Download or read book The Renaissance of Marriage in Fifteenth-Century Italy written by Anthony F. D’Elia and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Weddings in 15th-century Italian courts were grand, sumptuous affairs, often requiring guests to listen to lengthy orations given in Latin. D'Elia shows how Italian humanists used these orations to support claims of legitimacy and assertions of superiority among families jockeying for power, as well as to advocate for marriage and sexual pleasure.