Why were european middle-ages so backward, obscurantist, sinister, dirty, intolerant, violent, barbaric, ignorant, dull & boring to sutudy, irrelevant, filled of plagues/famines, etc?
Serious question about Dark Ages.
Why were european middle-ages so backward, obscurantist, sinister, dirty, intolerant, violent, barbaric, ignorant, dull & boring to sutudy, irrelevant, filled of plagues/famines, etc?
they werent.
basically it's just a revisionist fairytale created by the freemasons who needed to shit on the feudal system.
for example, https://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/hours_workweek.html
There were even cases of cannibalism. From the siege of Ma'arra:
"I shudder to tell that many of our people, harassed by the madness of excessive hunger, cut pieces from the buttocks of the Saracens already dead there, which they cooked, but when it was not yet roasted enough by the fire, they devoured it with savage mouth."
So you’re telling me there was… an isolated case of cannibalism in a period of 1,000 years… because of extreme hunger… I’m so glad classical antiquity had no cannibalism hunger or plagues HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Cannibalism isn't even that bad compared to other atrocities both sides committed. I'd rather eat my enemy for the sustenance to continue my deus volt than starve and deprive my God of more heathen skulls for his hallowed throne
This is actually heavily disputed. There are virtually no Arab sources affirming the authenticity of this event.
>heh a few dozen knights totally killed tens of thousands of turks and saracens
>Cannibilism? No we need the msim sources otherwise you can't corroborate it
The First Crusade was fricking wild.
>by the freemasons who needed to shit on the feudal system.
Everybody who wasn't a middling aristocrat hated the Feudal system.
I'm glad classical society was so equal and free
The frick are you talking about
if the system was so completely shit for every one all the time save for 5 ish percent of the population
you would expect a lot more peasants uprisings and there are surprisingly few of those. And they weren't focused on ending the feudal order.
directly after the fall of Rome Europe the Forer empire could be dived into two parts those mostly settled by the former barbarians where literacy declined because most of the population where now from tribes that had no own written language.
And those parts mostly inhabited by their pre fall of Rome population(s). Where literacy declined because it was already declining under the late Roman Empire.
It took longer to reestablish its self in those parts now dominated by new arrivals because they had to make a written version of their language because most people didn’t speak Latin or Greek to write in them. But once they did, they were very productive like the low countries pumping out loads of practical every day writing like legal documents and some really nice books.
Paper was introduced into europe in the 11th century, and the first paper-mills in France were established in 1189.Only by the second half of the 14th Century was the use of paper for all literary endeavours, before that writing was done only on expensive goat skin which was prohibitively expensive.
people ate a lot of animals and used a lot of skins for writing
books using the prime writing material where a lot more expensive per page than the other lesser quality page
Most written sources from the time also aren't full books but single pages or parts of pages.
Like accounts of legal procedingss written on the ofcut scraps you get when making and trimming pages. Not bound in a book but kept in a bag.
Often in a smaller hand with more shit ink and in a local vulage.
>you would expect a lot more peasants uprisings and there are surprisingly few of those.
There was plenty, if not epidemic unrest from the lower classes. The main destroyer of Feudalism wasn't them anyway. It was the Crown itself. What sort of King would willingly put up with Warlords ruling 'in their name' when the reality is that they are completely independent from them in all but name, the answer is, none of them. The French and English Kings spent centuries breaking down and destroying Feudalism in their countries because it actively weakened them. The Middle class mostly populated in cities just outright rejected Feudalism and in places like Northern Italy and the Low counties violently fought to keep it out, to much success in Italy. You're basically asking why people with no means didn't take actions to dismantle Feudalism, they didn't, because they couldn't, and those who did have the means did.
oh boy
>The Middle class mostly populated in cities just outright rejected Feudalism and in places like Northern Italy and the Low counties violently fought to keep it out
The flemish revolts where not against the feudal structure
it was a series of conflicts between the cities and the count over taxes
The count and the king over taxes
Or the cities themselves over trade and petty rivalry
The Low country also anded serfdom a lot faster because agriculture became less important. It didn't involve peasant uprisings.
>There was plenty, if not epidemic unrest from the lower classes.
So you should be able to furnish me with an example every two or tree generations in the same area.
Now you can post several dozen revolts from all over Europe and over a time span of nearly a thousand years. And that won't prove your point.
As you are trying to prove that it where peasant revolts, against the feudal structure and frequently. So if one gets put down in scotland and an other pops up in hungary 5 years later that only proves that the feudal system had a large geographic spread, which is in indicator of succes not of frequent revolts
>The Low country also anded serfdom a lot faster because agriculture became less important. It didn't involve peasant uprisings.
Serfdom has nothing to do with Feudalism. The fricking Roman Republic had a form of serfdom, the Merovingians and Carolingians had serfdom and Feudalism would not appear until the collapse of the Carolingian Empire. Serfdom did not need, nor did it exist because of Feudalism.
