his own nobility"--these were but a few of the maxims illustrated in what was perhaps the most widely read (and optimistic) of early modern Catalan emblem books. ⁽²⁷⁾ Naturally, we should not exaggerate the significance of these passages. Their importance lay, not in their strident if quite routine claims for the superiority of acquired over inherited nobility; rather, such texts provide a useful index of the extent to which many influential contemporaries regarded the acquisition of nobility through the study of liberal arts a legitimate source of aristocratic rank. After all, ideological justification of the union of the traditional nobility and the civic oligarchy rested ultimately upon establishing liberal education as an essential characteristic of all members of the upper class. Distinctions between acquired or inherited virtue played a far lesser role in defining the new, united ruling class of the early modern period than did the binding tie of shared knowledge.

The attitude of the traditional nobility toward formal education greatly preoccupied D. Francesch de Gilabert. His reflections on the problem took the form of The Discourse on the Source of True Nobility (1616), the single most important treatise on the Catalan aristocracy. ⁽²⁸⁾ Unfortunately, little is known about the author, save that his father won noble rank during the reign of Philip II, and that the son had previously served in the Spanish army overseas and as a courtier in Madrid. He was also deeply involved in Catalan urban affairs, having occupied at least once the office of head Councillor of the city of Lleida. His other works included a reply to Antonio de Herrera's commentary on the Aragonese [114] crisis of 1591; a short treatise on agriculture edited in 1626; and four other texts on Catalan society and politics published along with the Discourse in 1616. The literary citations in these treatises reveal a man well-versed in the Latin classics and later Patristic works. They also betray a certain familiarity with the Legists, possibly the product of a legal education. ⁽²⁹⁾

The declared purpose of the Discourse--formally addressed to the Bras Militar and its leading member, the Duke of Cardona--was to warn the Catalan aristocracy of the harmful consequences of its lack of letters. The text opened with the predictable erudite catalogue of answers to the age-old question "what is nobility?" Significantly, the author favored the definition penned by the fifteenth-century jurist Felino Sandeo as the best amid a barrage of responses. "Nobility," according to Felino, "proceeds from three sources: first, lineage and blood; second, virtue and letters; third, a mixture of these two. ⁽³⁰⁾ Gilabert then traced the history of knowledge from its origins in Greek and Persian Antiquity through the Roman and later Scholastic periods. He emphasized the concurrence of all authorities in the belief that knowledge not only ennobles but also confers the power (virtud de mandar) that most distinguishes nobles from commoners. After reviewing various practical applications of knowledge--which included praise for the utility of mechanical arts ⁽³¹⁾--he then discussed individual theoretical disciplines like theology, law, and medicine. He attached special importance to the impact on the aristocracy of the changing character of warfare, and underscored the need to absorb the new forms of knowledge underlying the revolution in military technology.

[115] These specifically included geometry--"necessary to build fortresses, dig mines, and lay trenches"--and other "mechanical arts, in order to create deadly weapons, both offensive and defensive." ⁽³²⁾ The treatise closed with a blanket condemnation of the Catalan nobility's insufficient application to liberal and technical studies. According to Gilabert, while aristocrats wasted their energies in internal rivalries and feuds, upstart commoners supplanted their rightful place at the helm of local society and government.

Several interesting themes emerge from this essay in political and social commentary by a Catalan provincial aristocrat. First, one should remark the uniqueness of this document within the Spanish context. ⁽³³⁾ The typology of the Discourse--a discussion of the nature and functions of the nobility by a nobleman himself--had little counterpart in the rest of the peninsula. Rather, it more closely resembled contemporary French treatises like Francois de la Noue's Political and Military Discourses. ⁽³⁴⁾ This new generation of aristocratic self-assessment demonstrated a realism far removed from the chivalric and courtly literature of the later Middle Ages. ⁽³⁵⁾ The work of Gilabert and others like him also represented a clear break with the abstract, legalistic approach of jurisprudence and moral theology. Finally, its focus on the problems of adjustment faced by the older established nobility brought it much closer to the writings of Castiglione than to those of the early Italian humanists.

