The Rise of Rome and the De Medici Family
The Medici family unit is one of the most powerful and influential groups in European history. They innovated new banking systems and laid the groundwork to make Florence a cultural hotspot. Through their political strategy and patronage of major artists similar Michelangelo, they created the High Renaissance. Such an extended family unit has a lot to talk about. Below are five highlights that outline the influence of the Medici family unit over hundreds of years.
i. The Medici Family unit Influence Lasted 500 Years, Producing Popes, Queens, And Artists
Italy wasn't a unified nation when the Medici family's power began. It was organized into city-states, contrary to surrounding nation-states like France. Some of these states were Siena, Venice, Naples, and Florence ; the terminal of which is where the Medicis took agree.
The peak of their power lasted from 1434 to 1737, and produced figures who would extend their influence outside of Florence. These include four popes: Leo X, Clement Vii, Pius Four, and Leo 11. Likewise as two queens of France: Catherine de' Medici and Marie de' Medici.
How Did They Rise To Power?
The short respond is that they formed the largest bank in Europe in the 15th century, from 1397 to 1494.
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Cosimo the Elderberry (1389-1464) established the Medici banking concern in Florence. He expanded it into other urban center-states, including Geneva, Venice, and Rome, where the Papal States would begin to piece of work with his business concern. In his lifetime, he would eventually go on to plant branches in foreign cities similar London, Bruges, and Lübeck. These branches made it easy for the Papacy to club appurtenances across Europe, and for bishoprics to pay fees from afar.
Location is just 1 part of what fabricated their bank prestigious. The Medici bank also developed some of the fiscal tools we still use today. They introduced Double Entry Bookkeeping, or the exercise of recording a payer's debits and credits in ane log. This fabricated it easier and more authentic to calculate one's net worth.
Additionally, it was unsafe to transport large sums of coin payments across the continent to pay for foreign goods in this era. The Medici Bank fixed this by inventing Messages of Credit. In practice, this could expect similar an Englishman paying a London Medici Banking concern in pounds for an art piece from Florence. The Florentine bank would then produce a Letter of Credit to the creative person as proof of future payment. Then, the creative person tin deliver the work, and take his payout of the bank in his own currency.
These achievements eventually helped the Medici family become the wealthiest in Europe.
2. Their Art Patronage Earned Them The Nickname "Godfathers of the Renaissance"
What practise the Sistine Chapel, the Duomo of Florence, and St. Peter's Basilica all have in common? The Medici family helped develop all of them. Through a mixture of peace-harvesting policies, patronage, and sometimes personal relationships, they created an atmosphere for artists like Michelangelo to create masterpieces.
They Set A Peaceful State For Art To Flourish
Betwixt Florence, Milan, Naples, and Rome, Florence was not the well-nigh militarily powerful nation. This made it vulnerable to conquering in a menses when Italian city-states would fight for power between each other. However, the Medici family were likewise astounding diplomats.
Cosimo the Elder believed state of war was bad for trade and negotiated the terminate to a series of wars in Lombardy. This helped plant a mutual territory understanding between the states.
His successor, Lorenzo de' Medici (1449-1492) ardently continued to keep the Treaty of Lodi live , the document which Naples, Milan, and Florence signed to continue their peace. Lorenzo besides earned the love of Florentine citizens by doing acts such as freeing and clothing galley slaves.
In fact, Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510) is said to have made the piece Pallas and the Centaur for him. Pallas Athena is the Goddess of Knowledge and wisdom, while the centaur represents humanity'south ferality. Lorenzo the Magnificent knew how to negotiate with Naples, even if Naples had a large army that could trounce the Florentine's. Even so, Lorenzo kept Florence contained and safe- Making Lorenzo Athena, and Naples the centaur.
On top of existence a powerful political figure, he was i of the greatest Medici patrons. He funded several major artists, including Botticelli and Michelangelo.
Lorenzo De' Medici Allowed Michelangelo To Alive With Him Similar His Own Son
Lorenzo met Michelangelo when he was a immature teenager studying at the University of San Marco. Co-ordinate to Ascanio Condivi'due south 1533 biography of Michelangelo, Lorenzo found him carving an ancient fawn stone head. He praised the young artist'south skill simply also teased him past pointing out an error: that an old fawn would not have a full set of healthy teeth. Then Michelangelo knocked off a few teeth and showed Lorenzo the slice once again.
This mixture of quick skill and talent charmed Lorenzo, so he invited the immature creative person to live in his palace from 1490 to 1492. In that location, Michelangelo studied nether the bang-up Renaissance artist Donatello . He lived alongside Lorenzo'south sons, the future Pope Leo X and Pope Clement VII, who would committee his work for their Papal States in the futurity. So, when Lorenzo the Magnificent died in 1492, Michelangelo's human relationship with the family endured.
