Editing Courtesy (section)

==History==
The apex of European courtly culture was reached in the [[Late Middle Ages]] and the [[Baroque period]] (i.e. roughly the four centuries spanning 1300–1700). 
The oldest courtesy books date to the 13th century, but they become an influential genre in the 16th, with the most influential of them being ''[[The Book of the Courtier|Il Cortegiano]]'' (1508), which not only covered basic [[etiquette]] and [[decorum]] but also provided models of sophisticated [[conversation]] and [[intellectual]] skill.<ref>{{citation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rQINrHtwNU0C |title=The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English |year=2006|editor-first=Dominic |editor-last=Head |chapter=courtesy book| page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=rQINrHtwNU0C&pg=PA249 249]}}</ref>

The royal courts of Europe persisted well into the 18th century (and to some limited extent to the present day), but in the 18th century, the  notion of ''courtesy'' was replaced by that of ''[[galant|gallantry]]'', referring to an ideal emphasizing the display of affected sensitivity in direct contrast with the ideals of self-denial and dignified seriousness that were the Baroque norm. During the late medieval and early modern period, the bourgeois class tended to emulate the courtly etiquette of their betters. This changed in the 19th century, after the end of the [[Napoleonic Wars]], with the emergence of a [[middle class]] with its own set of [[bourgeois]] etiquette, which in turn was mocked in the classist theory of [[Marxism]] as ''[[petite bourgeoisie]]''.

The analogue concept in the court culture of [[medieval India]] was known by the [[Sanskrit]] term {{transliteration|sa|dakṣiṇya}}, literally meaning "right-handedness", but as in English ''dexterity'' having a figurative meaning of "apt, clever, appropriate", glossed as  "[[kindness]] and consideration expressed in a [[sophistication|sophisticated]] and [[elegance|elegant]] way".<ref>{{citation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9BKW65Yt65wC |title=Courtly Culture and Political Life in Early Medieval India |first=Daud |last=Ali |chapter=The spirit of courtesy|year=2004 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=9BKW65Yt65wC&pg=PA135 135]| isbn=9780521816274 }}</ref>