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In his time, names in Italy were often differently structured than today, and they varried a lot. For example Leonardo's full name was Leonardo di ser Piero da
by Archelaos 2y ago
In his time, names in Italy were often differently structured than today, and they varried a lot. For example Leonardo's full name was Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci ("Leonardo, son of ser Piero from Vinci"). For Michelangelo it was Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni. For Raphael it was Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino. They all are known and commonly referred to by their baptismal name (often translated it. Raffaello => engl. Raphael, germ. Raffael).
However, there are other Italians contemporary to them, were we use other parts of their name as a shorthand, sometimes altered somewhat to adjust to our modern forename-surname system. For example: Filippo di ser Brunellesco di Lippo Lapi => Filippo Brunelleschi, or Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli => Niccolò Machiavelli.
There are other special cases: Giovanni Pico dei conti della Mirandola e della Concordia is known as "Giovanni Pico della Mirandola" and can be reffered to as "Pico della Mirandola" or "Pico", but usally not as "della Mriandola".
Galileo Galilei is also a special case, were both, "Galileo" and "Galilei", are acceptable (although I think "Galilei" is becoming more and more the standard).
So there is no rule of thumb how to refer to famous Italians of the Renaissance. It differs from case to case. You simply have to follow the individual practices.
- metalman 2y agoleft out Bernini, but then he is always left out. Alexander the Macedonian? hey! Cervantes has been reduced to an adjective taken out of context but for a more contemporary example, Albert, not only knew of but approved of the term "Einstoon", as he did experience becoming a charactature in his own time.
- filoeleven 2y agoHuh, I thought it was Donatello that was missing from the list.
- Frederation 2y agoTurtle Power! /s
- pinkmuffinere 2y agoThis is very informative! > It differs from case to case. You simply have to follow the individual practices. Surely in the case of Leonardo da Vinci, the “standard practice” in English is to say “da Vinci” or “ Leonardo da Vinci”, not _just_ “Leonardo”. Leonardo could be anyone for all I know
- Archelaos 2y agoPerhaps people mistook Dan Brown as authoritative on the matter. I browsed the read samples of some of the top listed books on Leonardo da Vinci on Amazon, and all use "Leonardo" in their introduction whenever they do not refer to him as "Leonardo da Vinci". I found no single isolated "da Vinci". See: https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/0715324535 https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/0715324535 https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/B0DHFRBMF3 https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/B0DHFRBMF3 https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/1501139169 https://www.amazon.com/-/en/dp/1501139169 The standard way to avoid confusion is to introduce him as "Leonardo da Vinci" and later just say "Leonardo".
- pinkmuffinere 2y agoAh, that makes sense. Your answers are really well researched, it raises the standard of the forum. Thanks!
- lxgr 2y agoI definitely thought of the aerospace/defense company before the polymath.
- Archelaos 2y agoActually, the company was (re)named after Leonardo da Vinci, see: https://www.defensenews.com/industry/2016/04/28/it-s-official-finmeccanica-is-now-leonardo/ https://www.defensenews.com/industry/2016/04/28/it-s-officia... (and then not named "Da Vinci").
- tejohnso 2y ago> Leonardo could be anyone for all I know If the topic is sketching and someone refers to Leonardo, you should know who it is. It's like referring to "Michael" when talking about basketball.
- srean 2y agoHistoric Arabic names also have such rich context - father's name, son's name, place. Ibn, bin -- son of Abu -- father of Sometimes, if Abdul happened not to have a son, the placeholder would be filled by some other famous Abdul's son.
- um1 2y agoDi caprio?