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Cardinal Pietro Bembo's accomplishments as a poet, linguist, philologist, and historian are well known, but his activities as an art collector have been comparatively little studied. In his writing, he directed his attention to the past via texts--Ciceronean Latin and Petrarchan Italian--for their potential to transform present and future ideas. His assembly of antiquities and contemporary art served an intermediary function parallel to his study of texts. In this dissertation I investigate Bembo as an agent of cultural exchange by offering a reconstruction of his art collection and, in so doing, access his thinking in a way not yet accomplished in previous work on this writer. Chapter One offers a historiographic overview of my topic and collecting as a subject of art historical study. Chapter Two maps the competition and overlapping interests of collectors who bought from Bembo's heirs. Chapter Three calls upon anthropological methodology for treating the study of material culture and applies it to Bembo's mission as a collector. Chapter Four concludes with a statistical analysis of subjects and object types to which Bembo was drawn. In the extensive Object Catalog individual works are examined in conjunction with one another and considered for what they reveal about Bembo's theoretical strategy. Appendix A is a timeline outlining Bembo's life. Appendix B is a chronologically ordered selection of accounts describing Bembo as a collector and descriptions of his collection and his properties. Appendix C is a Bembo family tree. Appendix D presents by location known repositories for traced objects that can be connected to Bembo's collection. The recovery of Pietro Bembo as a collector illustrates that his wide-ranging ambitions were intertwined. His museum was not a place fixed in geography but, rather, a dynamic mechanism for transmitting the analytic power and poetic potential he located in the visual. / Art History

This thesis examines Andrea Mantegna's painting of Judith and Holofernes in the context of attitudes towards women, material culture, and the Middle East during the Italian Renaissance.

Marcus Antonius Muretus, qui inde ab anno 1526o usque ad 1585m vixit, modo Latine scribendi optimo insignis et apud aequales et apud posteriores, annis 1573o et 1574o duas in Platonis Rem Publicam habuit orationes. Quarum contextus in hoc opusculo editur commentariisque instruitur, quo facilius a lectoribus hodiernis sententiae Mureti legantur ac intellegantur. In praefatione quam huic opusculo adiunximus tractantur etiam res nonnullae quae ad Muretum et ad has orationes de Platone habitas pertinent: videlicet Mureti vita, sententiae eius ad artem rhetoricam pertinentes, controversiae Ciceronianae, studia Graeca, philosophia Platonica, denique ratio quam ad hanc editionem perficiendam adhibuimus. Marc-Antoine Muret (1526-1585), known for his excellent Latin style both in his own time and afterwards, gave two inaugural speeches on Plato's Republic in 1573 and 1574. This thesis contains an edition of these speeches together with a commentary aimed at readers comfortable in classical Latin but perhaps new to Muret and to Renaissance studies. In a preface to this edition and commentary, several subjects are discussed that are essential for understanding Muret and the context of these speeches: Muret's life; his views on rhetoric and the imitation of Cicero; Greek studies in the Renaissance; Platonic philosophy; and finally the text of the speeches and other matters specific to this edition.

Leonardo da Vinci's art and science have a dynamic relationship that can be used to better understand the role of the individual and the human body within his art. Leonardo believed that movements of the body were expressions of the soul. He also thought that the body was as a microcosm of the physical world. The theories, based in ancient tradition, would be challenged by his work with the human anatomy. By studying his notebooks it becomes evident that Leonardo held nature to be the highest creator of the world but as he worked to understand the human body and through extension the physical world, his ideas about nature and the divine became more incomprehensible. Leonardo's art reflects this turn of perspective as he becomes unable to define the physical world through the human body.

