Italy: A Closer Look - Italy - page 600

SIGHTS Pisa, Venice, Genoa, and Siena reached their apogee during this
period. See the Romanesque architecture of Pisa, the Gothic cathedrals of Milan
and Siena, and the Middle Eastern-influenced architecture and art of Venice. In
Venice and Perugia are guild halls from this period. Ruined medieval fortifications
dot the countryside across northern and central Italy.
THE RENAISSANCE (LATE 14TH TO LATE 16TH C.)
The Renaissance, meaning “rebirth,” signaled a second coming of the humanistic
focus of the Greco-Roman classical period, as Italian thinkers started to study the
works of that era. Michelangelo, da Vinci, Dante, Petrarch, and Galileo are just a
few of the famed figures of this period. The unofficial beginning of the
Renaissance might be 1401, with Giotto's famous carved doors of Florence's
Baptistery. Florence itself is practically synonymous with the Renaissance, the
entire city a living reminder of the art, architecture, and politics of the time.
Politically, the Renaissance was the time of the Medicis, a power-hungry fam-
ily of bankers and textile merchants based in Florence. The family first leveraged
their finances to control local, and then regional government, sponsoring and
banking politicians and their armies. Soon, the Medicis took direct control of the
city, essentially making themselves dictators, while installing their relatives as
popes (Leo X and Clement VII) to expand their control nationwide. Lorenzo
de'Medici (1449-92) is most tightly associated with the Renaissance, being a
patron of Michelangelo and a Renaissance man himself: He had a career in art,
politics, banking, hunting, and horsemanship.
As the era moved to the late 1500s, the Medicis, and others like them, tried to
carry on their family fortunes through hereditary rule, rather than through legit-
imate business or political skill. Power-grabbing battles between (and inside) cities
made them vulnerable to foreign invasion. When Charles V, King of Spain,
sacked Rome in 1527, it marked the beginning of the end of Italy's reign as the
economic, political, and cultural center of Europe.
SIGHTS Along with the Roman Era, the Renaissance is Italy's richest source for
sights. Florence is practically a one-stop shop, with the city chock-full of artworks,
buildings, and a spirit dating from the era, with the Uffizi Galleries,
Michelangelo's David in the Accademia, and Brunelleschi's dome on the
Cathedral. Rome's Sistine Chapel, da Vinci's Last Supper in Milan, and the
National Gallery in Perugia are also emblematic of the progression of the arts
through this period.
DARK AGES PART II, AKA THE COUNTER-
REFORMATION (1500-1850)
With the end of the reign of the powerful merchant families, the Roman Catholic
Church once again became the most powerful Italian political, social, and mili-
tary force. And as during the Church's first reign in the early Middle Ages, Italy
became a feudalistic, static region. The Church led the Counter-Reformation to
fight the Protestant movement and the teachings of Luther. While there were
some reforms introduced to reign in corrupt clergy, and the construction of a new
generation of churches, Italy suffered through the Inquisition, autocratic rule, and