21H.311 The Renaissance, 1300-1600, Fall 2000

Abstract

European history from the fourteenth through the sixteenth century. Consideration of political, social, artistic, and scientific developments during this period of transition to the modern world. Examines the connections between Renaissance Humanism and the Protestant and Catholic reform movements of the sixteenth century. Studies works by Petrarch, Machiavelli, Brunelleschi, Leonardo, Erasmus, More, Luther, and Montaigne. From the course home page: Course Description The "Renaissance" as a phenomenon in European history is best understood as a series of social, political, and cultural responses to an intellectual trend which began in Italy in the fourteenth century. This intellectual tendency, known as humanism, or the studia humanitatis, was at the heart of developments in literature, the arts, the sciences, religion, and government for almost three hundred years. In this class, we will highlight the history of humanism, but we will also study religious reformations, high politics, the agrarian world, and European conquest and expansion abroad in the period.