Parts of Chapters 14 and 15

2. Plan for Today:
• Continue Chapter 14; Start 15
• Everyday Life (14)
• The Crusades (14)
• The Renaissance (15)
• Crisis in the Late Middle Ages (14)
• Reformation (15)
• Next Time
• European Global Expansion (16)

3. Everyday Life of the People
• Peasants of the Medieval period made up 90% of the population
• Largely concerned with agricultural production for their local lord
• Changing borders and consolidation into new kingdoms had little impact on
their lives, except when?
• Largely lived in villages under the Manorial System (see last class)
• Child mortality was high, 1/3 to 1/2 died before the age of 5
• Labor
• Men and boys often cleared land, plowed, and cared for larger animals
• Plowing was done by men, then oxen, then later horses
• Women and girls cared for small animals, spun thread, and prepared food
• Everyone was involved in the harvest and the planting
• Diet – Mostly Bread, some vegetables, rarely meat (why?)
• Drank water and ale (beer)(why beer?)

4. Everyday Life of the People
• Nobles
• Paid little (comparatively) in taxes, mostly serving as intermediaries, collecting
taxes for the nobles up the pyramid
• Main duties were military in nature, to prepare for and serve in the wars of
their liege lords (those they were vassals of)
• Chivalry – a code to govern Knights, usually centering around Christianity, protecting
countrymen, and later bravery, generosity, honor, graciousness, mercy, and gallantry
toward women
• Appointed administrators
• Noblewomen ran the household, and managed all of the affairs when their
husbands were away

5. Everyday Life of the People
• Towns and Cities
• Began to grow alongside the growing population
• Served as commercial centers, and centers for law and rule
• Serfs could (often) earn their independence if they fled to a city, were able to find
work, and evade recapture for a year and a day
• Craft Guilds arise to establish quality and prices for produced goods
• Trade increased between cities, with networks developing
• Hanseatic League – Cities in Central, Northern, and Eastern Europe
• Venice and sea trade with the Islamic kingdoms
• What do you think medieval cities were like to live in?
• 1100 CE
• London – 20,000
• Paris – 50,000
• Constantinople – 500k-800k
• Cordoba – 400,000

6. Everyday Life of the People
• Universities
• Wealthy Europeans or the Church would begin developing municipal schools
as far back as Charlemagne
• These would eventually become Universities
• Increased trade across Europe, with Constantinople, and the Muslim world brought more
ancient and contemporary texts into European Universities
• What were classes like?
• Most graduates would go on to serve as administrators within kingdoms or for
the church, some would teach, and some would continue study for higher
diplomas.
• Language
• Increased literary production meant more codified languages (French, English,
German, Italian, Polish, etc.)
• How would literary language differ from spoken?

7. Architecture - Gothic
Notre Dame, Paris
Cathedral of St.
John the Baptist in
Wrocław
This form of architecture
was popular in Europe
before the Renaissance

8. The Crusades
• Christian pilgrimages to the Holy Land had increased as that religion spread and
European population grew
• Generally, Muslim rulers allowed the pilgrims and benefitted from the tourism
• In the late 10th Century, the Seljuk Turks took over the Holy Land and stopped allowing safe
passage, even attacking pilgrims
• The Byzantine Emperor asked for help in stopping the looting
• Pope Urban II called for a Crusade in 1095
• This was also because the Catholic Church was tired of European nobles fighting each other
• Between 1096 and 1270 there were eight crusades sanctioned by the Catholic
Church
• Often the only one that is seen as successful was the first, which captured Jerusalem and set up
crusader states, many of which survived until Turkish control expanded in the region in the
1200s
• The Fourth Crusade (1202-1204) was particularly terrible, because the crusading
army never made it to the Holy Land at all, and actually ended up sacking
Constantinople itself, leaving the Byzantines broken
• The Crusades resulted in a rise in anti-Semitism in Europe, would irreparably
damage Christian-Muslim relations, and would contribute to the idea of the
conversion mission of later European states