>So you should be able to furnish me with an example every two or tree generations in the same area.
I assume you think unrest means outright rebellion against the state. Which it doesn't. You're just defining an arbitrary amount to make it endemic.
England in the reign of Edward III, every time an attempted taxation on wool was made it resulted in mass unrest over the country. As it turns out, states are willing to cater to the needs of their people and Edward stepped down his hard-line position each time it happened. Open rebellions weren't common, because it represented years of complete failure by the authorities to solve the issues which caused the unrest.
>As you are trying to prove that it where peasant revolts, against the feudal structure and frequently
No I'm not. Did you even read my other reply? I literally stated that they fricking didn't.
It wasn't. You fell for anti-Christian "enlightenment" propaganda
they were called the dark ages for a reason you fricking morons lol holy shit you are so dumb.
the answer is Christianity. it put science back a good 1000 years at least
What is with these redditor cultists with their carbon copy response? Religion is the only reason why literacy was preserved you fricking moron
Collapse of civilization
>dark ages
Weren't real
>backwards
They weren't, Europe was the most advanced place on earth for all but the very beginning of the dark ages.
>obscurantist
They weren't.
>sinister
All premodern societies were pretty morbid. You had to be to not go insane in a place where infant mortality is like 50%.
>barbaric
If you mean literally, because barbarians are what partially caused the "dark ages" by weakening western Rome. If you mean the modern use of the word, they weren't.
>ignorant
Because knowledge wasn't as developed as it is now? Dumb point.
>boring to study
It's one of history's most interesting and engaging points, except for maybe the world wars.
>irrelevant
The middle ages were extremely important for the development of the world's premier continent.
>full of plagues and famines
This is just part of life in premodern medicine and before modern agricultural practices.
I came to debuoonk OP (who is a gay)
But you have done it better than I could
Anon, despite what you think, europe wasnt actually a monty python sketch for ~1000 years. It was an incredibly complex period with some of the most unique societal, cultural, and economic development.
They were shackled by papism. See how little to nothing changed in the average catholic lands even after reformation.
see
>this Masonic fantasy again
https://historyforatheists.com/the-great-myths/
The nobility literally owned the population. Serf meant slave. Lord meant slavemaster, that's why it's the word used to translate the Latin Dominus in the bible. This diminishment invariably comes with dehumanization and dehumanization is invariably used as an excuse by people to act out their most vile and cruel urges.
The Dark Ages saw both the disintegration of the Western Roman Empire and the rise of the Barbarian kingdoms
We had no historical information about the Visiogoths, merovingian or lombard era north italy because no one could write.
What archaeological evidence that remains paint a stark picture compared to the roman empire
There is a lot of info about the Visigoths tho, their kingdom lasted from 5th century to early 8th century
I'd have said the same of the Lombards on account of Paul the Deacon's Historia Langobardorum.
So it's not that "we had no historical information", it's that
has no historical information b/c he talks too much and doesn't lurk enough.
The evidence suggests barbarian invasions led to a decline of citys and ecanomic decline to planet of the apes wooden plates and cups.
Based on a count of shipwrecks, in the western Mediterranean, sea trade dropped by about two-thirds between the sixth and seventh centuries (550-650) and continued to decline
There was no literacy, there was no education, and little commerce,
The situation was improved by introduction of paper in the 11th century.
and when you post
there is a
95 percent
increase
in reddit spacing
>merovingian or lombard era north italy because no one could write.
History of the Lombards
History of the Franks
Fredegar and his continuers
Royal Frankish chronicles
The numerous lives of Saints
Romantic literature employed by the Church and Elites, much the same as the support of the arts by the elites during the renaissance, historical fiction
>Romantic literature employed by the Church and Elites
You are describing nearly all literature.
>historical fiction
How exactly? Is Gregory of Tours somehow wrong about everything he wrote?
>Is Gregory of Tours somehow wrong about everything he wrote?
We cant fact check it because paper rots on cold climates
You are taking a faith based position upon one individuals interpretation of earlier lost works
>You are taking a faith based position upon one individuals interpretation of earlier lost works
This is literally all works before the 19th century
The dark ages are a meme invented and spread by euphoric rennaissance men fedoras.
Dark Ages is a term that has increasingly become applied to the period between around 476-800 AD, sometimes a bit later than that, all the way to 1066. There are some that put the entire 5th century as part of the Dark Ages, but that's just online opinions of web users I have seen.
The Dark Ages are a myth.
It comes from the Renaissance where they said "everything before us was shit."
>Dark Age following bronze age collapse
>I sleep
>Dark Age following Roman collapse
>UMM ACKSHULLY
It wasn't. All those examples of insane shit was put into art for a reason, it was shocking back then.
They had superior music.