Giovan Battista Cini

Who was Giovan Battista Cini?

Giovan Battista Cini was an Italian renaissance playwright at the court of the Medici in Florence.

Cini was a member of The Florentine Academy of Art which was founded by Grand Duke Cosimo I at the height of the Medici power during the 16th century. Cini's contemporaries there were his fellow authors Amberi, Lasca, Cecchi and Gelli. They studied the intellectual philosophies from Plautus and Terence to Ariosto and Machiavelli.

At the time Florence led Europe as a theatrical center. By the 15th century the city was renowned for its "sacre rappresentazioni": these were religious dramas incorporating stage machinery. However what was an important step to what was to become modern theater was the Florentine love of staging classical comedies, unlike the rest of intellectual Europe which merely read them. The first instance of a Florentine classical production was as early as 1476 when Terence's Andria was performed translated into Latin so that it could be clearly understood by a wider audience. The next step came in the late 16th century came when musical interludes were incorporated into the text and spoken dialogue—this was the birth of modern opera.