Princes of the Renaissance: The Hidden Power Behind an Artistic Revolution

by Mary Hollingsworth

Overview

A vivid history of the lives and times of the aristocratic elite whose patronage created the art and architecture of the Italian Renaissance.

The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was an era of dramatic political, religious, and cultural change in the Italian peninsula, witnessing major innovations in the visual arts, literature, music, and science.

Princes of the Renaissance charts these developments in a sequence of eleven chapters, each of which is devoted to two or three princely characters with a cast of minor ones—from Federigo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino, to Cosimo I de' Medici, Duke of Florence, and from Isabella d'Este of Mantua to Lucrezia Borgia. Many of these princes were related by blood or marriage, creating a web of alliances that held Renaissance society together—but whose tensions could spark feuds that threatened to tear it apart.

A vivid depiction of the lives and times of the aristocratic elite whose patronage created the art and architecture of the Renaissance, Princes of the Renaissance is a narrative that is as rigorous and definitively researched as it is accessible and entertaining. Perhaps most importantly, Mary Hollingsworth sets the aesthetic achievements of these aristocratic patrons in the context of the volatile, ever-shifting politics of an age of change and innovation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781643135465
Publisher:	Pegasus Books
Publication date:	03/02/2021
Pages:	504
Sales rank:	1,059,311
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.60(d)

About the Author

Mary Hollingsworth is a scholar of the Italian Renaissance. She is the author of The Cardinal's Hat; The Borgias: History's Most Notorious Dynasty; and The Family Medici: The Hidden History of the Medici Dynasty. She divides her time between Italy and England.

Table of Contents

Ducats, Scudi & Florins: A Note on Money

Introduction: An Italian Identity 10

1 Usurpers: Alfonso of Aragon & Francesco Sforza 24

2 Knights and Humanists: Leonello d'Este & Sigismondo Malatesta 62

3 A Family Man: Ludovico Gonzaga & Barbara, of Brandenburg 92

4 Conspiracy and Greed: Ferrante I of Naples & Federigo da Montefeltro 130

5 Nest of Vipers: Ludovico Sforza, Ascanio Sforza & Giangaleazzo Sforza 170

6 Survivors: Isabella d'Este & Alfonso d'Este 208

7 A New Political Order: Francesco Maria delta Rovere & Federigo Gonzaga 258

8 The New Rome: Doge Andrea Gritti & his cronies 300

9 Dynasty: Paul III & the Farnese 344

10 Precedence and Reform: The Este & Cosimo de' Medici 380

11 Conclusion: Conquerors 416

Appendices: Genealogical trees, Tables, Maps 454

Bibliography and Sources 476

Notes 484

Image credits 501

Acknowledgements 502

Index 503

Editorial Reviews

11/02/2020

Historian Hollingsworth (The Cardinal’s Hat) offers a lively and well-organized group portrait of nobles who patronized the artists of the Italian Renaissance. Members of the Sforza, de Medici, d’Este, and Borgia dynasties make frequent appearances as Hollingsworth details the alliances they built and broke in order to maintain power. Often, their status depended on staying in the good graces of the pope and his own extensive network of relatives and allies. For example, Hollingsworth describes how cardinal Ascania Sforza’s help in getting Rodrigo Borgia elected as Pope Alexander VI in 1492 helped Sforza to survive a later accusation that he murdered the pontiff’s son, Juan Borgia. Hollingsworth also profiles military commander Sigismondo Malatesta and shows how aristocrat Leonello d’Este’s reformation of the University of Ferrara, beginning in 1442, foreshadowed the humanistic direction of the Renaissance. Throughout, Hollingsworth shares memorable details about the period’s art and architecture, noting, for example, that Leonardo da Vinci’s painting Lady with an Ermine immortalizes the mistress of his patron, the Duke of Milan. Extensive color photographs enhance and reinforce Hollingsworth’s vivid biographical sketches and astute synthesis of the era’s tumultuous politics. The result is an accessible and entertaining introduction to a groundbreaking period in world and art history. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

"Mary Hollingsworth’s Princes of the Renaissance is a revealing account of the city-state dynasties that created unimaginable wealth, cut-throat competitions, and lavish displays of patronage, resulting in some of the Western world’s most sublime art. A significant addition to Renaissance studies, and a delicious deep dive for those fascinated by the era."

Foreword Reviews

Vivid and well-researched. Hollingsworth's implication is correct and praiseworthy - that we should remember the Medici for what they were, not for what they wanted us to think they were.

Christian Science Monitor

Praise for Mary Hollingsworth’s The Family Medici:

From the Publisher

2020-10-03
A history of Renaissance Italy emphasizing the wealthy and powerful and the artists, scholars, and architects they patronized.

Italian Renaissance scholar Hollingsworth has written several books on this eventful era, and readers would be advised to read them and a few other general histories before tackling this lively but intensely detailed chronicle of that land in the two centuries after 1400. Even readers who recognize political names from this period—Borgia, Medici, Visconti, Sforza, D’Este—may be surprised to learn that each family may represent half a dozen individuals. Luckily, the pantheon of great artists, from da Vinci to Michelangelo, stand on their own, and the book includes beautiful illustrations of their works, with architecture enjoying equal billing as painting and sculpture. From the Middle Ages through unification in the 19th century, Italy consisted of a handful of medium-sized states (Venice, Milan, the Papal States, the Kingdom of Naples) and a bewildering collection of principalities and city-states, mostly in the north, whose leaders seemed preoccupied with cheating, fighting, and murdering each other, often joined by some highly pugnacious popes. “For the rulers of the minor states of northern Italy, survival in the ruthless world of Italian politics was a matter of luck and judgement,” writes the author. “Too small to rely on their own military strength to overcome the aggression of the major powers, they needed to develop more cunning strategies—not least shrewd diplomacy and fruitful family alliances—to outwit their enemies.” Hollingsworth astutely shows how, in an era before royalties, museums, and mass-market printing, artists either worked for the rich or starved. Fortunately, it was considered proper for an aristocrat to take an interest in cultural matters. Readers struggling to sort out who was who in interminable wars and intrigues will welcome the author’s frequent digressions into the lives and work of Renaissance Italy’s pantheon of brilliant artists.

Dense politics relieved by dazzling art.

Kirkus Reviews