Historical reality in Renaissance military memoirs is almost always tangible. Whereas the cornerstone of late-modern historiography is abstractions such as ‘Protestant ethics gave rise to Capitalism’, the facts, actors and forces that make up the reality of Renaissance military memoirs are almost always things one could see and touch. This reflects the general tendencies of Renaissance historiography, which saw history largely in tangible terms, and had only limited awareness of the abstract side of history. It also reflects the noble worldview in general, which tended to privelege tangible actions and persons over abstractions.

An excellent analysis of how Renaissance noblemen privileged tangible actions over both abstractions and inner feelings is contained in Kristen Neuschel's research on how sixteenth-century French noblemen experienced power. She argues that these noblemen lacked an interior space where private emotional life could occur; that emotions like anger were for them objective states manifested in actions rather than inner feelings; and that their reality was therefore made of concrete actions rather than of abstract states-of-being.

Neuschel then discusses at much greater length the reality of power, and argues that ‘the nobles’ experience of power privileged lived moments of action over abstract analysis'. Power was not an abstract factor or process, but concrete events and actions – hence the enormous importance of gestures and ceremonies.