High Middle Ages

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High Middle Ages
Europe and Mediterranean region
Large map
Europe and the Mediterranean region, c. 1190
British Isles
Northern Europe
Eastern Europe
Iberian Peninsula
Central Europe
Italian Peninsula
The Balkans
North Africa
The Crusades

Small map
Central Europe
Guelf, Hohenstaufen, and Ascanian domains in Germany about 1176
The High Middle Ages, or High Medieval Period, was the period of European history that commenced around 1000 AD and lasted until around 1250 AD. The High Middle Ages were preceded by the Early Middle Ages and were followed by the Late Middle Ages, which by convention, ended around 1500.[1]
From around 780[citation needed], Europe saw the last of the barbarian invasions[2][not in citation given] and became more socially and politically organized.[3] The Carolingian Renaissance led to scientific and philosophical revivals in Europe. The first universities started operating in Bologna, Paris, Oxford and Modena. The Vikings settled in the British Isles, France and elsewhere, and Norse Christian kingdoms started developing in their Scandinavian homelands. The Magyars ceased their expansion in the 10th century, and by the year 1000, a Christian Kingdom of Hungary had become a recognized state in Central Europe that was forming alliances with regional powers. With the brief exception of the Mongol invasions in the 13th century, major nomadic incursions ceased. The powerful Byzantine Empire of the Macedonian and the Komnenos dynasties gradually gave way to the resurrected Serbia and Bulgaria and to a successor crusader state (1204 to 1261), which countered the continuous threat of the Seljuk Turks in Asia Minor.

Historical events and politics[edit]


Great Britain and Ireland[edit]


Spain and Italy[edit]

The Pontic steppes, c. 1015



France and Germany[edit]



Main article: Georgian Golden Age



Poland and Lithuania[edit]


Southeastern Europe[edit]


Climate and agriculture[edit]


The rise of chivalry[edit]



A limestone statue depicting Aaron, brother of Moses in the Old Testament, from the Cathedral of Noyon, c. 1170

Christian Church[edit]

The East–West Schism of 1054 formally separated the Christian church into two parts: Western Catholicism in Western Europe and Eastern Orthodoxy in the east. It occurred when Pope Leo IX and Patriarch Michael I excommunicated each other, mainly over disputes as to the existence of papal authority over the four Eastern patriarchs, as well as disagreement over the filioque.


Main article: Crusades
The Crusades occurred between the 11th and 13th centuries. They were conducted under papal authority with the intent of reestablishing Christian rule in The Holy Land by taking the area from the Muslim Fatimid Caliphate. The Fatimids had captured Palestine in AD 970, lost it to the Seljuk Turks in 1073 and recaptured it in 1098, just before they lost it again in 1099 as a result of the First Crusade.

Military orders[edit]

In the context of the crusades, monastic military orders were founded that would become the template for the late medieval chivalric orders.
The Knights Templar were a Christian military order founded after the First Crusade to help protect Christian pilgrims from hostile locals and highway bandits. The order was deeply involved in banking, and in 1307 Philip the Fair (Philippine le Bel) had the entire order arrested in France and dismantled on charges of heresy.
The Knights Hospitaller were originally a Christian organization founded in Jerusalem in 1080 to provide care for poor, sick, or injured pilgrims to the Holy Land. After Jerusalem was taken in the First Crusade, it became a religious/military order that was charged with the care and defence of the Holy Lands. After the Holy Lands were eventually taken by Muslim forces, it moved its operations to Rhodes, and later Malta.
The Teutonic Knights were a German religious order formed in 1190, in the city of Acre, to both aid Christian pilgims on their way to the Holy Lands and to operate hospitals for the sick and injured in Extremer. After Muslim forces captured the Holy Lands, the order moved to Transylvania in 1211 and later, after being expelled, invaded pagan Prussic with the intention of Christianizing the Baltic region. Yet, before and after the Order's main pagan opponent, Lithuania, converted to Christianity, the Order had already attacked other Christian nations such as Novgorod and Poland. The Teutonic Knights' power hold, which became considerable, was broken in 1410, at the Battle of Grunwald, where the Order suffered a devastating defeat against a joint Polish-Lithuanian army. After Grunwald, the Order declined in power until 1809 when it was officially dissolved. There were ten crusades in total.


