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C H A P T E R

12

The Making of Europe

CHAPTER OUTLINEAND FOCUS QUESTIONS

The Emergence of Europe in the Early MiddleAges

What contributions did the Romans, the Christianchurch, and the Germanic peoples make to the newcivilization that emerged in Europe after the collapseof the Western Roman Empire? What was thesignificance of Charlemagne’s coronation as emperor?

Europe in the High Middle AgesWhat roles did aristocrats, peasants, and townspeopleplay in medieval European civilization, and how didtheir lifestyles differ? How did cities in Europecompare with those in China and the Middle East?What were the main aspects of the political, economic,spiritual, and cultural revivals that took place inEurope during the High Middle Ages?

Medieval Europe and the WorldIn what ways did Europeans begin to relate to peoplesin other parts of the world after 1000 C.E.? What werethe reasons for the Crusades, and who or whatbenefited the most from them?

CRITICAL THINKINGIn what ways was the civilization that developedin Europe in the Middle Ages similar to those inChina and the Middle East? How were theydifferent?

The coronation of Charlemagne by Pope Leo III, as depicted in a medievalFrench manuscript

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IN 800, CHARLEMAGNE, the king of the Franks, jour-neyed to Rome to help Pope Leo III, head of the CatholicChurch, who was barely clinging to power in the face of re-bellious Romans. On Christmas Day, Charlemagne and hisfamily, attended by Romans and Franks, crowded into SaintPeter’s Basilica to hear Mass. Quite unexpectedly, accordingto a Frankish writer, ‘‘as the king rose from praying beforethe tomb of the blessed apostle Peter, Pope Leo placed agolden crown on his head.’’ The people in the churchshouted, ‘‘Long life and victory to Charles Augustus, crownedby 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, andhe had been crowned by the head of the western Christianchurch. In truth, the coronation of Charlemagne was a signnot of the rebirth of the Roman Empire but of the emergenceof a new European civilization that came into being in west-ern Europe after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.

This new civilization—European civilization—was formedby the coming together of three major elements: the legacyof the Romans, the Christian church, and the Germanic peo-ples who moved in and settled the western empire. Europeancivilization developed during a period that historians call theMiddle Ages, or the medieval period, which lasted fromabout 500 to about 1500. To the historians who first used thephrase, the Middle Ages was a middle period between the an-cient world and the modern world. During the Early MiddleAges, from about 500 to 1000 C.E., the Roman world of thewestern empire was slowly transformed into a new ChristianEuropean society.

327Copyright 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.

The Emergence of Europein the Early Middle Ages

FOCUS QUESTIONS:What contributions did theRomans,theChristian church, and theGermanic peoplesmake tothenew civilization that emerged in Europe after thecollapse of theWestern RomanEmpire?Whatwas thesignificanceof Charlemagne’s coronation as emperor?

As we saw in Chapter 10, China descended into politicalchaos and civil wars after the end of the Han Empire, and itwas almost four hundred years before a new imperial dynastyestablished political order. Similarly, after the collapse of theWestern Roman Empire in thefifth century, it would also takehundreds of years to establish anew society.

The New GermanicKingdomsThe Germanic peoples were animportant component of the newEuropean civilization. Already bythe third century C.E., they hadbegun to move into the lands ofthe Roman Empire. As imperialauthority vanished in the fifth cen-tury, a number of German kingsset up new states. By 500, theWestern Roman Empire had beenreplaced politically by a series ofstates ruled by German kings.

The fusion of Romans andGermans took different forms inthe various Germanic kingdoms.The kingdom of the Ostrogoths(AHSS-truh-gahths) in Italy (seeMap 12.1) managed to preservethe Roman tradition of govern-ment. After establishing his con-trol over Italy, the Ostrogothicking Theodoric (thee-AHD-uh-rik) (493–526) kept the entirestructure of imperial Roman gov-ernment, although he used sepa-rate systems of rule for Romansand Ostrogoths. The Roman pop-ulation of Italy lived underRoman law administered byRoman officials. The Ostrogothswere governed by their own cus-toms and their own officials.

Like the kingdom of the Ostro-goths in Italy, the kingdom ofthe Visigoths (VIZ-uh-gahths) in

Spain inherited and continued to maintain much of theRoman structure of government. In both states, the Romanpopulation was allowed to maintain Roman institutions whilebeing largely excluded from power as a Germanic warriorcaste came to dominate the considerably larger native popula-tion. Over a period of time, the Visigoths and the native peo-ples began to fuse together.

Roman influence was weaker in Britain. When the Romanarmies abandoned Britain at the beginning of the fifth cen-tury, the Angles and Saxons, Germanic tribes from Denmarkand northern Germany, moved in and settled there Eventu-ally, these peoples succeeded in carving out small kingdomsthroughout the island, Kent in southeast England being oneof them.

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MAP 12.1 The Germanic Kingdoms of the Old Western Empire. Germanic tribes filled the powervacuum caused by the demise of the Western Roman Empire, founding states that blended elementsof Germanic customs and laws with those of Roman culture, including large-scale conversions toChristianity. The Franks established the most durable of these Germanic states.

How did the movements of Franks during this period correspond to the borders of present-day France?

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328 CHAPTER 12 The Making of EuropeCopyright 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).


THE KINGDOM OF THE FRANKS One of the most prominentGerman states on the European continent was the kingdomof the Franks. The establishment of a Frankish kingdomwas the work of Clovis (KLOH-viss) (c. 482–511), a memberof the Merovingian (meh-ruh-VIN-jee-un) dynasty whobecame a Catholic Christian around 500. He was not the firstGerman king to convert to Christianity, but the others hadjoined the Arian (AR-ee-un) sect of Christianity, a groupwho believed that Jesus had been human and thus not trulyGod. The Christian church in Rome, which had becomeknown as the Roman Catholic Church, regarded the Ariansas heretics, people who believed in teachings different fromthe official church doctrine. To Catholics, Jesus was human,but of the ‘‘same substance’’ as God and therefore also trulyGod. Clovis found that his conversion to Catholic Christianitygained him the support of the Roman Catholic Church,which was only too eager to obtain the friendship of a majorGermanic ruler who was a Catholic Christian.

By 510, Clovis had established a powerful new Frankishkingdom stretching from the Pyrenees in the west to Germanlands in the east (modern France and western Germany). Af-ter Clovis’s death, however, his sons divided his newly cre-ated kingdom, as was the Frankish custom. During the sixthand seventh centuries, the once-united Frankish kingdomcame to be divided into three major areas: Neustria (NOO-stree-uh), in northern Gaul; Austrasia (awss-TRAY-zhuh),consisting of the ancient Frankish lands on both sides of theRhine; and the former kingdom of Burgundy.

THE SOCIETY OF THE GERMANIC PEOPLES As Germans andRomans intermarried and began to form a new society, someof the social customs of the Germanic peoples came to playan important role. The crucial social bond among the Ger-manic peoples was the family, especially the extended familyof husbands, wives, children, brothers, sisters, cousins, andgrandparents. 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 fellunder the legal domination of her husband. For most womenin the new Germanic kingdoms, their legal status reflectedthe material conditions of their lives. Most women had lifeexpectancies of only thirty or forty years, and perhaps 15 per-cent of women died in their childbearing years, no doubt dueto complications associated with childbirth. For most women,life consisted of domestic labor: providing food and clothingfor the household, caring for the children, and assisting withfarming chores.

The German conception of family affected the way Ger-manic law treated the problem of crime and punishment. Inthe Roman system, as in our own, a crime such as murderwas considered an offense against society or the state and washandled by a court that heard evidence and arrived at a deci-sion. Germanic law was personal. An injury to one person byanother could lead to a blood feud in which the family of theinjured party took revenge on the family of the wrongdoer.Feuds could involve savage acts of revenge, such as hackingoff hands or feet or gouging out eyes. Because this systemcould easily get out of control, an alternative system arose

that made use of a fine called wergeld (WUR-geld), whichwas paid by a wrongdoer to the family of the person injuredor killed. Wergeld, which literally means ‘‘man money,’’ wasthe value of a person in monetary terms. That value variedconsiderably according to social status. An offense against anobleman, for example, cost considerably more than oneagainst a freeman or a slave.

Germanic law also provided a means of determining guiltor innocence: the ordeal. The ordeal was based on the ideaof divine intervention: divine forces (whether pagan orChristian) would not allow an innocent person to be harmed(see the box on p. 330).

The Role of the Christian ChurchBy the end of the fourth century, Christianity had becomethe predominant religion of the Roman Empire. As the offi-cial Roman state disintegrated, the Christian church playedan increasingly important role in the growth of the new Euro-pean civilization.

THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH By the fourth cen-tury, the Christian church had developed a system of govern-ment. The Christian community in each city was headed by abishop, whose area of jurisdiction was known as a bishopric,or diocese; the bishoprics of each Roman province werejoined together under the direction of an archbishop. Thebishops of four great cities—Rome, Jerusalem, Alexandria,and Antioch—held positions of special power in church affairsbecause the churches in these cities all asserted that they hadbeen founded by the original apostles sent out by Jesus. Soon,however, one of them—the bishop of Rome—claimed thathe was the sole leader of the western Christian church.According to church tradition, Jesus had given the keys to thekingdom of heaven to Peter, who was considered the chiefapostle and the first bishop of Rome. Subsequent bishops ofRome were considered Peter’s successors and came to beknown as popes (from the Latin word papa, meaning ‘‘fa-ther’’). By the sixth century, the popes had been successful inextending papal authority over the Christian church in thewest and converting the pagan peoples of Germanic Europe.Their primary instrument of conversion was the monasticmovement.

THE MONKS AND THEIR MISSIONS A monk (in Latin, mona-chus, meaning ‘‘one who lives alone’’) was a man who soughtto live a life divorced from the world, cut off from ordinaryhuman society, in order to pursue an ideal of total dedicationto God. As the monastic ideal spread, a new form of monasti-cism based on living together in a community soon becamethe dominant form. Saint Benedict (c. 480–c. 543), whofounded a monastic house for which he wrote a set of rules,established the basic form of monastic life in the westernChristian church.

Benedict’s rules divided each day into a series of activities,with primary emphasis on prayer and manual labor. Physicalwork of some kind was required of all monks for several

The Emergence of Europe in the Early Middle Ages 329Copyright 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).


hours a day because idleness was ‘‘the enemy of the soul.’’ Atthe very heart of community practice was prayer, the proper‘‘work of God.’’ Although this included private meditationand reading, all monks gathered together seven times duringthe day for common prayer and chanting of psalms. The Ben-edictine life was a communal one. Monks ate, worked, slept,and worshiped together.

Each Benedictine monastery was strictly ruled by anabbot, or ‘‘father’’ of the monastery, who had completeauthority over his fellow monks. Unquestioning obedience tothe will of the abbot was expected of every monk. EachBenedictine monastery held lands that enabled it to be a self-sustaining community, isolated from and independent of theworld surrounding it. Within the monastery, however,monks were to fulfill their vow of poverty: ‘‘Let all things becommon to all, as it is written, lest anyone should say that

anything is his own.’’1 Only men could be monks, butwomen, called nuns, also began to withdraw from the worldto dedicate themselves to God.

Monasticism played an indispensable role in early medie-val civilization. Monks became the new heroes of Christiancivilization, and their dedication to God became the highestideal of Christian life. They were the social workers of theircommunities: monks provided schools for the young, hospi-tality for travelers, and hospitals for the sick. Monks also cop-ied Latin works and passed on the legacy of the ancient worldto the new European civilization. Monasteries became centersof learning wherever they were located, and monks workedto spread Christianity to all of Europe.

Women played an important role in the monastic mission-ary movement and the conversion of the Germanic king-doms. Some served as abbesses (an abbess was the head of a

Germanic Customary Law: The Ordeal

FAMILY &SOCIETY

In Germanic customary law, the ordeal was ameans by which accused persons might clearthemselves. Although the ordeal took differentforms, all involved a physical trial of some sort,

such as holding a red-hot iron. It was believed that Godwould protect the innocent and allow them to come throughthe ordeal unharmed. This sixth-century account by Gregoryof 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 religionmade venomous assertions against the Son of God and theHoly Ghost, as is the habit of that sect [the Arians]. But whenthe deacon had discoursed a long time concerning the reason-ableness of our faith and the heretic, blinded by the fog ofunbelief, continued to reject the truth, . . . the former said:‘‘Why weary ourselves with long discussions? Let actsapprove the truth; let a kettle be heated over the fire andsomeone’s ring be thrown into the boiling water. Let himwho shall take it from the heated liquid be approved as a fol-lower of the truth, and afterward let the other party be con-verted to the knowledge of the truth. And do you alsounderstand, O heretic, that this our party will fulfill the condi-tions with the aid of the Holy Ghost; you shalt confess thatthere is no discordance, no dissimilarity in the Holy Trinity.’’The heretic consented to the proposition and they separatedafter appointing the next morning for the trial. But the fervorof faith in which the deacon had first made this suggestionbegan to cool through the instigation of the enemy. Risingwith the dawn he bathed his arm in oil and smeared it withointment. But nevertheless he made the round of the sacredplaces and called in prayer on the Lord. . . . About the third

hour they met in the marketplace. The people came togetherto see the show. A fire was lighted, the kettle was placedupon it, and when it grew very hot the ring was thrown intothe boiling water. The deacon invited the heretic to take itout of the water first. But he promptly refused, saying, ‘‘Youwho did propose this trial are the one to take it out.’’ Thedeacon all of a tremble bared his arm. And when the hereticpresbyter saw it besmeared with ointment he cried out:‘‘With magic arts you have thought to protect yourself, thatyou have made use of these salves, but what you have donewill not avail.’’ While they were thus quarreling there cameup a deacon from Ravenna named Iacinthus and inquiredwhat the trouble was about. When he learned the truth hedrew his arm out from under his robe at once and plungedhis right hand into the kettle. Now the ring that had beenthrown in was a little thing and very light so that it wasthrown about by the water as chaff would be blown about bythe wind; and searching for it a long time he found it afterabout an hour. Meanwhile the flame beneath the kettleblazed up mightily so that the greater heat might make it dif-ficult for the ring to be followed by the hand; but the deaconextracted it at length and suffered no harm, protesting ratherthat at the bottom the kettle was cold while at the top it wasjust pleasantly warm. When the heretic beheld this he wasgreatly confused and audaciously thrust his hand into the ket-tle saying, ‘‘My faith will aid me.’’ As soon as his hand hadbeen thrust in all the flesh was boiled off the bones clear upto 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 societythat used it?



monastery for nuns, known as a convent); many abbessescame from aristocratic families, especially in Anglo-SaxonEngland. In the kingdom of Northumbria, for example, SaintHilda founded the monastery of Whitby in 657. As abbess,she was responsible for making learning an important part ofthe life of the monastery.

