The Oxford History of Medieval Europe

by George Arthur Holmes (Editor), Thomas Brown, Edward James

This is the most authoritative account of life in Medieval Europe between the fall of the Roman Empire and the coming of the Renaissance. Full coverage is given to all aspects of life in a thousand-year period which saw the creation of western civilization: from the empires and kingdoms of Charlemagne, the Byzantines, and the Hundred Years War, to the ideals of the crusades, the building of great cathedrals and the social catastrophe of the Black Death; the cultural worlds of chivalric knights, popular festivals, and new art forms. The chapters show the movement of the centre of gravity in European life from the Mediterranean to the north; and the authors explore the contrast between Byzantine and Renaissance cultures in the south and the new, complex political and social structures of north-west Europe, which by 1300 had the most advanced civilization the world had ever seen.

Genres: History, Medieval, Nonfiction, Medieval History, Reference, European History, Academic

395 pages, Paperback

First published May 19, 1988

About the author

George Arthur Holmes FBA (born 22 April 1927 in Aberystwth–died 29 January 2009) was Chichele Professor of Medieval History at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, 1989-94.

Reviews

[Jamie Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I never had much interest in medieval history. It was the ancient world, from Sumeria to Rome, that held my attention. Then I read J.B. Bury’s The Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, and was swept up by the story of how the Romans tried to stem the inexorable tide sweeping down on them from the north and east; the deals they made with their foederati, giving barbarian tribes land and partial citizenship rights in exchange for military service, until the army was made up almost entirely Germans, Slavs, and Huns, who eventually realized that they didn’t need Rome at all, and could be conquerors instead of hired soldiers.

The fall of Rome is usually dated from either 410, when the Visigoths under Alaric sacked the city, or 476 when the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustus, was deposed by the German Odacer. The Eastern Empire remained strong for hundreds of years, even reconquering Italy and parts of North Africa under Justinian, but a new age had arisen, and the unifying force would henceforth be the Church, which took on both civil and religious duties as Roman rule collapsed. There was “a widespread process of clericalization; episcopal election became the means for as disorientated aristocracy to maintain its traditional leadership of the community and for preservation of Roman customs and culture.” (p. 5)

The barbarians were Christianized, although initially they were mostly Arians, which rejected the concept of the Trinity and held that Jesus Christ was as separate and subordinate creation of God. With the conversion of Clovis to Catholicism in 496 the new polity began to emerge. Though the Roman empire was gone, its shadow lived on in its laws and institutions, which were widely adopted in the new barbarian kingdoms, and a new social structure was built around feudalism and mounted knights. The mostly small kingdoms could not support large armies, and a state of near-constant warfare required a mobile force that maximized offensive power.

The requirements for this means of waging war were sufficient speed to launch an attack, intercept one, or evade an interception, and sufficient protection and training to destroy an inferior force or hold off a superior one. These requirements were best met in the mounted knight; protective mail armour and shield, a horse bred to bear the weight of a man so equipped, a high saddle and stirrups which enabled the rider to put the horse’s momentum behind his spearpoint, and the lengthy training which gave him the skill to control these elements and to act in concert with his fellows made the knight the dominant force in battle.” (p. 122-123)

Charlemagne managed to assemble a large empire by being almost constantly at war, but upon his death in 814 it was split among his sons, and on their deaths it fragmented into a number of small, unstable kingdoms. Europe fell again into weakness at precisely the time it needed strength. Although Charles Martel had stopped the Islamic invasion of France in 732, around 800 the Vikings from the north and the Magyars from the east pressed the tottering kingdoms of Europe to the breaking point (for a more complete treatment of this critical time I recommend Paul Collins’s Birth of the West: Rome, Germany, France, and the Creation of Europe in the Tenth Century).

