0:00:05 > 0:00:11'When most people think of the Renaissance, they think of Italy -
0:00:11 > 0:00:16'a sun-kissed realm of Popes, piazzas and palazzos,
0:00:16 > 0:00:19'a place filled with hugely talented artists
0:00:19 > 0:00:22'like Leonardo and Michelangelo.
0:00:22 > 0:00:26'A generation who, in the 15th century, left the Middle Ages behind
0:00:26 > 0:00:30'and created a glorious new kind of art,
0:00:30 > 0:00:36'more inventive and more exuberant than anything seen before.
0:00:40 > 0:00:44'When most people think of the Renaissance,
0:00:44 > 0:00:46'they don't think of Britain.
0:00:47 > 0:00:52'While the Italians were busy building a modern world,
0:00:52 > 0:00:55'the British were still stuck in the medieval mud.
0:00:56 > 0:01:00'The Renaissance is supposed to have passed us by.'
0:01:02 > 0:01:07But that isn't true. The British did have a Renaissance
0:01:07 > 0:01:11and it was bold, it was beautiful and it was utterly brilliant.
0:01:11 > 0:01:14Yet, for some reason, we've all but forgotten it.
0:01:16 > 0:01:18'In this series, I want to rediscover
0:01:18 > 0:01:20'our forgotten Renaissance.
0:01:20 > 0:01:24'A dazzling movement that flourished from around 1500
0:01:24 > 0:01:28'to the Civil War 150 years later...
0:01:31 > 0:01:34'..that gave us our first great paintings...
0:01:36 > 0:01:39'..our first stately homes,
0:01:39 > 0:01:42'our earliest scientific breakthroughs
0:01:42 > 0:01:45'and, perhaps, the finest writer of them all.
0:01:45 > 0:01:49'A movement that catapulted us out of the Middle Ages
0:01:49 > 0:01:52'and laid the foundations of a modern British culture
0:01:52 > 0:01:54'that still shapes us today.'
0:01:55 > 0:02:00This series isn't about Kings and Queens or Tudors and Stuarts,
0:02:00 > 0:02:04it's about the painters, sculptors, poets, playwrights, composers,
0:02:04 > 0:02:07inventors, explorers and craftsmen
0:02:07 > 0:02:11who together revolutionised the way we saw the world.
0:02:12 > 0:02:17'And this episode is about how it all got started -
0:02:17 > 0:02:20'how a handful of brilliant European artists
0:02:20 > 0:02:24'brought the new ideas of the Renaissance to Britain,
0:02:24 > 0:02:26'how we learned from their techniques,
0:02:26 > 0:02:28'experimented with their ideas
0:02:28 > 0:02:33'and, through them, began to develop a voice of our own.'
0:02:57 > 0:03:00'OK, so the story of the British Renaissance
0:03:00 > 0:03:03'doesn't actually start in Britain.
0:03:03 > 0:03:06'It begins in Florence when an Italian sculptor
0:03:06 > 0:03:11'accidentally kick-starts our own artistic revolution.'
0:03:11 > 0:03:16Pietro Torrigiano was proud, arrogant
0:03:16 > 0:03:19and extremely competitive.
0:03:19 > 0:03:21He was childhood friends with Michelangelo
0:03:21 > 0:03:25but rather than admiring the great man like everyone else,
0:03:25 > 0:03:28he was pathologically jealous of him.
0:03:31 > 0:03:33'Things came to a head one day
0:03:33 > 0:03:38'when both men were in a chapel studying some frescos.'
0:03:42 > 0:03:45So they were next to each other, sketching,
0:03:45 > 0:03:50when Michelangelo apparently made some snide remark,
0:03:50 > 0:03:53and that's when it happened.
0:03:53 > 0:03:57That's when years of jealousy bubbled over.
0:03:57 > 0:04:01That's when Torrigiano snapped.
0:04:01 > 0:04:05"Clenching my fist, I gave him such a punch
0:04:05 > 0:04:11"that I felt the bone and cartilage in his nose crumble like a biscuit.
0:04:11 > 0:04:16"He will remain marked by me as long as he lives."
0:04:20 > 0:04:25'Torrigiano permanently disfigured Florence's favourite son.
0:04:25 > 0:04:28'He was left with only one option.
0:04:28 > 0:04:32'To flee the city and take his talent elsewhere.
0:04:37 > 0:04:40'Some time in about 1507,
0:04:40 > 0:04:43'Torrigiano fetched up in what was reported to be
0:04:43 > 0:04:46'Europe's most philistine backwater -
0:04:46 > 0:04:49'a grubby, dirty, uninspiring little place
0:04:49 > 0:04:53'at the end of the known world -
0:04:53 > 0:04:54'England.'
0:04:56 > 0:04:59When Torrigiano first arrived in England,
0:04:59 > 0:05:02it must have felt like he'd stepped back into the past.
0:05:02 > 0:05:06The Renaissance had been raging in Italy for almost 200 years
0:05:06 > 0:05:11but, here, there was absolutely no sign of it whatsoever.
0:05:13 > 0:05:17'After 150 years of bloody wars and infighting,
0:05:17 > 0:05:20'the British hadn't had time for a Renaissance.
0:05:20 > 0:05:22'They hadn't even had time for art.'
0:05:22 > 0:05:26In Britain, artists weren't celebrities
0:05:26 > 0:05:28like they were in Italy.
0:05:28 > 0:05:30They were anonymous workmen,
0:05:30 > 0:05:33paid the same as plasterers and ironmongers.
0:05:33 > 0:05:39And as for art, well, the British didn't really know what art was.
0:05:39 > 0:05:41They didn't even have a word for painting.
0:05:41 > 0:05:45If a painting was on canvas, it was called a "cloth",
0:05:45 > 0:05:49and if it was on panel, it was called a "table".
0:05:52 > 0:05:56'But Torrigiano wasn't without work for long.
0:05:59 > 0:06:02'In 1512, the young King Henry VIII,
0:06:02 > 0:06:05'who fancied himself as a patron of new ideas,
0:06:05 > 0:06:10'gave this exotic Italian artist a very special commission.'
0:06:11 > 0:06:16Torrigiano was offered a staggering £1,500,
0:06:16 > 0:06:19that's more than £1 million in today's money,
0:06:19 > 0:06:25to make and work "well, cleanly, surely, workmanly,
0:06:25 > 0:06:29"curiously and substantially," those are the words in the contract,
0:06:29 > 0:06:31a very special artwork.
0:06:31 > 0:06:33It would be his masterpiece
0:06:33 > 0:06:37and it would be unlike anything the British had ever seen.
0:06:41 > 0:06:45'Torrigiano's piece was commissioned for Westminster Abbey.
0:06:47 > 0:06:52'A place that pretty much summed up where England was artistically.
0:06:53 > 0:06:56'Still stuck in the Middle Ages.
0:06:59 > 0:07:04'With its stylised saints and pointed Gothic arches,
0:07:04 > 0:07:06'it was thoroughly medieval.
0:07:08 > 0:07:14'But what Torrigiano came up with was emphatically different.
0:07:18 > 0:07:24'In a quiet chapel at the back of the Abbey, inside an ornate chamber
0:07:24 > 0:07:29'is the tomb of King Henry VII and his wife Elizabeth of York...
