Medieval Times

The decline of the Roman Empire preceded a period in which Europeans will lay the foundations for medieval and modern Europe. The fusion of the Greco-Roman heritage, Germanic traditions, and the Christian faith will precipitate European civilization. During this primitive time chaos is abound, with no form of state organization. Warriors, the physically strong flourished, taking whatever was desired by brute force. Plunder, pillage and rape were commonplace occurrences. The “civilized” peoples of the Roman era, along with their political and cultural achievements were lost. Europe’s eventual emergence as a civilized, distinct society, rested on the pacification and the settling of the Germanic tribes.

The Roman Catholic Church (RCC) as an institution, and Christianity as a faith contributed significantly to this process. Christianity provided the foundation on which European societies metamorphosis took place. Though taking many generations, the slow but deliberate conversion of the Germanic tribes is realized as a result of the social, political, and economic role of the RCC. To attract followers to its faith, Christianity offered “Titled Nobility” in exchange for armed protection, resulting in mass conversion. Anointed by the RCC meant one is recognized in the eyes of God to be ruler, “the divine right of kings.” This rule passed through the sons and daughters forever by way of blood.

In essence, the RCC established a bond between Church and State through the power of God and Christ.

Medieval Times

While several Germanic kingdoms were established, only the Franks Merovingian kingdom, ruled under Clovis would endure for a significant period. Clovis’ conversion to orthodox Christianity in 496 gained him the support of the papacy against other Germanic tribes. Through a series of victories over other Germanic tribes, the Franks under Clovis emerged the dominant people in Europe by the early sixth century. After Clovis’ death, the Merovingian kingdom eventually disintegrated following the division and struggle between his four sons over the kingdom.

Reconstruction of the Frankish kingdom began with the efforts of Pippin of Landen, and continued through Charles Martel who in 733 stifled Arab expansion in northern Europe. Charles Martel’s son, Pippin would gain kingship by anointment from the Pope rather than royal blood. This alliance positioned the Carolingian dynasty under Pippin’s son, Charles the Great, to unite western Europe for the first time since the collapse of the Roman Empire.

By providing protection to the missionary activities of Saint Bonniface, Pippin gained papal support in his efforts to acquire rule over the Merovingian kingdom. Poised to unite the various Germanic tribes under one rule, Pippin questioned the Pope whether the man with the power was also entitled to kingship. Pope Zacharias responded in 751 that in fact, he who has the power should also have the title. Recognition of the Carolingian’s forced the Merovingian king to concede.

In 751 Pippin was formally elected king of the Franks. Three years later, Pope Stephen, seeking protection from the Lombards, personally anointed Pippin king. Pippin gained the titles “Protector of the Roman Church,” and “king and priest.” The Carolingian family received official recognition and anointment from the leading spiritual power in Europe, and the papacy gained a powerful military protector; bringing an important alliance between the papacy and the Frankish ruler.

Christianity’s roots as a city religion left some especially pious Christians feeling the only alternative to the decadence of urban life was complete separation from the world. Believed the Christian life as set forth in the Gospel could not be attained in the midst of such immorality, these people chose to live in isolation as hermits. In western Europe, several factors worked against the eremitical way of monasticism. The harsh winter months, coupled with dense forests filled with wild animals and wandering barbaric German tribes discouraged isolated living. Conscious of these dangers, and skeptical of claims made by many hermits of mystical experiences; church leaders encouraged communal living in monasteries, coenobitic monasticism. The communal atmosphere provided an ideal environment for instruction in the virtues of charity, poverty, and freedom from self-deception.

In 529 Benedict of Nursia, experienced in both the eremitical and the coenobitic varieties of monastic life, composed a brief set of regulations. Conceiving a simple code for ordinary people to follow, referred as “The Rules of Saint Benedict.” These rules outlined the monastic life of regularity, discipline, and moderation. The allure of Benedictine monasticism was the flexibility of admissions. One only had to be persistent to be deemed “right to join.” Once accepted in the monastery or convent, fundamental rules must be adhered to. Every individual admitted must work, pray, and accept total obedience towards the Abbot or Abbess.

