Renaissance and

equestrian portrait statues: that of the Roman Era- men stood apart from history and led a sheltered
peror Marcus Aurelius, from the second century A.D. existence among Classical temples and flower garand
Donatello's statue of Erasmo da Narni or Gat- dens. The Gattamelata, for example, embodies a
tameIam, the condottiere general-for-hire of the specific tactical alliance between the Communes of
Venetian Republicinthe1430s. Florence and Venice whom the deceased soldier
Both statues -- Donatello's is explicitly modeled on served. The wars of looting were an endemic feature
the antique predecessor- represent the individual as of feudal life and reached epidemic proportions as
,the embodiment of perfection, or universal law. But mercantile capitalism superimposed on a feudal
for the ancient sculptor (probably a Greek), the god- social structure approached its ultimate crisis in the
like quality of the Emperor, who was automatically 16th-17th centuries. But even in those works which do
apotheosized as a deity after his death, is fixed and not directly reference the wars of looting, the presence
eternal, and shines through the Emperor's individual of life-and-death struggles is never very difficult tO
traits. In fact, Marcus Aurelius, who in this detect.
representation commemorates a military'triumph of From the Black Death which in the mid-14th century
the Roman army, passively embodies Pax Romana, carried off at least half of the European population on
the law of the Roman Empire. For this reason, the the heels of the commercial revolution of the Middle
magnificent horse conveys more of the dynamic, Ages, down to the Thirty Years War in the first half of
combative spirit associated with a martial victory the 17th century, the recurrence of pestilence, famine,
than his god-like rider. Marcus Aurelius is a great war, inquisition, and ecological disaster formed the
man kept "clean" of the awful contingencies of persistent backdrop for the sublime productions of the
history. (5) Renaissance.
Not soGattamelata,whoseapotheosisisguaranteed Broadly, what occurred was the expansion of
by none, not even the Venetian Republic which medieval agriculture on the basis of a few techallowed
this unprecedented monument to be erected nological innovations -- chiefly the heavy plow and the
by the condottiere's widow. The sculptor Donatello water mill -- which had permitted continuous populaevokes
greatness with a frightening image of the grim tion expansion during the period of rapid Urban
and tense individual who holds immense emotional growth from the 10th century, exhausted marginal
and physical forces in check until the right moment land areas and hence the capacity for expansion in
for tactical action. His Romanized demeanor, colossal that mode of reproduction around the end of the 13th
horse and the classical ornaments of his con- century. While the early 14th century saw such
temporary-style armor imbue the figure with history, towering creative figures as Dante and Giotto, inyet
history is immediate. Gattamelata commands dividuals produced in the heroic period of the 13th
an invisible army of mercenaries in the vast St. An- Century Italian communes, famine and plague spread
thony's Square in Padua where, since the mid-15th through Europe in ever-expanding waves from 1300
' century, this effigy has presided over the traffic of onward, peaking inthe Black Death of 1348. (8)
- millions of pilgrims. (6) The fate of the great drainage and hydraulic
With such statues, Donatello slightly anticipated the systems supporting the most prosperous Italian cities
notion of Perfection in the individual which the great in the preceding period is exemplary. During the last
Florentine neo-Platonic philosophers of the suc- decades of the 14th century, the marshes around
ceeding generation, most notably Marsilio Ficino and Rome and Siena -- which only a century before had
Pico della Mirandola, were to express in rigorous rivaled Florence as the greatest banking and trading
theological guises. The notion is that man is the center -- lost 80 per cent of their population. As broad
"maker and molder" of himself, capable of descen- stretches of this countryside were turned into winter
ding to levels of bestiality below that of animals, but pasturage for sheep, and the country was simUlalso
capable of the universalizing behavior appro- taneously _deforested for wood to build ships' and
priate to a god. Because man, unlike God, is not fixed, provide fuel for the cities, floods became a perennial
but constantly yearning towards higher levels of danger to the cities. Pisa -- once the center of
perfection, his perfection is expressed in the "motion Mediterranean trade -- was surrounded by marshes
of the mind," and above all "by means of mind, and malaria by the 15th century, an example of how
creating mind." This was the central concern of the social crisis worked to reduce once-prosperous
Ficino. (7) urban centers to decay. (9)
Necessity of Progress The richest intellectual period within the entire
trajectory from 1450, when Medici dynastic rule
Taken together, the array of subjects whicl_ were Clamped firmly over Florence, until around 1520, when
)
selected by the great Renaissance artists provide the Charles V, the Hapsburg King of Spain, became Holy
necessary clues for refuting any delusions that-these _ Roman Emperor, was, ironically, also the period of
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