"Renaissance," French for "rebirth," perfectly describes the intellectual and economic
changes that occurred in Europe from the fourteenth through the sixteenth centuries.
During the era known by this name, Europe emerged from the economic stagnation of the
Middle Ages and experienced a time of financial growth. Also, and perhaps most
importantly, the Renaissance was an age in which artistic, social, scientific, and political
thought turned in new directions.
The Renaissance was a rebirth that occurred throughout most of Europe. However, the
changes that we associate with the Renaissance first occurred in the Italian city of
Florence and continued to be more pervasive there than anywhere else. The city's
economy and its writers, painters, architects, and philosophers all made Florence a model
of Renaissance culture.
Fifteenth-century Florence was an exciting place to be. In 1425 the city had a population
of 60,000 and was a self-governed, independent city-state. Twelve artist guilds that
regulated the trades were the basis of Florence's commercial success. Members of the
guilds, who were wealthy and held positions in government, were some of Florence's
most influential people in society and politics. Because of its strong economy and a
political philosophy that was dedicated to the welfare of the city, Florence thrived.
The most powerful guilds were those that represented textile workers. Much of Florence's
wealth was dependent on the manufacture or trade of cloth, primarily wool. Wool of
superior quality was often purchased unfinished and untreated from England and Iberia.
Florentine textile workers then cleaned, carded, spun, dyed, and wove the wool into
cloth of excellent quality. They sold the finished material in Italy, northern European
cities, and even in eastern countries. Other textile experts purchased inferior cloth from
northern cities and refinished it to create a superior product.
Because Florence was not a port city like Venice, sea trade was not a primary source of
its income. Banking, however, was. Many families of Florence, beginning in the
thirteenth century, were successful bankers. The Florentine gold coin known as the florin
was of such reliable purity that it was the standard coinage throughout Europe. Florentine
bankers were known throughout Europe as well, for they established banking houses in
other important cities such as London, Geneva, and Bruges (Belgium).
The Palazzo Vecchio, constructed in 1299, was the home of the Florentine guilds. Then,
as well as today, it functioned as the seat of municipal government and the heart of
Florentine culture. It was here that the city's 5,000 guild members, who had the power of
the vote, gathered to discuss and determine city issues. In addition to textile workers and
bankers, the guild members included masons and builders, sculptors, lawyers, and
solicitors.
The Renaissance (French for "rebirth"; Italian: Rinascimento), was a cultural movement
that spanned roughly the 14th through the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the late
Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. It encompassed the revival of
learning based on classical sources, the rise of courtly and papal patronage, the
development of perspective in painting, and advancements in science.[1] The Renaissance
had wide-ranging consequences in all intellectual pursuits, but is perhaps best known for
its artistic aspect and the contributions of such polymaths as Leonardo da Vinci and
Michelangelo, who have inspired the term "Renaissance men".[2][3]
There is a general — though by no means unchallenged — consensus that the
Renaissance began in Florence in the fourteenth century.[4] Various theories have been
proposed to explain its origin and characteristics, focusing on an assortment of factors,
including the social and civic peculiarities of Florence at this time including its political
structure and the patronage of its dominant family, the Medici.
The Renaissance has a long and complex historiography, and there has always been
debate among historians as to the usefulness of the Renaissance as a term and as a
historical age.[1] Some have called into question whether the Renaissance really was a
cultural "advance" from the Middle Ages, instead seeing it as a period of pessimism and
nostalgia for the classical age.[5] While nineteenth-century historians were keen to
emphasise that the Renaissance represented a clear "break" from Medieval thought and
practice, some modern historians have instead focused on the continuity between the two
eras.[6] Indeed, it is now usually considered incorrect to classify any historical period as
"better" or "worse", leading some to call for an end to the use of the term, which they see
as a product of presentism.[7] The word Renaissance has also been used to describe other
historical and cultural movements, such as the Carolingian Renaissance and the
Byzantine Renaissance.
