Fully illustrated throughout, The Renaissance is a highly accessible and colourful journey along the cultural contours of Europe from the Late Middle Ages to the early modern period.

The word renaissance means "rebirth," and the most obvious example of this phenomenon was the regeneration of Europe's classical Roman roots. The Renaissance began in northern Italy in the late 14th century and culminated in England in the early 17th century. Emphasis on the dignity of man (though not of woman) and on human potential distinguished the Renaissance from the previous Middle Ages. In poetry and literature, individual thought and action were prevalent, while depictions of the human form became a touchstone of Renaissance art. In science and medicine the macrocosm and microcosm of the human condition inspired remarkable strides in research and discovery, and the Earth itself was explored, situating Europeans within a wider realm of possibilities. Organized thematically, the Handbook to Life in Renaissance Europe covers all aspects of life in Renaissance Europe: History; religion; art and visual culture; architecture; literature and language; music; warfare; commerce; exploration and travel; science and medicine; education; daily life.

Arun Bala challenges Eurocentric conceptions of history by showing how Chinese, Indian, Arabic, and ancient Egyptian ideas in philosophy, mathematics, cosmology and physics played an indispensable role in making possible the birth of modern science.

This is the first large-scale historical investigation of the critical first stage of European integration, the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). John Gillingham discusses the thirty year Franco-German struggle for heavy industry mastery in Western Europe, describes the dreams and schemes of Jean Monnet, who designed the heavy industry pool, reveals the American vision that inspired his work, and discloses how his transatlantic partners used their great authority to assure its completion. Gillingham also lays bare the operating mechanisms of the coal-steel pool, showing that contrary to the hopes of Monnet and his supporters, the ECSC restored rather than reformed the European economy, leaving as a legacy not a detrustified industry, but one still dominated by the giant producers of the Ruhr.

This revised and updated paperback edition covers the introduction of the euro, the fall of Milosevic, and the impact of September 11 in European integration. The rejuvenation of Europe as a totalitarian century ends and a global century begins is a remarkable story. This book brings together the three dynamics of Europe's position at this extraordinary moment: European monetary union, the deepening of intra-EU cooperation, and the widening of the EU and NATO to take in central European members. It looks at the broad political and policy implications of EMU and shows how the United States views this integration. Elizabeth Pond, a longtime observer of events in Europe and Russia, sees these developments as the beginning of a new postnational European system that is replacing the centuries-old nation-state system. She shows how belligerence and anarchy have faded away on the European continent as compulsory cold war cooperation becomes a habit and as French-German reconciliation becomes the pattern for reconciliation between other old enemies. She follows NATO's transformation into a reluctant peacemaker in Bosnia and the United States' decision to remain a European power. She describes the leap of faith needed to create European monetary union and charts the magnetic attraction of both NATO and the EU in shaping the democratic, economic, and social revolutions in central Europe. She warns about the strains that will face the transatlantic relationship when the euro is on a par with the dollar as a reserve currency. And she concludes by agreeing with former Polish foreign minister Wladyslaw Barteszewski that we are witnessing, after the original birth of European consciousness a millennium ago, the rebirth of Europe.

Examines the intellectual and artistic foundations of the Imperial Renaissance in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Italy and traces its political realization in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe.

Renaissance Italy.