An extensive history of the Age of Reason, showing how, although it was an era of progress in many fields, it was also a time of ferocity and intolerance, by the author of The Borgias and The Florentines. During the 1600s, between the end of the Renaissance and the beginning of the Enlightenment, Europe went through a period known as the Age of Reason. This was a revolutionary period that saw great advances in fields such as art, science, philosophy, political theory, and economics. However, all this took place against a backdrop of extreme political turmoil and irrational behavior on a continental scale, in the form of internal conflicts and international wars. Indeed, the Age of Reason was born simultaneously with the Thirty Years' War, which would devastate central Europe to a degree not seen again until the twentieth century. This period also saw the expansion of European empires around the globe and a lucrative new transatlantic trade activity that brought transformational wealth to western European society. However, there was a dark side to this brilliant wealth: it depended on mass slavery. Exploring all the key events and bringing to life some of the most influential characters of the era, including Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Newton, Descartes, Spinoza, Louis XIV, and Charles I, Paul Strathern recounts the story of this contradictory era, while also tallying the human cost of enforcing the progress and modernity upon which the Western world was built.