The Dark Ages is a term for the Early Middle Ages ( c. 5th –10th centuries), or occasionally the entire Middle Ages ( c. 5th –15th centuries), in Western Europe after the fall of the Western Roman Empire , which characterises it as marked by economic, intellectual, and cultural decline.
181-685: The 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. 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 ( c. 11th to 14th centuries). The alternative term late antiquity , for
362-457: A dark age, their times were still not light enough for 18th-century writers who saw themselves as living in the real Age of Enlightenment, while the period to be condemned stretched to include what we now call Early Modern times. Additionally, Petrarch's metaphor of darkness, which he used mainly to deplore what he saw as a lack of secular achievement, was sharpened to take on a more explicitly anti-religious and anti-clerical meaning. In
543-631: A science and religion historian, says the 'Dark Ages' are "according to wide-spread popular belief" portrayed as "a time of ignorance , barbarism and superstition ", for which he asserts "blame is most often laid at the feet of the Christian church". Medieval historian Matthew Gabriele echoes this view as a myth of popular culture. Andrew B. R. Elliott notes the extent to which "Middle Ages/Dark Ages have come to be synonymous with religious persecution, witch hunts and scientific ignorance". Gothic War (376%E2%80%93382) The Gothic War of 376–382
724-511: A "Dark Age" as a historiographical periodization originated in the 1330s with the Italian scholar Petrarch , who regarded the post-Roman centuries as "dark" compared to the "light" of classical antiquity . The term employs traditional light-versus-darkness imagery to contrast the era's supposed darkness (ignorance and error) with earlier and later periods of light (knowledge and understanding). The phrase Dark Age(s) itself derives from
905-521: A 'dark' age for its lack of Christianity, in the 'light' of its cultural achievements, while Petrarch's own time, allegedly lacking such cultural achievements, was seen as the age of darkness. From his perspective on the Italian peninsula, Petrarch saw the Roman period and classical antiquity as an expression of greatness. He spent much of his time traveling through Europe, rediscovering and republishing classic Latin and Greek texts. He wanted to restore
1086-673: A beast of burden. These fire-breathers, harder on the Romans than Hannibal was, have now come over to our side. Tame and submissive, they entrust their persons and their arms to us, whether the emperor wants to employ them as farmers or as soldiers. Despite these hopes, the Gothic War changed the way the Roman Empire dealt with barbarian peoples, both out of and within the imperial border. The Therving Goths would now be able to negotiate their position with Rome, with force if necessary, as
1267-468: A brief moment deprived him of his possessions and of the sweet society of his dear ones; had driven him from his home, which he saw fallen to ashes and ruins and sacrificed him to a bloody victor, either to be torn from limb to limb or amid blows and tortures to serve as a slave. The Goths, joined by their new allies the Huns and Alans, travelled south in search of plunder and close to the city of Deultum won
1448-459: A collapse, this is perceived as out of the ordinary and thus undesirable; he counters that complexity is rare in human history, a costly mode of organization that must be constantly maintained, and periods of less complexity are common and to be expected as part of the overall progression towards greater complexity. In Peter S. Wells 's 2008 book, Barbarians to Angels: The Dark Ages Reconsidered , he writes, "I have tried to show that far from being
1629-783: 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 . The Merovingians established themselves in the power vacuum of
1810-652: A line of forts in the Haemus passes to block the Goths. The Romans hoped to weaken the enemy with the rigors of winter and starvation and then lure Fritigern into open battle on the plains between the Haemus mountains and the Danube to finish him off. The Goths, once again hungry and desperate, tried to break through the passes but were repulsed each time. Fritigern then enlisted the aid of mercenary Huns and Alans , who boosted his strength. Saturninus, realizing he could no longer hold
1991-555: A message declaring his victories and his imminent arrival. Valens, who had been impatiently waiting since June for the Western Roman army, was envious of the glory of his nephew and that of Sebastianus, so when he heard that the Goths were moving south towards Adrianople, Valens decamped his army and marched there to head them off. Roman scouting erroneously reported that the Goths, who were seen raiding near Nika, numbered only 10,000 fighting men. Around 7 August Ricomer returned from
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#17327581979522172-507: A mixture of Roman Christian , Arian Christian , Nestorian Christian , and pagan . 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
2353-417: 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
2534-513: A part. It seems Theodosius regained his post as dux Mœsiae. He may have been campaigning against the Goths by late 378. On 19 January 379, Theodosius was made emperor. Sources are silent on how this happened. Whether Gratian initiated Theodosius' elevation himself or the surviving army in the East forced Gratian to accept Theodosius as his colleague is unknown. Whatever the cause, Gratian did acknowledge Theodosius as his co-emperor but promptly left for
2715-625: 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
2896-551: A period of cultural bleakness and unmitigated violence, the centuries (5th - 9th) known popularly as the Dark Ages were a time of dynamic development, cultural creativity, and long-distance networking". He writes that our "popular understanding" of these centuries "depends largely on the picture of barbarian invaders that Edward Gibbon presented more than two hundred years ago," and that this view has been accepted "by many who have read and admire Gibbon's work." David C. Lindberg ,
3077-638: A powerful army. Valens, now recognizing the seriousness of the situation from his base in Antioch, sent general Victor to negotiate an immediate peace with the Sassanids. He also began to transfer the Eastern Roman army to Thrace. While the main army mobilized, he sent ahead an advance force under Traianus and Profuturus . Valens also reached out to the Western Roman emperor Gratian , his co-emperor and nephew, for aid. Gratian responded by sending
3258-469: 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
3439-417: A siege and losing many men to missiles, they abandoned the city. Fritigern declared he now "kept peace with walls". The Goths once again dispersed to loot the rich and undefended countryside. Using prisoners and Roman traitors, the Goths were led to hidden hoards, rich villages and such places. For without distinction of age or sex all places were ablaze with slaughter and great fires, sucklings were torn from
3620-451: A small group of their attendants to dine with him inside the city. The bulk of the Goths were encamped some distance outside, with Roman troops between them and the city. Due to the persistent refusal of the Roman soldiers to allow the Goths to buy supplies in the town's market, fighting broke out and several Roman soldiers were killed and robbed. Lupicinus, having received the news as he sat at
3801-400: A time of darkness in which he saw himself living. In around 1343, in the conclusion of his epic Africa , he wrote: "My fate is to live among varied and confusing storms. But for you perhaps, if as I hope and wish you will live long after me, there will follow a better age. This sleep of forgetfulness will not last forever. When the darkness has been dispersed, our descendants can come again in
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#17327581979523982-648: 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
