"Varia lección" and "encyclopaedia": Early Modern ideals of erudition

Abstract

This paper aims at analyzing the configuration of the Early Modern ideal of eruditio. It focuses on examining the fundamental channels of transmission and organization of knowledge, as well as the aspirations of the perfect erudition. It studies the predominant models of pedagogical methodology, designed in Renaissance educational treatises, and the fundamental goals of training in bonae literae. It attempts to prove that certain gnoseological paradigms, traditionally attributed to Modernity, can be detected already in Renaissance epistemological models.