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C H A P T E R
The Making of Europe
CHAPTER OUTLINE
AND FOCUS QUESTIONS
The Emergence of Europe in the Early Middle
Ages
What contributions did the Romans, the Christian
church, and the Germanic peoples make to the new
civilization that emerged in Europe after the collapse
of the Western Roman Empire? What was the
significance of Charlemagne’s coronation as emperor?
Europe in the High Middle Ages
What roles did aristocrats, peasants, and townspeople
play in medieval European civilization, and how did
their lifestyles differ? How did cities in Europe
compare with those in China and the Middle East?
What were the main aspects of the political, economic,
spiritual, and cultural revivals that took place in
Europe during the High Middle Ages?
Medieval Europe and the World
In what ways did Europeans begin to relate to peoples
in other parts of the world after 1000 C.E.? What were
the reasons for the Crusades, and who or what
benefited the most from them?
CRITICAL THINKING
In what ways was the civilization that developed
in Europe in the Middle Ages similar to those in
China and the Middle East? How were they
different?
The coronation of Charlemagne by Pope Leo III, as depicted in a medieval
French manuscript
IN 800, CHARLEMAGNE, the king of the Franks, journeyed to Rome to help Pope Leo III, head of the Catholic
Church, who was barely clinging to power in the face of rebellious Romans. On Christmas Day, Charlemagne and his
family, attended by Romans and Franks, crowded into Saint
Peter’s Basilica to hear Mass. Quite unexpectedly, according
to a Frankish writer, ‘‘as the king rose from praying before
the tomb of the blessed apostle Peter, Pope Leo placed a
golden crown on his head.’’ The people in the church
shouted, ‘‘Long life and victory to Charles Augustus, crowned
by God the great and peace-loving Emperor of the Romans.’’
Seemingly, the Roman Empire in the west had been reborn,
and Charles had become the first Roman emperor since 476.
But this ‘‘Roman emperor’’ was actually a German king, and
he had been crowned by the head of the western Christian
church. In truth, the coronation of Charlemagne was a sign
not of the rebirth of the Roman Empire but of the emergence
of a new European civilization that came into being in western Europe after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.
This new civilization—European civilization—was formed
by the coming together of three major elements: the legacy
of the Romans, the Christian church, and the Germanic peoples who moved in and settled the western empire. European
civilization developed during a period that historians call the
Middle Ages, or the medieval period, which lasted from
about 500 to about 1500. To the historians who first used the
phrase, the Middle Ages was a middle period between the ancient world and the modern world. During the Early Middle
Ages, from about 500 to 1000 C.E., the Roman world of the
western empire was slowly transformed into a new Christian
European society.
327
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The Emergence of Europe
in the Early Middle Ages
FOCUS QUESTIONS: What contributions did the Romans,
the Christian church, and the Germanic peoples make to
the new civilization that emerged in Europe after the
collapse of the Western Roman Empire? What was the
significance of Charlemagne’s coronation as emperor?
PICTS
P
HUMBRIA
RT
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As we saw in Chapter 10, China descended into political
chaos and civil wars after the end of the Han Empire, and it
was almost four hundred years before a new imperial dynasty
established political order. Similarly, after the collapse of the
Western Roman Empire in the
fifth century, it would also take
hundreds of years to establish a
Political
Divisions
new society.
Spain inherited and continued to maintain much of the
Roman structure of government. In both states, the Roman
population was allowed to maintain Roman institutions while
being largely excluded from power as a Germanic warrior
caste came to dominate the considerably larger native population. Over a period of time, the Visigoths and the native peoples began to fuse together.
Roman influence was weaker in Britain. When the Roman
armies abandoned Britain at the beginning of the fifth century, the Angles and Saxons, Germanic tribes from Denmark
and northern Germany, moved in and settled there Eventually, these peoples succeeded in carving out small kingdoms
throughout the island, Kent in southeast England being one
of them.
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ª Cengage Learning
The Germanic peoples were an
important component of the new
European civilization. Already by
the third century C.E., they had
begun to move into the lands of
the Roman Empire. As imperial
authority vanished in the fifth century, a number of German kings
set up new states. By 500, the
Western Roman Empire had been
replaced politically by a series of
states ruled by German kings.
The fusion of Romans and
Germans took different forms in
the various Germanic kingdoms.
The kingdom of the Ostrogoths
(AHSS-truh-gahths) in Italy (see
Map 12.1) managed to preserve
the Roman tradition of government. After establishing his control over Italy, the Ostrogothic
king Theodoric (thee-AHD-uhrik) (493–526) kept the entire
structure of imperial Roman government, although he used separate systems of rule for Romans
and Ostrogoths. The Roman population of Italy lived under
Roman law administered by
Roman officials. The Ostrogoths
were governed by their own customs and their own officials.
Like the kingdom of the Ostrogoths in Italy, the kingdom of
the Visigoths (VIZ-uh-gahths) in
Saxons
Li
Lindisfarne
0
200
0
400
200
600 Kilometers
400 Miles
MAP 12.1 The Germanic Kingdoms of the Old Western Empire. Germanic tribes filled the power
vacuum caused by the demise of the Western Roman Empire, founding states that blended elements
of Germanic customs and laws with those of Roman culture, including large-scale conversions to
Christianity. The Franks established the most durable of these Germanic states.
How did the movements of Franks during this period correspond to the borders of presentday France?
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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One of the most prominent
German states on the European continent was the kingdom
of the Franks. The establishment of a Frankish kingdom
was the work of Clovis (KLOH-viss) (c. 482–511), a member
of the Merovingian (meh-ruh-VIN-jee-un) dynasty who
became a Catholic Christian around 500. He was not the first
German king to convert to Christianity, but the others had
joined the Arian (AR-ee-un) sect of Christianity, a group
who believed that Jesus had been human and thus not truly
God. The Christian church in Rome, which had become
known as the Roman Catholic Church, regarded the Arians
as heretics, people who believed in teachings different from
the official church doctrine. To Catholics, Jesus was human,
but of the ‘‘same substance’’ as God and therefore also truly
God. Clovis found that his conversion to Catholic Christianity
gained him the support of the Roman Catholic Church,
which was only too eager to obtain the friendship of a major
Germanic ruler who was a Catholic Christian.
By 510, Clovis had established a powerful new Frankish
kingdom stretching from the Pyrenees in the west to German
lands in the east (modern France and western Germany). After Clovis’s death, however, his sons divided his newly created kingdom, as was the Frankish custom. During the sixth
and seventh centuries, the once-united Frankish kingdom
came to be divided into three major areas: Neustria (NOOstree-uh), in northern Gaul; Austrasia (awss-TRAY-zhuh),
consisting of the ancient Frankish lands on both sides of the
Rhine; and the former kingdom of Burgundy.
THE KINGDOM OF THE FRANKS
THE SOCIETY OF THE GERMANIC PEOPLES As Germans and
Romans intermarried and began to form a new society, some
of the social customs of the Germanic peoples came to play
an important role. The crucial social bond among the Germanic peoples was the family, especially the extended family
of husbands, wives, children, brothers, sisters, cousins, and
grandparents. The German family structure was quite simple.
Males were dominant and made all the important decisions.
A woman obeyed her father until she married and then fell
under the legal domination of her husband. For most women
in the new Germanic kingdoms, their legal status reflected
the material conditions of their lives. Most women had life
expectancies of only thirty or forty years, and perhaps 15 percent of women died in their childbearing years, no doubt due
to complications associated with childbirth. For most women,
life consisted of domestic labor: providing food and clothing
for the household, caring for the children, and assisting with
farming chores.
The German conception of family affected the way Germanic law treated the problem of crime and punishment. In
the Roman system, as in our own, a crime such as murder
was considered an offense against society or the state and was
handled by a court that heard evidence and arrived at a decision. Germanic law was personal. An injury to one person by
another could lead to a blood feud in which the family of the
injured party took revenge on the family of the wrongdoer.
Feuds could involve savage acts of revenge, such as hacking
off hands or feet or gouging out eyes. Because this system
could easily get out of control, an alternative system arose
that made use of a fine called wergeld (WUR-geld), which
was paid by a wrongdoer to the family of the person injured
or killed. Wergeld, which literally means ‘‘man money,’’ was
the value of a person in monetary terms. That value varied
considerably according to social status. An offense against a
nobleman, for example, cost considerably more than one
against a freeman or a slave.
Germanic law also provided a means of determining guilt
or innocence: the ordeal. The ordeal was based on the idea
of divine intervention: divine forces (whether pagan or
Christian) would not allow an innocent person to be harmed
(see the box on p. 330).
The Role of the Christian Church
By the end of the fourth century, Christianity had become
the predominant religion of the Roman Empire. As the official Roman state disintegrated, the Christian church played
an increasingly important role in the growth of the new European civilization.
By the fourth century, the Christian church had developed a system of government. The Christian community in each city was headed by a
bishop, whose area of jurisdiction was known as a bishopric,
or diocese; the bishoprics of each Roman province were
joined together under the direction of an archbishop. The
bishops of four great cities—Rome, Jerusalem, Alexandria,
and Antioch—held positions of special power in church affairs
because the churches in these cities all asserted that they had
been founded by the original apostles sent out by Jesus. Soon,
however, one of them—the bishop of Rome—claimed that
he was the sole leader of the western Christian church.
According to church tradition, Jesus had given the keys to the
kingdom of heaven to Peter, who was considered the chief
apostle and the first bishop of Rome. Subsequent bishops of
Rome were considered Peter’s successors and came to be
known as popes (from the Latin word papa, meaning ‘‘father’’). By the sixth century, the popes had been successful in
extending papal authority over the Christian church in the
west and converting the pagan peoples of Germanic Europe.
Their primary instrument of conversion was the monastic
movement.
THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH
A monk (in Latin, monachus, meaning ‘‘one who lives alone’’) was a man who sought
to live a life divorced from the world, cut off from ordinary
human society, in order to pursue an ideal of total dedication
to God. As the monastic ideal spread, a new form of monasticism based on living together in a community soon became
the dominant form. Saint Benedict (c. 480–c. 543), who
founded a monastic house for which he wrote a set of rules,
established the basic form of monastic life in the western
Christian church.
Benedict’s rules divided each day into a series of activities,
with primary emphasis on prayer and manual labor. Physical
work of some kind was required of all monks for several
THE MONKS AND THEIR MISSIONS
The Emergence of Europe in the Early Middle Ages
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329
Germanic Customary Law: The Ordeal
In Germanic customary law, the ordeal was a
means by which accused persons might clear
themselves. Although the ordeal took different
FAMILY &
SOCIETY
forms, all involved a physical trial of some sort,
such as holding a red-hot iron. It was believed that God
would protect the innocent and allow them to come through
the ordeal unharmed. This sixth-century account by Gregory
of Tours describes an ordeal by hot water.
Gregory of Tours, An Ordeal of Hot Water (c. 580)
An Arian presbyter disputing with a deacon of our religion
made venomous assertions against the Son of God and the
Holy Ghost, as is the habit of that sect [the Arians]. But when
the deacon had discoursed a long time concerning the reasonableness of our faith and the heretic, blinded by the fog of
unbelief, continued to reject the truth, . . . the former said:
‘‘Why weary ourselves with long discussions? Let acts
approve the truth; let a kettle be heated over the fire and
someone’s ring be thrown into the boiling water. Let him
who shall take it from the heated liquid be approved as a follower of the truth, and afterward let the other party be converted to the knowledge of the truth. And do you also
understand, O heretic, that this our party will fulfill the conditions with the aid of the Holy Ghost; you shalt confess that
there is no discordance, no dissimilarity in the Holy Trinity.’’
The heretic consented to the proposition and they separated
after appointing the next morning for the trial. But the fervor
of faith in which the deacon had first made this suggestion
began to cool through the instigation of the enemy. Rising
with the dawn he bathed his arm in oil and smeared it with
ointment. But nevertheless he made the round of the sacred
places and called in prayer on the Lord. . . . About the third
hours a day because idleness was ‘‘the enemy of the soul.’’ At
the very heart of community practice was prayer, the proper
‘‘work of God.’’ Although this included private meditation
and reading, all monks gathered together seven times during
the day for common prayer and chanting of psalms. The Benedictine life was a communal one. Monks ate, worked, slept,
and worshiped together.
Each Benedictine monastery was strictly ruled by an
abbot, or ‘‘father’’ of the monastery, who had complete
authority over his fellow monks. Unquestioning obedience to
the will of the abbot was expected of every monk. Each
Benedictine monastery held lands that enabled it to be a selfsustaining community, isolated from and independent of the
world surrounding it. Within the monastery, however,
monks were to fulfill their vow of poverty: ‘‘Let all things be
common to all, as it is written, lest anyone should say that
330
hour they met in the marketplace. The people came together
to see the show. A fire was lighted, the kettle was placed
upon it, and when it grew very hot the ring was thrown into
the boiling water. The deacon invited the heretic to take it
out of the water first. But he promptly refused, saying, ‘‘You
who did propose this trial are the one to take it out.’’ The
deacon all of a tremble bared his arm. And when the heretic
presbyter saw it besmeared with ointment he cried out:
‘‘With magic arts you have thought to protect yourself, that
you have made use of these salves, but what you have done
will not avail.’’ While they were thus quarreling there came
up a deacon from Ravenna named Iacinthus and inquired
what the trouble was about. When he learned the truth he
drew his arm out from under his robe at once and plunged
his right hand into the kettle. Now the ring that had been
thrown in was a little thing and very light so that it was
thrown about by the water as chaff would be blown about by
the wind; and searching for it a long time he found it after
about an hour. Meanwhile the flame beneath the kettle
blazed up mightily so that the greater heat might make it difficult for the ring to be followed by the hand; but the deacon
extracted it at length and suffered no harm, protesting rather
that at the bottom the kettle was cold while at the top it was
just pleasantly warm. When the heretic beheld this he was
greatly confused and audaciously thrust his hand into the kettle saying, ‘‘My faith will aid me.’’ As soon as his hand had
been thrust in all the flesh was boiled off the bones clear up
to the elbow. And so the dispute ended.
What was the purpose of the ordeal of hot water?
What does it reveal about the nature of the society
that used it?
anything is his own.’’1 Only men could be monks, but
women, called nuns, also began to withdraw from the world
to dedicate themselves to God.
Monasticism played an indispensable role in early medieval civilization. Monks became the new heroes of Christian
civilization, and their dedication to God became the highest
ideal of Christian life. They were the social workers of their
communities: monks provided schools for the young, hospitality for travelers, and hospitals for the sick. Monks also copied Latin works and passed on the legacy of the ancient world
to the new European civilization. Monasteries became centers
of learning wherever they were located, and monks worked
to spread Christianity to all of Europe.
