Middle Ages, period
in Western European history that followed the disintegration
of the West Roman Empire in the 4th and 5th cent. and lasted
into the 15th cent., i.e., into the period of the Renaissance.
The ideas and institutions of western civilization derive
largely from the turbulent events of the Early Middle Ages
and the rebirth of culture in the later years. The importance
of the Middle Ages has been increasingly recognized as scholarship
based on newly published source material, archaeological findings,
and studies of demographics and migration patterns presents
more accurate and detailed analyses of events and trends.
Beginnings and Cultural DevelopmentsAlthough the transitions
were gradual, and exact dates for the demarcation of the Middle
Ages are misleading, convention often places the beginning
of the period between the death of the Roman emperor Theodosius
I in 395 and the fall of Rome to the Visigoths Visigoths (West
Goths), division of the Goths, one of the most important groups
of Germans . Having settled in the region W of the Black Sea
in the 3d cent. A.D., the Goths soon split into two divisions,
the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths.
In
the Roman Empire
Medieval
Europe was far from unified; it was a large geographical region
divided into smaller and culturally diverse political units
that were never totally dominated by any one authority. With
the collapse of the Roman Empire, Christianity became the
standard-bearer of Western civilization. The papacy papacy
(pa`p?se), office of the pope, head of the Roman Catholic
Church. He is pope by reason of being bishop of Rome and thus,
according to Roman Catholic belief, successor in the see of
Rome (the Holy See) to its first bishop.
Transition
to the Modern WorldThe transition from the medieval to the
modern world was foreshadowed by economic expansion, political
centralization, and secularization. A money economy weakened
serfdom, and an inquiring spirit stimulated the age of exploration.
Banking, the bourgeois class, and secular ideals flourished
in the growing towns and lent support to the expanding monarchies.
The church was weakened by internal conflicts as well as by
quarrels between church and state church and state, the relationship
between the religion or religions of a nation and the civil
government of that nation, especially the relationship between
the Christian church and various civil governments. There
have been several phases in the relationship between the Christian
church and the state.
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