Regarding the Vikings in England, the author has an interesting counter-intuitive observation. They are usually seen as raiders and pillagers, an existential threat to England; however, they might have unintentionally been a unifying force, in that since the petty native kingdoms were constantly warring among themselves there was no chance for a strong, stable state to arise. “[I]t is difficult to imagine how England could have emerged by the late tenth century as a wealthy, powerful, and united kingdom had not the Vikings destroyed all native dynasties except that of the West Saxons. The English nation was, in a sense, created by the Vikings, with the help of the West Saxon propagandists.” (p. 114)

In the east, the Byzantines were weakened by constant war with the Persian Empire, then by Islam starting around 630. After losing Egypt, Palestine, and Syria they managed to stabilize their borders for around 400 years until the Seljuk Turks, migrating south from their homeland near the Aral Sea, entered eastern Anatolia. In 1071 the Byzantine army was disastrously defeated at the Battle of Manzikert after the emperor was betrayed by his second in command, who marched half the army away from the battle, leaving the rest to its fate. With the loss of the Levant and almost all of Anatolia, the Eastern Roman Empire shrunk to a remnant of its former self, and after being sacked by its erstwhile protectors during the Fourth Crusade in 1204, its final dissolution was inevitable. The Turks finished it off in 1453.

The book gives a good summary of the Crusades. What emerges is that the were doomed from the start. They set up four petty kingdoms, each with its own agenda and suspicious both of each other and the heretical Eastern Church in Constantinople. The capture of Jerusalem had reunited Islam, and the Western armies, built around their heavily armored knights, were easily outmaneuvered and defeated by the lighter, more mobile cavalry of their opponents, equipped with bows or javelins. In addition, there were never enough European settlers to hold the territory the Crusades had taken, and the kingdoms were picked off one by one.

The possessions of Outremer [the territory captured by the Crusades] had simply fallen to superior forces. Certainly it had not helped that Frederick II had returned to Italy as soon as he had taken the crown of Jerusalem; or that the military orders, and the omnipresent Venetians and Genoese, were constantly at loggerheads with each other and often in open warfare. Nor can it really be said that the crusaders had built socially cohesive states; they had remained distinct from the indigenous population throughout. But the crusader states were not particularly rotten. Without reinforcements from the west no amount of unity would have availed, and that further support, after 1270, was noticeably absent. Potential crusaders were either locked in other conflicts or rightly skeptical of their chances of success. In a sense, since it was perceived that it was moribund, Outremer was allowed to die. (p. 261)

There is also a good discussion of the beginning of the reconquista in Spain, which would not be completed until 1492. Starting from the northeast corner of the country the Christian armies gradually conquered west to the Atlantic and south to the Mediterranean. In the east and center of the country they made little initial progress, and were as frequently on the retreat as the advance. They adopted the weapons and tactics of their opponents, but it was largely because the caliphate had broken up into numerous petty kingdoms, often hostile to one another, that they were finally able to conquer all but a strip of land along the southern coast, which itself would eventually fall.

The story of the Middle Ages is remarkable, and well told in this book. It consists of a forward and epilogue by George Holmes, and six chapters, each by a different author. Modern society and civilizations emerged from this time period, with parliaments, universities, sophisticated banking systems, and monarchies with some semblance of stability, as opposed to being led by whoever the strongest thug was at the time. The Renaissance was able to take root from the seeds planted in this period, and thence on to modern society. This is not a book for medieval specialists, but for anyone looking for a general introduction to the Medieval world, it is a good start.

[Serge]

I always try to finish every book I read, however, I have unfortunately decided to add this to my DNF list for now. As a history book, this is quite informative, covering a large span of history in a relatively small amount of pages (around 400 in the Kindle edition), however, the writing style is very dry, and adopts a "listing of facts" approach, without any authorial voice that takes the reader on an immersive journey through this period of history. I do not fault the writers of the book for this, since for history enthusiasts who enjoy deep diving into history in that informative fashion, this book might be pretty good, but for the casual reader who wants to explore the general events of what happened during that time, this book could get extremely dry and difficult to get through.

What I absorbed from this book were the drastic changes Europe went through after the collapse of the Roman Empire, and the important role Christianity played in the relative centralization of political power in this area. The differences between Western Europe, falling under the grip of Germanic tribes and the metamorphosis into a Europe no longer united by Roman hegemony, and the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire were highlighted. We explore how what we know today as England fared after being abandoned by the Romans, and how Viking invasions played a role in creating a unified English identity.

I would have wanted to read more, but the endless listing of details of certain lords and barons and dates and the dry delivery method that focuses on the trees instead of the forest wasn't what I was able to handle. I was personally looking to read something that describes the general situation and how each nation was formed and the wars that took place which paved the way for Europe as we know it today to start forming after the end of the medieval era.

