Urbino
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Urbino is a city in the Marche in Italy, southwest of Pesaro, a World Heritage Site with a great cultural history during the Renaissance as the seat of Federico da Montefeltro. It has retained some of its picturesque medieval aspect on steep sloping ground, though tourists' carparks occupy the former fields below. Urbino is home to the University of Urbino, founded in 1564, and is the seat of the Archbishop of Urbino (see below). Its greatest urbanistic feature is the Palazzo Ducale, rebuilt by Luciano Laurana.
History
The modest Roman town of Urvinum Mataurense ("the little city on the river Mataurus") became an important strategic stronghold in the Gothic wars of the 6th century, captured in 538 from the Goths by the champion of the Emperor of the East, Belisarius, and frequently mentioned by the Byzantine historian Procopius. Though Pippin presented Urbino to the Papacy, independent traditions were expressed in its commune, until, around 1200 it came into the possession of the fighting nobles of nearby Montefeltro. They had no direct authority over the commune, but could pressure the commune to elect them podestà (potestas, "power") as Bonconte di Montefeltro managed in 1213, with the result that the Urbinese rebelled, formed an alliance with the independent commune of Rimini (1228), and by 1234 were masters of the city again. In the struggles between Guelph Ghibelline factions, associated with individual families and cities, rather than the struggle between Hohenstaufen emperors and the Papacy as they had been, the 13th and 14th century Montefeltro lords of Urbino were leaders of the Ghibellines of the Marche and in the Romagna.The most famous member of the Montefeltro was Federico, lord of Urbino 1444 to 1482, an oustandingly successful condottiere, a skillful diplomat and an enthusiastic patron of art and literature. At his court Piero della Francesca wrote on the science of perspective, Francesco di Giorgio Martini his Trattato di architettura ("Treatis on Architecture") and Raphael's father Giovanni Santi his poetical account of the chief artists of his time. Federico's brilliant court, through the descriptions in Baldassare Castiglione's Il Cortegiano ("The Book of the Courtier"), set standards of what characterized a "gentleman" in early modern Europe that were still a propos in World War I. (See Federico da Montefeltro for full biography.)
Cesare Borgia dispossessed Guidobaldo da Montefeltre, duke of Urbino, and Elisabetta Gonzaga in 1502, with the connivance of his Papal father Alexander VI. After the Medici pope Leo X's brief attempt to establish a young Medici as duke, thwarted by the early death of Lorenzo II de' Medici in 1519, Urbino remained part of the Papal States under a dynasty of Della Rovere dukes. In 1626 Pope Urban VIII incorporated the independent Duchy of Urbino into the papal dominions, the gift of the weary last Della Rovere duke in retirement after the assassination of his heir, to be governed by the archbishop. Its great library was removed to Rome and added to the Vatican Library in 1657. The later history of Urbino is part of the history of the Papal States and, after 1870, of the History of Italy.
See also: Dukes of Urbino
Archbishops of Urbino
The first known bishop in Urbino was Leontius, made Bishop of Rimini by Gregory the Great in 592. The cathedral was not permitted within the walls by the independent-spirited commune until 1021, under Bishop Theodoricus. Among a long list of bishops of interest within the Roman Catholic Church, Oddone Colonna (1380), later reigned as Pope Martin V. In 1563 Pius IV made the see metropolitan, that is independent of Rimini, with its own suffragans, or assistant bishops at Cagli, Sinigaglia, Pesaro, Forssombrone, Montefeltro, and Gubbio.The clay earth of Urbino, which still supports industrial brickworks, supplied a cluster of earthenware manufactories (botteghe) making the tin-glazed pottery known as maiolica. Simple local wares were being made in the 15th century at Urbino, but after 1520 the Della Rovere dukes, Francesco Maria della Rovere and his successor Guidobaldo II, encouraged the industry, which exported wares throughout Italy, first in a manner called istoriato using engravings after Mannerist painters, then in a style of light arabesques and grottesche after the manner of Raphael's stanzi at the Vatican. Other centers of 16th century wares in the Duchy of Urbino were at Gubbio and Castel Durante. The great name in Urbino majolica was that of Nicolo Pillipario's son Guido Fontana
Main sights
- The main attraction of Urbino is the Palazzo Ducale, began in the second half of the 15th century by Federico II da Montefeltro. It houses the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, one of the most important collection of Renaissance paintings in the world.
People from Urbino
Donato Bramante was born nearby, and witnessed Laurana's work going up while he was a youth. Raphael was also born at Urbino, where his family's house is a museum-shrine.Others notable people from Urbino include:
- Bartolomeo Carusi, theologian and professor at Bologna and Paris.
- Federico Commandini (1509), mathematician
- Bernardino Baldi, mathematician and writer
- Polydore Vergil or Virgil, chronicler in England
- Valentino Rossi, multiple MotoGP World Champion.
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