HST 731

While taking various forms, both the Renaissance and Reformation marked breaks with mediaeval Europe that radically transformed life in the early modern period. Each was built on, or incorporated, socio-economic changes, scholarly developments, the advent of printing, new forms of political authority, and stunning cultural and intellectual achievement. Yet while intermixed, the two movements were also fundamentally different: while one commonly celebrated the human and worldly, the other sought a purified Christian faith.