Or Plaidoyer For the Emancipation Of Early Music Francesco Petrarca, a 14 th century poet famous enough for his name to be Anglicized to “Petrarch,” is credited with giving a name to the “Dark Ages.” Meant were the centuries immediately following the fall of Rome, which were comparatively obscure and lacking in cultural achievements and historical artifacts. The time in which Petrarch lived was full of hardships; nevertheless, the arts and sciences flourished, and new ideas spread all over Europe. This age of humanism, however, is placed somewhere in the “dark ages” in the collective perception of our time, and its artistic works presented generally within strongly historical contexts. The artistic achievements of Petrarca’s age are generally of aesthetic interest exclusively to experts, and wider audiences (like regular classical music concert goers) are mostly unaware of the excitement that pre-Renaissance music and arts can provide. There is much injustice in such
Branimir Krstic