Women played an important role in the monastic missionary movement and the conversion of the Germanic kingdoms. Some served as abbesses (an abbess was the head of a
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
Copyright 2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
ª The Art Archive/Bibliothèque Municipale Valenciennes/ Gianni Dagli Orti
Charlemagne’s empire covered much of western and central
Europe; not until the time of Napoleon in the nineteenth century would an empire of its size be seen again in Europe (see
the box on p. 332).
Charlemagne continued the efforts of his father in organizing the Carolingian kingdom. Besides his household staff,
Charlemagne’s administration of the empire depended on the
use of counts as the king’s chief representatives in local areas.
As an important check on the power of the counts, Charlemagne established the missi dominici (MISS-ee doh-MIN-ichee) (‘‘messengers of the lord king’’), two men who were
sent out to local districts to ensure that the counts were executing the king’s wishes.
Saint Benedict. Benedict was the author of a set of rules that was
instrumental in the development of monastic groups in the Catholic
Church. In this thirteenth-century Latin manuscript, Benedict is shown
handing the rules of the Benedictine order to a group of nuns and a
group of monks.
monastery for nuns, known as a convent); many abbesses
came from aristocratic families, especially in Anglo-Saxon
England. In the kingdom of Northumbria, for example, Saint
Hilda founded the monastery of Whitby in 657. As abbess,
she was responsible for making learning an important part of
the life of the monastery.
Charlemagne and the Carolingians
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHARLEMAGNE As Charlemagne’s
power grew, so did his prestige as the most powerful Christian ruler of what one monk called the ‘‘kingdom of Europe.’’
In 800, Charlemagne acquired a new title: emperor of the
Romans. The significance of this imperial coronation has
been much debated by historians. We are not even sure if the
pope or Charlemagne initiated the idea when they met in the
summer of 799 in Paderborn in German lands or whether
Charles was pleased or displeased.
In any case, Charlemagne’s coronation as Roman emperor
demonstrated the strength, even after three hundred years, of
the concept of an enduring Roman Empire. More important, it
symbolized the fusion of Roman, Christian, and Germanic elements: a Germanic king had been crowned emperor of the
Romans by the spiritual leader of western Christendom. Charlemagne had assembled an empire that stretched from the North
Sea to Italy and from the Atlantic Ocean to the Danube River.
This differed significantly from the Roman Empire, which
encompassed much of the Mediterranean world. Had a new civilization emerged? And should Charlemagne be regarded, as
one of his biographers has argued, as the ‘‘father of Europe’’?2
e
During the seventh and eighth centuries, as the kings of the
Frankish kingdom gradually lost their power, the mayors of the
The World of Lords and Vassals
palace—the chief officers of the king’s household—assumed
The Carolingian Empire began to disintegrate soon after
more control of the kingdom. One of these mayors, Pepin
Charlemagne’s death in 814, and less than thirty years later,
(PEP-in or pay-PANH), finally took the logical step of assumin 843, it was divided among his grandsons into three major
ing the kingship of the Frankish state for himself and his family.
sections: the western Frankish lands,
Upon his death in 768, his son came to
which formed the core of the eventual
the throne of the Frankish kingdom.
kingdom of France; the eastern lands,
This new king was the dynamic and
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ª Cengage Learning
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The Emergence of Europe in the Early Middle Ages
Copyright 2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
331
The Achievements of Charlemagne
Einhard (YN-hart), the biographer of Charlemagne, was born in the valley of the Main River
in Germany about 775. Raised and educated in
POLITICS &
GOVERNMENT
the monastery of Fulda, an important center of
learning, he arrived at the court of Charlemagne in 791 or
792. Although he did not achieve high office under Charlemagne, he served as private secretary to Louis the Pious,
Charlemagne’s son and successor. In this selection, Einhard
discusses some of Charlemagne’s accomplishments.
Einhard, Life of Charlemagne
Such are the wars, most skillfully planned and successfully
fought, which this most powerful king waged during the
forty-seven years of his reign. He so largely increased the
Frank kingdom, which was already great and strong when he
received it at his father’s hands, that more than double its former territory was added to it. . . . He subdued all the wild
and barbarous tribes dwelling in Germany between the Rhine
and the Vistula, the Ocean and the Danube, all of which
speak very much the same language, but differ widely from
one another in customs and dress. . . .
He added to the glory of his reign by gaining the good will
of several kings and nations; so close, indeed, was the alliance
that he contracted with Alfonso, King of Galicia and Asturias,
that the latter, when sending letters or ambassadors to
Charles, invariably styled himself his man. . . . The Emperors
of Constantinople [the Byzantine emperors] sought friendship
and alliance with Charles by several embassies; and even
when the Greeks [the Byzantines] suspected him of designing
to take the empire from them, because of his assumption of
the title Emperor, they made a close alliance with him, that
he might have no cause of offense. In fact, the power of the
Franks was always viewed with a jealous eye, whence the
Greek proverb, ‘‘Have the Frank for your friend, but not for
your neighbor.’’
This King, who showed himself so great in extending his
empire and subduing foreign nations, and was constantly
occupied with plans to that end, undertook also very many
works calculated to adorn and benefit his kingdom, and
In the
ninth and tenth centuries, western Europe was beset by a wave
of invasions. Muslims attacked the southern coasts of Europe
and sent raiding parties into southern France. The Magyars
(MAG-yarz), a people from western Asia, moved into central
Europe at the end of the ninth century and settled on the plains
of Hungary, launching forays from there into western Europe.
Finally crushed at the Battle of Lechfeld (LEK-feld) in
INVASIONS OF THE NINTH AND TENTH CENTURIES
332
brought several of them to completion. Among these, the
most deserving of mention are the basilica of the Holy
Mother of God at Aix-la-Chapelle [Aachen], built in the most
admirable manner, and a bridge over the Rhine River at
Mainz, half a mile long, the breadth of the river at this point.
. . . Above all, sacred buildings were the object of his care
throughout his whole kingdom; and whenever he found
them falling to ruin from age, he commanded the priests and
fathers who had charge of them to repair them, and made
sure by commissioners that his instructions were obeyed. . . .
Thus did Charles defend and increase as well as beautify his
kingdom. . . .
He cherished with the greatest fervor and devotion the
principles of the Christian religion, which had been instilled
into him from infancy. Hence it was that he built the beautiful church at Aix-la-Chapelle, which he adorned with gold
and silver and lamps, and with rails and doors of solid brass.
He had the columns and marbles for this structure brought
from Rome and Ravenna, for he could not find such as were
suitable elsewhere. He was a constant worshiper at this
church as long as his health permitted, going morning and
evening, even after nightfall, besides attending mass. . . .
He was very forward in caring for the poor, so much so
that he not only made a point of giving in his own country
and his own kingdom, but when he discovered that there
were Christians living in poverty in Syria, Egypt, and Africa,
at Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Carthage, he had compassion
on their wants, and used to send money over the seas to
them. . . . He sent great and countless gifts to the popes, and
throughout his whole reign the wish that he had nearest at
heart was to reestablish the ancient authority of the city of
Rome under his care and by his influence, and to defend and
protect the Church of St. Peter, and to beautify and enrich it
out of his own store above all other churches.
How long did Einhard know Charlemagne? Does this
excerpt reflect close, personal knowledge of the man,
his court, and his works or hearsay and legend?
Germany in 955, the Magyars converted to Christianity, settled
down, and established the kingdom of Hungary.
The most far-reaching attacks of the time came from the
Northmen or Norsemen of Scandinavia, also known to us as
the Vikings. The Vikings were warriors whose love of adventure and search for booty and new avenues of trade may have
spurred them to invade other areas of Europe. Viking ships
were the best of the period. Long and narrow with
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
ª Robert Harding Picture Library Ltd (G. Richardson)/Alamy
ª The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York/Art Resource, NY
The Vikings Attack England. The illustration on the left, from an eleventh-century English manuscript, depicts a band of armed Vikings invading
England. Two ships have already reached the shore, and a few Vikings are shown walking down a long gangplank onto English soil. On the right is a
replica of a well-preserved Viking ship found at Oseberg, Norway. The Oseberg ship was one of the largest Viking ships of its day.
beautifully carved arched prows, the Viking ‘‘dragon ships’’
each carried about fifty men. Their shallow draft enabled
them to sail up European rivers and attack places at some distance inland. In the ninth century, Vikings sacked villages and
towns, destroyed churches, and easily defeated small local
armies. Viking attacks were terrifying, and many a clergyman
pleaded with his parishioners to change their behavior and
appease God’s anger to avert the attacks, as in this sermon by
an English archbishop in 1014:
Things have not gone well now for a long time at home or
abroad, but there has been devastation and persecution in every
district again and again, and the English have been for a long
time now completely defeated and too greatly disheartened
through God’s anger; and the pirates [Vikings] so strong with
God’s consent that often in battle one puts to flight ten, and
sometimes less, sometimes more, all because of our sins. . . . We
pay them continually and they humiliate us daily; they ravage
and they burn, plunder, and rob and carry on board; and lo, what
else is there in all these events except God’s anger clear and visible over this people?3
By the middle of the ninth century, the Norsemen had
begun to build winter settlements in different areas of
Europe. By 850, groups from Norway had settled in Ireland,
and Danes occupied northeastern England by 878. Beginning
in 911, the ruler of the western Frankish lands gave one band
of Vikings land at the mouth of the Seine (SEN) River, a territory that came to be known as Normandy. This policy of settling the Vikings and converting them to Christianity was a
deliberate one; by their conversion to Christianity, the Vikings were soon made a part of European civilization.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF FIEF-HOLDING The disintegration of
central authority in the Carolingian world and the invasions
by Muslims, Magyars, and Vikings led to the emergence of a
new type of relationship between free individuals. When governments ceased to be able to defend their subjects, it became
important to find some powerful lord who could offer protection in return for service. The contract sworn between a lord
and his subordinate (known as a vassal) is the basis of a form
of social organization that modern historians called feudalism.
The Emergence of Europe in the Early Middle Ages
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333
Ro
ad
vassal relationship, then, bound together both greater and
But feudalism was never a cohesive system, and many historilesser landowners. At all levels, the lord-vassal relationship
ans today prefer to avoid using the term (see the comparative
was always an honorable relationship between free men
essay ‘‘Feudal Orders Around the World’’ on p. 309).
and did not imply any sense of servitude.
With the breakdown of royal governments, powerful
Fief-holding came to be characterized by a set of practices
nobles took control of large areas of land. They needed men
that determined the relationship between a lord and his vasto fight for them, so the practice arose of giving grants of land
sal. The major obligation of a vassal to his lord was to perto vassals who in return would fight for their lord. The Frankform military service, usually about forty days a year. A
ish army had originally consisted of foot soldiers, dressed in
vassal was also required to appear at his lord’s court when
coats of mail and armed with swords. But in the eighth censummoned to give advice to the lord. He might also be asked
tury, larger horses began to be used, along with the stirrup,
to sit in judgment in a legal case, since the important vassals
which was introduced by nomadic horsemen from Asia. Earof a lord were peers and only they could judge each other.
lier, horsemen had been throwers of spears. Now they wore
Finally, vassals were also responsible for aids, or financial payarmor in the form of coats of mail (the larger horse could
ments to the lord on a number of occasions, including the
carry the weight) and wielded long lances that enabled them
knighting of the lord’s eldest son, the marriage of his eldest
to act as battering rams (the stirrups kept them on their
daughter, and the ransom of the lord’s person if he were
horses). For almost five hundred years, warfare in Europe
captured.
would be dominated by heavily armored cavalry, or knights,
In turn, a lord had responsibilities toward his vassals. His
as they were called. The knights came to have the greatest
major obligation was to protect his vassal, either by defending
social prestige and formed the backbone of the European
him militarily or by taking his side in a court of law. The lord
aristocracy.
was also responsible for the maintenance of the vassal,
Of course, it was expensive to have a horse, armor, and
usually by granting him a fief.
weapons. It also took time and much practice to learn to
wield these instruments skillfully from horseback. ConseTHE MANORIAL SYSTEM The landholding class of nobles
quently, a lord who wanted men to fight for him had to grant
and knights contained a military elite whose ability to funceach vassal a piece of land that provided for the support of
tion as warriors depended on having the leisure time to purthe vassal and his family. In return for the land, the vassal
sue the arts of war. Landed estates, located on the fiefs given
provided his lord with his fighting skills. Each needed the
to a vassal by his lord and worked by a dependent peasant
other. In the society of the Early Middle Ages, where there
class, provided the economic sustenance that made this way
was little trade and wealth was based primarily on land, land
of life possible. A manor was an agricultural estate operated
became the most important gift a lord could give to a vassal
by a lord and worked by peasants (see Map 12.2). Although a
in return for his loyalty and military service.
large class of free peasants continued to exist, increasing
By the ninth century, the grant of land made to a vassal
had become known as a fief (FEEF). A
fief was a piece of land held from the
lord by a vassal in return for military
Marsh
service, but vassals who held such
Lord’s demesne
grants of land came to exercise rights
Common
of jurisdiction or political and legal
Plot of peasant A
SPRING
Forest
Pasture
FIELD
authority within these fiefs. As the CarPlot of peasant B
olingian world disintegrated politically
Pond
under the impact of internal dissension
and invasions, an increasing number of
m
Mill
Common
S t r ea
powerful lords arose who were now reMeadow
Lord’s Oven
sponsible for keeping order.
Garden
ROT
N
IO
AT
IO
N
T
TA
RO
Press
Fiefholding also became increasingly
complicated with the development of
subinfeudation (sub-in-fyoo-DAYshun). The vassals of a king, who were
themselves great lords, might also have
vassals who would owe them military
service in return for a grant of land
taken from their estates. Those vassals,
in turn, might likewise have vassals,
who at such a level would be simple
knights with barely enough land to
provide their equipment. The lord-
THE PRACTICE OF FIEF-HOLDING
334
Village
ª Cengage Learning
FALLOW
FIELD
AUTUMN
FIELD
RO
Wasteland
TATION
Ro
ad
Manor
House
Lord’s
Close
Lord’s Orchard
d
Roa
d
MAP 12.2 A Typical Manor. The manorial system created small, tightly knit communities in
which peasants were economically and physically bound to their lord. Crops were rotated, with
roughly one-third of the fields lying fallow (untilled) at any one time, which helped replenish
soil nutrients.
How does the area of the lord’s demesne, his manor house, other buildings, garden,
and orchard compare with that of the peasant holdings in the village?
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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numbers of free peasants became serfs, who were bound to the
land and required to provide labor services, pay rents, and be subject to the lord’s jurisdiction. By the ninth century, probably 60
percent of the population of western Europe had become serfs.
Labor services involved working the lord’s demesne
(duh-MAYN or duh-MEEN), the land retained by the lord,
which might consist of one-third to one-half of the cultivated
lands scattered throughout the manor. The rest would be
used by the peasants for themselves. Building barns and digging ditches were also part of the labor services. Serfs usually
worked about three days a week for their lord and paid rents
by giving the lord a share of every product they raised.
