Note 1 — TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND MOST EXCELLENT SIGNOR COSIMO DE' MEDICI, DUKE OF FLORENCE

The word "artist" has become impossible as a translation of "artefice." Such words as "artificer," "art-worker," or "artisan," seem even worse. "Craftsman" loses the alliterative connection with "art," but it comes nearest to expressing Vasari's idea of the "artefice" as a practical workman (cf. his remark about Ambrogio Lorenzetti: "The ways of Ambrogio were rather those of a 'gentiluomo' than of an 'artefice'").