Historians conventionally view intellectual and artistic achievement as a seamless progression in a single direction. William J. Bouwsma rethinks the accepted view, arguing that while the Renaissance had a beginning and a climax, it also had an ending. View More...
In 1508, despite strong advice to the contrary, the powerful Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo Buonarroti to paint the ceiling of the newly restored Sistine Chapel in Rome. Four years earlier, at the age of twenty-nine, Michelangelo had unveiled his masterful statue of David in Florence; however, he had little experience as a painter, even less working in the delicate medium of fresco, and none with the curved surface of vaults, which dominated the chapel's ceiling. The temperamental Michelangelo was himself reluctant, and he stormed away from Rome, risking Julius's wrath, only to be pe... View More...
In two volumes, the Renaissance and Reformation Movements presents the panoramic history of the politico-ecclesiastical, intellectual, and cultural life of the two centuries preceding the 16th-century Reformation. This is volume 1. View More...
