European culture and the early Middle Ages. Abstract: Early Middle Ages in Western Europe
In 455, the Vandals captured and plundered Rome, which in 408 was already approached by the Visigoths led by Alaric. In 476, the nominal Roman emperor, whose residence was in Ravenna, was deposed by Odoacer, who had assumed a prominent position among the German mercenaries in Italy. Odoacer, who received the title of patrician, ruled Italy until 493, when Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, took over the power in the country. Ostrogothic rule lasted in Italy until the time when the commander of the Byzantine emperor Justinian Belisarius conquered Rome (536) and Ravenna (540). In the second half of the VI century. the Lombards captured and occupied northern Italy, and the governors of the Byzantine emperor settled in Ravenna. Rome came under the temporary control of the pope.
It can hardly be expected, of course, that philosophy flourished during the turbulent years of the fall of the Roman Empire and subsequent barbarian invasions. It would be an exaggeration, however, to describe
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the period following the collapse of the empire, as a time of complete barbarism As we have seen, Boethius lived in the Ostrogothic kingdom; also mentioned is Isidore of Seville, who died about 636 in the Visigothic kingdom in Spain. At the same time, the educational system of the Roman Empire fell into decay, and all the remaining education glimmered mainly in the monasteries. St. Benedict lived in 480-543, and the monasteries, which owed their spirit and order to his rule, became the link where the remnants of the old culture were preserved and then transferred to the "barbarian" peoples90.
In England, the situation began to improve from about 669, when the Greek monk Theodore of Tarsus, appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, together with his associates, organized a monastic school here. Bede the Venerable (674-735), interpreter of Pi-
90 There was also the cultural influence of the old Celtic monasticism, which spread from Ireland to Scotland and northern England.
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sania and historian (or at any rate chronicler), was a monk at Jarrow. And Bede's student, Egberg, made the greatest contribution to the development of York as a center of learning.
The literary revival in Europe took place during the reign of Charlemagne. In 496, King Clovis of the Franks converted to Christianity. In his reign and that of his successors, all the Frankish lands were united under the rule of the Merovingian dynasty. After the death of Dagoberg 1 (638), the Merovingians turned into purely nominal rulers, while the real power passed into the hands of the mayors. However, in 751, with the proclamation of Pepin the Short as king of the Franks, the Merovingian dynasty ended. Pepin left the kingdom to his two sons, Charles and Carloman. The latter died in 771 and Charles, who gained fame for himself as Charlemagne, became the only
91 Thus, Charles Martell, who defeated the Saracens at Poitiers in 732 and prevented the Muslim invasion of the West, which was already possible at that time, was not formally the king of the Franks, although in fact he ruled over them.
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new monarch. After the conquest of the Lombard state, several successful campaigns against the Saxons, the annexation of Bavaria, the subjugation of Bohemia and the conquest of some lands in Spain, Charlemagne became the greatest Christian ruler in Western Europe. At Christmas 800 in Rome, the pope anointed Charles as emperor, and this act marked a decisive break between Rome and Byzantium, and also emphasized the Christian duties of the monarch and the theocratic nature of the state. Charlemagne was not only a conqueror, but also a reformer who sought to develop enlightenment. and cultural revival of society. To this end, he gathered around him many scientists. Since the old Roman culture of Gaul had fallen to an extremely low level in the sixth and seventh centuries, the emperor had to rely mainly on scholars from abroad. At his invitation came some scholars from Italy and Spain, and his chief adviser, Alcuin, was a native of York. In 782, Alcuin organized the Palatine School - a.k.a.
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demiyu at the imperial court, where he taught his students Scripture, ancient literature, logic, grammar and astronomy. Alcuin was also a textbook writer and a diligent copyist of manuscripts, mostly Scripture. Among his students was Raban Maurus, known as the "mentor of Germany", who became the abbot of the Fulda monastery and later the archbishop of Mainz. It cannot be said that the work of Alcuin and his associates was original and creative. Their task was rather to disseminate the existing scholarship. This was done both through monastic schools, such as those created at the monasteries of St. Gallen and Fulda, and through episcopal or capitular schools. These establishments existed mainly, though not exclusively, for those preparing to become a monk or a priest. The Palatine school, however, was clearly conceived by the emperor as a place for the education of civil bureaucracy.
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wa, which was required to control the Carolingian empire92.
The training was conducted in Latin. Even if the use of Latin did not follow naturally from the predominantly ecclesiastical nature of education, it was dictated by administrative considerations in view of the diversity of the peoples inhabiting the Empire. The content of education was the seven liberal arts mentioned in the previous chapter, and theological studies, namely the study of Scripture. In addition to the development of education in this sense, the result of the cultural reform of Charlemagne was the multiplication of manuscripts and the enrichment of libraries.
In the era of the Carolingians, philosophy was essentially reduced to dialectics and logic, which, as we noted, were part of the trivium. With one great exception, which will be discussed next,
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In general, speculative philosophy existed only in rudimentary forms. For example, Candide's Sayings about the Image of God, attributed to the monk of Fulda, who lived at the beginning of IX a, contains proof of the existence of God, based on the idea that the hierarchy of beings requires the existence of an infinite divine intelligence. Further, in this period we can also see the beginnings of a dispute about universal terms, which will be considered further, the main content of which is salvation and transmission, one can hardly expect original philosophizing.
The great exception mentioned above is John Scotus Eriugena,93 the first eminent philosopher of the Middle Ages. Born in Ireland, John Scotus was educated in Ireland.
93 Combination of epithets Scott [Scot. – I.B.] and Eriugena (born in Ireland) may seem like a contradiction. However, in the ninth century Ireland was called Great Scotland, and the Irish - "cattle".
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land monastery, where he learned the Greek language94.
AT 850 he appeared at the court of Charles the Bald
and began teaching at the Palatine School. Charles was the king of the western part of the empire, Neustria(843-875), and in 875 he was crowned as emperor. He died in 877, around the same time, John Scotus probably also died, although the exact date and place of his death are unknown95. With his essay "On Predestination" (De praedestinatione), John Scotus intervened in the theological dispute that was taking place at that time, speaking in defense of human freedom. As a reward for his efforts, he
94 It would be quite rash to think that all Irish monks knew Greek. At the same time, in the ninth century knowledge of this language was more or less characteristic of Irish monasteries, and in other places, for example in a monastery St. Gallen, usually due to the influence of Irish monks.
95 Apparently, the story that John Scotus became abbot of the monastery at Athelney and was killed by the monks is either a legend, or refers to the philosopher by mistake and tells about some other John.
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attracted the suspicion of heresy and prudently turned his attention to other subjects. In 858 he began to translate into Latin the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius, which he provided with a commentary96. In addition, he translated some of the writings of Gregory of Nyssa and Maximus the Confessor, and seems to have written commentaries on the Gospel of John and on some of the works of Boethius. His fame was brought mainly by the work "On the division of nature" (De cuvisione naturae), probably created between 862 and 866. This work consists of five books and takes the form of a dialogue in which the teacher, or teacher, and the student participate. She reveals Eriugena's significant dependence on the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius and such Church Fathers as Gregory of Nyssa. Nevertheless, the composition of Eriugena is a remarkable achievement, for
96 In 827 Emperor Michael Shepelyaviy presented Louis the Pious with the works of Pseudo-Dionysius. The comments of John Scotus did not cover "Mystical Theology".
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contains a whole system, or worldview, and demonstrates a powerful and outstanding mind, limited, however, by the framework of the intellectual life of that time and the scarcity of philosophical material available for reflection, but far surpassing the minds of ordinary contemporary thinkers.
The word "nature" in the title of the work of John Scotus means the fullness of reality, including both God and creation. The author tries to show how God in himself, characterized by him as "creating and uncreated nature", gives rise to the divine Word, or Logos, and - in this Word - eternal divine ideas. These ideas are created, because logically, though not in time, they follow the Word born in eternity, and creative - at least in the sense that they serve as models or archetypes of finite things; together, therefore, they form "created and creative nature." Finite things, created in accordance with their eternal patterns, constitute "created and uncreative nature." They are divine self-manifestation, theophany, or God-
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phenomenon. Finally, John Scotus speaks of "nature neither creating nor created": such is the completion of the cosmic process, the result of the return of all things to their source, when God will be all in all.
Apparently, there is no convincing reason to doubt that John Scotus intended to present the Christian vision of the world, the all-encompassing interpretation of the universe in the light of the Christian faith. His initial attitude seems to have been faith seeking understanding.
The instrument of understanding is speculative philosophy, which ultimately goes back to Neoplatonism. The modern reader can hardly avoid the impression that in the hands of John Scotus Christianity is being modified, taking the form of a metaphysical system. True, it is not at all like the philosopher himself was thinking about the transformation of Christianity.
He sought rather to comprehend - so to speak, to comprehend through reason - the Christian vision of reality. However, as a result
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ambiguities or inconsistencies remained between what is usually considered a Christian teaching and the philosophical interpretation of this teaching given by Eriugena. Let's give two or three examples.
The Bible speaks of divine wisdom and a wise God. However, the path of denial, which seems to John Scotus to be fundamentally important, requires not attributing wisdom to God, since it is an attribute of some creations, the philosopher tries to find dialectical harmony between the corresponding biblical statements and the path of denial, interpreting the statement about the wisdom of God in the sense that God should be attributed super-wisdom. This does not contradict the biblical statement about the wisdom of God; but the prefix "over" indicates that divine wisdom exceeds human understanding.
And since the created wisdom - the wisdom known to us from experience - is denied in relation to God, the path of negation retains its dominant position. Obviously, John Scotus relies on the ideas of Pseudo-Dionysius. His reasoning is not
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are of unparalleled novelty. The main point, however, is that he starts with the biblical concept of God and then moves in a direction that logically (and can be proven) leads to agnosticism. First it is affirmed that God is X. Then it is denied that God is X. Then it is affirmed that God is super-X. A natural question arises: do we understand what we attribute to God when we say that He is super-X?
