Download History 214 Introduction to European History

The Renaissance and Humanism
How to Sniggle, 1653
"And because you that are but a young angler, know not
what snigling is, I will now teach it to you: ... you observing your time
in a warm day, when the water is lowest, may take a hook tied to a
strong line, or to a string about a yard long, and then into... any place
where you think an Eele may hide or shelter her selfe, there with the
help of a short stick put in your bait, but leisurely, and as far as you
may conveniently; and it is scarce to be doubted, but that if there be
an Eel within the sight of it, the Eele will bite instantly, and as
certainly gorge it... but pull him out by degrees, for he lying folded
double in his hole, will, with the help of his taile, break all, unless you
give him time to be wearied with pulling."
Izaak Walton, The Compleat Angler (1653)
What is the ‘Renaissance’?
It’s pretty messy!!....
 An historical ‘period’?
 An event?
 A cultural movement?
 Where does it take place?
 Who does it involve?
 What shapes and defines it?
Depends on who you ask…..
Renaissance Thoughts
Una rinascita – a ‘rebirth’ of classical values that re-energized Europe
Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574)
a new epoch of civilized life following a millennium of brutality and barbarism
Pier Paolo Vergerio (1370-1444)
“Only those liberal arts are worthy of free men; they alone can help us to attain
virtue and wisdom”
Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374)
The people who invented the term "Renaissance" for distinguishing their period
from the barbaric Middle Ages - were the Italian humanists.
Marsilio Ficino
...in a letter to a friend
If we are to call any age golden, it is beyond doubt that age which brings forth
golden talents in different places. That such is true of this our age [no one]
will hardly doubt. For this century, like a golden age, has restored to light the
liberal arts, which were almost extinct: grammar, poetry, rhetoric, painting,
sculpture, architecture, music . . . and all this in Florence. Achieving what
had been honored among the ancients, but almost forgotten since, the age
has joined wisdom with eloquence, and prudence with the military art. . . .
This century appears to have perfected astronomy, in Florence it has recalled
the Platonic teaching from darkness into light . . . and in Germany . . . [there]
have been invented the instruments for printing books.
Historians’ Thoughts
 Jakob Burkhardt (1818-1897); Swiss art
historian
 Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860s) –
profoundly influential
 "the discovery of the world and of man” – newness &
novelty
 Renaissance as secularizing urban movement which
breaks with the past
 The real development of the individual – a watershed
moment for modernity
 Italy the ‘firstborn among the sons of Modern Europe’
Burkhardt
In the Middle Ages both sides of human consciousness – that which was turned
within as that which was turned without -- lay dreaming or held 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. Man was conscious of himself as a member of a race, people,
party, family, or corporation -- only through some general category. In Italy
this veil first melted into air; an objective treatment and consideration of the
state and of all the things of this world became possible. The subjective side
at the same time asserted itself with corresponding emphasis; man became
a spiritual individual, and recognized himself as such. In the same way, the
Greek distinguished himself from the barbarian.
Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy
The Renaissance? As a cultural movement?

An historical ‘period’?

An event?
If and Intellectual and Cultural movement –

When does it start, and where? How? Who is involved? Break with the medieval past? NO

Downgraded past 1000 years as “Middle” Ages

Culmination of medieval aspirations in many ways – education, art, civil life, trade,
intellectual life
“not so much period as program” – Barbara Rosenwein

co-exists and overlaps with ‘late medieval’ AND ‘early modern’

