AP EURO unit 1 - people

Petrarch

(1304-1374) Italian scholar considered the "father of humanism"; revived classical Latin texts and argued that studying antiquity could improve moral and civic life

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola

(1463-1494) Wrote Oration on the Dignity of Man (1486)

Henry VII

(r. 1485-1509) First Tudor king of England; ended the Wars of the Roses and began centralizing royal authority

Henry VIII

(r. 1509-1547) English king who broke from the Catholic Church in 1534 (Act of Supremacy) after the Pope refused to annul his marriage

Elizabeth I

(r. 1558-1603) English "Virgin Queen" who stabilized England religiously (via the Elizabethan Settlement) and defeated the Spanish Armada in 1588

Isabella of Castile

(r. 1474-1504) Co-ruler of Spain with Ferdinand; funded Columbus's voyages and enforced the Spanish Inquisition to unify Spain under Catholicism

Ferdinand of Aragon

(r. 1479-1516) Co-ruler of Spain with Isabella; their marriage unified Spain's crowns and they used religious conformity (forcing conversion or expulsion of Jews/Muslims) to consolidate royal power

Charles VII (France)

(r. 1422-1461) French king who

Francis I

(r. 1515-1547) French king and major Renaissance patron (brought Leonardo da Vinci to France); his rivalry with Charles V shaped decades of European conflict

Louis XI

(r. 1461-1483) Known as the "Spider King" for his cunning diplomacy and use of political marriages/alliances to centralize French royal power and weaken the nobility

Lorenzo de Medici

(1449-1492) "Lorenzo the Magnificent

Savonarola

(1452-1498) Radical Dominican friar who briefly took control of Florence after the Medici's fall

Pope Alexander VI

(r. 1492-1503) Borgia pope infamous for corruption

Pope Julius II

(r. 1503-1513) The "Warrior Pope

Charles V (HRE)

(r. 1519-1556) Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain who ruled the largest European empire since Charlemagne; spent his reign fighting the Ottoman Empire

Castiglione

(1478-1529) Author of The Book of the Courtier (1528)

Boccaccio

(1313-1375) Author of The Decameron

Giotto

(1267-1337) Early Renaissance painter (pre-dates the "High Renaissance") who broke from flat medieval style

Raphael

(1483-1520) High Renaissance painter famous for The School of Athens

Michelangelo

(1475-1564) Renaissance sculptor

Ghiberti

(1378-1455) Early Renaissance sculptor famous for the bronze doors of the Florence Baptistery ("Gates of Paradise")

Botticelli

(1445-1510) Renaissance painter known for The Birth of Venus

Pizarro

(1471-1541) Spanish conquistador who conquered the Inca Empire in Peru (1533)

Cortes

(1485-1547) Spanish conquistador who conquered the Aztec Empire in Mexico (1521)

Magellan

(1480-1521) Portuguese explorer sailing for Spain whose expedition (1519-1522) was the first to circumnavigate the globe

Columbus

(1451-1506) Genoese explorer sailing for Spain who reached the Americas in 1492 seeking a westward route to Asia; his voyages opened the era of Spanish colonization and the Columbian Exchange

Bartolome de las Casas

(1484-1566) Spanish priest and former colonist who became a vocal critic of the encomienda system and the brutal treatment of indigenous peoples

Hans Holbein

(1497-1543) Northern Renaissance painter known for detailed

Pieter Bruegel the Elder

(1525-1569) Northern Renaissance painter famous for scenes of everyday peasant life (like The Harvesters)

Thomas More

(1478-1535) English humanist and statesman who wrote Utopia (1516)

Jean-Baptiste Colbert

(1619-1683) French finance minister under Louis XIV who promoted mercantilism

Niccolo Machiavelli

(1469-1527) Florentine political philosopher who wrote The Prince (1513)

Charles VIII

(r. 1483-1498) French king who invaded Italy in 1494