Renaissance

INTRODUCTION

Renaissance, series of literary and cultural movements in the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries. These movements began
in Italy and eventually expanded into Germany, France, England, and other parts of Europe. Participants studied the
great civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome and came to the conclusion that their own cultural achievements
rivaled those of antiquity. Their thinking was also influenced by the concept of humanism, which emphasizes the worth
of the individual. Renaissance humanists believed it was possible to improve human society through classical
education. This education relied on teachings from ancient texts and emphasized a range of disciplines, including
poetry, history, rhetoric (rules for writing influential prose or speeches), and moral philosophy.
The word renaissance means rebirth. The idea of rebirth originated in the belief that Europeans had rediscovered the
superiority of Greek and Roman culture after many centuries of what they considered intellectual and cultural decline.
The preceding era, which began with the collapse of the Roman Empire around the 5th century, became known as the
Middle Ages to indicate its position between the classical and modern world.
Scholars now recognize that there was considerable cultural activity during the Middle Ages, as well as some interest
in classical literature. A number of characteristics of Renaissance art and society had their origins in the Middle Ages.
Many scholars claim that much of the cultural dynamism of the Renaissance also had its roots in medieval times and
that changes were progressive rather than abrupt. Nevertheless, the Renaissance represents a change in focus and
emphasis from the Middle Ages, with enough unique qualities to justify considering it as a separate period of history.
This article begins with a brief overview of the characteristics of the Renaissance and then discusses conflicting views
on how to define and interpret the Renaissance. This analysis is followed by a discussion of the economic, social, and
political changes that began in the 14th century and contributed to the development of the Renaissance. The ideas of
the Renaissance, particularly of humanism, are then explored, and their impacts on established religion, on science,
and on the arts are examined.

II
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CHARACTERISTICS OF THE RENAISSANCE

During the Middle Ages there was a lively interest in classical literature, especially Latin and Latin translations of
Greek. This attention was mostly confined to the professional activities of theologians, philosophers, and writers. In the
Renaissance, however, people from various segments of societyfrom kings and nobles to merchants and soldiers
studied classical literature and art. Unlike the professional scholars of the Middle Ages, these people were amateurs
who studied for pleasure, and their interest in art from the past was soon extended to contemporary works. Medieval
art and literature tended to serve a specialized interest and purpose; Renaissance works of art and literature existed
largely for their own sake, as objects of ideal beauty or learning.

Curiosity and Objectivity

The Renaissance was marked by an intense interest in the visible world and in the knowledge derived from concrete
sensory experience. It turned away from the abstract speculations and interest in life after death that characterized
the Middle Ages. Although Christianity was not abandoned, the otherworldliness and monastic ideology of the Middle

Ages were largely discarded. The focus during the Renaissance turned from abstract discussions of religious issues to
the morality of human actions.

Individualism

In the Renaissance, the unique talents and potential of the individual became significant. The concept of personal fame
was much more highly developed than during the Middle Ages. Renaissance artists, valuing glory and renown in this
world, signed their works. Medieval artists, with their focus on otherworldliness and on glorifying God, were more
humble and remained largely anonymous.
The attention given to the development of an individuals potential during the Renaissance brought with it a new
emphasis on education. The goal of education was to develop the individual's talents in all intellectual and physical
areas, from scholarship and the writing of sonnets to swordsmanship and wrestling. It was believed that the ideal
person should not be bound to one specific discipline, such as that of scholar, priest, or warrior. This was in stark
contrast to the Middle Ages, when specialization had been encouraged.

III
A

INTERPRETATIONS OF THE RENAISSANCE

Both the idea of historical rebirth and the use of the term renaissance to describe this process were characteristic
products of the Renaissance itself. The term rinascit (an Italian word for 'renaissance') was probably first attached to
the modern period in a book of biography entitled Le vita de pi eccellenti architetti, pittori, ed scultori italiani (1550;
The Lives of the Most Eminent Italian Architects, Painters, and Sculptors, 1568), more commonly known as Lives of the
Artists, published by Italian painter Giorgio Vasari. Vasari applied the concept specifically to a rebirth of art that drew
its inspiration from antiquity rather than from the work of more recent medieval artists.
In the 14th and 15th centuries many Italian scholars began to display a remarkable awareness of history. They
believed that they lived in a new age, free from the darkness and ignorance that they felt characterized the preceding
era. These scholars compared their own achievements to the glories of ancient Rome and Greece. One group of Italian
writers in the 14th century, following the example of the contemporary poet Petrarch, emphasized that their age
resembled the great civilizations of the past because it focused on artistic achievement. In their view, this renewed
emphasis on the arts had begun in the late 13th and early 14th centuries with the work of Italian painter Giotto and
Italian poet Dante Alighieri.
Another group, led by Florentine scholar and diplomat Leonardo Bruni, added an equally important political dimension
to this concept. Bruni and his followers admired a republican or representative form of government and looked to
ancient Rome, as it was before the emperors came to power, as the best model. They applied humanistic learning to
social and political life and encouraged patriotism among the residents of Florence and other Italian city-states.
The Renaissance originally grew out of cultural and political developments in Italy. Over the next three centuries,
writers north of the Italian Alps adopted some of these ideas and soon spread them widely throughout Europe.
Northern European Renaissance scholars, such as Dutch writer Desiderius Erasmus, added their own dimension to the
Renaissance. They emphasized the need to reform Christian society and believed that this reform could be
accomplished through education that was based on the great writings of ancient Greece and Rome.

