Not all settlements arose so peacefully, and quite often the new inhabitants expelled or killed the former owners of the land, the Slavs. The city of Lübeck itself received from the emperors Frederick Barbarossa (1188) and Frederick II (1226) the rights of self-government. The construction of a brick two-towered cathedral began in 1173 and was completed only in the middle of the next century.

Social and economic stagnation

In the sparsely populated lands of Europe, immigration enriched both rulers and landowners, who invited new residents and organized the resettlement of peasants who agreed to this. But for the western regions, even such significant movements of people were not enough to solve the problem of overpopulation. A number of data indicate that by the end of the XIII century. in most of Europe, population growth reached a critical limit, beyond which limited land areas and backward, slowly developing technology for their cultivation no longer corresponded to it. Such a Malthusian interpretation is not easily supported or refuted. It should be noted that the British economist Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) argued that natural population growth would always outstrip food production, a theory that has not lost its relevance in our time.

Some of the facts known to us indicate that in the first decades of the XIV century. the development of the European economy has stalled, the growth of rents and prices has slowed or stopped, and the population has ceased to increase. One of the reasons for this was the crop failures in Northwestern Europe in 1415-1417, which caused great famine and high mortality. This disaster was probably due to the deterioration of the climate during the "Little Ice Age"; the consequences seemed to have been particularly hard on the outlying areas, which were now taking revenge on the overconfident colonists.

Did these phenomena mean anything more than just a slowdown in the pace of development characteristic of the previous three centuries? We do not know this, since the economy was not able to develop at a natural pace in the future: in 1346-1349. Europe was shaken by an epidemic of bubonic plague, which resulted in the death of, according to various estimates, from a quarter to a half of the entire population. The severity of the losses may have been exacerbated by circumstances of a “Malthusian” nature, but the disease itself, the Black Death, originated outside of Europe, and this will be discussed in the next chapter.

Organization of agricultural production

From the 10th to the 12th centuries the development of the manor and seigneury in abundance provided the landowners with labor in a relatively small and stable market for agricultural products. These conditions have changed in connection with the growth of population, the increase in the number of cities and urban markets, with the rise in prices and under the influence of mass migrations of peasants. Now it turned out to be profitable for landowners to manage based on an expanding market. There were several ways to do this. The owner of the land could expand his household plot and then work it with the hands of hired tenants, whose labor was probably much more efficient than that of the serfs. Most often this was done in the Netherlands and some areas of France, England and Germany, where the new system led to the rapid disappearance of the relations of the classical seigneury. On the contrary, it was possible to intensify the exploitation of the serfs and demand more unpaid labor from them, as was often the case even in the richest and most economically developed areas: for example, in South-East England. And, finally, to take advantage of the situation of land shortage and rising rents and simply rent out your household plot on favorable terms; this method, in turn, led to an accelerated erosion of senior relations, since the owner of the land no longer needed the labor of the serfs. Nevertheless, no one deprived him of other senior rights, for example, the exclusive right to keep a mill or brew beer in a given area, and most importantly, the right of lower jurisdiction. An important form of land leasing was the division of crops, when the landowner and the tenant literally divided each crop; especially often this method was resorted to in Northern Italy and Southern France.

In Eastern Europe, the cities were still very small, and production for the general market was only in its infancy. At the same time, local landowners offered comparatively favorable terms to tenants; otherwise, they simply would not have been able to persuade the peasants to move from their old place or prevent them from moving to another estate. These are the reasons why the classical lordship never took root in Eastern Europe.

Social conflicts and peasant movements

It took time for all these processes to fully manifest themselves. But already at the end of the XIII century. the former relative uniformity of the agrarian organization was replaced by a variety of land ownership relations and peasant duties. The inevitable result was increased tension as the interests of the landowners clashed with the desire of the peasants to protect their ancient customs and social and legal status. According to chronicles, starting from the last two decades of the 13th century. Peasant uprisings took place in a number of places, and between 1323 and 1328 they for the first time engulfed an entire region - coastal Flanders. From this time until the very end of the "Old Regime", which was laid down by the revolutions in France and Russia, peasant movements and uprisings remained an integral feature of European life. Although the uprisings occurred irregularly and did not always have similar goals, their main reasons remained the same: the impact of economic changes on the traditionally conservative peasant environment. The peasantry resisted change, despite the fact that they were defenseless against legally sanctioned exploitation: from the owners of land, and capital, and tax collectors, and princely army recruiters. A common feature of all these movements, up to 1789 in France, 1917 in Russia and 1949 in China, was their fundamental inefficiency: they achieved only partial and short-term successes. ruling classes- landowners and princes - possessed sufficient strength to maintain their positions, since in this struggle they retained all the strategic advantages - education, religious traditions, respect for the law, the habit of commanding and demanding obedience, and, finally, most importantly - the ability to organize and maintain professional troops.

Handicraft production and craft workshops

It is difficult to name the reasons that would prevent the occupation of crafts in the countryside and in the villages - as, in fact, it was at first. But the growing cities provided natural markets for all kinds of handicrafts: fabrics, clothing, shoes, all kinds of leather and metal products, and primarily for the construction of private houses, city walls, towers and churches. It is quite natural that cities were attractive to artisans. With the exception of bricklayers, masons, and some other trades, others worked from home, often employing day laborers—apprentices and skilled apprentices. From the 12th century or even earlier, representatives of one profession began to unite in craft workshops. These workshops were not like modern trade unions, since they included both employers and workers, and the employers - skilled craftsmen - always set the tone. The guilds adopted their charters, compiled written reports on their activities, not least for this reason historians often overestimated their importance.

In the XII and XIII centuries. craft workshops were, as a rule, only religious brotherhoods, whose members had common economic interests; these associations restored to people the sense of security and security lost with leaving the village, and also created much-needed institutions for the care of disabled or elderly members of the workshops, over widows and orphans. In any case, a workshop could only be founded in a large city, since in a small one there simply would not be a sufficient number of craftsmen of one profession. In large cities, such as London, there were associations of the rarest crafts. The resolution of the workshop of spur craftsmen from 1345 gives a clear idea of ​​the regulation of its activities, the noisy and sometimes dangerous behavior of the townspeople and the constant threat of fires in the medieval city:

Let everyone remember that on Tuesday, the day after the day of the Chains of St. Peter, in the nineteenth year of the reign of King Edward III, the articles signed here were read in the presence of John Hammond, the mayor ... First of all, none of the spur masters should work longer than from the beginning of the day until the signal to put out the fires from the Church of the Holy Sepulcher behind the New Gates. Because no one can work as carefully at night as during the day, and many craftsmen, knowing how to cheat in their trade, want to work more at night than during the day: then they can slip in bad or cracked iron. Further, many masters of spurs walk all day long and do not practice their trade at all, and when they get drunk and go berserk, they set to work, thereby causing anxiety to the sick and all neighbors, as well as quarrels that happen between them ... And when they are so they fan the flames so much that their furnaces at once begin to burn with a bright flame, they create a great danger for themselves and for all their neighbors ... Also, none of the named masters should keep a house or a workshop to do their job (unless he is a citizen of the city) ... Also, none of the named masters should invite an apprentice, assistant or apprentice of another master of this craft until the term agreed between him and his master has expired ... Also, no stranger should be trained in this craft or practice it, unless he received city rights from mayor, alderman, and chairman of the House…”

Gradually, but not everywhere, rules were established in the guilds that determined the conditions for hiring students, hours of work, quality of products and sometimes even prices.

Capitalism in handicraft production

Such a system of production worked well where the sources of raw materials and the market for handicrafts were local, limited and well known. But it stopped working in those places where the production of high-quality goods of narrow demand required imported raw materials or where goods entered the general market. So, in the XIII century. both Flemish and Italian cloth makers exported high-quality wool from England, and local spinners and weavers had to buy it from intermediaries. Since it was expensive, they were probably forced to take it on credit, becoming indebted and dependent on importing merchants. But much more often they took credit from exporters who sold finished fabric, for by the very nature of their craft they had no contact with the final buyer. In turn, the merchants - the only ones who owned the capital and the technology of buying and selling - found it convenient and profitable to organize the production of fabrics in accordance with the prevailing market conditions. By the end of the XIII century. this practice evolved into highly developed and well-organized capitalist production within the then advanced "vertical integration".

Account books for the 1280s of a certain Jean Boyenbrock of the Flemish city of Douai say that he had agents in England who bought raw wool, which he then distributed in succession to carders, spinners, weavers, fullers and dyers who did their work at home, and at the end of the cycle he sold the finished fabric to foreign merchants. The craftsmen he hired had no right to take orders from other employers, even if Boyenbrock did not have enough work for them: the fact is that he also owned the houses of these craftsmen, who undoubtedly had debts to him. In addition, Boyenbrock and his fellow employers sat on the city council and issued laws and statutes that publicly sanctioned such a system of exploitation.

The situation was approximately the same in Northern Italy. In Florence, for example, the production of high-quality fabrics from English wool was controlled by the woolen guild, an association of capitalists involved in the production of fabrics: it gave orders to residents not only of the city itself, but also of the surrounding villages. Such a system of organizing production was called "distribution". Employers, of course, were worried that workers would also create their own organization. Statutes of the Florentine Woolen Guild (arte della lana) dated 1317 forbade this quite definitely:

In order that ... the guild may prosper and enjoy its freedom, strength, honor and rights, and in order to restrain those who of their own accord oppose and rebel against the guild, we decree and declare that no member of the guild and no artisans are independent workers or members of any guilds, by no means or means or legal subterfuge, by action or design, shall create, organize, or establish any ... masters of the guild or against their honor, jurisdiction, guardianship, power or authority under the threat of a fine of 200 pounds of small florins. And secret spies are appointed to supervise these affairs; but at the same time, it is permissible for anyone to make accusations and denunciations openly or secretly, receiving a reward of half the fine, and the name of the informer is kept secret.

In fact, it was a kind of "anti-union law" that introduced a system of penalties for unauthorized associations. The chronicler Giovanni Villani reports that in 1338 30,000 people were employed in the Florentine woolen industry, including many women and children, who produced about 80,000 large cuts of fabric per year. In the previous thirty years, the cost of production had doubled, while the number of manufacturing companies had fallen from 300 to 200.

Thus, in Flanders and northern Italy, a real capitalist mode of production developed, in which workers actually became hired workers for wages, proletarians who own nothing but their labor, although at that time there were no factories yet, and workers worked at home and continued to hire apprentices and apprentices. The employment of workers depended on fluctuations in the international market, about which the workers themselves knew nothing and which they could not control. Therefore, it is not surprising that industrial conflicts began in these two areas - strikes and urban uprisings. When they coincided with or combined with peasant uprisings, they could, at least sometimes, be very dangerous.

The processes that developed in wool production were also characteristic of other industries. Where production required significant fixed (as, for example, in mining) or circulating (for example, in construction and shipbuilding) capital, entrepreneurs and the capitalist organization they created inexorably crowded out small independent artisans. This process was slow, not everywhere at the same time, and during this period affected only some areas of Europe and a relatively small part of the working population. But the 13th and 14th centuries became a watershed between traditional society, slowly emerging from a combination of late Roman craftsmanship and barbarian customs, and a dynamic, competitive and deeply divided modern society. It is in this era that those stereotypes of economic behavior and organization are born, with all the attendant problems of human relations, which are also characteristic of our days.

Capitalism and new forms of trade organization

If such significant changes took place in handicraft production, they were even more noticeable in trade. The growth of population, the production of goods and wealth, the development of cities and specialization all led to a huge expansion of trade. It took place at all levels, from the village market to large international fairs for professional merchants, from the expansion of urban grocers to the creation of large international trading companies. There was no sharp break with the processes of previous centuries, but where trade had previously been sporadic, it became organized and regular. The four fairs in Champagne were now constantly active for most of the year and created opportunities for regular communication between Flemish and Italian merchants until, in the 14th century. they were not replaced by the annual voyages of merchant fleets from Italy via Gibraltar to Bruges and Southampton. The people of Bruges, who refused to travel, found that they could live very well by staying at home and providing warehousing and intermediary services to foreign merchants in their city.

The Venetians, Genoese and Pisans were increasingly pushing out their competitors in the Mediterranean trade. It was the Italians who developed the most complex forms of trading operations: various options for trading partnerships allowed them to attract significant working capital necessary for building and equipping ships, buying goods and paying crew during overseas voyages that sometimes lasted months.

The existence of partnerships made it necessary to maintain regular accounts, which allowed each participant in each trading enterprise to receive his share of profits or suffer his share of losses. This is how the double-entry bookkeeping system was born. And since there was always a danger of becoming a victim of storms and rocks, pirates and military operations, merchants took out marine insurance as a guarantee of their investments. Insurance premiums were high, and many, like Shakespeare's Venetian merchant, even in the 16th century. believed that the cost of insurance does not pay off. However, almost all merchants used credit. Trade in the thirteenth century probably would not have grown as much if the pay-as-you-go principle had remained in place: there simply would not have been enough money in cash circulation, despite the fact that Western Europe returned to the minting of gold coins for the first time in 500 years: in 1255 Florence issued a gold florin, followed by Venice in 1284 a gold ducat. It was much more convenient and safer to buy and sell on credit, issuing promissory notes, rather than constantly paying significant - including by weight - amounts in silver and gold. These promissory notes, or bills of exchange, could also be used to hide interest on loans and not transfer them in cash. The fact is that the church frowned upon the charging of interest, since theologians adhered to the Aristotelian theory, according to which money is only a medium of exchange and, therefore, something "barren", that is, not bringing wealth. However, it proved impossible to ban the charging of interest on loans; quite often this was done quite openly, not least by merchants and bankers associated with the papacy.

Banking was also expanding, and there were two reasons for this. First, many different coins came into circulation, the comparative denomination of which was so difficult to ascertain that it soon required professional money changers. Secondly, merchants preferred to keep free funds in a safe place. When these two functions came together in the same hands and it became possible to withdraw or make deposits, modern banking was born.

Italy became the birthplace of new commercial operations, especially Genoa and Tuscany; here, in Italy, in the XIII-XIV centuries. the first written manuals on banking appeared. In the same way, the first descriptions of foreign ports and trade routes appeared in Italy, as well as dictionaries with translations of Italian words and phrases into oriental languages. Finally, it was in Italy that young people could learn the basics of commerce, not just as apprentices of reputable trading companies, but in schools and universities; for centuries the inhabitants northern countries Europe came to Italy to learn this art.

With the development of new methods of commercial activity, new mindsets appeared: rational calculation in the organization of an economic enterprise, digital, mathematical assessments of opportunities, as well as rational, mathematically verified methods of commerce began to be considered a recipe for success. According to Villani, in Florence in 1345, from 8 to 10 thousand boys and girls learned to read, and in six schools 1000 or 1200 boys (of course, this did not concern girls) - to use the abacus and arithmetic. But Florence, Venice, Genoa, and a few other Italian cities were far ahead of the rest of Europe. The majority of the population, and even the main part of the merchants, remained traditionalists: they were quite satisfied with the life that their ancestors led. The new attitude to work took root very slowly. The long resistance to the widespread use of Arabic numerals is a clear example of the fundamental conservatism inherent in even the most educated people of that time. Nevertheless, the appeal to rational methods and the rational organization of trade, strengthened by the Italian urban patrician, gave a powerful impetus to the general desire for rationality, which began to assert itself in almost every field of intellectual activity, specifically colored and ultimately determined the entire development of European civilization. .

System of monarchical government

By 1200, the era of the rapid formation of "empires" (vast states) was actually over, for which there were significant reasons. In the monarchies of Western and Southern Europe, royal power increasingly strengthened its position. The royal councils were still the body in which the king's largest secular and spiritual vassals (at least those whom he decided to invite) expressed their opinion on public policy. But at the same time, these councils had already begun to turn into a state body that was in charge of state affairs even in the absence of the king himself. The activities of the councils affected two main areas of politics - justice and royal finances; but within them, too, differentiation began to take shape. In England, already during the reign of Henry II (1154–1189), a guide to the work of the treasury was created - the Dialogue on the Treasury. The Court of Civil Claims at Westminster dealt with private cases, and the Court of King's Bench dealt with criminal offenses and cases affecting the rights of the crown, from the 13th century. it also began to consider appeals from lower courts. In addition, royal judges traveled throughout the country, collaborated with local jury courts and gradually replaced the feudal courts of the big nobility.

In France, these processes began somewhat later than in England, but went even faster. So, until 1295, the Knights Templar disposed of the French royal treasury. But already by 1306, the French "calculators" had more members than the English treasury. At about the same time, the supreme court of the French kingdom, the "parlement of Paris," had seven or eight times as many judges as the Court of Civil Claims and the Court of King's Bench combined.

Those who were in charge of royal affairs in the office, treasury and courts were now mostly professionals; and although on the whole they were, as before, ecclesiastics, the educated laity began to compete with them very successfully. In Germany, kings and territorial princes, dukes and bishops recruited such servants from among the semi-independent vassals, who traditionally "supplied" domestic servants and personal servants. Such employees were called ministeriales. Quite often they were rewarded with land, like other feudal vassals, and they too sought to make their possessions, and sometimes their duties, hereditary. So arose new class petty nobility, which, according to the customs of the time, was not considered completely free. This fact is another reminder to historians that feudalism was not a "strict" system of social relations, for it included many contradictory forms and phenomena. Only very gradually, during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, German ministeriales acquired the status of a free knighthood.

The destruction of medieval universalism

The growing complexity and professionalization of the central government, as well as its closer ties with the local administration, strengthened the sense of commonality and stability of political structures. The growth of prosperity and the widespread dissemination of education contributed to the formation of small regions into viable political units, in contrast to the 11th-12th centuries. now it was much easier to find professionals capable of solving management problems.

This was one of the main reasons for the regionalization of Europe, in contrast to the universalism of past centuries. However, transnational integration was not completely overcome: rather, two opposing trends over the next few centuries began to determine the development of Europe.

In the XIII century. these processes gave rise to a number of significant innovations. First of all, it became much more difficult for aggressive rulers to seize new territories; when they did succeed in something like this, it was much more difficult to include acquisitions in their possessions. Second, as power became more centralized and more efficient, it attracted all more people to participate in the management of society. We will discuss these two issues in more detail.

conquests

France

Nowhere was the problem of conquered territories more acute than in France. We may recall that the English king held most of Western France, from Normandy in the north to Aquitaine in the south, which were considered vassals of the French crown. In 1202, King Philip Augustus forced his feudal court to pass a decree depriving the English king John of all French fiefs. John's French vassals did not support him, as both he and his brother Richard the Lionheart used them for their own ambitious purposes. Not surprisingly, John ceded all of Normandy and Anjou (1204) to his overlord (retaining only Guyenne in the southwest). In exactly the same way, Henry the Lion in 1180 ceded all his possessions to his suzerain Frederick Barbarossa. But if Barbarossa had to immediately divide Saxony between Henry's largest vassals, then Philip-Augustus could annex Normandy and Anjou to his own possessions. It is true that these provinces retained many local laws and regulations, just as the Languedoc, Poitou, Toulouse, and other regions annexed by the French crown by conquest, inheritance, or purchase during the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. Right up to the revolution of 1789, France remained a country of semi-autonomous provinces, over which an increasingly complex centralized monarchical power towered.

England and the British Isles

The unification of new lands under the rule of the crown proved to be a more difficult task for the English kings than for the French. The British Isles never had a tradition of an all-encompassing monarchy of the kind that the Capetian dynasty had inherited from their Carolingian predecessors. The English kings claimed dominion over Ireland, but in Ireland itself this intention was taken into account only to the extent that the kings managed to put it into practice. The Anglo-Norman knights, who had seized large estates in Ireland during the reign of Henry II, were as little inclined to render any service to the king beyond hypocritical expressions of allegiance as were the local Gaelic-speaking Irish chieftains.

In Wales, the situation was approximately the same, although the local church was more closely connected with the English. Only Edward I (1272–1307), the most politically gifted English king since Henry II, managed to finally subdue Wales, which required a series of military victories and the construction of an elaborate system of castles. But even so, linguistically, culturally and administratively, Wales continued to be a largely alien and autonomous part of the kingdom.

Those measures that were good for Wales, located relatively close to the center of English royalty, were not good for distant Scotland. Edward's intervention in intra-Scottish succession disputes was only partially successful and plunged both countries into a state of hostility for two and a half centuries. In the frontier regions this feud was especially murderous and merciless, and this despite the fact that there was no noticeable ethnic or linguistic difference between the northern English and the Low Scottish populations. As is often the case, once enmity has begun, it is difficult to stop, because it is fueled by a feeling of resentment that is passed down from generation to generation.

