Assignment – 500 Word Essay

From the syllabus: You will select a historical event and write a concise 500-word essay
suggesting why it happened.

The assignment: Pick an event, whether from the course or another that interests you,
and locate it in a historical context. That is, explain the trends that led to it and show
how they’re connected.

For example:

The execution of Copernicus.

This essay explores why was Copernicus executed for saying the sun, rather than the
earth, was the centre of the universe.

Religion legitimated State power in medieval Europe. Copernicus’ ideas were contrary
to church dogma and thus seen as subversive. It wasn’t always this way. From Classicial
Greece until the conversion of the Roman Emperor Constantine to Christianity, religion
and science were intertwined. Science sometimes went contrary to religious beliefs, but
at other times was seen as a way of understanding God’s mystery. Following the
collapse of the Roman Empire and the steep decline in quality of life among Christian
nations, Christianity in Europe became a means for controlling society and legitimating
rulers. Copernicus was executed because his ideas were seen as a threat to the elite.
His theory suggested that the Church did not have the “direct line to God” it claimed, if
it didn’t even know the Earth’s place in the universe.

Science did not re-take an influential place in society until the Renaissance and
Enlightenment when new advances made clear improvements to the quality of life of
many people. These ideas spread with increased literacy (via the movable type printing
press) and improvements in material standard of living - possible via new scientific
advances - would eventually overtake religion as legitimators of state power. Perhaps
ironically, the treatment of Copernicus helped accelerate the rise of science