Note [310] page 157. They seem to have been playing primero (the modern primiera), a game much in vogue at this time.

Note [311] page 158. Loreto is a small hill town near Ancona, and is celebrated for its pilgrimage shrine of the Sacred House (Santa Casa), which was reputed to have been the veritable dwelling of the Virgin, miraculously transported by angels from Nazareth, and set down in Italy in 1294. In 1511 and again in 1524 Castiglione wrote to his mother that he was preparing to go to Our Lady of Loreto in fulfilment of a vow. The name was said to be derived from that of the widow upon whose land the house was deposited by the angels.

Note [312] page 158. Acquapendente is the name of a small town sixty-seven miles north-west of Rome.

Note [313] page 159. Monsignor of San Pietro ad Vincula was the title of Cardinal Galeatto della Rovere; see note [189].

Note [314] page 159. Monsignor of Aragon was the title of Cardinal Ludovico of Aragon, (born 1474), a natural son of Ferdinand I of Naples, and a half-brother of Alfonso II (see note [31]) and Federico III of Naples (see note 401). He was not elevated to the purple until 1519; Castiglione’s mention of him as a cardinal in dialogues supposed to take place twelve years earlier, doubtless arose from a natural confusion between the time when and the time of which they were written.

Note [315] page 159. ‘The Banchi’ (Banks) was the name of a street in Rome well known in the 15th and 16th centuries. Containing the offices of the papal Curia and magistrates, it became a preferred neighbourhood, and was enriched with fine buildings, among which was the counting-house of Julius II’s finance minister, Agostino Chigi, the greatest banker of his day.

Note [316] page 159. ‘The Chancery’ (Cancelleria) was a palace designed about 1500 by Bramante for Cardinal Riario, but at this time used for public offices and as the residence of Cardinal Galeotto della Rovere, who had enlarged and embellished the building. It was not far from the Banks.

Note [317] page 159. San Celso was the name of a street and church near the Banks. The saint (Celsus) whose memory is thus perpetuated was born at what is now Cimiez, near Nice, suffered martyrdom at Rome under Nero, and was finally put to death (together with his master, St. Nazarius) at Milan in the year 69.

Note [318] page 160. Cesare Beccadello is regarded by Cian as possibly identical with a certain Bolognese, who was the son of Domenico Maria Beccadello, married Landomia Fasanini, and was living at the papal court as late as 1559. The Spanish annotator Fabié suggests that he was the father (1502) of the author Ludovico Beccadello, who was a follower of Bembo and wrote biographies of Petrarch and others.

Note [319] page 161. These are characters occurring in the third, sixth and ninth tales of the Eighth Day, and in the fifth tale of the Ninth Day.