Page 309 - Western Civilization A Brief History, Volume I To 1715 9th - Jackson J. Spielvogel

of medieval civilization. At midcentury, one of the most destructive natural disasters in history erupted—the Black Death, a devastating plague that wiped out at least one-third of the European population, with even higher mortality rates in urban
areas. Reactions varied. Some escaped into alcohol, sex, and crime. Others, such as the flagellants, believing the Black Death to be a punishment from God, attempted to atone for peoples’ sins through self-inflicted pain. In many areas, the Jews became scapegoats. Economic crises and social upheavals, including a decline in trade and industry, bank failures, and peasant revolts pitting the lower classes against the upper classes, followed in the wake of the Black Death.
Political stability also declined, especially during the Hundred Years’ War, a long, drawn-out conflict between the English and the French. Armored knights on horseback formed the backbone of medieval armies, but English peasants using the longbow began to change the face of war. After numerous defeats, the French cause was saved by Joan of Arc, a young peasant woman whose leadership inspired the French, who also began to rely on cannons and were victorious by 1453.
CHAPTER TIMELINE
The Catholic Church, too,
experienced a crisis. The con-
frontation between Pope Boni-
face VIII and Philip IV of
France led to a loss of papal
power and the removal of the
papacy to Avignon on France’s
border in 1305. The absence
of the popes from Rome created a new crisis, but the return of the papacy to Rome in 1377 only led to new problems. The Great Schism witnessed the spectacle of two competing popes con- demning each other as the Antichrist. A new conciliar movement based on the belief that church councils, not popes, should rule the church finally ended the Great Schism in 1417.
All of these crises seemed to overpower Europeans in this calam- itous fourteenth century. Not surprisingly, much of the art of the period depicted the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse described in the New Testament Book of Revelation: Death, Famine, Pestilence, and War. No doubt, to some people, the last days of the world appeared to be at hand. European society, however, proved remark- ably resilient. Already in the fourteenth century new ideas and practices were beginning to emerge, as often happens in periods of crisis. As we shall see in the next chapter, the pace of change began to quicken as Europe experienced a rebirth of classical culture that some historians have called the Renaissance.
1300
Popes at Avignon
1325
Hundred Years’ War
1350
Golden Bull in Germany
1375 1400
(truce 1396–1415)
1425
1450
Battle of Agincourt
Black Death in Europe
Peasant revolts in France
Giovanni di Dondi’s clock
The Great Schism
Peasant revolt in England
Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales
Joan of Arc inspires the French
Work of Giotto
Dante, Divine Comedy
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Chapter Summary • 271