The Florentine Renaissance Essays

The Florentine Renaissance Essays The Florentine Renaissance Essay The Florentine Renaissance Essay In Florence, and also in the surrounding cities, the Renaissance was a time of awakening and rebirth. A time of examining the present and looking towards a future that would turn out to seem entirely different from the past, but at the same time hold striking similarities. How was this possible? The transformations in Florence began with new attitudes and new priorities in the minds of her citizens. At the beginning of the period that we call the Renaissance, many cities may have seemed very much alike. Most had similar economic structures, architecture, and trades. But some cities in Italy, especially Florence, were different: The towns often had Roman origins, and to a degree survived the social disorder of the barbarian invasions of the earlier middle ages. Not only was physical infrastructure often in place, but also the glue which gave order to civic arrangements, in form of the hardy survival of Roman law. Each town had its myth of origin, which not surprisingly usually fea tured a picture of a Roman, in the case of Florence usually Julius Caesar of the emperor Augustus. (12).Florence had a very strong history that had obvious influence on daily life. Therefore, even while Renaissance ideas and art began to take over, the foundations of the city were never lost or forgotten. Rather, the old was incorporated into the new.Florence was steeped in her Roman origins and her Christianity, both playing to full effect when dressed in the rhetoric of cultural supremacy. (20). Florentines were proud of their roots and their contemporary culture, and they demonstrated this in sometimes chaotic ways. We also know that religion was what made the city turn. Florentines lives were focused around Christianity. Religion saturated Florentine life to an extent that few questioned. (32). This attitude of revolutionizing their culture while at the same time maintaining long-he