Second example. In the first book of the essay "On the division of nature," John Scotus explains that he believes in the free divine creation of the world "out of nothing." Further, he proves that the statement about the creation of the world by God implies a change in God and an untenable idea about the existence of God "before" the world. Of course, Augustine already had to prove that the creation of the world should not be understood in the sense that God has a temporal priority (ie, exists in time) or undergoes metamorphosis in the act of creation. However, John Scotus believes that belief in creation should be understood in the sense that
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God is the essence of all things and even, quite surprisingly, is present in the things of which he is considered the creator. Here the neoplatonic idea of emanation, the expiration of things from the One, is clearly visible; but some of the statements of John Scotus themselves give the impression that he considers the world to be the objectification of God, or, to use Hegel's expression, God-in-his-otherness. At the same time, John Scotus says that God in himself remains transcendent, unchangeable, and imperishable. And although it is clear that he is trying to interpret the Judeo-Christian belief in divine creation with the help of philosophical tools, it is not entirely clear how to relate to the results of this attempt.
And the last example. John Scotus shares the Christian belief that man returns to God through Christ, the incarnate Son of God; he clearly says that individual personalities will be transformed rather than abolished or dissolved. Further, he shares the belief in reward and punishment in the Hereafter. At the same time, he claims that creations are again
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return to their eternal foundations in God (archetypal ideas) and cease to be called creatures. In addition, he understands the idea of eternal punishment of unrepentant sinners in the sense that God will forever prevent the perverted and stubborn will from concentrating on the images stored in the memory of those things that were the objects of the sinner's earthly desires.
This problem, which occupied John Scotus, is largely an internal problem of Christianity; Origen and St. Gregory Nyssky.
How can one, for example, reconcile the dogma of hell with the assertion of St. Paul that God will be all in all, and with faith in the universal saving will of God? At the same time, the philosopher is clearly trying to understand Christian eschatology in the light and with the help of the Neoplatonic belief in cosmic emanation and return to God. Its problematics is determined by the study of the Scriptures and treatises of Pseudo-Dionysius, Gregory of Nyssa and other thinkers.
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It may seem that the mention of the name of Hegel in connection with the thinker of the ninth century. is a monstrous anachronism. And in some important respects, this is true. However, despite the huge and obvious differences in the original intellectual foundations, historical context, approach and philosophical beliefs, we find in both these people a desire to explore the philosophical or speculative significance of Christian beliefs. As for the historians' dispute over whether John Scotus should be called a theist, a panentheist, or a pantheist, it hardly makes sense to address this topic without having a precise definition of these terms. True, we can say that John Scotus stands on the positions of Christian theism, tries to comprehend it, and in the process of comprehending it develops a system that can rightly be called panentheistic. However, if theism is not seen as equivalent to deism, then it must probably be panentheism in some sense.
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The remarkable achievements of John Scotus seem to have attracted almost no interest from his contemporaries. Of course, to a certain extent this is due to the conditions that prevailed after the collapse of the Carolingian empire. True, several writers of the early Middle Ages turned to the work De dmsione naturae, but it was not widely known until Amalric of Vienna (Amaury de Bene), who died at the beginning of the 13th century, turned to it. and clearly brought upon himself the accusation of pantheism. Through the efforts of Amalric, the magnum opus of John Scotus, in which they saw the root of evil, was condemned in 1225 by Pope Honorius III.
The empire of Charlemagne suffered a political collapse.
After the death of the emperor, his possessions were divided. Then came the wave of foreign conquests. The year 845 saw the burning of Hamburg and the sack of Paris by the Normans,
97 We know very little about Amalrik's ideas. It appears, however, that his writings have been interpreted—rightly or not—as identifying God with creatures.
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or the Vikings, in 847 the same fate befell Bordeaux. The Frankish Empire eventually broke up into five kingdoms, often at war with each other. Meanwhile, the Saracens invaded Italy and almost took Rome. Europe, with the exception of a thriving Muslim culture in Spain, was plunged into the Dark Ages for the second time. The church fell victim to exploitation by the new feudal nobility.
Abbeys and dioceses were distributed as a reward to laity and unworthy prelates, and in the tenth century. even the papacy itself was under the control of the local nobility and parties. In such circumstances, there was no reason to hope that the enlightenment movement, initiated by Charlemagne, would prove fruitful.
It cannot be said, of course, that education in Europe simply disappeared. In 910 the abbey of Cluny was founded; and monasteries of the Cluniac orientation, the first conductor of which in England was St. Dunstan, contributed to the maintenance of written culture. For example, a monk
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Abbo, who died in 1004, directed a monastic school on the Loire, where not only the Scriptures and the Church Fathers were studied, but also grammar, logic98 and mathematics. A more prominent figure, however, is Herbert of Aurillac. Herbert (born c. 938) became a Cluniac-reformed monk and studied in Spain, where he apparently became acquainted with Arabic science. Subsequently, he headed the school in Reims. Then he successively held the posts of abbot of the monastery of Bobbio, archbishop of Reims and archbishop of Ravenna, and in 999 he was elected pope under the name of Sylvester II. While teaching at Reims, Herbert lectured on logic, but was more remarkable for his research in the then available classical Latin literature and mathematics. He died in 1003.
One of the students of Herbert in Reims was the famous Fulber, who is considered the founder of
98 Logic included Aristotle's "Categories" and De Interpretatiom (the so-called "old logic") and Boethius' treatises on the First and Second Analysts.
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lem school in Chartres and was the bishop of that city. The cathedral school at Chartres had been in existence for a long time, but in 990 Fulber laid the foundations of a center for the humanities and philosophical and theological studies, a center famous in the 12th century, until the prestige of the regional schools faded before the glory of the University of Paris.
We have noted that dialectics, or logic, was one of the subjects of the trivium. Consequently, as a free art, it has long been studied in schools. However, in the XI century. logic, as it were, takes on a life of its own and is used as a tool to assert the superiority of reason, even in the field of faith. In other words, there emerged dialecticians who were not content simply with the study of Porphyry's Introduction, several of Aristotle's logical writings, and the commentaries and treatises of Boethius. It seems that there really was a share of verbal acrobatics in this, for the dialecticians sought to dazzle and amaze. But there were also people who used
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logic in that science, which was considered the main and most exalted - in theology.
True, to state the matter in this way is to mislead. After all, theology has never been considered protected from logical norms. Theologians did not neglect logical deduction either. The point here is the following. Theologians held that certain premises or doctrines (from which conclusions could be deduced) were revealed by God and should be accepted on the basis of faith in authority, while some eleventh-century dialecticians did not pay much attention to the idea of authority and tried to present revealed "mysteries" as the conclusions of reason. At least sometimes their reasoning led to changes in doctrine. It was this rationalistic attitude that aroused the hostility of a number of theologians and aroused lively disputes. The subject of discussion was the scope and boundaries of the human mind. Since philosophy at that time was practically identical to logic
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ke99, we can say that the dispute was about the relationship between philosophy and theology.
One of the main sinners (from the point of view of theologians) was the monk Berengarius of Tours (c. 1000-1088), a student of Fulbert of Chartres. Berengariy seemed to deny (on the basis of logical premises) that the bread and wine eaten in communion "are transmuted" (transubstantiated) into the body and blood of Christ. Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury (d. 1089) accused Berengaria of disrespect for authority and faith and of trying to understand "things that cannot be understood" 100 . It is not easy to understand what exactly Berengarius claimed; however, in On Holy Communion, v. Lanfranc, he undoubtedly extolled dialectic, or logic, as the "art of arts" and argued that "to turn to dialectic
99 We digress here from the question of whether logic should be considered as a part of philosophy, as a propaedeutic to philosophy, or as an independent and purely formal science. At the time, it was considered part of philosophy.
100 "On the body and blood of the Lord" (De sogrote et sanguine
Donmii), Migne, PL, 150, col. 427.
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ke means to turn to reason,"101 believing that every enlightened person should be ready for this. As for the application of dialectics to the Eucharist, he believed that it was meaningless to talk about accidents that exist separately from substance. In the perfective formula "this is My Body "(hoc est corpus teite) the pronoun "this" must refer to bread, which therefore remains bread. The subject of the utterance is bread, and although bread becomes a sacred sign of the body of Christ through consecration, it cannot be identified with the actual body of Christ, born of the Virgin Mary The real conversion or change takes place in the souls of those who take communion.
Apparently, Berengarius substantiated his theory with the help of the work of Rathramnus of Corby (d. 868), which he attributed to John Scotus Eriugena. This doctrine, formulated by Beren-
101 De sacra coena adversus Lanfrancum, ed. A.P. and F.Th. Vischer (Berlin, 1834), p. 101. This is an edition of a manuscript discovered in 1770.
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gary, was condemned by the Council of Rome (1050). It seems, however, that the condemnation did not make a strong impression on Berengaria, for in 1079 he was required to sign a document by which he was to confirm his belief in the essential transformation of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. Other requirements, except for the requirement to revise the former teaching in this way, were not presented to him.
The episode with Berengaria helps to explain the hostility of some theologians to dialectics, and if we remember what time we are talking about, then to philosophy. At the same time, it would be a mistake to think that all the dialectics of the 11th century. began to rationalize Christian dogmas. A more common reason for treating philosophy was "the conviction that it is not as valuable as the study of Scripture and the Fathers of the Church, and does not play any role in the salvation of the human soul. Thus, St. Peter Damiani (1007-1072) frankly did not recognize the free arts special value, and although he did not say, like Manegold of Lautenbach (d. 1103), that logic is not needed, but
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stood on the purely subordinate role of dialectics, seeing in it the "servant" of theology.
Of course, this point of view was no exception. It was shared, for example, by Gerard of Canada, a native of Venice, who became bishop of Canada in Hungary (d. 1046). And it wasn't all that strange in and of itself. For, as already noted, until logic became an independent science, it was natural to consider it an instrument for the development of other sciences. However, St. Peter Damiani went further than asserting the subordinate or auxiliary role of dialectics in relation to theology. He argued that one cannot take for granted the universal applicability of the principles of reason in the realm of theology. Some other thinkers, such as Manegold of Lautenbach, believed that the claims of the human mind were refuted by such truths as the virgin birth and the resurrection of Christ. But in this case, it was more about exceptional events.
102 "On Divine Omnipotence" (De dmna omnipotentia), Migne, PL, 145, col. 63.
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yakh than about the inconsistency of logical principles. Peter Damiani went further, arguing, for example, that God in his omnipotence can change the past. Thus, although it is actually true today that Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon, God could in principle make that statement false tomorrow if he wants to undo the past. If this thought diverges from the requirements of the mind, then so much the worse for the mind.
The number of theologians who viewed philosophy as a useless excess was, of course, limited. Lanfranc, who, as we know, criticized Berengaria, observed that the problem was not with the dialectic itself, but with its misuse. He recognized that theologians themselves use the dialectic to develop theology. An example is the writings of his student
103 Of course, this thesis is different from the claim that God could have kept Julius Caesar from crossing the Rubicon at all. This thesis presupposes historical events and then asserts that God could in principle cause them to no longer be historical events.
