AP European History Unit 1 Review Notes

The Renaissance

  • Definition: "Rebirth" of classical texts and ideas from Romans and Greeks.
  • Cause:
    • Islamic scholars translated Greek and Roman works into Arabic and Latin.
    • Increased European contact with Islamic people during the Crusades.
  • Location: Began in Italy.

Petrarch and Humanism

  • Petrarch: Laid the groundwork for Renaissance ideas.
  • Humanism:
    • Philosophy focused on the unlimited potential of human beings as an end in themselves.
    • Emphasized individualism, the triumph of the individual.
  • Cicero: Petrarch admired Cicero's eloquent support of the Roman Republic and opposition to Julius Caesar's tyranny.

Philology and Authority

  • Philology: Study of the history and development of languages.
  • Lorenzo Valla: Demonstrated that the "Donation of Constantine" was a forgery based on Latin usage.
  • Shift in Authority: Movement away from religious authority to secular authority.

Impact of the Printing Press

  • Invention: Movable type printing press in the 1440s enabled rapid spread of ideas.
  • Challenge to Institutions: Challenged the institutional power of universities and other centers of power.
  • Spread of Ideas: Allowed scholars to introduce the humanities into the curriculum, emphasizing history, moral philosophy, poetry, etc., all based on classical texts.

Education and The Courtier

  • Renaissance Education: Introduced humanities into the curriculum, emphasizing history, moral philosophy, poetry, etc., based on classical texts.
  • Baldassare Castiglione:
    • Wrote "The Courtier," a guide for how an educated young man should behave in courtly society.
    • Argued a gentleman should be skilled in humanistic disciplines, physically strong, and mentally awake.

Civic Humanism and Political Thought

  • Civic Humanism: Educated men should be active and engaged in local politics within Italian city-states.
  • Leonardo Bruni: Argued for the republicanism of ancient Rome as the best form of government.
  • Niccolò Machiavelli:
    • Wrote "The Prince."
    • Argued a ruler's basic function is to maintain power at all costs.
    • A prince should use whatever means necessary to establish order and security but avoid being hated.
    • It is much safer for the prince to be feared than loved, but he ought to avoid making himself hated.

Renaissance Art

  • Emphasis on Naturalism: Realistic portrayal of the world.
  • Italian Renaissance: Leaned towards idealistic naturalism.
  • Northern Renaissance: Depicted scenes of everyday life.
  • Geometric Perspective: Added depth and realism to paintings.
  • Themes: Religious, personal, political, and classical.

Key Artists

  • Michelangelo: Sculpture of David, embodying humanist philosophy with a perfect human specimen in the image of a Greek god.
  • Raphael: "The School of Athens," classical themes with Plato and Aristotle, using geometric perspective.
  • Filippo Brunelleschi:
    • Architect of the rebuilding of the Church of San Lorenzo in Florence.
    • Designed the dome on the Florence Cathedral without the use of flying buttresses.

Patronage

  • Wealthy individuals, rulers, and popes patronized artists to enhance their public prestige.
  • The Medici family were notable patrons.

The Northern Renaissance

  • Spread: Ideas of the Italian Renaissance spread to the rest of Europe north of the Italian Alps.
  • Focus: More religious (Christian) focus compared to the secular Italian Renaissance.
  • Christian Humanism: Synthesis of humanism with Christian ideas, emphasizing social reform.
  • Desiderius Erasmus:
    • Believed education in the classics and the Bible is the foundation of societal reform.
    • Authored "In Praise of Folly," a satire criticizing corrupt political, social, and religious institutions.

Northern Renaissance Artists

  • Retained a more religious Christian focus.
  • More human-centered and considered everyday objects and people more appropriate for objects of art.
  • Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "The Peasant Wedding," depicting ordinary people in celebration.
  • Rembrandt: "The Return of the Prodigal Son," emphasizing light and shade, inhabiting the narrative of scripture.

The Printing Press

  • Development: Developed by German metalsmiths in the 1440s; Johannes Gutenberg most associated with the technology.
  • Movable Type: Metal letters were slid into rows, blotted with ink, and pressed upon a piece of paper.
  • Impact:
    • Enabled rapid and cheap production of books.
    • Gutenberg Bible published in 1456.
    • By 1515, all major classical authors were in print.
  • Protestant Reformation: Martin Luther spread his ideas thanks to movable type, challenging the Catholic Church.
  • Vernacular Literature: Created demand for literature written in the language of the common people, fostering the development of national cultures.
    • Luther created a standard for the German language by producing a vernacular Bible.

Politics and Monarchical Power

  • Shift in Power: Monarchs and princes started taking power from the nobility.
  • Top-Down Reform: Religious and moral reform initiated by monarchs.

Henry VIII

  • Initially opposed the Protestant Reformation and was named "Defender of the Faith" by the Pope.
  • Denied an annulment, Henry divorced his wife and married Anne Boleyn.
  • Denounced the Pope, and Parliament made Henry the head of the newly formed Church of England.
  • Treason Act made it punishable by death to refuse to recognize the Church of England.

Elizabeth I

  • Steered England back to Anglicanism.
  • Act of Uniformity mandated that English subjects attend an Anglican church once a week or be fined.

Consolidation of Power

  • Monarchs established monopolies on tax collection, employed military force, dispensed justice, and gained the right to determine the religion of their subjects.
Spain (Ferdinand and Isabella)
  • Marriage began the process of the unification of Spain and the consolidation of monarchical power.
  • Raised revenue through national taxes and established a bureaucracy.
  • Completed the Reconquista, driving out Muslims and Jews and establishing Catholicism as the official religion of Spain.
France
  • Monarchs used national taxes and a complex bureaucracy.
  • Concordat of Bologna in 1516: the Pope got the right to collect income from the French Catholic Church, and Francis retained the right to appoint French Catholic Church leaders.
Peace of Augsburg
  • Gave individual leaders in the Holy Roman Empire the right to decide whether their subjects would be Catholic or Lutheran.