Intellectuals continued to build on the ideas of the Renaissance during the 18th century Age of Enlightenment, a time
when scientific advancements led to a new emphasis on the power of human reason. One of the early Enlightenment
thinkers was French philosopher and writer Voltaire. He claimed that the Renaissance was a crucial stage in liberating
the mind from the superstition and error that he believed characterized Christian society during the Middle Ages.
Voltaire applauded the declining power of the Roman Catholic Church during the Renaissance.
Later historians and writers who became part of the 19th-century romantic movement evaluated the Renaissance in an
entirely different manner. Followers of romanticism emphasized passion over reason. They showed a keen interest in
the vital, heroic, and unconventional personalities of the Renaissance such as Italian poet Petrarch, Italian artist
Michelangelo, and French philosopher Ren Descartes. The romantics believed that an important characteristic of the
Renaissance was individualism, which emphasized the capabilities and rights of the individual.
By the middle decades of the 19th century, two historiansJules Michelet of France and Jakob Burckhardt of
Switzerlandhad combined these various perspectives in their interpretation of the Renaissance. Michelet saw the
Renaissance as the momentous debut of a new phase in human history. He believed that it made possible all the great
achievements of modern man, including the discovery of the Americas, the new science, and modern literature and
art.
Michelets view of the Renaissance as the beginning of the modern era was refined in Jakob Burckhardt's Die Kultur der
Renaissance in Italien (The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, 1878), first published in 1860. He attached
particular importance to the Renaissance state and saw in it the origins of modern political attitudes and behavior. In
Burckhardt's view, Renaissance leaders conceived of the state as a work of art, one that they created deliberately by
identifying and then applying the best means to reach their desired goals. Another characteristic of the Renaissance
that Burckhardt considered modern was an interest in human personality and behavior.
Burckhardt saw all these traits as indications of a deeper quality: a fundamental individualism that was a central
feature of the Italian Renaissance. He believed that the absence of centralized control in Italy during the 13th century
had created an atmosphere of insecurity that encouraged the emergence of ruthless individuals, free spirits, and
geniuses. Burckhardt believed that the study of antiquity had inspired Italians, but that its impact was less significant
than other scholars had believed.
Historians who followed Burckhardt rarely disputed his interpretation of the Renaissance. However, they supplemented
it with detailed investigations of other aspects of Renaissance life, including economics, science, and philosophy. These
studies have reinforced the interpretation of the Renaissance as a period of striking innovation that pointed toward the
modern world. Other scholars have also applied Burckhardt's vision of the Italian Renaissance to Europe as a whole.

Renaissance as Gradual Change

Those who have challenged Burckhardts theories have generally argued that the Renaissance was not as unique or
different as previous scholars claimed. In particular, scholars who studied the Middle Ages became convinced that the
centuries before the Renaissance, far from being a period of unrelieved barbarism, had developed a high order of
civilization. They insist that most elements of the Renaissance had their roots in the past, and that it is misleading to
speak of the 'rebirth' of culture in the Renaissance or to emphasize its significance in the formation of the modern
world. These alternate interpretations have suggested that the Renaissance was a waning of the Middle Ages rather
than the dawning of a new era, and that medieval scholars also knew and valued classical writings.

Scholars have largely abandoned the notion of an abrupt break between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and
have modified older ideas about the nature of the era. It is now clear, for example, that people of the Renaissance did
not abandon Christianity and that vigorous religious impulses were a major feature of the Renaissance. Scholars
recognize that many aspects of the Renaissance were not modern; they also acknowledge that what may be true of
one movement, region, or decade, may not be true of another.
Despite these differing interpretations, there are many indications that Europe had changed dramatically by the 16th
century. Particularly noteworthy is the fact that Renaissance intellectuals believed their age marked a momentous
turning point in history and that they were somehow fundamentally different from their medieval ancestors.

IV
A

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL BASIS OF THE RENAISSANCE

The civilization of the Renaissance was the creation of prosperous cities and of rulers who drew substantial income
from their urban subjects in the Italian city-states and the countries of England and France. The commerce that kept
cities alive also provided the capital and the flow of ideas that helped build Renaissance culture. During the early
Middle Ages foreign trade had virtually come to a halt. By the 11th century, however, population growth and contact
with other cultures through military efforts such as the Crusades helped revive commercial activity. Trade slowly
increased with the exchange of luxury goods in the Mediterranean region and various commodities such as fish, furs,
and metals across the North and Baltic seas. Commerce soon moved inland, bringing new prosperity to the citizens of
towns along major trade routes. As traffic along these routes increased, existing settlements grew and new ones were
established.
The cities of Italy were strategically located between western Europe and the area along the eastern shore of the
Mediterranean Sea known as the Levant. Italys leadership in the Renaissance was due in part to its central location for
trade. The cities became important and wealthy commercial centers, and the riches accumulated by the merchants of
Venice, Genoa, Milan, and a host of smaller cities supported Italy's political and cultural achievements.
Important towns developed beyond Italy as well. Especially with the expansion of trade, towns grew along the Danube,
Rhine, and Rhne rivers of Europe; around the North Sea and the Baltic Sea; and in the Low Countries of Belgium,
Luxembourg and the Netherlands where northern and southern trade routes met. Wherever these towns were located,
they became a unique element in a medieval world that up to this time was dominated by seignorialism, an
agricultural system in which the primary economic and political relationship was between landowners and their
tenants.
Capital that accumulated through trade was eventually available for other enterprises, notably banking and, to a lesser
degree, industry. The wealth of Florence, the leading cultural center of the Renaissance, came particularly from these
alternate enterprises because the citys inland location limited participation in large-scale commerce. At its height the
Florentine textile industry employed 30,000 people, but it was banking that helped build the greatest family fortunes in
Florence.
In the early 14th century, Florence became the banking center of Italy. The citys importance as an international
financial center was reinforced in the 15th century by the Medici bank. Under the management of Cosimo de' Medici,
also known as Cosimo the Elder, this firm maintained branches in the major cities of Europe. The bank loaned money
to popes, rulers, and merchants; operated mines and woolen mills; and carried on various other commercial
enterprises. It accumulated huge profits that were used to finance political activity and to support cultural activities.

