Suggested Resources

*Asterisk denotes books recommended for young readers.

1. General Background

Breisach, Ernst. Renaissance Europe 1300–1517. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1973.

Burckhardt, Jakob. The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy. Trans. by S. G. C. Middlemore. 2 vols. New York: Harper & Row, 1958.

Ferguson, Wallace K. Europe in Transition 1300–1520. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962.

——. The Renaissance in Historical Thought. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1948.

Grendler, Paul F., ed. Encyclopedia of the Renaissance. 6 vols. New York: Scribners, 1999. Authoritative and thorough.

Hale, John, ed. A Concise Encyclopedia of the Italian Renaissance. London: Thames & Hudson, 1981. Short and useful.

Hay, Denys. Europe in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1966.

Rice, Eugene F., Jr. The Foundations of Early Modern Europe 1460–1559. New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 1970.

Ross, James Bruce and Mary Martin McLaughlin, eds. The Portable Renaissance Reader. New York: The Viking Press, 1953.

2. Humanism and Education

D'Amico, John F. Renaissance Humanism in Papal Rome. Baltimore: The John Hopkins Press, 1983.

Erasmus, Desiderius. The Erasmus Reader. Ed. by Erika Rummel. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990.

Grendler, Paul F. Schooling in Renaissance Italy. Literacy and Learning 1300–1600. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989.

——. The Universities of the Italian Renaissance. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002.

Gundersheimer, Werner L., ed. The Italian Renaissance. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1965.

Houston, R.A. Literacy in Early Modern Europe: Culture and Education, 1500–1800. Rev. ed. New York: Longman, 2002.

Kristeller, Paul Oskar. Renaissance Thought II. Papers on Humanism and the Arts. New York: Harper & Row, 1965.

——. Renaissance Thought: The Classic, Scholastic, and Humanist Strains. New York: Harper & Row, 1961.

Nauert, Charles, Jr. Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.

Woodward, William H. Vittorino da Feltre and Other Humanist Educators. New York: Columbia University Teachers College, 1963.

3. Nation, Politics, and War: General, Italy, Other Regions

General

Hall, Bert S. Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe: Gunpowder, Technology, and Tactics. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Mattingly, Garrett. Renaissance Diplomacy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1955.

Skinner, Quentin. The Foundations of Modern Political Thought. Vol. 1: The Renaissance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978.

Italy

Brucker, Gene A. Renaissance Florence. Rev. ed. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983.

*Chambers, D.S. The Imperial Age of Venice 1380–1580. London: Thames & Hudson, 1970. Illustrated popular account.

Hale, John R. Florence and the Medici: The Pattern of Control. London: Thames & Hudson, 1977.

Lane, Frederic C. Venice: A Maritime Republic. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973.

Laven, Peter. Renaissance Italy 1464–1534. London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1971.

Machiavelli, Niccolò. The Letters of Machiavelli. Trans. and ed. by Allan Gilbert. New York: Capricorn Books, 1961.

——. The Prince and selected Discourses. Trans. by Daniel Donno. New York: Bantam Books, 1966. There are many other translations of this important work.

Mallett, Michael. Mercenaries and their Masters: Warfare in Renaissance Italy. Totowa, N.J.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1974.

Other Regions

Baumgartner, Frederic J. France in the Sixteenth Century. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995.

Elliott, John H. Imperial Spain 1469–1716. New York: New American Library, 1963.

Elton, G. R. England Under the Tudors. 3rd. ed. New York: Routledge, 1991.

Evans, R. J. W. The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1550–1700: An Interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985.

Guy, John. Tudor England. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Holt, Mack P. The French Wars of Religion, 1562–1629. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.

Israel, Jonathan. The Dutch Republic: Its Rise, Greatness, and Fall, 1477–1806. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

Mattingly, Garrett. The Armada. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959.

Youings, Joyce. Sixteenth-Century England. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1984.

Zophy, Jonathan W. The Holy Roman Empire: A Dictionary Handbook. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1980.

4. Society and Economy [includes Women and Jewish Life]

Bell, Rudolph. M. How To Do It. Guides to Good Living for Renaissance Italians. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999.

Bonfil, Roberto. Jewish Life in Renaissance Italy. Trans. by Anthony Oldcorn. Berkeley: California University Press, 1994.