Serfs were legally bound to the lord’s lands and could not
leave without his permission. Although free to marry, serfs
could not marry anyone outside their manor without the
lord’s approval. Moreover, lords sometimes exercised public
rights or political authority on their lands, which gave them
the right to try peasants in their own courts.
Europe in the High Middle Ages
FOCUS QUESTIONS: What roles did aristocrats,
peasants, and townspeople play in medieval European
civilization, and how did their lifestyles differ? How did
cities in Europe compare with those in China and the
Middle East? What were the main aspects of the
political, economic, spiritual, and cultural revivals that
took place in Europe during the High Middle Ages?
The new European civilization that had emerged in the Early
Middle Ages began to flourish in the High Middle Ages (1000–
1300). New agricultural practices that increased the food supply spurred commercial and urban expansion. Both lords and
vassals recovered from the invasions and internal dissension of
the Early Middle Ages, and medieval kings began to exert a
centralizing authority. The recovery of the Catholic Church
made it a forceful presence in every area of life. The High Middle Ages also gave birth to a cultural revival.
Land and People
In the Early Middle Ages, Europe had a relatively small population of about 38 million, but in the High Middle Ages, the
number of people nearly doubled to 74 million. What
accounted for this dramatic increase? For one thing, conditions in Europe were more settled and more peaceful after
the invasions of the Early Middle Ages had ended. For
another, agricultural production surged after 1000.
During the High Middle Ages,
Europeans began to farm in new ways. An improvement in
climate resulted in better growing conditions, but an important factor in increasing food production was the expansion of
cultivated or arable land, accomplished by clearing forested
areas. Peasants of the eleventh and twelfth centuries cut
down trees and drained swamps until by the thirteenth century, Europeans had more acreage available for farming than
at any time before or since.
THE NEW AGRICULTURE
Technological changes also furthered the development of
farming. The Middle Ages saw an explosion of laborsaving
devices, many of which were made from iron, which was
mined in different areas of Europe. Iron was used to make
scythes, axes, and hoes for use on farms as well as saws, hammers, and nails for building purposes. Iron was crucial in
making the carruca (kuh-ROO-kuh), a heavy, wheeled plow
with an iron plowshare pulled by teams of horses, which
could turn over the heavy clay soil north of the Alps.
Besides using horsepower, the High Middle Ages harnessed the power of water and wind to do jobs formerly done
by human or animal power. Although the watermill had been
invented as early as the second century B.C.E., it did not come
into widespread use until the High Middle Ages. Located
along streams, watermills were used to grind grain into flour.
Often dams were constructed to increase the waterpower.
The development of the cam enabled millwrights to mechanize entire industries; waterpower was used in certain phases
of cloth production and to run trip-hammers for the working
of metals. The Chinese had made use of the cam in operating
trip-hammers for hulling rice by the third century C.E. but
apparently had not extended its use to other industries.
Where rivers were unavailable or not easily dammed,
Europeans developed windmills to use the power of the wind.
Historians are uncertain whether windmills were imported
into Europe (they were invented in Persia) or designed independently by Europeans. In either case, by the end of the
twelfth century, they were beginning to dot the European
landscape. The watermill and windmill were the most important devices for the harnessing of power before the invention
of the steam engine in the eighteenth century.
The shift from a two-field to a three-field system also contributed to the increase in food production (see the comparative illustration on p. 336). In the Early Middle Ages, peasants
had planted one field while another of equal size was allowed
to lie fallow (untilled) to regain its fertility. Now estates were
divided into three parts. One field was planted in the fall with
winter grains, such as rye and wheat, while spring grains,
such as oats or barley, and vegetables, such as peas or beans,
were planted in the second field. The third was allowed to lie
fallow. By rotating the use of the fields, only one-third rather
than one-half of the land lay fallow at any time. The rotation
of crops also kept the soil from being exhausted so quickly,
and more crops could now be grown.
The lifestyle of the peasants
was quite simple. Their cottages consisted of wood frames surrounded by sticks with the space between them filled with straw
and rubble and then plastered over with clay. Roofs were simply
thatched. The houses of poorer peasants consisted of a single
room, but others had at least two rooms—a main room for cooking, eating, and other activities and another room for sleeping.
Peasant women occupied an important but difficult position in manorial society. They were expected to carry and
bear their children and at the same time fulfill their obligation
to labor in the fields. Their ability to manage the household
might determine whether a peasant family would starve or
survive in difficult times.
DAILY LIFE OF THE PEASANTRY
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
335
COMPARATIVE
ILLUSTRATION
The New Agriculture in the
Medieval World. New
agricultural methods and techniques in the
Middle Ages enabled peasants in both Europe and
China to increase food production. This general
improvement in diet was a factor in supporting
noticeably larger populations in both areas. Below,
a thirteenth-century illustration shows a group of
English peasants harvesting grain. Overseeing their
work is a bailiff, or manager, who supervised the
work of the peasants. To the right, a thirteenthcentury painting shows Chinese peasants harvesting rice, which became the staple food in China.
ª The Art Archive/Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
EARTH &
ENVIRONMENT
ª The Art Archive/British Library, London
How important were staple foods (such
as wheat and rice) to the diet and health
of people in Europe and China during
the Middle Ages?
Though simple, a peasant’s daily diet was adequate
when food was available. The staple of the peasant diet,
and the medieval diet in general, was bread. Women made
the dough for the bread at home and then brought their
loaves to be baked in community ovens, which were
owned by the lord of the manor. Peasant bread was highly
nutritious, containing not only wheat and rye but also barley, millet, and oats, giving it a dark appearance and a very
heavy, hard texture. Bread was supplemented by numerous
vegetables from the household gardens, cheese from cow’s
or goat’s milk, nuts and berries from woodlands, and fruits,
such as apples, pears, and cherries. Chickens provided eggs
and sometimes meat.
In the High Middle
Ages, European society, like that of Japan during the same period, was dominated by men whose chief concern was warfare. Like the Japanese samurai, many Western nobles loved
war. As one nobleman wrote:
THE NOBILITY OF THE MIDDLE AGES
336
And well I like to hear the call of ‘‘Help’’ and see the
wounded fall,
Loudly for mercy praying,
And see the dead, both great and small,
Pierced by sharp spearheads one and all.4
The men of war were the lords and vassals of medieval society.
The lords were the kings, dukes, counts, barons, and viscounts (and even bishops and archbishops) who had extensive
landholdings and wielded considerable political influence. They
formed an aristocracy or nobility of people who held real political, economic, and social power. Both the great lords and
ordinary knights were warriors, and the institution of knighthood united them. But there were also social divisions among
them based on extremes of wealth and landholdings.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, under the influence of
the church, an ideal of civilized behavior called chivalry (SHIVuhl-ree) gradually evolved among the nobility. Chivalry represented a code of ethics that knights were supposed to uphold.
In addition to defending the church and the defenseless, knights
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
were expected to treat captives as honored guests instead of
throwing them in dungeons. Chivalry also implied that knights
should fight only for glory, but this account of a group of English knights by a medieval writer reveals another motive for
battle: ‘‘The whole city was plundered to the last farthing, and
then they proceeded to rob all the churches throughout the
city, . . . and seizing gold and silver, cloth of all colors, women’s
ornaments, gold rings, goblets, and precious stones . . . they all
returned to their own lords rich men.’’5 Apparently, the ideals
of chivalry were not always taken seriously.
Although aristocratic women could legally hold property,
most women remained under the control of men—their
fathers until they married and their husbands after that.
Nevertheless, these women had many opportunities for playing important roles. Because the lord was often away at war
or at court, the lady of the castle had to manage the estate.
Households could include large numbers of officials and servants, so this was no small responsibility. Maintaining the financial accounts alone took considerable financial knowledge.
The lady of the castle was also responsible for overseeing the
food supply and maintaining all the other supplies needed for
the smooth operation of the household.
Although women were expected to be subservient to their
husbands, there were many strong women who advised and
sometimes even dominated their husbands. Perhaps the most
famous was Eleanor of Aquitaine (c. 1122–1204). Married to
King Louis VII of France, Eleanor accompanied her husband
on a Crusade, but her alleged affair with her uncle during the
Crusade led Louis to have their marriage annulled. Eleanor
then married Henry, duke of Normandy and count of Anjou
(AHN-zhoo), who became King Henry II of England (1154–
1189). She took an active role in politics, even assisting her
sons in rebelling against Henry in 1173 and 1174 (see the Film
& History feature on p. 338).
with both the skills and the products for commercial activity.
Cities in Italy took the lead in this revival of trade. Venice, for
example, emerged as a town by the end of the eighth century,
developed a mercantile fleet, and by the end of the tenth century had become the chief western trading center for Byzantine
and Islamic commerce.
While the northern Italian cities were busy trading in the
Mediterranean, the towns of Flanders were doing likewise in
northern Europe. Flanders, the area along the coast of present-day Belgium and northern France, was known for its
high-quality woolen cloth. The location of Flanders made it
an ideal center for the traders of northern Europe. Merchants
from England, Scandinavia, France, and Germany converged
there to trade their goods for woolen cloth. Flanders prospered in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and such Flemish
towns as Bruges (BROOZH) and Ghent (GENT) became
centers of the medieval cloth trade.
By the twelfth century, a regular exchange of goods had
developed between Flanders and Italy, the two major centers
of northern and southern European trade. To encourage this
trade, the counts of Champagne in northern France began to
hold a series of six fairs annually in the chief towns of their territory. At these fairs, northern merchants brought the furs,
woolen cloth, tin, and honey of northern Europe and
exchanged them for the cloth and swords of northern Italy and
the silks, sugar, and spices of the East.
As trade increased, both gold and silver came to be in
demand at fairs and trading markets of all kinds. Slowly, a
money economy began to emerge. New trading companies
and banking firms were set up to manage the exchange and
sale of goods. All of these new practices were part of the rise
of commercial capitalism, an economic system in which
people invested in trade and goods in order to make profits.
ª Cengage Learning
TRADE OUTSIDE EUROPE In the High Middle Ages, Italian
merchants became even more daring in their trade activities.
The New World of Trade and Cities
They established trading posts in Cairo, Damascus, and a
Medieval Europe was overwhelmingly agrarian, with most
number of Black Sea ports, where they acquired spices, silks,
people living in small villages. In the eleventh and twelfth
jewelry, dyestuffs, and other goods brought by Muslim mercenturies, however, new elements
chants from India, China, and Southwere introduced that began to trans0
300
600Kil
Killome
meter
me
e ers
ers
er
east Asia.
form the economic foundation of
The spread of the Mongol Empire in
0
150
300
000 Mil
Miilleess
M
European civilization: a revival of
the thirteenth century (see Chapter 10)
trade, the emergence of specialized
Berge
geen
en
also opened the door to Italian merSWEDEN
NORWAY
craftspeople and artisans, and the
chants in the markets of Central Asia,
growth and development of towns.
India, and China (see the box on
Eddinburgh
nb
p. 339). As nomads who relied on
No rth
THE REVIVAL OF TRADE The retrade with settled communities, the
Sea
vival of trade was a gradual process.
Mongols maintained safe trade
Lübeck
Lü
Lüb
L
üb
übeck
ck
k
ENG
GLAN
GL
LAN
AND
During the chaotic conditions of the
routes for merchants moving
Hambur
H
Ha
Ham
aam
mbur
burrg
burg
Early Middle Ages, large-scale trade
through their lands. Two Venetian
Londo
don
do
on
Bru
B
ruges
ru
uges
g
had declined in western Europe
merchants, the brothers Niccolò
Ghent
hen
FLANDERS
N RS
except for Byzantine contacts with
and Maffeo Polo, began to travel in
Italy and the Jewish traders who
the Mongol Empire around 1260.
Trade routes
Paris
moved back and forth between the
The creation of the crusader
Champagne
trade fairs
Muslim and Christian worlds. By the
states
in Syria and Palestine in the
Lyons
end of the tenth century, however,
twelfth and thirteenth centuries
people were emerging in Europe
Flanders as a Trade Center
(discussed later in this chapter) was
Europe in the High Middle Ages
Copyright 2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
337
FILM & HISTORY
Directed by Anthony Harvey, The Lion in Winter is based on
a play by James Goldman, who also wrote the script for the
movie and won an Oscar for best adapted screenplay for it.
The action takes place in a castle in Chinon, France, over the
Christmas holidays in 1183. The setting is realistic: medieval
castles had dirt floors covered with rushes, under which lay,
according to one observer, ‘‘an ancient collection of grease,
fragments, bones, excrement of dogs and cats, and everything that is nasty.’’ The powerful but world-weary King
Henry II (Peter O’Toole), ruler of England and a number of
French lands (the ‘‘Angevin Empire’’), wants to establish his
legacy and plans a Christmas gathering to decide which of
his sons should succeed him. He favors his overindulged
youngest son John (Nigel Terry), but he is opposed by his
strong-willed and estranged wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine (Katharine Hepburn). She has been imprisoned by the king for
leading a rebellion against him but has been temporarily
freed for the holidays. Eleanor favors their son Richard (Anthony Hopkins), the most military minded of the brothers.
The middle brother, Geoffrey (John Castle), is not a candidate but manipulates the other brothers to gain his own
advantage. All three sons are portrayed as treacherous and
traitorous, and Henry is distrustful of them. At one point, he
threatens to imprison and even kill his sons; marry his mistress Alais (Jane Merrow), who is also the sister of the king of
France; and have a new family to replace them.
In contemporary terms, Henry and Eleanor are an unhappily married couple, and their family is acutely dysfunctional.
Sparks fly as family members plot against each other, using
intentionally cruel comments and sarcastic responses to
wound each other as much as possible. When Eleanor says
to Henry, ‘‘What would you have me do? Give up? Give in?’’
he responds, ‘‘Give me a little peace.’’ To which Eleanor
replies, ‘‘A little? Why so modest? How about eternal peace?
Now there’s a thought.’’ At one point, John responds to bad
news about his chances for the throne with ‘‘Poor John. Who
says poor John? Don’t everybody sob at once. My God, if I
went up in flames, there’s not a living soul who’d pee on me
to put the fire out!’’ His brother Richard replies, ‘‘Let’s strike
a flint and see.’’ Henry can also be cruel to his sons: ‘‘You’re
especially favorable to Italian merchants. In return for taking
the crusaders to the east, Italian merchant fleets received trading concessions in Syria and Palestine. Venice, for example,
which profited the most from this trade, was given a quarter,
soon known as ‘‘a little Venice in the east,’’ in Tyre on the
coast of what is now Lebanon. Such quarters here and in
other cities soon became bases for carrying on lucrative trade.