Contents
[hide]
• 1 Overview
• 2 The Renaissance's origins
o 2.1 Assimilation of Greek and Arabic knowledge
o 2.2 Social and political structures in Italy
o 2.3 The Black Death
o 2.4 Cultural conditions in Florence
• 3 The Renaissance's characteristics
o 3.1 Humanism
o 3.2 Art
o 3.3 Science
o 3.4 Religion
o 3.5 Renaissance self-awareness
• 4 The Renaissance spreads
o 4.1 The Northern Renaissance
• 5 The Renaissance's historiography
o 5.1 Conception
o 5.2 For better or for worse?
• 6 Other Renaissances
• 7 References and sources
o 7.1 References and notes
o 7.2 Sources
• 8 See also
o 8.1 Internal Links
o 8.2 External links
Overview
Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man shows clearly the effect writers of antiquity had on
Renaissance thinkers. Based on the specifications in Vitruvius's De architectura, da Vinci
tried to draw the perfectly proportioned man.
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that profoundly affected European intellectual
life in the early modern period. Beginning in Italy, and spreading to the rest of Europe by
the 16th century, its influence was felt in literature, philosophy, art, politics, science,
religion, and other aspects of intellectual enquiry. Renaissance scholars employed the
humanist method in study, and searched for realism and human emotion in art.[1]
Renaissance thinkers sought out learning from ancient texts, typically written in Latin or
ancient Greek. Scholars scoured Europe's monastic libraries, searching for works of
antiquity which had fallen into obscurity. In such texts they found a desire to improve and
perfect their worldly knowledge; an entirely different sentiment to the transcendental
spirituality stressed by medieval Christianity.[1][not in citation given] They did not reject
Christianity; quite the contrary, many of the Renaissance's greatest works were devoted to
it, and the Church patronized many works of Renaissance art. However, a subtle shift
took place in the way that intellectuals approached religion that was reflected in many
other areas of cultural life.[8]
Artists such as Masaccio strove to portray the human form realistically, developing
techniques to render perspective and light more naturally. Political philosophers, most
famously Niccolò Machiavelli, sought to describe political life as it really was, and to
improve government on the basis of reason. In addition to studying classical Latin and
Greek, authors also began increasingly to use vernacular languages; combined with the
invention of printing, this would allow many more people access to books, especially the
Bible.[9]
In all, the Renaissance could be viewed as an attempt by intellectuals to study and
improve the secular and worldly, both through the revival of ideas from antiquity, and
through novel approaches to thought.
The Renaissance's origins
Main articles: Renaissance of the 12th century and Italian Renaissance
Most historians agree that the ideas that characterized the Renaissance had their origin in
late 13th century Florence, in particular with the writings of Dante Alighieri (1265–1321)
and Francesco Petrarch (1304–1374), as well as the painting of Giotto di Bondone (1267-
1337).[10] Yet it remains unclear why the Renaissance began in Italy, and why it began
when it did. Accordingly, several theories have been put forward to explain its origins.
Assimilation of Greek and Arabic knowledge
Cicero
Further information: Latin translations of the 12th century
The Renaissance was so called because it was a "rebirth" of certain classical ideas that
had long been lost to Europe. It has been argued that the fuel for this rebirth was the
rediscovery of ancient texts that had been forgotten by Western civilization, but were
preserved in some monastic libraries and in the Islamic world, and the translations of
Greek and Arabic texts into Latin.[11] Renaissance scholars such as Niccolò de' Niccoli
and Poggio Bracciolini scoured the libraries of Europe in search of works by such
classical authors as Plato, Cicero and Vitruvius.[12] Additionally, as the reconquest of the
Iberian peninsula from Islamic Moors progressed, numerous Greek and Arabic works
were captured from educational institutions such as the library at Córdoba, which claimed
to have 400,000 books.[13] The works of ancient Greek and Hellenistic writers (such as
Plato, Aristotle, Euclid, and Ptolemy) and Muslim scientists and philosophers (such as
Geber, Abulcasis, Alhacen, Avicenna, Avempace, and Averroes), were imported into the
Christian world, providing new intellectual material for European scholars.