4163-580: A unified people inside the borders of the Empire and would transform themselves into the Visigoths . At times they would act as friends and allies to the Romans, at other times as enemies. This change in Rome's relationship with barbarians would lead to the sack of Rome in 410. The Gothic War also affected the religion of the Empire. Valens had been an Arian Christian and his death at Adrianople helped pave
4344-483: Is "rife outside of academic literature, including in newspaper articles and media debates." As to why it is used, according to Williams, legends and racial misunderstandings have been revitalized by modern nationalists, colonialists and imperialists around present-day concepts of identity, faith and origin myths i.e. appropriating historical myths for modern political ends. In a book about medievalisms in popular culture by Andrew B. R. Elliott (2017), he found "by far"
4525-561: Is a sharp drop from 34 volumes in the 9th century to just 8 in the 10th. The 11th century, with 13, evidences a certain recovery, and the 12th century, with 40, surpasses the 9th, something that the 13th, with just 26, fails to do. There was indeed a 'dark age', in Baronius's sense of a "lack of writers", between the Carolingian Renaissance in the 9th century and the beginnings, sometime in the 11th, of what has been called
4706-517: 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
4887-647: The comes domesticorum Ricomer and the comes rei militaris Frigeridus to guard the western passes through the Haemus mountains with their soldiers. The aim was to contain the Goths from spreading westward and for the two forces to join up eventually with the East Roman army . These huge movements of troops and the cooperation of the West spoke to the grave threat the Goths posed. Traianus and Profuturus arrived leading troops of Armenians, but Frigeridus, leading
5068-799: The Battle of Deultum destroying most of the Eastern Roman army and the city. Barzimeres, tribunum scutariorum (Commander of the Guards), was killed and Equitius, cura palatii (Marshal of the Court), was captured. The Goths marched on Augusta Trajana to attack the general Frigiderus but his scouts detected the invaders and he promptly withdrew to Illyria but the city was also destroyed. Equitius later managed to escape from captivity. Archaeological finds in this region and dated to this period reveal Roman villas with signs of abandonment and deliberate destruction. The devastation forced Valens to officially reduce taxes on
5249-482: The Battle of Marcianople and were annihilated. All the junior officers were killed, the military standards were lost and the Goths secured new weapons and armor from the dead Roman soldiers. Lupicinus survived and escaped back to Marcianople. The Thervings then raided and pillaged throughout the region. At Adrianople a small Gothic force employed by the Romans was garrisoned under the command of Sueridus and Colias, who were themselves Goths. When they received news of
5430-637: 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 . The arrival of the Huns in 372–375 ended the history of these kingdoms. The Huns, a confederation of central Asian tribes, founded an empire. They had mastered
5611-656: The Burgundians and bands of the Alamanni . In the fit of anti-barbarian hysteria which followed, the Western Roman Emperor Honorius had Stilicho summarily beheaded (408). Stilicho submitted his neck, "with a firmness not unworthy of the last of the Roman generals ", wrote Gibbon. Honorius was left with only worthless courtiers to advise him. In 410, the Visigoths led by Alaric I captured
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5792-593: The Catholic Church , such as popes ruling as kings, veneration of saints' relics , a licentious priesthood and institutionalized moral hypocrisy. In response to the Protestants , Catholics developed a counter-image to depict the High Middle Ages in particular as a period of social and religious harmony and not 'dark' at all. The most important Catholic reply to the Magdeburg Centuries
5973-705: The Danube River , the border of the Roman Empire, requesting asylum from the Huns . There were two groups: the Thervings led by Fritigern and Alavivus and the Greuthungi led by Alatheus and Saphrax . Eunapius states their number as 200,000 including civilians, but Peter Heather estimates that the Thervings may have had only 10,000 warriors and 50,000 people in total, with the Greuthungi about
6154-585: The Dnieper . By the 9th century, the Slavs had expanded into sparsely inhabited territories to the south and east from these natural frontiers, peacefully assimilating the indigenous Illyrian and Finnic populations. From the 7th century, Byzantine history was greatly affected by the rise of Islam and the Caliphates . Muslim Arabs first invaded historically Roman territory under Abū Bakr , first Caliph of
6335-623: The Frankish leader Charles Martel at the Battle of Poitiers in 732. The Umayyads were overthrown in 750 by the Abbāsids and most of the Umayyad clan were massacred. A surviving Umayyad prince, Abd-ar-rahman I , escaped to Spain and founded a new Umayyad dynasty in the Emirate of Cordoba in 756. Charles Martel's son Pippin the Short retook Narbonne , and his grandson Charlemagne established
6516-509: The Gothic War (376–382) , the Goths revolted and confronted the main Roman army in the Battle of Adrianople (378). By this time, the distinction in the Roman army between Roman regulars and barbarian auxiliaries had broken down, and the Roman army was composed mainly of barbarians and soldiers recruited for a single campaign. The general decline in discipline also led to the use of smaller shields and lighter weaponry. Not wanting to share
6697-593: The Greek-speaking successor to the classical Roman Empire. The inhabitants continued to regard themselves as Romans, or Romaioi , until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. Despite this, to distinguish it from its predominantly Latin-speaking predecessor, historians began referring to the empire as "Byzantine", after the original name of Constantinople, Byzantium The Eastern Roman or "Byzantine" Empire aimed to retain control of
6878-644: The Lentienses into Gaul in February 378, which Gratian defeated at the battle of Argentovaria . Then intelligence came from the other side of the Rhine warning of barbarian preparations for more invasions. This forced Gratian to preemptively cross the river himself and bring the situation under control as he successfully defeated the Alemanni . This took time however, and it was not until August that Gratian sent
7059-736: The Macedonian dynasty in 867 marked the end of the period of political and religious turmoil and introduced a new golden age of the empire. While the talented generals such as Nicephorus Phocas expanded the frontiers, the Macedonian emperors (such as Leo the Wise and Constantine VII ) presided over the cultural flowering in Constantinople, known as the Macedonian Renaissance . The enlightened Macedonian rulers scorned
7240-885: The Marca Hispanica across the Pyrenees in part of what today is Catalonia , reconquering Girona in 785 and Barcelona in 801. The Umayyads in Hispania proclaimed themselves caliphs in 929. Climatic conditions in Western Europe began to improve after 700. In that year, the two major powers in western Europe were the Franks in Gaul and the Lombards in Italy. The Lombards had been thoroughly Romanized, and their kingdom
7421-632: The Moors (mostly Berbers and some Arabs ) invaded the Christian Visigothic Kingdom in the year 711, under their Berber leader Tariq ibn Ziyad . They landed at Gibraltar on 30 April and worked their way northward. Tariq's forces were joined the next year by those of his superior, Musa ibn Nusair . During the eight-year campaign most of the Iberian Peninsula was brought under Muslim rule—except for small areas in