Well before the end of the 15th century, other powers challenged the economic leadership of Italy. In the kingdoms
beyond the Alps, powerful rulers consolidated their control. This consolidation was accompanied by the growing
prosperity of local businesses and by efforts to dispense with the Italian middlemen in trade. Rulers in France, England,
and the Spanish kingdoms pursued policies favorable to their own middle-class tradesmen. In central Europe, powerful
banking houses, such as that of the Fugger family in Augsburg, Germany, emerged at the encouragement of one of
Europes most prominent royal dynasties, the Habsburgs.
Portugals development of a direct sea route to Asia at the end of the 15th century also undercut Italys role as the
primary intermediary between the Far East and the Western world. Europes expansion to other parts of the world was
one of the most momentous developments of the Renaissance era. The voyages of Italian-Spanish navigator
Christopher Columbus to the Caribbean Sea in 1492 and of Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama to India in 1498 set in
motion a series of explorations that sparked European imagination during the late Renaissance period.
These journeys intensified national rivalries. The Atlantic powers, including Spain, Portugal, and France, competed for
colonial territory and vastly increased their wealth. For Italy the geographical discoveries had a less positive effect,
however. They signaled the eventual transfer of the worlds major commercial routes and, thus its wealth, from the
Mediterranean to the Atlantic seaboard. These economic developments also exposed other countries to Renaissance
ideas and gave them the resources to rival Italy in cultural expansion.

Urban Society

The relationship between economic prosperity and the achievements of the Renaissance is not direct. The 14th
century, which is generally regarded as the beginning of the Italian Renaissance, was a time of economic stagnation
and even contraction, at least compared to the centuries that preceded it. Political disorder interfered with commerce;
agricultural productivity appears to have declined; and the outbreak of the bubonic plague, or Black Death, drastically
reduced the population of many parts of Europe. The 15th century probably saw some recovery, but it is not certain
that this prosperity matched the success of the 13th century, particularly in Italy. Although economic conditions had an
effect on the development of the Renaissance, economic prosperity and the accumulation of wealth were not
necessarily the most important factors in the achievements of the era.
Other factors related to economic growth were at least as important in stimulating the political and cultural changes
that became part of the Renaissance. Certainly one of these was the new environment provided by the town, an
environment that was a by-product of increased commercial activity. The pursuit of wealth and the opportunity for
traders and bankers to interact with the world beyond their town walls created an atmosphere more open to new ideas
and to innovation, experimentation, and enterprise in all aspects of life.
The towns also developed a distinctive class structure. As urban areas grew in size and wealth, their social and political
organization became more complex. When towns were small, urban populations tended to be homogeneous and
democratic. With increased size and prosperity, the populations became more diverse, with different social classes that
varied in background and power.
Peasants migrated to the towns from the countryside, often to escape their status as serfs, and began to form a
growing working class that had no political rights. Members of the nobility who lived in the towns made up another
distinct class. Merchants who were engaged in large-scale commerce or other particularly profitable enterprises
gradually became differentiated from other tradesmen by their greater wealth. As a ruling class developed that
manipulated government for its own interests, the gulf between social groups widened. By the 14th century the

tensions generated by great inequalities of wealth and power had reached the breaking point. Disorder followed and,
as a result, ambitious despots became the rulers of many Italian towns, then known as communes.

Rural Society

Rural society also changed as a result of the development of trade and towns. The towns and noble families of Italy,
and later of northern Europe, provided the resources and the initiative behind the Renaissance, but the majority of
Europeans still lived in rural areas and worked the land. The new urban markets for agricultural products steadily
transformed a largely self-sufficient rural economy into a system that produced goods for sale. Whereas landowners
had previously required payments in goods or services from their tenants or serfs, they now wanted to receive money
in order to buy products sold by the merchants. The agricultural labor system known as serfdom was slowly
transformed. In the new system, tenants held land based on money rents. The practice of making collective decisions
based on long-established customs, a tradition that was common in closely knit medieval peasant communities,
dissolved into a more independent kind of rural life.
Otherwise, the rural populations participated little in the new movements of the Renaissance. People who lived in rural
areas often suffered profoundly from the political decisions of the period, as they bore the burdens of the warfare and
economic reorganization that national rivalries and internal struggles brought. In contrast, the cultural energy of the
Renaissance hardly affected them at all. The driving forces behind both the political and cultural changes of the period
were the townspeople, especially the urban elite, and the rulers with whom they were allied.