In 1508, Pope Julius Two, a non-Medici, commissioned Michelangelo to pigment the upper walls of the Sistine Chapel . There was a pause of 25 years earlier Michelangelo would touch information technology once more. When Pope Clement VII came into ability, he brought Michelangelo dorsum to the altar by asking him to pigment The Final Judgment.
Donatello Made Statues Symbolic Of Medici Values
Cosimo the Elder deputed Donatello'due south most famous piece, the statuary David. He intended to place information technology in the Palazzo Medici courtyard in Florence. This was a major piece because it was the get-go freestanding bronze cast statue of the Renaissance era . Information technology was also the commencement nude male person statue in the expanse since those of Aboriginal Greece.
Donatello created Judith and Holofernes for the garden fountain of the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, as well. Information technology stood alongside the bronze David in front of Cosimo the Elder'southward family palace in 1457.
Both David and Judith's stories in the Bible are symbolic of underdogs overthrowing tyranny. As well, Florence viewed itself equally tyrant slayers , standing powerful against their neighboring city states. Donatello finer captured the core values of Florence and the Medici family unit through his work.
Leonardo Da Vinci Studied In Their Network
Leonardo da Vinci didn't have as stiff a patronage by the Medici family as other artists, but he did begin his education through their network.
Equally a teenager, he became an apprentice of Andrea del Verrocchio . Verrocchio was a sculptor and painter who created tombs for Cosimo, Giovanni, and Piero de' Medici from the 1460s-70s. Nether him, da Vinci learned about painting, sculpture, engineering, and metalwork. He stayed working with Verrocchio for a decade.
Despite this, Lorenzo de' Medici did not include him on a list of great painters for the Pope to hire in 1481
In a diary entry from 1515, da Vinci wrote ,
" Li medici mi crearono e distrussono."
This translates to "the Medici [or physicians] created me so destroyed me."
Scholars are unsure if he meant to reference the Medici family, or physicians [the literal translation of medici]. da Vinci was known to be critical of physician careers, only its meaning remains a marvel.
Raphael Worked In The Vatican
Pope Leo X was Raphael'south greatest commissioner. He hired him to exercise a gear up of ten tapestries intended for the lower walls of the Sistine Chapel. They illustrated the Acts of the Apostles, and can now be seen in the Pinacoteca Vaticana in Rome.
Before Leo 10, Pope Julius II assigned him to paint some of his most famous frescoes, including School of Athens and Disputation of the Holy Sacrament. Merely after Julius 2'due south decease, Leo 10 continued to fund his piece of work for the Papal rooms. Leonardo had painted a piece called The Meeting of Leo the Great and Attila, based on Pope Leo I's meeting with Attila the Hun in 452 Ad. He later changed Pope Leo I's confront to resemble that of Leo 10 instead.
Patronage In Architecture: Edifice The Uffizi, Il Duomo, And More
The Medici family helped form the Uffizi Gallery, St. Peter'southward Basilica, and the Florence Cathedral.
Cosimo I de' Medici, First Duke of Tuscany (1519-1574), originally formed the Uffizi to be an administrative building for his family unit. The word Uffizi in fact meant offices. It opened to the public as an fine art gallery in 1765, shortly after the last fellow member of the Medici family died. Today, it houses The Nativity of Venus by Sandro Botticelli, and Laocoön and his Sons past Baccio Bandinelli.
Pope Leo X too commissioned the completion of St. Peter'due south Basilica. Martin Luther, the leader of the Protestant Reformation, attacked his funding of this slice as an example of the Papacy's greed. In his 95 Thesis, the document which began the Reformation, he wrote " why doesn't the Pope build the basilica of St Peter's out of his own money?"
Cosimo the Elder commissioned the Duomo in the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore (the Florence Cathedral). There were many pauses since the cathedral began structure in 1296, and no dome yet. Architects wanted to build it without Gothic buttresses, but this was a technical challenge. There was a competition to see who could plan it, and Filippo Brunelleschi won.
Brunelleschi believed he could build the dome without scaffolding, simply many nonetheless doubted his abilities. The Medici family, nevertheless, believed him enough to fund this work. Today, Brunelleschi's dome stands at 375.7 anxiety tall, making information technology one of the tallest domes in the earth.
3. Fifty-fifty the Enemies and Conspiracies Confronting Them Inspired Fascinating Work
The Pazzi Conspiracy was a plot betwixt Francesco de Pazzi and the Papacy to overthrow Medici ability.