[116] The clear note of self-doubt and loss of direction pervading the work conveys the impression of a traditional nobility in crisis. The text's opening pages breathe an atmosphere of instability, with Gilabert railing against the "inconstancy of the world, which treats each of us like a ball--playing with it, now hitting it forward, then back, sending it up or casting it down, propelling it against the wall of care, or puffing it up with the air of prosperity." ⁽³⁶⁾ To be sure, such passages draw to some extent upon traditional topoi bemoaning the vagaries of worldly fortune. Still, they betray a sense of urgency and resolution that leaves little room to doubt the author's belief that his were special times calling for special measures. As a consequence, Gilabert's depiction of the contemporary ruling class was far from encouraging. He portrayed a rural gentry fragmented into warring factions and plagued by internecine disputes, thus paving the way for anarchy and social unrest. Moreover, a challenge from below threatened this traditional squirearchy--that of the letrados, or educated bureaucrats, to whom noble gentlemen must now submit as "subjects." While Gilabert never ceased to affirm the superiority of arms over letters, he nevertheless admitted that unless the older aristocracy successfully reformed itself, nobles ran the risk of losing their power and preeminence. "Learned men and knowledgeable persons exercise dominion and power over those who are not," he lamented. "It is a thing worthy of tears, and hard to believe, how nobles reject such dominion through their ignorance." ⁽³⁷⁾ The only means by which the Catalan nobility might escape the consequences of the rise to power of "the favorite, the letrado, and the Viceroy's scribe" was thus the "study of letters and virtue." ⁽³⁸⁾

[117] The experience of Gilabert symbolized that of the traditional Catalan aristocracy as a whole. In his view, virtus still defined nobility: "antiquity of lineage and knowledge of letters do not in themselves constitute nobility, if they are not joined by virtue." ⁽³⁹⁾ But this elusive quality had to change in order to meet the challenge of modern times--a challenge born of profound transformations in the nature of warfare and the instruments of government. Both military and political leadership constituted traditional reserves of power and patronage slipping rapidly from the hands of a nobility forced to "modernize" in order to survive. While his work referred to tensions between new and old nobility--especially those between robe and sword--we should avoid being sidetracked by the familiar opposition to upstart letrados. Much more significant was Gilabert's pointing directly to the solution at hand--change on the part of the traditional aristocracy which would permit reconquest of its former "power of rulership" through the absorption of scientia. Both nobles and their "virtue" were to be recast to embrace letters as well as arms and lineage. The final product of the transformation would be a unified upper class, freed of internal tensions and strengthened in its efforts to resist monarchical encroachment on its prerogatives. ⁽⁴⁰⁾

Ironically, Gilabert's prescription for the aristocracy's vigorous response to the letrado challenge--a challenge forcefully stated in the juridical and moralistic texts studied earlier in this chapter--paved the way for the emergence of a spirit of commonality between older and newer members of the nobility. According to his and other contemporary texts, the proper relation between "arms and letters" was complementarity, not opposition. "He united Mars and Minerva in himself--thus read a [118] description of Joan Tomás de Rocabertí, Archbishop of Valencia and younger brother of the learned Viscount cited above. ⁽⁴¹⁾ And D. Josep de Aviles, author of a widely read heraldic treatise published in 1725, was also extolled as a noble "known not less for his valor and military prowess on the field of Mars than for his pen's successes in the school of Minerva." ⁽⁴²⁾ The wedding of Mars and Minerva provided a literary analogue to the merger of the civic oligarchy with the traditional nobility. I have already commented upon the institutional expressions of this amalgam. What remains to be examined are the ideological characterizations of their solidarity. The most significant development in the latter sphere was the gradual emergence of a binding ideal of a distinctive high "culture"--a concept that soon moved to the fore of the self-definition and comportment of urban notables.

A remarkable literary genre flourished in late seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Catalonia: the funeral oration for prominent members of the aristocracy. ⁽⁴³⁾ While the same years witnessed the apogee of this type of sermon literature throughout Spain, ⁽⁴⁴⁾ the appearance of the elogios at this juncture owed much to the peculiar biological fortunes of the Catalan titled nobility. During the later decades of the seventeenth century, direct male succession failed in all four of the leading families of the Catalan peer [119] age: the Cardona, Queralt, Montcada, and Rocabertí. These lineages followed the path traced earlier by the noted Requesens house: that is, the absorption of their titles and estates by collateral branches of Castilian origin.

