High middle ages and medieval civilization: the rise of western Europe

1. High middle ages and medieval civilization: the rise of western Europe 1000-1300 ad

2. High middle ages • Church and State • Out of the dark ages • Monarchies • The University

3. High middle ages • 1: Church and State • Period of great religious vitality: crusades, new orders (e.g. Franciscans and Dominicans), intellectual creativity, missionary work, papal leadership • These factors lead to the Church being the most advanced centralized government in Western Europe during the High Middle Ages • The basic problem from the point of view of the church reformers: • Bishops must be secular, so the spiritual realm suffers sometimes • Church is controlled by the state: $$$ talks (private donations of land to monasteries, sale of offices, etc.) • Popes head progress to moral reform, but it begins with monasteries • Reform begins with Cluny (Benedictine monastery, founded 910) • 1500 Cluniac monasteries throughout Europe • Demand high moral standard for clergy, including celibacy • Insist on separation of Church and State, including elimination of simony and lay investiture

4. High middle ages • Church and State • Pope is a monarch • Church unity = gathering around what is universally practiced and believed (= “catholicism” and its evolution into what we know as “Roman Catholicism” from the 16th century to the present); unity in the high middle ages consisted of conformity in RITES and OBEDIENCE to the pope • Hildebrand (1020-1085) = Pope Gregory vii (1073-1085) • Decreed against simony and married priests • Forwarded papal supremacy, most in the “investiture controversy” versus Henry iv (German emperor 1056-1106) • Gregory deposes Henry and excommunicates him over failed negotiations regarding the apptmt. of the Bishop of Milan • Leads to rebellion in Germany • Henry begs for absolution at Canossa • Investiture not resolved until 1122 Concordat of Worms (formal treaty): Emperor has right to nominate bishops, but pope alone has privilege of ceremonial investiture

5. High middle ages • Church and State • Papal rule • Papacy becomes supreme court (canon law): rule over clergy, church property, donations, marriages and families, inheritance, etc.; papal dispensation was a way around canon law • Popes gradually rise not from the monasteries but from training in canon law • Curia (created under Gregory’s watch) served as bank of the West also (church had become financial capital of Europe) • Pope holds sway with power of excommunication and interdict

6. High middle ages • Church and State • Pope Innocent iii considers himself overlord of the world • 1198-1216 • Founder of the “Papal State,” the historic precursor to Vatican City today • Called the 4th Crusade (bungled in Constantinople, 1204), also against heresy in the West (Cathars and Waldensians): Inquisition and military method to enforce unity • Assumed right to veto imperial election • Through excommunication and interdict, forced European kings to become vassals of Rome • Codified Roman rites (liturgy) and dogma: 4th Lateran Council (1215) • Papal monarchy fades with Boniface viii (1294-1303)

7. High middle ages • Church and State • Lay society • Saintsand relics • Orders: • Cluniac (frequent and lengthy church services) • Cistercians (private prayer and manual labor) • Mendicants (Dominicans: conversion of the Muslim and heretic through argument; Franciscans: devotion to poor and abandoned) • Christian piety: a life defined by the sacraments • Eucharist (concomitant) • Baptism • Penance

8. High middle ages • 2: Out of the Dark Ages • Agricultural revolution • 600’s ad: 14 million people in Europe • 1300: 74 million • Watermills and windmills, metal horseshoes, horse and ox collar, the heavy plow (6-8 horses or oxen) • 3-field system • Effects: villagers cooperated (plow teams and village council), more and better food (population growth) • Leads to migration and growth of cities

9. High middle ages • 2: Out of the Dark Ages • Cities • Lords, bishops, and kings have trouble with newly expanding cities (why?) • Create institutions and culture of self-rule • Rise of the new class: the merchant • Agricultural revolution and city growth contribute to economic boom in the 12th and 13th centuries • Also: advances in transportation: new roads and repairs, luxury trade (silk and spices) • Also: business technique: new minted coins, partnerships (banks), fairs • All of this sets the stage for a change from feudal economy

10. High middle ages • 3: Monarchies • France • Centralized French government, king on top, new royal officials in court (the baillis): a powerful bureaucracy • Louis ix 1226-1270 (St. Louis): renowned for piety • Philip iv (1285-1314): brings church under his control • England • William kept 20% of the land for himself in 1066 and parceled out the rest • Centralization is based on everyone else in England holding a fief from the king (all are vassals to the English crown) • Henry ii (1154-1189) reforms judiciary through use of sheriffs (cf. Robin Hood stories) • Creates circuit courts, grand juries, and trial by jury, the basis for law in the US, England, Canada today • Universal justice for all – even the clergy (backfired on him with the assassination of Thomas à Becket 12/29/1170)

11. High middle ages • 3: Monarchies • England and France • John (1199-1216) loses Normandy to Phillip ii of France • Barons of England, financing John’s losing wars, force him to sign Magna Carta (1215) • Fundamental principle: even kings must respect the law • Beginning of English Parliament • Holy Roman Empire (German states) • Subdivided and fragmented • Emperors rule through dukes (imperial vassals)

12. High middle ages • 4: The University • New ideas flourished because of contact with the ancient world (Roman law, Greek philosophy), Muslims (science, love poetry), and spread of education • Western distinctive art and learning develops: drama, literature, music, architecture • Literacy • 1050: 1% of population is literate (priests) • 1450: 40% of men in cities literate

13. High middle ages • 4: The University • Literacy • 1050: only monasteries and cathedral schools are educating (reading and writing, analysis) • 1100: curriculum of cathedral school expands: Roman masters, the beginning of the Liberal Arts • Scholasticism • Develops out of training in logic • Leads to use of Aristotle to interpret Bible and Fathers • Lectures and disputation provide framework for modern debate • Peter Abelard (1079-1142)

14. High middle ages • 4: The University • University begins from cathedral schools • Students (collected in guilds) bargain with professors for education • Charters granted for the work the students and professors do • Curriculum is basis for what we still do • Liberal arts: Grammar, Rhetoric, Logic (trivium) and Arithmetic, Geometry, Astronomy, Music (quadrivium) • Principally training to become priests (therefore women do not attend much till 19th century)

15. High middle ages • 4: The University • 12th century Renaissance • 1140-1260, new Latin translations of Greek classics from Sicily and Spain (Christian contact with Muslims and Jews) • Muslims translated Greek philosophy and science into Arabic • Jews translated the Arabic into Latin • Some Latin catholic scholars translated Greek to Latin from Byzantium too • Greek philosophy raises questions about reasoning and faith – for the Christian (Bible), Jew (Torah), and Muslim (Qu’ran) • Muslim Averroes (1126-1198): purpose of philosophy is to explain religious revelation • Jew Maimonides (1135-1204): synthesized philosophy, science, and Judaism • Christian Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274): draws distinction between natural truth and revealed truth; start with faith and use reason to reach conclusions (begins systematic theology)