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St. Anselm, which will be discussed in the next chapter. In general, it would be a mistake to succumb to the hypnosis of the rationalizations of some dialecticians on the one hand, and the exaggerated declarations of some theologians on the other, and consider the situation of the 11th century. simply as a struggle between reason, represented by the dialecticians, and obscurantism, represented by the theologians. However, if we take a broader view and consider such theologians as, for example, St. Anselm, we will see that both theologians and dialecticians played their part in the development of the intellectual life of the early Middle Ages. For example, the views of Berengaria, of course, can be considered from the standpoint of theological orthodoxy. However, we can
104 It is tempting, of course, to see in Berengaria the spiritual forerunner of the Protestant reformers. However, he did not think of church reform, nor of putting the authority of Scripture against the authority of the Church. He tried to apply the demands of reason, as he understood them, to the comprehension of what his opponents believed to be a "mystery" beyond human understanding.
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see them as a symptom of the awakening of intellectual life.
The above statement that in the XI century. philosophy was more or less equivalent to logic, needs some reservations. It overlooks, for example, the metaphysical elements in the thought of a theologian like Anselm. And turning to the dispute about universals, we will see that the ontological aspect of the problem occupied a prominent place in medieval discussions on this topic.
Consider the sentence "John Bel". The word "John" is used here, as it would be said in dictionaries, as a proper name. It refers to an individual.
It is possible, however, to formulate the conditions that any word must satisfy in order for us to call it by its proper name, and which the word "John" does not satisfy.
If we were to require, for example, that a proper name designate in principle one and only one individual thing, then the word "John" could not be classified as
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proper name. After all, the name "John" is called many people. And even if there really was only one person named John, it would still be possible to call other people by this name. In other words, if we wished, we could deprive proper names of their right to exist. However, under the circumstances, the word "John" is undoubtedly a proper name.
It is used to name rather than describe people105. However, the word "white" in the sentence "John white" is not a name, but a generic term that has a descriptive meaning. To say that John is white is to say that he has a certain quality. But the same quality can be attributed to other individuals, say Tom, Dick and Harry. And since the meaning of the word "white" in each of these cases is the same (or can be the same
105 It is clear to me that proper names such as "John" have no descriptive value, although this view has been questioned.
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same), we can ask if they all - John, Tom, Dick and Harry - are not involved in a certain reality called whiteness. If so, what is the ontological status of this reality? Perhaps this question is the result of a logical confusion. However, formulated in this way, it is an ontological question.
One of the sources of the dispute about universals in the early Middle Ages was a text from Boethius's second commentary on Porphyry's Isagoge. Boethius quotes Porphyry, who asks whether species and genera (such as the dog and the animal) really exist or are real only in concepts, and if they are really existing realities, whether they exist separately from material things or only in the latter. As Boethius notes, in this text Porphyry does not answer
106 See for example: Migne, PL, 64, col. 82, or: Selections from Medieval. Philosophers, ed. R. McKeon (London, 1930), I, p. 91.
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your questions. Boethius himself, however, discusses this problem and solves it in an Aristotelian spirit, and not because, as he says, he recognizes this solution as true, but because Porphyry's Isagoge is an introduction to Aristotle's "Categories". Thinkers of the early Middle Ages, having paid attention to these questions, did not properly appreciate the discussion of Boethius on this subject. We may add that the difficulty arose from Boethius' remark (in his commentary on Aristotle's Categories) that this is a work about words and not about things. For this statement presupposed a simple dichotomy. Are universals words or things?
Already in the IX century. we find signs of ultra-realism, which was an expression of the illegitimate assumption that every name must correspond to a real entity. For example, Fredegisius of Tours (d. 834), a student of Alcuin, wrote a "Letter on Nothing and Darkness", where, in particular, he argued that there should be
107 See Migne, PL, 64, col. 162.
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something corresponding to the word "nothing". It does not follow from this, however, that Fredegisius considered absolute nothing as a special kind of something. He wanted to prove that since God created the world "out of nothing" and since every name must designate a corresponding reality, God had to create the world from a pre-existing undifferentiated material or substance, to philosophize in this way is to philosophize like a grammarian. The same can be said of Remigius of Auxerre (d. 908), who explicitly stated that since "man" is the predicate of all concrete persons, they must all have the same substance.
When considering medieval ultra-realism, we must take into account the influence of theological factors. For example, when Odon of Tournai (d. 1113) argued that there is only one substance in all people and the emergence of a new individual means that this one and only substance began to exist in a new modification, he was not just in the grip of the naive theory "one name - one thing".
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In this respect, he was not preoccupied with expounding Spinozism before Spinoza, although his thesis logically presupposed a development in this direction. Odon was unable to understand how one could hold to the dogma of original sin passing from Adam to his descendants, unless one affirmed that one substance, defiled in Adam, was passed down from generation to generation. Consequently, in order to convince Odon of the absurdity of his position, it was necessary to supplement the logical analysis with a theological explanation of original sin, which would not be based on the ultra-realism he defended.
If ultrarealism goes back to the ninth century, so does its opposite. Yes, Gay
109 The theological theory that supplanted "traditionism" was reduced to the fact that original sin consists in the absence of sanctifying grace, i.e., in each generation of people, God creates new individual souls, which, due to the sin of Adam, are deprived of sanctifying grace in their original state.
How modern theologians understand original sin is not clear to me.
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Rick of Auxerre seemed to be saying that if we want to clarify what is meant by "whiteness", "man" or "animal", we must point to individual examples of white things, people or animals. Outside the mind there are no general realities corresponding to the names of qualities, species and genera. There are only individuals. The mind only "gathers together", for example, individual people and, for the purpose of economy, forms a special idea of a person.
Turning to a much later time, let us say that the anti-realist position was clearly articulated by Roscelinus, a canon of Compiegne, who taught in various schools
and died about 1120. True, it is very difficult to establish exactly what he claimed, since his writings, with the exception of letters to Abelard, have disappeared or, in any case, have been lost. We are forced to rely on the testimonies of other writers, such as Anselm, Abelard
and John of Salisbury. It is Anselm who attributes to Roscelin the assertion (which is always associated with his name) that the universal
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lii are just words110. Since Anselm clearly knew the teachings of Roscelin better than we do, we can hardly doubt his testimony. At the same time, it is not entirely clear what Roscelinus meant when he said that universals are simply words. Perhaps he wanted his statement to be taken literally; however, we need not interpret him as if he denied universal concepts and identified universals with words regarded simply as spoken or written entities. According to Abelard, Roscelinus argued that when we speak of substance as composed of parts, "part" is just a word. This could mean that in the case of a particular thing, such as an undivided apple, we ourselves imagine and name its parts. Since the apple is undivided ex bypothesi, these parts do not really exist, as they would if
110 Literally - flatus was, voice fluctuation. Migne, P.L.
111 Ibid., 178, col. 358V.
Early Middle Ages
we shared an apple. The statement that "part" is just a word does not necessarily mean that Roscelin identifies the presented or named parts of an uncut apple with the word "part". It is possible that with his statement about universals, he simply wanted to emphasize that there are no general entities outside and apart from the mind.
Be that as it may, Roscelinus, by applying his theory to the dogma of the Trinity, brought hostility upon himself. He argued, for example, that if the divine nature, or essence, or substance, is really the same in the three divine Persons, then we must say that all three Persons became incarnate in Christ. However, theology teaches otherwise. Shall we not, therefore, admit that the divine nature is not the same in all three Persons, and that the Persons are separate individual beings? Roscelinus, who drew attention to this difficulty, was accused of tritheism and dismissed this accusation from himself. In any case, the attacks do not appear to have hurt his career.
Early Middle Ages
In the era of the early Middle Ages, ultrarealism was considered an "old" doctrine, while the opposite doctrine, based on the slogan of the existence of only individual things, was called "new". The climax of the dispute between the two sides was the well-known discussion between Guillaume of Champeau and Abelard, as a result of which Guillaume, an adherent of the "old" doctrine, was put in a very stupid light. However, further remarks on their dispute are best left until our discussion of Abelard.
They are remembered for various events and changes. Next, we consider in more detail the features of the Middle Ages.
General information
The Middle Ages is a fairly long period. Within its framework, the origin and subsequent formation of European civilization took place, its transformation - the transition to the Middle Ages dates back to the fall of Western Rome (476), however, according to modern researchers, it would be more fair to extend the border until the beginning of 6 - the end of 8 century, after the invasion of the Lombards in Italy. The era of the Middle Ages ends in the middle of the 17th century. It is traditionally considered the end of the period. However, it is worth noting that the last centuries were far from medieval in character. Researchers tend to separate the period from the middle of the 16th to the beginning of the 17th century. This "independent" time period represents the era of the early Middle Ages. Nevertheless, this, that the previous periodization is very conditional.
Characteristics of the Middle Ages
During this period, the formation took place. At this time, a series of scientific and geographical discoveries begins, the first signs of modern democracy - parliamentarism appear. Domestic researchers, refusing to interpret the medieval period as an era of "obscurantism" and "dark ages", seek to highlight the phenomena and events that turned Europe into a completely new civilization, as objectively as possible. They set themselves several tasks. One of them is the definition of the basic social and economic features of this feudal civilization. In addition, researchers are trying to most fully represent the Christian world of the Middle Ages.
public structure
It was a time in which the feudal mode of production and the agrarian element prevailed. This is especially true for the early period. Society was represented in specific forms:
- Estate. Here the owner, through the labor of dependent people, satisfied most of his own material needs.
- Monastery. It differed from the estate in that periodically there were literate people who knew how to write books and had time for this.
- Royal court. He moved from one place to another and organized management and life following the example of an ordinary estate.
State structure
It was formed in two stages. The first was characterized by the coexistence of Roman and German modified social institutions, as well as political structures in the form of "barbarian kingdoms". At the 2nd stage, the state and represent a special system. In the course of social stratification and the strengthening of the influence of the landed aristocracy, relations of subordination and domination arose between landowners - the population and seniors. The era of the Middle Ages was distinguished by the presence of a class-corporate structure, arising from the need for separate social groups. The most important role belonged to the institution of the state. He ensured the protection of the population from feudal freemen and external threats. At the same time, the state acted as one of the main exploiters of the people, since it represented the interests, first of all, of the ruling classes.
