Renaissance and Exploration in Europe

Hey there students, Tom Ritchie here with Marco Learning and in this video I'm going to give you a quick overview of Unit 1 of the AP European History course, which focuses on the Renaissance and the Age of Exploration. Now, first of all, let's set up a little context. because where are we going and where are we starting? We're really starting at the beginning of what we would refer to as modern Europe, the end of the Middle Ages. Now, the Middle Ages were defined by, first of all, an education system known as scholasticism. Now, this was a church-controlled system of education that stressed theology. and logic. Now, those people that got to go to universities were very lucky because in general, there was a limited amount of literacy and access to books. Art wasn't really that interesting. It was flat and un-lifelike. You didn't think, oh, I'm looking at real people here. Global trade was very limited. If you wanted something from the Far East, you had to walk along the Silk Road and then. get to Constantinople, trade through the Mediterranean, and they didn't have the technology in Europe to engage in overseas trade. Europe was really not technologically distinguished from the rest of the world. And Europe really wasn't part of a global world, but really just one part of a Mediterranean world. And this all changes in the age of the Renaissance and exploration. Now, let's go ahead and start with the. basics of the Italian Renaissance. And we've got a few isms here. Now, first of all, humanism. Humanism involves human-centered thinking, whereas we are thinking about humanity and not just in the context of our place in the spiritual world, but our place in this world. Now, a key component of Renaissance humanism specifically is the emphasis on Greek, Roman, and biblical literature. So we see that it is reaching back to the ancient Greeks and Romans and kind of bypassing the Middle Ages. And that's why Renaissance means rebirth, a rebirth of what? Classical studies. So when we say the classics in terms of the Renaissance, we're talking about the literature of ancient Greece and Rome, which also includes the Bible. Secularism. Now, secularism is not a rejection of religion. Most of these Renaissance writers were devout Christians, but it does mean that they are not exclusively concerned with church matters, that what the church says may not carry as much weight. If you look at some of the developments with banking and ignoring the prohibition that the church had on usury, which is lending money with interest, and that leads to the development of capitalism. Now, capitalism is a loaded term, but in this context, what we're talking about is an economy that's based on finance and money and raising capital. And so what we see here with developments like the Medici Bank, we see that they are able to put large ventures together, and this is what's going to lead to an increase in trade and the age of exploration, the development of technology, Petrarc. is perhaps the most important person to know from the Renaissance. He is known as the father of humanism because he was very fascinated with the ancient Romans, specifically Cicero, who was a Roman politician and philosopher. And Petrarch went around looking for old texts from Cicero and found things that if not for Petrarch, they would have been lost. So, Petrarch really began this revival. of classical studies. And he did so a century before the starting point of this course, 1450. But you still need to know him. And the education system that began in the Renaissance, the system of classical Renaissance education was an education that stressed these ancient Greek and Roman writings and reading these things in order to develop leaders, specifically in positions of political leadership. The art of the Renaissance is known for its lifelike appearance. When we're thinking about Renaissance art, my favorite example is to bring in Raphael's The School of Athens. When you're looking at The School of Athens, you notice the bright colors. You notice that everything is And then also the use of linear perspective. We see that this art is three-dimensional. It's not flat. And finally, we see classical themes. We see at the very center here, Plato and Aristotle, these two ancient Greek philosophers. And they're surrounded by other philosophers like Socrates and the Cynic philosopher Diogenes. And this really defines. Renaissance art, that it is modeled after works of Greek and Roman art. When you look at Michelangelo's creation of Adam in the Sistine Chapel, notice these nude figures that you see that this is an imitation of classical art, as is Michelangelo's statue of David, which is a biblical figure, but sculpted in the classical style. So we see the fusion of the Christian. and the classical. Renaissance architecture also imitated that of the Greeks and the Romans. Brunelleschi's dome in Florence on the Florence Cathedral, this was the first dome of its kind really since the time of the Romans. Now, where's all this money coming from, you might ask? And this comes from patronage. Patronage is another key word that you need to know here because artists need people who are financing. their art. And the two biggest patrons of the arts in Renaissance Italy were the papacy and the Medici family, Cosimo de' Medici and Lorenzo de' Medici. Now let's move on to the Northern Renaissance. Although the Renaissance began in Italy with the help of the printing press, it traveled north of the Alps into modern day Germany, the Netherlands, and Britain. And so as far as what you need to know here, the. biggest point of comparison is that in comparison to the Italian Renaissance, which was known for being secular and individualistic, the Northern Renaissance is more focused on social reform according to Christian principles. Christian humanism is something that you need to be aware of here. And the most noteworthy Christian humanist of the