In the Renaissance, educated people did not believe the Earth was flat, but that it was in the centre of a spherical universe. A Greek-Egyptian of the second century A. D. was largely responsible for the beliefs on the nature of the cosmos which those in the Renaissance inherited. Ptolemy (around 140 AD) collected and organized the beliefs of earlier writers, and devised an elaborate model of the universe in order to explain the movements of the sun and planets. The illustration* is of a model of the universe as conceived by Ptolemy, conveniently designed to fit in a neat carrying case. There is no sense of the infinite here. To us it may seem a cozy place with the earth comfortably nestled in the centre of a series of spheres. The teaching of the Church, however, was that since the Fall that part of the cosmos that was at the centre -- within the sphere of the moon -- had been polluted by human sin, and was a kind of sinkhole or cesspool for all that was evil. Almost like hell. The enclosed earth, far from being a comforting shelter from the infinite, was a prison. The spheres The earth, according to Ptolemy, was stationary, while the spheres rotated at different speeds and in different directions. The system was arrived at by a combination of inductive and deductive reasoning. The movements of the sun from solstice to equinox, and of the moon and the planets, were carefully charted, partly because of their importance in navigation, and the fascination of the "wandering stars," the planets. However, the explanation of their movements involved not only a series of spheres but of extra circles in order to explain what we now know to be the elliptical orbits of the planets about the sun. The result was a highly complex system. Some spheres had to become centred somewhere other than on the earth and had to have on their surfaces circles ("epicycles") which themselves rotated. The system was virtually unchallenged for twelve hundred years. The Roman Catholic church accepted the Ptolemaic theory, because biblical passages suggested the sun was in constant motion while Earth remained in one place. Since the Church was in control during this time period, anyone who did not believe in the Ptolemaic theory would be punished, possibly with house arrest. The first modern* astronomer to propose that the sun is in the centre of the planets (not a planet itself, revolving around the Earth) was Copernicus (a Latinizing of the Polish KopĂ©rnic). He realized the greater mathematical logic of such a system, not to mention the accuracy*. It was a great leap of imagination to think of the Earth spinning around something else, not in the centre of the spheres. Not surprisingly, religious leaders of the time were suspicious of the hypothesis, since it could be seen as irreligious to challenge the accepted view of the universe, since to do so was to challenge divine order; Copernicus' book, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (published in the year of his death, 1543), was for a time forbidden reading (though it was dedicated to Pope Paul III, and though the mariners' charts derived from it continued to be used). Martin Luther was also opposed to the views of Copernicus Heliocentric Theory VS Geocentric Theory In the middle ages it was believed that the earth was located at the center of the universe and that all the planets revolved around the earth. The name for this belief was called the Geocentric Theory. The Geocentric theory was believed by the church especially because the church taught that God put earth as the center of the universe which made earth special and powerful. The Geocentric theory was active for almost 2,000 years and it was not until a man named Nicolaus Copernicus that the Geocentric theory was finally proven wrong. Copernicus was actually the first man to come up with the heliocentric theory. Copernicus felt that the geocentric theory did not accurately explain the movements of the sun, moon, and planets. Copernicus studied the movements of the planets for thirty years and he then figured out that the sun was actually at the center of the universe and not earth. Copernicus was told by many scholars that he should make his new findings accessible to others by publishing it. In 1543 the book called "On the revolutions of the heavenly bodies" was released. Copernicus's book had a great impact that angered the Catholic and Protestant Church. The reason why the Church became so angry was because the Geocentric theory made human beings seem closer to God and since earth was in the center that meant humans were more special. The heliocentric theory changed that perspective completely making humans lose that position in the universe. RENAISSANCE What we are accustomed to call the Renaissance began as a rediscovery of older knowledge, and flowered as a series of new discoveries and new attitudes. In the particular alchemy of the social and political climate of Florence* in the late fourteenth century, humanism was born: scholars and administrators read the Latin of Vergil and Cicero, and explored Greek writers for the first time in centuries. Contact with earlier ways of seeing the world encouraged a new exploration of ideas, of art, and of the physical universe. From Florence the movement of minds widened to include the whole of Italy, spreading through France, and finally reaching England about a century later. The word Renaissance (French for 'rebirth', or Rinascimento in Italian), was first used to define the historical age in Italy (and in Europe in general) that followed the Middle Ages and preceded the Reformation, spanning roughly the 14th through the 16th century. The principal features were the revival of learning based on classical sources, the rise of courtly and papal patronage, the development of perspective in painting, and the advancements of science. "English Renaissance" is a recent term used to describe a cultural and artistic movement in England from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that many cultural historians believe originated in northern Italy in the fourteenth century. This era in English cultural history is sometimes referred to as "the age of Shakespeare" or "the Elizabethan era," taking the name of the English Renaissance's most famous author and most important monarch, respectively; however it is worth remembering that these names are rather misleading: Shakespeare was not an especially famous writer in his own time, and the English Renaissance covers a period both before and after Elizabeth's reign.Poets such as Edmund Spenser and John Milton produced works that