Download Italian Renaissance

Why did the Renaissance begin in the
Italian city-states?
Ideas, Beliefs, and Values Between 1350 and
1550, Italian intellectuals believed they had
entered a new age of human achievement.
The Italian Renaissance
• The Italian Renaissance lasted from 1350 to
1550. It was a time period in which Europeans
believed they had witnessed a rebirth of the
ancient Greek and Roman worlds.
• Characteristics of the Renaissance:
– The Renaissance was mainly led by an urban
society, and Italian city-states came to dominate
political, social, and economic life.
– The Renaissance witnessed the rise of a secular
viewpoint of wealth and material items.
– The Renaissance occurred
during a time of recovery
from the disasters of the
fourteenth century: the
plague, political
instability, and a decline
of Church power.
– The Renaissance also
stressed the individual
ability of human beings.
Well-rounded individuals,
such as Leonardo da
Vinci, emphasized the
belief that individuals could
create a new social ideal.
• With the lack of centralized power, Italian citystates such as Milan, Venice, and Florence
played a crucial role in Italian economics and
politics.
• Milan’s location as a crossroads between the
coastal Italian cities and the Alpine passes
made it a very wealthy state.
• In 1447, Francesco Sforza conquered Milan
using an army of mercenaries. Sforza created
wealth for the government by
creating an efficient tax system.
• Venice was also located in a
strategic position, as a trading
link between Asia and Western
Europe.
• In 1434, Cosimo de’ Medici
and his family came to control
Florence using their wealth
and personal influence.
Cosimo’s grandson Lorenzo
de’ Medici later ruled the city.
• Powerful monarchial states in Europe were
attracted to the wealth of the Italian city-states,
and in 1494 Charles VIII of France occupied
Naples in southern Italy.
• The Spanish replied to the Italian cries of
assistance and engaged the French in a 30year war on the Apennine Peninsula.
• The turning point of the war came in 1527 when
soldiers and mercenaries of Spain’s King
Charles I, who had not been paid in months,
sacked Rome.
• Spain became the dominant force in Italy.
As a ruler,
• is it better to be feared or loved?
• does the end always justify the means?
Machiavelli on Power
• Niccolò Machiavelli wrote a book that
influenced political thought in Italy and
eventually all of Europe.
• In his influential work, The Prince, Machiavelli
wrote about how to acquire and hold political
power. He stated that a ruler must put the state
first and not focus on moral principles.
• Machiavelli’s rejection of popular Christian
values would have a profound influence on the
political leaders who followed.
Moral
Moral
Conduct
Conduct
Renaissance Society
• Despite being the minority, nobles dominated
sixteenth-century Europe during the Renaissance.
• Peasants continued to make up the bulk of European
society but were gaining more independence during
the Renaissance.
• The growing numbers of townspeople were
segregated into social groups based on income levels.
• The family bond provided a great deal of security to
Renaissance-era Italians. As in many societies, a
dowry was required in marriage contracts.
What characterizes Renaissance art, such as
da Vinci’s Mona Lisa?
Ideas, Beliefs, and Values Humanism was an
important intellectual movement of the
Renaissance and was reflected in the works of
Renaissance artists.
Italian Renaissance Humanism
• A key intellectual movement of the Renaissance
was humanism.
• Petrarch believed that intellectuals had a duty
to live an active civic life and put their study of
the humanities to the state’s service.
• The humanist emphasis on classical Latin led to
an increase in the writings of scholars, lawyers,
and theologians.
• The Italian author Dante and the English author
Geoffrey Chaucer wrote in vernacular, making
vernacular literature very popular.
Renaissance Education
• The humanist movement led to changes in
education.
• Humanists believed that individuals could attain
wisdom and virtue by studying liberal studies.
Physical education was also emphasized.
• Liberal Studies: history, moral philosophy,
eloquence, letters, poetry, mathematics,
astronomy, and music.
• The goal of humanist educators was to create
complete citizens, not great scholars.
Renaissance Art
• Renaissance artists
sought to imitate
nature through a
human-focused
worldview.
• Realistic portrayal of
the individual,
especially nude
depictions, became
one of the chief aims
of Italian Renaissance
art.
• Advances in understanding human movement
and anatomy led to advances in Renaissance
sculpture and architecture.
• The final era of Italian Renaissance painting
(1490 to 1520) is known as the High
Renaissance and is associated with Leonardo
da Vinci, Raphael, and Michelangelo.
(I wonder where these
turtles got their names?)
• Leonardo da Vinci mastered the art of realistic
painting and sought to advance to idealized
forms of nature and humans.
• Raphael was a well
known artist for his
paintings of the
madonna. His works
reveal a world of
balance, harmony, and
order.
• Michelangelo
was a painter,
sculptor, and
architect. His
depictions of
idealized
humans are
meant as a
reflection of
divine beauty.