Charlemagne and the CarolingiansDuring the seventh and eighth centuries, as the kings of theFrankish kingdom gradually lost their power, the mayors of thepalace—the chief officers of the king’s household—assumedmore control of the kingdom. One of these mayors, Pepin(PEP-in or pay-PANH), finally took the logical step of assum-ing the kingship of the Frankish state for himself and his family.Upon his death in 768, his son came tothe throne of the Frankish kingdom.

This new king was the dynamic andpowerful ruler known to history asCharles the Great (768–814), or Charle-magne (SHAR-luh-mayn) (from theLatin for Charles the Great, CarolusMagnus). He was determined and deci-sive, intelligent and inquisitive, astrong statesman, and a pious Chris-tian. Though unable to read or writehimself, he was a wise patron of learn-ing. In a series of military campaigns,he greatly expanded the territory hehad inherited and created what cameto be known as the Carolingian (kar-uh-LIN-jun) Empire. At its height,

Charlemagne’s empire covered much of western and centralEurope; not until the time of Napoleon in the nineteenth cen-tury would an empire of its size be seen again in Europe (seethe box on p. 332).

Charlemagne continued the efforts of his father in organiz-ing the Carolingian kingdom. Besides his household staff,Charlemagne’s administration of the empire depended on theuse of counts as the king’s chief representatives in local areas.As an important check on the power of the counts, Charle-magne established the missi dominici (MISS-ee doh-MIN-i-chee) (‘‘messengers of the lord king’’), two men who weresent out to local districts to ensure that the counts were exe-cuting the king’s wishes.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHARLEMAGNE As Charlemagne’spower grew, so did his prestige as the most powerful Chris-tian ruler of what one monk called the ‘‘kingdom of Europe.’’In 800, Charlemagne acquired a new title: emperor of theRomans. The significance of this imperial coronation hasbeen much debated by historians. We are not even sure if thepope or Charlemagne initiated the idea when they met in thesummer of 799 in Paderborn in German lands or whetherCharles was pleased or displeased.

In any case, Charlemagne’s coronation as Roman emperordemonstrated the strength, even after three hundred years, ofthe concept of an enduring Roman Empire. More important, itsymbolized the fusion of Roman, Christian, and Germanic ele-ments: a Germanic king had been crowned emperor of theRomans by the spiritual leader of western Christendom. Charle-magne had assembled an empire that stretched from the NorthSea to Italy and from the Atlantic Ocean to the Danube River.This differed significantly from the Roman Empire, whichencompassedmuch of the Mediterranean world. Had a new civ-ilization emerged? And should Charlemagne be regarded, asone of his biographers has argued, as the ‘‘father of Europe’’?2

The World of Lords and VassalsThe Carolingian Empire began to disintegrate soon afterCharlemagne’s death in 814, and less than thirty years later,in 843, it was divided among his grandsons into three major

sections: the western Frankish lands,which formed the core of the eventualkingdom of France; the eastern lands,which eventually became Germany;and a ‘‘middle kingdom’’ extendingfrom the North Sea to the Mediterra-nean. The territories of the middlekingdom became a source of incessantstruggle between the other two Frank-ish rulers and their heirs. At the sametime, powerful nobles gained evenmore dominance in their local territo-ries while the Carolingian rulersfought each other, and incursions byoutsiders into various parts of the Car-olingian world furthered the process ofdisintegration.

Saint Benedict. Benedict was the author of a set of rules that wasinstrumental in the development of monastic groups in the CatholicChurch. In this thirteenth-century Latin manuscript, Benedict is shownhanding the rules of the Benedictine order to a group of nuns and agroup of monks.

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INVASIONS OF THE NINTH AND TENTH CENTURIES In theninth and tenth centuries, western Europe was beset by a waveof invasions. Muslims attacked the southern coasts of Europeand sent raiding parties into southern France. The Magyars(MAG-yarz), a people from western Asia, moved into centralEurope at the end of the ninth century and settled on the plainsof Hungary, launching forays from there into western Europe.Finally crushed at the Battle of Lechfeld (LEK-feld) in

Germany in 955, the Magyars converted to Christianity, settleddown, and established the kingdom of Hungary.

The most far-reaching attacks of the time came from theNorthmen or Norsemen of Scandinavia, also known to us asthe Vikings. The Vikings were warriors whose love of adven-ture and search for booty and new avenues of trade may havespurred them to invade other areas of Europe. Viking shipswere the best of the period. Long and narrow with

The Achievements of Charlemagne

POLITICS &GOVERNMENT

Einhard (YN-hart), the biographer of Charle-magne, was born in the valley of the Main Riverin Germany about 775. Raised and educated inthe monastery of Fulda, an important center of

learning, he arrived at the court of Charlemagne in 791 or792. Although he did not achieve high office under Charle-magne, he served as private secretary to Louis the Pious,Charlemagne’s son and successor. In this selection, Einharddiscusses some of Charlemagne’s accomplishments.

Einhard, Life of CharlemagneSuch are the wars, most skillfully planned and successfullyfought, which this most powerful king waged during theforty-seven years of his reign. He so largely increased theFrank kingdom, which was already great and strong when hereceived it at his father’s hands, that more than double its for-mer territory was added to it. . . . He subdued all the wildand barbarous tribes dwelling in Germany between the Rhineand the Vistula, the Ocean and the Danube, all of whichspeak very much the same language, but differ widely fromone another in customs and dress. . . .

He added to the glory of his reign by gaining the good willof several kings and nations; so close, indeed, was the alliancethat he contracted with Alfonso, King of Galicia and Asturias,that the latter, when sending letters or ambassadors toCharles, invariably styled himself his man. . . . The Emperorsof Constantinople [the Byzantine emperors] sought friendshipand alliance with Charles by several embassies; and evenwhen the Greeks [the Byzantines] suspected him of designingto take the empire from them, because of his assumption ofthe title Emperor, they made a close alliance with him, thathe might have no cause of offense. In fact, the power of theFranks was always viewed with a jealous eye, whence theGreek proverb, ‘‘Have the Frank for your friend, but not foryour neighbor.’’

This King, who showed himself so great in extending hisempire and subduing foreign nations, and was constantlyoccupied with plans to that end, undertook also very manyworks calculated to adorn and benefit his kingdom, and

brought several of them to completion. Among these, themost deserving of mention are the basilica of the HolyMother of God at Aix-la-Chapelle [Aachen], built in the mostadmirable manner, and a bridge over the Rhine River atMainz, half a mile long, the breadth of the river at this point.. . . Above all, sacred buildings were the object of his carethroughout his whole kingdom; and whenever he foundthem falling to ruin from age, he commanded the priests andfathers who had charge of them to repair them, and madesure by commissioners that his instructions were obeyed. . . .Thus did Charles defend and increase as well as beautify hiskingdom. . . .

He cherished with the greatest fervor and devotion theprinciples of the Christian religion, which had been instilledinto him from infancy. Hence it was that he built the beauti-ful church at Aix-la-Chapelle, which he adorned with goldand silver and lamps, and with rails and doors of solid brass.He had the columns and marbles for this structure broughtfrom Rome and Ravenna, for he could not find such as weresuitable elsewhere. He was a constant worshiper at thischurch as long as his health permitted, going morning andevening, even after nightfall, besides attending mass. . . .

He was very forward in caring for the poor, so much sothat he not only made a point of giving in his own countryand his own kingdom, but when he discovered that therewere Christians living in poverty in Syria, Egypt, and Africa,at Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Carthage, he had compassionon their wants, and used to send money over the seas tothem. . . . He sent great and countless gifts to the popes, andthroughout his whole reign the wish that he had nearest atheart was to reestablish the ancient authority of the city ofRome under his care and by his influence, and to defend andprotect the Church of St. Peter, and to beautify and enrich itout of his own store above all other churches.

How long did Einhard know Charlemagne? Does thisexcerpt reflect close, personal knowledge of the man,his court, and his works or hearsay and legend?



beautifully carved arched prows, the Viking ‘‘dragon ships’’each carried about fifty men. Their shallow draft enabledthem to sail up European rivers and attack places at some dis-tance inland. In the ninth century, Vikings sacked villages andtowns, destroyed churches, and easily defeated small localarmies. Viking attacks were terrifying, and many a clergymanpleaded with his parishioners to change their behavior andappease God’s anger to avert the attacks, as in this sermon byan English archbishop in 1014:

Things have not gone well now for a long time at home orabroad, but there has been devastation and persecution in everydistrict again and again, and the English have been for a longtime now completely defeated and too greatly disheartenedthrough God’s anger; and the pirates [Vikings] so strong withGod’s consent that often in battle one puts to flight ten, andsometimes less, sometimes more, all because of our sins. . . . Wepay them continually and they humiliate us daily; they ravageand they burn, plunder, and rob and carry on board; and lo, whatelse is there in all these events except God’s anger clear and visi-ble over this people?3

By the middle of the ninth century, the Norsemen hadbegun to build winter settlements in different areas ofEurope. By 850, groups from Norway had settled in Ireland,and Danes occupied northeastern England by 878. Beginningin 911, the ruler of the western Frankish lands gave one bandof Vikings land at the mouth of the Seine (SEN) River, a terri-tory that came to be known as Normandy. This policy of set-tling the Vikings and converting them to Christianity was adeliberate one; by their conversion to Christianity, the Vik-ings were soon made a part of European civilization.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF FIEF-HOLDING The disintegration ofcentral authority in the Carolingian world and the invasionsby Muslims, Magyars, and Vikings led to the emergence of anew type of relationship between free individuals. When gov-ernments ceased to be able to defend their subjects, it becameimportant to find some powerful lord who could offer protec-tion in return for service. The contract sworn between a lordand his subordinate (known as a vassal) is the basis of a formof social organization that modern historians called feudalism.

The Vikings Attack England. The illustration on the left, from an eleventh-century English manuscript, depicts a band of armed Vikings invadingEngland. 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 areplica of a well-preserved Viking ship found at Oseberg, Norway. The Oseberg ship was one of the largest Viking ships of its day.

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But feudalism was never a cohesive system, and many histori-ans today prefer to avoid using the term (see the comparativeessay ‘‘Feudal Orders Around the World’’ on p. 309).

With the breakdown of royal governments, powerfulnobles took control of large areas of land. They needed mento fight for them, so the practice arose of giving grants of landto vassals who in return would fight for their lord. The Frank-ish army had originally consisted of foot soldiers, dressed incoats of mail and armed with swords. But in the eighth cen-tury, larger horses began to be used, along with the stirrup,which was introduced by nomadic horsemen from Asia. Ear-lier, horsemen had been throwers of spears. Now they worearmor in the form of coats of mail (the larger horse couldcarry the weight) and wielded long lances that enabled themto act as battering rams (the stirrups kept them on theirhorses). For almost five hundred years, warfare in Europewould be dominated by heavily armored cavalry, or knights,as they were called. The knights came to have the greatestsocial prestige and formed the backbone of the Europeanaristocracy.

Of course, it was expensive to have a horse, armor, andweapons. It also took time and much practice to learn towield these instruments skillfully from horseback. Conse-quently, a lord who wanted men to fight for him had to granteach vassal a piece of land that provided for the support ofthe vassal and his family. In return for the land, the vassalprovided his lord with his fighting skills. Each needed theother. In the society of the Early Middle Ages, where therewas little trade and wealth was based primarily on land, landbecame the most important gift a lord could give to a vassalin return for his loyalty and military service.

By the ninth century, the grant of land made to a vassalhad become known as a fief (FEEF). Afief was a piece of land held from thelord by a vassal in return for militaryservice, but vassals who held suchgrants of land came to exercise rightsof jurisdiction or political and legalauthority within these fiefs. As the Car-olingian world disintegrated politicallyunder the impact of internal dissensionand invasions, an increasing number ofpowerful lords arose who were now re-sponsible for keeping order.

THE PRACTICE OF FIEF-HOLDING Fief-holding also became increasinglycomplicated with the development ofsubinfeudation (sub-in-fyoo-DAY-shun). The vassals of a king, who werethemselves great lords, might also havevassals who would owe them militaryservice in return for a grant of landtaken from their estates. Those vassals,in turn, might likewise have vassals,who at such a level would be simpleknights with barely enough land toprovide their equipment. The lord-

vassal relationship, then, bound together both greater andlesser landowners. At all levels, the lord-vassal relationshipwas always an honorable relationship between free menand did not imply any sense of servitude.

