Feb
28
The Holy Alliance
By jhoehn on February 28, 2012 Leave a Comment
By: Jeffrey Hoehn
Credit Image: http://teacherweb.ftl.pinecrest.edu/snyderd/MWH/Projects/cov/Maps.htm
The Holy Alliance was derived out of the Quintuple Alliance in the Congress of Vienna on September 26th, 1815. The main purpose of the Holy Alliance was to uphold Christianity as the prominent faith and reflected the return to Conservative politics in Europe. Headed by Tsar Alexander, he wanted to return to politics long before the French Revolution and other revolutions in Europe. However, it is important to note that Great Britian was not part of the Holy Alliance, even though it was in the Quintuple Alliance. King George IV of Great Britian refused to sign on constitutional grounds. The alliance was noted for its union of politics and religion as one treaty.
The Alliance had three articles. The first article basically noted that all of the members of the Holy Alliance are brethren, and will assist each other when necessary to protect religion, peace, and justice. The second article established the three nations as a Christian nation. The second article also states we owe the treasures of our lives to God, and recommend to the subjects of the three nations to to enjoy God’s gifts, and exercise his principles. The third article states those that agree to this Alliance shall indeed utilize the principles of God and Christianity to shape the destinies of mankind of which they have influence over.
The Holy Alliance was a symbol to all revolutionaries of the old social order, and thus revered it with hatred. The Alliance did not want any liberal revolutionaries accomplishing any victories in Europe along with promoting Christian faith. This led to Austrian forces overturning a liberal revolution in southern Italian Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Additionally, the French aided Spanish King Ferdinand VII against a liberal revolution. Public opinion believed this alliance was to join with the Church to reestablish their powers as a political authority. However, in reality, the papal Councillors and bishops regarded the Alliance coldly because it contained schism, heresy, and orthodoxy. Therefore, it is not accurate to believe the idea that the Church and Monarchies were conspirators with one another to gain power. The Holy Alliance ended with the death of Tsar Alexander I in 1825.
Sources:
http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0824012.html
http://www.napoleon-series.org/research/government/diplomatic/c_alliance.html
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07398a.htm
Feb
27
Patronage System
By gburgos on February 27, 2012 Leave a Comment
The Enlightenment gave rise to the Classical Era during which musicians worked under what is known as the patronage system. Musicians and/or composers would ”[work] as servants to powerful noblemen” writing and performing pieces for their patron. There are pros and cons to this system: Some pros are financial stability and security; working under a patron gets you work, a full stomach, and a roof over your head. However, the cons are isolation and restricted creativity; musicians lived as servants with their patrons and were coWolmmitted to composing what their boss wanted, and when they wanted it. This left little exposure to the musical influences outside of the patrons walls. This too has pros and cons in that all work is unique and original, but there is little ouside inspiration.
Two important characters from the Enlightenment Era who were involved in the patronage system were Joseph II and Mozart. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart worked under Joseph II, son of Maria Theresa and brother to Marie Antoinette, in Vienna. Mozart composed three operas while serving Joseph: Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni (Don Juan, and Die Zauberflote (The Magic Flute).
The following is a condensed scene from the movie, Amadeus; a movie about Mozart’s life. The scene begins with the monarchy’s existing composer, Antonio Salieri, writing a welcome march for Mozart who has been invited to meet Joseph II in order to compose an opera. Salieri presents the march to Joseph who decides to play it during Mozart’s entrance. After meeting with Mozart, Joseph II offers the march to him as a gift, however Mozart claims that it has been committed to memory after hearing it only once; he then proves it upon request, and actually critques Salieri on his composition and ”improves” it. This scene is an example of a pre-existing patron-ship with Joseph and Salieri, and the beginning of Mozart servant hood in Vienna.
(Sources: The Classical Era. Music History. Web. 27 Feb. 2012. http://library.thinkquest.org/C0113187/en/html/history/classical_overview.shtml
Robert Sherrane. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The Special Collection created by ipl2. Web. 27 Feb. 2012. http://www.ipl.org/div/mushist/clas/mozart.html )
Feb
27
Timeline of the Scientific Revolution
By jmilton on February 27, 2012 Leave a Comment
The following link is to an impressively extensive timeline of the Scientific Revolution. This timeline was created by Dr. Robert A. Hatch of the University of Florida. The timeline chronicles events of the Scientific Revolution as early as 1451 with the birth of Christopher Columbus and ends with the publication of Issac Newton’s Observations Upon the Prophecies in 1733. In Dr. Hatch’s Scientific Revolution timeline he describes in varying length over 100 different events that helped shape the Scientific Revolution.
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/ufhatch/pages/03-Sci-Rev/SCI-REV-Home/05-sr-lng-timeline.htm
Posted by Jason Milton
Feb
27
A Quick Fun Intoduction to the Scientific Revolution
By jmilton on February 27, 2012 Leave a Comment
The following videos are a collection of clips from a variety of different educational programs. These videos describe key events and people from the Scientific Revolution. The videos highlight the major figures in the Scientific Revolution, and the significant impact they had on this revolutionary time.
