legacies of the renaisannce

Looking at the Renaissance

The Legacy of the Renaissance

The legacy of the Renaissance is something which is still hotly debated: philosophers, art historians, students of literature, historians all have a different perspective on its enduring impact. However all are in agreement that it does not unequivocally herald the start of the modern world. Indeed the Renaissance as a movement to bring about the rebirth of classical letters and classical values was looking fairly determinedly backwards. But the skills and pre-occupations of humanist scholars and the techniques of representation developed to pursue this enthusiasm for the classical past were themselves potent engines for change.

Most immediate in effect was the enthusiasm with which classical models were taken up by ruling elites, in part for purely aesthetic motives, but also, very definitely, as a means to validate their own authority. Association with republican, or, far more commonly, Imperial Rome gave weight even to those of very dubious credentials, such as soldiers of fortune who had fought their way to power. In visual terms this association was expressed through buildings that used classical architectural language to convey a sense of majesty and gravitas - a vocabulary that proved so potent that to this day it is still used to convey prestige. Architectural treatises such as that of Serlio and Palladio (1508-80) were used across Europe by princes and aristocrats who selected the elements appropriate to their particular purposes. The growing fashion for young aristocrats to undertake the 'grand tour' to Italy, to inspect the antique for themselves, served to reinforce the cultural association between the aristocracy and classicism.

But antiquity was too potent a source to be commandeered solely by the aristocracy. Political reformers could find inspiring models and sinew-stiffening maxims among the republican writers of Greece and Rome, whose celebration of heroism, self-denial and civic spirit gave hope of a fairer world built on liberty and equality.

Reverence for the classical languages, and for the values of the ancient world, provided the basis for an education system which extended beyond the elite and which structured the school curriculum in a way which survived in Britain until the 20th century. By doing so it ensured the enduring impact of classical values on attitudes to social organisation and to government. But in assessing the impact of the Renaissance equal importance has to be given to the way it interacted with other major cultural changes. The textual scrutiny applied by Renaissance humanists to ancient texts had revolutionary long-term significance when combined with the demands for religious reform that culminated in the Reformation. Married with investigations into the natural world, the critical attention to ancient texts opened up the study of science in a multitude of directions. And the impact of all these changes was vastly accelerated by the invention of print which made possible not only the wide dissemination of written and visual texts, but the close comparison of those texts that was at the heart of humanist scholarship. Humanists were entranced by learning and the search for knowledge touched all aspects of 15th- and 16th-century culture; the resulting complex legacy is part of the fascination of the Renaissance.