Such images were of higher resolution than the only previous pictures, of Halley's Comet taken by the Giotto spacecraft.

** The Giotto spacecraft flies past Comet 26P / Grigg-Skjellerup, gathering measurements about the comet.

* Halley's nucleus by Giotto spacecraft ( ESA link )

* Image of Halley in 1986 by Giotto spacecraft ( NASA link )

Giotto was a European robotic spacecraft mission from the European Space Agency, intended to fly by and study Halley's Comet.

The spacecraft was named after the Early Italian Renaissance painter Giotto di Bondone.

* Giotto was the first spacecraft to provide detailed pictures of a cometary nucleus.

* Giotto was the first spacecraft do a close flyby of two comets.

* Giotto was the first spacecraft to return from interplanetary space and perform an Earth swing by.

* Giotto was the first spacecraft to be re-activated from hibernation mode.

* Image of Halley in 1986 by Giotto spacecraft

Giotto ( spacecraft ) | Giotto – Comet Halley flyby

# REDIRECT Giotto ( spacecraft )

The European Space Agency used IDL to process almost all of the pictures of Halley's Comet taken by the Giotto spacecraft.

It was to be the first time a spacecraft would have flown in formation with a comet, though a U. S. spacecraft, International Cometary Explorer ( ICE ), flew by Comet Giacobini-Zinner in 1985, spacecraft from several countries encountered Comet Halley in 1986, and the Giotto spacecraft flew past Comet Grigg-Skjellerup in 1992.

He also participated in the planning of Giotto, the European Space Agency's mission to Halley's Comet, but died before the spacecraft was launched.

ICE transited between the Sun and Comet Halley in late March 1986, when other spacecraft ( Giotto, Vega 1 and 2, Suisei and Sakigake ) were in the vicinity of Comet Halley on their early March comet rendezvous missions ( see Halley Armada ).

* Giotto, Cappella degli Scrovegni ( Arena Chapel ), Padua

The Swiss historian Jacob Burckhardt ( 1818 – 1897 ) in his Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien ( 1860 ), by contrast, defined the Renaissance as the period between Giotto and Michelangelo in Italy, that is, the 14th to mid-16th centuries.

Giotto provided the first evidence in support of Fred Whipple's " dirty snowball " hypothesis for comet construction ; Whipple postulated that comets are icy objects warmed by the Sun as they approach the inner Solar System, causing ices on their surfaces to sublimate ( change directly from a solid to a gas ), and jets of volatile material to burst outward, creating the coma.

While in GTO a number of slew and spin-up manoeuvres ( to 90 RPM ) were carried out in preparation for the firing of the Apogee Boost Motor ( ABM ), although unlike orbit circularisations for geostationary orbit, the ABM for Giotto was fired at perigee.

* Giotto di Bondone ( 1995 ), " Madonna and Child "

* Busts of Giotto ( by Benedetto da Maiano ), Brunelleschi ( by Buggiano-1447 ), Marsilio Ficino, and Antonio Squarcialupi ( a most famous organist ).

The mosaics of Pietro Cavallini in Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome ( 1291 ), the frescos of Giotto in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua ( 1303 ), Domenico Ghirlandaio's fresco at the church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence ( 1486 ), and Donatello's gilded sculpture at the church of Santa Croce, Florence ( 1435 ) are famous examples.

Anna at the presentation of Jesus ( right ), from Giotto, Chapel of Scrovegni.

A multi-color underpainting was thought to be more useful by artists such as Giotto ( whose technique is described in detail by Cennino Cennini ), as well as by Jan van Eyck and Roger van der Weyden ( whose technique has been studied with modern scientific analysis ).

* Andrea Velletrano ( 14th century ), painter, contemporary of Giotto, is famous for the Triptych preserved at the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples, dated 1340 ;

Kiss of Judas ( 1304 – 06 ), fresco by Giotto, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua, Italy

Image: Giotto-Scrovegni-- 36-- Lamentation ( The Mourning of Christ ). jpg | Giotto, The Lamentation ( c. 1305 ), Scrovegni Chapel

), The Cambridge Companion to Giotto, Cambridge University Press, 2004.

* Giuliano Pisani, Il miracolo della Cappella degli Scrovegni di Giotto, in Modernitas – Festival della modernità ( Milano 22-25 giugno 2006 ), Spirali, Milano 2006, pp. 329 – 57.

In particular, A Concise History of Painting: From Giotto to Cézanne by Michael Levey ( of the National Gallery in London ), originally published in 1962 ( ISBN 0-500-20024-6 ), is a classic and authoritative introduction to the history of European art from the beginnings of perspective in Italy to the foundations of modern art at the start of the 20th century.

The Giotto and Vega missions gave planetary scientists their first view of Halley's surface and structure.

* 1986 – The Giotto probe provides the first ever close up images of Halley's Comet.

Giotto found Halley's nucleus was blacker than coal, which suggested a thick covering of dust.

* Giotto di Bondone's ' Adoration of the Magi ' painting that includes his rendition of Halley's Comet

It became a part of the Halley Armada together with Suisei, the Soviet / French Vega probes, the ESA Giotto and the NASA International Cometary Explorer, to explore Halley's Comet during its 1986 sojourn through the inner solar system.

Giotto witnessed an appearance of Halley's Comet in 1301.

It constituted a part of the Halley Armada together with Sakigake, the Soviet / French Vega probes, the ESA Giotto and the NASA International Cometary Explorer, to explore Halley's Comet during its 1986 sojourn through the inner solar system.

* Giotto – 2 July 1985 – Comet Halley flyby

During the 1986 apparition of the Comet Halley, a number of international space probes were sent to explore the cometary system, most prominent among them being ESA's highly successful Giotto.