THE GROWTH OF CITIES The revival of trade led to a revival of cities. Towns had greatly declined in the Early
338
Avco Embassy/The Kobal Collection
The Lion in Winter (1968)
Eleanor of Aquitaine (Katharine Hepburn) and Henry II (Peter O’Toole) at
dinner in Henry’s castle in Chinon, France.
not mine! We’re not connected! I deny you! None of you will
get my crown. I leave you nothing, and I wish you plague!’’
In developing this well-written, imaginative re-creation of a
royal family’s hapless Christmas gathering, James Goldman
had a great deal of material to use. Henry II was one of the
most powerful monarchs of his day, and Eleanor of Aquitaine
was one of the most powerful women. She had first been
queen of France, but that marriage was annulled. Next she
married Henry, who was then count of Anjou, and became
queen of England when he became king in 1154. During their
stormy marriage, Eleanor and Henry had five sons and three
daughters. She is supposed to have murdered Rosamond, one
of her husband’s mistresses, and aided her sons in a rebellion
against their father in 1173, causing Henry to distrust his sons
ever after. But Henry struck back, imprisoning Eleanor for sixteen years. After his death, however, Eleanor returned to Aquitaine and lived on to play an influential role in the reigns of her
two sons, Richard and John, who succeeded their father.
Middle Ages, especially in Europe north of the Alps. Old
Roman cities continued to exist but had dwindled in size
and population. With the revival of trade, merchants began
to settle in these old cities, followed by craftspeople or
artisans, people who on manors or elsewhere had developed skills and now saw an opportunity to ply their trade
and make goods that could be sold by the merchants. In
the course of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the old
Roman cities came alive with new populations and
growth.
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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An Italian Banker Discusses Trade Between Europe and China
Working on behalf of a banking guild in
Florence, Francesco Balducci Pegolotti
journeyed to England and Cyprus. As a result of
INTERACTION
& EXCHANGE
his contacts with many Italian merchants, he
acquired considerable information about long-distance trade
between Europe and China. In this account, written in 1340,
he provides advice for Italian merchants.
Francesco Balducci Pegolotti, An Account of
Traders Between Europe and China
In the first place, you must let your beard grow long and not
shave. And at Tana [modern Rostov] you should furnish
yourself with a guide. And you must not try to save money
in the matter of guides by taking a bad one instead of a good
one. For the additional wages of the good one will not cost
you so much as you will save by having him. And besides the
guide it will be well to take at least two good menservants
who are acquainted with the Turkish tongue . . . .
The road you travel from Tana to China is perfectly safe,
whether by day or night, according to what the merchants
say who have used it. Only if the merchant, in going or coming, should die upon the road, everything belonging to him
Beginning in the late tenth century, many new cities or
towns were also founded, particularly in northern Europe.
Usually, a group of merchants established a settlement near
some fortified stronghold, such as a castle or monastery. (This
explains why so many place names in Europe end in borough,
burgh, burg, or bourg, all of which mean ‘‘fortress’’ or ‘‘walled
enclosure.’’) Castles were particularly favored because they
were generally located along trade routes; the lords of the
castle also offered protection. If the settlement prospered and
expanded, new walls were built to protect it.
Although lords wanted to treat towns and townspeople as
they would their vassals and serfs, cities had totally different
needs and a different perspective. Townspeople needed mobility to trade. Consequently, these merchants and artisans
(who came to be called burghers or bourgeois, from the same
root as borough and burg) needed their own unique laws to
meet their requirements and were willing to pay for them. In
many instances, lords and kings saw that they could also
make money and were willing to sell to the townspeople the
liberties they were beginning to demand, including the right
to bequeath goods and sell property, freedom from any military obligation to the lord, and written urban laws that guaranteed their freedom. Some towns also obtained the right to
govern themselves by choosing their own officials and administering their own courts of law.
will become the possession of the lord in the country in
which he dies . . . . And in like manner if he dies in China . . . .
China is a province which contains a multitude of cities
and towns. Among others there is one in particular, that is
to say the capital city, to which many merchants are
attracted, and in which there is a vast amount of trade; and
this city is called Khanbaliq [modern Beijing]. And the said
city has a circuit of one hundred miles, and is all full of
people and houses . . . .
Whatever silver the merchants may carry with them as
far as China, the emperor of China will take from them and
put into his treasury. And to merchants who thus bring silver they give that paper money of theirs in exchange . . .
and with this money you can readily buy silk and all other
merchandise that you have a desire to buy. And all the people of the country are bound to receive it. And yet you shall
not pay a higher price for your goods because your money
is of paper.
What were Francesco Pegolotti’s impressions of
China? Were they positive or negative? Explain your
answer.
Where townspeople experienced difficulties in obtaining
privileges, they often swore an oath, forming an association
called a commune, and resorted to force against their lay or
ecclesiastical lords. Communes made their first appearance in
northern Italy, in towns that were governed by their bishops,
whom the emperors used as their chief administrators. In the
eleventh century, city residents swore communal associations
with the bishops’ noble vassals and overthrew the authority
of the bishops by force. Communes took over the rights of
government and created new offices for self-rule. Although
communes were also sworn in northern Europe, townspeople did not have the support of rural nobles, and revolts
against lay lords were usually suppressed. When they succeeded, communes received the right to choose their own
officials and run their own cities. Unlike the towns in Italy,
however, where the decline of the emperor’s authority
ensured that the northern Italian cities could function as selfgoverning republics, towns in France and England, like their
counterparts in the Islamic and Chinese empires, did not
become independent city-states but remained ultimately subject to royal authority.
Medieval cities in Europe, then, possessed varying degrees
of self-government, depending on the amount of control
retained over them by the lord or king in whose territory
they were located. Nevertheless, all towns, regardless of the
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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339
COMPARATIVE ESSAY
The exchange of goods between societies was a
feature of both the ancient and medieval worlds.
Trade routes crisscrossed the lands of the medieINTERACTION
& EXCHANGE
val world, and with increased trade came the
growth of cities. In Europe, towns had dwindled after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, but with the revival of trade
in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the cities came back to life.
This revival occurred first in the old Roman cities, but soon new
cities arose as merchants and artisans sought additional centers
for their activities. As cities grew, so did the number of fortified
houses, town halls, and churches whose towers punctuated the
urban European skyline. Nevertheless, in the Middle Ages, cities
in western Europe, especially north of the Alps, remained relatively small. Even the larger cities of Italy, with populations of
100,000, seemed insignificant in comparison with Constantinople and the great cities of the Middle East and China.
With a population of possibly 300,000 people, Constantinople, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire (see Chapter 13), was
the largest city in Europe in the Early and High Middle Ages, and
until the twelfth century, it was Europe’s greatest commercial
center, important for the exchange of goods between West and
East. In addition to palaces, cathedrals, and monastic buildings,
Constantinople also had numerous gardens and orchards that
occupied large areas inside its fortified walls. Despite the extensive open and cultivated spaces, the city was not self-sufficient
and relied on imports of food under close government direction.
As trade flourished in the Islamic world, cities prospered.
When the Abbasids were in power, Baghdad, with a population
close to 700,000, was probably the largest city in the empire
and one of the greatest cities in the world. After the rise of the
Fatimids in Egypt, however, the focus of trade shifted to Cairo.
Islamic cities had a distinctive physical appearance. Usually, the
most impressive urban buildings were the palaces for the
caliphs or the local governors and the great mosques for worship. There were also public buildings with fountains and
secluded courtyards, public baths, and bazaars. The bazaar, a
covered market, was a crucial part of every Muslim settlement
and an important trading center where goods from all the
known world were available. Food prepared for sale at the market was carefully supervised. A rule in one Muslim city stated,
‘‘Grilled meats should only be made with fresh meat and not
with meat coming from a sick animal and bought for its cheapness.’’ The merchants were among the greatest beneficiaries of
the growth of cities in the Islamic world.
During the medieval period, cities in China were the largest in the world. The southern port of Hangzhou had at least a
million residents by 1000, and a number of other cities, includ-
degree of outside control, evolved institutions of government
for running the affairs of the community. Only males who
were born in the city or had lived there for a specific length
340
ª British Library, London//HIP/Art Resource, NY
Cities in the Medieval World
Crime and Punishment in the Medieval City. Violence was a
common feature of medieval life. Criminals, if apprehended, were
punished quickly and severely, and public executions, like the one seen
here, were considered a deterrent to crime.
ing Chang’an and Kaifeng, may also have reached that size.
Chinese cities were known for their broad canals and wide,
tree-lined streets. They were no longer administrative centers
dominated by officials and their families but now included a
broader mix of officials, merchants, artisans, and entertainers.
The prosperity of Chinese cities was well known. Marco Polo,
in describing Hangzhou to unbelieving Europeans in the late
thirteenth century, said, ‘‘So many pleasures can be found that
one fancies himself to be in Paradise.’’
Based on a comparison of these medieval cities,
which of these civilizations do you think was the most
advanced? Why?
of time could be citizens. In many cities, these citizens elected
members of a city council who served as judges and city officials and passed laws.
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
Medieval cities remained relatively small in comparison
with either ancient or modern cities (see the comparative
essay ‘‘Cities in the Medieval World’’ on p. 340). A large trading city might have about 5,000 inhabitants. By 1200, London
was the largest city in England with 30,000 people. On the
Continent north of the Alps, only a few urban centers of commerce, such as Bruges and Ghent, had populations close to
40,000. Italian cities tended to be larger, with Venice, Florence, Genoa, Milan, and Naples numbering almost 100,000.
Even the largest European city, however, seemed small
beside the Byzantine capital of Constantinople or the Arab
cities of Damascus, Baghdad, and Cairo.
DAILY LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL CITY Medieval towns were
surrounded by stone walls that were expensive to build, so
the space within was precious. Consequently, most medieval
cities featured narrow, winding streets with houses crowded
against each other and second and third stories extending out
over the streets. Because dwellings were built mostly of
wood before the fourteenth century and candles and wood
fires were used for light and heat, fire was a constant threat.
Medieval cities burned rapidly once a fire started.
Most of the people who lived in cities were merchants
involved in trade and artisans engaged in manufacturing a wide
range of products, such as cloth, metalwork, shoes, and leather
goods. Generally, merchants and artisans had their own sections within a city. The merchant area included warehouses,
inns, and taverns. Artisan sections were usually divided along
craft lines. From the twelfth century on, craftspeople began to
organize themselves into guilds, and by the thirteenth century,
there were individual guilds for virtually every craft. Each craft
had its own street where its activity was pursued.
The physical environment of medieval cities was not pleasant. They were dirty and smelled of animal and human
wastes deposited in backyard privies or on the streets. The
rivers near most cities were polluted with wastes, especially
from the tanning and butchering industries. Because of the
pollution, cities did not use the rivers for drinking water but
relied instead on wells.
Private and public baths also existed in medieval towns.
Paris, for example, had thirty-two public baths for men and
women. City laws did not allow lepers and people with ‘‘bad
reputations’’ to use them. This did not, however, prevent
public baths from being known for permissiveness due to
public nudity. One contemporary commented on what
occurred in public bathhouses: ‘‘Shameful things. Men make
a point of staying all night in the public baths and women at
the break of day come in and through ‘ignorance’ find themselves in the men’s rooms.’’6
In medieval cities, women, in addition to supervising the
household, purchasing food and preparing meals, raising the
children, and managing the family finances, were also often
expected to help their husbands in their trades. Some women
also developed their own trades to earn extra money. When
some master craftspeople died, their widows even carried on
their trades. Some women in medieval towns were thus able
to lead lives of considerable independence.
Evolution of the European Kingdoms
The recovery and growth of European civilization in the
High Middle Ages also affected the state. Although lords and
vassals seemed forever mired in endless petty conflicts, some
medieval kings inaugurated the process of developing new
Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Paris//ª Snark/Art Resource, NY
Shops in a Medieval Town. Most urban
residents were merchants involved in trade and
artisans who manufactured a wide variety of
products. Master craftsmen had their workshops in
the ground-level rooms of their homes. In this
illustration, two well-dressed burghers are touring
the shopping district of a French town. Tailors,
furriers, a barber, and a grocer (from left to right)
are visible at work in their shops.
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
341
kinds of monarchical states that were based on the centralization of power rather than the decentralized political order
that was characteristic of fief-holding. By the thirteenth century, European monarchs were solidifying their governmental institutions in pursuit of greater power.
In late September
1066, an army of heavily armed knights under William of
Normandy landed on the coast of England, and a few weeks
later, on October 14, they soundly defeated King Harold and
his Anglo-Saxon foot soldiers in the Battle of Hastings. William (1066–1087) was crowned king of England at Christmastime in London and promptly began a process of combining
Anglo-Saxon and Norman institutions that would change
England forever. Many of the Norman knights were given
parcels of land that they held as fiefs from the new English
king. William made all nobles swear an oath of loyalty to him
as sole ruler of England and insisted that all people owed loyalty to the king. The Normans also took over existing AngloSaxon institutions, such as the office of sheriff. William took a
census and more fully developed the system of taxation and
royal courts begun by the Anglo-Saxon kings of the tenth and
eleventh centuries. All in all, William of Normandy established a strong, centralized monarchy.
The Norman Conquest had numerous repercussions. Because
the new king of England was still the duke of Normandy, he
was both a king (of England) and at the same time a vassal to a
king (of France), but a vassal who was now far more powerful
than his lord. This connection with France kept England heavily
involved in European affairs throughout the High Middle Ages.
In the twelfth century, the power of the English monarchy was greatly enlarged during the reign of Henry II
ª Musée de la Tapisserie, Bayeux/With special authorization of the city of Bayeux//The Bridgeman
Art Library
ENGLAND IN THE HIGH MIDDLE AGES
(1154–1189; see the Film & History feature on p. 338). The
new king was particularly successful in strengthening the
power of the royal courts. Henry expanded the number of
criminal cases to be tried in the king’s court and also
devised means for taking property cases from local courts
to the royal courts. Henry’s goals were clear: expanding the
power of the royal courts increased the king’s power and,
of course, brought revenues into his coffers. Moreover,
since the royal courts were now found throughout England,
a body of common law (law that was common to the
whole kingdom) began to replace the different law codes
that often varied from place to place.
Henry was less successful at imposing royal control over
the church and became involved in a famous struggle
between church and state. Henry claimed the right to punish
clergymen in the royal courts, but Thomas à Becket, as archbishop of Canterbury the highest-ranking English cleric,
claimed that only church courts could try clerics. Attempts at
compromise failed, and the angry king publicly expressed the
desire to be rid of Becket: ‘‘Who will free me of this priest?’’
he screamed. Four knights took the challenge, went to
Canterbury, and murdered the archbishop in the cathedral
(see the box on p. 343). Faced with public outrage, Henry
was forced to allow the right of appeal from English church
courts to the papal court.
