The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy

This book offers the first comprehensive account of the birth of a lay
intelligensia, the first in Europe, in the medieval kingdom of Italy. The
analysis deals extensively with cultural exchanges between the kingdom
and transalpine Europe, primarily Francia and Germany. Ronald G. Witt’s
research traces the rise of laymen to intellectual dominance in northern
and north-central Italy by the mid-thirteenth century and the evolution
of a new conception of secular life which, through Latin humanism,
ultimately had a transformative ef ect on the moral, political, and religious
values of western Europe.