Moreover, the Anglo-Scottish feud became an inevitable factor in the political struggle in Western Europe, and Edward I was the first English king to face the possibility of a deadly alliance between France and Scotland - an alliance that has become a tradition.

If the responsibility for this development lies mainly with Edward I, then it is not superfluous to add that any strong medieval ruler who had the appropriate opportunities would have done the same, that his contemporaries did not condemn Edward and that he (given the militant mores of medieval society) quite was aware of the possible consequences of the disloyal behavior of the Scottish kings. What contemporaries could not forgive was failures. When Edward's inept and weak son, Edward II (1307–1327), suffered a crushing defeat from the Scots at Bannockburn (1314), he immediately encountered the opposition of the barons, who eventually deprived him of his throne and life (1327).

Governance: law and society

During this period, the political practice of involving ever wider sections of the population in the management of society was born. It was influenced by a variety of factors: geographical, for example, on such large islands as England or Sicily, a common language, but the main ones were the commonality of political traditions developed within a common political system, as well as military needs and military experience. As kings extended their power beyond the purely feudal relationship of lord and vassal, their vassals and subjects in turn sought to escape that power or limit it by law in order to make the exercise of royal authority orderly and predictable. Almost everywhere in Europe, kings voluntarily gave in to such demands for the sake of maintaining inner peace and support in foreign wars; where this was not done voluntarily, the kings had to yield to the armed opposition. Everywhere the rulers granted self-government to their cities, and Frederick Barbarossa granted the cities of Northern Italy actual independence even from imperial power. Equally important were charters that guaranteed the rights and privileges of the nobility and required the king to comply with the laws of the country. Such were the ordinances of 1118 which had to be issued by Alfonso VIII, King of León (one of the Spanish kingdoms), or the privileges granted to the ecclesiastical princes of Germany by Emperor Frederick II in 1220 and extended by his son in 1231; such was the Golden Bull of the Hungarian king of 1222 and, finally, the most famous of all royal letters - the English Magna Carta of 1215.

England and Magna Carta

The immediate cause of the emergence of the Magna Carta (Magna Carta) the heavy taxes imposed by King John of England (1199-1216) served in order to recapture Normandy, lost in 1204. As often happens, the personal qualities of the participants in the events also played a role: John was a smart and powerful ruler; therefore people, not without reason, did not trust him. In his actions, he did not differ much from his father, Henry II, and his famous brother, Richard the Lionheart. But John lost both the war with France and the civil war with the discontented barons; by 1215 he had no room for maneuver and was forced to sign the Charter. The main meaning of the Charter was that it affirmed the rule of law; of course, it was not about the equality of all before the law: it brought benefits primarily to the rich and privileged strata of society, the barons and the church. However, unlike most continental royal decrees, the Magna Carta took into account the interests of ordinary people: it specifically stated that the freedoms that the king granted to vassals, they in turn should grant to their subjects. Its most famous clause reads: “No free man shall be imprisoned or imprisoned, or unlawfully deprived of his property, outlawed or exiled, or harmed in any way… except by the lawful decision of his peers, or by the law of the local land.” ". The principle of court "equals" was at one time widespread in Europe, but usually applied only to the nobility; here it is taken in a broad sense, applied to all free people, and associated with the establishment of the rule of law. In the next generation, English judges drew from this the logical consequence: "The king is subject to God and the law."

The true meaning of the Magna Carta came to light after 1215. It was confirmed several times by the great barons and representatives of the church, who were part of the government of regents under the infant king Henry III after the premature death of John. In the XIV century. Parliament interpreted the phrase "court of equals" in the sense of a jury trial that applied to everyone, not just free people.

A committee of twenty-five men was set up to oversee the execution of the Magna Carta, but only Parliament could exercise such oversight at all times; however, the promulgation of the Charter did not lead to the immediate creation of a parliament. The history of parliament will be dealt with in the next chapter.

Papacy, Empire and Secular Power

Innocent III

With the death of Emperor Henry VI in 1197, the papacy was freed from the last serious political rival in Italy. Just at that time, the cardinals elected the youngest of their number pope under the name of Innocent III. Among many outstanding medieval popes, Innocent III (1198-1216) stands out for his imperiousness and remarkable political successes. “Below God, but above men” – this is how he defined the greatness of his status, and about the relationship of the papacy and the state he wrote: “As the moon receives its light from the sun ... so the royal power borrows its splendor from the authority of the popes.” With unsurpassed skill, Innocent used every political opportunity to embody his vision of papal authority. Sicily, Aragon and Portugal recognized him as their feudal overlord, just as for a while the king of Poland, and even John the Landless. Innocent forced the French king Philip-Augustus to return his wife, whom he rejected and condemned during a dispute with John over Normandy. But even God effective was the constant intervention of the pope in the civil wars in Germany, where the candidates for the Hohenstaufen and Welf (the latter was the son of Henry the Lion) contested the throne. As a result of the Fourth Crusade, even Constantinople expressed its willingness to obey the pope. When Innocent solemnly opened the IV Lateran Council (1215), in the eyes of all Christendom the papacy was at an unattainable height.

Friedrich II

However, these successes have been deceptive. Circumstances have changed, and Innokenty's successor was far from his brilliant political talent. Now the advantage was on the side of the main enemy of the papacy, Emperor Frederick II (King of Sicily from 1198, Germany from 1212, Emperor in 1220-1250). The son of Henry VI, he was the most brilliant representative of the most gifted German dynasty - the Hohenstaufen. Raised in Sicily with its multinational, multilingual and multi-confessional heritage, Frederick II surrounded himself with a brilliant court of lawyers, writers, artists and scientists, and most actively participated in all their endeavors; he had at his disposal a harem of Saracen concubines and an army of Muslim mercenaries, on whose loyalty he could rely in the face of any papal invectives.

Having turned Sicily into a model European state, Frederick tried to restore imperial power in northern Italy and here, of course, he encountered both the Italian communes - independent Italian cities, and the papacy, which again felt fear of deadly political pressure from the power that controlled both Southern and Northern Italy. The struggle between Frederick II and the papacy actually acquired the character of an Italian civil war and went on with varying success until the sudden death of the emperor in 1250. After the death of Frederick, the positions of imperial forces in Italy were irretrievably lost.

Empire and Germany

The suddenness of this collapse was in itself evidence that the basis of imperial power had been dangerously narrowed. In the German civil wars of the early 13th century. rival factions squandered the main part of the imperial property, exhausted the resources of power. Frederick later had to use what was left of them to secure support for his Italian policy. After his death there followed a period of interregnum during which several foreign princes declared themselves kings with the support of various groups of German magnates, but never managed to acquire any significant power. Finally, in 1273, the largest German princes, the Electors, came to an agreement and elected the king of an uninfluential German count - Rudolf of Habsburg. They hoped that this would put an end to the anarchy of the interregnum, and that the weak king would not have the strength to restore the central authority of the German monarchy.

On both counts, they were right. Rudolph I could have had sufficient support to stop the extreme atrocities of the "robber barons". At the same time, he quite logically reasoned that his position ultimately depended on personal possessions, and he himself laid the foundations for the future greatness of the House of Habsburg, taking possession of the Austrian lands. The electors, for their part, continued to choose kings from different dynasties, guided mainly by their weakness. These kings often used their position to increase the family fortune, and thereby the prestige of royal power. Some of them even made trips to Italy and were crowned emperors there in order to revive the former imperial claims and hopes. But these sporadic raids were only a pale shadow of the great campaigns of the Saxon and Salic emperors, as well as the Hohenstaufen. The German Electors held the monarchy in a stranglehold and thereby actually saved Italy and the papacy from German interference.

Papacy and monarchies

So, the papacy seems to have won its last three stages and two centuries of struggle with the empire. But this impression again turned out to be deceptive. In the course of the struggle, the popes themselves, their ideologists and supporters developed a complex theory of papal supremacy both in the church itself and in relations with secular authorities, backed up by the relevant provisions of canon law. They also created a highly sophisticated organization of central control which enabled the popes to control local ecclesiastical administration by encouraging appeals to Rome from ecclesiastical courts, by using taxes on the clergy, appointments to episcopal and other ecclesiastical offices, and by the new monastic orders of the Dominicans and Franciscans, who remained outside the normal jurisdiction of local bishops.

The price of these innovations was very high. Popes Gregory IX and Innocent IV, who fought with Frederick II, used any weapon from the church arsenal to achieve purely political goals: excommunication, interdict, propaganda and just slander. Even King Louis IX of France (1226-1270), whose holiness and faithfulness to the church were beyond suspicion and who was officially canonized before the end of the century, disapproved of the methods of Innocent IV. In Southern Italy, the Popes granted the Hohenstaufen Kingdom of Sicily to the French Prince Charles of Anjou. But in 1282, the Sicilians killed the hated French during the so-called "Sicilian Vespers" and offered their country to the king of Aragon. All attempts by the popes and Charles of Anjou (who now actually owned only Naples) to return Sicily were unsuccessful. But if this relatively small and papal state could offer active resistance, then it was even more difficult to imagine that large monarchies would make concessions, which sought to control the church in their territories and which resented the constant intervention of the popes in their affairs. If the collision could not have been avoided, it was, as often happens, precipitated by strong personalities. The French king Philip IV (1285-1314) was determined to consolidate his power in the kingdom and expand its borders. In 1296, during the war with Edward I, he taxed the Church of France, just as Edward in England taxed the Church of England. Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303) rejected the right of both kings to do so and ordered the clergy of France and England to withdraw from their respective kings.

Since the time of Becket, the problem of conflict of allegiance has not been so acute in Western Europe. In addition, both the organizational model and the concept of a sovereign state were by that time so clearly developed that the demands of the pope looked like a direct undermining of the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bstatehood. In response, Philip banned the export of money and valuables from France. A few months later, dad had to give in. The French king found a much more effective weapon against the papacy than all the armies of the German emperors. In 1301 he initiated another confrontation by ordering the arrest and trial of a French bishop, in defiance of the pope's demand that all bishops be tried only in Rome. Boniface reacted to this very angrily, and more and more new facts poured in from both sides, and even fake documents from the French. In November 1302 the pope issued a bull Unam Sanctam, in which the most radical - ever made - claims of papal supremacy were set forth: the theory of "two swords" was combined here with the doctrine of the hierarchy of the great chain of being, and all this culminated in resounding words: "On this basis, we declare, We affirm, decree and proclaim that the indispensable condition of salvation for every creature is submission to the Roman Pontiff.

Once again, Philip responded with practical action. One of his close associates with a handful of French soldiers, united with the Roman enemies of Boniface, suddenly raided the summer residence of the pope in Anagni, captured the elderly pontiff and subjected him to insults and humiliations (1303); Dad passed away a few weeks later.

Boniface's successors had neither the courage nor the means to continue the quarrel with Philip. A few years later, Pope Clement V (1305–1314), a Frenchman, moved to Avignon on the Rhone, a small papal possession surrounded by French territory. Here the popes remained in "Babylonian captivity" until 1376; they were probably not as dependent on the French kings as was sometimes believed, but in the eyes of Europe their independence was in great doubt.

Historical Consequences of the Third Conflict between the Papacy and the Empire and the First Conflict with the French State

The irony of history is that the papacy, having won the great struggle with the empire, very soon submitted to the force that supported it in the struggle: the staff, as they said then, pierced the hand that leaned on it. But the essence of the matter was not in irony. First of all, the inevitable moral decline that accompanied what was considered a life-and-death struggle became apparent, for people were not inclined to forgive the pope what they would have forgiven the king. Secondly, the struggle changed the ideological attitudes of the parties both politically and intellectually. The emperors acted from the same positions as the papacy: they defended the very nature of universal authority, interpreting it in the spirit of the traditions of the former Roman Empire and calling for help from specifically interpreted biblical texts. But the kingdoms of France, England or Castile were far from being empires. Their kings proclaimed their sovereignty, but only in the sense that it must be absolute within their own dominions. In other words, they did not claim supremacy over the whole world, namely, popes and medieval emperors claimed this, although the latter did not have sufficient grounds for this. Ultimately, the more serious force capable of opposing the papacy turned out to be a geographically limited force - medieval kings and the idea of ​​state sovereignty.

European monarchs also received powerful intellectual and emotional support: at the end of the 12th century. Aristotle's "Politics" was "rediscovered", which in the XIII century. Thomas Aquinas adapted for the needs of Christian orthodoxy. Aristotle considered the origin and purpose of the state without any connection with the divine will:

A society consisting of several villages is a completely completed state, which, one might say, has reached a fully self-sufficient state and has arisen for the sake of the needs of life, but exists for the sake of achieving a good life ... From all that has been said, it is clear that the state belongs to that which exists by nature and that man by nature is a political being...

Thomas Aquinas formalized these “natural” foundations of the state into a refined theory of natural law, by which he understood the law of universal and human nature, acting without interference from above. The concept was not new, but in the person of Thomas Aquinas it received a new impetus in the history of European thought, retaining its relevance to this day. At the same time, Thomas Aquinas borrowed from Aristotle the concept of "evolution" and the concept of "real" - not identical to the ideal images of reality. From this, he concluded that “the law can be changed with every reason if the living conditions of people change and this requires other laws,” thereby recognizing the possibility of improving laws and, accordingly, political and social conditions. In the Renaissance, people began to purposefully use this theoretical opportunity to develop social and political "technologies".

The concept of natural law was, of course, quite applicable to religious thought, as Thomas Aquinas demonstrated. For him, there was no fundamental opposition between nature and grace. “Grace,” Thomas wrote, “does not eliminate nature, but perfects it.” At the end of the XIII - beginning of the XIV century. The publicists of Philip IV, who gave new content to political disputes with the help of the concept of natural law and the Aristotelian theory of the state, were able to undermine the positions of the papacy in a way that the former apologists of imperial power had never succeeded in doing. From now on, the state began to act as a rational and at the same time moral force, completely independent of the papacy, and the church, this "mystical body", "an assembly of the faithful", could even be considered something completely subordinate to the state.

These ideas took time to develop, and in their most radical versions they did not immediately gain influence. But for the first time since the 11th century, that is, with the beginning of the movement for ecclesiastical reform, the papacy and the church as a whole had to take up the defensive in the intellectual field.

religious life

In Byzantium, Western Christianity has always been considered primitive and crude, suitable only for a backward, semi-barbarian society. Indeed, starting from the 12th century, as Western society grew richer, became more urbanized and educated, new religious trends began to be felt in Europe, which could hardly please the church and the feudalized bishops and abbots drawn into the system of secular power. The Cluniac and Cistercian movements were outlets for those who wanted to escape from everyday life, and the incredible popularity of pilgrimages and crusades gave vent to the aspirations of those ordinary people who could not find an answer from the parish priests. But these movements did not end there.

Franciscans, Dominicans and Beguines

In the growing cities, new needs gave rise to new religious movements, united by the desire to give religious experience more personal expression. This could be achieved either through a genuinely Christian way of life, or, which suited most ordinary people, by observing such a way of life, imitating it and warmly approving it.

The most famous of these movements, which quickly gained wide popularity, was the Franciscan movement. St. Francis of Assisi (1181 / 2-1226), the son of a wealthy merchant, renounced all his property and began to live and preach in complete poverty, eating on alms. The beginning of St. Francis, approved by Pope Innocent III, despite the opposition of more conservative-minded cardinals, from the very beginning caused a lot of criticism, since the Franciscan brothers lived "in the world", among people (unlike other monks who lived in comfortable monasteries).

As soon as it appeared, the Franciscan movement with exceptional success attracted new supporters and achieved popular recognition. Many generations of ordinary people have watched with regret the secularization of the church and the craving of the higher clergy, including the abbots of the largest monasteries, for ostentatious luxury. The call for a return to the poverty, simplicity, and pure spirituality of the early church became one of the most effective propaganda tools used by the supporters of imperial power against the papacy. Finally, both men and women united in the ranks of the Franciscans: the women's order of the "mendicant Clarissa" was founded by St. Clara, noble lady of Assisi and great admirer of Francis. At the head of the movement was a great saint who lived a truly Christian life: according to stories, Francis had stigmas, bloody sores in those places where the wounds of Christ on the cross were inflicted. St. Bonaventure, general of the order from 1257 to 1274, wrote about this: "He became like Christ, crucified not by bodily pain, but by the attitude of mind and heart."

A few years after the death of Francis, a collection of stories about his life and the lives of his followers, entitled "Flowers of St. Francis."

A typical example of the narratives included in it is the story of Brother Bernard.

Since Saint Francis and his comrades were called and chosen by God to wear the Cross of Christ in their hearts and deeds and preach with their lips the Cross of Christ, they seemed and were crucified people in everything that concerns their deeds and harsh life; therefore they were more eager to endure, out of love for Christ, shame and reproach, than to accept the honors of the world, or prostrations, or empty praises. They even rejoiced at offenses and grieved in honors, and so they walked through the world, like strangers and strangers, carrying only the crucified Christ in themselves ... It happened at the beginning of the Order of St. Francis to send brother Bernard to Bologna, so that there he would bear fruit to God ... And brother Bernard, for the sake of of his obedience ... went and reached Bologna. And teenagers, seeing him in poor and unusual clothes, subjected him to many ridicule and many insults, like a madman. And Brother Bernard endured everything patiently and joyfully out of love for Christ; even for the sake of greater reproaches, he deliberately placed himself in the city square ... and for many days he returned to the same place to demolish such things ...

The rich and wise judge was so fascinated by the holiness of Brother Bernard that he gave him a house for the needs of the order.

And he said to brother Bernard: If you want to establish a monastery in which you could serve God, then I, for the sake of saving my soul, will gladly give you a place ... The said judge with great joy ... took brother Bernard to his house and then took him the promised place and at his own expense he adapted it and arranged it... Then St. Francis, having heard about everything in order, about the deeds of God, through brother Bernard, gave thanks to God, who thus began to multiply the poor and the disciples of the Cross, and then sent some of his comrades to Bologna and Lombardy , and they made many abodes in various places.

This short story highlights the psychological underpinnings of the spread of Franciscanism, but at the same time does not leave aside the fundamental dilemma that confronted the "mendicant" religious organizations: after all, in this case, property was donated to the order. Soon heated disputes flared up between the two currents of the Franciscans - the "spiritual" brothers, who demanded an absolute renunciation of property, and the "conventuals", who recognized common property, with the help of which one could more successfully engage in scientific research and preaching. At the beginning of the XIV century. the popes spoke out against the "spirituals", and many of them were even subjected to severe persecution for their views, which, according to the not unreasonable opinion of enemies, could serve as a justification for popular protest movements.

Around the same time that St. Francis of Assisi founded his order, the Spaniard St. Dominic (c. 1170-1221) laid the foundation for the "order of preachers" - "Dominicans", or "black brothers". Like the Franciscans, they were also mendicant monks who lived on alms, but, unlike the former, they considered it their main task to preach and fight against heresies, for which they earned the nickname "dogs of the Lord" (lat. domini canes). By the middle of the XIII century. representatives of the two mendicant orders - the Franciscans and the Dominicans - occupied the chairs of theology in many universities. The papacy, to which these orders were directly subordinate, acquired in their person a new powerful weapon.

Although the Franciscans and some other orders had sections for women, medieval society, with its ethical stereotypes, was convinced that life in an order with a strict rule was attractive to very few women, mostly from the upper classes. For specifically female religiosity, a different style was required, which was embodied by the beguine communities - women who lived in relative poverty and prayer classes, but did not take monastic vows. Beguine communities were especially numerous in the Rhineland and in the Netherlands; a fine example of one of the beguinage houses (beguinage) has been preserved in Bruges (modern Belgium).

heresy

Despite efforts to offer the laity a new, spiritually richer model of piety, the new orders still could not satisfy all the needs of religious life. The craving for deep and personal forms of religious experience began in the 12th century. find expression in heresies. Heresies arose in various parts of Europe and took the most diverse forms. Quite often, they were managed to cope with a combination of persuasion and intimidation. But the Cathars (translated from Greek - “clean”; sometimes they were called Albigensians after the city of Albi in Southern France) turned out to be impregnable. They professed the dualism of "good" and "evil" as two independent principles: the material world was for them the embodiment of evil, and Christ was a simple angel. This teaching completely broke with the traditional foundations of the Christian faith and the authority of the Catholic Church. The Cathars led an exceptionally strict life, nevertheless attractive to many, since not all adherents of the sect had to observe severe fasts and obey marriage prohibitions. In addition, many sovereign persons in southern France and northern Italy patronized the Cathars.

