Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/655

 THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE 599 were original geniuses. Their versatility is also noteworthy ; many were masters of more than one fine art. Of the three great fine arts architecture was the least im- portant during the Italian Renaissance. An abundance of churches and secular buildings had already been Earlier Ital constructed in the preceding medieval period ,ian archi- in both the Romanesque and the Italian Gothic tecture style, while Byzantine influence had come in here and there, notably at Venice in the church of St. Mark with its domes and mosaics, its marbles and metal-work. The chief his- toric public edifices which the tourist still sees in the Italian cities, such as the palace of the podesta or the hall of the merchants, had already been built in medieval style before the time of the Renaissance. To take Venice again as an example, the Palace of the Doge had a Gothic facade and many of the old private palaces lining the canals are of Gothic style, like the beautiful Ca d' Oro (House of Gold). In short, " Italy before the age of the Renaissance proper found herself provided with churches and palaces, which were destined in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to be adorned with frescoes and statues." Nevertheless, a considerable change took place in archi- tecture in the course of the fifteenth century. The Italians had never grasped the principles of Gothic con- R naig struction thoroughly, and were ready to revert sance archi- to Romanesque methods and to study the ruins and monuments of ancient Rome and imitate these. Changes were also made conformably to the more peaceful and lux- urious urban life of this period. The Renaissance architects were not so much scientific builders as they were decorators and designers. Many of them, indeed, were primarily paint- ers or sculptors, so that if in the French Gothic art sculp- ture was subordinated to architecture, in the Italian Ren- aissance we may say that construction was rather neglected for appearance. Brunelleschi (1 377-1446) is regarded as the earliest great Renaissance architect, while details from ancient Roman architecture were introduced in large measure by another Florentine, Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472).