Fief-holding came to be characterized by a set of practicesthat determined the relationship between a lord and his vas-sal. The major obligation of a vassal to his lord was to per-form military service, usually about forty days a year. Avassal was also required to appear at his lord’s court whensummoned to give advice to the lord. He might also be askedto sit in judgment in a legal case, since the important vassalsof a lord were peers and only they could judge each other.Finally, vassals were also responsible for aids, or financial pay-ments to the lord on a number of occasions, including theknighting of the lord’s eldest son, the marriage of his eldestdaughter, and the ransom of the lord’s person if he werecaptured.

In turn, a lord had responsibilities toward his vassals. Hismajor obligation was to protect his vassal, either by defendinghim militarily or by taking his side in a court of law. The lordwas also responsible for the maintenance of the vassal,usually by granting him a fief.

THE MANORIAL SYSTEM The landholding class of noblesand knights contained a military elite whose ability to func-tion as warriors depended on having the leisure time to pur-sue the arts of war. Landed estates, located on the fiefs givento a vassal by his lord and worked by a dependent peasantclass, provided the economic sustenance that made this wayof life possible. A manor was an agricultural estate operatedby a lord and worked by peasants (see Map 12.2). Although alarge class of free peasants continued to exist, increasing

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MAP 12.2 A Typical Manor. The manorial system created small, tightly knit communities inwhich peasants were economically and physically bound to their lord. Crops were rotated, withroughly one-third of the fields lying fallow (untilled) at any one time, which helped replenishsoil 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?

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numbers of free peasants became serfs, who were bound to theland and required to provide labor services, pay rents, and be sub-ject to the lord’s jurisdiction. By the ninth century, probably 60percent 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 cultivatedlands scattered throughout the manor. The rest would beused by the peasants for themselves. Building barns and dig-ging ditches were also part of the labor services. Serfs usuallyworked about three days a week for their lord and paid rentsby giving the lord a share of every product they raised.

Serfs were legally bound to the lord’s lands and could notleave without his permission. Although free to marry, serfscould not marry anyone outside their manor without thelord’s approval. Moreover, lords sometimes exercised publicrights or political authority on their lands, which gave themthe right to try peasants in their own courts.

Europe in the High Middle AgesFOCUS QUESTIONS:What roles did aristocrats,peasants, and townspeople play in medieval Europeancivilization, and how did their lifestyles differ? How didcities in Europe compare with those in China and theMiddle East?What were themain aspects of thepolitical, economic, spiritual, and cultural revivals thattook place in Europe during the HighMiddle Ages?

The new European civilization that had emerged in the EarlyMiddle Ages began to flourish in the High Middle Ages (1000–1300). New agricultural practices that increased the food sup-ply spurred commercial and urban expansion. Both lords andvassals recovered from the invasions and internal dissension ofthe Early Middle Ages, and medieval kings began to exert acentralizing authority. The recovery of the Catholic Churchmade it a forceful presence in every area of life. The High Mid-dle Ages also gave birth to a cultural revival.

Land and PeopleIn the Early Middle Ages, Europe had a relatively small popu-lation of about 38 million, but in the High Middle Ages, thenumber of people nearly doubled to 74 million. Whataccounted for this dramatic increase? For one thing, condi-tions in Europe were more settled and more peaceful afterthe invasions of the Early Middle Ages had ended. Foranother, agricultural production surged after 1000.

THE NEW AGRICULTURE During the High Middle Ages,Europeans began to farm in new ways. An improvement inclimate resulted in better growing conditions, but an impor-tant factor in increasing food production was the expansion ofcultivated or arable land, accomplished by clearing forestedareas. Peasants of the eleventh and twelfth centuries cutdown trees and drained swamps until by the thirteenth cen-tury, Europeans had more acreage available for farming thanat any time before or since.

Technological changes also furthered the development offarming. The Middle Ages saw an explosion of laborsavingdevices, many of which were made from iron, which wasmined in different areas of Europe. Iron was used to makescythes, axes, and hoes for use on farms as well as saws, ham-mers, and nails for building purposes. Iron was crucial inmaking the carruca (kuh-ROO-kuh), a heavy, wheeled plowwith an iron plowshare pulled by teams of horses, whichcould turn over the heavy clay soil north of the Alps.

Besides using horsepower, the High Middle Ages har-nessed the power of water and wind to do jobs formerly doneby human or animal power. Although the watermill had beeninvented as early as the second century B.C.E., it did not comeinto widespread use until the High Middle Ages. Locatedalong 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 mecha-nize entire industries; waterpower was used in certain phasesof cloth production and to run trip-hammers for the workingof metals. The Chinese had made use of the cam in operatingtrip-hammers for hulling rice by the third century C.E. butapparently 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 importedinto Europe (they were invented in Persia) or designed inde-pendently by Europeans. In either case, by the end of thetwelfth century, they were beginning to dot the Europeanlandscape. The watermill and windmill were the most impor-tant devices for the harnessing of power before the inventionof the steam engine in the eighteenth century.

The shift from a two-field to a three-field system also con-tributed to the increase in food production (see the compara-tive illustration on p. 336). In the Early Middle Ages, peasantshad planted one field while another of equal size was allowedto lie fallow (untilled) to regain its fertility. Now estates weredivided into three parts. One field was planted in the fall withwinter 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 liefallow. By rotating the use of the fields, only one-third ratherthan one-half of the land lay fallow at any time. The rotationof crops also kept the soil from being exhausted so quickly,and more crops could now be grown.

DAILY LIFE OF THE PEASANTRY The lifestyle of the peasantswas quite simple. Their cottages consisted of wood frames sur-rounded by sticks with the space between them filled with strawand rubble and then plastered over with clay. Roofs were simplythatched. The houses of poorer peasants consisted of a singleroom, but others had at least two rooms—a main room for cook-ing, eating, and other activities and another room for sleeping.

Peasant women occupied an important but difficult posi-tion in manorial society. They were expected to carry andbear their children and at the same time fulfill their obligationto labor in the fields. Their ability to manage the householdmight determine whether a peasant family would starve orsurvive in difficult times.

Europe in the High Middle Ages 335Copyright 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).


Though simple, a peasant’s daily diet was adequatewhen food was available. The staple of the peasant diet,and the medieval diet in general, was bread. Women madethe dough for the bread at home and then brought theirloaves to be baked in community ovens, which wereowned by the lord of the manor. Peasant bread was highlynutritious, containing not only wheat and rye but also bar-ley, millet, and oats, giving it a dark appearance and a veryheavy, hard texture. Bread was supplemented by numerousvegetables from the household gardens, cheese from cow’sor goat’s milk, nuts and berries from woodlands, and fruits,such as apples, pears, and cherries. Chickens provided eggsand sometimes meat.

THE NOBILITY OF THE MIDDLE AGES In the High MiddleAges, European society, like that of Japan during the same pe-riod, was dominated by men whose chief concern was war-fare. Like the Japanese samurai, many Western nobles lovedwar. As one nobleman wrote:

And well I like to hear the call of ‘‘Help’’ and see thewounded 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 vis-

counts (and even bishops and archbishops) who had extensivelandholdings and wielded considerable political influence. Theyformed an aristocracy or nobility of people who held real po-litical, economic, and social power. Both the great lords andordinary knights were warriors, and the institution of knight-hood united them. But there were also social divisions amongthem based on extremes of wealth and landholdings.

In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, under the influence ofthe church, an ideal of civilized behavior called chivalry (SHIV-uhl-ree) gradually evolved among the nobility. Chivalry repre-sented a code of ethics that knights were supposed to uphold.In addition to defending the church and the defenseless, knights

EARTH &ENVIRONMENT

COMPARATIVEILLUSTRATIONThe New Agriculture in theMedieval World. New

agricultural methods and techniques in theMiddle Ages enabled peasants in both Europe andChina to increase food production. This generalimprovement in diet was a factor in supportingnoticeably larger populations in both areas. Below,a thirteenth-century illustration shows a group ofEnglish peasants harvesting grain. Overseeing theirwork is a bailiff, or manager, who supervised thework of the peasants. To the right, a thirteenth-century painting shows Chinese peasants harvest-ing rice, which became the staple food in China.

How important were staple foods (suchas wheat and rice) to the diet and healthof people in Europe and China duringthe Middle Ages?

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were expected to treat captives as honored guests instead ofthrowing them in dungeons. Chivalry also implied that knightsshould fight only for glory, but this account of a group of En-glish knights by a medieval writer reveals another motive forbattle: ‘‘The whole city was plundered to the last farthing, andthen they proceeded to rob all the churches throughout thecity, . . . and seizing gold and silver, cloth of all colors, women’sornaments, gold rings, goblets, and precious stones . . . they allreturned to their own lords rich men.’’5 Apparently, the idealsof chivalry were not always taken seriously.

Although aristocratic women could legally hold property,most women remained under the control of men—theirfathers until they married and their husbands after that.Nevertheless, these women had many opportunities for play-ing important roles. Because the lord was often away at waror at court, the lady of the castle had to manage the estate.Households could include large numbers of officials and ser-vants, so this was no small responsibility. Maintaining the fi-nancial accounts alone took considerable financial knowledge.The lady of the castle was also responsible for overseeing thefood supply and maintaining all the other supplies needed forthe smooth operation of the household.

Although women were expected to be subservient to theirhusbands, there were many strong women who advised andsometimes even dominated their husbands. Perhaps the mostfamous was Eleanor of Aquitaine (c. 1122–1204). Married toKing Louis VII of France, Eleanor accompanied her husbandon a Crusade, but her alleged affair with her uncle during theCrusade led Louis to have their marriage annulled. Eleanorthen 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 hersons in rebelling against Henry in 1173 and 1174 (see the Film& History feature on p. 338).

The New World of Trade and CitiesMedieval Europe was overwhelmingly agrarian, with mostpeople living in small villages. In the eleventh and twelfthcenturies, however, new elementswere introduced that began to trans-form the economic foundation ofEuropean civilization: a revival oftrade, the emergence of specializedcraftspeople and artisans, and thegrowth and development of towns.

THE REVIVAL OF TRADE The re-vival of trade was a gradual process.During the chaotic conditions of theEarly Middle Ages, large-scale tradehad declined in western Europeexcept for Byzantine contacts withItaly and the Jewish traders whomoved back and forth between theMuslim and Christian worlds. By theend of the tenth century, however,people were emerging in Europe

with both the skills and the products for commercial activity.Cities in Italy took the lead in this revival of trade. Venice, forexample, emerged as a town by the end of the eighth century,developed a mercantile fleet, and by the end of the tenth cen-tury had become the chief western trading center for Byzantineand Islamic commerce.

While the northern Italian cities were busy trading in theMediterranean, the towns of Flanders were doing likewise innorthern Europe. Flanders, the area along the coast of pres-ent-day Belgium and northern France, was known for itshigh-quality woolen cloth. The location of Flanders made itan ideal center for the traders of northern Europe. Merchantsfrom England, Scandinavia, France, and Germany convergedthere to trade their goods for woolen cloth. Flanders pros-pered in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and such Flemishtowns as Bruges (BROOZH) and Ghent (GENT) becamecenters of the medieval cloth trade.

By the twelfth century, a regular exchange of goods haddeveloped between Flanders and Italy, the two major centersof northern and southern European trade. To encourage thistrade, the counts of Champagne in northern France began tohold a series of six fairs annually in the chief towns of their ter-ritory. At these fairs, northern merchants brought the furs,woolen cloth, tin, and honey of northern Europe andexchanged them for the cloth and swords of northern Italy andthe silks, sugar, and spices of the East.

As trade increased, both gold and silver came to be indemand at fairs and trading markets of all kinds. Slowly, amoney economy began to emerge. New trading companiesand banking firms were set up to manage the exchange andsale of goods. All of these new practices were part of the riseof commercial capitalism, an economic system in whichpeople invested in trade and goods in order to make profits.

TRADE OUTSIDE EUROPE In the High Middle Ages, Italianmerchants became even more daring in their trade activities.They established trading posts in Cairo, Damascus, and anumber of Black Sea ports, where they acquired spices, silks,jewelry, dyestuffs, and other goods brought by Muslim mer-

chants from India, China, and South-east Asia.

Thespreadof theMongolEmpire inthe thirteenth century (see Chapter 10)also opened the door to Italian mer-chants in the markets of Central Asia,India, and China (see the box onp. 339). As nomads who relied ontrade with settled communities, theMongols maintained safe traderoutes for merchants movingthrough their lands. Two Venetianmerchants, the brothers Niccoloand Maffeo Polo, began to travel inthe Mongol Empire around 1260.

The creation of the crusaderstates in Syria and Palestine in thetwelfth and thirteenth centuries(discussed later in this chapter) was

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especially favorable to Italian merchants. In return for takingthe crusaders to the east, Italian merchant fleets received trad-ing 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 thecoast of what is now Lebanon. Such quarters here and inother cities soon became bases for carrying on lucrative trade.

THE GROWTH OF CITIES The revival of trade led to a re-vival of cities. Towns had greatly declined in the Early

Middle Ages, especially in Europe north of the Alps. OldRoman cities continued to exist but had dwindled in sizeand population. With the revival of trade, merchants beganto settle in these old cities, followed by craftspeople orartisans, people who on manors or elsewhere had devel-oped skills and now saw an opportunity to ply their tradeand make goods that could be sold by the merchants. Inthe course of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the oldRoman cities came alive with new populations andgrowth.

