Well, Renaissance, Baroque, maybe earlier. But…
Why is it that some artists are typically referred to by their last name (Velazquez, Zurbaran, Murillo), while others their first name (Michelangelo, Rembrandt)?
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Family surnames (or at least those that didn’t describe your profession or town of origin) were a pretty recent innovation in the Renaissance
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Then, as today, artists were a pretentious, flashy lot. “Michaelangelo” and “Rembrandt” were sexier and more marketable than “Buonorotti” or “Van Rijn.” Similarly, “Madonna” and “Cher” are more marketable than “Madonna Ciccone Ritchie” or “Cherilyn LaPierre Sarkisian.”
In Italian, the surname is first, i.e., Buonarroti, Michelangelo
http://www.norwichfreeacademy.com/slater_museum/shows/cast/141_pieta.html
View his signature here.
His last name follows the first, thus it would be fair to say that either it was apt to refer to him as such, or the last name trend is a bumble that has lasted ages.
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn is a mouthful in any language, so that would point to why he signed only his first name.
Da Vinci is also sometimes referred to expressly as Leonardo and he is also Italian. I don’t know what the interchangeability of the names is owed to, though ‘Da Vinci’ is far more common.
So from this evidence I would say that the artists are referred to by the same name they sign on their works.
“da Vinci” may be more common among English speakers, but technically it’s not his last name. “Da Vinci” only refers to the village (i.e., Vinci) where he was born. In fact, Renaissance art historians usually refer to him just as “Leonardo,” sometimes as “Leonardo da Vinci,” but never simply as “da Vinci.”
Florentines in the Renaissance were customarily called by their first name. As one can see in the 1427 Catasto, only 37% of Florentine citizens had family names. For those 63% of citizens who lacked family names, for greater clarity you could call them by their city of origin (e.g., “Leonardo da Vinci”–note that “da Vinci” by itself would mean nothing unless in connection with a particular individual’s given name). Or, more commonly, they’d be called by their father’s name–Leonardo himself, indeed, was sometimes called “Leonardo di Ser Piero,” which would mean “Leonardo, son of Mr. Piero” (Piero being his dad’s first name; “Ser” was just a social title). You could tack on the grandfather’s name, too, until you have a whole string of di’s and della’s and so forth (see Cecil’s related column: “Do Italian last names beginning with “de,” “del,” or “della” indicate nobility?”)
Since these “last names” only referred to one’s immediate ancestors, they weren’t proper surnames–and wouldn’t become so until several generations had passed.
Michelangelo is one of the exceptions, as he actually had a real and true family name: “Buonarroti,” as mentioned above. But he became so famous that you didn’t need to distinguish him by his family name–just “Michelangelo” was sufficient (so he was kind of like Cher, as Krokodil says).
I like to compare these artists to modern-day Brazilian soccer stars (e.g., Ronaldo) who also go by their first name or nicknames.