Download The Late Middle Ages

The Magna Carta – the most well-known and most
important document to come out of the Middle Ages
>An agreement between England's major landholders (barons)
and King John, signed at Runnymede in 1215.
>Established idea that the King of England was not above the
law – a principle that became the cornerstone of representative
democracy.
> Not a statement of political philosophy, it was a list of
complaints and rights that the feudal vassals extracted from
their liege lord, King John.
Of the 63 clauses, only three are relevant today:
Trial by Jury of Peers
No taxation without representation
Punishments must fit the crime
The Late Middle Ages
1300-1450
Crisis and Dissolution
An Age of Adversity
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Economic problems
Famine & Plague
Peasant Rebellions
Decline of the Papacy
Hundred Years War (1337-1453)
Economic problems
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Early 1300's - “The Little Ice Age”
Declining agricultural production
Food shortages, malnutrition and famines
Silver shortage - Spiraling inflation
Diminished revenues from peasants
Knights turned to plunder and warfare
The Black Death
• 1347-1352
• Sicily
• Fleas on
black rats
• 20,000,000
dead
• “Divine
punishment
for human
sin”
Negative impact of the Plague
included:
• Panic- family, friends &
villages abandoned
• Food production
plummeted
• Jewish communities
massacred
• Church authority
questioned
• Economic and social
tensions emerged into
rebellions
• New artistic forms
focused on decay and
death
Positive long-term impact of the Plague
• Higher wages for
manual labor
• People questioned
the authority of
church leaders
• Re-emergence of
rational science
• Re-discovery of the
ancient past
• New, questioning
spirit- paved the way
for the Renaissance
The Jacquerie, France, 1358
The Ciompi – Italy,
1378
Wat Tyler’s Peasant Revolt,
aka The Great Rising, England, 1381
The Hundred Years War,
1337-1453
William of Normandy,
aka
William the
Conqueror, 1066
Crecy, 1346
Poitiers, 1356
The Long Bow vs
mounted knights
and the crossbow
Agincourt, 1415
Joan of Arc
(1412-1431)
• Jeanne D’Arc, 1429
• “The Maid of Orleans”
• Captured by
the Duke of
Burgundy in
1430 and
turned over to
English
Impact of the Hundred Years War
• English held only the port city of Calais
• England experienced a civil war: War of the
Roses
• French monarchy grew in power & prestige
• Kings won the right to collect taxes
• New weapons and strategy for warfare
• Code of Chivalry abandoned
• Feudalism began to decline
Decline of the Papacy
Pope Boniface VIII and
French king Philip IV
Clericos Laicos, 1296
“Churches and priests
that paid taxes to the
French king instead of the
Pope would face
excommunication.”
Unam Sanctam, 1302
“…if the earthly power errs, it
shall be judged by the spiritual
power…. but the pope can be
judged only by God, not by
man.
Therefore we declare, state,
define and pronounce that it is
altogether necessary to
salvation for every human
creature to be subject to the
Roman Pontiff.”
• September, 1303
“The Terrible
Day at Anagni.”
In 1309, Clement V -Avignon
The Babylonian Captivity, 1309-1377
• Along with Clement V, the next 6 popes (68 years)
were French.
• Many saw the pope as a puppet of the French king
• Widespread criticism among devout Catholics of
“the good life” led by the clergy at Avignon further
reduced the prestige of the church and the pope in
particular.
The Babylonian Captivity, 1309-1377
Petrarch, in 1353 wrote
• “I am now living in Avignon where reign the
successors of the poor fishermen of Galilee.
I am astounded…to see these men loaded with gold
and clad in purple, boasting of the spoils of princes
and nations; to see luxurious palaces and heights
crowned with fortifications, instead of a boat turned
downwards for their shelter.”
John Wycliffe (1320-1384)
• Stressed a personal
relationship with God
• Sacraments are not
necessary for salvation
• Denied that priests turned
bread/wine to body/blood of
Christ (transubstantiation)
• Denounced wealth and
advocated material poverty
• Followers called Lollards
The end to Medieval Scholasticism...
St. Thomas Aquinas, 1225-1274
Summa Theologica – the attempt to reconcile
the works of Aristotle, with its emphasis on
reason and logic, with Christianity.
Duns Scotus (1265-1308)
“Human reason cannot prove that
God is omnipotent, that He
rewards the righteous and
punishes the wicked, or that the
soul is immortal. These
doctrines are the province of
revelation and faith, not reason.”
William of Ockham (1285-1349)
“The tenets of faith are beyond the reach of
reason; there is no rational foundation
for Christianity.”
His approach, separating natural knowledge
from religious dogma, made it easier to
explore the natural world without fitting it
into a religious framework.
The Great Schism, 1378-1417
1378:Pope Urban VI
(Pope in Rome) and
Pope Clement VII
(Pope in Avignon)
The Great Schism,
1378-1417
• 1409,
Council of
Pisa elected
Alexander V
– a third
pope!
Council of
Constance, 1414-1417
elected Martin V as new
Pope.
Legacy of the Middle Ages…
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Notions of honor, duty, loyalty, and love
European cities / The middle class
The state system
English common law -concept of liberty
Equality and the sacred worth of the individual
Representative government
Universities
Corporations, Bookkeeping & Banking
Preserved Greco-Roman scholarship
Growth of secularism