GetWiki
Early Middle Ages
ARTICLE SUBJECTS
being →
database →
ethics →
fiction →
history →
internet →
language →
linux →
logic →
method →
news →
policy →
purpose →
religion →
science →
software →
truth →
unix →
wiki →
ARTICLE TYPES
essay →
feed →
help →
system →
wiki →
ARTICLE ORIGINS
critical →
forked →
imported →
original →
Early Middle Ages
please note:
- the content below is remote from Wikipedia
- it has been imported raw for GetWiki
{{Short description|Period of European history}}{{For|the scholarly journal| Early Medieval Europe (journal)}}{{More citations needed|date=October 2023}}{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2021}}File:Codex Aureus Sankt Emmeram.jpg|thumb|The jewelled cover of the Codex Aureus of St. Emmeram, {{circa|870}}, a Carolingian Gospel bookGospel bookThe Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th to the 10th century.{{NoteTag|For more detail on the various starting and ending dates used by historians, see {{slink|Middle Ages#Terminology and periodisation}}.}} They marked the start of the Middle Ages of European history, following the decline of the Western Roman Empire, and preceding the High Middle Ages ({{circa}} 11th to 14th centuries). The alternative term late antiquity, for the early part of the period, emphasizes elements of continuity with the Roman Empire, while early Middle Ages is used to emphasize developments characteristic of the earlier medieval period. The period saw a continuation of trends evident since late classical antiquity, including population decline, especially in urban centres, a decline of trade, a small rise in average temperatures in the North Atlantic region and increased migration. In the 19th century the early Middle Ages were often labelled the Dark Ages, a characterization based on the relative scarcity of literary and cultural output from this time. The term is rarely used by academics today.JOURNAL, Mommsen, Theodore E., Theodor Ernst Mommsen, Petrarch's Conception of the 'Dark Ages', Speculum (journal), Speculum, 17, 2, 226â227, Medieval Academy of America, Cambridge MA, 1942, 2856364, 10.2307/2856364, 161360211, The Eastern Roman Empire, or Byzantine Empire, survived, though in the 7th century the Rashidun Caliphate and the Umayyad Caliphate conquered the southern part of the Roman territory.Many of the listed trends reversed later in the period. In 800, the title of Emperor was revived in Western Europe with Charlemagne, whose Carolingian Empire greatly affected later European social structure and history. Europe experienced a return to systematic agriculture in the form of the feudal system, which adopted such innovations as three-field planting and the heavy plough. Barbarian migration stabilized in much of Europe, although the Viking expansion greatly affected Northern Europe.{{TOC limit|limit=4}}- the content below is remote from Wikipedia
- it has been imported raw for GetWiki
History
Collapse of Rome
Starting in the 2nd century, various indicators of Roman civilization began to decline, including urbanization, seaborne commerce, and population. Archaeologists have identified only 40 percent as many Mediterranean shipwrecks from the 3rd century as from the first.Hopkins, Keith Taxes and Trade in the Roman Empire (200 BC â AD 400) Estimates of the population of the Roman Empire during the period from 150 to 400 suggest a fall from 65 million to 50 million, a decline of more than 20 percent. Some scholars have connected this de-population to the Dark Ages Cold Period (300â700), when a decrease in global temperatures impaired agricultural yields.JOURNAL, Berglund, B. E., 2003, Human impact and climate changes â synchronous events and a causal link?, Quaternary International, 105, 1, 7â12, 10.1016/S1040-6182(02)00144-1,weblink 2003QuInt.105....7B, Curry, Andrew, "Fall of Rome Recorded in Trees {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220202011942weblink |date=2 February 2022 }}", ScienceNOW, 13 January 2011.File:2008-05-17-SuttonHoo.jpg|thumb|left|230px|Replica of the Sutton Hoo helmet; the original was buried with an Anglo-Saxon leader, probably King Rædwald of East Anglia, {{circa|620â625 CE}}.BOOK, Nees, Lawrence, 2002, Early Medieval Art,weblink Oxford and New York City, Oxford University PressOxford University PressEarly in the 3rd century Germanic peoples migrated south from Scandinavia and reached the Black Sea, creating formidable confederations which opposed the local Sarmatians. In Dacia (present-day Romania) and on the steppes north of the Black Sea the Goths, a Germanic people, established at least two kingdoms: Therving and Greuthung.Heather, Peter, 1998, The Goths, pp. 51â93The arrival of the Huns in 372â375 ended the history of these kingdoms. The Huns, a confederation of central Asian tribes, founded an empire. They had mastered the difficult art of shooting composite recurve bows from horseback. The Goths sought refuge in Roman territory (376), agreeing to enter the Empire as unarmed settlers. However many bribed the Danube border-guards into allowing them to bring their weapons.The discipline and organization of a Roman legion made it a superb fighting unit. The Romans preferred infantry to cavalry because infantry could be trained to retain the formation in combat, while cavalry tended to scatter when faced with opposition. While a barbarian army could be raised and inspired by the promise of plunder, the legions required a central government and taxation to pay for salaries, constant training, equipment, and food. The decline in agricultural and economic activity reduced the empire's taxable income and thus its ability to maintain a professional army to defend itself from external threats.{{multiple image| header_background = #f8eaba| header = The Barbarians' Invasionswidth1=300| caption1 = The destruction of the Gothic kingdoms by the Huns in 372â375 triggered the Germanic migrations of the 5th century. The Visigoths captured and looted the city of Rome in 410; the Vandals followed suit in 455 {{plainlist|{{col-begin}}{{col-break}}
Migration Period{{more citations needed section|date=November 2018}}{{multiple image| header_background = #f8eaba| header = Migration Period | width1=225|caption1=The Mausoleum of Theodoric in Ravenna is the only extant example of Ostrogothic architecture. | width2=165|caption2=Around 500, the Visigoths ruled large parts of what is now France, Spain, Andorra and Portugal.}}The Goths and Vandals were only the first of many bands of peoples that flooded Western Europe in the absence of administrative governance. Some{{who|date= November 2018}} lived only for war and pillage and disdained Roman ways. Other peoplesBOOK, Collins, Roger, 1999, Early Medieval Europe 300â1000,weblink limited, New York, Palgrave, 100â110, 978-0230006737, Roger Collins, had been in prolonged contact with the Roman civilization, and were, to a certain degree, romanized. "A poor Roman plays the Goth, a rich Goth the Roman," said King Theoderic of the Ostrogoths.WEB, Thayer, Bill, LacusCurtius ⢠Excerpta Valesiana â Latter Part,weblink 2022-01-14, penelope.uchicago.edu, The subjects of the Roman empire were a mixture of Roman Christian, Arian Christian, Nestorian Christian, and pagan.