The Renaissance Started with a New Way of Seeing

Albrect Durer, 1525 ("Durer's Window")

In architectural history, I was taught that the Renaissance started with the completion of the cathedral in Florence by the addition of Filippo Brunelleschi's dome. The story goes something like: the ambitious Florentines built a church so big, they could not figure out how to cover the center of it, until Brunelleschi came along, with some knowledge of classical building principles, and designed a masonry dome strong enough and light enough to span the opening.

Then I came across this little piece from "smart history" at Khan Academy:

I love the thought that the Renaissance was not started with a grand accomplishment (which is also a great way to start a new era), but with the planting of an idea. The the way we see the world is "explainable" from a mathematical construct: the linear perspective. That both the accomplishment and the idea both came from the same man just makes you wonder who he was, and how he figured things out.

(come and climb the dome with me)