Browse Items (202 total)

In Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, the influence of Italian political ideas is clearly evident throughout the book. Hobbes’s specifically parallels Machiavelli’s focus on the unity and security of a state in the Prince. This idea of state unity is very…

In Thomas Hobbes’s “Leviathan,” he draws out a widespread system of politics and governance based around the idea of a social contract between the public of a state and their sovereign or ruler. Hobbes argues for an absolute monarchy backed…

John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government reflect the anti-absolutist sentiments woven throughout England’s political fabric. He outlined the Law of Nature and how it granted each person the right to life, liberty, health, and property, maintaining…

Healing during the Early Modern period was very often the property of the church and of faith. Pilgrims would go on long journeys to the resting places of saints and other holy figures, in order to find any form of healing they could (Wiesner-Hanks…

This map of Flanders and Hainaut was constructed by Mercator following surveys by Jacob van Deventer. The above engraving is one of many engravings of this map, which became the standard map for the region. Historians have postulated that the…

16th century Europe saw the rise of the nation-state in many kingdoms. Monarchs across Europe sought to consolidate their power and develop large centralized institutions (Wiesner-Hanks 88). Additionally, New military technology led to an increase…

The beginning of the 18th century saw the final years of the Enlightenment and the beginning of a new era defined by colonial expansion. If maritime history during the early modern period was characterized by exploration and conquest, the 19th…

First published in Nuremberg in 1477, this woodcut portrait of Marco Polo describes the famous Venetian merchant as a “Great Traveller” and a discoverer of the “Great Wonders of the World”. Polo’s extensive travels to Asia in the late 13th century…

The Marekerk in Leiden is an exceptionally interesting study in how values can impact design when it comes to functional buildings, like churches. This is one of several Lutheran churches built in this style in the Netherlands, where Protestantism…

There has been substantial debate over the past 500 years over whether Martin Luther’s doctrine – and the Protestant Reformation as a whole – should be seen as a move towards a more egalitarian society. Should we see Luther’s Reformation as a…

Despite being born in Crete, Doménikos Theotokópoulos is perhaps the most recognizable Spanish painter from the 16th century. Known as El Greco, the artist moved from Venetian Greece to Venice itself to study sometime between the ages of 19 and 25,…

The mainstream Enlightenment may have put an emphasis on individual liberties and free thought, but these ideas rarely extended to “second class” members of early modern European society, including women. Mary Wollstonecraft, a feminist philosopher…