{{citation needed|date= November 2018}} The Germanic peoples knew little of cities, money, or writing, and were mostly pagan, though they were increasingly converting to Arianism, a non-trinitarian form of Christianity that considers God the Son to have been created by, and thus inferior to, God the Father, rather than the two being co-eternal, which is the position of Chalcedonian Christianity. Arianism found some favour in the Roman Empire before being eclipsed by the Chalcedonian position and then suppressed as heretical.During the migrations, or Völkerwanderung (wandering of the peoples), the earlier settled populations were sometimes left intact though usually partially or entirely displaced. Roman culture north of the Po River was almost entirely displaced by the migrations. Whereas the peoples of France, Italy, Spain and Portugal continued to speak the dialects of Vulgar Latin that today constitute the Romance languages, the language of the smaller Roman-era population of what is now England disappeared with barely a trace in the territories settled by the Anglo-Saxons, although the Brittanic kingdoms of the west remained Brythonic speakers. The new peoples greatly altered established society, including law, culture, religion, and patterns of property ownership.File:Trésor de Gourdon 02.JPG|thumb|upright=1.15|left|A paten from the Treasure of Gourdon, found at Gourdon, Saône-et-LoireGourdon, Saône-et-LoireThe pax Romana had provided safe conditions for trade and manufacture, and a unified cultural and educational milieu of far-ranging connections. As this was lost, it was replaced by the rule of local potentates, sometimes members of the established Romanized ruling elite, sometimes new lords of alien culture. In Aquitania, Gallia Narbonensis, southern Italy and Sicily, Baetica or southern Spain, and the Iberian Mediterranean coast, Roman culture lasted until the 6th or 7th centuries.The gradual breakdown and transformation of economic and social linkages and infrastructure resulted in increasingly localized outlooks. This breakdown was often fast and dramatic as it became unsafe to travel or carry goods over any distance; there was a consequent collapse in trade and manufacture for export. Major industries that depended on trade, such as large-scale pottery manufacture, vanished almost overnight in places like Britain. Tintagel in Cornwall, as well as several other centres, managed to obtain supplies of Mediterranean luxury goods well into the 6th century, but then lost their trading links. Administrative, educational and military infrastructure quickly vanished, and the loss of the established cursus honorum led to the collapse of the schools and to a rise of illiteracy even among the leadership. The careers of Cassiodorus (died {{circa|585}}) at the beginning of this period and of Alcuin of York (died 804) at its close were founded alike on their valued literacy. For the formerly Roman area, there was another 20 per cent decline in population between 400 and 600, or a one-third decline for 150â600.McEvedy 1992, op. cit. In the 8th century, the volume of trade reached its lowest level. The very small number of shipwrecks found that dated from the 8th century supports this (which represents less than 2 per cent of the number of shipwrecks dated from the 1st century). There was also reforestation and a retreat of agriculture centred around 500.The Romans had practiced two-field agriculture, with a crop grown in one field and the other left fallow and ploughed under to eliminate weeds. Systematic agriculture largely disappeared and yields declined. It is estimated that the Plague of Justinian which began in 541 and recurred periodically for 150 years thereafter killed as many as 100 million people across the world."Scientists Identify Genes Critical to Transmission of Bubonic Plague {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071007012619weblink |date=2007-10-07 }}", News Release, National Institutes of Health, 18 July 1996.The History of the Bubonic Plague {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080415231721weblink |date=15 April 2008 }}. Some historians such as Josiah C. Russell (1958) have suggested a total European population loss of 50 to 60 per cent between 541 and 700.WEB, Maugh, Thomas H., An Empire's Epidemic,weblink live, 2022-01-14, www.ph.ucla.edu,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20020804054553weblink">weblink 4 August 2002, After the year 750, major epidemic diseases did not appear again in Europe until the Black Death of the 14th century. The disease smallpox, which was eradicated in the late 20th century, did not definitively enter Western Europe until about 581 when Bishop Gregory of Tours provided an eyewitness account that describes the characteristic findings of smallpox.BOOK, Hopkins DR, The Greatest Killer: Smallpox in history, University of Chicago Press, 2002, 978-0-226-35168-1, registration,weblink Originally published as Princes and Peasants: Smallpox in History (1983), {{ISBN|0-226-35177-7}} Waves of epidemics wiped out large rural populations.How Smallpox Changed the World {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080906092625weblink |date=6 September 2008 }}, By Heather Whipps, LiveScience, 23 June 2008 Most of the details about the epidemics are lost, probably due to the scarcity of surviving written records.For almost a thousand years, Rome was the most politically important, richest and largest city in Europe.WEB,weblink Roman Empire Population | UNRV.com Roman History, www.unrv.com, Around 100 AD, it had a population of about 450,000,Storey, Glenn R., "weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110501052229weblink">The population of ancient Rome", Antiquity, 1 December 1997. and declined to a mere 20,000 during the early Middle Ages, reducing the sprawling city to groups of inhabited buildings interspersed among large areas of ruins and vegetation.Eastern Roman Empire{{multiple image| header_background = #f8eaba| header = Byzantine Empire| image1 = Justinien 527-565.svg| width1 = 300 | Byzantine Empire under the Justinian dynasty
* {{color box|#f6b65f|border=silver}} Justinian's conquests
Rise of Islam
Birth of the Latin West700â850File:Sutton Hoo helmet 2016.png|thumb|upright|The Sutton Hoo helmet, an Anglo-Saxon helmet from the early 7th century]]Climatic conditions in Western Europe began to improve after 700.Cini Castagnoli, G.C., Bonino, G., Taricco, C. and Bernasconi, S.M. 2002. "Solar radiation variability in the last 1400 years recorded in the carbon isotope ratio of a Mediterranean sea core", Advances in Space Research 29: 1989â1994. In that year, the two major powers in western Europe were the Franks in Gaul and the Lombards in Italy.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 102 The Lombards had been thoroughly Romanized, and their kingdom was stable and well developed. The Franks, in contrast, were barely any different from their barbarian Germanic ancestors. The Kingdom of the Franks was weak and divided.BOOK, The New Cambridge Medieval History: Volume 2, c. 700âc. 900, McKitterick, Rosamond, Cambridge University Press, 1995, 9780521362924, 87â90, Impossible to guess at the time, but by the end of the century, the Lombardic kingdom would be extinct, while the Frankish kingdom would have nearly reassembled the Western Roman Empire.Though much of Roman civilization north of the Po River had been wiped out in the years after the end of the Western Roman Empire, between the 5th and 8th centuries, new political and social infrastructure began to develop. Much of this was initially Germanic and pagan. Arian Christian missionaries had been spreading Arian Christianity throughout northern Europe, though by 700 the religion of northern Europeans was largely a mix of Germanic paganism, Christianized paganism, and Arian Christianity.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 147 Chalcedonian Christianity had barely started to spread in northern Europe by this time. Through the practice of simony, local princes typically auctioned off ecclesiastical offices, causing priests and bishops to function as though they were yet another noble under the patronage of the prince.