On Apr 26th, 1478, the Cathedral of Florence held a public mass with an audition of 10,000 people. Among the crowd were Lorenzo the Magnificent and his brother Giuliano de' Medici. A group of men interrupted the mass, attacking the duo with knives. Giuliano de' Medici was stabbed to death, but Lorenzo de' Medici managed to the church sacristy with only wounds.
Seeing their beloved Lorenzo the Magnificent attacked, the Florentine citizens took matters into their ain hands. They captured conspirator Jacopo de' Pazzi, threw him out a window, and so dragged him to the Arno River. Salviati, a co-conspirator who was also an archbishop of Pisa, was hanged outside the Palazzo Vecchio.
Ultimately, the attempt failed, and the Medici family unit threw remaining Pazzi members out of Florence. The outcome simply strengthened command of their city and was commemorated in art by Stefano Ussi and Tancredi Scarpelli.
Michelangelo'south David: A Rebellion Against The Medici Family?
The statue of David was originally deputed by the Arte Della Llane in 1501 to be placed in the Cathedral of Florence . The Medici family had been in exile since 1494 due to political losses and would return afterwards in 1512.
The government that replaced the Medicis was firmly anti-Medici. David, the biblical figure who defeated a giant with only a stone, was the perfect symbol for an unstable Florence. Not simply was Florence surrounded by city-states who always threatened its ability, merely now, also past the Medicis, who some saw every bit tyrants.
In 1504, the regime decided to identify David in the city'southward town hall instead. They oriented David's optics to point to Rome, where the Medicis were in exile. Considering that it was originally intended for a Cathedral, it's unlikely that Michelangelo intended for it to be political. This is especially because the Medici's assistance in his ain artistic development.
Fifty-fifty when a High Renaissance piece was spurred against the Medici family, information technology was still ultimately nearly them. David'south perfect Renaissance contrapposto and affiliation makes him ane of the greatest Renaissance highlights today.
Machiavelli Wrote The Prince To Get On Their Good Side
The Medici family was exiled from 1494 to 1513, when Piero de' Medici surrendered control to France. Meanwhile, Machiavelli was a prominent political theorist and diplomat. In the vacuum of the Medici, he formed a network with Anti-Medici government figures.
The Medici family returned to power in 1513 , and organized a listing of conspirators who would likely plot to overthrow them. Machiavelli's name was on the listing, so they imprisoned, tortured, and exiled him. However, there wasn't enough evidence of his straight involvement for them to execute him, so Pope Leo 10 immune them to remain in exile.
Machiavelli dedicated The Prince to the next Medici ruler of Florence as a guide on how to capture and keep control of a land. He did this to get a position within the Medici court, but it failed. Just in 1520 did he re-enter public life, when Central Giulio de' Medici deputed him to write a history of Florence.
4. They Stimulated Science, Music, And Style
Galileo Galilei was the tutor to Cosimo I de' Medici, grand duke of Tuscany. In 1610, he published The Starry Messenger, where he described recent discoveries he made through a telescope. In it, he noted that Jupiter had moons, naming them the "Medicean stars."
In music, Bartolomeo Cristofori was the first to invent the piano while working in Fernando de' Medici's court. The Renaissance also saw the nascence of operas in the late 1500s. The Medicis provided financial support for major opera houses like the Pergola theater.
Catherine de' Medici married King Henry II of France. She was a short woman and wanted to appear taller before meeting the French courtroom. And so she commissioned a pair of high heel shoes , turning them into symbols of wealth and status. This was remarkable in a time where high heels were reserved for butchers who didn't desire to get blood on their feet. She helped to ameliorate and popularize the horse side saddle , so women could ride without exposing themselves.
5. The Last Of The Medici Family unit Secured Her Treasures In Florence
The last K Knuckles of Tuscany, Gian Gastone de' Medici, died in 1737 with no sons. Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici was the only member of the family left and didn't take any children. With no one to continue their lineage, she knew that the power of Tuscany would go to Francis of Lorraine.
Anna Maria accepted that all the art, books, maps, and houses her family-endemic would be transferred to them. All the same, she created a Family Pact, declaring that these treasures should not get out Florence. She detailed ,
"That these things being for the ornament of the state, for the benefit of the people and for an inducement to the curiosity of foreigners, zero shall exist alienated or taken away from the capital or from the territories of the Chiliad Duchy."
The next leaders followed her wishes. Anna Maria essentially succeeded at keeping Florence the capital of everything the Medicis created. Florence continues to see about sixteen million tourists a year, who come to run into what this fascinating family built.
Source: https://www.thecollector.com/the-medici-family-legacy/
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