9. The Crusades

10. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• Increased trade throughout Europe, and between Europe and the
Islamic states in N. Africa and the Middle East brought immense wealth
to Venice and other Italian Kingdoms
• Wealthy merchants, cities, kingdoms, and the Catholic Church began
commissioning artists for everything from paintings, to buildings, to
sculptures, etc.
• Writers and scholars of this time became self-aware that they were in a
new era
• They were called Humanists, and this is where we get the titles Humanities and
Liberal Arts
• They look to the classical past for guidance on the contemporary world
• Christian Humanists sought to combine these ideas with Christian teachings
• Machiavelli, Thomas More, Desiderius Erasmus (writers)

11. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• The Moveable Type Printing Press
• Although the printing press was developed separately in Korea in the 13th
Century, it developed in Europe around 1450
• Johann Gutenberg was the most famous European associated with the development of
moveable type, mostly because he began printing the Bible
• By 1500 there were (literally) millions of books in Europe
• Governments could now print and disseminate decrees and laws
• Private citizens could now simultaneously read the same book and created
groups to discuss books
• The spread of ideas (political, religious, etc.)
• Helps to develop written languages

12. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• Commissioning art becomes a way to show your wealth and prestige
• Michelangelo Buonarotti (1475-1564)
Sistine Chapel (Rome),
Ceiling (1508-1512), and
Altar (1537-1541)
David (Florence),
(1501-1504)

13. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
Last Supper (Milan), (1495-1498)
Mona Lisa, 1503
The original “Renaissance Man,” studied geometry, engineering, anatomy
and physiology, art, cartography, and other areas of science.
Bill Gates owns one of his notebooks, the Codex Leicester. He bought it in
1994 for $30.8 million ($53.2 million today).

14. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• Donatello (Donato di Niccolo di Betto Bardi, 1386-1466)
St. Mark (Florence) (1411-
1413)
St. George (Florence) (1415-1417)
David (Florence) (1430-1440)
Bronze

15. The Renaissance (Chapter 15)
• Rafael Sanzio (1483-1520)
The School of Athens
(Vatican) (1509-1511)
Disputation of the Sacrament (Vatican) (1509-1510)
Also highly sought after for portraits.

16. Crises of the Late Middle Ages(Chapter 14)
• Between 1300 and 1450
• The “Little Ice Age”
• Rain and colder temperatures than normal led to poor harvests and livestock deaths
• This caused shortages and famine
• The Black Death
• Enters Europe in 1347, first seen with the Mongols as they enter the area
• Carried by rats and transmitted between them (and humans) by fleas
• With a vast misunderstanding of how bacteria works, most people try to avoid the plague by
staying isolated, bloodletting, smelling fragrant herbs, doing penance and praying
• Kills roughly 1/3 of the population in Europe
• The Hundred Years War (1337-1453)
• Between France and England
• Joan of Arc (1412-1431) - Peasant who claimed to hear angelic voices, later made co-
commander of French forces because she inspired the French army and her visions foresaw
the coronation of Charles VII
• Lasted 116 years
• Around half of the population of Europe died during this period in total
• Peasant revolts and Papal succession issues also occurred multiple times

17. European States in the Renaissance Period
France had expelled the English out of
Normandy after the Hundred Years War
Spain is unified with the marriage of Ferdinand
(of Aragon) and Isabella (of Castile), who then
retook the last Muslim territory of Granada in
1492. They also expelled Jews from Spain.
After the Hundred Years War, England would
undergo a civil war (The War of the Roses) and
would see peace with the reign of Henry VII (a
Tudor) which began in 1485.

18. European States in the Renaissance Period
As you can see the Holy Roman Empire was not
really a unified empire. It was a group of many
small states, loosely confederated under an
“Emperor” crowned by the Pope.
During this period that emperor was from the
Habsburg family, which was very powerful
throughout Europe, with descendants on the
throne in a number of the smaller states
(including the Netherlands, and Austria) and
eventually even England and Spain.

19. The Reformation
• The initial stages of the Reformation, including Martin Luther
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eO0pPrGi6o
• Calvinism and the further ramifications of the Reformation
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbBDP1Elbbg

20. Final Thoughts
• What do you think encouraged
European powers to expand their
sea trade in the late 1400s?
• For next time:
• Reformation and Counter-Reformation
• Chapter 16 and European Globalism
• Wrapping up the course
• See you Tuesday!