UNIT 1

Renaissance

rebirth- European movement that grew out of the study of ancient texts from Ancient Greece and Rome

What was the role of the black plague?

• mass death

  • resulted in the collapse of the feudal system

• limited the spread of classical texts before now

Where did the Renaissance begin?

Italian elites

.Who was Petrarch?

• father of the Renaissance

• initiated humanism and spread humanist ideas

  • looked at classical texts, specifically Cicero

What was humanism?

study of the unlimited potential of human beings

what was philology?

the study of language, specifically latin

reaction to the rise of classical texts which were in latin

who was Lorenza Valla?

• humanist and philologist

• determined the different stages of latin

  • used this to determine the dates of different church documents to discover their legitimacy

What was the Oration on Dignity of Man? Who was it by?

• written by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola

  • explains the potential of humans

what is secularism

separation of religion from society

what is individualism

importance of the individual over the community

what was the importance of the printing press

spread humanist ideas

what education reforms were employed by the humanists?

• valued education and recognized it as important to gain respect in society

• studied the humanities in school to become an eloquent member of society

what is civic humanism?

applied humanist ideas to society and politics

Who was Baldassare Castiglione? What did he write?

• wrote Cortier- explains how a educated man should behave in society

  • believes men should be skilled in humanities, an eloquent speaker, physically strong and open minded

who was leonardo bruni?

• advocate for civic humanism

• it was a man’s duty to employ humanist education to serve the state

Who was Macchievelli?

• wrote The Prince

  • ruler should preserve political power at all costs

  • ensure order and stability in their state

  • human beings are selfish and need to be controlled

  • ruler must be brutal or kind depending on what saves his power

• rejected the idea that a ruler should rule based on christian values

what is naturalism?

• portrayal of the natural world how it truly is

• main goal of renaissance artists

what was geometric perspective?

a method to portray objects or beings going back in space

who was da vinci? name one artwork

• renaissance artist

• employed geometric perspective, religious themes, and naturalism

• the last supper

who was Michelangelo? name one artwork

• renaissance painter and sculptor

• david

• naturalism, religious themes, and perfection of humanity (humanism)

who was raphael? name one artwork

• renaissance artist

• school of athens- classicism (philosophers), emphasized a perfect balance

who was Brunelleschi? name one artwork

• renaissance architect

• built the church of San Lorenzo- rejected gothic architectures and utilized roman columns

which family was the biggest patron of the arts?

the medici

what is classicism?

study of the classical texts

what was the northern renaissance?

• retained a christian framework for thought

  • didn’t employ secularism and individualism

• emphasized real people as subjects for art

• still focused on the greek and roman catholics

  • catalyst for christian humanism

Who was Pieter Bruegel the Elder? name his most famous work

• northern renaissance painter

• netherlandish proverbs

  • used people (mostly peasants) and animals as subjects

  • utilized naturalism

who was rembrandt? name one artwork

• northern renaissance painter

• slaughtered ox

  • portrayed everyday life

  • rejected elitism

• return of the prodigal son

  • portrays religious themes

what was christian humanism?

• based in France, Germany and Britain

• synthesize humanist thought with christian tradition

• sought out classical christian texts and discovered that christianity was simpler than catholic hierarchy portrayed (sought for reform)

• teaches humans have more potential than once believed and with religion society can develop

who was erasmus?

• christian humanist

• undermined political and social institutions in place

• believed:

  • education in the classics and the bible is needed for societal reform

  • society should be based on the Philosophy of Jesus

what was the impact of the printing press?

• ideas spread rapidly

  • allowed renaissance ideas to spread out of italy across europe

  • increased literature discussions

• increase in literacy

• increase in books in vernacular language

• solidified a national culture based on this language

who invented the printing press? what caused printing to spread?

• invented by Johannes Gutenberg

  • first book printed was the Gutenberg bible

  • utilized movable type to speed up the book production process

• printing spread though:

  • increase in literacy from 1474-1650

    • demand for literature

  • imported chinese paper making technology

how was government power divided before the new monarchs? what was the goal of the new monarchs?

• BEFORE:

  • monarchs had to share their power with the nobles and the church

  • overall the nobles held the most influence

    NEW MONARCHS:

  • wanted the power for themselves and worked to consolidate it (not absolutist)

How did new monarchs consolidate power?

• complete religious reform

• extenstion of bureaucratic power

• determining the religion of their people

What are examples of complete religious reform?

HENRY VIII

• king during the protestant reformation and opposed protestant doctrine

• wanted to divorce his wife and this was declared illegal by the Catholic Church

• in response he formed the Church of England and made himself the head of the church

• treason act: made it illegal to not be a member of the church of england

ELIZABETH I

• steered England towards the Anglican church

• act of uniformity: must attend church or you pay a fine

What are examples of new monarchs extending bureaucratic power?

