Renaissance why did it start in italy

After the fall of the Roman Empire, Italy was divided into a number of city-states each with a powerful ruling family at its head. The Medici family had a huge hand in the explosion of arts and culture that occurred in their city, leading Florence to be widely considered the home of the Renaissance itself.

As families such as the Medicis were patrician rather than noble, many viewed them as friends of the people. Other merchant families were too allowed significant power and influence, including on the management of laws concerning banking, shipping and trade. Much freer societies thus existed than in the cloistered monarchical and aristocratic systems of northern Europe, and ideas and cultures were more widely circulated.

Not without some healthy competition, the magnificent city-states of Italy also competed for who could build the most beautiful cities and output the most breathtaking art, forcing a rapid explosion of fine works and culture to occur. Trade routes as far as China and the Middle East terminated in Venice and Genoa, while routes from England and Scandinavia also operated frequently.

Not only did this create a melting pot of cultures, it also made the city-states and their merchant class very wealthy, with access to a vast array of commodities. Some of the most literally important of these were the sale of pigments, used in the paints of Renaissance artists. Venice was the main point of entry for pigmented goods, from verdigris green from Greece to the rare lapis lazuli of Central Asia.

Press ESC to cancel. Ben Davis May 1, What are 3 reasons why the Renaissance began in Italy? What are five reasons why the Renaissance began in Italy? When did the Renaissance began in Italy? What is the Italian Renaissance known for? What are the most important characteristics of Italian Renaissance?

What are the major features of Italian Renaissance humanism? What is Humanism in Italian Renaissance? How did humanism start the Renaissance? How did humanism affect the Italian Renaissance?

Wool was imported from Northern Europe and in the 16th century from Spain , and together with dyes from the east was used to make high quality textiles. In the 13th century, much of Europe experienced strong economic growth. The trade routes of the Italian states linked with those of established Mediterranean ports, and eventually the Hanseatic League of the Baltic and northern regions of Europe, to create a network economy in Europe for the first time since the 4th century.

The city-states of Italy expanded greatly during this period, and grew in power to become de facto fully independent of the Holy Roman Empire; apart from the Kingdom of Naples, outside powers kept their armies out of Italy.

During this period, the modern commercial infrastructure developed, with double-entry bookkeeping, joint stock companies, an international banking system, a systematized foreign exchange market, insurance, and government debt.

Florence became the center of this financial industry, and the gold florin became the main currency of international trade. While Roman urban republican sensibilities persisted, there were many movements and changes afoot. Italy first felt the changes in Europe from the 11th to the 13th centuries.

Typically there was:. The decline of feudalism and the rise of cities influenced each other; for example, the demand for luxury goods led to an increase in trade, which led to greater numbers of tradesmen becoming wealthy, who, in turn, demanded more luxury goods.

Palazzo della Signoria e Uffizzi, Florence: Florence was one of the most important city-states in Italy. The Italian trade routes that covered the Mediterranean and beyond were also major conduits of culture and knowledge. The recovery of lost Greek texts, which had been preserved by Arab scholars, following the Crusader conquest of the Byzantine heartlands revitalized medieval philosophy in the Renaissance of the 12th century.

Additionally, Byzantine scholars migrated to Italy during and following the Ottoman conquest of the Byzantines between the 12th and 15th centuries, and were important in sparking the new linguistic studies of the Renaissance, in newly created academies in Florence and Venice.

Humanist scholars searched monastic libraries for ancient manuscripts and recovered Tacitus and other Latin authors. The rediscovery of Vitruvius meant that the architectural principles of Antiquity could be observed once more, and Renaissance artists were encouraged, in the atmosphere of humanist optimism, to excel the achievements of the Ancients, like Apelles, of whom they read.

Together, the Ottoman Empire and Venice grew wealthy by facilitating trade: The Venetians had ships and nautical expertise; the Ottomans had access to many of the most valuable goods in the world, especially pepper and grain.

Working together across cultural and religious divides, they both become very rich, and the Ottomans became one of the most powerful political entities in the world. Italian politics during the time of the Renaissance was dominated by the rising merchant class, especially one family, the House of Medici, whose power in Florence was nearly absolute.

By the Late Middle Ages circa onward , Latium, the former heartland of the Roman Empire, and southern Italy were generally poorer than the north.

Rome was a city of ancient ruins, and the Papal States were loosely administered and vulnerable to external interference such as that of France, and later Spain. The papacy was affronted when the Avignon Papacy was created in southern France as a consequence of pressure from King Philip the Fair of France.

In the south, Sicily had for some time been under foreign domination, by the Arabs and then the Normans. Sicily had prospered for years during the Emirate of Sicily, and later for two centuries during the Norman Kingdom and the Hohenstaufen Kingdom, but had declined by the late Middle Ages. In contrast, Northern and Central Italy had become far more prosperous, and it has been calculated that the region was among the richest in Europe. The new mercantile governing class, who gained their position through financial skill, adapted to their purposes the feudal aristocratic model that had dominated Europe in the Middle Ages.

A feature of the High Middle Ages in Northern Italy was the rise of the urban communes, which had broken from the control of bishops and local counts. In much of the region, the landed nobility was poorer than the urban patriarchs in the high medieval money economy, whose inflationary rise left land-holding aristocrats impoverished.

The increase in trade during the early Renaissance enhanced these characteristics. This change also gave the merchants almost complete control of the governments of the Italian city-states, again enhancing trade. Later, in a movement known as the Counter-Reformation, the Catholic church censored artists and writers in response to the Protestant Reformation. Many Renaissance thinkers feared being too bold, which stifled creativity.

Furthermore, in , the Council of Trent established the Roman Inquisition , which made humanism and any views that challenged the Catholic church an act of heresy punishable by death. By the early 17th century, the Renaissance movement had died out, giving way to the Age of Enlightenment. The Renaissance, History World International. Facts About the Renaissance, Biography Online. Facts About the Renaissance Period, Interestingfacts. What is Humanism? International Humanist and Ethical Union.

Why Did the Italian Renaissance End? But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. Toward the end of the 14th century A. Known as the Renaissance, the period immediately following the Middle Ages in Europe saw a great revival of interest in the classical learning and values of ancient Greece and Rome. Against a backdrop of political stability and growing prosperity, the development of new The Harlem Renaissance was the development of the Harlem neighborhood in New York City as a Black cultural mecca in the early 20th Century and the subsequent social and artistic explosion that resulted.

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