RENAISSANCE

The Renaissance is a period of history and a

European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th
centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle
Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to
revive and surpass the ideas and achievements of classical
antiquity. Associated with great social change in most fields
and disciplines, including art, architecture,
politics, literature, exploration and science, the
Renaissance was first centered in the Republic of Florence,
then spread to the rest of Italy and later throughout Europe.
The term rinascita (rebirth) first appeared in Lives of the
Artists (c. 1550) by Giorgio Vasari, while the corresponding
French word renaissance was adopted into English as the
term for this period during the 1830s.

Time Period
The Renaissance period started during the crisis of the Late Middle Ages and
conventionally ends by the 1600s with the waning of humanism, and the advents of
the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, and in art the Baroque period. It had a
different period and characteristics in different regions, such as the Italian
Renaissance, the Northern Renaissance, the Spanish Renaissance, etc.

In addition to the standard periodization, proponents of a "long Renaissance"

may put its beginning in the 14th century and its end in the 17th century

The traditional view focuses more on the Renaissance's early modern aspects
and argues that it was a break from the past, but many historians today focus more
on its medieval aspects and argue that it was an extension of the Middle Ages. The
beginnings of the period—the early Renaissance of the 15th century and the
Italian Proto-Renaissance from around 1250 or 1300—overlap considerably with
the Late Middle Ages, conventionally dated to c. 1350–1500, and the Middle Ages
themselves were a long period filled with gradual changes, like the modern age; as a
transitional period between both, the Renaissance has close similarities to both,
especially the late and early sub-periods of either.

Overview

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 art, architecture, philosophy, literature, music, science, technology, politics,
religion, and other aspects of intellectual inquiry. Renaissance scholars employed
the humanist method in study, and searched for realism and human emotion in art.
 Renaissance humanists such as Poggio Bracciolini sought out in Europe's
monastic libraries the Latin literary, historical, and oratorical texts of antiquity, while
the fall of Constantinople (1453) generated a wave of émigré Greek
scholars bringing precious manuscripts in ancient Greek, many of which had fallen
into obscurity in the West. It was in their new focus on literary and historical texts that
Renaissance scholars differed so markedly from the medieval scholars of
the Renaissance of the 12th century, who had focused on
studying Greek and Arabic works of natural sciences, philosophy, and mathematics,
rather than on such cultural texts.

In the revival of neoplatonism,

Renaissance humanists did not
reject Christianity; on the contrary,
many of the Renaissance's greatest
works were devoted to it, and the
Church patronized many works of
Renaissance art. But a subtle shift
took place in the way that
intellectuals approached religion that
was reflected in many other areas of
cultural life. In addition, many Greek
Christian works, including the Greek
New Testament, were brought back
from Byzantium to Western Europe
and engaged Western scholars for
the first time since late antiquity. This
new engagement with Greek Christian works, and particularly the return to the
original Greek of the New Testament promoted by humanists Lorenzo
Valla and Erasmus, helped pave the way for the Reformation.

Well after the first artistic return to classicism had been exemplified in the
sculpture of Nicola Pisano, Florentine painters led by 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, that is to understand it rationally. A critical
contribution to Italian Renaissance humanism, Giovanni Pico della
Mirandola wrote De hominis dignitate (Oration on the Dignity of Man, 1486), a series
of theses on philosophy, natural thought, faith, and magic defended against any
opponent on the grounds of reason. In addition to studying classical Latin and Greek,
Renaissance authors also began increasingly to use vernacular languages;
combined with the introduction of the printing press, this allowed many more people
access to books, especially the Bible.

Characteristics
 Humanism
In some ways, Renaissance humanism was not a philosophy but a method of
learning. In contrast to the medieval scholastic mode, which focused on resolving
contradictions between authors, Renaissance humanists would study ancient texts in
their original languages and appraise them through a combination of reasoning
and empirical evidence. Humanist education was based on the programme of Studia
Humanitatis, the study of five humanities: poetry, grammar, history, moral
philosophy, and rhetoric. 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, following the Islamic steps
of Ibn Khaldun.

 Humanism and libraries

A unique characteristic of some Renaissance libraries is that they were open to

the public. These libraries were places where ideas were exchanged and where
scholarship and reading were considered both pleasurable and beneficial to the mind
and soul.

 Art

Renaissance art marks a cultural rebirth at the close of the Middle Ages and rise
of the Modern world. 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
demonstrations of architect Filippo Brunelleschi (1377–1446) and the subsequent
writings of Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) that perspective was formalized as an
artistic technique.

 Science
Science and art were intermingled in the early Renaissance, with polymath artists
such as Leonardo da Vinci making observational drawings of anatomy and nature.
Leonardo set up controlled experiments in water flow, medical dissection, and
systematic study of movement and aerodynamics, and he devised principles of
research method that led Fritjof Capra to classify him as the "father of modern
science". Other examples of Da Vinci's contribution during this period include
machines designed to saw marbles and lift monoliths, and new discoveries in
acoustics, botany, geology, anatomy, and mechanics.

 Navigation and geography

During the Renaissance, extending from 1450 to
1650, every continent was visited and mostly
mapped by Europeans, except the south polar
continent now known as Antarctica. This
development is depicted in the large world map Nova
Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula made by the Dutch
cartographer Joan Blaeu in 1648 to commemorate
the Peace of Westphalia.

In 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed across the Atlantic Ocean from Spain
seeking a direct route to India of the Delhi Sultanate. In 1606, the Dutch
navigator Willem Janszoon sailed from the East Indies in the Dutch East India
Company ship Duyfken and landed in Australia. He charted about 300 km of the
west coast of Cape York Peninsula in Queensland. By 1650, Dutch cartographers
had mapped most of the coastline of the continent, which they named New Holland,
except the east coast which was charted in 1770 by James Cook.