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7602-609: The Plague of Justinian . The Emperor himself was afflicted, and within the span of less than a year, an estimated 200,000 Constantinopolites—two out of every five city residents—had died of the disease. Justinian's successors Maurice and Heraclius confronted invasions by the Avar and Slavic tribes. After the devastations by the Slavs and the Avars, large areas of the Balkans became depopulated. In 626 Constantinople, by far
7783-635: 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. Chalcedonian Christianity had barely started to spread in northern Europe by this time. Through
7964-604: The Rashidun Caliphate , who entered Roman Syria and Roman Mesopotamia . The Byzantines and neighbouring Persian Sasanids had been severely weakened by a long succession of Byzantine–Sasanian wars , especially the climactic Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 . Under Umar , the second Caliph, the Muslims decisively conquered Syria and Mesopotamia , as well as Roman Palestine , Roman Egypt , parts of Asia Minor and Roman North Africa , while they entirely toppled
8145-484: The Renaissance of the 12th century . Furthermore, there was an earlier period of "lack of writers" during the 7th and 8th centuries. Therefore, in Western Europe, two 'dark ages' can be identified, separated by the brilliant but brief Carolingian Renaissance. Baronius' 'dark age' seems to have struck historians, for it was in the 17th century that the term started to spread to various European languages, with his original Latin term saeculum obscurum being reserved for
8326-419: The arrival of Christian missionaries in 597 . 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
8507-415: The river Hebrus and slaughtered most of them. The loot Sebastianus brought back was, according to Ammianus, too much for Adrianople to hold. Sebastianus' success convinced Fritigern to recall his raiding parties to the area of Cabyle , lest they be picked off piecemeal. Western Roman Emperor Gratian had meant to join up with Valens' army but events in the West detained him. First there was an invasion by
8688-403: The "rubbish of the Dark Ages". Yet just as Petrarch, seeing himself at the cusp of a "new age", was criticising the centuries before his own time, so too were Enlightenment writers. Consequently, an evolution had occurred in at least three ways. Petrarch's original metaphor of light versus dark has expanded over time, implicitly at least. Even if later humanists no longer saw themselves living in
8869-414: The 'Dark Ages'. These banal uses are little more than tropes that inherently contain a criticism about lack of progress. Elliott connects 'Dark Ages' to the " Myth of Progress ", also observed by Joseph Tainter , who says, "There is genuine bias against so-called 'Dark Ages'" because of a modern belief that society normally traverses from lesser to greater complexity, and when complexity is reduced during
9050-412: The 16th and 17th centuries, Protestants generally had a similar view to Renaissance humanists such as Petrarch, but also added an anti-Catholic perspective. They saw classical antiquity as a golden time not only because of its Latin literature but also because it witnessed the beginnings of Christianity. They promoted the idea that the 'Middle Age' was a time of darkness also because of corruption within
9231-498: The 1990s by historians of early medieval Britain, for example in the title of the 1991 book by Ann Williams , Alfred Smyth and D. P. Kirby , A Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain, England, Scotland and Wales, c.500–c.1050 , and in the comment by Richard Abels in 1998 that the greatness of Alfred the Great "was the greatness of a Dark Age king". In 2020, John Blair , Stephen Rippon and Christopher Smart observed that: "The days when archaeologists and historians referred to
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#17327581979529412-450: 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 c. 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
9593-421: The 8th century was out, the Farmer's Law signalled the resurrection of agricultural technologies in the Roman Empire. As the 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica noted, "the technological base of Byzantine society was more advanced than that of contemporary western Europe: iron tools could be found in the villages; water mills dotted the landscape; and field-sown beans provided a diet rich in protein". The ascension of
9774-408: The Anglo-Saxons in the sixth century, with 597 given as the traditional date for its large-scale adoption. Western 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
9955-430: The Dark Ages, the clergy were supreme." The OED in 1894 defined an uncapitalised "dark ages" as "a term sometimes applied to the period of the Middle Ages to mark the intellectual darkness characteristic of the time". Since the Late Middle Ages significantly overlap with the Renaissance, the term 'Dark Ages' became restricted to distinct times and places in medieval Europe . Thus the 5th and 6th centuries in Britain , at
10136-409: The Early Middle Ages, reducing the sprawling city to groups of inhabited buildings interspersed among large areas of ruins and vegetation. The death of Theodosius I in 395 was followed by the division of the empire between his two sons. The Western Roman Empire disintegrated into a mosaic of warring Germanic kingdoms in the 5th century, effectively making the Eastern Roman Empire in Constantinople
10317-421: The East, Julius, feared the Gothic populations elsewhere in the Eastern Roman Empire, both civilians and those Goths serving within army units across the Empire. After the events of Adrianople, they could ally themselves to Fritigern and spread the crisis to even more provinces. Julius therefore had those Goths near the frontier lured together and massacred. By 379, word reached the Goths in the interior provinces of
10498-400: The East, far away from the Danube. Ancient sources are unanimous that Valens was pleased at the appearance of the Goths, as it offered the opportunity of new soldiers at low cost. With Valens committed to action on the Eastern frontier, the appearance of a large number of barbarians meant his skeleton force in the Balkans were outnumbered. Valens must have appreciated the danger when he gave
10679-424: The Eastern Roman army. Sebastianus set out with a small force, drawn from the Emperor's own Scholae Palatinae , to engage separated Gothic raiding bands. He went first to Adrianople and such was the fear of the roving Goths, the city needed much persuasion to open its gates to him. After this, Sebastianus scored a few small victories. In one instance, he waited until nightfall to ambush a sleeping Gothic warband along
10860-489: 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
11041-483: The Goths could not be militarily defeated, sold the peace as a victory for the Romans who had won the Goths over to their side and turned them into farmers and allies. He believed that in time the barbarian Goths would become steadfast Romans themselves like the barbarian Galatians had before them. For just suppose that this destruction was an easy matter and that we possessed the means to accomplish it without suffering any consequences, although from past experience this
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#173275819795211222-472: The Goths. The Roman left flank was surrounded and destroyed and a rout began all along the lines which became a bloodbath for the Roman forces. They were so tightly packed they could not maneuver and some could not lift their arms at all. Few managed to run. And so the barbarians, their eyes blazing with frenzy, were pursuing our men, in whose veins the blood was chilled with numb horror: some fell without knowing who struck them down, others were buried beneath
11403-416: The Latin saeculum obscurum , originally applied by Caesar Baronius in 1602 when he referred to a tumultuous period in the 10th and 11th centuries. The concept thus came to characterize the entire Middle Ages as a time of intellectual darkness in Europe between the fall of Rome and the Renaissance , and became especially popular during the 18th-century Age of Enlightenment . Others, however, have used
