1.
1480s in art
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The decade of the 1480s in art involved some significant events. 1482 – Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, commissions Leonardo da Vinci to make a statue that would have been the largest in the world. A clay cast is made over sixteen years but the bronze is appropriated for use in cannons,1483 – In the Republic of Venice A competition to design a monument to Bartolomeo Colleoni is won by Andrea del Verrocchio with an equestrian design. Giovanni Bellini is named official painter to the Republic,1484 – Albrecht Dürer makes a Self-Portrait at the age of 13 in silverpoint. C. 1485-1489 – Jean Colombe completes the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry for Charles I,1487 Leonardo da Vinci creates his Vitruvian Man drawing. Bernt Notke creates his painted wooden sculpture of Saint George and the Dragon for the Storkyrkan in Stockholm,1488 - Giovanni di Stefano makes floor intarsia showing Hermes Trismegistus, Plato and Marsilio Ficino in the west entrance of Siena Cathedral
2.
15th century in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in the 15th century. See also, 15th century in poetry, 14th century in literature, 16th century in literature,1403 – A guild of stationers is founded in the City of London. As the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers, it continues to be a Livery Company in the 21st century, 1403–08 – The Yongle Encyclopedia is written in China. 1408–11 – An Leabhar Breac is probably compiled by Murchadh Ó Cuindlis at Duniry in Ireland, C.1410 – John, Duke of Berry, commissions the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, illustrated by the Limbourg brothers between c.1412 and 1416. 1424 – The first French royal library is transferred by the English regent of France, John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford,1425 – At about this date the first Guildhall Library is established in the City of London under the will of Richard Whittington. 1434 – Japanese Noh actor and playwright Zeami Motokiyo is exiled to Sado Island by the Shogun,1443 – King Sejong the Great establishes Hangul as the native alphabet of the Korean language. It is first described in the Hunminjeongeum published on 9 October 14461444,15 June – Cosimo de Medici founds the Laurentian Library in Florence,1448 – Pope Nicholas V founds the Vatican Library in Rome. 1450 – Johannes Gutenberg has set up his movable type printing press as an operation in Mainz by this date. 14511 August – A manuscript of Dantes Divine Comedy is sold in London,1452 – Completion of the Malatestiana Library in Cesena, the first European public library, in the sense of belonging to the commune and open to all citizens. 1453 – Pageant of Coriolan staged in the piazza of Milan Cathedral,145523 February – Johannes Gutenberg completes printing of the Gutenberg Bible in Mainz, the first major book printed with movable type in the West, using a textualis blackletter typeface. 5 June – French poet François Villon is implicated in a murder, the Central Library of Astan Quds Razavi in Persia is known to be in existence. 1460 – From about this date, Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, begins to form the Bibliotheca Corviniana,1462,8 November – First known sentence written in the Albanian language, a Formula e pagëzimit by Archbishop Pal Engjëlli. Soon after this he prints the first known Biblia pauperum,1463,5 January – François Villon is reprieved from hanging in Paris but never heard of again. 146831 May – The Byzantine scholar Cardinal Basilios Bessarion donates his library to the Republic of Venice, the printers Johann and Wendelin of Speyer settle in Venice, their first book published here, Ciceros Epistolae ad familiares, appears in 1469. 1470 Johann Heynlin prints the first book in Paris, the Epistolae Gasparini of Gasparinus de Bergamo, nicolas Jensons edition of Eusebius, published in Venice, is the first book to use a roman type based on the principles of typography rather than manuscript. 1473 First book printed in Hungary, Chronica Hungarorum, the Buda Chronicle, First known printing in Poland, Almanach cracoviense ad annum 1474, a wall calendar. 1474 – First book printed in Spain, Obres e trobes en lahors de la Verge María, recuyell of the Historyes of Troye is the first book to be printed in English, by William Caxton in Bruges. Rashis commentary on the Torah is the first dated book to be printed in Hebrew,147630 January – Constantine Lascariss Erotemata is the first book to be printed entirely in Greek
3.
Hanseatic League
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The Hanseatic League was a commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guilds and their market towns. Growing from a few North German towns in the late 1100s and it stretched from the Baltic to the North Sea and inland during the Late Middle Ages and early modern period. Hanse, later spelled as Hansa, was the Middle Low German word for a convoy, the League was created to protect the guilds economic interests and diplomatic privileges in their affiliated cities and countries, as well as along the trade routes the merchants visited. The Hanseatic cities had their own system and furnished their own armies for mutual protection. The hegemony of Lübeck peaked during the 15th century, Lübeck became a base for merchants from Saxony and Westphalia trading eastward and northward. This area was a source of timber, wax, amber, resins, the towns raised their own armies, with each guild required to provide levies when needed. The Hanseatic cities came to the aid of one another, and commercial ships often had to be used to carry soldiers, Visby functioned as the leading centre in the Baltic before the Hansa. Sailing east, Visby merchants established a trading post at Novgorod called Gutagard in 1080, Merchants from northern Germany also stayed in the early period of the Gotlander settlement. Later they established their own trading station in Novgorod, known as Peterhof, in 1229, German merchants at Novgorod were granted certain privileges that made their position more secure. Hansa societies worked to remove restrictions to trade for their members, before the official foundation of the League in 1356, the word Hanse did not occur in the Baltic language. The earliest remaining documentary mention, although without a name, of a specific German commercial federation is from London 1157. That year, the merchants of the Hansa in Cologne convinced Henry II, King of England, to them from all tolls in London. The allied cities gained control over most of the trade, especially the Scania Market. In 1266, Henry III of England granted the Lübeck and Hamburg Hansa a charter for operations in England, much of the drive for this co-operation came from the fragmented nature of existing territorial government, which failed to provide security for trade. Over the next 50 years the Hansa itself emerged with formal agreements for confederation and co-operation covering the west and east trade routes. The principal city and linchpin remained Lübeck, with the first general Diet of the Hansa held there in 1356, other such alliances formed throughout the Holy Roman Empire. Yet the League never became a closely managed formal organisation, over the period, a network of alliances grew to include a flexible roster of 70 to 170 cities. The league succeeded in establishing additional Kontors in Bruges, Bergen and these trading posts became significant enclaves
4.
Privateer
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A privateer was a private person or ship that engaged in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Captured ships were subject to condemnation and sale under prize law, a percentage share usually went to the issuer of the commission. Since robbery under arms was common to trade, all merchant ships were already armed. During war, naval resources were auxiliary to operations on land so privateering was a way of subsidizing state power by mobilizing armed ships, the letter of marque of a privateer would typically limit activity to one particular ship, and specified officers. Typically, the owners or captain would be required to post a performance bond, in the United Kingdom, letters of marque were revoked for various offences. Some crews were treated as harshly as naval crews of the time, some crews were made up of professional merchant seamen, others of pirates, debtors, and convicts. Some privateers ended up becoming pirates, not just in the eyes of their enemies, william Kidd, for instance, began as a legitimate British privateer but was later hanged for piracy. The investors would arm the vessels and recruit large crews, much larger than a merchantman or a vessel would carry. Privateers generally cruised independently, but it was not unknown for them to form squadrons, a number of privateers were part of the English fleet that opposed the Spanish Armada in 1588. Privateers generally avoided encounters with warships, as such encounters would be at best unprofitable, for instance, in 1815 Chasseur encountered HMS St Lawrence, herself a former American privateer, mistaking her for a merchantman until too late, in this instance, however, the privateer prevailed. The United States used mixed squadrons of frigates and privateers in the American Revolutionary War, the practice dated to at least the 13th century but the word itself was coined sometime in the mid-17th century. England, and later the United Kingdom, used privateers to great effect and these privately owned merchant ships, licensed by the crown, could legitimately take vessels that were deemed pirates. The increase in competition for crews on armed merchant vessels and privateers was due, in a large part, because of the chance for a considerable payoff. Whereas a seaman who shipped on a vessel was paid a wage and provided with victuals. This proved to be a far more attractive prospect and privateering flourished as a result, during Queen Elizabeths reign, she encouraged the development of this supplementary navy. Over the course of her rule, she had allowed Anglo-Spanish relations to deteriorate to the point where one could argue that a war with the Spanish was inevitable. By using privateers, if the Spanish were to take offense at the plundering of their ships, some of the most famous privateers that later fought in the Anglo-Spanish War included the Sea Dogs. In the late 16th century, English ships cruised in the Caribbean and off the coast of Spain, at this early stage the idea of a regular navy was not present, so there is little to distinguish the activity of English privateers from regular naval warfare
5.
Peter von Danzig (ship)
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Peter von Danzig was a 15th-century ship of the Hanseatic League. The three-masted ship was the first large vessel in the Baltic Sea with carvel planking, Peter von Danzig was built at the French west coast and originally named Pierre de la Rochelle or Peter van Rosseel. The ship arrived in Danzig in 1462, carrying sea salt from the Atlantic, while she anchored in roadstead, she was damaged by lightning. The ship lay inactive for a while in Danzig harbour, but was seized and changed over to a warship in 1469 after the Hanse had declared war on England. Between August 1471 and 1473 Peter von Danzig operated in the North Sea under captain Paul Beneke, hunting English merchantmen with a letter of marque and securing Hanse convoys. After the Treaty of Utrecht, the ship undertook several trips abroad. Berlin, Frankfurt/Main 1992 ISBN 3-549-05227-8 Media related to Peter von Danzig at Wikimedia Commons
6.
