Talk:Italian Renaissance

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	Italian Renaissance is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you can update or improve it, please do.
	This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on September 11, 2005.
Article Milestones Date Process Result June 23, 2005 Peer review Reviewed July 24, 2005 Featured article candidate Promoted Current Status: Featured article

This article has been selected for Version 0.5 and the next release version of Wikipedia. This History article has been rated FA-Class on the assessment scale.

Contents 1 Wrongly promoted to featured article status 2 Improvement Drive 3 About the revert 4 History Portal Selected Article 5 Minor Enlightenment Question 6 Refining this article

[edit] Wrongly promoted to featured article status

This article was wrongly promoted to featured status. I participated in the review process and raised three objections. One was addressed (footnotes), I withdrew another (I wanted people with a bit of expertise to look it over) and the third (issues with the style and grammar) I left in place. It was the only remaining objection, and I attempted to address it myself, going through half the article, improving the style. The latter half still contains choppy sentences, missing commas and other problems. If my objection is deemed unactionable (which I do not believe will happen) then it is one thing, but to simply promote an article to featured status that has a standing objection (and one about something as important as style) is not right. Most likely, this was an accident, but we need to address all actionable objections before featuring articles. I'll continue working to address my own objection, but the stylistic problems remain in the latter half. --Zantastik talk 08:01, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Improvement Drive

The article Culture of Italy has been listed to be improved on Wikipedia:This week's improvement drive. You can add your vote there if you would like to support the article.--Fenice 14:21, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Zantastik is right: this is not Wikipedia at its very best. It's a well-worn adage that every American High School graduate considers himself an expert on the Italian Renaissance. It may prove difficult to free this article of some of its twaddle and poppycock, with editors suppressing text such as:

It saw man as inherently good by nature which is in contrast to the Christian view of man as the original sinner who must be redeemed.

with remarks like "mainstream Christianity (cf. Gnosticism), has always preached that humans are essentially good. Redemption does not necessary conflict w/ this"

To suggest that such an editor read Pico della Mirandola or this or that would be pretentious and self-defeating. But can we maintain a minimum of decorum and competence in editing here? --Wetman 08:59, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] About the revert

I believe that a change a substantial as the recent one, moving the dates for the Italian Renaissance from the "14th to 16th centuries" to "1400-1600", and eliminating all discussion of the music of the trecento, the explosion of secular music which defined the musical Renaissance, even though it retained some medieval stylistic traits, --hidden under an edit summary of "copyediting and spacing" -- is far too large to be done without a bit of discussion here. Do we have some agreement that we can discuss the 14th century in this article? The version prior to my revert included the curious line "Nonetheless, 15th-century Italian Renaissance music and its composers were rather obscure, so much of its early history remains a mystery" --which is simply not true. It's only a mystery if you eliminate all discussion of the music of the trecento. Antandrus (talk) 05:27, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps I should delete some sentences and restore other ones. The acceptable beginning and end dates for the Renaissance, as well as Renaissance music, are 1400 to 1600. And Francesco Landini is generally regarded as a Medieval composer. Marcus2 15:09, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

What do you mean by "acceptable?" Both Encarta and the Columbia Encyclopedia have it beginning in the 14th century, as does pretty much every scholarly book I have read. Please also read the "End of the Italian Renaissance" section. It clearly states that the most common end dates are 1494 and 1527. Music is exceptional in that it is generally taken to still be Renaissance by 1600. - SimonP 15:21, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

The truth is that in the 14th century, there were some Renaissance characteristics, but many aspects of Italian life and society were largely Medieval. It did not actually come into full swing until about 1400. Marcus2 15:33, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Italian society was still largely medieval in 1700, the arts however had quite clearly changed in the fourteenth century. Please present some citations to support for your proposed dates. Here, for instance, is a quote from De Lamar Jensen's Renaissance Europe. "It is impossible to impose a rigid time frame on this period. Nevertheless by the latter half of the fourteenth century, as Europe was gradually recovering from the heaviest ravages of the Black Death, many of these characteristics were coming into play." ... "By the time of Petrarch's and Boccaccio's deaths (in 1374 and 1375 respectively), as their disciples were carrying the ideals of humanism into all parts of Italy, the spirit of the Renaissance was beginning to distinguish itself on a large enough scale to distinguish itself as a major movement". ... "Its manifestations were most pronounced in Italy from the late fourteenth to early sixteenth centuries (roughly 1375 to 1525)." (pg. 2) - SimonP 15:40, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