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 148 In contrast, a network of monasteries had sprung up as monks sought separation from the world. These monasteries remained independent from local princes, and as such constituted the "church" for most northern Europeans during this time. Being independent from local princes, they increasingly stood out as centres of learning, of scholarship, and as religious centres where individuals could receive spiritual or monetary assistance.The interaction between the culture of the newcomers, their warband loyalties, the remnants of classical culture, and Christian influences, produced a new model for society, based in part on feudal obligations. The centralized administrative systems of the Romans did not withstand the changes, and the institutional support for chattel slavery largely disappeared. The Anglo-Saxons in England had also started to convert from Anglo-Saxon polytheism after the arrival of Christian missionaries in 597.Italy{{Further|Lombards|King of Italy|Medieval Corsica}}(File:Italien zur Langobardenzeit.jpg|thumb|upright=1.15|right|The Lombard possessions in Italy: The Lombard Kingdom (Neustria, Austria and Tuscia) and the Lombard Duchies of Spoleto and Benevento)The Lombards, who first entered Italy in 568 under Alboin, carved out a state in the north, with its capital at Pavia. At first, they were unable to conquer the Exarchate of Ravenna, the Ducatus Romanus, and Calabria and Apulia. The next two hundred years were occupied in trying to conquer these territories from the Byzantine Empire.The Lombard state was relatively Romanized, at least when compared to the Germanic kingdoms in northern Europe. It was highly decentralized at first, with the territorial dukes having practical sovereignty in their duchies, especially in the southern duchies of Spoleto and Benevento. For a decade following the death of Cleph in 575, the Lombards did not even elect a king; this period is called the Rule of the Dukes. The first written legal code was composed in poor Latin in 643: the Edictum Rothari. It was primarily the codification of the oral legal tradition of the people.The Lombard state was well-organized and stabilized by the end of the long reign of Liutprand (717–744), but its collapse was sudden. Unsupported by the dukes, King Desiderius was defeated and forced to surrender his kingdom to Charlemagne in 774. The Lombard kingdom ended and a period of Frankish rule was initiated. The Frankish king Pepin the Short had, by the Donation of Pepin, given the pope the "Papal States" and the territory north of that swath of papally-governed land was ruled primarily by Lombard and Frankish vassals of the Holy Roman Emperor until the rise of the city-states in the 11th and 12th centuries.In the south, a period of chaos began. The Duchy of Benevento maintained its sovereignty in the face of the pretensions of both the Western and Eastern Empires. In the 9th century, the Muslims conquered Sicily. The cities on the Tyrrhenian Sea departed from Byzantine allegiance. Various states owing various nominal allegiances fought constantly over territory until events came to a head in the early 11th century with the coming of the Normans, who conquered the whole of the south by the end of the century.BritainRoman Britain was in a state of political and economic collapse at the time of the Roman departure c. 400. A series of settlements (traditionally referred to as an invasion) by Germanic peoples began in the early fifth century, and by the sixth century the island would consist of many small kingdoms engaged in ongoing warfare with each other. The Germanic kingdoms are now collectively referred to as Anglo-Saxons. Christianity began to take hold among the Anglo-Saxons in the sixth century, with 597 given as the traditional date for its large-scale adoption.File:Gokstadskipet1.jpg|thumb|left|upright|The Gokstad ship, a 9th-century Viking longshiplongshipWestern Britain (Wales), eastern and northern Scotland (Pictland) and the Scottish highlands and isles continued their separate evolution. The Irish descended and Irish-influenced people of western Scotland were Christian from the fifth century onward, the Picts adopted Christianity in the sixth century under the influence of Columba, and the Welsh had been Christian since the Roman era.The Kingdom of Northumbria was the pre-eminent power c. 600–700, absorbing several weaker Anglo-Saxon and Brythonic kingdoms, while Mercia held a similar status c. 700–800. Wessex would absorb all of the kingdoms in the south, both Anglo-Saxon and Briton. In Wales consolidation of power would not begin until the ninth century under the descendants of Merfyn Frych of Gwynedd, establishing a hierarchy that would last until the Norman invasion of Wales in 1081.The first Viking raids on Britain began before 800, increasing in scope and destructiveness over time. In 865 a large, well-organized Danish Viking army (called the Great Heathen Army) attempted a conquest, breaking or diminishing Anglo-Saxon power everywhere but in Wessex. Under the leadership of Alfred the Great and his descendants, Wessex would at first survive, then coexist with, and eventually conquer the Danes. It would then establish the Kingdom of England and rule until the establishment of an Anglo-Danish kingdom under Cnut, and then again until the Norman Invasion of 1066.Viking raids and invasion were no less dramatic for the north. Their defeat of the Picts in 839 led to a lasting Norse heritage in northernmost Scotland, and it led to the combination of the Picts and Gaels under the House of Alpin, which became the Kingdom of Alba, the predecessor of the Kingdom of Scotland. The Vikings combined with the Gaels of the Hebrides to become the Gall-Gaidel and establish the Kingdom of the Isles.Frankish EmpireFile:Europe 814.svg|thumb|upright=1.25|Europe in 814. Charlemagne's empire included most of modern France, Germany, the Low Countries, Austria and northern Italy.]]File:Sacre de Charlemagne.jpg|thumb|On 25 December 800, Charlemagne was crowned emperor by Pope Leo IIIPope Leo IIIFile:Aix dom int vue cote.jpg|thumbnail|upright=1.0|The Palatine Chapel (Octagon) in Aachen, Germany, now the central part of the cathedral ]]The Merovingians established themselves in the power vacuum of the former Roman provinces in Gaul, and Clovis I converted to Christianity following his victory over the Alemanni at the Battle of Tolbiac (496), laying the foundation of the Frankish Empire, the dominant state of early medieval Western Christendom. The Frankish kingdom grew through a complex development of conquest, patronage, and alliance building. Due to salic custom, inheritance rights were absolute, and all land was divided equally among the sons of a dead land holder.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 165 This meant that, when the king granted a prince land in reward for service, that prince and all of his descendants had an irrevocable right to that land that no future king could undo. Likewise, those princes (and their sons) could sublet their land to their own vassals, who could in turn sublet the land to lower sub-vassals. This all had the effect of weakening the power of the king as his kingdom grew, since the result was that the land became controlled not just by more princes and vassals, but by multiple layers of vassals. This also allowed his nobles to attempt to build their own power base, though given the strict salic tradition of hereditary kingship, few would ever consider overthrowing the king.This increasingly fragmented arrangement was highlighted by Charles Martel, who as Mayor of the Palace was effectively the strongest prince in the kingdom.