Many English nobles came to resent the growth of the
king’s power and rose in rebellion during the reign of King
John (1199–1216). At Runnymede in 1215, John was forced to
accept Magna Carta (Great Charter) guaranteeing feudal liberties. Feudal custom had always recognized that the relationship between king and vassals was based on mutual rights
and obligations. Magna Carta gave written recognition to that
The Norman Conquest of England. The Bayeux (bah-YUH or bah-YUR) tapestry, a magnificent wall hanging of
woolen embroidery on a linen backing, was made by English needlewomen before 1082 for Bayeux Cathedral. It depicts
scenes from the Norman invasion of England a decade and a half earlier. This segment shows the Norman cavalry charging
the shield wall of the Saxon infantry during the Battle of Hastings.
342
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
Murder in the Cathedral
The most famous church-state controversy in
medieval England arose between King Henry II
and Thomas à Becket, the archbishop of CanterPOLITICS &
GOVERNMENT
bury. This excerpt is from a letter by John of
Salisbury, who served as Becket’s secretary and was present
at the archbishop’s murder in 1170.
Letter from John of Salisbury to John
of Canterbury, Bishop of Poitiers
The martyr [Becket] stood in the cathedral, before Christ’s altar, as we have said, ready to suffer; the hour of slaughter
was at hand. When he heard that he was sought—heard the
knights who had come for him shouting in the throng of
clerks [clerics] and monks ‘‘Where is the archbishop?’’—he
turned to meet them on the steps which he had almost
climbed, and said with steady countenance: ‘‘Here am I!
What do you want?’’ One of the knight-assassins flung at him
in fury: ‘‘That you die now! That you should live longer is
impossible.’’ No martyr seems ever to have been more steadfast in his agony than he . . . and thus, steadfast in speech as
in spirit, he replied: ‘‘And I am prepared to die for my God,
to preserve justice and my church’s liberty. If you seek my
head, I forbid you on behalf of God almighty and on pain of
anathema to do any hurt to any other man, monk, clerk, or
layman, of high or low degree. Do not involve them in the
punishment, for they have not been involved in the cause: on
my head not on theirs be it if any of them have supported the
Church in its troubles. I embrace death readily, so long as
peace and liberty for the Church follow from the shedding of
fact and was used in later years to support the idea that a
monarch’s power was limited.
During the reign of Edward I (1272–1307), an institution
of great importance in the development of representative
government—the English Parliament—emerged. Originally,
the word parliament was applied to meetings of the king’s
Great Council, in which the greater barons and chief prelates
of the church met with the king’s judges and principal advisers to deal with judicial affairs. But needing money, in 1295
Edward invited two knights from every county and two residents from each town to meet with the Great Council to consent to new taxes. This was the first Parliament.
Thus, the English Parliament came to be composed of
two knights from every county and two burgesses from every
borough as well as the barons and ecclesiastical lords. Eventually, the barons and church lords formed the House of Lords;
the knights and burgesses, the House of Commons. The Parliaments of Edward I approved taxes, discussed politics,
passed laws, and handled judicial business. The law of the
realm was beginning to be determined not by the king alone
my blood. . . .’’ He spoke, and saw that the assassins had
drawn their swords; and bowed his head like one in prayer.
His last words were ‘‘To God and St. Mary and the saints
who protect and defend this church, and to the blessed Denis,
I commend myself and the Church’s cause.’’ No one could
dwell on what followed without deep sorrow and choking
tears. A son’s affection forbids me to describe each blow the
savage assassins struck, spurning all fear of God, forgetful of
all fealty and any human feeling. They defiled the cathedral
and the holy season [Christmas] with a bishop’s blood and
with slaughter; but that was not enough. They sliced off the
crown of his head, which had been specially dedicated to God
by anointing with holy chrism—a fearful thing even to
describe; then they used their evil swords, when he was dead,
to spill his brain and cruelly scattered it, mixed with blood
and bones, over the pavement. . . . Through all the agony the
martyr’s spirit was unconquered, his steadfastness marvelous
to observe; he spoke not a word, uttered no cry, let slip no
groan, raised no arm nor garment to protect himself from an
assailant, but bent his head, which he had laid bare to their
swords with wonderful courage, till all might be fulfilled.
Motionless he held it, and when at last he fell his body lay
straight; and he moved neither hand nor foot.
What was the cause of the conflict between Henry II
and the archbishop of Canterbury? What argument
does the archbishop make to defend his position?
How was the conflict resolved?
but by the king in consultation with representatives of various groups that constituted the community.
The Carolingian
Empire had been divided into three major sections in 843.
The western Frankish lands formed the core of the eventual
kingdom of France. In 987, after the death of the last Carolingian king, the western Frankish nobles chose Hugh Capet
(YOO ka-PAY) as the new king, thus establishing the Capetian (kuh-PEE-shun) dynasty of French kings. Although they
carried the title of kings, the Capetians had little real power.
They controlled as the royal domain only the lands around
Paris known as the Île-de-France (EEL-duh-fronhss). As
kings of France, the Capetians were formally the overlords of
the great lords of France, such as the dukes of Normandy,
Brittany, Burgundy, and Aquitaine. In reality, however, many
of the dukes were considerably more powerful than the
Capetian kings. All in all, it would take the Capetian dynasty
hundreds of years to create a truly centralized monarchical
authority in France.
GROWTH OF THE FRENCH KINGDOM
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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343
The reign of King Philip II Augustus (1180–1223) was an
important turning point in the growth of the French monarchy. Philip II waged war against the Plantagenet (plan-TAJuh-net) rulers of England, who also ruled the French territories of Normandy, Maine, Anjou, and Aquitaine, and was successful in gaining control of most of these territories, thereby
enlarging the power of the French monarchy (see Map 12.3).
To administer justice and collect royal revenues in his new territories, Philip appointed new royal officials, thus inaugurating
a French royal bureaucracy in the thirteenth century.
Capetian rulers after Philip II continued to add lands to the
royal domain. Philip IV the Fair (1285–1314) was especially
effective in strengthening the French monarchy. He reinforced
the royal bureaucracy and also brought a French parliament
into being by asking representatives of the three estates, or
classes—the clergy (First Estate), the nobles (Second Estate),
and the townspeople (Third Estate)—to meet with him. They
did so in 1302, inaugurating the Estates-General, the first
French parliament, although it had little real power. By the
end of the thirteenth century, France was the largest, wealthiest, and best-governed monarchical state in Europe.
Ber
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NORWAY
CHRISTIAN RECONQUEST: THE IBERIAN KINGDOMS Much
of Spain had been part of the Islamic world since the eighth
century. From the tenth century, however, the most noticeable feature of Spanish history was the weakening of Muslim
power and the beginning of a Christian reconquest that lasted
until the final expulsion of the Muslims at the end of the fifteenth century.
A number of small Christian kingdoms were established in
northern Spain in the eleventh century, and within a hundred
years, they had been consolidated into the Christian kingdoms
of Castile (ka-STEEL), Navarre, Aragon, and Portugal, which
first emerged as a separate kingdom in 1139. The southern half
of Spain still remained under the control of the Muslims.
But in the thirteenth century, Aragon, Castile, and Portugal made significant conquests of Muslim territory. The Muslims remained ensconced only in the kingdom of Granada in
the southeast of the Iberian peninsula, which remained an independent Muslim state until its final conquest by the forces
of Ferdinand and Isabella of Aragon and Castile in 1492.
The Spanish kingdoms followed no consistent policy in
their treatment of the conquered Muslim population. In
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GDO
DOM
D
DO
OM
OF S
OF
SIC
IIC
CIL
IILY
L
DOMINIONS OF
THE AL
LMOR
MORAV
AVIDS
AVI
DS
Bl ack Sea
300
600
300
Cre
Cr
Cre
Crete
rete
te
iterr
anean
Sea
CRUSAD
CRUSAD
DER
R
STAT
TES
TES
ES
Damascus
JJerusalem
900 Kilometers
600 Miles
SELJUK
UK
EMPIRE
E
Cyp
ypru
ypr
yp
ru
rus
FATIMI
IMI
MID
MI
ID
CALIPHATE
Allleexa
Ale
A
xan
xan
andri
d ia
C
Cairo
MAP 12.3 Europe in the High Middle Ages. Although the nobility dominated much of European society in the High Middle Ages, kings
began the process of extending their power in more effective ways, creating the monarchies that would form the European states.
Which were the strongest monarchical states by 1300? Why?
344
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Aragon, Muslim farmers continued to work the land but were
forced to pay very high rents. In Castile, King Alfonso X
(1252–1284), who called himself the ‘‘King of Three Religions,’’ encouraged the continued development of a cosmopolitan culture shared by Christians, Jews, and Muslims.
and southern Italy would mean the end of papal power in the
center of the peninsula. Furthermore, the northern Italian
cities were unwilling to give up their freedom. Frederick
nevertheless waged a long and bitter struggle, winning many
battles but ultimately losing the war.
The struggle between popes and emperors had dire consequences for the Holy Roman Empire. By spending their time
fighting in Italy, the German emperors left Germany in the
hands of powerful German lords who ignored the emperor and
created their own independent kingdoms. This ensured that the
German monarchy would remain weak and incapable of establishing a centralized monarchical state; thus, the German Holy
Roman Emperor had no real power over either Germany or
Italy. Unlike France and England, neither Germany nor Italy
had a centralized national monarchy in the Middle Ages. Both
of these regions consisted of many small, independent states, a
situation that changed little until the nineteenth century.
In the tenth century, the powerful dukes of the Saxons became kings of the eastern Frankish kingdom (or Germany, as it came to be called).
The best known of the Saxon kings of Germany was Otto I
(936–973), who intervened in Italian politics and for his efforts
was crowned emperor of the Romans by the pope in 962, reviving a title that had not been used since the time of Charlemagne.
In the eleventh century, German kings created a strong monarchy and a powerful empire by leading armies into Italy. To
strengthen their grip, they relied on their ability to control the
church and select bishops, whom they could then use as royal
administrators. But the struggle between church and state during
THE SLAVIC PEOPLES OF CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE
the reign of Henry IV (1056–1106) weakened the king’s ability to
The Slavs were originally a single people in central Europe,
use church officials in this way (see ‘‘Reform of the Papacy’’ later
but they gradually divided into three major groups: western,
in this chapter). The German kings also tried to bolster their
southern, and eastern (see Map 12.4). The western Slavs
power by using their position as emperors to exploit the reeventually formed the Polish and Bohemian kingdoms. Gersources of Italy. But this strategy tended to backfire; many a German Christian missionaries converted both the Czechs in
man king lost armies in Italy in pursuit of a dream of empire, and
Bohemia and the Slavs in Poland by the tenth century.
no German dynasty demonstrates this better than the Hohenstaufens (hoh-en-SHTOW-fens).
The two most famous members
of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, Freder0
100 2200
300 Kilometers
Baltic Sea
ick I Barbarossa (bar-buh-ROH-suh)
0
100
1
200 Miles
(1152–1190) and Frederick II (1212–
(MODERN STATE N
NAMES
ARE IN PARENTHESES)
H
1250), tried to create a new kind of
(RUSSIA)
empire. Previous German kings had
(POLAND)
OLA
focused on building a strong German
WE
ST
ERN
S
POLES
Elb
SLAVS SLAV
e
kingdom, but Frederick I planned to
(Approximate time
(App
(600
0 )
of m
movement)
(500)
get his chief revenues from Italy as the
Kiev
i
(450)
Od
(GERMANY)
NY
(500)
er
center of a ‘‘holy empire,’’ as he called
R
it (hence the name Holy Roman Empire).
EASTERN SLAVS
CHS
CZE
R.
(RUSSIANS,
But his attempt to conquer northern
(CZECH
a
l
)
BYELORUSSIANS,
(600 Vistu
REPUBLIC)
Italy ran into severe problems. The
UKRAINIANS)
R.
Danube
pope opposed him, fearful that the em(UKRAINE)
Dniester
(SLOVAKIA)
peror wanted to absorb Rome and the
R.
Carpathia
Papal States into his empire. The cities
n
of northern Italy, which had become
M
Alps
(AUSTRIA)
used to their freedom, were also
(HUNGARY)
N
(ROMANIA)
M
unwilling to be Frederick’s subjects.
SLOVEN
S
An alliance of these northern Italian
(SLOVENIA)
SL VENIA
NES
S
R.
O st
cities, with the support of the pope,
(600)
(CROATIA)
RO
Sava
defeated the emperor’s forces in 1176.
R.
0)
(60
TS
A
O
The main goal of Frederick II was
S
(BOSNIA CR
RB
)
.
the establishment of a strong centralSE
(600
nu b e R
Da
AND
ized state in Italy dominated by the
(SERBIA)
HERZEGOVINA)
ER
)
(ITALY)
a
kingdom in Sicily, which he had
inherited from his mother. FrederMAP 12.4 The Migrations of the Slavs. Originally from east-central Europe, the Slavic people
ick’s major task was to gain control broke into three groups. The western Slavs converted to Catholic Christianity, while most of the
of northern Italy. In the attempt, eastern and southern Slavs, under the influence of the Byzantine Empire, embraced the Eastern
however, he became involved in a Orthodox faith.
deadly conflict with the popes, who
What connections do these Slavic migrations have with what we today characterize as
feared that a single ruler of northern
eastern Europe?
THE LANDS OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE
Dnieper
R.
N SLAVS
(500)
SOUTH
ER
.
SL
OV
(60 AKS
0)
R.
ts
Sea
tic
Se
Black
ria
ª Cengage Learning
.
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Europe in the High Middle Ages
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345
A Muslim’s Description of the Rus
Despite the difficulties that travel presented,
early medieval civilization did witness some contact among the various cultures. This might
FAMILY &
SOCIETY
occur through trade, diplomacy, or the conquest
and migration of peoples. This document is a description of
the Swedish Rus, who eventually merged with the native
Slavic peoples to form the principality of Kiev, commonly
regarded as the first Russian state. It was written by Ibn
Fadlan, a Muslim diplomat sent from Baghdad in 921 to a
settlement on the Volga River. His comments on the filthiness of the Rus reflect the Muslim emphasis on cleanliness.
Ibn Fadlan, The Rus
I saw the Rus folk when they arrived on their trading mission
and settled at the river Atul (Volga). Never had I seen people
of more perfect physique. They are tall as date palms, and
reddish in color. They wear neither coat nor kaftan, but each
man carried a cape which covers one half of his body, leaving
one hand free. No one is ever parted from his axe, sword,
and knife. Their swords are Frankish in design, broad, flat,
and fluted. Each man has a number of trees, figures, and the
like from the fingernails to the neck. Each woman carried on
her bosom a container made of iron, silver, copper, or gold—
its size and substance depending on her man’s wealth.