North Sea
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The North Sea is a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean located between Great Britain, Scandinavia, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. An epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the ocean through the English Channel in the south and it is more than 970 kilometres long and 580 kilometres wide, with an area of around 570,000 square kilometres. The North Sea has long been the site of important European shipping lanes as well as a major fishery, the North Sea was the centre of the Vikings rise. Subsequently, the Hanseatic League, the Netherlands, and the British each sought to dominate the North Sea and thus the access to the markets, as Germanys only outlet to the ocean, the North Sea continued to be strategically important through both World Wars. The coast of the North Sea presents a diversity of geological and geographical features, in the north, deep fjords and sheer cliffs mark the Norwegian and Scottish coastlines, whereas in the south it consists primarily of sandy beaches and wide mudflats. Due to the population, heavy industrialization, and intense use of the sea and area surrounding it. In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean, in the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively. In the north it is bordered by the Shetland Islands, and connects with the Norwegian Sea, the North Sea is more than 970 kilometres long and 580 kilometres wide, with an area of 570,000 square kilometres and a volume of 54,000 cubic kilometres. Around the edges of the North Sea are sizeable islands and archipelagos, including Shetland, Orkney, the North Sea receives freshwater from a number of European continental watersheds, as well as the British Isles. A large part of the European drainage basin empties into the North Sea including water from the Baltic Sea, the largest and most important rivers flowing into the North Sea are the Elbe and the Rhine – Meuse watershed. Around 185 million people live in the catchment area of the rivers discharging into the North Sea encompassing some highly industrialized areas, for the most part, the sea lies on the European continental shelf with a mean depth of 90 metres. The only exception is the Norwegian trench, which extends parallel to the Norwegian shoreline from Oslo to a north of Bergen. It is between 20 and 30 kilometres wide and has a depth of 725 metres. The Dogger Bank, a vast moraine, or accumulation of unconsolidated glacial debris and this feature has produced the finest fishing location of the North Sea. The Long Forties and the Broad Fourteens are large areas with uniform depth in fathoms. These great banks and others make the North Sea particularly hazardous to navigate, the Devils Hole lies 200 miles east of Dundee, Scotland. The feature is a series of trenches between 20 and 30 kilometres long,1 and 2 kilometres wide and up to 230 metres deep. Other areas which are less deep are Cleaver Bank, Fisher Bank, the International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the North Sea as follows, On the Southwest
7.
Hans Memling
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Hans Memling was a German painter who moved to Flanders and worked in the tradition of Early Netherlandish painting. He then worked at Bruges, County of Flanders by 1465 and he may have been wounded at the Battle of Nancy, sheltered and cured by the Hospitallers at Bruges and to show his gratitude he refused payment for a picture he had painted for them. Memling did paint for the Hospitallers in 1479 and 1480, in 1477, when he was believed dead, he was under contract to create an altarpiece for the gild-chapel of the booksellers of Bruges. Critical opinion has been unanimous in assigning this altarpiece to Memling. The purchase of his pictures by an agent of the Medici demonstrates that he had a considerable reputation, the oldest allusions to pictures connected to Memling point to his relations with the Burgundian court, which was held in Brussels. The inventories of Margaret of Austria, drawn up in 1524, allude to a triptych of the God of Pity by Rogier van der Weyden and he may have been apprenticed to van der Weyden in Bruges, where he afterwards dwelt. Yet the whole piece was assigned to the former in the Zambeccari collection at Bologna, Memlings painting of the Baptist in the gallery of Munich is the oldest form in which Memlings style is displayed. The subsequent Last Judgment in Gdańsk shows that Memling preserved the tradition of sacred art used earlier by Rogier van der Weyden in the Beaune Altarpiece, Memlings portraits, in particular, were popular in Italy. Memlings portrait style influenced the work of numerous late-15th-century Italian painters and he was popular with Italian customers as shown in the preference given to them by such purchasers as Cardinal Grimani and Cardinal Bembo at Venice, and the heads of the house of Medici at Florence. Memlings reputation was not confined to Italy or Flanders, the Madonna and Saints, the Virgin and Child, and the four attributed portraits in the Uffizi Gallery of Florence, show that his work was widely appreciated in the 16th century. The masterpiece of Memlings later years, the Shrine of St Ursula in the museum of the hospital of Bruges, is supposed to have been ordered and finished in 1480. The delicacy of finish in its figures, the variety of its landscapes and costume. Near the close of Memlings career he was supported by his workshop. The registers of the guild at Bruges give the names of two apprentices who served their time with Memling and paid dues on admission to the guild in 1480 and 1486. Erwin Panofsky in his 1953 Early Netherlandish Painting, says of Memling and his works give the impression of derivativeness. Old St. Johns Hospital, Bruges Christ Giving His Blessing and they are characterized by guls with hooked lines radiating from a central body, and probably came from Anatolia or Armenia. This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh
8.
Triptych
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A triptych is a work of art that is divided into three sections, or three carved panels that are hinged together and can be folded shut or displayed open. It is therefore a type of polyptych, the term for all multi-panel works, the middle panel is typically the largest and it is flanked by two smaller related works, although there are triptychs of equal-sized panels. The form can also be used for pendant jewelry, despite its connection to an art format, the term is sometimes used more generally to connote anything with three parts, particularly if they are integrated into a single unit. The triptych form arises from early Christian art, and was a standard format for altar paintings from the Middle Ages onwards. Its geographical range was from the eastern Byzantine churches to the Celtic churches in the west, renaissance painters such as Hans Memling and Hieronymus Bosch used the form. Triptych forms also allow ease of transport, from the Gothic period onward, both in Europe and elsewhere, altarpieces in churches and cathedrals were often in triptych form. One such cathedral with an altarpiece triptych is Llandaff Cathedral, the Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp, Belgium, contains two examples by Rubens, and Notre Dame de Paris is another example of the use of triptych in architecture. One can also see the form echoed by the structure of many stained glass windows. Although strongly identified as a form, triptychs outside that context have been created, some of the best-known examples being works by Hieronymus Bosch, Max Beckmann. The then highest price paid for an artwork at auction was $142.4 million for a 1969 triptych, Three Studies of Lucian Freud. The record was broken in May 2015 by $179.4 million for Pablo Picassos 1955 painting Les Femmes d’Alger, the format has migrated and been used in other religions, including Islam and Buddhism. Likewise, Tibetan Buddhists have used it in traditional altars, a photographic triptych is a common style used in modern commercial artwork. The photographs are arranged with a plain border between them. The work may consist of images that are variants on a theme
9.
The Last Judgment (Memling)
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The Last Judgment is a triptych attributed to German painter Hans Memling and painted between 1467 and 1471. It is now in the National Museum in Gdańsk in Poland and it was commissioned by Angelo Tani, an agent of the Medici at Bruges, but was captured at sea by Paul Beneke, a privateer from Danzig. It was placed in the Basilica of the Assumption but in the 20th century it was moved to its present location, the central panel shows Jesus sitting in judgment on the world, while St Michael the Archangel is weighing souls and driving the damned towards Hell. On the left panel, the saved are being guided into heaven by St Peter. On the right-hand panel, the damned are being dragged to Hell, National Museum in Gdańsks page on the painting The Last Judgement Triptych
10.
Battle of Nancy
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Renés forces won the battle, and Charles mutilated body was found three days later. Charles was besieging the city of Nancy, capital of Lorraine, by late December René had gathered some 10-12,000 men from Lorraine and the Lower Union. A Swiss army of 10,000 men arrived to help out, René began his advance on Nancy early in January 1477, moving cautiously through the snow-covered landscape until they reached Nancy early on the morning of 5 January. Charles, as usual, deployed his troops to a battle plan despite the short notice he received of the approach of Renés forces. If Charles suffered from a lack of scouting, the same could not be said for the Allied army, despite the driving snow cutting visibility to a few yards, the Allied scouts soon recognized that a frontal assault on the Burgundian position would be disastrous. The small rearguard of 800 handgunners acted as reserve, after a march lasting some two hours, the center force emerged from the wooded slopes slightly to the rear of the Burgundian position and formed up in a wedge formation. The early notes of the Swiss horns sounded thrice, and the Swiss charged downhill into the Burgundian positions, the artillery attempted to retrain on the center force but could not elevate enough to be effective, the single volley discharged killed but two men. Although the right wing Burgundian cavalry held off the Swiss rivals, the Vanguard threw back the Burgundian left wing and put the artillery to flight. It is thought that during the fight Charles said, I struggle against a spider who is everywhere at once, determined to the last, Charles and his staff tried in vain to rally the broken army, but without success. His small band was carried with the flight until eventually surrounded by a party of Swiss, a halberdier quickly swung at the Dukes head and landed a deadly blow directly on his helmet. He was seen to fall but the battle flowed on around him and it was three days until the Dukes disfigured body was finally found and positively identified amongst the detritus of the slaughter. René II built the church of Notre-Dame-de-Bonsecours on the site of the battle, and he furthermore built the basilique of Saint-Nicolas-de-Port to recognize the help of St. Nicholas in the battle. The city adopted the motto of non inultus premor and the device of a thistle as its coat of arms to commemorate the defeat of Charles the Bold. René II also erected a cross to mark the spot where the body of Charles was found, the nearby étang Saint-Jean was drained in the 19th century, freeing the area of what is now Place de la Croix-de-Bourgogne in Nancy. The original cross was moved to the Lorraine museum, the current monument is a design by Victor Prouvé. Pierre de Blarru, canon of Saint-Dié, composed a vast poem called la Nancéide, in 5,044 Latin verses, in La Malgrange, a tower was erected in 1877 to commemorate the attack of René II. Battle of Grandson Battle of Morat Duchy of Burgundy Old Swiss Confederacy Battles of the Old Swiss Confederacy
11.