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 189 His accomplishments were highlighted, not just by his famous defeat of invading Muslims at the Battle of Tours, which is typically considered the battle that saved Europe from Muslim conquest, but by the fact that he greatly expanded Frankish influence. It was under his patronage that Boniface expanded Frankish influence into Germany by rebuilding the German church, with the result that, within a century, the German church was the strongest church in western Europe. Yet despite this, Charles Martel refused to overthrow the Frankish king. His son, Pepin the Short, inherited his power, and used it to further expand Frankish influence. Unlike his father, however, Pepin decided to seize the Frankish kingship. Given how strongly Frankish culture held to its principle of inheritance, few would support him if he attempted to overthrow the king.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p. 170 Instead, he sought the assistance of Pope Zachary, who was himself newly vulnerable due to fallout with the Byzantine Emperor over the Iconoclastic Controversy. Pepin agreed to support the pope and to give him land (the Donation of Pepin, which created the Papal States) in exchange for being consecrated as the new Frankish king. Given that Pepin's claim to the kingship was now based on an authority higher than Frankish custom, no resistance was offered to Pepin. With this, the Merovingian line of kings ended, and the Carolingian line began.Pepin's son Charlemagne continued in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. He further expanded and consolidated the Frankish kingdom (now commonly called the Carolingian Empire). His reign also saw a cultural rebirth, commonly called the Carolingian Renaissance. Though the exact reasons are unclear, Charlemagne was crowned "Roman Emperor" by Pope Leo III on Christmas Day, 800. Upon Charlemagne's death, his empire had united much of modern-day France, western Germany and northern Italy. The years after his death illustrated how Germanic his empire remained. Rather than an orderly succession, his empire was divided in accordance with Frankish inheritance custom, which resulted in instability that plagued his empire until the last king of a united empire, Charles the Fat, died in 887, which resulted in a permanent split of the empire into West Francia and East Francia. West Francia would be ruled by Carolingians until 987 and East Francia until 911, after which time the partition of the empire into France and Germany was complete.FeudalismAround 800 there was a return to systematic agriculture in the form of the open field, or strip, system. A manor would have several fields, each subdivided into {{convert|1|acre|m2|adj=on}} strips of land. An acre measured one "furlong" of 220 yards by one "chain" of 22 yards (that is, about 200 m by 20 m). A furlong (from "furrow long") was considered to be the distance an ox could plough before taking a rest; the strip shape of the acre field also reflected the difficulty in turning early heavy ploughs. In the idealized form of the system, each family got thirty such strips of land. The three-field system of crop rotation was first developed in the 9th century: wheat or rye was planted in one field, the second field had a nitrogen-fixing crop, and the third was fallow.WEB,weblink No. 1318: Three-Field Rotation, Engines of Our Ingenuity, Lienhard, John H., University of Houston, Compared to the earlier two-field system, a three-field system allowed for significantly more land to be put under cultivation. Even more important, the system allowed for two harvests a year, reducing the risk that a single crop failure will lead to famine. Three-field agriculture created a surplus of oats that could be used to feed horses. This surplus allowed for the replacement of the ox by the horse after the introduction of the padded horse collar in the 12th century. Because the system required a major rearrangement of real estate and of the social order, it took until the 11th century before it came into general use. The heavy wheeled plough was introduced in the late 10th century. It required greater animal power and promoted the use of teams of oxen. Illuminated manuscripts depict two-wheeled ploughs with both a mouldboard, or curved metal ploughshare, and a coulter, a vertical blade in front of the ploughshare. The Romans had used light, wheel-less ploughs with flat iron shares that often proved unequal to the heavy soils of northern Europe.The return to systemic agriculture coincided with the introduction of a new social system called feudalism. This system featured a hierarchy of reciprocal obligations. Each man was bound to serve his superior in return for the latter's protection. This made for confusion of territorial sovereignty since allegiances were subject to change over time and were sometimes mutually contradictory. Feudalism allowed the state to provide a degree of public safety despite the continued absence of bureaucracy and written records.Manors became largely self-sufficient, and the volume of trade along long-distance routes and in market towns declined during this period, though never ceased entirely. Roman roads decayed and long-distance trade depended more heavily on water transport.WEB,weblink The Economy of Medieval Europe: Expanding Trade and Cities,Viking AgeFile:Viking Expansion.svg|thumb|right|upright=1.35|Scandinavian settlements and raiding territory. Note : yellow in England and southern Italy covers the Viking expansion from Normandy, called by the name of Norman{hide}unbulleted list
|{{color box|#800000|border=silver{edih} 8th century homeland
}}|{{color box|#fe0000|border=silver}} 9th century expansion |{{color box|#ff7f00|border=silver}} 10th century expansion {{color box|#00ff01|border=silver}} Viking raiding regions]]The Viking Age spans the period roughly between the late 8th and mid-11th centuries in Scandinavia and Britain, following the Germanic Iron Age (and the Vendel Age in Sweden). During this period, the Vikings, Scandinavian warriors and traders raided and explored most parts of Europe, south-western Asia, northern Africa, and north-eastern North America.With the means to travel (longships and open water), desire for goods led Scandinavian traders to explore and develop extensive trading partnerships in new territories. Some of the most important trading ports during the period include both existing and ancient cities such as Aarhus, Ribe, Hedeby, Vineta, Truso, Kaupang, Birka, Bordeaux, York, Dublin, and Aldeigjuborg.Viking raiding expeditions were separate from, though coexisted with, regular trading expeditions. Apart from exploring Europe via its oceans and rivers, with the aid of their advanced navigational skills, they extended their trading routes across vast parts of the continent. They also engaged in warfare, looting and enslaving numerous Christian communities of Medieval Europe for centuries, contributing to the development of feudal systems in Europe. Eastern Europe