By the beginning of the XIII century. the movement of the Cathars acquired such menacing proportions that Innocent III decided to put an end to it. However, the measures that the pope imagined as a new conversion of heretics quickly turned into a crusade that, due to an unfortunate coincidence, combined the fanaticism of the masses and the personal interests of the French nobility and king. The Count of Toulouse and other noble feudal lords of the south lost their property and lands; several cities were destroyed and their inhabitants massacred. Although the Cathar heresy ceased to exist as a broad movement, other heresies continued to appear, as long as the social and psychological conditions that favored their emergence persisted. Worst of all, the "Albigensian Crusade" left a legacy of religious fanaticism and a policy of destruction justified by religious motives. Of course, in one way or another this was characteristic of all crusades, but now they have moved to the heart of Europe.

It is impossible not to admit that the papacy tried to streamline its relations with heretics, even in a civilized form. For this, the Inquisition was created - a church tribunal, whose task was to establish whether a particular person adheres to heretical views. The inquisitors were especially often Dominicans, who traveled everywhere, looking for heretics, and soon more sorcerers and witches. Among the inquisitors there were many people of high and humane convictions, who sincerely sought to return the "lost" to the bosom of the church. But the Inquisition also attracted other people - bigoted, self-righteous, greedy and ambitious; therefore, the notoriety that entrenched her in most cases was completely deserved.

Destruction of the Knights Templar

Probably, nowhere did the noted features of the Inquisition manifest themselves so clearly as in the liquidation of the religious knightly order of the Templars, founded in Jerusalem at the beginning of the 12th century. to protect Christian pilgrims and fight infidels. In gratitude, popes and kings granted the Templars extensive ecclesiastical privileges and vast wealth. The order used this wealth to create an international banking and trading system, providing loans and financial employees to the kings of France and other rulers. Not surprisingly, the Templars made many enemies. Philip IV the Handsome decided that by destroying the Templars, political popularity and financial gain could be achieved. Therefore, in 1307, he unexpectedly ordered the capture of all the Templars in France, and then betrayed them to the Inquisition. Under terrible torture, the inquisitors wrested confessions from the Templars in heretical beliefs, depraved life and ritual murders. A well-organized propaganda campaign - the first of its kind since the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire - convinced French society of the guilt of the Templars. The Order was liquidated; the French crown confiscated his huge property, and the papacy suffered another defeat, since the weak Pope Clement V could not protect the order. Needless to say, all the charges were fabricated. However, Philip IV and the Inquisitors found a means to stir up a hidden unrest in European society, a unrest that for centuries bore its bitter fruits in the form of persecution of Jews, witches, heretics, and ultimately religious civil wars.

Jews

In medieval Europe, the Jews were the only religious minority who, at least officially, were allowed to practice a non-Christian religion: popes and Christian theologians made quite clear statements about this. But in practice, the attitude towards Jews differed sharply from the established norm and varied depending on the location and time. The barbarians who invaded Europe were generally very tolerant of the Jews, but the Visigothic kings of Spain in the 7th century. issued special laws against the Jews and turned their subjects against them.

The Carolingian era, especially within the limits of the Carolingian Empire itself, was much more favorable: the Jews at that time performed a lot of useful functions as merchants, financiers and generally educated people, representing a kind of international elite, whose services were universally recognized. England at the end of the twelfth century. There were about 2,500 Jews, that is, 0.1% of the total population. In southern Italy and Spain, the Jewish colonies were much larger. In the XIV century. in Castile, according to modern estimates, the number of Jews ranged from 20 to 200 thousand. In southern Europe, the cultural role of the Jews was especially significant: they acted as intellectual and linguistic intermediaries between Arabs and Christians, thereby raising their status.

Starting from the XII century. the economic development of Europe and the spread of handicraft skills allowed Christians to take over some of the functions of the Jews, and the Jews, with historical inevitability, began to be perceived as more and more hated competitors. These sentiments coincided with the spread of new religious aspirations, and the Jews were now perceived as enemies of Christ. par excellence. In the XII century. stereotyped accusations of ritual murders and other heinous crimes were fabricated; in addition to this, Jews were prohibited from owning land. With rare insight, Abelard put the following words into the mouth of the Jew:

For us, only usury remains, so that we support our mortal existence by taking interest from strangers, and this makes us hated by them ... Anyone who does us any harm considers this a matter of the greatest justice and the greatest sacrifice before the Lord.

The Christian kings of Europe declared the Jews their property: they used, exploited, but also protected them. However, when the mass dissatisfaction with the Jews became too strong (in the 13th century, members of the mendicant orders showed particular zeal in inflating such passions, considering the existence of Jews, the “killers” of Christ, an insult to faith), the kings, without the slightest remorse, handed them over to be torn to pieces. In 1290, Edward I expelled the Jews from England, and the French kings, having expelled the Jews in 1306, admitted them again in 1315, and then expelled them again in 1322.

Fourth Crusade and the fall of Byzantium

It is obvious to the modern historian that by 1200 the true spirit of the Crusades, however flawed it may have been from the outset, had completely died out. But in those days it was not so clear: for almost a hundred years people continued to go on crusades and fought bravely in the Holy Land, and in the middle of the 15th century. and later plans were made in earnest for the recapture of Jerusalem.

Because of this, the desire of the papacy, which was at the zenith of power, to regain the initiative to organize a crusade looked highly natural. It seemed to Innocent III an auspicious moment when, after the death of Emperor Henry VI (1197), all the great kings of Western Europe were too busy fighting with internal pretenders to the throne or wars with each other to think about leading a crusade, as was the case under Barbarossa, Louis VII and Richard the Lionheart during the Third Crusade. In addition, the Church led the First Crusade without the participation of kings, and it turned out to be the most successful of the expeditions to the East. This time, like a hundred years ago, the real command was again taken over by the French, Dutch and Italian nobility, but now the leaders knew that the land route was too exhausting, and agreed with the Italian port cities to move by sea.

In 1202 most of the crusaders gathered in Venice. They turned out to be much smaller than expected, and they could not pay the “fare” the amount of money that the Venetian Republic insisted on. Then the old and almost blind Venetian Doge Enrico Dandolo proposed that, on account of full payment, the crusaders should help Venice recapture the Dalmatian port of Zadar, captured from the Venetians by the Hungarian king in 1186. Part of the clergy began to protest: the king of Hungary was a Catholic and he himself took up the cross. Innocent III hesitated; but when he nevertheless forbade the operation on pain of excommunication, the crusaders had already taken Zadar and were thus excommunicated.

The situation could still be corrected, but then the crusaders were drawn into Byzantine affairs. Ever since Emperor Augustus founded the Roman Empire, succession of power has been one of the weakest links in the political system. For many centuries this weakness was overcome by the establishment of dynastic succession or the appointment of co-rulers under the reigning emperors. However, in most cases, these methods proved to be ineffective. For example, the reign of Emperor Manuel I (1143-1180), a representative of the once brilliant Komnenos dynasty, was followed by weak rulers, civil wars and usurpations of power. In 1195, Isaac II Angel was deposed by his brother Alexei III, and then, according to Byzantine tradition, imprisoned and blinded. When the crusaders were in Zadar, the son of Isaac, also Alexei, the son-in-law of Philip of Swabia, the German king from the Hohenstaufen dynasty, came to their camp and asked for help against the usurper Alexei III. As a reward, he promised a huge amount of 200 thousand silver marks (the Venetians demanded 85 thousand for the transport of the crusaders), Byzantine participation in the crusade and the subordination of the Greek Church to Rome.

In this situation, part of the clergy, primarily the Cistercians, and some barons opposed the march on the Christian city, and almost half of the crusaders preferred to go home. But those who remained found Alexei's proposals extraordinarily attractive. Historians have long argued about whether the change in the purpose of the crusade was the result of a conspiracy organized by Tsarevich Alexei, the Venetians and ancient opponents of Byzantium, representatives of the Hohenstaufen dynasty and Norman families, or the result of an unforeseen set of circumstances. But, in any case, Dandolo and the Venetians purposefully pursued the political and commercial interests of their republic, and the pope, torn apart by conflicting feelings - aspirations for the brilliant prospect of uniting the churches and horror of a possible attack by the crusaders on Constantinople - was again late with his ban.

As soon as the crusaders appeared at the walls of Constantinople, events began to unfold with the fatal inevitability of a classic tragedy. Alexei III fled, and the blind Isaac II and his son, now Alexei IV, were proclaimed emperor and co-emperor. But they were completely unable either to pay the huge amount promised to the crusaders, or to persuade the majority of the Greek clergy to submit to Rome. According to the stories of the crusaders, the Greek archbishop of Corfu sarcastically remarked: he knows only one reason for the possible primacy of the Roman See, that is, that it was the Roman soldiers who crucified Christ. Relations between the crusaders and the Greeks rapidly deteriorated. The crusaders remembered or were prudently reminded that in 1182 the mob of Constantinople captured the Latin quarter of the city: then, according to reports, 30,000 Christian Latins were killed. In the spring of 1204, an open war began, and on April 12, the crusaders launched an assault on Constantinople. At night, part of the soldiers, who feared a Byzantine counteroffensive, began to set fire to houses. Geoffroy de Villehardouin, one of the leaders of the campaign and his chronicler, narrates about it this way:

The fire began to spread throughout the city, which soon blazed brightly and burned all night and all the next day until evening. This was the third fire in Constantinople since the Franks and Venetians came to this land, and more houses were burned in the city than can be counted in any of the three largest cities of the French kingdom.

What didn't burn down was looted.

The rest of the army, spreading out over the city, took a lot of booty - so much that no one could truly determine its quantity or value. There was gold and silver, tableware and precious stones, satin and silk, clothes with squirrel and ermine fur, and in general all the best that can be found on earth. Geoffroy de Villehardouin confirms by these words that, to the best of his knowledge, no city has taken such abundant booty since the creation of the world.

The Catholic clergy was mainly engaged in the search for sacred relics. So many of them were brought to France, including the crown of thorns of Christ, that King Louis IX (Saint Louis) decided to build Saint-Chapelle in Paris to adequately accommodate these treasures. The Venetians, in addition to other booty, got the famous four bronze horses, taken at one time by Emperor Augustus from Alexandria to Rome, and then by Emperor Constantine from Rome to Constantinople. They were placed above the portal of the Cathedral of St. Mark in Venice.

Latin Empire

The French founded the Latin Empire of Constantinople, and a Venetian became its Catholic Patriarch. At the right moment, the papal excommunication was lifted from the crusaders and Byzantium. Other Western leaders became kings of Thessalonica, dukes of Athens, or princes of the Seas (Peloponnese)—nothing more than robber states that existed at the mercy of Venice, which exploited them but could not always control them. The Venetians left for themselves Crete, which received the name "Candia", and the chain of islands of the Aegean Sea, which protected the trade communication with Constantinople, which from now on completely passed into the hands of the Venetians.

Having taken and destroyed Christian Constantinople, the “Frankish” Catholics relatively easily achieved what the German invaders could not achieve in the 4th-5th centuries. and what turned out to be beyond the power of the aggressors of subsequent centuries - the Persians, Arabs and Bulgarians. Too late, Innocent III began to regret the self-will and rebelliousness of the crusaders, their terrible, but quite predictable cruelty and greed in the capture of the imperial capital. Now he knew for sure that all chances for a genuine unification of the Latin and Byzantine churches were irrevocably lost, at least in the foreseeable future. Modern historians are able to trace the longer-term consequences of these events. The most powerful pope in the history of the Roman Church initiated a well-tried and by that time traditional operation for a purely religious goal - the liberation of Jerusalem and the Holy Sepulcher. But almost immediately, this movement got out of his control and fell into the hands of people who were guided by a bizarre mixture of motives, implicated in one way or another in the thirst for enrichment and the desire for conquest, seasoned with a modicum of self-righteousness, characteristic of those who are convinced that God is on their side. And since all these motives were reinforced by the unsurpassed organizational skills of the Venetians and the perfection of the military art of the French, the crusaders turned out to be irresistible. It was these abilities and skills that ensured the success of the Fourth Crusade, and they are the same in the future - from the end of the 15th to the middle of the 20th century. - the success of Europeans in subjugating or controlling most of the world. But it was no longer the popes and the church that carried out this expansion and reaped its fruits, but the states of New Europe.

Revival of Byzantium

In the XIII century. it was difficult to foresee future developments. Political and economic activity was not always combined with military qualifications. The new rulers of the feudal states in Greece and Thrace were at war with each other and could not protect their subjects from the renewed attacks of the Bulgarians. On the other hand, in Epirus (Western Greece) and in Anatolia, parts of the Byzantine Empire were preserved, which now existed as independent states. In 1261, one of their armies suddenly captured Constantinople, and the Byzantine Empire was restored under the rule of the Palaiologos dynasty. The trading privileges of the Venetians went to their rivals, the Genoese.

Western Europe did not accept this outcome; one after another, plans arose for the return of Constantinople. The greatest danger to the Byzantines was the expedition of Charles of Anjou, brother of Louis IX, who defeated the heirs of Emperor Frederick II in southern Italy and received the crown of Naples and Sicily from the hands of the pope. Charles's preparations were already in full swing when the Sicilians revolted against the French occupation. On Easter Monday 1282, at the signal of the evening bells, they killed 2,000 French soldiers in Palermo, and then offered the crown of Sicily to the Aragonese king Pedro III. Although Byzantine involvement has never been reliably established, it is at least as likely as the original Venetian plot to change the direction of the Fourth Crusade. However, regardless of whether the "Sicilian Vespers" was planned or not, it turned out to be the most effective response of Byzantium to the French, who were involved in almost three hundred years of war with the Spaniards for southern Italy. I had to say goodbye to hopes of organizing a campaign against Constantinople.

Nevertheless, Byzantium ceased to be a great Mediterranean power and, as often happens in such cases, proved unable to control the forces that it itself had brought to the scene. In 1311, several thousand Catalan and Aragonese mercenaries hired by the Byzantines captured the Duchy of Athens. The ancient classical buildings of the Acropolis - the Propylaea and the Parthenon - turned into the palace of the Spanish duke and the church of St. Mary, respectively. Of all the "Latin" rulers of late medieval Greece, the Spaniards were probably the most greedy and no doubt the most organized. The Spanish knights became large landowners and opened up new trading opportunities for merchants from Genoa and Barcelona. As if trying to emphasize its detachment from the former spirit of the Crusades, the Duchy of Athens in 1388 entered into an alliance with the Florentine banking house of Acciauoli. The union of the barons who seized the land and the capitalist merchants, which first proved its strength in 1204, again demonstrated the highest efficiency.

Last Crusades

If 1204 was the milestone of the triumph of cynicism and the creation of a new military-commercial alliance, then not everyone in Europe approved of this path. It may be recalled that almost half of the participants in the Fourth Crusade abandoned the war against Constantinople. However, some of them, such as Count Simon de Montfort, went on another crusade - against the Albigensians. In addition, in 1212, crusading fervor seized the youngest: thousands of adolescents, in fact still children, mainly from the Rhineland and Lorraine, left their homes to follow equally young preachers. They were taught that, unarmed and sinless, they would succeed where adult warriors failed or allowed themselves to be diverted from their goal. The church authorities tried to curtail this movement, but in view of mass enthusiasm they were forced to retreat. However, the miracle did not happen. Thousands of children died at sea or were sold into slavery, and those who were lucky enough to return home became objects of ridicule. This catastrophe was most conveniently explained by the fact that the children were led astray by the devil.

Innocent III also did not remain aloof from the events: shortly before his death (1216), he organized another crusade, the fifth in a row, which was supposed to be under the supervision of the papal legate so that another "deviation" from the goal did not occur. This campaign, directed against the fortress of Damietta in the Nile Delta, pursued a strategically sound goal: to defeat the most powerful enemy of Christians - Egypt. The actual military operations, which lasted from 1219 to 1221, were at first successful, but in the end they failed. Contemporaries spoke with indignation about the excessive interference of the papal legate in military and diplomatic decisions.

Since then, the popes have ceased to play a central role in the organization of the crusades. In 1228 Emperor Frederick II sailed to Palestine, being under papal excommunication, as he came out very late. AT next year he concluded a treaty for the return of Jerusalem with the Egyptian sultan. Still excommunicated, Frederick rode into the Holy City and assumed the crown of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. What the crusaders failed to do, shedding blood streams with the papal blessing, Frederick achieved without any war and under the papal curse. But for all his deliberately anti-papal stance, he was not such a representative of the new era of militant capitalism as the Doge Dandolo and his French allies. Rather, the emperor believed that, by virtue of his position, he had some kind of divine authority, and the newly acquired crown of the kingdom of Jerusalem only strengthened his confidence. When the emperor returned to Italy, the local Christian barons were, as they say, "on horseback", but in 1244 they managed to lose Jerusalem again.

The last two great crusades were organized by the king of France. In 1248, under the leadership of Louis IX, significant military forces moved against Egypt, with the aim of shaking the foundations of Muslim power. But the French were too far away from their bases; Louis was defeated and captured (1250). It seemed that all was lost, but at that moment the Mamluks overthrew the Egyptian sultan. The Mameluks were an army of white slaves, mostly Turks; the formation of such an army by a ruler who did not have other military forces at his disposal was fraught with his overthrow and loss of power. The Mamelukes took over Egypt and ruled it until they themselves were conquered by the Ottoman Turks in 1517. However, in fact, the power of the Mamelukes in Egypt remained until 1798, when the young general Napoleon Bonaparte inflicted a final defeat on them in the “battle of the pyramids”. In 1250 Saint Louis used a political upheaval to bargain for the release of his army. He took her to Palestine and in four years returned not only Jerusalem, but also most of the cities and fortresses that the crusaders had previously owned. In 1254 he returned to France.

The crusade of Louis IX was, against all expectations, at least partially successful. But the last crusading enterprise of the king ended in a real disaster. In 1270 he sailed for Tunis, perhaps at the request of his brother Charles of Anjou, who had shortly before become king of Sicily. In Tunisia, the king and most of his army died from the plague. In 1291 Acre, the last stronghold of the crusaders, surrendered to the Egyptian Mamelukes. The Europeans made the next, and again unsuccessful, attempt to establish themselves in the Levant only at the end of the 18th century.

Spain

The only place where the Christians managed to get the better of the Muslims was Spain. It was here in the middle of the XIII century. christian weapons won greatest victories. The kings of Aragon conquered Valencia and captured the island of Mallorca; the Portuguese occupied the Algravi and Portugal acquired its modern borders. But Castile achieved the greatest success, conquering most of the Al-Andalus region (Andalusia, the heart of Muslim Spain) up to the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Only the kingdom of Granada, a relatively small area in the southeast, remained an independent Muslim state.

For Andalusia and its inhabitants, the Christian conquest turned out to be a real disaster. Under the Muslims, it was a highly developed area with a significant urban population. Now many skilled artisans and farmers were forced to flee or lost their property. Warriors from the north did not know how to make wine, grow fruits and olives, which the Mauritanians successfully did. Over time, large areas turned into pastures, and a few large feudal lords and military knightly orders began to own huge estates. It is these seniors that until the present day determine the social and political life of southern Spain.

The eastern kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia had no such population transfer. Muslim inhabitants remained here; they no longer dominated either the economy or culture, but to a large extent retained their originality, which almost did not lend itself to assimilation, even if they formally converted to Christianity. For three and a half centuries this circumstance left its mark on Spanish history; for the Spaniards, it created problems similar to those that the ethnic and religious movements of national minorities now give rise to for us.

Mongol invasion

Christians and Muslims regarded each other as mortal enemies and equally hated the Jews. But these three cultures arose from the same Hellenistic and Semitic traditions; they all recognized the Bible as a sacred book, prayed to one God, and the educated elite sought to expand their horizons, exchanging the achievements of humanitarian and technical knowledge. The situation was quite different with the Mongols. They had nothing to do with Christian traditions, and it is probably for this reason that the inhabitants of Christendom did not take them seriously, except, of course, those who, by misfortune, fell in their way.

The Mongols were the last nomadic Central Asian people to invade the agricultural and urban civilizations of Eurasia; but they acted much more decisively and over immeasurably wider areas than any of their predecessors, beginning with the Huns. In 1200, the Mongols lived between Lake Baikal and the Altai Mountains in Central Asia. They were illiterate pagans, traditionally exceptionally skilled warriors. A cruel hierarchy was preserved in the social structure: on its upper step was the “aristocracy” (owners of herds of horses and cattle), to which numerous semi-dependent steppe dwellers and slaves were subordinate. In general, the Mongols differed little from other tribes that lived in the expanses of Inner Asia. For almost a thousand years, these peoples - from the Huns to the Avars, Bulgars and various Turkic tribes - demonstrated their ability to defeat the armies of more advanced peoples and create vast amorphous empires or possessions, provided that they did not stray too far from the geographic and climatic conditions of the Eurasian steppes familiar to them. .

