This book provides the first English study of five prominent Italian Renaissance utopias: Doni’s Wise and Crazy World, Patrizi’s The Happy City, and Zuccolo’s The Republic of Utopia, The Republic of Evandria, and The Happy City. The scholarship on Italian Renaissance utopias is still relatively underdeveloped; there is no English translation of these texts, and our understanding of the distinctive features of this utopian tradition is rather limited. This book therefore fills an important gap in the (...) existing critical literature, providing easier access to these utopian texts, and showing how the study of the utopias of Doni, Patrizi, and Zuccolo can shed crucial light on the scholarly debate about the essential traits of Renaissance utopias. (shrink)

"Plato in the Italian Renaissance, the first book-length treatment of Renaissance Platonism in over fifty years, is a study of the dramatic revival of interest in the Platonic dialogues in Italy in the fifteenth century. Through a richly contextual study of the translations and commentaries on Plato, James Hankins seeks to show how the interpretation of Plato was molded by the expectations of fifteenth-century readers, by the need to protect Plato against his critics, and the broader hermeneutical (...) assumptions and practices of the period. (shrink)

This title offers a cultural translation of modern Italian intellectual and philosophical history, a development book-ended by Giambattista Vico and Antonio Gramsci. It shows Italian philosophy to have emerged during the age of the Risorgimento in reaction to 18th century French revolutionary and rationalist standards in politics and philosophy and in critical assimilation of the German reaction to the same, mainly Hegelian idealism and, eventually, Heideggerian existentialism. This is the story of modern Italian philosophy told through the (...) lens of Renaissance scholarship. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:80 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Gilson often contrasts the God of Aquinas, who is esse, with the God of Augustine, who is essentia. This difference in terminology is taken as emphasizing the essentialist character of Augustine's thought. However, Professor Anderson maintains that essentia should not be regarded as equivalent to the Thomistic notion of essence. F,ssentia is derived, according to Augustine, from esse and is most equivalent to the Thomistic (...) ens. Hence, according to Anderson, Augustine was not ignoring or slighting the factor of existence when he referred to God as essentia. Once again, Anderson's point is valid only if we grant that esse meant "to exisff' for Augustine and could not be interpreted as meaning "to be unchangeable." That there is any doubt that esse meant "to exist" for Augustine seems to be ruled out by Anderson (p. 40). One of Anderson's most interesting theses is the suggestion that the Augustinian distinction between being and non-being is substantially the same as the Thomistie distinction between essence and existence. For Augustine God alone is esse itself, while all creatures are limited by non-esse, i.e., they share in both esse and non-esse. Similarly, for Aquinas only God is esse itself, while all creatures merely possess esse. It is evident that for both philosophers the distinction between what is esse itself and what is not csse itself provides an important way of distinguishing between God and creatures. How much more alike the two distinctions are will depend on how the notion of esse is interpreted by Augustine and Aquinas. One problem is bound to arise: If for Aquinas the "proportionality" of being is to be found in the relationship between esse and essentia in ens, while for Augustine essentia ---- ens, then either Augustine does not have a Thomistic notion of the analogy of being or it must be shown what Augustine 's equivalent for the Thomistic essentia would be. Non-being does not seem adequate for such a role. A good portion of Professor Anderson's essay is devoted to discussing Augustinian metaphysics precisely in the areas in which Gilson claims that Augustine's essentialism creates problems for Augustine the Christian. These include the problems of proving the existence of God, creation and the nature of participation. It is pointed out that many of Augustine's remarks which have frequently been supposed to be of Neoplatonic inspiration are in fact based upon Scripture as far as the Saint is concerned. Although I find some portions of his essay obscure, on the whole I should say that Professor Anderson's study is quite exciting and a considerable challenge to those who are tempted to draw striking contrasts between the "essentialism" of Augustine and the "existentialism" of Aquinas. BRUCE GARSIDE McGiU University Eight Philosophers o] the Italian Renaissance. By Paul Oskar Kristeller. (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1964.Pp. ix -~ 194.$5.00.) The eight chapters constituting the main body of this volume, devoted in succession to Petrarch, Valla, Ficino, Pieo, Pomponazzi, Telesio, Patrizi, and Bruno, are based on the Arensberg Lectures which were delivered by Professor Kristeller in 1961 at Stanford University. Footnotes and bibliographical references have been added, and as an appendix there is included an essay on "The Medieval Antecedents of Renaissance Humanism" which, though delivered as a lecture on several occasions, is here printed for the first time. The purpose of the series of eight lectures, as Kristeller indicates in his short preface, was "to give a brief survey of Italian thought during the Renaissance period". The aspects of Italian Renaissance thought, represented by the authors selected for discussion, are those traditionally described as humanism, Florentine Platonism, Paduan Aristotelianism, and speculative philosophies of nature. As representatives of the humanist movement Petrarch and Valla are selected, not merely because of their prominence but in order to make clear that Renaissance humanism cannot be identified with preference for a particular philosophical tradition. Petrarch preferred Plato to Aristotle, Augustine to Aquinas, and Cicero and Seneca to the Epicureans, whereas Valla preferred the Epicurean philosophy to that of the Stoics or Platonists, and appealed to Quintilian more than to Cicero in his proposals for a reform of... (shrink)

