istoryworld
Michelangelo the sculptor
Early in 1499 a sculpture of the Virgin Mary, holding on her lap the dead Christ, is placed in one of the chapels of old St Peter's in Rome. This Pietà is still one of the most beautiful works of art in the mighty new St Peter's, completed a century later. It is by a sculptor who has just turned twenty-four - Michelangelo.The precocious genius receives a commission two years later in his home city of Florence. The authorities want a marble statue of David. ...
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Act of Supremacy
The Act of Supremacy demands public consent to the king's newly assumed role as head of the Church of England. Prominent figures in public life are required to swear on oath their acceptance of this new doctrine. A few brave men refuse to do so, among them the bishop of Rochester (John Fisher) and Thomas More. Thomas More holds a position of particular significance. A scholar of distinction, friend of Erasmus, author of Utopia, he has also been a close friend of Henry VIII and ...
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John I
The great Dominican abbey known variously as Batalha ('battle') or Santa Maria da Vitória ('St Mary of Victory') is the triumphal celebration of the battle of 1385, fought nearby at Aljubarrota, which secures the kingdom of Portugal for John I. The victory hastens the end of the war against his Castilian rival, four months after John has himself been acclaimed king by the Cortes in Coimbra. As a child of seven, John was appointed master of the Order of St Benedict of Avis, a Portuguese ...
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Mongols
The aggressive energy of one man, Genghis Khan, lies behind the amazing eruption of the Mongols in the 13th century. In 1215 he reaches and captures Beijing. Samarkand and Bukhara are taken and sacked in 1220. The marauder then heads south and enters India, but he turns back from this rich prize when he reaches the Indus. By 1223 his armies have moved round the Caspian and up through the Caucasus mountains to plunder cities of the Crimea and southern Russia. This journey of conquest, ...
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Two Anglo-Afghan Wars
In January 1842 the British garrison of some 4500 troops withdraws from Kabul, leaving Shah Shuja to his fate (he is soon assassinated). Most of the retreating British and Indian soldiers are also killed during their attempt to regain the safety of India. A British army recaptures Kabul during the summer of 1842, more as a gesture of defiance than as a matter of practical policy - for the decision is subsequently taken to restore Dost Mohammed to his throne. He returns from India in ...
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Pharaohs called Ramses
In Egyptian tradition Ramses II comes to be considered the ideal pharaoh. This is due to many factors - the length of his reign, the size of his harem and family (at least 100 children), the prosperity and calm of Egypt at the time, and a flair for publicity revealed in the vast number of monuments and inscriptions commemorating his achievements (an inconclusive battle against the Hittites at Kadesh, where the pharaoh himself played a central and courageous part on the battlefield, is invariably described ...
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The Sassanians
Near Persepolis, at Naqsh-e-Rustam, Ardashir commissions a great relief sculpted high in the rock face. It depicts him on horseback, with a dead Parthian beneath his horse's hooves, while he receives the royal crown from Ahura Mazda. With the restoration of the first authentically Persian dynasty since the Achaemenids, the cult of Ahura Mazda becomes again the official state religion. There is now a ritual hierarchy throughout the empire, with chief priests for each major district and a supreme priest wielding overall authority.
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Ashur and the Assyrians
Since about 2000 BC the Assyrians, a Semitic group, have worshipped their god Ashur at a shrine on the Tigris known by his name. The city of Ashur has had periods of influence, trading and conquering westwards into Turkey, but the Assyrians have also often been subject to more powerful groups from those regions, such as the Hittites. And they have tended to be overshadowed by their great neighbour to the south, Babylon. The balance changes markedly in Ashur's favour with the accession, in 883, ...
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Mosaic in the Roman empire
The great Roman villa near Piazza Armerina in Sicily, built in about AD 300, has mosaic floors which were probably laid by craftsmen from north Africa. Originally they covered some 4200 square yards. Of their many lively scenes none has given more delight than the group of bikini-clad maidens playing a musical game with a ball. The mosaics of Piazza Armerina are of the early 4th century. By that time the bishop of Aquileia in northern Italy is adapting this Roman art form to his ...
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Mastabas and pyramids
The Saqqara pyramid uses stone in small pieces, almost as if it were still mud bricks. But soon the pharaohs bring stone architecture to a peak of monumental grandeur in the pyramids at Giza. The first of these, the Great Pyramid, is built for the pharaoh Khufu from about 2550 BC. The stone is now cut in massive blocks, and the angle of the steps is filled in to give the true pyramid shape (see building methods in Egypt). This is the largest building ever ...
