Neagu Djuvara and his oppinions

Yes Victor, the Renaissance was hastened by the fall of Constantinople. But THAT in itself is ample evidence that the artists who fled Constantinople found a more fertile ground to put their talent to good use in the West rather than East.

I agree, the Western lead in art and creation may have little to do with religion in itself. I never made a case based on religion. The point I was trying to make was that the Catholic/Protestant Churches have a very long history of encouraging art and creation (even if that was for their own benefit and enrichment, they had all the best opportunities and conditions, they never had to fight an enemy or each other, bla bla bla, etc) whereas the Orthodox church does not seem to have any tradition of art patronage.
All discussions about "reasons" and "causes" for this appear to be nothing more than a ruse to avoid the obvious: the West leads in the field of eccelsiastical art/creation.

Radu

In my understanding of the text Djuvara is talking about economic development. And we started talking about the impossibility of connecting religion to economic development.

Lavish art and architecture is the product/effect/consequence of develpment, not its cause. Your contribution may be good in showing how the Catholic Church used wealth intelligently, but not in showing how religion is connected with development.

To give you an example, Philip II built El Escorial with gold from the New World. If an Orthodox Church had that access to that amount of gold, and the safety offered by an army like Spain's, wouldn't you think a lot of things would have been built on a large scale? Look at Hagia Sophia.

I am willing to look more into the science connection, since science can actually impact development, but the subject is even trickier and I think the discussion would go off in another direction.

As I said, I never made a case based on religion.
It seems that you finally got my point: the Church in the West saw some kind benefit of investing in art, creation and knowledge. Creation and knowledge have a way of trickling down to benefit everyone in the long run. "The rising tide lifts all boats".
Radu

Is it really a falacy? You, even if aparently seem to be an inteligent person, are blinded by some new stereotypes.

How you can compare Britain, last time affected by an invasion at the begining of XI century if i remember correct, with, let say Serbia, who couple centuries after lost its independence and regained it in XIX century? How you can compare us, who had to fight against pretty much all neighbours, and all theoreticaly greater or much greater powers, with France, who fight from time to time with England, a similar power, with almost same culture?

Gosh, the army of Stephen the Great at Vaslui was bigger then combined armies of France and England at Agincourt (famous 100 years war, but fight mostly with small armies, and most of the time without to call all the peasents at arms, just knights and professional troops), yet Moldova was several times smaller and with a much smaller population then those two combined. Vlad Tepes with an even smaller army (after called in army anyone able to fight) killed most turks then same combined armies of french and english. All this wars was done with the usual "scorched earth" tactic, and wasnt one, but many battles, of various levels. And when was too exhausted to fight, we pay a tribute. Did this seem similar with, let say Spain, who after Reqonquista (hugely helped by the fall of arab power) didnt suffer any foreign invasions similar with us, or, if much later had the french coming, it was nothing similar with having a diferent culture distroying their heritage or keep them to not develope themselves and their beliefs.

And what great inventions was made by west? As i said, ancient romans was in many instances more developed, in almost any areas. What legacy they left behind? There is a bad legacy too, but is not the time to enter in details now.

Ofcourse, some things are undeniable, but as i said, have little to do with religion, or in a lesser degree that you seem to imply

This post has been edited by udar on January 30, 2011 09:20 pm

The way I see it, the Orthodox Church was oriented more towards community, while the Catholic Church towards estate and nobility. The great achievements of Renaissance, in all forms, were funded by representatives of the Church which were also kings or rulers. While Orthodoxy acted as a bond of holding the communities together, this was also its main weakness when its authority was put at "work" by foreign interests (the communism being the most handy example).

There were no such battles against Ottoman armies beginning with the XVIIth century, just desperate and unsuccessful attempts from the part of a ruler or another to keep his throne (and sometimes even his life) after falling out of favour for certain reasons. At Vienna in 1683, the Wallachian and Moldavian armies fought for the Ottoman Empire, and for most of the time Wallachia and Moldavia were dar al-sulh for the Ottomans.

