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The High Middle Ages
(ca. 900-1200)
The High Middle Ages

How can we view the Middle Ages as a
time of progress and innovation?
Economy and Society
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The Social Orders
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Oratores
Bellatores
Laboratores (SERFS)
Economy and Society
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Personal Dependency
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Lords and Vassals
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VASSALS served lords
Lords provided land
Lords and peasants
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Peasants worked, paid
dues
Status was hereditary
Lords provided
necessities
Reeve, and serfs at work
Economy and Society
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Agricultural
Innovations
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Three-field system
Iron plowshare
Horses
Results
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Better standard of living
Population doubled
Economy and Society
Economy and Society
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The Guilds
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Formed by urban merchants and artisans
Nature of guilds
*Economic: standards for products, additional
regulations
 Also social, spiritual
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Guild hierarchy: masters, journeymen,
apprentices
Economy and Society
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Engaging in the Economy
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CREDIT
Loans
USURY
Economy and Society
Economy and Society
Medieval Trade Routes
Economy and Society
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Trade in the Far East
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Mongol Empire
encouraged trade
Marco Polo
(1254-1324)
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Court of Kubilai Khan
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Venetian merchant
Present at court of
Kublai Khan
The Description of the
World (ca. 1298)
Economy and Society
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Questions?
The Emerging Western States
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England
(9th-10th cents.)
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Small kingdoms
Viking occupation
KING ALFRED THE
GREAT (r. 871-899)
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Raised army (878),
defeated Vikings
First king of all English
King Alfred the Great
The Emerging Western States
Bronze statue of King Alfred the Great
Winchester, United Kingdom
The Emerging Western States
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The Norman
Conquest
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The Bayeux Tapestry (ca. 1070-80)
Edward the Confessor
(r. 1042-1066) died
Two heirs: Harold of
Wessex, William of
Normandy
William invaded
England, defeated
Harold at BATTLE OF
HASTINGS (1066)
The Emerging Western States
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William the Conqueror
(r. 1066-1089)
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First Norman king of
England
Distributed lands
among family, Norman
barons
“Domesday Book”
(1086): census,
inventory
The Emerging Western States
The Emerging Western States
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Magna Carta (1215)
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Origins: King John’s
conflict with France
The document
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Defined rights,
obligations of nobility
King John forced to sign
Major point: king is not
above law!
The Emerging Western States
The Emerging Western States
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Holy Roman Empire
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Many principalities, under
an emperor
Princes governed
independent states
Emperors
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Claimed highest authority
Had to respect princes’
rights
A decentralized monarchy
The Emerging Western States
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Christian Spain
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Muslim power
weakened
Christian princes
seized opportunity
RECONQUISTA
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Christian reconquest of
Islamic Spain
Result: Christian Iberian
states emerging
The Emerging Western States
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Questions?
The Church and Christianity
The Church and Christianity
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The “Papal Monarchy”
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Supreme authority of
Latin Church
Claimed authority over
secular rulers, Greek
Church
Papal States
The Curia
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Papal Tiara (“Triregnum”)
Papal Court, Rome
COLLEGE OF
CARDINALS
The Church and Christianity
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The Great Schism
(1054)
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Eastern and Western
Churches at odds
Papal supremacy
asserted at
Constantinople (1054)
Greek and Latin
Churches excommunicated each
other
The Church and Christianity
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The Investiture Conflict
(1075-1076)
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Pope Gregory VII
prohibited lay investiture
Emperor Henry IV
appointed new archbishop
Gregory’s response
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Excommunicated Henry,
deprived him of office!
Released HRE from
allegiance to emperor!
Henry submitted
The Church and Christianity
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Pope Innocent III
(r. 1198-1216)
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Lawyer-pope
Most powerful pope ever
Clash with King John
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Over new archbishop of
Canterbury
Innocent excommunicated
John
John submitted to pope
Innocent III
The Church and Christianity
The Church and Christianity
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The Crusades
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Origins: Turkish threat to
Byzantine Empire
Council of Clermont (1095)
called for recapture of Holy
Land
First Crusade (1095-99)
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Siege of Antioch
Force of 50-60,000 
Holy Land
“Pilgrimage”  salvation
as reward!
