Leonardo da Vinci: Renaissance Master (15 page)

I do so much research for each book in The Treasure Chest series and discover so many cool facts that I can't fit into every book. Here are some of my favorites from my research for
The Treasure Chest: #9 Leonardo da Vinci: Renaissance Master
. Enjoy!

One of my favorite cities in the whole world is Florence, Italy. I've been lucky enough to go there dozens of times and always find something new to see. The works of art of Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli, and Michelangelo are all over the city, constant reminders of the lasting effects of the great art of the Renaissance.

In order to really appreciate the Renaissance, it's important to look back first at the Middle Ages and pre-Renaissance Italy. The Middle Ages, also called the Medieval Period or the Dark Ages, describes Europe between the fall of Rome in 476 CE and the beginning of the Renaissance in the fourteenth century. After the fall of the Roman Empire, no single state or government united the people, and the Catholic Church became so powerful that kings, queens, and other leaders derived
their
power from their alliances with the Church.

The influence of the Church's dominance during this period can be seen in many ways. In 1095, Pope Urban II authorized a holy army to fight nonbelievers all the way to Jerusalem. Known as the Crusades, this conflict continued for almost four hundred years. Another way to demonstrate devotion to the Church during this period was to build grand cathedrals. These cathedrals can still be visited in most of the cities throughout Europe.

In 1450, Johannes Gutenberg invented the first printing press; prior to that, many books were works of art handmade with gold and silver in monasteries and universities. These books were called illuminated manuscripts.

The political system during the Middle Ages was called feudalism. Peasants—also known as serfs—did the work on the large pieces of land that kings granted to noblemen. Most of the crops they planted and harvested went to the wealthy landowners. They also had to tithe—give 10 percent of their income to the church. In exchange for their labor, they were allowed to live free on the land and to get protection from the king.

Agricultural innovations such as the heavy plow and three-field crop rotation in the eleventh century made farming more efficient. As a result, fewer farm workers were needed. People began to move into the cities. Because of the Crusades, goods from distant lands were in demand, and ports were developed to receive these goods. Some European cities reached populations of fifty thousand citizens by 1300.

The unification of Italy did not happen for many centuries. During the pre-Renaissance, it was made up of city-states that always battled with each other. As Italy moved toward the Renaissance, a word which means
rebirth
, artists—many of them in Florence—helped shape the transition from the feudalistic Middle Ages to this new age of enlightenment.

The architect Filippo Brunelleschi combined elements of classical architecture with newer ideas in structures such as the Duomo of the cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence. The architect Leon Battista Alberti was one of the first to include the use of perspective in his designs, which he combined with classicism in such buildings as Santa Maria Novello in Florence. Also during this pre-Renaissance time, Dante wrote
The Divine Comedy
, and Giotto, credited with breathing life back into painting, popularized and revived art.

It is widely acknowledged that the Renaissance began in Florence, where bankers, merchants, and other wealthy members of society began to support the arts. The Medicis were the richest family in Italy—perhaps in all of Europe. Under Cosimo de' Medici, and then Lorenzo the Magnificent, artists were commissioned to paint, sculpt, and build private and public works of art. In medieval times, the Church sponsored art. But now wealthy families employed artists for the duration of a work of art's completion (which was often years), as well as supplying room and board and access to other wealthy families. This was a system that nurtured artists.

There is no precise date when the Renaissance came to an end, and there is no agreed upon reason for it. Many point to France's invasion of Italy as the beginning of the end. Others point to the rise of power of the monk Savonarola and his subsequent brief rule, during which many works of art were destroyed in what was known as the “Bonfire of the Vanities” in the center of Florence. A few years later a wide array of Renaissance works of literature were banned.

Just as important was the end of stability with a series of foreign invasions known as the Italian Wars beginning in 1494 when France wreaked widespread devastation on Northern Italy and ended the independence of many of the city-states. On May 6, 1527, Spanish and German troops sacked Rome, ending the role of the papacy as the largest patron of Renaissance art and architecture. Yet even then, a new Renaissance called the Northern Renaissance began to develop, continuing the ideals of the great Italian Renaissance.

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