Hence Castiglione in his 'Cortegiano' gives preference to the one-voiced song ('recitar alla lira') and it was quite natural that we find in the Petrucci collection frottole originally composed for four voices now appearing as soprano solos with lute accompaniment, the latter being arranged from the other three voices."[26] [Footnote 26: This passage is not a literal quotation, but partly a paraphrase and partly a condensation of the text of Ambros.] Castiglione (1478-1529) wrote somewhat later than the period of Poliziano.

The "Cortegiano" dates from 1514, though it was not published till a few years later, and the frottola was at the zenith of its excellence in the time of Bernado Tromboncino, who belongs to the latter half of the fifteenth century.

But the frottola was well established before the date of Poliziano's "Orfeo," for minor Italian composers had poured forth a mass of small lyrics for which they found their models in the polyphonic secular songs of Antoine de Busnois (1440-1482) and others of the Netherlands school, especially such writers as Loyset Compere, of St.Quentin, who died in 1518.

Two of his frottole appear in the Petrucci collection, showing that he was acquainted with this Italian form, and that his productions in it were known and admired in Italy.

His frottole are distinguished by uncommon grace and gaiety, for the frottola was generally rather passionate and melancholy, and full of what Castiglione called "flebile dolcezza." In view, then, of the state of part song composition in Italy at the time when Poliziano's "Orfeo" was written we are safe in assuming that its two choral numbers were set to music of the frottola type.