Renaissance and Reformation in Germany: An Agenda for Research

Abstract

The chief problem in treating and in Germany is a conceptual one. Simply put, central terms in subject do not have concrete referents to which all will agree. The fact that Germany, most concrete of them all, really denotes the Holy Roman Empire of German Nation is a case in point. Yet, by comparison with this minor irritant, other terms have created a massive scholarly headache that may well herald a terminal illness for idea that RenaisEance and constitute a distinct period in history of early modern Germany. Indeed, there is a certain truth to recent observation that whether one labels late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries late Middle Ages, Renaissance, or Reformation, or even some combination thereof depends far more upon specific subject under investigation than it does upon a. holistic judgment about age's particular characteristics and proper termina. l Given this massive confusion among specialists there can be little wonder that one scholar, in a brief survey of whole period from a pan-European perspective, should dub it the foundations of early modern Europe and be done with matter.2 In so doing he was simply mirroring findings of recent scholarship, chiefly from French and those influenced by them. Accordingly Renaissance and Reformation remain handy labels for fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but, strictly taken, they refer to little more than episodes of peculiar stress that allow historians a glimpse into enduring structures of civilization of Old Europe. and are now absorbed into longue duree that stretched from 1250 or so to middle of eighteenth century and that saw creation of modern world. The study of