Florio, John (c. 1553–1625) English courtier and
translator of Italian descent
His father was an Italian Protestant refugee and Florio
may have spent part of his youth abroad during the reign
of the Catholic Mary I. He obtained the patronage of the
earl of LEICESTERin the 1570s and in 1603 became reader
in Italian to the queen, Anne of Denmark. His Worlde of
Wordes, an Italian-English dictionary which appeared first
in 1598, was brought out in an enlarged edition in 1611
with a dedication to the queen. He also published a well-
received translation of MONTAIGNE’s Essays (1603). In
1620 he retired to Fulham, where he died of the plague.
Floris, Cornelis (Cornelis de Vriendt) (c. 1514–1575)
Netherlands sculptor and architect
A native of Antwerp and brother of Frans FLORIS, Cornelis
seems to have received his initial training from one of the
early Netherlands Italianist artists, possibly Pieter COECKE
VAN AELST. In 1538 he was in Rome, whence he had re-
turned to Antwerp by the following year. Floris published
two volumes of engravings: one, with various adaptions of
grotesque ornament, was published in 1556 and the other,
with numerous designs for funeral monuments, in 1557.
He executed numerous tombs, church screens, and other
ecclesiastical furnishings in the Netherlands, and as far
afield as north Germany and Scandinavia. However, his
most famous work was the new town hall at Antwerp
(1561–66), one of the key monuments of Flemish man-
nerist architecture. Floris’s principal student was Hans
VREDEMAN DE VRIES.
Floris, Frans (Frans de Vriendt) (1516–1570)
Netherlands painter
The brother of Cornelis FLORISand the most famous pupil
of Lambert LOMBARD, Floris was registered as a member of
the guild in his native Antwerp in 1540. Shortly after-
wards he visited Rome, where he was deeply impressed by
the Italian mannerists such as VASARI, SALVIATI, BRONZINO,
and ZUCCARO. By 1547 he had returned home, where he
worked for William the Silent and other illustrious pa-
trons as a painter and designer of festival decorations and
the like. His most famous painting, the Fall of the Rebel
Angels (1554; Antwerp), includes numerous direct quota-
tions from MICHELANGELO’s Last Judgment. His own later
Last Judgment (1565; Vienna) utilizes an expressively dy-
namic asymmetrical composition which suggests the in-
fluence of TINTORETTO. Floris’s style represents an
extremely Italianate formulation of northern MANNERISM,
although his drawing has a linearity and his subject mat-
ter a sense of fantasy, both of which recall the northern
late Gothic tradition. He was also capable of remarkably
naturalistic portraits, of which a fine example is the Fal-
coner’s Wife (1558; Caen). From the mid-16th century
Floris’s workshop was probably the most dynamic art cen-
ter in the Netherlands with, reputedly, more than 100
pupils.Flötner, Peter (active 1522–1546) Swiss sculptor and
engraver
Born in Thurgau, Flötner moved to Nuremberg in 1522,
shortly after his first journey to Italy, which he revisited
soon after 1530. His Stuttgart bronze horse (c. 1520–30)
seems to reflect the naturalistic trend in late Gothic, but
his masterpiece, the Nuremberg Apollo fountain (1532),
is an entirely classical conception. Ultimately based upon
the composition of an engraving by Jacopo de’ Barbari, its
formal clarity is remarkable. “Local color” is confined to
its base, which incorporates an agitated crowd of putti and
sea creatures. This contrast corresponds to certain devel-
opments in contemporary Italian MANNERISM. Flötner was
deeply conscious of the distinction between the German
and Italian traditions: a caption on a print which he exe-
cuted during the 1530s actually describes the sculptor’s
ability to work in “Italian” and “German” manners. His in-
fluence was broadcast by small sculptures and engravings.Fludd, Robert (1574–1637) English physician and
Rosicrucian
Fludd was born at Bearsted, Kent, attended Oxford uni-
versity (1591–97), and then traveled abroad, studying
chemistry and medicine and becoming acquainted with
the tenets of the shadowy Rosicrucians (see ROSICRUCIAN-
ISM). After several false attempts, he became a fellow of the
College of Physicians (1608) and practiced successfully in
London. He published an Apologia (1616) for the Rosi-
crucians, and their program underlay most of his medical
and philosophical writings, all of them in Latin, all pub-
lished in Continental Europe, and unkindly characterized
by an early biographer as “great, many, and mystical.” He
was, however, shrewd enough to be one of the first of his
profession to accept, in Medicina catholica (1631), William
HARVEY’s account of the circulation of the blood.Fontainebleau A town and former royal château south of
Paris. Set in parkland and forest, the medieval palace was
used as a hunting residence but it was pulled down by
FRANCIS I, who wanted to enhance his prestige by building
a magnificent palace in the new Renaissance style. Two
schools of painting and architectural decoration were as-
sociated with Fontainebleau during the 16th century. The
first was the more important and was based on the court
of Francis I, who brought a number of leading artists from
Italy and other countries to work on the interior of the
newly rebuilt château. Chief of these artists was ROSSO
FIORENTINO, who arrived in 1530 and was responsible for
the Galerie François I (c. 1533–44). PRIMATICCIO, who
joined Rosso in 1532, is best remembered for the decora-
tion of the Galerie d’Ulysse. Other visiting artists were
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