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Why did the Sack of Rome in 1527 mark the end of the Renaissance in Italy?

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Leonardo da Vinci: Last Supper — Renaissance *Last Supper*, wall painting by Leonardo da Vinci, 1495–98, after its restoration was completed in 1999; in Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan.

The Sack of Rome in 1527 is considered the end of the Renaissance in Italy because it shattered the cultural and political stability that had allowed the movement to flourish.12

When the mutinous imperial troops of Charles V stormed the city, they engaged in widespread destruction, massacre, and the desecration of sacred sites, including St. Peter’s Basilica. This event forced the artists of Pope Clement VII’s court to flee, effectively scattering the concentration of talent that had defined the High Renaissance.13

The trauma of the sack, which resulted in the death or flight of half the city's population, signaled a profound shift in the Italian landscape. As the Reformation and Counter-Reformation intensified, the intellectual and artistic climate moved away from the humanistic ideals of the Renaissance toward the more complex, unsettled styles of Mannerism and, eventually, the piety of the Baroque.13