POLITICS IN THE RENAISSANCE

Dramatic political changes occurred in Europe during the Renaissance. For many centuries after the collapse of the
western Roman Empire around 500, the only strong unifying force in Europe was the Roman Catholic Church. However,
the growth in commerce increasingly unified Europe economically. Invasions from the outside declined, and rulers in
the various countries gradually consolidated their power. In most of Europe, the states they ruled became focused
almost exclusively on self-preservation. They operated with growing efficiency and increasingly used their power at
home as a basis for expansion abroad.
This trend developed in different ways in Italy than it did in areas north of the Alps. As towns grew in Italy, they
demanded self-rule and often developed into strong, independent city-states. In the northern areas of Europe, national
monarchs established their power over the nobility. During the Renaissance, both of these political systems evolved
from medieval roots, but neither was completely transformed into a modern state. The advancements that did occur
were accompanied by even greater changes in attitudes toward politics.
The way was prepared for these changes by the decline of the Holy Roman Empire and the papacy, or office of the
pope. These two universal institutions played a large role in medieval politics. In the medieval world, the Holy Roman
emperor held political control over large amounts of territory in central Europe and in Italy. The pope, as head of the
Catholic Church, wielded spiritual authority over all of Europe. The church and the state were viewed as two different
aspects of one Christian society, sometimes referred to as Christendom.
Despite the strong ties between church and state, popes and secular rulers frequently struggled with each other for
control over church administration and secular lands. Since the church was responsible for the souls of the people,
including the emperor himself, the popes claimed ultimate supremacy over the state as well as the administration of
the Catholic Church. At the same time, rulers sought to protect and expand their power within their domains. In

addition, the Holy Roman emperors were frequently involved in struggles to control territory in Italy; they were
generally opposed in this effort by the popes.
In the 13th century this struggle for dominance between the emperor and the pope was almost fatal to the authority of
both. Innocent III, who became pope in 1197, tried to strengthen papal authority. He claimed that the pope had the
right to play a role in naming a new Holy Roman emperor after the death of Henry VI. The maneuvering that followed
greatly diminished the power of the emperor. Henrys son promised many concessions to the papacy in exchange for
the popes support of his claim to the throne; later, when he was named Frederick II, king of Germany and Holy Roman
emperor, he failed to fulfill all of his promises. After the death of Frederick II in 1250, the imperial throne was vacant
for over two decades. The German princes, whose lands made up most of the Holy Roman Empire, took the
opportunity to increase their own power.
The papacy was also weakened and discredited by its concentration on political control rather than spiritual matters,
and the papacy fell increasingly under French influence. Between 1309 and 1377 the popes were forced to live in
Avignon in the south of France under the domination of several French monarchs; this papal exile is sometimes
referred to as the Babylonian Captivity. The return of the papal court to Rome was promptly followed by the so-called
Great Schism that lasted from 1378 to 1417. During much of this period, three contenders vied for the title of pope.
When the Council of Constance unified the papacy in 1417 with the election of Martin V, the popes political authority
outside of the church was dead.

Growth of the Italian City-States

In Italy the towns had taken advantage of the struggle between the popes and emperors and enlarged their own power
and independence. During the 14th century, many of these cities expanded their rule to include much of the
surrounding countryside.
The Italian city-states slowly consolidated their power, and by the 15th century five states controlled the entire
peninsula. The kingdom of Naples and Sicily in the south, in contrast to the northern states, still retained the system of
political and military relationships among the nobility known as feudalism. In the Papal States, which occupied the
center, the popes were preoccupied during the 15th century with recovering the control they had lost during the
period of Avignon and the Great Schism. Florence dominated the Tuscany (Toscana) region to the north, although the
state was plagued in the 14th century by class conflicts, which led eventually to a behind-the-scenes dictatorship by
the powerful Medici banking family. Milan was firmly controlled by the Visconti family that led Milan in extending its
empire over large areas of northern and central Italy. Venice, too, expanded on the mainland to protect its trade routes
and food supply. Its relatively unified population and its complicated constitution kept class conflict at a minimum and
preserved its republican government.
None of these powers was strong enough to control the others. Attempts at more than local conquest, such as a move
by the Visconti of Milan to expand southward, only united the other states in opposition. A shaky equilibrium resulted,
which was given formal recognition by the general Peace of Lodi in 1454. This agreement is often cited as the first
example of that basic principle of modern international relations, the balance of power, in which states use alliances as
a means of equalizing political power. In fact, the most modern aspect of the states of the Italian Renaissance was
their relationship with one another. They behaved as independent and sovereign nations, rather than as members of
the broader community of Christendom. In order to carry on the diplomacy required by this new idea of the state, they
developed such techniques as the institution of resident ambassadors.

Consolidation of Monarchies in Northern Europe

Somewhat later, a similar development occurred in the monarchies north of the Alps. During the last half of the 15th
century in France, England, and Spain, strong rulers emerged. These rulers were far more successful than earlier
monarchs had been in securing the resources and developing the machinery of effective centralized government. Not
all aspects of the reigns of these 'new monarchs'Louis XI of France, Henry VII of England, and Ferdinand and Isabella
in Spainwere equally new, and they still wielded far less power than later rulers would. In particular, with the
possible exception of the French king, these monarchs were limited in the essential ability to tax. Nevertheless, their
reigns marked the beginning of the development toward the modern state.
These European rulers had much in common. Their success was largely due to their subjects longing for peace and
order after prolonged civil wars in each country: the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453) in France, the Wars of the Roses
(1455-1485) in England, and factional struggles among the nobles of Spain in the first half of the 15th century and
before. These troubles were primarily caused by a disorderly feudal system, in which the nobility had an interest in
restricting the power of the king. Monarchs soon realized that they could challenge the nobility, who had become their
greatest enemies, by forming alliances with townspeople. The wealth of city residents was based on trade, and they
owed no particular allegiance to members of the landholding or noble classes. Monarchs began to serve as
administrators rather than leaders of a constantly battling aristocracy. They developed a new, professional
bureaucracy staffed by lawyers and other non-noble subjects and used it to impose a new degree of order and unity in
their states.
The German king Maximilian I was unable to unify his empire in a similar fashion. He did bring together the holdings of
the Habsburg family in central Europe. In other regions, however, increasingly ambitious rulers consolidated political
power and adopted an attitude toward the use of this power that closely resembled that of the princes of Italy.
The two political systems drew closer together during the latter part of the 15th century. The wealth of Italy had
always attracted the interest of outside powers, and disunity made Italy increasingly vulnerable to attack and
conquest. Beginning in 1494 when the armies of French king Charles VIII marched into Italy, France and then Spain
attempted conquest. They fought each other for dominance until 1559, when Spain gained control of most of the
peninsula. These wars effectively ended the independence of the Italians until the 19th century.
The fighting in Italy disrupted daily life and destroyed wealth. The culture, which had flourished in the independent
atmosphere of the Italian city-states, now languished in a quite different environment. Many scholars believe that this
period marks the end of the Renaissance.
For the northern powers fighting in Italy, the wars interrupted the work of consolidation that the preceding generation
had begun. The war efforts used energy as well as resources that might have aided the internal development of the
northern domains. However, the wars also exposed northern Europeans to the accomplishments and the attitudes of
the Italian Renaissance. Between 1494 and the 16th-century religious revolution, known as the Reformation, Italian
influences were widely dispersed. These influences made a significant contribution to the development of the
Renaissance throughout Europe.

New Approaches to Politics

New attitudes toward politics accompanied the new forms of political organization and behavior, both in Italy and in
the north. These changes first became evident in historical writing, and then appeared in more theoretical works.
During the Middle Ages, historians had used their own moral framework to study the past; they depicted events as
part of the destiny of all Christendom. In contrast, histories composed by humanists such as Leonardo Bruni stressed
the earthly progress of a particular place and accounted for political developments in purely natural and nonreligious

terms. These humanists described human rather than divine control and direction of events, and they used their
writings to support causes that they considered patriotic or worthwhile.
By the 16th century, as Italy's troubles mounted, this tendency to free politics from any relationship to religion became
an important part of the thinking of a number of distinguished Florentine writers, including the best known, Niccol
Machiavelli. Stimulated by the political crisis of his time, Machiavelli sought to base statecraft or the art of governance
on science rather than on Christian principles. He focused on how to preserve the state by any effective means. His
acceptance of the principle that the end justifies the means, so bluntly expressed in his most famous work, Il principe
(1532; The Prince, 1640), reflects the degree to which the new political environment had changed popular thinking.
This new political perspective also began to appear in the monarchies of the north. These ideas were first introduced in
the writings of humanists who came from Italy, but before the end of the 16th century, northern Europeans had begun
to develop similar philosophies. In his Six Livres de la Rpublique (1576; Six Books of the Republic, 1606), for example,
French historian Jean Bodin advanced a theory of sovereignty that gave almost unlimited authority to the national ruler
and that was based on purely secular arguments.
This modern way of thinking about politics emerged during the Renaissance, but it was not universally accepted at the
time. Works such as Utopia, written by English statesman Sir Thomas More in 1516, show that idealistic and religious
attitudes toward politics still remained strong in this era. Nevertheless, the modern secular state that recognized no
higher law than its own welfare originated in the Renaissance.

VI

THE CHURCH AND RELIGION IN THE RENAISSANCE.

The history of Christianity during the Renaissance presents a number of sharp contrasts. In various ways, the influence
and prestige of the Catholic Church were declining. Its institutions were deeply rooted in older patterns of life and
traditional ways of thought, and these institutions were slow in adapting to new conditions. For example, the church
had long been an important part of the feudal system, which was based on allegiances between lords and vassals. The
Catholic Church had difficulty adjusting to the demands of a society based on money rather than allegiances. As towns
grew, the parish priests and monks, who had served as the main religious teachers of the peasantry, found that they
knew little about the needs of the rising commercial class.
The prestige of the church also suffered when some church leaders sold their services, violated the biblical laws they
were entrusted with upholding, and lived no differently than secular merchants and political figures. Furthermore, the
leaders of the growing city-states, as well as the new monarchs, had much less need of an alliance with the Catholic
Church to maintain power than they had in the past.
The result was a series of failures, such as the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism, that discredited and
weakened the Catholic Church. Yet there is no evidence to suggest that significant numbers of Europeans rejected
Christianity as a result; on the contrary, during the 14th and 15th centuries there was a widespread revival of popular
religious fervor, reaching a climax in the Reformation of the 16th century.

Decline of the Roman Catholic Church

The 14th century had opened with the dramatic humiliation of the papacy, as the French king forced the papal court to
move to Avignon and made the churchs highest leadership appear to be pawns of France. Disaster then followed
disaster for the church. Instead of providing spiritual direction in a rapidly changing world, the papal court was
preoccupied with the development of its administrative machinery and with the collection of revenue. The problems

only grew worse with the Great Schism, as rival popes competed for control. Although the papacy was reunited in
1417, it faced other challenges to its authority and struggled to recover control of the Papal States, which it had lost
during the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism.
Certain Renaissance popes were learned, devout, and worthy leaders of the Catholic Church during this difficult period.
Notable examples are Nicholas V, who ruled in the mid-15th century, and Pius II, who followed him. Other popessuch
as Alexander VI, who took over the papacy in 1492, and Julius II and Leo X, who held the position in the early 16th
centurywere chiefly concerned with politics, the promotion of their families, or the patronage of the arts. These
popes further weakened the ability of the church to influence society. Under these conditions, local and national forces
increasingly challenged papal control over the church, and clerical discipline and morale deteriorated. Heresy
(challenges to church doctrine) flourished, and critics of the Catholic Church became more numerous and outspoken.

