Il Galateo

Galateo: The Rules of Polite Behavior (Il Galateo, overo de' costumi) by Florentine Giovanni Della Casa (1503–56) was published in Venice in 1558. A guide to what one should do and avoid in ordinary social life, this courtesy book of the Renaissance explores subjects such as dress, table manners, and conversation. It became so popular that the title, which refers to the name of one of the author’s distinguished friends, entered into the Italian language as a general term for social etiquette.

Della Casa did not live to see his manuscript’s widespread and lasting success, which arrived shortly after its publication. It was translated into French (1562), English (1576), Latin (1580), Spanish (1585), and German (1587), and has been read and studied in every generation. Della Casa's work set the foundation for modern etiquette writers and authorities on manners, such as “Miss Manners” Judith Martin, Amy Vanderbilt, and Emily Post.

In the twentieth century, scholars usually situated Galateo among the courtesy books and conduct manuals that were very popular during the Renaissance. In addition to Castiglione’s celebrated Courtier, other important Italian treatises and dialogues include Alessandro Piccolomini’s Moral institutione (1560), Luigi Cornaro’s Treatise on the Sober Life (1558-1565), and Stefano Guazzo’s Art of Civil Conversation (1579).

In recent years, attention has turned to the humor and dramatic flair of Della Casa’s book. It has been argued that the style sheds light on Shakespeare’s comedies. When it first appeared in English translation by Robert Peterson in 1575, it would have been available in book stalls in Shakespeare's London. Stephen Greenblatt, author of Will in the World, writes, "To understand the culture out of which Shakespeare is writing, it helps to read Renaissance courtesy manuals like Baldassare Castiglione’s famous Book of the Courtier (1528) or, still better, Giovanni della Casa’s Galateo or, The Rules of Polite Behavior (1558, available in a delightful new translation by M.F. Rusnak). It is fine for gentlemen and ladies to make jokes, della Casa writes, for we all like people who are funny, and a genuine witticism produces “joy, laughter, and a kind of astonishment.” But mockery has its risks. It is perilously easy to cross a social and moral line of no return."

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