The Renaissance and the Age of Exploration were happening simultaneously – which, when you think about it, is really odd. Why did intellectual ferment go in one direction in Italy and in a completely different direction in Spain and Portugal? I’ve read a bit on both eras separately, but would be interested in a book that pulled together a big-picture look at what was going on in Europe during that period.
The only survey I have is the late John Hale’s, which is okay if a bit older ( my copy is from 1971 ). But it looks like this latest edition is ridiculously expensive for an old survey history. Get a cheaper used copy if you can find one.
As a middlebrow, I’d recommend William Manchester’s A World Lit Only By Fire, anchored by Luther and Magellan. “Well, it’s good to be back home. Hey, how come the ship’s log is a day off?”
A World Lit Only By Fire is rather notorious in medievalist circles for being just so wrong - it’s a crappy text outdated even when it was written, the field has moved so far beyond it it’s just not funny…here’s a good introductory reviewthat has a nice list of alternatives at the end, and links to this more detailed analysis.
I know this is a little earlier than you specifically requested, but A Distant Mirror by Barbara Tuchman is a fantastic read about the century preceding.
I am a big fan of Tuchman’s “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous Fourteenth Century.” I found it very readable, informative and downright entertaining.
She has faded in popularity since her death, but I always enjoyed her writings with the possible exception of Stillwell: The American Experience in China. That was a labor of obsession.
To answer your specific question, many of the explorers in the age of exploration of course were Italian - like Columbus and Cabot (A/K/A “Columbo” and “Chabotto”), not to mention “Amerigo Vespucci” after which “America” was named!
The difference is that they all tended to have non-Italian state sponsors. The reasons for this were:
the nations they worked for had an Atlantic focus;
the money in Italy was based on the trade with the ME and the Black Sea - trade routes the Atlantic powers were trying to ‘outflank’; and
the city-states of Italy were small, while exploration was expensive. The new nation-states like England and Spain had the cash.
Gotcha, Malthus – I’m looking for a book that spells all of that out in more detail.
And I own a copy of A Distant Mirror (or I did at some point … it’s hard keeping track of the books that have gone in and out of my life over the last 30 years), so maybe I’ll finally get around to reading it.