Second period
After the end of the period of the early Middle Ages, there is a significant acceleration in the evolution of society. Such activity was due to the development of monetary relations and the exchange of commodity production. The importance of the city continues to grow, at first remaining in political and administrative subordination to the seigneury - the estate, and ideologically - to the monastery. Subsequently, the formation of the political legal system in the New Time is connected with its development. This process will be perceived as the result of the creation of urban communes that defended liberties in the struggle against the ruling lord. It was at that time that the first elements of democratic legal consciousness began to take shape. However, historians believe that it would not be entirely correct to look for the origins of the legal ideas of modernity exclusively in the urban environment. Representatives of other classes were also of great importance. For example, the formation of ideas about personal dignity took place in the class feudal consciousness and was originally of an aristocratic nature. From this we can conclude that democratic freedoms developed from the love of freedom of the upper classes.
The role of the church
The religious philosophy of the Middle Ages had a comprehensive meaning. The Church and faith completely filled human life - from birth to death. Religion claimed to control society, it performed quite a lot of functions, which later passed to the state. The church of that period was organized according to strict hierarchical canons. At the head was the Pope - the Roman High Priest. He had his own state in Central Italy. In all European countries, bishops and archbishops were subordinate to the pope. All of them were the largest feudal lords and possessed entire principalities. It was the top of the feudal society. Under the influence of religion were various spheres of human activity: science, education, culture of the Middle Ages. Great power was concentrated in the hands of the church. Seniors and kings, who needed her help and support, showered her with gifts, privileges, trying to buy her assistance and favor. At the same time, the Middle Ages had a calming effect on people. The Church sought to smooth out social conflicts, called for mercy towards the destitute and oppressed, for the distribution of alms to the poor and the suppression of lawlessness.
The influence of religion on the development of civilization
The church controlled the production of books and education. Due to the influence of Christianity, by the 9th century, a fundamentally new attitude and understanding of marriage and family had developed in society. In the early Middle Ages, unions between close relatives were quite common, and numerous marriages were quite common. This is what the church has been fighting against. The problem of marriage, which was one of the Christian sacraments, became practically the main theme of a large number of theological writings. One of the fundamental achievements of the church in that historical period is considered to be the formation of a marital cell - a normal form of family life that exists to this day.
Economic development
According to many researchers, technological progress was also associated with the widespread dissemination of Christian doctrine. The result was a change in people's attitude to nature. In particular, we are talking about the rejection of taboos and prohibitions that hindered the development of agriculture. Nature has ceased to be a source of fears and an object of worship. The economic situation, technical improvements and inventions contributed to a significant increase in the standard of living, which held out quite steadily for several centuries of the feudal period. The Middle Ages, thus, became a necessary and very natural stage in the formation of Christian civilization.
Formation of a new perception
In society, the human person has become more valued than in Antiquity. This was mainly due to the fact that medieval civilization, imbued with the spirit of Christianity, did not seek to isolate a person from the environment because of the tendency to a holistic perception of the world. In this regard, it would be wrong to talk about the church dictatorship that allegedly prevented the formation of individual traits over a person who lived in the Middle Ages. In the Western European territories, religion, as a rule, performed a conservative and stabilizing task, providing favorable conditions for the development of the individual. It is impossible to imagine the spiritual quest of a man of that time outside the church. It was the knowledge of the surrounding conditions and God, which was inspired by church ideals, that gave birth to a diverse, colorful and vibrant culture of the Middle Ages. The church formed schools and universities, encouraged printing and various theological disputes.
Finally
The whole system of society of the Middle Ages is usually called feudalism (according to the term "feud" - an award to a vassal). And this is despite the fact that this term does not give an exhaustive description of the social structure of the period. The main features of that time should include:
Christianity became the most important factor in the cultural community of Europe. It was during the period under review that it became one of the world religions. The Christian Church was based on ancient civilization, not only denying the old values, but also rethinking them. Religion, its wealth and hierarchy, centralization and worldview, morality, law and ethics - all this formed a single ideology of feudalism. It was Christianity that largely determined the difference between the medieval society of Europe and other social structures on other continents at that time.
Abstract on the discipline: "World History" on the topic: "Early Middle Ages in Western Europe"
Introduction
The term "Middle Ages" - "me im aeuim" - was first used by Italian humanists in the 15th century: this is how they designated the period between classical antiquity and their time. In Russian historiography, the lower boundary of the Middle Ages is also traditionally considered to be the 5th century. AD - the fall of the Western Roman Empire, and the upper one - the end of the 16th - the beginning of the 17th centuries, when capitalist society began to intensively form in Western Europe.
The period of the Middle Ages is extremely important for Western European civilization. The processes and events of that time still largely determine the political, economic, cultural development of the countries of Western Europe. So, it was during this period that the religious community of Europe was formed and a new trend in Christianity emerged, which was most conducive to the formation of bourgeois relations - Protestantism; an urban culture is taking shape, which largely determined the modern mass Western European culture; the first parliaments arise and the principle of separation of powers is put into practice, the foundations of modern science and the education system are laid; the ground is being prepared for the industrial revolution and the transition to an industrial society.
general characteristics
During the early Middle Ages, the territory on which the formation of Western European civilization is taking place is significantly expanding: if ancient civilization developed mainly in the territory of Ancient Greece and Rome, then medieval civilization will cover almost all of Europe. The settlement of Germanic tribes in the western and northern territories of the continent was actively going on. The cultural, economic, religious, and subsequently political community of Western Europe will be largely based on the ethnic community of the Western European peoples.
The process of formation of nation-states began. So, in the ninth century. states were formed in England, Germany, France. However, their borders were constantly changing: the states either merged into larger state associations, or split up into smaller ones. This political mobility contributed to the formation of a pan-European civilization. The process of pan-European integration was contradictory: along with rapprochement in the field of ethnic and cultural, there is a desire for national isolation in terms of the development of statehood. The political system of the early feudal states is a monarchy.
During the early Middle Ages, the main classes of feudal society were formed: the nobility, the clergy and the people - the so-called third estate, it included peasants, merchants, and artisans. Estates have different rights and obligations, different socio-political and economic roles. The early 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. Over 90% of Western Europeans lived outside the city. If cities were very important for ancient Europe - they were independent and leading centers of life, the nature of which was predominantly municipal, and a person's belonging to a given city determined his civil rights, then in early medieval Europe cities did not play a big role.
Labor in agriculture was manual, which predetermined its low efficiency and the slow pace of the technical and economic revolution. The usual yield was sam-3, although the three-field replaced the two-field everywhere. They kept mainly small cattle - goats, sheep, pigs, and there were few horses and cows. The level of specialization was low. Each estate had almost all the vital 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. Domestic trade developed slowly and, in general, commodity-money relations were poorly developed. This type of economy - subsistence economy - thus dictated the predominant development of long-distance rather than near trade. Far (foreign) trade was focused exclusively on the upper strata of the population, and luxury goods were the main item of Western European imports. Silk, brocade, velvet, fine wines and exotic fruits, various spices, carpets, weapons, precious stones, pearls, ivory were brought to Europe from the East.
Industry existed in the form of domestic industry and handicrafts: artisans worked to order, since the domestic market was very limited.
Kingdom of the Franks. Empire of Charlemagne
In the 5th century AD in a significant part of Western Europe, formerly part of the Roman Empire, lived the Franks - warlike Germanic tribes, then divided into two large branches - coastal and coastal.
One of the leaders of the Franks was the legendary Merovei, who fought with Attila and became the ancestor of the Merovingian royal dynasty. However, the most prominent representative of this family was not Merovei himself, but the king of the Salic Franks Clovis, known as a brave warrior who managed to conquer vast areas in Gaul, as well as a prudent and far-sighted politician. In 496, Clovis accepted the rite of baptism, and with him three thousand of his warriors converted to the Christian faith. Conversion to Christianity, having provided Clovis with the support of the clergy and a significant part of the Galo-Roman population, greatly facilitated his further conquests. As a result of the numerous campaigns of Clovis, at the very beginning of the 6th century, the Frankish kingdom was created, covering almost all of the former Roman Gaul.
It was during the reign of King Clovis, at the beginning of the 6th century, that the beginning of the recording of the Salic truth, the ancient judicial customs of the Franks, dates back. This ancient code book is the most valuable reliable historical source about the life and customs of the Franks. Salic truth was divided into titles (chapters), and each title into paragraphs. It lists in detail the various cases and punishments for violation of laws and regulations.
The lower social levels were occupied by semi-free peasants and freedmen - slaves set free; below them were only slaves, however, not numerous. The bulk of the population was made up of communal peasants, personally free and enjoying fairly broad rights. Above them stood the servants of the nobility, who were in the service of the king - counts, combatants. This ruling elite was formed during the early Middle Ages from the tribal nobility, as well as from the environment of free wealthy peasants. In addition to them, ministers of the Christian church were in a privileged position, since Chlodkig was extremely interested in their support in strengthening royal power and thereby his own position.
Clovis, according to contemporaries, is a cunning, resolute, vengeful and treacherous man, capable of holding a grudge for years, and then swiftly and cruelly cracking down on enemies, by the end of his reign he achieved complete sole power, destroying all his rivals, including many his close relatives.
His descendants, at the head of the Frankish kingdom in the 6th - early 8th centuries, saw their task in continuing the line of Clovis. Trying, in order to strengthen their own positions, to enlist the support of the emerging and rapidly strengthening nobility, they actively distributed lands to their close ones for service. This led to the strengthening of many aristocratic families, and in parallel there was a weakening of the real power of the Merovingians. Some areas of the state openly declared their independence and unwillingness to submit further to the Merovingians. In this regard, the Merovingians received the nickname "lazy kings", and representatives of the rich, famous and powerful family of the Carolingians came to the fore. At the beginning of the 8th century The Carolingian dynasty replaced the Merovingian dynasty on the throne.
The first in the new dynasty was Karl Martell (Hammer), known for his brilliant military victories over the Arabs, in particular, in the battle of Poitiers (732). As a result of aggressive campaigns, he expanded the territory of the state and the tribes of the Saxons and Bavarians paid tribute to him. He was succeeded by his son, Pepin the Short, who, having imprisoned the last of the Merovingians in her monastery, turned to the Pope with the question, is it good that uncrowned kings rule in the kingdom? To which the pope replied that it was better to call the king of the one who has power, rather than the one who lives as a king, having no real royal power, and soon crowned Pepin the Short. Pepin knew how to be grateful: he conquered the Ravenna region in Italy and betrayed it to the pope, which was the beginning of the secular power of the papacy.
