Venice and the Defense of Republican Liberty: Renaissance Values in the Age of the Counter Reformation

Venice and the Defense of Republican Liberty: Renaissance Values in the Age of the Counter Reformation by William J. Bouwsma recasts the history of the Renaissance by shifting the spotlight from Florence to Venice. What began as a study of Paolo Sarpi expands into a sweeping exploration of how Venice, under pressure from papal interdicts, forged a distinctive republican ideology in opposition to the Counter-Reformation's universalist claims. Two confrontations with Rome—Julius II's interdic...