THE GOLDEN CENTURY: Europe 1598-1715 - In political terms the seventeenth century was one of continuous wars and revolutions. But the achievements in arts and sciences made it for Europe a golden age. Its span reached from the last thirty years of Spanish predominance-the Spain of Cervantes and Velázquez- to what Voltaire called The golden age of Louis XIV. In it flourished the Amsterdam of Hals and Rembrandt, the London of Milton and Shakespeare, the Antwerp of Rubens and the Paris of Molière. It was the supreme age of English poetry and of Dutch painting, and it saw the dawn of modern philosophy and science. But above all, this period was a golden age because it witnessed the emergence of toleration, especially in the Protestant countries. At the beginning of the century the Spainish Inquisition still flourished: Bruno was burned to death for believing that the earth moved around the sun. By the end of it witches had virtually ceased to be burned and pantheism was becoming respectable.

Condition: Good - Author: Maurice Ashely - Publisher: Phoenix - Pages: 255 - Paperback