Northern Renaissance are Erasmus and Thomas More. Erasmus wrote The Praise of Folly, in which... He's not trying to teach young men how to be great leaders, but he's trying to criticize social institutions, specifically the Catholic Church. When we look at this classical text, the New Testament, why is it that the apostles were so poor? But the bishops of the Catholic Church today who claim to be their successors are rich. So we see here this idea of reforming society according to Christian principles, Christian humanism. Now, the. art of the Northern Renaissance was still lifelike like Italian Renaissance art, but it was more likely to show the mundane, the everyday. So you look at something like the work of Peter Bruegel, the elder, and you see these people that are just out in the fields harvesting grain. This is something that you would have just seen. So a little less focused on philosophers and a bit more focused on real life. And let's not forget the printing press. Seriously, let's not forget this one, because this is the important, the most important invention of the Renaissance and what really marks the Renaissance as modern, because the printing press, which was invented in the 1450s, allowed people to mass produce information for the first time. So now when somebody writes a book, it can go to the printer and hundreds of copies can be printed rather than just transcribed by hand. Now, the result of the printing press was an increase in literacy and a greater appreciation for vernacular literature, literature that's written in the language of the people. And so we see that the works by these humanist authors are popularized. Lots of people are reading them. And it's also a causal factor in the Reformation. So when we're thinking about the printing press, it not only supported the spread of Renaissance humanism, but. also led to the Protestant Reformation as those ideas were able to get out there. During this time, we also see the rise of the new monarchies. During the Middle Ages, we see that Europe is largely feudal, that there are kings, but the kings don't really control everything. They were responsive to the nobles and the church. And what we're seeing during this time. with the new monarchs is the centralization of political power and the control over religion and tax collection. My favorite new monarchs, as far as remembering for the exam, are Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. Now, also, Henry VIII and Elizabeth can be classified as new monarchs as well because they asserted control, like Ferdinand and Isabella did, over the religious life of their subjects. Now let's move on to the age of exploration. First of all, we want to note the technological advances that made the age of exploration possible. Advances in navigation, such as the magnetic compass. Cartography, which is a fancy word for map making. The Mercator Projection Map. This is a map that is specifically made for sailors. Military technology, such as firearms. Once these European explorers go to these new lands. They now have superior military technology that they would not have had a century before that. The motivations for the age of exploration, the three G's, God, glory and gold to spread the Christian religion, to attain glory and fame for themselves. These conquistadors and gold. to make money, right, to get rich. Now, probably not in that order, but for some reason, God, glory, and gold just has a ring to it. Then we move on to the consequences. Remember that during the Middle Ages, Europe was just another part of the world. Nobody would have thought, oh, the Europeans, really, you know, these are the dominant people in the world right now. But this is what we start to see during this time of the Age of Exploration, an increase in the global dominance of Europe. also cheaper access to a greater amount of exotic goods, silks and spices. Because of the age of exploration, Spain and Portugal rose to prominence in the 16th century. Now, they were followed by other countries, largely along the Atlantic coastline. So we see where Spain and Portugal got this started. They were soon joined by Britain, the Netherlands and France because they saw what was happening there, and they begin to amass wealth as well. So with the Age of Exploration, we see that the epicenter of European trade is moving away from the Mediterranean, away from Italy, away from Constantinople, and it is moving toward the Atlantic with Spain, Portugal, France, the Netherlands, and Britain. One of the greatest consequences of the Age of Exploration is the Columbian Exchange. Now, this is something that's going to be helpful for any AP History subject that you're taking. The Columbian Exchange, even though we could say technically there were the Vikings, the Europeans who got to North America before Columbus, Columbus's expedition started a permanent trade relationship between the Old and the New Worlds. So you have all of these things coming from Europe, livestock. bananas, which grow very well in Central America. You have ideas such as capitalism. You also have diseases which wiped out the native population. And so the Colombian exchange, things are also moving from the new world to the old world, such as tobacco, which Europeans had never known before. Of course, that may not have been the best thing to introduce, but at the time they really liked it. So that about sums up Unit 1. Remember that we want to focus on the importance of Renaissance humanism and also comparing the Italian and the Northern Renaissance. The arrival of the new monarchs resulted in centralization of tax collection and also a greater amount of royal control over the religious life of European subjects. The Age of Exploration discovery made exotic goods more plentiful. and cheaper for the upper classes. But remember, for the average European peasant, life really did not change that much at all. And that, my friends, is Unit 1. It's always a pleasure.

