HY 102 Lecture Notes - Lecture 35: Lorenzo Valla, Leonardo Bruni, Realpolitik
30 May 2018
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Chapter 12 – Renaissance Ideals and Realities, C. 1350 – 1550
I.Introduction
A. From darkness to light?
B. The Renaissance spirit
1. An intellectual and cultural movement
2. Diversity of attitudes and approaches
II. The Renaissance and the Middle Ages
. Observations
1. Classical culture was alive in the Middle Ages
2. "Renaissance paganism" and medieval "age of faith" a false contrast
3. There was no Renaissance position on anything
A. Renaissance classicism
1. Significant quantitative difference between medieval and Renaissance learning
a. Rediscovery of classical texts (e.g., Virgil, Ovid, and Cicero)
b. Recovery of classical Greece from Byzantium
c. Forced scholars to learn Greek
2. Renaissance scholars used classical texts in new ways
. An awareness of history
a. An awareness of cultural gaps
b. Models of thought and action
i. Similarities between ancient city-states and those of Renaissance Italy
3. Renaissance culture more worldly and materialistic
. Italian city-states
a. The importance of the urban political arena
b. A nonecclesiastical culture
c. Relative weakness of the Church in Italy
B. Renaissance humanism
1. A program of study
. From scholastic logic and metaphysics to language, literature, rhetoric, history, and
ethics
a. Vernacular literature as a diversion for the masses
b. Serious scholarship written in Latin (Cicero and Virgil) or Greek
2. The charge of elitism
. Turned Latin into a fossilized language
3. The Renaissance educational program
. The study of Latin and Greek
a. Producing virtuous citizens and able public officials
b. A practical elitism
c. Little concern for the education of women
d. The humanities
III. The Renaissance in Italy
. The origins of the Italian Renaissance—why Italy?
1. Italy was the most advanced urban society
. Aristocrats lived in urban centers
a. More fully involved in urban public life
b. Aristocrats and merchants less sharply defined
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