GER FAMILYof Augsburg, who had built their fortune in the
silver and copper mines of Slovakia, the Welsers, also of
Augsburg, and the Höchstetters. The commercial and fi-
nancial capital of Europe was then Antwerp. However, the
opening up of the world beyond Europe occasioned fur-
ther changes; by the early 17th century the lead had
passed to the Dutch, backed by the wealth from their East
Indian empire.
What distinguished these firms were their interna-
tional connections and the scale of their operations. Al-
most anybody with capital could, and did, lend money.
For example, the English kings of the late 14th and early
15th centuries preferred to deal with syndicates of English
merchants rather than the Italian houses. At a lower level,
money-lenders and pawnbrokers abounded. The taking of
interest—usury—was technically against canon law, but
was generally practiced, especially by the JEWS upon
whom, of course, canon law was not binding.
In the late 16th century there began to emerge a major
change in banking: the provision of capital for loans by
accepting deposits, on which interest was paid. This led to
the establishment of firms that concentrated solely on
banking, without a base in trade, commerce, or other in-
dustry. Such a “public bank,” the Banco della Piazza di Ri-
alto, was established in Venice in 1587, and in 1609 the
Dutch launched the great Bank of Amsterdam.
Further reading: Fernand Braudel, The Wheels of
Commerce (New York: Harper & Row, 1985; new ed.
Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1992);
Frederic Chapin Lane and Reinhold C. Mueller, Money
and Banking in Medieval and Renaissance Venice, 2 vols
(Baltimore, Md. and London: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1985, 97); Raymond de Roover, The Rise and Decline
of the Medici Bank 1397–1494 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1963); Richard Fremantle, God and
Money; Florence and the Medici in the Renaissance (Flo-
rence, Italy: Olschki, 1992).
Barbari, Jacopo de’ (c. 1450–c. 1515) Italian painter and
engraver
Barbari was a native of Venice and may have met DÜRERon
the latter’s visit to Italy in 1495, but little is known of his
early career. He produced a grand woodcut panorama of
Venice in 12 sheets, and the same year (1500) he moved
to Nuremberg as painter to Emperor Maximilian I. During
his peripatetic career in northern Europe he was im-
mensely important in propagating Italian Renaissance mo-
tifs and style among northern artists. After a period
(1503–05) serving Frederick (III) the Wise of Saxony, he
moved to the Netherlands (c. 1508), working first for
Philip of Burgundy and later for the Hapsburg regent Mar-
garet of Austria. His still life of a dead bird (1504; Munich)
is a very early example of the genre. Among the artists
who were deeply influenced by him were Jan GOSSAERT
and Bernard van ORLEY.
Barbaro, Daniele (1513–1570) Italian nobleman and
polymath
Barbaro belonged to a landed Venetian family and studied
science, philosophy, mathematics, and literature in Padua.
In 1545 he founded and became curator of the botanic
garden there. In 1548 he was sent to England as ambas-
sador and on his return (1550) was appointed patriarch of
Aquileia, in which role he attended the Council of TRENT.
He commissioned the Villa Barbaro (1560–68) at Maser
from PALLADIO, who had earlier provided the illustrations
to Barbaro’s edition of VITRUVIUS(1556), and engaged
VERONESEto decorate the interior. Barbaro’s Pratica della
perspettiva (1568/69), giving an interesting account of the
camera obscura, has some illustrative material borrowed
from the 1566 edition of SERLIO’s architectural treatise; the
fact that this edition had been dedicated to Barbaro is still
further evidence of his informed patronage.Barbaro, Ermolao (Almoro di Zaccaria) (1453–c. 1493)
Italian poet and scholar
He was born at Venice and studied at Rome under Pom-
ponio LETO, was crowned laureate at 14, and appointed
professor of philosophy at Padua in 1477. There he corre-
sponded with POLITIANand PICO DELLA MIRANDOLAand
lectured on Aristotle. He went on a number of diplomatic
missions for the city and was made patriarch of Aquileia
by Pope Innocent VIII (1491). Unfortunately he failed to
obtain the permission of the Venetian senate for this post
and he was banished to Rome, where he died, probably of
plague. His major scholarly activity was textual criticism
(his Castigationes Pliniae (1492) emended over 5000 pas-
sages in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History). He also edited
Pomponius Mela (1493) and translated Themistius’s
Greek commentary on Aristotle (1480). His translation of
Aristotle’s Rhetorica into Latin was not printed until 1544.Barbarossa (Italian, “Redbeard,” Khair ed-Din) (c. 1465–
1546) Barbary pirate and admiral of the Ottoman fleet
Raised on Lesbos, he moved to Djerba with his three
brothers when their father died. Scorning both the weak-
ness of the Muslim rulers and the presence of Iberian in-
vaders in North Africa, the brothers undertook a
campaign of brutal piracy. They formed a principality on
Djidjelli, but Spain captured their land in 1518. Bar-
barossa, now the head of the family, was saved from anni-
hilation by the sultan of Turkey, and for the rest of his life
he worked for the sultan. He conquered Tunis for the Ot-
tomans (1534) and permanently loosened Spain’s grip on
North Africa.Bardi, Count Giovanni de’ (1534–1612) Italian
composer and writer
Bardi was the founder of the Florentine Camerata, a group
of scholars who sought to rediscover the music and drama
of ancient Greece. They believed that the Greek tragedies4444 BBaarrbbaarrii,, JJaaccooppoo ddee’’