When were the "dark ages"?

[barca]

In this age of historical revisionism some have questioned whether the dark ages ever existed, pointing out numerous developments in the Medieval World. It is clear to me that Western Europe suffered a significant setback with the fall of Rome, and there were a few isolated episodes of recovery, but Europe did not fully recover until the Renaissance.

 

So when did they begin?

 

Deposition of Romulus Augustus? Probably not since the Ostrogoths seemed to have retained much of the Roman establishment. There was also the brief reconquest by Justinian.

 

The invasion of Italy by the Lombards?

 

When did they end? Certainly not with Charlemagne. His brief "Renaissance" was followed by gloom and doom.

 

The Crusades? The Court of eleanor of Aquitaine? Thomas Aquinas? 1453? 1492?

 

Any thoughts are appreciated.

[Melvadius]

The term 'Dark Ages' is one which a lot of modern Historians are pulling back from using now as I understand that it really stems from one of the Early Christian writers talking about the situation which he saw in Britain rather than in Europe as a whole.

 

The term used generally now is the Middle Ages and not just by 'revisionists'. The period as a whole is usually cited as starting with the fall of Rome in AD 476 AD, although Britain's period possibly started somewhat earlier with the departure of Rome's legions and the consequent loss of direct influence sometimes cited. IIRC again, as far as Britain is concerned, ending with the victory of Henry VII at Bosworth in AD 1485. However the actual end date varies depending upon which specific European country you are discussing and stretches over something like a century.

[Northern Neil]

Although the term 'Dark Age' is currently out of vogue, there was a massive economic collapse and drop in population which effected most of Western Europe between 400 and 1000, its low point (in terms of political and economical development) dated at roughly 800. By that time, most towns in Western Europe consisted of a church surrounded by a huddle of huts, and fields of rubble where the once extensive Roman town lay. The same thing happened in the east from about 625, although with less far reaching effects.

 

Put another way: The average citizen in 400 ( and some animals!) resided under a tiled roof, had access to a wide variety of cheaply available consumer products, and was able to send a letter from York to Alexandria. A standing army ensured the security of the countryside and literacy - if not universal - was widespread.

 

One hundred years later everything had changed; most people lived in wattle huts with thatched roofs, had access to a very reduced 'kit' of household goods - usually self made, and were unlikely to stray more than a days walk from their own homes. Trade in the Mediterranean did not attain early 3rd century levels until the 18th century, and urban re-growth did not start until the tenth century. The term Dark Age may well be out of vogue and the Middle Ages indeed encompass the period under discussion. But commentators at the time ( Gildas, Sidonius Apollinaris ) were pretty sure that a precipitous and rapid collapse of civilisation had occurred. Modern historians such as Ward Perkins would agree - see his well researched book 'The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilisation'.

 

As Melvadius says, it happened at different times within a hundred year spread. In Italy itself, for example, the 'Dark Ages' probably did not begin in earnest until, ironically, the Empire reclaimed Italy from the Ostrogoths, and by so doing left it weakened and unable to resist the Lombards, who destroyed Roman material culture for good.

 

The term Dark Age has been used with regard to the situation with the Greeks between the Santorini eruption c.1250BC and the emergence of classical culture in about 700BC. Again, economic decline, a loss of literacy and a paucity of written records characterise this period.

 

Maybe we could dispense with the term 'Dark Age' and use the less emotive and more accurate term ' Rapidly ocurring and long lasting economic decline'. But it all amounts to the same thing.

[GhostOfClayton]

Maybe we could dispense with the term 'Dark Age' and use the less emotive and more accurate term ' Rapidly ocurring and long lasting economic decline'. But it all amounts to the same thing.

 

I can't help agreeing with Melvadius and Nortern Neil. It's very easy to cite various improvements during the (so-called) Dark Ages and say 'were they really that dark, because So-and-So painted Such-and-Such, and Watt Dabney invented the Inverted Firkin. However, if you were, say, the Sean Connery character from Highlander, and you'd lived through them, you'd probably look back on that whole post-Roman, pre-Rennaisance part of your life as being a bit grim.

[Melvadius]

<SNIP>

Put another way: The average citizen in 400 ( and some animals!) resided under a tiled roof, had access to a wide variety of cheaply available consumer products, and was able to send a letter from York to Alexandria. A standing army ensured the security of the countryside and literacy - if not universal - was widespread.

