Browse Items (202 total)

The philosophy of the Enlightenment is nothing if not versatile. This can be readily observed in the contemporary world, with every side of any political fight claiming that “rights” and “reason” lend support to their arguments. This modern…

Neoclassical architecture, which looked not to the Renaissance for its inspiration as the preceding baroque and rococo styles had, but instead to the classical world, was Enlightenment philosophy realized as marble and glass. Like their counterparts…

The Florence Cathedral, officially called the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore (the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Flower) and usually simply referred to as “il Duomo,” or “the Cathedral,” is arguably the Florentine building. It has earned this…

The Rundetaarn, whose name is Danish for “Round Tower,” is a remarkable piece of Early Modern architecture. This is not due to the technologies used to build it (which were standard for the time), nor its actual design (which is utilitarian and,…

The Bank of Amsterdam was originally a town hall, but was converted into a bank by the city of Amsterdam in the year 1609. The Bank of Amsterdam is considered to be the first modern central bank. As the Netherlands entered the Dutch Golden Age in the…

Pictured in this engraving is Marie Angélique Arnauld, who served as abbess of the Abbey of Port-Royal near Paris. She was a leading proponent of Jansenism, a theological movement in seventeenth century France. It emphasized the reading of Scripture…

A religious educator as depicted in this picture, Angela Merici (1474-1540) was the founder of the Company of St.Ursula, “a group of lay single women and widows [who are] dedicated to the poor” (Wiesner-Hanks, 189). The company “received papal…

Written in 1302, Pietro de Crescenzi’s famous “Ruralia Commodia” offers a unique perspective on rural peasant life in the early modern era. This particular illustration depicting two peasant men mowing hay was included in the book’s first publication…

Within The Republic, Plato sought to answer questions regarding ethics and to design an ideal government. For this item, The Republic will largely be discussed in terms of its political theory. His conception of justice, morality, and metaphysics can…

This medal was commissioned by Pope Gregory XIII in commemoration of the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, one of the bloodiest events of the French Wars of Religion. Catholics targeted and killed many prominent Protestants who were in Paris for the…

Almost three years after Martin Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses set off a religious wildfire, Pope Leo X issued this papal bull, named after the first two words in the Latin text, “Arise, O Lord.” The document lists forty-one purported errors of Luther.…

In the face of a proliferation of Protestant books and other writings across the European continent, the papacy created the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, “the Index of Banned Books.” By outlawing the ownership and reading of works that expressed…