Book Description

Isabella D'Este, the Marchioness of Mantua (1474-1539) was one of the dazzling figures of the Italian Renaissance, playing the Renaissance game with an expertise that outflanked Popes and Emperors, using her brains, her charm, and her unswerving purpose to psych her opponents. This is the first biography of an important Renaissance figure. It is above all as a patron of art and letters that Isabella D'Este will be remembered. In this respect she deserves a place with the most enlightened princes of the Renaissance, with Lorenzo de Medici and Lodovico Sforza. This book provides a thorough examination of D'Este's life, and a detailed account of an intriguing woman of the Italian Renaissance, with illustrations and family trees. Illustrations include a portrait by Leonardo Da Vinci, and another by Titian of Isabella dressed in full regalia.