However, if you do have the desire to immerse yourself in the details, seeing the internal aspects of the political entities described during this period, then this would be a good book to try. I will either be trying to find a more summarized book covering this time period, or switch to a different medium, perhaps in documentary format, to learn more about this time period.

[kia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read out of interest for European history. Very informative.

[Tim Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

According to George Holmes, editor of _The Oxford History of Medieval Europe_, "western civilization was created in medieval Europe." Much of modern thought and culture, including the modern nation state, ideas of popular sovereignty, modern parliaments, banking, universities that award degrees, and the literary form of the novel, has its origins in the struggles and society of the medieval centuries. Since 1500 nothing comparable to the shattering and rebirth of the West that happened between the years 400 and 900 has occurred, nor has arisen anything as fundamentally novel and distinct as the culture that grew up around the cathedrals, universities, royal courts, and commercial cities between the years 900 and 1500.

This book is an anthology and is divided into eight sections; an editor's forward and an editor's postscript, both by Holmes, and six chapters, each by a different author and each concerned with a different era and region of medieval Europe (chapters focus on either the Mediterranean basin or northern Europe beyond the Alps and the Pyrenees). In addition to the text there were a number of plates depicting medieval art and around twenty very helpful maps throughout the book.

Chapter one was on the transformation of the Roman Mediterranean into that of the early medieval era (400 to 900) and was by Thomas Brown. Main themes are the rise and long, slow decline of the Byzantine Empire and what Brown called the "age of invasions," the upheaval in the region caused by the arrival of Germanic peoples (notably the Lombards, the most devastating), the Slavs, the Persians (a revitalized Persian empire, though eventually defeated by Emperor Heraclius, did lead to a failure of the Byzantines to reestablish authority over Italy and the Balkans), and the Arabs. Islam had phenomenal success due to the struggle between the Persians and the Byzantines, the abilities and dedication of its soldiers, the political prowess of the early caliphs, the simple appeal of its doctrines, and the political and religious alienation of Byzantium's subjects. Also of great importance was the growing power and independence of the pope (thanks in large part due to the Franks, beginning with Charlemagne), vital in creating a distinctive Western Europe, different politically, ecclesiastically, and culturally from Byzantium (other factors in fostering a distinct Western identity were the collapse of land trade routes and the growing linguistic cleavage).

Chapter two dealt with northern Europe in the Dark Ages (400 to 900) and was written by Edward James. In this period the north found "its own voice," as thanks to the spread of Christianity (and writing) northerners began to produce their own written record, allowing the north to emerge "into the light of history" for the first time, as Romanization (the spread of writing, ideas of law and government, and Greek and Latin knowledge) continued ironically after the collapse of the actual Roman Empire. As with the preceding chapter much of this section dealt with the invasions of various peoples, largely Germanic (James preferred the term migrations). James also discussed the social structure of the various barbarian kingdoms, the importance of the kin-group as a social and legal institution, the evolution of Latin in the region, and the impact of the Vikings.

Chapter three was written by David Whitton and focused on the society of northern Europe in the High Middle Ages (900-1200). Major themes were what Whitten called the "lineaments of power," the complex nature of feudalism; the intricate web of duties, obligations, vassalage, and tenure between kings, nobility, and the men under them and the medieval arms race of castle building and producing expensively equipped knights, caused not by Viking or Magyar invasions (which had ended) or a decline in the economy (which was recovering quite well) but by the anxiety of lords to consolidate, maintain, and even expand their power and domains. Also covered was the evolution of monasticism, the nature of papal authority in northern Europe, and the twelfth-century Renaissance.

Chapter four (by Rosemary Morris) was titled "northern Europe invades the Mediterranean," an apt name as it chronicled the intervention of northern European powers into Italy, lands of the "Byzantine Commonwealth" (lands under the authority of Constantinople or within its powerful cultural orbit), and the Islamic world (notably in Spain - the beginnings of the Reconquista - and of course the Crusades). I found the comparison between Christian settlers and their society and their treatment of non-Christian subjects in Spain and in Outremer - the Christian conquered areas of the Holy Land - quite fascinating. A fantastic chapter, Morris covered the decline of the Abbasid caliphate in Baghdad, the rise of independent Muslim states, the subsequent reunification of Islam in the twelfth century as a direct result of Christian involvement in the Middle East, and the polarization of Muslim and Christian religious attitudes (away from earlier more tolerant ones) particularly in Spain. Also covered were issues of church reform and the development of long distance trade.

