Talk:Leone Battista Alberti

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I have a nice photograph of the Trevi Fountain. I took this picture last yeat during a travel to Rome and I would like to submit it under FDL to Wikipedia.

Who shall I contact for that? Should I resize the picture and provide it in a specific format (well, I can do that easily with GIMP)?

I read in How does one edit a page that I should e-mail it, but where will it be located after?

Thanks for helping!

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Ok, this image is now available on my own website. Its intermediate size is adapted for being included in a Wikipedia article and should fit perfectly.

Get the image of the Trevi Fountain here...

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Wait! The Trevi fountain AS IT APPEARS TODAY is a much later object. It wasn't finished until the 18th century. If anything is left of Alberti's work, it's in the plumbing system.--MichaelTinkler

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Leone Battista or Leon Battista?

He is generally known as Leon in Italy, but having to fix a redirect, I'd need some hints from the English-speaking world. Thank you :-) --Gianfranco

I have no idea why this article is called Leone; I am in the UK and have always known him as 'Leon'. Well, not personally. (as an aside, I also don't think 'illegitimate' (section 2) needs to be a link... it's not a dictionary, guys) - N.

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Come on.. no mention that he was able to leap over a man's head from a standing start? ;) (c.f., Renaissance Man the movie) --Dante Alighieri | Talk 23:23, Mar 22, 2004 (UTC)

Rats! I forgot to mention that he was faster than a speeding bullet. As for the leaping, he could do tall buildings at a single bound. I know of nothing on his strengh, but he was related to my grandfather Stonebender, so we might be able to deduce something from that. Can we put that in? ww 16:48, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Contents 1 Birthdate 2 I Libri della Famiglia 3 composer? 4 Reference 5 Bibliography? 6 "Extreme caution" 7 Intro Again 8 "Extreme Caution" 9 large portions of Alberti text cribbed

[edit] Birthdate

We had in the article that Alberti was born on the 14th of February, but several places put it at 18th Februrary instead (e.g. Catholic encyclopedia). february 1404 doesn't seem conclusive. I've temporarily removed the precise date from the article. — Matt 13:38, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Britannica has him down as born Feb. 14, 1404 in Genoa. — Matt 14:23, 22 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] I Libri della Famiglia

Recent scholars have been bewitched by Alberti's "Libri"--translated in the U of S. Carolina Press as "The Family in Renaissance Italy." It's a heyday for feminists, of course. But any economic historian interested in the evolution of the European "oikos" should probably know about it, too.

Reading the book, you really get a sense of Alberti's genius and his "nervous" frailties. I would describe it as a cross of Machievelli's Prince and Weber's Protestant Ethic. Really absolutely fascinating.

[edit] composer?

I am unable to find any evidence that he was a composer, or that any music survives which can be reliably attributed to him. There is no entry on him in the 20-volume Grove Dictionary (note that there were at least seven other Albertis who were composers, including Antonio degli Alberti (1360-1415), Domenico (the most famous), Gasparo (1480-1560), Giuseppe, Innocentio, Johann Friedrich, and Pietro--I just want to make sure whoever put him in the Italian composers category made sure he wasn't confused with one of these). Sorry about being pedantic ... :-) Antandrus 23:42, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Reference

Today's new addition seems completely taken from another website -- http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/alberti.htm . If it is free for copying, it should at least be referenced. If it is not free for copying, it should be deleted. Does anyone know the copyright status of this material? Mlouns 04:08, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bibliography?

I remember that there was once a growing bibliography. It seems to have disappeared. And now there is only one listing! Could have come in handy for a student.

[edit] "Extreme caution"

The last parapgraph "Use extreme caution" etc. seems a bit over-kill and certainly not all scholarship since Burkhardt has been given over to hyperbole. ANyway most people who work on Alberti know Italian and Latin and don't need to be reminded about being careful. I also think that just as important as facts are, interpretation is also a significant and indispensible part of historical work as well. If we are going to comment on Renaissance historiography, then that should be a separate section.

[edit] Intro Again

This is the old intro :::Leone Battista Alberti (February 14, 1404 – April 25, 1472) was an Italian painter, poet, linguist, philosopher, cryptographer, musician, architect, and general Renaissance polymath. I rearrange has accomplishments so that they more accuirately reflect his genuine accomplishments. I also took out some varies at the beginning of second par. to keep it more encyclopedic in tone

[edit] "Extreme Caution"

Agree with the above comment.I am removing all of this: The point is generally correct but has a lot of opinions about things that are inappropriate for this entry.

"Extreme caution should be used in the study of Alberti. He is the perfect example of a person who has been killed due to too much scholarship and not enough perspective (pardon the pun). In large part due to the "Vita" [the so-called autobiography] and Burckhardt's paraphrase of the "Vita," Alberti, the man, has become something of a comic book hero, the "Universal Man," to quote Burckhardt. Because Alberti was such a many-sided fellow, he has been somewhat difficult to study. And because academics are so specialized, there has been a tendency to butcher those elements of Alberti which exist outside of their professional domains. Architectural historians tend to be terrible music historians, and art historians tend to be rather simplistic historians of science and philosophy. Those interested in studying Alberti should stick to the facts and not get lost in the echo chamber of hyperbole that can be found in almost all secondary literature written since Burckhardt."

[edit] large portions of Alberti text cribbed

Yes, sadly so it seems someone cribbed much of the Alberti text from -- http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/alberti.htm !! The list at the bottom of this contributions predates this, so I would suggest that one expand on that.