Church and Society in Western Europe

THE AGE OF FAITH

Objective: Explain the spiritual revival and Church reforms that began in the 11th century.

Monasteries led the spiritual revival. The monastery founded at Cluny in France in 910 was especially important. The reformers there wanted to return to the basic principles of Christianity. To do so they established new religious orders. Influenced by the devotion and reverence for God shown by the new monasteries, the popes began to reform the Church. They restored and expanded its power and authority. A new age of religious feeling was born—the Age of Faith. Still, many problems troubled the Church.

Reform and Church Organization

Pope Leo IX and Pope Gregory VII enforced Church laws against simony and the marriage of priests. The popes who followed Leo and Gregory reorganized the Church to continue the policy of reform. In the 1100s and 1200s, the Church was restructured to resemble a kingdom, with the pope at its head. The pope’s group of advisers was called the papal Curia.

The Curia also acted as a court. It developed canon law (the law of the Church) on matters such as marriage, divorce, and inheritance. The Curia also decided cases based on these laws. Diplomats for the pope traveled through Europe dealing with bishops and kings. In this way the popes established their authority throughout Europe.

The Church collected taxes in the form of tithes. These consumed one-tenth the yearly income from every Christian family. The Church used some of the money to perform social services such as caring for the sick and the poor. In fact, the Church operated most hospitals in medieval Europe.

THE AGE OF FAITH

Problems in the Church

Some priests were nearly illiterate and could barely read their prayers. Some of the popes were men of questionable morals. Many bishops and abbots cared more about their positions as feudal lords than about their duties as spiritual leaders. Reformers were most distressed by three main issues.

• Many village priests married and had families. Such marriages were against Church rulings.

• Bishops sold positions in the Church, a practice called simony.

• Using the practice of lay investiture, kings appointed church bishops. Church reformers believed the Church alone should appoint bishops.

New Religious Orders

The Cluniac Reforms of the early 900s renewed interest in monastic life. In the early 1200s, wandering friars traveled from place to place preaching and spreading the Church’s ideas. Like monks, friars took vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. Unlike monks, friars did not live apart from the world in monasteries. Instead they preached to the poor throughout Europe’s towns and cities. Friars owned nothing and lived by begging.

Dominic, a Spanish priest, founded the Dominicans, one of the earliest orders of friars. Because Dominic emphasized the importance of study, many Dominicans were scholars. Francis of Assisi, an Italian, founded another order of friars, the Franciscans. Francis treated all creatures, including animals, as if they were his spiritual brothers and sisters.

Women played an important role in the spiritual revival. Women joined the Dominicans, Benedictines, and Franciscans. In 1212, a woman named Clare and her friend Francis of Assisi founded the Franciscan order for women. It was known as the Poor Clares. In Germany, Hildegard of Bingen founded a Benedictine convent in 1147. Like friars, these women lived in poverty and worked to help the poor and sick. Unlike the friars, however, women were not allowed to travel from place to place as preachers.

CATHEDRALS - CITIES OF GOD

Objective: Describe the Gothic cathedrals of the 12th century.

During the medieval period, most people worshiped in small churches near their homes. Larger churches called cathedrals were built in city areas. The cathedral was viewed as the representation of the City of God. As such, it was decorated with all the richness that Christians could offer.

Between about 800 and 1100, churches were built in the Romanesque style. The churches had round arches and a heavy roof held up by thick walls and pillars. The thick walls had tiny windows that let in little light.

CATHEDRALS

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CITIES OF GOD

A New Style of Church Architecture

A new spirit in the church and access to more money from the growing wealth of towns and from trade helped fuel the building of churches in several European countries. In the early 1100s, a new style of architecture, known as Gothic, evolved throughout medieval Europe. The term Gothic comes from a Germanic tribe named the Goths.

Unlike the heavy, gloomy Romanesque buildings, Gothic cathedrals thrust upward as if reaching toward heaven. Light streamed in through huge stained-glass windows. Other arts of the medieval world were incorporated around or in the Gothic cathedral—sculpture, wood-carvings, and stained-glass windows. These elements were meant to inspire the worshiper with the magnificence of God.

