The Renaissance: The Resurrection of Knowledge The Renaissance: The Resurrection of Knowledge Author Aaron Cope Supervising Editor Kate McPherson Editor Kate McPherson Copy Editor Leah Hamby Senior Encoder Leah Hamby Encoding and Metadata LEMDO Team Copyright Holder (Content) Kate McPherson Copyright Holder (XML and interface) University of Victoria Early Modern England Encyclopedia EMEE

Anthology Leads: Kate McPherson and Kate Moncrief.

 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Mitacs Globablink Research Internship

Released with Early Modern England Encyclopedia 1.0a

 University of Victoria on the Linked Early Modern Drama Online Platform

Intellectual copyright in this entry is held by Kate McPherson on behalf of the contributors. Copyright on the TEI-XML markup is held by the University of Victoria on behalf of the LEMDO Team. The content and TEI-XML markup in this file are licensed under a CC BY-NC_ND 4.0 license. This file is freely downloadable without permission under the following conditions: (1) credit must be given to the authors, EMEE, and LEMDO in any subsequent use of the files and /or data; (2) this availability statement must remain in the file; (3) the content cannot be adapted or repurposed (except for quotations for the purposes of academic review and citation); and (4) commercial uses are not permitted without the knowledge and consent of the authors, EMEE, and LEMDO. Neither the content nor the code in this file is licensed for training large language models (LLMs), ingestion into an LLM, or any use in any artificial intelligence applications; such uses are considered to be commercial uses and are strictly prohibited.

Early Modern England Encyclopedia

By Aaron Cope, inspired by Michael Best’s Shakespeare’s Life and Times, Internet Shakespeare Editions

Encoded in TEI P5 according to the LEMDO Customization and Encoding Guidelines

This document uses Canadian English spelling

 Document Types All documents in LEMDO are either born-digital documents or primary documents. Within those two general categories, LEMDO offers additional ways to categorize a file. Born-digital Born-digital documents are anything other than primary texts Critical Critical material, such as a general introduction or a textual introduction. Responsibilities Responsibilities Author A person, family, or organization responsible for creating a work that is primarily textual in content, regardless of media type (e.g., printed text, spoken word, electronic text, tactile text) or genre (e.g., poems, novels, screenplays, blogs). Use also for persons, etc., creating a new work by paraphrasing, rewriting, or adapting works by another creator such that the modification has substantially changed the nature and content of the original or changed the medium of expression. LEMDO uses the term author in two contexts: (1) to indicate the author of a primary work or document (such as Hamlet), and (2) to indicate the author of a secondary text (such as the Critical Introduction to <title level="m">Hamlet, by David Bevington). Editor A person, family, or organization contributing to a resource by revising or elucidating the content, e.g., adding an introduction, notes, or other critical matter. An editor may also prepare a resource for production, publication, or distribution. For major revisions, adaptations, etc., that substantially change the nature and content of the original work, resulting in a new work, see author. LEMDO uses the general term editor only in edition metadata and only to indicate when a person is responsible for editing all parts of an edition. Otherwise, use the more granular terms to describe the precise nature of the editorial role. Supervising Editor An editor who supervises the work of a student editor. Copy Editor LEMDO uses the term owner for the person who checks facts, quotations, and citations; may make formatting changes; may convert from one citation style to another; may suggest wording changes; and enforces conformity with the project style guide. Markup Editor A person or organization performing the coding of SGML, HTML, or XML markup of metadata, text, etc. Gloss needed. Copyright Holder A person or organization to whom copy and legal rights have been granted or transferred for the intellectual content of a work. The copyright holder, although not necessarily the creator of the work, usually has the exclusive right to benefit financially from the sale and use of the work to which the associated copyright protection applies. Normally the editor is the copyright holder for an LEMDO edition. EMEE Keywords Culture Learn about the customs, beliefs, and daily lives of people in early modern England. Education Classical Literature Humanism Literature and the Arts Alighieri, Dante (1265–1321) Italy Petrarch, Francesco (1304–1374) The Prince (text) Published file. Updated metadata proofed Review of article finished. updated author respStmt. Created File. Michael Best Michael Best

