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Authors: Basilica: The Splendor,the Scandal: Building St. Peter's

Tags: #Europe, #Basilica Di San Pietro in Vaticano - History, #Buildings, #Art, #Religion, #Vatican City - Buildings; Structures; Etc, #Subjects & Themes, #General, #Renaissance, #Architecture, #Italy, #Christianity, #Religious, #Vatican City - History, #History

R. A. Scotti

BOOK: R. A. Scotti
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BASILICA

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for Francesca,
a beauty inside and out

R. A. SCOTTI
BASILICA

The Splendor and the Scandal: Building St. Peter's

VIKING

VIKING

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

First published in 2006 by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Copyright © Rita A. Scotti, 2006

All rights reserved

Illustration credits appears at the end of this book.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA

ISBN: 978-1-1011-5781-7

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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CONTENTS

If they were great enough to invent such legends, we at least should be great enough to believe them.

—Goethe

BUILDING THE BASILICA

Basilica of Constantine

When Nicholas V (1447–1455) returned the papacy to Rome after Avignon, he made the Vatican the permanent seat of the Church for the first time and, soon after, he began to rebuild the hallowed, old basilica of St. Peter, erected by Constantine in
A
.
D
. 326. After Nicholas died, the project languished until the new century, when Julius II was consecrated pope. During the interim years, Columbus discovered a New World, Lorenzo de' Medici died in Florence, Michelangelo, Raphael, Magellan, Copernicus, and Martin Luther were born, and Leonardo painted
The Last Supper.

Basilica of Julius

(For a complete list of the popes from Nicholas V to Alexander VII, see the appendix.)

VISUAL GLOSSARIES

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