[The Rus] are the filthiest of God’s creatures. They do not
wash after discharging their natural functions, neither do they
wash their hands after meals. They are as lousy as donkeys.
German Christians also converted the non-Slavic kingdom of
Hungary, which emerged after the Magyars settled down after their defeat in 955. The Poles, Czechs, and Hungarians all
accepted Catholic or western Christianity and became closely
tied to the Roman Catholic Church and its Latin culture.
The southern and eastern Slavic populations took a different path: the Slavic peoples of Moravia were converted to the
Orthodox Christianity of the Byzantine Empire (see Chapter
13) by two Byzantine missionary brothers, Cyril and Methodius, who began their activities in 863. The southern Slavic
peoples included the Croats, Serbs, and Bulgarians. For the
most part, they too embraced Eastern Orthodoxy, although
the Croats came to accept the Roman Catholic faith. The
adoption of Eastern Orthodoxy by the Serbs and Bulgarians
tied their cultural life to the Byzantine state.
The eastern Slavic peoples, from whom the modern Russians and Ukrainians are descended, had settled in the territory of present-day Ukraine and European Russia. There,
beginning in the late eighth century, they began to encounter
Swedish Vikings who moved down the extensive network of
346
They arrive from their distant lands and lay their ships alongside the banks of the Atul, which is a great river, and there
they build big houses on its shores. Ten or twenty of them
may live together in one house, and each of them has a couch
of his own where he sits and diverts himself with the pretty
slave girls whom he had brought along for sale. He will make
love with one of them while a comrade looks on; sometimes
they indulge in a communal orgy, and, if a customer should
turn up to buy a girl, the Rus man will not let her go till he
has finished with her.
They wash their hands and faces every day in incredibly
filthy water. Every morning the girl brings her master a large
bowl of water in which he washes his hands and face and
hair, then blows his nose into it and spits into it. When he has
finished the girl takes the bowl to his neighbor—who repeats
the performance. Thus, the bowl goes the rounds of the
entire household. . . .
If one of the Rus folk falls sick they put him in a tent by
himself and leave bread and water for him. They do not visit
him, however, or speak to him, especially if he is a serf.
Should he recover he rejoins the others; if he dies they burn
him. But if he happens to be a serf they leave him for the
dogs and vultures to devour. If they catch a robber they hang
him to a tree until he is torn to shreds by wind and weather.
What was Ibn Fadlan’s impression of the Rus? Why do
you think he was so critical of their behavior?
rivers into the lands of the eastern Slavs in search of booty
and new trade routes (see the box above). These Vikings built
trading settlements and eventually came to dominate the
native peoples, who called them ‘‘the Rus’’ (ROOSS or
ROOSH), from which the name Russia is derived.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF RUSSIA: IMPACT OF THE MONGOLS
A Viking leader named Oleg (c. 873–913) settled in Kiev
(KEE-yev) at the beginning of the tenth century and founded
the Rus state known as the principality of Kiev. His successors extended their control over the eastern Slavs and
expanded the territory of Kiev until it included the area
between the Baltic and Black Seas and the Danube and Volga
Rivers. By marrying Slavic wives, the Viking ruling class was
gradually assimilated into the Slavic population.
The growth of the principality of Kiev attracted religious
missionaries, especially from the Byzantine Empire. One Rus
ruler, Vladimir (VLAD-ih-meer) (c. 980–1015), married the
Byzantine emperor’s sister and in 987 officially accepted
Christianity for himself and his people. By the end of the
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
tenth century, Byzantine Christianity had become the model
for Russian religious life.
The Kievan Rus state prospered and reached its high point
in the first half of the eleventh century. But civil wars and
new invasions by Asian nomads caused the principality of
Kiev to collapse, and its sack by north Russian princes in 1169
brought an end to the first Russian state, which had remained
closely tied to the Byzantine Empire, not to Europe. In the
thirteenth century, the Mongols conquered Russia and cut it
off even more from Europe.
The Mongols had exploded onto the scene in the thirteenth
century, moving east into China and west into the Middle East
and central Europe. Although they conquered Russia, they were
not numerous enough to settle the vast Russian lands. They
occupied only part of Russia but required Russian princes to pay
tribute to them. One Russian prince soon emerged as more
powerful than the others. Alexander Nevsky (NYEF-skee),
prince of Novgorod (NAHV-guh-rahd), defeated a German
invading army in northwestern Russia in 1242. His cooperation
with the Mongols won him their favor. The khan, leader of the
western part of the Mongol Empire, rewarded Alexander Nevsky
with the title of grand-prince, enabling his descendants to become
the princes of Moscow and eventually leaders of all Russia.
Christianity and Medieval Civilization
Christianity was an integral part of the fabric of European society and the consciousness of Europe. Papal directives
affected the actions of kings and princes alike, and Christian
teachings and practices touched the lives of all Europeans.
REFORM OF THE PAPACY Since the fifth century, the popes of
the Catholic Church had reigned supreme over church affairs.
They had also come to exercise control over the territories in
central Italy that came to be known as the Papal States, which
kept the popes involved in political matters, often at the expense
of their spiritual obligations. At the same time, the church
became increasingly entangled in the evolving feudal relationships. High officials of the church, such as bishops and abbots,
came to hold their offices as fiefs from nobles. As vassals, they
were obliged to carry out the usual duties, including military
service. Of course, lords assumed the right to choose their vassals and thus came to appoint bishops and abbots. Because lords
often chose their vassals from other noble families for political
reasons, these bishops and abbots were often worldly figures
who cared little about their spiritual responsibilities.
By the eleventh century, church leaders realized the need
to free the church from the interference of lords in the
appointment of church officials. Lay investiture was the practice by which secular rulers both chose nominees to church
offices and invested them with (bestowed on them) the symbols of their office. Pope Gregory VII (1073–1085) decided to
fight this practice. Gregory claimed that he, as pope, was
God’s ‘‘vicar on earth’’ and that the pope’s authority extended
over all of Christendom, including its rulers. In 1075, he
issued a decree forbidding high-ranking clerics from receiving
their investiture from lay leaders.
Gregory soon found himself in conflict with the German
king over his actions. King Henry IV was also a determined
CHRONOLOGY
The European Kingdoms
England
Norman Conquest
William the Conqueror
Henry II
John
Magna Carta
Edward I
First Parliament
France
Philip II Augustus
Philip IV
First Estates-General
Germany and the Holy Roman Empire
Otto I
Henry IV
Frederick I
Northern Italian cities defeat Frederick
Frederick II
The Eastern World
Alexander Nevsky, prince of Novgorod
Mongol conquest of Russia
1066
1066–1087
1154–1189
1199–1216
1215
1272–1307
1295
1180–1223
1285–1314
1302
936–973
1056–1106
1152–1190
1176
1212–1250
c. 1220–1263
1230s
man who had appointed high-ranking clerics, especially bishops, as his vassals in order to use them as administrators.
Henry had no intention of obeying a decree that challenged
the very heart of his administration.
The struggle between Henry IV and Gregory VII, which
is known as the Investiture Controversy, was one of the great
conflicts between church and state in the High Middle Ages. It
dragged on until a new German king and a new pope reached
a compromise in 1122 called the Concordat of Worms (kunKOR-dat of WURMZ or VORMPS). Under this agreement, a
bishop in Germany was first elected by church officials. After
election, the nominee paid homage to the king as his lord,
who then invested him with the symbols of temporal office. A
representative of the pope, however, then invested the new
bishop with the symbols of his spiritual office.
The popes
of the twelfth century did not abandon the reform ideals of
Pope Gregory VII, but they were more inclined to consolidate their power and build a strong administrative system.
During the papacy of Pope Innocent III (1198–1216), the
Catholic Church reached the height of its power. At the beginning of his pontificate, in a letter to a priest, the pope
made a clear statement of his views on papal supremacy:
THE CHURCH SUPREME: THE PAPAL MONARCHY
As God, the creator of the universe, set two great lights in the firmament of heaven, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light
to rule the night, so He set two great dignities in the firmament of
the universal church, . . . the greater to rule the day, that is, souls,
and the lesser to rule the night, that is, bodies. These dignities are
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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347
A Miracle of Saint Bernard
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux has been called the
most widely respected holy man of the twelfth
century. He was an outstanding preacher, wholly
RELIGION &
PHILOSOPHY
dedicated to the service of God. His reputation
reportedly influenced many young men to join the Cistercian
order. He also inspired myriad stories dealing with his
miracles.
A Miracle of Saint Bernard
A certain monk, departing from his monastery . . . , threw off
his habit, and returned to the world at the persuasion of the
Devil. And he took a certain parish living; for he was a priest.
Because sin is punished with sin, the deserter from his Order
lapsed into the vice of lechery. He took a concubine to live
with him, as in fact is done by many, and by her he had
children.
But as God is merciful and does not wish anyone to perish,
it happened that many years after, the blessed abbot [Saint
Bernard] was passing through the village in which this same
monk was living, and went to stay at his house. The renegade
monk recognized him, and received him very reverently, and
waited on him devoutly . . . but as yet the abbot did not recognize him.
On the morrow, the holy man said Matins and prepared
to be off. But as he could not speak to the priest, since he had
got up and gone to the church for Matins, he said to the
priest’s son, ‘‘Go, give this message to your master.’’ Now
the boy had been born [mute]. He obeyed the command and
feeling in himself the power of him who had given it, he ran
to his father and uttered the words of the Holy Father clearly
and exactly. His father, on hearing his son’s voice for the first
the papal authority and the royal power. And just as the moon gets
her light from the sun, and is inferior to the sun . . . so the royal
power gets the splendor of its dignity from the papal authority.7
Innocent III’s actions were those of a man who believed
that he, as pope, was the supreme judge of European affairs.
To achieve his political ends, he did not hesitate to use the
spiritual weapons at his command, especially the interdict,
which forbade priests to dispense the sacraments of the
church in the hope that the people, deprived of the comforts
of religion, would exert pressure against their ruler. Apparently, Pope Innocent’s interdicts worked: for example, one of
them forced the king of France, Philip Augustus, to take back
his wife and queen after Philip had tried to have his marriage
annulled.
NEW RELIGIOUS ORDERS AND NEW SPIRITUAL IDEALS
Between 1050 and 1150, a wave of religious enthusiasm
seized Europe, leading to a spectacular growth in the number
348
time, wept for joy, and made him repeat the same words . . .
and he asked what the abbot had done to him. ‘‘He did nothing to me,’’ said the boy, ‘‘except to say, ‘Go and say this to
your father.’’’
At so evident a miracle the priest repented, and hastened
after the holy man and fell at his feet saying, ‘‘My Lord and
Father, I was your monk so-and-so, and at such-and-such a
time I ran away from your monastery. I ask your Paternity to
allow me to return with you to the monastery, for in your
coming God has visited my heart.’’ The saint replied unto
him, ‘‘Wait for me here, and I will come back quickly when I
have done my business, and I will take you with me.’’ But the
priest, fearing death (which he had not done before),
answered, ‘‘Lord, I am afraid of dying before then.’’ But the
saint replied, ‘‘Know this for certain, that if you die in this
condition, and in this resolve, you will find yourself a monk
before God.’’
The saint [eventually] returned and heard that the priest
had recently died and been buried. He ordered the tomb to
be opened. And when they asked him what he wanted to do,
he said, ‘‘I want to see if he is lying as a monk or a clerk in his
tomb.’’ ‘‘As a clerk,’’ they said; ‘‘we buried him in his secular
habit.’’ But when they had dug up the earth, they found that
he was not in the clothes in which they had buried him; but
he appeared in all points, tonsure and habit, as a monk. And
they all praised God.
What two miracles occur in this tale of Saint Bernard?
What does this document reveal about popular
religious practices during the Middle Ages?
of monasteries and the emergence of new monastic orders.
Most important was the Cistercian (sis-TUR-shun) order,
founded in 1098 by a group of monks dissatisfied with the
moral degeneration and lack of strict discipline at their own
Benedictine monastery. The Cistercians were strict. They ate
a simple diet and possessed only a single robe apiece. More
time for prayer and manual labor was provided by shortening
the number of hours spent at religious services. The Cistercians played a major role in developing a new, activist spiritual model for twelfth-century Europe. A Benedictine monk
often spent hours in prayer to honor God. The Cistercian
ideal had a different emphasis: ‘‘Arise, soldier of Christ, arise!
Get up off the ground and return to the battle from which
you have fled! Fight more boldly after your flight, and triumph in glory!’’8 These were the words of Saint Bernard of
Clairvaux (klayr-VOH) (1090–1153), who more than any
other person embodied the new spiritual ideal of Cistercian
monasticism (see the box above).
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
ª Musée de l’Assistance Publique, Hopitaux de Paris//Archives Charmet/
The Bridgeman Art Library
A Group of Nuns. Although still viewed by
the medieval church as inferior to men,
women were as susceptible to the spiritual
fervor of the twelfth century as men, and
female monasticism grew accordingly. This
manuscript illustration shows at the left a
group of nuns welcoming a novice (dressed in
white) to their order. At the right, a nun
receives a sick person on a stretcher for the
order’s hospital care.
Women were also actively involved in the spiritual movements of the age. The number of women joining religious
houses grew dramatically in the High Middle Ages. Most nuns
were from the ranks of the landed aristocracy. Convents were
convenient for families unable or unwilling to find husbands for
their daughters and for aristocratic women who did not wish to
marry. Female intellectuals found them a haven for their activities. Most of the learned women of the Middle Ages were nuns.
In the thirteenth century, two new religious orders
emerged that had a profound impact on the lives of ordinary
people. Like their founder, Saint Francis of Assisi (uh-SEEzee) (1182–1226), the Franciscans lived among the people,
preaching repentance and aiding the poor. Their calls for a
return to the simplicity and poverty of the early church, reinforced by their own example, were especially effective and
made them very popular.
The Dominican order arose out of the desire of a Spanish
priest, Dominic de Guzmán (DAH-muh-nik duh goozMAHN) (1170–1221), to defend church teachings from
heresy—beliefs contrary to official church doctrine. Unlike
Francis, Dominic was an intellectual who was appalled by the
growth of heresy. He came to believe that a new religious
order of men who lived lives of poverty but were learned and
capable of preaching effectively would best be able to attack
heresy. The Dominicans became especially well known for
their roles as the inquisitors of the papal Inquisition.
The Holy Office, as the papal Inquisition was formally
called, was a court established by the church to find and try
heretics. Anyone accused of heresy who refused to confess
was considered guilty and was turned over to the state for
execution. So were relapsed heretics—those who confessed,
did penance, and then reverted to heresy again. Most heretics,
however, were put in prison or made to do various forms of
penance. To the Christians of the thirteenth century, who
believed that there was only one path to salvation, heresy
was a crime against God and against humanity. In their
minds, force should be used to save souls from damnation.
