Medieval Europe

Description

A new look at the middle ages -- Rome and its western successors, 500-750 -- Crisis and transformation in the east, 500-850/1000 -- The Carolingian experiment, 750-1000 -- The expansion of Christian Europe, 500-1100 -- Reshaping western Europe, 1000-1150 -- The long economic boom, 950-1300 -- The ambiguities of political reconstruction, 1150-1300 -- 1204 : the failure of alternatives -- Defining society : gender and community in late medieval Europe -- Money, war and death, 1350-1500 -- Rethinking politics, 1350-1500 -- Conclusion.;"The millennium between the breakup of the western Roman Empire and the Reformation was a long and hugely transformative period--one not easily chronicled within the scope of a few hundred pages. Yet distinguished historian Chris Wickham has taken up the challenge in this landmark book, and he succeeds in producing the most riveting account of medieval Europe in a generation. Tracking the entire sweep of the Middle Ages across Europe, Wickham focuses on important changes century by century, including such pivotal crises and moments as the fall of the western Roman Empire, Charlemagne's reforms, the feudal revolution, the challenge of heresy, the destruction of the Byzantine Empire, the rebuilding of late medieval states, and the appalling devastation of the Black Death. He provides illuminating vignettes that underscore how shifting social, economic, and political circumstances affected individual lives and international events. Wickham offers both a new conception of Europe's medieval period and a provocative revision of exactly how and why the Middle Ages matter"--