After the death of Pepin the Short in 768, the Crown passed to his son Charles, later called the Great - he was so active in military and administrative affairs and skillful in diplomacy. He organized 50 military campaigns, as a result of which he conquered and converted to Christianity the Saxons who lived from the Rhine to the Elbe, as well as the Lombards, Avars, and created a vast state, which in 800 was declared an empire by Pope Leo III.
The imperial court became the center of administration of the empire of Charlemagne. Twice a year, large landowners were invited to the royal palace to jointly discuss and resolve the most important current issues. The empire was divided into regions headed by counts (governors). The count collected royal duties, commanded the militia. To control their activities, Karl from time to time sent special officials to the region. Such was the content of the administrative reform.
Charlemagne also carried out a judicial reform, during which the elective positions of judges from the people were abolished, and the judges became state officials who received state salaries and were subordinate to the count - the head of the region.
Another major reform was the military. As a result, its peasants were completely exempted from military service, and since then the royal beneficiaries have been the main military force. The army of the king thus becomes professional.
Charlemagne became famous as a patron of the arts and sciences. The cultural flowering of the kingdom in his reign is referred to as the "Carolingian Renaissance". At the court of the king, an academy was created - a circle of theologians, historians, poets, who in their writings revived the ancient Latin canons. The influence of antiquity manifested itself both in the visual arts and in architecture. Schools were established in the kingdom, where they taught Latin, literacy, theology and literature.
The empire of Charlemagne was characterized by the extreme diversity of the ethnic composition of the population. In addition, its various areas were developed differently economically, politically, socially and culturally. The most developed were Provence, Aquitaine, Septimania; Bavaria, Saxony, and Thuringia lagged far behind them. There were no significant economic ties between the regions, and this became the main reason for the collapse of the empire shortly after the death of Charlemagne in 814.
The grandchildren of Charlemagne in 843 signed the Treaty of Verdun, according to which Lothair received a strip of land along the left bank of the Rhine (future Lorraine) and Northern Italy, lands to the east of the Rhine (future Germany) - Louis the German, lands to the west of the Rhine (future France) - Charles the Bald. The Treaty of Verdun was the beginning of the formation of France as an independent state.
France in IX-XI centuries
France of this period was a series of political independent possessions - counties and duchies, in the conditions of a subsistence economy, almost not interconnected either economically or politically. A complex hierarchy of feuds was established, vassalage ties took shape. A new political structure was formed - feudal fragmentation. The feudal lords, full masters of their possessions, took care of their expansion and strengthening by all means, were at enmity with each other, waging endless internecine wars. The most powerful fiefs were the duchies of Brittany, Normandy, Burgundy and Aquitaine, as well as the counties of Toulouse, Flanders, Anjou, Champagne and Poitou.
Although formally the kings of the Carolingian dynasty were at the head of France, in reality their power was very weak. The last of the Carolingians had almost no influence. In 987, there was a change in the royal dynasty, and Count Hugh Capet was elected king of France, giving rise to the royal dynasty of Capet.
Throughout the following century, the Capetians, however, just like their immediate predecessors - the last of the Carolingians - did not achieve power. Their real power was limited to the boundaries of their ancestral possessions - the royal domain, which bore the name of Ile-de-France. Its dimensions were not very large, but it was here that such large centers as Orleans and Paris were located, which contributed to the strengthening of the power of the Capetians. To achieve this goal, the first Capetians did not disdain many: one of them hired a rich Norman baron for money, and also somehow robbed Italian merchants passing through his possessions. The Capetians believed that all means were good if they led to an increase in their wealth, power and influence. So did other feudal lords who inhabited the Ile-de-France, and other areas of the kingdom. They, not wanting to submit to anyone's authority, increased their armed detachments and robbed on the high roads.
Formally, the king's vassals are required to perform military service, pay him a monetary contribution upon entering into an inheritance, and also obey the decisions of the king as the supreme arbiter in interfeudal disputes. In fact, the fulfillment of all these circumstances in the 9th - 10th centuries. entirely dependent on the will of powerful feudal lords.
The central place in the economy during this period was occupied by the feudal estate. The peasant community was subordinate to the feudal lord, became dependent. The main form of feudal rent was labor rent. The peasant, who ran his own household on the land of the feudal lord, had to work out the corvée. Peasants paid dues in kind. The feudal lord could annually take from each family a tax called talya. A smaller part of the peasantry were villans - personally free peasants who were in land dependence on the feudal lord. At the end of the 10th century, the lords received rights that bore the names of banalities, which meant the feudal lord's monopoly on grinding grain, baking bread, and squeezing grapes. The peasant was obliged to bake bread only in the master's oven, to grind grain only in the master's mill, and so on. And for all this, the peasant had to pay extra.
Thus, at the end of the early Middle Ages, feudal fragmentation is established in France, and it is a single kingdom in name only.
Germany in IX-XI centuries
In the 9th century, Germany included the duchies of Saxony, Thuringia, Franconia, Swabia and Bavaria, at the beginning of the 10th century Lorraine was annexed to them, at the beginning of the 11th century - the kingdom of Burgundy and Friesland. All these lands were very different from each other in ethnic composition, language and level of development.
However, in general, feudal relations in this country developed much more slowly than, for example, in France. This was a consequence of the fact that the territory of Germany was not part of the Roman Empire, and the influence of the Roman order, Roman culture on the development of its social system was insignificant. The process of attaching the peasants to the land was slow, which left its mark on the organization of the ruling class. Even by the beginning of the 10th century, feudal ownership of land was not fully formed here, and the judicial and military power of the feudal lords was at the first stage of its development. Thus, the feudal lords did not have the right to personally judge free peasants and could not deal with major criminal cases, such as murder and arson. In Germany at that time, a clear feudal hierarchy had not yet developed, just as the system of inheritance of higher positions, including counts, had not yet developed.
The central power in Germany was rather weak, but somewhat strengthened in those moments when the king led the military aggression of the feudal lords against neighboring countries. This was the case, for example, at the beginning of the 10th century, during the reign of Henry I the Fowler (919 - 936), the first representative of the Saxon dynasty, which ruled from 919 to 1024. The German lands then constituted one kingdom, which from the beginning of the 10th century began to be called Teutonic after one of the Germanic tribes - the Teutons.
Henry I began to wage wars of conquest against the Polabian Slavs, and forced the Czech prince Wenceslas I to recognize vassal dependence on Germany in 933. He defeated the Hungarians.
The successor of Henry the Fowler Otto I (936 - 973) continued this policy. The inhabitants of the conquered regions had to convert to Christianity and pay tribute to the victors. Rich Italy especially attracted Otto I and his knights - and in the middle of the 10th century they managed to capture Northern and partially Central Italy (Lombardy and Tuscany).
The capture of Italian lands allowed Otto I to be crowned in Rome, where the pope placed the imperial crown on him. The new empire of Otto I did not have a political center, and the numerous nationalities that inhabited it were at different stages of socio-economic and socio-political development. The most developed were the Italian lands. The dominance of the German emperors here was more nominal than real, but nevertheless the German feudal lords received significant land holdings and new incomes.
Otto I also tried to get the support of church feudal lords - bishops and abbots, giving them immunity rights, which went down in history as the distribution of "Ottonian privileges". Such a policy inevitably led to the strengthening of the positions of many feudal lords.
The power of the feudal lords was fully manifested under Henry III (1039 - 1056), a representative of the new Franconian (Salic) dynasty, and especially under his successor, Henry IV (1054 - 1106).
The young king Henry IV, supported by his courtiers - royal ministerials, decided to turn Saxony into a royal domain - his private possession. The Saxon feudal lords living there, dissatisfied with the expansion of the royal domain (and it was carried out by confiscating their
lands), conspired against Henry IV. It resulted in the Saxon uprising of 1073-1075, in which peasants also participated, both personally free and personally dependent. Henry IV was able to suppress this uprising, but the royal power as a result of it was greatly weakened.
Pope Gregory VII took advantage of this. He demanded that Henry IV stop the practice of the unauthorized appointment of bishops to episcopal chairs, accompanied by grants of land holdings to the fief, arguing that bishops and abbots throughout Western Europe, including Germany, can only be appointed by the pope himself or his envoys - legates. Henry IV refused to satisfy the demands of the pope, after which the synod, led by the pope, excommunicated the emperor from the church. In turn, Henry IV declared the pope deposed.
The German feudal lords were drawn into the conflict between the papacy and the emperor; most of them opposed the emperor. Henry IV was forced to undergo a public and humiliating procedure of repentance before the pope. He arrived at the residence of Gregory VII without an army in January 1077. According to chroniclers, for three days, standing in front of everyone in the clothes of a penitent sinner, barefoot and with his head uncovered, not taking food, he begged the pope to forgive him and lift his excommunication from the church. The excommunication was lifted, but the struggle continued. The balance of power was rapidly changing in favor of the pope, and the emperor lost his former unlimited right to appoint bishops and abbots at his own discretion.
England in 7th-11th centuries
In the first centuries of our era (until the 4th century), England, except for the northern part, was a province of the Roman Empire, inhabited mainly by the Britons - Celtic tribes; in the 5th century, the Germanic tribes of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes began to invade its territory from the north of the European continent. Despite stubborn resistance - the Britons fought for their land for more than 150 years - the victory was mainly on the side of the invaders. Only the western (Wales) and northern (Scotland) regions of Britain were able to defend their independence. As a result, at the beginning of the 7th century, several states were formed on the island: Kent, founded by the Jutes, Wessex, Sessex and Essex, founded by the Saxons, and East Anglia, Northumbria Mercia, founded by the Angles.
These were early feudal monarchies headed by kings, at the head of which the landowning nobility was grouped. The formation of state structures was accompanied by the Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons, which began in 597 and ended only in the second half of the 7th century.
The nature of public administration in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms changed significantly during the early Middle Ages. If at the beginning of this period all kinds of economic affairs, disputes between neighbors, litigation were resolved at a general meeting of all free residents of the community under the leadership of an elected headman, then with the development of feudal relations, elected leaders are replaced by royal officials - representatives of the central government; priests and wealthy peasants also participate in the administration. The popular assemblies of the Anglo-Saxons, beginning in the ninth century, became the assemblies of the counties. At the head of the counties - large administrative districts - were special rulers - gerefs; besides them, the most noble and powerful people of the county, who owned large estates, as well as bishops and abbots, took part in the administration.