Soon Gothic cathedrals were built in many French towns. In Paris, the vaulted ceiling of the Cathedral of Notre Dame rose to more than 100 feet. In all, nearly 500 Gothic churches were built between 1170 and 1270.

THE CRUSADES

Objective: Summarize the causes of the Crusades.

The Age of Faith also inspired wars of conquest. In 1093, the Byzantine emperor Alexius Comnenus sent an appeal to Robert, Count of Flanders. The emperor asked for help against the Muslim Turks. They were threatening to conquer his capital, Constantinople. Pope Urban II also read that letter. Shortly after this appeal, he issued a call for what he termed a “holy war,” a Crusade, to gain control of the Holy Land. Over nearly 200 years, a number of such Crusades were launched and fought.

The First and Second Crusades

Pope Urban’s call brought a tremendous outpouring of religious feeling and support for the Crusade. According to the pope, those who died on Crusade were assured of a place in heaven.

With red crosses sewn on tunics worn over their armor and the battle cry of “God wills it!” on their lips, knights and commoners were fired up by religious zeal and became Crusaders.

By early 1097, three armies of knights and people of all classes had gathered outside Constantinople. Most of the Crusaders were French, but Bohemians, Germans, Englishmen, Scots, Italians, and Spaniards came as well. The Crusaders were ill prepared for war in this First Crusade. Many knew nothing of the geography, climate, or culture of the Holy Land. They had no grand strategy to capture Jerusalem. The nobles argued among themselves and couldn’t agree on a leader. Finally an army of 12,000 (less than one- fourth of the original army) approached Jerusalem. The Crusaders besieged the city for over a month. On July 15, 1099, they captured the city.

All in all, the Crusaders had won a narrow strip of land. It stretched about 650 miles from Edessa in the north to Jerusalem in the south. Four feudal Crusader states were carved out of this territory, each ruled by a European noble.

The Crusaders’ states were extremely vulnerable to Muslim counterattack. In 1144, Edessa was reconquered by the Turks. The Second Crusade was organized to recapture the city. But its armies straggled home in defeat. In 1187, Europeans were shocked to learn that Jerusalem itself had fallen to a Kurdish warrior and Muslim leader Saladin.

THE CRUSADES

Goals of the Crusades

The Crusades had economic, social, and political goals as well as religious motives. Muslims controlled Palestine (the Holy Land) and threatened Constantinople. The Byzantine emperor in Constantinople appealed to Christians to stop Muslim attacks. In addition, the pope wanted to reclaim Palestine and reunite Christendom, which had split into Eastern and Western branches in 1054.

Kings and the Church both saw the Crusades as an opportunity to get rid of quarrelsome knights who fought each other. These knights threatened the peace of the kingdoms, as well as Church property.

Others who participated in the Crusades were younger sons who, unlike eldest sons, did not stand to inherit their father’s property. They were looking for land and a position in society, or for adventure.

In the later Crusades, merchants profited by making cash loans to finance the journey. They also leased their ships for a hefty fee to transport armies over the Mediterranean Sea. At the same time, the merchants of Pisa, Genoa, and Venice hoped to win control of key trade routes to India, Southeast Asia, and China from Muslim traders.

The Third Crusade

The Third Crusade to recapture Jerusalem was led by three of Europe’s most powerful monarchs. They were Philip II (Augustus) of France, German emperor Frederick I (Barbarossa), and the English king, Richard the Lion-Hearted. Philip argued with Richard and went home. Barbarossa drowned on the journey. So Richard was left to lead the Crusaders in an attempt to regain the Holy Land from Saladin. Both Richard and Saladin were brilliant warriors. After many battles, the two agreed to a truce in 1192. Jerusalem remained under Muslim control. In return, Saladin promised that unarmed Christian pilgrims could freely visit the city’s holy places.

THE CRUSADING SPIRIT DWINDLES

Objective: Summarize the reasons the zeal for the Crusades dwindled.

In 1204, the Fourth Crusade to capture Jerusalem failed. The knights did not reach the Holy Land. Instead, they ended up looting the city of Constantinople. In the 1200s, four more Crusades to free the holy land were also unsuccessful. The religious spirit of the First Crusade faded, and the search for personal gain grew. In two later Crusades, armies marched not to the Holy Land but to Egypt. The Crusaders intended to weaken Muslim forces there before going to the Holy Land. But none of these attempts conquered much land.

