Republic of Letters
The Republic of Letters was the long-distance intellectual community in the late 17th and 18th centuries in Europe and the Americas. It fostered communication among the intellectuals of the Age of Enlightenment, or philosophes as they were called in France. These communities that transcended national boundaries formed the basis of a metaphysical republic. Because of societal constraints on women, the Republic of Letters consisted mostly of men.
The Republic of Letters relied heavily on handwritten letters for correspondence.
Historians are presently debating the importance of the Republic of Letters in influencing the Enlightenment. Dena Goodman and Susan Dalton hold the view that women played a role in the Enlightenment.
History
The first known occurrence of the term in its Latin form is in a letter by Francesco Barbaro to Poggio Bracciolini dated July 6, 1417. Currently, the consensus is that Pierre Bayle first translated the term in his journal Nouvelles de la République des Lettres in 1684. But there are some historians who disagree and some have gone so far as to say that its origin dates back to Plato's Republic.File:Coat_of_arms_of_the_Royal_Society.svg|thumb|right|Academies like the Royal Society encouraged discourse and debate that led to enlightenment. Their motto Nullius in verba embodied the spirit of inquiry and scientific investigation.
The Royal Society primarily promoted science, which was undertaken by wealthy gentlemen acting independently. The Royal Society created its charters and established a system of governance. Its most famous leader was Isaac Newton, president from 1703 until his death in 1727. Other notable members include diarist John Evelyn, writer Thomas Sprat, and scientist Robert Hooke, the Society's first curator of experiments. It played an international role to adjudicate scientific findings, and published the journal Philosophical Transactions of the [Royal Society] edited by Henry Oldenburg.
The seventeenth century saw new academies open in France, Germany, and elsewhere. By 1700, they were found in most major cultural centers. Anne Goldgar argues that, in the transitional period between the 17th century and the Enlightenment, the most important common concern by members of the Republic was their own conduct. In the conception of its own members, ideology, religion, political philosophy, scientific strategy, and other intellectual or philosophical frameworks were not as important as their own identity as a community.
File:Presumed Portrait of Madame Geoffrin.jpg|thumb|Presumed portrait of Mme Geoffrin, by Marianne Loir
A radical critique of worldliness, inspired by Rousseau, emerged in salons after 1770. These radicals denounced the mechanisms of polite sociability and called for a new model of the independent writer who would address the public and the nation.