1. European Renaissance
c c. 1600

3. What was the Renaissance?
A period from c to c of artistic, literary, cultural, and intellectual change
This was not the term used by people to describe the intellectual, cultural, and artistic changes going on around them.
Rather, people used other terms to describe their era, such as “golden age”

4. What’s in a Name? The word is French for “re-birth”
It is a term modern people have used to describe the changes happening at the time
It was first used in English in the 1820s
In Italian, in the 16th Century

5. But what was being born again during this period?
An interest in the writings of the ancient Greeks and Romans
Interestingly, happens just when other forms of pagan ideas are being met with increased persecution
(like witchcraft and magic)

6. The Renaissance as a Golden Age
The idea of a “golden age” was drawn from Greek mythology of a time before the beginning of civilization where the world lived in peace and harmony with the rest of nature
The golden age is thought to have been followed by the silver, bronze, and iron ages.

7. Garden of Eden, Jacob de Backer, 1555

8. Lucas Cranach the Elder, The Golden Age (Goldenes Zeitalter), 1530
Goldenes Zeitalter, Lucas Cranach the Elder, 1530
Lucas Cranach the Elder, The Golden Age (Goldenes Zeitalter), 1530

9. Historical geography of the Renaissance
Renaissance trends begin in the northern Mediterranean, particularly around present-day Italy, beginning in the 14th Century
Gradually, similar trends are replicated to the north and west over the next 200 years

11. What allowed this Golden Age to Happen?
Economic Causes
Political Causes
Technological Causes

12. Economic Factors
The morbid advantages of the Black Death and long-term plague in general: less people = more money and resources for the people who survive
The major cities = important trade centers Florence, Venice, Genoa, Milan
This created a wealthy elite class, but also a wealthy merchant class and the establishment of banks independent of the Catholic Church

13. Political Factors
Economic growth in major cities led to new forms of local government
Large cities became independent communes
Political instability (fighting over who ruled the communes) usually led to i popolo, the people, rising up and forming Republics

14. Political factors, ctd.
Republics usually ended up being ruled by the rich and influential families
The Medici family in Venice or the Sforza family in Milan, for example
New forms of education were directed toward these new political classes
these new wealthy political families devoted resources to education and the arts

15. Technological Factors
C. 1440, Johannes Gutenberg invented the first moveable type printing press
Different from earlier forms:
Stamps
Wax print setups

16. Johannes Gutenberg
Born in Mainz, Germany c. 1398
Came up with the idea for the press in 1440
1450, A set of poems were printed in Mainz—possibly the first printed pages
1455, publishes his first set of Bibles, about 180

17. Tech., continued
Mass production of books (most importantly, the Bible)
Book making becomes easier, less time consuming, and cheaper
Spread of new knowledge (and old, pagan knowledge) much more accessible

20. Renaissance Thought: Humanism
Drawn from the renewed interest and study of ancient Latin and Greek texts.
Began in Italy, but by the end of the 1400s, many of the upper classes in Europe had humanist educations
Reaction to Scholasticism

21. Humanism v. Scholasticism
Scholasticism was meant to create professionals (doctors, priests, mathematicians, engineers, etc.)
The Humanist education was designed to educate and create informed citizens and non-professionals
To the trivium (rhetoric) and quadrivium (maths), a humanist education would also add poetry, history, languages, and moral philosophy

22. Key Ideas of Humanists
Human beings are capable of great things since they have a link to the divine world (think of the myth of “golden” beginnings)
The goal of life is to be active in the world and society—this activity is not only for personal gain but also the gain of others in society

23. Key Ideas, ctd.
Stressed the importance of the quality called virtù: being able to control the world and shape it according to your own will; being a master of your environment and surroundings
As a result, the genre of biography was popular with humanists