FILM & HISTORY

The Lion in Winter (1968)

Directed by Anthony Harvey, The Lion in Winter is based ona play by James Goldman, who also wrote the script for themovie and won an Oscar for best adapted screenplay for it.The action takes place in a castle in Chinon, France, over theChristmas holidays in 1183. The setting is realistic: medievalcastles 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 every-thing that is nasty.’’ The powerful but world-weary KingHenry II (Peter O’Toole), ruler of England and a number ofFrench lands (the ‘‘Angevin Empire’’), wants to establish hislegacy and plans a Christmas gathering to decide which ofhis sons should succeed him. He favors his overindulgedyoungest son John (Nigel Terry), but he is opposed by hisstrong-willed and estranged wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine (Kath-arine Hepburn). She has been imprisoned by the king forleading a rebellion against him but has been temporarilyfreed for the holidays. Eleanor favors their son Richard (An-thony Hopkins), the most military minded of the brothers.The middle brother, Geoffrey (John Castle), is not a candi-date but manipulates the other brothers to gain his ownadvantage. All three sons are portrayed as treacherous andtraitorous, and Henry is distrustful of them. At one point, hethreatens to imprison and even kill his sons; marry his mis-tress Alais (Jane Merrow), who is also the sister of the king ofFrance; and have a new family to replace them.

In contemporary terms, Henry and Eleanor are an unhap-pily married couple, and their family is acutely dysfunctional.Sparks fly as family members plot against each other, usingintentionally cruel comments and sarcastic responses towound each other as much as possible. When Eleanor saysto Henry, ‘‘What would you have me do? Give up? Give in?’’he responds, ‘‘Give me a little peace.’’ To which Eleanorreplies, ‘‘A little? Why so modest? How about eternal peace?Now there’s a thought.’’ At one point, John responds to badnews about his chances for the throne with ‘‘Poor John. Whosays poor John? Don’t everybody sob at once. My God, if Iwent up in flames, there’s not a living soul who’d pee on meto put the fire out!’’ His brother Richard replies, ‘‘Let’s strikea flint and see.’’ Henry can also be cruel to his sons: ‘‘You’re

not mine! We’re not connected! I deny you! None of you willget my crown. I leave you nothing, and I wish you plague!’’

In developing this well-written, imaginative re-creation of aroyal family’s hapless Christmas gathering, JamesGoldmanhad a great deal of material to use. Henry II was one of themost powerful monarchs of his day, and Eleanor of Aquitainewas one of themost powerful women. She had first beenqueen of France, but that marriage was annulled. Next shemarried Henry, who was then count of Anjou, and becamequeen of England when he became king in 1154. During theirstormymarriage, Eleanor and Henry had five sons and threedaughters. She is supposed to havemurdered Rosamond, oneof her husband’s mistresses, and aided her sons in a rebellionagainst their father in 1173, causing Henry to distrust his sonsever after. But Henry struck back, imprisoning Eleanor for six-teen years. After his death, however, Eleanor returned to Aqui-taine and lived on to play an influential role in the reigns of hertwo sons, Richard and John, who succeeded their father.

Eleanor of Aquitaine (Katharine Hepburn) and Henry II (Peter O’Toole) atdinner in Henry’s castle in Chinon, France.

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Beginning in the late tenth century, many new cities ortowns were also founded, particularly in northern Europe.Usually, a group of merchants established a settlement nearsome fortified stronghold, such as a castle or monastery. (Thisexplains why so many place names in Europe end in borough,burgh, burg, or bourg, all of which mean ‘‘fortress’’ or ‘‘walledenclosure.’’) Castles were particularly favored because theywere generally located along trade routes; the lords of thecastle also offered protection. If the settlement prospered andexpanded, new walls were built to protect it.

Although lords wanted to treat towns and townspeople asthey would their vassals and serfs, cities had totally differentneeds and a different perspective. Townspeople needed mo-bility to trade. Consequently, these merchants and artisans(who came to be called burghers or bourgeois, from the sameroot as borough and burg) needed their own unique laws tomeet their requirements and were willing to pay for them. Inmany instances, lords and kings saw that they could alsomake money and were willing to sell to the townspeople theliberties they were beginning to demand, including the rightto bequeath goods and sell property, freedom from any mili-tary obligation to the lord, and written urban laws that guar-anteed their freedom. Some towns also obtained the right togovern themselves by choosing their own officials and admin-istering their own courts of law.

Where townspeople experienced difficulties in obtainingprivileges, they often swore an oath, forming an associationcalled a commune, and resorted to force against their lay orecclesiastical lords. Communes made their first appearance innorthern Italy, in towns that were governed by their bishops,whom the emperors used as their chief administrators. In theeleventh century, city residents swore communal associationswith the bishops’ noble vassals and overthrew the authorityof the bishops by force. Communes took over the rights ofgovernment and created new offices for self-rule. Althoughcommunes were also sworn in northern Europe, townspeo-ple did not have the support of rural nobles, and revoltsagainst lay lords were usually suppressed. When they suc-ceeded, communes received the right to choose their ownofficials and run their own cities. Unlike the towns in Italy,however, where the decline of the emperor’s authorityensured that the northern Italian cities could function as self-governing republics, towns in France and England, like theircounterparts in the Islamic and Chinese empires, did notbecome independent city-states but remained ultimately sub-ject to royal authority.

Medieval cities in Europe, then, possessed varying degreesof self-government, depending on the amount of controlretained over them by the lord or king in whose territorythey were located. Nevertheless, all towns, regardless of the

An Italian Banker Discusses Trade Between Europe and China

INTERACTION & EXCHANGE

Working on behalf of a banking guild inFlorence, Francesco Balducci Pegolottijourneyed to England and Cyprus. As a result ofhis contacts with many Italian merchants, he

acquired considerable information about long-distance tradebetween Europe and China. In this account, written in 1340,he provides advice for Italian merchants.

Francesco Balducci Pegolotti, An Account ofTraders Between Europe and ChinaIn the first place, you must let your beard grow long and notshave. And at Tana [modern Rostov] you should furnishyourself with a guide. And you must not try to save moneyin the matter of guides by taking a bad one instead of a goodone. For the additional wages of the good one will not costyou so much as you will save by having him. And besides theguide it will be well to take at least two good menservantswho 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 merchantssay who have used it. Only if the merchant, in going or com-ing, should die upon the road, everything belonging to him

will become the possession of the lord in the country inwhich he dies . . . . And in like manner if he dies in China . . . .

China is a province which contains a multitude of citiesand towns. Among others there is one in particular, that isto say the capital city, to which many merchants areattracted, and in which there is a vast amount of trade; andthis city is called Khanbaliq [modern Beijing]. And the saidcity has a circuit of one hundred miles, and is all full ofpeople and houses . . . .

Whatever silver the merchants may carry with them asfar as China, the emperor of China will take from them andput into his treasury. And to merchants who thus bring sil-ver they give that paper money of theirs in exchange . . .and with this money you can readily buy silk and all othermerchandise that you have a desire to buy. And all the peo-ple of the country are bound to receive it. And yet you shallnot pay a higher price for your goods because your moneyis of paper.

What were Francesco Pegolotti’s impressions ofChina? Were they positive or negative? Explain youranswer.



degree of outside control, evolved institutions of governmentfor running the affairs of the community. Only males whowere born in the city or had lived there for a specific length

of time could be citizens. In many cities, these citizens electedmembers of a city council who served as judges and city offi-cials and passed laws.

COMPARATIVE ESSAY

Cities in the Medieval World

INTERACTION & EXCHANGE

The exchange of goods between societies was afeature of both the ancient andmedieval worlds.Trade routes crisscrossed the lands of themedie-val world, and with increased trade came the

growth of cities. In Europe, towns had dwindled after the col-lapse of theWestern Roman Empire, but with the revival of tradein the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the cities cameback to life.This revival occurred first in the old Roman cities, but soon newcities arose asmerchants and artisans sought additional centersfor their activities. As cities grew, so did the number of fortifiedhouses, town halls, and churches whose towers punctuated theurban European skyline. Nevertheless, in theMiddle Ages, citiesin western Europe, especially north of the Alps, remained rela-tively small. Even the larger cities of Italy, with populations of100,000, seemed insignificant in comparisonwith Constantino-ple and the great cities of theMiddle East andChina.

With a population of possibly 300,000 people, Constantino-ple, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire (seeChapter 13), wasthe largest city in Europe in the Early andHighMiddle Ages, anduntil the twelfth century, it was Europe’s greatest commercialcenter, important for the exchange of goods betweenWest andEast. In addition to palaces, cathedrals, andmonastic buildings,Constantinople also had numerous gardens and orchards thatoccupied large areas inside its fortifiedwalls. Despite the exten-sive open and cultivated spaces, the city was not self-sufficientand 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 populationclose to 700,000, was probably the largest city in the empireand one of the greatest cities in the world. After the rise of theFatimids in Egypt, however, the focus of trade shifted to Cairo.Islamic cities had a distinctive physical appearance. Usually, themost impressive urban buildings were the palaces for thecaliphs or the local governors and the great mosques for wor-ship. There were also public buildings with fountains andsecluded courtyards, public baths, and bazaars. The bazaar, acovered market, was a crucial part of every Muslim settlementand an important trading center where goods from all theknown world were available. Food prepared for sale at the mar-ket was carefully supervised. A rule in one Muslim city stated,‘‘Grilled meats should only be made with fresh meat and notwith meat coming from a sick animal and bought for its cheap-ness.’’ The merchants were among the greatest beneficiaries ofthe growth of cities in the Islamic world.

During the medieval period, cities in China were the larg-est in the world. The southern port of Hangzhou had at least amillion residents by 1000, and a number of other cities, includ-

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 centersdominated by officials and their families but now included abroader 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 latethirteenth century, said, ‘‘So many pleasures can be found thatone fancies himself to be in Paradise.’’

Based on a comparison of these medieval cities,which of these civilizations do you think was the mostadvanced? Why?

Crime and Punishment in the Medieval City. Violence was acommon feature of medieval life. Criminals, if apprehended, werepunished quickly and severely, and public executions, like the one seenhere, were considered a deterrent to crime.

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Medieval cities remained relatively small in comparisonwith either ancient or modern cities (see the comparativeessay ‘‘Cities in the Medieval World’’ on p. 340). A large trad-ing city might have about 5,000 inhabitants. By 1200, Londonwas the largest city in England with 30,000 people. On theContinent north of the Alps, only a few urban centers of com-merce, such as Bruges and Ghent, had populations close to40,000. Italian cities tended to be larger, with Venice, Flor-ence, Genoa, Milan, and Naples numbering almost 100,000.Even the largest European city, however, seemed smallbeside the Byzantine capital of Constantinople or the Arabcities of Damascus, Baghdad, and Cairo.

DAILY LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL CITY Medieval towns weresurrounded by stone walls that were expensive to build, sothe space within was precious. Consequently, most medievalcities featured narrow, winding streets with houses crowdedagainst each other and second and third stories extending outover the streets. Because dwellings were built mostly ofwood before the fourteenth century and candles and woodfires 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 merchantsinvolved in trade and artisans engaged in manufacturing a widerange of products, such as cloth, metalwork, shoes, and leathergoods. Generally, merchants and artisans had their own sec-tions within a city. The merchant area included warehouses,inns, and taverns. Artisan sections were usually divided alongcraft lines. From the twelfth century on, craftspeople began toorganize themselves into guilds, and by the thirteenth century,there were individual guilds for virtually every craft. Each crafthad its own street where its activity was pursued.

The physical environment of medieval cities was not pleas-ant. They were dirty and smelled of animal and humanwastes deposited in backyard privies or on the streets. Therivers near most cities were polluted with wastes, especiallyfrom the tanning and butchering industries. Because of thepollution, cities did not use the rivers for drinking water butrelied instead on wells.

Private and public baths also existed in medieval towns.Paris, for example, had thirty-two public baths for men andwomen. City laws did not allow lepers and people with ‘‘badreputations’’ to use them. This did not, however, preventpublic baths from being known for permissiveness due topublic nudity. One contemporary commented on whatoccurred in public bathhouses: ‘‘Shameful things. Men makea point of staying all night in the public baths and women atthe break of day come in and through ‘ignorance’ find them-selves in the men’s rooms.’’6

In medieval cities, women, in addition to supervising thehousehold, purchasing food and preparing meals, raising thechildren, and managing the family finances, were also oftenexpected to help their husbands in their trades. Some womenalso developed their own trades to earn extra money. Whensome master craftspeople died, their widows even carried ontheir trades. Some women in medieval towns were thus ableto lead lives of considerable independence.

Evolution of the European KingdomsThe recovery and growth of European civilization in theHigh Middle Ages also affected the state. Although lords andvassals seemed forever mired in endless petty conflicts, somemedieval kings inaugurated the process of developing new

Shops in a Medieval Town. Most urbanresidents were merchants involved in trade andartisans who manufactured a wide variety ofproducts. Master craftsmen had their workshops inthe ground-level rooms of their homes. In thisillustration, two well-dressed burghers are touringthe shopping district of a French town. Tailors,furriers, a barber, and a grocer (from left to right)are visible at work in their shops.

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kinds of monarchical states that were based on the centraliza-tion of power rather than the decentralized political orderthat was characteristic of fief-holding. By the thirteenth cen-tury, European monarchs were solidifying their governmen-tal institutions in pursuit of greater power.