This post has been edited by Amicus_Plato on January 31, 2011 12:26 am

The Orthodox Church owned a lot of estates and many important clerics lived a luxuriant life and aimed to have an important influence in the political life. The Catholic Churches have also an orientation towards their communities, but in theory they must obey the Pope, who represents the Universal principle of the Church, before anything else, even before local peculiarities or political conjunctures. Though in practice various forms of "Gallicanism" were never foreign in many of these Catholic Churches.

This post has been edited by Amicus_Plato on January 31, 2011 12:19 am

since the end of the viking era, the limited usefulness of calling up ill equipped peasant levies has become obvious to most warlords in the conflict ridden western europe. until the cheap(er) flintlock and mass armies of the 18th century, mercenaries and standing armies were used in warfare, which, for obvious cost reasons led to lower numbers. even at pavia, or throughout the 30 years war, armies seldom surpassed 25.000 men. certainly a commander could recruit many more, but prolonged campaigns and logistic shortcommings would limit the size until the late 17th century. for example, the king of sweden commanded some 40.000 troops at nürnberg in 1632, but split them up as soon as he could.
it didn't do much good to fill the field with pitchfork carrying peasants, as the peasants wars of the 15-16th centuries showed.

OK, I will accept your "bid". Stephen the Great was... great... Then what? The point is that there were no major prolonged campaigns against the Turks, only occasional battles. Even he, the Great, did not manage to beat the Turks too well. He fought them many times, forty-eight times (and "lost" twice) if I recall. Well, if he had "beat" them, he only needed to fight them once, the first time. Furthermore, by the time Stephen the Great came about to keep back the Turks from the cathedral construction sites in the West, many of these cathedrals were already built. St. Stephen Cathedral in Budapest was already up for more than 200 years. St Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna was already up for more than 200 years. I only picked the "Stephens" but I can look for more if you want. Anyway, the argument of "we fought the Turks while they built their cathedrals" does not hold if you look at it literally (or objectively). Sounds good, but means nothing.

Where is the proof of that? Can you quote a source? Did this "scorched earth" method have such an economic impact as to stunt the development of an entire nation for hundreds of years while the West flourished? Was this method never used in the West? There are serious holes in this argument. E cusuta cu atza alba.

This reminds me of that Monty Python sketch of "What did the Romans ever do for us?".
Oh, if I were a mean man...

Read again what I said. I never made a case based on "religion" and nor did I ever "imply" it. I said it twice already. This is the third time.

Radu

This post has been edited by Radub on January 31, 2011 07:12 am

As I said, I never made a case based on religion.
It seems that you finally got my point: the Church in the West saw some kind benefit of investing in art, creation and knowledge. Creation and knowledge have a way of trickling down to benefit everyone in the long run. "The rising tide lifts all boats".
Radu

I see, but like I said, investment in art and architecture is not relevant when it comes to development. Because, taking what you're saying into contemporary times to make myself better understood, it would mean that your solution to underdevelopment in Africa would be lavish investment in art and architecture! Those people would first tell you they lack the funds to make those investments and secondly that those investments would be pointless for the development stage they're in.

Education and science are more relevant. But education was present in the Orthodox Church too. Science is the only thing left but we'd need a whole other discussion on it. Why? Because we/you would have to show how the science encouraged by the CC impacted development in a certain period. Many of the scientists I saw on that Wiki page were astronomers, doctors or mathematicians. Development in their age was driven by trade, colonialism, agriculture, industry. We'd have to see if and how their discoveries had any economic impact.

Thats the problem i was talking about, they didnt needed to rise big popular armies, since they didnt had to face big inavsions of vastly superior enemies.
And second, the tactics used during medieval era here was quite diferent usualy, compared with those in western Europe, and peasent level armies was useful in many circumstances.
The system with "oastea cea mica" formed by "professional warriors" and "oastea cea mare" formed by every men able to wear a weapon was used here too, and not allways the "big army" was used, but in many instances it was

