Carl Jacob Christoph Burckhardt (May 25, 1818 – August 8, 1897) was a
historian of
art and
culture, and an influential figure in the
historiography of both these fields. He is known as one of the major progenitors of
cultural history.
Siegfried Giedion described Burckhardt's achievement in the following terms: "The great discoverer of the age of the
Renaissance, he first showed how a period should be treated in its entirety, with regard not only for its painting, sculpture and architecture, but for the social institutions of its daily life as well." Burckhardt's best known work is
The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860).