Georg Voigt

Voigt belonged to the founders of modern research into the Italian Renaissance along with Jacob Burckhardt.

In 1860, Voigt was called by Heinrich von Sybel to the University of Rostock as professor of history.

Unlike Burckhardt, Voigt described only the first century of a movement which came from Renaissance Florence and spread all through Europe.

In recognizing his own self as a human in context with the studies of the Classical authors, Petrarch left the old mediaeval world and its structures behind.

In the tradition of Ranke and Johann Gustav Droysen, Voigt used the term "humanism" for the description of a historical period.