Much of Europe was devastated by the “Black Death” during the late Middle Ages: The Bubonic Plague wiped out approximately two-thirds of the population on the continent. Urban areas in Northern Europe were severely depopulated. However, some Italian city-states like Venice, Milan and Ferrara managed to survive the times virtually intact, due primarily to their relative geographical isolation from the mainland.

The medieval world was a miserable place to live. The Hundred Years War caused untold death, starvation, and famine. The plague killed millions more. In such a profoundly dogmatic era this was all seen as a judgment from God. As a result, many considered life on Earth a terrible, sinful place, full of suffering and endless toil. Man was a wicked and immoral creature. Many prominent theologians felt that humans should reject the physical world spend their lives praying for a better life in heaven.

As they slowly began to recover economically and culturally from the surrounding devastation, local scholars in Italy and elsewhere chose to look to the past and model their lives after the ancient Greeks and Romans, instead of the regressive ideas of their contemporaries. The emphasis was on a return to past glories, and the evidence of its former brilliance was all around them.

The remnants of the great empires were the inspiration for a new breed of thinkers and inventors.

This movement to emulate the ancients is commonly referred to as the ‘Renaissance,’ although scholars rarely use the term anymore to describe a specific epoch. It is best understood in a more limited sense to describe the narrow intellectual currents which developed in the region of northern Italy in the late fifteenth century.

The Renaissance was concerned with elevating and promoting art, architecture, literature, and philosophy. It was an intellectual movement in opposition to the dominant academic system of scholasticism.

Renaissance scholars had high regard for technology and science; they encouraged political speculation, and they exhibited a healthy distrust of the ruling class [although they gladly accepted their generous patronage].

Most importantly, the concept of ‘Humanism’ developed from this new way of looking at the world. Humanists endorsed reason and responsibility over ignorance and dogma. This was supposed to be accomplished through the rigorous study of the liberal arts: grammar, rhetoric, history, poetry and philosophy.

Of course, access to this nascent ‘high culture’ was restricted mostly to the wealthy elite. It was never more than a small minority of prominent artisans and wealthy patrons who initiated the Renaissance. But scribes and scholars from every corner of the globe whose views were heavily funded and were able to take advantage of technological advances as well. The ‘classics’ [including the Bible, of course…] were circulated by means of the latest invention, the printing press.  

This development enabled the ancient texts which had been preserved by the scribes in Constantinople and the other parts of the Muslim world to be re-printed and analyzed by a much wider audience. The printing press allowed ideas to be shared and disseminated rapidly. This process is the origin of mass media.

Thus, the writings of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, and others which had escaped destruction by the Christian hordes in ancient times were once again widely distributed throughout Europe.

Humanism was the most important intellectual development of The Renaissance. Petrarch is known as the “Father” of Humanism. He was the first philosopher to insist forcefully and polemically that the culture of his day was inadequate and that it needed reorientation toward the past. He believed in the immense moral and practical value of studying ancient history and literature. He ridiculed the “disgusting pride” of his contemporaries, and he derided the military class as “vainglorious fellows” who tainted society.

Petrarch argued that God gave humans enormous potential to be fully useful and creative in this physical realm. He inspired humanist philosophy, which led to the intellectual flowering of The Renaissance.

We need this man today.

[Edited re-post from 2015]