The Crises of the Late Middle Ages

This is Unit Twelve of Western Civilization One, part one of two: the crises of the late Middle Ages, the Mongols, the Black Death, and the Hundred Years' War. Unit eleven closed on the chain that built Europe: peace, plow, coin, town, school. Carry one idea through this unit. Three crises in one century tested what that chain had built, and the way to hold them is to see what each did to the order. The Mongols came first and stopped short, leaving Russia under tribute and the Silk Road quiet enough for a plague to travel. The plague struck a Europe already hungry, killed a third or more, and reversed the manor's bargain: labor scarce, wages rising, lords resisting, peasants rising and losing, wages rising anyway. The war ran through all of it, and the longbow showed that a peasant could kill a knight. Part two takes the fourth blow, a Church with two popes. By the end you will be able to tell the Mongols from Chinggis to the Tatar Yoke. To describe famine, plague, its toll and the responses. To explain the labor shortage's effects. To tell the war from Aquitaine to Joan. And to state what it left.

Four entries on the Mongols: the largest land empire in history, the machine that built it, the death that spared Europe, and the tribute Russia paid.

Universal lord, and the largest land empire.

WC1 1101 Temujin to Chinggis: 1206 and the Conquests to 1279

Temujin, born about eleven sixty-two, was elected Khan in twelve oh six as Chinggis, universal lord, in the anchor's spelling. His sons and grandsons took Persia in twelve twenty-one, Baghdad in twelve fifty-eight, and all China by twelve seventy-nine, the largest land empire in history, relevant here for wrecking the Middle East and shaping Russia. The anchor's eleven sixty-seven for his birth is recorded.

Law, decimal units, spies, and terror.

WC1 1102 Yasa, Tumen, Spies: The Mongol Machine

Mongol armies ran on the Yasa, law or tradition, and decimal units up to the tumen of ten thousand, with clans mixed to dilute loyalty. Several horses per man, signal flags, spies, adaptive siegecraft and terror, conquered engineers redeployed, and plague corpses catapulted into cities, the anchor's biological warfare, made them unbeatable. The anchor calls Chinggis's exterminations medieval genocide, its word, attributed.

Spared by a death, not a victory.

WC1 1103 Russia 1240, Hungary 1241, and Ogodei's Death

In twelve thirty-six the Mongols struck disunited Russia and by twelve forty had destroyed or taken every major city. In twelve forty-one, the witness's date, they beat Poland and Hungary at once, and withdrew only because the Great Khan Ogodei died, the tumen recalled to Karakorum. The Mongols never came back. Europe was spared by a death, not a victory.

Stopped in Palestine, and two centuries of tribute.

WC1 1104 Ain Jalut, the Khanates, and the Tatar Yoke

In twelve sixty the Mamluks of Egypt stopped a Mongol army at Ain Jalut, a witness name, as the khanates turned independent, and the Silk Road stabilized under Mongol peace. Russia paid tribute to Mongol lords until the later fifteenth century, the Tatar Yoke of Russian teaching, which the anchor calls exaggerated. The tribute is the record.

Four entries on famine and plague: a Europe malnourished before thirteen forty-eight, what the disease probably was, the toll in three years, and quarantine, flagellants and massacre.

Hunger came before plague.

WC1 1105 Famine First: Europe Before 1348

Bad harvests from the early fourteenth century, the Great Famine of thirteen fifteen on the witness, left generations malnourished by thirteen forty-eight, with reported cannibalism. Medicine held the miasma theory, bad air, so onions lined the streets, and cities were incubators: Florence in thirteen thirty had one hundred thousand people and twenty thousand paupers, the anchor's figures. Hunger came before plague.

The theory, and the doubt.

WC1 1106 Miasma, Fleas, and What the Black Death Probably Was

The prevailing theory is bubonic plague, carried by fleas on rats and humans, with a pneumonic form spread by coughing that killed about ninety percent, and the consensus is that it began in the Mongol khanates and moved west. Its speed troubles the theory, and the anchor says the identity is still debated. No verdict on the disease: state the theory and the doubt.

A third of Europe in three years.

WC1 1107 1348 to 1351: One-Third to One-Half

Plague reached southern Europe in thirteen forty-eight, England in forty-nine, Scandinavia in fifty, and burned out by fifty-one. About one-third of Europe died in three years, the anchor's conservative figure, and some historians say nearly half; cities lost over half, villages were left with one survivor, and it recurred every twenty years. The lasting consequence was the labor shortage, which the next topic follows.