Greek and Arabic knowledge were not only assimilated from Spain, but also directly
from the Middle East. The study of mathematics was flourishing in the Middle East, and
mathematical knowledge was brought back by crusaders in the 13th century.[14] The
decline of the Byzantine Empire after 1204 - and its eventual fall in 1453 - led to an
exodus of Greek scholars to the West. These scholars brought with them texts and
knowledge of the classical Greek civilization which had been lost for centuries in the
West.[15]
Social and political structures in Italy
A political map of the Italian Peninsula circa 1494.
The unique political structures of late Middle Ages Italy have led some to theorize that its
unusual social climate allowed the emergence of a rare cultural efflorescence. Italy did
not exist as a political entity in the early modern period. Instead, it was divided into
smaller city states and territories: the kingdom of Naples controlled the south, the
Republic of Florence and the Papal States the center, the Genoese and the Milanese the
north and west, and the Venetians the east. Fifteenth-century Italy was one of the most
urbanised areas in Europe.[16] Many of its cities stood among the ruins of ancient Roman
buildings; it seems likely that the classical nature of the Renaissance was linked to its
origin in the Roman Empire's heartlands.[17]
Italy at this time was notable for its merchant Republics, including the Republic of
Florence and the Republic of Venice. Although in practice these were oligarchical, and
bore little resemblance to a modern democracy, the relative political freedom they
afforded was conducive to academic and artistic advancement.[18] Likewise, the position
of Italian cities such as Venice as great trading centres made them intellectual crossroads.
Merchants brought with them ideas from far corners of the globe, particularly the Levant.
Venice was Europe's gateway to trade with the East, and a producer of fine glass, while
Florence was a capital of silk and jewelry. The wealth such business brought to Italy
meant that large public and private artistic projects could be commissioned and
individuals had more leisure time for study.[18]
The Black Death
One theory that has been advanced is that the devastation caused by the Black Death in
Florence (and elsewhere in Europe) resulted in a shift in the world view of people in 14th
century Italy. Italy was particularly badly hit by the plague, and it has been speculated
that the familiarity with death that this brought thinkers to dwell more on their lives on
Earth, rather than on spirituality and the afterlife.[19] It has also been argued that the Black
Death prompted a new wave of piety, manifested in the sponsorship of religious works of
art.[20] However, this does not fully explain why the Renaissance occurred specifically in
Italy in the 14th century. The Black Death was a pandemic that affected all of Europe in
the ways described, not only Italy. The Renaissance's emergence in Italy was most likely
the result of the complex interaction of the above factors.[21]
Cultural conditions in Florence
Lorenzo de' Medici, ruler of Florence and patron of arts.
It has long been a matter of debate why the Renaissance began in Florence, and not
elsewhere in Italy. Scholars have noted several features unique to Florentine cultural life
which may have caused such a cultural movement. Many have emphasised the role
played by the Medici family in patronising and stimulating the arts. Lorenzo de' Medici
devoted huge sums to commissioning works from Florence's leading artists, including
Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli, and Michelangelo Buonarroti.[12]
The Renaissance was certainly already underway before Lorenzo came to power,
however. Indeed, before the Medici family itself achieved hegemony in Florentine
society. Some historians have postulated that Florence was the birthplace of the
Renaissance as a result of luck, i.e. because "Great Men" were born there by chance.[22]
Da Vinci, Botticelli and Michelangelo were all born in Tuscany. Arguing that such chance
seems improbable, other historians have contended that these "Great Men" were only able
to rise to prominence because of the prevailing cultural conditions at the time.[23]
The Renaissance's characteristics
Humanism
Main article: Renaissance humanism
Humanism was not a philosophy per se, but rather a method of learning. In contrast to the
medieval scholastic mode, which focused on resolving contradictions between authors,
humanists would study ancient texts in the original, and appraise them through a
combination of reasoning and empirical evidence. Humanist education was based on the
study of poetry, grammar, ethics and rhetoric. Above all, humanists asserted "the genius
of man... the unique and extraordinary ability of the human mind."[24]
Humanist scholars shaped the intellectual landscape throughout the early modern period.
