Painting Mona Lisa aka I, Mona Lisa

Historical Perspective

April 26, 1478

Lorenzo’s brother, Giuliano de’ Medici, is murdered in the cathedral of Santa Maria della Fiore

December 1479

Leonardo da Vinci sketches the executed Bernardo Baroncelli

March 15, 1479

Recorded date of Lisa di Antonio Gherardini’s birth

1482

Leonardo leaves Florence for Milan

April 8, 1492

Lorenzo de’ Medici dies

November 8, 1494

Piero de’ Medici and his brothers are expelled from Florence

Medici brothers eventually settle in Rome

November 17, 1494

Charles VIII of France and his army enter Florence

March 5, 1495

Lisa Gherardini marries Francesco del Giocondo

February 7, 1497

Savonarola’s “bonfire of the vanities”

April 7, 1498

The infamous “trial by fire”

May 23, 1498

Savonarola executed

December 28, 1503

Piero di Lorenzo de’ Medici drowns in the Garigliano River

August 1512

Giuliano di Lorenzo de’ Medici welcomed home as Florence’s ruler

March 11, 1513

Giovanni di Lorenzo de’ Medici elected Pope (Leo X)

1516

Leonardo travels to France. King Francis I purchases the Mona Lisa. The painting remains in France at the Louvre Museum to this day.