demonstrated an increased interest in understanding English Christian beliefs, such as the allegorical representation of the Tudor Dynasty in The Faerie Queen and the retelling of mankind’s fall from paradise in Paradise Lost; playwrights, such as Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare, composed theatrical representations of the English take on life, death, and history. Nearing the end of the Tudor Dynasty, philosophers like Sir Thomas More and Sir Francis Bacon published their own ideas about humanity and the aspects of a perfect society, pushing the limits of metacognition at that time. As England abolished its astrologers and alchemists, it came closer to reaching modern science with the Baconian Method, a forerunner of the Scientific Method. The Elizabethan Era is the period associated with the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603) and is often considered to be a golden age in English history. It was the height of the English Renaissance, and saw the flowering of English literature and poetry. This was also the time during which Elizabethan theatre flourished and William Shakespeare, among others, composed plays that broke away from England's past style of plays. It was an age of expansion and exploration abroad, while at home the Protestant Reformation became entrenched in the national mindset.The Elizabethan Age is viewed so highly because of the contrasts with the periods before and after. It was a brief period of largely internal peace between the English Reformation and the battles between Protestants and Catholics and the battles between parliament and the monarchy that would engulf the seventeenth century. The Protestant/Catholic divide was settled, for a time, by the Elizabethan Religious Settlement and parliament was still not strong enough to challenge royal absolutism. The Jacobean era refers to a period in English and Scottish history that coincides with the reign of James I (1603 – 1625). The Jacobean era succeeds the Elizabethan era and precedes the Caroline era, and specifically denotes a style of architecture, visual arts, decorative arts, and literature that is predominant of that period. The era took its name from the Latin form, Jacobus, of the name of King James I and VI. Literature In literature, some of Shakespeare's most powerful plays are written in that period (for example The Tempest, King Lear, and Macbeth), as well as powerful works by John Webster and Ben Jonson. Ben Jonson also contributed to some of the era's best poetry, together with John Donne and the Cavalier poets. In prose, the most representative works are found in those of Francis Bacon and the King James Bible.Jonson was also an important innovator in the specialized literary sub-genre of the masque, which went through an intense development in the Jacobean era. His name is linked with that of Inigo Jones as co-developers of the literary and visual/technical aspects of this hybrid art form. [For Jonson's masques, see: The Masque of Blackness, The Masque of Queens, etc.] The high costs of these spectacles, however, positioned the Stuarts far from the relative frugality of Elizabeth's reign, and alienated the middle classes and the Puritans with a prospect of waste and self-indulgent excess.
Friday, 9 March 2012
Shakesperean times
In the Renaissance, educated people did not believe the Earth was flat, but that it was in the centre of a spherical universe. A Greek-Egyptian of the second century A. D. was largely responsible for the beliefs on the nature of the cosmos which those in the Renaissance inherited. Ptolemy (around 140 AD) collected and organized the beliefs of earlier writers, and devised an elaborate model of the universe in order to explain the movements of the sun and planets. The illustration* is of a model of the universe as conceived by Ptolemy, conveniently designed to fit in a neat carrying case. There is no sense of the infinite here. To us it may seem a cozy place with the earth comfortably nestled in the centre of a series of spheres. The teaching of the Church, however, was that since the Fall that part of the cosmos that was at the centre -- within the sphere of the moon -- had been polluted by human sin, and was a kind of sinkhole or cesspool for all that was evil. Almost like hell. The enclosed earth, far from being a comforting shelter from the infinite, was a prison. The spheres The earth, according to Ptolemy, was stationary, while the spheres rotated at different speeds and in different directions. The system was arrived at by a combination of inductive and deductive reasoning. The movements of the sun from solstice to equinox, and of the moon and the planets, were carefully charted, partly because of their importance in navigation, and the fascination of the "wandering stars," the planets. However, the explanation of their movements involved not only a series of spheres but of extra circles in order to explain what we now know to be the elliptical orbits of the planets about the sun. The result was a highly complex system. Some spheres had to become centred somewhere other than on the earth and had to have on their surfaces circles ("epicycles") which themselves rotated. The system was virtually unchallenged for twelve hundred years. The Roman Catholic church accepted the Ptolemaic theory, because biblical passages suggested the sun was in constant motion while Earth remained in one place. Since the Church was in control during this time period, anyone who did not believe in the Ptolemaic theory would be punished, possibly with house arrest. The first modern* astronomer to propose that the sun is in the centre of the planets (not a planet itself, revolving around the Earth) was Copernicus (a Latinizing of the Polish KopĂ©rnic). He realized the greater mathematical logic of such a system, not to mention the accuracy*. It was a great leap of imagination to think of the Earth spinning around something else, not in the centre of the spheres. Not surprisingly, religious leaders of the time were suspicious of the hypothesis, since it could be seen as irreligious to challenge the accepted view of the universe, since to do so was to challenge divine order; Copernicus' book, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (published in the year of his death, 1543), was for a time forbidden reading (though it was dedicated to Pope Paul III, and though the mariners' charts derived from it continued to be used). Martin Luther was also opposed to the views of Copernicus Heliocentric Theory VS Geocentric Theory In the middle ages it was believed that the earth was located at