Political philosophers such as Niccolò Machiavelli and Thomas More revived the ideas of
Greek and Roman thinkers, and applied them in critiques of contemporary government.
Theologians, notably Erasmus and Martin Luther, challenged the Aristotelian status quo,
introducing radical new ideas of justification and faith (for more, see Religion below).
Art
Main articles: Italian Renaissance painting, Renaissance painting, and
Renaissance architecture
Raphael's School of Athens depicts illustrious contemporaries as Classical scholars, with
Leonardo central as Plato.
One of the distinguishing features of Renaissance art was its development of highly
realistic linear perspective. Giotto di Bondone (1267-1337) is credited with first treating a
painting as a window into space, but it was not until the writings of architects Filippo
Brunelleschi (1377-1446) and Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) that perspective was
formalised as an artistic technique.[25] The development of perspective was part of a wider
trend towards realism in the arts (for more, see Renaissance Classicism).[26] To that end,
painters also developed other techniques, studying light, shadow, and, famously in the
case of Leonardo da Vinci, human anatomy. Underlying these changes in artistic method
was a renewed desire to depict the beauty of nature, and to unravel the axioms of
aesthetics, with the works of Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael representing artistic
pinnacles that were to be much imitated by other artists.[27]
Concurrently, in the Netherlands, a particularly vibrant artistic culture developed, the
work of Hugo van der Goes and Jan van Eyck having particular influence on the
development of painting in Italy, both technically with the introduction of oil paint and
canvas, and stylistically in terms of naturalism in representation. (for more, see
Renaissance in the Netherlands). Later, the work of Pieter Brueghel the Elder would
inspire artists to depict themes of everyday life.[28]
In architecture, Filippo Brunelleschi was foremost in studying the remains of ancient
Classical buildings, and with rediscovered knowledge from the 1st century writer
Vitruvius and the flourishing discipline of mathematics, formulated the Renaissance style.
Brunelleschi's major feat of engineering was the building of the dome of Florence
Cathedral.[29] The outstanding architectural work of the High Renaissance was the
rebuilding of St. Peter's Basilica, combining the skills of Bramante, Michelangelo,
Raphael, Sangallo and Maderno.
Science
Main article: History of science in the Renaissance
The upheavals occurring in the arts and humanities were mirrored by a dynamic period of
change in the sciences. Some have seen this flurry of activity as a "scientific revolution,"
heralding the beginning of the modern age.[30] Others have seen it merely as an
acceleration of a continuous process stretching from the ancient world to the present
day.[31] Regardless, there is general agreement that the Renaissance saw significant
changes in the way the universe was viewed and the methods with which philosophers
sought to explain natural phenomena.[32]
Science and art were very much intermingled in the early Renaissance, with artists such
as Leonardo da Vinci making observational drawings of anatomy and nature. Yet the most
significant development of the era was not a specific discovery, but rather a process for
discovery, the scientific method.[32] This revolutionary new way of learning about the
world focused on empirical evidence, the importance of mathematics, and discarding the
Aristotelian "final cause" in favour of a mechanical philosophy. Early and influential
proponents of these ideas included Copernicus and Galileo.
The new scientific method led to great contributions in the fields of astronomy, physics,
biology, and anatomy. With the publication of Vesalius's De humani corporis fabrica, a
new confidence was placed in the role of dissection, observation, and a mechanistic view
of anatomy.[32]
Religion
Alexander VI, a Borgia pope infamous for his corruption.
Main articles: Reformation and Counter-Reformation
It should be emphasised that the new ideals of humanism, although more secular in some
aspects, developed against an unquestioned Christian backdrop, especially in the
Northern Renaissance. Indeed, much (if not most) of the new art was commissioned by or
in dedication to the Church.[8] However, the Renaissance had a profound effect on
contemporary theology, particularly in the way people perceived the relationship between
man and God.[8] Many of the period's foremost theologians were followers of the
humanist method, including Erasmus, Zwingli, Thomas More, Martin Luther, and John
Calvin.
