Lifecasting was the renaissance art of making sculptures using molds taken from real-life plants and animals.

Magellan’s voyage in search of the “Spice Islands” was marked by storms, sharks, and scurvy—plus multiple attempts at mutiny.

If thieves’ cant—a language known only to criminals—was the Devil’s cabinet, bourgeois society couldn’t help but peep inside.

Renaissance-era anatomists taught people to “knowe thyself” by reading the books of bodies.

In 1588, Pope Sixtus V issued a papal bull officially classifying abortion, regardless of the stage of fetal development, as homicide.

The role beards played in defining masculinity during the Renaissance.