New changes in the organization and management of society were associated with the unification of the early feudal kingdoms and the formation in 829 of a single state of the Anglo-Saxons, which from that time was called England.
In the united kingdom, under the king, a special advisory body was formed - the Council of the Wise - Witenagemot. Its members took part in the discussion of all state problems, and all important matters were henceforth decided by the king only with his consent. The Witenagemot thus limited the power of the king. People's assemblies no longer met.
The need for unification and the creation of a single state was dictated by the fact that already from the end of the 8th century, the territory of England was subjected to constant raids by warlike Scandinavians, who ravaged the graying of the islanders and tried to establish their own. The Scandinavians (who entered English history as "Danes" because they attacked mainly from Denmark) were able to conquer the northeast, and established their own rules there: this territory, called Danlo, is known as the area of \u200b\u200b"Danish law".
The English king Alfred the Great, ruling in 871 - 899, after a series of military failures, managed to strengthen the English army, erected border fortifications and built a large fleet. In 875 and 878 he stopped the onslaught of the Normans and concluded an agreement with them, as a result of which the whole country was divided into two parts: the northeastern lands went to the conquerors, and the southwestern ones remained with the British. However, in reality there was no strict division: the Scandinavians, ethnically close to the population of England, easily mixed with the locals as a result of marriages.
Alfred reorganized the administration, introducing strict accounting and distribution of resources, opened schools for children, under him the beginning of writing in English was laid - the compilation of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
A new stage of Danish conquests occurred at the turn of the 10th - 11th centuries, when the Danish kings subjugated the entire territory of the island. One of the kings, Knut the Great (1017 - 1035) was even the king of England, Denmark and Norway at the same time, part of Sweden also obeyed him. Knut considered England, not Denmark, to be the center of his power, and therefore adopted English customs and respected local laws. But this state association was fragile and fell apart immediately after his death.
Since 1042, the old Anglo-Saxon dynasty reigned on the English throne again, and Edward the Confessor (1042 - 1066) became king of England. The period of his reign was relatively calm for England in terms of external danger and unstable in terms of domestic politics. This was due to the fact that Edward the Confessor was related to one of the Norman dukes, which provided him with protection from the devastating raids of the Scandinavians and even their support. However, his desire to rely on the Norman feudal lords irritated the local Anglo-Saxon nobility. An uprising was organized against him, in which the peasants also took part. The result was the actual removal in 1053 of Edward the Confessor from government. In 1066 he died.
According to his will, the English throne was to pass to the Duke of Normandy William, his relative. However, Witenagemot, who, deciding the issue of succession, had to approve the will of the king, opposed. He chose as king not the Norman William, but Harold, the Anglo-Saxon. William's claim to the English throne served as a pretext for a new Scandinavian campaign in England. The conquest of England by the Norman feudal lords in the second half of the 11th century would be a turning point in its medieval history.
Byzantium
In the V - VI centuries. The Eastern Roman Empire - Byzantium - was a major power, rich and strong, playing an important role in international affairs, which is reflected in its name - the Byzantine Empire.
Its trade and diplomatic relations with Iran, Arabia, Ethiopia, Italy, Spain and other countries were active. The most important trade routes between East and West went through Byzantium, but Byzantium was not limited to performing only the functions of an international transit country. Already in the early Middle Ages, commodity production developed here on a large scale. The centers of textile craft were Phenicia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt. Artisans made magnificent silk, woolen and linen fabrics, these places were also famous for making exquisite glassware and unusual jewelry, high metalworking techniques.
Byzantium had many prosperous cities. In addition to Constantinople - the capital of Byzantium - major centers were Antioch in Syria, Alexandria in Egypt, Nicaea in Asia Minor, Corinth and Thessaloniki in the European part of the Roman Empire.
The richest Byzantine lands also served as a tasty morsel for the conquerors. By the middle of the 7th century, the territory of Byzantium was greatly reduced: almost twice as compared with the 6th century. A number of eastern provinces - Syria, Egypt, Palestine, upper Mesopotamia were captured by the Arabs, Spain - by the Visigoths, Armenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia became independent. Byzantium left only small territories in Asia Minor, part of the Balkan Peninsula, some lands in southern Italy (Ravenna) and Sicily. The ethnic composition of the empire also changed significantly, and the Slavs played an increasingly important role in ethnogenesis.
The loss of rich provinces, especially Syria, Palestine and Egypt, had the most negative impact on the economy of Byzantium, and this led to a significant reduction in foreign trade relations with the peoples of the East. Trade with the peoples of Europe came to the fore, especially with the Slavic countries - Bulgaria, Serbian lands, Russia. An active commodity exchange was also established between Byzantium and the countries of Transcaucasia - Georgia and Armenia.
In general, throughout the entire period of the early Middle Ages, the foreign policy position of the empire was never stable. At the end of the 7th - 9th centuries. Byzantium waged heavy defensive wars, among its most dangerous opponents were the Arabs.
In the 70s. In the 7th century, when the Arabs besieged Constantinople, the Byzantines first used a new and very effective weapon - "Greek fire" - a combustible composition of oil, which has the ability to heat on water. The secret of its manufacture was carefully guarded and its use brought victory to the Byzantine troops for many centuries. The Arabs were then thrown back from the capital, but were able to conquer all the Byzantine possessions in Africa. In the ninth century they captured the island of Crete and part of Sicily.
Bulgaria, formed as a state at the end of the 7th century, in the 9th century. becomes a dangerous rival of Byzantium in the Balkans. The situation was aggravated by the constant confrontation between Byzantium and the Slavs, from which, however, Byzantium often emerged victorious. At the end of the X century. Byzantine Emperor Basil II the Bulgar-Slayer (963 - 1025) gained the upper hand in a protracted 40-year war and conquered Bulgaria for a while. However, after his death, from the second quarter of the 11th century, the foreign policy position of Byzantium was shaken again. A new and formidable enemy appeared in the East - the Seljuk graters. The Russians stepped up their pressure. The inevitable result of wars was the ruin of lands, the undermining of trade and crafts, and the naturalization of the economy. However, gradually ruined cities and villages were rebuilt and economic life improved.
In the IX - X centuries. Byzantium experienced an economic boom. There were many centers of handicraft production. Craft developed especially intensively in Greece and Asia Minor. So, Corinth and Thebes were famous for the production of silk fabrics, ceramic and glass products. In the coastal cities of Asia Minor, the manufacture of weapons reached perfection. The wealthy Constantinople was the center of luxury goods production.
The economic life of artisans was regulated and controlled by the state. It set prices, regulated the volume of production, special government officials monitored the quality of products.
In addition to professional artisans, some crafts, such as weaving, leather and pottery, were also practiced by peasants.
Peasants made up the majority of the empire's population. In the V - IX centuries. they were mostly free people. From the 8th century their position was determined by the "Land Owner's Law", a collection of legislative decrees.
Free landowners were united in neighboring communities, the lands in the community were privately owned by community members. However, the rights of the peasants to their land were not complete. So, they could only rent or exchange their plots, but not sell them, since the peasant community became the supreme owner of the land over them.
Peasants carried various state duties. The duties of some villages included the supply of food to the imperial palace, others were supposed to harvest timber and coal. All peasants paid a court fee.
Gradually, a layer of wealthy peasants is formed within the community. They managed to expand their possessions at the expense of the lands of the poor. The landless poor are increasingly employed by wealthy families as domestic servants and shepherds. Their position was very close to that of slaves.
The worsening situation of the peasants led to numerous popular unrest, the most massive of which was the movement in Asia Minor in 932, headed by the warrior Basil the Copper Hand (he lost his arm and a copper prosthesis was made for him). The troops of Emperor Roman Lecapenus managed to defeat the rebels, and Basil the Copper Hand was burned on one of the squares of the capital.
Thus, the state, distributing land to the feudal lords, contributed to the growth of the power of the landowning nobility. Land magnates, having received economic independence, began to strive for political independence. In the X - XI centuries. the emperors of the Macedonian dynasty, ruling in Byzantium from 867 to 1056, Roman Lecapinus and Basil II (976 - 1025) adopted a series of laws aimed at limiting the power of large feudal lords. However, these laws were not very successful.
Byzantium during the early Middle Ages was characterized by the preservation of a centralized system of state administration. The peculiarity of the administrative-territorial structure of the empire was that the country was divided into military districts - themes. At the head of the theme was a strategist - the commander of the theme army. Stratig united in his hands the military and the highest civil power.
The theme system contributed to the strengthening of the army and navy of the empire and, in general, increased the country's defense capability. The theme army consisted mainly of stratiot warriors - former free peasants who received additional land plots from the state and had to do military service for this.
At the beginning of the 8th century, when due to the difficult foreign policy situation of the empire, the government once again faced the urgent task of increasing the number of soldiers, its eyes turned to the huge land holdings of churches and monasteries.
The struggle for land was reflected in the so-called iconoclastic movement, which lasted throughout the 8th - 9th centuries. Its beginning dates back to 726, when Emperor Leo III issued an edict forbidding the veneration of icons. The emperor's iconoclasm was aimed at the reform of Christianity, partly caused by the heavy defeats suffered by Byzantium in the struggle against the "infidels", the Arab conquerors. The emperor saw the reasons for the defeat in the fact that the peasants, honoring the holy icons, turned away from the prohibition of Moses to worship man-made images. The party of iconoclasts, led by the emperors themselves, consisted of representatives of the military service nobility, stratiot warriors, and a significant part of the peasant and artisan population of the country.
Their opponents made up the party of iconodules. Basically, it was monasticism and the highest clergy of the country, supported by a part of the common people, mainly in the European regions of the empire.
The leader of the icon worshipers, John of Damascus, taught that the holy icon, which is looked at during prayer, creates a mysterious connection between the person praying and the one depicted on it.
The struggle between iconoclasts and iconodules flared up with particular force during the reign of Emperor Constantine V (741-755). Under him, speculation of church and monastery lands began, in a number of places monasteries, both male and female, were sold along with utensils, and monks were even forced to marry. In 753, a church council convened on the initiative of Constantine V condemned icon veneration. However, under Empress Theodora in 843, icon veneration was restored, but most of the confiscated lands remained in the hands of the military nobility.
The church in Byzantium, therefore, to a greater extent than in the West, was subordinate to the state. The welfare of the priests depended on the disposition of the emperors. Only at the end of the early Middle Ages, voluntary donations to the church turned into a permanent and state-approved tax, imposed on the entire population.