Brown, Judith C., and Robert C. Davis, eds. Gender and Society in Renaissance Italy. London: Longman, 1998.

*Brucker, Gene. Giovanni and Lusanna: Love and Marriage in Renaissance Florence. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986.

Burke, Peter. Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe. Rev. ed. Brookfield, Vermont: Scolar Press, 1994.

Cipolla, Carlo M. Before the Industrial Revolution. European Society and Economy, 1000–1700. New York: Norton & Co., 1976.

——, ed. The Fontana Economic History of Europe: The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. Glasgow: Collins/Fontana Books, 1974.

Davis, Natalie Zemon. Society and Culture in Early Modern France. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1975.

Huppert, George. After the Black Death. A Social History of Early Modern Europe. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986.

Israel, Jonathan I. European Jewry in the Age of Mercantilism. 3rd ed. Portland, Or: Valentine Mitchell, 1998.

King, Margaret L. Women of the Renaissance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991.

Origo, Iris. The Merchant of Prato, Franceso di Marco Datini, 1335–1410. New York: Knopf, 1957, with many reprints. Excellent account of the family life and business of a merchant.

Roth, Cecil. The Jews in the Renaissance. New York: Harper & Row, 1959.

Swetz, Frank J. Capitalism and Arithmetic. The New Math of the 15th Century. La Salle, Ill.: Open Court, 1987.

Warnicke, Retha M. Women of the English Renaissance and Reformation. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1983.

5. Art and Architecture: General, Italy, Other

General

Aston, Margaret. The Panorama of the Renaissance. New York: Abrams, 2000.

Holmes, George. Renaissance. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996.

*Janson, H.W., and Anthony F. Janson. History of Art for Young People. 5th ed. N.Y.: Abrams, 1997.

Levey, Michael. Early Renaissance. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin, 1967.

McCorquodale, Charles. The Renaissance: European painting, 1400–1600. London: Studio Editions, 1994.

Murray, Linda. The High Renaissance and Mannerism: Italy, the North and Spain, 1500–1600. New York: Thames & Hudson, 1985.

Murray, Peter, and Linda Murray. The Art of the Renaissance. London: Thames & Hudson, 1985.

Shearman, John. Mannerism. Baltimore: Penguin, 1967.

Italy

Avery, Charles. Florentine Renaissance Sculpture. London: J. Murray, 1970.

Baxandall, Michael. Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy. A Primer in the Social History of Pictorial Style. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Hartt, Frederick. History of Italian Renaissance Art. 4th ed. Rev. by David G. Wilkins. New York: Abrams, 1994.

Hopkins, Andrew. Italian Architecture: from Michelangelo to Borromini. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002.

Pope-Hennessy, J. Italian Renaissance Sculpture, 3rd ed. Oxford: Phaidon, 1986.

Rosand, David. Painting in Sixteenth-Century Venice: Titian, Veronese, Tintoretto. Rev. ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.

Rowe, Colin. Italian Architecture of the 16th Century. Princeton: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002.

Seymour, Charles. Sculpture in Italy, 1400–1500. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin, 1966.

Taylor, Pamela, ed. The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci. New York: New American Library, 1960.

Vasari, Giorgio. Lives of the Artists. Trans. by George Bull. Baltimore: Penguin, 1965.

Other Regions

Bialostocki, Jan. The Art of the Renaissance in Eastern Europe: Hungary, Bohemia, Poland. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1976.

Blunt, Anthony. Art and Architecture in France 1500–1700. 4th ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982.

Brown, Jonathan. The Golden Age of Painting in Spain. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991.

Chastel, André. French Art: The Renaissance, 1430–1620. Paris: Abbeville Press, 1995.

Cuttler, Charles D. Northern Painting: From Pucelle to Bruegel. Fort Worth, Tex.: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1991.

Gent, Lucy, ed. Albion's Classicism: The Visual Arts in Britain, 1550–1660. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995.

Moffitt, John F. The Arts in Spain. New York: Thames & Hudson, 1999.

Snyder, James. Northern Renaissance Art. New York: Abrams, 1985.

6. Music and Theater

Atlas, Allan W., ed. Renaissance Music: Music in Western Europe, 1400–1600. New York: W. W. Norton, 1998.

