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Tag Archives: Dark Ages
Early conquest
The empires of Byzantium and Persia had been fighting over the territory between them since about 570. By 630, many of cities on the front had suffered destruction of walls and crops, and many of the men of fighting age … Continue reading
Mediterranean world in 600
Mohammed reported his first vision in the year 610. By 640, his followers had a small, growing empire. Before we trace this explosive growth, let’s look at the world that the Muslims challenged. The map of Europe in 600 shows … Continue reading
The rude garb of barbarians
On the other extreme from the urbane Mediterranean Byzantines were the tribes drifting in from the Central Asian plain. Asia birthed several waves of people who took turns pushing each other into Europe: first the Germans (Goths, Franks, Burgundians, Vandals, … Continue reading
Charlemagne’s vegetables
He wanted his stewards to send him all wolf hides caught and tanned on his estates, feed his hunting dog puppies at their own expense, and use barrels instead of leather bottles. He wanted them to be sure that the … Continue reading
Charlemagne the Farmer: Pt. 1
The earliest detailed document we have about food in Dark Ages Europe is the set of regulations that Emperor Charlemagne imposed on his archipelago of manor farms. A king’s court was too large to stay in one place for long, … Continue reading
Medieval farming takes on horses
The new iron-shod moldboard plow could open up fields on land that had looked off limits, and it doubled grain yield per acre. Every 50 years, some higher altitude lands were a few degrees warmer, so farming spread upward, away … Continue reading
Dark Ages grain farming
Dark Ages farming in Europe had to adapt Mediterranean Roman techniques to a different climate and soil. At first, fields were planted one year and left fallow the next, to avoid exhausting the soil. Roman farmers had discovered crop rotation … Continue reading
Dark Ages animals
So we travel back to the Dark Ages, the early medieval years when constant migration of barbarians kept civilization to a lower level than Rome had reached. Most of Europe is heavily forested. Settlement tends to be along rivers and … Continue reading
Early medieval burials
The Medieval period is generally counted from around the end of the Western Roman Empire, sort of 500-600ish, to the end of the Eastern Roman Empire with the fall of Constantinople. One of the major dividing lines within this period … Continue reading