Conclusion
The Western European Middle Ages has always attracted the close attention of scientists, but so far no single assessment has been developed for this period. So, some historians consider it as a time of decline, regression compared to the period of antiquity; others, on the contrary, believe that the Middle Ages were a new, higher stage in the development of human society. However, all researchers equally agree that the Middle Ages, which covered more than a thousand-year period of time, was heterogeneous in terms of the main socio-economic, socio-political and cultural processes then taking place. In accordance with their specificity, three stages are distinguished in the Western European Middle Ages. The first one is the early Middle Ages (5th - 10th centuries), when the basic structures of the early feudal society were being formed. The second stage - the classical Middle Ages (XI - XV centuries), the time of maximum development of medieval feudal institutions. The third stage - the late Middle Ages (XVI - XVII centuries) - the period when capitalist society begins to take shape within the framework of the feudal society.
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Renaissance thinkers called the "Middle Ages" in the development of European culture the time of general decline, which fell on the period between brilliant Antiquity and the talented Renaissance. In fact, the culture of the early Middle Ages (V-IX centuries) was a complex and multifaceted phenomenon. It has become a new stage in the development of European consciousness and spiritual life.
The transition to the Middle Ages from Antiquity was due to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and the collapse of ancient culture, and the formation of a new culture took place in the context of a dramatic clash of two completely different cultures - ancient (Roman) and barbarian (Germanic). No less important factor than the two mentioned was the growing influence of Christianity, which became the integrating principle of a single, integral culture of a new level.
Culture in the early Middle Ages is a unique mixture of different cultures, which occurred as a result of a very controversial synthesis of the ancient heritage with young barbarian ideas, which occurred under the influence of Christianity. It was it that became the dominant culture of this period, the basis of a new worldview, attitude and worldview of people.
Spiritual life is always based on material life. In the early Middle Ages, the social basis of culture consisted of the following features:
- alienation of the peasant from the land;
- conditionality of the rights of feudal lords to land property (vassal system);
- feudal hierarchy, excluding the existence of full private property.
In such conditions, two sociocultural poles were formed - the feudal lords and the peasants dependent on them. This led to the emergence of an intellectual and spiritual elite that was diametrically different from the "silent majority" of the illiterate common people. The features of economic life that the early Middle Ages had had a significant impact on the formation of culture.
This period for Europe is special. It was at this time that the tasks that determined the future of European civilization were solved. In ancient times, "Europe" did not exist as a cultural-historical community. It began to form only at this time.
The early Middle Ages did not give the world great achievements, but it was this period that laid the foundation for the culture of Europe proper. Therefore, its value can be compared with the heights of ancient culture.
The most striking phenomena in the cultural life of the 5th-7th centuries are associated with the assimilation of the ancient heritage, which was especially lively in Italy and Spain. Theology and rhetorical culture are developing rapidly. But already from the second half of the 7th century, Western European culture was in decline. She huddles in monasteries, guarded only by monks.
The early Middle Ages is the time of the creation of the first written "Histories" of the barbarians. The abolition of slavery contributed to the more rapid development of technical inventions. Already in the 6th century, the use of water energy began.
It is almost impossible to recreate the cultural life of the barbarian tribes. It is generally accepted that by the time of the Great Migration, the Barbarians had already begun to take shape, they brought a new view of the perception of the world, based on primitive power, ancestral ties, militant energy, unity with nature and the inseparability of people from the gods.
The early Middle Ages was the beginning of the growth of the self-consciousness of the barbarian peoples. The philosophy of this time gravitates towards universalism. Spirit prevails over matter, God - over the world.
Oral poetry develops, especially in England.
A special phenomenon of culture was acting. Glory enjoyed troubadours - poets who performed their own poems to musical accompaniment.
The rhythm of society favors the peasantry, which, despite being ignored by the ruling class, in a certain sense dominated the Church was not hostile to the peasants, considering poverty an ideal state. The schools of Europe were in the hands of the church, but the level of education was minimal.
Europe arises in the Middle Ages, the countdown of which begins with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and the formation of the so-called "barbarian" kingdoms on its territory.
There are three periods of the Middle Ages:
1. Early Middle Ages (V-XI centuries) - the period of the formation of European civilization as a synthesis of late antique and barbarian social structures.
2. The classical Middle Ages (XI-XV centuries) - the period when Europe becomes the center of culture and breaks ahead in comparison with the East in terms of the level and pace of socio-economic and political development.
3. Late Middle Ages (XVI-XVII centuries) - the period of the crisis of feudalism and the formation of bourgeois society.
The period of public charity covers two periods of the Middle Ages - early and classical.
The medieval West was born on ruins ancient rome , which has been experiencing since the II century. acute domestic political crisis, the features of which are:
1. Decomposition of the slave-owning social system.
2. Crisis of ideology.
3. Refusal of new military campaigns in order to expand the territory of the state and the collapse of a single empire in 395 into the Western (centered in Rome) and Eastern (centered in Constantinople) Roman Empires.
The consequence of the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and the invasions of the barbarians was the onset of the so-called "Dark Ages" (V-VII centuries):
· General quantitative and qualitative regress both in economic and political terms;
oblivion of the achievements of Roman classical law; the decline of the system of government and power;
Loss of stone processing skills as a building material.
By the VIII-IX centuries. the process of formation of Western European civilization begins with the birth of a new feudal order:
· Establishment of relations of vassalage among the ruling class of feudal lords. Formation of a land feud (seigneuries - for counts; estates - for knights).
· Enslavement of the peasantry.
· Growth of the influence and role of the Christian church. From the end of the 4th century the Christian church is gradually strengthening its position, turning into a "state within a state."
The main functions of the church:
1) religious;
2) political (negotiations with barbarians);
3) economic (distribution of food and alms);
4) social (protection of the weak and disadvantaged);
5) military (organization of resistance to barbarian raids);
6) cultural and educational (preservation of the Roman heritage, Latin literacy, Roman law, etc.).
It is the church that becomes the main center of charity and charity in the period of early and. classical medieval. A large role in the life of the Christian church was played by monastic orders - communities of people who voluntarily doom themselves to celibacy. and renunciation of all the blessings of the world. As a special institution, Christian monasticism appeared only in the 4th century.
Classical Middle Ages (XI-XV centuries)
A characteristic feature of this period was the so-called agrarian revolution and the formation of national European states.
The glorification of poverty became the basis for religious literary monuments of the early Middle Ages.
The program of the church in this regard was actually reduced to the demand for alms in favor of the poor. They did not even think about ways to end poverty - alms were supposed to perpetuate it, since it inclined the poor to remain in the position of dependents, feeding on the crumbs given to wealthy people.
The beggar acted as a means to "self-purification".
Assistance institutions:
· a shelter for the elderly, a hospital, a hospice and almshouses for the weak and crippled.
· The first monastic hospitals were distinguished by an extremely low level of treatment and care for sick people: the medical training of the monks was insufficient, and the treatment of "fasting and prayer" rarely reached its goal. During periods of epidemics, hospitals built in the absence of sanitary and hygienic knowledge, with crowded patients, turned into hotbeds of contagious diseases.
· The homeless have also become an object of concern for the Catholic Church. A special shelter was opened, called the "House of the Lord", where both monks and volunteers from the townspeople worked.
Thus, in the early Middle Ages, the church had the social function of maintaining peace and balance in society, by means of keeping the poor in churches to demanding alms in favor of the poor, the need for atonement for sins.
The economy of the Medieval West was intended to provide people with a livelihood, acquiring the character of simple reproduction. She didn't go beyond that.
The economic goal of the medieval West was to create the necessary, subsistence, and the obligation to give alms to the poor is also included in the category of the necessary. In the same way, peasants work hard in the fields in order to acquire food, clothing and other necessary things, they must give tithes and alms.
Created; society, the constituent parts of which carried strictly defined functions:
The secular aristocracy was obliged to maintain a decent lifestyle, spending their surpluses on gifts and alms;
The clergy spent part of their wealth on luxury, the construction and decoration of churches, on the organization of magnificent liturgies, using the rest to support the poor poor;
The peasantry was reduced to a minimum standard of living due to the collection of a part of its product by the lords in the form of feudal rent and the church in the form of tithes, but also obliged to do alms for the benefit of the poor.
The medieval West is above all a universe of hunger, tormented by the fear of hunger and too often by hunger itself.
Up to the XIII century. every 3-5 years, crop failure regularly caused famine.
Reasons for hunger:
1. The weakness of medieval technology and economics.
2. Lack or loss of skills and abilities to store products for a long time.
3. The impotence of state power.
4. A lot of customs barriers - fees and duties on the ways of moving goods.
5. Underdevelopment of transport infrastructure.
Starting from the 11th century, large secular and especially ecclesiastical lords, sovereigns, as well as cities created reserves and, in times of crop shortage or famine, carried out an extraordinary distribution of these reserves or even tried to import food.
The open system of charity includes such measures as the distribution of alms to the poor and the feeding of the poor, the closed system - measures to prevent grain speculation, to improve crop rotation.
One of the strict concerns of the church in lean years was the obligation to feed the hungry, clothe them and provide temporary shelter. Every major abbey had almsgiving and hospitality services, as well as two special officers who carried out these obediences.
Do not remain alien to the affairs of charity and private individuals.
The medieval world is a world constantly on the brink of starvation, malnourished and eating bad food. This is the root of epidemics caused by the consumption of unsuitable foodstuffs.
Infant and child mortality did not spare even the royal families.
Among the most common diseases stood out: tuberculosis, gangrene, scabies, tumors, eczema, erysipelas. Diseases caused by beriberi, as well as deformities and nervous diseases.
The fever disease was replaced by a no less terrible epidemic of another disease - leprosy (or leprosy), the cause of which in Europe is considered to be communication with foci of infection in the East that began as a result of the Crusades. Leprosy doomed a person to a slow, painful death through the gradual death of organs, the doomed person died over several years. The consequence of the spread of leprosy was the appearance of special isolation wards for the sick - leper colonies, organized by the Catholic Church specially established for the care of lepers by the Order of St. Lazarus (hence the infirmaries). In total in Western Europe in the XIII century. there were at least 19 thousand leper colonies for patients with leprosy.
