A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
This article asks urban historians to recognize that their discipline has given special preference to particular periods and topics of research. Using Genoa as an example, the author reveals the importance of overcoming such prejudices. Medieval cities in Italy have often stood in the shadow of magnificent Renaissance environments, specifically those of Florence, Rome, and Venice. Such a focus fails to acknowledge the pluralistic nature of Italian culture. Genoa, with whole neighborhoods from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries intact, offers the opportunity to examine a medieval Italian city. In contrast to contemporary city-states where the central communal and papal authority was instrumental in molding urban form, Genoa was shaped primarily by powerful families. Individual clans controlled whole neighborhoods; they carefully coded these zones architecturally and iconographically. The author draws upon archival and physical data to explain the evolution of one such urban enclave, the Piazza San Matteo of the Doria family. This neighborhood reveals the value of considering not only the patronage of individual urban buildings, but also patterns of patronage throughout an entire city.
This article asks urban historians to recognize that their discipline has given special preference to particular periods and topics of research. Using Genoa as an example, the author reveals the importance of overcoming such prejudices. Medieval cities in Italy have often stood in the shadow of magnificent Renaissance environments, specifically those of Florence, Rome, and Venice. Such a focus fails to acknowledge the pluralistic nature of Italian culture. Genoa, with whole neighborhoods from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries intact, offers the opportunity to examine a medieval Italian city. In contrast to contemporary city-states where the central communal and papal authority was instrumental in molding urban form, Genoa was shaped primarily by powerful families. Individual clans controlled whole neighborhoods; they carefully coded these zones architecturally and iconographically. The author draws upon archival and physical data to explain the evolution of one such urban enclave, the Piazza San Matteo of the Doria family. This neighborhood reveals the value of considering not only the patronage of individual urban buildings, but also patterns of patronage throughout an entire city.
A Family Enclave in Medieval Genoa
Gorse, George (author)
Journal of Architectural Education ; 41 ; 20-24
1988-04-01
5 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
English
Constructing fame in a town: the case of medieval Genoa
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Engineering Index Backfile | 1931