Virtue politics: soulcraft and statecraft in Renaissance Italy

A civilization in crisis: a new "paideuma" and the birth of the humanities

the causes of the crisis

the reform of Christian culture

the humanist movement takes shape

Virtue politics: obedience and legitimacy

virtue politics

classical sources of virtue politics

how not to reform a republic

eloquence and the "virtuous environment"

a new way of thinking about politics

What was a republic in the Renaissance?: the Renaissance concept of the state

what is the meaning of respublica in the Italian Renaissance?

Respublica Romana

respublica in medieval scholasticism

Leonardo Bruni and respublica in the fifteenth century

respublica: an idealization of ancient government

is civic humanism found only in non-monarchical republics?

Taming the tyrant: tyranny in Greek philosophy

Cicero's understanding of Caesar's tyranny as violation of ius

Bartolus of Sassoferrato and Baldo degli Ubaldi

Petrarch on living with tyrants

was Caesar a tyrant? Petrarch, Salutati, Guarino, Poggio

Poggio on tyranny and the "problem of counsel"

Pier Candido Decembrio on the virtues of a tyrant

the recovery of ancient Greek sources on tyranny

The triumph of virtue - Petrarch's political thought: Petrarch's politics of virtue

Cola di Rienzo: populism and its limits

Petrarch's new realism

Should a good man participate in a corrupt government?: Petrarch on the solitary life

the De vita solitaria: an ideal of private life for literary men

the defense of private life

Seneca versus Augustine: political obligation and political autonomy

Boccaccio on the perils of wealth and status: Boccaccio's political experience

the need to reform the materia prima of politics: human nature

virtue, education, and tyranny

Boccaccio and the humanist debate about private wealth and economic injustice

Boccaccio and virtue politics

Leonardo Bruni and the virtuous hegemon: why Florence deserves to be the heir of Rome: the Panegyric of the city of Florence

political liberty as a source of virtue

the Etruscan model: leadership in a federal republic

Dante and Bruni on the legitimation of empire

War and military service in the virtuous republic: late medieval civic knighthood and the context of Leonardo Bruni's De militia

excursus: the humanists and partisan politics

Bruni's De militia: a new interpretation

excursus on the "virtuous environment": Donatello and the representation of classical military virtue

do humanist teachings on warfare anticipate Machiavelli?

virtue in military life

Roberto Valturio on the education of soldiers

A mirror for statesmen: Leonardo Bruni's history of the Florentine people

history as political theory

virtue in the service of the republic's glory

the primacy of the popolo and the suppression of factions

moderation in politics as the key to social concord

Biondo Flavio: what made the Romans great: the roma Triumphans and the revival of Roman civilization

what was the Respublica Romana for Biondo?

Biondo's virtue politics, republicanism, and the greatness of Rome

a cosmopolitan papalist

Cyriac of Ancona on democracy and empire: a short history of the term democratia

Cyriac of Ancona's attempted rehabilitation of the term democratia

Cyriac the Caesarian

Leon Battista Alberti on corrupt princes and virtuous oligarchs: why virtue is incompatible with court life

who should constitute the political elite?

The De iciarchia and the regime of virtuous "house-princes"

George of Trebizond on cosmopolitanism and liberty: George's attack on nativism and defense of cosmopolitanism

a Renaissance libertarian?

Francesco Filelfo and the Spartan Republic: Filelfo and the recovery of the Spartan tradition

Filelfo and humanist adaptations of the myth of Sparta

Greek constitutional theory in the quattrocento: the "second wave" of Greek constitutional theory

legitimation and the republican regime

Francesco Patrizi on republican constitutions

delegitimation: Bruni and the chivalric ideal

substitution: platonizing Venice's constitution

Mario Salamonio compares Florence to Athens

Francesco Patrizi and humanist absolutism: the recovery of ancient Greek monarchical theory

Patrizi and his project in the De regno

virtuous royal legitimacy and humanist absolutism

the argument for monarchy

can monarchical power be virtuous?

how the king may become virtuous

Machiavelli: reviving the military republic: the calamità d'Italia

Machiavelli and humanist literary culture

Machiavelli's political education and the art of war

why princes and republics should follow the ancient way of warfare

Machiavelli: from virtue to virtù: Machiavelli's Prince and renaissance concepts of tyranny

the Machiavellian revolution in political thought

Machiavelli's virtù

Two cures for hyperpartisanship: Bruni versus Machiavelli: two competing narratives of Florentine history

the ordinances of justice

Walter of Brienne and the instability of tyranny

the restoration of popular institutions in 1343

two cures for hyperpartisanship

Conclusion: Ex Oriente Lux.