Humanities 3: Renaissance, Reformation, and Early Modern Europe

This course was taught in an entirely remote format due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


Course Schedule


UNIT 1 | THE RENAISSANCE IN SWERVES | 10/2 – 10/26

10/2 | The Renaissance: Life After the Plague — No reading.

10/5-7 | The Swerve: A Chance Encounter in a German Monastery Vault

  • Lucretius, selections from On the Nature of the Universe (rediscovered in 1417)

    • Book 1: lines 1-172, 215-249, 265-345, 418-502, 599-614, 921-1040

    • Book 2: lines 1-141, 216-263, 1048-1175

    • Book 3: lines 31-176, 830-1094

    • Book 5: lines 925-1457

    • Book 6: lines 1-41, 1090-1286

10/9-14 | The Swerve in Politics: The “Real Truth” about Power

  • Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince (1513)

10/16 | The Swerve Abroad: The Spanish Conquest of the New World

  • (*) Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, selections from On the Just Causes for War Against the Indians (1547)

  • (*) Mexica (Aztec) & Tlaxcala Accounts of the Spanish Conquest (1500s)

  • (*) Bartolomé de Las Casas, selections from A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies (1552)

10/19-21 | The Swerve in Religion: The Protestant Reformation

  • (*) Martin Luther, selections from “Freedom of a Christian” (1520)

10/23-26 | The Swerve in Science: A New Scientific Method  

  • (*) Francis Bacon, selections from New Organon (1620)

UNIT 2 | KNOWLEDGE, POWER & CRUELTY | 10/28 – 11/13

10/28-11/2 | Knowledge & Suffering

  • Michel de Montaigne, selections from The Essays (1580): Read “On the Cannibals,” “On Conscience,” “On Cruelty,” “On the Lame,” and “To Philosophize Is to Learn How to Die”

 11/4 | The Case Against Cruelty

  • (*) Margaret Cavendish, selections from Poems & Fancies (1653)

 11/6-13 | Knowledge, Power & Cruelty

  • William Shakespeare, The Tempest (1611)

  • 11/11 (2-5pm) – Optional group viewing and discussion of a performance via the live-streaming platform Twitch.

UNIT 3 | STUDIES IN TYRANNY | 11/16 – 12/11

11/16 | Tyranny & Rebellion in the English Revolution

  • (*) Optional reading: See “Tyranny Reader.”

    • James I’s Speech to Parliament (1610)

    • Selections from Agreement of the People (1647)

    • Gerrard Winstanley, selections from The Law of Freedom in a Platform (1652)

    • Anna Trapnel, selections from Report and Plea (1654)

11/18-23 | Liberty, Security, and the State

  • Thomas Hobbes, selections from Leviathan (1651): Intro (pp. 3-5); Chapters 1, 5 (¶1-2), 6, 13-14, 17, 18 (¶1-15), 21, and 29

11/25-11/30 | Science & Empire

  • Margaret Cavendish, selections from The Blazing-World (1666): pp. 123-65, 203-25

12/2-11 | The “Tyranny of Heaven”

  • John Milton, selections from Paradise Lost (1674)