| A | B |
|---|
| Geoffrey Chaucer | English poet of The Canterbury Tales |
| Desiderus Erasmus | Dutch scholar and priest who wrote In Praise of Folly, mocking the church |
| Donatello | Florentine sculptor who drew on the classical model; bronze David |
| Masaccio | Florentine artist who developed perspective, and used light and shading |
| Petrarch | Italian sonnet writer, who wrote poems for Laura |
| Machiavelli | Italian writer who wrote a handbook for rulers called The Prince |
| Lorenzo de Medici | "The Magnificent" head of an influential Florentine family of bankers who were great patrons of the arts |
| Johann Guttenberg | inventor of the moveable type press |
| Miguel de Cervantes | Spanish author of Don Quixote |
| Baldassare Castiglione | Italian author of the Book of the Courtier |
| Brunelleschi | Florentine architect who rediscovered the art of building a large dome, and created the Cathedral of Florence |
| Michelangelo | Italian artist who painted the Sistine Chapel and sculpted the marble David |
| Pieter Bruegel | Flemish artist famous for his peasant scenes |
| Albrecht Durer | German artist, famous for his woodprints, Praying Hands |
| Sir Thomas More | leader of English humanists, wrote Utopia, and was beheaded by Henry VIII for refusing to convert to the Church of England |
| Hans Holbein | German artist, famous for his portraits of English nobility |
| Leonardo da Vinci | "Renaissance Man"; a sculptor, painter, writer, scholar, architect, and inventor; he painted Mona Lisa and Last Supper |
| Raphael Santi | Italian artist, famous for his Madonnas |
| William Shakespere | English playwright who wrote Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, etc. |
| John Milton | author of Paradise Lost |
| Dante Aligheri | Italian author of the Divine Comedy in which he travels through the Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise |
