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Early Modern England Encyclopedia
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The Renaissance is a term applied by historians to a period of development, advancement and rediscovery that occurred in Europe in the 14th through 16th centuries. It began as interest in classical antiquity, with knowledge of the past flourishing in the Italian cities like Florence, at Italian universities like Bologna and Siena, as well as later in Italian commercial centers like Venice.
The city of Florence possessed tremendous wealth from international banking and trade. This wealth lent itself to political and social influence well beyond the city walls. Florence is often named as the birthplace of a philosophy called humanism. Italian Renaissance humanism stemmed from a desire to expand on the medieval understanding of the world, including growth in scientific, religious, and cultural ideas. Thinkers examined surviving Greek and Roman texts and expanded the use of literature, poetry in particular, as valid sources of learning. Authors such as Dante Alighieri (1265–1321), Francesco Petrarcha (1304–1374), and Giovanni Boccacio (1313–1375) were key in centering Classical literature, especially poetry, in this new mindset.
This new approach was particularly noticeable in the religious sphere, as the humanists wished to undo or bypass medieval theology. Humanists were neither anti-religious nor nontheistic. Instead, they placed strong emphasis on the divinely-inspired ability of humankind to invent and achieve as manifestations of God-given abilities. Italian Renaissance humanism did encourage the investigation of pagan texts and values, as well as instruction in classical virtues as a way to enhance Christianity.
The immediate impact of this rebirth of classical lore is that scholars and administrators were exposed to Roman writers like Vergil and Cicero, Greek philosophers like Aristotle, and Hindu-Arabic number systems. Exposure to new ideas encouraged exploration in fields such as natural philosophy and also allowed for political philosophy to flourish. This period also produced the well-known and dramatic changes in art and sculpture, with its focus on realism and perspective.
Though Florence was its birthplace, this movement of minds spread to the whole of the Italian peninsula and, through the trade empires, to the whole of Europe, with England being the last to adopt distinctly Renaissance values in the early 16th century.
A number of Italian city states experimented with republics as governmental bodies. Though highly oligarchical, meaning led by a small ruling class, with ruling councils made up of aristocracy and rich merchants, republics like Florence or Venice did devise systems of checks and balances. They pioneered a number of concepts that were later integrated by more modern democracies starting in the late 18th century. The premier example of this neo-republic was the Great Council of Venice, otherwise known as the Major Council, which originated in the 13th century.
Some Italian philosophers, such as the Florentine writer Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527), sought to codify effective political strategies and tactics by examining underlying behaviors. Machiavelli wrote a number of political texts, the most famous of which is