At the very beginning of the XIII century. an exceptionally gifted leader - Genghis Khan (c. 1162-1227) - managed to unite the Mongol tribes, and then extend his power to the east and west. There is no reason to believe that the Mongols began to move under the influence of some climatic changes that adversely affected livestock grazing. Under the command of Genghis Khan was an excellently organized and disciplined army; it consisted of mounted archers and possessed exceptional mobility combined with superiority in long-range weapons. Genghis Khan himself was remarkable for his amazing ability to adapt to unfamiliar conditions and willingly used Chinese and Muslim-Turkic "specialists" in his army. He organized a magnificent "service of informants", and merchants of all nationalities and religions delivered a lot of information to him, whom he encouraged in every possible way. Genghis Khan also succeeded in the cold-blooded, thoughtful use of diplomatic measures and military force in accordance with the circumstances. All these qualities allowed Genghis Khan, his gifted sons, grandchildren and military leaders to continuously win victories over the next enemy. Beijing fell in 1215, although it took the Mongols another fifty years to conquer all of China. The Islamic states to the east of the Caspian Sea with their rich cities of Bukhara and Samarkand were conquered much faster (1219–1220). By 1233 Persia had been conquered and, at about the same time, Korea on the other side of Asia. In 1258 the Mongols took Baghdad; at the same time, the last caliph from the Abbasid dynasty died. Only the Mamluks managed to defeat the Mongol detachment in Palestine (1260), thereby protecting Egypt from the Mongol invasion. It was a victory comparable to that of Charles Martel over the Arabs at Tours and Poitiers, for it marked a turning point in repulsing the wave of invasion.

Between 1237 and 1241 the Mongols invaded Europe. Their onslaught, as in Asia, was cruel and intimidating. Having devastated Russia, southern Poland and a significant part of Hungary, they destroyed the army of German knights in Silesia (1241) near the city of Liegnitz (Legnica), west of the Oder River. Apparently, only the problems associated with the choice of a successor to Genghis Khan forced the leaders of the Mongols to turn east after this victory.

Meanwhile, the great rulers of Western Europe - the emperor, pope and kings of France and England - were busy sorting things out and, not taking the Mongol threat seriously, comforted themselves with the reassuring thought that Genghis Khan was the legendary John the Presbyter, or made tempting plans to convert the khan to Christianity. Saint Louis even tried to negotiate with the Mongols on joint actions against the Muslims in Syria. The Mongols were not particularly impressed and showed no interest. In 1245, the khan told the papal envoy: “From sunrise to sunset, all lands are subject to me. Who could do such a thing against the will of God?”

Is it possible to say that Western and Southern Europe simply by a lucky chance escaped the Mongol invasion? Probably you can. The Russians were much less fortunate, and for almost 300 years they were forced to bear all the hardships Mongolian yoke. However, it is also quite probable that the Mongols have exhausted their conquering possibilities. Their operations in the tropical rainforests and jungles of Vietnam and Cambodia were unsuccessful, and naval expeditions against Japan and Java ended in complete failure. Although the Mongols possessed a very advanced siege technique, their cavalry armies would hardly have been able to prevail in Western Europe with its hundreds of fortified cities and castles. At least it is doubtful. The first two generations of Mongol leaders and their successors were overwhelmed by a passion for profit and domination. But even for this last purpose, a developed administrative organization was needed, and from the very beginning the Mongols had to adopt such an organization from the conquered, but more developed peoples and appoint experienced Chinese, Persians, Turks and Arabs to important posts. The religious beliefs of the Mongols could not compete with the great world religions - Buddhism, Islam, Judaism and Christianity. It is not surprising that they tried not to delve too deeply into this issue: Marco Polo and other Western travelers who visited the court of the Great Khan noted the tolerance of the Mongols and open respect for the religion of strangers. However, even those of modern historians who carefully assess the Mongols can hardly find any justification for their conquests, except that the caravan trade between East and West became safer, and the Mongol subjects lived in conditions pax mongolica- peace that came after the destruction of all real and potential opponents. Indeed, the Mongol conquests were very reminiscent of those of the Romans, of which their contemporary from Britain said: "They turn everything into a desert and call it peace."

In the XIV century. the rulers of various parts of the Mongol Empire adopted Buddhism or Islam; this meant that in fact they were subjugated by the cultures in which they lived - Chinese, Persian or Arabic. With the decline of the great caravan routes, which gave way to sea routes, and with the development of new military-commercial states, the era of the great continental nomadic empires came to an end. They gave nothing to humanity and left a bad memory everywhere. But the indirect results were enormous: successive nomadic invasions provoked the migration of other, more sedentary peoples, who in turn defeated the former ancient civilizations. This is exactly what happened in the 4th-5th centuries. happened with the Germanic tribes, who destroyed the Roman Empire in the West, and then with some Turkic tribes, who finally destroyed what was left of its eastern part.

Mongol rule in Ancient Russia

Most of the nomadic tribes that invaded the Russian steppes for many centuries, first of all, sought to find lands where they could roam with herds, and only then - to conquer other peoples. The Mongols behaved quite differently. Russian chronicler monks exaggerated their number just as Western chronicler monks exaggerated the number of Vikings. But the Mongols did not even come close to having the number of people that could populate the occupied lands. The Mongol armies were the vanguard of a great empire that stretched across Asia, and they were primarily interested in conquering peoples. The Mongols dominated the territory from the lower reaches of the Volga and the northern shores of the Caspian and Black Seas to the Kyiv they destroyed. Outside this steppe zone, they were content to keep their henchmen at the courts of the Russian princes to directly collect tribute or to oversee this process.

Almost from the very beginning of the Mongol conquests in Europe, the khan, or ruler of the western part of the Mongol empire, was virtually independent of the great khan, who remained in distant Mongolia or China. The Khan's residence was the city of Saray in the lower reaches of the Volga, and perhaps the gilded roof of the Khan's palace gave the Europeans a reason to call these Mongols the "Golden Horde". Russian princes were obliged to visit Sarai, and the title of "Grand Duke" depended on the mercy of the Khan. The Mongols used the strife between the Russian princes to consolidate their power, and the princes sought the favor of the Mongols in order to defeat their rivals.

Almost immediately after the Mongol invasion, the Rurik prince Alexander Nevsky (c. 1220-1263) demonstrated all the advantages of cooperation with the Mongols. As the elected prince of Novgorod, he fought the German and Swedish invaders who invaded North-Western Russia, and won a famous victory on the ice of Lake Peipus (1242). A few years later, Alexander denounced his brother, the Grand Duke of Vladimir, to the Mongol Khan, and was rewarded with the title of Grand Duke. He then proved to be a loyal ally of the Mongols, putting down uprisings against the collection of Mongol tribute in Novgorod and throughout Northwestern Russia, possibly wishing to avoid harsh Mongol repression. The descendants of Alexander became the princes of Moscow and subsequently - the rulers of all Russia.

Remembering how Sid's reputation developed in Spain, we should probably not be surprised that this undoubtedly courageous, but also very ambiguous personality became one of the greatest heroic images of Russian literature and political mythology and even surpassed Sid in one thing - Alexander Nevsky was officially canonized in 1547. The Russian Church, like Alexander Nevsky, supported the Mongol government. The Mongols of the Golden Horde, who converted to Islam at the end of the 13th century, were generally tolerant of Christianity and rightly regarded the Russian Church as a useful ally. In contrast, the papacy tried to force the arrogant and suspicious Orthodox Church to recognize the primacy of the popes and at the same time encouraged the attacks of the German knights on the lands of North-Western Russia.

It used to be believed that the Mongol conquest radically changed Russian traditions and turned Russia from a European country into an Asian one. However, most modern historians are inclined to believe that the Mongol invasion, with all its profound impact on Russian history, is unlikely to significantly affect the character of the Russian people and their traditions. To a large extent, features national character were shaped by the Russian Church, with its traditional orthodoxy and hostility to everything foreign, especially to Latin Christians, who were hated and feared. But what the Mongols could and did teach the Russian princes was the practical skills in which they showed themselves head and shoulders above the Europeans: methods and techniques for squeezing huge taxes from all classes of the population, ways of organizing and protecting communication lines that cross vast spaces, and the ability to to use the military equipment of opponents for their own needs.

Intellectual life, literature and art

The fate of the revival of the XII century. was different than the results of the Carolingian Renaissance, drowned in the disasters of the 9th-10th centuries. 13th century people revered the ancients no less than their grandfathers; moreover, they were more able to imitate the ancients, since they had a significant number of Greek and Latin texts and could rely on the experience of the previous century. It was in the XIII century. in the West, the works of the Spanish-Jewish philosopher Maimonides (1135-1204) and the Spanish-Muslim philosopher Averroes (1126-1192) spread. Of course, some pedants were horrified by such teaching, but the best minds of Christianity not only appreciated Maimonides and Averroes for their excellent works on medicine and commentaries on Aristotle and Plato, but also - wittingly or unwittingly - reckoned with their opinions on metaphysical and religious questions.

Universities and scholasticism

Europe has become much richer and has acquired a higher social and political organization than in former times. Now she needed a lot more educated people and could support them. It should be noted that educated women were still a rare exception.

Primary education, as in earlier centuries, was provided by local schools; rich people could hire private tutors. But higher education now it was possible to obtain only in universities. Universities received rights from kings or popes, and their leaders were allowed to create associations that determined the content training courses and degrees awarded. Only in the famous law school of Bologna did the students themselves organize a university and have the right to choose teachers. By the middle of the XIV century. there were at least fourteen universities in Italy, eight in France, seven each in Spain and Portugal, two in England (Oxford and Cambridge), and only one in Central Europe (Prague). Young people from Germany, Scandinavia and Poland had to go to Bologna, Padua or Paris, and many preferred these universities even after the end of the 14th and 15th centuries. similar educational establishments were opened in their homeland.

Almost all universities, with the exception of Paris and Bologna, were very small: they had only a few buildings and, as a rule, had no libraries. Books were still extremely expensive, and lecturers had to dictate quotations from major works: the Bible, St. Augustine or the Code of Justinian, accompanying them with comments by famous authors and much less often with their own. Questions that arose in the course of studying the texts were discussed at "disputes", where it was required to logically build arguments and counterarguments, formulate definitions and draw conclusions. This was the essence of the "school" method, which gave its name, "scholasticism", to all late medieval philosophy: for outstanding minds, this method, the main features of which were rationality and intellectual culture, was an extremely effective means. In the minds of mediocre people, of course, it sometimes degenerated into naked pedantry and dry exercises in logical definitions. That is how it was perceived by the humanists of the 15th century, who contributed to the fact that the term "scholasticism" acquired a negative connotation.

But in the XIII century. scholasticism and the universities spread rapidly and were able to offer the few elites an intellectual life much richer and more varied than before. Theological and legal degrees were especially valued; but each student studied the seven "liberal arts" for three years: grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. These sciences also had their own authorities. In particular, the English Franciscan Roger Bacon (c. 1220-1292) extolled mathematics as the only discipline in which truth could be established without the risk of error, and gave a visual representation of all kinds of inventions, which then seemed like something fantastic; unlike the modern genre of science fiction, which is busy describing the inventions of the future, Bacon, as a rule, attributed them to the ancients.

I now intend to describe the first works of all kinds of craftsmanship and wonders of nature, and then explain their causes and properties. There is no magic in them, for the whole power of magic seems to be inferior to these mechanisms and unworthy of them. And first, I will talk about what is created by the productive and formative power of handicraft art alone. Sea navigation devices can do without rowers, so that the largest ships ... can be driven by a single person, and they sail at a much higher speed than if they had many rowers on them. In exactly the same way, it is possible to make carts that move without animals and with incredible speed, as, one must think, the chariots, seated with scythe blades, on which the ancients fought, moved. In the same way, aircraft can be made, where a person sits inside and rotates some ingenious device, by means of which skillfully placed wings flap through the air, like those of a flying bird ... Devices can also be made to move along the bottom of the sea or rivers without any danger. Such devices, according to the stories of the astronomer Ethics, Alexander the Great used to study the mysteries of the ocean. These things were made in antiquity, and in our times too, and this is beyond doubt; the exception is perhaps the flying machine, which I have not seen and do not know a single person who has seen.

St. Thomas Aquinas

An outstanding and at the same time the most typical representative of scholasticism of the XIII century. was Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274). This Dominican professor, who taught in Paris and various schools in Italy, conceived, nothing more and nothing less, to combine the Christian faith with nature and reason in one comprehensive system:

Evidence on the basis of authority is the method most suitable for doctrine, where the starting premises are borrowed from revelation ... But with all this, the sacred doctrine also uses the abilities of the human mind - of course, not to justify faith, for this would eliminate the very merit of belief, but for in order to clarify certain issues of revelation. Since grace does not eliminate nature, but perfects it, natural reason must also obey faith, just as natural love inclination obeys divine love. St. Paul says that all understanding should serve Christ. Therefore, the sacred teaching is also based on the authority of those philosophers who were able to know the truth with the help of natural reason ...

Not all of Thomas Aquinas' contemporaries were ready to accept his conclusions. However, it was impossible to ignore them; representing a fertile ground for discussions and even disagreements, they at the same time testified to a further shift of Christian thought towards rationalism - to the recognition of the natural world and the value of its study.

Literature

While all the intellectual debates of the era, all university teaching and the vast majority of official documents were conducted in Latin, national languages ​​were increasingly spread in historical writings and in all genres of poetry. The French chronicler William of Tire (c. 1130–1185) wrote the best history of the 12th century crusades of his time. in Latin. But Geoffroy de Villehardouin (c. 1150–1213) compiled his eyewitness account of the Fourth Crusade and the capture of Constantinople in French. This first attempt at prose writing in French served as the exemplary beginning of a long series of eminent French chronicles and histories. The most famous monument of the historical genre of that era was Sir de Joinville's History of St. Louis, completed in 1310. Probably its best pages are devoted to describing Louis's two crusades, in the first of which Joinville accompanied the king. But the most popular was the description of Louis IX as the ideal king:

In the summer, after hearing mass, the king would often go to the Bois de Vincennes [near Paris] and there he would sit with his back against an oak tree and invite us all to sit beside it. Whoever had requests or complaints to him, they could speak to him freely, without any interference from the provost or any other person. The king directly addressed them and asked: “Does anyone have a matter that needs to be resolved?”, and the one who had a request stood up. Then the king said: “And you are all silent for now; each of you will be heard, one after the other." Then he called Pierre de Fontaine and Geoffroy de Villette and said to one of them: "Solve this matter for me." If he saw that something needed to be corrected in the words of someone who spoke on his own behalf or on behalf of another person, then he intervened himself in order to achieve the desired decision.

For many centuries the French ideal of monarchy was fueled by the mystical image of royalty, embodied in Louis IX, but this image would hardly have gained such influence if it were not for the literary gift of Joinville.

The story of Villardouin has often been called a "heroic prose poem". At that time, many heroic poems and ancient sagas received their final written version; although they told about the exploits of the past, these exploits were perceived in a modern way, that is, in the spirit of the lifestyle and basic values ​​​​of European society of the 13th century. It will suffice to mention the poem "The Song of the Nibelungs", written by an unknown author c. 1200 in Middle High German. The plot outline of the poem - the deeds of the dragon slayer Siegfried, his death at the hands of Hagen, the death of Hagen and the Burgundian Gunter at the hands of the Huns - goes back to the Germanic sagas and legends of the 5th century. The main theme of the poem is the glorification of the highest of medieval knightly virtues - personal loyalty. However, this quality was no longer perceived as Roland's ingenuous and enthusiastic loyalty to Charlemagne: it is burdened with crimes and tragic events in which people are involved in the conflict of loyalty. Probably, here you can see the medieval analogue of the hopeless situation of the hero of the Greek tragedy, torn apart by the opposing demands of different laws, a classic example of which is Sophocles' Antigone. These sentiments undoubtedly reflected the self-awareness of the 13th century, which came face to face with the dilemma of loyalty to church and state, and, at least hidden, criticism of the attitude towards women. The murder of Siegfried, the terrible revenge of Siegfried's wife Kriemhild on his brothers, was a direct consequence of the terrible position in which she was placed as a woman, a position typical of most of her contemporaries.

Among the troubadours of Southern France, the traditional attitude towards women was expressed differently: they avoided excessive drama and placed a woman at the center of their love poetry. Attention to the feelings of an individual - man or woman - made the poetry of the troubadours the first example of European romantic lyrics.

Love has a high gift -
Witch power.
That in winter, in the cruel frost,
She raised flowers for me.
Howling winds, streams of rain -
Everything was nice to me.
Here's a new line song
Curl light-winged.
And love is so tender
And love is so clear
Like ice floes, like spring,
Awakened to life.

Such verses very soon became widespread, first in southern France, northern Italy, Spain (perhaps even in the Arabic-speaking court of Cordoba), and then throughout Europe.

It is in this lyrical tradition that the most famous medieval French poem, The Romance of the Rose, was written (between 1240 and 1280), a lengthy allegorical description of courtly love. The second part of the poem is replete with long false stories in which the hypocrisy of the mendicant brothers and other famous actors era, the hypocrisy of the institutions and values ​​of that time. Criticism of social and moral vices became one of the most characteristic features of European society.

Architecture and Art: Gothic Style

The history of architecture shows in detail how the Gothic style (the very name "Gothic" appeared only in the Renaissance and served as a synonym for the barbarian style) consistently, step by step, developed from new methods of erecting lancet vaults with intersecting surfaces. In combination with lancet arches, this technique allowed the architects to increase the height of the church, but in turn required the creation of arched buttresses that compensated for the pressure of the walls and ceiling and at the same time made it possible to make the walls thinner, and the window openings more numerous and large. These are the characteristic technical features of Gothic. But the masters of the Gothic are not just highly professional builders, well-versed in mathematics and mechanics; they were artists who created, with the help of new techniques, one of the most original building styles in the history of the world. In their hands, supporting structures, lancet arches and columns turned into an artistic means of organizing the internal space. Arched buttresses - structural elements wall reinforcements were also deliberately used to highlight the rhythmic three-dimensional dynamics of the building structure, its upward aspiration. This architectural identity was emphasized by an abundance of sculpture, usually human figures, sculpted with an almost classical sense of idealized realism. Huge windows were filled with colored stained-glass windows (perhaps the best examples of which are in the cathedrals of Chartres and Bourges), which created amazing lighting in the interiors with soft, muted colors that changed depending on the time of day. The stained-glass windows, whose magnificent color palette could compete even with the amazing Byzantine mosaics, depicted the world of God in a completely realistic manner - with its angels, saints, people, animals and flowers.

It is not surprising that some architects and their patrons, inspired by their successes and somewhat overestimating them, began to demand the impossible from the magical new technology. They raised the ceilings of the naves higher and higher, achieving the best spatial and lighting effects; as a result, ceilings collapsed in some churches in Europe. The most famous disaster is the destruction of the choirs of the cathedral in Beauvais (Northern France): the nave, erected to a height of 48 m, collapsed in 1284. It took almost forty years to restore it, and since then the masons have been working with great care. In the Cologne Cathedral, the archivolts of the vaults were conceived at almost the same height (45 m), but they were completed only in the 19th century.

Some historians have previously tried to interpret Gothic architecture as an exquisite symbolic language and looked for semantic parallels in it to scholasticism. Now there is no doubt that many details of Gothic buildings, and in particular their decor, were indeed endowed with a symbolic meaning. Of course, this is quite difficult to identify on the scale of the architectonics of the entire building; we do not have such exhaustive evidence of the time as we have for the architecture of the Renaissance. But in any case, it is fair to assume that the architects of the XIII-XIV centuries. and their church patrons, being educated people, had an idea of ​​the prevailing philosophical conviction of the era about the harmony of the universe and all the creations contained in it. Even images of the Creator in the form of an architect holding one of the indispensable attributes of this profession, a compass, have come down to us.

The Gothic style quickly spread from France to England, Germany and Spain; only Italy resisted his temptations for some time. Such a rapid spread was primarily due to the fact that everywhere involved in the construction best architects with their brigades, mostly French; of no small importance was the international system of apprenticeship, which attracted promising young people to the "lodges" of the great masters, just as young scientists sought to get into the circle of the best teachers of the largest universities. Architects could now learn from drawings or collections of "standard" projects that came into use, as well as from detailed designs of real buildings. These projects were worked out so carefully that on their basis in the 19th century. it was possible to complete the cathedrals in Cologne and Ulm with absolute certainty.

