I know this is more of a historiography question, but being that I don't really have my finger on the pulse of the academic world, I thought maybe somebody here could lend me some insight.
So, I was having a discussion today with a friend about the Council of Nicaea, and some of the common "Dark Ages" misconceptions started rearing their ugly heads. I referred him to the FAQ here, as I find myself doing all too frequently, and started rereading some of the responses myself. I came across this comment, and, while recognizing its validity, I found myself wondering why this might be the case?
I'm inclined to think that it had something to do with Enlightenment-era obsession with classicism, since it seemed pretty vogue to place Rome on a pedestal (what with the republican fervor and architectural styles), but I'm not sure. Even if I'm 100% correct in this, could anybody lend any insight into how this mode of thinking evolved?
To follow up the above question, what is the alternative to Greek and Roman culture to look up to in the pre-industrial world? Were the Greek and Roman cultures selected solely because they had a lot of written records accessible during the Renaissance?
It has a lot to do with the Renaissance. Petrarch and others believed there was a lost knowledge of a greater time to be found in the works of Cicero. He believed this discovery would lead to a return to a golden age, with a middle age falling in between the two. He didn't have a very accurate understanding of the Middle Ages, and the complexity of philosophy, art, and law that was developed during the period. Petrarch and others viewed the Middle Ages as a time of intellectual darkness, hence the dark ages. It's from here that western culture really starts to look at roman and Greek civilizations with reverence. Latin is studied in the way Cicero wrote it, Greek starts to become important again. It is really here that Rome, especially the republic is held to be the pinnacle of human civilization.
hi! you may be interested in this thread from a few days ago