This volume deals with the psychological, metaphysical and scientific ideas of two major and influential Aristotelian philosophers of the Italian Renaissance - Nicoletto Vernia (d. 1499) and Agostino Nifo (ca 1470-1538) - whose careers must be seen as inter-related. Both began by holding Averroes to be the true interpreter of Aristotle's thought, but were influenced by the work of humanists, such as Ermolao Barbaro, though to a different degree. Translations of the Greek commentators on Aristotle (Alexander of Aphrodisias, (...) Themistius and Simplicius) provided them with new material and new ways of understanding Aristotle - Nifo even put himself to learning Greek - and led them to abandon Averroes, especially as regards his views on the soul and intellect. Nevertheless, both Vernia and Nifo engaged seriously with the thought of medieval scholars such as Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas and John of Jandun. Both also showed interest in their celebrated contemporary, Marsilio Ficino. (shrink)

The ideas of Plato (429-347 BC) have exerted such an abiding influence on western philosophy and political thought that it is easy to forget that for many centuries, between about 500 and 1400, his works were almost unknown in western Europe. This was partly because very few people in Medieval Europe knew enough Greek to read Plato and even if they had, copies of the Dialogues were almost impossible to obtain, with only the Timaeus available in Latin translation. Scholars were (...) therefore largely dependent on earlier Latin authors such as Cicero and St Augustine for a second-hand knowledge of Plato's ideas. It was the rediscovery of the Dialogues in the original during the Italian Renaissance of the fifteenth century that set western thought off on new paths, a rediscovery that was made possible by the preservation and transmission of Plato's work by scholars in Byzantium. (shrink)

This is a one-volume edition of the original two-volume work published in 1990 with a second edition in 1991. The work falls into two main parts. Volume 1 is devoted to a series of studies describing the revival and dissemination of Plato in the Italian Renaissance. There are four main parts to the first volume. The first part treats the revival of Platonic studies in early fifteenth-century Florence. Here the figure of Leonardo Bruni looms large. Part 2 deals (...) with the revival of Platonic studies in Milan. The translations of the Republic by Uberto Decembrio and later by his son Pier Candido Decembrio receive most of the attention. Part 3 deals with mid fifteenth-century developments of Platonic studies in Rome. Here Hankins provides chapters on George of Trebizond, Pletho, Cardinal Bessarion, and a fascinating account of the dispute between Trebizond and Bessarion. Finally, volume 1 ends with an extensive discussion of the Platonism of Marsilio Ficino. Volume 2 consists of various appendices dealing with specific topics, texts by a variety of Renaissance authors dealing with the interpretation of Plato’s writings, and an exhaustive “Census of Manuscripts” designed “to document the diffusion and influence of Renaissance translations of Plato”. Of course, a review of this size can hardly begin to do justice to the breadth and richness of Hankins’s research. Instead, I shall try to point out the general trajectory of his account of the development of Platonism in the fifteenth century. Of course, Hankins’s project is not a philosophical one, as he admits. Indeed, his goal is to place the transmission of Plato within a well-constructed historical context. However, I shall suggest at the end of this review some ways in which Hankins’s study should provoke philosophers to a more careful consideration of the arguments of Renaissance Platonists. (shrink)

