Transcript Ch. 3 Sect. 4 and Ch. 4 Sect. 1: Europe in the Middle

Pgs. 116 – 123, 129 - 138
 After the fall of the western Roman Empire in
AD 476, Europe broke up into a dozen or so
minor kingdoms. These states were united to
one another in three ways: They were all
Germanic, they all shared some of the
cultural tradition of the Roman Empire, and
after a period of time, they were all Christian.
 These states developed over the medieval
period, or Middle Ages, which lasted from AD
500 to 1500.
 Of these early medieval states, the only one
which lasted was the Frankish Kingdom of
France and western Germany. Founded
around AD 500 by Clovis, the Merovingian
dynasty ruled until AD 768 and managed to
repel the Muslim invasion of the Pyrenees
Mountains at the Battle of Tours (AD 732).
Clovis I
 After Theodosius the Great (AD 378-395) declared
Pope Sylvester I
Benedictine copyists
that Christianity was the official religion of the
Roman Empire, the Church rapidly expanded its
influence and organization throughout Europe.
When the Empire collapsed 100 years later, the
Church was left to preserve civilization.
 Small Christian communities, called parishes, were
led by priests. Several parishes were gathered
together in a diocese, under the leadership of a
bishop. Over the first 300 years of Church history, the
bishop of Rome asserted his authority over the
western Church, and was eventually recognized as
the Pope (Latin “papa” = “father”).
 A later development in Church organization was the
development of monasticism, or communities of
monks (and later nuns). Monks served as copyists,
teachers and healers.
 In AD 768, a new ruler known as
Charlemagne (Charles the Great)
took over the Frankish Kingdom. He
was a patron of the arts and a devout
Christian.
 Charlemagne expanded his kingdom
into Germany, Holland and Italy. He
established the Carolingian Empire
and, on Christmas day AD 800, he
had the Pope crown him as the first
Holy Roman Emperor.
 The three themes of Western
civilization (Germanic kingship,
Roman heritage and Christianity)
were brought together under
Charlemagne. These themes were
emulated by every other ruler in
Europe for 1200 years.
Charlemagne
 When Charlemagne died in AD 814, his empire passed to
his son, Louis the Pious. Upon his death in AD 840, the
empire was split between his three sons: Lothair I, Louis
the German and Charles the Bald. These three spent
their reigns fighting with one another.
 The Empire, and Europe in general, was so divided and
weak that there was virtually no resistance when the
Vikings began to raid in the eighth and ninth centuries.
The Vikings were Germanic peoples from Norway,
Sweden and Denmark who made a living by pillaging
cities and churches . Their raids were so terrifying and
destructive that a ninth-century Catholic hymnal
included the prayer, “Protect us, O Lord, from the wrath
of the Northmen.”
 While emperors and kings were powerless to defend
against the Vikings, people turned to local lords for
safety. In exchange for military protection, these lords
required taxes and other obligations. This established
the socio-economic system known as feudalism.
 Knights and Vassals
 The Feudal Contract
 England
 Pgs. 118 - 121
 The Germanic concept of vassalage was an oath
sworn by a warrior to his leader. He promised to be
loyal and to fight for his lord, and in exchange the
lord would provide for his warriors economically.
 Armor, weapons and war horses were expensive. As
time passed, military technology improved and
became even more expensive. A feudal lord would
grant his warriors land so that they would have an
income and be able to afford the best gear. Land
ownership was the basis of the lord’s power and the
key to the feudal system.
 By the 800s AD, military tactics and technological
advancements had transformed barbarian warriors
into medieval knights. They wore coats of chainmail
and plate armor. They fought with sword, shield and
lance from atop specially bred war horses. Until AD
1485, these knights dominated warfare in Europe.
 The relationship between a lord and
William, Duke of Normandy
his vassal was governed by a system
of largely unwritten rules, called the
feudal contract. In this agreement,
the lord provided prestige, land and
other economic support in exchange
for the vassal’s military service for 40
or so days per year.
 As central political authority eroded
in the ninth century AD, the only
system of law and defense left was
the local lord and his warrior
entourage (his comitatus). A lord
was technically the vassal of a king
or emperor, who had granted him
his lands in the first place, but in
practical terms a lord was a law unto
himself.
 Under the Anglo-Saxon kings
of England, monarchy
continued to be a weak
institution. But in AD 1066,
the Duke of Normandy,
William the Conqueror,
defeated Harold II at the
Battle of Hastings and took
the throne for himself. He and
the other early Norman kings
of England established a
strong central government.
