500 - 1450 Major Themes, Buzz Words

1. “Christendom II”
Post Classical Western Europe
By: Janet Pareja for AP World History, 2014

2. High Middle
Ages
1000 – 1450
Change or Continuity?

3. POLITICS
Decentralized System
Holy Roman Empire
Church and State
Expansion

4. 1. Continuity: Holy Roman Empire

5. 2. CHANGE: Competition between
Independent “States”
• France:
– Hugh Capet
– (Capetian Dynasty)
– Important role of Church
in society, government
– Dynastic Monarchy
– Language: FRENCH

6. England: Norman Conquest, 1066
William the Conqueror
• Battle of Hastings
• Bayeux Tapestry
– 230 ‘ long
• Brought centralized
structure from France;
dynastic rule, aristocrats…
FRENCH language, culture.
• Domesday Book – Census,
Catalogue

7. “Normans” crossing the Channel

8. Look, it’s Halley’s Comet!

9. 3. Quest for Power:
Competition between Church and State.
Competition between Ruler and Elite.
Competition between States.
Change or Continuity?

10. 1075 – Investiture Controversy
• Who has the power to name new
people to church positions, such as
Arch-Bishop of Canterbury – a
position that is also a counselor to the
King?
• The Interdiction
England placed under an Interdiction
for five years between 1208 and 1213,
after King John refused to accept the
pope's appointee Stephen Langton as
Archbishop of Canterbury.
• Papal Inquisition
CHANGE!!

11. 1215 - Magna Carta
• King John forced to sign in a field
at Runnymeade
• Separation of Church and State
• Limited Power of the King
• Reinstated power of Feudal Lords
• Extended rule of law to Burgher
Class
• Later… Parliament with Burghers
in house of Commons deciding
trade & taxation; Lords advising
king & presiding over legislative issues

12. England Attacked France:
Hundred Years War
1337 – 1453
• French had conquered England in 1066. Now
England already occupied French-speaking
Brittany
• Joan of Arc – wakened a
sense of “nationalism”
in France; England withdrew.
• One of biggest and longest wars in
European history – but did not
change much!

13. Italy
• NOT centralized.
• Some Papal States.
• Some Northern City States
– Florence, Venice, Genoa...
– Ruled by wealthy
bankers, merchants: NOT
Royalty!!
– Traded in Mediterranean
with Arabs…

14. Germany
• NOT UNIFIED- Small
regional princedoms,
duchies.
• Strong mercantile
cities, like in Italy.
• Traded NORTH
across Baltic and
between each other.

15. Spain
• Marriage of Ferdinand &
Isabella, Aragon & Castile,
UNIFIED SPAIN - 1469
• Reconquista – 1492
• Columbus discovered
America - 1492
• Inquisition
• Started to build an
Empire on the Sea, & in
New World!
• Court: continued some
arts from pre-Reconquista
such as Minstrels…

16. Russia
• 1242 – Fell to Mongol
Invasion by Golden Horde.
• 200 years!
• 1400’s:
– Ivan the Great
• Independence from Mongols
• Declared himself “Czar”
– Ivan IV (the Terrible)
• Reign of Terror!

17. Frequent
Conquest

18. Economy
Agriculture
Population
Cities
Trade

19. Medieval Economy: Change
Agricultural Revolution, 1000 CE
– More land under production
– More crops, more variety – legumes, fertilizer
– More animals – food, beasts of burden, fish ponds
– Books about Farming – in vernacular: Almanacs
• Increased population of peasants
• Fewer hands needed on farms with new tech
• Surplus of Peasants: more born and lived
• Many entered the church, moved to cities, moved to
Eastern Europe looking for their own land

21. Effect of Environment?

22. New Class… BURGHER/ Bourgeoisie
On edges of manors, around churches or artisan
clusters, at cross roads…
• Artisans – men AND women
– Baker, Cook, Smith, Weaver, Brewer, Tailor, Shoemaker…
doctors, lawyers, furriers…
• Merchants
• Services

24. City Life: CHANGE
Town Charter
• Pay Lord a “tax” to live free in
town & specialize, earn own
livelihood
• Why did the Lord allow people
to leave the manor??? Who
would do the WORK??

25. So… Changed Social Hierarchy!
900- 1350
-Feudalism / Manorialism
continued.
-Inequality built into system,
accepted.
1000 – 1450
-People left manors and
created towns!