Gentile Bellini
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Gentile Bellini was an Italian painter of the school of Venice. He came from Venices leading family of painters, and at least in the part of his career was more highly regarded than his younger brother Giovanni Bellini. In 1479 he was sent to Constantinople by the Venetian government when the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II requested an artist, thereafter a number of his subjects were set in the East, and he is one of the founders of the Orientalist tradition in Western painting. His portrait of the Sultan was also copied in paintings and prints and he was christened Gentile after Jacopos master, Gentile da Fabriano. Gentile was taught painting in the workshop of his father, Gentiles earliest signed work is The Blessed Lorenzo Giustinian, one of the oldest surviving oil paintings in Venice. During the 1450s Bellini worked on a commission for the Scuola Grande di San Marco and painted in conjunction with his brother, from 1454 he was also the official portrait artist for the Doges of Venice. Much of Gentile Bellini’s surviving work consists of large paintings for public buildings. The commission was intended to celebrate the relic of the Holy Cross which the confraternity had received in 1369, Venice was, at that time, a very important point in which cultures and trade bordered on the eastern Mediterranean Sea and provided gateways to Asia and Africa. As noted, in his lifetime, Gentile was the most prestigious painter in Venice, therefore, in 1479, he was chosen by the government of Venice to work for Sultan Mehmed II in Constantinople. However, in addition to his work at the Ottoman Court, Gentiles work also responded to other aspects of the East, in September 1479 Gentile was sent by the Venetian Senate to the new Ottoman capital Istanbul as part of the peace settlement between Venice and the Turks. His role was not only as a painter in an exotic locale. This was important to Mehmed II, as he was interested in the art and culture of Italy. He finally reached his goal with Gentile, who is believed to have painted the portrait of Mehmed II now in the National Gallery, London. It has been noticed that the portrait is one of the figures in a painting by Marco Palmezzano. So the dating and authorship of the portrait by Bellini have been placed in question, subsequently, an Oriental flavour appears in several of his paintings, including the portrait of a Turkish artist and St. Mark Preaching at Alexandria. The last was completed by his brother, Giovanni Bellini, according to Carlo Ridolfi in his 1648 history of the Venetian artists, Bellini made a painting of the head of John the Baptist on a charger, the saint being revered by the Turks as a prophet. Gentile, fearful at such barbarities, immediately tried in every way to be released from his contract in one day he himself should be the victim of such a joke. This anecdote is likely apocryphal, as a story had been told by Seneca of Parrhasius
12.
Venice
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Venice is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is situated across a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and these are located in the shallow Venetian Lagoon, an enclosed bay that lies between the mouths of the Po and the Piave Rivers. Parts of Venice are renowned for the beauty of their settings, their architecture, the lagoon and a part of the city are listed as a World Heritage Site. In 2014,264,579 people resided in Comune di Venezia, together with Padua and Treviso, the city is included in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, with a total population of 2.6 million. PATREVE is a metropolitan area without any degree of autonomy. The name is derived from the ancient Veneti people who inhabited the region by the 10th century BC, the city was historically the capital of the Republic of Venice. Venice has been known as the La Dominante, Serenissima, Queen of the Adriatic, City of Water, City of Masks, City of Bridges, The Floating City, and City of Canals. The City State of Venice is considered to have been the first real international financial center which gradually emerged from the 9th century to its peak in the 14th century and this made Venice a wealthy city throughout most of its history. It is also known for its several important artistic movements, especially the Renaissance period, Venice has played an important role in the history of symphonic and operatic music, and it is the birthplace of Antonio Vivaldi. Venice has been ranked the most beautiful city in the world as of 2016, the name Venetia, however, derives from the Roman name for the people known as the Veneti, and called by the Greeks Eneti. The meaning of the word is uncertain, although there are other Indo-European tribes with similar-sounding names, such as the Celtic Veneti, Baltic Veneti, and the Slavic Wends. Linguists suggest that the name is based on an Indo-European root *wen, so that *wenetoi would mean beloved, lovable, a connection with the Latin word venetus, meaning the color sea-blue, is also possible. The alternative obsolete form is Vinegia, some late Roman sources reveal the existence of fishermen on the islands in the original marshy lagoons. They were referred to as incolae lacunae, the traditional founding is identified with the dedication of the first church, that of San Giacomo on the islet of Rialto — said to have taken place at the stroke of noon on 25 March 421. Beginning as early as AD166 to 168, the Quadi and Marcomanni destroyed the center in the area. The Roman defences were again overthrown in the early 5th century by the Visigoths and, some 50 years later, New ports were built, including those at Malamocco and Torcello in the Venetian lagoon. The tribuni maiores, the earliest central standing governing committee of the islands in the Lagoon, the traditional first doge of Venice, Paolo Lucio Anafesto, was actually Exarch Paul, and his successor, Marcello Tegalliano, was Pauls magister militum. In 726 the soldiers and citizens of the Exarchate rose in a rebellion over the controversy at the urging of Pope Gregory II
13.
Ottoman Empire
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After 1354, the Ottomans crossed into Europe, and with the conquest of the Balkans the Ottoman Beylik was transformed into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the 1453 conquest of Constantinople by Mehmed the Conqueror, at the beginning of the 17th century the empire contained 32 provinces and numerous vassal states. Some of these were later absorbed into the Ottoman Empire, while others were granted various types of autonomy during the course of centuries. With Constantinople as its capital and control of lands around the Mediterranean basin, while the empire was once thought to have entered a period of decline following the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, this view is no longer supported by the majority of academic historians. The empire continued to maintain a flexible and strong economy, society, however, during a long period of peace from 1740 to 1768, the Ottoman military system fell behind that of their European rivals, the Habsburg and Russian Empires. While the Empire was able to hold its own during the conflict, it was struggling with internal dissent. Starting before World War I, but growing increasingly common and violent during it, major atrocities were committed by the Ottoman government against the Armenians, Assyrians and Pontic Greeks. The word Ottoman is an anglicisation of the name of Osman I. Osmans name in turn was the Turkish form of the Arabic name ʿUthmān, in Ottoman Turkish, the empire was referred to as Devlet-i ʿAlīye-yi ʿOsmānīye, or alternatively ʿOsmānlı Devleti. In Modern Turkish, it is known as Osmanlı İmparatorluğu or Osmanlı Devleti, the Turkish word for Ottoman originally referred to the tribal followers of Osman in the fourteenth century, and subsequently came to be used to refer to the empires military-administrative elite. In contrast, the term Turk was used to refer to the Anatolian peasant and tribal population, the term Rūmī was also used to refer to Turkish-speakers by the other Muslim peoples of the empire and beyond. In Western Europe, the two names Ottoman Empire and Turkey were often used interchangeably, with Turkey being increasingly favored both in formal and informal situations and this dichotomy was officially ended in 1920–23, when the newly established Ankara-based Turkish government chose Turkey as the sole official name. Most scholarly historians avoid the terms Turkey, Turks, and Turkish when referring to the Ottomans, as the power of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum declined in the 13th century, Anatolia was divided into a patchwork of independent Turkish principalities known as the Anatolian Beyliks. One of these beyliks, in the region of Bithynia on the frontier of the Byzantine Empire, was led by the Turkish tribal leader Osman, osmans early followers consisted both of Turkish tribal groups and Byzantine renegades, many but not all converts to Islam. Osman extended the control of his principality by conquering Byzantine towns along the Sakarya River and it is not well understood how the early Ottomans came to dominate their neighbours, due to the scarcity of the sources which survive from this period. One school of thought which was popular during the twentieth century argued that the Ottomans achieved success by rallying religious warriors to fight for them in the name of Islam, in the century after the death of Osman I, Ottoman rule began to extend over Anatolia and the Balkans. Osmans son, Orhan, captured the northwestern Anatolian city of Bursa in 1326 and this conquest meant the loss of Byzantine control over northwestern Anatolia. The important city of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387, the Ottoman victory at Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe
14.
