Copyright © Peter Burke 1986, 1999, 2014
First edition 1972 by Batsford, UK. Scribner, US. Paperback edition published by Collins Fontana 1974. Revised edition first published 1987 by Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd. Reprinted in 1988, 1991, 1993, 1994
Revised second edition first published 1999.
Reprinted in 2000, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010.
This revised third edition first published 2014.
Polity Press
65 Bridge Street
Cambridge CB2 1UR, UK
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
ISBN 978-0-7456-7967-9
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Image nos. 1–5, 8, 11–12, 16–22, 24–6, 29–32, 34–6 Wikimedia Commons; 6–7 by permission of Cambridge University Library; 9, Musei Vaticani; 10, Fabbrica di San Pietro in Vaticano; 13, Photgraph by James Austin; 14, St Bernard preaching, by Francesco di Giorgio e di Lorenzo known as the Elder (Vecchietta) (ca 1412–1480), Detail / De Agostini Picture Library / The Bridgeman Art Library; 15, Galleria Estense, Modena; 23, Musee Jacquemart-Andre, Paris (Photographie Bulloz); 27, Two studies of a man suspended by his left leg (red chalk on cream paper), Sarto, Andrea del (1486–1530) / Chatsworth House, Derbyshire, UK / © Devonshire Collection, Chatsworth / Reproduced by permission of Chatsworth Settlement Trustees / The Bridgeman Art Library; 28 & 33, Getty Images.
For more information about polity please go to our website, www.politybooks.com
Part I
T HE P ROBLEM
Part II
T HE A RTS IN T HEIR M ILIEU
Part III
T HE W IDER S OCIETY
A PPENDIX : T HE C REATIVE E LITE
The six hundred painters, sculptors, architects, writers, humanists, scientists and musicians whose lives form the basis of chapter 3 , in particular, were selected as follows:
1 314 painters and sculptors from the article on Italian Art in the Encyclopaedia of World Art (organized by region, this list seemed to counter the Tuscan bias of Vasari).
2 88 writers from E. H. Wilkins, A History of Italian Literature (Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard University Press, 1954).
3 74 humanists from E. Garin, Italian Humanism (Eng. trans., Oxford: Blackwell, 1965).
4 55 ‘scientists’ from R. Taton (ed.), A General History of the Sciences , vol. 2 (London: Thames & Hudson, 1965), revised with the help of Professor Marshall Clagett.
5 50 musicians selected from G. Reese, Music in the Renaissance (New York and London: W. W. Norton, 1959).
6 19 writers and humanists not in Wilkins or Garin, added to round the number up to 600 and chosen because I thought them important: J. Aconcio, G. B. Adriani, Aldo Manuzio, G. Aurispa, F. Barbaro, G. Barzizza, G. Benivieni, F. Beroaldo, B. Bibbiena, A. Bonfini, V. Calmeta, J. Caviceo, B. Corio, L. Domenichi, F. Nerli, B. Rucellai, M. A. Sabellico, B. della Scala and B. Segni.
The complete list can be found in the index to this book, with asterisks against the names.
Such a list is inevitably arbitrary, at least at the edges. Contemporaries, however much in sympathy with the idea of a collection of biographies, might have found the criterion of selection, ‘creativity’, hard to understand, and the learned would have expected to find canon lawyers or theologians rather than artists. The object of the exercise was to
First edition 1972 by Batsford, UK. Scribner, US. Paperback edition published by Collins Fontana 1974. Revised edition first published 1987 by Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd. Reprinted in 1988, 1991, 1993, 1994
Revised second edition first published 1999.
Reprinted in 2000, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010.
This revised third edition first published 2014.
Polity Press
65 Bridge Street
Cambridge CB2 1UR, UK
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
ISBN 978-0-7456-7967-9
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Image nos. 1–5, 8, 11–12, 16–22, 24–6, 29–32, 34–6 Wikimedia Commons; 6–7 by permission of Cambridge University Library; 9, Musei Vaticani; 10, Fabbrica di San Pietro in Vaticano; 13, Photgraph by James Austin; 14, St Bernard preaching, by Francesco di Giorgio e di Lorenzo known as the Elder (Vecchietta) (ca 1412–1480), Detail / De Agostini Picture Library / The Bridgeman Art Library; 15, Galleria Estense, Modena; 23, Musee Jacquemart-Andre, Paris (Photographie Bulloz); 27, Two studies of a man suspended by his left leg (red chalk on cream paper), Sarto, Andrea del (1486–1530) / Chatsworth House, Derbyshire, UK / © Devonshire Collection, Chatsworth / Reproduced by permission of Chatsworth Settlement Trustees / The Bridgeman Art Library; 28 & 33, Getty Images.
For more information about polity please go to our website, www.politybooks.com
Part I
T HE P ROBLEM
Part II
T HE A RTS IN T HEIR M ILIEU
Part III
T HE W IDER S OCIETY
A PPENDIX : T HE C REATIVE E LITE
The six hundred painters, sculptors, architects, writers, humanists, scientists and musicians whose lives form the basis of chapter 3 , in particular, were selected as follows:
1 314 painters and sculptors from the article on Italian Art in the Encyclopaedia of World Art (organized by region, this list seemed to counter the Tuscan bias of Vasari).
2 88 writers from E. H. Wilkins, A History of Italian Literature (Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard University Press, 1954).
3 74 humanists from E. Garin, Italian Humanism (Eng. trans., Oxford: Blackwell, 1965).
4 55 ‘scientists’ from R. Taton (ed.), A General History of the Sciences , vol. 2 (London: Thames & Hudson, 1965), revised with the help of Professor Marshall Clagett.
5 50 musicians selected from G. Reese, Music in the Renaissance (New York and London: W. W. Norton, 1959).
6 19 writers and humanists not in Wilkins or Garin, added to round the number up to 600 and chosen because I thought them important: J. Aconcio, G. B. Adriani, Aldo Manuzio, G. Aurispa, F. Barbaro, G. Barzizza, G. Benivieni, F. Beroaldo, B. Bibbiena, A. Bonfini, V. Calmeta, J. Caviceo, B. Corio, L. Domenichi, F. Nerli, B. Rucellai, M. A. Sabellico, B. della Scala and B. Segni.
The complete list can be found in the index to this book, with asterisks against the names.
Such a list is inevitably arbitrary, at least at the edges. Contemporaries, however much in sympathy with the idea of a collection of biographies, might have found the criterion of selection, ‘creativity’, hard to understand, and the learned would have expected to find canon lawyers or theologians rather than artists. The object of the exercise was to
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