0:07:43 > 0:07:48'..their life-size effigies rest on an imposing tomb chest
0:07:48 > 0:07:52'that's decorated with biblical figures and saints.'
0:07:56 > 0:07:59It's a revolutionary piece of work
0:07:59 > 0:08:02and I think it's revolutionary for two reasons.
0:08:02 > 0:08:06First, Torrigiano did it all.
0:08:06 > 0:08:10He conceived it, he designed it, he modelled the figures,
0:08:10 > 0:08:15he cast the bronze, he carved the stone, he gilded the surfaces.
0:08:15 > 0:08:18He did absolutely everything.
0:08:18 > 0:08:23And if that doesn't seem particularly unusual today,
0:08:23 > 0:08:25in his time it was unheard of.
0:08:25 > 0:08:28In Britain, most tombs, indeed most artworks,
0:08:28 > 0:08:31were made by anonymous artisans.
0:08:31 > 0:08:34But Torrigiano was no medieval craftsman,
0:08:34 > 0:08:36he was a Renaissance artist.
0:08:41 > 0:08:45The second revolutionary thing about this tomb is its style.
0:08:45 > 0:08:48It is Renaissance through and through.
0:08:48 > 0:08:51It's made from white marble and gilt bronze -
0:08:51 > 0:08:55the materials that Donatello and Michelangelo would have used.
0:08:55 > 0:08:57It's adorned with columns and acanthus leaves
0:08:57 > 0:09:00that hark back to the classical ruins of Italy.
0:09:00 > 0:09:03The figures of the King and his wife are lifelike,
0:09:03 > 0:09:07their hands bulging with veins and dimples.
0:09:07 > 0:09:11But for me, the most Renaissance thing of all about this tomb
0:09:11 > 0:09:14are these cheeky little chappies.
0:09:14 > 0:09:18They're called putti, and they're Italian cherubs.
0:09:18 > 0:09:21They were two-a-penny in Italian Renaissance paintings,
0:09:21 > 0:09:24but they were completely new in this country.
0:09:35 > 0:09:39All in all, it's like a little piece of the Renaissance
0:09:39 > 0:09:43has been beamed down into the Middle Ages.
0:09:44 > 0:09:46Isn't it?
0:09:48 > 0:09:52'Torrigiano's tomb marked a turning point in British art.
0:09:52 > 0:09:56'It brought a modern style to a medieval country.
0:09:56 > 0:10:00'It proved that artists were much more than mere craftsmen
0:10:00 > 0:10:05'and it showed that art itself could finally take centre stage
0:10:05 > 0:10:07'in British life.
0:10:07 > 0:10:10'Our Renaissance had begun.
0:10:14 > 0:10:18'In the few years since Torrigiano had come and gone,
0:10:18 > 0:10:21'England had begun to change dramatically.
0:10:21 > 0:10:26'Under Henry VIII, it was peaceful for the first time in decades
0:10:26 > 0:10:29'and its economy was booming.'
0:10:29 > 0:10:32It was now a land of opportunity
0:10:32 > 0:10:36and it wasn't long before the finest minds of the Renaissance
0:10:36 > 0:10:37came knocking.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47'Artists poured into Britain from all over Europe.
0:10:49 > 0:10:52'But none of them would have a greater impact
0:10:52 > 0:10:55'than the brilliant Swiss-German painter Hans Holbein.'
0:10:58 > 0:11:04Hans Holbein arrived in England in the autumn of 1526.
0:11:04 > 0:11:07He was just 29 years old.
0:11:07 > 0:11:09He came with no friends and family,
0:11:09 > 0:11:11he didn't speak a word of the language
0:11:11 > 0:11:13and he had virtually no money.
0:11:13 > 0:11:17But Holbein had big ambitions.
0:11:17 > 0:11:21'Holbein had made his reputation as a portrait painter
0:11:21 > 0:11:23'in the Swiss city of Basel -
0:11:23 > 0:11:26'a place that was now being torn apart
0:11:26 > 0:11:29'by the struggles of the Protestant Reformation.
0:11:31 > 0:11:35'He would be the first artist to bring the new techniques and ideas
0:11:35 > 0:11:38'of the Renaissance portrait to Britain,
0:11:38 > 0:11:43'a place where portrait painting was almost non-existent.
0:11:47 > 0:11:51'Holbein would look closer and harder at British faces
0:11:51 > 0:11:54'than anyone had done before him.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59'He would capture their idiosyncrasies
0:11:59 > 0:12:00'and their imperfections
0:12:00 > 0:12:04'and in doing so, he would make us think differently about each other
0:12:04 > 0:12:07'and ourselves.
0:12:11 > 0:12:15'Holbein's genius is best seen not in his finished works
0:12:15 > 0:12:20'but in intimate pictures that he hoped few would ever see.
0:12:22 > 0:12:27'Today, they are housed at Windsor in the Royal Collection.'
0:12:30 > 0:12:33These are some of Holbein's preparatory drawings
0:12:33 > 0:12:34for his portraits.
0:12:34 > 0:12:39And these really are some of the most breathtaking artworks
0:12:39 > 0:12:40I've ever seen.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43They were made 500 years ago
0:12:43 > 0:12:48and yet these people look like the people you see on the streets today.
0:12:51 > 0:12:55'In fact, these are portraits of a new class of people.
0:12:55 > 0:12:58'Merchants and scholars and courtiers -
0:12:58 > 0:13:01'the people who had taken over from the Church
0:13:01 > 0:13:03'as the new patrons of art.'
0:13:04 > 0:13:08This is Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey,
0:13:08 > 0:13:10when he was about 15 years old,
0:13:10 > 0:13:14and it is alarming how present he feels.
0:13:14 > 0:13:19He stares right out at us, right through us, and it almost feels
0:13:19 > 0:13:22that if you look at him long enough, you'll see him blink
0:13:22 > 0:13:26and if you lean in close enough, you'll smell his breath.
0:13:27 > 0:13:29Howard was executed,
0:13:29 > 0:13:33beheaded a few years after this portrait was made,
0:13:33 > 0:13:37yet, on this piece of paper, he'll always be alive.
0:13:41 > 0:13:45This is the courtier Sir Richard Southwell. He was a famously
0:13:45 > 0:13:49unpleasant man and I don't think Holbein liked him either.
0:13:49 > 0:13:52He looks pompous and humourless.
0:13:52 > 0:13:57His nose is flared with self-regard and Holbein has made sure to include
0:13:57 > 0:13:59some scars under his throat
0:13:59 > 0:14:03that he got from an infection of the lymph nodes.
0:14:03 > 0:14:06But the best bit is this little line in German.
0:14:06 > 0:14:10A note from Holbein to himself that translates as,
0:14:10 > 0:14:13"The eyes, rather yellow."
0:14:16 > 0:14:19'And Holbein's women are just as fascinating -
0:14:19 > 0:14:21'beautiful, ethereal
0:14:21 > 0:14:24'and so elegantly anxious.'
0:14:25 > 0:14:28One of the most impressive things about these drawings
0:14:28 > 0:14:30is the technique.
