Brahe, Sophie
(1556-1643) Danish astronomer The younger sister of Tycho brahe, Sophie was unable, as a woman, to enter university, but studied mathematics, music, astrology, medicine, and alchemy with tutors at home. She learned astronomy at her brother’s observatory on Hven, assisting him in the study of eclipses and translating Latin texts on astrology into Danish. After her arranged marriage to a much older man, she took up chemistry, biology, and horticulture, and designed her garden at Eriksholm, in Scania. Following her husband’s death she worked again with her brother, tracing the orbit of planets and their position relative to the stars. Her impecunious second husband brought debts upon the family, which she paid off by casting horoscopes and working as a herbalist and healer. Sophie’s contribution to astronomy is frequently subsumed within her brother’s groundbreaking work.
Brahe, Tycho
(1546-1601) Danish astronomer The first important observational astronomer of modern times, Brahe was born at Knudstrup, the son of a nobleman, and educated at Leipzig university. After a tour of Europe, in the course of which he lost the tip of his nose in a duel, Brahe returned to Denmark and established his international reputation with his observation in 1572 of the first ever new star to be recorded in the West. His report, De nova.. .stella (1573), was taken by many as proof of the inadequacy of the traditional Aristotelian cosmology. With the financial support of the Danish king, Frederick II (1534-88), Brahe began to build at Uraniborg on the island of Hven the finest observatory of his day. Using a nine-foot armillary sphere and a 14-foot mural quadrant, Brahe undertook a major survey of the heavens, often working in collaboration with his sister, Sophie (see brahe, sophie). Within a decade he had calculated the position of nearly 800 stars with an unparalleled accuracy. Whereas earlier astronomers had worked within a margin of error of 10′, Brahe reduced this to the 4′ recognized to be fairly close to the limits of naked-eye observation.
Although anxious to replace the unsatisfactory Prutenic Tables (see astronomy) with his own observations, Brahe proved to be the victim of his own imperious temperament. A quarrel with Frederick’s successor, Christian IV (1577-1648), led to a withdrawal of patronage and forced Brahe to abandon Hven (1596). After several years’ travel he settled finally in 1599 at the court of Emperor rudolf ii in Prague. Appointed imperial mathematician, he set up his new observatory at Benatek outside Prague where, with the assistance of the young kepler, he began to prepare his observations for publication. Although Brahe died long before the work could be completed, it was finally published in 1627 by Kepler as the Rudolfine Tables.
Tycho Brahe A portrait of the author in the posthumously published Astronomiae instauratae progymnasmata (1610), which was seen through the press by Johannes Kepler. The book contains a detailed description of the nova of 1572.
At a more theoretical level Brahe was led, following his observation of the nova of 1572, and the comet of 1577, to reject the crystalline spheres of classical cosmology. He did not, however, as might have been expected, embrace the heliocentric system of copernicus, but instead proposed in his De mundi aetherei recentioribus phaenominis (On recent phenomena of the aetherial world; 1588) his alternative tychonic system.
Bramante, Donato
(c. 1444-1514) Italian architect Born near Urbino, Bramante began his career as a painter, allegedly a pupil of piero della francesca and man-tegna who instilled in him an appreciation of classical antiquity as mirrored in the architecture of the Palazzo Ducale, Urbino. Little is known of him until 1497 when he entered the service of Duke Lodovico Sforza "il Moro" of Milan, who also patronized leonardo da vinci. Leonardo’s fascination with centrally planned forms and his understanding of brunelleschi’s concept of perspective profoundly influenced Bramante, whose design for Sta. Maria presso San Satiro, Milan (1482-86), displays an awareness of Brunelleschi’s Pazzi chapel in Florence (1429-69) in its oblong plan with niches carved out of the wall mass; the coffered dome is evidence of an impressive implementation of antique style and techniques. Bra-mante’s concern with harmonious spatial effects led him to create an illusionistic east end for this church—necessary because a street ran across the end of the building. His manipulation of real and illusionistic space also manifested itself in Sta. Maria delle Grazie, Milan, begun in 1493; there the fictive roundels of the dome and fake ped-imented windows in its base create an impression of clarity and light. The spatial solutions of the centrally planned east end reflect Leonardo’s handling of volume in the last supper in the refectory of the same church. The cloisters of Sant’ Ambrogio (1497-98) demonstrate Bramante’s increasing understanding of the classical language of orders. His use of basket capitals and tree-trunk columns in the Corinthian cloister shows a radical interpretation of vit-ruvius.
