Аннотация:Women trained in humanism were essentially monstrous: female but eloquent. Such aberrations were routinely shut away in various forms in order to put an end to a disturbing anomaly. However, learned women were also displayed publicly. The Renaissance virtue of magnificentia can help explain this paradox. Magnificence celebrated the superfluous, the rare, the competitive. Thus women's "useless" knowledge was proof of abundant cultural resources; their performances served as displays of valuable curiosa; their presence gave boasting rights to families, states, and ages.