 Henry II (AD 1154-1189)
expanded royal authority over
the legal system, created new
courts of law, and oversaw the
formation of the English
Common Law.
William the Conqueror
The Battle of Hastings
Henry II
 English nobles resented the expansion of royal
authority in the eleventh century AD. In 1215,
King John pressed his nobles too far when he
raised taxes and attempted to seize private lands.
At a field called Runnymede, a group of rebellious
barons forced John to sign Magna Carta. He tried
to break the contract the following year.
 Magna Carta is a document that legally
recognized the lords’ rights to property and access
to justice. By the fourteenth century, it had been
Magna Carta
reinterpreted to apply to all citizens.
 In the reign of Edward I (AD 1272-1307), Magna
Carta was used to establish the English
Parliament, a council of great lords who make
laws, collect taxes and advise the king. Eventually,
the council was reorganized into the House of
Lords and the House of Commons.
Parliament in the 1600s
 France
 The Holy Roman Empire
 The Slavic Nations
 Pg. 121
 The Carolingian Empire fell apart with the
death of Louis the Pious in AD 843. The
western section became the Kingdom of the
Franks, and later France. In AD 987, the people
of France chose as their king a lord named
Hugh Capet, who established the Capetian
Dynasty.
 The Capetian kings (ruled AD 987-1328) held
direct control over the area of Paris only, while
powerful barons ruled the rest of the country
as independent fiefs.
 Philip II Augustus (AD 1180-1223) waged a
series of successful wars against the English
and their holdings in France. He greatly
increased the size of the monarch’s domain
and the power of the king over the nation. By
the beginning of the fourteenth century,
France was the largest and best-run monarchy
in Europe.
The first Capetian monarchs
 The eastern third of Charlemagne’s empire,
modern-day Germany, came under the
control of the powerful Dukes of Saxony in
the 900s AD. In recognition for protecting
the Pope, Duke Otto I was made Emperor of
the Romans (Holy Roman Emperor) in AD
962.
 The emperors Frederick I (Barbarossa, AD
1155-1190) and Frederick II (AD 1120-1250)
attempted to gain control of Italy as well as
Germany. They were opposed by the popes,
and the two sides struggled for control of the
region for hundreds of years.
 While the emperors were occupied in Italy,
the German barons split off and established
their own semi-independent domains.
 The Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe organized themselves
into three separate groups: the Western Slavs (Poles, Czechs),
the Southern Slavs (Croats, Serbs, Bulgarians), and the
Eastern Slavs (Romanians, Ukrainians, Russians). The Poles,
Czechs, Croats and the non-Slavic Hungarians all became
Catholic, while the rest followed the Eastern Orthodox
Church of Byzantium.
 Swedish Vikings settled in Russia and the Ukraine starting in
the 800s AD. In the tenth century, a leader named Oleg
established a base at Kiev, from which he and his successors
dominated the Eastern Slavs. The Kievan Rus ruled over the
territory between the Baltic and Black seas and the Volga and
Danube rivers.
 The Kingdom of Kiev was beset by civil wars. In AD 1169, the
Mongols invaded and occupied Russia for the next 300 years.
They elevated a local lord, Alexander Nevsky of Novgorod, to
be Grand Prince. His family ruled Russia for the Mongols.
 Answer each question in a half-page response with
complete sentences. Be accurate, be specific, be
complete. Due tomorrow.
 1. What was the significance of Charlemagne’s
coronation as Holy Roman Emperor? How did it unify
the themes of medieval Europe? (Pgs. 117-118)
 2. What social and political conditions led to the
establishment of feudalism? (Pgs. 118-119)
 3. Describe how English kings William the Conqueror,
Henry II and John contributed to the development of
the medieval state. (Pgs. 119-120)
 The Byzantine Empire
 Conflicts and Problems
 The Crusades
 Pgs. 122 - 123
 The Eastern Roman Empire, centered on
Constantinople, did not fall to the
barbarians in the fifth century AD. It
survived as the Byzantine Empire, and
under Emperor Justinian I (AD 527-565), it
reconquered much of the western half as
well.
 Justinian’s military conquests did not last
long after his death. His major
contribution was the simplification of
Roman legal practice into The Body of
Civil Law.
 Under pressure from Arab attacks, the
Byzantine Empire shrank until, in the
early 800s AD, all that remained was Asia
Minor and the Balkans. Within the
empire, the common language was Greek
and the common faith was Orthodox
Justinian, military & religious advisers Christianity.