Constantinople
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Constantinople was the capital city of the Roman/Byzantine Empire, and also of the brief Latin, and the later Ottoman empires. It was reinaugurated in 324 AD from ancient Byzantium as the new capital of the Roman Empire by Emperor Constantine the Great, after whom it was named, Constantinople was famed for its massive and complex defences. The first wall of the city was erected by Constantine I, Constantinople never truly recovered from the devastation of the Fourth Crusade and the decades of misrule by the Latins. The origins of the name of Byzantion, more known by the later Latin Byzantium, are not entirely clear. The founding myth of the city has it told that the settlement was named after the leader of the Megarian colonists, Byzas. The later Byzantines of Constantinople themselves would maintain that the city was named in honour of two men, Byzas and Antes, though this was likely just a play on the word Byzantion. During this time, the city was also called Second Rome, Eastern Rome, and Roma Constantinopolitana. As the city became the remaining capital of the Roman Empire after the fall of the West, and its wealth, population, and influence grew. In the language of other peoples, Constantinople was referred to just as reverently, the medieval Vikings, who had contacts with the empire through their expansion in eastern Europe used the Old Norse name Miklagarðr, and later Miklagard and Miklagarth. In Arabic, the city was sometimes called Rūmiyyat al-kubra and in Persian as Takht-e Rum, in East and South Slavic languages, including in medieval Russia, Constantinople was referred to as Tsargrad or Carigrad, City of the Caesar, from the Slavonic words tsar and grad. This was presumably a calque on a Greek phrase such as Βασιλέως Πόλις, the modern Turkish name for the city, İstanbul, derives from the Greek phrase eis tin polin, meaning into the city or to the city. In 1928, the Turkish alphabet was changed from Arabic script to Latin script, in time the city came to be known as Istanbul and its variations in most world languages. In Greece today, the city is still called Konstantinoúpolis/Konstantinoúpoli or simply just the City, apart from this, little is known about this initial settlement, except that it was abandoned by the time the Megarian colonists settled the site anew. A farsighted treaty with the emergent power of Rome in c.150 BC which stipulated tribute in exchange for independent status allowed it to enter Roman rule unscathed. The site lay astride the land route from Europe to Asia and the seaway from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, and had in the Golden Horn an excellent and spacious harbour. He would later rebuild Byzantium towards the end of his reign, in which it would be briefly renamed Augusta Antonina, fortifying it with a new city wall in his name, Constantine had altogether more colourful plans. Rome was too far from the frontiers, and hence from the armies and the imperial courts, yet it had been the capital of the state for over a thousand years, and it might have seemed unthinkable to suggest that the capital be moved to a different location. Constantinople was built over 6 years, and consecrated on 11 May 330, Constantine divided the expanded city, like Rome, into 14 regions, and ornamented it with public works worthy of an imperial metropolis
15.
Neroccio di Bartolomeo de' Landi
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Neroccio di Bartolomeo de Landi was an Italian painter and sculptor of the early-Renaissance or Quattrocento period in Siena. He was a student of Vecchietta, and then he shared a workshop with Francesco di Giorgio from 1468. In 1472 he painted an Assumption for the abbey of Monte Oliveto Maggiore and he separated from di Giorgio in 1475. In 1483, he designed the Hellespontine Sybil for the pavement of the Cathedral of Siena. Walter Armstrong and Robert Edmund Graves, ed, dictionary of Painters and Engravers, Biographical and Critical. York St. #4, Covent Garden, London, Original from Fogg Library, Digitized May 18,2007, George Bell, Italian Paintings, Sienese and Central Italian Schools, a collection catalog containing information about Neroccio and his works
16.
Catherine of Siena
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Saint Catherine of Siena, T. O. S. D. was a tertiary of the Dominican Order and a Scholastic philosopher and theologian. She also worked to bring the papacy of Gregory XI back to Rome from its displacement in France, since 18 June 1939, Catherine of Siena has been one of the two patron saints of Italy, together with St. Francis of Assisi. The house where Catherine grew up is still in existence, Lapa was about forty years old when she gave premature birth to twin daughters Catherine and Giovanna. She had already borne 22 children, but half of them had died, Giovanna was handed over to a wet-nurse and died soon after. Catherine was nursed by her mother and developed into a healthy child and she was two years old when Lapa had her 25th child, another daughter named Giovanna. As a child Catherine was so merry that the family gave her the pet name of Euphrosyne, which is Greek for joy and the name of an early Christian saint. Catherine is said by her confessor and biographer Raymond of Capua O. P. Raymond continues that at age seven, Catherine vowed to give her whole life to God. When Catherine was sixteen, her older sister Bonaventura died in childbirth, already anguished by this and she was absolutely opposed and started a massive fast. She had learned this from Bonaventura, her husband had been far from considerate, besides fasting, Catherine further disappointed her mother by cutting off her long hair as a protest against being overly encouraged to improve her appearance to attract a husband. Catherine would later advise Raymond of Capua to do during times of trouble what she did now as a teenager, Build a cell inside your mind, from which you can never flee. In this inner cell she made her father into a representation of Christ, her mother into the Blessed Virgin Mary, serving them humbly became an opportunity for spiritual growth. Catherine resisted the accepted course of marriage and motherhood on the one hand and she chose to live an active and prayerful life outside a convent’s walls following the model of the Dominicans. Eventually her father gave up and permitted her to live as she pleased. A vision of St. Dominic gave strength to Catherine, but her wish to join his Order was no comfort to Lapa, who took her daughter with her to the baths in Bagno Vignoni to improve her health. Catherine fell seriously ill with a violent rash, fever and pain, which made her mother accept her wish to join the Mantellate. Lapa went to the Sisters of the Order and persuaded them to take in her daughter, within days, Catherine seemed entirely restored, rose from bed and donned the black and white habit of the Third Order of St. Dominic. Catherine received the habit of a Dominican tertiary from the friars of the Order after vigorous protests from the tertiaries themselves, as a tertiary, she lived outside the convent, at home with her family like before. The Mantellate taught Catherine how to read, and she lived in almost total silence and her custom of giving away clothing and food without asking anyones permission cost her family significantly, but she demanded nothing for herself
17.
Siena
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Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena, the historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nations most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008, Siena is famous for its cuisine, art, museums, medieval cityscape and the Palio, a horse race held twice a year. Siena, like other Tuscan hill towns, was first settled in the time of the Etruscans when it was inhabited by a called the Saina. A Roman town called Saena Julia was founded at the site in the time of the Emperor Augustus, the first document mentioning it dates from AD70. Some archaeologists assert that Siena was controlled for a period by a Gaulish tribe called the Senones, according to local legend, Siena was founded by Senius and Aschius, two sons of Remus and thus nephews of Romulus, after whom Rome was named. Supposedly after their fathers murder by Romulus, they fled Rome, taking them the statue of the she-wolf suckling the infants. Additionally they rode white and black horses, giving rise to the Balzana, some claim the name Siena derives from Senius. Other etymologies derive the name from the Etruscan family name Saina, Siena did not prosper under Roman rule. It was not sited near any major roads and lacked opportunities for trade and its insular status meant that Christianity did not penetrate until the 4th century AD, and it was not until the Lombards invaded Siena and the surrounding territory that it knew prosperity. Siena prospered as a trading post, and the constant streams of pilgrims passing to, the oldest aristocratic families in Siena date their line to the Lombards surrender in 774 to Charlemagne. This ultimately resulted in the creation of the Republic of Siena, the Republic existed for over four hundred years, from the late 11th century until the year 1555. During the golden age of Siena before the Black Death in 1348, in the Italian War of 1551–59, the republic was defeated by the rival Duchy of Florence in alliance with the Spanish crown. After 18 months of resistance, Siena surrendered to Spain on 17 April 1555, the new Spanish King Felipe II, owing huge sums to the Medici, ceded it to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, to which it belonged until the unification of Italy in the 19th century. A Republican government of 700 Sienese families in Montalcino resisted until 1559, the picturesque city remains an important cultural centre, especially for humanist disciplines. The city lies at 322 m above sea level, the Siena Cathedral, begun in the 12th century, is a masterpiece of Italian Romanesque-Gothic architecture. Its main façade was completed in 1380, the original plan called for an ambitiously massive basilica, the largest then in the world, with, as was customary, an east-west nave. However, the scarcity of funds, in due to war and plague, truncated the project
18.
Leonardo da Vinci
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He has been variously called the father of palaeontology, ichnology, and architecture, and is widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time. Sometimes credited with the inventions of the parachute, helicopter and tank, many historians and scholars regard Leonardo as the prime exemplar of the Universal Genius or Renaissance Man, an individual of unquenchable curiosity and feverishly inventive imagination. Much of his working life was spent in the service of Ludovico il Moro in Milan. He later worked in Rome, Bologna and Venice, and he spent his last years in France at the home awarded to him by Francis I of France, Leonardo was, and is, renowned primarily as a painter. Among his works, the Mona Lisa is the most famous and most parodied portrait, Leonardos drawing of the Vitruvian Man is also regarded as a cultural icon, being reproduced on items as varied as the euro coin, textbooks, and T-shirts. Perhaps fifteen of his paintings have survived, Leonardo is revered for his technological ingenuity. He conceptualised flying machines, a type of armoured fighting vehicle, concentrated power, an adding machine. Some of his inventions, however, such as an automated bobbin winder. A number of Leonardos most practical inventions are nowadays displayed as working models at the Museum of Vinci. He made substantial discoveries in anatomy, civil engineering, geology, optics, and hydrodynamics, today, Leonardo is widely considered one of the most diversely talented individuals ever to have lived. Leonardo was born on 15 April 1452 at the hour of the night in the Tuscan hill town of Vinci. He was the son of the wealthy Messer Piero Fruosino di Antonio da Vinci, a Florentine legal notary, and Caterina. Leonardo had no surname in the modern sense – da Vinci simply meaning of Vinci, his birth name was Lionardo di ser Piero da Vinci, meaning Leonardo. The inclusion of the title ser indicated that Leonardos father was a gentleman, little is known about Leonardos early life. He spent his first five years in the hamlet of Anchiano in the home of his mother and his father had married a sixteen-year-old girl named Albiera Amadori, who loved Leonardo but died young in 1465 without children. When Leonardo was sixteen, his father married again to twenty-year-old Francesca Lanfredini, pieros legitimate heirs were born from his third wife Margherita di Guglielmo and his fourth and final wife, Lucrezia Cortigiani. Leonardo received an education in Latin, geometry and mathematics. In later life, Leonardo recorded only two childhood incidents, one, which he regarded as an omen, was when a kite dropped from the sky and hovered over his cradle, its tail feathers brushing his face
19.