Main article: Scholasticism
The new Christian method of learning was influenced by Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109) from the rediscovery of the works of Aristotle, at first indirectly through Medieval Jewish and Muslim Philosophy (Maimonides, Avicenna, and Averroes) and then through Aristotle's own works brought back from Byzantine and Muslim libraries; and those whom he influenced, most notably Albertus Magnus, Bonaventure and Abélard. Many scholastics believed in empiricism and supporting Roman Catholic doctrines through secular study, reason, and logic. They opposed Christian mysticism, and the Platonist-Augustinian belief that the mind is an immaterial substance. The most famous of the scholastics was Thomas Aquinas (later declared a "Doctor of the Church"), who led the move away from the Platonic and Augustinian and towards Aristotelianism. Aquinas developed a philosophy of mind by writing that the mind was at birth a tabula rasa ("blank slate") that was given the ability to think and recognize forms or ideas through a divine spark. Other notable scholastics included Roscelin, Abélard, Peter Lombard, and Francisco Suárez. One of the main questions during this time was the problem of universals. Prominent opponents of various aspects of the scholastic mainstream included Duns Scotus, William of Ockham, Peter Damian, Bernard of Clairvaux, and the Victorines. [1]

Golden age of monasticism[edit]

Mendicant orders[edit]

  • The 13th century saw the rise of the Mendicant orders such as the:
    • Carmelites (Hermits of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Carmel, commonly known as the White Friars), founded 1206–1214
    • Augustinians (Hermits of St. Augustine, commonly called the Austin Friars), founded 1256

Heretical movements[edit]

Christian heresies existed in Europe before the 11th century but only in small numbers and of local character: in most cases, a rogue priest, or a village returning to pagan traditions. Beginning in the 11th century, however mass-movement heresies appeared. The roots of this can be partially sought in the rise of urban cities, free merchants, and a new money-based economy. The rural values of monasticism held little appeal to urban people who began to form sects more in tune with urban culture. The first large-scale heretical movements in Western Europe originated in the newly urbanized areas such as southern France and northern Italy and were probably influenced by the Bogomils and other dualist movements. These heresies were on a scale the Catholic Church had never seen before; the response was one of elimination for some (such as the Cathars), and acceptance and integration of others (such as the veneration of Francis of Assisi, the son of an urban merchant who renounced money).


Cathars being expelled from Carcassonne in 1209
Main article: Catharism
Catharism was a movement with Gnostic elements that originated around the middle of the 10th century, branded by the contemporary Roman Catholic Church as heretical. It existed throughout much of Western Europe, but its origination was in Languedoc and surrounding areas in southern France.
The name Cathar stems from Greek katharos, "pure". One of the first recorded uses is Eckbert von Schönau who wrote on heretics from Cologne in 1181: "Hos nostra Germania catharos appellat."
The Cathars are also called Albigensians. This name originates from the end of the 12th century, and was used by the chronicler Geoffroy du Breuil of Vigeois in 1181. The name refers to the southern town of Albi (the ancient Albiga). The designation is hardly exact, for the centre was at Toulouse and in the neighbouring districts.
The Albigensians were strong in southern France, northern Italy, and the southwestern Holy Roman Empire.


Peter Waldo of Lyon was a wealthy merchant who gave up his riches around 1175 after a religious experience and became a preacher. He founded the Waldensians which became a Christian sect believing that all religious practices should have scriptural basis. Waldo was denied the right to preach his sermons by the Third Lateran Council in 1179, which he did not obey and continued to speak freely until he was excommunicated in 1184. Waldo was critical of the Christian clergy saying they did not live according to the word. He rejected the practice of selling indulgences, as well as the common saint cult practices of the day.
Waldensians are considered a forerunner to the Protestant Reformation, and they melted into Protestantism with the outbreak of the Reformation and became a part of the wider Reformed tradition after the views of John Calvin and his theological successors in Geneva proved very similar to their own theological thought. Waldensian churches still exist, located on several continents.

Trade and commerce[edit]

In Northern Europe, the Hanseatic League, a federation of free cities to advance trade by sea, was founded in the 12th century, with the foundation of the city of Lübeck, which would later dominate the League, in 1158—1159. Many northern cities of the Holy Roman Empire became hanseatic cities, including Amsterdam, Cologne, Bremen, Hanover and Berlin. Hanseatic cities outside the Holy Roman Empire were, for instance, Bruges and the Polish city of Gdańsk (Danzig), as well as Königsberg, capital of the monastic state of the Teutonic Knights. In Bergen, Norway and Veliky Novgorod, Russia the league had factories and middlemen. In this period the Germans started colonising Europe beyond the Empire, into Prussia and Silesia.
In the late 13th century, a Venetian explorer named Marco Polo became one of the first Europeans to travel the Silk Road to China. Westerners became more aware of the Far East when Polo documented his travels in Il Milione. He was followed by numerous Christian missionaries to the East, such as William of Rubruck, Giovanni da Pian del Carpine, André de Longjumeau, Odoric of Pordenone, Giovanni de' Marignolli, Giovanni di Monte Corvino, and other travellers such as Niccolò de' Conti.