When depends on where

Renaissance Italy – 14th-16th centuries

Renaissance Scotland – late 16th & early 17th centuries
The Renaissance – The Human Experience
The Renaissance – validates the human experience in a profound way
Takes up the medieval ideas about moral discretion – and the trustworthiness
of the senses, optics, investigation (inquisition!) and turns them all into
something which is creative and productive
The individual lies at the centre of this experience
What does it mean to live in a human society? What does it mean to create?
How should human beings treat one another? What is the best condition of
life? What kinds of practical considerations do human beings need to think
of? How can human excellence be achieved through human abilities?
 Artistic
 Textual / Literary
 Conduct & Civility
The Renaissance Ideal?
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494)
Oration on the Dignity of Man
 Never actually given!
 Captures the ‘essence’ of the Renaissance
Human beings
 can move up and down the ‘ladder’ of the
created, ordered, cosmos. As spiritual beings,
excelling in intellect, they can be higher than
the angels; as vegetative or staid brutish
lustful animals, they can be like beasts or a
stone: they have the choice.
Humanity as chameleon like
 can transform using its god-given gifts, and
thus better itself through imagination,
creation, intellectual activity, rational
knowledge…
The Renaissance – Definitions & Myths
 Some Myths
 That the Renaissance is a secular movement, representing a decline in the significance of
Christianity (or Catholicism)
 That the art, philosophy, politics (etc.) of 1400-1600 necessarily cohere as one unified
culture
 That the Renaissance is a pure revival of the Ancients (rather than a re-invention)
 That Renaissance Humanism replaces Medieval Scholasticism (or Renaissance art replaces
Gothic architecture), etc. (They co-exist for a while)
View its emergence as transition, spread of interests, of cultural expressions,
practices of interaction and thought in
 Art - Conduct Literature - Interest in Classical Authors - Textual Practices –
Invention - Interrogation of Authority
Inspirations and Context
Why did the Renaissance occur?
This is a difficult question at best -- there are no easy answers
 Commercial changes & Affluence
 Nominalism
 the stagnation of late medieval thought
 Reaction against the synthesis or the idea of overly formal and systematic ideas
 The Black Death
Inspirations and Context
 Northern Italian cities: self-governing states,
ongoing wars
 Defending their “liberty”, firstly from outside (Pope,
Emperor [Guelphs v Ghibellines], France);
 then from within: rise of signori (dynastic lords), e.g.
Ferrara, Verona, late 13th: republic vs princely rule
 the “Mirror for Rulers” genre (rhetoric)
 Key theme: Virtue (as the “true nobility”) and Fortune
 interest in Roman history (republic vs empire)
 Sight of the world of Man (humanity) and the world
of Nature
Inspirations and Context
Ad Fontes
 “to the source”
 reading classical literature and appreciating classical art anew.
 Return to Graeco-Roman authors, interests, and styles as source for
inspiration – ‘light’ after the darkness of a millennium
 Retrieving classical sources involved an effort of critical historical
scholarship: philology and history were important Renaissance disciplines.
Resources for ‘true’ human living and learning
 Plato (c.427-c.347) and Cicero (106-43) - the ‘conscience’ of the
Renaissance
 Learned from the past and borrow what is deemed most useful
Authors - Petrarch
Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374)
 Born in Avignon; in orders
 Humanist, poet (Tuscany, S. France, Milan, Padua)
 Pursues the revival of Latin literature, especially
Cicero
 Invents the idea of the ‘Middle Ages’
 Christian ethics
Letter to Posterity: "Among the many subjects which
interested me, I dwelt especially upon antiquity, for
our own age has always repelled me…. In order to
forget my own time I have constantly striven to place
myself in a spirit of other ages, and consequently, I
delight in history."
Turned from Aristotle to Plato: the lyrical, poetic, soulful
Plato was the antithesis of and antidote for the
logical, scientific, unemotional Aristotle.
Authors – Dante, Boccacio & Ficino
Dante Alighieri (c. 1265-1321)
 Divina Commedia (written c. 1308-1321)
Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375)
 Decameron (c. 1349-)
Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499)
 Theologia Platonica
Humanism
 Is not secularism; Humanists are teachers of litterae humaniores (or studia
humanitatis) = Classics (grammar; rhetoric; poetry; history; moral philosophy)
 Revival of classical genres:
 History as focused on actions of man, not God
 Philosophical dialogues like Plato’s which question long-standing assumptions
 Lyric poetry which talk about writer's private emotions
 Series of interests which view scholasticism as impractical
 Who cares how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
 Rhetoric (eloquence): persuasion rather than proof
 Imitation of Ancients:
return to classical Latin
literary forms of Ancients (Cicero’s letters & speeches, e.g.)
 Philology: New texts available (direct access to Greek texts), new editions and
translations
Humanism – as an intellectual ‘toolbox’
 Paul Oskar Kristeller (1905-1999)
 Historian & Renaissance scholar
 Humanism is a set of rhetorical and
philological techniques, without any pregiven ends in view:
“Characteristic phase in what may be called
the rhetorical tradition in Western
culture”
 A shift in practice – not just content of
intellectual and cultural inquiry
 Move away from the scholastic notion of
disputation, as well as its interests in
systematic explanations of everything
Humanism - Italy

Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374)

Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375)

Coluccio Salutati (1331-1406)

Leonardo Bruni (1369-1444)

Lorenzo Valla (1407-1457)

Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499)

G. Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494)

Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527)

N. Italian cities: between Emperors and Popes (c.11001400): liberty

Florence in 15th century

from republic to the Medici Grand Dukes
Humanism – Northern Europe
 Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464)
 Rudolf Agricola (1443-1485)
 Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam (c. 14661536)


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Translation of New Testament (c. 1514)
Praise of Folly (1509)
Education of the Christian Prince (1516)
 John Colet (1467?-1519)
 Johann Reuchlin
 Thomas More

Utopia (1516)
 Jacques LeFevre d’Etaples (c.1450-1536)
Humanism – Textual Criticism




Humanist methods can
impact on other areas,
e.g. Religious studies:
Lorenzo Valla (14071457), On the Donation of
Constantine [De falso
credita et ementita
Constantini Donatione
declamatio]
Erasmus, translation of
New Testament (1516), In
Praise of Folly (1515)
Compultensian Polyglot
Bible (1514)
Artistic Life – The Artist
 The Artist is a God-like creator, a true philosopher
 Reveals more of the world by re-creating and representing it
Alberti On Painting (1436) the artist is “another god” (alter deus)
Ficino De furore divino (1457) an artist has divine inspiration
 Uses Platonic idea of the furore or frenzy and ecstasy
 function of the Arts and the Artist was to remind the soul of its origin in the
divine world
“those whose spirit is drawn away and freed from the clay of the body first see
form and grace in any one, they rejoice, as at the reflection of divine beauty.
But those people should at once recall to memory that divine beauty, which
they should honour and desire above all; as it is by a burning desire for this
beauty that they may be drawn to the heavens. This first attempt at flight
Plato calls divine ecstasy and frenzy.”
Artistic Life
Italian painters and sculptures copied classical art
and then went beyond it
 Revival of naturalistic representation
 Use of perspective to order space
 Artists visit Roman ruins to study the art and
architecture
 Start of Archaeology
 Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture
 Florentines in the 1400’s emphasized
naturalism, beauty of human body
Italian first artistic centres – then Low Countries
Giotto (1267?-1337)
Fra Angelico (c. 1395 –
1455)
Leone Battista
Alberti (1404–1472)
Donatello (1386-1466)
Sandro Botticelli
Filippo Lippi (1406-1469)
Titian
Leonardo da Vinci (14521519)
Michelangelo (1475-1564)
Raphael
Hieronymus Bosch (c.
1450 – 1516)
Jan van Eyck (1385?–
1440?)
Hugo van der Goes
Hans Memling (c. 1430 –
1494)
Rogier van der Weyden
Artistic Life
Artistic Life – Art and Invention
Leonardo da Vinci ( 1452 - 1519)
Brings all artistic domains together: Painting, Sculpture,
Invention, Learning in math and observation
"knowing how to see, controls the skilled hand”
 Observation & Studies – whether human anatomy
or fortifications
 Dissection
 Realism – Mona Lisa
 New technologies – human creativity and ingenuity
used to solve practical problems
Virtù vs Fortuna
Greatness (for men!) not determined by battle, but by human
capacity, virtu and civility – moral and intellectual
excellence
the ancients reincarnate: ancient Greek ‘Arete’ “excellence”
– virtue and knowledge, the pinnacle of humanity

Virtù : individual agency to shape one’s destiny and to
make history (against Fortune, and providence)

The point of education
A great man:

Seeks virtue

Lives the good life

Explores all potentialities

Serves the civitas
Not blind obedience to God’s will, but exercise of God’s gift of
Free Will through rational actions and discernment
Governance & Public Life
Burkhardt – ‘The State as a Work of Art’ – the governor as a man of virtu
 Rhetoric teaching in late 1200s: turn to classical authors as examples of style;
then revival of classical ideas
 Eloquence and good government

Humanism developing alongside scholasticism

Cicero, dialogues (esp. De Officiis, On Duties)

Aristotle, esp. Politics and Ethics
 Public life is objective of man of virtu – participation and action in civic sphere
 Mirrors for Princes

Advice for rulers genre emerges by 1300 (e.g. John of Viterbo)

Rhetorical treatment of virtues of a ruler:

‘Should a ruler be loved or feared?’, etc.
The Palazzo Pubblico, Siena, 1340s
Ambrogio Lorenzetti fresco, The
effects of Good Government
on the City.
The Renaissance and Patronage - Popes
 Rebuilding Prestige of the Papacy & Rome

repairing old buildings, and constructing splendid new ones;

commissioning impressive works of art;

winning back the papal states, which might involve political
intrigue and military force;

increasing papal authority relative to the powers of European
national governments, which might involve canny diplomacy;

strengthening revenues and improving the papal treasury.
 Nicholas V (1447-1455)

rebuilding of St. Peter's Basilica
 Julius II (1503-1513)

Warrior Pope

Michelangelo to decorate the Sistine Chapel
The Renaissance and Patronage - Medici
Florence the city of the Renaissance
 Dominated by Medici in 15th century
 Cosimo & Lorenzo ‘The Magnificent’
 Become powerful – four popes; eventually Dukes of
Florence
 Plato's Academy in Florence

Marcilio Ficino reconcile sPlato and Moses, Socrates and Christ

Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494)

a universal religion combining Plato's Ideas, the Jewish Kabbala,
and Christianity
 The Arts

Sponsor rebuilding of churches and chapels

As popes sponsor artists - Michelangelo
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527)
Serves Florentine government 1498-1512
Exiled and jailed by Medici
The Prince (Il Principe), written 1513, published 1532

A new, realist ‘mirror for princes’

How can a prince maintain his status/rule? Force!

A ruler not to be too good “a prince who wants to
keep his post must learn how not to be good”

Too much goodness can be weakness.

Princes should only cultivate virtues like humanity,
generosity, if they help them keep control

A distinct ethics for rulers: ‘Reason of State’ (raison
d’état; ragione di stato)
Discorsi (on Livy), c. 1513, on republican government
Machiavelli – The Prince, ch.XV
“And since I am aware that many have written on this theme, I
am afraid that ... I may be considered presumptuous,
especially as I depart from the methods adopted by others...
But since my intention is to write something useful... it seems
to me more beneficial to go behind to the effectual truth of the
matter rather than focusing on the imagining of it.”
“... something which seems virtue can, if put into practice, cause
his ruin, while another thing which seems a vice can, when put
into practice, result in his security and well-being”.
Rebirth or something new?
The Artisan, Inventor, and the Prince as men of virtu –
who excel in god-given talents
 Optimistic view of human potential and capacity
 Humanism: a coherent new philosophy?
(Burckhardt)
 Or a set of techniques, an intellectual toolbox?
(Kristeller)
 Merely just a rediscovery of the World and
Nature?
Combines humanistic values, Thomism,
Augustinianism, paganism, mysticism and the new
science side by side with an increasing impatience
with the older medieval forms of society, cultural
and intellectual life
Timeline
•Cosimo de'Medici
returns from Exile
•Thomas More's Utopia,
1516
•The Last Judgement by
Michelangelo in the
Sistine Chapel
Take Away
Renaissance as a turning point in European history
Complex interaction of artistic, intellectual, and social
changes
Terms
Ad Fontes
Humanism
Humanism as textual and intellectual practices focused
on rhetoric and interest in classical past as solution
for current problems and issues
Machiavelli
Leads to profound changes in European society and
culture over the course of centuries
Virtù
Difficult, however, to define as a ‘period’ – more a
cultural program or shift in interests
Focus on human experience and lauding of human
capacity
Artist and Princes both examples of excellence – in
creation of new works, or in governance
Petrarch
Perspective