Renaissance Women During the Renaissance (14th-16th c.), Italy flourished in cultural and artistic achievements. However, as culture and education advanced, restrictions on women grew. The status of women in the Renaissance remains a contested topic amongst historians today. Most notably, historians Jacob Burckhardt and Joan Kelly adopt differing views in their works on hwo the Renaissance impacted women. In his 1860 work The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, Swiss historian Burckhardt famously asserts that women experienced the same benefits as men did in the Renaissance, noting “the fact that women stood on a footing of perfect equality with men” (Burckhardt 156). Joan Kelly, on the other hand, refutes Burckhardt’s claim in her
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The Family dialogue was written at various points during Alberti 's life and not published until years later in 1843. The characters in Alberti’s dialogue, Lionardo and Giannozzo, discuss the methods in which a household should be managed. Written in the Tuscan dialect, book III contains Alberti’s most famous views on non-artistic subjects, such as education, marriage, and money. In contrast to Castiglione’s The Courtier, Alberti’s work focuses on the middle-class, which shows how women in this context enjoyed less freedom than …show more content…
As learning became indispensable, educational opportunities for women were vastly increased, and elite daughters were being versed in Latin and classical texts, along with men. Women of The Courtier received an education equal to that of the courtier, with Castiglione noting that “everything men can understand, women can too; and where a man’s intellect can penetrate, so along with it can a woman’s” (Castiglione 218). Burckhardt, in his work, regards education as the most equalizing aspect between men and women, noting that “with education, the individuality of women in the upper classes was developed in the same way as that of men” (Burckhardt 156). Kelly, however, regards this advancement as “a further decline in the lady’s influence over courtly society” (Kelly 35). This argument has validity, yet it overstates the injustice of noblewomen. Although Castiglione found some qualities of women to be “unbecoming,” he notes that “many virtues of the mind are as necessary to a woman as to a man” (Castiglione 211). Despite the purpose of their education to glorify the court and ruler, upper-class women were at least afforded the opportunity to become as learned as men. As a result, they acquired an education most women in Alberti’s book were not
The Family dialogue was written at various points during Alberti 's life and not published until years later in 1843. The characters in Alberti’s dialogue, Lionardo and Giannozzo, discuss the methods in which a household should be managed. Written in the Tuscan dialect, book III contains Alberti’s most famous views on non-artistic subjects, such as education, marriage, and money. In contrast to Castiglione’s The Courtier, Alberti’s work focuses on the middle-class, which shows how women in this context enjoyed less freedom than …show more content…
As learning became indispensable, educational opportunities for women were vastly increased, and elite daughters were being versed in Latin and classical texts, along with men. Women of The Courtier received an education equal to that of the courtier, with Castiglione noting that “everything men can understand, women can too; and where a man’s intellect can penetrate, so along with it can a woman’s” (Castiglione 218). Burckhardt, in his work, regards education as the most equalizing aspect between men and women, noting that “with education, the individuality of women in the upper classes was developed in the same way as that of men” (Burckhardt 156). Kelly, however, regards this advancement as “a further decline in the lady’s influence over courtly society” (Kelly 35). This argument has validity, yet it overstates the injustice of noblewomen. Although Castiglione found some qualities of women to be “unbecoming,” he notes that “many virtues of the mind are as necessary to a woman as to a man” (Castiglione 211). Despite the purpose of their education to glorify the court and ruler, upper-class women were at least afforded the opportunity to become as learned as men. As a result, they acquired an education most women in Alberti’s book were not