RENAISSANCE

When the mighty Roman Empire fell, about 1,500 years ago, it left a weak and divided
Europe. Trade and business almost disappeared, travel became dangerous and the arts and
culture declined. The great cities began to decay and the magnificent monuments and
highways of the Empire were left to crumble.

Europe turned into feudal estates, ruled by hostile nobles and worked by peasants (serfs).
Indeed, life in the Middle Ages was poor and cruel for most people. There was little time for
art or culture, and it would have disappeared if it had not been for the church.

Reading and writing were taught by priests in the monasteries. Many cathedrals, which were
built all over Europe, were decorated with statues of saints and windows were painted with
scenes from the Bible. Both music of the time and books were religious.

Many events led to many changes in Europe, notably return to commerce and travel, cities
and towns were built around and feudalism declined, mainly because of the plague, the Black
Death, which left many feudal estates unpopulated, and hence the economic system of the
Middle Ages based on Manorialism (Review Life within the manors:
prezi.com/lod89weeoviz/the-middle-ages).

The crusaders returned from the East carrying new treasures and filled with new ideas. Thus,
a growing middle class of merchants and skilled craftsmen began to support kings instead of
feudal lords. As feudalism died, the Middles Ages decreased in Europe, too. A new era / age,
the Renaissance, was born.

The Renaissance, which means “rebirth,” brought tremendous advances in art, literature,
music, architecture, science, philosophy and exploration. These advances between the 13th
and 16th centuries paved the way to the modern world.

The Renaissance began with a renewed interest in the culture of the ancient Greek and
Roman world. Obviously, the artistic and philosophical achievements of the past were
reviewed and copied. This led to a rebirth of a philosophy called “humanism”.

Humanism focuses on the preservation of human beings’ moral values, including their
dignity, natural rights and human interests, instead of only those of the church.

Humanism took many forms during the Renaissance. Instead of only dealing with religious
subjects, artists created paintings of kings and common people, of landscapes and of
mythological scenes. Architects began to design homes, palaces for the wealthy and buildings
for government instead of only cathedrals. In addition, writers, who used to deal with the
church matters, now wrote political essays, love poetry, comedies and historical plays, and
Renaissance composers’ works were not limited to only church music.

Italy was the birthplace of the Renaissance due, mainly, to its geographical location. In fact,
Italy is located on the Mediterranean Sea, closer to the East than any other European country.
As trade with the East increased in the late Middle Ages, Italian cities grew rich. Thus, the

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princes and merchants in these cities were able to pay for nice homes, valuable paintings and
other works of arts. That is why they became fans of the arts.

Italy also possessed a great treasure of ancient Greek and Roman art and literature. There
were ruins of classical temples and magnificent homes, in addition to sculptures of statues
and splendid wall paintings, manuscripts of ancient poetry, plays and essays. It is worth
noting that these artistic works had been gathered during the Roman Empire more than 1,000
years before, and hence were the basis of the new interests in the classical period.

The church in Italy also contributed to the Renaissance because the best painters, sculptors
and architects were hired by the church to build and decorate the Vatican City, the seat of the
Roman Catholic Church and the home of the Pope, in Rome. Therefore, Vatican City became
a brilliant center of art and architecture, during the Renaissance.

Most of the famous Renaissance masters worked for the church. Michelangelo made great
things; he painted the walls and ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and designed the dome for St
Peter’s Church. He also made marvelous sculptures, such as the Pieta, for the Vatican. Many
other artists, notably Leonardo da Vinci, Giotto, Raphael, Sandro Botticelli and Caravaggio
created masterpieces for the church.

During the Renaissance, Greek and Roman classical writings were reviewed and literature
began to use the vernacular, which means the language spoken by the common / indigenous
people. Indeed, the only language which was used in the former eras was Latin, the language
of the church. Then, the use of vernacular languages in writing during the Renaissance was a
significant change.

The Decameron, or The Human Comedy is a collection of entertaining stories about the Black
Death, written by Giovanni Boccaccio in the 14th century, is one of the outstanding examples
of Italian Renaissance literature. The use of the vernacular in literary works was strongly
adopted mainly in Northern Europe, France, England and the Germanic countries, as a means
of nationalism.

Actually, literature written in English and French had significant effect on respectively
English and French speaking people than anything written in Latin. In Germany the use of the
vernacular was mainly a kind of protest against the Pope and the Church of Rome (the
Catholic Church). The spokesman of the movement that was behind such rebellion was
Martin Luther.

Martin was a German priest and a professor of theology who strongly believed in the
reformation of the church. In fact, he suggested allowing prayer in the vernacular, instead of
only in Latin. He also asked the church to give up much of its ceremonies on collecting
wealth and that all people are created equal before God. His ideals were marked ultimately by
faith in God alone was the only way of salvation, and the Bible is the central source of
religious authority.

Thus, from the teaching and writings of Martin Luther, John Calvin of Switzerland, John
Knox of Scotland and other reformers came the Protestant faiths and the religious movement
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known as the Reformation. During the Reformation, Protestantism, nationalism and
humanism contributed to loosen the hold of the Catholic Church on Europe, more particularly
in the northern countries.

Thanks to modern sciences and technology that emerged during the Renaissance, the notion
of people about the world around them dramatically changed. Indeed, the most significant
change came with the invention of the moving type printing press by the German Johannes
Gutenberg around 1439.

Before Gutenberg’s invention, all printing was done by hand. As hand-printing made books
rarely and expensive, reading was exceptionally limited to the rich. However, books became
more available and less expensive thanks to Gutenberg’s movable printing press.
Consequently, more and more people learned to read.

Moreover, the Renaissance saw significant advances in medicine. Girolamo Fracastoro, one
of the renowned doctors, famous for his researches on contagious diseases, was the first
doctor to identify typhus. Worth to noted, before Fracastoro and other medical pioneers of the
Renaissance, diseases, notably plagues, were considered a punishment sent by God. The
workings of the human body were thought to be unsolvable mysteries.

Other pivotal figures of Renaissance medicine were Philippus Pacacelsus, a Swiss physician,
and Andreas Vesalius, a Belgian doctor. The former was one of the first physicians to
recognize the use of chemicals and minerals in medical treatment, whereas the latter is known
as the “father of anatomy” for his works on the vascular and circulatory systems of the human
body.

As for modern astronomy, it also emerged during the Renaissance. The best works to be
mentioned in this field are those of a Polish scientist, Nicolaus Copernicus. In fact, he showed
mathematically and logically that the Earth and the other planets revolve around the sun. This
theory was given further proof by Galileo Galilei, an Italian astronomer. Indeed, by means of
a telescope when he observed the night sky, he discovered that Jupiter has moons revolving
around it. Galilei further discovered that Venus goes through phases as it circles the sun, just
as our moon goes through phases as it circles the Earth. Therefore, the works of both
scientists changed forever the idea that the Earth was the center of the universe.

Explorers, particularly Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, Amerigo Vespucci, John

Cabot, Sir Francis Drake and Jacques Cartier, were as much a part of the Renaissance as the
creative geniuses Leonardo da Vinci, William Shakespeare and Miguel Cervantes.

Many new worlds were opened during the Renaissance. They were the worlds of art and
science, of education and medicine, of religion and philosophy, and of music and literature.
Also new horizons were extended far beyond the bounds of Europe, the Old World, as sailing
ships reached the shores of the New World. Thus, a new age was beginning, built on the
strides taken by the giants of the Renaissance.