Jacob Burckhardt

Works

• 1860The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy

  Six parts on Italy from the fourteenth to the early sixteenth century: the state as a work of art, the development of the individual, the revival of antiquity, the discovery of the world and of man, social life and festivals, morality and religion.

• 1905Reflections on History

  Lectures of 1868–73, published after his death by his nephew Jacob Oeri: history is studied as the interplay of three powers – state, religion and culture – and of historical crises, without claiming to know a plan of world history.

Position

Burckhardt is on the map as a founder of modern cultural history and as a sceptical counterpart to the philosophies of history of his century. “The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy” (1860) presented Italy from the fourteenth to the early sixteenth century not through events but through structures and attitudes: the state as a calculated “work of art”, the development of the individual, the revival of antiquity, the discovery of the world and of man, sociability and festivals, morality and religion. The image of the Renaissance as the birth of modern individuality, which he shaped more than anyone, has been criticised and qualified ever since – by Huizinga among others – but the book remains a classic. In the lectures published after his death as “Reflections on History” he rejected Hegel’s philosophy of history: we are not initiated into the purposes of eternal wisdom; history can only be studied as the interplay of three “powers” – the state, religion and culture – and of the crises in which they shift. He viewed modernity with deep pessimism, saw power as “evil in itself” and warned in his letters of the “terrible simplifiers” who would wield unlimited power in an age of masses. Nietzsche, his younger colleague in Basel, admired him. His letters also contain anti-Jewish remarks; these are discussed under “Context & critique”.

Life & context

Jacob Burckhardt was born on 25 May 1818 in Basel, the son of a Protestant pastor. He began studying theology in Basel, then turned to history and studied in Berlin (1839–43) with Leopold von Ranke, Johann Gustav Droysen and the art historian Franz Kugler, and for a semester in Bonn. After working as a journalist and lecturer in Basel and travelling in Italy, he published the art guide “Der Cicerone” (1855) and taught at the new Federal Polytechnic in Zurich (1855–58). From 1858 to 1893 he was professor of history, and from 1874 also of art history, at the University of Basel; in 1872 he declined an offer to succeed Ranke in Berlin. He lived modestly and unmarried, gave public lectures for the citizens of Basel and published little after 1867. He died in Basel on 8 August 1897.

Further main works

• Die Zeit Constantins des Großen (1853)
• Der Cicerone (1855)
• Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien (1860)
• Griechische Kulturgeschichte (1898–1902, ed. J. Oeri)
• Weltgeschichtliche Betrachtungen (1905, ed. J. Oeri)