11584-441: The Latin language to its former purity. Renaissance humanists saw the preceding 900 years as a time of stagnation, with history unfolding not along the religious outline of Saint Augustine 's Six Ages of the World , but in cultural (or secular) terms through progressive development of classical ideals , literature , and art . Petrarch wrote that history had two periods: the classic period of Greeks and Romans , followed by
11765-422: 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. The Eastern Roman Empire, or Byzantine Empire , survived, though in the 7th century the Rashidun Caliphate and the Umayyad Caliphate conquered
11946-447: The Pannonian and the transalpine auxiliaries, fell ill from gout. Ricomer, having led a force cut from Gratian's palatine army, took command of the combined forces by the mutual consent of the other leaders, probably at Marcianople. The Goths withdrew north of the Haemus mountains, and the Romans moved to engage. At a place called Ad Salices ("The Willows"), they fought the Battle of the Willows . The Romans were outnumbered, and during
12127-426: The Roman Empire, including Rome and the Italian peninsula itself, but he also codified Roman law (with his codification remaining in force in many areas of Europe until the 19th century) and commissioned the building of the largest and most architecturally advanced edifice of the Early Middle Ages, the Hagia Sophia . However, his reign also saw the outbreak of a bubonic plague pandemic , now known retroactively as
12308-404: The Roman formations. Valens reconsidered the peace offer and was preparing to send Ricomer to meet with Fritigern when two Roman elite Scholae Palatinae units, the Scutarii under Cassio and the Sagittarii under Bacurius , engaged the Goths without orders. This forced the Battle of Adrianople to begin. As the armies engaged, the Greuthungi and Alan cavalry arrived and swung the battle in favor of
12489-438: The Roman military writer Ammianus Marcellinus . The core army of the Eastern Roman Empire was destroyed, Valens was killed, and the Goths were freed to lay waste to the Balkans , including the armories along the Danube. As Edward Gibbon comments, "The Romans, who so coolly and so concisely mention the acts of justice which were exercised by the legions, reserve their compassion and their eloquence for their own sufferings, when
12670-400: The Roman state, a night without the bright light of the moon put an end. Sebastianus, Traianus, tribune Aequitius and thirty-five senior officers had been slain, while Ricomer, Victor and Saturninus had escaped. Two-thirds of the Eastern Roman army lay dead upon the field. There are conflicting stories as to what happened to the Emperor himself. One claims that he was wounded and dragged off
12851-406: The Romans in charge accepted bribes, the Romans did not have the manpower to check all of the incoming warriors, or warriors recruited into the Roman army would need their own arms, many Goths were allowed to retain their weapons. The Romans placed the Thervings along the southern bank of the Danube in Lower Mœsia as they waited for the land allocations to begin. In the interim, the Roman state
13032-466: The Romans retreated to Marcianople, and the Goths of Fritigern spent seven days within their wagon fort before moving out. Frigeridus destroyed and enslaved a band of marauding Goths under Farnobius and sent the survivors to Italy. That autumn, Ricomer returned to Gaul to collect more troops for the next year's campaign. Valens meanwhile sent soldiers under magister equitum Saturninus to Thrace to join up with Traianus . Saturninus and Traianus erected
13213-524: The Romans would have to stay mobilized so that he could enforce the peace on his own people. Whether Fritigern was earnest or not is unknown, as Valens rejected the proposal. On the morning of 9 August, Valens left his treasury, imperial seal and civilian officials in Adrianople and marched north to engage the Goths. At around two in the afternoon the Romans came within sight of the Gothic wagon fort. Unlike
13394-412: The Romans, the Goths were well rested and the two sides drew up into battle formations. Fritigern sent more peace envoys and had long since sent for the aid of the Greuthungi cavalry under Alatheus and Saphrax who were separated from the main Gothic body. These remained undetected by Roman scouts. The Eastern Roman army withered under the hot summer sun and the Goths lit fires to blow smoke and ash into
13575-828: The Sasanids. In the mid 7th century, following the Muslim conquest of Persia , Islam penetrated into the Caucasus region, of which parts would later permanently become part of Russia . This expansion of Islam continued under Umar's successors and then the Umayyad Caliphate , which conquered the rest of Mediterranean North Africa and most of the Iberian Peninsula . Over the next centuries Muslim forces were able to take further European territory, including Cyprus , Malta , Septimania , Crete , and Sicily and parts of southern Italy . The Muslim conquest of Hispania began when
13756-526: The Therving Goths to grow rebellious and Lupicinus decided to move them south to Marcianople , his regional headquarters. To guard the march south, Lupicinus was forced to pull out the Roman troops guarding the Danube, which allowed the Greuthungi promptly to cross into Roman territory. The Thervings then deliberately slowed their march to allow the Greuthungi to catch up. As the Thervings approached Marcianople, Lupicinus invited Fritigern, Alavivus and
13937-462: The Thervings permission to enter the empire and the terms he gave them were highly favorable. This was not the first time barbarian tribes had been settled; the usual course was that some would be recruited into the army and the rest would be broken up into small groups and resettled across the empire at the Emperor's discretion. This would keep them from posing a unified threat and assimilate them into
14118-479: The Thervings were free to force the local Roman cities in this new region to pay them tribute. It was then that the Western Roman Empire finally offered some help. Having ended the Gothic invasion of Pannonia, Gratian met Theodosius at Sirmium and directed his generals Arbogast and Bauto to help drive the Goths back into Thrace, which they successfully accomplished by the summer of 381. Theodosius meanwhile left for Constantinople, where he stayed. After years of war,
14299-667: The West to deal with the Alemanni. Gratian offered little help to Theodosius for dealing with the Goths, outside of giving him control of the Western imperial dioceses of Dacia and Macedonia . Theodosius set about recruiting a new army at his headquarters in Thessalonica . Farmers were drafted, and barbarian mercenaries from beyond the Danube were bought. The drafting of farmers created much resentment. Some mutilated their own thumbs, but many more hid themselves or deserted with
14480-475: The West with the Western armies' advanced guard and a new message: Gratian was nearing the Succi pass which led to Adrianople and he advised his uncle to wait for him. Valens called a council of war to decide the issue. According to Ammianus, Sebastianus advocated for an immediate assault upon the Goths and that Victor cautioned to wait for Gratian. According to Eunapius, Sebestianus said they should wait. In any case,
14661-478: The age 'dark' because of the paucity of written records. The "lack of writers" he referred to may be illustrated by comparing the number of volumes in Migne 's Patrologia Latina containing the work of Latin writers from the 10th century (the heart of the age he called 'dark') with the number containing the work of writers from the preceding and succeeding centuries. A minority of these writers were historians. There
14842-416: The banquet with the Gothic leaders, ordered Fritigern and Alavivus held hostage and their retainers executed. When news of the killings came to the Goths outside, they prepared to assault Marcianople. Fritigern advised Lupicinus that the best way to calm the situation was to allow him to rejoin his people and show them that he was still alive. Lupicinus agreed and set him free. Alavivus is not mentioned again in