You're absolutely right. There is no rigid time frame. However, Renaissance art and music was largely Medieval throughout virtually all of the 1300s, I believe. I have looked through a couple books for Italian art and all I find is art from the 15th and 16th centuries. In addition, the Encarta Encyclopedia classifies Italian artists born in the late 1300s and early 1400s as "Early Renaissance". Also, after the Renaissance period ended, the Baroque period began, and I don't believe it began in the early 1500s. Marcus2 19:29, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Calling the trecento "medieval", and placing figures such as Giotto and Petrarch outside of the Renaissance, is to put it politely, nonsense. And speaking of music, it is utterly impossible to understand what happened in the 15th century without first discussing the 14th. No, the Renaissance in Italy encompassed the 14th century. There are no clear divisions between historical epochs; it's not like everyone woke up on January 1, 1401 and said, "hey, it's the Renaissance now, let's go in the streets and dance!" There are transitional periods between all eras, and scholars in different fields never precisely agree on dates. I'm not going to revert you for now: I'm giving you the opportunity to do it yourself. Not including the 14th century in this article is a disastrous factual error. Antandrus (talk) 20:48, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps you didn't fully understand my edits, particularly my most recent one. I never put Giotto and Petrarch outside the Renaissance. What I did say was that the Renaissance traces its origins to the earlier chunk of the 14th century. I am including the 14th century in some way. Maybe it was a tad earlier than 1400 when the Renaissance was in full swing. Marcus2 21:11, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] History Portal Selected Article

Hello, I'm a random guy who is volunteering to help with the terribly outdated History Portal.

The only thing I've done so far is..... CONGRATULATIONS! Italian Renaissance is now the History Portal selected article! Way to go; this is a very good article.

Please hop on over to the History Portal and help me bring all of it up to date. It's been so neglected it's tragic.

Peace,

NickDupree 13:39, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Minor Enlightenment Question

I am curious about that statement that Copernicus, Francis Bacon, and Descartes are often referred to as early Enlightenment figures. Descartes I can accept. Bacon seems borderline; I do not remember seeing this sort of claim made for him, but it sort of makes sense. Copernicus? He was older than Luther! I have read enough about Copernicus that I would expect to remember seeing this if it were a common claim. Maybe I overlooked it, though. Who does say it? Maestlin 18:26, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

It seems dubious to me as well. I removed that statement; if someone has a citation, they can add it back.--ragesoss 04:24, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Refining this article

Perhaps this article is still not as good as we seem to think it is. I have made a number of revisions, introducing names, dates, examples to take the place of some of the vague generalities. I have also added to the scanty Main article... headings: comparison with the smaller, more focused "branch" articles often gives clues to improving sections of this "trunk" article. There is much residual confusion between aspects of the High Middle Ages and the Italian Renaissance. This article should certainly mention all the major Renaissance figures of Italy, with brief disambiguations to set them in context: Julius II wasn't mentioned. No one contributing to this article seems to have read anything from the C15 save Il principe. Coverage of painting is primitive. The minor arts, the arts of life, are not touched: think of majolica or cassone. The revival of the villa and of gardens, the ideal city (Filarete, Sforzinda), court entertainments like the masque, the art of the medal, Botticelli, Fra Angelico—no mentions. Please vet my changes individually, and assess their individual motivation, for none was arbitrary or thoughtless. Thank you. --Wetman 19:34, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Articles in the Wikipedia Index beginning "Renaissance..." that concern the Italian Renaissance but which don't yet appear here as Main article:... section headings: Renaissance classicism, Renaissance dance, Renaissance literature, Renaissance philosophy. Don't each of these "branch" articles deserve a subsection heading and a condensed treatment? --Wetman 19:52, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Good edits. Stylistically speaking, I'm not sure I agree with the use of "floating Main article" templates. Typically they are found directly underneath a section heading, to signify that that section is a summary of a main article elsewhere. When they float in the middle of a section, it looks bad and is confusing, choppy. Better to incorporate the link into the text, or create a new section if it really is that relevant that it needs a main article tag to make it stand out. Also this article made Featured about a year ago, not sure it would pass now. Few pictures, few footnotes except from Peter Burke, no historiography. -- Stbalbach 20:21, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I was curious to know if anyone would be willing to discuss the view of the renaissance by scholars today, as many scholars now see the renaissance as a time period which had very little affect on anyone except the elite upper class. Thanks