There is a very obvious connection between art, architecture, creation and scientific development/progress. Architecture requires mathematical, geometrical, engineering, geology, hydrology, physics, mechanics, metalwork, and even chemistry knowledge, otherwise you get a pile of rotting rubble instead of a thousand year-old cathedral. Painting and sculpture are closely related to the study of anatomy/medicine and study of nature, study of chemistry for pigments and lacquers, study of metallurgy for tools, study of mechanics and geology for the quarying and transportation of immense blocks of marble in pristine conditions. These ARE hard science subjects. These guys often started from nothing and had to study and learn these things by themselves, but by doing so they enriched the world manyfold. That is the esence of the Renaissance - this immense explosion in knowledge. This wealth of knowledge eventually "overflowed" into other domains and fields. As I said, rising tide lifts all boats.
I do not wish to link Renaissance with religion as such, but there is no doubt that the Renaissance enriched the world, and the Renaiossance is closely related with the Catholic/Protestant Church that sponsored and encouraged it. Sadly, the Orthodox Church did not have a Renaissance.
Radu

But that does not apply in the case of the "principalities" either. There was no "major campaign" against the Turks. There never was a major army.
And what about this "humongous" army that Stephen put together at Valui to beat the turks and give some respite to Western architects? According to our hisitory books, at Vaslui Stefan cel Mare had only 12.000 troops (and that appears to be a rough estimate). You said that weas greater than the army used at the battle of Agincourt. Well... Henry's army at Agincourt was 12.000 troops, and he had to ship them by boat across the channel. There were hundreds of other battles in the West that amassed larger numbers of troops on either side. So no, no bigwhoopdeedoo at Vaslui. And did Stefan win? No, not really. He won a number of battles but the war was lost. (This is like saying that Romania won WW2 because they won at Odessa) We still paid taxes to the Turks until the "War of Independnce" in 1877 (the clue is in the name).
This is history at taught by Sergiu Nicolaescu. Forget it!
Radu

Only ocassional battles? So 46 battles (as i remember, 48 as you said), not only against the turks, but against others too, in 47 years is just some ocassional stuff who didnt affect much the country? They should build a Notre Dame with easy, betwen those foreign invasions, it was the Orthodox Church who had other ideas (even if somehow managed to build those monasteries which are in UNESCO patrimony)?

Radu de la Afumati had 22 battles in 7 years. Vlad Tepes fight in 6 years several campaigns and battles, with other throne pretenders, a campaign in Transilvania, one against turks in south of Danube, faced a big invasion in his country, and in the same time even fight against moldavians who wanted to secure Chilia for them. Still managed to rebuild and reinforce Targoviste, Poienari and Bucharest. If you think it was possiblle to build a "Sagrada Familia" in the same time, i think you are already in an alternative history domain.

Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna was already up for more than 200 years you said, but did they had similar problems there? What invasions suffered hungarians after mongols? Yes, turks, who transform them in a ottoman province in XVI century, but before that? The western countries was way more protected from that

Yes, i will search for a source, i dont have time now, i believed it was much of a common knowledge. And this, and even paying a tribute or being ruled by Fanariots, who's main interest was to get as much money as possible surely affected the development of the country. Not to mention that Transilvania entered at some point under foreign ocupation.

But, as i said, the main blow was done with WW II and comunism, this is what really created a gap in development betwen east and west, in my opinion

Oh, please, dont be shy
And ofcourse Monty Python was right, Romans did much more for "them" (english in that case) or was more advanced in some areas that they was able to achieve sometimes up tp industrialization era and XIX century

This post has been edited by udar on January 31, 2011 09:43 am

Not all the battles were fought against the Ottomans (Stephen the Great fought also against the Wallachians, the Tatars, the Poles and the Hungarians ), and the battle of Vaslui was followed by the battle of Valea Albă. It was impossible for the Moldavians to face alone the Ottomans, without foreign material help, as the ratio of military force was thoroughly unbalanced. Finally, the only realistic alternative would have been to change the master, i.e. to replace the Turk with another one, but it was not accidental that Stephen requested his heir to render the country to "the Turk", the Turk being considered by Stephen "more powerful and wiser" than others.

This post has been edited by Amicus_Plato on January 31, 2011 09:52 am