The Last Days of Beauty

At the highpoint of the Renaissance, Rome was the centre of the Western world. The Sack of Rome on 6 May 1527 marked the end of this epoch. Charles V’s soldiers stormed the walls of the city of Rome, enacting scenes of carnage unlike any other in the history of the city. The German Landsknechte laid waste to the city, Pope Clement VII was taken prisoner, the water supply destroyed, and the plague broke out. The bright skies of the Renaissance grew heavy, ushering in a dark new era.

Niklas Maak tells the story of the Renaissance from the perspective of its final untroubled moment and its sudden end. He takes us into the workshops of Michelangelo and Parmigianino, onto the battlefields, into the palaces of bankers and popes – and of the »Prima Donna del Mondo«, the fascinating Isabella d’Este.

The author shows how fragile this thing we call culture is, and how quickly disinformation and imprudent politics can lead to the end of freedom. And how was it possible for the Sack of Rome to occur in the first place? An event that nobody expected, and which in many respects is reminiscent of the escalation of current religious, ideological, and military crises.