The Medici’s Influence: Revival of Political and Financial Thought in Europe
Sema Yılmaz Genç1, Hassan Syed2
1Kocaeli University, Department of Marketing and Advertising, Kocaeli/TURKEY
2BPP University, Islamic Finance Law, London/UNITED KINGDOM
Keywords: Medici Bank, Medieval Europe, Averroes, Avicenna
Abstract
The history of the European Renaissance has been written in many versions. The move from medieval to Renaissance period in world history shows clashes between empires and human nature. The contemporary scholars have many variants of history to choose from and form their own views about what actually transpired during the historical period. The most significant role of the Medici family was in the new era of European history that witnessed the art of administration on the Medici Bank in Florence/Italy. This paper portrays the point of view of the influence of Islamic Arab scholars as scribes in the re-introduction of Greek-Aristotelian philosophies to Renaissance Europe. This view is being increasingly challenged. The Islamic-Arab scholars such as Averroes and Avicenna were not mere scribes. Better translations of Arabic and Persian historical treasures reveal that the Islamic-Arab scholars during the golden age of Islam were globally accepted literary giants who made profound changes to the ideological shaping of Renaissance Europe.