Annunciation (Leonardo)
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Annunciation, by the Italian Renaissance artists Leonardo da Vinci and Andrea del Verrocchio, dates from circa 1472–1475 and is housed in the Uffizi gallery of Florence, Italy. The subject matter is drawn from Luke 1, the subject was very popular for artworks and had been depicted many times in the art of Florence, including several examples by the Early Renaissance painter Fra Angelico. The details of its commission and its early history remain obscure, the painting has since been attributed to different artists, including Leonardo and Verrocchios contemporary Domenico Ghirlandaio. It was more determined to be a collaboration between Leonardo and his master Verrocchio, with whom Leonardo collaborated on the Baptism of Jesus. The angel holds a Madonna lily, a symbol of Marys virginity and it is supposed that Leonardo originally copied the wings from those of a bird in flight, but they have since been lengthened by a later artist. Since then a drawing for the angels sleeve has been recognized and attributed to Leonardo. Verrocchio used lead-based paint and heavy brush strokes and he left a note for Leonardo to finish the background and the angel. Leonardo used light brush strokes and no lead, when the Annunciation was x-rayed, Verrocchios work was evident while Leonardos angel was invisible. The marble table, in front of the Virgin, probably quotes the tomb of Piero and Giovanni de Medici in the Basilica of San Lorenzo, Florence, which Verrocchio had sculpted during this same period. Some immature hesitancies are usually noted, especially the Virgins ambiguous spatial relation to the desk and the marble on which it rests. On March 12,2007, the painting was at the center of a furor between Italian citizens and the Minister of Culture, who decided to place the picture on loan to exhibit in Japan. Leonardo da Vinci, anatomical drawings from the Royal Library, Windsor Castle, exhibition catalog fully online as PDF from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which contains material on Annunciation
20.
Uffizi
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The Uffizi Gallery is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in central Florence, region of Tuscany, Italy. The building of Uffizi complex was begun by Giorgio Vasari in 1560 for Cosimo I de Medici so as to accommodate the offices of the Florentine magistrates, hence the name uffizi, the construction was later continued by Alfonso Parigi and Bernardo Buontalenti and completed in 1581. The niches in the piers that alternate with columns filled with sculptures of artists in the 19th century. The Uffizi brought together under one roof the administrative offices, the Tribunal and the Archivio di Stato, the state archive. He commissioned from the architect Buontalenti the design of the Tribuna degli Uffizi that collected a series of masterpieces in one room, over the years, more sections of the palace were recruited to exhibit paintings and sculpture collected or commissioned by the Medici. The gallery had been open to visitors by request since the sixteenth century, because of its huge collection, some of its works have in the past been transferred to other museums in Florence—for example, some famous statues to the Bargello. A project was finished in 2006 to expand the exhibition space some 6,000 metres² to almost 13,000 metres². On 27 May 1993, a car exploded in Via dei Georgofili and damaged parts of the palace. The most severe damage was to the Niobe room and classical sculptures and neoclassical interior, the identity of the bomber or bombers are unknown, although it was almost certainly attributable to the Sicilian Mafia who were engaged in a period of terrorism at that time. Today, the Uffizi is one of the most popular tourist attractions of Florence, in high season, waiting times can be up to five hours. In early August 2007, Florence experienced a heavy rainstorm, the Gallery was partially flooded, with water leaking through the ceiling, and the visitors had to be evacuated. There was a more significant flood in 1966 which damaged most of the art collections in Florence severely. Here is a selection from the collection, The collection also contains some ancient sculptures, such as the Arrotino. Collections of the Uffizi Official website Uffizi – Google Art Project
21.
Carlo Crivelli
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Crivelli was born around 1430–35 in Venice to a family of painters and received his artistic formation there and in Padua. The details of Crivellis career are still sparse, He is said to have studied under Jacobello del Fiore and he was master of his own shop when sent to prison for adultery in 1457. Only two pictures can be today in Venice, both in the church of San Sebastiano. He painted in only, despite the increasing popularity of oil painting during his lifetime. His predilection for decoratively punched gilded backgrounds is one of the marks of this conservative taste, of his early polyptychs, only one, the altarpiece from Ascoli Piceno, survives in its entirety in its original frame. All the others have been disassembled and their panels and predella scenes are divided among several museums, an amorphous band of contemporaries, imitators and followers, termed Crivelleschi, reflect to varying degrees aspects of his style. Unlike the naturalistic trends arising in Florence during his lifetime, Crivellis style continues to represent the courtly International Gothic sensibility and his urban settings are jewel-like and full of elaborate allegorical detail. His paintings have a linear quality identified with his Umbrian contemporaries, Crivelli is a painter of marked individuality. Unlike Giovanni Bellini, his contemporary, his works are not soft, commissioned by the Franciscans and Dominicans of Ascoli, Crivellis work is exclusively religious in nature. His paintings consist largely of Madonna and Child images, Pietà, often filled with images of suffering, such as gaping wounds in Christs hands and side and the mouths of mourners twisted in agony, Crivellis work fulfills the spiritual needs of his patrons. These ultra-realistic, sometimes disturbing qualities have led critics to label Crivellis paintings grotesque, much like his fellow Northern Italian painter. His work attracted numerous commissions and must have appealed to the taste of his patrons. Carlo Crivelli died in the Marche around 1495, vittorio Crivelli, with whom he occasionally collaborated, was his younger brother. Pietro Alemanno, a painter who immigrated to the March of Ancona from Germany/Austria, was his pupil, donato Crivelli, who was also a pupil of Jacobello and was working in 1459, may be of the same family as Carlo. His work fell out of following his death and Vasaris Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects. He had something of a revival, especially in the UK, during the time of the painters, several of whom, including Edward Burne-Jones. His reputation faded with that movement, but recent writings on his work, susan Sontag in Notes on Camp wrote, Camp is the paintings of Carlo Crivelli, with their real jewels and trompe-loeil insects and cracks in the masonry. Adoration of the Shepherds, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg Annunciation with St Emidius, National Gallery, London, possibly his most famous painting An Apostle, c
22.
Francis of Assisi
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Saint Francis of Assisi, born Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone, informally named as Francesco, was an Italian Roman Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the mens Order of Friars Minor, the women’s Order of Saint Clare, the Third Order of Saint Francis, Francis is one of the most venerated religious figures in history. Pope Gregory IX canonized Francis on 16 July 1228, along with Saint Catherine of Siena, he was designated Patron saint of Italy. In 1219, he went to Egypt in an attempt to convert the Sultan to put an end to the conflict of the Crusades, by this point, the Franciscan Order had grown to such an extent that its primitive organizational structure was no longer sufficient. He returned to Italy to organize the Order, once his community was authorized by the Pope, he withdrew increasingly from external affairs. Francis is also known for his love of the Eucharist, in 1223, Francis arranged for the first Christmas live nativity scene. He died during the hours of 3 October 1226, while listening to a reading he had requested of Psalm 142. Pietro was in France on business when Francis was born in Assisi, upon his return to Assisi, Pietro took to calling his son Francesco, possibly in honor of his commercial success and enthusiasm for all things French. Since the child was renamed in infancy, the change can hardly have had anything to do with his aptitude for learning French, as some have thought. While going off to war in 1202, Francis had a vision that directed him back to Assisi, in 1205, Francis left for Apulia to enlist in the army of Walter III, Count of Brienne. Francis lived the high-spirited life typical of a young man. In 1201, he joined an expedition against Perugia and was taken as a prisoner at Collestrada. It is possible that his conversion was a gradual process rooted in this experience. Upon his return to Assisi in 1203, Francis returned to his carefree life, in 1204, a serious illness led him to a spiritual crisis. A strange vision made him return to Assisi, deepening his ecclesiastical awakening, on a pilgrimage to Rome, he joined the poor in begging at St. Peters Basilica, an experience that moved him to live in poverty. Francis returned home, began preaching on the streets, and soon gathered followers and his Order was authorized by Pope Innocent III in 1210. He then founded the Order of Poor Clares, which became a religious order for women. As a youth, Francesco became a devotee of troubadours and was fascinated with all things Transalpine, in this account, he was selling cloth and velvet in the marketplace on behalf of his father when a beggar came to him and asked for alms
23.