Alexius Comnenus
Battle of Manzikert
Pope Urban II
 In the tenth and eleventh centuries, the Byzantine Empire was ruled by a
family of dynamic, aggressive emperors called the Macedonians (ruled AD
867-1081). By AD 1025, they had regained much of their lost territory.
 Expansion brought the Byzantines into conflict with the Seljuk Turks in
eastern Asia Minor. The two fought the Battle of Manzikert in AD 1071, where
the Byzantines were badly beaten. Emperor Alexius Comnenus wrote to the
nations of Western Europe, asking for help against the Turks.
 Pope Urban II (AD 1088-1099) responded to Alexius
Comnenus’s plea for help by organizing the First Crusade
(1096-1099), a vast military expedition to save
Constantinople from the Turks and liberate Jerusalem.
Urban’s plan was to simultaneously unify the Christians of
Europe behind a single cause and give the warring lords
something else to do with their soldiers.
 The First Crusade was composed largely of Norman knights
from France and southern Italy, with some German forces
and commoners as well. The leaders of the various factions
did not get along well and the armies were disorganized.
 Instead of saving Constantinople, they marched on the
Holy Land and besieged the cities of Nicaea, Antioch and
Jerusalem. The Turks were unprepared for war, and the
cities fell one by one. When Jerusalem was captured, the
Christians established a kingdom there under Godfrey of
Lorraine.
Siege of Jerusalem
Godfrey of Lorraine
Richard the Lionheart
Saladin the Magnificent
 The gains of the First Crusade did not last long. The
Christian kingdoms were surrounded by Muslim states,
and in AD 1187, Sultan Salah al-Din (Saladin) of Egypt
reconquered the region.
 Over the next 100 years, eight more Crusades were
launched. The Third Crusade (AD 1189-1192), led by King
Richard the Lionheart of England, managed to assault
Jerusalem but not capture it. The Fourth (AD 1202-1204)
was just a Byzantine coup backed by the Venetians. The
Eighth (AD 1270) was defeated by uncommonly hot
weather in North Africa.
 One unofficial campaign in AD 1212 (the Children’s
Crusade) saw thousands of German teenagers die of cold
crossing the Alps. Those who survived and made it to
Marseilles were sold into slavery.
 By AD 1272, Christian kings and popes had given up on
reconquering the Holy Land. The Crusades were a
 The New Agriculture
 The Manorial System
 Daily Life of the Peasants
 Pgs. 129 - 131
 The population of Europe nearly




doubled between AD 800 and 1300.
Four factors increased food
production and reduced the death
rate:
An era of peace followed the
invasions and raids of the 9th and 10th
centuries.
The Medieval Warming Period
caused the climate to improve.
New developments in agricultural
practices: Clearing forests and
draining swamps, three-field rotation
instead of two.
New technologies: the windmill, the
water wheel, the iron-bladed plow
(the carruca).
Three-field rotation; plow
Windmill
Water wheel
 A feudal lord was primarily a warrior. He
Serfs
Knight and Retainers
was expected to provide military service to
his king whenever called upon, and to bring
a number of other heavily armed soldiers
with him. The equipment required was
expensive, and training required a great deal
of free time.
 In order to support the noble’s military
lifestyle, his king would give him a manor, or
landed estate. These agricultural manors
were worked by peasants who lived on them.
 In the early Middle Ages, these peasants
were free, but by AD 800, more than half
were serfs. Serfs were required to provide
free labor, pay taxes, and they were not
allowed to leave the manor.
 Peasants lived in simply constructed
cottages made of wooden beams and
woven sticks covered in clay. The
poorest peasant cottages consisted of
a single room, but most had at least
two. There was no such thing as
privacy, and often farm animals lived
indoors with the family.
 Peasant women were expected to
manage the household, bear and
raise children, grow a garden, do the
cooking, and help the men in the
fields.
Wattle-and-daub house
Breton women by Cezanne
 Agricultural labor was highly
The yearly round
seasonal. The hardest work came
at harvest, in August and
September. Serfs were expected
to harvest their lord’s fields as
well as their own. A poor harvest
of grain might mean starvation in
the winter.
 In October, farmers broke the soil
for the following year’s planting.
In early winter, animals were
slaughtered and their meat salted
to preserve it through spring.
Early summer was less busy, but
included sheep shearing.
