HS 311 - Great Age of Italian Cities

During the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance period, the Italian peninsula was home to a web of independent city-states built upon the preexisting Roman city network. These city-states, which were to become the cradle of Europe’s great cultural, political, and economic renaissance, made the Italian peninsula one of the centers of the emerging Western civilization.

This course will offer an overview of Medieval and Renaissance history of Italian cities and an introduction to the Medieval and Renaissance architectural heritage and urban planning of Italian cities.

The cityscape of Milan, one of the peninsula’s major economic and political centers during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, will be used as an entry point for exploring how, through the signs inscribed on urban spaces, the past meets the present in European cities. It will become a site for experiencing history come alive.