From the Middle Ages to Renaissance

Medieval Towns  Isolation  Ruled by the RCC  Feudalism  Scholasticism

Medieval Towns Cont

Why did Feudalism end?  Causes:  Technological Changes  Better Farming  More Energy  Faster Travel  Bubonic Plague  Distrust in the RCC  Wars/Famine/distrust  Effects:  More Food=More people  Gradual Rise in prices (price revolution)  Rise of towns and trade  1/3 of Europe died resulting in labor scarcity  Power vacuum that secular leaders consolidated power and control over their populations

Cinque Terre

How did the political organization of the Italian peninsula cause the southern Renaissance?

Renaissance Themes  Rebirth of the Classical  Greek  Roman  Humanism  Literary Movement  Focus on present life, not afterlife  Secularism  Religion moves out of the public sphere  Individualism  Virtu

Where did they get the classics?

Rebirth of the Classics, Raphael’s School of Athens

Why not rediscover the classics when you live on top of them?

Importance of Perspective

Renaissance vs Middle Ages

Middle Ages vs Renaissance Again

Giotto the transition man  Fresco of the Lamentation  Mood and shape  Done in 1305

Giotto’s Emotions

Life as an Artist  Who funded the Arts?  How did life as an artist change from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance?

Leonardo DaVinci

Individualism?

Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel

His Sistine Chapel

Sistine Chapel Sistine Chapel

Raphael, 1505 St. George and the Dragon

Raphael Pope Leo X, 1518

Besides the Artists  Writers  Dante, Petrach, Boccacio, Cellini, Castiglione, Machiavelli, Thomas Moore, Erasmus, Copernicus (scientist)  Important Families  Medici: Giovanni , Cosimo , Lorenzo the Magnificent  Borgia: Pope VI Alexander, Cesare  Sforza ruled Milan

Some Tombs in Santa Croce Florence Dante Galileo Machiavelli Michelangelo

Medici Family Symbols

After the Renaissance what happens to the Italian city states?

Until they win the World Cup!

Generic Ideas About the Renaissance  It is located primarily in cities because that's where the contact with other cultures happens first. In the south they have more money, because of more trade with the Arabs and the Byzantines, so they have more to spend on art. In the north they focus more on learning and science and technology. That's one reason why the Reformation starts there - that and its distance from Rome where the Popes are and all the money raised for the Church goes. The north is far behind the south in the establishment of institutions of higher learning so between 1386 and 1506 fourteen new universities are founded in Germany. It is probably cheaper to start a university than it is to paint the Sistine Chapel.  There is a lot more secular content in art but the Renaissance DOES NOT abandon interest in religion, since the biggest patron of the arts continues to be the church. Secular influence in painting is shown in patron's portraits being used as the faced for holy subjects. Also rich patrons, often bankers and merchants as well as political powers and nobility, use their money to decorate their own homes and public spaces.  Intellectually there is a focus on this world rather than the afterlife, and on description rather than prescription. A big breakthrough is the use of the vernacular in literature. For the first time authors and artists are making money writing and painting: it is the birth of an array of new professions that cater to wealthy patrons. Writing addresses new subjects - especially human experience, manners, politics and so on, these new subjects were called "the humane letters," from whence the term "humanism" is derived.

Generic Ideas About the Renaissance  But where's the "rebirth?" In Italy it is the re-discovery of the ancient Greek and Latin - pagan - texts that had been preserved in the Arab world during the European Dark and Middle Ages. In northern Europe they are equally excited about the re-discovery of the texts of the ancient church fathers, another factor leading to the locus of the Reformation being north.  The Germans used this new knowledge and the Renaissance spirit of the individual and took it in a religious direction, to mysticism. Mysticism holds that the individual soul can commune with God all by itself without the church, without other people, without sacraments. These mystics did not rebel against the church, but they did not think they really needed it to attain salvation.  Another idea that is reborn is the notion of patriotism towards one's city, also an idea that was born in the classical past. There develops a new idea for the ideal Renaissance man. He has "virtu" the "quality of being a man." He is active, skillful, multi-faceted in his knowledge and experience. This idea rejects the medieval values of contemplation and renunciation.  It is important to remember that the Renaissance was NOT a rebirth in law, government or economic production. All of Europe's most basic institutions had originated in the Middle Ages.

Play Divine Proportion Divine Proportion  Cleaning/Restoring Paintings Cleaning/Restoring Paintings Cleaning/Restoring Paintings  Math World Formulas for the Golden Ratio Math World Formulas for the Golden Ratio Math World Formulas for the Golden Ratio  Interactive Leonardo DaVinci Interactive Leonardo DaVinci Interactive Leonardo DaVinci  Sistine Chapel Photos Sistine Chapel Photos Sistine Chapel Photos