Philosophical and scientific teaching of the Early Middle Ages was based upon few copies and commentaries of ancient Greek texts that remained in Western Europe after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire. Most of them were studied only in Latin as knowledge of Greek was very limited.
This scenario changed during the Renaissance of the 12th century. The intellectual revitalization of Europe started with the birth of medieval universities. The increased contact with the Islamic world in Spain and Sicily during the Reconquista, and the Byzantine world and Muslim Levant during the Crusades, allowed Europeans access to scientific Arabic and Greek texts, including the works of Aristotle, Alhazen, and Averroes. The European universities aided materially in the translation and propagation of these texts and started a new infrastructure which was needed for scientific communities.
Detail of a portrait of Hugh de Provence (wearing spectacles), painted by Tomasso da Modena in 1352


During the 12th and 13th century in Europe there was a radical change in the rate of new inventions, innovations in the ways of managing traditional means of production, and economic growth. In less than a century there were more inventions developed and applied usefully than in the previous thousand years of human history all over the globe. The period saw major technological advances, including the adoption or invention of windmills, watermills, printing (though not yet with movable type), gunpowder, the astrolabe, glasses, scissors of the modern shape, a better clock, and greatly improved ships. The latter two advances made possible the dawn of the Age of Discovery. These inventions were influenced by foreign culture and society.
  • Paper manufacture began in Italy around 1270.
  • Eye glasses were invented in Italy in the late 1280s.
  • The astrolabe returned to Europe via Islamic Spain.
  • Fibonacci introduces Arabic numerals to Europe with his book Liber Abaci in 1202.
  • The West's oldest known depiction of a stern-mounted rudder can be found on church carvings dating to around 1180.


Visual arts[edit]

A fresco from the Boyana Church depicting Emperor Constantine Tikh Asen. The murals are among the finest achievements of the Bulgarian culture in the 13th century.
Main article: Medieval art
Art in the High Middle Ages includes these important movements:


Main article: Gothic architecture


Main article: Medieval literature
John the Apostle and Marcion of Sinope in an Italian illuminated manuscript, painting on vellum, 11th century
A variety of cultures influenced the literature of the High Middle Ages, one of the strongest among them being Christianity. The connection to Christianity was greatest in Latin literature, which influenced the vernacular languages in the literary cycle of the Matter of Rome. Other literary cycles, or interrelated groups of stories, included the Matter of France (stories about Charlemagne and his court), the Acritic songs dealing with the chivalry of Byzantium's frontiersmen, and perhaps the best known cycle, the Matter of Britain, which featured tales about King Arthur, his court, and related stories from Brittany, Cornwall, Wales and Ireland. An anonymous German poet tried to bring the Germanic myths from the Migration Period to the level of the French and British epics, producing the Nibelungenlied. There was also a quantity of poetry and historical writings which were written during this period, such as Historia Regum Britanniae by Geoffrey of Monmouth.
Despite political decline during the late 12th and much of the 13th centuries, the Byzantine scholarly tradition remained particularly fruitful over the time period. One of the most prominent philosophers of the 11th century, Michael Psellos, reinvigorated Neoplatonism on Christian foundations and bolstered the study of ancient philosophical texts, along with contributing to history, grammar, and rhetorics. His pupil and successor at the head of Philosophy at the University of Constantinople Ioannes Italos continued the Platonic line in Byzantine thought and was criticized by the Church for holding opinions it considered heretical, such as the doctrine of transmigration. Two Orthodox theologians important in the dialogue between the eastern and western churches were Nikephoros Blemmydes and Maximus Planudes. Byzantine historical tradition also flourished with the works of the brothers Niketas and Michael Choniates in the beginning of the 13th century and George Akropolites a generation later. Dating from 12th century Byzantine Empire is also Timarion, an Orthodox Christian anticipation of Divine Comedy. Around the same time the so-called Byzantine novel rose in popularity with its synthesis of ancient pagan and contemporaneous Christian themes.
At the same time southern France gave birth to Occitan literature, which is best known for troubadours who sang of courtly love. It included elements from Latin literature and Arab-influenced Spain and North Africa. Later its influence spread to several cultures in Western Europe, notably in Portugal and the Minnesänger in Germany. Provençal literature also reached Sicily and Northern Italy laying the foundation of the "sweet new style" of Dante and later Petrarca. Indeed, the most important poem of the Late Middle Ages, the allegorical Divine Comedy, is to a large degree a product of both the theology of Thomas Aquinas and the largely secular Occitan literature.