Italie phare selon les mots de Jacques Le Goff, Italie proie durant les invasions étrangères ou simple « expression géographique » selon le prince de Metternich, l’Italie a depuis son premier souffle offert à l’histoire du monde de nombreux visages. A ce titre, elle fait figure de véritable étrangeté dans le paysage européen actuel. Une Italie politique et religieuse dans une Europe intensément laïque. Une toute jeune nation au milieu de patries millénaires. Un pays où, encore aujourd’hui, politique et religion marchent main dans la main. Où les consciences s’éveillent à la messe comme dans l’isoloir. Un pays où l’humain cherche désespérément à toucher du doigt le divin. Où le divin lui-même devient humain en la personne des successeurs de Saint-Pierre, pendants aussi appréciés que redoutés des dirigeants temporels italiques. Or, si l’Italie occupe une telle place pour notre humanité, c’est avant tout du fait de la dichotomie qui l’a toujours habitée. Âme guerrière et conquérante autant qu’émanation sanctifiée de la religion catholique, elle est la terre qu’humain et divin se sont disputés pendant des décennies. Et c’est à la Renaissance que ce combat atteint son apex. Car temporel et spirituel furent animés d’une même tension créatrice dans leur âpreté à « faire l’Italie » et leurs affrontements incessants allaient façonner l’essence même de l’Italie d’aujourd’hui, lui donnant ce caractère bicéphale qui est probablement l’un des aspects les plus constitutifs de l’identité italienne actuelle. Et lui confère une spécificité sans pareille en Europe / Italy lighthouse according to Jacques Goff’s words, Italy prey during the French and Spanish invasions ou simple « geographic expression » according to the prince of Metternich ; Italy has since her very first breath given the world history many visages. As such, Italy is a true strangeness in our modern European landscape, deeply proud of still exposing today the two side of her personnality. A politic and religious Italy in a very secular Europe. A very young nation among millenial homelands. A country transcended by its stormy story, by its intrinsic fragilities. A country where today, politic and religious are walking together. Where the minds awakes during the mass or in the voting booth. A country where human is begging for divine. Where divine himself becomes human in the sanctified person of St-Peters’s successors, equivalent as appreciated as feared of Italic secular leaders. And whose power exceeds the Vatican confines to radiate in the whole world, making Italy a real beacon illuminating the whole planet. Or, if Italy occupies such a place in our humanity, it is because of the dichotomy who always inhabited it. Warrior soul and hallowed emanation of catholicity, Italy is the place that human and divine have fought about during centuries. And this quarrel reaches its climax during the Renaissance era. Where temporal and spiritual power were also guided by a same creative strenght in their acerbity to do Italy et their ceaseless quarrels were going to shape the very soul of modern Italy, giving her this two-headed dimension which is likely the most constituent aspect of Italian identity. And gives this Nation an unparalleled specificity in Europe

En s'appuyant sur un corpus de sources d'archives décidément vaste, et sur une ample bibliographie, cette recherche apporte plusieurs éléments novateurs à l'étude des échanges politiques et diplomatiques dans l'Italie du premier Quattrocento. Au fil des trois parties dont cette thèse se compose, l'analyse des sources (du point de vue non seulement des contenus, mais aussi linguistique) a permis quelques éclaircissements sur la guerre entre Florence et Venise contre Philippe Marie Visconti. L'importance de ce travail réside tout d'abord dans la fourchette chronologique prise en compte : les années Vingt du Quattrocento, en effet, sont quasiment absentes dans l'historiographie sur la diplomatie italienne à la Renaissance, un vide qui peut assurément être allégué à une polarisation documentaire conséquente (les sources d'archives se font plus riches à partir de la seconde moitié du siècle).Deuxièmement, le bassin documentaire a compris plus de 60 fonds d'archives, ce qui a donné à la recherche une base solide pour poursuivre l'enquête historique, grâce aussi à l'osmose et au dialogue établis entre les différentes sources.Quant aux résultats, au-delà du plan strictement événementiel, en ce qui concerne les phénomènes et les trajectoires nous avons pu identifier les évolutions politico-territoriales des puissances italiennes durant la première partie du siècle, bien avant, donc, le moment crucial de la 'Lega italica' (1455), qui est d'habitude vue comme le point de départ de toute analyse diplomatique. Il nous a été possible, par exemple, de remonter jusqu'à la source des liens entre Eugène IV et les Médicis ; ou de montrer les raisons et les enjeux de la montée de la Savoie en Italie ; ou, enfin, de mettre en exergue, au sein de la vie politique italienne, l'évolution de la présence pontificale, qui passa de la neutralité à la gestion des alliances diplomatiques. / Based on a large corpus of archival sources, and on an extensive bibliography, this research sheds a light on several innovative elements regarding the study of political and diplomatic exchanges in Italy during the first Quattrocento. Through the three parts of the thesis, the analysis of the sources (from the point of view not only of the contents, but also a linguistic one) has clarified the meanings of the war between Florence and Venice against Philippe Marie Visconti.The importance of this work remains first and foremost in the chronological range analyzed: the 1420s are almost absent in the historiography on Italian diplomacy during the Renaissance, a vacuum that can certainly be alleged at a documentary polarization (archives sources become richer from the second half of the century).Secondly, the documentary basin included more than 60 archive collections, which gave the research a solid basis for continuing the historical inquiry, as well as the dialogue established between the different sources.As for the results, beyond the strictly event-oriented plan, from the phenomenon point of view, we have been able to identify the political-territorial evolution of the Italian powers during the first part of the century, long before the crucial moment of the 'Lega Italica' 1455), which is usually the starting point of any diplomatic analysis.It has been possible for us, for example, to go back to the source of the links between Eugene IV and the Medici; or to show the reasons and the issues of the rise of Savoy in Italy; or, finally, to highlight, within Italian political life, the evolution of the papal presence, which shifted from neutrality to the management of diplomatic alliances.

