ex cathedra: Alternative Renaissance

Friday, August 30, 2013

Alternative Renaissance

A funny thought.

The Renaissance was largely the re-integration by the Christian West of its Greco-Roman pagan roots. Who leads Dante through the Inferno? Virgil. Two of the three traitors eternally chewed in Satan's mouth there (the third being Judas) are the kilers of Julius Caesar. Even on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, in a supporting but visible role, we find the Sybils, pagan female shamans who foretold the future in ecstatic trances. Not unlike the Delphic Oracle herself. The Sybil is even mentioned in the great medieval death-chant, Dies Irae...dixit David cum Sybilla...the Jewish and the Gentile prophets mixed together.

What if the Renaissance had begun in the North instead? Would we have chapels mixing Isaiah with the Norns. Country houses with Odin and Thor painted on the ceiling? Would our classics scholars be studying Norse and quoting wisely from the Edda?

Funny to think it.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...: An interesting idea, but I'm not sure it would've been possible. A crucial part of the Renaissance was an rediscovery of Classical European due to increased contact between Italians and North African/Middle Eastern cultures, which had maintained archives of the great Greek and Roman thinkers, and even added some medieval Muslim works, particularly in the province of mathematics.

The only place in Europe where these documents were saved was Ireland, specifically, the Irish monasteries. Unless Ireland had somehow become a trade hub, I'm not sure Northern Europeans would've disseminated Classical thinking and used it.

Plus, there's the kinship factor. You're going to be more interested in the writings of your ancestors from when they had a mighty civilization than those of some people who kicked conquered your ancestors.

But perhaps the increase in nationalistic sentiments in Northern Europe constitutes the Northern European equivalent of a Renaissance; remember, Renaissance simply means "rebirth" of a culture and it takes about a millennium for a culture that has collapsed to revive.

Veddy interesting...

-Sean; 2:56 PM, August 30, 2013

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