FERDINAND AND ISABELLA:

• established national taxes

• massive bureaucracy to collect taxes and facilitate justice

CONCORDAT OF BOLOGNA IN FRANCE:

• pope could collect taxes from the church if the king could appoint the church officials

what is a bureaucracy?

group of officials who make sure people are following the law

What was the peace of augsburg

• gave individual rulers in the HRE the right to decide whether their subjects were protestant or lutheran

what was the secular state?

church had no political influence in the state (discussed across Europe)

what were the new political ideas of the time?

MACHIAVELLI- REPUBLICANISM

• elected representatives make the law

BODIN- ABSOLUTISM AND DIVINE RIGHT

• monarchs are meant to act like an extension of God

What influential banking families played a role in politics?

• medici family: established banking in Italy

• fugger family: established banking in Germany

• both had a close alliance with their monarchs (because they handled all of the money) and wielded political power/influence

what were the three motivations for exploration?

gold, god, glory

what was the motivation of gold for exploration?

• mercantilism

• favorable balance of trade: more exports than imports

• colonies were a means of getting more gold

  • you could either get gold itself or you could get raw materials to sell for gold

What is mercantilism?

• believed there was only a set amount of gold and silver on earth, therefore the state needed to get as much gold and silver as possible

Who was Jean Baptiste-Colbert?

• French controller general

• enabled industry to make everything they needed so they didn’t have to import as much

• enacted tariffs

• claimed North American land

What was the significance of luxury goods?

• elites wanted porcelain and spices but they were expensive to obtain by land due to Ottoman occupation

• wanted to find a route to Asia by sea

What was the God motivation for exploration?

• wanted to spread christianity to distant lands

• spain- just had the reconquista (drove out all other religions under Ferdinand and Isabella)

  • wanted to see catholicism ascend over protestantism

  • send Jesuit missionaries to convert the indigenous people

  • many believed that the indigenous people were a good source of forced labor which led to establishment of control and segregation in the imperial state

Who was Bartolomeu de las Casa?

• spanish catholic priest

• advocated for the indigenous people in the face of spanish oppression

what was the glory motivation for exploration?

• states were in competition for power

• empires=power

what is a maritime empire?

• sea-based empire

• enabled by the development of European technologies

What were the new exploration technologies?

• cartography: developments in map making

• shipmaking: the caravel was a ship developed specifically for trade (navigable, fast with lateen sails)

• lateen sails: took wind from all sides

• navigation: magnetic compass and astrolabe

What were the goals of Portugal in exploration?

• first to explore

• had trouble trading on land because they ran into issues with Spain

  • wanted to find a route by sea to the Indian Coast

• Sent Henry the Navigator and Vasco de Gama to find the route

• established trade ports across the Indian Ocean Coast

  • trading post empire

  • uninterested in settling people there beyond the economic gain

Who was Prince Henry the Navigator?

• Portuguese

• led Portuguese ships around the African Coast

Who was Vasco de Gama?

• Portuguese

• discovered the route to the Indian Ocean

What is a trading post empire? Give an example

• only wanted trading ports to establish their control/empire and to dominate trade in the area

  • ex. Portugal during the Age of Exploration

What were the goals of Spain in exploration?

• Sailed west to the indian ocean- sent Christopher Columbus

• after Columbus discovered North America, they refocused on the potential there

  • settled in the Caribbean, Central America, North America, and South America

• sent conquistadors to discover and conquer the land

  • most of the native were taken out by smallpox and measles

Who was Christopher Columbus?

• 'spanish

• sent by Ferdinand and Isabella to sail west to the Indian Ocean but instead discovered Cuba and Hispaniola

Who was Hernan Cortes?

• influential conquistador for the Spanish during exploration

What were the goals of the french during exploration?

• settled in North America and Canada

• made a few permanent settlements (Quebec) but mostly interested in the fur trade

Who was Samuel de Champlain?

• French

• sent in 1608 to establish settlement in Quebec

What was the Huron Confederacy?

• French alliance with indigenous people to take part in the fur trade

What were the goals of the british in exploration?

• establish settler colonies: colonies where English people actually moved into and settled to find a new life

• settled on the North American coast and Caribbean

• economic gains in the tobacco trade

What was the goal of the Dutch in Exploration?

• established some North American colonies

• mostly interested in trade in the Indian Ocean

  • rivalry with the Portuguese

What was the Portugal-Spain exploration rivalry?

• 1481: pope gave all land south of the Canary Islands to Portugal

• 1493: Columbus claimed Caribbean islands for Spain (which is south of the Canary Islands)

  • on his return home, he stops in Portugal to tell the king he discovered these islands and the king believes they are his

  • Ferdinand and Isabella thought the land was theirs

• Portugal sends a fleet of ships to claim the land

  • Spain knows they can’t compete and goes to the pope with the issue

• ends in the Treaty of Tordesillas

What is the Treaty of Tordesillas?

