Prompt

Are you currently living through a period of great social, cultural, and political change? If so, how? If not, why?

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Renaissance:Innovation or Continuation?

School of Athens - Raphael

Review:

What was Medieval Universalism?

European Renaissance14th – 16th Centuries

Cattedrale di Santa Maria Del Fiore - Florence

Revival of Ancient Learning and Culture

Cicero

Transition from Medieval Universalism to modern transformations of the 17th Century

Harbor Scene with St. Paul’s Departure from Caesarea – Jan Brueghel the Elder

False Achievements

Breaking with Medieval values and institutions

New awareness of the Individual

Awakened Interest in Material World and Nature

Recovery of cultural heritage of Greece and Rome

Helical Air Screw – Leonardo Da Vinci

Perceived Innovations

Revival of Urban Life

Commercial enterprise

Banking

Formation of States

Investigation of Physical World

Classical Scholarship

Vernacular Literature

The Creation of Adam - Michelangelo

Renaissance Religion

Increasingly Secular

Though not abandonment of traditional beliefs

Madonna the Magnificent – Sandro Botticelli

Renaissance Government

Declining Hegemony of Holy Roman Empire and Papacy

Development of local nationalist principalities

HRE Papal States

Eliminating medieval feudal jurisdictions common throughout Europe

Formation of City-State political system in Italy

Piazza San Marco - Venice

True Renaissance

“Rediscovery of World and Man”

Found in Literature and Art

Mostly influenced by the latest medieval classical revivals

Vitruvian Man – Leonardo Da Vinci

Humanism

Scholarly study of Latin and Greek Classics, and of ancient Church Fathers

To promote rebirth of ancient norms and values

Portrait of Petrarch – Simone Martini

Renaissance Society

Yet standards of behavior remained unchanging

Traditional Moral and Social Codes

Ones identity came fromClassFamilyOccupationCommunity

The Gonzaga Family – Andrea Mantegna

Disperse with Dichotomies

Renaissance vs Medieval

Classical vs Gothic

Modern vs Feudal

Focus less on Italy, Italy, Italy;

More on Individuality - Florence, Venice, Rome… etc.

Di’Medici Family Coat of Arms

Italian Renaissance

Grasp fuller interrelatedness of Italy with the rest of Europe

Then appreciate the uniqueness of Italy

Reflection

Should the Renaissance be viewed as an era of great change or a continuation of previous norms? What aspects of civilization, if any, changed? Which if any, remained the same?

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