The Renaissance began in times of religious turmoil. The late Middle Ages saw a period
of political intrigue surrounding the Papacy, culminating in the Western Schism, in which
three men simultaneously claimed to be true Bishop of Rome.[33] While the schism was
resolved by the Council of Constance (1414), the fifteenth century saw a resulting reform
movement know as Conciliarism, which sought to limit the pope's power. While the
papacy eventually emerged supreme in ecclesiastical matters by the Fifth Council of the
Lateran (1511), it was dogged by continued accusations of corruption, most famously in
the person of Pope Alexander VI, who was accused variously of simony, nepotism and
fathering four illegitimate children whilst Pope, whom he married off to gain more
power.[34]
Churchmen such as Erasmus and Luther proposed reform to the Church, often based on
humanist textual criticism of the New Testament.[8] Indeed, it was Luther who in October
1517 published the 95 Theses, challenging papal authority and criticising its perceived
corruption, particularly with regard to its sale of indulgences. The 95 Theses led to the
Reformation, a break with the Roman Catholic Church that previously claimed hegemony
in Western Europe. Humanism and the Renaissance therefore played a direct role in
sparking the Reformation, as well as in many other contemporaneous religious debates
and conflicts.
Renaissance self-awareness
By the fifteenth century, writers, artists and architects in Italy were well aware of the
transformations that were taking place and were using phrases like modi antichi (in the
antique manner) or alle romana et alla antica (in the manner of the Romans and the
ancients) to describe their work. The term "la rinascita" first appeared, however, in its
broad sense in Giorgio Vasari's Vite de' più eccellenti architetti, pittori, et scultori Italiani
(The Lives of the Artists, 1550, revised 1568).[35][36] Vasari divides the age into three
phases: the first phase contains Cimabue, Giotto, and Arnolfo di Cambio; the second
phase contains Masaccio, Brunelleschi, and Donatello; the third centers on Leonardo da
Vinci and culminates with Michelangelo. It was not just the growing awareness of
classical antiquity that drove this development, according to Vasari, but also the growing
desire to study and imitate nature.[37]
The Renaissance spreads
In the 15th century the Renaissance spread with great speed from its birthplace in
Florence, first to the rest of Italy, and soon to the rest of Europe. The invention of the
printing press allowed the rapid transmission of these new ideas. As it spread, its ideas
diversified and changed, being adapted to local culture. In the twentieth century, scholars
began to break the Renaissance into regional and national movements, including:
• The Italian Renaissance
• The English Renaissance
• The German Renaissance
• The Northern Renaissance
• The French Renaissance
• The Renaissance in the Netherlands
• The Polish Renaissance
• The Spanish Renaissance
• Renaissance architecture in Eastern Europe
The Northern Renaissance
Main article: Northern Renaissance
The Arnolfini Portrait, by Jan van Eyck, painted 1434
The Renaissance as it occurred in Northern Europe has been termed the "Northern
Renaissance". It arrived first in France, imported by King Charles VIII after his invasion
of Italy. Francis I imported Italian art and artists, including Leonardo Da Vinci, and at
great expense built ornate palaces. Writers such as François Rabelais, Pierre de Ronsard,
Joachim du Bellay and Michel de Montaigne, painters such as Jean Clouet and musicians
such as Jean Mouton also borrowed from the spirit of the Italian Renaissance.
In the second half of the 15th century, Italians brought the new style to Poland and
Hungary. After the marriage in 1476 of Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, to Beatrix
of Naples, Buda became the one of the most important artistic centres of the Renaissance
north of the Alps.[38] The most important humanists living in Matthias' court were
Antonio Bonfini and Janus Pannonius.[38] In 1526 the Ottoman conquest of Hungary put
an abrupt end to the short-lived Hungarian Renaissance.
