The first item is excerpted from Francois Rabelais's novel Gargantua (1534). This passage describes the interior and exterior decoration of the Thelemites' Abbey, a palace built and furnished by the novel's hero, Gargantua. Not a religious abbey in the usual sense, its decor represents an ideal to which the wealthiest nobles. of France might aspire Although drawings circulated widely, hardly anyone in Europe had seen living African animals. Thus, Rabelais believes the hippopotamus has a horn. The final two items, reproduced exactly as they were written, are carefully detailed inventories of the Lutheran pastors who served the Saxon town of Prettin in the 1530s and 1550s, respectively The inventories provide good examples of what relatively well-off small town homes would contain Given the detail, note the relative lack of furniture. The appraisers did not forget these items; the furniture simply did not exist Note the difference...