Posted By Jason Milton
Feb
23
The Builders of Britain during the Industrial Revolution
By Julia on February 23, 2012 Leave a Comment
The following documentary is called “The Children Who Built the Victorian Britain.” This was a documentary featured on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). I found this to be very interesting and informative about the decision to use children to work during the Industrial Revolution. It also included many examples of stories about children who lived and worked during this time. Some key points to mention about the content in the documentary is that the machines were designed to be operated by small hands and orphans were a target to become workers in factories. If they did not want to work in the factories, then they would enlist in the military.
The main reason, stated in the documentary, why children were forced to work is because of the population increase. From the mid-1700 to 1800, the population increased 50%. The reason why there were so many children at this one point in time is because their parents would live with their employer who was typically a farm owner. These farm owners encouraged his young workers to stay single. Once advances in farming took place, there was no need for so many workers. That would mean they were free to marry whenever they pleased. The average woman married at about 27 years and dropped to 23.5 years. Women were more fertile at the age of 23.5 than at 27.
This documentary is cut into 4 parts, 15 minutes each.
The Children Who Built the Victorian Britain:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Posted by: Julia Jin
Feb
22
King James I
By azint on February 22, 2012 Leave a Comment
The Life of King James I
By John Butler
James I of England and VI of Scotland was born in 1566, the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and Henry, Lord Darnley. James had to face difficulties from his earliest years—his mother was an incompetent ruler who quarrelled with politicians and churchmen such as John Knox, and she may have been involved in the murder of her husband Darnley, himself a worthless character. The murder was carried out partly to avenge the slaying of Mary’s secretary and possible lover, David Rizzio or Riccio, in which Darnley played a part (before James’s birth), and it also enabled Mary to marry her current lover, the Earl of Bothwell. Mary was deposed by the Scottish lords in 1567, and fled to England, where she sought the protective custody of Elizabeth I, who clapped her in prison and had her beheaded twenty years later.
James grew up under various regencies and a couple of notable tutors, the poet, dramatist and humanist George Buchanan, and Peter Young, whose good nature and enthusiasm for lighter reading somewhat offset the formidable learning and sometimes overbearingly serious teaching methods of Buchanan. James chafed against Buchanan and disliked him, but in later years would boast that he had been the great man’s pupil. Buchanan instilled in James political theories which included the idea that the king is beholden to the people for his power, a belief which James later came to reject in favour of Divine Right kingship. From Young he learned to appreciate poetry (Buchanan wrote Latin poetry of a largely didactic nature, and encouraged James to read mostly Latin and Greek books) and delved deeply into his mother’s library of French verse and romances. James developed a genuine love of learning (he was not, as many authors have claimed, a mere pedant), some skill in writing poetry, and a lively prose style. He also showed an interest in plays, including those of Shakespeare and Jonson, and was particularly fond of the masque, which would become the leading form of court entertainment when James became King of England in 1603. His marriage to Anne of Denmark, herself a great patron of masques and a connoisseur of literature, may have piqued his interest in this particularly royal form of entertainment, with its music, dancing, singing and elaborate sets designed by Inigo Jones. Of the children of King James and Queen Anne, only three survived to adulthood: Henry, Prince of Wales, who died untimely in 1612, possibly of typhoid fever, Charles, who succeeded his father as king, and Princess Elizabeth, who married Frederick V, Elector Palatine.
James published his first book in 1584, entitled The Essays of a Prentice in the Divine Art of Poesy, which he followed up in 1591 with His Majesties Poetical Exercises at Vacant Hours. In the first book James included some translations he had made from du Bartas, whose Uranie takes the muse Urania and transforms her into a Christian figure representing the Holy Spirit, an idea which appealed to James at the time, because he thought he could employ poetry for the dissemination of his religious and political beliefs. As a King, James had a special relationship with God and could therefore write religious poetry from a special viewpoint. James’s poetry is competent, and sometimes he manages a striking line or two; one of his best poems is the sonnet he wrote prefacing his book Basilikon Doron (1599).
The majority of James’s written works are concerned with theology and the justification of the theory of Divine Right, and for those reasons he must be considered as a major writer of political philosophy. In lively style and with considerable learning he defended the Oath of Allegiance which Catholics were required to take, disputed it with the great Cardinal Bellarmine, wrote two books on Divine Right, one, Basilikon Doron, for the edification of his son Prince Henry (1594-1612) and the other, The True Law of Free Monarchies, was a simple explanation of his theories for the general literate public. D.H. Willson, one of James’s biographers, calls the first book “entertaining and quotable” (133) and also cites Francis Bacon as finding that it “filled the whole realm as with a good perfume or incense, being excellently written and having nothing of affectation” (166). James’s comment on Bacon’s Advancement of Learning was “it was like the peace of God, which passeth all understanding” (Ashton 142). James also wrote some rather moving “Meditations on the Lord’s Prayer” and a justly famous essay, “A Counterblast to Tobacco” (1604), one of the first, and surely one of the best attacks on smoking ever written. Smoking, James tells us, is “a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black, stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless.”
