Literature and Science :  

 Historical and Scientific Background:

Renaissance

 

 

 

 

a) BBC In Our Time: Renaissance.   A great place to start would be the programs on Renaissance Magic, Renaissance Astrology and Renaissance Maths. All of the programs are very useful radio discussions between the host Melvyn Bragg and three professors in the field who will discuss a major theme, author or historical period. Each one gives you three lifetimes of knowledge in 45 minutes. Download to your phone and listen at your leisure. They are also useful for a class period: students can practice taking notes while the program is on. And for students: you get a lot of easily digestible knowledge, giving you a real sense of the parameters of a subject without having to spend months reading!

 

b) Timeline for the Renaissance and Seventeenth Century Science.

 

1476

William Caxton sets up his press in Westminster. The advent of printing gives unprecedented  impetus to the formation of a standard language and begins the period of early modern English.

 

1517

Martin Luther sets off the Protestant Reformation, calling into question the validity of received religious authority and ultimately aiding in the secularization of modern society.

 

1543

Copernicus initiates the Scientific Revolution with his work On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, which argued that the Earth revolves around the Sun; Andreas Vesalius publishes his work On the Fabric of the Human Body, first modern reference on human anatomy.

 

1546

Girolamo Fracastoro theorizes that contagious diseases are caused by invisible bodies that pass from one person to another (see 1861).

1590

Zacharias Janssen makes the first compound microscope.

 

1600

Italian philosopher Giordano Bruno, having hypothesized the existence of multiple worlds and rejected the geocentric astronomy, is burned at the stake after an 8 year trial by the Inquisition.

 

1607

Jamestown settlers arrive in Virginia, first permanent British settlement in North America.

 

1608

Hans Lipperhey invents the telescope in Holland.

 

1609

Galileo builds his first telescope, eventually obtains a magnification of about 30.

 

1610

Galileo's Starry Messenger announces the existence of myriads of new stars, shows the moon to be deformed by huge mountains and craters rather than being a perfect sphere, and reveals the existence of four moons orbiting Jupiter.

 

1611

King James translation of the Bible, becomes the standard for more than three centuries. It and the works of Shakespeare (1564-1616) become the two most important influences on the development of English during the final decades of the Renaissance.

 

1615

In his work "Concerning the Use of Biblical Quotations in the Matters of Science," Galileo argues that faith and reason cannot be in contradiction because the Bible and creation are both of divine origin. However, in questions concerning nature, science supersedes theology when there appears to be a contradiction, since the Bible was intended to be understood by common people and can be readily reinterpreted in a way that nature cannot be.

 

1619

Lucilio Vanini is burned alive at the stake for his proposal that humans evolved from apes.

 

1628

William Harvey describes blood circulation and explains the function of the valves in the veins.

 

1632

Galilieo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, Ptolemaic and Copernican is the clearest and best argument yet of  the Copernican system. A literary work, set in the form of a dialogue and aimed at the largest popular audience, it angers the pope and is banned.

 

1633

Roman Catholic Inquisition forces Galileo to recant his Copernican view.

 

1642

Galileo dies, Pope Urban VIII prohibits any monument to his memory. Isaac Newton born.

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