Petrarch In exactly a hundred years had passed since Jacob Burckhardt published his famous essay The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, ...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Lost Italian Renaissance: Humanists, Historians, and Latin’s LegacyPaul Richard BlumChristopher S. Celenza. The Lost Italian Renaissance: Humanists, Historians, and Latin’s Legacy. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004. Pp. xx + 210. Cloth, $45.00This is a programmatic book about why and how philosophy should care about Renaissance texts. Celenza starts with an assessment of the neglect of the wealth of Latin (...) class='Hi'>Renaissance [End Page 485] sources by nineteenth-century historiography, followed by portraits of two prototypal twentieth-century historians and their philosophical approach. He proposes a method of study for Renaissance thinkers and exemplifies it with two key figures and with the concept of honor. A survey of the field of study and an appendix concerning Renaissance research in the US conclude the book."The Renaissance" as a field of research between the Middle Ages and what is now cowardly called "Early Modern" became legitimate through the awakening of national consciousness in the nineteenth century. Consequently, the emphasis lay on vernacular language works in Italy and elsewhere. Latin Renaissance literature never was worthy of Grossforschung, i.e., of national projects like the academy enterprises concerning world history or classical studies, even though classical philology originated in the humanists' emulation of the ancients. This however would be absorbed by the nineteenth-century idea of national character (12).Italian Hegelianism of the nineteenth and early-twentieth century included Renaissance philosophy in the evolution of national spirit, and the late Eugenio Garin as its pupil spent his scholarly life portraying with astounding precision and detail Italian Humanism and Renaissance as a dialectic and rational development. Equally diligent was the German born Paul Oskar Kristeller, clinging, however, to a very different understanding of philosophy, which Celenza describes as rationalist in the Kantian and metaphysical in the Platonico-Aristotelian tradition (41). Here the author underestimates the influence of Heidegger on Kristeller: his dissertation was clearly an interpretation of Plotinus in the light of existentialism, which still transpires in his famous Ficino book and many later philosophical statements. The problem with both approaches, that of Garin and that of Kristeller, is that those philosophers who ignore history (deliberately or incidentally) and those who lost an understanding of metaphysics do not know how to read Renaissance thinkers.'Microhistory' is the formula Celenza proposes: Richard Rorty's abolishing the notion of 'representing' reality in favor of evocation and conversation—both for the interpretation of the past and the past itself—and Pierre Bourdieux's notions of 'field' and 'relational thinking' open the possibility of locating past thinkers in their community and, consequently, the meaning of their philosophical endeavor. What Celenza exercised with Garin and Kristeller applies also to Renaissance authors. Under the heading 'Orthodoxy,' Celenza shows that it is unfortunate to censure Lorenzo Valla (+ 1457) or Marsilio Ficino (+ 1499) as being unorthodox or as precursors to the Reformation, because this perspective misses the point of their lives' work—namely, to find out what makes Christian beliefs and their sources Christian. Valla's discoveries in Greek and Latin philology and Ficino's experiments with magic are part of their scrutiny of orthopraxy (my term), the right way of Christian life, and are embedded in their conversations with friend and foe, who in some cases still await discovery. The far-reaching message of these two samples is: reading their work and studying their conversations is the way to study philosophy in the fifteenth century.The same is proven by engaging in social concepts such as 'honor.' Starting with a surprising appreciation of gender studies, Celenza suggests taking a look at intellectual masculinity among courtiers and writers. Then it turns out that Machiavelli bequeathed to modernity—perhaps as a caricature—the structure of struggle for power, ideas, and provision in which humanists were engaged, being the first large generation of intellectuals outside the safe haven of cathedrals and convents."What is really there?" is the concluding question. A new canon, the prelude to early modern sociology of scholarship, and models of—presently highly acclaimed—contextualization of intellectual productivity. Returning to the Latinity of Renaissance sources Celenza shows that even the emergence of vernacular literature, which bewitched nationalist historiography, was by itself a fruit... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:80 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Gilson often contrasts the God of Aquinas, who is esse, with the God of Augustine, who is essentia. This difference in terminology is taken as emphasizing the essentialist character of Augustine's thought. However, Professor Anderson maintains that essentia should not be regarded as equivalent to the Thomistic notion of essence. F,ssentia is derived, according to Augustine, from esse and is most equivalent to the Thomistic (...) ens. Hence, according to Anderson, Augustine was not ignoring or slighting the factor of existence when he referred to God as essentia. Once again, Anderson's point is valid only if we grant that esse meant "to exisff' for Augustine and could not be interpreted as meaning "to be unchangeable." That there is any doubt that esse meant "to exist" for Augustine seems to be ruled out by Anderson (p. 40). One of Anderson's most interesting theses is the suggestion that the Augustinian distinction between being and non-being is substantially the same as the Thomistie distinction between essence and existence. For Augustine God alone is esse itself, while all creatures are limited by non-esse, i.e., they share in both esse and non-esse. Similarly, for Aquinas only God is esse itself, while all creatures merely possess esse. It is evident that for both philosophers the distinction between what is esse itself and what is not csse itself provides an important way of distinguishing between God and creatures. How much more alike the two distinctions are will depend on how the notion of esse is interpreted by Augustine and Aquinas. One problem is bound to arise: If for Aquinas the "proportionality" of being is to be found in the relationship between esse and essentia in ens, while for Augustine essentia ---- ens, then either Augustine does not have a Thomistic notion of the analogy of being or it must be shown what Augustine 's equivalent for the Thomistic essentia would be. Non-being does not seem adequate for such a role. A good portion of Professor Anderson's essay is devoted to discussing Augustinian metaphysics precisely in the areas in which Gilson claims that Augustine's essentialism creates problems for Augustine the Christian. These include the problems of proving the existence of God, creation and the nature of participation. It is pointed out that many of Augustine's remarks which have frequently been supposed to be of Neoplatonic inspiration are in fact based upon Scripture as far as the Saint is concerned. Although I find some portions of his essay obscure, on the whole I should say that Professor Anderson's study is quite exciting and a considerable challenge to those who are tempted to draw striking contrasts between the "essentialism" of Augustine and the "existentialism" of Aquinas. BRUCE GARSIDE McGiU University Eight Philosophers o] the Italian Renaissance. By Paul Oskar Kristeller. (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1964.Pp. ix -~ 194.$5.00.) The eight chapters constituting the main body of this volume, devoted in succession to Petrarch, Valla, Ficino, Pieo, Pomponazzi, Telesio, Patrizi, and Bruno, are based on the Arensberg Lectures which were delivered by Professor Kristeller in 1961 at Stanford University. Footnotes and bibliographical references have been added, and as an appendix there is included an essay on "The Medieval Antecedents of Renaissance Humanism" which, though delivered as a lecture on several occasions, is here printed for the first time. The purpose of the series of eight lectures, as Kristeller indicates in his short preface, was "to give a brief survey of Italian thought during the Renaissance period". The aspects of Italian Renaissance thought, represented by the authors selected for discussion, are those traditionally described as humanism, Florentine Platonism, Paduan Aristotelianism, and speculative philosophies of nature. As representatives of the humanist movement Petrarch and Valla are selected, not merely because of their prominence but in order to make clear that Renaissance humanism cannot be identified with preference for a particular philosophical tradition. Petrarch preferred Plato to Aristotle, Augustine to Aquinas, and Cicero and Seneca to the Epicureans, whereas Valla preferred the Epicurean philosophy to that of the Stoics or Platonists, and appealed to Quintilian more than to Cicero in his proposals for a reform of... (shrink)

