Renaissance, Scientific Revolution & Reformation
The European transition from the medieval period to modernity was catalyzed by the Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, and the Scientific Revolution between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries. Originating in Italian commercial city-states like Florence, the Renaissance championed secular Humanism, classical Greek and Roman scholarship, and groundbreaking artistic perspectives pioneered by Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael. Johannes Gutenberg's invention of the movable-type printing press around 1440 accelerated the dissemination of ideas. In 1517, Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to the Wittenberg castle church door, sparking the Protestant Reformation against papal indulgences. Simultaneously, astronomers like Nicolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei challenged geocentric cosmology, establishing empirical scientific methodology.
Key Concepts & Examination Highlights
- The fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453 CE prompted Greek scholars to migrate to Italy with classical manuscripts, fueling the Renaissance.
- Martin Luther initiated the Protestant Reformation in October 1517 by publishing his Ninety-Five Theses against the sale of Catholic indulgences.
- Nicolaus Copernicus published 'De revolutionibus orbium coelestium' in 1543, proposing the heliocentric model of the solar system.
- The Peace of Westphalia (1648) ended the Thirty Years' War in Europe, establishing the modern principle of sovereign nation-states.