Commercial and Professional Groups

  • Merchants and bankers gained power and played a greater role in political affairs.
  • The Medici family established the banking industry in Italy; the Fugger family did the same in Augsburg, Germany.
  • The rise of the money economy and a close alliance of these groups with the monarch allowed them to exercise increased political power in their respective areas of influence.

European Exploration

  • Motivations: Gold, God, and glory.

God

  • Desire to spread Christianity and convert other people.
  • Spain wanted to spread Catholicism as far as they could.
  • Jesuit missionaries were sent to convert indigenous people.
  • Bartolomé de las Casas fought for the dignity of the peoples in the Americas.

Gold

  • Mercantilism: the dominant economic system of Europe (finite amount of wealth in the world measured in gold and silver).
  • Favorable balance of trade, with more exports than imports.
  • Colonies provided mineral wealth and raw materials.
  • Jean-Baptiste Colbert: Believed a country's wealth should serve the state and aimed to claim as much of North America as possible.
  • Increasing demand for luxury goods from Asia.

Glory

  • Bitter rivalry among European powers to grab as many colonial possessions as possible.

New Navigational Technology

  • Advances in cartography.
  • Caravel: Fast and highly navigable ship developed by the Spanish and Portuguese.
  • Lateen sail: Could take wind from any side.
  • Compass: Helped establish direction.
  • Astrolabe: Gave an accurate reckoning of latitude.
Portugal
  • First Europeans to actively seek a sea route to Asia by sailing around Africa.
  • Established trading posts all around the coast, creating a trading-post empire.
Spain
  • Ferdinand and Isabella commissioned Christopher Columbus to find a sea route to Asia by sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean.
  • Columbus landed in the Bahamas and claimed much of the Caribbean, Central America, North America, and the coastline of South America.
France
  • Claimed large parts of North America and Canada primarily for trading, especially fur, rather than establishing proper colonial settlements.
England
  • Claimed parts of Canada, the Caribbean, and the eastern coast of North America.
  • Built settler colonies for people to make a new life.
The Netherlands
  • Interested in trade, establishing a few colonies in the Americas but focusing on dominating trade in Southeast Asia.
Rivalry Between Colonial Powers
  • Diplomacy and negotiation: Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, mediated by Pope Alexander VI, divided the Americas between Spain and Portugal.
  • Coercion and war: Tensions and rivalries due to the balance of power sought by each European nation.

The Columbian Exchange

  • Definition: Global exchange of goods, flora, fauna, cultural practices, and disease between the Old World and the New World.

Major Exchanges

Disease
  • Europeans, Africans, and Asians had developed some immunity, while the indigenous peoples of the Americas had no immunity.
  • Smallpox and measles devastated native populations.
    • Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés defeated the massive Aztec Empire with relatively few men because of the introduction of smallpox and measles.
Food
  • From the Americas to Europe: maize, tomatoes, potatoes, and cacao.
  • From Europe and Africa to the Americas: rice, wheat, soybeans, rye, and oats.
Animals
  • Europeans introduced horses, pigs, chickens, and cattle to the Americas.
  • Pigs and cattle transformed the diet of Native Americans.
  • Horses revolutionized farming and warfare.
Minerals
  • Europeans plundered gold and silver, making Spain wealthy beyond belief.
  • The influx of wealth transformed the Americas by attracting European colonizers and transformed Europe, leading to unprecedented economic growth.
  • Shift from feudalism to an early form of capitalism.
People
  • The African slave trade involved millions of Africans being forcibly removed from their land to work on plantations in European colonies.

Impact on Europe

  • The influx of mineral wealth and the establishment of trading empires shifted the center of economic power in Europe from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic states.
  • Subjugation of people by the Spanish, who created the encomienda system in the Americas, granting leading men land and making the natives unpaid laborers.
  • Issued Requerimiento gave spanish monarchs authority to claim lands and proselytize.
  • African slave trade gradually replaced forced indigenous labor because Africans had some degree of immunity, didn't know the land, and were less likely to escape.

Commercial Revolution

  • Describes the great increase in global commerce that changed the face of economics in Europe.

Ingredients

Changes in Banking and Finance
  • Rise of the money economy, where goods, services, wages, and investments were made with cash instead of gold and silver.
  • Great banking centers in Genoa, Amsterdam, and London.
  • Double-entry bookkeeping: detailed ledger kept of all debits and credits.
  • The joint-stock company was used, where investors bought stock in a company's profits.
    • Ex. The Dutch East India Company: formed in 1602 to finance trade in Asia.
Social Hierarchies
  • On a grand scale feudalism was coming to an end.
  • Tenets of feudalism remained at the local level.
  • Subsistence agriculture was the rule in most places in Europe.
  • Soil exhaustion was a constant threat.
    • Solution was crop rotation!
  • Price Revolution resulted from influx of Spanish silver and gold causing the prices of food and necessities to rise over an extended period of time.
    • This inflation contributed to the growth of commerce known as the price revolution, and this was critical in the commercialization of agriculture.
  • Enclosure Movement
    • Land that was available to all was being enclosed and therefore shrinking smaller and smaller
    • Benefited large landowners with profits, but it disrupted norms and life for the peasantry and led to increased poverty.
    • Caused a massive migration movement of the landless poor into cities to look for work.
    • Nobles also moved into the cities in some cases, and the influx of both led to the resentment of the urban merchant classes, and the problem of housing was particularly acute.