The Renaissance begins in a graveyard. Plague killed a third to a half of Italy and left the survivors richer per head — total wealth fell, but the number of hands it passed through fell faster. Move the four dials and watch the two bars go in opposite directions. Then notice that money alone builds nothing: it takes rival cities and a reason to spend.
Four dialsdrag them
Each dial changes one condition of fifteenth-century Italy. Everything on the right recalculates as you move.
45%
No plagueHalf the city dead
3
None — full recovery1363 · 1374 · 1400 · more
A dozen rivals
One strong crownA checkerboard of rivals
80% commissioned
Hoard it, buy landChapels, tombs, altarpieces
The ledgerlive
Every bar is an index. 100 = Florence before 1340. The grey tick on each track is that baseline.
below 1340above 1340the surpluswhat gets built
Move a dialThe reading will appear here.
Read this as a teaching model, not a data set. The direction of each relationship is well attested; the exact numbers are illustrative. And the chapter is blunt that none of this “caused” the Renaissance in any simple sense — Petrarch was already at work before the plague arrived.
Where the money lands
Each block is a patronage centre competing for prestige. Height shows how much it can commission.