Renaissance
1400 – 1600 ADThe recovery and surpassing of antiquity. Florentine painters mastered perspective, humanists recovered Greek manuscripts, and the printing press multiplied the reach of ideas. Shakespeare and Monteverdi mark the era's culmination — the invention of modern theater and opera.
Literature & Philosophy
Visual Arts & Architecture
Music & Performing Arts
1400–1500
VisualBrunelleschi1377 – 1446Dome of Florence CathedralVisualLorenzo Ghiberti1378 – 1455Gates of Paradise — Florence BaptisteryLiteratureThomas à Kempis~1380 – 1471Imitation of Christ — the most read Christian book after the BibleVisualDonatello1386 – 1466David, GattamelataVisualJan van Eyck~1390 – 1441Ghent Altarpiece, Arnolfini Portrait — oil painting perfectedVisualFra Angelico~1395 – 1455San Marco frescoes — the blessed painterVisualPaolo Uccello1397 – 1475Battle of San Romano — perspective obsessiveVisualMasaccio1401 – 1428Brancacci Chapel — painting's second founderVisualLeon Battista Alberti1404 – 1472De Pictura, Tempio Malatestiano — Renaissance polymathVisualFra Filippo Lippi~1406 – 1469Madonna and Child — the carnal friarVisualPiero della Francesca~1415 – 1492Legend of the True Cross — geometry and lightVisualGiovanni Bellini~1430 – 1516Venetian light — father of Venetian paintingVisualAndrea Mantegna1431 – 1506Camera degli Sposi, Dead ChristVisualVerrocchio1435 – 1488Colleoni monument — Leonardo's teacherVisualBotticelli1445 – 1510Birth of Venus, PrimaveraVisualLuca Signorelli~1445 – 1523Last Judgment — Orvieto CathedralVisualPerugino~1446 – 1523Delivery of the Keys — Raphael's teacherVisualDomenico Ghirlandaio1449 – 1494Tornabuoni Chapel — Michelangelo's teacherMusicJosquin des Prez~1450 – 1521Master of Renaissance polyphonyVisualHieronymus Bosch~1450 – 1516Garden of Earthly Delights — visionary nightmares
1500–1600
VisualLeonardo da Vinci1452 – 1519Last Supper, Mona LisaLiteratureErasmus1466 – 1536In Praise of FollyLiteratureMachiavelli1469 – 1527The PrinceVisualMatthias Grunewald~1470 – 1528Isenheim Altarpiece — agony and transfigurationVisualAlbrecht Durer1471 – 1528Melencolia I, self-portraits — Northern Renaissance masterVisualLucas Cranach the Elder1472 – 1553Luther's portraitist — German RenaissanceLiteratureLudovico Ariosto1474 – 1533Orlando Furioso — the great Italian romance epicVisualMichelangelo1475 – 1564Sistine Chapel, David, St Peter'sVisualGiorgione~1477 – 1510The Tempest — Venetian mood paintingVisualMatrakçı Nasuh~1480 – ~1564Topographic miniatures — polymath and painterVisualRaphael1483 – 1520School of AthensLiteratureFuzûlî~1483 – 1556Leylâ ve Mecnûn — greatest Ottoman poetVisualAndrea del Sarto1486 – 1530The faultless painterVisualTitian~1488 – 1576Venetian colorist masterVisualCorreggio~1489 – 1534Assumption of the Virgin — Parma's domeVisualMimar Sinan~1489 – 1588Süleymaniye, Selimiye — the Ottoman MichelangeloLiteratureFrancois Rabelais~1494 – 1553Gargantua and PantagruelVisualHans Holbein the Younger1497 – 1543The Ambassadors — Tudor court painterVisualBenvenuto Cellini1500 – 1571Perseus with the Head of Medusa — goldsmith and braggartMusicThomas Tallis1505 – 1585Spem in alium — English polyphonyVisualAndrea Palladio1508 – 1580Four Books of Architecture, Villa RotondaVisualTintoretto1518 – 1594Paradise, Scuola di San Rocco — Venetian furyMusicPalestrina1525 – 1594Missa Papae MarcelliVisualPieter Bruegel the Elder~1525 – 1569Hunters in the Snow, peasant scenes — the Flemish HomerLiteratureBâkî1526 – 1600Sultan of Poets — Ottoman classical verse at its heightVisualVeronese1528 – 1588Wedding at Cana — Venetian spectacleVisualGiambologna1529 – 1608Rape of the Sabines — Mannerist sculptureVisualNakkaş Osman~1530 – ~1592Süleymannâme illustrations — master of Ottoman miniatureMusicOrlando di Lasso1532 – 1594Penitential Psalms — cosmopolitan polyphonistLiteratureMontaigne1533 – 1592Essais — invention of the essayMusicWilliam Byrd1543 – 1623English keyboard and choral masterLiteratureTorquato Tasso1544 – 1595Gerusalemme Liberata — the Counter-Reformation epicMusicTomas Luis de Victoria1548 – 1611Officium Defunctorum — Spanish sacred polyphonyLiteratureEdmund Spenser1552 – 1599The Faerie Queene — England's national epicMusicJohn Dowland1563 – 1626Lachrimae — melancholy lute songsLiteratureShakespeare1564 – 1616Hamlet, King Lear, the sonnetsLiteratureChristopher Marlowe1564 – 1593Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine — the mighty lineMusicCarlo Gesualdo1566 – 1613Chromatic madrigals — prince and murdererMusicMonteverdi1567 – 1643L'Orfeo — birth of opera