How was the creation of the modern world possible?

The Renaissance can be divided into an early period in the 12th century and the more widely known cultural flowering during the 14th to the 17th centuries. A part of the cultural change may be attributed to the flow of Islamic knowledge into Europe from Muslim Spain and cosmopolitan Sicily as well as the movement of Byzantine savants into the West after the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in the 15th century. What other factors enabled the Renaissance to take place?

England, France and Spain all went through processes by which the monarchies were strengthened and extended central power especially during the 14th and 15th centuries. Eugen Weber suggests that this was due in part to the introduction of firearms into Europe in the 13th century. He suggests that the availability of artillary and other firearm technology triggered mutually reinforcing processes in which the increasing power of central government to tax financed increasingly powerful weaponry and military capabilities, and the military power enforced the increasing ability of those in control to appropriate revenues.

Without disagreeing with Weber, I want to explore other processes that were going on during this period.

Trade

According to the Encarta Encyclopedia:

By the 11th century.......population growth and contact with other cultures through military efforts such as the Crusades helped revive commercial activity. Trade slowly increased with the exchange of luxury goods in the Mediterranean region and various commodities such as fish, furs, and metals across the North and Baltic seas. Commerce soon moved inland, bringing new prosperity to the citizens of towns along major trade routes. As traffic along these routes increased, existing settlements grew and new ones were established.

Transportation

While merchant shipping in the Mediterranean goes back to ancient times, there was a significant advance in the Middle Ages, leading to the large Venetian fleet at the time of the renaissance. There were also advances in shipbuilding, and the caravel was widely used from the 12th through the 16th century, improving the efficiency of marine commerce.

Roads had deteriorated after the fall of the Roman empire. In feudal times their maintenance was typically the responsibility of each feudal lord within his domain. One assumes that the expansion of national power led also to the improvement of the national system of roads. Apparently the same technological advances that led to the creation of Gothic cathedrals in the late Middle Ages also led to the construction of systems of bridges, financed by local monastaries. The first known road map of Britain dates to the 14th century. Thus it seems likely that the growth of trade in the late Middle Ages and thereafter was accompanied not only be improved shipping, but also be improved road systems. These in turn would have facilitated transport by the increasingly used wheeled vehicles pulled by draft animals.

Agriculture

The Eurasian land mass allows for east-west transfer of crops in ways that are in some ways simpler than would be north-south transfers. The Muslim expansion facilitated those transfers, providing a realm of cultural exchange that ranged from India to Spain. Note too that there was an Islamic Golden Age which culturally contributed to the process of agricultural innovation and the transfers of agricultural technologies and practices. As a result, new crops and agricultural practices were introduced into Southern Europe from Muslim lands.

Moreover, according to A History of World Agriculture by Marcel Mazoyer, Laurence Roudart and James H. Membrez, during the late Middle Ages there was an agricultural revolution. In Northern parts of Europe it was based on fallowing and animal drawn plows increased agricultural productivity, and other methods were used in Mediterranean regions.

The increase in agricultural productivity made possible the growth of urban populations (that did not grow food but imported it from their rural supply bases) as well as the feed increases that allowed for greater use of animal power for transportation as well as agriculture, and of course the campaigns of larger military units during the growing season, allowing the broader exercise of power.

Climate

The Medieval Climate Optimum was a time of unusually warm climate in the North Atlantic region, lasting from about the tenth century to about the fourteenth century. It followed the Migration Period Pessimum or Dark Ages Cold Period. The MWP was followed by the Little Ice Age. It would seem that the climate of the period was conducive to increased agricultural productivity, longer periods in which transportation was possible, and population growth.

Epidemiology

The plague reached Europe in the 1340's and is estimated to have killed 30 to 60 percent of Europe's population. New epidemics swept Europe relatively frequently until the 1700s. According to Wikipedia:

The 14th century eruption of the Black Death had a drastic effect on Europe's population, irrevocably changing the social structure. It was a serious blow to the Roman Catholic Church, and resulted in widespread persecution of minorities such as Jews, foreigners, beggars, and lepers.

It has been noted that the sudden depopulation of Europe due to the plague resulted in more land and capital available per person for the survivors. That in turn lead to increased per capita production, and allowed more diversification in productive activity, which (as Adam Smith has pointed out) led to still further increases in per capita production.

Final Comment

The foregoing is an exploration in keeping with theories of historical determinism. I guess I do believe that the creation of modern culture and institutions is at least enabled by changes in the underlying technology and economic productivity. There is certainly a case to be made that the direction of the Renaissance was influenced by the genius of a sequence of great men. So too, the delay of nation building in Germany and Italy as compared with Spain, France and England testifies that the outcomes are historically contingent on factors other than those mentioned above.