| Slavs>Slavic tribes | width1 = 220| caption1 = Slavic tribes in central, eastern and southern Europe during the 7th to 9th centuries }}The Early Middle Ages marked the beginning of the cultural distinctions between Western and Eastern Europe north of the Mediterranean. Influence from the Byzantine Empire impacted the Christianization and hence almost every aspect of the cultural and political development of the East from the preeminence of Caesaropapism and Eastern Christianity to the spread of the Cyrillic alphabet. The turmoil of the so-called Barbarian invasions in the beginning of the period gradually gave way to more stabilized societies and states as the origins of contemporary Eastern Europe began to take shape during the High Middle Ages.{{multiple image| header_background = #f8eaba| header = Magyar tribes | width1 = 220| caption1 = Magyar campaigns in the 10th century {{color box|#eca0a2|border=silver}} Magyar region Most European nations were praying for mercy: "Sagittis hungarorum libera nos, Domine" - "Lord save us from the arrows of Hungarians" {{citation needed|reason=Like the famous 'A furore Normannorum libera nos, Domine' (which cannot be found in any Medieval Prayer book), this phrase is quoted everywhere and yet nobody seems to bother to provide a citation so it seems reasonable to expect a citation to whichever prayer book "Sagittis hungarorum libera nos Domine" came from and some proof that this prayer was widely used.|date=October 2015}}}}Turkic and Iranian invaders from Central Asia pressured the agricultural populations both in the Byzantine Balkans and in Central Europe creating a number of successor states in the Pontic steppes. After the dissolution of the Hunnic Empire, the Western Turkic and Avar Khaganates dominated territories from Pannonia to the Caspian Sea before being replaced by the short lived Old Great Bulgaria and the more successful Khazar Khaganate north of the Black Sea and the Magyars in Central Europe.The Khazars were a nomadic Turkic people who managed to develop a multiethnic commercial state which owed its success to the control of much of the waterway trade between Europe and Central Asia. The Khazars also exacted tribute from the Alani, Magyars, various Slavic tribes, the Crimean Goths, and the Greeks of Crimea. Through a network of Jewish itinerant merchants, or Radhanites, they were in contact with the trade emporia of India and Spain.Once they found themselves confronted by Arab expansionism, the Khazars pragmatically allied themselves with Constantinople and clashed with the Caliphate. Despite initial setbacks, they managed to recover Derbent and eventually penetrated as far south as Caucasian Iberia, Caucasian Albania and Armenia. In doing so, they effectively blocked the northward expansion of Islam into Eastern Europe even before khan Tervel achieved the same at the Second Arab Siege of Constantinople and several decades before the Battle of Tours in Western Europe. Islam eventually penetrated into Eastern Europe in the 920s when Volga Bulgaria exploited the decline of Khazar power in the region to adopt Islam from the Baghdad missionaries. The state religion of Khazaria, Judaism, disappeared as a political force with the fall of Khazaria, while Islam of Volga Bulgaria has survived in the region up to the present.In the beginning of the period, the Slavic tribes started to expand aggressively into Byzantine possessions on the Balkans. The first attested Slavic polities were Serbia and Great Moravia, the latter of which emerged under the aegis of the Frankish Empire in the early 9th century. Great Moravia was ultimately overrun by the Magyars, who invaded the Pannonian Basin around 896. The Slavic state became a stage for confrontation between the Christian missionaries from Constantinople and Rome. Although West Slavs, Croats and Slovenes eventually acknowledged Roman ecclesiastical authority, the clergy of Constantinople succeeded in converting to Eastern Christianity two of the largest states of early medieval Europe, Bulgaria around 864, and Kievan Rus' c. 990. BulgariaFile:St. Theodor.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.8|Ceramic icon of St Theodore from around 900, found in PreslavPreslavIn 632 the Bulgars established the khanate of Old Great Bulgaria under the leadership of Kubrat. The Khazars managed to oust the Bulgars from Southern Ukraine into lands along middle Volga (Volga Bulgaria) and along lower Danube (Danube Bulgaria).In 681 the Bulgars founded a powerful and ethnically diverse state that played a defining role in the history of early medieval Southeastern Europe. Bulgaria withstood the pressure from Pontic steppe tribes like the Pechenegs, Khazars, and Cumans, and in 806 destroyed the Avar Khanate. The Danube Bulgars were quickly slavicized and, despite constant campaigning against Constantinople, accepted Christianity from the Byzantine Empire. Through the efforts of missionaries Cyril and Methodius, mainly their disciples like Clement of Ohrid and Naum,Barford, P. M. (2001). The Early Slavs. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press the spread, initially of the Glagolitic, and later of the Cyrillic alphabet, developed in the capital Preslav. The local vernacular dialect, now known as Old Bulgarian or Old Church Slavonic, was established as the language of books and liturgy among Orthodox Christian Slavs.After the adoption of Christianity in 864, Bulgaria became a cultural and spiritual hub of the Eastern Orthodox Slavic world. The Cyrillic script was developed around 885â886, and was afterwards also introduced with books to Serbia and Kievan Rus'. Literature, art, and architecture were thriving with the establishment of the Preslav and Ohrid Literary Schools along with the distinct Preslav Ceramics School. In 927 the Bulgarian Orthodox Church was the first European national Church to gain independence with its own Patriarch while conducting services in the vernacular Old Church Slavonic.Under Simeon I (893â927), the state was the largest and one of the most powerful political entities of Europe, and it consistently threatened the existence of the Byzantine empire. From the middle of the 10th century Bulgaria was in decline as it entered a social and spiritual turmoil. It was in part due to Simeon's devastating wars, but was also exacerbatedby a series of successful Byzantine military campaigns. Bulgaria was conquered after a long resistance in 1018.Kievan Rus'Led by a Varangian dynasty, the Kievan Rus' controlled the routes connecting Northern Europe to Byzantium and to the Orient (for example: the Volga trade route). The Kievan state began with the rule (882â912) of Prince Oleg, who extended his control from Novgorod southwards along the Dnieper river valley in order to protect trade from Khazar incursions from the east and moved his capital to the more strategic Kiev. Sviatoslav I (died 972) achieved the first major expansion of Kievan Rus' territorial control, fighting a war of conquest against the Khazar Empire and inflicting a serious blow on Bulgaria. A Rus' attack (967 or 968), instigated by the Byzantines, led to the collapse of the Bulgarian state and the occupation of the east of the country by the Rus'. An ensuing direct military confrontation between the Rus' and Byzantium (970â971) ended with a Byzantine victory (971). The Rus' withdrew and the Byzantine Empire incorporated eastern Bulgaria. Both before and after their conversion to Christianity (conventionally dated 988 under Vladimir I of Kievâknown as Vladimir the Great), the Rus' also embarked on predatory military campaigns against the Byzantine Empire, some of which resulted in trade treaties. The importance of Russo-Byzantine relations to Constantinople was highlighted by the fact that Vladimir I of Kiev, son of Svyatoslav I, became the only foreigner to marry (989) a Byzantine princess of the Macedonian dynasty (which ruled the Eastern Roman Empire from 867 to 1056), a singular honour sought in vain by many other rulers.Transmission of learningfile:Silos-Claustro.jpg|thumb|upright|Abbey of Santo Domingo de Silos In the early Middle Ages, cultural life was concentrated at monasteries.]]With the Fall of the Western Roman Empire and with urban centres in decline, literacy and learning decreased in the West. Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p 52 De-urbanization reduced the scope of education, and by the 6th century teaching and learning moved to monastic and cathedral schools, with the study of biblical texts at the centre of education.Pierre Riché, Education and Culture in the Barbarian West: From the Jeremy Marcelino II, (Columbia: Univ. of South Carolina Pr., 1976), pp. 100-129. The education of the laity continued with little interruption in Italy, Spain, and the southern part of Gaul, where Roman influences lasted longer. In the 7th century, however, learning expanded in Ireland and the Celtic lands, where Latin was a foreign language and Latin texts were eagerly studied and taught.Pierre Riché, Education and Culture in the Barbarian West: From the Sixth through the Eighth Century, (Columbia: Univ. of South Carolina Pr., 1976), pp. 307-323. The Carolingian Renaissance of classical education appeared in the Carolingian Empire in the 8th century.In the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantium), learning (in the sense of formal education involving literature) was maintained at a higher level than in the West. The classical education system, which would persist for hundreds of years, emphasized grammar, Latin, Greek, and rhetoric. Pupils read and reread classic works and wrote essays imitating their style. By the 4th century, this education system was Christianized. In De Doctrina Christiana (started 396, completed 426), Augustine explained how classical education fits into the Christian worldview: Christianity is a religion of the book, so Christians must be literate. Tertullian was more skeptical of the value of classical learning, asking "What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem?"WEB,weblink Philip Schaff: ANF03. Latin Christianity: Its Founder, Tertullian - Christian Classics Ethereal Library, www.ccel.org,ScienceIn the ancient world, Greek was the primary language of science. Advanced scientific research and teaching was mainly carried on in the Hellenistic side of the Roman empire, and in Greek. Late Roman attempts to translate Greek writings into Latin had limited success.William Stahl, Roman Science, (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Pr.) 1962, see esp. pp. 120-133. As the knowledge of Greek declined, the Latin West found itself cut off from some of its Greek philosophical and scientific roots. For a time, Latin-speakers who wanted to learn about science had access to only a couple of books by Boethius (c. 470â524) that summarized Greek handbooks by Nicomachus of Gerasa. Isidore of Seville produced a Latin encyclopedia in 630. Private libraries would have existed, and monasteries would also keep various kinds of texts.The study of nature was pursued more for practical reasons than as an abstract inquiry: the need to care for the sick led to the study of medicine and of ancient texts on drugs;Linda E. Voigts, "Anglo-Saxon Plant Remedies and the Anglo-Saxons", Isis, 70(1979):250-268; reprinted in M. H. Shank, ed., The Scientific Enterprise in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Pr., 2000). the need for monks to determine the proper time to pray led them to study the motion of the stars;Stephen C. McCluskey, "Gregory of Tours, Monastic Timekeeping, and Early Christian Attitudes to Astronomy", Isis, 81(1990):9-22; reprinted in M. H. Shank, ed., The Scientific Enterprise in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Pr., 2000). and the need to compute the date of Easter led them to study and teach mathematics and the motions of the Sun and Moon.Stephen C. McCluskey, Astronomies and Cultures in Early Medieval Europe, (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Pr., 1998), pp. 149-57.Faith Wallis, "'Number Mystique' in Early Medieval Computus Texts", pp. 179-99 in T. Koetsier and L. Bergmans, eds. Mathematics and the Divine: A Historical Study, (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2005).Carolingian RenaissanceIn the late 8th century, there was renewed interest in Classical Antiquity as part of the Carolingian Renaissance. Charlemagne carried out a reform in education. The English monk Alcuin of York elaborated a project of scholarly development aimed at resuscitating classical knowledge by establishing programs of study based upon the seven liberal arts: the trivium, or literary education (grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic), and the quadrivium, or scientific education (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music). From 787 on, decrees began to circulate recommending the restoration of old schools and the founding of new ones across the empire.Institutionally, these new schools were either under the responsibility of a monastery (monastic schools), a cathedral, or a noble court. The teaching of dialectic (a discipline that corresponds to today's logic) was responsible for the increase in the interest in speculative inquiry; from this interest would follow the rise of the Scholastic tradition of Christian philosophy. In the 12th and 13th centuries, many of those schools founded under the auspices of Charlemagne, especially cathedral schools, would become universities.Byzantium's golden age{{multiple image| header_background = #f8eaba | Byzantium under the Macedonians>Macedonian Byzantium | width1 = 220| caption1 = Miniature from the Paris Psalter Byzantium in the 10th century experienced a wide-scale cultural revival.}}Byzantium's great intellectual achievement was the Corpus Juris Civilis ("Body of Civil Law"), a massive compilation of Roman law made under Justinian (r. 528â65). The work includes a section called the Digesta which abstracts the principles of Roman law in such a way that they can be applied to any situation. The level of literacy was considerably higher in the Byzantine Empire than in the Latin West. Elementary education was much more widely available, sometimes even in the countryside. Secondary schools still taught the Iliad and other classics.As for higher education, the Neoplatonic Academy in Athens was closed in 526. There was also a school in Alexandria which remained open until the Arab conquest (640). The University of Constantinople, founded by Emperor Theodosius II (425), seems to have dissolved around this time. It was refounded by Emperor Michael III in 849. Higher education in this period focused on rhetoric, although Aristotle's logic was covered in simple outline. Under the Macedonian dynasty (867â1056), Byzantium enjoyed a golden age and a revival of classical learning. There was little original research, but many lexicons, anthologies, encyclopedias, and commentaries. Islamic learningIn the course of the 11th century, Islam's scientific knowledge began to reach Western Europe, via Islamic Spain. The works of Euclid and Archimedes, lost in the West, were translated from Arabic to Latin in Spain. The modern HinduâArabic numeral system, including a notation for zero, were developed by Hindu mathematicians in the 5th and 6th centuries. Muslim mathematicians learned of it in the 7th century and added a notation for decimal fractions in the 9th and 10th centuries. Around 1000, Gerbert of Aurillac (later Pope Sylvester II) made an abacus with counters engraved with Arabic numerals. A treatise by Al-KhwÄrizmÄ« on how to perform calculations with these numerals was translated into Latin in Spain in the 12th century.MonasteriesMonasteries were targeted in the eighth and ninth centuries by Vikings who invaded the coasts of northern Europe. They were targeted not only