The medieval period is frequently caricatured as a "time of ignorance and superstition" that placed "the word of religious authorities over personal experience and rational activity." This is a legacy ...
The Late Middle Ages in Europe as a whole correspond to the Trecento and Early Renaissance cultural periods in Italy, although Northern Europe and Spain continued to use Gothic styles, increasingly el ...
One of the major developments in the military sphere during the Late Middle Ages was the increasing use of infantry and light cavalry. The English also employed longbowmen, but other countries were un ...
he Later Middle Ages saw a reaction against scholasticism led by John Duns Scotus (d. 1308) and William of Ockham (d. c. 1348), both of whom objected to the application of reason to faith. Their effor ...
The troubled 14th century saw the Avignon Papacy of 1305–78, also called the "Babylonian Captivity of the Papacy" (a reference to the Babylonian captivity of the Jews), and then the Great Schism that ...
Although the Palaeologi emperors recaptured Constantinople from the Western Europeans in 1261, they were never able to regain control of much of the former imperial lands. They usually controlled only ...
The Late Middle Ages witnessed the rise of strong, royalty-based nation states throughout Europe, particularly in England, France, and the Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula: Aragon, Castile, ...
Society throughout Europe was disturbed by the dislocations caused by the Black Death. Lands that had been marginally productive were abandoned, as the survivors were able to acquire more fertile area ...
The first years of the 14th century were marked by famines, culminating in the Great Famine of 1315–17. The causes of the Great Famine included the slow transition from the Medieval Warm Period to th ...
Monastic reform became an important issue during the 11th century, as elites began to worry that monks were not adhering to the rules binding them to a strictly religious life. Cluny Abbey, founded in ...
In the 10th century the establishment of churches and monasteries led to the development of stone architecture that elaborated vernacular Roman forms, from which the term "Romanesque" is derived. Wher ...
In the 12th and 13th centuries, Europe saw economic growth and innovations in methods of production. Major technological advances included the invention of the windmill, the first mechanical clocks, t ...
During the 11th century, developments in philosophy and theology led to increased intellectual activity. There was debate between the realists and the nominalists over the concept of "universals". Phi ...
In the 11th century, the Seljuk Turks took over much of the Middle East, occupying Persia during the 1040s, Armenia in the 1060s, and Jerusalem in 1070. In 1071, the Turkish army defeated the Byzantin ...
The High Middle Ages was the formative period in the history of the modern Western state. Kings in France, England, and Spain consolidated their power, and set up lasting governing institutions. New k ...