POPULAR RELIGION IN THE HIGH MIDDLE AGES We have
witnessed the actions of popes, bishops, and monks. But what
of ordinary clergy and laypeople? What were their religious
hopes and fears? What were their spiritual aspirations?
The sacraments of the Catholic Church ensured that the
church was an integral part of people’s lives, from birth to
death. There were (and still are) seven sacraments, administered only by the clergy. Sacraments, such as baptism and the
Eucharist (YOO-kuh-rest) (the Lord’s Supper), were viewed
as outward symbols of an inward grace and were considered
imperative for a Christian’s salvation. Therefore, the clergy
were seen to have a key role in the attainment of salvation.
Other church practices were also important to ordinary
people. Saints were seen as men and women who, through
their holiness, had achieved a special position in heaven,
enabling them to act as intercessors with God. The saints’
ability to protect poor souls enabled them to take on great
importance at the popular level. Jesus’s apostles were, of
course, recognized throughout Europe as saints, but there
were also numerous local saints who were of special significance to a single area. New cults developed rapidly, especially
in the intense religious atmosphere of the eleventh and
twelfth centuries. The English, for example, introduced Saint
Nicholas, the patron saint of children, who is known today as
Santa Claus.
In the High Middle Ages, the foremost position among the
saints was occupied by the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus.
Mary was viewed as the most important mediator with her
son, Jesus, the judge of all sinners. Moreover, from the eleventh century on, a fascination with Mary as Jesus’s human
mother became more evident. A sign of Mary’s importance
was the growing number of churches all over Europe that
were dedicated to her in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
Emphasis on the role of the saints was closely tied to the
use of relics, which also increased noticeably in the High Middle Ages. Relics were usually the bones of saints or objects
intimately connected to saints that were considered worthy
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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349
University Students and Violence at Oxford
Medieval universities shared in the violent
atmosphere of their age. Town and gown quarrels often resulted in bloody conflicts, especially
ART &
IDEAS
during the universities’ formative period. This
selection is taken from an anonymous description of a student riot at Oxford at the end of the thirteenth century.
A Student Riot at Oxford
They [the townsmen] seized and imprisoned all scholars on
whom they could lay hands, invaded their inns [halls of residence], made havoc of their goods and trampled their books
under foot. In the face of such provocation the proctors [university officials] sent their assistants about the town, forbidding the students to leave their inns. But all commands and
exhortations were in vain. By nine o’clock next morning,
bands of scholars were parading the streets in martial array. If
the proctors failed to restrain them, the mayor was equally
powerless to restrain his townsmen. The great bell of St. Martin’s rang out an alarm; oxhorns were sounded in the streets;
messengers were sent into the country to collect rustic allies.
The clerks [students and teachers], who numbered 3,000 in
all, began their attack simultaneously in various quarters.
They broke open warehouses in the Spicery, the Cutlery and
elsewhere. Armed with bow and arrows, swords and buck-
of veneration by the faithful. A twelfth-century English monk
began his description of the abbey’s relics by saying that
‘‘there is kept there a thing more precious than gold, . . . the
right arm of St. Oswald. . . . This we have seen with our own
eyes and have kissed, and have handled with our own hands.
. . . There are kept here also part of his ribs and of the soil on
which he fell.’’9 The monk went on to list additional relics
possessed by the abbey, including two pieces of Jesus’s swaddling clothes, pieces of Jesus’s manger, and part of the five
loaves of bread with which Jesus fed five thousand people.
Because the holiness of the saint was considered to be inherent in his relics, these objects were believed to be capable of
healing people or producing other miracles.
The Culture of the High Middle Ages
The High Middle Ages was a time of extraordinary intellectual and artistic vitality. It witnessed the birth of universities
and a building spree that left Europe bedecked with churches
and cathedrals.
The university as we know it—
with faculty, students, and degrees—was a product of the
High Middle Ages. The word university is derived from the
Latin word universitas (yoo-nee-VAYR-see-tahss), meaning
THE RISE OF UNIVERSITIES
350
lers, slings and stones, they fell upon their opponents. Three
they slew, and wounded fifty or more. One band . . . took up
a position in High Street between the Churches of St. Mary
and All Saints’, and attacked the house of a certain Edward
Hales. This Hales was a longstanding enemy of the clerks.
There were no half measures with him. He seized his crossbow, and from an upper chamber sent an unerring shaft into
the eye of the pugnacious rector. The death of their valiant
leader caused the clerks to lose heart. They fled, closely pursued by the townsmen and country-folk. Some were struck
down in the streets, and others who had taken refuge in the
churches were dragged out and driven mercilessly to prison,
lashed with thongs and goaded with iron spikes.
Complaints of murder, violence and robbery were lodged
straightway with the king by both parties. The townsmen
claimed 3,000 pounds’ damage. The commissioners, however, appointed to decide the matter, condemned them to
pay 200 marks, removed the bailiffs, and banished twelve of
the most turbulent citizens from Oxford.
Who do you think was responsible for this conflict
between town and gown? Why? Why do you think the
king supported the university?
a corporation or guild, and referred to either a corporation of
teachers or a corporation of students. Medieval universities
were educational guilds or corporations that produced educated and trained individuals.
The first European university appeared in Bologna (bohLOHN-yuh), Italy, where a great teacher named Irnerius
(1088–1125), who taught Roman law, attracted students from
all over Europe. Most of them were laymen, usually older
individuals who were administrators for kings and princes
and were eager to learn more about law so that they could
apply it in their own jobs. To protect themselves, students at
Bologna formed a guild or universitas, which was recognized
by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa and given a charter in 1158.
Kings, popes, and princes soon competed to found new universities, and by the end of the Middle Ages, there were
eighty universities in Europe, most of them in England,
France, Italy, and Germany (see the box above).
University students (all men—women did not attend universities in the Middle Ages) began their studies with the traditional liberal arts curriculum, which consisted of grammar,
rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy.
Teaching was done by the lecture method. The word lecture
is derived from the Latin verb for ‘‘read.’’ Before the development of the printing press in the fifteenth century, books
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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were expensive and few students could afford them, so teachers read from a basic text (such as a collection of laws if the
subject was law) and then added their explanations. No
exams were given after a series of lectures, but when a student applied for a degree, he was given a comprehensive oral
examination by a committee of teachers. The exam was taken
after a four- or six-year period of study. The first degree a student could earn was a bachelor of arts; later he might receive
a master of arts degree.
After completing the liberal arts curriculum, a student
could go on to study law, medicine, or theology. This last
was the most highly regarded subject at the medieval university. The study of any of these three disciplines could take a
decade or more. A student who passed his final oral examinations was granted a doctor’s degree, which officially enabled
him to teach his subject. Students who received degrees from
medieval universities could pursue other careers besides
teaching that proved to be much more lucrative. A law
degree was necessary for those who wished to serve as advisers to kings and princes. The growing administrative bureaucracies of popes and kings also demanded a supply of clerks
with a university education who could keep records and draw
up official documents. Universities provided the teachers,
administrators, lawyers, and doctors for medieval society.
The importance of
Christianity in medieval society made it certain that theology
would play a central role in the European intellectual world.
Theology, the formal study of religion, was ‘‘queen of the sciences’’ in the new universities.
Beginning in the eleventh century, the effort to apply reason
or logical analysis to the church’s basic theological doctrines had
a significant impact on the study of theology. The philosophical
and theological system of the medieval schools is known as
scholasticism (skoh-LAS-tih-sizm). Scholasticism tried to reconcile faith and reason, to demonstrate that what was accepted
on faith was in harmony with what could be learned by reason.
The overriding task of scholasticism was to harmonize
Christian teachings with the work of the Greek philosopher
Aristotle. In the twelfth century, due largely to the work of
Muslim and Jewish scholars in Spain, western Europe was
introduced to a large number of Greek scientific and philosophical works, including the works of Aristotle. But Aristotle’s works threw many theologians into consternation.
Aristotle was so highly regarded that he was called ‘‘the philosopher,’’ yet he had arrived at his conclusions by rational
thought, not by faith, and some of his doctrines contradicted
the teachings of the church. The most famous attempt to reconcile Aristotle and the doctrines of Christianity was that of
Saint Thomas Aquinas (uh-KWY-nuss).
Aquinas (1225–1274) is best known for his Summa Theologica (SOO-muh tay-oh-LAH-jee-kuh) (Summa of Theology—
a summa was a compendium of knowledge that attempted to
bring together all the received learning of the preceding centuries on a given subject). Aquinas’s masterpiece was organized according to the dialectical method of the scholastics.
Aquinas first posed a question, cited sources that offered
opposing opinions on the question, and then resolved the
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SCHOLASTICISM
matter by arriving at his own conclusions. In this fashion,
Aquinas raised and discussed some six hundred articles.
Aquinas’s reputation derives from his masterful attempt to
reconcile faith and reason. He took it for granted that there
were truths derived by reason and truths derived by faith. He
was certain, however, that the two truths could not be in conflict. The natural mind, unaided by faith, could arrive at truths
concerning the physical universe. Without the help of God’s
grace, however, reason alone could not grasp spiritual truths,
such as the Trinity (the manifestation of God in three separate
yet identical persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) or the
Incarnation (Jesus’s simultaneous identity as God and human).
The eleventh and twelfth
centuries witnessed an explosion of building, both private
and public. The construction of castles and churches absorbed
most of the surplus resources of medieval society and at the
same time reflected its basic preoccupations, God and warfare. The churches were by far the most conspicuous of the
public buildings.
The cathedrals of the eleventh and twelfth centuries were
built in the Romanesque (roh-man-ESK) style, prominent
examples of which can be found in Germany, France, and
Spain. Romanesque churches were normally built in the basilica shape used in the construction of churches in the Late
Roman Empire. Basilicas were rectangular churches with flat
wooden roofs. Romanesque builders made a significant innovation by replacing the flat wooden roof with a long, round
stone vault called a barrel vault (or a cross vault where two
barrel vaults intersected). Although barrel and cross vaults
were technically difficult to create, they were considered aesthetically more pleasing than flat wooden roofs and were also
less apt to catch fire.
Because stone roofs were extremely heavy, Romanesque
churches required massive pillars and walls to hold them up.
This left little space for windows, and Romanesque churches
were correspondingly dark on the inside. Their massive walls
and pillars gave Romanesque churches a sense of solidity and
almost the impression of a fortress.
ROMANESQUE ARCHITECTURE
THE GOTHIC CATHEDRAL Begun in the twelfth century and
brought to perfection in the thirteenth, the Gothic cathedral
remains one of the greatest artistic triumphs of the High Middle Ages. Soaring skyward, as if to reach heaven, it was a fitting symbol for medieval people’s preoccupation with God.
Two fundamental innovations of the twelfth century made
Gothic cathedrals possible. The combination of ribbed vaults
and pointed arches replaced the barrel vaults of Romanesque
churches and enabled builders to make Gothic churches
higher than Romanesque ones. The use of pointed arches and
ribbed vaults created an impression of upward movement, a
sense of weightless upward thrust that implied the energy of
God. Another technical innovation, the flying buttress, a
heavy arched pier of stone built onto the outside of the walls,
made it possible to distribute the weight of the church’s
vaulted ceilings outward and down and thus eliminate the
heavy walls used in Romanesque churches to hold the weight
of the massive barrel vaults. Thus, Gothic cathedrals could be
Europe in the High Middle Ages
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351
built with thin walls containing magnificent stained-glass windows, which created a play of light inside that varied with the
sun at different times of the day. The extensive use of colored
light in Gothic cathedrals was not accidental but was executed
by people who believed that natural light was a symbol of the
divine light of God.
The first fully Gothic church was the abbey of Saint-Denis
(san-duh-NEE) near Paris, inspired by its famous Abbot
Suger (soo-ZHAYR) (1122–1151) and built between 1140 and
1150. By the mid-thirteenth century, French Gothic architecture, most brilliantly executed in cathedrals in Paris (NotreDame), Reims, Amiens, and Chartres, had spread to virtually
all of Europe.
A Gothic cathedral was the work of the entire community.
All classes contributed to its construction. Master masons,
who were both architects and engineers, designed them, and
stonemasons and other craftspeople were paid a daily wage
and provided the skilled labor to build them. A Gothic cathedral symbolized the chief preoccupation of a medieval Christian community, its dedication to a spiritual ideal. As we have
observed before, the largest buildings of an era reflect the values of its society. The Gothic cathedral, with its towers soaring toward heaven, gave witness to an age when a spiritual
impulse underlay most aspects of its existence.
352
ª S. Grandadam/Photo Researchers, Inc.
ª The Art Archive/Gianni Dagli Orti
Barrel Vaulting. The eleventh and twelfth centuries witnessed an
enormous amount of church construction. Using the basilica shape,
master builders replaced flat wooden roofs with long, round stone vaults,
known as barrel vaults. As this illustration of a Romanesque church in
Vienne, France, indicates, the barrel vault limited the size of a church and
left little room in the walls for windows.
The Gothic Cathedral. The Gothic cathedral was one of the great
artistic triumphs of the High Middle Ages. Shown here is the cathedral of
Notre-Dame in Paris. Begun in 1163, it was not completed until the
beginning of the fourteenth century.
Medieval Europe and the World
FOCUS QUESTIONS: In what ways did Europeans begin
to relate to peoples in other parts of the world after
1000 C.E.? What were the reasons for the Crusades, and
who or what benefited the most from them?
As it developed, European civilization remained largely confined to its home continent, although Europe was never completely isolated. Some Europeans, especially merchants, had
contacts with parts of Asia and Africa. The goods of those
lands made their way into medieval castles, and the works of
Muslim philosophers were read in medieval universities. The
Vikings were also daring explorers. After 860, they sailed
westward in their long ships across the North Atlantic Ocean,
reaching Iceland in 874. Erik the Red, a Viking exiled from
Iceland, traveled even farther west and discovered Greenland
in 985. Some Vikings even reached North America, landing in
Newfoundland, the only known Viking site in North America, but it proved to be short-lived as Viking expansion drew
to a close by the tenth century. Only at the end of the eleventh century did Europeans begin their first concerted
attempt to expand beyond the frontiers of Europe by conquering the land of Palestine.
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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ª Adam Woolfitt/CORBIS
The First Crusades
Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Paris//ª Scala/Art Resource, NY
Chartres Cathedral: Stained-Glass Window. The stained glass of
Gothic cathedrals is remarkable for the beauty and variety of its colors.
Stained-glass windows depicted a remarkable variety of scenes. The
windows of Chartres Cathedral, for example, present the saints, views of
the everyday activities of ordinary men and women, and, as in this
panel, scenes from the life of Jesus.
The Crusades were based on the idea of a holy war against
infidels (unbelievers). Christian wrath against Muslims had already found some expression in the attempt to wrest Spain
from the Moors and the success of the Normans in reclaiming
Sicily. At the end of the eleventh century, Christian Europe
found itself with a glorious opportunity to go after the Muslims when the Byzantine emperor, Alexius I, asked Pope
Urban II for help against the Seljuk Turks (see Chapter 13).