ENGLAND IN THE HIGH MIDDLE AGES In late September1066, an army of heavily armed knights under William ofNormandy landed on the coast of England, and a few weekslater, on October 14, they soundly defeated King Harold andhis Anglo-Saxon foot soldiers in the Battle of Hastings. Wil-liam (1066–1087) was crowned king of England at Christmas-time in London and promptly began a process of combiningAnglo-Saxon and Norman institutions that would changeEngland forever. Many of the Norman knights were givenparcels of land that they held as fiefs from the new Englishking. William made all nobles swear an oath of loyalty to himas sole ruler of England and insisted that all people owed loy-alty to the king. The Normans also took over existing Anglo-Saxon institutions, such as the office of sheriff. William took acensus and more fully developed the system of taxation androyal courts begun by the Anglo-Saxon kings of the tenth andeleventh centuries. All in all, William of Normandy estab-lished a strong, centralized monarchy.

The Norman Conquest had numerous repercussions. Becausethe new king of England was still the duke of Normandy, hewas both a king (of England) and at the same time a vassal to aking (of France), but a vassal who was now far more powerfulthan his lord. This connection with France kept England heavilyinvolved in European affairs throughout the HighMiddle Ages.

In the twelfth century, the power of the English mon-archy was greatly enlarged during the reign of Henry II

(1154–1189; see the Film & History feature on p. 338). Thenew king was particularly successful in strengthening thepower of the royal courts. Henry expanded the number ofcriminal cases to be tried in the king’s court and alsodevised means for taking property cases from local courtsto the royal courts. Henry’s goals were clear: expanding thepower 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 thewhole kingdom) began to replace the different law codesthat often varied from place to place.

Henry was less successful at imposing royal control overthe church and became involved in a famous strugglebetween church and state. Henry claimed the right to punishclergymen in the royal courts, but Thomas a Becket, as arch-bishop of Canterbury the highest-ranking English cleric,claimed that only church courts could try clerics. Attempts atcompromise failed, and the angry king publicly expressed thedesire to be rid of Becket: ‘‘Who will free me of this priest?’’he screamed. Four knights took the challenge, went toCanterbury, and murdered the archbishop in the cathedral(see the box on p. 343). Faced with public outrage, Henrywas forced to allow the right of appeal from English churchcourts to the papal court.

Many English nobles came to resent the growth of theking’s power and rose in rebellion during the reign of KingJohn (1199–1216). At Runnymede in 1215, John was forced toaccept Magna Carta (Great Charter) guaranteeing feudal lib-erties. Feudal custom had always recognized that the relation-ship between king and vassals was based on mutual rightsand 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 ofwoolen embroidery on a linen backing, was made by English needlewomen before 1082 for Bayeux Cathedral. It depictsscenes from the Norman invasion of England a decade and a half earlier. This segment shows the Norman cavalry chargingthe shield wall of the Saxon infantry during the Battle of Hastings.

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fact and was used in later years to support the idea that amonarch’s power was limited.

During the reign of Edward I (1272–1307), an institutionof great importance in the development of representativegovernment—the English Parliament—emerged. Originally,the word parliament was applied to meetings of the king’sGreat Council, in which the greater barons and chief prelatesof the church met with the king’s judges and principal advis-ers to deal with judicial affairs. But needing money, in 1295Edward invited two knights from every county and two resi-dents from each town to meet with the Great Council to con-sent to new taxes. This was the first Parliament.

Thus, the English Parliament came to be composed oftwo knights from every county and two burgesses from everyborough as well as the barons and ecclesiastical lords. Eventu-ally, the barons and church lords formed the House of Lords;the knights and burgesses, the House of Commons. The Par-liaments of Edward I approved taxes, discussed politics,passed laws, and handled judicial business. The law of therealm was beginning to be determined not by the king alone

but by the king in consultation with representatives of vari-ous groups that constituted the community.

GROWTH OF THE FRENCH KINGDOM The CarolingianEmpire had been divided into three major sections in 843.The western Frankish lands formed the core of the eventualkingdom of France. In 987, after the death of the last Carolin-gian king, the western Frankish nobles chose Hugh Capet(YOO ka-PAY) as the new king, thus establishing the Cape-tian (kuh-PEE-shun) dynasty of French kings. Although theycarried the title of kings, the Capetians had little real power.They controlled as the royal domain only the lands aroundParis known as the Ile-de-France (EEL-duh-fronhss). Askings of France, the Capetians were formally the overlords ofthe great lords of France, such as the dukes of Normandy,Brittany, Burgundy, and Aquitaine. In reality, however, manyof the dukes were considerably more powerful than theCapetian kings. All in all, it would take the Capetian dynastyhundreds of years to create a truly centralized monarchicalauthority in France.

Murder in the Cathedral

POLITICS &GOVERNMENT

The most famous church-state controversy inmedieval England arose between King Henry IIand Thomas a Becket, the archbishop of Canter-bury. This excerpt is from a letter by John of

Salisbury, who served as Becket’s secretary and was presentat the archbishop’s murder in 1170.

Letter from John of Salisbury to Johnof Canterbury, Bishop of PoitiersThe martyr [Becket] stood in the cathedral, before Christ’s al-tar, as we have said, ready to suffer; the hour of slaughterwas at hand. When he heard that he was sought—heard theknights who had come for him shouting in the throng ofclerks [clerics] and monks ‘‘Where is the archbishop?’’—heturned to meet them on the steps which he had almostclimbed, and said with steady countenance: ‘‘Here am I!What do you want?’’ One of the knight-assassins flung at himin fury: ‘‘That you die now! That you should live longer isimpossible.’’ No martyr seems ever to have been more stead-fast in his agony than he . . . and thus, steadfast in speech asin spirit, he replied: ‘‘And I am prepared to die for my God,to preserve justice and my church’s liberty. If you seek myhead, I forbid you on behalf of God almighty and on pain ofanathema to do any hurt to any other man, monk, clerk, orlayman, of high or low degree. Do not involve them in thepunishment, for they have not been involved in the cause: onmy head not on theirs be it if any of them have supported theChurch in its troubles. I embrace death readily, so long aspeace and liberty for the Church follow from the shedding of

my blood. . . .’’ He spoke, and saw that the assassins haddrawn their swords; and bowed his head like one in prayer.His last words were ‘‘To God and St. Mary and the saintswho protect and defend this church, and to the blessed Denis,I commend myself and the Church’s cause.’’ No one coulddwell on what followed without deep sorrow and chokingtears. A son’s affection forbids me to describe each blow thesavage assassins struck, spurning all fear of God, forgetful ofall fealty and any human feeling. They defiled the cathedraland the holy season [Christmas] with a bishop’s blood andwith slaughter; but that was not enough. They sliced off thecrown of his head, which had been specially dedicated to Godby anointing with holy chrism—a fearful thing even todescribe; then they used their evil swords, when he was dead,to spill his brain and cruelly scattered it, mixed with bloodand bones, over the pavement. . . . Through all the agony themartyr’s spirit was unconquered, his steadfastness marvelousto observe; he spoke not a word, uttered no cry, let slip nogroan, raised no arm nor garment to protect himself from anassailant, but bent his head, which he had laid bare to theirswords with wonderful courage, till all might be fulfilled.Motionless he held it, and when at last he fell his body laystraight; and he moved neither hand nor foot.

What was the cause of the conflict between Henry IIand the archbishop of Canterbury? What argumentdoes the archbishop make to defend his position?How was the conflict resolved?



The reign of King Philip II Augustus (1180–1223) was animportant turning point in the growth of the French mon-archy. Philip II waged war against the Plantagenet (plan-TAJ-uh-net) rulers of England, who also ruled the French territo-ries of Normandy, Maine, Anjou, and Aquitaine, and was suc-cessful in gaining control of most of these territories, therebyenlarging the power of the French monarchy (see Map 12.3).To administer justice and collect royal revenues in his new ter-ritories, Philip appointed new royal officials, thus inauguratinga French royal bureaucracy in the thirteenth century.

Capetian rulers after Philip II continued to add lands to theroyal domain. Philip IV the Fair (1285–1314) was especiallyeffective in strengthening the French monarchy. He reinforcedthe royal bureaucracy and also brought a French parliamentinto being by asking representatives of the three estates, orclasses—the clergy (First Estate), the nobles (Second Estate),and the townspeople (Third Estate)—to meet with him. Theydid so in 1302, inaugurating the Estates-General, the firstFrench parliament, although it had little real power. By theend of the thirteenth century, France was the largest, wealth-iest, and best-governed monarchical state in Europe.

CHRISTIAN RECONQUEST: THE IBERIAN KINGDOMS Muchof Spain had been part of the Islamic world since the eighthcentury. From the tenth century, however, the most notice-able feature of Spanish history was the weakening of Muslimpower and the beginning of a Christian reconquest that lasteduntil the final expulsion of the Muslims at the end of the fif-teenth century.

A number of small Christian kingdoms were established innorthern Spain in the eleventh century, and within a hundredyears, they had been consolidated into the Christian kingdomsof Castile (ka-STEEL), Navarre, Aragon, and Portugal, whichfirst emerged as a separate kingdom in 1139. The southern halfof Spain still remained under the control of the Muslims.

But in the thirteenth century, Aragon, Castile, and Portu-gal made significant conquests of Muslim territory. The Mus-lims remained ensconced only in the kingdom of Granada inthe southeast of the Iberian peninsula, which remained an in-dependent Muslim state until its final conquest by the forcesof Ferdinand and Isabella of Aragon and Castile in 1492.

The Spanish kingdoms followed no consistent policy intheir treatment of the conquered Muslim population. In

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MAP 12.3 Europe in the High Middle Ages. Although the nobility dominated much of European society in the High Middle Ages, kingsbegan 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?

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Aragon, Muslim farmers continued to work the land but wereforced to pay very high rents. In Castile, King Alfonso X(1252–1284), who called himself the ‘‘King of Three Reli-gions,’’ encouraged the continued development of a cosmo-politan culture shared by Christians, Jews, and Muslims.

THE LANDS OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE In the tenth cen-tury, the powerful dukes of the Saxons became kings of the east-ern 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 effortswas crowned emperor of the Romans by the pope in 962, reviv-ing a title that had not been used since the time of Charlemagne.

In the eleventh century, German kings created a strong mon-archy and a powerful empire by leading armies into Italy. Tostrengthen their grip, they relied on their ability to control thechurch and select bishops, whom they could then use as royaladministrators. But the struggle between church and state duringthe reign of Henry IV (1056–1106) weakened the king’s ability touse church officials in this way (see ‘‘Reform of the Papacy’’ laterin this chapter). The German kings also tried to bolster theirpower by using their position as emperors to exploit the re-sources of Italy. But this strategy tended to backfire; many a Ger-man king lost armies in Italy in pursuit of a dream of empire, andno German dynasty demonstrates this better than the Hohen-staufens (hoh-en-SHTOW-fens).

The two most famous membersof the Hohenstaufen dynasty, Freder-ick I Barbarossa (bar-buh-ROH-suh)(1152–1190) and Frederick II (1212–1250), tried to create a new kind ofempire. Previous German kings hadfocused on building a strong Germankingdom, but Frederick I planned toget his chief revenues from Italy as thecenter of a ‘‘holy empire,’’ as he calledit (hence the nameHoly Roman Empire).But his attempt to conquer northernItaly ran into severe problems. Thepope opposed him, fearful that the em-peror wanted to absorb Rome and thePapal States into his empire. The citiesof northern Italy, which had becomeused to their freedom, were alsounwilling to be Frederick’s subjects.An alliance of these northern Italiancities, with the support of the pope,defeated the emperor’s forces in 1176.

The main goal of Frederick II wasthe establishment of a strong central-ized state in Italy dominated by thekingdom in Sicily, which he hadinherited from his mother. Freder-ick’s major task was to gain controlof northern Italy. In the attempt,however, he became involved in adeadly conflict with the popes, whofeared that a single ruler of northern

and southern Italy would mean the end of papal power in thecenter of the peninsula. Furthermore, the northern Italiancities were unwilling to give up their freedom. Fredericknevertheless waged a long and bitter struggle, winning manybattles but ultimately losing the war.

The struggle between popes and emperors had dire conse-quences for the Holy Roman Empire. By spending their timefighting in Italy, the German emperors left Germany in thehands of powerful German lords who ignored the emperor andcreated their own independent kingdoms. This ensured that theGerman monarchy would remain weak and incapable of estab-lishing a centralized monarchical state; thus, the German HolyRoman Emperor had no real power over either Germany orItaly. Unlike France and England, neither Germany nor Italyhad a centralized national monarchy in the Middle Ages. Bothof these regions consisted of many small, independent states, asituation that changed little until the nineteenth century.

THE SLAVIC PEOPLES OF CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE

The Slavs were originally a single people in central Europe,but they gradually divided into three major groups: western,southern, and eastern (see Map 12.4). The western Slavseventually formed the Polish and Bohemian kingdoms. Ger-man Christian missionaries converted both the Czechs inBohemia and the Slavs in Poland by the tenth century.

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MAP 12.4 The Migrations of the Slavs.Originally from east-central Europe, the Slavic peoplebroke into three groups. The western Slavs converted to Catholic Christianity, while most of theeastern and southern Slavs, under the influence of the Byzantine Empire, embraced the EasternOrthodox faith.

What connections do these Slavic migrations have with what we today characterize aseastern Europe?