Brown, Howard Mayer, and Louis K. Stein. Music in the Renaissance. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1999.

*Charney, Maurice. All of Shakespeare. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

Doughtie, Edward. English Renaissance Song. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1986.

Fenlon, Iain. Music and Culture in Late Renaissance Italy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

——, ed. The Renaissance from the 1470s to the End of the 16th Century. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1989.

Hunter, George K. English Drama, 1586–1642. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.

McKendrick, Melveena. Theater in Spain 1490–1700. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.

Palisca, Claude V. Baroque Music. Reprint, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1991.

*Yancey, Diane. Life in the Elizabethan Theater. The Way People Live Series. San Diego: Lucent Books, 1997.

7. Literature: General, English

General

Ariosto, Ludovico. Orlando Furioso (The Frenzy of Orlando). Trans. by Barbara Reynolds. 2 vols. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1975.

Bentley, Eric, ed. The Genius of the Italian Theater. New York: The New American Library, 1964. Seven Italian plays, four from the Renaissance.

Bishop, Morris. Petrarch and His World. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1963.

Boccaccio, Giovanni. The Decameron. Trans. by G.H. McWilliam. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1972.

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de. The Portable Cervantes. Trans. by Samuel Putnam. New York: The Viking Press, 1951.

Hardin, James, and Max Reinhart, eds. German Writers of the Renaissance and Reformation, 1280–1580. Dictionary of Literary Biography, vol. 179. Detroit: Gale Research, 1997. Has biographies of 40 writers.

McFarlane, I.D. Renaissance France, 1470–1589. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1974.

Montaigne, Michel de. Montaigne's Essays and Selected Writings. A Bilingual Edition. Trans. and ed. by Donald M. Frame. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1963.

More, Thomas. Utopia. Trans. by Paul Turner. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1965. Many reprints and other translations.

Pascal, Roy. German Literature in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries: Renaissance, Reformation, Baroque. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1968.

Rabelais, François. The Histories of Gargantua and Pantagruel. Trans. by J. M. Cohen. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1955.

English

*Andrews, John F., ed. Shakespeare's World and Work. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2001.

Bacon, Francis. The Advancement of Learning and New Atlantis. Ed. by Arthur Johnston. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974. Many other editions of these works.

Boyce, Charles. Shakespeare A to Z. The Essential Reference to His Plays, His Poems, His Life and Times, and More. New York: Dell Publishing, 1990.

Donne, John. John Donne: A Selection of His Poetry. Ed. by John Hayward. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1950.

Haydn, Hiram, ed. The Portable Elizabethan Reader. New York: Viking Press, 1955.

Lewis, C.S. Preface to Paradise Lost. N.Y.: Oxford University Press, 1961.

Marlowe, Christopher. The Complete Plays. New York: Viking Press, 1969.

Milton, John. Paradise Lost. Ed. by John Leonard. New York: Penguin Books, 2003.

Shakespeare, William. The Complete Works of Shakespeare. Ed. by David Bevington. 4th ed. New York: Scott, Foresman, 1997.

Schoenbaum, Sidney. Shakespeare: The Globe and the World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1979.

Sidney, Philip. Selected Prose and Poetry. Ed. by Robert Kimbrough. 2nd edition. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1983.

Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queene. Ed. by A.C. Hamilton. New York: Longman, 1977.

8. Religion

Bireley, Robert. The Refashioning of Catholicism, 1450–1700. Washington, D.C: The Catholic University of America Press, 1999.

Chadwick, Owen. The Reformation. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1964.

O'Connell, Marvin. The Counter Reformation 1560–1610. New York: Harper & Row, 1974.

O'Malley, John W. The First Jesuits. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993.

Spitz, Lewis W. The Protestant Reformation 1517–1559. New York: Harper & Row, 1985.

9. Philosophy, Science, and Technology [includes printing]

*Baigrie, Brian S., ed. The Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2001.

Copenhaver, Brian P., and Charles B. Schmitt. Renaissance Philosophy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Febvre, Lucien, and Henri-Jean Martin. The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing 1450–1800. Trans. by David Gerard. London: N.L.B., 1976.