15023-409: The battle, their left wing began to collapse. Only with hasty reinforcements and Roman discipline was the situation retrieved. The battle lasted until dusk, when the opposing armies ceased combat and left the field. The Goths withdrew into their wall of wagons , leaving the battle a bloody draw. Both sides counted heavy losses, including Profuturus, who was slain on the battlefield. After the battle,
15204-458: The characteristic findings of smallpox. Waves of epidemics wiped out large rural populations. 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. Around 100 AD, it had a population of about 450,000, and declined to a mere 20,000 during
15385-410: The city and stirred them against the garrison. The mob demanded that the Goths follow orders and leave immediately. The men under Sueridus and Colias initially stood still but when they were pelted with curses and missiles from the mob, attacked and killed many. The Gothic garrison left the city and joined Fritigern, and the Goths besieged Adrianople. But lacking the equipment and the experience to conduct
15566-407: The city but when their stories did not match, they were imprisoned and tortured. They confessed to the trap and were beheaded. The Goths launched another assault but it too failed. With this final defeat, the Goths gave up and marched away. They together with some Huns and Alans went first to Perinthus and then to Constantinople. There they were fended off in the small battle of Constantinople with
15747-472: The city of Rome and for three days fire and slaughter ensued as bodies filled the streets, palaces were stripped of their valuables, and the invaders interrogated and tortured those citizens thought to have hidden wealth. As newly converted Christians, the Goths respected church property, but those who found sanctuary in the Vatican and in other churches were the fortunate few. The Goths and Vandals were only
15928-517: The council and Valens decided to attack immediately, egged on by court flatterers of the easy victory to come. The Goths sent envoys led by a Christian priest to the Romans to negotiate on the night of 8 August. With them Fritigern sent two letters. The first stipulated that the Goths only wanted lands in Thrace and in exchange would ally themselves to the Romans. The second letter, privately addressed to Valens, said that Fritigern truly wanted peace but
16109-707: The culture and the imperial traditions of the Eastern Roman Empire attracted its northern neighbours—Slavs, Bulgars, and Khazars—to Constantinople , in search of either pillage or enlightenment. The movement of the Germanic tribes to the south triggered the great migration of the Slavs , who occupied the vacated territories. In the 7th century, they moved westward to the Elbe , southward to the Danube and eastward to
16290-494: 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
16471-687: The decisive victory at Ongala in 680 the armies of the Bulgars and Slavs advanced to the south of the Balkan mountains, defeating again the Byzantines who were then forced to sign a humiliating peace treaty which acknowledged the establishment of the First Bulgarian Empire on the borders of the Empire. To counter these threats a new system of administration was introduced. The regional civil and military administration were combined in
16652-439: The defeat of two Roman armies and continued stalemate, peace negotiations were opened. Ricomer and Saturninus conducted the negotiations for the Romans and peace was declared on 3 October 382. By then, the Gothic commanders from Adrianople were gone; Fritigern, Alatheus and Saphrax are never again mentioned in the ancient histories and their ultimate fates are unknown. Speculation ranges from death in battle to overthrown as
16833-431: 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
17014-461: 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
17195-417: 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
17376-490: The end of the century. Roman 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
17557-528: The environmental and social upheavals and utilitarianism of the developing Industrial Revolution . The Romantics' view is still represented in modern-day fairs and festivals celebrating the period with ' merrie ' costumes and events. Just as Petrarch had twisted the meaning of light and darkness, the Romantics had twisted the judgment of the Enlightenment. However, the period that they idealized
17738-430: The errors there shone forth men of genius; no less keen were their eyes, although they were surrounded by darkness and dense gloom". Christian writers, including Petrarch himself, had long used traditional metaphors of ' light versus darkness ' to describe ' good versus evil '. Petrarch was the first to give the metaphor secular meaning by reversing its application. He now saw classical antiquity , so long considered
17919-501: The events they decided to remain in place "considering their own welfare the most important thing of all." The Emperor, afraid of having a Roman garrison under Gothic control so close to a Gothic rebellion, ordered Sueridus and Colias to march east to Hellespontus . The two commanders asked for food and money for the journey, as well as a postponement of two days to prepare. The local Roman magistrate , angry at this garrison for having earlier pillaged his suburban villa , armed people from
18100-572: 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
18281-446: The field by some of his men to a farmhouse. The Goths approached it and were shot at with arrows, which caused the Goths to burn it down with the Emperor inside. The other report states Valens was slain in combat on the field with his army. Whatever happened, his body was never found. The Goths, invigorated by their incredible victory, besieged Adrianople but the city resisted. Its walls were strengthened, huge stones were placed behind
18462-551: The fifth to the tenth centuries as the 'Dark Ages' are long gone, and the material culture produced during that period demonstrates a high degree of sophistication." A 2021 lecture by Howard Williams of Chester University explored how "stereotypes and popular perceptions of the Early Middle Ages ;– popularly still considered the European 'Dark Ages' – plague popular culture"; and finding 'Dark Ages'
18643-529: The first of many bands of peoples that flooded Western Europe in the absence of administrative governance. Some lived only for war and pillage and disdained Roman ways. Other peoples 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. The subjects of the Roman empire were
18824-498: The first. 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 (300–700), when a decrease in global temperatures impaired agricultural yields. Early in the 3rd century Germanic peoples migrated south from Scandinavia and reached
19005-470: The following generation began to take on the idyllic image of an "Age of Faith". This, reacting to a world dominated by Enlightenment rationalism , expressed a romantic view of a Golden Age of chivalry . The Middle Ages were seen with nostalgia as a period of social and environmental harmony and spiritual inspiration, in contrast to the excesses of the French Revolution and, most of all, to
19186-471: 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. In
19367-552: 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
19548-476: The former pure radiance." In the 15th century, historians Leonardo Bruni and Flavio Biondo developed a three-tier outline of history. They used Petrarch's two ages, plus a modern, 'better age', which they believed the world had entered. Later, the term 'Middle Ages' – Latin media tempestas (1469) or medium aevum (1604), was used to describe the period of supposed decline. During the Reformations of
19729-418: The formerly Roman area, there was another 20 per cent decline in population between 400 and 600, or a one-third decline for 150–600. 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