The long-imagined south polar continent was eventually sighted in 1820.

Throughout the Renaissance it had been known as Terra Australis, or 'Australia' for
short. However, after that name was transferred to New Holland in the nineteenth
century, the new name of 'Antarctica' was bestowed on the south polar continent.

 Music
From this changing society emerged a common, unifying musical language, in
particular the polyphonic style of the Franco-Flemish school. The development
of printing made distribution of music possible on a wide scale. Demand for music as
entertainment and as an activity for educated amateurs increased with the
emergence of a bourgeois class. Dissemination of chansons, motets,
and masses throughout Europe coincided with the unification of polyphonic practice
into the fluid style that culminated in the second half of the sixteenth century in the
work of composers such as Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Orlande de
Lassus, Tomás Luis de Victoria, and William Byrd.

 Religion
The new ideals of humanism, although more secular in some aspects, developed
against a Christian backdrop, especially in the Northern Renaissance. Much, if not
most, of the new art was commissioned by or in dedication to the Roman Catholic
Church. However, the Renaissance had a profound effect on contemporary theology,
particularly in the way people perceived the relationship between man and
God. Many of the period's foremost theologians were followers of the humanist
method, including Erasmus, Huldrych Zwingli, Thomas More, Martin Luther,
and John Calvin.

The Renaissance began in times of religious turmoil. The Late Middle Ages was
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.
While the schism was resolved by the Council of Constance (1414), a resulting
reform movement known as Conciliarism sought to limit the power of the pope.
Although 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 children (most of whom were married
off, presumably for the consolidation of power) while a cardinal.

 Self-awareness
By the 15th century, writers, artists, and architects in Italy were well aware of the
transformations that were taking place and were using phrases such as 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. In the 1330s Petrarch referred to
pre-Christian times as antiqua (ancient) and to the Christian period
as nova (new). From Petrarch's Italian perspective, this new period (which included
his own time) was an age of national eclipse. Leonardo Bruni was the first to use
tripartite periodization in his History of the Florentine People (1442). Bruni's first two
periods were based on those of Petrarch, but he added a third period because he
believed that Italy was no longer in a state of decline. Flavio Biondo used a similar
framework in Decades of History from the Deterioration of the Roman Empire (1439–
1453).

The Renaissance Writers Who Shaped the Modern World

Some of the writers who emerged during the Renaissance remain the most
influential writers of all time and were responsible for literary techniques, thoughts,
and philosophies that are still borrowed and explored today. Reading the works
of these Renaissance writers will not only give you a good idea of what characterized
Renaissance thought and philosophy, but it will also give you a solid grasp of
modern writing in general because these writers are where our modern sense of
literature began.

1. William Shakespeare

One does not discuss literature without mentioning Shakespeare. His influence
simply cannot be overstated. He created many words still in common English usage
today (including bedazzled, which might be his greatest achievement), he coined
many of the phrases and idioms we still use today. There is literally no other writer
who has had a bigger influence on the English language.

2. Geoffrey Chaucer

Chaucer’s influence can be summarized in one sentence: Without him,

Shakespeare wouldn’t be Shakespeare. Not only did Chaucer’s "Canterbury Tales"
mark the first time English was used for a serious work of literary ambition (English
being considered a "common" language for the uneducated at the time when the
royal family of England still considered themselves in many ways French and in fact
French was the official language of the court), but Chaucer’s technique of using five
stresses in a line was a direct ancestor of the iambic pentameter used by
Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

3. Nicholas Machiavelli

Nicholas Machiavelli was a Florentine diplomat, author, philosopher, and

historian who lived during the Italian Renaissance. He is best known for his political
treatise The Prince, written around 1513 but not published until 1532, five years after
his death.

4. Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish writer widely regarded as the

greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world's pre-eminent novelists.
He is best known for his novel Don Quixote, a work considered as the first modern
novel.

5. Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri (May 1265 –September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously
as Dante, was an Italian poet, writer, and philosopher. His Divine Comedy, originally
called Comedìa (modern Italian: Commedia) and later christened Divina by Giovanni
Boccaccio, is widely considered one of the most important poems of the Middle Ages
and the greatest literary work in the Italian language.

6. John Donne

John Donne was an English poet, scholar, soldier and secretary born into a
recusant family, who later became a cleric in the Church of England. Under Royal
Patronage, he was made Dean of St Paul's Cathedral in London. He is considered
the preeminent representative of the metaphysical poets.

7. Edmund Spenser

Edmund Spenser was an English poet best known for The Faerie Queene, an
epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He
is recognized as one of the premier craftsmen of nascent Modern English verse, and
he is considered one of the great poets in the English language.

8. Giovanni Boccaccio

Giovanni Boccaccio was an Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and

an important Renaissance humanist.

9. Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)

Francis Petrarch, born Francesco di Petracco, was a scholar from Arezzo and
poet of the early Italian Renaissance and one of the earliest humanists. Petrarch's
rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited with initiating the 14th-century Italian
Renaissance and the founding of Renaissance humanism.

10. John Milton

John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet,

polemicist, and civil servant. His 1667 epic poem Paradise Lost, written in blank
verse and including twelve books, was written in a time of immense religious flux and
political upheaval. It addressed the fall of man, including the temptation of Adam and
Eve by the fallen angel Satan and God's expulsion of them from the Garden of Eden.
Paradise Lost elevated Milton's reputation as one of history's greatest poets. He also
served as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under its Council of State
and later under Oliver Cromwell.

11. Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (Molière)

 Molière was one of the first major comedy writers of the Renaissance. Humorous
writing had always existed, of course, but Molière reinvented it as a form of social
satire that had an incredible influence on French culture and literature in general.