Gualdo Tadino
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Gualdo Tadino, an ancient town of Italy, in the province of Perugia in northeastern Umbria, on the lower flanks of Mt. Penna, a mountain of the Apennines. It is 47 km NE of Perugia and 30 km SE of Gubbio, Gualdo has a long history and was originally an Umbrian village known as Tarsina. Conquered by the Romans in 266 BC and re-christened Tadinum, it was a station on the Via Flaminia, in 217 BC it was destroyed by Hannibals troops. A similar defeat was inflicted on it in 47 BC by Julius Caesar and this suspicion may have received confirmation in 2004. The ancient city survived that war, only to be destroyed in a war at the instigation of the Holy Roman Emperor Otto III in 966. It was later rebuilt, only to be destroyed a second time by fire in 1237, finally, the Emperor Frederick II ordered the city rebuilt for a third time in 1239, and it is this incarnation which survives today. Gualdo Tadino sister cities are, West Pittston, PA and Audun Le Tiche, France Rocca Flea, san Francesco, housing frescoes by Matteo da Gualdo. Gualdo Tadino Cathedral, with an external fountain attributed to Antonio da Sangallo the Elder, civic Gallery, with works by Matteo da Gualdo and others. Gualdo Tadino has a station on the line from Ancona to Foligno. The journey time to Ancona is typically one hour and 45 minutes, and to Foligno 40 minutes
24.
Umbria
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Umbria, is a region of historic and modern central Italy. It is the only Italian region having neither a coastline nor a border with other countries and it includes the Lake Trasimeno, Marmores Falls, and is crossed by the River Tiber. Umbria is known for its landscapes, traditions, history, culinary delights, artistic legacy, and influence on culture. Contained within Umbria is Cospaia, a republic created by accident that existed from 1440 to 1826 Umbria is bordered by Tuscany to the west, Marche to the east. It is the only Italian region having neither a coastline nor a border with other countries. The commune of Città di Castello has an exclave named Monte Ruperto within Marche. Umbria is crossed by two valleys, the Umbrian valley, stretching from Perugia to Spoleto, and the Tiber Valley, west of the first one, the Tiber River forms the approximate border with Lazio, although its source is just over the Tuscan border. The Tibers three principal tributaries flow southward through Umbria, the Chiascio basin is relatively uninhabited as far as Bastia Umbra. About 10 kilometres farther on, it joins the Tiber at Torgiano, the third river is the Nera, flowing into the Tiber further south, at Terni, its valley is called the Valnerina. The upper Nera cuts ravines in the mountains, the lower, in antiquity, the plain was covered by a pair of shallow, interlocking lakes, the Lacus Clitorius and the Lacus Umber. They were drained by the Romans over several hundred years, an earthquake in the 4th century and the political collapse of the Roman Empire resulted in the refilling of the basin. The eastern part of the region, being crossed by many faults, has often hit by earthquakes, the last ones have been that of 1997. In literature, Umbria is referred to as il cuore verde dItalia, the phrase is taken from a poem by Giosuè Carducci, the subject of which is the source of the Clitunno River in Umbria. The region is named for the Umbri people, an Italic people which was absorbed by the expansion of the Romans, the Umbris capital city was Gubbio, where today is housed the longest and most important document of any of the Osco-Umbrian group of languages, the Iguvine Tablets. In fact, they belonged to a family of neighbouring peoples with similar roots. Their language was Umbrian, one of the Italic languages, related to Latin, the Etruscans were the chief enemies of the Umbri. The Etruscan invasion went from the western seaboard towards the north and east, eventually driving the Umbrians towards the Apennine uplands, nevertheless, the Umbrian population does not seem to have been eradicated in the conquered districts. The border between Etruria and Umbria was the Tiber river, the ancient name of Todi, Tular, after the downfall of the Etruscans, Umbrians aided the Samnites in their struggle against Rome
25.
Fabriano
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Fabriano is a town and comune of Ancona province in the Italian region of the Marche, at 325 metres above sea level. It lies in the Esino valley 44 kilometres upstream and southwest of Jesi and its location on the main highway and rail line from Umbria to the Adriatic make it a mid-sized regional center in the Apennines. Fabriano is the headquarters of the giant appliance maker Indesit, Fabriano, with Bologna, is the only Italian creative city. The town is in the category Folk Arts, Fabriano appears to have been founded in the early Middle Ages by the inhabitants of a small Roman town 5 kilometres south at Attiggio, of which some slight remains and inscriptions are extant. Fabrianos wealth and commitment to the arts in the late medieval period have left it with many monuments. Fabriano Cathedral, dedicated to San Venanzio, from the Baroque restoration are the stucco decoration of the interior and the canvasses by Gregorio Preti, Salvator Rosa, Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri, Giuseppe Puglia and Orazio Gentileschi. To the original Cathedral belong the polygonal apse, the cloister, also important are the frescoes with Stories of the True Cross by the Folignate painter Giovanni di Corraduccio. Nicholas Santa Maria del Piangato St Benedict Oratory of the Gonfalone Palazzo del Podestà built in stone from Vallemontagnana. It has a bridge structure, a memory of the stream which once flowed under it. The central arcade has frescoes from the 13th-14th centuries portraying warriors, sturinalto Fountain, designed by Jacopo di Grondolo, who was inspired by the Fontana Maggiore in Perugia. It was the residence of the Chiavelli family, lords of the city until 1435, in the courtyard is a lapidarium with fragments of buildings of the ancient Roman cities of Attidium, Tuficum and Sentinum. Pinacoteca Civica Bruno Malajoli displayed in the former Hospital - The hospital was first built in 1456, the art collection of the Pinacoteca were moved here in 1994. Loggiato of St. Saint John dal Bastone 12th-century Silvestrine monk, jessica Rizzo, an actress and businesswoman. Fabriano official website Museo della Carta Fabriano Storica - history, art, culture, legend, curiosity Bill Thayers site Made in Fabriano Academy
26.
Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
27.
Cosimo Rosselli
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He painted almost entirely religious subjects, with a few portraits. He did other large frescos with his workship, from which Fra Bartolomeo and Piero di Cosimo and these include a chapel in SantAmbrogio, Florence and one of the large spaces in the cloister of Santissima Annunziata, Florence. In 1460, at the age of fourteen, he became a pupil of Neri di Bicci, a first youthful work of Cosimo mentioned by Giorgio Vasari is the Assumption of the Virgin altarpiece in the third chapel on the left of the nave in SantAmbrogio in Florence. In the same church, on the wall of one of the chapels, is a fresco by Cosimo which Vasari praises highly, especially for a portrait of the young scholar Pico of Mirandola. The scene, a bearing a miracle-working chalice, is painted with vigor. A picture painted by Rosselli for the church of the Annunziata, barbara, Matthew and the Baptist, is in the Academy of Florence. Rosselli also spent some time in Lucca, where he painted altarpieces for various churches. A picture attributed to him, taken from the church of St. Girolamo at Fiesole, is now in the National Gallery of London, though dry and hard in treatment, the figures are designed with much dignity. Rosselli and his collaborators executed two or three frescoes, the Descent from Mount Sinai, the Last Supper and, perhaps, the Sermon of the Mount, the Passage of the Red Sea is variously attributed to him, to Ghirlandaio or to Biagio dAntonio. The Gemäldegalerie, Berlin has three pictures by Rosselli, The Virgin in Glory, The Entombment of Christ and The Massacre of the Innocents. In 1480 Rosselli, together with the painters of Florence, was invited by Pope Sixtus IV to Rome to assist in the painting of the frescoes in the Sistine Chapel. Three of these were executed by him The Destruction of Pharaohs Army in the Red Sea, Christ Preaching by the Lake of Tiberias and his chief pupil was Fra Bartolomeo. Among Rosellis other pupils were Angelo di Donino and Giovanni Battista Vanni, according to Vasari, Rosselli died in 1484, but this is a mistake, as he was known to have been living on 25 November 1506. Sources This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh. Pope-Hennessy, John & Kanter, Laurence B, the Robert Lehman Collection I, Italian Paintings. New York, Princeton, The Metropolitan Museum of Art in association with Princeton University Press, cS1 maint, Multiple names, authors list
28.
