Virtù

{{lang|it|Virtù}}, an Italian word meaning "virtue" or "power",{{cite web|url=https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/virt%C3%B9|title=Virtù - Wiktionary}} is derived from the Latin {{lang|la|virtus}} (lit. "manliness" but for a sense of 'man' closer to 'gentleman' than 'masculine' or 'male'). It describes the qualities desirable for a man, as opposed to {{lang|it|vizio}} (vice). In the Italian language, the term {{lang|it|virtù}} is historically related to the Greek concept of {{transliteration|grc|aretḗ}}, the Latin {{lang|la|virtus}}, and medieval Catholic virtues, e.g. the seven virtues. Thus, Machiavelli's use of the term is linked to the concept of virtue ethics.

Aristotle had early raised the question "whether we ought to regard the virtue of a good man and that of a sound citizen as the same virtue";{{cite book|author=Aristotle|title=Politics|at=III.4 (1276b16)}} Thomas Aquinas stressed that sometimes "someone is a good citizen who has not the quality... [of] a good man".{{cite book|last=Ullmann|first=Walter|title=A History of Political Thought: The Middle Ages|year=1965|page=176}}

Machiavelli suggests a different set of virtues than Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas, apparently with less focus on beneficence and concord, and with more focus on courage. According to Machiavelli, {{lang|it|virtù}} includes pride, bravery, skill, forcefulness, and an ability to harness ruthlessness when necessary.{{r|Mansfield}}

Florentine republicans at the turn of {{CE|the 16th century}} like Francesco Guicciardini rediscovered the classical concept of the virtue of the active citizen, and looked to it for an answer to the problems of preserving their city-state's independence.{{cite book|last=Hexter|first=J. H.|title=On Historians|year=1979|pages=276–79}}

Machiavelli extended the study of classical virtue to include skill, valor, and leadership, and to encompass the individual prince or war-leader as well.{{cite book|last=Donnelly|first=Jack|title=Realism and International Relations|year=2000|pages=175–77}}

{{lang|it|Virtù}}, for Machiavelli, was not equivalent to moral virtue, but was instead linked to the ability for a prince to win and maitain his state, even at the expense of ethical conduct.{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GF6X2ow__MgC&dq=virt%C3%B9%20in%20a%20prince.%20Hitherto%2C%20as%20we%20have%20seen%2C%20it%20had%20generally%20been%20assumed%20that%20the%20possession%20of%20virt%C3%B9%20could%20be%20equated%20with%20the%20possession%20of%20all%20the%20major%20virtues.%20With%20Machiavelli%2C%20by%20contrast%2C%20the%20concept%20of%20virt%C3%B9%20is%20simply%20.&pg=PA138 | title=The Foundations of Modern Political Thought: Volume 1, the Renaissance | isbn=978-0-521-29337-2 | last1=Skinner | first1=Quentin | date=30 November 1978 | publisher=Cambridge University Press }}

Both the positive Machiavellian idealisation of the virtues of ancient Roman republicanism, and the negative image of {{lang|it|virtù}} as {{lang|de|realpolitik}} passed into the wider European consciousness over the centuries that followed.{{cite book|editor-last=Pocock|editor-first=J .G. A.|title=The Varieties of British Political Thought, 1500-1800|year=1996|pages=58 and 68}}

A secondary English meaning developed in the 18th century: a curio or art-object – something of value in itself.{{cite book|last=Pound|first=Ezra|author-link=Ezra Pound|title=Ezra Pound and the Visual Arts|editor-first=Harriet|editor-last=Zinnes|year=1980|page=65}} Thus, Horace Walpole could refer to "my books, my virtus and my other follies".{{cite book|editor-last=Osborne|editor-first=Harold|title=The Oxford Companion to Art|year=1992|page=1195}}

Following the establishment of the Royal Academy in 1768, one contemporary considered that "the taste for virtu has become universal; persons of all ranks and degrees set up for connoisseurs".Fugitive Miscellanies (1773), quoted in {{cite book|last=George|first=M. Dorothy|title=Hogarth to Cruikshank|location=London|year=1967|page=121}}

• {{annotated link|Hercules at the crossroads}}
• {{annotated link|Virtuosos}}

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{{Niccolò Machiavelli}}

{{Virtues}}

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Category:Machiavellianism

Category:Niccolò Machiavelli

Category:Virtue

Category:Concepts in political philosophy