Chapter five was by Peter Denley and focused on the Renaissance Mediterranean. Too much was covered to adequately summarize here, but I found Denley's assertions that the early voyages of exploration by Vasco da Gama and others had deep medieval routes (though of course their results produced a profound break with the middle ages) and however revolutionary humanist and Renaissance ideas were, their origins (particularly two elements, chivalric and religious in nature) were firmly rooted in medieval culture.

Chapter six dealt with civilization in northern Europe from 1200 to 1500 and was by Malcolm Vale. Major themes included the evolution of the ceremonies and symbols of royalty, the rise and fall of various royal dynasties (that got a little dry), the evolution of the papacy and monasticism, and a discussion of chivalry and of medieval literature.

I found the book interesting and a good overview. Some parts were more interesting than others but all in all I found it a valuable read. I would have liked more detail on some issues but it was intended to be fairly broad in scope.

[Connor Coyne · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm not going to spend much time reviewing these books... but I picked this one because I wanted to have a general overview of the middle ages for Urbantasm. This one was ever so slightly dated, but otherwise dense of information.

The reason why I so enjoyed Chester Starr's history of the Ancient World is that, despite many of the questionable opinions he puts forward, he presents an interpretation of that world that is broad and deep, taking in not only military adventures and seismic demographic shifts, but the religion, literature, art, and cultural life at length. One always has the option to disagree with the author (and I frequently do), but his vehemence and sense of relevance makes the cultural life of the Minoans and the Etruscans important and engaging.

This book, the Oxford Illustrated History of Medieval Europe is perhaps a more traditional venture, in the sense that it is almost entirely preoccupied not only with politics, demography, and commerce, but that from the exclusive perspective of the nobility, despite an abundance of clerical and mercantile records.

This wasn't without exception... this gentrified political focus was used with great subtlety in treatments of Constantinople and the Spanish frontier, in a way the was suggestive of a greater reality (and in the case of latter-day Romans, even moving).

For a non-historian, however, the text was quite dry, which didn't help the fact that it was a long, long, LONG read (approaching 400 pages of tiny text with lots of dates). Whatever the hazards of bias in a history that takes in too much loose territory, I simply cannot get that into a history of the Middle Ages that neglects Chaucer and Dante, Giotto and Pisano, the Beowulf poet and Peter Abelard, the Romanesque and the Gothic Cathedrals. The freaking Hagia Sophia. These are at least as significant to that time's landscape as the wars between German emperors and the pope, and the book suffered from the omissions.

This book was useful, but its limitations were quite apparent. I wish I would have read something either more brief and economical, or more vividly rendered.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mission 2026: Binge reviewing all previous Reads, I was too slothful to review back when I read them

This book is the academic equivalent of a well-built cathedral: solid foundations, careful proportions, zero unnecessary decoration—and absolutely not designed for speed-reading.

This is ‘‘proper institutional history’’, the kind that doesn’t chase novelty or theory for clout. Holmes and his contributors aim to ‘map’ medieval Europe rather than dramatize it.

Politics, economy, church, society—everything gets its allocated chapter, its due seriousness, and its measured tone. No hype, no hot takes, no Twitter-friendly conclusions. Just history doing its job.

What the book does exceptionally well is ‘‘balance breadth with coherence’’.

Medieval Europe is sprawling, messy, and regionally uneven, yet this volume manages to keep the narrative intelligible without flattening differences. France, England, the Holy Roman Empire, Italy—each is treated as part of a shared civilizational space, not as isolated proto-nations.

That alone makes it valuable, especially for readers tired of nationalist back-projections.

The medieval Church is handled with particular care. Neither villain nor haloed hero, it appears as an organizing force—intellectual, political, and cultural—holding together a world where institutions were fragile and literacy scarce.

The book avoids melodrama and lets structures speak for themselves, which is both its strength and its limitation.