26. GUILDS
• Forerunners of Town Halls
• Each occupation had its own
• Set prices, trained apprentices, socialized.
• Competition over which had best guild hall
Women in Guilds?!
• Weavers, Brewers, Bakers…women’s guilds.
• Worked with husband:
– Smiths, Candles, Merchants, Physicians,
Pharmacists…
• Femmes Soles – legal independence to
own property, collect & keep rents, sell
property.
• As towns grew and after Reformation,
men came to dominate workforce, and
women became helpers or homemakers.

27. Concept of Citizenship

28. • Northern Italian City
States
– Venice, Genoa, Pisa…
– Mediterranean Sea
with Arab Merchants
• HANSA:
– Hanseatic League
– Northern German &
Norse merchant
mariners – North Sea,
Baltic, Russian
Rivers…

29. TRADE!
1. Surplus Produce
2. County Fairs, Regional Fairs

31. Social Hierarchy
Three Estates:
Those who Fight, Those who Work,
Those who Pray

32. Nobility: Those Who Fight
• RULE!
• More educated
• CHIVALRY
– loyalty, honor, ethics,
court behavior
– Protection of, respect
for women
– “Chaste love” from afar
– “Christian knights”
– Arthurian Cycle
• Eleanor of Aquitaine, 1122-1204
– Troubadors / minstrels – courtly love,
based on poetry of Moorish Spain

33. Eleanor of Aquitaine
-Wife of two kings: Louis VII
of France & Henry II of
England.
-Mother of two more:
Richard the Lionheart &
“Nasty” Prince/King John.
-Went on Second Crusade
with Louis
- Ruled England temporarily
in Richard's absence in the
Holy Land.

34. Commoners: Those Who Work
• Obedient & submissive
– Depended on Lord to eat,
work, live
– Depended on Church for
Salvation
• Agriculture on Manor,
Own field
• City Dweller with
Specialty or Service

35. Those Who Pray
• Monasteries lost importance.
• Cathedrals  Towns sprang up
• Competition for best
Gothic Cathedrals
• Education:
– Cathedral Schools  Universities
– “Latin Quarter”
– Taught only clerics, at first

36. POPES after 1000 CE: BELEAGURED!
• Losing power & influence over rulers,
but still had wealth & power over
masses
– Investiture Contest, 1075
– Crusades, 1095
– Cardinals, Bishops advised Kings
– Magna Carta – Pope tried to get it
rescinded
– Inquisition & fighting heretics
– Overindulgence & overspending during
Renaissance  Protestant Reformation
later
– Corruption & competition between
families to be Pope

37. Medieval Women

38. Art & Architecture
Minstrels,
Tapestries and Illuminated Manuscripts
Churches,
Public Buildings in Cities

39. Yes, Wikipedia!
• Medieval art was produced in many
media, and the works that remain in large
numbers include sculpture, illuminated
manuscripts, stained
glass, metalwork and mosaics, all of which
have had a higher survival rate than other
media such as fresco wall-paintings, work in
precious metals or textiles, including tapestry.

40. Detail of The Effects of Good Government, a fresco in the City Hall of Siena by
Ambrogio Lorenzetti, 1338.

41. Importance of Fine
Materials
• Gold Leaf
• Lapiz Lazuli for Blue Paint-
BVM
• Ivory carvings
• Vellum more expensive
than parchment – calf
hide rather than
sheep/goat
• Paper extremely
expensive – available last
centuries of the period
(match book size or
smaller)

43. Cathedral at Cologne

44. • Mountains
• Dense forests
• Seas
• The Dark
Monasteries gave way to
GOTHIC CATHEDRALS
in cities…. 1200’s – 13’00’s

47. • 200 years to build
• Countless lifetimes
& lives
• Fortunes of
merchants, nobility,
common people…

52. Technology
Domes
Lateen Sail, Shipbuilding
Compass, Paper
Map making
Math
Geography
Sugar and Plantations

53. Intellectual
Social Commentaries
Universities
Scholasticism
“Natural Philosophy”

54. Literature
Social
Commentary?
– Piers
Plowman
– Canterbury
Tales

55. Universities
Bologne, 1088; Paris, 1155;
Oxford, 1166; Cambridge, 1209;
Padua, 1222; Siena, 1240;
Heidelberg, 1386…

56. “Philosophy”
• Crusades  Arrival of
Greek Philosophy: Aristotle
• Scholasticism –
Integration of Aristotelian
logic with Christianity
– St. Thomas Aquinas – Proof
of God
– Moses Maimonides – Torah
– Averroes (Ibn Rushde) – “The
Commentator”
• “Natural Philosophy” –
Reason applied to world
around them = “Science”
– Francis Bacon

57. BLACK DEATH
Early – Mid 1300’s

58. Renaissance
1300’s – 1600’s