We're really starting at the beginning of what we would refer to as modern Europe, the end of the Middle Ages. Now, the Middle Ages were defined by, first of all, an education system known as scholasticism. Now, this was a church-controlled system of education that stressed theology.

and logic. Now, those people that got to go to universities were very lucky because in general, there was a limited amount of literacy and access to books. Art wasn't really that interesting. It was flat and un-lifelike. You didn't think, oh, I'm looking at real people here.

Global trade was very limited. If you wanted something from the Far East, you had to walk along the Silk Road and then. get to Constantinople, trade through the Mediterranean, and they didn't have the technology in Europe to engage in overseas trade. Europe was really not technologically distinguished from the rest of the world. And Europe really wasn't part of a global world, but really just one part of a Mediterranean world.

And this all changes in the age of the Renaissance and exploration. Now, let's go ahead and start with the. basics of the Italian Renaissance. And we've got a few isms here. Now, first of all, humanism.

Humanism involves human-centered thinking, whereas we are thinking about humanity and not just in the context of our place in the spiritual world, but our place in this world. Now, a key component of Renaissance humanism specifically is the emphasis on Greek, Roman, and biblical literature. So we see that it is reaching back to the ancient Greeks and Romans and kind of bypassing the Middle Ages.

And that's why Renaissance means rebirth, a rebirth of what? Classical studies. So when we say the classics in terms of the Renaissance, we're talking about the literature of ancient Greece and Rome, which also includes the Bible.

Secularism. Now, secularism is not a rejection of religion. Most of these Renaissance writers were devout Christians, but it does mean that they are not exclusively concerned with church matters, that what the church says may not carry as much weight.

If you look at some of the developments with banking and ignoring the prohibition that the church had on usury, which is lending money with interest, and that leads to the development of capitalism. Now, capitalism is a loaded term, but in this context, what we're talking about is an economy that's based on finance and money and raising capital. And so what we see here with developments like the Medici Bank, we see that they are able to put large ventures together, and this is what's going to lead to an increase in trade and the age of exploration, the development of technology, Petrarc.

is perhaps the most important person to know from the Renaissance. He is known as the father of humanism because he was very fascinated with the ancient Romans, specifically Cicero, who was a Roman politician and philosopher. And Petrarch went around looking for old texts from Cicero and found things that if not for Petrarch, they would have been lost. So, Petrarch really began this revival.

of classical studies. And he did so a century before the starting point of this course, 1450. But you still need to know him. And the education system that began in the Renaissance, the system of classical Renaissance education was an education that stressed these ancient Greek and Roman writings and reading these things in order to develop leaders, specifically in positions of political leadership. The art of the Renaissance is known for its lifelike appearance.

When we're thinking about Renaissance art, my favorite example is to bring in Raphael's The School of Athens. When you're looking at The School of Athens, you notice the bright colors. You notice that everything is And then also the use of linear perspective. We see that this art is three-dimensional. It's not flat.

And finally, we see classical themes. We see at the very center here, Plato and Aristotle, these two ancient Greek philosophers. And they're surrounded by other philosophers like Socrates and the Cynic philosopher Diogenes. And this really defines.

Renaissance art, that it is modeled after works of Greek and Roman art. When you look at Michelangelo's creation of Adam in the Sistine Chapel, notice these nude figures that you see that this is an imitation of classical art, as is Michelangelo's statue of David, which is a biblical figure, but sculpted in the classical style. So we see the fusion of the Christian.

and the classical. Renaissance architecture also imitated that of the Greeks and the Romans. Brunelleschi's dome in Florence on the Florence Cathedral, this was the first dome of its kind really since the time of the Romans. Now, where's all this money coming from, you might ask? And this comes from patronage.

Patronage is another key word that you need to know here because artists need people who are financing. their art. And the two biggest patrons of the arts in Renaissance Italy were the papacy and the Medici family, Cosimo de' Medici and Lorenzo de' Medici. Now let's move on to the Northern Renaissance.

Although the Renaissance began in Italy with the help of the printing press, it traveled north of the Alps into modern day Germany, the Netherlands, and Britain. And so as far as what you need to know here, the. biggest point of comparison is that in comparison to the Italian Renaissance, which was known for being secular and individualistic, the Northern Renaissance is more focused on social reform according to Christian principles. Christian humanism is something that you need to be aware of here.