L’illusionnisme, ou prestidigitation, est magie simulée, mise en scène du surnaturel. Cette thèse dresse un panorama de cette discipline à la Renaissance selon deux généalogies. La première est technique et pratique. Elle se fonde sur la littérature antique des secrets et la magie naturelle, transmises jusqu’aux savants, ingénieurs, artisans, saltimbanques et philosophes naturels renaissants. Elle implique une esthétique spécifique du choc, de la merveille ou de l’attraction. Sa subtilité technique fascine. Basée sur l’ingenium, elle suppose un « double public » de profanes et d’initiés. Elle ouvre à une science spectaculaire, une technique ludique, se révèle un puissant outil pédagogique et un excellent remède à la mélancolie. La seconde généalogie concerne sa réception sociale. La théologie, la démonologie, la littérature et les beaux-arts se sont confrontés au bateleur et en ont fait un marqueur d’illusion. Figure symbolique utilisée par les prédicateurs ou les polémistes, il prend place au cœur des débats sur la nature des actions diaboliques, la puissance du signe ou la transsubstantiation. Faisant du diable le suprême bateleur, la démonologie condamne généralement en retour le « prestigiateur » et ses illusions. A la croisée de ces deux généalogies, Reginald Scot, protestant, démonologue et premier pédagogue de la prestidigitation, en fait l’instrument de la critique sceptique la plus radicale, dédiabolisant les phénomènes surnaturels. Finalement, l’illusionnisme, véritable objet de savoir transverse à tous les champs, permet de jeter un autre regard sur la technique à la Renaissance. / Illusionism, conjuring art or legerdemain, is simulated magic, staging the supernatural. This thesis provides a global picture of this discipline during the Renaissance period, following two genealogies. The first is technical and practical. It is based on the ancient books of secrets and natural magic, transmitted to scholars, engineers, craftsmen, mountebanks and natural philosophers of the Renaissance periode. It involves a specific aesthetic of shock, wonder or attraction. Its technical subtlety fascinates. Based on ingenium, it assumes a "dual public" of laymen and initiates. It opens to spectacular science and playful technique. It is a powerful teaching tool and an excellent remedy for melancholy. The second genealogy deals with its social reception. Theology, demonology, literature, and the fine arts faced the juggler and made it an illusion sign. This symbol is used by preachers or polemists and takes place at the heart of debates on the nature of devil actions, the power of the sign, or transubstantiation reality. Making the devil the supreme juggler, demonology generally condemns in return the praestigiator and his illusions. Merging these two genealogies, Reginald Scot, Protestant, demonologist and first pedagogue of legerdemain, makes it the instrument of the most radical skeptical criticism, de-demonizing supernatural phenomena. Finally, illusionism is a true object of knowledge, transverse to all the fields, giving a new insight on the Renaissance period technique.