A History of Modern Europe - From the Renaissance to the Present

Part One

Foundations

As Europe emerged from the Middle Ages, a dynamic
era of trade, statebuilding, and global discovery began that
would for centuries affect the lives of rich and poor alike, not
only in Europe but across the oceans as well. Spanish and Por¬
tuguese conquerors and merchants expanding their trade
routes laid the foundations for the first transoceanic European
empires. During the Italian Renaissance, which lasted from
about 1330 to 1530, humanists rediscovered texts from classi­
cal Greece and Rome. Renaissance artists and scholars cele­

brated the beauty of nature and the dignity of mankind, helping
shape the intellectual and cultural history of the modern world.
Moreover, after a period when almost all of Western Europe
adhered to Roman Catholicism, abuses in the Church would
lead to cries for reform that would not be stilled until most of Eu­

rope was divided between Protestants and Catholics. By 1540,
the Reformation had carved out large zones of Protestant alle­
giance in central and northern Europe, as well as in England and
parts of France. Religious conflict and wars would tear Europe
apart, leading to reform in the Church but leaving permanent
religious divisions where once there had been near-uniformity of
belief and worship.