a question of history
So I'm endeavoring to become a scholar of the 14th/15th centuries European cultural history. I have a history minor, and to fulfill that I'm taking a Renaissance survey. It's 4000-level so full of undergrads yet will still count for grad credit. It's kind of boring, because it's an intro to the Ren, and a little too general and reviewish to be really stimulating, but it's filling in a few political history gaps here and there, which is why I'm taking it in the first place.
This the thing, though:
It's all about Italy!
And come to think about it, my Ren survey as an undergrad was, too!
I know the Italian Renaissance is a huge factor to consider. No one can deny the high cultural interest of the Italians in things classical. But for the past five or so years (basically since I wrote my SIP), I've had a picture of European politics that goes beyond Italy.
Am I just biased (or perspectived, to make up a word) because I'm a musicologist? But I thought the most significant cultural, political, and economic force in Europe in the first half of the 15th century was Burgundy!!! During that time their court was flourishing, they had a ton of money (trade, commerce, industry; and my personal view is that they were the only ones who really could afford to announce a crusade against the Turks in the mid-century, since they were the only ones who did), and they had considerable influence with other large political powers of Europe.
So where do they get gapped in a survey of the Renaissance??
I also think that the patronage, the ceremonial, and the display at the Burgundian court provided a model for the cultural flowering of the courts in the Italian city-states. The idea that a ruler used the results of his patronage to create an image of himself as strong and virtuous is such a central part of Burgundy.
Do I have a warped view of Europe? Am I making a bigger deal of Burgundy than reality reflects? But then again, what is historical reality anyway, but what we make of it? In a sense, I guess, there's no real reason why my picture of 15th Europe needs to be the same as the one the History Department gives to its undergrads. At the same time, though, I do feel a little betrayed. And then simultaneously frustrated by the shallowness of the betrayal...betrayed by subjectivity?
It's moments like these that remind me how small my corner of the world really is. Maybe I get too emotionally involved in my studies, but when I spend so much time with it, it's hard not to think of places like Burgundy as "my places". (At the same, though, I do believe in the healthy dose of visceral engagement with one's work...it is a little bit like falling in love.) When we grow up and realize that the world is bigger than home, it's sort of scary. Home gets reinterpreted. Maybe I don't want that to happen to "my places." Maybe it has nothing to do with "my places." Maybe I should allow myself to become numb and process monographs and finish the degree with mechanical effeciency.