Hall, Maria Boas. The Scientific Renaissance, 1450–1630. New York: Dover Publications, 1994.

Kapr, Albert. Johann Gutenberg. The Man and his Invention. Trans. by Douglas Martin. Brookfield, Vt: Scholar Press, 1996.

Koyre, A. The Astronomical Revolution. Trans by R.E.W. Maddison. Reprint, New York: Dover Publications, 1992.

Kristeller, Paul Oskar. Eight Philosophers of the Renaissance. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1964.

*Spangenburg, Ray. The History of Science from the Ancient Greeks to the Scientific Revolution. New York: Facts on File, 1993.

*Stefoff, Rebecca. The Young Oxford Companion to Maps and Mapmaking. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

10. Exploration

*Allen, John Logan, E. Julius Dasch, and Barry M. Gough. Explorers: From Ancient Times to the Space Age. 3 vols. New York: Simon & Schuster Macmillan, 1999.

Boxer, C.R. Portuguese Seaborne Empire. London: Hutchinson, 1969.

*Gough, Barry M., ed. Geography and Exploration. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2002.

Hale, J.R. Renaissance Exploration. London: British Broadcasting Corporation, 1968.

Parry, J. H. The Age of Reconnaissance. New York: New American Library, 1963.

Penrose, Boies. Travel and Discovery in the Renaissance 1420–1620. New York: Atheneum, 1962.

Subrahmanyam, Sanjay. The Portuguese Empire in Asia, 1500–1700: A Political and Economic History. New York: Longman, 1993.

11. Biographies

Alberti, Leon Battista. Gadol, Joan. Leon Battista Alberti: Universal Man of the Renaissance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969.

Borgias. Mallett, Michael. The Borgias: The Rise and Fall of a Renaissance Dynasty. Chicago: Academy Chicago Publisher, 1987.

Catherine of Aragon. Mattingly, Garrett. Catherine of Aragon. New York: AMS Press, 2003.

Charles V. Brandi, Karl. The Emperor Charles V: The Growth and Destiny of a Man and a World-Emperor. Trans. by C.V. Wedgewood. London: J. Cape, 1980.

——. Maltby, William S. The Reign of Charles V New York: Palgrave, 2002.

Columbus, Christopher. Phillips, William D., Jr., and Carla Rahn Phillips. The World of Christopher Columbus. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

Donne, John. Bald, R.C. John Donne: A Life. New York: Oxford University Press, 1970. Reprint, with corrections, 1986.

Dürer, Albrecht. Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. 4th ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971.

Elizabeth I. MacCaffrey, Wallace. Elizabeth I. New York: E. Arnold, 1993.

——. Weir, Alison. The Life of Elizabeth I. New York: Ballantine Books, 1999.

——. *Williams, Neville. The Life and Times of Elizabeth I. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, 1972. Well-illustrated popular biography.

Erasmus. Bainton, Roland H. Erasmus of Christendom. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1969.

——. Sowards, J. Kelley. Desiderius Erasmus. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1975.

Francis I. Knecht, R.J. Renaissance Warrior and Patron: The Reign of Francis I. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Galileo. Drake, Stillman. Galileo at Work: His Scientific Biography. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978.

——. Reston, James, Jr. Galileo: A Life. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994.

Guicciardini, Francesco. Ridolfi, Roberto. The Life of Francesco Guicciardini. Trans. by Cecil Grayson. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967.

Habsburg. Wandruszka, Adam. The House of Habsburg: Six Hundred Years of a European Dynasty. Trans. by Cathleen Epstein and Hans Epstein. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1964.

Henry VIII. *Dwyer, Frank. Henry VIII. World Leaders Past and Present Series. New York: Chelsea House, 1988.

——. Scarisbrick, J. J. Henry VIII. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968.

Isabella of Castile. Liss, Peggy K. Isabel the Queen. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.

James I. Carrier, Irene. James VI and I: King of Great Britain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Jonson, Ben.Kay, W. David. Ben Jonson: A Literary Life. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995.

Leonardo da Vinci. Clark, Kenneth. Leonardo da Vinci. Rev. by M. Kemp. New York: Penguin, 1993.

Luther, Martin.Bainton, Roland H. Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther. New York: Abingdon-Cokesbury Press, 1950.

