The Renaissance - the Age of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci - Episode 2

Good morning!  We are continuing with our exploration of the Renaissance.  The run time is 42:25.

People started keeping track of Time.  The pocket watch was invented.  Merchants earned their fortunes with time.  Seafarers were able to explore more.  The world tripled in size.  An empire arose where the sun never set.  Scholars could use time and make new discoveries.  The pocket watches along with other inventions transformed the world.

It is 1504, Leonardo da Vinci is a powerful figure.  The Mona Lisa was created during this period.  It took years for Leonardo to finish.  He was never satisfied with his work and always tried to perfect his work.  The pope even said that Leonardo would never amount to anything.  He was the most versatile geniuses of all time. He was an artist, sculptor, inventor, and architect.  The painting was a necessary evil to him.

Only fifteen paintings were attributed to him. He cared more about his inventions rather than his painting.  He sometimes made minor corrections to a painting.  His paintings were in great demand because they were well done and finished.  He painted to earn money to pursue his scientific research.

Italy was ravaged by numerous conflicts.  The Italian cities constantly fought with each other.  However, art was promoted by these wars.  Money flowed from the big cities into the small cities.  War was turned to gold and that gold was turned into art.  Leonardo applied to work with a city leader.  Leonardo was able to create war weapons.  One invention was a tortoise-like weapon that was too heavy to operate.  Leonardo loved mechanics.  Even today, his designs and inventions leave scholars puzzled.  Even if something was not invented, Leonardo continued to innovate, experiment, and theorize on mechanics.

Clocks were the most mechanical invention during the Renaissance.  However, the church believed that time belonged to God and only God could control time.  The church also banned the charging interest.  The pocket watch allowed man to control time and make money.  Time became a valuable commodity and the restrictions on charging interest were lifted.  Martin Luther still upheld the ban on charging interest.  John Calvin, another religious reformer, believed that charging interest was okay.  Calvin said that economic success was tied to a person’s salvation.  Zurich, Switzerland set up money exchanges.  Switzerland became a banking pioneer and the people’s wealth increased.

In Renaissance, people looked to the stars and studied the motion of the moon and stars.  People could put spend time measuring the sky.  Nicholas Copernicus was a mathematician who theorized that the earth revolved around the sun.  The people around him tried to encourage him to publish his works.  However, he refused because he was afraid that he was going to be made fun of. He kept quiet.  It was only seventy years when Copernicus was found to be right: that the earth moved around the sun.  Galileo was able to confirm Copernicus was right.  The earth was removed from the center of the universe.  It would take three hundred years to get the evidence.

The cross-staff or Jacob’s Staff was invented and it allowed sailors to find latitude at sea.  It was possible to navigate on the high seas.  There were also astronomical tables invented with allowed sailors to navigate the seas.  These two objects guided sailors on the sea.  Trigonometry emboldened explorers to search for new sources of wealth.  It was faster to transport goods over the sea rather than on land.  Venice’s monopoly on the spice trade collapsed.

Spain and Portugal became leading sailing nations.  One man, Christopher Columbus looked to cut the sailing time between Asia and Europe even further.  He went to get funding for his exploration from the Portuguese. However, the sailing time was longer than Columbus believed.  Even mathematicians looked at the math and thought Columbus was wrong.  The Portuguese turned down Columbus but the Spanish funded his voyages.  He discovered a new land.  He thought he had found the islands off China and would believe this until the day he died.  So what would the impact on the world be as a result of this discovery?  Tune into the rest of the episode to find out.

Honestly, this episode was not as good as the first part, so this one I would skip showing in a classroom.