Victory  Crusader States
established
The Church and Christianity
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Other Crusades
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Because Christians lost
ground in Holy Land
Third Crusade
(1189-92)
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Saladin captured
Jerusalem (1187)
Another crusade 
failure
Crusades over by 1300
Saladin
The Church and Christianity
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The Franciscans
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Founder: Francis of Assisi
(ca. 1182-1226)
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Son of cloth merchant
Conversion experience 
poverty
Franciscans (1215)
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Friars
Poverty
Preached penance, served
lepers and poor
Francis of Assisi
The Church and Christianity
Robe of Francis of Asissi,
Basilica di S. Francesco, Assisi
The Church and Christianity
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The Dominicans
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Founder: Dominic Guzman
(1170-1221)
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Spanish missionary
Disillusioned by Church’s
preaching methods
Preach as seen in Gospels!
Dominicans (1216)
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Friars
Preaching on foot
Intellectual order
The Church and Christianity
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Medieval Heresy
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Many heretical groups
The Church’s response
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Preaching
Medieval Inquisition
(1231)
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Guide heretics to
recantation, penance
Variety of penalties
The Church and Christianity
The Church and Christianity
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The Sacraments
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Seven
Essential to salvation!
Performed by clergy
alone
The Eucharist
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Corpus Christi Procession
Sacrament of the Mass
TRANSUBSTANTIATION
The Church and Christianity
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Questions?
Culture
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The University
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Organization of master and students
Specialization
Students given clerical status, grouped into “nations”
Culture
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Classroom Setting
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Lectures considered
best method of
teaching
Books very expensive!
Master’s role
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Read excerpt of text
Commentary
Refute objections
Students’ role: commit
it all to memory!
Culture and Society
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Scholasticism
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Used Aristotelian logic
to explain knowledge
Faith, reason are
harmonious!
THOMAS AQUINAS
(1225-1274)
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Dominican
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Summa Theologica
Culture and Society
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Vernacular Literature
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Latin: language of
Church, academia
VERNACULAR
Vernacular literature
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Chanson de Roland
(12th cent.)
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Dante Alighieri
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The Divine Comedy
(1313-1321)
Beowulf (ca. 1000)
Culture and Society
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Opening section of Beowulf
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“HWÆT, WE GAR-DEna in geardagum, þeodcyninga
þrym gefrunon, hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon! oft
Scyld Scefing sceaþena þreatum, monegum mægþum
meodosetla ofteah, egsode eorlas, syððanærest
wearðfeasceaft funden; he þæs frofre gebad, weox
under wolcnum weorð myndum þah, oð þæt him
æghwylc ymbsittendra ofer hronrade hyran scolde,
gomban gyldan; þæt wæs god cyning!”
Culture and Society
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Romanesque
Architecture
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Massive stone
churches
Sculpture on exterior
Round arches
“Leaning Tower,” Pisa (1053-1272)
Culture and Society
St. Sernin de Toulouse (1070-1120), France
Exterior
Culture and Society
St. Sernin de Toulouse,
Interior
Culture and Society
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Gothic Architecture
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Chartres Cathedral (1145-1220), France
Pointed arches
Stained-glass windows
Flying buttresses
Culture and Society
Chartres Cathedral
Interior
Stained-Glass Window,
Chartres Cathedral
Culture and Society
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Women during the High Middle Ages
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Still a man’s world!
Rulers were mostly male
 Women excluded from universities
 Guilds run by men
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Significant roles for women?
Noblewomen
 Convents
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Culture and Society
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Female Rulers
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Women were lords,
vassals
ELEANOR OF
AQUITAINE
(1122-1204)
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French landowner
Wife, mother of kings
Patroness of
troubadours
Eleanor of Aquitaine
Culture and Society
Eleanor of Aquitaine
in Robin Hood (2010)
Culture and Society
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Women and the Church
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Only role: convent
Clare of Assisi
(1194-1253)
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Clare of Assisi
Loyal disciple of Francis
Formed Order of Sisters
of St. Francis (1212)
Sisters worked alongside
friars, but later cloistered
Culture and Society
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Questions?
The High Middle Ages

How can we view the Middle Ages as a
time of progress and innovation?