In 1499 Bramante moved to Rome. First-hand contact with Roman antique architecture introduced a new and weighty classicism to his designs. The cloister of Sta. Maria della Pace, begun in 1500, has sturdy piers and attached Ionic columns on the ground floor, deriving from the Colosseum. This air of majestic gravity reached its apogee in the Tempietto (1502) at San Pietro in Montorio, Rome. The small circular structure, erected as a mar-tyrium to St. Peter, is reminiscent of the temple of Sibyl at Tivoli, with its classical entablature carried on a Tuscan Doric colonnade and rich frieze of metopes and triglyphs. It is the first monument of the High Renaissance and established a prototype for 16th-century church design. Bra-mante’s Palazzo Caprini (1510, now destroyed) did the same for palace design in its symmetrical plan and repetitive use of simple but elegant elements.
Bramante’s last years were spent in the service of pope julius ii for whom he remodeled part of the Vatican palace. The Cortile di San Damaso was built as a series of open arcades and the Belvedere was linked to the palace by a classically inspired amphitheater on three levels. His most important project was that of st. peter’s, which, taking its cue from the Tempietto, was envisaged as a mar-tyrium on a heroic scale. His plan—a Greek cross with four smaller Greek crosses in the angles—was to have been crowned by a huge cupola reminiscent of the Pantheon. Although only the central crossing was built according to his plan, Bramante’s ideas were the starting point for all subsequent designs, and his work in Rome was the foundation of Roman High Renaissance architecture.
Brant, Sebastian (1457/8-1521)
German humanist and poet
Famed in his time both as a poet and as a legal authority, Brant is remembered now as a major influence on German literature. Born at Strasbourg, he was introduced to humanism at Basle university, where from 1475 he studied law and then taught it. In Basle he also practiced as a lawyer and selected and edited books for the city’s printers. In 1501 he returned to Strasbourg, where he became municipal secretary and co-founded a literary society. Throughout his life he corresponded with other eminent humanists. His wide-ranging interests expressed themselves in poetry (composed initially in Latin but increasingly in German), translations from Latin and medieval German, legal and historical works, and secular pamphlets and broadsheets. It was, however, his satirical poem Das Narrenschyff (1494; translated as The Ship of Fools) that proved most influential. It describes every imaginable type of fool, such as the complacent priest and deceitful cook, with the didactic aim of bringing the reader to recognize his own folly. An immediate popular success—not least because of its outstanding woodcuts—it went into numerous editions and was quickly translated into Latin, French, English, and Dutch. See illustration overleaf.
Sebastian Brant Ships laden with fools wearing jesters’ caps and armed with the tools of their trade adorn the opening page of the 1509 Latin translation of Das Narrenschyff.
Brantome, Pierre de Bourdeille, Abbe et Seigneur de
(c. 1540-1614) French chronicler, soldier, and courtier Brantome was born at Bourdeille (now Bourdeilles) and spent his early years at the court of marguerite de navarre. He then studied in Paris and at the university of Poitiers before embarking on a military career. He fought in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, in Africa against the Turks, and supported the guise faction in the Wars of religion. Forced to retire through injury, after falling from his horse, he began to write his memoirs: these were published posthumously (1665-66) and include Les Vies des hommes illustres et des grands capitaines, an informative account of military life in the 16th century, Les Vies des dames galantes, an anecdotal expose of the scandals of the French court, and Discours sur les duels.
Breda, Compromise of (1566) A petition by Dutch noblemen and burghers to the Hapsburg regent, margaret of parma, against the attempts of philip ii of Spain to force
Catholicism on the Netherlands. The scornful rejection of the petitioners as "beggars" and Philip’s refusal to modify his religious policy were followed by an uprising (see netherlands, revolt of the).
