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The Middle Ages and the Renaissance
I.
Medieval Trade and Commerce
A. Guilds—two types: merchant guilds and craft guilds
1. merchant guilds came first, and as towns began to specialize in
certain crafts, more specific guilds formed
2. purpose of both kinds was to preserve a monopoly on a product
3. any attempts at capitalism were squashed
4. quality control was important and regulated to diminish unfair
practices
B. Commerce on a larger scale: in decline after the fall of Rome until 1000
C.E.
1. small urban centers began to emerge under the protective eye of
kings and nobles
2. some of the increase in commerce came from an agricultural
surplus and population increase
3. Italy had the most towns the fastest—it had a more urban
tradition than other areas in Europe.
a. mostly coastal towns in the Mediterranean Sea
b. Venice was a meeting point of east (Byzantine Empire) and
western Europe
c. The Crusades were economic opportunities for Italy
d. In other parts of Europe the only two professions that were
noble were warfare and agriculture, but in Italy, commerce
was honorable
4. Northern cities: produced high-quality cloth from English wool.
The first European industry came from this
5. Champagne Fairs linked north and south for trading 6 times a
year
II.
The Invention of the State
A. Claims of Emperors and Popes
1. Holy Roman Empire: Neither holy, Roman, nor an empire.
a. “Germany” was a conglomeration of independent states
b. Otto “the Great” (late 900s) established imperial policy for 300
years. Kings were elected and then crowned emperor by the
Pope.
c. Fathers were generally able to get their sons elected, and so the
office of emperor was somewhat hereditary
d. Emperors, in turn, intervened in selection of popes and bishops.
e. Investiture controversy—part of a reform movement in the
church, over the right of emperors to invest or appoint bishops
they wanted—result was weakening of both church and state
f. New nation-states represented a new ideal in this controversy
B. France: created by biology and bureaucracy
1. Every royal descendent of Hugh Capet (king of Franks in 987)
had a male heir (but kings were willing to risk
excommunication by divorcing wives that didn’t produce males)
2. Kings acquired land through profitable marriages and keeping
local traditions alive
C. England: had an early representative government while the king was
still sovereign
1. In 1215 King John was forced to sign the Magna Carta, which
said the king was not above the law.
D. The Hundred Years’ War—3 long-term disputes
1. The kings of England owned Gascony, a bit of France. No one
liked this arrangement, which was a remnant of feudalistic days.
2. Flemish cloth towns (in France) needed English wool and had a
close relationship. A fight over monopolies last for years.
3. Royal succession in France was disputed—the closest
descendent of the French king in the early 1300s was the King
of England.
a. Angry French nobles lied and said ancient law wouldn’t
allow the line to pass through a female
b. The crown passed to a distant cousin, which didn’t upset the
English until the Gascony fight got intense
4. The real catalyst of the war was the code of honor—maintain
honor with violence—chivalry
5. For years the two fought and made truces, and the French
kingdom began to fall apart. In this way the Hundred Years’
War was a French civil war.
6. In England, the War of the Roses stemmed from all of this:
House of York (white roses) and House of Lancaster (red roses)
Henry Tudor of Lancaster won.
7. Both England and France emerged from these controversies
with their monarchies in tact
III.
The Renaissance: “Rebirth”
A. Economic changes after the Black Death helped produce it
1. production and consumption of luxuries soared—people
wanted exotic goods
2. competition for scarce resources made the family an economic
unit—most children learned the crafts of their fathers. Females
were supposed to marry well.
3. Females were married by 20 and were in a state of constant
pregnancy
4. Men married by 25 because of the cost of setting up trade or
land, a rite of passage
5. For most, the world of the Renaissance wasn’t much different
from the world of the Middle Ages.
B. Renaissance Art—led by Florence, Italy alongside Renaissance Ideals
1. Humanists scoured the works of ancient texts for ways to make
life better. They had a
secular outlook, but not antireligious (but they were anti-Scholasticism)
2. Humanist scholars stressed grammar, rhetoric, moral
philosophy, and history. This
gave rise to the
ideal of “perfectability” of the human. (The Renaissance Man)
3. Machiavelli’s The Prince: a handbook for rulers who wanted a
lasting government. Most famous for the principle, “The end
justifies the means.”
4. In art, the painter or sculptor sought to be realistic (threedimensional, accurate perspective) while emulating the ideal of
“perfectability” as can be seen in works like “David”