THE CRUSADING SPIRIT DWINDLES

The Strange Story of the Children’s Crusade

Some stories of the Crusades mention that in 1212, thousands of children set out to conquer Jerusalem. From France, Stephen of Cloyes led as many as 30,000 children south to the Mediterranean. From Germany, Nicholas of Cologne marched about 20,000 young people over the Alps to the sea. Many died of cold and starvation on the journey. Thousands more were sold into slavery or drowned at sea after boarding ships for the Holy Land. Perhaps as few as one-tenth of those who set out on this Children’s Crusade returned home.

Historians doubt that this Children’s Crusade happened. The “children” probably were landless peasants and laborers searching for a better life. There certainly were young people in the crowds who took to the road in 1212, and some may have intended to travel to the Holy Land. However, the story of pious young people taking up the crusaders’ banner is more fiction than fact.

THE EFFECTS OF THE CRUSADES

Objective: Analyze the effects of the Crusades.

The Crusades are a forceful example of the power of the Church during the medieval period. The call to go to the Holy Land encouraged thousands to leave their homes and travel to faraway lands. For those who stayed home, especially women, it meant a chance to manage affairs on the estates or to operate shops and inns.

European merchants who lived and traded in the Crusader states expanded trade between Europe and Southwest Asia. The goods imported from Southwest Asia included spices, fruits, and cloth. This trade with the West benefited both Christians and Muslims.

However, the failure of later Crusades also lessened the power of the pope. The Crusades weakened the feudal nobility and increased the power of kings. Thousands of knights and other participants lost their lives and fortunes. The fall of Constantinople weakened the Byzantine Empire.

For Muslims, the intolerance and prejudice displayed by Christians in the Holy Land left behind a legacy of bitterness and hatred. This legacy continues to the present. For Christians and Jews who remained in the Muslim-controlled region after the fall of the Crusader states, relations with the Muslim leadership worsened. The Crusades grew out of religious fervor, feudalism, and chivalry, which came together with explosive energy. This same energy led to the growth of trade, towns, and universities in medieval Europe.

THE EFFECTS OF THE CRUSADES

A GROWING FOOD SUPPLY

Objective: Describe advances in agriculture.

Europe’s great revival would have been impossible without better ways of farming. Expanding civilization required an increased food supply. A warmer climate, which lasted from about 800 to 1200, brought improved farm production. Farmers began to cultivate lands in regions once too cold to grow crops. They also developed new methods to take advantage of more available land.

The Three-Field System

Around AD 800, some villages began to organize their lands into three fields instead of two. Two of the fields were planted, and the other lay fallow (resting) for a year. Under this new three-field system, farmers could grow crops on two-thirds of their land each year, not just on half of it.

As a result, food production increased. Villagers had more to eat. Well-fed people, especially children, could better resist disease and live longer, and as a result the European population grew dramatically.

A GROWING FOOD SUPPLY

Switch to Horsepower

For hundreds of years, peasants had depended on oxen to pull their plows. Oxen lived on the poorest straw and stubble, so they were easy to keep. Horses needed better food, but a team of horses could plow three times as much land in a day as a team of oxen.

Before farmers could use horses, however, a better harness was needed. Sometime before 900, farmers in Europe began using a harness that fitted across the horse’s chest, enabling it to pull a plow. As a result, horses gradually replaced oxen for plowing and for pulling wagons. All over Europe, axes rang as the great forests were cleared for new fields.

Objective: Explain the importance of guilds.

THE GUILDS

A second change in the European economy was the development of the guild. A guild was an organization of individuals in the same business or occupation working to improve the economic and social conditions of its members. The first guilds were merchant guilds. Merchants banded together to control the number of goods being traded and to keep prices up. They also provided security in trading and reduced losses.

THE GUILDS

About the same time, skilled artisans, such as wheelwrights, glassmakers, winemakers, tailors, and druggists, began craft guilds. In most crafts, both husband and wife worked at the family trade. In a few crafts, especially for cloth making, women formed the majority. The guilds set standards for quality of work, wages, and working conditions. For example, bakers were required to sell loaves of bread of a standard size and weight. The guilds also created plans for supervised training of new workers.

