The Middle Ages

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The Middle Ages

• Steve Wood
• TCCC

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The Middle Ages

• To understand the Middle Ages, lets start with
  the name itself.
• What exactly were these ages in the middle of?

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The Middle Ages

• The Middle Ages is a period of time lasting for
  roughly 1000 years, from approximately AD
  500-1500.
• They were called Middle Ages because they were
  between the Classical world of ancient Greek and
  Roman civilization and the modern world beginning
  with the Renaissance.

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The Dark Ages

• Unfortunately, the name often gives rise to the
  belief that the Middle Ages are a cultural valley
  between the two peaks of Roman culture and the
  European Renaissance.
• That is why some refer to the Middle Ages,
  especially the first few centuries, as the Dark
  Ages.

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The Dark Ages

• The reality is that the Middle Ages was a time of
  great change in Western Europe.
• Some of those changes were positive, some
  negative, while most of them were painful and
  disruptive.

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Filling the Void

• The Roman Empire, which had dominated the region
  for several centuries, had begun to dissolve.
• Because Nature abhors a vacuum, the void left by
  the Romans was eventually filled by a number of
  social, political, and religious institutions.
• It is these institutions such as chivalry,
  feudalism, and the church -- that we most often
  think of when we think of the Middle Ages.

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Dating the Middle Ages

• Precise dates for the beginning and end of any
  historical period can be difficult however,
  there are two dates that serve as convenient
  markers for the Middle Ages A.D 476 and A.D.
  1453.
• Both dates are associated with the fall of the
  Roman empire.

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The Roman Empire

• At the zenith of their power, the Romans ruled
  the world from Britain to the northern Africa,
  from Spain to the Holy Land and beyond.

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A Divided Empire

• The Roman Empire had been split in two since the
  late 200s (the reign of Diocletian). Subsequent
  emperors, especially Constantine, had tried to
  reunite the halves, although pressure from
  various groups of barbarians had shrunk the
  empire in the west.
• Finally, in 395, Theodosius formally split the
  empire in two parts the western Roman empire
  centered on Rome and the eastern Byzantine empire
  centered on Constantinople.

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Foundations of Empire

• Humanitas (social heroism) subordination of the
  individual to the social good
• Pietas (piety) subordination of the human will
  to the divine
• Gravitas (self-restraint) intellectual
  integrity
• Virtus (masculine virtue) strength, courage,
  military prowess

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Pax Romana

• The Romans pacified much of the world by ruling
  fairly, but also brutally.
• The Pax Romana was not totally peaceful, but
  Rome itself was largely safe and orderly even
  though the question of succession rose again and
  again. Relatively speaking, Pax Romana was the
  most peaceful two centuries of human history.
  Human frailty brought this period to an end it
  is still with us. Harry Rosenberg, here.

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A.D. 476

• In 476, the last emperor of the western Roman
  empire, a boy named Romulus Augustulus, is
  deposed by the barbarian king Odacer. Odacer
  then sent word to the eastern Roman Emperor Zeno
  that no replacement emperor was needed.
• This date is often used as the beginning of the
  Middle Ages as various forces struggled to fill
  the cultural, political, military, and social
  void left by the Romans.

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The Example of Law

• For example, the Roman concept of law, to which
  the English and American systems owe a great
  deal, had once help tie together an empire of
  disparate cultures.
• Roman law was founded on three principles
• Single sovereignty law should come from a
  single source
• Universality all citizens are under the same
  laws
• Equity circumstances should alter the
  individual application of laws

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The Example of Law

• This system was replaced by the Germanic trial by
  combat or the trial by ordeal.
• Trial by combat meant that the two parties in a
  legal dispute fought, and the winner was the
  legal victor. In some cases, a representative of
  the king would fight.

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The Example of Law

• Trial by ordeal involved various forms of
  physical torture. For example, someone accused
  of stealing would be forced to grasp a red-hot
  iron bar. Based on how the wound healed, the
  accused was declared innocent or not.
• Both of these trials were based on the belief
  that the gods would insure the just outcome.

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Filling the Void

• Three of the forces that eventually filled the
  void left by the Romans were
• Feudalism
• Chivalry
• Christianity

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Feudalismfrom Britain Express.com

• Feudalism in practice meant that the country was
  not governed by the king but by individual lords,
  or barons, who administered their own estates,
  dispensed their own justice, minted their own
  money, levied taxes and tolls, and demanded
  military service from vassals. Usually the lords
  could field greater armies than the king. In
  theory the king was the chief feudal lord, but in
  reality the individual lords were supreme in
  their own territory. Many kings were little more
  than figurehead rulers.

