istoryworld
Events relating to the renaissance
In keeping with his personal interest in Plato, Cosimo de' Medici founds a Platonic Academy in Florence
After his death in 1464, Cosimo de' Medici acquires the posthumous title pater patriae – father of the fatherland
The Sicilian artist Antonello da Messina adopts the Flemish technique of painting in oils
The first Italian printing press is set up in Venice, which soon rivals Germany for the quality of its printing
Sandro Botticelli is established as one of the leading painters of Florence, working in particular for the Medici
The new pope, Sixtus IV, secures his name in history, establishing the Sistine chapel and the Sistine choir
Leonardo da Vinci joins the painters' guild in Florence, probably after training with Verrocchio
Giovanni Bellini becomes the key figure in the development of the Renaissance style in Venice
Ptolemy's concept of the world, with the Atlantic stretching to China and India, is printed in Bologna – fifteen years before Columbus sails west
A plot by the Pazzi family, with papal connivance, results in the murder of Guiliano de' Medici during high mass in Florence's cathedral
Leonardo da Vinci takes a professional interest in the new science of fortification
Botticelli paints the Birth of Venus and Spring for the villa of a Medici cousin of Lorenzo the Magnificent
Boiardo publishes a romantic epic, Orlando Innamorato, about Roland's love for a bewitching princess
Leonardo da Vinci begins an unprecedented series of detailed anatomical drawings, based on corpses dissected in Rome
Savonarola, the new prior of San Marco, is a stern critic of both the pope in Rome and the Medici in Florence
Rodrigo Borgia, elected pope as Alexander VI, already has four illegitimate children and possibly sires three more while pope
Pope Alexander VI draws a line through the Atlantic, dividing new discoveries between Spain (west) and Portugal (east)
Charles VIII, king of France, marches through the Alps with an army of 30,000, to claim the throne of Naples
Piero de' Medici and his brothers flee from Florence, after a mob ransacks the Medici palace
Charles VIII captures Naples in February and is crowned there in May, but is forced back across the Alps before the end of the year
Dürer, the first great artist to tackle the complexities of printing, becomes a master of woodcut and engraving
The type faces known as roman and italic are created in Venice by the printers Nicolas Jenson and Aldus Manutius
Savonarola, in the carnival before Lent, urges the people of Florence to throw playing cards and lewd images on a great bonfire of vanities
The Florentine mob, weary of puritanism, attacks the convent of San Marco and drags Savonarola away to be hanged and burnt
24-year-old Michelangelo provides for St Peter's in Rome an exquisite Pietà – the Virgin holding on her lap the dead Christ