By the 1000s, artisans and craftspeople were manufacturing goods by hand for local and long-distance trade. More and better products were now available to buyers in small towns, in bigger cities, and at trade fairs. Guilds became powerful forces in the medieval economy. The wealth they accumulated helped them establish influence over the government and the economy of towns and cities.

COMMERCIAL REVOLUTION

Objective: Trace the growth of trade and finance.

Just as agriculture was expanding and craftsmanship changing, so were trade and finance. Increased availability of trade goods and new ways of doing business changed life in Europe. Taken together, this expansion of

trade and business is called the Commercial Revolution.

Business and Banking

As traders moved from fair to fair, they needed large amounts of cash or credit and ways to exchange many types of currencies. Enterprising merchants found ways to solve these problems. For example, bills of exchange established exchange rates between different coinage systems. Letters of credit between merchants eliminated the need to carry large amounts of cash and made trading easier. Trading firms and associations formed to offer these services to their groups.

Merchants looked for new markets and opportunities to make a profit. Merchants first had to purchase goods from distant places. To do so they had to borrow money, but the Church forbade Christians from lending money at interest, a sin called usury. Over time, the Church relaxed its rule on usury and Christians entered the banking business. Banking became an important business, especially in Italy.

COMMERCIAL REVOLUTION

Society Changes

The changes brought about by the Commercial Revolution were slow, yet they had a major effect on the lives of Europeans. Increased trade brought many changes to aspects of society. Two of the most important changes involved what people did to earn a living and where they lived. As towns attracted workers, the towns grew into cities. Life in the cities was different from life in the sleepy villages or on manors.

Fairs and Trade

Most trade took place in towns. Peasants from nearby manors traveled to town on fair days, hauling items to trade. Great fairs were held several times a year, usually during religious festivals, when many people would be in town. People visited the stalls set up by merchants from all parts of Europe.

Cloth was the most common trade item. Other items included bacon, salt, honey, cheese, wine, leather, dyes, knives, and ropes. Such local markets met all the needs of daily life for a small community. No longer was everything produced on a self-sufficient manor.

More goods from foreign lands became available. Trade routes spread across Europe from Flanders to Italy. Italian merchant ships traveled the Mediterranean to ports in Byzantium such as Constantinople. They also traveled to Muslim ports along the North African coast. Trade routes were opened to Asia, in part by the Crusades.

Increased business at markets and fairs made merchants willing to take chances on buying merchandise that they could sell at a profit. Merchants then reinvested the profits in more goods.

URBAN LIFE FLORISHES

Objective: Trace the development of medieval towns.

Merchant Class Shifts the Social Order

The merchants and craftspeople of medieval towns did not fit into the traditional medieval social order of noble, clergy, and peasant. At first, towns came under the authority of feudal lords, who used their authority to levy fees, taxes, and rents.

As trade expanded, the burghers, or merchant-class town dwellers, resented this interference in their trade and commerce. They organized themselves and demanded privileges. These rights included freedom from certain kinds of tolls and the right to govern the town. At times they fought against their landlords and won these rights by force.

Scholars estimate that between 1000 and 1150, the population of western Europe rose from around 30 million to about 42 million. Towns grew and flourished. Compared to great cities like Constantinople, European towns were unsophisticated and tiny. Europe’s largest city, Paris, probably had no more than 60,000 people by the year 1200. A typical town in medieval Europe had only about 1,500 to 2,500 people. Even so, these small communities became a powerful force for change in Europe.

Trade and Towns Grow Together

By the later Middle Ages, trade was the very lifeblood of the new towns, which sprung up at ports and crossroads, on hilltops, and along rivers. As trade grew, towns all over Europe swelled with people. The excitement and bustle of towns drew many people. But there were some drawbacks to living in a medieval town. Streets were narrow, filled with animals and their waste. With no sewers, most people dumped household and human waste into the street in front of the house. Most people never bathed, and their houses lacked fresh air, light, and clean water.