Dissent, Reform, and Popular Religion

Dissent and concern over the condition of the church are evidence of the strength, not the weakness, of religion.
Christianity during the Renaissance presents a contradiction: Although the institution of the Roman Catholic Church
was in decay, there was extraordinary religious fervor in every part of Europe. Preachers, such as the highly popular
Girolamo Savonarola of Florence, called on sinners to repent and enjoyed great success in Italy. A mystical religious
movement that drew, in part, from the teachings of German mystic Meister Eckhart flourished in the portion of western
Germany known as the Rhineland. Its members sought direct revelations from God without the church as an
intermediary. In the Low Countries of Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands a movement known as the devotio
moderna emphasized individual and practical faith, a contrast with the more communal and metaphysical faith of the
Catholic Church.
These teachings spread through schools and gained public attention through The Imitation of Christ (approximately
1424), a highly influential work usually attributed to Thomas Kempis, a German monk and writer. Eager laymen built
churches and chapels, and new devotional exercisessuch as the stations of the cross and prayers using the rosary
became popular. With the introduction of the printing press in Europe during the 15th century, religious books were
produced by the millions, and they found a ready market.
The increase in popular devotion posed a threat to traditional religion, especially when the prestige of church officials
was low and they seemed incapable of, or uninterested in, close supervision of the faithful. Popular heretical
movements emerged and challenged papal authority. These movements proposed, in varying degrees, to do away with
the church as an institution. In the 14th century, British philosopher and reformer John Wycliffe and his counterpart in
Bohemia, Jan Hus, formalized these attacks on church authority in their teachings and writings.
Heretics remained a small minority, however, and a variety of reformers who hoped to change the existing church
were far more characteristic of the Renaissance. Theologians such as Jean de Gerson, who was particularly influential
at the University of Paris in the early 15th century, supported conciliar theory, which aimed at reforming the Roman
Catholic Church by placing supreme authority in a general council rather than in the papacy. Mystics preferred to
deepen the religious life of individuals, while many humanists hoped to reform Christian society by relying on
education rather than on religious faith.
The Renaissance also encouraged practical reformers. As papal legate (official representative of the pope) to Germany
in the mid-15th century, Nicholas of Cusa pursued a vigorous reform campaign directed particularly at monks who had
violated their monastic vows. The monasteries in Paris also underwent significant reform in the early decades of the
16th century. Most successful of all was the work of Cardinal Ximenes, the leading church figure of Spain in the early

16th century. He set standards for qualifications, training, and discipline for the Spanish clergy. Such reforms were by
no means universal, and the visible condition of the church continued to bring widespread demands for reform. The
religious history of the Renaissance reveals both weakness and vigor. People of this era expressed discontent with the
actual state of the church, but they also expressed hope for improvement.

VII

HUMANISM

The dominant intellectual movement of the Renaissance was humanism, a philosophy based on the idea that people
are rational beings. It emphasized the dignity and worth of the individual, an emphasis that was central to Renaissance
developments in many areas. Humanism originated in the study of classical culture, and it took its name from one of
the eras earliest and most crucial concerns: the promotion of a new educational curriculum that emphasized a group
of subjects known collectively as the studia humanitatis, or the humanities.
Humanities disciplines included grammar, rhetoric, history, poetry, and ethics. These subjects were all studied,
whenever possible, in the original classical texts. The humanities curriculum conflicted directly with more traditional
education that was based on scholasticism. A scholastic education concentrated on the study of logic, natural
philosophy (science), and metaphysics, or the nature of reality. Scholars often clashed sharply over these two systems
of education.
Far more was at stake in these academic controversies than the content of education. Scholastic training prepared
students for careers in fields such as medicine, law, and, above all, theology. The humanists believed that this
scholastic course of study was focused too narrowly on only a few professions. They claimed that it was not based
sufficiently on practical experience or the needs of society, but relied too heavily on abstract thought. The humanists
proposed to educate the whole person and placed emphasis not only on intellectual achievement, but also on physical
and moral development.
The humanists also stressed the general responsibilities of citizenship and social leadership. Humanists felt that they
had an obligation to participate in the political life of the community. From their perspective, the specialized disciplines
taught by the scholastics had failed to instill a respect for public duty.
Underlying the differences between these two philosophies was the humanists deep conviction that society had
outgrown older ways of thought. According to the humanists, these ways of thought emphasized abstract speculation
and relied too heavily on Christian teachings. Many of the humanists were townspeople who were not directly
associated with the church. These urban residents tended to object to an educational system that was largely
monopolized by the clergy and oriented to clerical needs. Humanists were accustomed to the ever-changing, concrete
activities of city life and found the rigid and closed systems of abstract thought to be both useless and irrelevant. In
sum, humanism reflected the new environment of the Renaissance. Its essential contribution to the modern world was
not its concern with antiquity, but its flexibility and openness to all the possibilities of life.
Renaissance humanism was complex, with few unifying features beyond a common belief that humanity and society
could be improved through a new kind of education based on a study of the classics. Humanists varied widely in the
ways they applied these ideas to areas that interested them. Some humanists were mainly interested in rhetoric and
Latin prose style, while others analyzed ancient texts to determine exact meanings. One group focused on ways to
improve society in general, while Christian humanism applied the techniques of humanist scholarship to the study of
church documents, particularly the Bible.