0:14:30 > 0:14:32It is so economical.
0:14:32 > 0:14:34A simple outline of pen and ink,
0:14:34 > 0:14:37a tiny touch of blue chalk for the eyes,
0:14:37 > 0:14:40a tiny stroke of pink chalk for the lips
0:14:40 > 0:14:43and Holbein lets the paper do the rest.
0:14:43 > 0:14:46And it's that delicacy that enables him
0:14:46 > 0:14:49to capture the fragile, the fleeting, the transient quality
0:14:49 > 0:14:51of life itself.
0:14:52 > 0:14:57'Holbein's drawings are the first really lifelike faces
0:14:57 > 0:15:00'in the whole of British history
0:15:00 > 0:15:03'and they mark the beginning of a major British tradition -
0:15:03 > 0:15:07'a warts-and-all preference for reality over beauty
0:15:07 > 0:15:10'that has persisted ever since.
0:15:11 > 0:15:15'But I think they're even more important than that.'
0:15:17 > 0:15:21Holbein's portraits contain the seeds of a new idea.
0:15:21 > 0:15:24They mark, I think, a moment when people stopped thinking about
0:15:24 > 0:15:28themselves simply as types - as kings, as knights, as courtiers,
0:15:28 > 0:15:32and started thinking about themselves as individuals
0:15:32 > 0:15:34with their own unique characteristics,
0:15:34 > 0:15:37their own unique hopes and fears,
0:15:37 > 0:15:39and that birth of the individual
0:15:39 > 0:15:43is a defining feature of the Renaissance.
0:15:50 > 0:15:54'But the Renaissance wasn't only about looking differently at each
0:15:54 > 0:15:59'other, it was also about looking differently at the world itself.
0:16:00 > 0:16:03'And Holbein captured this radical world view
0:16:03 > 0:16:06'in his most famous painting -
0:16:06 > 0:16:09'one of the great paintings of the Renaissance...
0:16:11 > 0:16:13'..The Ambassadors.'
0:16:15 > 0:16:18And here are the ambassadors themselves -
0:16:18 > 0:16:22Jean de Dinteville and Georges de Selve,
0:16:22 > 0:16:26looking proud of their achievements and even prouder of their clothes.
0:16:27 > 0:16:30But the first thing you notice about this painting,
0:16:30 > 0:16:33the most mysterious thing, the most famous thing,
0:16:33 > 0:16:34are not the ambassadors
0:16:34 > 0:16:36but this splodge.
0:16:36 > 0:16:38If you look at it from this angle,
0:16:38 > 0:16:44you'll see it's actually a distorted but anatomically accurate skull.
0:16:44 > 0:16:48And it's a reminder that even rich and powerful men like these two
0:16:48 > 0:16:52will die like everyone else.
0:16:54 > 0:17:00But I don't think this picture is really about the ambassadors.
0:17:00 > 0:17:05I think it's about what's right at the very centre -
0:17:05 > 0:17:09this cryptic array of objects.
0:17:11 > 0:17:15On the top shelf, these objects relate to the heavens -
0:17:15 > 0:17:20a celestial glove, two quadrants, a sundial.
0:17:20 > 0:17:22On the shelf below,
0:17:22 > 0:17:25these objects relate to the earthly realm -
0:17:25 > 0:17:29a terrestrial globe, a book of arithmetic,
0:17:29 > 0:17:33some musical instruments and a book of hymns
0:17:33 > 0:17:37that's painted in so much detail I can actually sing them.
0:17:38 > 0:17:45These two shelves depict no less than the entire cosmos,
0:17:45 > 0:17:47heaven and earth, together.
0:17:47 > 0:17:51Holbein has created an image of a world in which everything
0:17:51 > 0:17:54can be charted, measured, quantified, understood -
0:17:54 > 0:17:59a world that mankind finally has mastery over.
0:17:59 > 0:18:03This is Holbein's most ambitious portrait.
0:18:04 > 0:18:08It is a portrait of the Renaissance itself.
0:18:11 > 0:18:14'As Holbein assembled his Renaissance stage set,
0:18:14 > 0:18:18'he would have looked to his best friend for the props,
0:18:18 > 0:18:21'a German mathematician and astronomer
0:18:21 > 0:18:24'called Nicholas Kratzer.
0:18:24 > 0:18:29'Kratzer represented the other crucial aspect of the Renaissance -
0:18:29 > 0:18:33'the spirit of scientific inquiry.
0:18:38 > 0:18:43'Kratzer arrived in England in about 1518.
0:18:43 > 0:18:48'But his reasons for coming remain a mystery.'
0:18:49 > 0:18:52When one friend heard of his visit, he advised Kratzer
0:18:52 > 0:18:57to keep his things secret and tell no-one who summoned him.
0:18:57 > 0:19:01He's to invent an excuse as far from the truth as possible.
0:19:05 > 0:19:08'We may never know Kratzer's true motives.
0:19:08 > 0:19:10'He may have been on a secret mission.
0:19:10 > 0:19:12'He may have been a spy.
0:19:12 > 0:19:15'But we do know that he was immediately employed
0:19:15 > 0:19:19'by the King himself as the royal clock-maker.
0:19:23 > 0:19:26'Spy or not, when Kratzer came to London,
0:19:26 > 0:19:29'he certainly brought secrets with him.
0:19:29 > 0:19:32'This is his private notebook
0:19:32 > 0:19:36'and it contains diagrams, equations and instructions
0:19:36 > 0:19:39'for the instruments he made.'
0:19:40 > 0:19:43It's so exciting to be looking through this book
0:19:43 > 0:19:46because looking through it is like peering into
0:19:46 > 0:19:48Nicholas Kratzer's mind.
0:19:48 > 0:19:52And it was clearly a formidable mind.
0:19:52 > 0:19:55'It was also a genuinely Renaissance mind -
0:19:55 > 0:19:59'a mind that believed in observation and calculation,
0:19:59 > 0:20:03'a mind that believed the secrets of the universe could be unlocked
0:20:03 > 0:20:05'with precision engineering.
0:20:08 > 0:20:13'And for Kratzer and his peers, nothing was quite as precise
0:20:13 > 0:20:15'as a sundial...
0:20:16 > 0:20:20'..an instrument that harnessed the sun itself, transforming its rays
0:20:20 > 0:20:24'into the hands of a mathematically-designed clock.
0:20:27 > 0:20:30'Joanna Migdal is one of the few people
0:20:30 > 0:20:32'to continue the great art of dialling.'
0:20:33 > 0:20:37As an instrument-maker yourself, how do you rate Kratzer?
0:20:37 > 0:20:41What was extraordinary about Kratzer was he brought the knowledge
0:20:41 > 0:20:43from Europe to this country.
0:20:43 > 0:20:47The 50 years that were after Kratzer, the dials became amazing
0:20:47 > 0:20:50and so, whatever he did, he changed the consciousness
0:20:50 > 0:20:53of understanding of sundials.
0:20:53 > 0:20:57- So he really kick-started things in this country?- Yes, he really did.
0:20:57 > 0:20:59I don't think Henry VIII would have brought him over
0:20:59 > 0:21:02unless he had something special about him.
0:21:02 > 0:21:05Do we know much, Joanna, about Kratzer as a person?