Bregno, Andrea (Andrea da Milano)
(1421-1506) Italian sculptor
He was born at Osteno, near Lugano, and was active in Rome from 1465, producing monumental decorative sculptures, tombs, and altars in marble. Gian Cristoforo romano was one of the pupils in this thriving workshop. In Rome he is principally noted for his work in Sta. Maria del Popolo, while outside Rome he made the Piccolomini altar in Siena cathedral (1485), which has statues of saints by Michelangelo, and the tabernacle in Sta. Maria della Quercia outside Viterbo (1490).
Briggs, Henry
(1561-1631) English mathematician Born at Warley Wood, near Halifax, and educated at Cambridge, Briggs served as professor of geometry at Gresham College, London (1596-1619), and as Savilian professor of geometry at Oxford from 1620 until his death. In 1615 he visited John napier, the inventor of logarithms, and they agreed to develop a system of decimal logarithms in which log. 1 = 0, and log. 10 = 1. Napier, however, was too old to undertake the prolonged labours involved in constructing the necessary tables, so the task fell to Briggs. In 1617 he published his Logarithmorum chilias prima in which the logarithms of the numbers 1 to 1000 were listed to 14 decimal places. The tables were extended in his Arithmetica logarithmica (1624) to include the numbers up to 20,000 and from 90,000 to 100,000. The gap between 20,000 and 90,000 was filled by Adrien Vlacq (1600-66) in 1628. Briggs was also keen to see science applied in other areas. Consequently he worked with, among others, William gilbert on magnetism, merchants on the application of mathematics to navigation, and surveyors wishing to master the use of logarithms.
Briot, Francois
(c. 1550-1616) French metalworker Briot was born in Damblain, but was active from 1579 in Montbeliard, in the county of Wurttemberg. He was celebrated as a master of pewter relief work, especially for his masterpiece, the Temperantia Dish (1585-90; Louvre, Paris), with its central allegorical figure of Temperance. Other works included the Mars Dish and, probably, the Suzannah Dish both of which were later imitated by Gas-par enderlein and other notable metalworkers at Nuremberg.
Brito, Bernardo de
(1568-1617) Portuguese Cistercian monk and historian, born at Almeida
His magnum opus on Portuguese history, Monarchia Lusi-tania (two parts, 1597, 1609) begins with the creation of Adam and includes more fabulous material than sober historical data. Despite its shortcomings it was continued by four other hands. His Primeira parte da Chronica de Cister appeared in 1602.
Bronzino, Il (Agnolo Allori di Cosimo di Mariano)
(1503-1572) Italian painter
Born at Monticelli, near Florence, he was the pupil and adopted son of pontormo, whom he assisted in a number of works that included the decorations, now destroyed, in the chapel of San Lorenzo, Florence. Bronzino’s first paintings are in the early mannerist style of Pontormo but they quickly developed away from the sensitivity of Pontormo towards the cold, courtly, artificial, and technically superb style of portraiture for which Bronzino is best known. As court painter to cosimo i de’ medici, he undertook portraits of the Medici and of eminent figures from the past like boccaccio, dante, and petrarch. The sitters appeared stiff, elegant, and reserved, set apart from the rest of humanity. Fine rich colors were used and, unlike most portraits of the day, dark forms were set against a light background. The development of European court portraiture was strongly influenced by these works. Bronzino also produced rather feelingless religious paintings, whose grandeur of design reflects his study of Michelangelo, and equally cold allegorical works such as Venus, Cupid, Folly, and Time (1546; National Gallery, London). Mannerist figure elongation is evident in both these categories (see mannerism). He also wrote poetry.
Brownism
A separatist movement within the Church of England, out of which the Independent or Congregation-alist churches developed. Robert Browne (c. 1550-1633) maintained that local gathered churches should reform their doctrines and practices without waiting for authority from the civil power. He established congregations at Norwich and elsewhere but on suffering harassment from the Church authorities, he and some of his disciples moved (1581) to Middelburg in the Netherlands. Browne soon returned and submitted to the Anglican authorities in the late 1580s; he was ordained in 1591 and from then until his death held the living of Achurch, Northamptonshire. In 1593 some of his principal followers were hanged. Later many emigrated to America; others became the predominant element in Oliver Cromwell’s army.
