The World of the Early Sienese Painter

Siena of the 13th and 14th centuries was one of the great cities of Europe and its artists - Duccio, Simone Martini, and Ambrogio and Pietro Lorenzetti - were among those who reshaped the nature and place of painting first in Italy, then across Europe. Drawing on the extraordinary riches of Sienese archives, on early unpublished secondary sources, and on the recent work of historians, Hayden Maginnis situates early Sienese painters within their society and their city and provides a comprehensive account of the economic, social, religious and intellectual world of Siena’s artists. The text examines where the painters lived, how much they were paid, their social status and whether they were aware of the novel importance of 13-century optics. Maginnis demonstrates how firmly the painters’ lives were embedded in the values and customs of their society and how important the particular character of their society was for the patronage artists received.