In the fifteenth century we have reason to believe that many women practised art in various departments, but so scanty and imperfect are the records of individual artists that little more than their names are known, and we have no absolute knowledge of the value of their works, or where, if still existing, they are to be seen.

The art of the Renaissance reached its greatest excellence during the last three decades of the fifteenth and the first half of the sixteenth century.  This was a glorious period in the History of Art.  The barbarism of the Middle Ages was essentially a thing of the past, but much barbaric splendor in the celebration of ceremonies and festivals still remained to satisfy the artistic sense, while every-day costumes and customs lent a picturesqueness to ordinary life.  So much of the pagan spirit as endured was modified by the spirit of the Renaissance.  The result was a new order of things especially favorable to painting.

An artist now felt himself as free to illustrate the pagan myths as to represent the events in the lives of the Saviour, the Virgin and the saints, and the actors in the sacred subjects were represented with the same beauty and grace of form as were given the heroes and heroines of Hellenic legend.  St. Sebastian was as beautiful as Apollo, and the imagination and senses were moved alike by pictures of Danae and the Magdalene—­the two subjects being often the work of the same artist.

The human form was now esteemed as something more than the mere habitation of a soul; it was beautiful in itself and capable of awakening unnumbered emotions in the human heart.  Nature, too, presented herself in a new aspect and inspired the artist with an ardor in her representation such as few of the older painters had experienced in their devotion to religious subjects.

This expansion of thought and purpose was inaugurating an art attractive to women, to which the increasing liberty of artistic theory and practice must logically make them welcome; a result which is a distinguishing feature of sixteenth-century painting.

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The sixteenth century was noteworthy for the generous patronage of art, especially in Florence, where the policy of its ruling house could not fail to produce marvellous results, and the history of the Medici discloses many reasons why the bud of the Renaissance perfected its bloom in Florence more rapidly and more gloriously than elsewhere.

For centuries Italy had been a treasure-house of Greek, Etruscan, and Byzantine Art.  In no other country had a civilization like that of ancient Rome existed, and no other land had been so richly prepared to be the birthplace and to promote the development of the art of the Renaissance.

The intellectually progressive life of this period did much for the advancement of women.  The fame of Vittoria Colonna, Tullia d’Aragona, Olympia Morata, and many others who merit association in this goodly company, proves the generous spirit of the age, when in the scholastic centres of Italy women were free to study all branches of learning.