Renaissance man: a universal individual

Renaissance man, or "polimat" (universal man) is a fully developed personality who has many knowledge and is a specialist in several scientific disciplines.

Definition has largely emerged due to outstanding artists, great thinkers and scholars of the era of the European Renaissance (starting around 1450). Michelangelo Buonarroti, Galileo Galilei, Nicolaus Copernicus, Miguel Servetus, Leon Battista Alberti, Isaac Newton are the most important names of people who were researchers in several fields of science and art. But, perhaps, the brightest representative, a true man of the Renaissance-Leonardo da Vinci. He was an artist, an engineer, an anatomist, interested in many other disciplines and achieved great success in his studies.

The term "polymath" precedes the Renaissance, it comes from the Greek word "polymathes", which can be translated as "possessing many knowledge" - an idea that was extremely important for Plato and Aristotle, the great thinkers of the Ancient World.

Leon Battista Alberti said: "People can do anything if they want to." This idea embodied the basic principles of the Renaissance humanism, which determined that the individual is unlimited in his capabilities and development. Of course, the concept of "Renaissance man" should be attributed only to gifted individuals who tried to develop their skills in all areas of knowledge, in the arts, in physical development, unlike other people who lived in that era, more of a low-educated society.

Many people who received an education, aspired to the position of "universal man." They constantly engaged in self-improvement, developing the opportunities they received, studying foreign languages, conducting scientific research, understanding and explaining philosophical problems, appreciating art, practicing sports (they perfected their bodies). At an early stage, when the concept was generally defined, educated people had access to many knowledge - the works of Greek thinkers and philosophers (many works were lost in subsequent centuries). In addition, a man of the Renaissance was a continuer of knightly traditions. Knights of the early Middle Ages, as you know, were literate people, understood poetry and art, had good manners, and enjoyed personal independence (excluding duties to the feudal ruler). And the human right to freedom is the main theme of true Renaissance humanism.

To a certain extent, humanism was not a philosophy, but a method of research. Humanists believed that a man in the Renaissance should come to the end of his life with a wonderful mind and a magnificent body. All this could be achieved by constantly learning and improving. The main goal of humanism was to create a universal human being that would unite intellectual and physical superiority.

The reopening of ancient texts and the invention of printing have democratized learning and allowed the ideas to spread more quickly. In the early Renaissance, humanitarian science has developed especially . At the same time, the works of Nicholas of Cusa (1450), which preceded the heliocentric worldview of Copernicus, laid to a certain extent the beginning of the natural sciences. But still the science of the Renaissance and art (as disciplines) were very mixed at the beginning of the era. A vivid example is the great genius of Leonardo da Vinci, who is an outstanding painter, he is also called the father of modern science.