1510 – 1520s

Events in the 1510s 14

• 1445 – 1518 Loyset Compère Franco-Flemish Renaissance composer Loyset Compère was a French composer and singer at the Sforza court in Milan and later at the French royal chapel. His motets and chansons show graceful melodic invention.
• 1445 – 1510 Sandro Botticelli Early Renaissance · Italy Sandro Botticelli (March 1, 1445 – May 17, 1510) was a Florentine painter whose Birth of Venus and Primavera are icons of the Early Renaissance. He was a favourite of the Medici family.
• 1450 – 1517 Heinrich Isaac Franco-Flemish Renaissance composer Heinrich Isaac was a prolific composer who served the Medici in Florence and later the Habsburg court. His Choralis Constantinus was one of the largest collections of sacred polyphony.
• 1450 – 1516 Hieronymus Bosch Northern Renaissance · Netherlands Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450 – August 9, 1516) was a Dutch painter whose fantastical visions of heaven, hell and human folly remain among the most extraordinary in Western art. The Garden of Earthly Delights is his masterpiece.
• 1452 – 1519 Leonardo da Vinci Painter, sculptor, engineer, scientist — the ultimate Renaissance man Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452 in Vinci, near Florence, and died on May 2, 1519 in Clos Lucé, France. The most diversely talented person who ever lived, he excelled as painter, sculptor, architect, musician, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, botanist and writer.
• 1460 – 1512 Antoine Brumel French Renaissance composer Antoine Brumel was a French composer known for his masses and motets. His twelve-voice Missa Et ecce terrae motus is one of the most spectacular works of the Renaissance.
• 1460 – 1518 Pierre de La Rue Franco-Flemish Renaissance composer Pierre de La Rue was a leading composer of the Burgundian and Habsburg courts whose masses and motets show great contrapuntal mastery and expressive depth.
• 1474 – 1512 Antoine de Févin French Renaissance composer Antoine de Févin was a French composer who served at the court of Louis XII. His masses show the influence of Josquin while demonstrating considerable independent skill.
• 1510 – 1586 Andrea Gabrieli Venetian Renaissance composer Andrea Gabrieli was organist at St Mark's Basilica in Venice and a leading composer of sacred and secular music. His ceremonial works for multiple choirs established the Venetian grand style.
• 1510 – 1556 Jacobus Clemens non Papa Franco-Flemish composer Jacobus Clemens non Papa was a prolific Flemish composer of masses, motets and chansons. His nickname distinguished him from Pope Clement VII and from the poet Jacobus Papa.
• 1510 – 1572 Pierre Certon French Renaissance composer Pierre Certon was a French composer and singer at the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris whose chansons and sacred works were widely published and admired.
• 1515 – 1565 Cipriano de Rore Franco-Flemish madrigal composer Cipriano de Rore was one of the most innovative composers of the mid-16th century whose chromatic madrigals profoundly influenced later composers including Monteverdi.
• 1519 – 1521 Hernán Cortés arrives -- the world changes Hernán Cortés lands on the coast of Mexico in February 1519 with 508 soldiers, 16 horses, 14 cannon and 13 muskets -- a force that seems laughably small against an empire of millions. His achievement is not primarily military but diplomatic: he exploits the deep resentments of subject peoples (particularly the Tlaxcalans), the political divisions within the Triple Alliance, and possibly the psychological disruption caused by the arrival of bearded strangers in the Year One Reed (the predicted return year of the feathered serpent god Quetzalcoatl). Within two years he transforms a diplomatic visit into a conquest. The allies without whom Cortés would certainly have failed -- the Tlaxcalans, Texcocans and dozens of other subject peoples -- are the real story of the Spanish conquest, as much as any European military advantage.
• 1519 – 1521 Tlaxcala -- the empire's greatest enemy becomes its destroyer Tlaxcala, an independent confederation of four city-states in the mountains east of the Valley of Mexico, is the Aztec empire's most formidable unconquered enemy -- fighting the Flower Wars with the Triple Alliance for decades without being conquered. When Cortés arrives in 1519, the Tlaxcalans initially fight him fiercely (and nearly destroy his force), then -- recognising an opportunity -- ally with him against their Aztec overlords. The Tlaxcalan alliance is the single most important factor in the Spanish conquest: Cortés's Tlaxcalan allies provide the mass of infantry for the siege of Tenochtitlan, the carriers for the brigantine boats, the intelligence about Aztec defences, and the motivated warriors who constitute perhaps 80% of the actual fighting force. Without Tlaxcala there is no conquest. This history is genuinely complex: Tlaxcala considers itself a liberator of subject peoples, not a collaborator with foreign invaders -- a perspective that Mexican national historiography has been slow to acknowledge.