These are the kind of things that I wish to have — engraved amethysts, rosaries of black, amber and gold, blue cloth for a camora, black cloth for a mantle, such as shall be without a rival in the world, even if it costs ten ducats a yard; as long as it is of real excellence, never mind! If it is only as good as those which I see other people wear, I had rather be without it!
—seventeen-year-old Marchioness of Mantua, April, 1491. From a letter to Girolamo Zigliolo, about to leave for France. Quoted and translated from the Italian by Evelyn Welch in Shopping in the Renaissance: Consumer Cultures in Italy, 1400—1600, 2005.
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