 D. The Revival of Trade
 E. The Growth of Cities
 F. Life in the Medieval City
 G. Industry and Guilds
 Pgs. 131-132
 Interregional trade had almost disappeared in
Europe following the fall of the Roman
Empire. By the 1000s AD, trade was on the rise
again. This has been called the Commercial
Revolution.
 Merchants in Venice and other northern
Italian cities began to buy and sell bulk
products across the Mediterranean. Merchants
in Flanders (modern-day Belgium) were doing
the same thing in northern Europe.
 Market towns grew up all over western and
central Europe, and a demand for gold and
silver coins followed. This established a money
economy for the first time in 500 years.
 The need for concentrated capital led to the
Medieval silver coins
creation of trading companies and banks to
provide loans. The organized pursuit of profit
through trade is called commercial capitalism.
 The number and size of cities and towns had
decreased after the fall of the Roman Empire, but
the commercial revolution encouraged new urban
growth.
 Merchants moved to old Roman towns to establish
markets to sell their goods. Craftspeople followed, Lincoln, England
in order to sell their products to the merchants. By
1200, large cities had grown up over southern
Europe.
 In northern Europe, where no old Roman towns
existed, merchants congregated around castles
near trade routes. This merchant class became
Market Day
known as burghers or bourgeoisie, from the
German and French words for walled towns.
 These trading towns were relatively small. Even the
large Italian cities of Milan, Florence and Venice
only had 80,000 inhabitants, compared to the
millions who lived in Constantinople or Baghdad.
German Burg
Dubrovnic
Paris sewers
Great Fire
 Medieval cities were usually surrounded by
stone walls for protection. This meant that the
amount of space within the city was limited and
therefore crowded. There was no space between
houses, and the upper stories hung out over the
street. Roads were narrow, winding and
unpaved.
 Houses were built of wood. The bottom story
was often a shop, the second was living
quarters, and the third was used for storage.
 Since light and heat came from open wood
fires and candles, fires were common. Crowded
conditions meant that a fire would spread
rapidly and destroy whole neighborhoods.
 Most cities had no sewage system, so human
and animal waste were usually thrown into the
street. The smell would have been
overpowering, and diseases spread constantly.
 As trade returned, manufacturing
became an important economic activity
in medieval towns. City-dwellers made a
living by making cloth, metal tools,
leatherwork and other trade goods.
Artisans worked and did business from
their homes.
 From the eleventh century on, workers
in each major trade organized
themselves into associations called
guilds. These guilds would reduce
competition by setting prices and
restricting membership. Almost every
craft and trade was represented by a
guild, including merchants and bankers.
Armorsmith guild flag
 Answer each question in a half-page response with
complete sentences. Be accurate, be specific, be
complete. Due tomorrow.
 1. Read the “Science, Technology & Society” box on pg.
130. What do windmills and watermills do? What were
they used for originally? What other uses were adapted
later? What replaced them?
 2. How were increased trade and the development of a
money economy related? (Pg. 131)
 3. Describe the conflict between Pope Gregory VII and
King Henry IV. (Pgs. 132-133)
 H. The Papal Monarchy
 I. New Religious Orders
 J. A New Activism
 Pgs. 132 - 134
 From early on in Church history, the
pope had been both a spiritual
authority and a political leader. The
Church directly controlled a large
territory in central Italy called the
Papal States. By the 700s AD, the
pope was as much a feudal lord as he
was a priest.
 In the 800s and 900s, however, the
temporal power of the pope had
been reduced to the point that local
lords were appointing bishops within
their territories and treating them
like vassals.
 In AD 1073, Pope Gregory VII (reigned 1073 –
Gregory VII
Innocent III
1085) began to rebuild the Church’s authority.
He claimed the right to appoint bishops, and to
depose any lords or kings who contested his
choices.
 The Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV opposed
Gregory’s reforms. He and later emperors
claimed the right to nominate bishops and
utilize them as administrators. The investiture
controversy continued for 200 years, but
eventually the popes won out.
 Popes of the twelfth and thirteenth century
continued to expand their political power and
claim authority over kings. Pope Innocent III
(reigned 1198 – 1216) was powerful enough to
contest the rule of Phillip II Augustus of France
and John of England at the same time.
 At the close of the tenth century, many
Christians became convinced that the
biblical apocalypse would occur in the year
AD 1000. Some gave away their possessions
in preparation for the end times or practiced
flagellation to repent for their sins. When
the world did not end, some of these
believers felt let down.