0:21:05 > 0:21:08One of the sundials, there's a quotation on it, I think in Oxford,
0:21:08 > 0:21:12where he proudly says that he and his stonemason
0:21:12 > 0:21:15could drink in the German style, which basically meant they could
0:21:15 > 0:21:18drink anyone under the table.
0:21:18 > 0:21:21So he was obviously a fun-loving man, too.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26'Kratzer evidently could handle his drink
0:21:26 > 0:21:29'because he specialised in miniature sundials
0:21:29 > 0:21:34'and these required a clear head and a steady hand to make.
0:21:35 > 0:21:39'Miraculously, one of them still survives.'
0:21:40 > 0:21:44This is a delightful little sundial,
0:21:44 > 0:21:48handmade out of gilt brass.
0:21:48 > 0:21:53But it doesn't just have one dial, it has nine of them.
0:21:53 > 0:21:58Seven along the edge and one on each side.
0:21:59 > 0:22:02'Each one of them is perfectly calibrated.
0:22:02 > 0:22:04'All are set to a latitude
0:22:04 > 0:22:08'of 51.5 degrees north of the Equator
0:22:08 > 0:22:12'and that means it was designed to work in London.'
0:22:14 > 0:22:17So, to use it, the first thing you need to do
0:22:17 > 0:22:21is to orient these gnomons towards the north.
0:22:21 > 0:22:24And right at the top of it there's a little hole
0:22:24 > 0:22:27and inside that hole there would have been a compass
0:22:27 > 0:22:31and that would have helped you position it exactly right.
0:22:31 > 0:22:33And when the positioning is right,
0:22:33 > 0:22:37the sun...and I'm going to use a torch because we're indoors,
0:22:37 > 0:22:39the sun would pass over
0:22:39 > 0:22:44the surface of the sundials
0:22:44 > 0:22:47and would help you tell the time.
0:22:47 > 0:22:49And the really clever thing is that actually,
0:22:49 > 0:22:53not just one of these sundials will tell the time, but all of them.
0:22:53 > 0:22:55And this was completely new in Britain.
0:22:55 > 0:22:58There had been sundials before, there had been pocket sundials,
0:22:58 > 0:23:03but nothing as showy, as complex, as sophisticated as this.
0:23:04 > 0:23:07And most remarkable of all,
0:23:07 > 0:23:11we know for whom this object was made.
0:23:11 > 0:23:15Right here, on the stand,
0:23:15 > 0:23:19is a little picture of a dinky cardinal's hat,
0:23:19 > 0:23:23and that tells us that this sundial was made for Cardinal Wolsey,
0:23:23 > 0:23:26King Henry's chief minister.
0:23:26 > 0:23:30And, you know, I can just imagine the chubby figure of Wolsey
0:23:30 > 0:23:34pulling this out after dinner, passing it around the table
0:23:34 > 0:23:38and showing off his fiendishly clever gadget.
0:23:40 > 0:23:44'Foreign technology was becoming fashionable,
0:23:44 > 0:23:48'reflecting an appetite for scientific knowledge,
0:23:48 > 0:23:52'an excitement that was not confined to England.
0:23:56 > 0:23:59'Thanks to Scotland's long-running alliance with France,
0:23:59 > 0:24:04'the Scottish Stuart kings had embraced the Renaissance with enthusiasm.
0:24:09 > 0:24:12'Their base was Stirling Castle,
0:24:12 > 0:24:15'part of which they restyled according to the latest fashion.
0:24:19 > 0:24:24'They filled it with modish sculptures of European monarchs,
0:24:24 > 0:24:28'classical heroes and lots of Italian putti.
0:24:32 > 0:24:34'And they invited musicians,
0:24:34 > 0:24:39'scholars and scientists from all over Europe to come and work there.
0:24:40 > 0:24:46'One of the most eccentric was a young Italian called Giovanni Damiano.
0:24:46 > 0:24:51'Or as the Scots called him, John Damian.'
0:24:51 > 0:24:53John Damian was an alchemist
0:24:53 > 0:24:57and he divided opinion dramatically.
0:24:57 > 0:25:01Some people thought he was a charlatan and they accused him
0:25:01 > 0:25:07of murdering a priest in Italy and impersonating a doctor in France.
0:25:07 > 0:25:10But the king thought he was a genius.
0:25:11 > 0:25:14'Damian was a contemporary of Leonardo.
0:25:14 > 0:25:19'And both were obsessed with the ultimate Renaissance ambition -
0:25:19 > 0:25:22'human flight.
0:25:22 > 0:25:25'In fact, Leonardo's famous drawings of flying machines may well
0:25:25 > 0:25:31'have inspired Damian to embark on his most audacious experiment.
0:25:35 > 0:25:40'It was the morning of 27th September 1507.
0:25:40 > 0:25:44'The king had just dispatched two ambassadors to France.
0:25:44 > 0:25:49'But as they exited, Damian entered.'
0:25:49 > 0:25:54John Damian assembled the court and made a staggering announcement.
0:25:54 > 0:25:57He would beat the ambassadors to Paris.
0:25:57 > 0:26:01He then strapped on two large wings which he had fashioned from hen feathers.
0:26:01 > 0:26:05He stepped up on to those ramparts over there
0:26:05 > 0:26:09and when he had everyone's attention, he leapt off.
0:26:16 > 0:26:19'In the end, Damian didn't quite make it to France.
0:26:20 > 0:26:25'Instead, he landed in a dunghill near the foot of the castle...
0:26:26 > 0:26:28'..and broke his leg.'
0:26:30 > 0:26:34John Damian's flight could be seen as a miserable failure.
0:26:34 > 0:26:36But I disagree.
0:26:36 > 0:26:40These ramparts are really, really high and for him to jump off them
0:26:40 > 0:26:44and only break his leg, I think he must have flown at least for a bit.
0:26:44 > 0:26:47Which would make this one of the first human flights
0:26:47 > 0:26:49in British history.
0:26:53 > 0:26:56'John Damian's grand ambitions pleased the king,
0:26:56 > 0:27:00'but many others at court mocked and insulted him relentlessly.
0:27:03 > 0:27:06'And in doing so, they revealed a broader tension
0:27:06 > 0:27:09'at the heart of the British Renaissance.'
0:27:24 > 0:27:27The British Renaissance had started brilliantly.
0:27:27 > 0:27:32But, as I'm sure you've noticed, it had not been very British.
0:27:32 > 0:27:34Its greatest sculptor had been Italian.
0:27:34 > 0:27:37Its greatest painter had come from Switzerland.
0:27:37 > 0:27:39And its greatest inventor had been German.
0:27:39 > 0:27:43And this was not lost on the natives.
0:27:45 > 0:27:48'For some time, Londoners had been concerned
0:27:48 > 0:27:51'that foreigners were stealing their jobs.
0:27:53 > 0:27:58'In 1517, this resentment had bubbled over into outright violence.'
0:28:03 > 0:28:05It was about 9pm in the evening
0:28:05 > 0:28:11when 1,000 angry English apprentices gathered in the city of London.