the center of the universe and that all the planets revolved around the earth. The name for this belief was called the Geocentric Theory. The Geocentric theory was believed by the church especially because the church taught that God put earth as the center of the universe which made earth special and powerful. The Geocentric theory was active for almost 2,000 years and it was not until a man named Nicolaus Copernicus that the Geocentric theory was finally proven wrong. Copernicus was actually the first man to come up with the heliocentric theory. Copernicus felt that the geocentric theory did not accurately explain the movements of the sun, moon, and planets. Copernicus studied the movements of the planets for thirty years and he then figured out that the sun was actually at the center of the universe and not earth. Copernicus was told by many scholars that he should make his new findings accessible to others by publishing it. In 1543 the book called "On the revolutions of the heavenly bodies" was released. Copernicus's book had a great impact that angered the Catholic and Protestant Church. The reason why the Church became so angry was because the Geocentric theory made human beings seem closer to God and since earth was in the center that meant humans were more special. The heliocentric theory changed that perspective completely making humans lose that position in the universe. RENAISSANCE What we are accustomed to call the Renaissance began as a rediscovery of older knowledge, and flowered as a series of new discoveries and new attitudes. In the particular alchemy of the social and political climate of Florence* in the late fourteenth century, humanism was born: scholars and administrators read the Latin of Vergil and Cicero, and explored Greek writers for the first time in centuries. Contact with earlier ways of seeing the world encouraged a new exploration of ideas, of art, and of the physical universe. From Florence the movement of minds widened to include the whole of Italy, spreading through France, and finally reaching England about a century later. The word Renaissance (French for 'rebirth', or Rinascimento in Italian), was first used to define the historical age in Italy (and in Europe in general) that followed the Middle Ages and preceded the Reformation, spanning roughly the 14th through the 16th century. The principal features were the revival of learning based on classical sources, the rise of courtly and papal patronage, the development of perspective in painting, and the advancements of science. "English Renaissance" is a recent term used to describe a cultural and artistic movement in England from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that many cultural historians believe originated in northern Italy in the fourteenth century. This era in English cultural history is sometimes referred to as "the age of Shakespeare" or "the Elizabethan era," taking the name of the English Renaissance's most famous author and most important monarch, respectively; however it is worth remembering that these names are rather misleading: Shakespeare was not an especially famous writer in his own time, and the English Renaissance covers a period both before and after Elizabeth's reign.Poets such as Edmund Spenser and John Milton produced works that demonstrated an increased interest in understanding English Christian beliefs, such as the allegorical representation of the Tudor Dynasty in The Faerie Queen and the retelling of mankind’s fall from paradise in Paradise Lost; playwrights, such as Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare, composed theatrical representations of the English take on life, death, and history. Nearing the end of the Tudor Dynasty, philosophers like Sir Thomas More and Sir Francis Bacon published their own ideas about humanity and the aspects of a perfect society, pushing the limits of metacognition at that time. As England abolished its astrologers and alchemists, it came closer to reaching modern science with the Baconian Method, a forerunner of the Scientific Method. The Elizabethan Era is the period associated with the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603) and is often considered to be a golden age in English history. It was the height of the English Renaissance, and saw the flowering of English literature and poetry. This was also the time during which Elizabethan theatre flourished and William Shakespeare, among others, composed plays that broke away from England's past style of plays. It was an age of expansion and exploration abroad, while at home the Protestant Reformation became entrenched in the national mindset.The Elizabethan Age is viewed so highly because of the contrasts with the periods before and after. It was a brief period of largely internal peace between the English Reformation and the battles between Protestants and Catholics and the battles between parliament and the monarchy that would engulf the seventeenth century. The Protestant/Catholic divide was settled, for a time, by the Elizabethan Religious Settlement and parliament was still not strong enough to challenge royal absolutism. The Jacobean era refers to a period in English and Scottish history that coincides with the reign of James I (1603 – 1625). The Jacobean era succeeds the Elizabethan era and precedes the Caroline era, and specifically denotes a style of architecture, visual arts, decorative arts, and literature that is predominant of that period. The era took its name from the Latin form, Jacobus, of the name of King James I and VI. Literature In literature, some of Shakespeare's most powerful plays are written in that period (for example The Tempest, King Lear, and Macbeth), as well as powerful works by John Webster and Ben Jonson. Ben Jonson also contributed to some of the era's best poetry, together with John Donne and the Cavalier poets. In prose, the most representative works are found in those of Francis Bacon and the King James Bible.Jonson was also an important innovator in the specialized literary sub-genre of the masque, which went through an intense development in the Jacobean era. His name is linked with that of Inigo Jones as co-developers of the literary and visual/technical aspects of this hybrid art form. [For Jonson's masques, see: The Masque of Blackness, The Masque of Queens, etc.] The high costs of these spectacles, however, positioned the Stuarts far from the relative frugality of Elizabeth's reign, and alienated the middle classes and the Puritans with a prospect of waste and self-indulgent excess.
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