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England sophisticated
By the time of Richard II the English kingdom can hold its own in learning and the arts. The university of Oxford, which earlier in the century has produced William of Ockham (one of the last great figures of medieval scholasticism), is now buzzing with the radical notions of John Wycliffe. He dies in 1384, but his writings have a profound influence in Europe during the build-up towards the Reformation. In art and literature there is the same excellence. Richard II commissions some of the ...
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Venetian mosaics
When the Torcello mosaics are being installed, this cathedral is no longer the most important one in the Venetian lagoon. That honour has passed to St Mark's, where craftsmen in mosaic are busy at the same period. Their labours produce probably the most sumptuous church interior in the world, with every corner a sombre glittering gold. It has been calculated that the mosaics of St Mark's cover an area of about an acre. Dating mainly from the 12th and 13th centuries, these Italian mosaics represent ...
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Toltecs
The Toltecs lose control of their empire during the 12th century, when both Tula and Chichén Itzá are destroyed. But the Toltecs are not immediately replaced by another ruling dynasty in central Mexico. Instead the region lapses into a prolonged period of chaos and anarchy. Not until the 14th century does a migrant tribe create a base, at what is now Mexico City, from which they will establish the last and the most powerful of the Indian empires of central America. They are the Aztecs.
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Chinese architectural tradition
Minor improvements are introduced with the advance of technology. The colourful ceramic roof tiles of Chinese pavilions are an innovation in the Song dynasty in the 11th century. But in broad terms the civic buildings of China retain their appearance through the ages. A good example is the magnificent Temple of Heaven in Beijing. Its colours, frequently restored, are so fresh that the building looks new. But the structure dates from the early 15th century, in the Ming dynasty, and its appearance on its marble ...
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Trial and execution of Charles I
Charles refuses to recognize the court and merely reiterates the doctrine of the divine right of kings. His accusers respond with arguments based upon the sovereignty of parliament. Thus the entire issue of the civil war is restated, with unflinching intransigence on each side, within the narrow confines of this historic hall.On January 27 the tribunal finds the king guilty of treason. A high scaffold is constructed in Whitehall. Three days later the king steps on to it from one of the large windows of ...
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Sculpture as a public statement
The Romans develop very skilfully this Greek theme of a narrative frieze, using it particularly - since this is a militaristic society - for the important matter of publicizing Rome's victories. The outstanding example is the continuous strip, nearly 200 metres long, which circles its way up the marble column of Trajan in Rome. Dating from AD 113, it recounts in minute and realistic detail the emperor's successful campaign in Dacia (the region of modern Romania). But the type of sculpture which the Romans make ...
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The illustrated book
Books printed by Gutenberg's method are ideal for combining text and illustration on the same page. Movable type can be set in any shape round a wood block. The raised surfaces of both type and image will receive the ink together and can transfer it to the paper at a single impression. The pioneer in this field is Albrecht Pfister, a printer in Bamberg, who publishes several illustrated books beginning with Der Ackermann aus Böhmen (The Farmer of Bohemia) in about 1461. By the end ...
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British India
A year after the Crimean War, and at the same time as the second Opium War in China, an event occurs which transforms British involvement in India. This is the traumatic Indian Mutiny. It suggests that the East India Company's interests in the subcontinent have reached the point at which they should more properly be the concern of government. Until this time all the British in India, including even the soldiers, have been employees of the East India Company. The India Act of 1858, passed ...
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Philip II and Louis IX
The piety of Saint Louis (he is canonized in 1297) is very much in the spirit of his time. He creates one of the most spectacular of Gothic buildings, the Sainte Chapelle, to house a relic - the supposed Crown of Thorns. And he twice goes on crusade to the Middle East, dying in north Africa during the second expedition. Louis' domestic policy to some extent reflects this piety. Solemn edicts are issued against prostitution, gambling and blasphemy. But he also runs an honest and ...
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Moghul domes
Aurangzeb, Shah Jahan's son, does not inherit his father's passionate interest in architecture. But he commissions two admirable buildings in the same tradition. One is the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, begun in 1673; even larger than his father's Friday Mosque in Delhi, it rivals it in the beauty of its domes. The other, begun in 1662, goes to the other extreme; the tiny Pearl Mosque in the Red Fort in Delhi, begun in 1662 for Aurangzeb's private worship, is a small miracle of white marble. ...
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