Because yes—this book ‘‘feels dated’’. Social history, gender, everyday life, marginal voices: they exist, but they don’t drive the narrative. The focus is still very much on elites, institutions, and high politics. If you’ve been trained on newer medieval historiography, you’ll notice what’s missing. This isn’t a flaw so much as a generational fingerprint.

Stylistically, it’s sober, restrained, and occasionally dry. You read this with a pencil, not vibes. But the clarity is refreshing. Holmes doesn’t try to impress; he tries to explain. And that makes the book a ‘‘reliable baseline text’’—something you argue ‘with’, not something you discard.

So, final take? This book is a classic, disciplined survey of mediaeval Europe—structurally sound, intellectually honest, and slightly old-school.

The book is not exciting, not trendy, but still a rock-solid reference if you want to understand how mediaeval Europe actually worked before theory took over the room.

Most recommended.

[Simon Mcleish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally published on my blog here in November 1999.

This history, in tone somewhere between a popular and an academic exposition, divides Europe into two zones (north and Mediterranean) and the medieval period into three sections (500-900,900-1200,1200-1500). Each division is covered by a lengthy essay by a different author, making six in all, topped and tailed by short editorial commentaries.

The strength of the editing is indicated by the fact that there is no obvious stylistic change from one chapter to another; the writing is sufficiently uniform to be the work of a single writer. Rather than following political events, the emphasis is on developments on the social and economic fronts, to show the reader a broad outline of the way in which the ancient world transformed itself into the medieval and thence to the modern. English language medieval histories tend to concentrate on England and France; this one has more about Italy and Germany, making a refreshing change.

The illustrations are interesting and well selected - not just the standard pictures which are reproduced endlessly. It would be nice if a few more of them were in colour. There is a small problem with proof reading - in the genealogical table of the kings of Castile, for example, the date of death of Alfonso XI is given as 1350, while in the text a point is made of its being 1349 (he was the only major ruler to die in the massive plague epidemic of that year).

[Dave Harmon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Did not finish.
This just isn't readable. It's like a giant never ending run-on sentence and you can never tell what they're talking about or what point or story they're telling. I'm struggling through it and not getting anything from it.

[Ben Sibley]

Partial

[Jason Larimer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad book, just felt like part of it was missing.

[Charlie Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes, I really liked it. But...I have come to believe that I cannot achieve a clear understanding of my culture and that of Europe without understanding the period from the collapse of the Roman Empire to, say, the end of the Renaissance or the beginning of the Enlightenment. The dark years from 500 to 1000 set the stage for the events of the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries, leading to what Barbara Tuchman called the "disastrous" 14th century. This book takes aim at exactly this period of time; in particular it examines the effects of the Byzantine empire and Muslim culture on Western Europe in those years, a subject that is poorly studied (to put it mildly) in Southern California. What an incredible time! The Muslims were insular and rarely traveled to or studied Europe; the Europeans through the vehicle of the Crusades exported their soldiers of fortune, the condodittieri, frequently imbued with the insane philosophy of chivalry.

The Renaissance was about the re-discovery of ancient knowledge, among other things. The Muslim world played a key role in preserving this knowledge and provided one of the primary resources for this re-discovery:

"the [Spanish] peninsula still provided an important meeting-place for Christian, Muslim, and Jewish culture. An influential school of translation emerged in Toledo...and attracted scholars from all over Europe. Its main area of interest was scientific and mathematical works...But the distniguished abbot of Cluny, Peter the Venerable...commissioned a translation into Latin of the Koran...On a less elevated level, Peter Alfonsi (the converted Jew Moses Sephardi) was responsible through his works for the introduction of many oriental tales into the literature of western Europe--both Chaucer and Boccaccio were to draw upon his stories. Many of the musical instruments familiar to mediaval men were also of Moorish origin..." Suffice to say, this book can fill many chinks in the wall of knowledge for someone trying to understand the transition from the medieval to the modern world.

[Todd Stockslager · Rating 3 out of 5]

High-level survey by multiple authors of Middle Ages from the Dark Ages to the Renaissance. As a survey, the writing doesn't inspire, but it does inform. See, for example, Morris Bishop's The Middle Ages for a history with a consistently higher level of writing.

Interesting is that Dark Ages weren't so dark, nor were they the result and fault of a repressive Christianity. The common folks of classic civilization lived lives just like the lives of those of the Dark Ages.

