A COMPARISON OF THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE IN ITALY (14TH-16TH CENTURIES)


Petrarch (1304-1374) and the Italian humanists created a new periodization in history. They gave us the notion of Western history as divided in ANCIENT--MIDDLE AGES--MODERN. They saw their own age as "a rebirth of classical antiquity". Incorrectly, they believed the Middle Ages was igonorant of Classical Antiquity. For the humanists, "light" meant Antiquity and "dark" meant ignorance of the Classics. Hence, the middle ages were the "Dark Ages". They inverted the Christian view of the association of light with Christianity and darkness with ignorance of Christianity. It was this awareness of living in a new age of great cultural revival that distiguishes the Italian Renaissance from the Carolingian Renaissance of the 8-9th centuries and the 12th century "Renaissance". These earlier periods had no sense of a break or new era. For Christians the central act of history was the Crusifixion; for the humanists it was the Fall of Rome about 500 A.D.

The humanists also gave us a new educational program. They stressed the studia humanitatis, or studies befitting a human. Study the "humanities" because they produce a better, more desirable human being. It was the Roman politician and writer Cicero, who originated the term studia humanitatis, or studies befitting a human being. THE HUMANISTS or humanista emphasized the study of GRAMMAR, RHETORIC, POETRY, HISTORY, MORAL PHILOSOPHY, but not science, metaphysics, dialectic, or logic. They emphasized the study of the classics as a model to be copied and for graceful stlye and eloquence (Cicero). This was a break with medieval scholasticism which emphasized Aristotle, metaphysics, theology, logic, and dialectic. It was not modern in its neglect of science. Medieval universities had 4 faculties - arts, theology, law (cannon and secular), and medicine. Since Alcuin in Charlemagne's time, the 7 liberal arts had been the basis of what we would call primary education. They consisted of the trivium, or 3 verbal arts, grammar, rhetoric, and logic and the quadrivium, or 4 mathematical arts, arithmetic, astronomy, geometry, and music. There was a shift away from logic and dialectic, the basis of scholasticism, to rhetoric, poetry, and the "belles lettres".

MEDIEVAL VALUES RENAISSANCE VALUES
highest good=salvation of your soul virtu or superiority in human achievement (like Greeks)
asceticism or self-denial (flesh=sin) gratify earthly desires; hedonism
GOD MAN
self-denial & self-abnegation earthly pleasure
religiosity secularism
withdrawal from world or cloister participation and involvement
supernatural nature or natural
spirit or soul flesh and body
faith reason
corporatism individualism
rural urban
apostolic poverty wealth and leisure
Fraility of man & dependence on God's grace. Original Sin. Last Judgement & Hell. Reason & Free Will can produce much. DIGNITY OF MAN & UNAIDED HUMAN ACCOMPLISHMENT WITHOUT GRACE.
IDEAL IS THE MONASTERY -- withdrawal from the world as sinful. Denial of the flesh-wore hairshirt. Flagellation. Contemplative life. (Renaissance preferred the active life) IDEAL IS CIVIC PARTICIPATION and delight in earthly pleasures. Emphasize human accomplishments and individual excellence. Classics are models.


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