Renaissance on the Road

The Renaissance was a highly mobile turbulent era in Europe when war poverty and persecution pushed many people onto the roads in search of a living or a safe place to settle. In the same period the expansion of European states overseas opened up new avenues of long-distance migration while also fuelling the global traffic in slaves. The accelerating movement of people stimulated commercial political religious and artistic exchanges while also prompting the establishment of new structures of control and surveillance. This Element illuminates the material and social mechanisms that enacted mobility in the Renaissance and thereby offers a new way to understand the period's dynamism creativity and conflict. Spurred by recent 'mobilities' studies it highlights the experiences of a wide range of mobile populations paying particular attention to the concrete practical dimensions of moving around at this time whether on a local or a global scale.