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virtu
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From: The Oxford Dictionary of Art
Date: 20040101
Author:IAN CHILVERS
virtu (or vertu ).
‘A love of or taste for works of art or curios; a knowledge of or interest in the fine arts; the fine arts as a subject of study or interest’ ( OED ). The word, deriving from the Latin virtus (‘excellence’) via the Italian virtù , became common in England in the 18th century ( Horace Walpole in a letter of 1746 refers to ‘my books, my virtu and my other follies and amusements’). It now hardly survives apart from the term ‘object of virtu’ (or ‘object de vertu’), meaning a curio, which is still ...Read the rest of this article with a Free Trial at HighBeam Research.
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