 

I am not convinced that the archaeological record supports the view of a ubiquitous use of tiles for roofs throughout Roman Britian so I would put one caveat on this.

 

Although a proportion of the population in Britian probably did reside under a tiled roof it was probably more a material used for 'status' buildings and a few other buildings mainly in towns so by no means universally used. The roofing material of choice in most rural areas, unless you lived in a larger villa, retained a heavy pre-Roman influence as we have a lot of evidence now for roundhouses continuing in use well into the 3rd or possibly even 4th centuries AD so was probably a lot more skewed towards reed or other forms of thatch throughout the Roman period.

 

<SNIP>

 

Maybe we could dispense with the term 'Dark Age' and use the less emotive and more accurate term ' Rapidly ocurring and long lasting economic decline'. But it all amounts to the same thing.

 

I would agree that we 'could' use such a term but it is a bit of a mouthful which is probably why the Media still trot out the 'Dark Ages' tag on a regular basis. It may not be accurate but to a great extent is self-perpetuating having gained almost a cult following amongst a large number of people.

[Maladict]

How about 'premedieval contraction' or 'post-roman hangover' or 'The Great Depression of somewhere between AD 400 and 1000'?

Edited November 26, 2010 by Maladict

[Ludovicus]

How about 'premedieval contraction' or 'post-roman hangover' or 'The Great Depression of somewhere between AD 400 and 1000'?

 

That's great! Remove's the period right out of the ivory tower.

[Kosmo]

How about 'premedieval contraction' or 'post-roman hangover' or 'The Great Depression of somewhere between AD 400 and 1000'?

 

Nice!

The worst part of the crisis was over by 500 AD but the recovery took 1.000 years.

[DecimusCaesar]

I think the Dark Ages started in different areas at different times. For instance in Britain you could argue it started in AD 410 when the Romans withdrew. It then continued in its 'darkest' period (an era where we have virtually no writing) until the Conquest of Britain by Gildas around AD 590. Perhaps in italy the period could start with Romulus Augustus getting deposed by Odoacer in AD 476, although Theodoric the Great still attempted to keep latin culture alive for many years after the fall.

[Viggen]

...its been a while since i asked When does antiquity end?

 

, so here it goes, the big antiquity thread, as it fits nicely with this discussion...

http://www.unrv.com/...04&st=0&p=45934

 

cheers and enjoy...

viggen

[caldrail]

In this age of historical revisionism some have questioned whether the dark ages ever existed, pointing out numerous developments in the Medieval World. It is clear to me that Western Europe suffered a significant setback with the fall of Rome, and there were a few isolated episodes of recovery, but Europe did not fully recover until the Renaissance.

 

So when did they begin?

 

Deposition of Romulus Augustus? Probably not since the Ostrogoths seemed to have retained much of the Roman establishment. There was also the brief reconquest by Justinian.

 

The invasion of Italy by the Lombards?

 

When did they end? Certainly not with Charlemagne. His brief "Renaissance" was followed by gloom and doom.

 

The Crusades? The Court of eleanor of Aquitaine? Thomas Aquinas? 1453? 1492?

 

Any thoughts are appreciated.

 

The 'Dark Ages' are something of a convenience, a label for the period between the Roman withdrawal and the Norman invasion, although some might argue that is also a convenient definition and biased toward a British perspective. After all, the Romans, under another convenient label as the Byzantines, were carrying on business throughout that period albeit with a problem or two along the way.

 

In a literary sense, the Dark Ages certainly are apt. There are no survivng texts from that period. All we have are medieval copies, mistakes and all. Worse still, until the relatively enlightened post settlement part of the period, no-one wrote anything down. Our records originate from annalists who compiled their ambiguous lists of events centuries afterward, and then often from dubious sources as folklore, epic poems, and a few lost works.

 

In fact, the only contemporary text (copied of course) from the settlement period (the middle bit of the Dark Ages) is the 'De Exidio et Conquestu Brittanniae' and that was a sermon against the evil and folly of godless men of his time, a vague and frustrating document to use as a historical source.

 

As far as Europe or the rest of the world is concerned I'm afraid I'm something of an ignoramous there. That said, it is important to realise that the phrase 'Dark Ages' refers to the British perspective and not to events elsewhere. It's just that having catalogued history under that chapter, historians have tended to document history elsewhere in the same time frame.