Because houses were built of wood with thatched roofs, they were a constant fire hazard. Nonetheless, many people chose to move to towns to pursue the economic and social opportunities they offered. People were no longer content with their old feudal existence on manors or in tiny villages. Even though legally bound to their lord’s manor, many serfs ran away. According to custom, a serf could now become free by living within a town for a year and a day. A saying of the time went, “Town air makes you free.” Many of these runaway serfs, now free people, made better lives for themselves in towns.

URBAN LIFE FLORISHES

ENGLAND ABSORDS WAVES OF INVADERS

Objective: Describe the various invaders who contributed to English culture.

For centuries, invaders from various regions in Europe landed on English shores. The Angles and the Saxons stayed, bringing their own ways and creating an Anglo-Saxon culture.

ENGLAND ABSORBS WAVES OF INVADERS

Early Invasions

In the 800s, Britain was battered by fierce raids of Danish Vikings. These invaders were so feared that a special prayer was said in churches: “God, deliver us from the fury of the Northmen.” Only Alfred the Great, Anglo-Saxon king from 871 to 899, managed to turn back the Viking invaders. Gradually he and his successors united the kingdom under one rule, calling it England, “land of the Angles.” The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that had invaded the island of Britain.

In 1016, the Danish king Canute conquered England, molding Anglo-Saxons and Vikings into one people. In 1042, King Edward the Confessor, a descendant of Alfred the Great, took the throne. Edward died in January 1066 without an heir. A great struggle for the throne erupted, leading to one last invasion.

The Norman Conquest

The invader was William, duke of Normandy, who became known as William the Conqueror. Normandy is a region in the north of France that had been conquered by the Vikings. Its name comes from the French term for the Vikings—North men, or Norman. The Normans were descended from the Vikings, but they were French in language and in culture. As King Edward’s cousin, William claimed the English crown and invaded England with a Norman army.

William’s rival was Harold Godwinson, the Anglo-Saxon who claimed the throne. Harold was equally ambitious. On October 14, 1066, Normans and Anglo-Saxons fought the battle that changed the course of English history—the Battle of Hastings. After Harold was killed by an arrow that pierced his eye, the Normans won a decisive victory.

After his victory, William declared all England his personal property. William kept about one-fifth of England for himself. The English lords who supported Harold lost their lands. William then granted their lands to about 200 Norman lords who swore oaths of loyalty to him personally. By doing this, William unified control of the lands and laid the foundation for centralized government in England.

Objective: Explain how England’s government took the first steps toward democracy.

ENGLAND'S EVOLVING GOVERNMENT

Over the next centuries, English kings tried to achieve two goals. First, they wanted to hold and add to their French lands. Second, they wanted to strengthen their own power over the nobles and the Church.

William the Conqueror’s descendants owned land both in Normandy and in England. The English king Henry II added to these holdings by marrying Eleanor of Aquitaine from France.

The marriage brought Henry a large territory in France called Aquitaine. He added Aquitaine to the lands in Normandy he had already inherited from William the Conqueror. Because Henry held lands in France, he was a vassal to the French king. But he was also a king in his own right.

The Magna Carta

Henry was succeeded first by his son Richard the Lion-Hearted, hero of the Third Crusade. When Richard died, his younger brother John took the throne. John ruled from 1199 to 1216. He failed as a military leader, earning the nickname John Softsword. John lost Normandy

and all his lands in northern France to the French under Philip Augustus. This loss forced a confrontation with his own nobles.

Some of John’s problems stemmed from his own personality. He was cruel to his subjects and tried to squeeze money out of them. He alienated the Church and threatened to take away town charters guaranteeing selfgovernment. John raised taxes to an all-time high to finance his wars. His nobles revolted. On June 15, 1215, they forced John to agree to the most celebrated document in English history, the Magna Carta (Great Charter). This document, drawn up by English nobles and reluctantly approved by King John, guaranteed certain basic political rights.

The nobles wanted to safeguard their own feudal rights and limit the king’s powers. In later years, however, English people of all classes argued that certain clauses in the Magna Carta applied to every citizen. Guaranteed rights included no taxation without representation, a jury trial, and the protection of the law. The Magna Carta guaranteed what are now considered basic legal rights both in England and in the United States.

ENGLAND'S EVOLVING GOVERNMENT

The Model Parliament

Another important step toward democratic government came during the rule of the next English king, Edward I. Edward needed to raise taxes for a war against the French, the Welsh, and the Scots. In 1295, Edward summoned two burgesses (citizens of wealth and property) from every borough and two knights from every county to serve as a parliament, or legislative group.