0:28:11 > 0:28:13They broke into Newgate Prison,
0:28:13 > 0:28:17liberated several prisoners who had already been arrested for race crimes
0:28:17 > 0:28:20and then marched through the streets
0:28:20 > 0:28:23looting foreign craftsmen's workshops
0:28:23 > 0:28:26and assaulting anyone who got in their way.
0:28:30 > 0:28:33'By 3am, the riots had been quelled,
0:28:33 > 0:28:36'but the problem would not go away.
0:28:37 > 0:28:40'British artists and craftsmen soon realised
0:28:40 > 0:28:43'that they would have to move with the times.
0:28:51 > 0:28:59'From the 1520s, a new generation began to discover Renaissance ideas for themselves.
0:29:02 > 0:29:05'But they wouldn't simply copy Europe.
0:29:06 > 0:29:08'They would do things differently.'
0:29:10 > 0:29:14On the continent, the Renaissance had typically been elegant and refined.
0:29:14 > 0:29:18The British, however, were not a particularly elegant and refined bunch.
0:29:18 > 0:29:21So when we did the Renaissance, it was earthy,
0:29:21 > 0:29:25visceral and at first, a bit rough around the edges.
0:29:28 > 0:29:32'The first of these native pioneers was a young English courtier
0:29:32 > 0:29:37'called Thomas Wyatt, captured here by none other than Hans Holbein.'
0:29:40 > 0:29:45Thomas Wyatt was a playboy, assassin, spy, diplomat.
0:29:45 > 0:29:49He is famous for having had a secret affair with Anne Boleyn.
0:29:49 > 0:29:53But the real reason we should remember him is this.
0:29:53 > 0:29:54He was, in my opinion,
0:29:54 > 0:29:58the man who brought the Renaissance to English literature.
0:30:03 > 0:30:07'Before Wyatt, English poetry was stuck in a rut.
0:30:07 > 0:30:13'In the 120 years since Chaucer, there hadn't been one original voice
0:30:13 > 0:30:18'and poets seemed content to translate French romances
0:30:18 > 0:30:20'into bad English verse.
0:30:20 > 0:30:24'But Wyatt would turn his back on archaic fairy tales
0:30:24 > 0:30:29'and make poetry one of Britain's most dynamic art forms.
0:30:30 > 0:30:33'And it all started with a chance encounter.'
0:30:38 > 0:30:43It was New Year, 1527. Thomas Wyatt was 24 years old.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46He was on the banks of the Thames
0:30:46 > 0:30:49when he saw a man preparing a boat for travel.
0:30:49 > 0:30:52Wyatt asked the man where he was going
0:30:52 > 0:30:55and the man said, "To Italy for the king."
0:30:55 > 0:30:59Wyatt absorbed this information and then asked if he could join him.
0:31:00 > 0:31:02'The trip would inspire Wyatt,
0:31:02 > 0:31:05'but it would also nearly cost him his life.
0:31:13 > 0:31:16'The two men arrived in Italy in February
0:31:16 > 0:31:19'on a diplomatic mission to meet the Pope.
0:31:22 > 0:31:26'But Italy was a lot more dangerous than Wyatt had bargained for.
0:31:30 > 0:31:33'While travelling alone to deliver a letter,
0:31:33 > 0:31:36'Wyatt was kidnapped by mercenaries,
0:31:36 > 0:31:39'held for ransom and finally released.'
0:31:41 > 0:31:44At this point, most people would have run home
0:31:44 > 0:31:48with their tails between their legs, but not Thomas Wyatt.
0:31:48 > 0:31:50Because Wyatt was in love.
0:31:58 > 0:32:02'While travelling around, Wyatt had seen the Italian Renaissance
0:32:02 > 0:32:04'with his own eyes for the first time
0:32:04 > 0:32:07'and he loved everything about it.
0:32:09 > 0:32:13'But nothing appealed to him quite like its poetry.
0:32:16 > 0:32:19'And most of all, the love lyrics of Petrarch.'
0:32:21 > 0:32:26Petrarch was a towering figure of the Italian Renaissance.
0:32:26 > 0:32:30In fact, many people think he actually invented the idea of the Renaissance.
0:32:30 > 0:32:33But he was also a hopeless romantic.
0:32:34 > 0:32:37'Petrarch was a pioneer of the sonnet -
0:32:37 > 0:32:41'a short poem made up of one verse and 14 lines.'
0:32:41 > 0:32:46Petrarch pretty much reinvented the sonnet as the perfect love poem.
0:32:46 > 0:32:50One that could express the true complexity of emotion
0:32:50 > 0:32:52in an extremely condensed form.
0:32:52 > 0:32:55His first eight lines, they would set up the problem,
0:32:55 > 0:32:59which was usually a burning desire for an unattainable woman.
0:32:59 > 0:33:03And the last six lines would resolve that desire.
0:33:04 > 0:33:07It was short, it was sweet and it was passionate.
0:33:07 > 0:33:10And Thomas Wyatt was smitten.
0:33:17 > 0:33:20'In May 1527, Wyatt returned to London
0:33:20 > 0:33:24'wanting to breathe new life into English poetry.
0:33:27 > 0:33:32'Wyatt took the Italian sonnet and put it to bold new use.
0:33:32 > 0:33:36'He wrote tortured love poems for his friends in the Tudor court.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39'They were very private, often intimate.'
0:33:42 > 0:33:45Wyatt's poems were written by hand
0:33:45 > 0:33:48on to small, precious pieces of paper.
0:33:48 > 0:33:51They were folded, rolled up, wrapped in ribbon
0:33:51 > 0:33:56and then furtively passed from person to person,
0:33:56 > 0:34:01tucked into a pocket or left under a pillow for a lucky lady to find.
0:34:04 > 0:34:07'Unlike Petrarch's spiritual love poems,
0:34:07 > 0:34:11'Wyatt's were more passionate, more pained and more human.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17'This is a copy of one of his finest.'
0:34:18 > 0:34:23"They flee from me that sometime did me seek
0:34:23 > 0:34:26"With naked foot, stalking in my chamber.
0:34:26 > 0:34:31"I have seen them gentle, tame and meek,
0:34:31 > 0:34:34"But now are wild and do not remember."
0:34:36 > 0:34:39What an explosive start to a poem.
0:34:39 > 0:34:43"They flee from me that sometime did me seek."
0:34:43 > 0:34:46It is so simple, yet so powerful.
0:34:46 > 0:34:51It's about loss. It's about rejection. It's about heartbreak.
0:34:51 > 0:34:54And who, ultimately, hasn't felt those things in their life?
0:34:55 > 0:34:59And that ultimately is the most amazing thing about this poem.
0:34:59 > 0:35:02Thomas Wyatt wrote it 500 years ago
0:35:02 > 0:35:05and you can still feel his pain today.
0:35:09 > 0:35:12'Wyatt repeatedly explored the pain of rejection.'
0:35:14 > 0:35:17"I find no peace, and all my war is done.
0:35:17 > 0:35:20"I fear and hope, I burn and freeze like ice.
0:35:20 > 0:35:23"I fly above the wind, yet can I not arise.
0:35:23 > 0:35:27"And nought I have, and all the world I season.
0:35:27 > 0:35:30"I desire to perish, and yet I ask health.
