Vasco Núñez de Balboa was a Spanish conquistador who founded the colony of Darién in Panama, the oldest extant European settlement in the mainland of the Americas. He crossed the Isthmus in search of gold, reaching the Pacific Ocean after a...

Pope Leo X, born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici, was Pope from 9 March 1513 to his death in 1521. The second son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, ruler of the Florentine Republic, he was elevated to the cardinalate in 1489. He is probably bes...

Francisco Hernández de Córdoba is usually reputed as the founder of Nicaragua, and in fact he founded two important Nicaraguan cities, Granada and León. The currency of Nicaragua is named the córdoba in his memory. Cordoba was an officer of...

Diego de Almagro, also known as El Adelantado and El Viejo (The Elder), was a Spanish conquistador and a companion and later rival of Francisco Pizarro. He participated in the Spanish conquest of Peru and is credited as the first European d...

Francisco Pizarro was a Conquistador who seized the Inca empire for Spain. In 1510 he enrolled in an expedition of exploration in the New World, and three years later he joined Vasco Núñez de Balboa on the expedition that discovered the Pac...

Michelangelo Buonarroti was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, poet, and engineer of the High Renaissance who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art. Despite making few forays beyond the arts, his versatil...

Juan Sebastián Elcano was a Basque navigator, subject of the Kingdom of Castile. He is best known for completing the first world circumnavigation in History. Elcano was a naval commander subject of Charles I of Castile and he completed the...

Louise of Savoy was a French noble, Duchess regnant of Auvergne and Bourbon, Duchess of Nemours, the mother of King Francis I of France. She was politically active and served as the Regent of France in 1515, in 1525–1526 and in 1529....

Giorgione was an Italian painter of the Venetian school in the High Renaissance from Venice, whose career was cut off by his death at a little over 30. Giorgione is known for the elusive poetic quality of his work, though only about six sur...

Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire, was an English diplomat and politician in the Tudor era. He was born at the family home, Hever Castle, Kent, which had been purchased by his grandfather Geoffrey Boleyn, who was a wealthy mercer. He was...

Francisco de los Cobos y Molina was the secretary of State and Comendador for the kingdom of Castile under the rule of the Emperor Charles I of Spain. His career benefited from the help aforded by his uncle, Diego Vela Allide, treasurer and...

Philip I, known as Philip the Handsome or the Fair, was the first Habsburg King of Castile. The son of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, Philip inherited the greater part of the Duchy of Burgundy and the Burgundian Netherlands (as Philip IV...

Leonardo da Vinci, Codex Atlanticus : Autograph paper codex (1478-1518 c.), 1119 ff., 65x44cm. This is the largest collection of Leonardo's manuscript sheets, formed at the end of the sixteenth century by the sculptor Pompeo Leoni, who dis...

Jan Mabuse was the name adopted (from his birthplace, Maubeuge) by the Flemish painter Jan Gossaert; or Jennyn van Hennegouwe (Hainaut), as he called himself when he matriculated in the guild of St Luke, at Antwerp, in 1503. From 1508-9 he...

Clement VII, Pope 1523-1534, the illegitimate son of Giuliano de' Medici, he was raised by his uncle Lorenzo de' Medici. In 1513 he was made archbishop of Florence and cardinal by his cousin Pope Leo X. He commissioned art from Raphael and...