This book explores how René of Anjou, French prince and exiled king of Naples (1409–80) engaged his Italian network in a programme of cultural politics conducted with an eye towards a return to power in Italy. Built on a series of original interpretations of humanistic and artistic material (chiefly neo-Latin literature and illuminated manuscripts of classical texts), the book is also a case study for a ‘diplomatic approach’ to culture. It recasts this source base as a form of high-level communication for a hyper-literate elite of those who could read the works created by humanist and artistic ... More

This book explores how René of Anjou, French prince and exiled king of Naples (1409–80) engaged his Italian network in a programme of cultural politics conducted with an eye towards a return to power in Italy. Built on a series of original interpretations of humanistic and artistic material (chiefly neo-Latin literature and illuminated manuscripts of classical texts), the book is also a case study for a ‘diplomatic approach’ to culture. It recasts this source base as a form of high-level communication for a hyper-literate elite of those who could read the works created by humanist and artistic agents for their constituent parts: the potent words or phrases and relevant classical allusions; the channels through which a given work was commissioned or transmitted; and then the nature of the network gathered around a political agenda. Works produced by Janus Pannonius, Giovanni Bellini, and others were crucial to the development and aggrandizement of the network, which was the foundation of a power bloc intended to return René to power in Naples. After René’s ultimate military failure in the 1458–64 Neapolitan war of succession, his network evolved into a faction opposed to the Italian League and the state system it sustained. This book poses a challenge to conventional interpretations of the politics of humanism, and offers a new vision of the Quattrocento: a century in which the Italian Renaissance began its takeover of Europe, but in which Renaissance culture was itself shaped by its European political, social, and diplomatic context.