Main article: Medieval music
The surviving music of the High Middle Ages is primarily religious in nature, since music notation developed in religious institutions, and the application of notation to secular music was a later development. Early in the period, Gregorian chant was the dominant form of church music; other forms, beginning with organum, and later including clausulae, conductus, and the motet, developed using the chant as source material.
During the 11th century, Guido of Arezzo was one of the first to develop musical notation, which made it easier for singers to remember Gregorian chants.
It was during the 12th and 13th centuries that Gregorian plainchant gave birth to polyphony, which appeared in the works of French Notre Dame School (Léonin and Pérotin). Later it evolved into the ars nova (Philippe de Vitry, Guillaume de Machaut) and the musical genres of late Middle Ages. An important composer during the 12th century was the nun Hildegard of Bingen.
The most significant secular movement was that of the troubadours, who arose in Occitania (Southern France) in the late 11th century. The troubadours were often itinerant, came from all classes of society, and wrote songs on a variety of topics, though with a particular focus on courtly love. Their style went on to influence the trouvères of northern France, the minnesingers of Germany, and the composers of secular music of the Trecento in northern Italy.


Main article: Medieval theatre
Economic and political changes in the High Middle Ages led to the formation of guilds and the growth of towns, and this would lead to significant changes for theatre starting in this time and continuing into in the Late Middle Ages. Trade guilds began to perform plays, usually religiously based, and often dealing with a biblical story that referenced their profession. For instance, a baker's guild would perform a reenactment of the Last Supper.[8] In the British Isles, plays were produced in some 127 different towns during the Middle Ages. These vernacular Mystery plays were written in cycles of a large number of plays: York (48 plays), Chester (24), Wakefield (32) and Unknown (42). A larger number of plays survive from France and Germany in this period and some type of religious dramas were performed in nearly every European country in the Late Middle Ages. Many of these plays contained comedy, devils, villains and clowns.[9]


Further information: Timeline of the Middle Ages
The cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris, whose construction began in 1163, is one of the finer examples of the High Middle Ages architecture

See also[edit]


  2. ^ http://www.fafich.ufmg.br/hist_discip_grad/barbarians_inavsions_halsall.pdf
  3. ^ http://www.cambridge.org/gb/knowledge/isbn/item1173036/?site_locale=en_GB
  4. ^ See ffor example: Aberth, John (2012). "The early medieval woodland". An Environmental History of the Middle Ages: The Crucible of Nature. Abingdon: Routledge. p. 87. ISBN 9780415779456. Retrieved 2017-08-17. The French historian of the early medieval forest, Charles Higounet, produced a map in the 1960s, which has been much reproduced since, that purports to show the distribution of the forest cover in Europe on the eve of the so-called 'great clearances' (les grands défrichements) between 1000 and 1300. 
  6. ^ Jellinek, E. M. 1976. "Drinkers and Alcoholics in Ancient Rome." Edited by Carole D. Yawney andRobert E. Popham. Journal of Studies on Alcohol 37 (11): 1718-1740.
  7. ^ Franklin, J., "The Renaissance myth", Quadrant 26 (11) (Nov, 1982), 51-60. (Retrieved on-line at 06-07-2007)
  8. ^ A History of English literature for Students, by Robert Huntington Fletcher, 1916: pp. 85-88
  9. ^ Brockett and Hildy (2003, 86)
  10. ^ Brockett and Hildy (2003, 96)

Further reading[edit]

  • Fuhrmann, Horst. Germany in the high Middle Ages: c. 1050-1200 (Cambridge UP, 1986).
  • Jordan, William C. Europe in the high middle ages (2nd ed. Penguin, 2004).
  • Mundy, John H. Europe in the High Middle Ages, 1150-1309 (2014)--online
  • Power, Daniel, ed. The Central Middle Ages: Europe 950-1320 (Oxford UP, 2006).

External links[edit]

  1. Music of the Middle Ages: 475-1500
  2. Middle Ages: The High Middle Ages on Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia at infoplease
  3. Provençal literature on Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia at infoplease

External links[edit]

Media related to High Middle Ages at Wikimedia Commons
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