evil and the poem concludes as Godfrey leads the tri-
umphant crusaders to the Holy Sepulcher. It was trans-
lated into English (1594, 1600) by Edward Fairfax and
influenced parts of Spenser’s FAERIE QUEENE. There is a
modern verse translation by Anthony Esolen (Detroit,
Mich., 1987).
Gesner, Konrad (1516–1565) Swiss naturalist and
bibliographer
The son of a Zürich artisan, Gesner was educated at the
university of Basle. After continuing his education in Paris
and Montpellier, he returned to Switzerland in 1641 to be-
come professor of Greek at Lausanne university. He later
turned to medicine, becoming in 1541 chief physician of
Zürich. A prolific author, Gesner wrote more than 80
works, the best known of which is his comprehensive five-
volume Historiae animalium (1551–87). A related Histo-
riae plantarum, with 1500 illustrations, appeared
posthumously (1751–59). Much shorter, but more per-
ceptive, is Gesner’s De omni rerum fossilium genere (1565),
in which he proposes a possible organic origin for fossils
(see MINERALOGY). In the field of bibliography Gesner’s
major work is Bibliotheca universalis (1545–49) in which
he tried to list and summarize all known Greek, Latin, and
Hebrew works. He died in Zürich of the plague.
Gesualdo, Carlo (c. 1561–1613) Italian nobleman and
composer
Born in Naples, Gesualdo held the title of prince of
Venosa. Following the widely publicized murder of his
wife and her lover (1590), Gesualdo retired to his estate at
Gesualdo near Avellino. In 1594 he went to Ferrara to
marry Leonora d’Este, niece to the reigning duke. In the
same year his first two books of MADRIGALSwere pub-
lished in Ferrara. Gesualdo suffered from melancholy, and
spent most of the rest of his life on his estate at Gesualdo;
his letters from this period reveal an extraordinary sensi-
tivity. He published in all six books of madrigals, two of
motets, one of responsories, and some keyboard works. It
is for his madrigals that he is chiefly remembered; chro-
matic harmonies and the juxtaposition of fast and slow
movements result in a mannered, idiosyncratic style
which was much admired, though little imitated.
Further reading: Glenn Watkins, Gesualdo: The Man
and His Music (1973; 2nd ed. Oxford, U.K.: Clarendon
Press, 1991).
Ghent The capital of the modern province of East Flan-
ders, Belgium, situated at the junction of the Scheldt and
Lys rivers. Ghent supplanted neighboring Bruges as seat of
the counts of Flanders in the late 12th century but its
wealthy merchant class soon gained a measure of inde-
pendence from its feudal overlord and a degree of democ-
ratic self-government which was mainly in the hands of
those connected with the cloth industry. Ghent passed
with the rest of Flanders to Burgundian and then Haps-
burg rule, and in the 16th century played a prominent role
in the attempt to throw off the Spanish yoke. It rebelled
and was severely crushed by CHARLES Vin 1540, and in
1576 the leaders of the Netherlands patriots met there to
sign the Pacification of Ghent as a compact for preserving
their lands from Hapsburg despotism. It was regained for
Spain by Alessandro FARNESE, Duke of Parma, but depop-
ulation and religious persecution had wrecked its pros-
perity, and the closing of the Scheldt to trade (1648)
ended its chances of recovery.
The cathedral of St. Bavon contains the van EYCK
brothers’ great masterpiece, The Adoration of the Lamb (see
GHENT ALTARPIECE). The town hall has one Flamboyant
Gothic facade (1518–33) and one in the Renaissance style
(1595–1628).Ghent altarpiece (The Adoration of the Lamb, The Mys-
tic Lamb; 1432) A polyptych painted for the cathedral of
St. Bavon, Ghent, by Hubert and Jan van EYCK. The sub-
ject matter of the two-tier, shuttered altarpiece is complex.
The lower register of the interior features The Adoration of
the Lamb of God by the Elect (hence the altarpiece’s alter-
native name), and the upper shows God the Father en-
throned between the Virgin and St. John the Baptist,
musical angels, and Adam and Eve. On the lowest level of
the exterior, Jodocus Vyd and his wife, patrons of the al-
tarpiece, kneel in prayer before two simulated statues of
St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. These fig-
ures are surmounted by an Annunciation, and, at the top,
pictures of the prophets and sibyls who foresaw the Virgin
Birth. Each of the polyptych’s 20 separate panels has the
same high finish and extraordinary attention to detail, and
the relative contributions of the two brothers van Eyck re-
main controversial among art historians.Ghibellines See GUELFS AND GHIBELLINESGhiberti, Lorenzo (1378–1455) Italian sculptor
Unlike many other Florentine sculptors, Ghiberti, who
trained as a goldsmith, specialized exclusively in bronze
casting. The Renaissance is often taken as beginning with
the competition (1401) to find the executant of the doors
for the Baptistery, which Ghiberti won—narrowly—from
BRUNELLESCHI, both submitting specimen panels in relief
of the Sacrifice of Isaac (Bargello, Florence). Ghiberti is
famed for the two sets of great bronze doors he produced:
those now on the north of the Baptistery took him the first
half of his career (1403–24); those on the east, facing the
facade of the cathedral (called by Michelangelo the “Gates
of Paradise”), preoccupied him from 1425 until 1452. His
style developed considerably from the 28 small decorative
panels of the earlier doors to the 10 great panoramic nar-
rative scenes of the later ones.221100 GGeessnneerr,, KKoonnrraadd