19910-415: The fortress of Durostorum . They were ferried by the Romans in boats, rafts and in hollowed tree-trunks; Ammianus Marcellinus remarks bitterly that "diligent care was taken that no future destroyer of the Roman state should be left behind, even if he were smitten by a fatal disease". Even so, the river swelled with rain and many drowned. The Goths were to have their weapons confiscated but, whether because
20091-449: The gates and arrows, stones, javelins and artillery rained down upon the attackers. The Goths lost men but made no progress. So they resorted to trickery: they ordered some Roman traitors to pretend to be fleeing from the Goths and infiltrate the city, where they were to set fires to allow the Goths, while the citizens were busy putting the fires out, to attack the undefended walls. The plan did not work. The Roman traitors were welcomed into
20272-542: The glory, Eastern Emperor Valens ordered an attack on the Therving infantry under Fritigern without waiting for Western Emperor Gratian , who was on the way with reinforcements. While the Romans were fully engaged, the Greuthung cavalry arrived. Only one-third of the Roman army managed to escape. This represented the most shattering defeat that the Romans had suffered since the Battle of Cannae (216 BC), according to
20453-480: The glowing ashes of their ancestral homes. Many Goths inside Roman territory joined Fritigern, as did assorted slaves, miners and prisoners. Roman garrisons in fortified towns held out but those outside of them were easy prey. The Goths created a vast wagon train to hold all the loot and supplies pillaged from the Roman countryside and they had much rage against the Roman population for what they had endured. Those who had started as starving refugees had transformed into
20634-425: The greater Roman population. The agreement differed with the Thervings by allowing them to choose the place of their settlement, Thrace , and allowed them to remain united. During the negotiations, the Thervings also expressed a willingness to convert to Christianity. As for the Greuthungi, Roman army and naval forces blocked the river and denied their crossing. The Thervings were probably allowed to cross at or near
20815-473: The hands of a general, or strategos. A theme , which formerly denoted a subdivision of the Byzantine army, came to refer to a region governed by a strategos. The reform led to the emergence of great landed families which controlled the regional military and often pressed their claims to the throne (see Bardas Phocas and Bardas Sklerus for characteristic examples). By the early 8th century, notwithstanding
20996-455: The heavy plough. Barbarian migration stabilized in much of Europe , although the Viking expansion greatly affected Northern Europe . 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
21177-610: The height of the Saxon invasions, have been called "the darkest of the Dark Ages". The term "Dark Ages" was increasingly questioned from the mid-twentieth century as archaeological, historical and literary studies led to greater understanding of the period, In 1977, the historian Denys Hay spoke ironically of "the lively centuries which we call dark". More forcefully, a book about the history of German literature published in 2007 describes "the dark ages" as "a popular if uninformed manner of speaking". Most modern historians do not use
21358-515: The help of landowners, who were not pleased with losing their workers to the army. Theodosius responded with many harsh laws punishing those who hid deserters and rewarding those who turned them in. Even those who mutilated themselves were still forced into the Roman military. Theodosius' general Modares , a Goth himself, won a minor victory against Fritigern. Even small victories such as these were massively lauded by imperial propagandists; there are records of victory celebrations equaling half that of
21539-436: The help of the city's Arab garrison. At one moment, an Arab dressed only in a loincloth rushed forward against the Goths, slit one of their throats and sucked out the blood. This terrified the Goths and combined with the immense size of the city and its walls, they decided to march off once again to plunder the countryside. With Valens dead, the Eastern Roman Empire had to operate without an Emperor. The magister militum of
21720-667: The king. 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
21901-408: The lack of sources to establish whether the plague pandemic of 541 to 750 reached Northern Europe, opines that "the epithet Dark Ages is surely still an appropriate description of this period". However, from the later 20th century onward, other historians became critical even of this nonjudgmental use of the term for two main reasons. Firstly, it is questionable whether it is ever possible to use
22082-453: The laments of high-born boys and maidens, whose hands were fettered in cruel captivity. Behind these were led last of all grown-up girls and chaste wives, weeping and with downcast faces, longing even by a death of torment to forestall the imminent violation of their modesty. Among these was a freeborn man, not long ago rich and independent, dragged along like some wild beast and railing at thee, Fortune, as merciless and blind, since thou hadst in
22263-509: The largest city of early medieval Europe, withstood a combined siege by Avars and Persians. Within several decades, Heraclius completed a holy war against the Persians, taking their capital and having a Sassanid monarch assassinated. Yet Heraclius lived to see his spectacular success undone by the Muslim conquests of Syria , three Palaestina provinces , Egypt , and North Africa which was considerably facilitated by religious disunity and
22444-708: 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. Around 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 1-acre (4,000 m) 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")
22625-579: The late 18th and the early 19th centuries, the Romantics reversed the negative assessment of Enlightenment critics with a vogue for medievalism . The word " Gothic " had been a term of opprobrium akin to " Vandal " until a few self-confident mid-18th-century English "Goths" like Horace Walpole initiated the Gothic Revival in the arts. This stimulated interest in the Middle Ages, which for
22806-537: The later 17th century. The earliest reference seems to be in the "Epistle Dedicatory" to Volume I of The History of the Reformation of the Church of England of 1679, where he writes: "The design of the reformation was to restore Christianity to what it was at first, and to purge it of those corruptions, with which it was overrun in the later and darker ages." He uses it again in the 1682 Volume II, where he dismisses
22987-589: 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
23168-514: The massacres and some rioted, especially in Asia Minor . The Romans put down the riots and slaughtered the Goths in those places as well, both innocent and guilty. For the events of the Gothic War between 379 and 382, there are few sources, and accounts become more confused, especially concerning the rise of Theodosius I as the new Eastern Roman Emperor. Theodosius, born in Hispania , was
23349-415: The mere weight of their assailants; some were slain by the sword of a comrade; for though they often rallied, there was no ground given, nor did anyone spare those who retreated. Besides all this, the roads were blocked by many who lay mortally wounded, lamenting the torment of their wounds; and with them also mounds of fallen horses filled the plains with corpses. To these ever irreparable losses, so costly to
23530-515: The most common use of 'Dark Ages' is to "signify a general sense of backwardness or lack of technological sophistication", in particular noting how it has become entrenched in daily and political discourse. Reasons for use, according to Elliott, are often "banal medievalisms", which are "characterized mainly by being unconscious, unwitting and by having little or no intention to refer to the Middle Ages"; for example, referring to an insurance industry still reliant on paper instead of computers as being in