An account of the astrological controversies that arose in Renaissance Italy in the wake of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s _Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem_, published in 1496.

In this article the survival of the sapphic fragments of the ancient times in Renaissance period is examined. More specifically the reappearance of the sapphic verses is presented concerning the first publications (editio princeps) and the most widespread texts of ancient authors during West Renaissance. These texts were the primary sources, on which the later publications of the sapphic work were based, while they also had a great influence on the reception of the ancient poet by the (...) class='Hi'>Renaissance writers. (shrink)

Oberman, H. A. Quoscunque tulit foecunda vetustas.--Bouwsma, W. J. The two faces of humanism.--Gilmore, M. P. Italian reactions to Erasmian humanism.--Dresden, S. The profile of the reception of the Italian Renaissance in France.--IJsewijn, J. The coming of humanism to the Low Countries.--Hay, D. England and the humanities in the fifteenth century.--Spitz, L. W. The course of German humanism.

The first study of the rebirth of ancient sophists in Speroni (1500-1588) and the early-modern Italian literature, from Leonardo Bruni to Jacopo Mazzoni.

This paper examines the production and circulation of astrological prognostications regarding the illness and death of kings, princes, and popes in the Italian Renaissance . The distribution and consumption of this type of astrological information was often closely linked to the specific political situation in which they were produced. Depending on the astrological techniques used , and the media in which they appeared these prognostications fulfilled different functions in the information economy of Renaissance Italy. Some were used (...) to legitimise the rule of a political leader, others to do just the opposite. Astrological prorogations and interrogations were often used to plan military and political strategies in case of the illness or death of a political leader, while astrological prognostications were generally written to promote certain political leaders while undermining others. While certainly often partisan to this game, astrologers, for their part, worked within a very well established tradition that gave authority to their forecasts. This paper argues that, as indicators of deeper political tensions otherwise not always explicitly manifest, these prognostications are privileged sources of information providing a better understanding of the political history of the period. (shrink)

In this book, Christopher Celenza provides an intellectual history of the Italian Renaissance during the long fifteenth century, from c.1350–1525. His book fills a bibliographic gap between Petrarch and Machiavelli and offers clear case studies of contemporary luminaries, including Leonardo Bruni, Poggio Bracciolini, Lorenzo Valla, Marsilio Ficino, Angelo Poliziano, and Pietro Bembo. Integrating sources in Italian and Latin, Celenza focuses on the linked issues of language and philosophy. He also examines the conditions in which Renaissance intellectuals (...) operated in an era before the invention of printing, analyzing reading strategies and showing how texts were consulted, and how new ideas were generated as a result of conversations, both oral and epistolary. The result is a volume that offers a new view on both the history of philosophy and Italian Renaissance intellectual life. It will serve as a key resource for students and scholars of early modern Italian humanism and culture. (shrink)

The value of this book lies in its aspiration not to be a doxography, but to help us recover the tradition of the humanities or liberal arts, which Kristeller believes is presently threatened. It is easy to agree that this end would be promoted by a recovery of the original meaning of liberal education, as well as how it differs from the humanities and especially from humanism. The author intimates the rise of platonism in late medieval and renaissance thought (...) signifies a turn away from Aristotle's "divine science" and scholastic scientific theology to the study of man. The humanities would then take their origin from a change in orientation toward theology. While these opinions may be sound, this study does not show us that they are, for it rehearses opinion without exhibiting either its ground or import. Kristeller might have fulfilled his aim had he imitated the scholarship of the men he studies rather than that which thrives on the loss of the meaning of "liberal education." The eight philosophers are: Petrarch, Valla, Ficino, Pico, Pomponazzi, Telesio, Patrizi, Bruno. The appendix on the medieval antecedents of renaissance humanism is the best part of the book.—H. C. (shrink)

Virgil's fourth Eclogue is one of the most quoted, adapted and discussed works of classical literature. This study traces the fortunes of Eclogue 4 in the literature and art of the Italian Renaissance. It sheds new light on some of the most canonical works of Western art and literature, as well as introducing a large number of other, lesser-known items, some of which have not appeared in print since their original publication, while others are extant only in manuscript. (...) Individual chapters are devoted to the uses made of the fourth Eclogue in the political panegyric of Medici Florence, the Venetian Republic and the Renaissance papacy, and to religious appropriations of the Virgilian text in the genres of epic and pastoral poetry. The book also investigates the appearance of quotations from the poem in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century fresco cycles representing the prophetic Sibyls in Italian churches. (shrink)

This study uses university commentaries on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics as a window onto changing ideals and practices of education and of humanist Aristotelianism in Renaissance Italy, particularly in Florence, Padua, Bologna, and Rome (including the Collegio Romano).