The signed manuscript of "The Book of the Courtier"

The work by Castiglione published in 1528, is one of the first great modern European books and is well-known throughout the continent, contributing perhaps more than any other work to give form to courtly society, until the French Revolution. Its immense success is attested to by the amount of translations, notations, imitations and alterations it has received. The Book of the Courtier is a moral treatise, which aims to educate a cultured and conscious ruling class that it can correct the arbitrariness of principles.