Michael Best is Professor Emeritus at the University of Victoria, BC. He founded the Internet Shakespeare Editions in 1996, and was Coordinating Editor until 2017, contributing two editions to the ISE: King John and King Lear (the latter also available in print from Broadview Press). In print, he has published editions of works of Elizabethan magic and huswifery, a collection of letters from the Australian goldfields, and Shakespeare on the Art of Love (2008). He contributed regular columns for the Shakespeare Newsletter on Electronic Shakespeares, and has written many articles and chapters for both print and online books and journals, principally on questions raised by the new medium in the editing and publication of texts. He has delivered papers and plenary lectures on electronic media and the Internet Shakespeare Editions at conferences in Canada, the USA, the UK, Spain, Australia, and Japan.

 Aaron Cope Aaron Cope

Aaron Cope was a student at Utah Valley University.

 Leah Hamby Leah Hamby

Leah Hamby is the primary encoder for the Early Modern England Encyclopedia. Aside from encoding, she also works as an editor for the project and contributed several articles of her own. She has been working on the EMEE since February 2023. As of February 2026, she is soon to graduate with honours from Utah Valley University with a major in history and a minor in creative writing. Her other work with the LEMDO program includes remediating William Kemp’s Kemp’s Nine Day’s Wonder for the Digital Renaissance Editions.

 Navarra Houldin Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

 Kate McPherson Kate McPherson

Kate McPherson is Professor of English and Honors Program Director at Utah Valley University (Orem, UT, USA). In 2015, she began working to redevelop Shakespeare’s Life and Times, created by Michael Best, into the Early Modern England Encyclopedia. Her other publications include commentary on Pericles and The Comedy of Errors for the New Oxford Shakespeare (2016); the co-edited volumes Stages of Engagement: Drama and Religion in Post-Reformation England with James Mardock (Duquesne University Press, 2014) and Shakespeare Expressed: Page, Stage, and Classroom in Shakespeare and His Contemporaries, with Kathryn M. Moncrief and Sarah Enloe (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2013). With Kathryn M. Moncrief, Kate has also two edited collections, Performing Pedagogy in Early Modern England: Gender, Instruction, and Performance (Ashgate, 2011) and Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate 2008). She has also published numerous articles on early modern maternity in scholarly journals. Kate participated in the 2008 National Endowment for the Humanities Institute, Shakespeare’s Blackfriars: The Study, the Stage, the Classroom, at the American Shakespeare Center. She also served as Play Seminar Director, a public humanities position, for the Utah Shakespeare Festival in 2017 and 2018.

 LEMDO Team The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors. University of Victoria https://www.uvic.ca/
Origins and Major Shifts

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.

Experiments in Political Theory

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 The Prince, a treatise written to provide prospective princes with instructions on how to maintain power and efficiently run a state. Its acceptance of immoral but politically expedient acts scandalized readers. Regardless of the morality of the work, it stands as one of the first Renaissance works of political philosophy, one which continues to influence leaders today.

Key Print Sources Baker, Patrick. Italian Renaissance Humanism in the Mirror. Cambridge University Press, 2015. Celenza, Christopher S. The Intellectual World of the Italian Renaissance: Language, Philosophy, and the Search for Meaning. Cambridge University Press, 2017. Gamberini, Andrea, and Isabella Lazzarini, ed. The Italian Renaissance State. Cambridge University Press, 2012.
Key Online Sources Best, Michael. A Rebirth of Knowledge. Shakespeare’s Life and Times. Internet Shakespeare Editions. University of Victoria, 4 Jan. 2011. https://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/ideas/new%20knowledge/renaissance.html. Accessed 11 Feb. 2026. Cartwright, Mark. Renaissance Humanism. World History Encyclopedia. 4 Nov. 2020. https://www.worldhistory.org/Renaissance_Humanism/. Honeycutt, Kevin. Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527). Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://iep.utm.edu/machiave/. Accessed 13 Jul. 2024.