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Visual History of the World
(CONTENTS)
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The Middle Ages
5th - 15th century
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The upheaval that
accompanied the migration of European peoples of late antiquity
shattered the power of the Roman Empire and consequently the entire
political order of Europe. Although Germanic kingdoms replaced Rome,
the culture of late antiquity, especially Christianity, continued to
have an effect and defined the early Middle Ages. Concurrent to the
developments in the Christian West, in Arabia the Prophet Muhammad
in the seventh century founded Islam, a new religion with immense
political and military effectiveness. Within a very short time,
great Islamic empires developed from the Iberian Peninsula and the
Maghreb to India and Central Asia, with centers such as Cordoba,
Cairo, Baghdad, and Samarkand.
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The Cathedral Notre Dame de Reims, built in the 1 3th—14th century
in the Gothic style; the cathedral served for many centuries as the
location for the ceremonial coronation of the French king.
The Cathedral of Reims, by Domenico Quaglio
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Northern Europe
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8TH-16TH CENTURY
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1 Stave Church, Borgund, Norway,
built in the twelfth century
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From Scandinavia, the Vikings started sailing along the European
coasts during the eighth century. Initially they sailed as warriors and
pirates, but later also as traders and settlers. In the ninth and tenth
centuries, the kingdoms of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden emerged in
Scandinavia, 1 Christianity played a major role in the formation of
these states. The kings were constantly opposed by a strong aristocracy.
Even the Kalmar Union, which united the three northern kingdoms from the
14th to 16th centuries, could not obscure the structural weaknesses of
the kingdoms.
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The Vikings and the Kingdom of Norway
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Daring seafarers, the Vikings for a time ruled the seas around
Europe. Norway experienced a golden age from the 13th century until it
came under Danish rule in 1387.
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The Scandinavians of the Early Middle Ages were also known as
2
Vikings, Varangians, or Normans, though they formed no ethnic or
political unity.
Over time, various groups sailed from their northern
homelands due to limited resources and political change, but also out of
a thirst for adventure.
Viking advances in 3 shipbuilding technology
enabled them to conduct warring and raiding expeditions along the
European coasts and even up rivers far into the interior.
Trade also
played a significant role, as is testified to by the
5 port cities, such
as the North German trading settlement of Haithabu.
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2 Tyr, the Norse mythology god of warfare
and battle, with a tied wolf
of the
underworld, bronze relief, sixth ñ
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3 The Oseberg ship, found in
a large burial mound in Norway,
9th century
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5 Port city of the Vikings, reconstruction drawing,
20th century
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Eventually, the
Scandinavians also appeared as settlers and founders of empires in
England, Ireland Normandy, and Russia.
The
Vikings also reached Iceland and Greenland and, around the year 1000,
led by 6 Leif Eriksson, the North American coast.
In the homeland of the Vikings, the increasing power of the
4 kings
curbed the former freedom and self-governance of the clans.
Opponents of
the new kingdoms usually joined the emigrants.
7 Harold I Fairhair,
about 870, was the first to unite the Norwegian monarchies.
Christianity was introduced, occasionally forcibly. In particular, Olaf
I Tryggvason and Olaf II Haraldsson (St. Olaf) used the Church to
support the centralization of the state in the eleventh century. As in
other European countries, conflicts over the appointing of church
offices arose in the twelfth century. Sverre Sigurdsson was able to
strengthen the power of the monarchy again by 1202. During the reign of
his grandson Haakon IV (the Old), Norwegian rule was extended over
Greenland in 1261 and Iceland in 1262; for centuries before that, the
institution of the Althing, an assembly of all free men in which
political and legal affairs were discussed, had governed Iceland. In
1319 the Swedish Folkungs inherited Norway, and in 1380 it was inherited
by the Danish queen Margaret I. Norway remained united with Denmark
until 1814.
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6 Leif Eriksson sees North America,
painting, 19th century
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4 A king, Norwegian
toy figure, twelfth c.
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7 Harold Fairhair and a giant, Iceland
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Denmark and Sweden
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In the Kalmar Union, Denmark attempted to dominate the Baltic Sea
region. However, it came up against great opposition, particularly from
Sweden.
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The development of the Danish kingdom began with Gorm the Old, who
about 940 subjugated the Vikings of Haithabu.
His son 10 Harold II
Bluetooth followed him around 950, but was killed by his son Sweyn I
Forkbeard in 986.
Sweyn and his son 12 Canute the Great occupied
England and Norway, thus creating a great kingdom along the coasts of
the North Sea.
Only a few years after Canute's death in 1035, however,
England and Norway regained their independence.
Denmark was weakened by struggles over succession in the further course
of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
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10 Stone with runes of
Harold Bluetooth, ca. 965
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12 King Canute the Great and his
wife donate a cross,
book illustration,
1031
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Beginning in 1157, Valdemar I (the Great) was able to conquer
territories in northern Germany and along the Baltic coast, but his son
Valdemar II was defeated in 1227 at the 8
Battle of Bornhoved by the North German princes
and the Hanseatic city of Lubeck.
8 Battle of Bornhoved, book illustration, ca. 1300
Following the Hanseatic War, Valdemar
IV Atterdag was forced to recognize the demands of the Hanseatic League
in the Treaty of Stralsund of 1370. His daughter Margaret I, widow of
King Haakon VI Magnusson of Norway and Sweden, secured the Danish crown
for her son Olaf and, after his death in 1387, took over the
regency herself.
In 1397, she united the three kingdoms as the 9 Kalmar Union.
9 Kalmar Castle in Southern Sweden, built 12th—16th ñ
The history of the Swedish monarchy had begun in 980 with Erik VIII
Bjornsson. His son Olaf Skotkonung III was baptized in 1008.
Nevertheless, the entire period of the High Middle Ages was defined by
clashes with non-Christian sections of the population and fighting over
the throne by rival dynasties. In 1250, the House of Folkung came to the
throne.
The founder, Birger Jarl, a regent of the empire, completed the conquest
of Finland, which had been the goal of Swedish
11 warriors, 13
missionaries, and settlers since the twelfth century.
Margaret I of Denmark, the heiress of the last Folkungs, brought
Sweden into the Kalmar Union. Sweden, in particular, chafed under the
Danish domination of the Kalmar Union. The Swedish nobility rose up
against Margaret's successors, particularly against the kings from the
House of Oldenburg who reigned after 1448. This ended in 1523 when
Gustav I Vasa, king of Sweden, broke away from Denmark.
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11 Mounted warriors on reindeers and
soldiers on skis, wood engraving,
16th ñ
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13 Bishop Henry of Uppsala, a missionary
in Finland, book illustration,
ca. 1475
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see also texts
"The
Nibelungenlied"
"Beowulf"
"The Poetic Edda"
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The Hanseatic League
Lubeck and other trading cities joined together between the twelfth and
14th centuries as the Merchants' League of the Hanse.
The Hanseatic
League maintained common trading posts, secured the routes of their
merchant ships—the so-called cogs—against pirate attacks, and intervened
in the domestic politics of neighboring countries to gain more favorable
concessions.
The increasing strength of the Northern European states and
the shift of the main trade routes to the Atlantic in the 16th century
led to the decline of the Hanse.
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see also texts
"The
Nibelungenlied"
"Beowulf"
"The Poetic Edda"
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Hanseatic League ship
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