I was recently asked what the Italian Renaissance was, and it occurred to me, something I hadn't thought of, is that usually, the term Renaissance tends to conjure up pictures of Elizabethan England. ::sheepish grin:: My bad. So, you wonder what the Italian Renaissance is, hm? Well, The Italian Renaissance was the Birth of the Renaissance (there were three: the Italian, the Northern, and the English). The Italian Renaissance started the whole thing rolling when around 1250 (1300 depending on who you ask) the Italians (usually scholars attribute this to Giotto and call his time the Proto Renaissance) began using perspective in their paintings to give a feel of more realism. Before, the icons were painted flat and not at all realistically, but after Giotto, perspective and "3-D" realism, form and color became of the utmost importance to the painters, sculptors and architects; churches and castles began to take on a more Classical shape; sculpture (after the discovery of an ancient Roman sculpture that the name escapes me at the moment) began to look less wooden and became more fluid; nudes began to be a favorite subject.

In letters, the poets Cicero and Plutarch were rediscovered and poets and thinkers began pondering the ancients right along side with their own religious studies.... Botticelli, Lorenzo de'Medici, Ficino and their circle were the biggest, most well-respected artists and thinkers of their day, usually refered to as simply the Italian Renaissance. It all culminated in Raphael, and Leonardo da Vinci who took it out from Florence into Milan and ... Spain, if I recall correctly, in the 1500s (the High Renaissance). And because of the influx of trade and monies and artists back and forth, the Italians influenced the Spaniards and the Germans (the ones that began the Northern Renaissance) and then from there, it spread out to England, a relative latecomer to the Renaissance. All the while, Italy was moving into the Baroque period, which was an elaboration on the discoveries in style and form born of the Renaissance.

And that, dear friends, the Italian Renaissance circa 1250-1550, is what I mean when I talk about the Renaissance, and it is this, and the Italian Baroque period (approx. 1550-1700), that most of my scholarly writing is concerned with. :o)