Leonello d'Este, Marquis of Ferrara, 1441-50

At the beginning of his serial dialogue De politia litteraria, or On Literary Elegance, Angelo Decembrio remarks that his models are the Attic Nights of Aulus Gellius and Quintilian’s Education of an Orator, but it is hard to see why he should think this. His matter is more varied and the form from which he sets out, at least, is the type of humanist dialogue derived from Cicero’s De oratore. The book is set up as a series of conversations in the circle of …