Week Twelve

Empire, Trade, and Urbanism in Northern Europe

Postscript to Last Week → Renaissance Views

● Idealized urban spaces came into their own → order was imposed on previously
unaligned streets and architecture and likewise on urban life through new governmental
systems, a renaissance quest for order architecturally and socially
● See Urbino panels and note the strict linear perspective, contrast with lorenzetti’s
Allegory of good government
● This is not confined to frescoes, see the 1460s redesigned Pienza as designed by Pope
Pius II
● Pius was a very “renaissance” pope, who demonstrated a commitment to greco-roman
concepts like symmetry in his remodeling of this his hometown (known before the
redesign by a different name, then named after himself)
● One overarching feature of this redesign was the emphasis on sightlines and the splendid
hilltop views
● The vistas privileged a unified viewpoint as in the urbino panels.
And Now… What Happened to Northern Europe?
Two German Case Studies: Augsburg and Nuremberg
● These two cities are namely not London or Paris, we’re talking about these because of
their more interesting political history
● London and paris were cities that formed a part of a nation-state, the capital of their
respective nation-states, subordinate to the monarch and had to negotiate for rights, in
this context running state affairs was not a city job
● By contrast, the german cities had power more like those in italy because germany was
not a unified state
Terminology
● In the medieval and early modern period, germany did not exist (contrast with england
and france)
● What we had instead was the Holy Roman Empire → the question of how far south it’s
purview extended was hotly contested as one should remember from early lectures
● Why Holy? Implied the claim that the emperor was the political leader of Christendom
● Why Roman? The idea that the emperor was the legitimate successor of the ancient
roman emperors
● Why empire? We’re speaking about a vast claimed territory
● In reality the emperor was not really such a leader, the claim to roman descent is rather
diminishing
● Voltaire quipped it was neither holy nor roman nor an empire
● At the head we have, of course, the emperor… but everything else is more complicated
and bureaucratic (400 subunits that convened in the imperial diet) included duchies,
principalities, bishop ruled territories
● Imperial cities with a special
● The weak central power was an advantage to the cities, no strong central government like
france or england
● The main thing to remember is that this was a good thing for city autonomy, particularly
the imperial cities accountable only to the emperor, about 18 of them, small territotrial
units in their own right
● Imperial cities enjoyed a tripartite
1. Voting rights at the imperial diet
2. Imperial cities enjoyed a high degree of political autonomy, allowed to establish courts,
laws, and taxes; Allowed to enter alliances with each other and foreign powers
3. Wide ranging economic independence → the real power of these cities lay in their
economic strengths
● Nazis considered nuremberg to be the quintessential german town → held their
conventions there despite history in the first reich (empire) of city disassociation from the
larger conglomerate leadership
● Nuremburg → a center of Europe, though landlocked it was referred to as the german
venice because as in the case of venice trade and industry were important driving forces
behind
● The most important of nuremberg’s industries was metal making → nuremburg artisans
made work sought after across Europe
● The Rhine provided a route towards nuremburg
● Nuremberg was not a Roman city, it was north of the ancient roman limas border
● The was however a small agricultural center
● The first mention of nuremberg as a town/city was in the 11th century
● It is a prime example of the burgh city emerging around a castle
● The castle in NUremberg is to this day the most visible landmark of the city
● The main purpose of the castle’s initial construction was as a symbol of imperial power
● Since the emperor was itenerant, he couldn’t alwys be at nuremberg so he installed
someone to serve as a deputy → the castellan
● This was a common situation that was found elsewhere in cities of the burgh type
● The rural people were attracted to the protection offered by the presence of imperial
soldiers, artisans and craftsman were particularly attracted to this type of protection,
gradually merchants came to partake in the exchange of artisans’ goods
● In the absence of the emperor the castellan emerged as a powerful ruler in his own right?
● The town dwelllers ended up aying taxes to both the meperor and the castellan
● This way until the 12th and 13th century will pick up next week