Quarantine, whips, and wells.

WC1 1108 Quarantine, Flagellants, and the Massacre of Jews

Quarantine, the only partly effective measure, delayed more than stopped. Prayer and scapegoats followed: Jews were accused of poisoning wells and the anchor's thousands were massacred, the crusading era's anti-Semitism renewed; the Flagellants whipped themselves through the streets; and many read famine and pestilence as the End Times. The massacres are the record, stated plainly.

Two entries on the world after the plague: wages that rose though every revolt failed, and a century of wider rights for women beside a culture that danced with skeletons.

The revolts failed; wages rose anyway.

WC1 1109 The Labor Shortage: Wages Up, Lords Resist, Peasants Rise

With workers scarce, lords tried to hold peasants and freeze wages, the Statute of Laborers on the witness, and peasants rose: the Jacquerie in France in thirteen fifty-eight and the English Rising of thirteen eighty-one, witness names, both bloodily suppressed. Wages rose for decades regardless, ironically positive for survivors, the anchor says. The revolts failed; wages rose anyway.

Fewer workers, wider rights, and skeletons on tombs.

WC1 1110 A Century of Wider Rights for Women, and the Dance of Death

The same shortage gave women property, commercial and land rights for about a century, even guild entry: fewer workers, wider rights. Culture made death familiar, the dance of death, skeletons on tombs, the deathbed as a public lesson against enjoying life. The rights lasted about a century, and the anchor says so.

Four entries on the Hundred Years' War: why two intertwined crowns fought, the longbow at three battles, Joan of Arc and fourteen fifty-three, and what the war left each side.

A vassal's duchy and a rejected claim.

WC1 1111 Why England and France Fought: Normandy, Aquitaine, 1328

Since ten sixty-six the two crowns and nobilities were intertwined, and the English king held Aquitaine as the French king's vassal. When Charles the Fourth died in thirteen twenty-eight, Edward the Third's claim was rejected for Philip the Sixth, and disputes over Aquitaine brought war in thirteen thirty-seven, battles, short wars and long truces to fourteen fifty-three. A feudal dispute became a national war.

A peasant archer worth a knight.

WC1 1112 Crecy, Poitiers, Agincourt: The Longbow Against the Knight

English raiders beat a richer France at Crecy in thirteen forty-six and Poitiers in thirteen fifty-six, witness names, and at Agincourt in fourteen fifteen, where longbows cut down elite cavalry, a peasant archer worth a knight, with Burgundy independent and pro-English. Henry the Fifth was accepted as France's heir, then died. The anchor names Agincourt only; the witness supplies the other two.

A peasant with a vision, burned for heresy.

WC1 1113 Joan of Arc and 1453

In fourteen twenty-nine Joan of Arc, a peasant with a vision, led the Dauphin Charles the Seventh's armies in battle. Captured by the Burgundians, she was burned by the English in fourteen thirty-one for heresy, a martyr and later a national symbol. The English threat ended in fourteen fifty-three. Where the anchor says burned as a witch, the charge was heresy.

Two stronger crowns, one halved country.

WC1 1114 What the War Left: Taxes, Halved France, an English England

War and plague halved France's population, the anchor says, and shut its luxury trades; the crown gained the gabelle on salt and the taille on households. England's elite was severed from France, and English became the language of state and law for the first time. Two stronger, more centralized monarchies is the anchor's conclusion, and unit fourteen builds on both taxes.

Look at what you can now do. You can tell Chinggis elected in twelve oh six, the Yasa and the tumen, Russia destroyed by twelve forty, Hungary beaten and Europe spared by Ogodei's death, and the tribute Russia paid. You can describe the famine of thirteen fifteen, the theory of fleas and the doubt about it, a third of Europe dead by thirteen fifty-one, and quarantine, flagellants and the massacre of Jews stated plainly. You can explain that the revolts failed and wages rose anyway, and that women gained rights for about a century while art danced with skeletons. You can tell Aquitaine and the rejected claim of thirteen twenty-eight, the longbow at Crecy, Poitiers and Agincourt, and Joan burned for heresy before fourteen fifty-three. And you can state what the war left: the gabelle and the taille, a halved France, and an English England. Part two opens on the fourth blow, a pope seized at Anagni, seventy years at Avignon, and a Church with three popes.