Description
This book brings together a bold revision of the traditional view of the Renaissance with a new comparative synthesis of global empires in early modern Europe. It examines the rise of a virulent form of Renaissance scholarship, art, and architecture that had as its aim the revival of the cultural and political grandeur of the Roman Empire in Western Europe. Imperial humanism, a distinct form of humanism, emerged in the earliest stages of the Italian Renaissance as figures such as Petrarch, Guarino, and Biondo sought to revive and advance the example of the Caesars and their empire. Originating in the courts of Ferrara, Mantua, and Rome, this movement also revived ancient imperial iconography in painting and sculpture, as well as Vitruvian architecture. While the Italian princes never realized their dream of political power equal to the ancient emperors, the Imperial Renaissance they set in motion reached its full realization in the global empires of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spain, France, and Great Britain.
Chapter
The Imperial Renaissance in the Northern Italian Courts
Leonello d’Este as a New Caesar
The Gonzaga and Imperial Palace Culture
Renaissance Rome as New Imperial City: Phase One
2 The Return of Caesar: The Hybrid Empire of Charles V, 1517 to 1556
The Aragonese Mediterranean Empire
Adding the Name of Caesar to Spanish King
Machiavelli and Charles V as the Imperial Prince
Marcus Aurelius as Ideal Emperor in the Spanish Renaissance
Charles V and the “Empire of the World”
The Imperial Coronation in Bologna, 1529 to 1530
The Roman Imperial Palace of Charles V in Granada
Caesar and the Art of War
Charles V and Global Empire
The Imperial Image of Charles V
Transitions: 1549 to 1558
3 The Spanish Empire, Apex of the Imperial Renaissance
Imperial Inheritance as Triumph and Challenge, 1545 to 1577
The New World in the Age of Philip II
The Age of Imperial Consolidation and Exploitation
El Escorial and Philip II as the New Constantine
The Renaissance of Empire in Italy in the Age of Philip II
The Imperial Renaissance in Florence
Philip II and the Conquest of the Portuguese Empire
Imperial Limits: The Wars against England and France
Philip III, Tacitus, and the Arts of Imperial Maintenance
4 The Renaissance of Empire in France
Early Renaissance Images of the French Imperial Monarchy
The Imperial Political Science of Jean Bodin
Louis XIII, Richelieu, and the Belliqueuse Nation
The Perfect Captain and the Bellicose Nation
The French Empire in the Age of Louis XIV
The Imperial Arts and Louis XIV
The French Empire in North America
The War of the Spanish Succession and the End of Louis XIV’s Imperial Project
5 Britain as Late Renaissance Empire
Bucer and Edward VI as the New Constantine
Elizabeth I: From Constantine to Caesar
James I and the “Imperial Crown of Great Britain”
Inigo Jones and the Vitruvian Revival in Britain
Colonies for the Imperial Crown
Charles II and the Ancients