Brueghel, Jan ("Velvet" Brueghel or Breughel)
(15681625) Netherlands painter
Born in Brussels, Jan lost his famous father, Pieter, when he was only one year old. He received his initial training from his grandmother, Maria Bessemers, a miniaturist. Between 1590 and 1595 he was in Naples, Rome, and Milan under the patronage of Cardinal Federico Borromeo. In 1596 he returned to Antwerp where, a year later, he entered the artists’ guild, of which he became dean (1602). In 1604 he visited Prague and in 1606 Nuremberg. Appointed court artist to Archduke Albert of Austria at Brussels in 1609, he also worked for Emperor rudolf ii and King Sigismund of Poland. His collaborators included rubens, Frans Francken II, Hans Rottenhammer, and Joos de Momper; the Flemish flower painter Daniel Seghers was his pupil. Breughel was famous for his brightly colored historical subjects, filled with tiny figures, and for his landscapes and flower paintings.
Brueghel, Pieter (Pieter Bruegel or Breughel)
(c. 15251569) Netherlands painter and print designer Brueghel was possibly born near Breda and apparently trained in Brussels under Pieter coecke van aelst, whose daughter he married. After Coecke’s death, he visited Rome (1552-53), where he became acquainted with the miniaturist Giulio clovio. From Rome he returned to Antwerp, where he remained until 1563; he then moved to Brussels, where he subsequently died.
As a young artist, Brueghel was principally a designer of prints for the engraver and publisher Hieronymus Cock in Antwerp. Such famous works as the Big Fish Eat Little Fish, published in 1557, and the cycles of the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Virtues reveal a perceptive study of the paintings of Hieronymus bosch, whose work remained internationally famous decades after his death. The moralizing subject matter of Brueghel’s early designs for engravings conditioned the outlook of much of his subsequent painting. For example, the Fall of Icarus (c. 1555; Brussels) is essentially a condemnation of pride. In the Berlin Netherlandish Proverbs (1559), sometimes misunderstood as a compendium of folk customs, mankind’s foolishness is expressed through illustrations of popular sayings. The Combat Between Carnival and Lent (also 1559; Vienna) is an ironic condemnation of the hypocrisy of both Protestants and Catholics, which inclines only slightly towards the latter, the artist’s own coreligionists. An extremely important illustration of intellectual attitudes towards the religious strife in the Netherlands on the eve of the Dutch revolt, this painting reflects Brueghel’s connections with the liberal humanistic circle of the geographer Abraham ortelius. References to the uneasy political situation in the Netherlands have also been divined in his Road to Calvary (1564; Vienna) and his John the Baptist Preaching in the Wilderness (1566; Budapest). There is a resurgence of Bosch’s influence in
Pieter Brueghel The Beekeepers, one of Brueghel’s many scenes of rural peasant life, engraved in the 1560s.
Brueghel’s paintings of 1562: the Brussels Fall of the Rebel Angels, the Antwerp Dulle Griet, and the Madrid Triumph of Death. However, naturalism reigns supreme in the five paintings of the Months, dated 1565 and currently divided between Vienna, Prague, and New York. Although the subject matter of these works derives from 15th-century manuscript illuminations, they are fundamentally innovatory as depictions not only of seasons but also of specific effects of weather.
For most of his career Brueghel was primarily concerned with the depiction of landscapes peopled with multitudes of tiny figures. Larger figures predominate in his Peasant Dance and Peasant Wedding (1566-67; Vienna). This development culminates in the Vienna Parable of the Bird’s Nest, executed the year before his death. Brueghel was certainly the most accomplished landscape painter of the 16th century. On account of his penchant for peasant scenes, he is often considered as the originator of the genre scene popularized by 17th-century Dutch artists. However, the thrust of Brueghel’s own peasant paintings was directed principally at questions of morality and the human condition. Historically, he may be considered as the artist who concluded the great chapter of northern painting initiated more than a century earlier by Jan van eyck.