[Northern Neil]

In as far as Europe or the rest of the world is concerned I'm afraid I'm something of an ignoramous there. That said, it is important to realise that the phrase 'Dark Ages' refers to the British perspective and not to events elsewhere. It's just that having catalogued history under that chapter, historians have tended to document history elsewhere in the same time frame.

Hmmm... I am a bit of a Ward Perkins fan when discussing this subject. Almost all over the old Western Empire, things were very bleak indeed from 400 to about 1000, and not much better in the Eastern Empire from the Arab invasions on. The age was dark in other ways, with the closure of the philosophical schools, the end of classical science and the onset of dogmatic thinking and book burning. When one considers the massive ammount of supporting evidence, the 'Early Medieval' period was indeed a moribund and gloomy time compared to the classical world which preceeded it. Objects such as the Book of Kells and the Sutton Hoo burial are noteable not just because of their beauty, but also their comparative rarity in an otherwise austere world.

[Offits]

I am interested in learning about and playing in Dark Ages Britain. As it is likely to be some time before I can get time to model an army I am looking at learning as much as I can about the period. While there seem to be plenty of books on the post-romaa pre-conquest Britain many have mixed reviews on Amazon and the like. Can anyone recommend good books on the period. I would also be interested in any good fiction set in the period.

 

Thanks in advance.

[caldrail]

Almost all over the old Western Empire, things were very bleak indeed from 400 to about 1000, and not much better in the Eastern Empire from the Arab invasions on. The age was dark in other ways, with the closure of the philosophical schools, the end of classical science and the onset of dogmatic thinking and book burning. When one considers the massive ammount of supporting evidence, the 'Early Medieval' period was indeed a moribund and gloomy time compared to the classical world which preceeded it.

 

In terms of British experience, to which the phrase 'Dark Age' actually belongs, times were indeed quite tough in some respects. On the one hand, agriculture was set back on its heels by the collapse of markets and the villa system, and it took hundreds of years (with some disasters along the way) for rural prosperity to return. The balkanisation of the british isles did the region no favours with foreign tribes looking at the fertile farmland and wealthy christian centres somewhat avariciously.

 

The problem is that we assume the Dark Ages were uniformly bad. That's a false assumption because we know from Gildas and others that fortunes for the british waxed and waned. Yet the dark age record shows a civic, economic, and political restoration inprogress throughout the period, set back only by the arrival of hostile forces and weak leadership.

 

In theory the balkanisation of Britain, the breakup of the sub-Roman world into warring petty kingdoms, came to an end with Ecbert's domination of the kingdoms in the early ninth century. Athelstan reasserted the english throne (and some claim he was the first king of England, which conveniently ignores that fact that the other english kingdoms had accepted Wessex as overlords since Mercian power was destroyed in the wake of the Battle of Ellandun).

 

During this period we have a series of lawmakers, Ine and Alfred in particular, both of whom followed Constantinian principles in underpinning their edicts with Christian affiliation, and although the isles were effectively recolonised by catholic missionaries we mustn't forget that irish christianity was already strong and exporting it's beliefs to the continent.. We see farming becoming more productive, more profitable, and architecture evolving in sophistication and scope. We see the english navy becoming a national institution for the first time, helping to safeguard coastlines and trade routes against pirates or raiders, and in case, we know that travel to and from the continent was a regular and apparently trouble-free event.

 

Was the medieval world moribund? Certainly not. Okay, it had bad times, but then the classical period wasn't always sweetness and light. Now I would agree it was largely a time of ignorance and violence, but that was the nature of society back then and since when was the ancient world entirely a safe place? The fact remains it was the medieval period that saw western europe drag itself back to prosperity - and lets not forget - the Renaissance didn't happen out of thin air.

Edited April 4, 2011 by caldrail

[Ursus]

In this age of historical revisionism some have questioned whether the dark ages ever existed, pointing out numerous developments in the Medieval World. It is clear to me that Western Europe suffered a significant setback with the fall of Rome, and there were a few isolated episodes of recovery, but Europe did not fully recover until the Renaissance.

 

 

For whatever it's worth ... my high school history book taught the Dark Ages as between the fall of Western Rome and the rise of Charles The Great (with the Middle Ages then being from Charles the Great to the Renaissance).