In the mid-1880s, an influential British architectural journal published an article characterizing Renaissance architecture as a corruption of classical architecture. By the turn of the century, however, the same journal praised the Renaissance architect Filippo Brunelleschi as the ?Christopher Columbus of modern architecture.? Relevant for architectural historians, literary scholars and those in Victorian studies, this book examines the conflicting late nineteenth-century characterizations of Renaissance architecture and reassesses them within the formation of a modern, British architectural profession.