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German Christians also converted the non-Slavic kingdom ofHungary, which emerged after the Magyars settled down af-ter their defeat in 955. The Poles, Czechs, and Hungarians allaccepted Catholic or western Christianity and became closelytied to the Roman Catholic Church and its Latin culture.

The southern and eastern Slavic populations took a differ-ent path: the Slavic peoples of Moravia were converted to theOrthodox Christianity of the Byzantine Empire (see Chapter13) by two Byzantine missionary brothers, Cyril and Metho-dius, who began their activities in 863. The southern Slavicpeoples included the Croats, Serbs, and Bulgarians. For themost part, they too embraced Eastern Orthodoxy, althoughthe Croats came to accept the Roman Catholic faith. Theadoption of Eastern Orthodoxy by the Serbs and Bulgarianstied their cultural life to the Byzantine state.

The eastern Slavic peoples, from whom the modern Rus-sians and Ukrainians are descended, had settled in the terri-tory of present-day Ukraine and European Russia. There,beginning in the late eighth century, they began to encounterSwedish Vikings who moved down the extensive network of

rivers into the lands of the eastern Slavs in search of bootyand new trade routes (see the box above). These Vikings builttrading settlements and eventually came to dominate thenative peoples, who called them ‘‘the Rus’’ (ROOSS orROOSH), from which the name Russia is derived.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF RUSSIA: IMPACT OF THE MONGOLSA Viking leader named Oleg (c. 873–913) settled in Kiev(KEE-yev) at the beginning of the tenth century and foundedthe Rus state known as the principality of Kiev. His succes-sors extended their control over the eastern Slavs andexpanded the territory of Kiev until it included the areabetween the Baltic and Black Seas and the Danube and VolgaRivers. By marrying Slavic wives, the Viking ruling class wasgradually assimilated into the Slavic population.

The growth of the principality of Kiev attracted religiousmissionaries, especially from the Byzantine Empire. One Rusruler, Vladimir (VLAD-ih-meer) (c. 980–1015), married theByzantine emperor’s sister and in 987 officially acceptedChristianity for himself and his people. By the end of the

A Muslim’s Description of the Rus

FAMILY &SOCIETY

Despite the difficulties that travel presented,early medieval civilization did witness some con-tact among the various cultures. This mightoccur through trade, diplomacy, or the conquest

and migration of peoples. This document is a description ofthe Swedish Rus, who eventually merged with the nativeSlavic peoples to form the principality of Kiev, commonlyregarded as the first Russian state. It was written by IbnFadlan, a Muslim diplomat sent from Baghdad in 921 to asettlement on the Volga River. His comments on the filthi-ness of the Rus reflect the Muslim emphasis on cleanliness.

Ibn Fadlan, The RusI saw the Rus folk when they arrived on their trading missionand settled at the river Atul (Volga). Never had I seen peopleof more perfect physique. They are tall as date palms, andreddish in color. They wear neither coat nor kaftan, but eachman carried a cape which covers one half of his body, leavingone 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 thelike from the fingernails to the neck. Each woman carried onher 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 notwash after discharging their natural functions, neither do theywash their hands after meals. They are as lousy as donkeys.

They arrive from their distant lands and lay their ships along-side the banks of the Atul, which is a great river, and therethey build big houses on its shores. Ten or twenty of themmay live together in one house, and each of them has a couchof his own where he sits and diverts himself with the prettyslave girls whom he had brought along for sale. He will makelove with one of them while a comrade looks on; sometimesthey indulge in a communal orgy, and, if a customer shouldturn up to buy a girl, the Rus man will not let her go till hehas finished with her.

They wash their hands and faces every day in incrediblyfilthy water. Every morning the girl brings her master a largebowl of water in which he washes his hands and face andhair, then blows his nose into it and spits into it. When he hasfinished the girl takes the bowl to his neighbor—who repeatsthe performance. Thus, the bowl goes the rounds of theentire household. . . .

If one of the Rus folk falls sick they put him in a tent byhimself and leave bread and water for him. They do not visithim, however, or speak to him, especially if he is a serf.Should he recover he rejoins the others; if he dies they burnhim. But if he happens to be a serf they leave him for thedogs and vultures to devour. If they catch a robber they hanghim to a tree until he is torn to shreds by wind and weather.

What was Ibn Fadlan’s impression of the Rus? Why doyou think he was so critical of their behavior?



tenth century, Byzantine Christianity had become the modelfor Russian religious life.

The Kievan Rus state prospered and reached its high pointin the first half of the eleventh century. But civil wars andnew invasions by Asian nomads caused the principality ofKiev to collapse, and its sack by north Russian princes in 1169brought an end to the first Russian state, which had remainedclosely tied to the Byzantine Empire, not to Europe. In thethirteenth century, the Mongols conquered Russia and cut itoff even more from Europe.

The Mongols had exploded onto the scene in the thirteenthcentury, moving east into China and west into the Middle Eastand central Europe. Although they conquered Russia, they werenot numerous enough to settle the vast Russian lands. Theyoccupied only part of Russia but required Russian princes to paytribute to them. One Russian prince soon emerged as morepowerful than the others. Alexander Nevsky (NYEF-skee),prince of Novgorod (NAHV-guh-rahd), defeated a Germaninvading army in northwestern Russia in 1242. His cooperationwith the Mongols won him their favor. The khan, leader of thewestern part of the Mongol Empire, rewarded Alexander Nevskywith the title of grand-prince, enabling his descendants to becomethe princes of Moscow and eventually leaders of all Russia.

Christianity and Medieval CivilizationChristianity was an integral part of the fabric of European so-ciety and the consciousness of Europe. Papal directivesaffected the actions of kings and princes alike, and Christianteachings and practices touched the lives of all Europeans.

REFORM OF THE PAPACY Since the fifth century, the popes ofthe Catholic Church had reigned supreme over church affairs.They had also come to exercise control over the territories incentral Italy that came to be known as the Papal States, whichkept the popes involved in political matters, often at the expenseof their spiritual obligations. At the same time, the churchbecame increasingly entangled in the evolving feudal relation-ships. High officials of the church, such as bishops and abbots,came to hold their offices as fiefs from nobles. As vassals, theywere obliged to carry out the usual duties, including militaryservice. Of course, lords assumed the right to choose their vas-sals and thus came to appoint bishops and abbots. Because lordsoften chose their vassals from other noble families for politicalreasons, these bishops and abbots were often worldly figureswho cared little about their spiritual responsibilities.

By the eleventh century, church leaders realized the needto free the church from the interference of lords in theappointment of church officials. Lay investiture was the prac-tice by which secular rulers both chose nominees to churchoffices and invested them with (bestowed on them) the sym-bols of their office. Pope Gregory VII (1073–1085) decided tofight this practice. Gregory claimed that he, as pope, wasGod’s ‘‘vicar on earth’’ and that the pope’s authority extendedover all of Christendom, including its rulers. In 1075, heissued a decree forbidding high-ranking clerics from receivingtheir investiture from lay leaders.

Gregory soon found himself in conflict with the Germanking over his actions. King Henry IV was also a determined

man who had appointed high-ranking clerics, especially bish-ops, as his vassals in order to use them as administrators.Henry had no intention of obeying a decree that challengedthe very heart of his administration.

The struggle between Henry IV and Gregory VII, whichis known as the Investiture Controversy, was one of the greatconflicts between church and state in the High Middle Ages. Itdragged on until a new German king and a new pope reacheda compromise in 1122 called the Concordat of Worms (kun-KOR-dat of WURMZ or VORMPS). Under this agreement, abishop in Germany was first elected by church officials. Afterelection, the nominee paid homage to the king as his lord,who then invested him with the symbols of temporal office. Arepresentative of the pope, however, then invested the newbishop with the symbols of his spiritual office.

THE CHURCH SUPREME: THE PAPAL MONARCHY The popesof the twelfth century did not abandon the reform ideals ofPope Gregory VII, but they were more inclined to consoli-date their power and build a strong administrative system.During the papacy of Pope Innocent III (1198–1216), theCatholic Church reached the height of its power. At the be-ginning of his pontificate, in a letter to a priest, the popemade a clear statement of his views on papal supremacy:

As God, the creator of the universe, set two great lights in the firma-ment of heaven, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser lightto rule the night, so He set two great dignities in the firmament ofthe universal church, . . . the greater to rule the day, that is, souls,and the lesser to rule the night, that is, bodies. These dignities are

CHRONOLOGY The European Kingdoms

England

Norman Conquest 1066

William the Conqueror 1066–1087

Henry II 1154–1189

John 1199–1216

Magna Carta 1215

Edward I 1272–1307

First Parliament 1295

France

Philip II Augustus 1180–1223

Philip IV 1285–1314

First Estates-General 1302

Germany and the Holy Roman Empire

Otto I 936–973

Henry IV 1056–1106

Frederick I 1152–1190

Northern Italian cities defeat Frederick 1176

Frederick II 1212–1250

The Eastern World

Alexander Nevsky, prince of Novgorod c. 1220–1263

Mongol conquest of Russia 1230s



the papal authority and the royal power. And just as the moon getsher light from the sun, and is inferior to the sun . . . so the royalpower gets the splendor of its dignity from the papal authority.7

Innocent III’s actions were those of a man who believedthat he, as pope, was the supreme judge of European affairs.To achieve his political ends, he did not hesitate to use thespiritual weapons at his command, especially the interdict,which forbade priests to dispense the sacraments of thechurch in the hope that the people, deprived of the comfortsof religion, would exert pressure against their ruler. Appar-ently, Pope Innocent’s interdicts worked: for example, one ofthem forced the king of France, Philip Augustus, to take backhis wife and queen after Philip had tried to have his marriageannulled.

NEW RELIGIOUS ORDERS AND NEW SPIRITUAL IDEALS

Between 1050 and 1150, a wave of religious enthusiasmseized Europe, leading to a spectacular growth in the number

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 themoral degeneration and lack of strict discipline at their ownBenedictine monastery. The Cistercians were strict. They atea simple diet and possessed only a single robe apiece. Moretime for prayer and manual labor was provided by shorteningthe number of hours spent at religious services. The Cister-cians played a major role in developing a new, activist spirit-ual model for twelfth-century Europe. A Benedictine monkoften spent hours in prayer to honor God. The Cistercianideal had a different emphasis: ‘‘Arise, soldier of Christ, arise!Get up off the ground and return to the battle from whichyou have fled! Fight more boldly after your flight, and tri-umph in glory!’’8 These were the words of Saint Bernard ofClairvaux (klayr-VOH) (1090–1153), who more than anyother person embodied the new spiritual ideal of Cistercianmonasticism (see the box above).

A Miracle of Saint Bernard

RELIGION &PHILOSOPHY

Saint Bernard of Clairvaux has been called themost widely respected holy man of the twelfthcentury. He was an outstanding preacher, whollydedicated to the service of God. His reputation

reportedly influenced many young men to join the Cistercianorder. He also inspired myriad stories dealing with hismiracles.

A Miracle of Saint BernardA certain monk, departing from his monastery . . . , threw offhis habit, and returned to the world at the persuasion of theDevil. And he took a certain parish living; for he was a priest.Because sin is punished with sin, the deserter from his Orderlapsed into the vice of lechery. He took a concubine to livewith him, as in fact is done by many, and by her he hadchildren.

But as God is merciful and does not wish anyone to perish,it happened that many years after, the blessed abbot [SaintBernard] was passing through the village in which this samemonk was living, and went to stay at his house. The renegademonk recognized him, and received him very reverently, andwaited on him devoutly . . . but as yet the abbot did not rec-ognize him.

On the morrow, the holy man said Matins and preparedto be off. But as he could not speak to the priest, since he hadgot up and gone to the church for Matins, he said to thepriest’s son, ‘‘Go, give this message to your master.’’ Nowthe boy had been born [mute]. He obeyed the command andfeeling in himself the power of him who had given it, he ranto his father and uttered the words of the Holy Father clearlyand exactly. His father, on hearing his son’s voice for the first

time, wept for joy, and made him repeat the same words . . .and he asked what the abbot had done to him. ‘‘He did noth-ing to me,’’ said the boy, ‘‘except to say, ‘Go and say this toyour father.’’’

At so evident a miracle the priest repented, and hastenedafter the holy man and fell at his feet saying, ‘‘My Lord andFather, I was your monk so-and-so, and at such-and-such atime I ran away from your monastery. I ask your Paternity toallow me to return with you to the monastery, for in yourcoming God has visited my heart.’’ The saint replied untohim, ‘‘Wait for me here, and I will come back quickly when Ihave done my business, and I will take you with me.’’ But thepriest, fearing death (which he had not done before),answered, ‘‘Lord, I am afraid of dying before then.’’ But thesaint replied, ‘‘Know this for certain, that if you die in thiscondition, and in this resolve, you will find yourself a monkbefore God.’’

The saint [eventually] returned and heard that the priesthad recently died and been buried. He ordered the tomb tobe 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 histomb.’’ ‘‘As a clerk,’’ they said; ‘‘we buried him in his secularhabit.’’ But when they had dug up the earth, they found thathe was not in the clothes in which they had buried him; buthe appeared in all points, tonsure and habit, as a monk. Andthey all praised God.

What two miracles occur in this tale of Saint Bernard?What does this document reveal about popularreligious practices during the Middle Ages?



Women were also actively involved in the spiritual move-ments of the age. The number of women joining religioushouses grew dramatically in the High Middle Ages. Most nunswere from the ranks of the landed aristocracy. Convents wereconvenient for families unable or unwilling to find husbands fortheir daughters and for aristocratic women who did not wish tomarry. Female intellectuals found them a haven for their activ-ities. Most of the learned women of the Middle Ages were nuns.