The pope saw this as a chance to rally the warriors of Europe
for the liberation of Jerusalem and the Holy Land of Palestine
from the infidels. The Holy City of Jerusalem had long been
the focus of Christian pilgrimages. At the Council of Clermont in southern France toward the end of 1095, Urban challenged Christians to take up their weapons and join in a holy
war to recover the Holy Land. The pope promised remission
of sins: ‘‘All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea,
or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. This I grant them through the power of God
with which I am invested.’’10 The enthusiastic crowd cried
out in response: ‘‘It is the will of God, it is the will of God.’’
The initial response to Urban’s speech reveals how appealing many people found this combined call to military arms
and religious fervor. A self-appointed leader, Peter the Hermit, who preached of his visions of the Holy City of Jerusalem, convinced a large mob, most of them poor and many of
them peasants, to undertake a Crusade to liberate the city.
One person who encountered Peter described him in these
words: ‘‘Outdoors he wore a woolen tunic, which revealed
his ankles, and above it a hood; he wore a cloak to cover his
upper body, a bit of his arms, but his feet were bare. He
drank wine and ate fish, but scarcely ever ate bread. This
man, partly because of his reputation, partly because of his
preaching, [assembled] a very large army.’’11
This ‘‘Peasant’s Crusade’’ or ‘‘Crusade of the Poor’’ consisted of a ragtag rabble that moved through the Balkans, terThe First Crusade: The Capture of
Jerusalem. Recruited from the noble class
of western Europe, the first crusading army
reached Constantinople by 1097. By 1098,
the crusaders had taken Antioch. Working
down the coast of Palestine, they captured
Jerusalem in 1099. Shown here in a
fifteenth-century French manuscript
illustration is a fanciful re-creation of the
capture and sack of Jerusalem. A crusader in
the center is shown wearing the crusading
cross on his back.
Medieval Europe and the World
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
353
CHRONOLOGY
to the dogs that which is most holy? Will you cast pearls before
swine?’’12 Bernard even managed to enlist two powerful rulers,
but their Second Crusade proved to be a total failure.
The Third Crusade was a reaction to the fall of the Holy
City of Jerusalem in 1187 to the Muslim forces under Saladin.
Now all of Christendom was ablaze with calls for a new Crusade. Three major monarchs agreed to lead their forces in
person: Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of Germany, Richard I
the Lionhearted of England (1189–1199), and Philip II Augustus, king of France. Some of the crusaders finally arrived in
the Holy Land by 1189 only to encounter problems. Frederick Barbarossa drowned while swimming in a local river, and
his army quickly disintegrated. The English and French
arrived by sea and met with success against the coastal cities,
where they had the support of their fleets, but when they
moved inland, they failed miserably. Eventually, after Philip
went home, Richard the Lionhearted negotiated a settlement
whereby Saladin agreed to allow Christian pilgrims free
access to Jerusalem.
The Crusades
Pope Urban II’s call for a Crusade at Clermont
First Crusade
Second Crusade
Saladin’s conquest of Jerusalem
1095
1096–1099
1147–1149
1187
Third Crusade
Fourth Crusade—sack of Constantinople
Latin Empire of Constantinople
1189–1192
1204
1204–1261
R.
354
e
Ni
ª Cengage Learning
R.
rorizing natives and looting for their food and supplies. Their
misplaced religious enthusiasm led to another tragic by-product as well, the persecution of the Jews, long pictured by the
church as the murderers of Christ. As a contemporary chronicler described it, ‘‘They persecuted the hated race of the Jews
wherever they were found.’’ Two bands of peasant crusaders,
led by Peter the Hermit, managed to reach Constantinople.
The Byzantine emperor wisely shipped them over to Asia
The Later Crusades
Minor, where the Turks massacred the undisciplined and
After the death of Saladin in 1193, Pope Innocent III initiated
poorly armed mob.
the Fourth Crusade. On its way east, the crusading army
Pope Urban II did not share the wishful thinking of the
became involved in a dispute over the succession to the Byzpeasant crusaders but was more inclined to trust knights who
antine throne. The Venetian leaders of the Fourth Crusade
had been well trained in the art of war. Three organized crusaw an opportunity to neutralize their greatest commercial
sading bands of noble warriors, most of them French, made
competitor, the Byzantine Empire. Diverted to Constantinotheir way eastward. The crusading army probably numbered
ple, the crusaders sacked the great capital city of Byzantium
several thousand cavalry and as many as ten thousand infanin 1204 and set up the new Latin Empire of Constantinople
try. After the capture of Antioch in 1098, much of the crusad(see Chapter 13). Not until 1261 did a Byzantine army recaping host proceeded down the Palestinian coast, evading the
ture Constantinople. In the meantime, additional Crusades
well-defended coastal cities, and reached Jerusalem in June
were undertaken to reconquer the Holy Land. All of them
1099. After a five-week siege, the Holy City was taken amid a
were largely disasters, and by the end of the thirteenth cenhorrible massacre of the inhabitants—men, women, and chiltury, the European military effort to capture Palestine was
dren (see the box on p. 195).
recognized as a complete failure.
After further conquest of Palestinian lands, the crusaders
ignored the wishes of the Byzantine emperor and organized
four Latin crusader states. Because the crusader kingdoms
What Were the Effects
were surrounded by Muslims hostile
of the Crusades?
to them, they grew increasingly deBlac k Se a
pendent on the Italian commercial
Whether the Crusades had much effect
Consta
Con
stanti
nti
tiino
nop
n
o le
cities for supplies from Europe. Some
on European civilization is debatable.
Manzikert
Italian cities, such as Genoa, Pisa, and
The only visible remains are the Euroespecially Venice, grew rich and
pean castles that began to incorporate
COUNTY
TY OF
TY
Tigri
powerful in the process.
features adopted from fortresses that
s
EDE
ESSA
Ede
Ed
deessa
d
But it was not easy for the cruthe crusaders observed in the east (see
An
A
Ant
n io
nt
ioc
occh
SELJJUK
UKS
S
sader kingdoms to maintain themthe comparative illustration on p. 194).
PR
RINCIPALITY
NCIPA
Cyp
prus
uss
OF
O
F ANTIOCH
OC
selves. Already by the 1120s, the
Although there may have been some
Tripo
Tri
Tr
poli
COUNTY
Mediterranean Accre OF TRIPOLI
Muslims had begun to strike back.
broadening of perspective from the
Sea
The fall of one of the Latin kingdoms
exchange between two cultures, the
Jerusa
Jer
usale
lem
m K
KING
KI
IN DOM OF
in 1144 led to renewed calls for
Alexan
Ale
A
xand
andri
driia
interaction of Christian Europe with
JE
JERUSALEM
E
another Crusade, especially from the
Damieeettta
the Muslim world was actually both
Cairo
monastic firebrand Saint Bernard of
more intense and more meaningful in
Clairvaux. He exclaimed, ‘‘Now, on
Spain and Sicily than in the Holy Land.
l
account of our sins, the enemies of
Did the Crusades help stabilize EuRed
Crusader kingdoms
the cross have begun to show their
ropean
society by removing large numSea
faces. . . . What are you doing, you
bers of young warriors who would
servants of the cross? Will you throw
Crusader Kingdoms in Palestine
have fought each other in Europe?
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
Copyright 2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
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Some historians think so and believe that Western monarchs
established their control more easily as a result. There is no
doubt that the Crusades did contribute to the economic
growth of the Italian port cities, especially Genoa, Pisa, and
Venice. But it is important to remember that the growing
wealth and population of twelfth-century Europe had made
the Crusades possible in the first place. The Crusades may
have enhanced the revival of trade, but they certainly did not
cause it. Even without the Crusades, Italian merchants would
have pursued new trade contacts with the Eastern world.
Did the Crusades have side effects that would haunt European society for generations? Some historians have argued
that the Crusades might be considered a ‘‘Christian holy
war,’’ whose memories still trouble the relationship between
the Muslim world and the West today. Other historians argue
that the early crusaders were motivated as much by economic and political reasons as religious ones.
Another possible side effect is more apparent. The first
widespread attacks on the Jews began with the Crusades. As
some Christians argued, to undertake holy wars against infidel Muslims while the ‘‘murderers of Christ’’ ran free at
home was unthinkable. With the Crusades, the massacre of
Jews became a regular feature of medieval European life.
CHAPTER SUMMARY
After the collapse of the Han dynasty in the third century
C.E., China experienced nearly four centuries of internal chaos
until the Tang dynasty in the seventh century C.E. attempted
to follow the pattern of the Han dynasty and restore the
power of the Chinese Empire. The fall of the Western
Roman Empire in the fifth century brought a quite different
result as three new civilizations emerged out of the collapse
of Roman power in the Mediterranean. A new world of Islam
emerged in the east; it occupied large parts of the old Roman
Empire and created its own flourishing civilization. As we
shall see in Chapter 13, the eastern part of the old Roman
Empire, increasingly Greek in culture, continued to survive
as the Christian Byzantine Empire. At the same time, a new
Christian European civilization was establishing its roots in
the West. By the eleventh and twelfth centuries, these three
heirs of Rome began their own conflict for control of the lands of the
eastern Mediterranean.
The coronation of Charlemagne,
the descendant of a Germanic tribe
converted to Christianity, as emperor
of the Romans in 800 symbolized the
fusion of the three chief components
of the new European civilization: the
German tribes, the Roman legacy,
and the Christian church. Charlemagne’s Carolingian Empire fostered the idea of a distinct European identity. With the disintegration of that empire,
however, power fell into the hands of many different lords,
who came to constitute a nobility that dominated Europe’s political, economic, and social life. But within this world of castles
and private power, during the High Middle Ages kings gradually began to develop the machinery of government and accu-
mulate political authority. Although they could not know it
then, the actions of these medieval monarchs laid the foundation for the European states that in one form or another have
dominated the European political
scene ever since.
European civilization began to
flourish in the High Middle Ages.
The revival of trade, the expansion of
towns and cities, and the development of a money economy did not
mean the end of a predominantly rural European society, but they did
open the door to new ways to make a
living and new opportunities for people to expand and enrich their lives.
At the same time, the High Middle Ages also gave birth to a
cultural revival that led to new centers of learning in the universities, to the use of reason to systematize the study of theology, and to a dramatic increase in the number and size of
churches.
The Catholic Church
shared in the challenge of new
growth by reforming itself
and striking out on a path toward greater papal power,
both within the church and
over European society. The
High Middle Ages witnessed a spiritual renewal that
enhanced papal leadership and the religious life of the clergy
and laity. At the same time, this spiritual renewal also gave
rise to the crusading ‘‘holy warrior,’’ thereby creating an
animosity between Christians and Muslims that still has
repercussions to this day.
Chapter Summary
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355
CHAPTER TIMELINE
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
1200
1300
Magna
Carta
Germanic kingdoms
Reign of Charlemagne
Emergence
of English
Parliament
Pope Gregory VII and
the Investiture Controversy
Growth of trade and towns
First Crusade
Benedictine order established
Innocent III and
papal power
Norman conquest
of England
Rise of
universities
Thomas Aquinas
and scholasticism
Gothic cathedrals
CHAPTER REVIEW
Upon Reflection
Q What impact did the Vikings have on the history and
culture of medieval Europe?
Q
How did the revival of trade and cities affect the
economy and society of Europe in the High Middle Ages?
Q
The medieval Catholic Church developed in the High
Middle Ages at two levels—an institutional level and a
popular religion level. What were the most important
features of each level?
Key Terms
wergeld (p. 329)
diocese (p. 329)
monk (p. 329)
monasticism (p. 329)
abbot (p. 330)
nuns (p. 330)
abbesses (p. 330)
vassal (p. 333)
fief (p. 334)
subinfeudation (p. 334)
manor (p. 334)
serfs (p. 335)
demesne (p. 335)
356
aristocracy (p. 336)
chivalry (p. 336)
commercial capitalism (p. 337)
commune (p. 339)
guilds (p. 341)
common law (p. 342)
lay investiture (p. 347)
interdict (p. 348)
sacraments (p. 348)
heresy (p. 349)
liberal arts (p. 350)
scholasticism (p. 351)
Romanesque (p. 351)
Gothic (p. 351)
Suggested Reading
EARLY MIDDLE AGES For general histories of the Middle Ages,
see J. M. Riddle, A History of the Middle Ages, 300–1500 (New York,
2008), and B. Rosenwein, A Short History of the Middle Ages (Orchard
Park, N.Y., 2002). A brief history of the Early Middle Ages can be found
in R. Collins, Early Medieval Europe, 300–1000 (New York, 1991). On
Charlemagne, see A. Barbero, Charlemagne: Father of a Continent, trans.
A. Cameron (Berkeley, Calif., 2004).
The Vikings are examined in M. Arnold, The Vikings: Culture and
Conquest (London, 2006). For an important revisionist view of feudalism,
see S. Reynolds, Fiefs and Vassals (Oxford, 1994).
CHAPTER 12 The Making of Europe
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HIGH MIDDLE AGES
For a good introduction to the High Middle
Ages, see W. C. Jordan, Europe in the High Middle Ages (New York,
2003).
Urban history is covered in D. Nicholas, The Growth of the Medieval
City: From Late Antiquity to the Early Fourteenth Century (New York,
1997). On women, see L. Bitel, Women in Early Medieval Europe, 400–
1100 (Cambridge, 2002). On daily life, see R. Fossier, The Axe and the
Oath (Princeton, N.J., 2010).
For a general survey of Christianity in the Middle Ages, see F. D.
Logan, A History of the Church in the Middle Ages (London, 2002). For a
superb introduction to early Christianity, see P. Brown, The Rise of
Western Christendom: Triumph and Adversity, A.D. 200–1000, 2nd ed.
(Oxford, 2002). On the papacy in the High Middle Ages, see I. S. Robinson, The Papacy (Cambridge, 1990). On monasticism, see C. H. Lawrence, Medieval Monasticism, 3rd ed. (London, 2000), a good general
account.
On medieval intellectual life, see M. L. Colish, Medieval Foundations
of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 400–1400 (New Haven, Conn.,
1997). A good introduction to Romanesque style is A. Petzold, Romanesque Art, rev. ed. (New York, 2003). On the Gothic movement, see M.
Camille, Gothic Art: Glorious Visions, rev. ed. (New York, 2003).
MEDIEVAL EUROPE AND THE WORLD
For a detailed survey
of the Crusades, see C. Tyerman, God’s War: A New History of the Crusades (Cambridge, Mass., 2006). Also see J. Riley-Smith, ed., The Oxford
Illustrated History of the Crusades (New York, 1995).
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Chapter Summary
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Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
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