The orations themselves--habitually declaimed and then published by the leading preachers of the city ⁽⁴⁵⁾--followed a set pattern organized around a single theme, usually a verse from the Psalms or the New Testament. Their highly formalized and stereotyped exposition oscillated between systematic theological exegesis and increasingly strained linguistic invenciones, which often included puns and other word-play. A stock repertory of attributes deemed typical of the exemplary aristocrat informed these frequently bizarre exercises in verbal artistry. The evolution of the concept of nobilitas, and the growing success of the formulaic wedding of noble virtue to the twin qualities of education and service to the state, can best be studied in the context of a single lineage. Descriptions of members of the Rocaberti family--heirs to the title of Viscount of Rocaberti, and (after 1599) Counts of Peralada--illustrate the changing public image of the traditional aristocrat.

One of the earliest and most interesting panegyrics of the family was pronounced, not on the occasion of a funeral; rather, it was included in the preface to the Fatal Omens tract published in 1646 by D. Ramon Dalmau de Rocabertí. In his flattering introduction to the treatise, Friar Gabriel Agusti Rius praised the "full and overwhelmingly qualified nobility" of its author, eulogizing him as an exemplar of Ovid's four "notable proofs" of nobilitas: "estates or wealth; antiquity of lineage; personal virtue; and ingenio (genius)." ⁽⁴⁶⁾ Rius went on to note the tested fidelity [120] of the Viscount to the Spanish monarchy, and concluded with fulsome praise of his "virtuous employment" in letters. In this eulogy, one already notes the convergence of common themes of later funeral panegyrics: stock references to aristocratic virtus; emphasis placed on loyalty to the crown; and, most significantly, the close identification between intellectual attainment and membership in the ruling class embodied in the concept of noble ingenio.

Two texts from 1676 drew upon more conventional depictions of the exemplary aristocrat. The funeral oration preached by Francisco Sobrecasas for Ramón Dalmau's brother-in-law, D. Joan de Boixadors i de Rocabertí, scarcely departed from the traditional themes of noble description, military prowess, and other chivalric virtues. A similar emphasis pervaded Josep Dro-mendari's lengthy genealogy, commissioned by the family and published in a lavish folio edition in Genoa ⁽⁴⁷⁾ Both texts elaborated liberally upon the older conception of nobility which prized martial valor and personal fidelity to the monarch. That such themes should have been emphasized at this moment hardly seems surprising, given the widespread "disloyalty" to the Castilian monarch among the lower ranks of the Catalan nobility during the revolt of 1640-1652 and the corresponding exile imposed upon the peerage for its adherence to the Castilian cause. ⁽⁴⁸⁾

Later funeral orations stressed a different conception of nobility, one closer to the terms depicting Ramon Dalmau in 1646. This exemplum received its most refined formulation in the exequies for his grand-nephew and successor, D. Bernat Antoni de Boixadors, fifth Count of Peralada. Friar Josep Mercader preached the sermon in 1755 at the Dominican monastery of St. Catherine's. He divided the text into three parts, corresponding to the deceased's leading realms of accomplishment: "letters, [121] arms, and statecraft." Significantly, Mercader interpreted the Count's precocious enthusiasm for humanistic studies as an obligation imposed by rank. "He knew that the glory of Julius Caesar derived as much from letters as from military triumphs, and that Alexander the Great had become even greater through his studies with Aristotle." ⁽⁴⁹⁾Boixadors' early predilection for literary study found later expression in a multitude of works. The most important of these were his numerous presentations to the local Academy, which ultimately named him its president. ⁽⁵⁰⁾

The "greatness of soul" revealed by youthful absorption in study could not but foster a "noble inclination to serve Prince and homeland"--hence the beginnings of Peralada's lengthy career in military campaigns throughout Europe. However, Mercader took pains to stress that the Count's many services to the crown were not exclusively indebted to mere martial prowess. To the contrary, both his readings in the classics and the "geographical and historical studies he had made of Italy constantly brought to mind famous deeds both ancient and modern." ⁽⁵¹⁾ Classical erudition thus joined physical strength and skill to serve the monarch on the field of battle. Furthermore, this scholarly soldier employed his learning to further the interests of the crown in yet another field, that of statecraft. Like that other warrior-poet David, Boixadors also felt the attraction of political service in the court. Frequent assignments as ambassador to the leading capitals of Europe tested time and again his diplomatic skills and cosmopolitan education. Thus Mercader recounts that Philip V's respect for the "erudition and cultura" of the Count was such that after receiving a cipher from the Republic of Holland, [122] the King remarked that only Peralada could interpret it correctly. ⁽⁵²⁾