Petrarch

Francesco Petrarca, known as Petrarch, incorporated most elements of Renaissance humanism into his work. Called the
first great humanist, Petrarch was born in 1304 near Florence and spent much of his life in the cities of Italy. He
absorbed the typical urban emphasis on the practical and concrete experiences of daily life. Petrarch traveled widely,
climbed mountains simply to see what he could see, and displayed a keen interest in the human personality, most
notably his own. The classics further nourished his interest in broad human experience.
Petrarch was displeased by what he saw in the world. He wavered between nostalgic contemplation of the ideal world
of antiquity and active efforts to improve his own times. He acted as an emissary for the duke of Milan, attempted to
serve as peacemaker in Italys constant wars, and urged the pope to end his exile in Avignon during the Babylonian
Captivity. He also attacked the scholastics for their failure to address the true needs of humanity.
Petrarch believed in the possibility of a better future, and he hoped, above all, to better the world by the study of
classical literature. He admired the formal beauty of classical writing and considered it a remedy for contemporary
ugliness. To promote the study of classical literature, he collected ancient texts during his travels. He studied and
imitated them in Latin writings of his own, and then attempted to extend their teachings to as many other people as
possible.

Development of Humanism

After Petrarch, humanism spread first in Italy and then beyond the Alps. Most of Petrarchs early followers were little
more than enthusiastic, and somewhat amateurish, classical scholars. Through one of his friends, Italian writer
Giovanni Boccaccio, Petrarchs influence was transmitted to Florence. In the mid- to late 14th century, a number of
scholars in Florence collected and studied ancient works, lectured about them, imitated their style, and made the city
a center of humanistic learning. Among them were Boccaccio, the scholar Niccol Niccoli, and above all the Florentine
government leader, Coluccio Salutati.
Some humanists became experts in rhetoric, and town governments frequently employed them to give style to formal
documents, to compose speeches for public occasions, and to write official histories. These humanists often became so
pretentious and artificial that they eventually lost sight of significant issues in their focus on technique and detail. By
the early 16th century a few of these humanists cultivated such an extremely pure style of Latin that they would only
employ words used by the ancient Roman orator Cicero. It was primarily this type of humanist who was responsible for
the frequent accusation that humanism was a frivolous pursuit and that, far from reviving Latin, it finally killed the
language by isolating it from everyday life.
Other humanists adopted an entirely different and more political approach to classical studies. Many of the humanists
of Florence, led by historian Leonardo Bruni, became fervently patriotic. Their patriotism was in part a response to
frequent armed attacks by Milan, a rival city-state, during the first decades of the 15th century. As they began to apply
classical teachings to their immediate problems, they found that ancient Roman literature encouraged love of country
and offered practical historical lessons. These humanists also took a positive attitude toward their native language;
they applied classical literary standards to everyday writing, laying a foundation for later literary development. Their
interest in the destiny of Florence influenced them to write seriously about the citys past and stimulated the
emergence of the modern historical perspective.
The work of Lorenzo Valla during the first half of the 15th century inspired a new quality in humanist scholarship. Valla
studied ancient texts with an increased rigor and contributed significantly to the development of textual and historical
criticism. Vittorino da Feltre, a teacher at the palace school of Mantua (Mantova) during the early 15th century, worked
to establish the humanist goal of educating the whole person for a life of political leadership. This ideal was

popularized by Il cortegiano (1528; Book of the Courtier, 1561) by Italian diplomat Conte Baldassare Castiglione, a
work that circulated throughout Europe. Castigliones treatise on proper training and values for members of the royal
court influenced the upbringing of the European ruling classes for centuries.
During the 15th century, a steadily increasing number of Italian humanists learned Greek. For the first time since
ancient times Greek texts were being read in the original language in western Europe. A whole new body of ideas
became available for the humanists to study, and this led to a more precise understanding of Greek philosophy.
In particular, the Greek philosopher Plato increasingly gained respect among the humanists. His most prominent
Renaissance disciple was Italian philosopher Marsilio Ficino, who in the late 15th century led scholars at the Florentine
Academy into more serious study of Platos work. Ficino hoped to make Plato a new guide for Western thought, just as
scholastic thinkers had based many of their ideas on the work of Platos student Aristotle.