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Feudalismfrom Britain Express.com

• Feudalism was built upon a relationship of
  obligation and mutual service between vassals and
  lords. A vassal held his land, or fief, as a
  grant from a lord. When a vassal died, his heir
  was required to publicly renew his oath of
  faithfulness (fealty) to his lord (suzerain).
  This public oath was called "homage".

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Feudalismfrom Britain Express.com

• The vassal was required to attend the lord at
  his court, help administer justice, and
  contribute money if needed. He must answer a
  summons to battle, bringing an agreed upon number
  of fighting men. As well, he must feed and house
  the lord and his company when they travelled
  across his land.

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Feudalismfrom Britain Express.com

• This last obligation could be an onerous one.
  William the Conqueror travelled with a very large
  household, and if they extended their stay it
  could nearly bankrupt the lord hosting them. In a
  few days of Christmas feasting one year William
  and his retinue consumed 6,000 chickens, 1,000
  rabbits, 90 boars, 50 peacocks, 200 geese, 10,000
  eels, thousands of eggs and loaves of bread, and
  hundreds of casks of wine and cider.

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Feudalismfrom Britain Express.com

• On the lord's side, he was obliged to protect
  the vassal, give military aid, and guard his
  children. If a daughter inherited, the lord
  arranged her marriage. If there were no heirs the
  lord disposed of the fief as he chose.

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Important Feudal Terms

• Fief or feodum the land itself that was the
  basis for the feudal system
• Homage the ceremony in which a vassal would
  swear an oath of fealty to his lord
• Fealty the two-way obligation between lord and
  vassal
• Primogeniture the inheritance of the fief and
  the attendant oaths by the eldest son
• Perfidy oath-breaking

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Chivalry

• The warrior codes of the tribes who replaced the
  Romans in western Europe eventually became the
  practice known as chivalry.

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Chivalry

• The term chivalry comes from the French
  chevalier, which meant Horseman.
• Thus, originally, chivalry referred to the
  military tactics of the mounted soldier or
  knight.
• Along the way, though, a whole series of social
  and religious conventions were attached to the
  process.

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Chivalryfrom Britain Express.com

• After the lord on the social ladder came the
  knight. The path to knighthood began at the age
  of seven, when a vassal sent his son to the
  lord's house to become a page. For seven years a
  page was cared for by the women of the house, who
  instructed him in comportment, courtesy,
  cleanliness, and religion.At 14 the page became a
  squire, a personal attendant to a knight. From
  the knight he learned riding and all the skills
  of war, as well as hunting, hawking, and other
  sports.

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Chivalryfrom Britain Express.com

• When he was judged ready (generally between the
  ages of 18 and 21) the squire was knighted in a
  religious ceremony after spending the night
  guarding his armour before a church altar. He had
  to swear to the knightly code which asked him to
  protect the weak, defenseless, and helpless, and
  fight for the general welfare of all.

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The Duties of a Knightfrom John of Salisbury

• But what is the office of the duly ordained
  soldiery? To defend the Church, to assail
  infidelity, to venerate the priesthood, to
  protect the poor from injuries, to pacify the
  province, to pour out their blood for their
  brothers (as the formula of their oath instructs
  them), and, if need be, to lay down their lives.

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Christianity

• The third force will helped fill the void left by
  the Roman Empire is Christianity, which also had
  a great impact on the other two forces.
• From its beginnings in Jerusalem, Christianity
  had begun to spread throughout the Roman Empire.

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Christianity A.D. 185
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Christianity in the Roman Empire

• AD 303 Emperor Diocletian tries to purge
  Christianity from the empire the Great
  Persecution.
• AD 312 Emperor Constantine converts to
  Christianity.

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Christianity in the Roman Empire

• AD 313 Emperor Constantine issues Edict of Milan,
  which declares toleration of all religions in the
  empire.

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Christianity in the Roman Empire

• AD 361 Emperor Julian tries to abolish
  Christianity in the empire, but Christians
  revolt.
• AD 391 Emperor Theodosius makes Christianity the
  official religion of the empire, and all pagan
  religions are outlawed.
• AD 395 As the empire splits upon the death of
  Theodosius, so, in effect, does the church.

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Christianity A.D. 600
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Filling the Void

• As Christianity spread through what had been the
  Roman empire and gained footholds with the
  various Germanic tribes in western Europe, it
  came to fulfill many important social functions,
  including education, historical record-keeping,
  and local political structure.

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A.D. 1453

• The date generally given as the end of the Middle
  Ages is 1453, which is the date of the fall of
  Constantinople and of the eastern Roman Empire.
• This fall is significant because many scholars
  and texts made their way from Constantinople to
  the west, thus helping to touch off the
  Renaissance.