Rulers habitually say this sort of thing to keep their followers happy. And one can guess that the troops serving under the learned Count held a rather different opinion of his penchant for quoting Tacitus on the battlefield. Still, we are dealing here not with the reality of court and country. Rather, our concern is with the face aristocrats chose to show to the rest of society, and the willingness of scribes to reproduce this image. In this regard it can hardly be doubted that such a paragon of erudition--to whom (it was said) the great Muratori planned to dedicate his De Moderatione Ingeniorum -- proved a shining exemplar of the noble "great in letters, great in arms, and great in política. " ⁽⁵³⁾ The lavish funeral monument by the sculptor Manuel Tramulles (Illustration 2) also emphasized this "image" of the learned aristocrat. The catafalque itself was divided into four stories. The statues on the bottom tier of the "symbolic cenotaph" represented the four principal objects of study in Barcelona's Academy: History, Moral Philosophy, Eloquence, and Poetry. The figures on the second level symbolized the four countries where Peralada had carried out military and diplomatic missions: Spain, Portugal, France, and Italy. The third stage comprised a temple erected by the twin deities of Honor and Virtue, while the skeletal figure of Death bearing the legend Hinc Raptus ad Astra crowned the top of the bier. ⁽⁵⁴⁾

The inscriptions on the plaques surrounding the base of the tomb also drew heavily upon the vocabulary and imagery of contemporary academic discourse--hence the familiar mixture of crushing erudition with puns and other rhetorical devices; the [124] presence of standard figures like Hercules, Orpheus, Phoebus, and Minerva; and the constant association of "virtue, wealth, merit, and studies." While the relatively uncomplicated prose of Mercader's sermon may have been linked to the extraordinary circumstances of the Count's demise--his death in the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 must have rendered him the envy of Enlightened intellectuals throughout Europe--its continuity with past academic style is nevertheless quite striking. The eulogy and monument constituted the most explicit local statement of the concept of the nobility of letters argued during the early modern era. By the mid-eighteenth century, the association of nobility with cultura provided an exemplar for aristocrats both old and new. For, as Mercader piously noted, even as a child Boixadors had learned the elementary lesson that "a noble without letters was like a ship without oars, or a bird without feathers." ⁽⁵⁵⁾

"Even today there are scholars who feel that working in laboratory experiments hardly suits the decorum of the nobility--as if it were more honorable to study the purely abstract ideas of men than the works of God ... in ... nature." ⁽⁵⁶⁾ Local Jesuits penned this complaint in 1762, hoping to justify adding experiments in physics to their traditional scholastic curriculum. On the one hand, the statement illustrates the efforts made to absorb newer, more empirical forms of knowledge and techniques into the corpus of elite learning. It also bears witness to continued resistance to such innovations--a resistance whose intellectual foundations rested upon a firm distinction between the theoretical [125] sapientia identified with aristocrats, and the more practical and "impure" lore of the artisan. ⁽⁵⁷⁾

The time-worn dichotomy between empirical and theoretical knowledge--the object of growing intellectual debate throughout eighteenth-century Spain ⁽⁵⁸⁾--underlay and was in turn reinforced by existing patterns of social hierarchy. As we have seen, one of the more striking features of this configuration was the way in which humanist and juridical arguments for the "nobility of letters" lent impetus to a novel characterization of the aristocracy. This ideology did much to dignify the status of upwardly mobile urban elites determined to redefine the boundaries of the ruling class. Yet by erecting new foundations for upper-class identity, it also cleared the way for a "reconversion" of the existing aristocracy. Noble urbanity and cultura formed a crucible for the merger of the two strata. The amalgam's final issue was a unified civic ruling class, tightly bonded by a common public persona.

