Renaissance narratives

The Renaissance was a cultural movement in late medieval and early modern Europe. Most historians agree that it started in the Italian city-state of Florence in the fourteenth century and gradually spread across Europe.

The Renaissance produced dramatic changes in European art, architecture, and culture. Artists like Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci embraced realism and individualism. Artistic styles moved away from a focus on religion. Humanist scholars like Francesco Petrarch combined ideas from Christianity with the philosophy of the Greeks and Romans. Humanists studied philosophy, rhetoric, and literature in the belief that human achievements were as important as religious theory. Architects imitated the style of Roman and Greek ruins to create new architectural marvels. The artists and writers of the Italian Renaissance believed they were creating something totally new by reviving the teachings of the ancient world.

But did Italian Renaissance artists and thinkers create something new and uniquely European?

The term Renaissance (French for “rebirth”) was coined by European historians in the nineteenth century. These historians began portraying the Renaissance as something uniquely European, supporting narratives about the “rise of the West.” Narratives of European cultural superiority were then used to justify the expansion of European empires.

But as a student of history, you know that challenging narratives is central to the work of historians. To evaluate the narratives of the Renaissance, we need to answer some questions: Who participated in the Renaissance? Where did it take place? And why did it start?

Renaissance “man”

The Renaissance was important—if you were a wealthy, educated man. For most people living in Europe, the Renaissance was not something they experienced or noticed.

Although it was mostly men involved in the Renaissance, women were not silent in this period. In fact, several women did help shape the Renaissance. Christine de Pisan, for example, wrote dozens of works of poetry and political theory, arguing for women’s education. Catherine de’ Medici, the queen of France, wielded significant political power. Another influential woman was Lucrezia Borgia, who held ruled an Italian city for a period of time. There were plenty of others, who were patrons of the arts and artists themselves. Like the men, these women came almost exclusively from the upper classes. Today, the phrase “Renaissance Man” is used to describe someone who has broad knowledge in many topics. Among the wealthy classes, at least, it seems there were plenty of “Renaissance Women.”

It should be noted that life did not change drastically for most peasant farmers—who made up the vast majority of the population. For most people, changes started by the Renaissance would not be felt for generations.

An economic rebirth

Although the Renaissance had cultural and artistic elements, there were also great changes to trade.

The Renaissance started at the end of some major upheavals. The Black Death had killed millions. The Crusades and other wars, such as the Hundred Years War, created instability. Trade overall was affected by this. By the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, these upheavals settled down enough to allow trade networks to expand between Europe and the Islamic world. Trade also increased between Northern and Southern Europe.

As parts of Europe emerged from the devastation of the Black Death, patterns of wealth and labor changed. As more people could afford luxury goods, demand for trade increased. Italian merchants grew wealthy from trade, and Italian cities emerged as commercial hubs. Powerful banking families, like the Medici in Florence, dominated the politics of the region.

With their new wealth, these merchants, bankers, and rulers funded the arts and architecture of the Renaissance. They patronized, or funded, artists like Donatello, Botticelli, and Titian. These patrons wanted art and buildings that showed their wealth and power. In many cases, the wealthy commissioned elaborate portraits of themselves or had their family inserted into paintings of biblical or historical scenes.

Many Renaissance advancements were the result of Europe’s integration into Afro-Eurasian trade networks. Trade introduced new pigments from Central and South Asian plants and minerals for Renaissance painters. Bankers relied on mathematical concepts developed by Arabic and Indian scholars. Even the technologies behind the printing press—invented in the fifteenth century—were probably the result of Afro-Eurasian trade. Moveable type and papermaking were first pioneered in China, Korea, and the Islamic world.

Renaissance sultans

Another narrative is that the Renaissance was inspired by ancient Greece and Rome. That narrative is worth looking closely at, too.

To the east, the Ottomans rose to a position of dominance after taking Constantinople in 1453. As the Ottomans expanded their empire, they also funded architectural, artistic, and intellectual innovations. Sultan Mehmet II hired Italian artists and architects to work in his court. These artists in turn drew inspiration from the art and architecture of the great Islamic cities.

The Italian Renaissance is inseparable from cultural and economic exchange with the Islamic world. Muslim scholars preserved Greek and Roman texts. Renaissance poets and writers were inspired by themes in Islamic poetry. Much of the architecture of the Italian Renaissance was modeled on the great cities to the east, such as Aleppo, Cairo, and Tabriz.

The painting above shows the Christian Saint Mark preaching in Alexandria, Egypt. His audience is a crowd of Muslim men. However, Islam was not actually founded until 600 years after Saint Mark’s death. The historian Jerry Brotton argues that the painting “shows how the European Renaissance began to define itself through an extensive and complex exchange of ideas and materials.” The Italian Renaissance was as much defined by its exchange with Islamic culture as its rediscovery of Greco-Roman styles.

Legacies of the Renaissance

Trade also inspired some Europeans to sail south along Africa’s western coast. European merchants bought silks and spices from the Ottomans. Italian merchants sent Portuguese sailors to bring back gold from West Africa. These voyages also introduced Europe to West African art.

The painting on the next page, by an unknown artist, shows the waterfront of the Portuguese capital of Lisbon. Many of these people are enslaved Black people, but the painting features several free Black people. It shows Black and white people dancing together. In the middle-right, a Black man rides a horse. He is a knight of the Order of Santiago. This painting and many others show that Renaissance European cities had racial, ethnic, and religious diversity.

However, this painting is also a reminder that systems of racism and enslavement were developing. The Portuguese voyages to West Africa returned with enslaved Africans. By the mid-fifteenth century, slavery was common in the Italian city-states and the Iberian Peninsula. The great cultural achievements of Renaissance art were made possible by the same economy that eventually created the institutions of the modern slave trade.