Rehabilitating Machiavelli: Kaspar Schoppe with and against Rome. Issue 8 (16th November 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Almási, Gábor
• Is Part Of: History of European ideas. Volume 42:Issue 8(2016)
• Page Start: 981
• Page End: 1004
• Publication Date: 2016-11-16
• Subjects: Machiavelli -- reception -- Catholic -- science -- politics; Europe -- Intellectual life -- Periodicals; Europe -- History -- Periodicals; 190.5
• DOI: 10.1080/01916599.2016.1161537
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0191-6599

Abstract

SUMMARY: This paper presents the unusual story of the efforts of the political agent and pamphleteer Kaspar Schoppe to rehabilitate Machiavelli. Unlike the few earlier attempts by Machiavelli's Florentine descendants, Schoppe's campaign was motivated by complex factors, which were in a great part related to his vision of Catholic renewal. Through the story of Schoppe's campaign for Machiavelli (which at a certain moment became related to Galileo's similar fight for Copernicanism), this paper offers not only a novel interpretation of this fascinating figure of the Counter-Reformation but also insight into the problems of science and political philosophy in the Catholic world.