In fact, with the collapse of the Roman Empire and the rise and spread of Christianity, there was a flowering of study, history, and literature, much of liturgical or doctrinal, some heretical, some orthodox. Its was a battle for hearts and minds, waged of course among the smaller upper crust of literacy.

After the establishment of orthodoxy and the politicization of Christianity, literary and intellectual freedom did seem to decline, to a large part due to a bunker mentality on the part of a church attempting to maintain a separate by equal authority with and over secular empires and kings, and not helped by the east/west split between Rome and Constantinople, and the encroachment by Muslims from the east and literal barbarians from the north.

[Pessoa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a popular book. It doesn’t read as a bedtime story. It can bore the reader if approached casually. It's so dense that even certain things mentioned in a sentence or two have great importance in the history. This is also why I like this book: it’s a great reference book that tries to give a general picture. Therefore it can be better enjoyed if read slowly and carefully. I enjoyed a lot searching on the Internet the names, concepts, etc. mentioned briefly in this book.

Nevertheless, no single book can successfully cover the history of (mostly Western) Europe over a thousand years. Naturally in this book, as in other similar efforts, a lot of subjects are left out. Certain issues are barely mentioned. But this isn’t a chronology enumerating historical facts. This is a general overview. They had to be selective. And on that matter, the editors and writers did justice to the subject. They haven’t left out the most important developments. The book stays faithful to what historians generally tend to agree.

[Ryanofthenorth · Rating 1 out of 5]

Words fail to describe how terrible this book was. I've read quite a few Historical surveys and, while I understand the limitations of the format, I've never encountered one that was so devoid of coherence as this one.

You will learn little about Medieval Europe reading this, as most of the Authors act like Medieval chroniclers rather than historians. Dates and names fill the pages nearly context free, except when they take the time to point out how a superior work (Waning of the Middle ages) is incorrect (although their argument is pathetically weak).

Chapter 4 was tolerable, the rest was a mess.

I'm not sure how Oxford thought this was a good idea.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm currently just getting to the end of the third chapter though I've been reading it for a while because this is my 'waiting for class to start/waiting for my ride' book that I take to classes with me.
So far, I love it (as if you couldn't tell from the rating). I love how it's divided and all the pictures! So many history books seem to be 'picture-phobic' this, as you would expect from the title, not.
Finished.

[Frederick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good collection of articles by different authors. They are all brought together skillfully by the editor as the chapters flow seamlessly and lack that awkwardness that so many books that consist of the thoughts of various authors are plagued by. The consistency and just all around good writing make this easy to read and easy to understand. I recommend it for those interested in Medieval history. I learned a lot of things I didn't know from reading this.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was disappointed first of all that Islam was treated as an afterthought rather than the major driving force in the development of Europe that it was, and also that there wasn't any history of everyday life.

[John Of Oxshott · Rating 3 out of 5]

I classify this as dry, analytical history. You have to know something of the period before you start reading it, otherwise it won’t make much sense. As such, it’s probably aimed at the university student rather than the casual reader. I suppose the students were expected to read other books as well but the bibliography is uninspiring and very dated now. (My edition is from 1992.)

The book is edited by George Holmes and is a collection of six essays by different historians dealing with southern and northern Europe (separately) in three time periods: 400-900, 900-1200 and 1200-1500.

The overviews are fairly sketchy with the emphasis being on trends and themes rather than specific events. The Hundred Years War gets eight and a half pages, two of which are maps. We learn that the war was expensive and forged modern France. The cause of the war is explained well. We are told the outcome of it and how much it damaged rural society but you’ll need something like Desmond Seward’s “Brief History” if you want to know anything of what actually happened.

The maps throughout the book are quite good. So are the genealogical charts of ruling families.

There are also some black and white photographic plates but they don’t really add much. David Whitton’s chapter on medieval Germany (with a nod to France and a grudging acknowledgement of the existence of Scandinavia) begins with a description of a picture found in the gospels commissioned by Henry the Lion. It’s a rare section in the book where the focus is on something very specific so it would have made sense to reproduce this picture, preferably in colour. But I had to go to the internet to find it.

I also used the internet to find out more about the battle of Lechfeld, “one of the most decisive battles in the course of history.” That was a very welcome diversion.

