World History
Born the son of a lawyer in Florence in 1377, Filippo Brunelleschi rejected his father’s choice of a law career and trained as a goldsmith and sculptor. After six years of his apprenticeship he passed the exam and officially became a master in the goldsmith’s guild.
During his apprenticeship, he was a student of Polo Pozzo Toscandli, a merchant and medical doctor, who taught him the principles of mathematics and geometry and how to use the latest technology. Goldsmithing gave him the opportunity to work with clocks, wheels, gears, and weights, a skill that would come in handy for an architect destined to design his innovative dome of the cathedral in Florence.
In 1401–02, he entered a competition for the design of the new Florence Baptistery doors, but he was defeated by another goldsmith and sculptor, Lorenzo Ghiberti. This failure led him to architecture in addition to his artistic career.
In 1418 he entered another competition to design the dome of the Cathedral Maria del Fiore, (also known as the Duomo), in Florence. His design for the octagonal ribbed dome, not finished until 1434, is the work for which he is best known and one of his most important contributions to architecture and construction engineering. Brunelleschi designed special hoisting machines to raise the huge wood and stone elements into place.
He solved the problem of constructing a huge cupola (dome) without a supporting framework and invented a beltlike reinforcement of iron and sandstone chains to stabilize the outward thrusts at the base of the great dome. His innovative brick-laying techniques were refined in response to the requirements of the steep angles of the vaulting in the dome. It remains the largest masonry dome in the world.
In 1430 and again in 1432 Brunelleschi visited Rome with his friend, Donatello, where he became interested in Roman engineering, especially the use of vaulting and proportion. Influenced by Roman architecture, he used ancient principles in his projects, using Corinthian columns, geometrical balance, and symmetrical order.
Brunelleschi’s oeuvre includes the Ospedale degli Innocenti (Foundling Hospital, 1419–45), the reconstruction of San Lorenzo (1421–60), the Medici Chapel in San Lorenzo (1421), the New Sacristy at San Lorenzo (now known as the Old Sacristy; 1428), the Pazzi Chapel in the Cloisters of Santa Croce (1430), and Santo Spirito (1436).
These works renewed the appearance of Florence. His architectural works in other cities include the Ponte a Mare at Pisa, Palazzo di Parte Guelfa (1425), the unfinished Rotonda degli Angeli (1434), and the Pitti Palace (commissioned by Luca Pitti in 1440 when Brunelleschi was 60 years old) in Rome.
Brunelleschi’s design for the Ospedale degli Innocenti is mathematically based on repeated squares, and by a series of arches supported on columns—a motif later widely borrowed by renaissance architects. Brunelleschi often used the simplest materials: local gray stone (pietra serena) and whitewashed plaster.
The sober, muted colors give an air of peaceful tranquility to the walls of Brunelleschi’s buildings. Brunelleschi reintroduced the pendentive dome (developed long before by the Byzantines) in the Old Sacristy. The arched colonnade from the Ospedale degli Innocenti is again repeated inside the Church of San Lorenzo.
After his death in 1446, Brunelleschi was buried in Santa Maria del Fiore in a tomb that, though it lay unrecognized for centuries, was identified in 1972. There is also a commemorative statue of the architect in the Piazza del Duomo, facing the cathedral. He was a well-known and widely respected designer during his lifetime, and his fame continued long after his death.
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World History
Filippo Brunelleschi
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| Filippo Brunelleschi |
Born the son of a lawyer in Florence in 1377, Filippo Brunelleschi rejected his father’s choice of a law career and trained as a goldsmith and sculptor. After six years of his apprenticeship he passed the exam and officially became a master in the goldsmith’s guild.
During his apprenticeship, he was a student of Polo Pozzo Toscandli, a merchant and medical doctor, who taught him the principles of mathematics and geometry and how to use the latest technology. Goldsmithing gave him the opportunity to work with clocks, wheels, gears, and weights, a skill that would come in handy for an architect destined to design his innovative dome of the cathedral in Florence.