because they stored books but also precious objects that were looted by invaders. In the earliest monasteries, there were no special rooms set aside as a library, but from the sixth century onwards libraries became an essential aspect of monastic life in Western Europe. The Benedictines placed books in the care of a librarian who supervised their use. In some monastic reading rooms, valuable books would be chained to shelves, but there were also lending sections as well. Copying was also another important aspect of monastic libraries, this was undertaken by resident or visiting monks and took place in the scriptorium. In the Byzantine world, religious houses rarely maintained their own copying centres. Instead they acquired donations from wealthy donors. In the tenth century, the largest collection in the Byzantine world was found in the monasteries of Mount Athos (modern-day Greece), which accumulated over 10,000 books. Scholars travelled from one monastery to another in search of the texts they wished to study. Travelling monks were often given funds to buy books, and certain monasteries which held a reputation for intellectual activities welcomed travelling monks who came to copy manuscripts for their own libraries. One of these was the monastery of Bobbio in Italy, which was founded by the Irish abbot Columbanus in 614, and by the ninth century boasted a catalogue of 666 manuscripts, including religious works, classical texts, histories and mathematical treatises.BOOK, Books A Living History, Lyons, Martyn, Getty Publications, 2011, 9781606060834, United States, 15, 38â40,Christianity West and East{{further|Christianity in the 6th century|Christianity in the 7th century|Christianity in the 8th century}}{{multiple image|direction=vertical| header_background = #f8eaba| header = Medieval Christians | width1 = 220| caption1 = Sacramentarium Gelasianum. Frontispiece of Incipit from the Vatican manuscript | width2 = 220| caption2 = St Boniface - Baptism and Martyrdom.}}From the early Christians, early medieval Christians inherited a church united by major creeds, a stable Biblical canon, and a well-developed philosophical tradition. The history of medieval Christianity traces Christianity during the Middle Agesâthe period after the fall of the Western Roman Empire until the Protestant Reformation. The institutional structure of Christianity in the west during this period is different from what it would become later in the Middle Ages. As opposed to the later church, the church of the early Middle Ages consisted primarily of the monasteries.Cantor, Norman. "The Civilization of the Middle Ages". p 153 The practice of simony has caused the ecclesiastical offices to become the property of local princes, and as such the monasteries constituted the only church institution independent of the local princes. In addition, the papacy was relatively weak, and its power was mostly confined to central Italy. Individualized religious practice was uncommon, as it typically required membership in a religious order, such as the Order of Saint Benedict. Religious orders would not proliferate until the high Middle Ages. For the typical Christian at this time, religious participation was largely confined to occasionally receiving mass from wandering monks. Few would receive this as often as once a month. By the end of this period, individual practice of religion was becoming more common, as monasteries started to transform into something approximating modern churches, where some monks might even give occasional sermons.During the early Middle Ages, the divide between Eastern and Western Christianity widened, paving the way for the East-West Schism in the 11th century. In the West, the power of the Bishop of Rome expanded. In 607, Boniface III became the first Bishop of Rome to use the title Pope.{{citation needed|reason=Not mentioned in other Wikipedia articles such as Pope Boniface and History of the Papacy|date=September 2016}} Pope Gregory I used his office as a temporal power, expanded Rome's missionary efforts to the British Isles, and laid the foundations for the expansion of monastic orders. Roman church traditions and practices gradually replaced local variants, including Celtic Christianity in the British Isles. Various barbarian tribes went from raiding and pillaging the island to invading and settling. They were entirely pagan, having never been part of the Empire, though they experienced Christian influence from the surrounding peoples, such as those who were converted by the mission of Augustine of Canterbury, sent by Pope Gregory I. In the East, the conquests of Islam reduced the power of the Greek-speaking patriarchates.Christianization of the WestThe Roman Church, the only centralized institution to survive the fall of the Western Roman Empire intact, was the sole unifying cultural influence in the West, preserving Latin learning, maintaining the art of writing, and preserving a centralized administration through its network of bishops ordained in succession. The early Middle Ages are characterized by the urban control of bishops and the territorial control exercised by dukes and counts. The rise of urban communes marked the beginning of the High Middle Ages.The Christianization of Germanic tribes began in the 4th century with the Goths and continued throughout the early Middle Ages, led in the 6th to 7th centuries by the Hiberno-Scottish mission and replaced in the 8th to 9th centuries by the Anglo-Saxon mission, with Anglo-Saxons like Alcuin playing an important role in the Carolingian Renaissance. Boniface, the Apostle of the Germans, propagated Christianity in the Frankish Empire during the 8th century. He helped shape Western Christianity, and many of the dioceses he proposed remain until today. After his martyrdom, he was quickly hailed as a saint. By 1000, even Iceland had become Christian, leaving only more remote parts of Europe (Scandinavia, the Baltic, and Finnic lands) to be Christianized during the High Middle Ages.Europe in 1000{{further|AD 1000}}Speculation that the world would end in the year 1000 was confined to a few uneasy French monks.Cantor, 1993 Europe in 1050 p 235. Ordinary clerks used regnal years, e.g. the 4th year of the reign of Robert II (the Pious) of France. The use of the modern "anno domini" system of dating was largely confined to chroniclers of universal history, such as the Venerable Bede.Western Europe remained less developed compared to the Islamic world, with its vast network of caravan trade, or China, at this time the world's most populous empire under the Song Dynasty. Constantinople had a population of about 300,000, but Rome had a mere 35,000 and Paris 20,000.WEB,weblink Estimating The Population Sizes of Cities, Pasciuti, Daniel, Chase-Dunn, Christopher, Urbanization and Empire Formation Project, University of California, Riverside, 21 May 2002, 17 June 2006, 21 May 2011,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110521163735weblink">weblink dead, WEB,weblink СÑмбÑÑ. СÑÑÐ°Ð½Ñ Ð¸ гоÑода. ÐемогÑаÑÐ¸Ñ Ð´Ñевнего Ðиева, 19 June 2006, 19 September 2006,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20060919085046weblink">weblink dead, By contrast, Córdoba, in Islamic Spain, at this time the world's largest city contained 450,000 inhabitants. The Vikings had a trade network in northern Europe, including a route connecting the Baltic to Constantinople through Russia, as did the Radhanites.File:St Michaels Church Hildesheim.jpg|thumb|St. Michael's Church, Hildesheim, Germany, 1010s. Ottonian architecture draws its inspiration from Carolingian and Byzantine architecture.]]With nearly the entire nation freshly ravaged