There is a chronology at the back which is quite useful but you need some knowledge of the events that are referenced because it’s not self-explanatory. For instance:

“1210-29 Albingensian Crusades in southern France against Cathar heretics.”

Incidentally, the Albigensian Crusades are mainly mentioned in the chapters on southern Europe, even though they occurred in northern Europe according to the book’s division between north and south. That’s a typical anomaly of the book’s arbitrary structure.

Although the essays are sketchy, they are not a quick read. The sentences are dense with abstract nouns and technical vocabulary of the kind you only find in history books of this type. Some of the generalisations are useful, some of them less so. David Whitton’s comment on the term noble could apply to any century up to the present and tells us next to nothing.

“Uncertainty about the proper application of the term noble was not simply a reflection of social mobility; it also reflected widespread change in society, occurring with differing forces and to differing degrees in different parts of Europe, and often recognized only after it had already taken place.”

I didn’t really need to be told that the requirements of waging war “were best met in the mounted knight” because

“protective mail armour and shield, a horse bred to bear the weight of a man so equipped, a high saddle and stirrups which enabled the rider to put his horse’s momentum behind his spearpoint, and the lengthy training which gave him the skill to control these elements and to act in concert with his fellows made the knight the dominant force in battle.”

I suppose that had to be said but it would have been more interesting if it had been put in the context of the evolving role of the mounted soldier during the whole of this period. There were times when it was a decided disadvantage in battle to be a heavy knight on a heavy horse, such as the battles of Stirling Bridge (1297), Crécy (1346) and Agincourt (1415). This is another weakness of the book’s structure.

The observation (by Malcolm Vale) on papal sovereignty, on the other hand, was intriguing:

“An institution which lacked coercive force, which was highly dependent upon secular rulers to enforce its edicts and which could only establish an effective presence within the kingdoms and principalities of Europe by proxy, had necessarily to be headed by a lawyer-pope.”

And there are many more such nuggets scattered throughout the book.

It’s not a bad book if you don’t expect too much from it. It is probably best used to complement detailed narratives of the periods or topics that interest you.

[JimZ · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thousand years in 329 pages; a history of arguably the most significant civilization in world history. Editor George Holmes opens his foreword with the statement "Western civilization was created in medieval Europe." 'The Oxford History of Medieval Europe' is almost a lifetime of immersion into that period after Rome and before the Renaissance.

Medieval society had strong ties to the civilizations both forward and backward in time. The era sought in many ways to claim and retain its "Roman" origins. It also foretold the coming renaissance. The Christian church dominated most aspects of life, yet across this millennium was by no means static. A catastrophic plague struck Europe, slashing its population by a third, yet placed the continent on the road toward a sort of modernity, economically and socially.

Medieval Europe had many faces, each unique whether in the Mediterranean regions, the areas now known as France, Germany, Bohemia, the Baltic states, Britain, or the eastern lands. Maps in the volume show an amazing number of ever-shifting principalities many of whose names have come down to us today. The papacy came into its own, and then faded as a central focus of power and significance. Wars were endemic throughout the period, yet alliances were anything but stable.

Constantinople becomes a center of attention as the church split into east and west. The eastern empire grew in strength, wealth and territory. Its relationship with the church in the west varied a great deal over the centuries. Turkey played a significant role in the shaping of the east.

Europe was economically primarily agricultural, yet it saw the development of city-states in Italy and the low countries. These cities differed from ancient Rome in that their power stemmed from trade and invention rather than armies and tribute. The position of the vast non-wealthy population saw significant changes as to their legal, political and social standing.

The question of which institutions dominated life, church, monarchy, empire, landowners, was continually evolving. Toward the end of the period there were tiny hints of what historians would later deem republican political structures, although not in the sense of full popular sovereignty as we know it today.

For the serious reader, Holmes provides an 18-page Chronology as a sort of tracking device or record of "progress" throughout the middle ages. And the Index, some 25 pages (small print), adds value to the volume for looking up names, periods, places, artistic and scientific matters.

In all, this reader gives the book 5 well-deserved stars.

[John Cairns · Rating 4 out of 5]

The sack of Rome was put down to Xian atheism. Islam means total submission! Jesus! Xianity catered to people's wishful thinking and gave social acceptance. A man who stayed on a pillar for thirty-seven years nonetheless gave good counsel to those who did not. We're nearer the ancients' ideal of rationalist self-sufficiency and self-confidence than being helpless before supernatural forces. Xianity (and Islam) reinforced misogyny.

