15 Europe in the Renaissance And Reformation 1350–1600

> In what ways did the Renaissance and Reformation represent breaks from the medieval past? Chapter 15 examines cultural, intellectual, and religious change during Europe’s Renaissance and Reformation. While disease, famine, and war marked the fourteenth century in much of Europe, the era also witnessed the beginnings of remarkable changes in many aspects of intellectual and cultural life. First in Italy and then elsewhere, artists and writers thought that they were living in a new golden age, later termed the Renaissance, in which Europeans recaptured the glories of the classical past. Religious reformers carried out even more dramatic changes. In the sixteenth century, long-standing calls for religious reform gained wide acceptance. In a movement termed the Protestant Reformation, Western Christianity broke into many divisions, a situation that continues today.