Although the term feudalism was not coined until the seventeenth century, feudalism emerged in western Europe during the ninth century, and lasted to about the 1300’s. Feudalism is a decentralized form of government, “in which political power was treated as a private possession and was divided among many lords.” The three social levels included: those who fight, those who pray, and those who work. By the thirteenth century, nobles were broadly described as “those who fight,” those who had the profession of arms. Germany, until about 1200, had approximately one thousand families descended from the Carolingian imperial aristocracy and perhaps from the original German tribal nobility, forming the ruling social group. Members from this group intermarried, holding most of the important positions in church and state. The medieval nobility developed independently of knighthood and preceded it; all nobles were knights, but not all knights were noble. Charles Martel and other powerful men bound their retainers by oaths of loyalty and ceremonies of homage. Some great lords gave their armed cavalrymen, or vassals, estates, or fiefs, which produced income to maintain the retainer and his family.

Medieval Europeans believed monks performed the most important social service, prayer. Peasants provided sustenance through their labor, knights protected and defended society with the sword, so the monks with their prayers and chants worked to secure God’s blessing for society. Medieval monasteries were religious institutions whose organization and structure fulfilled the social needs of the feudal nobility. Economic necessities compelled some aristocratic families to seek a life in the church for some members. There simply were not sufficient resources or career opportunities to provide suitable, honorable positions in life for all children. Monasteries provided both an honorable and aristocratic life, and opportunities for ecclesiastical careers for these children.

Peasants comprised the largest and most economically productive sector in medieval European society. Working the land constituted the majority of the population. “Where feudalism concerned the rights, powers, and lifestyle of the military elite; manorialism involved the services and obligations of the peasant classes.” The economic power of the warring class depended on estates worked by peasants.

Therefore, feudalism and manorialism were inextricably linked. Peasants needed protection, and lords demanded something in return for that protection. Free peasants sometimes surrendered themselves and their lands to the lord’s jurisdiction. The land was often returned, only to tie the peasants to the land through various payments and services. Peasants were required to give a percentage of the annual harvest in produce or cash to the lord. The lord burdened the peasants life with fees and taxes; from marrying to inheriting their families’ property. Above all, the peasants became part of the lord’s permanent labor force.

In entering into a relationship with a feudal lord, any social status was lost. Exchanged for that of a serf bound to the land, only permission from the lord could reverse this. The peasant class was also subject to the jurisdiction of the lord’s court in any dispute over property or if he were suspected of criminal behavior. By the year 800, almost 60 percent of western Europe’s population had been reduced to serfdom.

“Charles the Great (768-814) built on the military and diplomatic foundations of his ancestors.” Though crude and brutal, Charlemagne managed to extend his feudal domain across much of Europe. Being an unusually effective speaker is contrasted by the fact Charlemagne was practically illiterate. Considering himself a Christian king ruling a Christian people, Charlemagne appreciated fine literature. Charlemagne’s military conquests can be partly attributed to the overwhelming energy he possessed. Continuing the expansionist policies of his ancestors, Charlemagne fought more than fifty campaigns, becoming the greatest warrior in the early Middle Ages.

Virtually all of feudal Europe west of the Rhine shaped Charlemagne’s empire. By constant travel, personal appearance, and the sheer force of his personality Charlemagne sought to control this vast territory. The political power of the Carolingians rested on the cooperation of the dominant social class, the Frankish aristocracy. By the seventh century, through mutual cooperation and marriage alliances, these families exercised great power not deriving from the Merovingian kings. The Carolingians themselves emerged from this aristocracy, and their military and political success depended on its support.

In the year 800, Charlemagne paid a momentous visit to Rome over Christmas week. On Christmas day in Saint Peter’s Cathedral, Charlemagne was crowned “Holy Roman Emperor” by the Pope. In effect, propelling Charlemagne’s status as a king over king’s. The imperial coronation of Charlemagne had a profound effect on the course of German history and on the later history of Europe.

