Medici

Italian family of music patrons. The rulers of Florence for most of the period 1434-1737, they were renowned for their patronage of learning, literature, the arts and science. Musical chapels were maintained at the city's cathedral and baptistry from 1438; especially influential were Lorenzo the Magnificent (ruled 1449-92) and his son Giovanni, who ruled as Pope Leo X from 1513 and patronized many famous musicians. Duke Cosimo I (ruled 1537-74) reorganized and enlarged the chapels and began the practice of retaining musicians and dancers at court. He was also the first to commission musical festivities for family and state occasions. Intermedi were staged between the acts of plays, and in 1600 the first operas were given: Caccini's Il rapimento di Cefalo and Peri's Euridice (the earliest complete extant opera). A later Medici heir apparent, Prince Ferdinando (1663-1713), patronized Alessandro and Domenico Scarlatti, Handel and others.

---

Italian noble family that produced three popes (Leo X, Clement VII, and Leo XI) and two queens of France (Catherine de Médicis and Marie de Médicis). Cosimo "the Elder" (1389-1464) was the first of the family to rule Florence. Lorenzo "the Magnificent" (1449-1492) was an outstanding patron of learning and the arts, whose clients included Michelangelo and Botticelli.

Medicean Med'i·ce'an (-chē'ən, -sē'-) adj.

(med-uh-chee)

A family of skilled politicians and patrons of the arts who lived in Florence, Italy, during the Renaissance. (See Lorenzo de Medici.)

The family produced two queens of France: Catherine, in the sixteenth century, and Marie, in the seventeenth.

Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: aristocratic Italian family of powerful merchants and bankers who ruled Florence in the 15th century

---

medici humidors