Cosimo Tura
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Cosimo Tura, also known as Il Cosmè or Cosmè Tura, was an Italian early-Renaissance painter and considered one of the founders of the School of Ferrara. Born in Ferrara, he was a student of Francesco Squarcione of Padua, later he obtained patronage from both Dukes Borso and Ercole I dEste. By 1460, he was given a stipend by the Ferrarese Court and his pupils include Francesco del Cossa and Francesco Bianchi. He appears to have influenced by Mantegnas and Piero della Francescas Quattrocento styles. In Ferrara, he is represented by frescoes in the Palazzo Schifanoia. This pleasure palace, with facade and architecture of little note, cosimo, along with Francesco del Cossa, helped produce an intricately conceived allegorical series about the months of the year and zodiac symbols. The series contains portraits of musicians, laborers, and carnival floats in idyllic parades. As in Piero della Francescas world, the unemotive figures mill in classical serenity and he also painted the organ doors for the Duomo showing the Annunciation. He collaborated in the painting of a series of muses for a Studiolo of the Palace Belfiore of Leonello dEste in Ferrara, portrait Eleonora dAragona, Duchess of Ferrara - Pierpont Morgan Library, New York Spring or the muse Calliope - National Gallery, London. The Princess - Museo del Duomo, Ferrara, cosme Tura of Ferrara, Style, Politics, and the Renaissance City, 1450-1495. Cosme Tura at Panopticon Virtual Art Gallery Italian Paintings, North Italian School, a collection catalog containing information about Tura and his works
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Scenes from the Passion of Christ
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Scenes from the Passion of Christ is an oil painting on a panel of Baltic oak, painted c.1470 by German-born Early Netherlandish painter Hans Memling. The painting is small,56.7 ×92.2 cm. It may have intended for Portinaris chapel in the church of St Jacob in Bruges. It was not catalogued in Portinaris belongings when he died in 1501 and it is first recorded in the collection of Cosimo I in Florence in 1550. The painting is now held by the Galleria Sabauda in Turin, the scenes are distributed in and around an idealized Jerusalem, depicted as a walled medieval city with exotic towers topped by domes. The high birds-eye point of view makes Calvary visible behind the city
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Piero del Pollaiolo
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Piero del Pollaiuolo, also known as Piero Benci, was an Italian Renaissance painter from Florence. His brother was the artist Antonio del Pollaiuolo and the two worked together. Their work shows both influences and an interest in human anatomy, reportedly, the brothers carried out dissections to improve their knowledge of the subject. Giorgio Vasari includes a biography of Pollaiuolo in his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects
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Francesco del Cossa
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Francesco del Cossa was an Italian Renaissance painter of the School of Ferrara. The son of a stonemason in Ferrara, little is known about his early works, Cossa is best known for his frescoes. One of his followers was Leonardo Scaletti of Faenza, in conjunction with Cosimo Tura, Cossa is now known for fresco decoration of the summer pleasure villa/palazzo known as the Palazzo Schifanoia, located just outside the city gates. Together, they painted a series of the elaborate allegories around the themes of zodiacal signs and these were only partially restored in the 20th century, and there are three that are reasonably assigned to Cossa. Of these, one of the most remarkable images is the horde of naked toddlers in the Allegory of May – Triumph of Apollo, apparently a sign of springtimes prolific blossoming, the crowded rows of babies mass like a phalanx of infantile Rockettes. The Allegory of April has a depiction of the trio of Graces, sandro Botticellis version in Primavera dates from 1482. See the 1501 version of the Three Graces, assuming the date of death of Cossa is correct, this one must have been completed prior to the others. Unhappy that he had paid by the square foot for his work for Duke Borso and complaining he was being paid the same as the worst dauber in Ferrara. In Bologna he obtained many commissions under the patronage of the Bentivoglio family and he executed stained glass windows in Bologna, the best of which is a circular window, in the church of San Giovanni in Monte, representing St. John in Patmos. In the National Gallery of London there is a picture by him representing St. Vincent Ferrer, there is a fine profile portrait at Locko Park near Derby, said to represent Duke Ercole I of Ferrara. In the Dresden collection there is also an Annunciation that has, however, del Cossa features as one of the two protagonists in Ali Smiths novel How to Be Both, short-listed for the 2014 Man Booker Prize. Encyclopedia of Artists, volume 2, edited by William H. T. Vaughan, ISBN 0-19-521572-9,2000 Web Gallery of Art
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Ercole de' Roberti
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Ercole de Roberti, also known as Ercole Ferrarese or Ercole da Ferrara, was an Italian artist of the Early Renaissance and the School of Ferrara. He was profiled in Vasaris Le Vite delle più eccellenti pittori, scultori, the son of the doorkeeper at the Este castle, Ercole later held the position of court artist for the Este family in Ferrara. His life was short and many of his works have been destroyed, by 1473, when he was 17, Ercole had left Ferrara and was working in Bologna in the studio of Francesco del Cossa. According to Vasari, Ercole also apprenticed under Lorenzo Costa in Bologna, Vasari was likely confusing him with Ercole da Bologna or Ercole Banci. Ercole de Roberti is known to have collaborated in the frescoes of Palazzo Schifanoia, in 1480, Ercole created a large altarpiece with a Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints for Santa Maria in Porto in Ravenna, which is now in the Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan. Portraits of Giovanni II Bentivoglio and Ginevra Bentivoglio attributed to Ercole de Roberti are in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Ercole succeeded Cosmè Tura as court painter to the Este family in Ferrara around 1486. A painting of Portia and Brutus, believed to be painted for Eleonora of Aragon, duchess of Ferrara, is in the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas. Ercoles painting of Saint Jerome in the Wilderness from this period is in the collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Vasari, Vite, profile of Ercole Pieta at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK Information on St. Jerome in the Wilderness, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
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Andrea del Verrocchio
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Andrea del Verrocchio, born Andrea di Michele di Francesco de Cioni, was an Italian painter, sculptor, and goldsmith who was a master of an important workshop in Florence. He became known by his nickname Verrocchio, from vero occhio, which in Italian means true eye, few paintings are attributed to him with certainty, but a number of important painters were trained at his workshop. His pupils included Leonardo da Vinci, Pietro Perugino and Lorenzo di Credi and his greatest importance was as a sculptor and his last work, the Equestrian statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni in Venice, is generally accepted as a masterpiece. Verrocchio was born in Florence in around 1435 and his father, Michele di Francesco Cioni, initially worked as a tile and brick maker, then later as a tax collector. Verrocchio never married, and had to provide support for some members of his family. He was at first apprenticed to a goldsmith and it has been suggested that he was later apprenticed to Donatello, but there is no evidence of this and John Pope-Hennessy considered that it is contradicted by the style of his early works. It has been suggested that he was trained as a painter under Fra Filippo Lippi, little is known about his life. His main works are dated in his last twenty years and his advancement owed much to the patronage of Lorenzo de Medici and his workshop was in Florence where he was a member of the Guild of St Luke. At the end of his life he opened a new workshop in Venice where he was working on the statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni and he died in Venice in 1488. Despite the importance of Verrocchios workshop in the training of younger painters, very few paintings are universally recognised as his own work, a painting of the Madonna with seated child in tempera on panel is considered an early work of 1468-70. It is a work which has formerly been attributed to Pollaiuolo. Covi thinks that it was painted with assistance from Ghirlandaio. It is now in London at the National Gallery, the Baptism of Christ, now in the Uffizi Gallery at Florence, was painted in 1474–75. In this work Verrocchio was assisted by Leonardo da Vinci, then a youth and a member of his workshop, who painted the angel on the left and the part of the background above. According to Vasari, Andrea resolved never to touch the brush again because Leonardo, his pupil, had far surpassed him, the Madonna enthroned with John the Baptist and St Donato is in the Pistoia Cathedral. It had been left unfinished and was completed by Lorenzo di Credi when Verrocchio was in Venice near the end of his life, around 1465 he is believed to have worked on the lavabo of the Old Sacristy in San Lorenzo, Florence. He therefore had the problem of placing two statues in a tabernacle originally intended for one, as Covi says, the problem was resolved in a most felicitous manner. The work was placed in position in 1483 and has been acclaimed since the day of its unveiling, in 1468 Verrocchio made a bronze candlestick, now in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, for the Signoria of Florence
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Ginevra de' Benci
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Ginevra de Benci is a portrait painting by Leonardo da Vinci of the 15th-century Florentine aristocrat Ginevra de Benci. The oil-on-wood portrait was acquired by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the sum of US$5 million—a record price at the time—came from the Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund and was paid to the Princely House of Liechtenstein. It is the painting by Leonardo on public view in the Americas. It is known that Leonardo painted a portrait of Ginevra de Benci in 1474, the paintings imagery and the text on the reverse of the panel support the identification of this picture. Directly behind the lady in the portrait is a juniper tree. The reverse of the portrait is decorated with a juniper sprig encircled by a wreath of laurel, the laurel and palm are in the personal emblem of Bernardo Bembo, Venetian ambassador to Florence, whose platonic relationship with Ginevra is revealed in poems dedicated to them. Infrared examination has revealed Bembos motto Virtue and Honor beneath Ginevras, so it is likely Bembo ordered the emblematic painting on the verso of the portrait. The portrait is one of the highlights of the National Gallery of Art, Ginevra is beautiful, but austere, she has no hint of a smile and her gaze, although forward, seems indifferent to the viewer. A strip from the bottom of the painting was removed in the past, presumably owing to damage, using the golden section, Susan Dorothea White has drawn an interpretation of how her arms and hands may have been positioned in the original. The adaptation is based on images of hands by Leonardo that are thought to have been executed as studies for this painting, for an unorthodox view on Ginevra de Benci see Angelo Paratico Leonardo Da Vinci. A Chinese Scholar Lost in Renaissance Italy Lascar Publishing,2015 ISBN 978-988-14-1980-4, hand, J. O. National Gallery of Art, Master Paintings from the Collection. New York, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Virtue and Beauty, Leonardos Ginevra de Benci and Renaissance Portraits of Women
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Donne Triptych