Ironically, the most enduring legacy of Charlemagne is his contributions towards intellectual development. Barely literate himself, Charlemagne nevertheless set in motion a cultural revival that scholars named the “Carolinian Renaissance.” The provinces within Charlemagne’s empire were directed to construct churches and schools, where the earliest forms of Latin were taught to the priests. Some of these early schools became famous scholarly centers. It is in these centers that Charlemagne placed an emphasis on creating a form of church education.

One famous learning center is in Aachen, where Charlemagne managed to attract Alcuin of York, a Benedictine monk. Trained in the Northern monasteries of England during the brief North Umbrian Renaissance; Alcuin produced an educational curriculum for Charlemagne’s schools, and created the Caroligian Minuscule, or lower-case lettering.

Following his death in 814, Charlemagne’s empire began to disintegrate, largely due to the absence of a bureaucratic administration. Fortunately, the priority he placed towards education and learning helped preserve the writings of the ancients and laid the foundations for all subsequent medieval culture in Europe. Among the legacies left behind were many schools across Europe attached to monasteries and cathedrals. Basic literacy was established among the clergy and some nobility. The language, thought, and writings of classical Greece and Rome were salvaged and preserved. And Latin became the medium language throughout the Carolingian Empire.

Societies values, reflected by the expenditure of its wealth, testified to the overriding religious faith the medieval people of Europe possessed. Medieval architecture became the medium through which theology was expressed. Extraordinary amounts of wealth, time and resources were exhausted in the construction of many great cathedrals, abbeys and village churches. Because Christians placed great spiritual meaning upon their architecture, a transformation from Romanesque to Gothic occurred.

Romanesque, derived from the earlier Roman architecture, was noted for its narrow windows, dark interior, use of the keystone arch, and massive amounts of stone. In contrast, Gothic architecture, one of feudal European’s contributions, is identified by the use of the pointed arch, ribbed vaults, and the flying buttress. Most significant is the unparalleled interior lightness made possible in Gothic architecture.

Gothic construction was desired over Romanesque largely because less surface area was needed to support the ceilings. This allowed stained-glass windows to be cut into the stone, flooding the church with light. The inspiration for Gothic architecture originated from Sugar, abbot of Saint-Denis (1122-1151), after deciding to reconstruct the old Carolingian abbey church at Saint-Denis. Begun in Iie-de-France, Gothic architecture rapidly spread throughout the continent.

“The fundamental objective of all medieval agriculture was the production of an adequate food supply.” A poor harvest meant starvation. Prior to key transformations in agriculture, Europe did not have a surplus of food. Farmers, being aware of the importance of animal compost and fertilizers, eventually incorporated other means of soil rejuvenation. It is not until the realization that Roman farming techniques are inadequate, will a significant change in agriculture transpire. It is these developments which bring to the forefront the agricultural revolution/evolution.

Europe’s soil, being very damp, must be air-rated in order for it to receive the oxygen and nitrogen necessary for proper nutrients. With the advent of the mortor-board plow, the soil’s productivity increased. Effectively turning the soil unto itself allowed the soil underneath to be exposed to the atmosphere, improved the quality of the soil.

Once the “three-field method” was employed, the land’s ability to rejuvenate increased. At any one time two-thirds of the manorial land was under cultivation and the remaining one-third lay fallow, or unplanted. Local needs, the fertility of the soil, and dietary customs determined what was planted.

The introduction of a species of winter-wheat dramatically improved the nutritional status of the Middle Ages. Able to survive and grow during the winter, this strain of wheat provided sustenance during the severest time of year.

The development of the padded horse collar was another key ingredient in the agricultural evolution. The horse’s greater strength and agility over the oxen brought greater efficiency to farming. Some scholars believed the use of the horse in agriculture was one of the decisive ways in which western Europe advanced over the rest of the world. With the increased yields of cereals and grains, surpluses are sold to merchants in nearby towns.

Early medieval society was traditional, agricultural and rural. The emergence of a new class as a result of the agricultural surplus brought about a social revolution. People were able to specialize in individual endeavors. The new commercial class consisted of artisans, traders and merchants, who primarily rose from the peasantry.