 Others took the continued existence of the
world as a positive sign. Religious
enthusiasm rose all over Europe in the
eleventh century. Men and women gave up
their former lives and joined monasteries in
huge numbers. New religious orders were
created to organize these prospective monks
and nuns.
The Four Horsemen
Flagellants
 Some new monks were dissatisfied with the
Bernard of Clairvaux
Hildegard of Bingen
Benedictine order and its emphasis on
seclusion. They felt that they could better
serve the Christian community by living
amongst the poor, preaching and providing
aid. In southern France in 1098, these monks
founded a new order called the Cistercians.
 The daughters and widows of the noble classes
joined religious orders in huge numbers,
especially in Germany. Within a convent, an
aristocratic woman was able to pursue
spiritual and intellectual goals that were
unavailable to her in the secular world.
 K. The Franciscans and the Dominicans
 L. Popular Religion in the Middle Ages
 M. The Rise of Universities
 N. The First Universities
 Francis of Assisi was born into a wealthy
family in central Italy. He had a profound
spiritual experience in his youth, and
thereafter gave up all wealth and worldly
goods. He lived by working and begging, and
Francis of Assisi
he preached and aided the poor. His message
of repentance and universal love was so
popular that thousands joined him and
created the Franciscan order in AD 1209.
 Dominic de Guzman, a Spanish monk,
focused on battling heresy and other doctrinal
Dominic de Guzman threats to the Church. He founded the
Dominican order in AD 1216 for the purpose of
discovering heretics and converting them. The
Dominicans became closely connected with
the office of the Inquisition.
 For common people, religion was a simple but
very important part of their existence. The
Church provided the seven sacraments
(baptism, the Eucharist, reconciliation,
Confirmation, marriage, holy orders and
Extreme Unction), which structured people’s
entire lives.
 The veneration of the saints was an extremely
popular form of worship in the Middle Ages.
Major figures from the New Testament were
important, but thousands of local saints were
also prayed to for intercession.
 Medieval Christians also believed in the
importance of pilgrimage to holy shrines. The
most important destination was Jerusalem,
but Rome and Santiago de Compostela in
Spain were popular as well. Nearly all cities
and towns had shrines to saints.
Santiago de Compostela
 Education was an informal institution in
A medieval classroom
Look familiar?
the early Middle Ages. There was no such
thing as public school, and very low
literacy rates. The only sectors of society
that were educated were the clerics and a
few of the nobility.
 At first, education was provided
exclusively by the Church. In the High
Middle Ages, with the rise of the urban
middle class, private universities appeared
in larger cities.
 The term “university” comes from the
Latin word “universitas,” which means
“guild” or “corporation.” They were public
institutions funded by the students’
tuition and protected by the city.
 The first universities were founded in
Italy by popular lecturers who taught a
single subject. The University of
Bologna was created in AD 1088 by
Irnerius, who specialized in Roman
law. Administrators and advisers to
kings from all over Europe went to
Bologna to study law. Other
universities focused on medicine or
theology.
 In AD 1150, the University of Paris was
founded. By 1167, professors and
students from Paris had started a new
institution in Oxford, England. By
1500, there were over 80 universities in
Europe.
University of Bologna
 O. University Curricula
 P. Architecture
 Q. The Late Middle Ages
 R. The Black Death
 Pgs. 135-137
 Most universities taught a liberal arts course
St. Andrews graduates
Oxford University
of study, or curriculum. This consisted of
basic-level classes in grammar, rhetoric, logic,
arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy.
 Books were rare and expensive, so professors
would read their copy of the text aloud to
their classes, adding commentary.
 There were no written tests. Instead, a
student would complete an oral examination
at the completion of their degree.
 After four or six years of undergraduate work,
a student could complete a doctorate in law,
medicine or theology. Of the three, theology
was considered the most prestigious.
 In the early Middle Ages, churches were built
along the model of late Roman basilicas. They
were square, squat buildings with round barrel
vaults and narrow windows. The space inside
was dark with low ceilings. This was called the
Romanesque style.
 In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, a new
style of church was developed, called the
Gothic style. The Gothic church was the
greatest artistic and technical achievement of
the medieval period.
 Gothic churches use pointed arches and ribbed
vaults to create higher ceilings. This makes the
building seem to stretch towards heaven.
 The Gothic style also makes use of the flying
buttress to support thinner walls. There is
more room for stained-glass windows, making
Gothic churches lighter on the inside.
 European culture reached a peak in the late thirteenth century.