There was of course nothing new in the association of social and political elites with the instruments of learning. Skillful manipulation of literacy and other forms of knowledge had lent powerful support to class dominance in many previous societies. ⁽⁵⁹⁾ Nor was elite monopolization of specific cultural activities limited to the explicitly theocratic states of the Middle Ages. The possession of learning provided an "argument for the superiority of the upper class" as far back as Antiquity. Both Aristotelian [126] and Platonic traditions emphasized the close ties linking empirical knowledge, manual labor, and the lower classes. They similarly associated the nobility with more abstract, speculative thought, and conceived knowledge to be a "disinterested contemplation of conceptual truths" exclusively limited to the upper class. In the eyes of most classical writers and their successors, the hierarchy of labor was in fact a hierarchy of intelligence. Individual forms of economic endeavor arrayed themselves along a spectrum bounded by the twin poles of manual labor/social inferiority, and intellectual contemplation/social superiority. ⁽⁶⁰⁾

The longstanding association of the "upper" class with superior intellect and education nevertheless experienced a significant transformation during the early modern period. For the first time, the identification of nobilitas with distinct patterns of knowledge and behavior became automatic, even necessary. Simply put, at the end of the Middle Ages it was still possible-- albeit increasingly less common--to be both noble and illiterate. By the end of the period under study, an illiterate aristocrat was regarded as an intolerable contradiction. Gone were the days of the medieval knight Perceval, whose noble blood had triumphed over a lack of education. ⁽⁶¹⁾ The possession of some measure of "culture" had in the meantime become an essential hallmark of nobility. In the words of the most popular courtesy manual of eighteenth-century Barcelona, "be he a prince, be he the wisest man, be he powerful or rich, if he lacks education, or is uncivil, he will surely be despised. . . . Incivility is low and plebeian, courtesy is always noble." ⁽⁶²⁾

2. Goubert, Ancien Regime, Chapter 7. See also: Hexter, "Education of the Aristocracy"; Stone, Crisis of the Aristocracy, 672-724; Labatut, Noblesses Européenes, 85-101; Bitton, French Nobility, Chapter 2; Sales, "Desaparición"; Wood, Nobility, Chapter 3; and Vale, War and Chivalry.

3. For a revealing sketch of the unlettered rural nobility of 17th-century Poland, see Sienkiewicz' The Deluge. This novel--originally published in 1886--drew heavily upon the fascinating memoirs of  a noble military commander during the Commonwealth Wars (Leach, Memoirs of the Polish Baroque).

4. E.g., the Decameron, fourth day, first story. See also Huizinga, Waning of the Middle Ages, chapters 3-4; and Duby, Chivalrous Society, 86.

5. Skinner, Foundations of Modern Political Thought, I, Chapters 2, 4, 8, and 9.

6. Garin, Prosatori Latini, 141-168; Baron, Crisis, 420-423; Poggio, Opera, 64-83; Holmes, Florentine Enlightenment, 148, and his "Emergence of Urban Ideology," 126-128.

7. Poggio, Opera, 79 and 85.

8. Salutati, De Nobilitate Legum et Medicinae, 8. See also: Garin, Disfruta delle Arti, and his  L'Educazione in Europa, 145-148; Thorndike, "Medicine vs. Law"; and Ullman, Humanism of Coluccio Salutati, 31-32.

9. Delia Casa, Galateo, 21 (R. S. Pine-Coffin's translation). Pages 101-131 of this edition discuss courtesy books in England, as does Woodward, Studies in Education, 268-382. For this text's diffusion in the rest of Europe, see: Retali, Galateo, and Richter, Giovanni Della Casa in Francia. A Castilian translation by Domingo de Becerra was published in Venice in 1585.

10. Muzio, Gentilhuomo. Also see Clements, Picta Poesis, Chapter 7.

11. Berengo, Nobili e Mercanti, 254.

12. Botero, "Treatise of the Greatness of Cities," in his The Reason of State, 251; Bartoli,  L'Uomo di Lettere. Both works were translated into Castilian and published in Barcelona, respectively in 1603 and 1744. Bartoli's work in particular was popular with local readers, as evidenced by its frequent appearance in notarial inventories.

13. Tiraqueau, Commentarii de Nobilitate. See also Brejon, André Tiraqueau.

14. Loyseau, Traité des Ordres et Simples Dignitez, IV, 1. My citation is from Peter Evans'  translation of Mousnier, Social Hierarchies, 84, which reproduces Loyseau's arguments in detail.

15. Fayard, Membres du Conseil de Castile, 181; Mendo, De Iure Academico. Chapter 6 of  Fayard's study, entitled "Nobles et Letrados" provides a succinct review of the literature in Castilian.

