The beginning of the Renaissance is marked in this translation of Leonardo Bruni's first work, the "Laudatio Florentinae Urbis" (Panegyric of the City of Florence). Written around 1400, this treatise introduces many of the ideas that became central to the Italian Renaissance--republican liberty, free competition, and the balance of power--and influenced many later thinkers of the Renaissance, including Machiavelli. With the ideas outlined in this work, Bruni decisively influenced all later European and American thought about republican and democratic government. In addition to the...