Agriculture was more productive, commerce was booming,
kings consolidated power over their nobles, intellectual
pursuits were encouraged, and Gothic churches reached to the
skies.
 All of this changed in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. A
series of widespread disasters befell Europe which put back
cultural and social progress by a century. By far the worst of
these disasters was the Black Death.
 The Black Death refers to a family of diseases,
especially the bubonic plague, which devastated
Europe off and on for hundreds of years. The
plague is spread by fleas that infest black rats.
 The plague was introduced to medieval Europe by
Italian merchants returning from the Black Sea in
October 1347. It spread along trade routes, affecting
France, Spain, the Low Countries and Germany by
1348, England in 1349, and eastern Europe by 1351.
 Before the Black Death, Europe’s population was
about 75 million. By 1351, it was half of that. In
some of the crowded Italian cities, more than 60%
of the population died.
 The massive loss of population caused trade to
decline, the price of labor to increase, and the
demand for food to drop.
Plague Chapel
Plague doctor
 Answer each question in a half-page response with complete
sentences. Be accurate, be specific, be complete. Due
tomorrow.
 1. What impact did the Franciscans and the Dominicans have
on the lives of people in the thirteenth century? (Pg. 134)
 2. Read the “Connections: Past to Present” box on pg. 135.
How did Saint Nicholas become Santa Claus? What about
him changed along the way?
 3. Critical Thinking: The Black Death caused the population
of Europe to drop by half. What economic consequences do
you think would come from the loss of so many people? How
do you think society would change in the decades after such a
catastrophe? (Pgs. 136-137)Worth 10 points.
 S. The Decline of Church Power
 T. Political Crisis and Recovery
 Pgs. 137-138
 By the end of the thirteenth century,
Boniface VIII
Phillip IV “the Fair”
powerful western European monarchs were
unwilling to accept the political supremacy
of the pope.
 Phillip IV of France engaged in a very public
conflict with Pope Boniface VIII over the
pope’s authority to collect Church taxes
within France. The argument ended when
Boniface died in AD 1303 and Phillip
arranged the election of a French pope,
Clement V in 1305.
 Clement took up residence in Avignon, a
city in southern France, and for the next 72
years, the papacy was dominated by French
kings.
 The Papacy remained in Avignon until 1377, when Pope Gregory XI
returned to the Vatican in Rome. Unfortunately, Gregory died in
1378. The French cardinals took the opportunity to elect a new pope
(“Clement VII”), and a separate group of Italian cardinals elected
their own candidate (Urban VI). This started the Great Schism.
 From 1378 until 1449, there were often two popes at the same time,
and as many as four. Each pope denounced the others as antipopes
and Antichrists. The French popes were supported by France and its
allies, while the Italian popes were backed by England.
 By the end of the Great Schism, the office of the pope had lost most
of its political authority and some of its spiritual primacy as well.
The Papal Residence, Avignon
Nicholas V
Poitiers
Crecy
Joan of Arc
Castillon
 The Late Middle Ages experienced widespread periods of warfare. The




greatest of these conflicts was the Hundred Years’ War (AD 1337 – 1453)
between England and France.
When Charles IV of France died without heirs in 1328, Edward III of
England claimed his right to rule France through his mother (Charles’
aunt).
English forces were highly successful at first. At the Battle of Crecy in 1346,
English longbowmen destroyed a much larger army of mounted knights. At
Poitiers in 1356, the Black Prince led a raiding party to defeat a French army.
The war changed with the emergence of Joan of Arc, a French peasant girl
who claimed to be divinely guided. She led an army to lift the siege of
Orleans in 1429. The English captured Joan, tried her for heresy and burned
her at the stake.
The war ended in 1453 at the Battle of Castillon. The war had been an
economic and political crisis for both sides, and both monarchies were
severely tested.
 In the late fourteenth and early fifteenth
Henry VII of England
Ivan III of Russia
centuries, the western European nations of
France, England and Spain addressed the political
problems they faced by increasing the central
authority of the monarchy. Powerful lords were
subjected to the will of an even more powerful
king. These three are often referred to as new
monarchies.
 Royal power was not consolidated in the same
way in central and eastern Europe. The Holy
Roman Emperor continued to have little authority
over his territory, and Germany became a loose
collection of dozens of small independent states.
 Religious and cultural differences kept the Slavic
nations from uniting against foreign invasion. In
Russia, distant Mongol authority was beginning
to give way to the powerful princes of Moscow.