An early Italian humanist who came to Poland in the mid-15th century was Filip
Callimachus. Many Italian artists came to Poland with Bona Sforza of Milano, when she
married King Zygmunt I of Poland in 1518.[39] This was supported by temporarily
strengthened monarchies in both areas, as well as by newly-established universities.[40]
The spirit of the age spread from France to the Low Countries and Germany, and finally
by the late 16th century to England, Scandinavia, and remaining parts of Central Europe.
In these areas humanism became closely linked to the turmoil of the Protestant
Reformation, and the art and writing of the German Renaissance frequently reflected this
dispute.[41]
In England, the Elizabethan era marked the beginning of the English Renaissance with
the work of writers William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, John Milton, and
Edmund Spenser, as well as great artists, architects (such as Inigo Jones), and composers
such as Thomas Tallis, John Taverner, and William Byrd.
Poznań City Hall rebuilt from the Gothic style by Giovanni Batista di Quadro (1550-
1555).
The Renaissance arrived in the Iberian peninsula through the Mediterranean possessions
of the Aragonese Crown and the city of Valencia. Early Iberian Renaissance writers
include Ausiàs March, Joanot Martorell, Fernando de Rojas, Juan del Encina, Garcilaso
de la Vega, Gil Vicente and Bernardim Ribeiro. The late Renaissance in Spain saw writers
such as Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Luis de Góngora and Tirso de Molina, artists
such as El Greco and composers such as Tomás Luis de Victoria. In Portugal writers such
as Sá de Miranda and Luís de Camões and artists such as Nuno Gonçalves appeared.
While Renaissance ideas were moving north from Italy, there was a simultaneous
southward spread of innovation, particularly in music.[42] The music of the 15th century
Burgundian School defined the beginning of the Renaissance in that art and the
polyphony of the Netherlanders, as it moved with the musicians themselves into Italy,
formed the core of what was the first true international style in music since the
standardization of Gregorian Chant in the 9th century.[42] The culmination of the
Netherlandish school was in the music of the Italian composer, Palestrina. At the end of
the 16th century Italy again became a center of musical innovation, with the development
of the polychoral style of the Venetian School, which spread northward into Germany
around 1600.
The paintings of the Italian Renaissance differed from those of the Northern Renaissance.
Italian Renaissance artists were among the first to paint secular scenes, breaking away
from the purely religious art of medieval painters. At first, Northern Renaissance artists
remained focused on religious subjects, such as the contemporary religious upheaval
portrayed by Albrecht Dürer. Later on, the works of Pieter Bruegel influenced artists to
paint scenes of daily life rather than religious or classical themes. It was also during the
northern Renaissance that Flemish brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck perfected the oil
painting technique, which enabled artists to produce strong colors on a hard surface that
could survive for centuries.[43]
The Renaissance's historiography
Conception
It was not until the nineteenth century that the French word Renaissance achieved
popularity in describing the cultural movement that began in the late 13th century. The
Renaissance was first defined by French historian Jules Michelet (1798-1874), in his
1855 work, Histoire de France. For Michelet, the Renaissance was more a development
in science than in art and culture. He asserted that it spanned the period from Columbus
to Copernicus to Galileo; that is, from the end of the fifteenth century to the middle of the
seventeenth century.[44] Moreover, Michelet distinguished between what he called, "the
bizarre and monstrous" quality of the Middle Ages and the democratic values that he, as a
vocal Republican, chose to see in its character.[21] A French nationalist, Michelet also
sought to claim the Renaissance as a French movement.[21] The Swiss historian Jacob
Burckhardt, (1818-1897) in his Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien, by contrast,
defined the Renaissance as the period between Giotto and Michelangelo in Italy. He saw
in the Renaissance the emergence of the modern spirit of individuality, which had been
stifled in the Middle Ages.[45] His book was widely read and was influential in the
development of the modern interpretation of the Italian Renaissance.[46] However,
Buckhardt has been accused of setting forth a linear Whiggish view of history in seeing
the Renaissance as the origin of the modern world.[6]
More recently, historians have been much less keen to define the Renaissance as a
historical age, or even a coherent cultural movement. As Randolph Starn has put it,
Rather than a period with definitive beginnings and endings and
“ consistent content in between, the Renaissance can be (and occasionally
has been) seen as a movement of practices and ideas to which specific
groups and identifiable persons variously responded in different times and
places. It would be in this sense a network of diverse, sometimes
converging, sometimes conflicting cultures, not a single, time-bound
culture.
