Story of Civilization VIII.vi.i-VIII.viii.iv

Dutch history holds a peculiar intrigue for me.  From 1550 to 1750, the Dutch were extraordinarily productive in several areas.  They produced Rubens, Vandyck, Hals, Rembrandt, and in the minor artist Jacob van Ruisdael, some of the most profound landscape painting that our historical journey has yet shown us.  (Consider his “Wheat Fields“.)

As previously discussed, they also produced the first substantial, lasting religious toleration since the Reformation – although the neglected Poland produced substantial religious toleration, it turned out to be fleeting – and the first republican government outside the cantons of Switzerland – although again, this government flourished under what was essentially the one-man rule of Johan de Witt.

But the thing that really caught my eye in Durant’s history of the Dutch during the age of Louis XIV was the re-occurrence of the dikes as a military tool.  Durant originally cited the dikes as a decisive element in the victory of the northern, Protestant states of the Netherlands in their war for independence against Spain.  The armies of William of Orange had suffered substantial defeats throughout the war, but the Spanish generals were unable to make military progress against the northern states because, according to Durant, Dutch guerillas called the Beggars of the Sea unleashed the dikes to halt the advance of the Spanish troops.

I thought it sounded reasonable enough at the time that, as a one-time military strategy, this might work.  But when the dikes emerged again as the decisive element in stalling the advance of Louis XIV through the Netherlands in his quest to extend French territory to the Rhine, I raised an eyebrow.  How, precisely, could these dikes be the solution to every Dutch military problem.

The answer is fascinatingly complex and ingenious.

An Art Reinvented – Story of Civilization V.iv.vi-V.vi.vii

The most interesting way to write about history is as a revisionist.  The historian picks a period, examines common suppositions and conclusions, and then, through detailed analysis, shows that it was not so.

For the Renaissance, I suspect that such a treatment would be most unjust.  The Renaissance is supposed to have been a flowering of all of the arts and graces of civilization, and so it was.  No field better shows the contrast between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance than painting.

There may have been painting in The Age of Faith; if so, I don’t remember.  But in the Renaissance, it is as if man discovered canvas, and then through raw genius, invented de novo the art of covering it.  If some future revisionist wishes to annul this impression, let the sheer volume of Renaissance painting and painters overwhelm him, as it does the student of art.

The high state of painting during the 1400s is almost a curse; if we ever hope to make it to the 1500s, we must pass by whole careers of genius with a line, or even a word.  One or two who stood above the rest come to symbolize their age; so in the Renaissance, when we think of painting, we think of Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael.

Let this note, then, stand as a monument to forgotten genius: among these thousand Renaissance painters, Andrea del Sarto is also worthy of remembrance.  Michelangelo said of him to Raphael, “There is a little fellow in Florence who will bring sweat to your brow if ever he is engaged in great works.”  Indeed, Andrea’s especial focus on a narrow circle of subjects, particularly Madonnas, is apparently what has kept him from greater critical acclaim, in both his own day and ours.  Nonetheless, Durant prefers many aspects of his painting to that of the remembered greats, citing composition, anatomy, and color among others as elements in which Andrea surpassed all.

Botticelli's Madonna of the Magnificat

This humble critic also found Andrea’s work to be exceptional, particularly in the field of anatomy (nearly the only field in which he is a qualified judge).  Compare the Madonna of the Harpies, for example, to anything from Botticelli.  I found Andrea’s Last Supper preferable in some ways to Leonardo’s (though perhaps this is only a consequence of time’s caprice).  As Wikipedia says, each figure in Andrea’s rendition is like a portrait, exceptionally individualized, and excelling Leonardo’s in picturing the varied tones and shades of human skins and faces.  What a progression from Fra Angelico to this, in less than a hundred years!

Andrea del Sarto's Madonna of the Harpies

We can only hope that, in our own characteristic arts, our age may baffle future critics as the Renaissance baffles us.