Italian cities . SaintJohns feast, some other, but the Florentines led as inother directions, for with their Orfeo of Politian,their music of Squarcialupi, their garden concertswith recitations, they were preparing the way forthe opera and the modern theatre. The popularity of pageants in the churches andstreets was immense. After the allegories of Dante,the Triumphs of Love and Fame and Chastity ofPetrarch, the greatest artists could not disdain thesetting and even the stage-carpentry of the pom-pous ballet-spectacles in which kings of Scripture,heroes of antiquity, the virtues and vices, ele
Italian cities . SaintJohns feast, some other, but the Florentines led as inother directions, for with their Orfeo of Politian,their music of Squarcialupi, their garden concertswith recitations, they were preparing the way forthe opera and the modern theatre. The popularity of pageants in the churches andstreets was immense. After the allegories of Dante,the Triumphs of Love and Fame and Chastity ofPetrarch, the greatest artists could not disdain thesetting and even the stage-carpentry of the pom-pous ballet-spectacles in which kings of Scripture,heroes of antiquity, the virtues and vices, elementsand attributes, marched and countermarched throughthe cities of Italy. In the mysteries of the Norththe missal borders of the middle ages had come tolife, with all their soldiers and saints, their devilsand dragons; but the Italians, that people of artists,added the myths of classical antiquity and in-yterwove their Bible with Ovid. Brunelleschi set 222 FLORENCE SAN LORENZODESIDERIO DA SETTIGNANO TABERNACLE. IN TLORENCE WITH ROMOLA his copper spheres a-whirlmg and invented hisheaven of angels dancing in concentric rings, hisGabriel lowered by pulleys from a star; Donatellobuilt his colossal wooden horse for a Paduan pageant,and Leonardo da Vinci superintended the festivalsat Milan. The charming half-feminine soldier-saints andheroes of Perugino in the Sala del Cambio of hisnative city might be seen in their fantastic feathers,their semi-Koman costumes, upon the squares ofPerugia, in moralities and plays. The women ofBotticelli and Pollajuolo who with corseleted breastsand drawn swords sit as Fortitude and Justice inthe Uffizi, passed throned upon the processionalchariots of Cecca. Mantegnas slender nymphsfilled the car of Venus, while the Theology andJurisprudence of Eaphaels Vatican ceiling werenot wanting. The Florentines made a profession of organizingfestivals, and went about Italy as impresari ; whilethe whole youth of the country, men and women,took various parts, fr
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1903