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The Donne Triptych is a hinged-triptych altarpiece by the Early Netherlandish painter Hans Memling. It consists of five individual panel paintings, an inner panel. When Donne commissioned the work is unknown, an earlier date of sometime in the late 1470s is possible, at the time he completed the similar St John Altarpiece, or it may have been painted as a precursor to that altarpiece. Early Netherlandish Triptychs, A Study in Patronage, los Angeles, University of California Press,1969 Bruce, Donald. Aug 94, Vol.265 Issue 1543, p72
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St John Altarpiece (Memling)
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The St John Altarpiece is a large oil-on-oak hinged-triptych altarpiece completed around 1479 by the Early Netherlandish master painter Hans Memling. It was commissioned in the mid-1470s in Bruges for the Old St. Johns Hospital during the building of a new apse and it is signed and dated 1479 on the original frame – its date of installation – and is today at the hospital in the Memling museum. The altarpiece consists of five paintings – a central inner panel and those on the reverse of wings are visible when the shutters are closed, and show the hospital donors flanked by their patron saints. Hans Memling purchased citizenship in Bruges in late January 30, which suggests he was a recent arrival to the city and he probably came from Brussels where he had been apprenticed to Rogier van der Weyden. In Bruges he established himself as a painter fairly quickly, according to Weale, Memlings position in Bruges was secured by the Dukes of Burgundy. Old St. Johns Hospital was one of four hospitals in the city, one took in lepers, one paupers. Established in the late 12th century, it was dedicated to John the Evangelist, the Bruges civic authorities financed the hospital and oversaw its direction until the 1440s when a fiscal crisis caused them to decrease funding and increase their supervision. By the 1470s the hospital masters and bursars not only averted bankruptcy, the altarpiece was probably commissioned in the mid-1470s for the new apse, and almost certainly completed in 1479. The central frame is inscribed in Latin and reads, OPUS, LXXIX, The date gives clues to the donors on the exterior panels, and because one died in 1475, scholars are confident in a start date before that year. Memling probably began work on the piece as early as 1473, when plans were made to extend the already large 240-bed infirmary, as at the Hospices de Beaune, patients in Sint-Janshospitaal could follow the Liturgy of the Hours from their beds. The altarpieces prestigious location, coupled with its scope and execution and those are today displayed in the Memling museum, located in a room adjacent to the original infirmary. Although still in its original frames, the altarpiece has seen extensive overcleaning, affecting its condition, the exterior panels contain both saints and donors, the kneeling donors face inwards towards the center panel. Art historians speculate Memling meant to emphasize the importance of the scenes on the interior panels by having the donors gaze directly at the opening between the panel doors. The left panel has St Anthony Abbot with his emblematic pig, Seghers joined the hospital as a brother in 1445 and by 1461 had risen to hospital master, a position he held intermittently until his death in 1475. He faces the center of the panel, flanked by his saint, Anthony. Ceunic, a brother from 1469 and bursar between 1488 and 1490, kneels to the left behind Seghers. His patron saint, James, stands behind him, the right panel shows St Agnes and St Clare standing behind the female donors, Agnes Casembrood, hospital prioress, and sister Clara van Hulson. She joined the hospital in 1447, became prioress in 1455 and her namesake, St Agnes, is identified by the lamb at her side
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Annunciation
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Gabriel told Mary to name her son Yehoshua, meaning YHWH is salvation. According to Luke 1,26, the Annunciation occurred in the month of Elizabeths pregnancy with John the Baptist. Many Christians observe this event with the Feast of the Annunciation on 25 March, an approximation of the vernal equinox nine full months before Christmas. In England, this came to be known as Lady Day and it marked the new year until 1752. The 2nd-century writer Irenaeus of Lyon regarded the conception of Jesus as 25 March coinciding with the Passion, the Annunciation has been a key topic in Christian art in general, as well as in Marian art in the Catholic Church, particularly during the Middle Ages and Renaissance. A work of art depicting the Annunciation is sometimes called an Annunciation. 28 And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured,29 And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be. 30 And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary,31 And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. 34 Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be,36 And, behold, thy cousin Elisabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month with her, who was called barren. 37 For with God nothing shall be impossible,38 And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her,19 Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily. 21 And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS,35 In answer the angel said to her, Holy spirit will come upon you, and power of the Most High will overshadow you. And for that reason the one who is born will be called holy, manuscript 4Q246 of the Dead Sea Scrolls reads, shall be great upon the earth. O king, all people shall make peace, and all shall serve him and he shall be called the son of the Great God, and by his name shall he be hailed as the Son of God, and they shall call him Son of the Most High. It has been suggested that the similarity in content is such that Lukes version may in some way be dependent on the Qumran text, the Annunciation is described in the Quran, in Sura 003,045 verses 45–51,45 Behold. Muslim tradition holds that the Annunciation took place during the month of Ramadan, in Greek, the Annunciation is known as the Good Tidings or Evangelism. In the Orthodox Churches that use a new style Calendar, the feast is celebrated on March 25, in churches using the old style Julian calendar, the feast day is April 7. The traditional hymn for the feast of the Annunciation goes back to St Athanasius, indeed, the Divine Liturgy is celebrated on Great and Holy Friday only when the latter coincides with the feast of the Annunciation
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Andrea Mantegna
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Andrea Mantegna was an Italian painter, a student of Roman archeology, and son-in-law of Jacopo Bellini. Like other artists of the time, Mantegna experimented with perspective and his flinty, metallic landscapes and somewhat stony figures give evidence of a fundamentally sculptural approach to painting. He also led a workshop that was the producer of prints in Venice before 1500. Mantegna was born in Isola di Carturo, Republic of Venice close to Padua, second son of a carpenter, at the age of eleven he became the apprentice of Francesco Squarcione, Paduan painter. Squarcione, whose vocation was tailoring, appears to have had a remarkable enthusiasm for ancient art. All the while, he continued undertaking works on commission for which his pupils no less than himself were made available, as many as 137 painters and pictorial students passed through Squarciones school, which had been established towards 1440 and which became famous all over Italy. Padua was attractive for artists coming not only from Veneto but also from Tuscany, such as Paolo Uccello, Filippo Lippi, Mantegnas early career was shaped indeed by impressions of Florentine works. At the time, Mantegna was said to be a favorite pupil, Squarcione taught him Latin and instructed him to study fragments of Roman sculpture. The master also preferred forced perspective, the results of which may account for some of Mantegnas later innovations. However, at the age of seventeen, Mantegna separated himself from Squarcione and he later claimed that Squarcione had profited from his work without paying the rights. His first work, now lost, was an altarpiece for the church of Santa Sofia in 1448. After a series of coincidences, Mantegna finished most of the work alone, though Ansuino and this series was almost entirely lost in the 1944 allied bombings of Padua. The most dramatic work of the cycle was the work set in the worms-eye view perspective. The sketch of the St. Stephen fresco survived and is the earliest known preliminary sketch which still exists to compare to the corresponding fresco, the drawing shows proof that nude figures were used in the conception of works during the Early Renaissance. In the preliminary sketch, the perspective is less developed and closer to a more average viewpoint however, despite the authentic look of the monument, it is not a copy of any known Roman structure. Luke and other saints for the church of S. Giustina, as the young artist progressed in his work, he came under the influence of Jacopo Bellini, father of the celebrated painters Giovanni Bellini and Gentile Bellini, and of a daughter Nicolosia. In 1453 Jacopo consented to a marriage between Nicolosia and Mantegna, trained as he had been in the study of marbles and the severity of the antique, Mantegna openly avowed that he considered ancient art superior to nature as being more eclectic in form. As a result, the painter exercised precision in outline, privileging the figure, overall, Mantegnas work thus tended towards rigidity, demonstrating an austere wholeness rather than graceful sensitivity of expression
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Fresco
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Fresco is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly-laid, or wet lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the fresco technique has been employed since antiquity and is closely associated with Italian Renaissance painting. Buon fresco pigment mixed with water of temperature on a thin layer of wet, fresh plaster, for which the Italian word for plaster. Because of the makeup of the plaster, a binder is not required, as the pigment mixed solely with the water will sink into the intonaco. The pigment is absorbed by the wet plaster, after a number of hours, many artists sketched their compositions on this underlayer, which would never be seen, in a red pigment called sinopia, a name also used to refer to these under-paintings. Later, new techniques for transferring paper drawings to the wall were developed. The main lines of a drawing made on paper were pricked over with a point, the paper held against the wall, if the painting was to be done over an existing fresco, the surface would be roughened to provide better adhesion. This area is called the giornata, and the different day stages can usually be seen in a large fresco, buon frescoes are difficult to create because of the deadline associated with the drying plaster. Once a giornata is dried, no more buon fresco can be done, if mistakes have been made, it may also be necessary to remove the whole intonaco for that area—or to change them later, a secco. An indispensable component of this process is the carbonatation of the lime, the eyes of the people of the School of Athens are sunken-in using this technique which causes the eyes to seem deeper and more pensive. Michelangelo used this technique as part of his trademark outlining of his central figures within his frescoes, in a wall-sized fresco, there may be ten to twenty or even more giornate, or separate areas of plaster. After five centuries, the giornate, which were nearly invisible, have sometimes become visible, and in many large-scale frescoes. Additionally, the border between giornate was often covered by an a secco painting, which has fallen off. One of the first painters in the period to use this technique was the Isaac Master in the Upper Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi. A person who creates fresco is called a frescoist, a secco or fresco-secco painting is done on dry plaster. The pigments thus require a medium, such as egg. Blue was a problem, and skies and blue robes were often added a secco, because neither azurite blue nor lapis lazuli. By the end of the century this had largely displaced buon fresco