In 1401–02, he entered a competition for the design of the new Florence Baptistery doors, but he was defeated by another goldsmith and sculptor, Lorenzo Ghiberti. This failure led him to architecture in addition to his artistic career.
  |   |
In 1418 he entered another competition to design the dome of the Cathedral Maria del Fiore, (also known as the Duomo), in Florence. His design for the octagonal ribbed dome, not finished until 1434, is the work for which he is best known and one of his most important contributions to architecture and construction engineering. Brunelleschi designed special hoisting machines to raise the huge wood and stone elements into place.
He solved the problem of constructing a huge cupola (dome) without a supporting framework and invented a beltlike reinforcement of iron and sandstone chains to stabilize the outward thrusts at the base of the great dome. His innovative brick-laying techniques were refined in response to the requirements of the steep angles of the vaulting in the dome. It remains the largest masonry dome in the world.
In 1430 and again in 1432 Brunelleschi visited Rome with his friend, Donatello, where he became interested in Roman engineering, especially the use of vaulting and proportion. Influenced by Roman architecture, he used ancient principles in his projects, using Corinthian columns, geometrical balance, and symmetrical order.
 |
| the dome of the Cathedral Maria del Fiore |
Brunelleschi’s oeuvre includes the Ospedale degli Innocenti (Foundling Hospital, 1419–45), the reconstruction of San Lorenzo (1421–60), the Medici Chapel in San Lorenzo (1421), the New Sacristy at San Lorenzo (now known as the Old Sacristy; 1428), the Pazzi Chapel in the Cloisters of Santa Croce (1430), and Santo Spirito (1436).
These works renewed the appearance of Florence. His architectural works in other cities include the Ponte a Mare at Pisa, Palazzo di Parte Guelfa (1425), the unfinished Rotonda degli Angeli (1434), and the Pitti Palace (commissioned by Luca Pitti in 1440 when Brunelleschi was 60 years old) in Rome.
Brunelleschi’s design for the Ospedale degli Innocenti is mathematically based on repeated squares, and by a series of arches supported on columns—a motif later widely borrowed by renaissance architects. Brunelleschi often used the simplest materials: local gray stone (pietra serena) and whitewashed plaster.
The sober, muted colors give an air of peaceful tranquility to the walls of Brunelleschi’s buildings. Brunelleschi reintroduced the pendentive dome (developed long before by the Byzantines) in the Old Sacristy. The arched colonnade from the Ospedale degli Innocenti is again repeated inside the Church of San Lorenzo.
After his death in 1446, Brunelleschi was buried in Santa Maria del Fiore in a tomb that, though it lay unrecognized for centuries, was identified in 1972. There is also a commemorative statue of the architect in the Piazza del Duomo, facing the cathedral. He was a well-known and widely respected designer during his lifetime, and his fame continued long after his death.
- Donatello
Donatello Donato di Niccolode Bettto Bardi (Donatello) is one of the greatest and most famous Italian sculptors of the 15th century, whose work was greatly influenced by the early European Renaissance. He was born in Florence (or in its vicinities) between...
- Giotto Di Bondone
Giotto di Bondone The early life, artistic training, and attributed works of Giotto di Bondone (commonly referred to as Giotto) are all shrouded in mystery and legend. In his Lives, Vasari provided the first biography and chronicle of the works of Giotto....
- Medici Family
Medici FamilySalvestro de’ Medici, in the 14th century, was the first of the family to make a bid for political power when he led the revolt of the the small artisan class against the nobility who governed the city. Salvestro overbid his hand and...
- Abdul-menan Sinan - Ottoman Architect
Abdul-Menan SinanSinan was born in Kayseri in central Anatolia to a Greek Orthodox family. When he was in his early 20s, older than was customary, he was recruited in the devshirme levy to be educated in Istanbul. He was selected for the elite Janissaries...
- Historic Italy Through Google Street Views
Larry Ferlazzo has posted a webpage with what he thinks are the best social studies sites for 2012 so far. One of the sites is a Google (who would have guessed)site with a street view collection of images in Italy including the Appian Way, the baths...