Humanism in Northern Europe

Italy had always been an important educational center, attracting numerous students from abroad and sending its own
scholars to work in countries beyond the Alps. Well before the end of the 15th century, the ideas and interests of the
Italian humanists had spread into much of Western Europe. Humanism was promoted not only by scholars trained in
Italy, but also by those who had traveled in Italy and adopted the humanists ideas, such as English theologian John
Colet and German poet Conrad Celtis.
Northern humanism exhibited many of the same qualities as Italian humanism, but it was strongly influenced by its
different setting. Italian humanists saw Roman history as a glorious episode in their own national past, a past that had
been interrupted when Germanic and other peoples invaded the empire beginning in the 5th century. Northern
Europeans did not identify as strongly with ancient Rome and often approached the Middle Ages with more sympathy.
Northern society retained stronger ties to Christianity than Italy did, and the northern humanists were less hostile to
scholasticism.
By the time humanism had taken root in the north, the Reformation had begun to gain momentum. As a result,
northern humanism is generally identified with Christian humanism, a movement that attempted to apply the scholarly
techniques of humanism to the study of religious documents. Christian humanists studied the Bible directly, ignoring
medieval interpretations. As their knowledge of languages increased, the humanists also read the biblical texts in the
original Greek and Hebrew. Their work in translating and analyzing original sources often uncovered discrepancies
among these sources, which led to questions about the Catholic Churchs practices and encouraged efforts for reform.
The best-known Christian humanist was Dutch writer and scholar Desiderius Erasmus. His numerous works of classical
and biblical scholarship, including a Latin translation of the New Testament as well as a Greek edition based on
recently discovered manuscripts, gave him an unequaled reputation in the world of letters. He condemned overly rigid
belief systems, favoring more flexibility and tolerance. His views influenced large numbers of both Catholics and
Protestants for generations.
The Christian humanists, like other religious reformers of the Renaissance, generally considered themselves to be good
Catholics. They were receptive to change, but believed strongly in the unity of the church and the preservation of a
reformed Catholic tradition. For this reason Erasmus and other Christian humanists refused to accept the arguments of
German theologian Martin Luther, who condemned some of the basic teachings of the Catholic Church. As a result, the
contributions of Christian humanism to the Reformation were largely indirect. Humanists inspired the spirit of

questioning and skepticism that characterized the Reformation, but they would not support Luthers notion that major
doctrines of the Catholic Church could be proved wrong with absolute certainty.

VIII

SCIENCE IN THE RENAISSANCE

The age of the Renaissance occupies a crucial place in the history of science, but the nature and extent of humanisms
contribution to science are difficult to measure. Humanism had an indirect impact on many fields of scientific inquiry.
Humanist scholarship made available the scientific writings of antiquity, which are known to have influenced 16thcentury Polish astronomer Nicholaus Copernicus and possibly other Renaissance scientists. The humanists study of
Plato contributed to new conceptions of the universe that relied on mathematical rather than descriptive approaches.
The Renaissance spirit of curiosity, experimentation, and objectivity were also important to the development of science
in Europe. Renaissance scholars emphasized concrete experience over abstract theory and tried to observe the natural
world carefully, completely, and without preconceived ideas. This spirit of impartial inquiry was more important to the
future of science than any specific achievement.
The scientific advances of the Renaissance were evident in many fields. In medicine, Belgian physician Andreas
Vesalius dissected cadavers and made numerous discoveries about human anatomy. The spirit of curiosity was also
extended to exploration and navigation. Italian-Spanish navigator Christopher Columbus, English explorer Sir Francis
Drake, and others made use of the latest inventions and discoveries in navigation, astronomy, and mathematics.
Artists explored the mathematical relationships inherent in nature. They closely studied perspective, investigating how
to portray depth and depict objects as they appeared to the eye. Florentine artist Leonardo da Vinci united art with
science in his studies of the structures and processes of nature, as well as in his designs for machines and mechanical
devices. Important inventions such as gunpowder, the printing press, and the compass were practical results of
Renaissance scientific inquiry.
Despite these influences, the humanists made few direct contributions to the sciences; indeed, their emphasis on a
polished style and their dislike of ordered thought may well have slowed scientific advance. The major contributions to
science during this period were made by the same scholastic thinkers whose work, according to the humanists, did not
address the real needs of humanity.
The scholastics were also responsible for a great breakthrough in Western thinking on the nature of the universe. The
chief obstacle to the emergence of modern science lay in a view of nature that was based on the ideas of Aristotle and
of Christian theologians. According to this view, the entire physical universe was centered on humankind, and there
was a basic purpose to all movement. Gravity was explained as the inclination of all bodies to be at the center of the
earth; acceleration was believed to be a consequence of the growing eagerness of a falling body as it moved closer to
its natural home. Such a view of the universe was still essentially supernatural and could not be studied objectively or
by experimentation. The most significant achievement of Renaissance science was the introduction of the concept of
the universe as an entity that could be approached objectively.
Scholars brought these ideas to the University of Padua in Italy, where other thinkers, notably 15th-century Italian
theologian Cajetan, further developed them and explained their implications. Padua (Padova) became the scientific
capital of Europe. Almost every great scientist was associated at one time or another with the University of Padua,
from Polish astronomer Nicholaus Copernicus in the early 16th century to Italian astronomer Galileo and English
physician William Harvey in the 17th century. Scholastic speculation reached its peak at Padua and provided essential
preparation for the more dramatic achievements of scientists such as Johannes Kepler of Germany and Sir Isaac
Newton of England in formulating the laws of motion. The new scientific attitude that arose at Padua during the

Renaissance emphasized objectivity and experimentation, and represented another significant accomplishment of the
period.

LEGACY OF THE RENAISSANCE

The Renaissance was a time when long-standing beliefs were tested, and Europeans became increasingly confident
that they were creating a whole new culture. It was a period of intellectual ferment that prepared the ground for the
thinkers and scientists of the 17th century. The Renaissance idea that humankind rules nature, for example,
contributed to the development of modern science and technology. Renaissance thinkers used classical precedents to
preserve and defend the concepts of republicanism and human freedom. These ideas had a permanent impact on the
course of English constitutional theory. Renaissance political thought may also have been a source for the form of
government adopted in the United States. Above all, however, the Renaissance left to the world monuments of artistic
beauty that define Western culture.