Chapter 10

1. Chapter 10 Renaissance and Discovery

2. The Renaissance in Italy (1375-1527) • Overview • “Prototype of the modern world” (Burckhardt) • Revival of ancient learning in fourteenth and fifteenth century Italy gave rise to new secular and scientific values • Adopted a rational and statistical approach to reality • Rediscovered the worth and creativity of the individual • Continuity? • Christian character of Renaissance humanism

3. The Renaissance in Italy (1375-1527) • Earlier ‘renaissances’ • Most scholars agree this is a time of transition from medieval to modern • Medieval: feudal, agricultural economy, dominated by church in thought and culture • Renaissance: national consciousness and political centralization, urban economy, lay and secular control of thought and culture including religion

4. The Renaissance in Italy (1375-1527) • Time frame: 1375-1527 • Death of Petrarch and Boccaccio • Growth of civic humanism • Ended when the Spanish conquered Rome

5. Italian City-States • Natural gateway to Europe (East and West) • Experienced traders • Mastered skills of business: organization, bookkeeping, scouting new markets, securing monopolies • Dominated political and economic life in surrounding countryside

6. Bankers for Europe • War between the emperor and the pope • Assisted growth of cities; strengthened merchant oligarchies • Free to expand on their own (north was kings and territorial princes that controlled growth) • Duchy of Milan, Republics of Florence and Venice, the Papal States, and the kingdom of Naples

7. Government • Became for the most part, despotisms, exception was Venice, ruled by a merchant oligarchy • Senate of 300 • Judicial body (ruthless)

8. Social Class and Conflict • Florence • 4 distinguishable groups • Grandi: old rich; nobles and merchants • Popolo grosso: new rich merchant class, capitalists and bankers; known as the “fat people” • Middle-burgher ranks of guild masters, shop owners, and professionals, the smaller businesspeople • Popolo minuto: “little people”lower economic class • Ciompi Revolt • Caused by feuding between old and new rich, the loss of population from the plague, and collapse of the great banking houses of Bardi and Peruzzi • Four years of reign by lower Florentine classes

9. Cosimo de’ Medici • Stability returned • Controlled Florence behind the scenes • Signoria ruling council • Cosimo was head of Office of Public Debt

10. Lorenzo de’ Medici • Ruled in almost totalitarian fashion • Assassination of his brother

11. Other despots • Hired strongmen known as podestá • Held executive, military, and judicial power • Purpose was to maintain normal flow of business by whatever means necessary • Operated mercenary armies obtained through brokers known as condottieri

12. Art of Diplomacy • Diplomats • Resident embassies • Represented city-states in ceremonies, negotiations, and were watchful eyes and ears at foreign courts

13. Humanism • Scholarly view • Burckhardt’s ideas: birth of modernity, driven by un-Christian philosophy that stressed dignity of humankind, individualism and secular values • Second view: humanists were actually champions of Catholic Christianity, opposing pagan teaching of Aristotle and the Scholasticism his writings nurtured • Third view: a neutral form of historical scholarship adopted to promote above all a sense of civic responsibility and political liberty • Kristleller: the above deals with secondary effects • Humanism was an educational program built on rhetoric and scholarship for their own sake http://www.humanismforschools.org.uk/teachingtoolkits/presentations/Toolkit_6.html

14. Studia Humanitatis • Liberal arts program: grammar, rhetoric, poetry, history, politics, and moral philosophy • Celebrated dignity of humankind • Prepared people for a life of virtuous action • Orators and poets • Wrote original literature in both classical and vernacular • Taught rhetoric in the universities • Employed as teachers of rhetoric, and in the courts as secretaries, speechwriters, and diplomats • Compared to earlier renaissances, more secular and lay dominated, much broader interests, more recovered manuscripts, scholars possessed superior technical skills • Less bound to recent tradition and did not focus on comparing views of recognized authorities • Sources were classical and biblical

15. Petrarch, Dante, and Boccaccio • Petrarch: Father of Humanism • Literature: • Letters to the Ancient Dead (personal letters to Cicero, Livy, Virgil, and Horace • Africa (poem) • Biographies • Lives of Illustrious Men • Love Sonnets (see sample) • Critical Text: • Criticism for Scholastics • Dialogues with Saint Augustine • Defense of the soul

16. Petrarch, Dante, and Boccaccio • Dante • Vita Nuovaand Divine Comedy • Boccaccio • Decameron • Encyclopedia of Greek and Roman Mythology

17. Educational Reforms and Goals • Goal: wisdom, eloquently spoken, both knowledge of the good and the ability to move others to desire it • Learning was not meant to remain abstract and unpracticed • “It is better to will the good than to know the truth”—Petrarch • Education should be useful and well-rounded • Not confined to the classroom • Baldassare Castiglione’s Book of the Courtier

18. Women were also educated • Christine de Pisan • Daughter of Charles V (French king) • The Treasure of the City of Ladies • Christine de Pisan Instructs Women on How to Handle their Husbands”pg. 290 • Isabella de’ Este

19. The Florentine Academy • Revival of Greek studies • Especially the works of Plato • Factors in the revival: • 1397: Florence invites Manuel Chrysoloras to come from Constantinople to promote Greek earning. • 1439: the ecumenical Council of Ferrara-Florence, convened to negotiate the reunion of the Eastern and Western churches • Opened the door for scholars and manuscripts • 1453: Fall of Constantinople • Greek scholars seek refuge in Florence

20. Florentine Platonic Academy • Patronage of Cosimo de Medici, supervision of Marsilio Ficino and Pico della Mirandola • Attracted to Platonic tradition • Plato had flattering view of human nature • Distinguished between an eternal sphere of being and the perishable world in which human actually lived • Not a formal school, but an informal gathering of influential Florentine humanists

21. Critics of tradition • Pico’s Oration on the Dignity of Man (see pg 292) • Lorenzo Valla • Elegances of the Latin Language (1444) • Donation of Constantine; defense of predestination • Critic of the church although did not intend to be

22. Civic Humanism • Basic criticism of Scholastic education was content was useless • Should promote individual virtue and public service