In the thirteenth century, two new religious ordersemerged that had a profound impact on the lives of ordinarypeople. Like their founder, Saint Francis of Assisi (uh-SEE-zee) (1182–1226), the Franciscans lived among the people,preaching repentance and aiding the poor. Their calls for areturn to the simplicity and poverty of the early church, rein-forced by their own example, were especially effective andmade them very popular.

The Dominican order arose out of the desire of a Spanishpriest, Dominic de Guzman (DAH-muh-nik duh gooz-MAHN) (1170–1221), to defend church teachings fromheresy—beliefs contrary to official church doctrine. UnlikeFrancis, Dominic was an intellectual who was appalled by thegrowth of heresy. He came to believe that a new religiousorder of men who lived lives of poverty but were learned andcapable of preaching effectively would best be able to attackheresy. The Dominicans became especially well known fortheir roles as the inquisitors of the papal Inquisition.

The Holy Office, as the papal Inquisition was formallycalled, was a court established by the church to find and tryheretics. Anyone accused of heresy who refused to confesswas considered guilty and was turned over to the state forexecution. 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 ofpenance. To the Christians of the thirteenth century, whobelieved that there was only one path to salvation, heresywas a crime against God and against humanity. In theirminds, force should be used to save souls from damnation.

POPULAR RELIGION IN THE HIGH MIDDLE AGES We havewitnessed the actions of popes, bishops, and monks. But whatof ordinary clergy and laypeople? What were their religioushopes and fears? What were their spiritual aspirations?

The sacraments of the Catholic Church ensured that thechurch was an integral part of people’s lives, from birth todeath. There were (and still are) seven sacraments, adminis-tered only by the clergy. Sacraments, such as baptism and theEucharist (YOO-kuh-rest) (the Lord’s Supper), were viewedas outward symbols of an inward grace and were consideredimperative for a Christian’s salvation. Therefore, the clergywere seen to have a key role in the attainment of salvation.

Other church practices were also important to ordinarypeople. Saints were seen as men and women who, throughtheir 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 greatimportance at the popular level. Jesus’s apostles were, ofcourse, recognized throughout Europe as saints, but therewere also numerous local saints who were of special signifi-cance to a single area. New cults developed rapidly, especiallyin the intense religious atmosphere of the eleventh andtwelfth centuries. The English, for example, introduced SaintNicholas, the patron saint of children, who is known today asSanta Claus.

In the High Middle Ages, the foremost position among thesaints was occupied by the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus.Mary was viewed as the most important mediator with herson, Jesus, the judge of all sinners. Moreover, from the elev-enth century on, a fascination with Mary as Jesus’s humanmother became more evident. A sign of Mary’s importancewas the growing number of churches all over Europe thatwere dedicated to her in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

Emphasis on the role of the saints was closely tied to theuse of relics, which also increased noticeably in the High Mid-dle Ages. Relics were usually the bones of saints or objectsintimately connected to saints that were considered worthy

A Group of Nuns. Although still viewed bythe medieval church as inferior to men,women were as susceptible to the spiritualfervor of the twelfth century as men, andfemale monasticism grew accordingly. Thismanuscript illustration shows at the left agroup of nuns welcoming a novice (dressed inwhite) to their order. At the right, a nunreceives a sick person on a stretcher for theorder’s hospital care.

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of veneration by the faithful. A twelfth-century English monkbegan his description of the abbey’s relics by saying that‘‘there is kept there a thing more precious than gold, . . . theright arm of St. Oswald. . . . This we have seen with our owneyes and have kissed, and have handled with our own hands.. . . There are kept here also part of his ribs and of the soil onwhich he fell.’’9 The monk went on to list additional relicspossessed by the abbey, including two pieces of Jesus’s swad-dling clothes, pieces of Jesus’s manger, and part of the fiveloaves of bread with which Jesus fed five thousand people.Because the holiness of the saint was considered to be inher-ent in his relics, these objects were believed to be capable ofhealing people or producing other miracles.

The Culture of the High Middle AgesThe High Middle Ages was a time of extraordinary intellec-tual and artistic vitality. It witnessed the birth of universitiesand a building spree that left Europe bedecked with churchesand cathedrals.

THE RISE OF UNIVERSITIES The university as we know it—with faculty, students, and degrees—was a product of theHigh Middle Ages. The word university is derived from theLatin word universitas (yoo-nee-VAYR-see-tahss), meaning

a corporation or guild, and referred to either a corporation ofteachers or a corporation of students. Medieval universitieswere educational guilds or corporations that produced edu-cated and trained individuals.

The first European university appeared in Bologna (boh-LOHN-yuh), Italy, where a great teacher named Irnerius(1088–1125), who taught Roman law, attracted students fromall over Europe. Most of them were laymen, usually olderindividuals who were administrators for kings and princesand were eager to learn more about law so that they couldapply it in their own jobs. To protect themselves, students atBologna formed a guild or universitas, which was recognizedby Emperor Frederick Barbarossa and given a charter in 1158.Kings, popes, and princes soon competed to found new uni-versities, and by the end of the Middle Ages, there wereeighty universities in Europe, most of them in England,France, Italy, and Germany (see the box above).

University students (all men—women did not attend uni-versities in the Middle Ages) began their studies with the tra-ditional liberal arts curriculum, which consisted of grammar,rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy.Teaching was done by the lecture method. The word lectureis derived from the Latin verb for ‘‘read.’’ Before the develop-ment of the printing press in the fifteenth century, books

University Students and Violence at Oxford

ART &IDEAS

Medieval universities shared in the violentatmosphere of their age. Town and gown quar-rels often resulted in bloody conflicts, especiallyduring the universities’ formative period. This

selection is taken from an anonymous description of a stu-dent riot at Oxford at the end of the thirteenth century.

A Student Riot at OxfordThey [the townsmen] seized and imprisoned all scholars onwhom they could lay hands, invaded their inns [halls of resi-dence], made havoc of their goods and trampled their booksunder foot. In the face of such provocation the proctors [uni-versity officials] sent their assistants about the town, forbid-ding the students to leave their inns. But all commands andexhortations were in vain. By nine o’clock next morning,bands of scholars were parading the streets in martial array. Ifthe proctors failed to restrain them, the mayor was equallypowerless to restrain his townsmen. The great bell of St. Mar-tin’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 inall, began their attack simultaneously in various quarters.They broke open warehouses in the Spicery, the Cutlery andelsewhere. Armed with bow and arrows, swords and buck-

lers, slings and stones, they fell upon their opponents. Threethey slew, and wounded fifty or more. One band . . . took upa position in High Street between the Churches of St. Maryand All Saints’, and attacked the house of a certain EdwardHales. This Hales was a longstanding enemy of the clerks.There were no half measures with him. He seized his cross-bow, and from an upper chamber sent an unerring shaft intothe eye of the pugnacious rector. The death of their valiantleader caused the clerks to lose heart. They fled, closely pur-sued by the townsmen and country-folk. Some were struckdown in the streets, and others who had taken refuge in thechurches were dragged out and driven mercilessly to prison,lashed with thongs and goaded with iron spikes.

Complaints of murder, violence and robbery were lodgedstraightway with the king by both parties. The townsmenclaimed 3,000 pounds’ damage. The commissioners, how-ever, appointed to decide the matter, condemned them topay 200 marks, removed the bailiffs, and banished twelve ofthe most turbulent citizens from Oxford.

Who do you think was responsible for this conflictbetween town and gown? Why? Why do you think theking supported the university?



were expensive and few students could afford them, so teach-ers read from a basic text (such as a collection of laws if thesubject was law) and then added their explanations. Noexams were given after a series of lectures, but when a stu-dent applied for a degree, he was given a comprehensive oralexamination by a committee of teachers. The exam was takenafter a four- or six-year period of study. The first degree a stu-dent could earn was a bachelor of arts; later he might receivea master of arts degree.

After completing the liberal arts curriculum, a studentcould go on to study law, medicine, or theology. This lastwas the most highly regarded subject at the medieval univer-sity. The study of any of these three disciplines could take adecade or more. A student who passed his final oral examina-tions was granted a doctor’s degree, which officially enabledhim to teach his subject. Students who received degrees frommedieval universities could pursue other careers besidesteaching that proved to be much more lucrative. A lawdegree was necessary for those who wished to serve as advis-ers to kings and princes. The growing administrative bureau-cracies of popes and kings also demanded a supply of clerkswith a university education who could keep records and drawup official documents. Universities provided the teachers,administrators, lawyers, and doctors for medieval society.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF SCHOLASTICISM The importance ofChristianity in medieval society made it certain that theologywould play a central role in the European intellectual world.Theology, the formal study of religion, was ‘‘queen of the sci-ences’’ in the new universities.

Beginning in the eleventh century, the effort to apply reasonor logical analysis to the church’s basic theological doctrines hada significant impact on the study of theology. The philosophicaland theological system of the medieval schools is known asscholasticism (skoh-LAS-tih-sizm). Scholasticism tried to rec-oncile faith and reason, to demonstrate that what was acceptedon faith was in harmony with what could be learned by reason.

The overriding task of scholasticism was to harmonizeChristian teachings with the work of the Greek philosopherAristotle. In the twelfth century, due largely to the work ofMuslim and Jewish scholars in Spain, western Europe wasintroduced to a large number of Greek scientific and philo-sophical works, including the works of Aristotle. But Aris-totle’s works threw many theologians into consternation.Aristotle was so highly regarded that he was called ‘‘the phi-losopher,’’ yet he had arrived at his conclusions by rationalthought, not by faith, and some of his doctrines contradictedthe teachings of the church. The most famous attempt to rec-oncile Aristotle and the doctrines of Christianity was that ofSaint Thomas Aquinas (uh-KWY-nuss).

Aquinas (1225–1274) is best known for his Summa Theolog-ica (SOO-muh tay-oh-LAH-jee-kuh) (Summa of Theology—a summa was a compendium of knowledge that attempted tobring together all the received learning of the preceding cen-turies on a given subject). Aquinas’s masterpiece was orga-nized according to the dialectical method of the scholastics.Aquinas first posed a question, cited sources that offeredopposing opinions on the question, and then resolved the

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 toreconcile faith and reason. He took it for granted that therewere truths derived by reason and truths derived by faith. Hewas certain, however, that the two truths could not be in con-flict. The natural mind, unaided by faith, could arrive at truthsconcerning the physical universe. Without the help of God’sgrace, however, reason alone could not grasp spiritual truths,such as the Trinity (the manifestation of God in three separateyet identical persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) or theIncarnation (Jesus’s simultaneous identity as God and human).

ROMANESQUE ARCHITECTURE The eleventh and twelfthcenturies witnessed an explosion of building, both privateand public. The construction of castles and churches absorbedmost of the surplus resources of medieval society and at thesame time reflected its basic preoccupations, God and war-fare. The churches were by far the most conspicuous of thepublic buildings.

The cathedrals of the eleventh and twelfth centuries werebuilt in the Romanesque (roh-man-ESK) style, prominentexamples of which can be found in Germany, France, andSpain. Romanesque churches were normally built in the basil-ica shape used in the construction of churches in the LateRoman Empire. Basilicas were rectangular churches with flatwooden roofs. Romanesque builders made a significant inno-vation by replacing the flat wooden roof with a long, roundstone vault called a barrel vault (or a cross vault where twobarrel vaults intersected). Although barrel and cross vaultswere technically difficult to create, they were considered aes-thetically more pleasing than flat wooden roofs and were alsoless apt to catch fire.

Because stone roofs were extremely heavy, Romanesquechurches required massive pillars and walls to hold them up.This left little space for windows, and Romanesque churcheswere correspondingly dark on the inside. Their massive wallsand pillars gave Romanesque churches a sense of solidity andalmost the impression of a fortress.

THE GOTHIC CATHEDRAL Begun in the twelfth century andbrought to perfection in the thirteenth, the Gothic cathedralremains one of the greatest artistic triumphs of the High Mid-dle Ages. Soaring skyward, as if to reach heaven, it was a fit-ting symbol for medieval people’s preoccupation with God.

Two fundamental innovations of the twelfth century madeGothic cathedrals possible. The combination of ribbed vaultsand pointed arches replaced the barrel vaults of Romanesquechurches and enabled builders to make Gothic churcheshigher than Romanesque ones. The use of pointed arches andribbed vaults created an impression of upward movement, asense of weightless upward thrust that implied the energy ofGod. Another technical innovation, the flying buttress, aheavy arched pier of stone built onto the outside of the walls,made it possible to distribute the weight of the church’svaulted ceilings outward and down and thus eliminate theheavy walls used in Romanesque churches to hold the weightof the massive barrel vaults. Thus, Gothic cathedrals could be



built with thin walls containing magnificent stained-glass win-dows, which created a play of light inside that varied with thesun at different times of the day. The extensive use of coloredlight in Gothic cathedrals was not accidental but was executedby people who believed that natural light was a symbol of thedivine light of God.

The first fully Gothic church was the abbey of Saint-Denis(san-duh-NEE) near Paris, inspired by its famous AbbotSuger (soo-ZHAYR) (1122–1151) and built between 1140 and1150. By the mid-thirteenth century, French Gothic architec-ture, most brilliantly executed in cathedrals in Paris (Notre-Dame), Reims, Amiens, and Chartres, had spread to virtuallyall 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, andstonemasons and other craftspeople were paid a daily wageand provided the skilled labor to build them. A Gothic cathe-dral symbolized the chief preoccupation of a medieval Chris-tian community, its dedication to a spiritual ideal. As we haveobserved before, the largest buildings of an era reflect the val-ues of its society. The Gothic cathedral, with its towers soar-ing toward heaven, gave witness to an age when a spiritualimpulse underlay most aspects of its existence.