16. Maravall, Poder, Honor y Elites, 41-61; Arriaza, "Nobility in Renaissance Castile."

17. Cited in Palacio, "Contribución," 307. See also Fayard, Membres du Conseil de Castile, 181-185.

18. Stone, Crisis of the Aristocracy, 21; Diefendorf, Paris City Councillors, 168; Jouanna, Ordre Social, I-II.

19. Boscán, Cuatro Libros del Cortesano. See also Morreale, Castiglione y Boscán. While Boscà and  other early modern Catalan writers followed Castiglione in according considerable importance to inherited nobilitas,  they rarely seem to have associated nobility with race. This not only contrasts with Arlette Jouanna's findings for sixteenth-century France, but also raises questions about the stereotype of early modern Iberian obsession with  limpieza, or "racial purity." I have been struck by the virtual absence of references to conversos (converted Jews) in local documents from this period. For further discussion of this anomaly, see Amelang, "Honored Citizens,"  271-273.

20. Fontanella, Sacri Regii Senatus, section 29; Bosch, Títols, 29-32, 65-68, and 348-365; Vilaplana, Tractatus, 221-225 and 256-268.

21. Magarola's El Abogado Perfecto of 1789, for example, borrowed arguments from Xenophon, Plutarch, Cicero, and Seneca to support his characterization of jurisprudence as a liberal, and thus "noble art."

22. Pujades, Dietari, II, 219; Amargós, Relació.

23. Godelier, "Work and Its Representations," 172. Especially influential in this regard was Aristotle's Politics, VII-VIII.

24. One of the most interesting texts to sound this theme was the Vicios de las Tertulias (1785), a free translation  by the cleric Gabriel Quijano of the abbé Zucchino Stafni's Los Specchio del Disinganno (Rome, 1751). See also  Martin Gaite, Usos Amorosos, and Deacon, "Cortejo."

25. A.H.M.B./Ms. B-98, June 10 and July 22, 1700. Rius specifically cited Saavedra Fajardo's Emblemas Políticas,  no. 8. The most famous early modern emblem book, Alciati's Emblemata, also defended the superiority of letters over arms; see nos. 132 and 180 of the Spanish translation (Lyon, 1549). For a brief study of this literary genre in Spain, see Sánchez Pérez, Literatura Emblemática.

26. A. de Armengol i de Aymerich, Libro de los Assumptos que . . . ha Trabajado para la Academia de Buenas Letras, B.C./Ms. 1874, 1 Jan. 1731, 25r. In 1607 the Saragossa academy also railed against noble  idleness: B.N./Ms. 9396, Pítima Contra la Ociosidad. See also Chisick, Limits of Reform, 99 and 153.

27. Garau, Sabio Instruido, "Sumario del Libro."

28. Gilabert, Discurso

29. Elliott, Revolt, 69. A Hierònim Gilabert, utriusque iuris doctor, registered in the Barcelona criminal  court in 1551; however, I have not been able to determine his relation to the author. Gilabert was apparently the  central figure within a small group of humanist intellectuals in Lleida. This circle also included the Aragonese physician  Jerónimo de Mondragón, who in 1598 dedicated his eccentric Censura de la Locura Humana to Gilabert.

30. Gilabert, Discurso, 3v.

31. His passage strongly echoes part 19 of the Barcelona theologian Narcís Antoni Gamós' Microcosmia of 1592.

32. Gilabert, Discurso, l6v.-17r.

33. In the eighteenth century the Catalan aristocrat D. Joan de Sagarriga penned a work entitled Como deve Pintarse  o Describirse el Noble, which has unfortunately been lost; see Cosme Parpal's introduction to Sagarriga's  Dietario de Barcelona, xvii-xx.

34. Huseman, "Francois de la Noue"; Schalk, "Appearance and Reality of Nobility." There are also some intriguing parallels between Gilabert and the Austrian provincial nobleman Wolf Helmhard von Hohberg. For a   suggestive study of the latter's writings, see Brunner, Adeliges Landleben.

35. The best-known Catalan chivalric tracts were Lull's Orde de Cavallería (late thirteenth century) and Ponç de Menaguerra's fifteenth-century Lo Cavaller, both edited by Pere Bohigas in the anthology Tractats de  Cavalleria.

36. Gilabert, Discurso, 1r.-v.

37. Ibid., 8v. and 21r. The first part of this section consciously draws upon Aristotle's Politics, I.

38. Gilabert, Discurso, 22r. Francisco Núñez de Velasco's Diálogos De Contención entre la Milicia y la Ciencia, while not cited by Gilabert, was probably a source for this portion of his treatise.