And the most noteworthy Christian humanist of the Northern Renaissance are Erasmus and Thomas More. Erasmus wrote The Praise of Folly, in which... He's not trying to teach young men how to be great leaders, but he's trying to criticize social institutions, specifically the Catholic Church. When we look at this classical text, the New Testament, why is it that the apostles were so poor?

But the bishops of the Catholic Church today who claim to be their successors are rich. So we see here this idea of reforming society according to Christian principles, Christian humanism. Now, the. art of the Northern Renaissance was still lifelike like Italian Renaissance art, but it was more likely to show the mundane, the everyday.

So you look at something like the work of Peter Bruegel, the elder, and you see these people that are just out in the fields harvesting grain. This is something that you would have just seen. So a little less focused on philosophers and a bit more focused on real life. And let's not forget the printing press. Seriously, let's not forget this one, because this is the important, the most important invention of the Renaissance and what really marks the Renaissance as modern, because the printing press, which was invented in the 1450s, allowed people to mass produce information for the first time.

So now when somebody writes a book, it can go to the printer and hundreds of copies can be printed rather than just transcribed by hand. Now, the result of the printing press was an increase in literacy and a greater appreciation for vernacular literature, literature that's written in the language of the people. And so we see that the works by these humanist authors are popularized. Lots of people are reading them.

And it's also a causal factor in the Reformation. So when we're thinking about the printing press, it not only supported the spread of Renaissance humanism, but. also led to the Protestant Reformation as those ideas were able to get out there. During this time, we also see the rise of the new monarchies.

During the Middle Ages, we see that Europe is largely feudal, that there are kings, but the kings don't really control everything. They were responsive to the nobles and the church. And what we're seeing during this time. with the new monarchs is the centralization of political power and the control over religion and tax collection.

My favorite new monarchs, as far as remembering for the exam, are Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. Now, also, Henry VIII and Elizabeth can be classified as new monarchs as well because they asserted control, like Ferdinand and Isabella did, over the religious life of their subjects. Now let's move on to the age of exploration. First of all, we want to note the technological advances that made the age of exploration possible. Advances in navigation, such as the magnetic compass.

Cartography, which is a fancy word for map making. The Mercator Projection Map. This is a map that is specifically made for sailors.

Military technology, such as firearms. Once these European explorers go to these new lands. They now have superior military technology that they would not have had a century before that. The motivations for the age of exploration, the three G's, God, glory and gold to spread the Christian religion, to attain glory and fame for themselves.

These conquistadors and gold. to make money, right, to get rich. Now, probably not in that order, but for some reason, God, glory, and gold just has a ring to it. Then we move on to the consequences.

Remember that during the Middle Ages, Europe was just another part of the world. Nobody would have thought, oh, the Europeans, really, you know, these are the dominant people in the world right now. But this is what we start to see during this time of the Age of Exploration, an increase in the global dominance of Europe.

also cheaper access to a greater amount of exotic goods, silks and spices. Because of the age of exploration, Spain and Portugal rose to prominence in the 16th century. Now, they were followed by other countries, largely along the Atlantic coastline.

So we see where Spain and Portugal got this started. They were soon joined by Britain, the Netherlands and France because they saw what was happening there, and they begin to amass wealth as well. So with the Age of Exploration, we see that the epicenter of European trade is moving away from the Mediterranean, away from Italy, away from Constantinople, and it is moving toward the Atlantic with Spain, Portugal, France, the Netherlands, and Britain. One of the greatest consequences of the Age of Exploration is the Columbian Exchange. Now, this is something that's going to be helpful for any AP History subject that you're taking.

The Columbian Exchange, even though we could say technically there were the Vikings, the Europeans who got to North America before Columbus, Columbus's expedition started a permanent trade relationship between the Old and the New Worlds. So you have all of these things coming from Europe, livestock. bananas, which grow very well in Central America.

You have ideas such as capitalism. You also have diseases which wiped out the native population. And so the Colombian exchange, things are also moving from the new world to the old world, such as tobacco, which Europeans had never known before.

Of course, that may not have been the best thing to introduce, but at the time they really liked it. So that about sums up Unit 1. Remember that we want to focus on the importance of Renaissance humanism and also comparing the Italian and the Northern Renaissance. The arrival of the new monarchs resulted in centralization of tax collection and also a greater amount of royal control over the religious life of European subjects.

The Age of Exploration discovery made exotic goods more plentiful. and cheaper for the upper classes. But remember, for the average European peasant, life really did not change that much at all.

And that, my friends, is Unit 1. It's always a pleasure.

Transcript for:Renaissance and Exploration in Europe

Transcript for:
Renaissance and Exploration in Europe