23711-620: 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
23892-571: The north-northwest ( Asturias ) and largely Basque regions in the Pyrenees . This territory, under the Arab name Al-Andalus , became part of the expanding Umayyad empire. The unsuccessful second siege of Constantinople (717) weakened the Umayyad dynasty and reduced their prestige. After their success in overrunning Iberia, the conquerors moved northeast across the Pyrenees. They were defeated by
24073-445: 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
24254-606: The passes against them, abandoned the blockade and retreated. The Goths were thus free to raid anew, reaching as far as the Rhodope Mountains and the Hellespont . Then there were to be seen and to lament acts most frightful to see and to describe: women driven along by cracking whips and stupefied with fear, still heavy with their unborn children, which before coming into the world endured many horrors; little children too clinging to their mothers. Then could be heard
24435-696: 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 . Dark Ages (historiography) The concept of
24616-415: The period to which he had applied it. Some, following Baronius, used 'dark age' neutrally to refer to a dearth of written records, but others used it pejoratively and lapsed into that lack of objectivity that has discredited the term for many modern historians. The first British historian to use the term was most likely Gilbert Burnet , in the form 'darker ages' which appears several times in his work during
24797-567: The populations of Mœsia and Scythia. Valens finally extracted himself from the Eastern front, after granting many concessions to the Persians and arrived with most of his army in Constantinople on 30 May 378. His entry into the city caused small riots against him. According to the Historia Ecclesiastica of Socrates Scholasticus , the citizens of the capital accused Emperor Valens of neglecting their defense, exposing them to
24978-662: 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. 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
25159-691: The previous seven decades combined. Theodosius needed victories and needed to be seen as dealing with the Gothic crisis. In 380, the Goths split. The Greuthungi went to Illyricum and invaded the Western province of Pannonia . What happened is again disputed; they were either defeated by Gratian's forces, or they peaceably signed a deal that settled them in Pannonia. The Thervings went south into Macedonia and Thessaly. Theodosius with his new army marched to meet them but, filled with unreliable barbarians and raw recruits, it melted away . The barbarian soldiers joined Fritigern, and many Romans deserted. With victory
25340-400: The price for peace. In the peace, the Romans recognized no overall leader of the Goths and the Goths were nominally incorporated into the Roman Empire. The Romans gained a military alliance with them as foederati : the Goths would be drafted into the Roman army and in special circumstances could be called upon to field full armies for the Romans. What differed from traditional Roman practice
25521-516: The proliferation of heretical movements (notably Monophysitism and Nestorianism ) in the areas converted to Islam. Although Heraclius's successors managed to salvage Constantinople from two Arab sieges (in 674–77 and 717), the empire of the 8th and early 9th century was rocked by the great Iconoclastic Controversy , punctuated by dynastic struggles between various factions at court. The Bulgar and Slavic tribes profited from these disorders and invaded Illyria , Thrace and even Greece . After
25702-401: The provinces were invaded and desolated by the arms of the successful Barbarians." The empire lacked the resources, and perhaps the will, to reconstruct the professional mobile army destroyed at Adrianople, so it had to rely on barbarian armies to fight for it. The Eastern Roman Empire succeeded in buying off the Goths with tribute. The Western Roman Empire proved less fortunate. Stilicho ,
25883-526: The raids of the Goths who now threatened Constantinople itself and urged him to leave the city and confront the invaders instead of continuing to delay. Valens left the city after twelve days and moved with his army to his imperial villa Melanthias, west of Constantinople, on 12 June. There he distributed pay, supplies and speeches to his soldiers to boost morale. Blaming Traianus for the bloody draw at The Willows, Valens demoted him and appointed Sebastianus , who had arrived from Italy, to command and organize
26064-432: The rulers of Western Europe as illiterate barbarians and maintained a nominal claim to rule over the West. Although this fiction had been exploded with the coronation of Charlemagne in Rome (800), the Byzantine rulers did not treat their Western counterparts as equals. Generally, they had little interest in political and economic developments in the barbarian (from their point of view) West. Against this economic background
26245-552: The same size. The Cambridge Ancient History places modern estimates at around 90,000 people. The Goths sent ambassadors to Valens , the Eastern Roman emperor, requesting permission to settle their people inside the Empire. It took them some time to arrive, for the Emperor was in Antioch preparing for a campaign against the Sasanian Empire over control of Armenia and Iberia . The bulk of his forces were stationed in
26426-422: The shrinking territory of the empire, Constantinople remained the largest and the wealthiest city west of China , comparable only to Sassanid Ctesiphon , and later Abbasid Baghdad . The population of the imperial capital fluctuated between 300,000 and 400,000 as the emperors undertook measures to restrain its growth. The only other large Christian cities were Rome (50,000) and Thessalonica (30,000). Even before
26607-489: 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
26788-527: The son of a successful general . As dux Mœsiae , he campaigned in the eastern Balkans against the Sarmatians in 374. After his father fell victim to court intrigue following the death of Western Roman Emperor Valentinian I , Theodosius decided to retire to his estates in Spain. Why he was recalled to the East is a mystery. Perhaps his military experience and the critical need for it in any new emperor played
26969-399: The sources and his fate is unknown. Having survived the chaos of the night and the earlier humiliations, Fritigern and the Thervings decided it was time to break the treaty and rebel against the Romans, and the Greuthungi immediately joined them. Fritigern led the Goths away from Marcianople towards Scythia . Lupicinus and his army pursued them 14 km (8.7 mi) from the city, fought
27150-422: 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
27331-464: The story of "St George's fighting with the dragon" as "a legend formed in the darker ages to support the humour of chivalry". Burnet was a bishop chronicling how England became Protestant, and his use of the term is invariably pejorative. During the Age of Enlightenment of the 17th and 18th centuries, many critical thinkers saw religion as antithetical to reason. For them the Middle Ages, or "Age of Faith",
27512-436: The term "dark ages" and prefer terms such as Early Middle Ages . However, when used by some historians today, the term "Dark Ages" is meant to describe the economic, political and cultural problems of the era. For others, the term Dark Ages is intended to be neutral, expressing the idea that the events of the period seem 'dark' to us because of the paucity of the historical record . For example, Robert Sallares, commenting on
27693-468: The term altogether because of its negative connotations, finding it misleading and inaccurate. Despite this, Petrarch's pejorative meaning remains in use, particularly in popular culture , which often simplistically views the Middle Ages as a time of violence and backwardness. The idea of a Dark Age originated with the Tuscan scholar Petrarch in the 1330s. Writing of the past, he said: "Amidst
27874-405: The term in a neutral way: scholars may intend it, but ordinary readers may not understand it so. Secondly, 20th-century scholarship had increased understanding of the history and culture of the period, to such an extent that it is no longer really 'dark' to modern viewers. To avoid the value judgment implied by the expression, many historians now avoid it altogether. It was occasionally used up to
28055-472: The term to denote the relative scarcity of records regarding at least the early part of the Middle Ages. As the accomplishments of the era came to be better understood in the 19th and the 20th centuries, scholars began restricting the Dark Ages appellation to the Early Middle Ages ( c. 5th–10th century ); today's scholars maintain this posture. The majority of modern scholars avoid
28236-411: The third was fallow. 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
28417-539: The trade routes between Europe and the Orient, which made the Empire the richest polity in Medieval Europe. Making use of their sophisticated warfare and superior diplomacy, the Byzantines managed to fend off assaults by the migrating barbarians. Their dreams of subduing the Western potentates briefly materialized during the reign of Justinian I in 527–565. Not only did Justinian restore some western territories to
28598-416: The very breasts of their mothers and slain, matrons and widows whose husbands had been killed before their eyes were carried off, boys of tender or adult age were dragged away over the dead bodies of their parents. Finally many aged men, crying that they had lived long enough after losing their possessions and their beautiful women, were led into exile with their arms pinioned behind their backs and weeping over
28779-463: The victory you won through these inner resources of yours was finer than it would have been had you prevailed by arms. For you have not destroyed those who wronged us but appropriated them. You did not punish them by seizing their land but have acquired more farmers for us. You did not slaughter them like wild beasts but charmed away their savagery just as if someone, after trapping a lion or a leopard in nets, were not to kill it but to accustom it to being
28960-478: The western empire's half-Vandal military commander, stripped the Rhine frontier of troops to fend off invasions of Italy by the Visigoths in 402–03 and by other Goths in 406–07. Fleeing before the advance of the Huns , the Vandals , Suebi , and Alans launched an attack across the frozen Rhine near Mainz ; on 31 December 406, the frontier gave way and these tribes surged into Roman Gaul . There soon followed
29141-536: The world. 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. 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
29322-400: Was divided equally among the sons of a dead land holder. 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
29503-805: 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. The pax Romana had provided safe conditions for trade and manufacture, and
29684-626: 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. The Viking Age spans
29865-489: 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
30046-421: 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
30227-417: 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
30408-525: Was highlighted by Charles Martel , who as Mayor of the Palace was effectively the strongest prince in the kingdom. 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
30589-605: Was in Volume X that Baronius coined the term "dark age" for the period between the end of the Carolingian Empire in 888 and the first stirrings of Gregorian Reform under Pope Clement II in 1046: volumes "The new age ( saeculum ) that was beginning, for its harshness and barrenness of good could well be called iron, for its baseness and abounding evil leaden, and moreover for its lack of writers ( inopia scriptorum ) dark ( obscurum )". Significantly, Baronius termed
30770-406: Was largely the High Middle Ages , extending into Early Modern times. In one respect, that negated the religious aspect of Petrarch's judgment, since these later centuries were those when the power and prestige of the Church were at their height. To many, the scope of the Dark Ages was becoming divorced from this period, denoting mainly the centuries immediately following the fall of Rome. The term
30951-609: Was neither a foregone nor likely conclusion, nevertheless just suppose, as I said, that this solution lay within our power. Was it then better to fill Thrace with corpses or with farmers? To make it full of tombs or living men? To progress through a wilderness or a cultivated land? To count up the number of the slaughtered or those who till the soil? To colonize it with Phrygians and Bithynians perhaps, or to live in harmony with those we have subdued. All that [military] ingenuity of ours has proved useless; only your [Theodosius'] advice and your judgment provided an invincible resistance and
31132-606: 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
31313-474: 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
31494-413: Was one of several Gothic Wars in Roman history in which the Goths fought against the Roman Empire . This particular conflict included the catastrophic Roman defeat at the Battle of Adrianople , and is commonly seen as a part— albeit a part of disputed significance— of the century of events leading to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire . In the summer of 376, a massive number of Goths arrived on
31675-438: 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
31856-404: 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. 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
32037-435: Was that the Goths were given lands inside the Roman Empire itself, in the provinces of Scythia, Mœsia and possibly Macedonia, under their own authority and were not dispersed. This allowed them to stay together as a unified people with their own internal laws and cultural traditions. To seal the agreement, Theodosius threw the Goths a large feast. Themistius , a Roman orator and imperial propagandist, while acknowledging that
32218-425: Was the Annales Ecclesiastici by Cardinal Caesar Baronius . Baronius was a trained historian who produced a work that the Encyclopædia Britannica in 1911 described as "far surpassing anything before" and that Acton regarded as "the greatest history of the Church ever written". The Annales covered the first twelve centuries of Christianity to 1198 and was published in twelve volumes between 1588 and 1607. It
32399-427: Was therefore the opposite of the Age of Reason . Baruch Spinoza , Bernard Fontenelle , Immanuel Kant , David Hume , Thomas Jefferson , Thomas Paine , Denis Diderot , Voltaire , Marquis De Sade and Jean-Jacques Rousseau were vocal in attacking the Middle Ages as a period of social regress dominated by religion, while Gibbon in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire expressed contempt for
32580-455: Was to provide them food. So many people in such a small area caused a food shortage and the Thervings began to starve. Roman logistics could not cope with the vast numbers, and officials under the command of Lupicinus simply sold off much of the food before it reached the hands of the Goths. Desperate, Gothic families sold many of their children into slavery to Romans for dog meat at the price of one child per one dog. This treatment caused
32761-528: Was widely used by 19th-century historians. In 1860, in The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy , Jacob Burckhardt delineated the contrast between the medieval 'dark ages' and the more enlightened Renaissance , which had revived the cultural and intellectual achievements of antiquity. The earliest entry for a capitalized "Dark Ages" in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a reference in Henry Thomas Buckle 's History of Civilization in England in 1857, who wrote: "During these, which are rightly called
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