Brunelleschi's Dome: How a Renaissance Genius Reinvented Architecture

By:

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into Bookshare to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis
Brunelleschi's Dome is the story of how a Renaissance genius bent men, materials, and the very forces of nature to build an architectural wonder we continue to marvel at today. Denounced at first as a madman, Brunelleschi was celebrated at the end as a genius. He engineered the perfect placement of brick and stone, built ingenious hoists and cranes (among some of the most renowned machines of the Renaissance) to carry an estimated 70 million pounds hundreds of feet into the air, and designed the workers' platforms and routines so carefully that only one man died during the decades of construction--all the while defying those who said the dome would surely collapse and his own personal obstacles that at times threatened to overwhelm him.

This drama was played out amid plagues, wars, political feuds, and the intellectual ferments of Renaissance Florence-- events Ross King weaves into the story to great effect, from Brunelleschi's bitter, ongoing rivalry with the sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti to the near catpure of Florence by the Duke of Milan. King also offers a wealth of fascinating detail that opens windows onto fifteenth-century life: the celebrated traditions of the brickmaker's art, the daily routine of the artisans laboring hundreds of feet above the ground as the dome grew ever higher, the problems of transportation, the power of the guilds.

Even today, in an age of soaring skyscrapers, the cathedral dome of Santa Maria del Fiore retains a rare power to astonish. Ross King brings its creation to life in a fifteenth-century chronicle with twenty-first-century resonance.

Copyright:
2000

Book Details

Book Quality:
Excellent
Book Size:
195 Pages
ISBN-13:
9780142000151
Related ISBNs:
9781620401934
Publisher:
N/A
Date of Addition:
Copyrighted By:
Ross King
Adult content:
No
Language:
English
Has Image Descriptions:
No
Categories:
History, Nonfiction, Art and Architecture, Religion and Spirituality
Submitted By:
Dr. Kenneth Cross
Proofread By:
David H. Carter
Usage Restrictions:
This is a copyrighted book.

Reviews

No Rating Yet