Machiavelli, Niccolò. Ridolfi, Roberto. The Life of Niccolo Machiavelli. Trans. by Cecil Grayson. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963.

——. Viroli, Maurizio. Niccolò's Smile: A Biography of Machiavelli. Trans. by Antony Shugaar. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2000.

Maximilian II. Fichtner, Paula Sutter. Emperor Maximilian II. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001.

Michelangelo. Hibbard, Howard. Michelangelo. New York: Harper & Row, 1985.

Milton, John. Brown, Cedric C. John Milton: A Literary Life. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995.

More, Thomas. Ackroyd, Peter. The Life of Thomas More. London: Chatto & Windus, 1998.

——. Marius, Richard. Thomas More: A Biography. New York: Knopf, 1984.

Philip II. Kamen, Henry. Philip of Spain. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997.

Rubens, Peter Paul. *McLanathan, Richard. Peter Paul Rubens. New York: Abrams, 1995.

Shakespeare, William. *Stanley, Diane, and Peter Vennema. Bard of Avon: The Story of William Shakespeare. New York: Morrow Junior Books, 1992.

——. Holden, Anthony. William Shakespeare: The Man Behind the Genius. Boston: Little Brown, 2000.

——. Shoenbaum, Sidney. William Shakespeare: A Compact Documentary Life. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.

Titian. Hope, Charles. Titian. New York: Harper & Row, 1980.

Vesalius, Andreas. O'Malley, Charles D. Andreas Vesalius of Brussels 1514–1564. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965.

12. Novels and Films

Shellabarger, Samuel. Captain from Castile. Boston: Little, Brown, 1945. Novel about Cortes's invasion of Mexico, 1519–1521. Made into a film starring Tyrone Power in 1947.

Stone, Irving. The Agony and the Ecstasy: A Biographical Novel of Michelangelo. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Co., 1961.

Hamlet. 1948. Shakespeare's play. Directed by and starring Laurence Olivier.

Henry V. 1989. Shakespeare's play. Directed and starring Kenneth Branagh.

Henry V. 1944. Shakespeare's play. Directed by and starring Laurence Olivier.

Macbeth. 1948. Shakespeare's play. Directed by and starring Orson Welles.

A Man for All Seasons. 1966. Directed by Fred Zinnemann. Starring Paul Scofield. Life of Thomas More.

Mary Queen of Scots. 1971. Directed by Charles Jarrott. Starring Vanessa Redgrave and Glenda Jackson.

Prince of Foxes. 1949. Directed by Henry King. Starring Tyrone Power and Orson Welles. Cesare Borgia is the villain in a swashbuckling story set in Italy ca. 1500.

Return of Martin Guerre. 1982. Directed by Daniel Vigne. Starring Gerard Dépardieu and Nathalie Baye. Case of assumed identity in a village in France of the 1500s.

Richard III. 1956. Shakespeare's play. Directed by and starring Laurence Olivier.

Romeo and Juliet. 1968. Shakespeare's play. Directed by Franco Zeffirelli. Starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey.

Shakespeare in Love. 1998. Directed by John Madden. Starring Joseph Fiennes and Gwyneth Paltrow. Shakespeare has writer's block until he meets Paltrow and writes Romeo and Juliet.

The Taming of the Shrew. 1966. Shakespeare's comedy. Directed by Franco Zeffirelli. Starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.

West Side Story. 1961. Directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. Music by Leonard Bernstein. Starring Natalie Wood and Richard Beyman. Musical loosely based on Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet.

13. On-Line Resources

16th Century English Renaissance Literature (1485–1603). Information on the leading English writers of the era, including biographies, essays, and works. http://www.luminarium.org/renlit/

Art History Resources on the Web. An informative and in-depth look at art, architecture, and sculpture from throughout Renaissance Europe. http://witcombe.sbc.edu/ARTHLinks2.html

Encyclopaedia Britannica's Shakespeare and the Globe: Then and Now. Explores the history and legacy of Shakespeare, his plays, and other important Elizabethans. http://Shakespeare.eb.com

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. A searchable database of the philosophers and ideas of the Renaissance. http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/r/renaiss.htm

Web Gallery of Art. A searchable guide to European art from 1150–1800. http://gallery.euroweb.hu/