Popular Culture

The term "popular culture" is the modern name for the rituals, customs, and entertainments of ordinary people. During the Renaissance, this term did not exist. People of the time did not draw clear lines between high culture and popular, or "low," culture. However, this line was beginning to appear as Renaissance elites* separated themselves from the common people. For example, readers who closely followed the guidelines for elegant behavior in Baldassare Castiglione's The Courtier (1528) learned to look down on popular traditions. At the same time, religious reform movements frowned on elements of popular culture that seemed non-Christian, immoral, or common. The humanist* movement, with its focus on ancient cultures, also encouraged the elites to withdraw from the culture of ordinary people.

Several barriers kept the common people from enjoying forms of high culture such as art and literature. The first of these was language. Much of high culture centered on Latin, a language that the vast majority of the population never learned. A second barrier was literacy*. Only a limited number of people—mostly urban males—could read and write. Finally, money posed a barrier for most people, who could not afford to buy books and paintings. Some could afford other forms of art, however, such as inexpensive prints, engravings, and ceramics.

POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT AND TRADITION

The culture of ordinary people was in many ways a culture of the spoken word. At home, children learned songs, stories, and proverbs. Beyond the household, rumor and gossip were the main sources of information. In addition to this "homemade" culture, people had access to professional communicators such as preachers and actors, especially in towns.

Popular culture also expressed itself through religious beliefs and practices, such as the widespread faith in saints. Many people viewed saints as powerful protectors and healers and associated certain saints with particular situations. For example, Saint Margaret offered protection against the dangers of childbirth, while Saint Blaise guarded against sore throats. Cities, guilds*, and individuals also looked to specific saints for help. The faithful made offerings to these saints or took images of them on processions through the city. The people believed that their saints would punish them if they did not give them enough attention. However, if the people did not get the help they wanted, they sometimes "punished" their saints by dunking their images in water.

Events such as fairs and festivals marked the change of seasons and other important events in the lives of ordinary people. Various popular traditions marked these events. For example, during the rowdy annual festival of Carnival, people across Europe overturned the normal rules of society. The most popular activities included overeating, sex, and violence.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN HIGH AND LOW CULTURE

Popular culture often imitated the subjects and forms of high culture. For example, upper-class knights and ladies were the first people to enjoy tales of chivalry* during the Middle Ages, but by the 1500s these stories appealed to ordinary people as well. Many popular traditional folktales and ballads dealt with the courts of Charlemagne and King Arthur. Some modern scholars think that these tales of Roland, Lancelot, and other heroes may have had different meanings for listeners from high and low society. However, the stories themselves were neither "high" nor "low." They were a form of culture that different social groups shared and enjoyed in different ways.

Many people lived somewhere between the popular and elite worlds, or had a foot in both. Craftspeople, shopkeepers, and other townsfolk in large towns had access to schools, plays, and public works of art. Some individuals, such as servants in upper-class households and priests who worked in the community, moved from the popular to the elite world and back again. They played important roles in the interaction between popular culture and the high culture of the Renaissance.

High Culture and the Common People. Some ordinary people knew of at least a small part of the classical* tradition. Publishers printed works by ancient Roman writers in the vernacular*, and stories from Roman history became the subjects of songs, plays, and woodcuts*. Ludovico Ariosto's long poem Orlando Furioso (Mad Roland, 1516) is an example of how high culture traveled into popular culture. Written by a noble for nobles, it was fairly expensive in its published form. But during the 1500s inexpensive booklets containing sections or summaries of the poem became available, and visitors to Italy reported hearing verses of it in the streets.

Although most Renaissance artists were middle-class crafts workers, only members of the educated elite could afford to buy their works. However, the general public could view their artworks in the form of woodcuts, prints, and engravings. Ordinary people could not afford marble or bronze sculptures, but they could and did buy ceramic plates and jugs, many of which featured painted scenes from classical mythology or ancient history.

Drama also introduced the general population to Renaissance culture. Actors performed plays in the new commedia dell'arte* style in cities as well as in royal or noble courts. Ordinary folk as well as elites attended the permanent public theaters that opened in the late 1500s in cities such as London, Paris, and Madrid.

Popular Influences on High Culture. Low or popular culture also influenced the high culture of the Renaissance. For example, Giovanni Boccaccio was a learned man who wrote scholarly works in Latin. However, he took many of the stories in his Decameron (completed in the early 1350s) from the popular tradition of spoken folktales. Several of the plots turn on practical jokes, a central element of popular culture in Tuscany, Boccaccio's home.

The Dutch painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder, active in the 1500s, linked high and low culture in his paintings. He was part of a circle of learned men and was familiar with at least some elements of classical tradition, yet his art frequently shows peasants dancing, working, or enjoying games or Carnival activities. One of Brueghel's biographers wrote that he attended peasant weddings to gather material for his art.

English playwright William Shakespeare included peasants and craftsmen as comic figures in some of his plays. In addition, his comedies draw on popular festive traditions. The play A Midsummer Night's Dream, for example, reflects the customs of May Game, a traditional English spring festival.

(See alsoArt; Commedia dell'Arte; Decorative Arts; Fairs and Festivals; Parades and Pageants; Social Status. )

* elite

privileged group; upper class

* humanist

referring to a Renaissance cultural movement promoting the study of the humanities (the languages, literature, and history of ancient Greece and Rome) as a guide to living

* literacy

ability to read

* guild

association of craft and trade owners and workers that set standards for and represented the interests of its members

* chivalry

rules and customs of medieval knighthood

* classical

in the tradition of ancient Greece and Rome

* vernacular

native language or dialect of a region or country

* woodcut

print made from a block of wood with an image carved into it

* commedia dell'arte

improvisational comedy that began in Italy during the Middle Ages and featured stock characters such as a boastful captain, pairs of lovers, and bumbling servants