Is the misspelling of 'minuscule' evidence deterioration of Scottish education under the nationalists has reached university level? The homophonous error p 129 is to be expected of English. The brothers Hewald, consoled by martyrdom, met savage deaths at the hands of the Saxons. Congal Clàen, the Squinting or Half-Blind, was king of the Cruthin, Irish Picts. By being acclaimed Augustus, Charlemagne was implying restoration of the Roman Empire.

The Popular Crusades pillaged the Balkans, insisted on being taken across the Bosphorus and were massacred by the Turks, a sardonically fitting reward for their faith. From the map Sijilmasa wasn't on a trade route from the Sudan as the text says but from the Sahel. I'd wondered why trades grouped together; they were made to, to encourage competition for the sake of the consumer, and not so much from own choice.

The crusader states were like colonies, like Israel is, an extension of western society. I googled dead reckoning, an innovation in navigation, and also Frederick II who had gone off on a crusade but was too quickly back to have done any good. It was the sixth crusade, the only successful one after the first. He was king of Jerusalem by marriage and by negotiation had the city given back, had himself crowned king after he no longer was but with the imperial crown, so maybe not, and left the kingdom to his infant son who was the king. The Chronology at the end of the book does amplify a little what the text gives. How Milan successfully mitigated the effect of the Black Death should have been given.

I’ve seen Brunelleschi’s cupola in Florence. The Hundred Years War was caused by the murder of a duke of Burgundy by the supporters of the dauphin at a diplomatic encounter; his son perforce supported the English.

[AB · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been reading a lot of Medieval primary sources recently and was looking for a textbook to help process this period. Holmes writes about a broad stretch of time. He especially focuses on a cause and effect model, showing how political or social aspects influenced both their milieu and the following periods. In the broadest sense, he starts with the end of Late Antiquity and bleeds into the Renaissance.
While primarily focused on European history, there is a pleasant amount of cross over (naturally for the period) with the Islamic world. Each chapter typically features a section dealing with the broad events of North Africa and the Near East. I'd highly recommend this for people new to the period or interested in delving deeper.

[Johns · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oxford historian, George Arthur Holmes, has given history readers an invaluable resource by pulling together this edited volume containing the literate work of six other veteran historians.

The book is complete with many photos and other illustrations that tease out salient points of historical fact in the story of Europe between roughly 500 and 15oo AD.

Also appreciated is the very complete bibliography which lays out basically a PhD course for any avid reader intent on pursuing more information on the period.

If you can locate this valuable book, buy it and add it to your library. You will return to it often.

[David Cooper · Rating 4 out of 5]

This consists of six essays by different authors. The essays- two cover the years 400-900, two covers years 900-1200, and two more for 1200-1500. I liked some essays more than others, but all were informative. The essays show how the Visigoths and Ostrogoths built kingdoms after the decline of Roman power. The influence of Vikings, Franks, Avars, Burgundians is shown and the kingdom of Charlemagne is discussed. The papacy and its development is talked of, as well as, the Muslim encroachment into Europe. Lots of maps and family charts are extremely helpful.

[Craig Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

My knowledge of this period of European history has been sorely lacking. I can imagine that the task of engaging with the works of historians past and of accessing, collating, and evaluating archives in various aspects would be an endevour that could occupy an academic for a lifetime. Given that there were 6 contributing authors to this work gives credence to the idea that no one individual is up to the task themselves... that it is a concerted effort of many.

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very sketchy and allusive in places but that's to be expected when dealing with such a large subject matter. It nevertheless does a good job of conveying the geist of each era, and the illustrations are well chosen.

[madi! · Rating 4 out of 5]

never knew that espionage and mass genocide could be so attractive 🤤 (just kidding) but i will be rereading this over and over again just bc i am very interested in medieval europe so this book was like an orgasm

[Jeroen Van de Crommenacker · Rating 2 out of 5]

Too disjointed. Has some interesting parts but no cohesion.

[Alex York · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good survey of medieval history.

[Belle Meade School]

940.1

[Kaitlynn Taft]

It was educational.