Towns began as places of defense, providing local farmers an area of protection during time of attack. Later, merchants were attracted to these areas because they provided an area of diversity and change. As populations increased, towns regularly rebuilt their walls, expanding the living space to accommodate growing numbers. They constituted an entirely new element in medieval society. Their occupations were different from those of the feudal nobility and the laboring peasantry. The aristocratic nobility felt superior over this new class, but was not above borrowing from them. The peasantry harbored suspicion and fear at the town dwellers.

With towns, came new customs, jobs, and coined money. Trade associations or guilds were formed to promote business. With organized membership, regulations and standards concerning business conduct were established and implemented. Quality control, the formation of insurance, import/export brokers, and measured levels of competence were some of the lasting contributions conceived by these associations. The Hanseatic League being one of the most famous trade associations.

The new bureaucratic organizations of a growing church and state needed a form of institutionalized learning. Universities responded to this need, first appearing in Bologna, Toledo, Oxford and Paris. Medieval universities were educational guilds that produced educated and trained individuals. The early methods employed by the medieval universities continue to influence learning in the Western world.

Until now, the only formal instruction available had been in the form of monasteries and cathedral schools. At the beginning of the twelfth century, thinking moved from the religious to secular. Students converged on Paris, and crowded the cathedral school of Notre Dame. One of the most famous of them was the teacher Peter Abelard, who opened the way to new thinking. Peter believed most problems could be solved by the systematic compilation of information, utilizing logic. His book Sic et Non (Yes and No) was a list of apparently contradictory propositions drawn from the Bible and the writings of the church fathers. Peter Abelard’s logic challenged, the merely asserted, theological principals. Though heavily censured by the church, Peter Abelard gained popularity among the growing students.

An enormous amount of time was devoted to producing summa, or reference books by thirteenth-century Scholastics. These collections organized knowledge pertaining to all topics. Saint Thomas Aquinas, a professor at Paris who studied Aristotle, produced the most famous collection dealing with a number of theological questions, The Summa Theologica.

Aquinas drew an important distinction between faith and reason; and effectively proved there was no conflict between faith and reason. He maintained that although reason can demonstrate many basic Christian principles such as the existence of God, other fundamental teachings such as the Trinity and original sin cannot be proved by logic. He showed that while God created science, math and logic, faith exists in the supernatural world of God. Thus, if one applies reason to faith, conflicts arise. His work later became the fundamental text of Roman Catholic doctrine.

The emergence of intellect during the fourteenth-century produced widespread use of national languages (vernacular) in both verbal communication and literature. This new-found pride is expressed in two masterpieces of European culture, Dante’s Divine Comedy, and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

Dante’s work, written in Italian as opposed to the “tragic” Latin, was named “…Comedy.” The Divine Comedy is an allegorical trilogy of one hundred cantos whose three equal parts describe one of the realms of the next world: Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. The Divine Comedy portrays contemporary and historical figures, comments on secular and ecclesiastical affairs, and draws on Scholastic philosophy.

Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories not based on religious beliefs, but rather how life really was. On a pilgrimage to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury, thirty people of various social backgrounds each tell a tale, some considered to be obscene. In depicting the interests and behavior of all types of people, Chaucer presented a true view of English social life in the fourteenth century. Like the Divine Comedy, Canterbury Tales reflected the cultural tensions of the times.

The concepts of state and law were Rome’s legacies; but lay dormant for almost five-hundred years following the collapse of the Roman Empire. By the High Middle Ages, rulers of England, France, and Germany shared common goals: To strengthen and extend royal authority within their territories, implement effective means of communication, increase revenue, and create efficient bureaucracies. The solutions to these concerns laid the foundations for modern national states.

Civil wars and foreign invasions left the territories now called “France” divided into provinces and counties, each controlled by local feudal lords. After the death of the last Carolingian ruler, an assembly of nobles chose a successor. Hugh Capet, head of a powerful clan in the West Frankish kingdom, was chosen. The French royal line, the Capetians, was established by Hugh Capet.

The work of unifying France began under Louis VI’s grandson Philip II. Philip devised methods to govern the provinces and provide communication between the central government in Paris and local communities. Although each province retained its own institutions and laws, royal agents (baillis and seneschals) possessed the authority to act as official representatives of the king in the provinces.

