"An engrossing world of politics and popes, religion and renegades, lifestyles and literature
that few historical works encompass....a joy for devotees of the Renaissance."--AudioFile

In this landmark study of Italy from the fourteenth through the early sixteenth century, Swiss historian Jacob
Burckhardt chronicles the rise of Florence and Venice as powerful city-states, the breakup of the medieval
worldview that came with the rediscovery of Greek and Roman culture, and the new emphasis on the role of
the individual. All these, Burckhardt explains, went hand in hand with the explorations of science and the
more naturalistic depiction of the world in art and literature.

Within the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, Burckhardt finds the first stirrings of the modern world and,
in the Renaissance Italian, the first modern man. His book-length essay includes discussions of all aspects of
Italian civilization: art, fashion, literature, and music of the time, as well as the flourishing intellectual and spiritual
life.