0:35:30 > 0:35:34"I love another, and thus I hate myself.
0:35:34 > 0:35:36"I love another, and thus I hate myself."
0:35:36 > 0:35:39- That is a great line. - It is a great line.
0:35:39 > 0:35:41How good a poet was he?
0:35:41 > 0:35:43I think he was a genius.
0:35:43 > 0:35:48If you spend some time with Wyatt's poetry,
0:35:48 > 0:35:52the more you look at it, the more impressive it is.
0:35:52 > 0:35:57He produced a poetry which is much more human than Petrarchan poetry.
0:35:57 > 0:36:01He produced a poem which actually addresses our own human feelings
0:36:01 > 0:36:07of frustration, entitlement, bewilderment, rejection, abandonment.
0:36:07 > 0:36:10There isn't anybody who could read a Wyatt poem and not feel,
0:36:10 > 0:36:13"Yes, I have been there."
0:36:15 > 0:36:18'Wyatt also didn't shy away from writing about sex.'
0:36:18 > 0:36:22"When her loose gown from her shoulders did fall
0:36:22 > 0:36:25"And she me caught in her arms long and small.
0:36:25 > 0:36:27"Therewith all sweetly did me kiss,
0:36:27 > 0:36:32"And softly said, 'Dear heart, how like you this?'
0:36:33 > 0:36:35"It was no dream
0:36:35 > 0:36:38"I lay broad waking."
0:36:38 > 0:36:42But nobody in medieval poetry went to bed with anybody, only in dreams.
0:36:42 > 0:36:45That's why this is such a radical poem.
0:36:46 > 0:36:49There is a real Englishness to his poetry, isn't there?
0:36:49 > 0:36:51I think he is above all an English poet.
0:36:51 > 0:36:55Unlike most of the other architects of the Renaissance, he was English.
0:36:56 > 0:37:00Torrigiano was Italian. Holbein was German.
0:37:00 > 0:37:03So he had a conscious desire to write in English
0:37:03 > 0:37:08and make English a language which was as flexible and as beautiful
0:37:08 > 0:37:12and a vehicle for the expression of complex ideas as Latin
0:37:12 > 0:37:14or as Greek or as Italian had been.
0:37:16 > 0:37:19'Thomas Wyatt died when he was only 39,
0:37:19 > 0:37:23'but his influence on English literature was profound.
0:37:23 > 0:37:26'He had taken a refined foreign art form
0:37:26 > 0:37:29'and made it unmistakably English,
0:37:29 > 0:37:31'less concerned with elegance
0:37:31 > 0:37:35'than with capturing the messy quality of life as lived,
0:37:35 > 0:37:40'setting the tone for English poets from Shakespeare to Philip Larkin.
0:37:50 > 0:37:55'If Thomas Wyatt introduced an unglamorous realism to poetry,
0:37:55 > 0:37:58'another Englishman was to do the same with painting.
0:38:00 > 0:38:02'His name was John Bettes.'
0:38:04 > 0:38:07Like so many British artists of this period,
0:38:07 > 0:38:11virtually nothing is known about John Bettes.
0:38:11 > 0:38:17But it seems he was trained by none other than Hans Holbein.
0:38:17 > 0:38:20Now, if that's true, it makes him a crucial figure -
0:38:20 > 0:38:24the first Renaissance trained British artist in history.
0:38:26 > 0:38:29'Only a handful of his portraits survive.
0:38:29 > 0:38:31'One of them of an unknown man
0:38:31 > 0:38:36'is the earliest British picture in the Tate collection.'
0:38:36 > 0:38:38And this is it.
0:38:38 > 0:38:44It was painted in 1545, just two years after Holbein died.
0:38:44 > 0:38:46Now, I'll be honest.
0:38:46 > 0:38:49It is not as good as Holbein, but it is pretty darn good
0:38:49 > 0:38:52and it has got that defining Renaissance feature -
0:38:52 > 0:38:56the desire to be realistic.
0:38:56 > 0:38:58John Bettes has individually painted
0:38:58 > 0:39:02every single curling hair in this man's ginger beard.
0:39:02 > 0:39:07He's used wet paint to capture the ruffle of the fur collar.
0:39:09 > 0:39:14And the face, well, for maybe the first time in British art,
0:39:14 > 0:39:16it's lifelike.
0:39:19 > 0:39:26This picture is the beginning of a home-grown renaissance in painting.
0:39:26 > 0:39:29But it suggests that our renaissance would not be about beauty,
0:39:29 > 0:39:32grace and endless cherubs.
0:39:32 > 0:39:36It would instead have a solid and earthy reality.
0:39:40 > 0:39:45'But just as British painting was finally about to flourish,
0:39:45 > 0:39:48'the country descended into darkness.'
0:39:53 > 0:39:55'After the death of Henry VIII,
0:39:55 > 0:39:59'the long-standing tensions between the old Catholic Church
0:39:59 > 0:40:03'and the new Protestant faith erupted into violence.
0:40:14 > 0:40:19'In the 1550s, over 300 innocent men and women
0:40:19 > 0:40:23'were cruelly and publicly burnt alive.
0:40:23 > 0:40:25'Their crime?
0:40:25 > 0:40:29'Being Protestant during the reign of a Catholic monarch.
0:40:32 > 0:40:36'The new medium used to document these atrocities
0:40:36 > 0:40:38'was the printed book.
0:40:39 > 0:40:44'And the man who made it happen was an evangelical London printer
0:40:44 > 0:40:46'called John Day...
0:40:47 > 0:40:51'..a man who would arguably have a greater impact on the culture
0:40:51 > 0:40:54'of this country than anyone of his generation.
0:40:57 > 0:41:01'John Day was nearly murdered himself.
0:41:01 > 0:41:04'He was a passionate Protestant and during the reign of Catholic
0:41:04 > 0:41:09'Mary Tudor he was arrested for publicising the Protestant cause.'
0:41:10 > 0:41:13But he was one of the lucky ones.
0:41:13 > 0:41:17Day watched in horror as hundreds of other Protestants were
0:41:17 > 0:41:23burnt at the stake and he became determined to avenge their deaths.
0:41:25 > 0:41:28'When Mary died, Day got his chance.'
0:41:29 > 0:41:32In the autumn of 1559,
0:41:32 > 0:41:36John Day was approached by a writer called John Foxe.
0:41:36 > 0:41:38Foxe was a man on a mission.
0:41:38 > 0:41:42For some time, he had been working on a book about the many Protestant martyrs.
0:41:42 > 0:41:46It would be a witness to what he believed was an English genocide.
0:41:48 > 0:41:53'John Day immediately agreed to print the book at whatever cost
0:41:53 > 0:41:56'and crucially, he insisted that it be illustrated
0:41:56 > 0:41:58'with nothing censored.
0:42:01 > 0:42:04'It has since become known as Foxe's Book of Martyrs
0:42:04 > 0:42:09'and it is a milestone in the history of book making.'
0:42:09 > 0:42:111,800 pages,
0:42:11 > 0:42:141.9 million words -
0:42:14 > 0:42:18the Book of Martyrs was the longest book in British history
0:42:18 > 0:42:21and more than twice as long as the Bible.
0:42:21 > 0:42:26However, I think its real genius was not John Foxe's text,
0:42:26 > 0:42:29but John Day's illustrations.
0:42:36 > 0:42:39'They depict the suffering of Protestants
0:42:39 > 0:42:41'and they are vivid and gruesome.
0:42:42 > 0:42:45'Burnings, torture, disembowelment.
0:42:51 > 0:42:55'Foxe and Day used the shock tactics of modern photojournalism.
0:42:56 > 0:42:59'But they weren't out merely to shock.
0:42:59 > 0:43:01'They wanted to expose the truth.
0:43:03 > 0:43:07'As in the sensational case of a supposed suicide.'
0:43:09 > 0:43:14Richard Hun was imprisoned after a minor disagreement with a priest.
0:43:14 > 0:43:16A few days after his incarceration,
0:43:16 > 0:43:19he was being brought some food in his cell
0:43:19 > 0:43:24when he was found dead, hanging from his own belt.
0:43:26 > 0:43:29The authorities thought it was a straightforward suicide,
0:43:29 > 0:43:33but Foxe and Day did their homework, they even read the coroner's report,
0:43:33 > 0:43:36and they thought otherwise.
0:43:41 > 0:43:43The report said that a fresh candle
0:43:43 > 0:43:47had been found snuffed out in the dead man's cell.
0:43:50 > 0:43:52Now, why would Richard Hun have done that?
0:43:52 > 0:43:55Why would he have extinguished his candle
0:43:55 > 0:43:57before he tied that noose and hanged himself?
0:43:58 > 0:44:04For Day and Foxe, that candle was a clinching piece of evidence.
0:44:04 > 0:44:06Someone else must have done it.
0:44:06 > 0:44:10Someone who wanted to cover their tracks.
0:44:16 > 0:44:19Foxe and Day were convinced that these three men
0:44:19 > 0:44:23had been sent by the Catholic church to murder Richard Hun
0:44:23 > 0:44:25and then make it look like suicide.
0:44:30 > 0:44:34'The Book of Martyrs had more impact than Day could ever have imagined.
0:44:38 > 0:44:42'It was distributed to churches, schools and even pubs
0:44:42 > 0:44:45'and it became the most widely read book in England
0:44:45 > 0:44:47'for the next 200 years.'
0:44:47 > 0:44:52This book had a profound effect on the English people.
0:44:52 > 0:44:56It helped forge the identity of England as a Protestant nation.
0:44:56 > 0:45:00And John Day's images were crucial to its success.
0:45:00 > 0:45:03They ensured that all British people,
0:45:03 > 0:45:07literate and illiterate alike, could understand Foxe's message.
0:45:08 > 0:45:12'The Book of Martyrs is a monumental work of the Renaissance,
0:45:12 > 0:45:16'but it is also the beginning of a distinctly British tradition -
0:45:16 > 0:45:19'a tradition of graphically exposing injustice
0:45:19 > 0:45:22'that runs all the way through our culture,
0:45:22 > 0:45:24'from William Hogarth to Gerald Scarfe.
0:45:31 > 0:45:34'By the middle of the century, British artists
0:45:34 > 0:45:38'and writers had not just absorbed the newest ideas from abroad,
0:45:38 > 0:45:42'they had brilliantly adapted them to their own tastes.
0:45:44 > 0:45:47'Thomas Wyatt had turned the Italian sonnet
0:45:47 > 0:45:49'into the classic form of English poetry.
0:45:51 > 0:45:54'John Bettes had combined Holbein's impeccable technique
0:45:54 > 0:45:57'with an uncompromising realism.
0:45:58 > 0:46:01'And John Day had used a renaissance invention
0:46:01 > 0:46:05'to teach the English people about their own history.
0:46:08 > 0:46:11'In spite of the dark times they had lived through,
0:46:11 > 0:46:14'they had proved a match for their continental counterparts.
0:46:17 > 0:46:19'But that wasn't enough.'
0:46:23 > 0:46:25'Now, with the new Queen, Elizabeth, on the throne,
0:46:25 > 0:46:29'and the country more at ease with itself, British artists
0:46:29 > 0:46:34'wanted to produce work that was better than anything in Europe.
0:46:35 > 0:46:37'And that competitive spirit
0:46:37 > 0:46:40'would lead to one of the greatest pieces of music ever written.'
0:46:44 > 0:46:48According to one anecdote, sometime in the 1500s,
0:46:48 > 0:46:52and Italian song arrived in England for 30 different voices.
0:46:52 > 0:46:55On hearing it, one great duke challenged
0:46:55 > 0:46:58the composers of England to do the same.
0:46:58 > 0:47:01Eventually, one English composer came back with a song,
0:47:01 > 0:47:05not for 30 voices, but for 40 voices.
0:47:07 > 0:47:10'His name was Thomas Tallis.
0:47:10 > 0:47:13'He was an organist and singer for the Royal Court,
0:47:14 > 0:47:16'who, over the course of a long life,
0:47:16 > 0:47:21'composed music for virtually the entire Tudor dynasty.'
0:47:21 > 0:47:24Thomas Tallis' greatest work was the one he produced
0:47:24 > 0:47:27as a result of that challenge -
0:47:27 > 0:47:31a motet for 40 voices called Spem in Alium.
0:47:33 > 0:47:38'Tallis was used to composing the for four, five or six voices.
0:47:38 > 0:47:44Composing 40 different melodies, all to be sung at the same time, was a huge leap.
0:47:44 > 0:47:48But the result, Spem in Alium, is one of the richest
0:47:48 > 0:47:52and most ambitious pieces of choral music in the English canon.
0:47:55 > 0:47:59It is so beautiful, I am not going to ruin it by talking.
0:48:00 > 0:48:03MUSIC: Spem in Alium by Thomas Tallis
0:49:17 > 0:49:21'David Hurley has sung Spem in Alium many times.'
0:49:21 > 0:49:25So, David, what is it actually like to perform Spem in Alium?
0:49:25 > 0:49:27It's quite terrifying, actually.
0:49:27 > 0:49:30You either are the person who comes in first,
0:49:30 > 0:49:32which in itself is terrifying.
0:49:32 > 0:49:37Or you are in choir six or seven and you have to wait around for ages
0:49:37 > 0:49:41and work out exactly when it is you're meant to come in.
0:49:41 > 0:49:45When all those voices come in at that point in the music,
0:49:45 > 0:49:49it must be a euphoric experience. It must be wonderful.
0:49:49 > 0:49:52It's an incredible sound both for the people listening
0:49:52 > 0:49:54and actually for the people involved.
0:49:54 > 0:49:58It's just this... this wall of sound -
0:49:58 > 0:50:03an ancient Renaissance version of surround sound before its time.
0:50:03 > 0:50:07Was there a broader feel at the time that the English were
0:50:07 > 0:50:10competing with what was coming from the continent?
0:50:10 > 0:50:14Yes, I think we have a little bit of an inferiority complex.
0:50:14 > 0:50:17Their way of dealing with it was to make England
0:50:17 > 0:50:20this incredibly important place artistically.
0:50:20 > 0:50:23English music is very much an important part
0:50:23 > 0:50:26of showing how wonderful England was.