The French government administration consisted of a professional royal bureaucracy. As new territories were added, the bureaucracy expanded. This expansion increased the need for more money. Philip created the baillis and seneschals, responsible for collecting taxes in their districts. An additional source of revenue was obtained from the church and townspeople. Tallage or the taille, a tax arbitrarily laid by the king, had to be paid.

The nation state formed an organized territory with definite geographical boundaries recognized by other states. It possessed a body of law and institutions of government. Protection, and a consistent, uniform monetary system was provided for the populations. The church is an example of the first organized nation state. The only difference being it had no boundaries.

Throughout the Middle Ages the RCC continued to build materialistic and political power, culminating in corruption and misuse of authority within the RCC. The eleventh century witnessed the beginnings of a remarkable religious revival.

Conflict between the RCC and Henry IV in the Holy Roman Empire, William the Conqueror in England, and Philip I in France reached heightened proportions under Pope Gregory VII. Though the papal reform movement is frequently called the “Gregorian reform movement,” after Pope Gregory VII. Once in power, the reform of the papacy took on a new dimension. His goal was not just the moral regeneration of the clergy and centralization of the church under papal authority. Gregory and his assistants began to insist on the “freedom of the church.” By this they meant freedom from control and interference by laymen. This concept of freedom from the church signals the end of lay investiture, the selection and appointment of church officials by secular authority. Pope Gregory VII believed ultimate power belonged to the papacy, and used excommunication in an attempt to intimidate and manipulate the lords into accepting this view.

Pope Urban II laid the real foundations for the papal monarchy by reorganizing the central government for the Roman church, the papal writing office (the Chancery), and papal finances. He recognized the college of cardinals as a definite consultative body. These agencies, together with the papal chapel, constituted the papal court, or curia, the papacy’s administrative bureaucracy and its court of law. The papal curia was the first well-organized institution of monarchial authority in medieval Europe. Though Pope Urban made significant strides, he continued in Pope Gregory’s direction, desiring power over the lords. In an unsuccessful attempt at gaining total authority over the monarchs, Pope Urban started the Crusades.

Monasteries, always the leaders in ecclesiastical reform, remodeled themselves under the leadership of the Burgundian abbey of Cluny, established in 909 by William the Pious. Cluny, independent of RCC authority, represented clerical celibacy and the suppression of simony, the sale of church offices.

Reform also came from outside the church. As the commercial revolution of the High Middle Ages fostered urban development, the towns experienced an enormous growth of heresy. The term heresy, which derives from the Greek haireses, meaning “individual choosing,” came to be applied to the position of a Christian who chose and stubbornly held to doctrinal error in defiance of church authority. In its struggle against heresy, the church gained the support of two remarkable men, Saint Dominic and Saint Francis.

Saint Dominic started a group known as the “Preaching Friars,” and won papal recognition as a new religious order. In order to preach effectively, they had to study, so Saint Dominic sent his recruits to the universities for training in theology.

Saint Francis, inspired by two biblical texts, Matthew 19:21 and Luke 9:3, set out to live and preach the Gospel in absolute poverty. The simplicity, humility, and joyful devotion with which Saint Francis carried out his mission soon attracted others. Although he resisted pressure to establish an order, he developed the “Rule of the Little Brothers of Saint Francis,” which the papacy approved.

The new Dominican and Franciscan orders differed significantly from older monastic orders. First, they were friars, not monks. They worked in cities and university towns, not in the secluded and cloistered world of the monastery. Second, the friars stressed apostolic poverty, a life based on the Gospel’s teachings. They owned no property and depended on Christian people for their material needs; thus they were called mendicants, begging friars.

Reform did not take place without its share of problems. The Great Schism, which divided Western Christendom until 1417, came about when internal conflicts allowed two Popes to reside office at the same time. Pope Urban VI at Rome and the “anti-pope,” Pope Clement VII, in Avignon, France. The powers of Europe aligned themselves with Urban or Clement strictly on political lines.

At a time when ordinary Christians needed the consolation of religion and confidence in religious leaders, church officials were fighting among themselves for power.

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