Fate and fortune in European thought, ca. 1400-1650 / / edited by Ovanes Akopyan.

• Superior document: Brill's studies in intellectual history ; Volume 327
• TeilnehmendeR: Akopyan, Ovanes,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden, The Netherlands ;, Boston : : Brill,, [2021]; ©2021
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Series: Brill's studies in intellectual history ; Volume 327.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource.

If the universe were conceived to fulfill a certain divine plan or to manifest God's will and glory, what would the place of an individual be within this plan? What is more, if, from the very beginning of its existence and through divine providence, it were predestined to be driven toward a certain end, how could people adjust their individual lives to the incognizable universal design and react to the obscure future fraught with both luck and failure? These questions, which have bothered humanity for centuries, formed a remarkable element of early modern European thought. This collection of essays presents new insights into what shaped and constituted reflections on fate and fortune between, roughly, 1400 and 1650, both in word and image. This volume argues that these ideas were emblematic of a more fundamental argument about the self, society, and the universe and shows that their influence was more widespread, geographically and thematically, than hitherto assumed. Contributors are: Damiano Acciarino, Ovanes Akopyan, Elisabeth Blum, Paul Richard Blum, Jo Coture, Guido Giglioni, Dalia Judovitz, Sophie Raux, Orlando Reade, and John Sellars.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations -- Note on Contributors -- Introduction: Not Simple Twists of Fate / Ovanes Akopyan -- Part 1: The Concept of Fate in Philosophy and Theology -- 1 Renaissance Consolations: Philosophical Remedies for Fate and Fortune / John Sellars -- 2 Coluccio Salutati and the Humanist Critique of Fate / Paul Richard Blum -- 3 Fate, Providence, and Fortuna in Giordano Bruno's Expulsion of the Triumphant Beast / Elisabeth Blum -- 4 Fortune and Fate in the Philosophy of Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655): Balancing between Freedom and Necessity / Jo Coture -- Part 2: Political and Social Context -- 5 Fate and Fortune in Machiavelli's Anatomy of the Body Politic / Guido Giglioni -- 6 "Fortune is a Mistresse": Figures of Fortune in English Renaissance Poetry / Orlando Reade -- 7 The Game of Art and Chance: Lottery, Fortune, and Fatum in the Low Countries in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries / Sophie Raux -- Part 3: Artistic Considerations -- 8 Renaissance Iconology of Fate / Damiano Acciarino -- 9 Fortune, Fate and Providential Design in Georges de La Tour / Dalia Judovitz -- 10 Ptolemy, Fortune, and Politics: A Case of the Reception of Western Scholarship in Early Modern Russia / Ovanes Akopyan -- Bibliography -- Index Nominum.