”
—Randolph Starn[6]
For better or for worse?
Painting of the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, an event in the French Wars of
Religion, by François Dubois.
Much of the debate around the Renaissance has centred around whether the Renaissance
truly was an "improvement" on the culture of the Middle Ages. Both Michelet and
Burckhardt were keen to describe the progress made in the Renaissance towards the
"modern age". Burckhardt likened the change to a veil being removed from man's eyes,
allowing him to see clearly.
On the other hand, many historians now point out that most of the negative social factors
popularly associated with the "medieval" period - poverty, warfare, religious and political
persecution, for example - seem to have worsened in this era which saw the rise of
Machiavelli, the Wars of Religion, the corrupt Borgia Popes, and the intensified witch-
hunts of the 16th century. Many people who lived during the Renaissance did not view it
as the "golden age" imagined by certain 19th-century authors, but were concerned by
these social maladies.[47] Significantly, though, the artists, writers, and patrons involved in
the cultural movements in question believed they were living in a new era that was a
clean break from the Middle Ages.[35] Some Marxist historians prefer to describe the
Renaissance in material terms, holding the view that the changes in art, literature, and
philosophy were part of a general economic trend away from feudalism towards
capitalism, resulting in a bourgeois class with leisure time to devote to the arts.[48]
In the Middle Ages both sides of
human consciousness--that which
was turned within as that which was
turned without-- lay dreaming or
half awake beneath a common veil.
The veil was woven of faith,
illusion, and childish prepossession,
through which the world and history
were seen clad in strange hues.
Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization
of the Renaissance in Italy
Johan Huizinga (1872–1945) acknowledged the existence of the Renaissance but
questioned whether it was a positive change. In his book The Waning of the Middle Ages,
he argued that the Renaissance was a period of decline from the High Middle Ages,
destroying much that was important.[5] The Latin language, for instance, had evolved
greatly from the classical period and was still a living language used in the church and
elsewhere. The Renaissance obsession with classical purity halted its further evolution
and saw Latin revert to its classical form. Robert S. Lopez has contended that it was a
period of deep economic recession. Meanwhile George Sarton and Lynn Thorndike have
both argued that scientific progress was slowed.
James Franklin has argued that the idea of an European Renaissance around the 15th
century is a myth.[49] He claims that the gap between 1453 and 1564 was in fact a period
when thought declined significantly, bringing to an end a period of advance near the end
of the Middle Ages. He sees the medieval Twelfth-century Renaissance as the "real, true,
and unqualified renaissance", noting for example that the rediscovery of ancient
knowledge, which the later Italian humanists claimed for themselves, was actually
accomplished in the twelfth century. Franklin concedes that painting was an area where
the Renaissance really did excel, but unfortunately, he says, the skill of the Renaissance
in art covered up its incompetence at anything else.
Historians have begun to consider the word Renaissance as unnecessarily loaded,
implying an unambiguously positive rebirth from the supposedly more primitive "Dark
Ages" (Middle Ages). Many historians now prefer to use the term "Early Modern" for
this period, a more neutral designation that highlights the period as a transitional one
between the Middle Ages and the modern era.[50]
Other Renaissances
The term Renaissance has also been used to define time periods outside of the 15th and
16th centuries. Charles H. Haskins (1870–1937), for example, made a convincing case
for a Renaissance of the 12th century.[51] Other historians have argued for a Carolingian
Renaissance in the eighth and ninth centuries, and still later for an Ottonian Renaissance
in the tenth century.[52] Other periods of cultural rebirth have also been termed
"renaissances", such as the Bengal Renaissance or the Harlem Renaissance.
