The role of the aristocracy varied throughout Europe and changed over the course of the Renaissance.

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         A.W.

        Social inequality was an accepted part of Renaissance        society. Every European culture awarded special powers and privileges to the aristocracy, or nobility. However, societies had different ways of defining what it meant to be noble. The role of the aristocracy varied throughout Europe and changed over the course of the Renaissance.  

Definitions of Aristocracy

The men and women of the Renaissance based their ideas about aristocracy on concepts inherited from the ancient world. In Greek philosophy, an aristocracy was a state or community ruled by the best men. Eventually, the term came to refer to the ruling class in such a society.

  Societies used three different concepts to identify the “best” individuals. According to the political definition, aristocrats were those who held political power—usually the wealthiest members of society. The hereditary definition, by contrast, depended on birth. The idea behind this view was that great people passed on their qualities to their descendants. By the 1000s and 1100s, many cultures had developed a military definition. According to this view, a nobleman was a man who fought. This idea presented the aristocracy as one of three main segments of society, along with the clergy (those who prayed) and the commoners (those who worked).

  All three definitions of aristocracy relied on the notion that some people were better than others. In other ways, however, the three definitions were quite different. The political and military visions allowed individuals to rise from one class to a higher one, while the hereditary view fixed a person’s social class at birth. The hereditary and military models recognized the idea that poor people could be noble, but the political view usually defined nobles as wealthy.

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  These three contrasting views all remained powerful between the 1400s and 1600s. Europeans admired individuals who combined all three ideals—men from old families who fought in battles and governed. However, new ideas about nobility began to gain ground during the Renaissance. Humanists* such as Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus and English statesman Thomas More mocked ignorant and violent noblemen. They suggested that to be truly noble, people needed education. Aristocrats across Europe responded to this message. During the 1500s, they attended universities in large numbers. Learning became a requirement for high positions in society and government. This shift in values improved ...

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