However, a more important reason for the wide spread of the Gothic style and its extreme longevity (in continental Europe until the middle of the 16th century, in England until the 18th century) was its obvious aesthetic and religious appeal. In its various forms, depending on the region and era, the Gothic style continued to satisfy the needs of many generations of believers. Only this circumstance can explain the number and size of Gothic cathedrals and churches built throughout Europe since the 13th century. Indeed, neither the system of values ​​nor the priorities of European society underwent fundamental changes compared to the 11th-12th centuries: a significant part of the surplus product still continued to go to acts of piety, wars and the construction of cathedrals and castles.

Conclusion

The thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries were a time of rapid development. The European population became more numerous than ever before and continued to grow. Most still lived in poverty, but in the cities and even in many villages, life took on richer and more diverse forms, at least for certain, albeit small, strata. People constantly improved their skills - in the technical, intellectual, military fields, and these acquired skills spread rapidly, which, in turn, was expressed in the growth of prosperity on the ground. This growth, as well as the division of labor, against the background of the development of communications, a much more intensive movement of people and ideas, led to an increasing self-sufficiency of individual regions of Europe. Many outstanding works of literature appeared in national languages ​​- in Spain and Iceland, Italy and Germany, and above all in France.

Within the framework of the dominant Gothic style, the architecture of cathedrals and castles increasingly acquired a local flavor. The papacy reached the zenith of its power as an international institution and triumphed over the Holy Roman Empire, which made the same universal claims, but in turn was forced to succumb to national monarchies.

It was at this time that the “international” era of the Middle Ages ended. The outstanding philosopher of history Arnold Toynbee considered this era a turning point, when the historical development of European society took a tragically wrong direction, the result of which was almost inevitably to be the final collapse of European society. However, there seems to be much more evidence that the reason for the departure from universalism lies not in the wrong, but, on the contrary, in the extremely successful development of European society. The universalism of the mature Middle Ages, which, as we have seen, was based on the transnational communication of only a small stratum of educated and qualified people, such universalism could only be maintained in Europe under conditions of economic stagnation and intellectual stagnation. But this would cancel out all the dynamic possibilities of a society that arose from the fusion of barbarian tribes with the advanced civilization of the late Roman Empire. The merits of the "international sector" of medieval society include economic and cultural growth, which contributed to the regionalization of Europe (and thereby undermined the roots of universalism). In turn, regionalization played the role of a new dynamic element: it expanded the possibilities and intensity of competition, thus forcing the sacrifice of tradition in favor of rationality and ingenuity. These processes by the end of the XV century. gave Europeans technical, military and political superiority over the indigenous peoples of America, Africa and most of Asia, who were subjugated and partially enslaved. But the Europeans also had to pay for this: they were forced to come to terms with the collapse (in the era of the Reformation) of the ideal of a unified Christendom they had cherished, and the European states, by the inevitable course of events, became involved in wars among themselves (since each of them claimed universal dominion, befitting only churches). The successes and tragedies of human history are not easily separated.

MIDDLE AGES

Early Middle Ages

(from 500 to 1000)

It starts from the time of the fall of the Great Roman Empire (476) and lasts about 5 centuries. This is the time of the so-called Great Migration of Peoples, which began in the 4th century and ended in the 7th. During this time, the Germanic tribes captured and subjugated all the countries of Western Europe, thus determining the face of the modern European world. The main reasons for mass migration during this period of the Middle Ages were the search for fertile lands and favorable conditions, as well as a sharp cooling of the climate. Therefore, the northern tribes moved closer to the south. In addition to the Germanic tribes, Turks, Slavs and Finno-Ugric tribes participated in the resettlement. The great migration of peoples was accompanied by the destruction of many tribes and nomadic peoples.

Viking tribes appeared, the kingdoms of the Ostrogoths in Italy and the Visigoths in Aquitaine and the Iberian Peninsula arose, the Frankish state was formed, which occupied most of Europe during its heyday. North Africa and Spain became part of the Arab Caliphate, many small states of the Angles, Saxons and Celts existed on the British Isles, states appeared in Scandinavia, as well as in central and eastern Europe: Great Moravia and the Old Russian state. The neighbors of the Europeans were the Byzantines, the population of the ancient Russian principalities and Muslim Arabs. The inhabitants of Europe maintained different relations with the nearest countries and states. The biggest impact on all aspects of life European countries provided by the Arab states and Byzantium.

The medieval society of Western Europe was agrarian. The basis of the economy was agriculture, and the vast majority of the population was employed in this area. Labor in agriculture, as well as in other branches of production, was manual, which predetermined its low efficiency and slow overall rates of technical and economic evolution.

The vast majority of the population of Western Europe throughout the entire period of the Middle Ages lived outside the city. If cities were very important for ancient Europe - they were independent centers of life, the nature of which was predominantly municipal, and a person’s belonging to a city determined his civil rights, then in Medieval Europe, especially in the first seven centuries, the role of cities was insignificant, although over time time, the influence of cities is increasing.

The early Middle Ages in Europe are characterized by constant wars. Barbarian tribes, having destroyed the Roman Empire, began to create their own states of the Angles, Franks and others. They fought fierce wars with each other for territory. In 800, Charlemagne managed, at the cost of numerous campaigns of conquest, to subjugate many peoples and create the Frankish Empire. Having broken up after the death of Charles after 43 years, it was again recreated in the 10th century by the German kings.

In the Middle Ages, the formation of Western European civilization began, developing with greater dynamism than all previous civilizations, which was determined by a number of historical factors (the legacy of Roman material and spiritual culture, the existence of the empires of Charlemagne and Otto I in Europe, which united many tribes and countries, the influence of Christianity as a single religion for all, the role of corporatism, penetrating all spheres of social order).

The basis of the economy of the Middle Ages was agriculture, which employed most of the population. The peasants cultivated both their land plots and those of the masters. More precisely, the peasants had nothing of their own; only personal freedom distinguished them from slaves.

By the end of the first period of the Middle Ages, all peasants (both personally dependent and personally free) have an owner. Feudal law did not recognize simply free, independent people, trying to build social relations according to the principle: "There is no man without a master."

During the formation of medieval society, the pace of development was slow. Although in agriculture the three-field instead of the two-field was already fully established, the yield was low. They kept mainly small livestock - goats, sheep, pigs, and there were few horses and cows. The level of specialization of agriculture was low. Each estate had almost all vital, from the point of view of Western Europeans, branches of the economy: field crops, cattle breeding, and various crafts. The economy was natural, and agricultural products were not specially produced for the market; the craft also existed in the form of work to order. The domestic market was thus very limited.

In the period of the early Middle Ages - the beginning of the formation of medieval society - the territory on which the formation of Western European civilization is taking place is significantly expanding: if the basis of ancient civilization was Ancient Greece and Rome, then medieval civilization covers almost the whole of Europe. The most important process in the early Middle Ages in the socio-economic sphere was the formation of feudal relations, the core of which was the formation of feudal land ownership. This happened in two ways. The first way is through the peasant community. The allotment of land owned by a peasant family was inherited from father to son (and from the 6th century to daughter) and was their property. This is how the allod gradually took shape - the freely alienable land property of the communal peasants. Allod accelerated the stratification of property among free peasants: the lands began to be concentrated in the hands of the communal elite, which already acts as part of the feudal class. Thus, this was the way of forming the patrimonial-allodial form of feudal ownership of land, which was especially characteristic of the Germanic tribes.

During the early Middle Ages, feudal fragmentation was observed in Europe. Then the role of Christianity in the creation of a united Europe increases.

Medieval cities

They arose primarily in places of lively trade. In Europe it was Italy and France. Here, cities appeared already in the 9th century. The time of appearance of other cities refers to

Beginning in the 12th and 13th centuries, there was a sharp rise in the development of technology in Europe and an increase in the number of innovations in the means of production, which contributed to the economic growth of the region. In less than a century, more inventions have been made than in the previous thousand years.

Cannons, glasses, artesian wells were invented. Gunpowder, silk, compass and astrolabe came from the East. There were also great advances in shipbuilding and watches. At the same time, a huge number of Greek and Arabic works on medicine and science were translated and distributed throughout Europe.

At that time, science and culture began to develop. The most progressive rulers also understood the value of education and science. For example, back in the 8th century, on the orders of Charlemagne, the Academy was formed, bearing his name.

Among the sciences: astronomy. In the Middle Ages, it was closely associated with astrology. The geocentric concept of Ptolemy was taken as the basis of the world, although many scientists by that time were already sure of its fallacy. But Nicolaus Copernicus was the first to openly criticize; Chemistry: In the Middle Ages it was called alchemy. Scientists-alchemists were looking for a philosopher's stone that gives wisdom, and a way to create gold from other metals. In the process of these searches, a huge number of important inventions were made, etc.

In Western European art of the 10th-12th centuries, the Romanesque style prevails. He expressed himself most fully in architecture.

Classical (High) Middle Ages

(1000 to 1300)

The main characterizing trend of this period was the rapid increase in the population of Europe, which in turn led to dramatic changes in the social, political and other spheres of life.

In the XI-XV centuries. in Europe, there is a process of gradual formation of centralized states - England, France, Portugal, Spain, Holland, etc., where new forms of government controlled- Cortes (Spain), Parliament (England), States General (France). The strengthening of centralized power contributed to the more successful development of the economy, science, culture, the emergence of a new form of organization of production - manufactory. In Europe, capitalist relations are emerging and establishing themselves, which was largely facilitated by the Great geographical discoveries.

In the High Middle Ages, Europe begins to actively flourish. The arrival of Christianity in Scandinavia. The collapse of the Carolingian Empire into two separate states, on the territories of which modern Germany and France were later formed. The organization of Christian crusades with the aim of recapturing Palestine from the Seljuks. Cities are developing and getting rich. Culture is developing very actively. There are new styles and trends in architecture and music.

In Eastern Europe, the era of the High Middle Ages was marked by the flourishing of the Old Russian state and the appearance on the historical stage of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The invasion of the Mongols in the XIII century caused irreparable damage to the development of Eastern Europe. Many states of this region were plundered and enslaved.

The Western European Middle Ages is a period of dominance of natural economy and weak development of commodity-money relations. The insignificant level of specialization of the regions associated with this type of economy determined the development of mainly distant (foreign) rather than near (internal) trade. Long-distance trade was focused mainly on the upper strata of society. Industry during this period existed in the form of handicrafts and manufactory.

Medieval society - class. There were three main estates: the nobility, the clergy and the people (peasants, artisans, merchants were united under this concept). Estates had different rights and obligations, played different socio-political and economic roles.

The most important characteristic of medieval Western European society was its hierarchical structure, the system of vassalage. At the head of the feudal hierarchy was the king - the supreme overlord and, at the same time, often only a nominal head of state. This conditionality of the absolute power of the highest person in the states of Western Europe is also an essential feature of Western European society, in contrast to the truly absolute monarchies of the East. Thus, the king in medieval Europe is only a “first among equals”, and not an omnipotent despot. It is characteristic that the king, occupying the first step of the hierarchical ladder in his state, could well be a vassal of another king or the pope.

On the second rung of the feudal ladder were the direct vassals of the king. These were large feudal lords - dukes, counts, archbishops, bishops, abbots. According to the immunity letter received from the king, they had various types of immunity (from Latin - immunity). The most common types of immunity were tax, judicial and administrative, i.e. the owners of immunity certificates themselves collected taxes from their peasants and townspeople, ruled the court, and made administrative decisions. Feudal lords of this level could themselves mint their own coin, which often had circulation not only within the boundaries of the given estate, but also outside it. The subordination of such feudal lords to the king was often merely formal.

On the third rung of the feudal ladder stood the vassals of dukes, counts, bishops - barons. They enjoyed virtual immunity on their estates. Even lower were the vassals of the barons - the knights. Some of them could also have their own vassals - even smaller knights, others had only peasants in submission, who, however, stood outside the feudal ladder.

The system of vassalage was based on the practice of land grants. The person who received the land became a vassal, the one who gave it became a seigneur. The owner of the land - a seigneur, could give a fief for temporary use ( land plot) under special conditions. The land was given under certain conditions, the most important of which was the service of the seigneur, which, as a rule, was 40 days a year according to feudal custom. The most important duties of a vassal in relation to his lord were participation in the lord's army, protection of his possessions, honor, dignity, participation in his council. If necessary, the vassals redeemed the lord from captivity.

When receiving land, the vassal took an oath of allegiance to his master. If the vassal did not fulfill his obligations, the lord could take away his land, but this was not so easy to do, since the vassal, as a feudal lord, was inclined to defend his property with weapons in his hands. In general, despite the apparent clear order, the system of vassalage was rather confusing, and a vassal could have several lords at the same time. Then the principle "the vassal of my vassal is not my vassal" was in effect.

In the Middle Ages, two main classes of feudal society were also formed: feudal lords, spiritual and secular - land owners, and peasants - land holders. The basis of the economy of the Middle Ages was agriculture, which employed most of the population. The peasants cultivated both their land plots and those of the masters.

Among the peasants there were two groups, differing in their economic and social status. Personally free peasants could, at will, leave the owner, give up their land holdings: rent them out or sell them to another peasant. Having freedom of movement, they often moved to cities or to new places. They paid fixed taxes in kind and in cash and performed certain work in the household of their master. The other group is the personally dependent peasants. Their obligations were wider, moreover (and this is the most important difference) they were not fixed, so that personally dependent peasants were subjected to arbitrary taxation. They also carried a number of specific taxes: posthumous - upon entering into an inheritance, marriage - redemption of the right of the first night, etc. These peasants did not enjoy freedom of movement.

The producer of material goods under feudalism was the peasant, who, unlike a slave and a hired worker, ran the household himself, and in many respects quite independently, that is, he was the owner. The peasant was the owner of the yard, the main means of production. He also acted as the owner of the land, but was a subordinate owner, while the feudal lord was the supreme owner. The supreme owner of the land is always at the same time the supreme owner of the personalities of the subordinate landowners, and thus also of their labor force. Here, as in the case of slavery, there is an extra-economic dependence of the exploited on the exploiter, but not complete, but supreme. Therefore, the peasant, unlike the slave, is the owner of his personality and labor force, but not complete, but subordinate.

Progress in agriculture was also facilitated by the liberation of peasants from personal dependence. The decision on this was made either by the city near which the peasants lived and with which they were connected socially and economically, or by their lord-feudal lord, on whose land they lived. The rights of peasants to land allotments were strengthened. Increasingly, they could freely pass on land by inheritance, bequeath it and mortgage it, lease it, donate it, and sell it. This is how the land market is gradually formed and becomes wider. Commodity-money relations develop.

Church. The schism (schism) of 1054 led to the formation of two main branches of the Christian Church - the Roman Catholic Church in Western Europe and the Orthodox Church in Eastern Europe. In the era of the classical Middle Ages in Europe, the Catholic Church reached its power. It influenced all spheres of human life. The rulers could not compare with its wealth - the church owned 1/3 of all land in each country.

A whole series of crusades took place over the course of 400 years, from the 11th to the 15th centuries. They were organized by the Catholic Church against Muslim countries under the slogan of protecting the Holy Sepulcher. In fact, it was an attempt to capture new territories. Knights from all over Europe went on these campaigns. For young warriors, participation in such an adventure was a prerequisite to prove their courage and confirm their knighthood.

Medieval man was extremely religious. What is considered incredible and supernatural for us was ordinary for him. Faith in the dark and light kingdoms, demons, spirits and angels - this is what surrounded a person, and in which he unconditionally believed.

The church strictly watched that its prestige was not damaged. All free-thinking thoughts were nipped in the bud. Many scientists suffered from the actions of the church: Giordano Bruno, Galileo Galilei, Nicolaus Copernicus and others. At the same time, in the Middle Ages it was the center of education and scientific thought. At the monasteries there were church schools in which they taught literacy, prayers, the Latin language and the singing of hymns. In the workshops for copying books, in the same place, at the monasteries, the works of ancient authors were carefully copied, preserving them for posterity.

The main branch of the economy of Western European countries during the classical Middle Ages, as before, was agriculture. The main characteristics of the development of the agricultural sector as a whole was the process of rapid development of new lands, known in history as the process of internal colonization. It contributed not only to the quantitative growth of the economy, but also to serious qualitative progress, since the duties imposed on the peasants on the new lands were predominantly monetary, and not in kind. The process of replacing in-kind duties with monetary ones, known in the scientific literature as rent switching, contributed to the growth of economic independence and enterprise of the peasants, and to an increase in their labor productivity. The sowing of oilseeds and industrial crops is expanding, and oil and winemaking are developing.

Grain yield reaches the level of sam-4 and sam-5. The growth of peasant activity and the expansion of the peasant economy led to a reduction in the economy of the feudal lord, which in the new conditions turned out to be less profitable.

Artisans were an important ever-increasing stratum of the urban population. From the XII-XIII centuries. In connection with the increase in the purchasing power of the population, the growth of consumer demand is marked by the growth of urban crafts. From work to order, artisans move to work for the market. The craft becomes a respected occupation that brings a good income. Special respect was enjoyed by people of construction specialties - masons, carpenters, plasterers. Architecture was then engaged in the most gifted people, with a high level vocational training. During this period, the specialization of crafts deepened, the range of products expanded, handicraft techniques improved, remaining, as before, manual.

The technologies in metallurgy, in the manufacture of cloth fabrics become more complicated and become more effective, and in Europe they begin to wear woolen clothes instead of fur and linen. In the XII century. in Europe, mechanical watches were made, in the XIII century. - a large tower clock, in the XV century. - pocket watch. Watchmaking is becoming the school in which the technique of precision engineering was developed, which played a significant role in the development of the productive forces of Western society. Other sciences also developed successfully, and many discoveries were made in them. The water wheel was invented, water and windmills were improved, mechanical watches, glasses, and a loom were created.

Craftsmen united in guilds that protected their members from competition from "wild" artisans. In cities there could be dozens and hundreds of workshops of various economic orientations, because the specialization of production took place not within the workshop, but between workshops. So, in Paris there were more than 350 workshops. The most important feature of the shops was also a certain regulation of production in order to prevent overproduction, to maintain prices at a fairly high level; shop authorities, taking into account the volume of the potential market, determined the quantity of output.

Throughout this period, the guilds waged a struggle with the tops of the city for access to management. The city leaders, called the patriciate, united representatives of the landed aristocracy, wealthy merchants, usurers. Often the actions of influential artisans were successful, and they were included in the city authorities.

The guild organization of handicraft production had both obvious disadvantages and advantages, one of which was a well-established apprenticeship system. The official training period in different workshops ranged from 2 to 14 years, it was assumed that during this time the artisan must go from apprentice and apprentice to master.

The workshops developed strict requirements for the material from which the goods were made, for tools of labor, and production technology. All this ensured stable operation and guaranteed excellent product quality. The high level of medieval Western European craft is evidenced by the fact that an apprentice who wanted to receive the title of master was obliged to complete the final work, which was called a “masterpiece” (the modern meaning of the word speaks for itself).

The workshops also created conditions for the transfer of accumulated experience, ensuring the continuity of handicraft generations. In addition, artisans participated in the formation of a united Europe: apprentices in the learning process could roam around different countries; masters, if they were recruited in the city more than required, easily moved to new places.

On the other hand, by the end of the classical Middle Ages, in the 14th-15th centuries, the guild organization of industrial production began to act more and more obviously as a retarding factor. Shops are becoming more and more isolated, stopping in development. In particular, it was practically impossible for many to become a master: only the son of a master or his son-in-law could actually obtain the status of a master. This led to the fact that a significant layer of "eternal apprentices" appeared in the cities. In addition, the strict regulation of the craft begins to hinder the introduction of technological innovations, without which progress in the field of material production is unthinkable. Therefore, the workshops gradually exhaust themselves, and by the end of the classical Middle Ages, new form organization of industrial production - manufactory.

In the classical Middle Ages, old cities quickly grow and new cities appear - near castles, fortresses, monasteries, bridges, river crossings. Cities with a population of 4-6 thousand inhabitants were considered average. There were very large cities, such as Paris, Milan, Florence, where 80 thousand people lived. Life in a medieval city was difficult and dangerous - frequent epidemics claimed the lives of more than half of the townspeople, as happened, for example, during the "black death" - a plague epidemic in the middle of the 14th century. Fires were also frequent. However, they still aspired to the cities, because, as the proverb testified, “the city air made the dependent person free” - for this it was necessary to live in the city for one year and one day.

