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The Middle Ages, which lasted from the fall of Rome in the late 5th century until the 14th century, are often referred to as the “Dark Ages” due to the relative lack of scientific, artistic, and economic progress made during this long period. The Middle Ages were presided over by the Catholic Church, which preached the denial of worldly pleasures and discouraged self-expression. During this time, Europe was defined by feudalism, a hierarchical system based on social class, with lords at the top and peasants at the bottom. Under this system, Europe was divided into a large number of scattered, self-sufficient feudal units, each made up of a lord, his subservient vassals, and impoverished, near-enslaved serfs. These feudal lords were constantly at war during the Early Middle Ages, seeking to both to defend and expand their current territory.
However, during the later Middle Ages, the power of the Church declined as monarchies consolidated feudal manors into powerful city- and nation-states that challenged the Church in matters of tax collection and legal jurisdiction. With the monarchies came the money economy, and feudal lords concentrated less upon defending their lands and more upon acquiring large quantities of cash to raise their standard of living and participate in the growing market economy. The practice of serfdom declined, and former serfs soon became either tenant farmers or landowners. As the trade of agricultural and manufactured goods grew in importance, so did. Strategically located and wealthy cities became populous and modernized, by Medieval standards.
Because of the simultaneous decline of traditional values and the rise of the market economy, the cities of Italy gave birth to the Renaissance. In the Middle Ages, religious salvation after death was of the utmost importance, but during the Renaissance, this ideal was replaced with humanism, which stressed the need for individuals to reach their greatest potentials in life. This moral change accompanied a larger political and economic change, with the rise of strong central governments and an increasingly urban economy that was based on commerce, not agriculture.
The cultural influence of the Italian Renaissance is still felt today. Though it was over by the mid-16th century, the ideas of Italian Renaissance thinkers traveled over the Alps to northern Europe, which saw a similar revival in art and learning. The art and literature produced in Italy between 1350 and 1550 had a profound impact on the development of Europe during the next centuries and continue to be considered some of the greatest works ever created, due to both the sheer volume of work produced and the talent of Renaissance artists and writers.
Perhaps the greatest immediate impact of the Renaissance was the Reformation, beginning in 1517. Although the arguments of the Protestant reformers were already centuries old, it was the Renaissance that created the climate of passion and intellectualism necessary to challenge age-old values. During the Renaissance, popes behaved more like princes than religious leaders as they attempted to compete with the gilded city-states around them, falling into corruption on more than one occasion. The sale of indulgences, which promised pardons for sins in the afterlife, pushed the reformers over the edge and into protest. Humanism weakened the church’s influence as well, as scholars used ancient history and documents to prove many of the Church’s doctrinal claims to be false. The result was a movement that shook the foundations of all of Europe and created a split in Christianity that remains a potent source of conflict even today.