In November 1295, knights, burgesses, bishops, and lords met together at Westminster in London. This is now called the Model Parliament because its new makeup (commoners, or non nobles, as well as lords) served as a model for later kings.

Over the next century, from 1300 to 1400, the king called the knights and burgesses whenever a new tax was needed. In Parliament, these two groups gradually formed an assembly of their own called the House of Commons. Nobles and bishops met separately as the House of Lords. Under Edward I, Parliament was in part a royal tool that weakened the great lords. As time went by, Parliament became strong. Like the Magna Carta, it provided a check on royal power.

Juries and Common Law

Henry ruled England from 1154 to 1189. He strengthened the royal courts of justice by sending royal judges to every part of England at least once a year. They collected taxes, settled lawsuits, and punished crimes. Henry also introduced the use of the jury in English courts. A jury in medieval England was a group of local people—usually 12 neighbors of the accused—who answered a royal judge’s questions about the facts of a case. Jury trials became a popular means of settling disputes. Only the king’s courts were allowed to conduct them.

Over the centuries, case by case, the rulings of England’s royal judges

formed a unified body of law that became known as common law. Today

the principles of English common law are the basis for law in many English-speaking countries, including the United States.

THE GREAT FAMINE AND BUBONIC PLAGUE STRIKE

Objective: Describe the bubonic plague and its effects on Europe.

By 1300, Europe’s population was booming. Then a series of disasters

struck, beginning with the Great Famine. From 1315 to 1317, abnormally severe winters and torrential rains throughout the spring and summer growing seasons ruined crop yields across northern Europe. Grains were the main staple of the European diet, but soggy fields became difficult, if not impossible, to plow. In addition, the inclement weather limited the ability to dry or cure hay to feed livestock.

In desperation, starving people ate the grain seeds they needed to plant more crops and killed the animals they used to plow the fields. The famine devastated the population and damaged the social network. Its lingering effects were felt until the early 1320s. However, the longer-term impact on this population whose immune

systems were weakened by famine would prove costly.

Origins and Impact of the Plague

In 1346, plague struck Mongol armies laying siege to Kaffa, a port on the Black Sea. From there rats infested with fleas carrying the disease made their way onto ships. Infected fleas bit humans transferring the disease to them. As merchants traveled, so did the plague. It spread quickly throughout Europe, first striking coastal regions of Italy. From there it moved inland along trade routes to Spain, France, Germany, England, and beyond.

By 1351, almost no part of Europe remained untouched by the Black Death. Remarkably, some communities escaped the plague relatively unharmed. In others, two-thirds to three-quarters of those who caught the disease died. The plague returned every few years, though it never struck as severely as in the first outbreak. However, the periodic attacks further reduced the population.

THE GREAT FAMINE AND BUBONIC PLAGUE STRIKE

Effects of the Plague

The economic and social effects of the plague were enormous. The old manorial system began to crumble. Some of the effects included:

• Town populations fell.

• Trade declined. Prices rose.

• Serfs left manors in search of better wages.

• Nobles fiercely resisted peasant demands for higher wages, causing peasant revolts in England, France, Italy, and Belgium.

• Jews were falsely blamed for bringing on the plague. All over Europe, Jews were driven from their homes or, worse, massacred.

• The Church suffered a loss of prestige when its prayers failed to stop the onslaught of the bubonic plague and priests abandoned their duties.

The plague and its aftermath disrupted medieval society, hastening changes that were already in the making. The society of the Middle Ages was collapsing. The century of war between England and France was that society’s final death struggle.

The Plague Strikes

During the 1300s an epidemic struck parts of Asia, North Africa, and Europe. Approximately one-third of the population of Europe, and millions more in Asia and Africa, died of the deadly disease known as the Black Death. It got this name because of the purplish or black spots it produced on the skin. This devastating plague swept across Europe between 1347 and 1351.

Historians are still not sure what disease the Black Death was, or even if it was a single disease. One theory is that the disease took two different forms. One, called bubonic plague, was spread by fleas that lived on rats and other animals. The other, pneumonic plague, could be spread through the air from person to person through coughs and sneezes.