Cities arose on the lands of the king or large feudal lords and were beneficial to them, bringing income in the form of taxes from crafts and trade.

At the beginning of this period, most cities were dependent on their lords. The townspeople fought for gaining independence, that is, for turning into a free city. The authorities of independent cities were elected and had the right to collect taxes, pay the treasury, manage city finances at their own discretion, have their own court, mint their own coin, and even declare war and make peace. The means of struggle of the urban population for their rights were urban uprisings - communal revolutions, as well as the redemption of their rights from the lord. Only the richest cities, such as London and Paris, could afford such a ransom. However, many other Western European cities were also rich enough to gain independence for money. So, in the XIII century. About half of all cities in England gained independence in collecting taxes - that is, about 200.

The wealth of cities was based on the wealth of their citizens. Among the richest were moneylenders and money changers. They determined the quality and usefulness of the coin, and this was extremely important in the conditions of the defacing of the coin that was constantly practiced by mercantilist governments; they exchanged money and transferred it from one city to another; took on the preservation of free capital and provided loans.

At the beginning of the classical Middle Ages, banking activity was most actively developed in Northern Italy. The activities of usurers and money changers could be extremely profitable, but sometimes (if large feudal lords and kings refused to return large loans) they also became bankrupt.

Late Middle Ages

(1300-1640)

In Western European science, the end of the Middle Ages is usually associated with the beginning of the Church Reformation (beginning of the 16th century) or the era of great geographical discoveries (15th-17th centuries). The late Middle Ages is also called the Renaissance.

This is one of the most tragic periods of the Middle Ages. In the XIV century, almost the whole world experienced several epidemics of the plague, the Black Death. In Europe alone, it killed more than 60 million people, almost half of the population. This is the time of the strongest peasant uprisings in England and France and the longest war in the history of mankind - the Hundred Years. But at the same time - this is the era of the great geographical discoveries and the Renaissance.

Reformation (lat. reformatio - correction, transformation, reformation) - a broad religious and socio-political movement in Western and Central Europe of the 16th - early 17th centuries, aimed at reforming Catholic Christianity in accordance with the Bible.

The main cause of the Reformation was the struggle between those who represented the emerging capitalist mode of production and the defenders of the then dominant feudal system, whose ideological dogmas were protected by the Catholic Church. The interests and aspirations of the emerging bourgeois class and the masses of the people who somehow supported its ideology found expression in the founding of Protestant churches that called for modesty, economy, accumulation and self-reliance, as well as in the formation of nation-states in which the church did not play a major role.

Until the 16th century, the church in Europe owned large fiefs, and its power could only last as long as the feudal system existed. The riches of the church were based on the ownership of land, church tithes and payment for ceremonies. The splendor and decoration of the temples was amazing. The church and the feudal system ideally complemented each other.

With the advent of a new class of society, gradually gaining strength - the bourgeoisie, the situation began to change. Many have long expressed dissatisfaction with the excessive splendor of the rites and temples of the church. The high cost of church rites also caused a great protest among the population. The bourgeoisie was especially dissatisfied with this state of affairs, which wanted to invest not in magnificent and expensive church rites, but in production.

In some countries where the power of the king was strong, the church was limited in its appetites. In many others, where the priests could manage to their heart's content, she was hated by the entire population. Here the Reformation found fertile ground.

In the 14th century, Oxford professor John Wyclif spoke openly against the Catholic Church, calling for the destruction of the institution of the papacy and the removal of all land from the priests. His successor was Jan Hus, rector of the University of Prague and part-time pastor. He fully supported the idea of ​​Wyclif and proposed to reform the church in the Czech Republic. For this he was declared a heretic and burned at the stake.

The beginning of the Reformation is considered to be the speech of Martin Luther, doctor of theology at Wittenberg University: on October 31, 1517, he nailed his “95 theses” to the doors of the Wittenberg Castle Church, in which he opposed the existing abuses of the Catholic Church, in particular against the sale of indulgences. Historians consider the end of the Reformation to be the signing of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, as a result of which the religious factor ceased to play a significant role in European politics.

The main idea of ​​his composition is that a person does not need the mediation of the church to turn to God, he has enough faith. This act was the beginning of the Reformation in Germany. Luther was persecuted by church authorities who demanded that he retract his words. The ruler of Saxony, Friedrich, stood up for him, hiding the doctor of theology in his castle. Followers of Luther's teachings continued to fight to bring about a change in the church. The speeches, which were brutally suppressed, led to the Peasants' War in Germany. Supporters of the Reformation began to be called Protestants.

The death of Luther did not end the Reformation. It began in other European countries - in Denmark, England, Norway, Austria, Sweden, Switzerland, the Baltic States, Poland.

Protestantism spread throughout Europe in the creeds of the followers of Luther (Lutheranism), John Calvin (Calvinism), Ulrich Zwingli (Zwinglianism), and others.

A set of measures taken by the Catholic Church and the Jesuits to combat the Reformation,

The process of pan-European integration was contradictory: along with rapprochement in the field of culture and religion, there is a desire for national isolation in terms of the development of statehood. The Middle Ages is the time of the formation of national states that exist in the form of monarchies, both absolute and class-representative. The peculiarities of political power were its fragmentation, as well as its connection with conditional ownership of land. If in ancient Europe the right to own land was determined for a free person by his ethnicity - the fact of his birth in a given policy and the civil rights arising from this, then in medieval Europe the right to land depended on a person's belonging to a certain estate.

At this time, centralized power is being strengthened in most Western European countries, national states (England, France, Germany, etc.) begin to form and strengthen. Large feudal lords are increasingly dependent on the king. However, the king's power is still not truly absolute. The era of estate-representative monarchies is coming. It was during this period that the practical implementation of the principle of separation of powers begins, and the first parliaments arise - class-representative bodies that significantly limit the power of the king. The earliest such parliament - the Cortes - appeared in Spain (end of the 12th - beginning of the 12th centuries). In 1265 Parliament appears in England. In the XIV century. Parliaments have already been established in most Western European countries. At first, the work of parliaments was not regulated in any way, neither the dates of meetings nor the procedure for holding them were determined - all this was decided by the king, depending on the specific situation. However, even then it became the most important and permanent issue that was considered by parliamentarians - taxes.

Parliaments could act both as an advisory, and as a legislative, and as a judicial body. Legislative functions are gradually assigned to parliament, and a certain confrontation between parliament and the king is outlined. Thus, the king could not impose additional taxes without the sanction of the parliament, although formally the king was much higher than the parliament, and it was the king who convened and dissolved the parliament and proposed issues for discussion.

Parliaments were not the only political innovation of the classical Middle Ages. Another important new component of public life was political parties, which first began to form in the 13th century. in Italy, and then (in the XIV century) in France. The political parties were rigidly opposed to each other, but the reason for their confrontation then was rather psychological reasons than economic ones.

In the XV-XVII centuries. in the field of politics also appeared a lot of new things. Statehood and state structures are noticeably strengthening. The line of political evolution common to most European countries was to strengthen the central government, to strengthen the role of the state in the life of society.

Almost all countries of Western Europe during this period went through the horrors of bloody strife and wars. An example is the War of the Scarlet and White Roses in England in the 15th century. As a result of this war, England lost a fourth of its population. The Middle Ages is also a time of peasant uprisings, unrest and riots. An example is the revolt led by Wat Tyler and John Ball in England in 1381.

Great geographical discoveries. One of the first expeditions to India was organized by Portuguese sailors who tried to reach it by going around Africa. In 1487 they discovered the Cape of Good Hope - the southernmost point of the African continent. At the same time, the Italian Christopher Columbus (1451–1506) was also looking for a way to India, who managed to equip four expeditions with the money of the Spanish court. The Spanish royal couple - Ferdinand and Isabella - believed his arguments and promised him huge incomes from the newly discovered lands. Already during the first expedition in October 1492, Columbus discovered the New World, then called America by the name of Amerigo Vespucci (1454–1512), who participated in expeditions in South America in 1499–1504 It was he who first described the new lands and first expressed the idea that this is a new, not yet known to Europeans, part of the world.

sea ​​route the Portuguese expedition led by Vasco da Gama (1469–1524) in 1498 first made its way to real India. Of the 256 people of Magellan's team, only 18 survived, and Magellan himself died in a fight with the natives. Many expeditions of that time ended so sadly.

In the second half of the XVI - XVII centuries. on the way colonial conquests the British, Dutch and French entered. By the middle of the XVII century. Europeans discovered Australia and New Zealand.

As a result of the Great geographical discoveries, colonial empires begin to take shape, and from the newly discovered lands to Europe - the Old World - treasures flow - gold and silver. The consequence of this was an increase in prices, especially for agricultural products. This process, which took place to one degree or another in all countries of Western Europe, was called the price revolution in the historical literature. It contributed to the growth of monetary wealth among merchants, entrepreneurs, speculators and served as one of the sources of the initial accumulation of capital.

Another most important consequence of the Great Geographical Discoveries was the movement of world trade routes: the monopoly of Venetian merchants on caravan trade with the East in Southern Europe was broken. The Portuguese began to sell Indian goods several times cheaper than the Venetian merchants.

The countries actively engaged in intermediary trade - England and the Netherlands - are gaining strength. Intermediary trade was very unreliable and dangerous, but very profitable: for example, if one of the three ships sent to India returned, the expedition was considered successful, and the merchants' profits often reached 1000%. Thus, trade was the most important source for the formation of large private capital.

The quantitative growth of trade contributed to the emergence of new forms in which trade was organized. In the XVI century. for the first time there are exchanges, the main purpose and purpose of which was to use price fluctuations over time. Thanks to the development of trade at this time, there is a much stronger connection between the continents than before. This is how the foundations of the world market begin to be laid.

The era of the mature Middle Ages begins with the time of "cultural silence", which lasted almost until the end of the 10th century. Endless wars, civil strife, the political decline of the state led to the division of the empire of Charlemagne (843) and laid the foundation for three states: France, Italy and Germany.

During the period of the classical or high Middle Ages, Europe began to overcome difficulties and revive. In the XI century. the improvement of the economic situation, the growth of the population, the decrease in hostilities led to the acceleration of the process of separation of craft from agriculture, which resulted in the growth of both new cities and their size. In the XII-XIII centuries. many cities are liberated from the power of spiritual or secular feudal lords.

Since the 10th century, state structures have been enlarged, which made it possible to raise larger armies and, to some extent, to stop raids and robberies. Missionaries brought Christianity to the countries of Scandinavia, Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, so that these states also entered the orbit of Western culture. The relative stability that followed made it possible for cities and the economy to rapidly expand. Life began to change for the better, the cities flourished their own culture and spiritual life. A big role in this was played by the same church, which also developed, improved its teaching and organization.

European medieval society was very religious and the power of the clergy over the minds was extremely great. The teaching of the church was the starting point of all thinking, all sciences - jurisprudence, natural science, philosophy, logic - everything was brought into line with Christianity. The clergy were the only educated class, and it was the church that for a long time determined the policy in the field of education. The entire cultural life of European society of this period was largely determined by Christianity.

An important layer of the formation of folk culture during the classical Middle Ages is sermons. The bulk of society remained illiterate. In order for the thoughts of the social and spiritual elite to become the dominant thoughts of all parishioners, they had to be "translated" into a language accessible to all people. This is what the preachers did. Parish priests, monks, and missionaries had to explain to the people the basic principles of theology, instil the principles of Christian behavior and eradicate the wrong way of thinking. The sermon assumed as its listener any person - literate and illiterate, noble and commoner, city dweller and peasant, rich and poor.

The most famous preachers structured their sermons in such a way as to hold the attention of the public for a long time and convey to it the ideas of church teaching in the form of simple examples. Some used for this the so-called "examples" - short stories written in the form of parables on everyday topics. These "examples" are one of the early literary genres and are of particular interest for a more complete understanding of the worldview of ordinary believers. "Example" was one of the most effective means of didactic influence on parishioners. In these "cases from life" one can see the original world of medieval man, with his ideas about saints and evil spirits as real participants in a person's daily life. However, the most famous preachers, such as Berthold of Regenburg (XIII century), did not use the "Examples" in their sermons, building them mainly on biblical texts. This preacher built his sermons in the form of dialogues, addressed appeals and statements to a certain part of the audience or professional categories. He widely used the method of enumeration, riddles and other techniques that made his sermons small performances. The ministers of the church, as a rule, did not introduce any original ideas and statements into their sermons, this was not expected of them, and the parishioners would be unable to appreciate this. The audience received satisfaction just from listening to familiar and well-known things.

In the XII-XIII centuries. the church, having reached the peak of its power in the fight against the state, gradually began to lose its positions in the fight against the royal power. By the XIII century. natural economy begins to collapse as a result of the development of commodity-money relations, the personal dependence of the peasants is weakened.

MIDDLE AGES

Early Middle Ages

(from 500 to 1000)

It starts from the time of the fall of the Great Roman Empire (476) and lasts about 5 centuries. This is the time of the so-called Great Migration of Peoples, which began in the 4th century and ended in the 7th. During this time, the Germanic tribes captured and subjugated all the countries of Western Europe, thus determining the face of the modern European world. The main reasons for mass migration during this period of the Middle Ages were the search for fertile lands and favorable conditions, as well as a sharp cooling of the climate. Therefore, the northern tribes moved closer to the south. In addition to the Germanic tribes, Turks, Slavs and Finno-Ugric tribes participated in the resettlement. The great migration of peoples was accompanied by the destruction of many tribes and nomadic peoples.

Viking tribes appeared, the kingdoms of the Ostrogoths in Italy and the Visigoths in Aquitaine and the Iberian Peninsula arose, the Frankish state was formed, which occupied most of Europe during its heyday. North Africa and Spain became part of the Arab Caliphate, many small states of the Angles, Saxons and Celts existed on the British Isles, states appeared in Scandinavia, as well as in central and eastern Europe: Great Moravia and the Old Russian state. The neighbors of the Europeans were the Byzantines, the population of the ancient Russian principalities and Muslim Arabs. The inhabitants of Europe maintained different relations with the nearest countries and states. The Arab states and Byzantium had the greatest influence on all aspects of the life of European countries.

The medieval society of Western Europe was agrarian. The basis of the economy was agriculture, and the vast majority of the population was employed in this area. Labor in agriculture, as well as in other branches of production, was manual, which predetermined its low efficiency and slow overall rates of technical and economic evolution.

The vast majority of the population of Western Europe throughout the entire period of the Middle Ages lived outside the city. If cities were very important for ancient Europe - they were independent centers of life, the nature of which was predominantly municipal, and a person’s belonging to a city determined his civil rights, then in Medieval Europe, especially in the first seven centuries, the role of cities was insignificant, although over time time, the influence of cities is increasing.

The early Middle Ages in Europe are characterized by constant wars. Barbarian tribes, having destroyed the Roman Empire, began to create their own states of the Angles, Franks and others. They fought fierce wars with each other for territory. In 800, Charlemagne managed, at the cost of numerous campaigns of conquest, to subjugate many peoples and create the Frankish Empire. Having broken up after the death of Charles after 43 years, it was again recreated in the 10th century by the German kings.

In the Middle Ages, the formation of Western European civilization began, developing with greater dynamism than all previous civilizations, which was determined by a number of historical factors (the legacy of Roman material and spiritual culture, the existence of the empires of Charlemagne and Otto I in Europe, which united many tribes and countries, the influence of Christianity as a single religion for all, the role of corporatism, penetrating all spheres of social order).

The basis of the economy of the Middle Ages was agriculture, which employed most of the population. The peasants cultivated both their land plots and those of the masters. More precisely, the peasants had nothing of their own; only personal freedom distinguished them from slaves.

By the end of the first period of the Middle Ages, all peasants (both personally dependent and personally free) have an owner. Feudal law did not recognize simply free, independent people, trying to build social relations according to the principle: "There is no man without a master."

During the formation of medieval society, the pace of development was slow. Although in agriculture the three-field instead of the two-field was already fully established, the yield was low. They kept mainly small livestock - goats, sheep, pigs, and there were few horses and cows. The level of specialization of agriculture was low. Each estate had almost all vital, from the point of view of Western Europeans, branches of the economy: field crops, cattle breeding, and various crafts. The economy was natural, and agricultural products were not specially produced for the market; the craft also existed in the form of work to order. The domestic market was thus very limited.

In the period of the early Middle Ages - the beginning of the formation of medieval society - the territory on which the formation of Western European civilization is taking place significantly expands: if the basis of ancient civilization was Ancient Greece and Rome, then medieval civilization covers almost all of Europe. The most important process in the early Middle Ages in the socio-economic sphere was the formation of feudal relations, the core of which was the formation of feudal land ownership. This happened in two ways. The first way is through the peasant community. The allotment of land owned by a peasant family was inherited from father to son (and from the 6th century to daughter) and was their property. This is how the allod gradually took shape - the freely alienable land property of the communal peasants. Allod accelerated the stratification of property among free peasants: the lands began to be concentrated in the hands of the communal elite, which already acts as part of the feudal class. Thus, this was the way of forming the patrimonial-allodial form of feudal ownership of land, which was especially characteristic of the Germanic tribes.

During the early Middle Ages, feudal fragmentation was observed in Europe. Then the role of Christianity in the creation of a united Europe increases.

Medieval cities

They arose primarily in places of lively trade. In Europe it was Italy and France. Here, cities appeared already in the 9th century. The time of appearance of other cities refers to

Beginning in the 12th and 13th centuries, there was a sharp rise in the development of technology in Europe and an increase in the number of innovations in the means of production, which contributed to the economic growth of the region. In less than a century, more inventions have been made than in the previous thousand years.

Cannons, glasses, artesian wells were invented. Gunpowder, silk, compass and astrolabe came from the East. There were also great advances in shipbuilding and watches. At the same time, a huge number of Greek and Arabic works on medicine and science were translated and distributed throughout Europe.

At that time, science and culture began to develop. The most progressive rulers also understood the value of education and science. For example, back in the 8th century, on the orders of Charlemagne, the Academy was formed, bearing his name.

Among the sciences: astronomy. In the Middle Ages, it was closely associated with astrology. The geocentric concept of Ptolemy was taken as the basis of the world, although many scientists by that time were already sure of its fallacy. But Nicolaus Copernicus was the first to openly criticize; Chemistry: In the Middle Ages it was called alchemy. Scientists-alchemists were looking for a philosopher's stone that gives wisdom, and a way to create gold from other metals. In the process of these searches, a huge number of important inventions were made, etc.

In Western European art of the 10th-12th centuries, the Romanesque style prevails. He expressed himself most fully in architecture.

Classical (High) Middle Ages

(1000 to 1300)

The main characterizing trend of this period was the rapid increase in the population of Europe, which in turn led to dramatic changes in the social, political and other spheres of life.

In the XI-XV centuries. in Europe, there is a process of gradual formation of centralized states - England, France, Portugal, Spain, Holland, etc., where new forms of government arise - the Cortes (Spain), Parliament (England), States General (France). The strengthening of centralized power contributed to the more successful development of the economy, science, culture, the emergence of a new form of organization of production - manufactory. In Europe, capitalist relations are emerging and establishing themselves, which was largely facilitated by the Great Geographical Discoveries.

In the High Middle Ages, Europe begins to actively flourish. The arrival of Christianity in Scandinavia. The collapse of the Carolingian Empire into two separate states, on the territories of which modern Germany and France were later formed. The organization of Christian crusades with the aim of recapturing Palestine from the Seljuks. Cities are developing and getting rich. Culture is developing very actively. There are new styles and trends in architecture and music.

In Eastern Europe, the era of the High Middle Ages was marked by the flourishing of the Old Russian state and the appearance on the historical stage of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The invasion of the Mongols in the XIII century caused irreparable damage to the development of Eastern Europe. Many states of this region were plundered and enslaved.

The Western European Middle Ages is a period of dominance of natural economy and weak development of commodity-money relations. The insignificant level of specialization of the regions associated with this type of economy determined the development of mainly distant (foreign) rather than near (internal) trade. Long-distance trade was focused mainly on the upper strata of society. Industry during this period existed in the form of handicrafts and manufactory.

Medieval society - class. There were three main estates: the nobility, the clergy and the people (peasants, artisans, merchants were united under this concept). Estates had different rights and obligations, played different socio-political and economic roles.