Finally, the III Lateran Cathedral of 1179, having allowed the construction of chapels and cemeteries on the territory of leper colonies, thereby predetermined their transformation into closed worlds, from which the sick could only leave, having previously cleared their way with the noise of rattles, horns or bells. Head of the Order of St. Lazarus could also be elected only as a patient with leprosy. Lepers were also forbidden to visit mills, bakeries, bakeries, wells and springs (that is, places where food is made and sold and sources of drinking water).
Medieval society needed these people: they were suppressed because they were dangerous, but at the same time they were not let out of sight; even in the care shown, one felt a conscious desire to mystically transfer to them all the evil that society tried in vain to get rid of. Leprosariums were arranged, although outside the city wall, but not far from it.
Outcasts of medieval society easily became victims in the years of epidemics and national disasters. Lepers were persecuted throughout France, suspected of poisoning wells and springs.
The wretched and crippled were also among the outcasts. Deformity was an external sign of sinfulness, and those who were stricken with physical ailments were cursed by God, and therefore by people. The church could temporarily receive them in its hospitals and feed them on holidays, and the rest of the time the poor could only beg and wander. It is no coincidence that the words "poor", "sick", "stray" were synonymous. The hospitals themselves were most often located near bridges, on passes, that is, in places where these wanderers necessarily passed.
In the middle of the XIV century. an even more terrible epidemic disease came to Europe, putting the Western world on the verge of life and death - the plague.
In the conditions of recurring epidemics, it is the monasteries that turn into centers for the distribution of alms. The distribution of alms was made on certain days, which were well known in the district, so the beggars traveled considerable distances from one city to another. It is no coincidence that in this connection the emergence of professional brotherhoods of beggars was noted.
Church charity:
1) distribution of alms;
2) constant assistance to those in need through the establishment of monastic hospitals;
3) monastic hospitals provided lodging for needy pilgrims;
4) "pious banks" provided assistance to the poor against the harassment of usurers;
5) religious brotherhoods supported the infirm poor;
6) the parish authorities tried to support those in need.
In the XV century. the practice of concentrating aid at monasteries became widespread in most European states.
At the same time, charity also played a negative role here: abundant alms had a demoralizing effect and aroused to idleness. It is no coincidence that in connection with this, the first attempts to establish secular control over the activities of hospitals are noted, while joining efforts with the spiritual authorities. At the end of the XIV century. A special commission was created, which included both clergy and secular persons, the purpose of which was to study the situation in the city, conduct a census of the poor and "sick" poor and arrange rooms for them in hospitals.
At the same time, frequent epidemics, which brought about a demographic catastrophe, led to a gradual change in attitude towards the poor. Already in the second half of the XIII century. writings appear with the first attacks against healthy beggars.
There are attempts to regulate assistance to those in need. Periodic censuses of local beggars are introduced, non-permanent beggars (“strangers”) were supposed to stay in the city for no more than three days. They were required to pay the same taxes as the rest of the workers.
Plague epidemics also marked the beginning of the formation of sanitary legislation and urban sanitation.
People expelled from society replenished the number of vagabonds, becoming either professional beggars or bandits.
The medieval world was far from those feelings of mercy and compassion for one's neighbor, which were preached by the Christian Church. The idealization of beggary did not at all imply philanthropy, and the attitude towards terminally ill people bordered on feelings of fear and disgust. The Western world itself was on the verge of life and death, and the progress of European civilization was largely dictated by the need for survival.
Late Middle Ages (XVI-XVII centuries)
The crisis of feudalism and the formation of bourgeois society. The formation of the state system of charity.
In the XIV-XVI centuries. European civilization is entering a new stage of development, the main features of which are:
1) the destruction of the local isolation of states and the establishment of interstate relations;
2) the weakening of the dictates of traditions and the increase in the activity of an individual;
3) the triumph of rationalism and the secularization of consciousness.
Classic Middle Ages. In the XIV-XV centuries. account for Renaissance :
humanization and individualization of public consciousness;
approval of market relations;
High social activity and blurring of class boundaries;
The desire to understand and improve the principles of the device.
From the beginning of the XVI century. within the Catholic Church there was a "reformation", which gave rise to Protestantism.
Protestantism was based on the following ideas:
liberation of the sphere of production from religious pressure;
· spiritual sanction for profit as the goal of human economic activity;
the uselessness of intermediaries between man and God;
Recognition of faith, and not strict observance of rites, as a means to the salvation of the soul.
Protestantism won in England, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, Switzerland, pushing these countries onto the path of bourgeois development, while Catholicism gained a foothold in Spain, Italy, Poland, the Czech Republic, ultimately slowing down the pace of economic and political development of these countries.
The most important results of the development of Western European countries were:
1. Creation of absolute monarchies.
2. The process of initial accumulation of capital and modernization.
3. The formation of a new type of person with new criteria of values:
At the end of the Middle Ages, the church and monastery system of charity becomes less and less regulated, crowds of professional beggars appear. The situation was worsened by epidemics of bubonic plague, which exacerbated social problems. The church could no longer independently engage in charity work. There was a need to create a new system of charity, legally regulated by the state.
Late Middle Ages (XVI-XVII centuries)The crisis of communal charity in Europe and the "witch hunt". XVI-XVII centuries became the period of the "witch hunt".
The ideological basis for the witch hunt was the attitudes that prevailed in the period of the early and classical Middle Ages, about the struggle between God and the devil, saints and sorcerers.
Many prosecutions of witches began under pressure from the local population, which demanded reprisals against the "culprits" of the disasters that befell it: loss of livestock, crop failure, sudden frosts, death of a child.
The sources that initiated the "witch hunt" include the following:
1) Uncertainty of the peasantry in the future.
2) Fear of death and afterlife torment.
3) Transformation of the image of Satan and his minions.
4) Reform of the court and criminal law.
Late Middle Ages XVI-XVII centuries. The position of outcasts of society (venereal patients, madmen and beggars).
The period of the classical Middle Ages saw the scope of epidemics of leprosy, which struck in the XII-XIV centuries. at least 300-400 thousand people. However, since the fifteenth century leper colonies fall into disrepair; in the 16th century
By the beginning of the XVI century. leper colonies have become the richest owners. Royal power in France throughout the sixteenth century. tried to take control of those huge wealth, which was the land holdings and real estate of leper colonies, and to redistribute them:
· "all the funds received from this search, for the maintenance of noblemen who fell into need and crippled soldiers";
to buy food for the poor.
The problem of leper colonies was not settled in France until the end of the 17th century. In 1672, Ludwig XIV gave the Order of St. Lazarus and the Carmelites the property of all spiritual and knightly orders and entrusted them with the management of all the leper colonies of the kingdom.
The property of leper colonies was taken over by other hospitals and charitable institutions. In Paris, the property was transferred to the General Hospital; in Toulouse - a hospital for the terminally ill.
Leper colonies were empty in England as well. The funds belonging to these institutions were transferred to the needs of the poor.
The retreat of leprosy, only more slowly, was also observed in Germany; the functions of leper colonies changed in exactly the same way.
The disappearance of leprosy was not the merit of the then medicine, it happened for two main reasons:
due to the isolation of patients;
due to the termination of contacts with the eastern foci of infection after the end of the crusades.
The role of the leper will be taken on by the poor, vagrants, venereal patients, criminals and "injured in mind".
Leprosy passed the baton to venereal diseases, the outbreak of which became one of the negative consequences of the Age of Discovery.
Venerikov is isolated from society, but at the same time they are trying to treat.
The main distributors of venereal diseases were prostitutes and men who resorted to their services.
Attitudes towards prostitution were often ambivalent:
· the Christian church, stigmatizing prostitutes, accepts them as a necessary evil: “Destroy prostitutes and society will wallow in debauchery”;
· from time to time, measures were taken to combat prostitution: "... expel prostitutes from Paris, destroy all the hot spots in the capital ..."
The danger of the spread of venereal diseases led in the 16th century. to tighten measures to combat street prostitution through the organization of brothels (brothels). The latter were usually located near or on the other side of the city gates (outside the city limits).
By the beginning of the 17th century, the problem of venereal diseases had faded into the background, both due to the isolation of patients, and due to the methods used for their treatment and prevention. The main problem soon becomes an even more complex phenomenon - insanity.
On the one hand, the insane were driven out of the cities: the cities, at the first opportunity, drove the insane out of their walls; and they wandered through remote villages
Already in the XIII century. the first attempts were made to single out different categories of lunatics: "violent" or "violent", who needed care, or rather, imprisonment in special hospitals; "melancholics", whose ailments were also of physical origin, who needed a priest rather than a doctor; "possessed", whom only an "exorcist" (specialist in exorcism) could free from the disease. At the beginning of the XIV century. in English law, the principle was established that "the feeble-minded or insane is not responsible for the crime."
The insane were placed in hospitals specially designed for this purpose. In some medieval cities, the existence of special deductions for the needs of the insane or donations in their favor was even noted.
To "cure" the insane, the same well-known "great medicines" were used: bloodletting, gastric lavage and emetics. Hospitals for the violently insane appeared in other cities of Europe.
During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries undergoes major changes and attitudes towards begging. In the XV century. the practice of selling indulgences - documents of remission of sins.
Under such conditions, the beggar acquired a new look in Europe, unknown in the early and classical Middle Ages. The Renaissance deprived him of the mystical halo of righteousness: Poverty lost its absolute meaning, and Mercy lost the value that the help of Poverty gave it.
Vagrancy and begging violated the distribution of social roles, creating zones free from police supervision, generating discontent among the townsfolk and threatening public order.
In a papal edict of 1561, it was forbidden to beg in the streets under threat of punishment, expulsion, or being sent to the galleys. The policy of repression was combined with efforts to reorganize social assistance aimed at supporting the sick and infirm. All the beggars, vagabonds and persons with no specific occupation were gathered in one place and divided into categories: the sick were sent to hospitals, those who were recognized as able-bodied were given work. There was a desire to isolate the poor from society by creating a kind of poverty zones (like ghettos in areas of isolated residence of Jews).
The policy of isolating the poor allowed the creation, under the auspices of the Brotherhood of the Holy Spirit, of a special hospital, which played the role of both a refuge and a workhouse for healthy beggars.
Under Innocent XII (1691-1700), it was forbidden both to ask for alms and to give them. A census was conducted and a list of the poor was compiled, the beggars were escorted under armed escort to an orphanage. There they received work depending on their state of health: weaving, sewing shoes and clothes, or dressing leather. Under the successors of Innocent, similar shelters were set up for orphans and the elderly. However, the implementation of the projects was constantly faced with a lack of funds and administrative difficulties.
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