latristereina: Isabel owned, in manuscript and in print, in Castilian and in Latin, nearly four hund

latristereina:

Isabel owned, in manuscript and in print, in Castilian and in Latin, nearly four hundred volumes; many of them were additions made during her reign to the royal library she had first encountered in Segovia. As she knew from its various guides for princes, and as Talavera had reminded her, good rulers should love reading and books. Most of the royal library was as expected. There were the traditional treatises on the education of the prince, some in manuscript possibly inherited, others recently printed. There were also numerous religious works, including Bibles, books of hours, psalters, commentaries, and the philosophy adjudged Christian of Aristotle, Seneca, and Boethius. Even so, the books she reportedly most enjoyed were chivalric romances. Those she owned were among the earliest of published works and included The Prison of Love, a courtly romance appearing in 1492 (and quickly going through twenty Spanish editions) and Tirant lo Blanc (1490), the adventures in Africa and Asia Minor of a knight steeped in fortitude and the sexual forbearance of courtly love. Isabel possessed as well several compilations of the prophecies of Merlin. Her serious opinion may have coincided with the informed one of the day, that “it is said the Devil was Merlin’s father and I would not advise anyone to waste time in such reading.“ Still, by classifying his prophecies as fables, she could read collections like the Baladro de Merlin with clear conscience; and certainly she did not dismiss one prophecy found there, that of a lion-like ruler who would be a Christian champion. Far places and distant times interested her; she owned Sir John Mandeville’s book of his travels, generally recognized as mixing fact and fable. Her library reflects something else. Isabel, if determinedly decorous, was earthy, not of delicate sensibility. Two of her favored courtiers, both priests, Alonso de Burgos and Iñigo de Mendoza, were renowned for being ribald. And some of her books were erotic and reflected the late medieval delight in playful obscenity; such were Boccaccio’s Decameron, the tales of the archpriest of Hita, and a purported biography of Aesop illustrated with “scabrous engravings”.

- Peggy K. Liss, Isabel the Queen: Life and Times

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