(BQ) Part 2 book "A brief illustrated history of machines and mechanisms" has contents: The machine renaissancemachines in the first colonial empires, machinery during the industrial revolution, a vision on machines. | Chapter 5 The Machine Renaissance The Renaissance in Western Europe in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries marked strong activity of recovery and revitalisation in artistic, scientific, and literature frames that overcame the stagnation of the Middle Ages. Unlike during medieval times, the opening of society during the Renaissance promoted the spread of machines in many environments. Little by little, many existing machines were no longer considered simply as a means of carrying out civil or military engineering works. The first modern approaches to machines in the fourteenth century opened the way to the activities of the fifteenth century, which endowed machine technology and raised the engineering profession to a status with some dignity. Thus, since the sixteenth century recognition was given to machine experts and then, since the beginning of the seventeenth century, machine knowledge was treated as an academic subject. During the Machine Renaissance (which is the Renaissance period in which there was strong reconsideration and evaluation of machines), two separate but related activities may be recognised; namely they are theoretical study with a scientific approach and professional practice of an experimental nature. Both lines gradually converged until they came together in the seventeenth century. The fifteenth century might be considered the high point in machine development, with outstanding personalities such as Francesco di Giorgio (1439–1501) and Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519). At the same time, an interest in the theoretical aspects of machines led to the knowledge from Antiquity being recovered. Greek mechanical works were again examined and the machines of Roman engineers were studied and copied. These works were translated, interpreted, and illustrated, since the original illustrations had never existed or had not been preserved. Leonardo da Vinci, of widespread fame and a brilliant mind, was able to develop machines with a high level of genius