Pneumonic plague spread more quickly. Unlike catastrophes that pull communities together, this epidemic was so terrifying that it ripped apart the very fabric of society.

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR

Objective: Explain the Hundred Years’ War and its impact.

Not only did the people in Europe during the 1300s have to deal with epidemic disease, but they also had to deal with war. England and France battled with each other on French soil for just over a century. The century of war between England and France marked the end of medieval Europe’s society.

When the last Capetian king died without a successor, England’s Edward III, as grandson of Philip IV, claimed the right to the French throne. The war that Edward III launched for that throne continued on and off from 1337 to 1453. It became known as the Hundred Years’ War. Victory passed back and forth between the two countries. Finally, between 1421 and 1453, the French rallied and drove the English out of France entirely, except for the port city of Calais.

The Hundred Years’ War brought a change in the style of warfare in Europe. At this time some combatants were still operating under medieval ideals of chivalry. They looked with contempt on the common foot soldiers and archers who fought alongside them. This contempt would change as the longbow changed warfare.

Joan of Arc

In 1420, the French and English signed a treaty stating that Henry V would inherit the French crown upon the death of the French king Charles VI. Then, in 1429, a teenage French peasant girl named Joan of Arc felt moved by God to rescue France from its English conquerors. When Joan was just 13 she began to have visions and hear what she believed were voices of the saints. They urged her to drive the English from France and give the French crown to France’s true king, Charles VII, son of Charles VI.

On May 7, 1429, Joan led the French army into battle at a fort city near Orléans. The fort blocked the road to Orléans. It was a hard-fought battle for both sides. The French finally retreated in despair. Suddenly, Joan and a few soldiers charged back toward the fort. The entire French army stormed after her. The siege of Orléans was broken. Joan of Arc guided the French onto the path of victory.

After that victory, Joan persuaded Charles to go with her to Reims. There he was crowned king on July 17, 1429. In 1430, the Burgundians, England’s allies, captured Joan in battle. They turned her over to the English. The English, in turn, handed her over to Church authorities to stand trial. Although the French king Charles VII owed his crown to Joan, he did nothing to rescue her. Condemned as a witch and a heretic because of her claim to hear voices, Joan was burned at the stake on May 30, 1431.

THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR

The Impact of the Hundred Years’ War

The long, exhausting war finally ended in 1453. Each side experienced major changes.

• A feeling of nationalism emerged in England and France. Now people thought of the king as a national leader, fighting for the glory of the country, not simply a feudal lord.

• The power and prestige of the French monarch increased.

• The English suffered a period of internal turmoil known as the War of the Roses, in which two noble houses fought for the throne.

Some historians consider the end of the Hundred Years’ War in 1453 as the end of the Middle Ages. The twin pillars of the medieval world, religious devotion and the code of chivalry, both crumbled. The Age of Faith died a slow death. This death was caused by the Great Schism, the scandalous display of wealth by the Church, and the discrediting of

the Church during the bubonic plague. The Age of Chivalry died on the battlefields of Crécy, Poitiers, and Agincourt.

The Longbow Changes Warfare

The English introduced the longbow and demonstrated its power in three significant battles: Crécy, Poitiers, and Agincourt. The first and most spectacular battle was the Battle of Crécy on August 26, 1346. The English army, including longbowmen, was outnumbered by a French army three times its size. The French army included knights and archers with crossbows. French knights believed themselves invincible and attacked.

English longbowmen let fly thousands of arrows at the oncoming French. The crossbowmen, peppered with English arrows, retreated in panic. The knights trampled their own archers in an effort to cut a path through them. English longbowmen sent volley after volley of deadly arrows. They unhorsed knights who then lay helplessly on the ground in their heavy armor. Then, using long knives, the English foot soldiers attacked, slaughtering the French. At the end of the day, more than a third of the French force lay dead. Among them were some of the most honored in chivalry. The longbow, not chivalry, had won the day. The mounted,

heavily armored medieval knight was soon to become extinct.

The English repeated their victory ten years later at the Battle of Poitiers. The third English victory, the Battle of Agincourt, took place in 1415. The success of the longbow in these battles spelled doom for chivalric warfare.