The most important characteristic of medieval Western European society was its hierarchical structure, the system of vassalage. At the head of the feudal hierarchy was the king - the supreme overlord and, at the same time, often only a nominal head of state. This conditionality of the absolute power of the highest person in the states of Western Europe is also an essential feature of Western European society, in contrast to the truly absolute monarchies of the East. Thus, the king in medieval Europe is only a “first among equals”, and not an omnipotent despot. It is characteristic that the king, occupying the first step of the hierarchical ladder in his state, could well be a vassal of another king or the pope.

On the second rung of the feudal ladder were the direct vassals of the king. These were large feudal lords - dukes, counts, archbishops, bishops, abbots. According to the immunity letter received from the king, they had various types of immunity (from Latin - immunity). The most common types of immunity were tax, judicial and administrative, i.e. the owners of immunity certificates themselves collected taxes from their peasants and townspeople, ruled the court, and made administrative decisions. Feudal lords of this level could themselves mint their own coin, which often had circulation not only within the boundaries of the given estate, but also outside it. The subordination of such feudal lords to the king was often merely formal.

On the third rung of the feudal ladder stood the vassals of dukes, counts, bishops - barons. They enjoyed virtual immunity on their estates. Even lower were the vassals of the barons - the knights. Some of them could also have their own vassals - even smaller knights, others had only peasants in submission, who, however, stood outside the feudal ladder.

The system of vassalage was based on the practice of land grants. The person who received the land became a vassal, the one who gave it became a seigneur. The owner of the land - the seigneur, could give a fief (land plot) for temporary use on special conditions. The land was given under certain conditions, the most important of which was the service of the seigneur, which, as a rule, was 40 days a year according to feudal custom. The most important duties of a vassal in relation to his lord were participation in the lord's army, protection of his possessions, honor, dignity, participation in his council. If necessary, the vassals redeemed the lord from captivity.

When receiving land, the vassal took an oath of allegiance to his master. If the vassal did not fulfill his obligations, the lord could take away his land, but this was not so easy to do, since the vassal, as a feudal lord, was inclined to defend his property with weapons in his hands. In general, despite the apparent clear order, the system of vassalage was rather confusing, and a vassal could have several lords at the same time. Then the principle "the vassal of my vassal is not my vassal" was in effect.

In the Middle Ages, two main classes of feudal society were also formed: feudal lords, spiritual and secular - land owners, and peasants - land holders. The basis of the economy of the Middle Ages was agriculture, which employed most of the population. The peasants cultivated both their land plots and those of the masters.

Among the peasants there were two groups, differing in their economic and social status. Personally free peasants could, at will, leave the owner, give up their land holdings: rent them out or sell them to another peasant. Having freedom of movement, they often moved to cities or to new places. They paid fixed taxes in kind and in cash and performed certain work in the household of their master. The other group is the personally dependent peasants. Their obligations were wider, moreover (and this is the most important difference) they were not fixed, so that personally dependent peasants were subjected to arbitrary taxation. They also carried a number of specific taxes: posthumous - upon entering into an inheritance, marriage - redemption of the right of the first night, etc. These peasants did not enjoy freedom of movement.

The producer of material goods under feudalism was the peasant, who, unlike a slave and a hired worker, ran the household himself, and in many respects quite independently, that is, he was the owner. The peasant was the owner of the yard, the main means of production. He also acted as the owner of the land, but was a subordinate owner, while the feudal lord was the supreme owner. The supreme owner of the land is always at the same time the supreme owner of the personalities of the subordinate landowners, and thus also of their labor force. Here, as in the case of slavery, there is an extra-economic dependence of the exploited on the exploiter, but not complete, but supreme. Therefore, the peasant, unlike the slave, is the owner of his personality and labor force, but not complete, but subordinate.

Progress in agriculture was also facilitated by the liberation of peasants from personal dependence. The decision on this was made either by the city near which the peasants lived and with which they were connected socially and economically, or by their lord-feudal lord, on whose land they lived. The rights of peasants to land allotments were strengthened. Increasingly, they could freely pass on land by inheritance, bequeath it and mortgage it, lease it, donate it, and sell it. This is how the land market is gradually formed and becomes wider. Commodity-money relations develop.

Church. The schism (schism) of 1054 led to the formation of two main branches of the Christian Church - the Roman Catholic Church in Western Europe and the Orthodox Church in Eastern Europe. In the era of the classical Middle Ages in Europe, the Catholic Church reached its power. It influenced all spheres of human life. The rulers could not compare with its wealth - the church owned 1/3 of all land in each country.

A whole series of crusades took place over the course of 400 years, from the 11th to the 15th centuries. They were organized by the Catholic Church against Muslim countries under the slogan of protecting the Holy Sepulcher. In fact, it was an attempt to capture new territories. Knights from all over Europe went on these campaigns. For young warriors, participation in such an adventure was a prerequisite to prove their courage and confirm their knighthood.

Medieval man was extremely religious. What is considered incredible and supernatural for us was ordinary for him. Faith in the dark and light kingdoms, demons, spirits and angels - this is what surrounded a person, and in which he unconditionally believed.

The church strictly watched that its prestige was not damaged. All free-thinking thoughts were nipped in the bud. Many scientists suffered from the actions of the church: Giordano Bruno, Galileo Galilei, Nicolaus Copernicus and others. At the same time, in the Middle Ages it was the center of education and scientific thought. At the monasteries there were church schools in which they taught literacy, prayers, the Latin language and the singing of hymns. In the workshops for copying books, in the same place, at the monasteries, the works of ancient authors were carefully copied, preserving them for posterity.

The main branch of the economy of Western European countries during the classical Middle Ages, as before, was agriculture. The main characteristics of the development of the agricultural sector as a whole was the process of rapid development of new lands, known in history as the process of internal colonization. It contributed not only to the quantitative growth of the economy, but also to serious qualitative progress, since the duties imposed on the peasants on the new lands were predominantly monetary, and not in kind. The process of replacing in-kind duties with monetary ones, known in the scientific literature as rent switching, contributed to the growth of economic independence and enterprise of the peasants, and to an increase in their labor productivity. The sowing of oilseeds and industrial crops is expanding, and oil and winemaking are developing.

Grain yield reaches the level of sam-4 and sam-5. The growth of peasant activity and the expansion of the peasant economy led to a reduction in the economy of the feudal lord, which in the new conditions turned out to be less profitable.

Artisans were an important ever-increasing stratum of the urban population. From the XII-XIII centuries. In connection with the increase in the purchasing power of the population, the growth of consumer demand is marked by the growth of urban crafts. From work to order, artisans move to work for the market. The craft becomes a respected occupation that brings a good income. Special respect was enjoyed by people of construction specialties - masons, carpenters, plasterers. At that time, the most gifted people, with a high level of professional training, were engaged in architecture. During this period, the specialization of crafts deepened, the range of products expanded, handicraft techniques improved, remaining, as before, manual.

The technologies in metallurgy, in the manufacture of cloth fabrics become more complicated and become more effective, and in Europe they begin to wear woolen clothes instead of fur and linen. In the XII century. in Europe, mechanical watches were made, in the XIII century. - a large tower clock, in the XV century. - pocket watch. Watchmaking is becoming the school in which the technique of precision engineering was developed, which played a significant role in the development of the productive forces of Western society. Other sciences also developed successfully, and many discoveries were made in them. The water wheel was invented, water and windmills were improved, mechanical watches, glasses, and a loom were created.

Craftsmen united in guilds that protected their members from competition from "wild" artisans. In cities there could be dozens and hundreds of workshops of various economic orientations, because the specialization of production took place not within the workshop, but between workshops. So, in Paris there were more than 350 workshops. The most important feature of the shops was also a certain regulation of production in order to prevent overproduction, to maintain prices at a fairly high level; shop authorities, taking into account the volume of the potential market, determined the quantity of output.

Throughout this period, the guilds waged a struggle with the tops of the city for access to management. The city leaders, called the patriciate, united representatives of the landed aristocracy, wealthy merchants, usurers. Often the actions of influential artisans were successful, and they were included in the city authorities.

The guild organization of handicraft production had both obvious disadvantages and advantages, one of which was a well-established apprenticeship system. The official training period in different workshops ranged from 2 to 14 years, it was assumed that during this time the artisan must go from apprentice and apprentice to master.

The workshops developed strict requirements for the material from which the goods were made, for tools of labor, and production technology. All this ensured stable operation and guaranteed excellent product quality. The high level of medieval Western European craft is evidenced by the fact that an apprentice who wanted to receive the title of master was obliged to complete the final work, which was called a “masterpiece” (the modern meaning of the word speaks for itself).

The workshops also created conditions for the transfer of accumulated experience, ensuring the continuity of handicraft generations. In addition, artisans participated in the formation of a united Europe: apprentices in the learning process could roam around different countries; masters, if they were recruited in the city more than required, easily moved to new places.

On the other hand, by the end of the classical Middle Ages, in the 14th-15th centuries, the guild organization of industrial production began to act more and more obviously as a retarding factor. Shops are becoming more and more isolated, stopping in development. In particular, it was practically impossible for many to become a master: only the son of a master or his son-in-law could actually obtain the status of a master. This led to the fact that a significant layer of "eternal apprentices" appeared in the cities. In addition, the strict regulation of the craft begins to hinder the introduction of technological innovations, without which progress in the field of material production is unthinkable. Therefore, workshops gradually exhaust themselves, and by the end of the classical Middle Ages, a new form of industrial production organization appears - manufactory.

In the classical Middle Ages, old cities quickly grow and new cities appear - near castles, fortresses, monasteries, bridges, river crossings. Cities with a population of 4-6 thousand inhabitants were considered average. There were very large cities, such as Paris, Milan, Florence, where 80 thousand people lived. Life in a medieval city was difficult and dangerous - frequent epidemics claimed the lives of more than half of the townspeople, as happened, for example, during the "black death" - a plague epidemic in the middle of the 14th century. Fires were also frequent. However, they still aspired to the cities, because, as the proverb testified, “the city air made the dependent person free” - for this it was necessary to live in the city for one year and one day.

Cities arose on the lands of the king or large feudal lords and were beneficial to them, bringing income in the form of taxes from crafts and trade.

At the beginning of this period, most cities were dependent on their lords. The townspeople fought for gaining independence, that is, for turning into a free city. The authorities of independent cities were elected and had the right to collect taxes, pay the treasury, manage city finances at their own discretion, have their own court, mint their own coin, and even declare war and make peace. The means of struggle of the urban population for their rights were urban uprisings - communal revolutions, as well as the redemption of their rights from the lord. Only the richest cities, such as London and Paris, could afford such a ransom. However, many other Western European cities were also rich enough to gain independence for money. So, in the XIII century. About half of all cities in England gained independence in collecting taxes - that is, about 200.

The wealth of cities was based on the wealth of their citizens. Among the richest were moneylenders and money changers. They determined the quality and usefulness of the coin, and this was extremely important in the conditions of the defacing of the coin that was constantly practiced by mercantilist governments; they exchanged money and transferred it from one city to another; took on the preservation of free capital and provided loans.

At the beginning of the classical Middle Ages, banking activity was most actively developed in Northern Italy. The activities of usurers and money changers could be extremely profitable, but sometimes (if large feudal lords and kings refused to return large loans) they also became bankrupt.

Late Middle Ages

(1300-1640)

In Western European science, the end of the Middle Ages is usually associated with the beginning of the Church Reformation (beginning of the 16th century) or the era of great geographical discoveries (15th-17th centuries). The late Middle Ages is also called the Renaissance.

This is one of the most tragic periods of the Middle Ages. In the XIV century, almost the whole world experienced several epidemics of the plague, the Black Death. In Europe alone, it killed more than 60 million people, almost half of the population. This is the time of the strongest peasant uprisings in England and France and the longest war in the history of mankind - the Hundred Years. But at the same time - this is the era of the great geographical discoveries and the Renaissance.

Reformation (lat. reformatio - correction, transformation, reformation) - a broad religious and socio-political movement in Western and Central Europe of the 16th - early 17th centuries, aimed at reforming Catholic Christianity in accordance with the Bible.

The main cause of the Reformation was the struggle between those who represented the emerging capitalist mode of production and the defenders of the then dominant feudal system, whose ideological dogmas were protected by the Catholic Church. The interests and aspirations of the emerging bourgeois class and the masses of the people who somehow supported its ideology found expression in the founding of Protestant churches that called for modesty, economy, accumulation and self-reliance, as well as in the formation of nation-states in which the church did not play a major role.

Until the 16th century, the church in Europe owned large fiefs, and its power could only last as long as the feudal system existed. The riches of the church were based on the ownership of land, church tithes and payment for ceremonies. The splendor and decoration of the temples was amazing. The church and the feudal system ideally complemented each other.

With the advent of a new class of society, gradually gaining strength - the bourgeoisie, the situation began to change. Many have long expressed dissatisfaction with the excessive splendor of the rites and temples of the church. The high cost of church rites also caused a great protest among the population. The bourgeoisie was especially dissatisfied with this state of affairs, which wanted to invest not in magnificent and expensive church rites, but in production.

In some countries where the power of the king was strong, the church was limited in its appetites. In many others, where the priests could manage to their heart's content, she was hated by the entire population. Here the Reformation found fertile ground.

In the 14th century, Oxford professor John Wyclif spoke openly against the Catholic Church, calling for the destruction of the institution of the papacy and the removal of all land from the priests. His successor was Jan Hus, rector of the University of Prague and part-time pastor. He fully supported the idea of ​​Wyclif and proposed to reform the church in the Czech Republic. For this he was declared a heretic and burned at the stake.

The beginning of the Reformation is considered to be the speech of Martin Luther, doctor of theology at Wittenberg University: on October 31, 1517, he nailed his “95 theses” to the doors of the Wittenberg Castle Church, in which he opposed the existing abuses of the Catholic Church, in particular against the sale of indulgences. Historians consider the end of the Reformation to be the signing of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, as a result of which the religious factor ceased to play a significant role in European politics.

The main idea of ​​his composition is that a person does not need the mediation of the church to turn to God, he has enough faith. This act was the beginning of the Reformation in Germany. Luther was persecuted by church authorities who demanded that he retract his words. The ruler of Saxony, Friedrich, stood up for him, hiding the doctor of theology in his castle. Followers of Luther's teachings continued to fight to bring about a change in the church. The speeches, which were brutally suppressed, led to the Peasants' War in Germany. Supporters of the Reformation began to be called Protestants.

The death of Luther did not end the Reformation. It began in other European countries - in Denmark, England, Norway, Austria, Sweden, Switzerland, the Baltic States, Poland.

Protestantism spread throughout Europe in the creeds of the followers of Luther (Lutheranism), John Calvin (Calvinism), Ulrich Zwingli (Zwinglianism), and others.

A set of measures taken by the Catholic Church and the Jesuits to combat the Reformation,

The process of pan-European integration was contradictory: along with rapprochement in the field of culture and religion, there is a desire for national isolation in terms of the development of statehood. The Middle Ages is the time of the formation of national states that exist in the form of monarchies, both absolute and class-representative. The peculiarities of political power were its fragmentation, as well as its connection with conditional ownership of land. If in ancient Europe the right to own land was determined for a free person by his ethnicity - the fact of his birth in a given policy and the civil rights arising from this, then in medieval Europe the right to land depended on a person's belonging to a certain estate.

At this time, centralized power is being strengthened in most Western European countries, national states (England, France, Germany, etc.) begin to form and strengthen. Large feudal lords are increasingly dependent on the king. However, the king's power is still not truly absolute. The era of estate-representative monarchies is coming. It was during this period that the practical implementation of the principle of separation of powers begins, and the first parliaments arise - class-representative bodies that significantly limit the power of the king. The earliest such parliament - the Cortes - appeared in Spain (end of the 12th - beginning of the 12th centuries). In 1265 Parliament appears in England. In the XIV century. Parliaments have already been established in most Western European countries. At first, the work of parliaments was not regulated in any way, neither the dates of meetings nor the procedure for holding them were determined - all this was decided by the king, depending on the specific situation. However, even then it became the most important and permanent issue that was considered by parliamentarians - taxes.

Parliaments could act both as an advisory, and as a legislative, and as a judicial body. Legislative functions are gradually assigned to parliament, and a certain confrontation between parliament and the king is outlined. Thus, the king could not impose additional taxes without the sanction of the parliament, although formally the king was much higher than the parliament, and it was the king who convened and dissolved the parliament and proposed issues for discussion.

Parliaments were not the only political innovation of the classical Middle Ages. Another important new component of public life was political parties, which first began to form in the 13th century. in Italy, and then (in the XIV century) in France. Political parties fiercely opposed each other, but the reason for their confrontation then was more psychological reasons than economic ones.

In the XV-XVII centuries. in the field of politics also appeared a lot of new things. Statehood and state structures are noticeably strengthening. The line of political evolution common to most European countries was to strengthen the central government, to strengthen the role of the state in the life of society.

Almost all countries of Western Europe during this period went through the horrors of bloody strife and wars. An example is the War of the Scarlet and White Roses in England in the 15th century. As a result of this war, England lost a fourth of its population. The Middle Ages is also a time of peasant uprisings, unrest and riots. An example is the revolt led by Wat Tyler and John Ball in England in 1381.

Great geographical discoveries. One of the first expeditions to India was organized by Portuguese sailors who tried to reach it by going around Africa. In 1487 they discovered the Cape of Good Hope - the southernmost point of the African continent. At the same time, the Italian Christopher Columbus (1451–1506) was also looking for a way to India, who managed to equip four expeditions with the money of the Spanish court. The Spanish royal couple - Ferdinand and Isabella - believed his arguments and promised him huge incomes from the newly discovered lands. Already during the first expedition in October 1492, Columbus discovered the New World, then named America after Amerigo Vespucci (1454–1512), who participated in expeditions to South America in 1499–1504. It was he who first described the new lands and first expressed the idea that this is a new, not yet known to Europeans, part of the world.

The sea route to real India was first laid by the Portuguese expedition led by Vasco da Gama (1469-1524) in 1498. The first round-the-world voyage was made in 1519-1521, led by the Portuguese Magellan (1480-1521). Of the 256 people of Magellan's team, only 18 survived, and Magellan himself died in a fight with the natives. Many expeditions of that time ended so sadly.

In the second half of the XVI - XVII centuries. the British, Dutch and French entered the path of colonial conquests. By the middle of the XVII century. Europeans discovered Australia and New Zealand.

As a result of the Great geographical discoveries, colonial empires begin to take shape, and from the newly discovered lands to Europe - the Old World - treasures flow - gold and silver. The consequence of this was an increase in prices, especially for agricultural products. This process, which took place to one degree or another in all countries of Western Europe, was called the price revolution in the historical literature. It contributed to the growth of monetary wealth among merchants, entrepreneurs, speculators and served as one of the sources of the initial accumulation of capital.

Another most important consequence of the Great Geographical Discoveries was the movement of world trade routes: the monopoly of Venetian merchants on caravan trade with the East in Southern Europe was broken. The Portuguese began to sell Indian goods several times cheaper than the Venetian merchants.

The countries actively engaged in intermediary trade - England and the Netherlands - are gaining strength. Intermediary trade was very unreliable and dangerous, but very profitable: for example, if one of the three ships sent to India returned, the expedition was considered successful, and the merchants' profits often reached 1000%. Thus, trade was the most important source for the formation of large private capital.

The quantitative growth of trade contributed to the emergence of new forms in which trade was organized. In the XVI century. for the first time there are exchanges, the main purpose and purpose of which was to use price fluctuations over time. Thanks to the development of trade at this time, there is a much stronger connection between the continents than before. This is how the foundations of the world market begin to be laid.

The process of primitive accumulation of capital also took place in the sphere of agriculture, which is still the basis of the economy of Western European society. In the late Middle Ages, the specialization of agricultural areas was significantly enhanced, which was mainly based on various natural conditions. There is an intensive draining of swamps, and by transforming nature, people have transformed themselves.

The area under crops, the gross harvest of grain crops increased everywhere, and the yield increased. This progress was largely based on the positive evolution of agricultural technology and agriculture. So, although all the main agricultural implements remained the same (plow, harrow, scythe and sickle), they began to be made of higher quality metal, fertilizers were widely used, multi-field and grass sowing were introduced into agricultural circulation. Cattle breeding also developed successfully, cattle breeds were improved, and stall fattening was used. Socio-economic relations in the field of agriculture were also changing rapidly: in Italy, England, France, and the Netherlands, almost all peasants were already personally free. The most important innovation of this period was the widespread development of rental relations. Landowners were more and more willing to rent land to the peasants, since it was economically more profitable than organizing their own landlord economy.