0:50:31 > 0:50:33'In rising to the Italian challenge,
0:50:33 > 0:50:37'Tallis had created a work that was as sophisticated as anything
0:50:37 > 0:50:43'on the continent, but at the same time, distinctly English -
0:50:43 > 0:50:46'a breathtaking feat of virtuosity that was
0:50:46 > 0:50:49'a sign of the country's growing confidence.
0:51:00 > 0:51:04'By the 1560s, the British Renaissance had serious momentum.
0:51:05 > 0:51:08'And yet, if you walked through any town you would be
0:51:08 > 0:51:12'forgiven for thinking you were still in the Middle Ages
0:51:12 > 0:51:15'because our buildings were still resolutely medieval.
0:51:18 > 0:51:22'That finally began to change when a few builders started to
0:51:22 > 0:51:26'dabble in the new classical style of the European Renaissance.
0:51:28 > 0:51:31'And they got their ideas from architectural pattern books
0:51:31 > 0:51:33'from France and Italy.'
0:51:35 > 0:51:38When it comes to classical architecture, there is
0:51:38 > 0:51:41pretty much everything here you could ever want.
0:51:41 > 0:51:43So what have we got?
0:51:43 > 0:51:47We have Doric columns like those used on the Parthenon.
0:51:47 > 0:51:51We have Ionic columns and you can always tell an Ionic column
0:51:51 > 0:51:54because it has these little curls on the top.
0:51:54 > 0:51:56And we have Corinthian columns.
0:51:56 > 0:52:00Corinthian columns with their acanthus leaf capitals.
0:52:02 > 0:52:07'There are also pediments, domes, temple fronts
0:52:07 > 0:52:10'and triumphal arches like those built by the Roman emperors.
0:52:12 > 0:52:16'But it took one determined, even obsessive, Englishman
0:52:16 > 0:52:19'to bring all these ideas together
0:52:19 > 0:52:22'and to create something that was both utterly unique
0:52:22 > 0:52:25'and unmistakably British.
0:52:26 > 0:52:29'His name was John Thynn.
0:52:32 > 0:52:34'John Thynn was born in 1515.
0:52:34 > 0:52:37'He was the son of a Midlands farmer.
0:52:37 > 0:52:40'But he had grand designs.
0:52:41 > 0:52:43'He married the Lord Mayor of London's daughter
0:52:43 > 0:52:47'and with his wife's fortune, bought a former priory in Wiltshire
0:52:47 > 0:52:50'and proceeded to turn it into his family seat.'
0:52:52 > 0:52:56John Thynn was frankly pretty unpleasant.
0:52:56 > 0:53:00He was famously impatient and had a ferocious temper.
0:53:00 > 0:53:03But he was also ambitious and single-minded.
0:53:03 > 0:53:08And when he set his mind on something, he never gave up.
0:53:10 > 0:53:13'He wanted a house to suit his ego.
0:53:13 > 0:53:16'It had to be new. It had to be modern.
0:53:16 > 0:53:19'And for John Thynn, that meant it had to be classical.
0:53:22 > 0:53:25'Thynn was so determined to get his house just right
0:53:25 > 0:53:29'that he wrote letters to his builders every single day.'
0:53:32 > 0:53:36"Would you not forget to mend the lanes with gravel
0:53:36 > 0:53:40"in such places as need or require.
0:53:40 > 0:53:44"Also, let there be haste made with the top of my tower.
0:53:44 > 0:53:50"Further, would you not forget to get planks sawn from my doors?"
0:53:50 > 0:53:53Every single detail of his house, he is writing about.
0:53:53 > 0:53:56He must have been a nightmare employer.
0:53:57 > 0:54:02'But John Thynn's obsessive attention to detail eventually paid off.
0:54:03 > 0:54:08'In 1568, after 30 years of building and rebuilding
0:54:08 > 0:54:12'and rebuilding again, he finished his house.
0:54:12 > 0:54:15'It is still standing today.
0:54:15 > 0:54:17'It is called Longleat.
0:54:20 > 0:54:24'And it's the first of England's great stately homes.
0:54:33 > 0:54:39'Longleat is completely unlike the fortified manor houses of its time.
0:54:39 > 0:54:44'It's symmetrical and it's smothered in classical features.'
0:54:50 > 0:54:54'But it's also unlike any classical building in Europe.
0:54:54 > 0:54:58'It doesn't slavishly follow the architectural pattern books.
0:54:58 > 0:55:02'It mixes everything up, creating an eclectic,
0:55:02 > 0:55:05'exuberant and rule-breaking English style.
0:55:20 > 0:55:24'Thynn loved to take his guests behind the scenes of his lavish home.
0:55:28 > 0:55:30'For he had a surprise to show them.'
0:55:33 > 0:55:38After dinner, John Thynn would lead his guests up this staircase.
0:55:38 > 0:55:41They can't have had a clue where he was taking them.
0:55:47 > 0:55:49'But it was worth the climb.'
0:55:54 > 0:55:59This is the roof at Longleat and when John Thynn's guests
0:55:59 > 0:56:03came up here, they must have been completely overwhelmed.
0:56:03 > 0:56:06It must have been like nothing they had ever seen before
0:56:06 > 0:56:11because it is filled with columns and statues and domes
0:56:11 > 0:56:16and John Thynn's land stretches out for as far as the eye can see.
0:56:16 > 0:56:21It is utterly amazing and back then it must have felt like
0:56:21 > 0:56:24the entire Renaissance had been assembled
0:56:24 > 0:56:27and then set down on top of one house.
0:56:27 > 0:56:30But John Thynn had another trick up his sleeve.
0:56:35 > 0:56:39'He would present his guests with a very special work of art -
0:56:39 > 0:56:44'exquisitely designed sculptures, some of them covered in gold.
0:56:44 > 0:56:49'They were phenomenally fashionable and phenomenally expensive.'
0:56:51 > 0:56:54These are sugar sculptures
0:56:54 > 0:56:59and they would have appeared at any self-respecting renaissance banquet.
0:56:59 > 0:57:03They are exquisite little things and the best thing of all is that
0:57:03 > 0:57:08everything here is edible, even the plates.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15'But that was just the icing on the cake.
0:57:15 > 0:57:19'Longleat itself is a seminal masterpiece.
0:57:19 > 0:57:21'Impossible without foreign inspiration,
0:57:21 > 0:57:24'yet like so much in our Renaissance,
0:57:24 > 0:57:26'quintessentially British.
0:57:31 > 0:57:34'It was 60 years since Pietro Torrigiano
0:57:34 > 0:57:37'had stepped foot on English soil.
0:57:37 > 0:57:41'But Britain was no longer a cultural backwater.
0:57:41 > 0:57:46'It was on the verge of becoming a cultural superpower.
0:57:46 > 0:57:48'And this was only the beginning.
0:57:50 > 0:57:53'Next time, as the nation's confidence grows,
0:57:53 > 0:57:57'its artists turn away from Europe completely.
0:57:57 > 0:58:00'They fill their paintings with secret signs
0:58:00 > 0:58:02'and their buildings with riddles.
0:58:04 > 0:58:09'And finally, they set sail, taking their Renaissance to the New World.'