Buon Giorno, Leonardo... Buona Sera, Botticelli... | florence baptistry and duomo |
It was so exciting and touching, to me, to find out how Florence retains such strong resemblance to the small late-medieval centre it once was and that contributed so much to the cultural and political development of Europe.
I don't know whether this is insane of me or not (!?!), but what I most felt about Florence was as if time had stood still and I was able to see it the same way Dante, Leonardo, Galilleo and so many others saw it...
You look at the city skyline from the distance and the feeling goes stronger yet.
Yes, I was insane enough to almost succed in abstracting the crowds, the scooters and the scaffoldings-everywhere-you-look...
It was difficult to me not to be emotional about the place...
Just remembering that...thanks to Dante, the Italian language was born; with Petrarch and Boccaccio literary studies were affirmed; with Humanism the philosophy and values of classical civilization were revived; with Machiavelli modern political science was born; and with Galileo, modern experimental science.
So, is it or not kind of a privillege to put our feet on the same paths those few listed below once wandered around??
Giovanni Cimabue (artist, 1240-1302),
Dante Alighieri (poet, 1265-1321), Giovanni Boccaccio (poet, 1313-1375),
Filippo Brunelleschi (architect, 1377-1446),
Lorenzo Ghiberti (sculptor, 1378-1455),
Donato dei Bardi, called 'il Donatello' (sculptor, 1386-1466), Luca della Robbia (sculptor, 1400-1482),
Filippo Lippi (artist, 1406-1469), Antonio Pollaiolo (sculptor, 1432-1498),
Alessandro Filipepi called 'il Botticelli' (artist, 1445-1510), Domenico Bigordi
called 'Ghirlandaio' (artist, 1449-1494),
Lorenzo the Magnificent (the most famous of the Medicis, 1449-1492),
Leonardo da Vinci (artist, 1452-1519),
Amerigo Vespucci (explorer who gave the name to the continent of America, 1454-1512),
Michelangelo Buonarroti (artist, 1475-1564),
Francesco Guicciardini (historian, 1483-1540),
Andrea del Sarto (artist, 1486-1530),
Niccol? Machiavelli (politician and historian, 1489-1527),
Benvenuto Cellini (goldsmith, 1500-1571).
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