• line of demarcation which gave Spain land to the east and Portugal land to the west

  • ended the spanish-portugal caribbean rivalry

  • not followed strictly by either state

What was the Columbian Exchange?

• the global transfer of goods, plants, animals, cultural practices, and disease between the old world and the new world as a result of European imperialism

  • as new world and old worlds come in contact, societies transformed

What were the major things traded in the columbian exchange?

• disease

  • smallpox to indigenous peoples

• food

  • maize, tomatoes, potatoes, and cacao to Europe

  • rice and wheat to the indigenous people

• minerals

  • gold and silver to Europe

• People

  • enslaved africans to the Americas

What was the impact of Smallpox on indigenous peoples?

• Great dying: indigenous peoples had no immunity and the population plummeted

• Hispaniola: Arawak and Taino lost 300,000

• Inca: started at 9 million in 1530 decreased to 500,000 by 1630

What was the lasting impact of food traded in the columbian exchange?

• improved diet and longer life expectancy

/what was the impact of exploration wealth in Europe?

• plundered from the empires they conquered

• increased European colonizers in the Americas

• increased the breakdown of the feudal system

  • transition into a more capitalist economy (JUST THE BEGINNING STILL MOSTLY MERCANTALIST)

what is feudalism?

• a system where peasants worked on the land of nobles in exchange for armed protection

what is capitalism?

• economic system based on private ownership and free and open exchange of goods between property owners (only the beginning)

What were the economic impacts of exchange?

• before: economic power focused around the Mediterranean states where the most trade occurred

• after: shifted to the atlantic powers making maritime empires

why was the antwerp port so prosperous?

• close location to the spanish, portuguese, french, and britain

how did the spanish subjugate the native people?

• imposed casta system

  • hierarchical status system based on race and origin of birth

• encomienda: an economic and social system where Spaniards could, by law, exact tribute and labor from native people

  • required to provide protection but this was geographically ineffective

What was the cause of the African slave trade?

• establishment of plantation economy in european colonies

  • fueled by mercantilism

  • ideal climate for growing cash crops in large plantations held the most potential profit

  • cash crops: sugar cane, coffee, ect.

• originally forced the native peoples to do the labor

  • natives often escaped or died of disease

  • ineffective labor

• turned to enslaved africans to fix the problem

  • increase in the slave trade due to increase in labor demand

  • africans already had immunity to european diseases

  • africans did not know the terrain and could not escape

what was the system of slavery?

• africans captured from their homes

• middle passage: brutal journey across the atlantic which took about 2-6 weeks to cross

  • filled the ships FULL of people and left them in inhumane conditions

  • diseases killed many, malnourished, humiliated

• life of brutal slavery awaited them

What was the cause for the rise of banks during exploration?

• money economy: an economy in which goods, services, and wages are paid for with money

  • end of the barter system in response to a globalized economy (inefficient)

• massive shift in how the idea of wealth was handled

• bank of Amsterdam: major bank that opened in response to a money economy and economic change

  • dealt heavily with the dutch east india company

• shift of economic power to Amsterdam, London, and Genoa

• double entry bookkeeping: a system put in place to handle the large wealth in the banks

What was the Dutch East India Company?

• oversees the dutch trade in the indian ocean

  • joint-stock company

  • contributed to dutch successes

what is a joint-stock company?

• prive company rather than a state sponsored company in which investors bought shares in the company, sharing the risk and the reward

What was the cause of the price revolution?

• spanish found TONS of silver in the mountain of Petosi

  • brought these massive amounts of wealth back with them causes inflation

what was the price revolution?

• a phenomenon in which prices steadily rose for about a century and a half

  • unequal distribution of wealth caused the lower class to struggle to pay for goods

• impacted all of europe

What was the agricultural impact of the price revolution?

• before the price revolution:

  • originally done through feudalism which revolved around a manor

  • subsidence farming: only grow what they needed to survive (led to soil exhaustion)

  • crop rotation: two-field or three-field system to replenish nutrients in the soil

• after price revolution:

  • large landowners and investors though this system was wasteful and desired to increase available land to increase yields

  • enclosure movement

  • commercialization of agriculture

what was the enclosure movement?

• allowed for the purchase of public lands once available to peasants (increase in poverty)

what was the commercialization of agriculture?

• the land was seen not as a way to exist but as a means to earn more money for the one who owned it

what were the effects of the rise of the commercial revolution?

• rise of a new economic elite:

  • nobles of the robe in france: those who didn’t have nobility in their blood but could afford to buy their way in

• increasing freedom of serfs in the west

  • movement of commercialization sent many of them free

• eastern countries decreased the rights of serfs

  • more peasant revolts

• urbanization:

  • serfs fled to cities looking for work

  • put a strain on city conditions (spread of disease, rise of urban poverty)

• family patterns:

  • later marriages, more risks with child bearing