James’s interest in literature was tied in with a shrewd sense of propaganda. He realised that books, masques, sermons, and plays could all be employed in the service of the king, that they were the media which could best disseminate his views of kingship and impress upon a large number of people its power and majesty. The court masque, expensive and elaborate, baroque and ritualistic, symbolised that power and majesty, and the king’s physical place as the focal point of the entertainment reinforced it further. Thus James and Queen Anne patronised Ben Jonson and Inigo Jones, the great architect and designer of the sets for Jonson’s masques. The publication of sermons, also, was of particular interest to the theologically-minded king, and his personal encouragement of the church career of John Donne, whom James appointed Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, was no accident, for Donne was a staunch supporter of kingly power and majesty, and often preached before the King himself, as did his eminent colleague Lancelot Andrewes, another of James’s favourite divines.
James’s political accomplishments (or lack thereof) as King do not concern us here, but suffice it to say that he has had a mixed reception from historians. Most agree that he was a success in Scotland but a partial failure in England, although recently his English kingship has undergone massive studies by Conrad Russell and others which have tended to show James in a much more favourable light. For example, he consistently strove for peace both at home and abroad, with varying success, but was determined never to go to war if it could be helped.
James I’s impact on English literature is considerable, not least because of his encouragement of and participation in the translation of the Bible into English (1611), the translation that many people still consider the best, and which bears his name, the King James Bible. That, above everything he wrote, is James’s monument, but his literary works deserve some credit, and he is always a pleasure to read.
http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/james/jamesbio.htm
Posted by: Alyssa Zint
Feb
22
The London Crystal Palace Exhibition of 1851
By mfritz on February 22, 2012 Leave a Comment
During the Industrial Revolution, many major advances occurred in agriculture, technology, and even society itself. Some saw the need to document or flaunt these substantial changes. The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, also referred to as The Crystal Palace Exhibition (Named after the original structure it took place in), began in Hyde Park, London in 1851. It was one of many international exhibitions showcasing culture and industry. The Crystal Palace Exhibition was organized by Prince Albert and Henry Cole. Many very prominent figures of that time were in attendance, such as Samuel Colt, Charles Darwin, and members of the French royal family. There were many notable exhibits. Samuel Colt had an exhibit for his Colt Navy, Walker, and Dragoon revolvers. Matthew Brady showcased his daguerreotype (one of the first cameras) and received a medal. And Frederick Bakewell showed what would be a precursor to the fax machine.
Feb
21
Absolutism
By Chet on February 21, 2012 Leave a Comment
Feb
21
Agricultural Revolution in Europe
By Julia on February 21, 2012 Leave a Comment
The Industrial Revolution did not only mean changes in mechanical, industrious inventions. It also meant changes in how agriculture can be improved to be able to supply for the growing population. There were many things that attributed to the Agricultural Revolution in Europe, which was from the 16th century and onward. According to Professor Mark Overton at the University of Exeter, the three major changes that attributed to this were the breeding of livestock selectively, removing the rights to commonly own property, and the advancing cropping systems.
You could even say that because of the Agricultural Revolution, the Industrial Revolution was possible.
Here in this website, Professor Overton gives in detail as to how much the Agricultural Revolution was an impact to the Industrial Revolution: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/agricultural_revolution_01.shtml. His points include more food for more people, crop yields, farming systems, and more food per worker.
Overton, M.. “Agricultural revolution in england 1500 – 1850.” Agricultural Revolution in England 1500 – 1850. N.p., 2011. Web. 20 Feb 2012. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/agricultural_revolution_01.shtml>.
Posted by: Julia Jin
Feb
20
Propaganda during WWI
By kfields on February 20, 2012 Leave a Comment
Each of the nations which participated in World War One from 1914-18 used propaganda posters not only as a means of justifying involvement to their own populace, but also as a means of procuring men, money and resources to sustain the military campaign.
In countries such as Britain the use of propaganda posters was readily understandable: in 1914 she only possessed a professional army and did not have in place a policy of national service, as was standard in other major nations such as France and Germany.
Yet while the use of posters proved initially successful in Britain the numbers required for active service at the Front were such as to ultimately require the introduction of conscription. Nevertheless recruitment posters remained in use for the duration of the war – as was indeed the case in most other countries including France, Germany and Italy.
However wartime posters were not solely used to recruit men to the military cause. Posters commonly urged wartime thrift, and were vocal in seeking funds from the general public via subscription to various war bond schemes (usually with great success).
Interestingly, for all that the U.S.A. joined the war relatively late – April 1917 – she produced many more propaganda posters than any other single nation.
Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/posters/index.htm
Propaganda advertising the Allie powers
Image Source: http://www.ww1-propaganda-cards.com/
Propaganda urging Americans to volunteer as their patriotic duty
Image Source: http://dominickuraga.blogspot.com/2010/03/world-war-1-propaganda-w-detailed.html
Similar to an American Propaganda poster, this one urges the British to join the war effort.
Image Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_propaganda_during_World_War_I
