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The Miracles of Prato

Page 32

by Laurie Albanese


  Colorful primary sources such as Giorgio Vasari’s Lives of the Most Emminent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, trans. Gaston du C. de Vère (New York: AMS Press, 1976; first published in Rome, 1550) and Iris Origo, The Merchant of Prato: Francesco di Marco Datini 1335–1410 (Boston: David R. Godine Publisher, 1986) helped bring the world of Renaissance Prato and Florence to life. The texture and details of many scenes in our novel benefited from the excellent information available in works on the daily life of Renaissance Italy including Elisabeth S. Cohen and Thomas V. Cohen, Daily Life in Renaissance Italy (London/Westport: Greenport Press, 2001); Christiane Klapish-Zuber, Women, Family, and Ritual in Renaissance Italy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985); and Jacqueline Marie Musacchio, The Art and Ritual of Childbirth in Renaissance Italy (New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 1999). Information on herbs and herbal remedies was drawn primarily from the Internet source www.botanical.com.

  WORKS BY FRA FILIPPO LIPPI MENTIONED IN

  The Miracles of Prato

  Portrait of a Woman with a Man at a Casement

  About 1435–1436

  Panel, 122.6 x 62.8 cm.

  Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

  The Barbadori Altarpiece

  Begun 1437; finished c. 1439

  Panel, 208 x 244 cm.

  Musée du Louvre, Paris

  The Coronation of the Virgin (the Maringhi Coronation)

  1439–1447

  Panel, 200 x 287 cm.

  Uffizi, Florence

  The Annunciation

  Late 1430s–1440

  Panel, 175 x 183 cm.

  San Lorenzo, Florence

  The Madonna del Ceppo (Madonna and Child with Saint Stephen, Saint John the Baptist, Francesco di Marco Datini, and Four Buonomini of the Hospital of the Ceppo of Prato)

  1453

  Panel, 187 x 120 cm.

  Galleria Communale di Palazzo Pretario, Prato

  Saint Anthony Abbot and Saint Michael, side wings of the now lost Adoration triptych for King Alfonso of Naples

  1456–1458

  Masonite (transferred from panel), each 81.3 x 29.8 cm.

  Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland

  The Death of Saint Jerome

  Early to mid 1450s

  Panel, 268 x 165 cm.

  Cathedral of Santo Stefano, Prato

  The Madonna della Cintola with Saints Margaret, Gregory, Augustine, and Raphael with Tobias

  Late 1455 to mid 1460s

  Panel, 191 x 187 cm.

  Galleria Communale di Palazzo Pretario, Prato

  Lives of Saints Stephen and John

  1452–1465

  Frescoes

  Main chapel, Cathedral of Santo Stefano, Prato

  All other works in the novel are the invention of the authors.

  About the Authors

  LAURIE ALBANESE is the author of the novel Lynelle by the Sea and the memoir Blue Suburbia, which was named a Book Sense Best Book of the Year and was an Entertainment Weekly Editor’s Choice selection. Please visit her website at www.laurielicoalbanese.com.

  Her best friend and coauthor, LAURA MOROWITZ, is an associate professor of art history and coauthor of Consuming the Past: The Medieval Revival in Fin-de-siècle France.

  They both live in New Jersey with their families.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

  ALSO BY LAURIE ALBANESE

  Blue Suburbia: Almost a Memoir

  Lynelle by the Sea: A Novel

  ALSO BY LAURA MOROWITZ

  Consuming the Past:

  The Medieval Revival in Fin-de-siècle France

  (with Elizabeth Emery)

  Artistic Brotherhoods in the Nineteenth Century

  (with William Vaughan)

  Credits

  Jacket design by Mary Schuck

  Jacket photograph © The Bridgeman Art Library

  Jacket painting: The Madonna of the Sacred Girdle by Fra Filippo Lippi © Museo Civico, Prato, Italy/The Bridgeman Art Library

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  THE MIRACLES OF PRATO. Copyright © 2009 by Laurie Lico Albanese and Laura Morowitz. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  EPub © Edition DECEMBER 2008 ISBN: 9780061984556

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