This chapter paints the political and intellectual backdrop of Padua in the 1300s, which sets the stage for Alberti’s education. While Rolandino, Lovato, and Mussato were intellectual giants of a commune, Petrarch, Conversino, and Vergerio were literary giants at a court – that of Francesco Il Vecchio da Carrara, a patron of classical medals, art, and humanist educators and antiquarians. Accordingly, five factors made Padua a center of early humanism: independent university faculty, accession of classical rhetoric, Petrarch and his library, Carrara’s support for educators and antiquarians, and the city’s absorption by Venice, allowing unfettered education to gift Alberti a literary and visual universe.

Discussion of French teaching material; edition with translation of a French model love letter and a passage on seduction from a French conversation manual

This chapter undertakes a corpus linguistic exploration of the royal correspondence material, following the scribal/holograph division of the previous chapter. Using keyword analysis and lexical bundles, the analysis identifies features that firstly, differentiate royal correspondence from its non-royal counterpart; and secondly, differentiate scribal and holograph royal letters. The evidence correlates with the material analysis in Chapter 2, with formulaicity and consistency key elements of scribal letters which may have indexed a more overt and institutionalised royal power. Holograph letters, on the other hand, show a more variable and idiosyncratic make-up, providing a more personal frame to the epistolary interaction with a letter's recipient.