39. Gilabert, Discurso, 12v.

40. Significantly, Gilabert played a key role in combatting royal policy during the parliamentary session of 1626.  See Pujades, Dietari, IV, 33, and B.U.B./Ms. 1009, 61r.-63v., Discurs sobre lo Servey que lo Rey, N^re Senyor, Demana en Catalunya, per D. Francesch Gilabert.

41. Cited in Torras Bages, En Rocabertí, 17.

42. Avilés, Ciencia Heroyca, I, "Aprobación" of D. José Ventura Güell i Trelles. For the topos of "arms and letters"  in early modern Spanish literature, see: Curtius, European Literature, 178-179; Russell, "Arms vs. Letters"; and Gutiérrez, "Armas, Letras, y Estoicismo." The most famous version of this disputa is found in Don Quijote,  I, Chapters 37-38.

43. Representative examples other than the ones cited below include: Potau, Oración Fúnebre; Miracle, Llanto de los Hombres; and Rocabertí, Sermón Fúnebre.

44. Herrero Salgado, Aportación Bibliográfica, 739-741. For sermon literature in early seventeenth-century Spain, see Smith, Preaching.

45. One Pere Dimas Potau apparently led the pack of local orators, rushing into print over a dozen such sermons  from the 1680's to 1710. Noble funeral laments drew heavily from imagery used in other threnodies, especially those of monarchs like the unfortunate Charles II, whose eulogies started well before his death in 1700.

46. Rocaberti, Presagios Fatales, A3

47. Sobrecasas, Oración Fúnebre; Dromendari, Arbol Genealógico

48. Vidal Pía, Guerra dels Segadors

49. Mercader, Oración Fúnebre, 10-11.

50. Miret Sans, "Dos Siglos de Vida Académica," 31; Carreras Bulbena, "Estudis Biogràfichs," 187-191; Memorias . . . R. Academia de Buenas Letras de Barcelona, I, 1756, "Resumen Histórico." At one point Boixadors' literary curiosity got him into trouble with the Inquisition, which suspected him of owning forbidden books: A.H.N./ Inquisición, leg. 3724 (30), undated.

51. Mercader, Oración Fúnebre, n and 15.

52. Ibid., 13 and 20.

53. Ibid., 20-21. There is no mention of Boixadors in the edition I have consulted (Muratori, Opere, I, 294-325).

54. The iconographic program of this engraving was published along with the inscriptions as a preface to Mercader's sermon. For aristocratic funeral monuments in the rest of Spain, see Lleó, Nueva Roma, 95-149; and Gallego, Visión, 139-150.

55. Mercader, Oración Fúnebre, 10. Apparently the Count's moral virtues were not inherited by his son,  described by a hardened reprobate like Casanova as "a great debauchee and lover of bad company, an enemy of religion, morality, and law"; Casanova, Memoirs, VI, 209. Another noble writer, the Baron of Maldà, also  referred in disgusted tones to the young Count's vida putesca, which led eventually to the latter's imprisonment (Galí, Maldà, 256).

56. Galí, Maldà, 153.

57. Rossi, Philosophy, Chapter 1. The principal aim of this stimulating work is to study those early modern writers whose positive reassessment of manual labor contributed to the rise of experimental science and applied technology. My interest is in the other side of the coin--the older world-view, quite healthy in this period,  perhaps even strengthened by the partial incorporation within elite scientia of experimental methods. For a revised chronology of the latter, see Kuhn, "Mathematical Vs. Experimental Traditions."

58. See for example Feijoo's famous essay "Causas del Atraso que se Padece en España en Orden a la Ciencias Naturales" and other texts in García Camarero, Polémica de la Ciencia Española.

59. Goody and I. Watt, "The Consequences of Literacy," in Goody, Literacy in Traditional Societies, 27-68.

60. Bauman, "Marxism and the Contemporary Theory of Culture"; Mondolfo, "Greek Attitude To Manual Labour," and "Trabajo Manual y Trabajo Intelectual Desde la Antigüedad Hasta El Renacimiento," in his Orígenes, 121-144; Rossi, Philosophy, 55.

61. Duby, Chivalrous Society, 107.

62. Reglas de Buena Crianza Civil y Christiana, 5. I owe this reference to Gary McDonogh, whose translation  I have used.