Keith Tyler

Medieval Europe

Final

The medieval period moved into the Renaissance amid a storm of troubles which seemed likely to bring about the demise of Western Europe anew. At the least, these crises could have served to undo all the important creations of the age, and perhaps return the region to the state it found itself at the beginning of this period. However, by the end of the medieval period, a certain mixture of different lifestyles of society, one old and one new, was in shift, and this somewhat divided culture must have had elements which allowed the civilization to survive.

The major crises of the late middle ages each affected different divisions of this culture in different ways. Each had their own roots and each had their own effective target. In order for each division of society to survive the effects of these crises, the other divisions had to be there to back them up and rebuild them. Likewise, in order for society as a whole to survive these crises, there had to remain some established divisions of society which could carry on. Otherwise, the whole of society would fall apart.

The two main divisions concerned here are manorial life and urban life. Manorial life's strength came from its age and its establishment. The feudal system had remained almost entirely unchanged for the whole of the medieval period. Manorial or rural life therefore had a certain stability. Urban life on the other hand was much younger. However, its strength lied in its population, its wealth, and also its knowledge. Where manorial life was stable, urban life was a dynamic force. Both aspects of culture can be benefits or hindrances.

The three main crises that arrive in the late middle ages are the schisms and questionings of the Church, the Black Plague, and the Hundred Years' War. Each affected the divisions of culture in different ways, and the affects of each were repulsed by the divisions in different ways.

The first to look at, as it is more simply explained by this idea, is the Black Plague. The cities had more or less brought the Plague upon themselves via their extensive trade with outside cultures. Their trade also allowed the Plague to travel throughout Europe due to their even more extensive trade within Christendom. In such largely populated areas such as the cities, and with its strength based in the produced wealth of people, the widespread loss of people to the disease was very damaging to the survival of cities. The plague put urban European economics on a roller coaster ride. Plus, the concentration of learned knowledge here could have meant the loss of much of this knowledge (once again!) from the Western world.

On the other hand, manorial life had been put under stress by the increased population of the late middle ages. There was little room left for the expansion of manor­ed countryside. Since townspeople kept generally to themselves, and had little contact with cities save the markets, the impact of the plague on that division of life was less damaging than it was a release of pressure. Eventually, the persistence of manorial life provided just enough strength, in terms of people and goods, to help breathe life into the cities.

The second crisis is the schisms and calling of Church doctrines into question. The Church's power was undoubtedly in decline by the late middle ages. The schisms over the papacy, the heavy politics involved, and the infighting of the high clerics threw the Church into disarray and confusion. For the most part, urban life couldn't care less. Already cities had distanced themselves ideologically from the Church. Much of the worry was in the political leaders of the continent. But faith had typically been a strong maintaining force in manorial life.

The rise of opposition to papal power, and protestation of Church doctrine came just around the time the Church was pulling itself back together after the Great Schism. The elements of reason, which both the Church and the urban culture combined had inadvertently brought into medieval culture, threatened not just the politics, but some of the very essential precepts of the Church. Urban, scholastic life reveled in this sort of intellectual controversy, but manorial life, which was so strongly based around rules of faith and laws of the Church, was confused. Had this opposition to the Church and use of reason somehow come about without the existence of cities, manorial life would not likely have survived such strong challenges to fundamental beliefs. It was the urban lifestyle which was capable of handling the philosophical consequences of these lines of thought, and its influence on the rest of society had a reassuring effect.

The last of the major crises, the Hundred Years' War, is the least well defined by this theory. In a sense, both manorial life and urban life withstood its effects simultaneously. Both the manorial world and the urban world were spread out across the continent. Regardless of its duration, the battles of the war only directly affected a few strongholds, major towns, and parts of counties. Although those areas which were battlefields in the War were obviously hurt, elsewhere manorial and urban life was maintained.

However, there were twofold effects of the politics of the War. Unsure military advances threatened the prosperity of towns and trade, as well as the lives of their citizens. At the same time, poor leadership by the English and French kings, which was symptomatic of the war, threatened manorial life and that of the nobility. Though the effects on cities would be short-term and sporadic, the effect of brash, unthoughtful rulers would remain a bad effect the rural life. In the end, the urban life would bounce back quicker, while manorial life would begin to decline, though due to its stability and long life, the feudal concept would last in some areas through and beyond the next age.

Late medieval Europe faced a variety of crises, each of which independently could have destroyed important aspects of Western life. Two distinct divisions of the culture, the manorial and urban lifestyles, were at this time in a state of flux, moving from the pastoral to the commercial. It is the peculiar combination of these two lifestyles within the same society at this point in time which may have allowed Western civilization to live to see beyond the middle ages.