During the late Middle Ages, rent existed in two forms: feudal and capitalist. In the case of feudal lease, the landowner gave the peasant some piece of land, usually not very large, and, if necessary, could supply him with seeds, livestock, implements, and the peasant gave part of the crop for this. The essence of capitalist lease was somewhat different: the owner of the land received a cash rent from the tenant, the tenant himself was a farmer, his production was market-oriented, and the scale of production was significant. An important feature of capitalist rent was the use of hired labor. During this period, farming expanded most rapidly in England, northern France and the Netherlands.

Some progress was also observed in the industry. Manufactory assumed specialization between workers in the manufacture of any product, which significantly increased the productivity of labor, which, as before, remained manual. Wage workers worked at the manufactories of Western Europe.

Technique and technology improved. In industries such as metallurgy, blast furnaces, drawing and rolling mechanisms are beginning to be used, and steel production is increasing significantly. In mining, sump pumps and hoists were widely used, which increased the productivity of miners. In weaving, and in particular in cloth-making, the method invented at the end of the 15th century was actively used. a self-spinning wheel that performed two operations at once - twisting and winding the thread.

The most important processes taking place at that time in the field of socio-economic relations in industry were reduced to the ruin of a part of the artisans and their transformation into hired workers in manufactories.

An important layer of the urban population were merchants, who played a major role in domestic and foreign trade. They constantly traveled around the cities with goods. Merchants, as a rule, were literate and could speak the languages ​​of the countries through which they passed. Foreign trade during this period, apparently, is still more developed than domestic. The centers of foreign trade in Western Europe then were the North, Baltic and Mediterranean Seas. Cloth, wine, metal products, honey, timber, fur, resin were exported from Western Europe. From East to West, mainly luxury items were transported: colored fabrics, silk, brocade, precious stones, ivory, wine, fruits, spices, carpets. Imports to Europe generally exceeded exports. The largest participant in the foreign trade of Western Europe were the Hanseatic cities. There were about 80 of them, and the largest of them were Hamburg, Bremen, Gdansk and Cologne.

The development of internal trade was significantly hampered by the lack of a unified monetary system, numerous internal customs and customs duties, the lack of a good transport network, and constant robbery on the roads.

European science is also actively developing, having so strongly influenced not only European civilization, but also all of humanity. In the XVI-XVII centuries. in the development of natural science there are significant shifts associated with the general cultural progress of society, the development of human consciousness and the growth of material production. This was greatly facilitated by the Great Geographical Discoveries, which gave a lot of new facts in geography, geology, botany, zoology, and astronomy. The main progress in the field of natural sciences in this period went along the line of generalization and comprehension of the accumulated information. Thus, the German Agricola (1494–1555) collected and systematized information about ores and minerals and described the mining technique. The Swiss Konrad Gesner (1516–1565) compiled the fundamental work The History of Animals. The first multi-volume classifications of plants in European history appeared, and the first botanical gardens were founded. The famous Swiss doctor

F. Paracelsus (1493-1541), studied the nature of the human body, the causes of diseases, methods of their treatment. Vesalius (1514-1564), born in Brussels, studied in France and Italy, author of the work "On the structure of the human body", laid the foundations modern anatomy, and already in the XVII century. Vesalius' ideas were recognized in all European countries. The English scientist William Harvey (1578–1657) discovered the human circulation. An important role in the development of the methods of natural science was played by the Englishman Francis Bacon (1564-1626), who argued that true knowledge should be based on experience.

There are a number of great names in the field of physics. This is, above all, Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519). The brilliant scientist made technical projects that were far ahead of his time - drawings of mechanisms, machine tools, apparatus, including a project for a flying machine. The Italian Evangelista Torricelli (1608–1647) studied hydrodynamics, studied atmospheric pressure, and created a mercury barometer. The French scientist Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) discovered the law of pressure transmission in liquids and gases.

A major contribution to the development of physics was made by the Italian Galileo Galilei (1564–1642), who gained great fame as an astronomer: he first designed a telescope and for the first time in the history of mankind saw a huge number of stars invisible to the naked eye, mountains on the surface of the Moon, spots on the Sun. His predecessor was the Polish scientist Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), the author of the famous work "On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres", in which he proved that the Earth is not a fixed center of the world, but rotates along with other planets around the Sun. The views of Copernicus were developed by the German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571–1630), who succeeded in formulating the laws of planetary motion. These ideas were also shared by Giordano Bruno (1548-1600), who argued that the world is infinite and that the Sun is only one of an infinite number of stars, which, like the Sun, have planets similar to the Earth.

Mathematics is developing intensively. Italian Gerolamo Cardano (1501–1576) finds a way to solve equations of the third degree. The first tables of logarithms were invented and published in 1614. By the middle of the XVII century. special signs for recording algebraic operations are in general use: signs of addition, exponentiation, root extraction, equality, brackets, etc. The famous French mathematician Francois Viet (1540–1603) proposed using letter designations not only for unknown, but also for known quantities , which made it possible to set and solve algebraic problems in a general form. Mathematical symbolism was improved by René Descartes (1596–1650), who created analytic geometry. The Frenchman Pierre Fermat (1601–1665) successfully developed the problem of calculating infinitesimal quantities.

National achievements quickly became the property of all-European scientific thought. By the end of the late Middle Ages in Europe, the organization of science and scientific research was noticeably changing. Communities of scientists are being created, jointly discussing experiments, methods, tasks, and results. On the basis of scientific circles in the middle of the XVII century. national academies of sciences are formed, the first of them arose in England and France.

During the late Middle Ages, the most important idea of ​​the West took shape: an active attitude to life, the desire to learn the world and the conviction that it can be known with the help of reason, the desire to transform the world in the interests of man.

In the field of technology, great progress was observed: more advanced horse harness and wagons with a rotary axle, stirrups for riders, windmills, articulated steering wheels on ships, blast furnaces and cast iron, firearms, and a printing press appeared. In the Middle Ages, organized vocational training appeared in the form of universities, but in general, science was in deep decline. In the XII century, there were no more than 10 scientists in the whole of Europe, in the XIII - no more than 15, in the XIV - less than 25 (for comparison: today there are hundreds of thousands of them).

Renaissance, or Renaissance (French Renaissance, Italian Rinascimento; from "re / ri" - "again" or "again" and "nasci" - "born") - an era in the history of European culture, which replaced the culture of the Middle Ages and pre-modern culture. Approximate chronological framework era: the beginning of the XIV - the last quarter of the XVI century and in some cases - the first decades of the XVII century (for example, in England and, especially, in Spain). A distinctive feature of the Renaissance is the secular nature of culture and its anthropocentrism (that is, interest, first of all, in a person and his activities). There is an interest in ancient culture, there is, as it were, its “revival” - and this is how the term appeared.

The growth of city-republics led to an increase in the influence of estates that did not participate in feudal relations: artisans and artisans, merchants, and bankers. All of them were alien to the hierarchical system of values ​​created by medieval, in many respects church culture, and its ascetic, humble spirit. This led to the emergence of humanism - a socio-philosophical movement that considered a person, his personality, his freedom, his active, creative activity as the highest value and criterion for evaluating social institutions.

In the late Middle Ages, a new worldview based on humanism was taking shape in Europe. Now a specific person was placed at the center of the world, and not the church. Humanists sharply opposed the traditional medieval ideology, denying the need for complete subordination of the soul and mind to religion. Man is becoming more and more interested in the world around him. During this period, inequality in the levels of economic and political development of individual countries is more clearly manifested. Italy, the Netherlands, England and France are developing at a faster pace. Spain, Portugal, Germany are lagging behind. However, the most important processes in the development of European countries are still common to all countries.

Secular centers of science and art began to appear in the cities, the activities of which were outside the control of the church. The new worldview turned to antiquity, seeing in it an example of humanistic, non-ascetic relations. The invention of printing in the middle of the 15th century played a huge role in spreading the ancient heritage and new views throughout Europe.

The revival arose in Italy, where its first signs were noticeable as early as the 13th and 14th centuries (in the activities of the Pisano family, Giotto, Orcagna, etc.), but it was firmly established only from the 20s of the 15th century. In France, Germany and other countries, this movement began much later. By the end of the 15th century, it reached its peak. In the 16th century, a crisis of Renaissance ideas was brewing, resulting in the emergence of Mannerism and Baroque.

NEW TIME

Modern time is still a rather conditional concept, since all countries entered it at different times. New time was a stage of great changes in all spheres of life: economic, social, political. It occupies a shorter period when compared with the Middle Ages, and even more so with the ancient world, but in history this period is extremely important. The famous geographical discoveries, the book of Nicolaus Copernicus changed the old ideas of people about the Earth, expanded human knowledge about the world.

The Reformation, which passed through all the countries of Europe, abolished the power of the popes over the minds of people, and led to the emergence of the Protestant movement. The humanists of the Renaissance achieved the emergence of many universities and led to a complete revolution in the mind of man, explaining his place in the world around him.

In the era of modern times, mankind has realized that they actually live in a small space. Geographical discoveries led to the convergence of countries and peoples. In the Middle Ages, things were different. The slow speed of movement, the inability to cross the ocean led to the fact that even about neighboring countries there was no reliable information.

Western Europe has carried out expansion in modern times, establishing its dominance over most countries in Asia and Africa. For the peoples of these countries, the new time has become a period of brutal colonization by European invaders.

How did the small countries of Western Europe manage to subjugate vast territories in Africa and Asia in a short time? There were several reasons for this. European countries are far ahead in their development. In the East, the life of subjects, their lands and property belonged to the ruler. Most of all, it was not the personal qualities of a person that were valued, but the interests of the community. The basis of the economy was agriculture. In the West, things were different. Above all were human rights, his personal qualities, the desire for profit and prosperity. The cities that arose in the Middle Ages led to the emergence of a variety of crafts and a breakthrough in the development of technology. In this respect, the countries of the European countries have gone far ahead of the eastern ones.

The new time has led to a change in the political system in many countries. The rapid development of trade, especially during the period of famous geographical discoveries, the emergence of banking, the emergence of manufactories began to increasingly contradict the traditional economy and political system. The emerging new class, the bourgeoisie, is gradually beginning to play a significant role in the state.

In the 18th century the power of the bourgeoisie increased manifold. In many countries, the contradictions between the capitalist mode of production and the feudal system, which had reached their limit, led to bourgeois revolutions. This happened in England and France. Capitalism is finally victorious in Europe. The industrial revolution begins, and the obsolete manufactory is replaced by the factory.

Most European countries in modern times are going through a difficult time of changing forms of power, a crisis of absolute monarchy. As a result of changes in the political system, parliamentary democracy is emerging in the most progressive countries. In the same period, the modern system of international relations began to take shape.

New time is a period of a kind of second Renaissance. Reality showed how much an ordinary person can actually do and change. Gradually, a thought is formed in the human mind - a person can actually do anything. There is a conviction that he can subdue nature and change his future.

Philosophy is developing a lot. There is a literal rebirth. Philosophy has managed to retain its dominant position among the sciences. Modern philosophers sincerely believed that society needed their ideas. A completely new philosophy is being formed, the problems of which remain important today.

In the early modern period in the European economy, the agrarian sphere of production still sharply prevailed over industry; despite a number of technical discoveries, manual labor dominated everywhere. In these conditions special meaning acquired such factors of the economy as the labor force, the scale of the labor market, the level of professionalism of each employee. Demographic processes had a noticeable impact on the development of the economy in this era.

One of the main historical background the genesis of capitalism was high level division of social labor, as well as technical changes in the leading industries, which made it possible to organize manufacturing production. The progressive nature of the genesis of capitalism, its irreversibility, also largely depended on the breadth of exports of manufactured consumer goods. So, a large part of them began to be absorbed by the colonies, which prompted the production of clothing, utensils and other goods in European countries.

The early modern era was the era of the formation of the prerequisites for capitalism and the formation of the early capitalist structure in the economy of a feudal society. One of the main aspects of this process is the initial accumulation of capital in its various forms - commercial, banking and usurious and industrial - in conditions of a higher level of production and exchange than in the Middle Ages. In the early modern times, commodity circulation quickly outgrew local and national boundaries, acquiring a wide international scope. Initial accumulation was given a powerful impetus by the Great Geographical Discoveries and the development of new lands and trade routes associated with them, which accelerated the formation of the world market. In the XVI - the first half of the XVII century. production for the export of consumer goods steadily increased, the trade in them by European countries acquired a much more significant scale than before. Trade with the colonies, in which the rate of profit was especially high, accelerated the formation of large merchant capital.

A significant impact on the economic development of Europe had the so-called "price revolution" (a kind of mechanism for the depreciation of money) - an increase in food prices caused by an increase in the mass of money in circulation. With the development of the American colonies, rich in deposits of precious metals, and the robbery of the treasures of the Indians, cheap gold and silver began to flow into Europe - their low cost was associated with the use of almost free labor of the local population in the mines. The "price revolution" that lasted for many decades led to the enrichment of the most diverse sections of European society, depending on the economic and political situation in a particular country. So, in England, it was mainly the new nobility and farmers who benefited from it, in Spain - the grandees, in Germany - the big merchant class.

The accumulation of capital in the sphere of trade was favored by the system of monopolies that had developed in previous centuries. In a number of countries, the demands of the rank-and-file merchants to introduce free trade and resolutely fight monopolies on trade certain types goods were generally in vain. Monopolies were often imposed or actively supported by the royal power. So it was in Spain, England, France. The process of primitive accumulation was also accelerated by the significant difference in prices for many "colonial" goods. Thus, the sale price for spices imported from Indonesia, India, and Arabia was a hundred or more times higher than their cost at the place of production. Such an important economic factor of the era as the availability of cheap labor in the conditions of mass pauperization of the peasantry and urban artisans also played a significant role in the initial accumulation. Especially cheap was women's and children's labor, the widespread use of which became a characteristic and very sad sign of the times.

In the banking and usurious sphere, the accumulation of capital had its many sources - state and large private loans, a system of tax-collection payoffs, usurious lending to artisans (loans secured by a workshop, machine tools, inventory) and, on a particularly large scale, financing at high interest rates from the peasantry. The monetary dependence of tenants and other categories of land holders on the usurer deepened the differentiation in their environment, this contributed to the replenishment of the free labor market and at the same time led to a significant enrichment of lenders.

Merchant capital in craft and industry. It was merchant capital that initiated innovations in the organization of market-oriented production in this era, with a tendency to expand exports of products to other countries.

The financial dependence of artisans on merchants - and usurers acted hand in hand with them - led to the gradual loss of property rights by independent producers to the workshop, tools of production and their transformation, in essence, into hired workers. The expropriation of urban and rural artisans, the pauperization of the bulk of the producers - a process that invariably accompanied the penetration of merchant capital into the sphere of handicraft and industry.

The deepest and most widespread was the introduction of commercial capital into mining, metallurgy, textile and book production. New methods of organizing production gave rise to changes in the social status of its contractors: a merchant and a master turned into entrepreneurs of the early capitalist type, and artisans formed an environment of dispossessed hired workers, pre-proletariat,

Manufactory. The subordination of handicrafts and industry to profit-oriented commercial capital entailed the search for new, more profitable forms of organization of production. This form of early capitalist entrepreneurship was manufactory, based in general on manual labor, but the most specialized. The economic base of the manufactory was the entrepreneur's ownership of the tools of production, the organization and control over the process of manufacturing products and their marketing, and the use of hired labor of workers. Early modern times are marked by a variety of types of manufactory - depending on the nature of the production itself and the degree to which it is covered by capital. Manufactories were of three types - scattered, mixed and centralized.

Mixed manufacture turned out to be more economically efficient, when part of the production operations were carried out in the entrepreneur's workshop.

Industrial capital in the early modern times was just beginning to take shape as an independent financial sector, more often it was one of the functions of commercial and banking capital. In the new forms of industrial organization, primarily in manufactories, favorable conditions were created for initial accumulation. The growth of profits here was facilitated by: an increase in labor productivity, in which technical improvements and improvement in production technology played a significant role; lack of competition in the labor market; finally, the protectionist policy of the authorities pursued in a number of countries.

When all the functions of capital were combined in the activities of individual merchant houses, companies, clans, conditions were created for the formation of huge fortunes for that era, sometimes millions of dollars. The presence of large capital was an important, but not the only condition for intensifying the process of the genesis of capitalism. In addition, the large masses of money accumulated in the trade and banking sphere were by no means always rushed into industry, into entrepreneurship of the early capitalist type. More reliable, as before, was the investment of capital in landed property and other real estate. Often, wealthy merchants spent huge sums on acquiring noble titles and titles, on buying profitable positions in the state apparatus, and also on maintaining a lavish, prestigious lifestyle.

Apart from the accumulation of capital, another important economic condition for the genesis of capitalism was the existence of a free labor market. In the early modern times, such a market was actively formed due to the pauperization of the peasantry and urban artisans. Deprived of the means of production, knocked out of the usual rut of life, the poor were forced to sell their labor to the entrepreneur on favorable terms for him. Laws against vagrancy (in England, France) forced the beggars and vagabonds to work, forcibly drawing them into the sphere of early capitalist production and making them the object of particularly cruel exploitation. The socially heterogeneous mass of poor people was, as a rule, deprived of any legal protection and doomed to a miserable, semi-beggarly existence, even in those cases when, voluntarily or under duress, they got work in manufactories. The genesis of capitalism was accompanied by an unprecedented intensification of labor and a high rate of exploitation of hired workers (low wages, long working hours, the use of the labor of women and children, who were paid less for work equal to men).

In the early modern times, the early capitalist way of life took shape or began to take shape in most European countries. The dynamics of its development also actively influenced the traditional forms of feudal production, prompting changes in the guild craft, rental relations, and free small-scale farming. Early capitalism marked the main line of economic progress in Europe in the following centuries.

The greatest achievement of modern times was the destruction of the feudal-patriarchal fetters and the proclamation of the rights and freedoms of man and citizen. It unleashed huge creative forces, which changed the face of the world, but could not prevent the concentration of property and power in the hands of a few, the exploitation and suppression by them of the majority of individuals and peoples. Collisions between freedom and equality, the interests of the individual and society, the efficiency of production and social justice have been exposed as never before. The result of the fetishization of capital was the extreme aggravation of class, interethnic and other social contradictions. They contributed to the rise of nationalist and socialist utopias, which further exacerbated the antagonisms.

Agriculture in the early modern period was still engaged in by the vast majority of the population of Europe. This main sector of the economy remained little affected by changes in both agriculture and inventory. In land use methods, one can note the transition in a number of areas of grain farming to multi-field and fallow grass sowing, as well as the more frequent use of fertilizers than in previous centuries. Types of iron agricultural implements multiplied, replacing wooden implements. There were no cardinal changes in the organization of production - it remained small, individual, based on manual labor with the traditional use of animal traction - horses and bulls.

And yet, under the influence of expanding market relations, the rural landscape began to change: in many areas, grain crops were reduced, but the size of the areas occupied by orchards and kitchen gardens increased, the scale of cultivation of industrial crops - flax, hemp, more beautiful (woad, madder, saffron) increased. . The intensification of farming methods was more noticeable in viticulture and horticulture than in arable farming; it occurred mainly under the influence of the requirements of urban or foreign markets (for example, export trade and wine). The food demands of the townspeople had a noticeable effect on the expansion of garden crops. The diet of a Western European city dweller now included, in addition to traditional vegetable crops, potatoes, tomatoes, cauliflower, artichokes, and twill.

There was an evolution of land relations: although different forms of feudal holding did not disappear (sometimes only the legal status of the land user changed), they gave way to free fixed-term lease with a tendency to reduce its terms, which is typical for many countries. Land owners were directly interested in this, since a short period of time - from 3 to 5 years - made it possible to change the terms of the lease more often and increase the payment for land, bringing it in line with the changing market conditions.

The middle stratum of the peasantry, which consisted mainly of personally free tenants of relatively small plots of land, increasingly oriented its economy towards connection with the market. This was expressed, in particular, in the rejection of arable farming and the transition to intensive gardening, viticulture, and the cultivation of industrial crops. This stratum is characterized by the use of wage labor along with family labor.

The peasant poor, although they had a small household plot, not always provided with draft animals, saw the main source of livelihood in wages, hiring themselves to wealthy neighbors, urban landowners, and farmers. From the mass of the poor, a rural pre-proletariat was formed, which was also involved in the village craft organized by entrepreneurs.

A stratum of farming also took shape - large tenants (or owners) of land, for the cultivation of which laborers were involved. Farms were usually commercial in nature, they often encountered new methods of intensifying labor and specialization dictated by market conditions. Both people from wealthy peasants and townspeople who switched to agricultural entrepreneurship became farmers. Early capitalist relations began to penetrate into the rural economy, but their share in agriculture was small.

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