Medieval Europe and the WorldFOCUS QUESTIONS: Inwhatwaysdid Europeansbeginto relate topeoples in other parts of theworld after1000 C.E.?Whatwere the reasons for theCrusades, andwhoorwhat benefited themost from them?

As it developed, European civilization remained largely con-fined to its home continent, although Europe was never com-pletely isolated. Some Europeans, especially merchants, hadcontacts with parts of Asia and Africa. The goods of thoselands made their way into medieval castles, and the works ofMuslim philosophers were read in medieval universities. TheVikings were also daring explorers. After 860, they sailedwestward in their long ships across the North Atlantic Ocean,reaching Iceland in 874. Erik the Red, a Viking exiled fromIceland, traveled even farther west and discovered Greenlandin 985. Some Vikings even reached North America, landing inNewfoundland, the only known Viking site in North Amer-ica, but it proved to be short-lived as Viking expansion drewto a close by the tenth century. Only at the end of the elev-enth century did Europeans begin their first concertedattempt to expand beyond the frontiers of Europe by con-quering the land of Palestine.

The Gothic Cathedral. The Gothic cathedral was one of the greatartistic triumphs of the High Middle Ages. Shown here is the cathedral ofNotre-Dame in Paris. Begun in 1163, it was not completed until thebeginning of the fourteenth century.

Barrel Vaulting. The eleventh and twelfth centuries witnessed anenormous 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 inVienne, France, indicates, the barrel vault limited the size of a church andleft little room in the walls for windows.

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The First CrusadesThe Crusades were based on the idea of a holy war againstinfidels (unbelievers). Christian wrath against Muslims had al-ready found some expression in the attempt to wrest Spainfrom the Moors and the success of the Normans in reclaimingSicily. At the end of the eleventh century, Christian Europefound itself with a glorious opportunity to go after the Mus-lims when the Byzantine emperor, Alexius I, asked PopeUrban II for help against the Seljuk Turks (see Chapter 13).The pope saw this as a chance to rally the warriors of Europefor the liberation of Jerusalem and the Holy Land of Palestinefrom the infidels. The Holy City of Jerusalem had long beenthe focus of Christian pilgrimages. At the Council of Cler-mont in southern France toward the end of 1095, Urban chal-lenged Christians to take up their weapons and join in a holywar to recover the Holy Land. The pope promised remissionof sins: ‘‘All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea,or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remis-sion of sins. This I grant them through the power of Godwith which I am invested.’’10 The enthusiastic crowd criedout in response: ‘‘It is the will of God, it is the will of God.’’

The initial response to Urban’s speech reveals how appeal-ing many people found this combined call to military armsand religious fervor. A self-appointed leader, Peter the Her-mit, who preached of his visions of the Holy City of Jerusa-lem, convinced a large mob, most of them poor and many ofthem peasants, to undertake a Crusade to liberate the city.One person who encountered Peter described him in thesewords: ‘‘Outdoors he wore a woolen tunic, which revealedhis ankles, and above it a hood; he wore a cloak to cover hisupper body, a bit of his arms, but his feet were bare. Hedrank wine and ate fish, but scarcely ever ate bread. Thisman, partly because of his reputation, partly because of hispreaching, [assembled] a very large army.’’11

This ‘‘Peasant’s Crusade’’ or ‘‘Crusade of the Poor’’ con-sisted of a ragtag rabble that moved through the Balkans, ter-

Chartres Cathedral: Stained-Glass Window. The stained glass ofGothic cathedrals is remarkable for the beauty and variety of its colors.Stained-glass windows depicted a remarkable variety of scenes. Thewindows of Chartres Cathedral, for example, present the saints, views ofthe everyday activities of ordinary men and women, and, as in thispanel, scenes from the life of Jesus.

The First Crusade: The Capture ofJerusalem. Recruited from the noble classof western Europe, the first crusading armyreached Constantinople by 1097. By 1098,the crusaders had taken Antioch. Workingdown the coast of Palestine, they capturedJerusalem in 1099. Shown here in afifteenth-century French manuscriptillustration is a fanciful re-creation of thecapture and sack of Jerusalem. A crusader inthe center is shown wearing the crusadingcross on his back.

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Medieval Europe and the World 353Copyright 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).


rorizing natives and looting for their food and supplies. Theirmisplaced religious enthusiasm led to another tragic by-prod-uct as well, the persecution of the Jews, long pictured by thechurch as the murderers of Christ. As a contemporary chroni-cler described it, ‘‘They persecuted the hated race of the Jewswherever 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 AsiaMinor, where the Turks massacred the undisciplined andpoorly armed mob.

Pope Urban II did not share the wishful thinking of thepeasant crusaders but was more inclined to trust knights whohad been well trained in the art of war. Three organized cru-sading bands of noble warriors, most of them French, madetheir way eastward. The crusading army probably numberedseveral thousand cavalry and as many as ten thousand infan-try. After the capture of Antioch in 1098, much of the crusad-ing host proceeded down the Palestinian coast, evading thewell-defended coastal cities, and reached Jerusalem in June1099. After a five-week siege, the Holy City was taken amid ahorrible massacre of the inhabitants—men, women, and chil-dren (see the box on p. 195).

After further conquest of Palestinian lands, the crusadersignored the wishes of the Byzantine emperor and organizedfour Latin crusader states. Because the crusader kingdomswere surrounded by Muslims hostileto them, they grew increasingly de-pendent on the Italian commercialcities for supplies from Europe. SomeItalian cities, such as Genoa, Pisa, andespecially Venice, grew rich andpowerful in the process.

But it was not easy for the cru-sader kingdoms to maintain them-selves. Already by the 1120s, theMuslims had begun to strike back.The fall of one of the Latin kingdomsin 1144 led to renewed calls foranother Crusade, especially from themonastic firebrand Saint Bernard ofClairvaux. He exclaimed, ‘‘Now, onaccount of our sins, the enemies ofthe cross have begun to show theirfaces. . . . What are you doing, youservants of the cross? Will you throw

to the dogs that which is most holy? Will you cast pearls beforeswine?’’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 HolyCity of Jerusalem in 1187 to the Muslim forces under Saladin.Now all of Christendom was ablaze with calls for a new Cru-sade. Three major monarchs agreed to lead their forces inperson: Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of Germany, Richard Ithe Lionhearted of England (1189–1199), and Philip II Augus-tus, king of France. Some of the crusaders finally arrived inthe Holy Land by 1189 only to encounter problems. Freder-ick Barbarossa drowned while swimming in a local river, andhis army quickly disintegrated. The English and Frencharrived by sea and met with success against the coastal cities,where they had the support of their fleets, but when theymoved inland, they failed miserably. Eventually, after Philipwent home, Richard the Lionhearted negotiated a settlementwhereby Saladin agreed to allow Christian pilgrims freeaccess to Jerusalem.

The Later CrusadesAfter the death of Saladin in 1193, Pope Innocent III initiatedthe Fourth Crusade. On its way east, the crusading armybecame involved in a dispute over the succession to the Byz-antine throne. The Venetian leaders of the Fourth Crusadesaw an opportunity to neutralize their greatest commercialcompetitor, the Byzantine Empire. Diverted to Constantino-ple, the crusaders sacked the great capital city of Byzantiumin 1204 and set up the new Latin Empire of Constantinople(see Chapter 13). Not until 1261 did a Byzantine army recap-ture Constantinople. In the meantime, additional Crusadeswere undertaken to reconquer the Holy Land. All of themwere largely disasters, and by the end of the thirteenth cen-tury, the European military effort to capture Palestine wasrecognized as a complete failure.

What Were the Effectsof the Crusades?Whether the Crusades had much effecton European civilization is debatable.The only visible remains are the Euro-pean castles that began to incorporatefeatures adopted from fortresses thatthe crusaders observed in the east (seethe comparative illustration on p. 194).Although there may have been somebroadening of perspective from theexchange between two cultures, theinteraction of Christian Europe withthe Muslim world was actually bothmore intense and more meaningful inSpain and Sicily than in the Holy Land.

Did the Crusades help stabilize Eu-ropean society by removing large num-bers of young warriors who wouldhave fought each other in Europe?

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CHRONOLOGY The Crusades

Pope Urban II’s call for a Crusade at Clermont 1095

First Crusade 1096–1099

Second Crusade 1147–1149

Saladin’s conquest of Jerusalem 1187

Third Crusade 1189–1192

Fourth Crusade—sack of Constantinople 1204

Latin Empire of Constantinople 1204–1261

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Some historians think so and believe that Western monarchsestablished their control more easily as a result. There is nodoubt that the Crusades did contribute to the economicgrowth of the Italian port cities, especially Genoa, Pisa, andVenice. But it is important to remember that the growingwealth and population of twelfth-century Europe had madethe Crusades possible in the first place. The Crusades mayhave enhanced the revival of trade, but they certainly did notcause it. Even without the Crusades, Italian merchants wouldhave pursued new trade contacts with the Eastern world.

Did the Crusades have side effects that would haunt Euro-pean society for generations? Some historians have argued

that the Crusades might be considered a ‘‘Christian holywar,’’ whose memories still trouble the relationship betweenthe Muslim world and the West today. Other historians arguethat the early crusaders were motivated as much by eco-nomic and political reasons as religious ones.

Another possible side effect is more apparent. The firstwidespread attacks on the Jews began with the Crusades. Assome Christians argued, to undertake holy wars against infi-del Muslims while the ‘‘murderers of Christ’’ ran free athome was unthinkable. With the Crusades, the massacre ofJews became a regular feature of medieval European life.

CHAPTER SUMMARYAfter the collapse of the Han dynasty in the third centuryC.E., China experienced nearly four centuries of internal chaosuntil the Tang dynasty in the seventh century C.E. attemptedto follow the pattern of the Han dynasty and restore thepower of the Chinese Empire. The fall of the WesternRoman Empire in the fifth century brought a quite differentresult as three new civilizations emerged out of the collapseof Roman power in the Mediterranean. A new world of Islamemerged in the east; it occupied large parts of the old RomanEmpire and created its own flourishing civilization. As weshall see in Chapter 13, the eastern part of the old RomanEmpire, increasingly Greek in culture, continued to surviveas the Christian Byzantine Empire. At the same time, a newChristian European civilization was establishing its roots inthe West. By the eleventh and twelfth centuries, these three

heirs of Rome began their own con-flict for control of the lands of theeastern Mediterranean.

The coronation of Charlemagne,the descendant of a Germanic tribeconverted to Christianity, as emperorof the Romans in 800 symbolized thefusion of the three chief componentsof the new European civilization: theGerman tribes, the Roman legacy,and the Christian church. Charle-

magne’s Carolingian Empire fostered the idea of a distinct Eu-ropean 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 po-litical, economic, and social life. But within this world of castlesand private power, during the High Middle Ages kings gradu-ally began to develop the machinery of government and accu-

mulate political authority. Although they could not know itthen, the actions of these medieval monarchs laid the founda-tion for the European states that in one form or another havedominated the European politicalscene ever since.

European civilization began toflourish in the High Middle Ages.The revival of trade, the expansion oftowns and cities, and the develop-ment of a money economy did notmean the end of a predominantly ru-ral European society, but they didopen the door to new ways to make aliving and new opportunities for peo-ple to expand and enrich their lives.At the same time, the High Middle Ages also gave birth to acultural revival that led to new centers of learning in the uni-versities, to the use of reason to systematize the study of the-ology, and to a dramatic increase in the number and size ofchurches.

The Catholic Churchshared in the challenge of newgrowth by reforming itselfand striking out on a path to-ward greater papal power,both within the church andover European society. TheHigh Middle Ages witnessed a spiritual renewal thatenhanced papal leadership and the religious life of the clergyand laity. At the same time, this spiritual renewal also gaverise to the crusading ‘‘holy warrior,’’ thereby creating ananimosity between Christians and Muslims that still hasrepercussions to this day.

Chapter Summary 355Copyright 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).


CHAPTER TIMELINE

500 600 700 900 1000 1100 1200 1300800

Rise of universities

Thomas Aquinas and scholasticism

Gothic cathedrals

Benedictine order established

Growth of trade and towns

First Crusade

Norman conquest of England

Innocent III and papal power

Germanic kingdoms Reign of Charlemagne Pope Gregory VII and the Investiture Controversy

MagnaCarta

Emergence of English Parliament

CHAPTER REVIEW

Upon ReflectionQ What impact did the Vikings have on the history andculture of medieval Europe?

Q How did the revival of trade and cities affect theeconomy and society of Europe in the High Middle Ages?

Q The medieval Catholic Church developed in the HighMiddle Ages at two levels—an institutional level and apopular religion level. What were the most importantfeatures of each level?

Key Termswergeld (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)

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 ReadingEARLY 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).



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. Robin-

son, The Papacy (Cambridge, 1990). On monasticism, see C. H. Law-

rence, 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, Roman-

esque 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 Cru-

sades (Cambridge, Mass., 2006). Also see J. Riley-Smith, ed., The Oxford

Illustrated History of the Crusades (New York, 1995).

Go to the CourseMatewebsite atwww.cengagebrain.comfor additional study toolsand review materials—including audio and videoclips—for this chapter.

Chapter Summary 357Copyright 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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