by the Vikings, England was in a desperate state. The long-suffering English later responded with a massacre of Danish settlers in 1002, leading to a round of reprisals and finally to Danish rule (1013), though England regained independence shortly after. But Christianization made rapid progress and proved itself the long-term solution to the problem of barbarian raiding. The territories of Scandinavia were soon to be fully Christianized Kingdoms: Denmark in the 10th century, Norway in the 11th, and Sweden, the country with the least raiding activity, in the 12th. Kievan Rus, recently converted to Orthodox Christianity, flourished as the largest state in Europe. Iceland, Greenland, and Hungary were all declared Christian about 1000.In Europe, a formalized institution of marriage was established. The proscribed degree of consanguinity varied, but the custom made marriages annullable by application to the Pope.JOURNAL, The Cincinnati Lancet-Clinic, 89,weblink 478, Heredity with Especial Reference to Certain Eye Affections, Dowling, Francis, 9 May 1903, North of Italy, where masonry construction was never extinguished, stone construction was replacing timber in important structures. Deforestation of the densely wooded continent was under way. The 10th century marked a return of urban life, with the Italian cities doubling in population. London, abandoned for many centuries, was again England's main economic centre by 1000. By 1000, Bruges and Ghent held regular trade fairs behind castle walls, a tentative return of economic life to western Europe.In the culture of Europe, several features surfaced soon after 1000 that mark the end of the early Middle Ages: the rise of the medieval communes, the reawakening of city life, and the appearance of the burgher class, the founding of the first universities, the rediscovery of Roman law, and the beginnings of vernacular literature.In 1000, the papacy was firmly under the control of German Emperor Otto III, or "emperor of the world" as he styled himself. But later church reforms enhanced its independence and prestige: the Cluniac movement, the building of the first great Transalpine stone cathedrals and the collation of the mass of accumulated decretals into a formulated canon law.Middle EastRise of IslamImageSize = width:800 height:75PlotArea = width:720 height:50 left:65 bottom:20AlignBars = justifyColors =
id:time value:rgb(0.7,0.7,1) #
Period = from:622 till:666TimeAxis = orientation:horizontalScaleMajor = unit:year increment:10 start:622ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1 start:622PlotData =
id:period value:rgb(1,0.7,0.5) # id:span value:rgb(0.9,0.8,0.5) # id:age value:rgb(0.95,0.85,0.5) # id:era value:rgb(1,0.85,0.5) # id:eon value:rgb(1,0.85,0.7) # id:filler value:gray(0.8) # background bar id:black value:black
align:center textcolor:black fontsize:8 mark:(line, black) width:10 shift:(0,-3)
from: 622 till: 632 color:era text:Muhammad
Consult particular article for details{{multiple image| direction = vertical| header_background = #f8eaba| header = Rise of Islam| image1 = Arabische Rijk.jpg| width1 = 220from: 632 till: 634 color:age text:Abu Bakr from: 634 till: 644 color:era text:Umar ibn al-Khattab from: 644 till: 656 color:age text:Uthman ibn Affan from: 656 till: 661 color:era text:Ali ibn Abi Talib from: 661 till: 666 color:age text:Muawiyah I |
Islamic expansion{{multiple image|direction=vertical| header_background = #f8eaba | Early Muslim conquests>Muslim Expansions in 7th & 8th Centuries | width1=220 |
Caliphs and empireThe Abbasid Caliphate, ruled by the Abbasid dynasty of caliphs, was the third of the Islamic caliphates. Under the Abbasids, the Islamic Golden Age philosophers, scientists, and engineers of the Islamic world contributed enormously to technology, both by preserving earlier traditions and by adding their own inventions and innovations. Scientific and intellectual achievements blossomed in the period.The Abbasids built their capital in Baghdad after replacing the Umayyad caliphs from all but the Iberian peninsula. The influence held by Muslim merchants over African-Arabian and Arabian-Asian trade routes was tremendous. As a result, Islamic civilization grew and expanded on the basis of its merchant economy, in contrast to their Christian, Indian, and Chinese peers who built societies from an agricultural landholding nobility.The Abbasids flourished for two centuries but slowly went into decline with the rise to power of the Turkish army they had created, the Mamluks. Within 150 years of gaining control of Persia, the caliphs were forced to cede power to local dynastic emirs who only nominally acknowledged their authority. After the Abbasids lost their military dominance, the Samanids (or Samanid Empire) rose up in Central Asia. The Sunni Islam empire was a Tajik state and had a Zoroastrian theocratic nobility. It was the next native Persian dynasty after the collapse of the Sassanid Persian empire, caused by the Arab conquest.Timeline{{Further|Timeline of the Middle Ages}}Beginning yearsImageSize = width:800 height:65PlotArea = width:720 height:40 left:65 bottom:20AlignBars = justifyColors =
id:time value:rgb(0.7,0.7,1) #
Period = from:400 till:700TimeAxis = orientation:horizontalScaleMajor = unit:year increment:10 start:400ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1 start:400PlotData =
id:period value:rgb(1,0.7,0.5) # id:age value:rgb(0.95,0.85,0.5) # id:era value:rgb(1,0.85,0.5) # id:eon value:rgb(1,0.85,0.7) # id:filler value:gray(0.8) # background bar id:black value:black
align:center textcolor:black fontsize:8 mark:(line,black) width:10 shift:(0, -3)
bar:People color:era
from:400 till:430 text:Augustine from:466 till:511 text:Clovis I from:527 till:565 text:Justinian I from:570 till:632 text:Muhammad bar: color:era from:433 till:493 text:Odoacer from:540 till:604 text:Gregory I bar:Events color:age from:496 till:496 text:Tolbiac from:602 till:629 text:Roman-Persian War from:535 till:552 text:Gothic War from:674 till:678 text:Constantinople Siege
Ending yearsImageSize = width:800 height:65PlotArea = width:720 height:40 left:65 bottom:20AlignBars = justifyColors =
id:time value:rgb(0.7,0.7,1) #
Period = from:700 till:1000TimeAxis = orientation:horizontalScaleMajor = unit:year increment:10 start:700ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1 start:700PlotData =
id:period value:rgb(1,0.7,0.5) # id:age value:rgb(0.95,0.85,0.5) # id:era value:rgb(1,0.85,0.5) # id:eon value:rgb(1,0.85,0.7) # id:filler value:gray(0.8) # background bar id:black value:black
align:center textcolor:black fontsize:8 mark:(line,black) width:10 shift:(0, -3)
bar:People color:era
from:714 till:721 text:Ardo from:768 till:814 text:Charlemagne from:871 till:899 text:Alfred the Great from:912 till:973 text:Otto I bar:Events color:age from:711 till:718 text:Al-Andalus bar: color:age from:732 till:732 text:Poitiers
See also
Notes{{NoteFoot}}References
Further reading
External links{{commons category|Early Middle Ages}}
|
- content above as imported from Wikipedia
- "Early Middle Ages" does not exist on GetWiki (yet)
- time: 1:31am EDT - Sat, May 18 2024
- "Early Middle Ages" does not exist on GetWiki (yet)
- time: 1:31am EDT - Sat, May 18 2024
[ this remote article is provided by Wikipedia ]
LATEST EDITS [ see all ]
GETWIKI 23 MAY 2022
The Illusion of Choice
Culture
Culture
GETWIKI 09 JUL 2019
Eastern Philosophy
History of Philosophy
History of Philosophy
GETWIKI 09 MAY 2016
GetMeta:About
GetWiki
GetWiki
GETWIKI 18 OCT 2015
M.R.M. Parrott
Biographies
Biographies
GETWIKI 20 AUG 2014
GetMeta:News
GetWiki
GetWiki
© 2024 M.R.M. PARROTT | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED