A new civilisation arose in western Europe during the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries, transforming medieval society as a result of economic and religious elements. Local political and administrative systems were roughly set up on the basis of local official and dynastic traditions, and were further modified by fighting wars to compose various administrative areas to bring local orders of society on the basis of aristocratic interests that became semi-independent, subject to a higher aristocratic authority, and exercised the rights and privileges of a rudimentary state. The most distinctive characteristic of that civilisation was the prominence of the Catholic church in nearly every aspect of life, in addition to important economic developments and the expansion of interests outside of Europe through the crusades that had brought about different long-term consequences. The crusades reduced the number of contentious aristocrats, especially among the vassals of the monarchy in France, which could have enabled European monarchs were able to consolidate their control much more easily after the warrior class had been reduced in number, either as a result of not returning to their landholdings, or selling them, which displaced their property and corresponding power that was correspondingly conferred onto a central monarchical authority. The crusades also enabled serfs to acquire a degree of freedom it from nobility and clergy who were going to set out for the holy land, in addition to others fleeing from nobles by finding refuge in the cities that willingly took them in during the development of business opportunities and trade routes, which further undermined the nobility’s economic resources. Monarchical authority became increasingly consolidated as a result of the absence or death or economic ruin of vassals who had perpetuated feudal anarchy, and thus led to establishing order, such as in the increasingly centralised kingdom France, where several assemblies of vassals who had established their independence from the monarchy met with the monarchical authorities to make preparations for the second crusade and introduced measures for maintaining public order along with executing legislative authority during the absence of Louis VII. In contrast, central authority declined rapidly in the German states during the crusades, as the elective emperors granted several advantages to the clergy and the increasingly more independent cities to offset the power of the most powerful hereditary vassals who emperors depended on for their election, and maintained separate interests from those of the state populations. The Italian peninsula was likewise fragmented into separate states while lacking any centralising authority in the face of independent states. Among them were republican states that contributed to abolishing feudalism, beginning in the cities of Lombardy and then a large part of Italy, through engaging mercenaries for their defence through money payments raised by taxation, rather than ensuring the presence of armed force through reciprocal territorial arrangements with a landholding aristocrat for the defence of territorial property and mutual protection. Italian merchants, s especially from Genoa, Venice, and Pisa, also profited greatly from supplying the crusades, which also brought new trade from the east as products from India and elsewhere were introduced to western Europeans, and therefore contributed to the economic growth of these Italian port cities, which had earlier initiated the establishment of trade routes between Byzantium and western Europe during the tenth century and thereafter.
Rival nobles perpetuated a state of continual anarchy among themselves with their vassals in the absence of civil laws and responsibly regulated political authorities. In addition to petty nobles supported by peasantry and engaging in robbery, they waged innumerable private wars among each other over border disputes, seeking plunder and holding other nobles for ransom after defeating them in battle. There were also foreign invaders of some kind laying waste to the country and plundering resources, maltreating and enslaving the people they found in the towns and villages and monasteries. The perpetual Viking raids isolated communities by discouraging travel and communications, which made trade decline. They also weakened the authority of kings who appeared to be unable to protect their people and territory, which contributed to the development of feudalism as a form of loose political organization based on reciprocal relationships of service, fidelity, protection and support.
While large landowners raised their following of vassals through their territorial possessions, who they were responsible for equipping for fighting, they and their vassals both built castles in which they lived, as well as to protect the open country where nobles and their vassals, as well as peasants from the surrounding areas supporting them in material terms, could take refuge. Separate castles also served as centres of rudimentary civil administration where a regional lord administered justice by judging local disputes. This had the effect of increasing their authority and self-sufficiency, as well as making them less dependent on unified kingdoms that were consequently weakened. As a result, castles had to be built from stones and the town surrounded by stone walls. Local self defence was supplemented by fortifications, since one locality could not support many knights that could stand off an assault before a more considerable force of knights could assemble and counterattack.
Nobles as large landowners had begun to build forts for themselves throughout the latter part of the ninth and the tenth centuries, which were initially generally nothing more than a great round mound of earth encircled by a ditch and a wall constructed of stakes. On the summit of the mound was a wooden fortress surrounded by a fence or palisade similar to the one at the foot of the mound. This was the type of castle that was common for several centuries after the death of Charlemagne. By about 1100, these wooden buildings began to be replaced by great square stone towers due to the fact that the methods of attacking castles had so changed that wood was no longer a sufficient form of protection. Some of these places were owned by a king or his trusted vassals, but they progressively mostly were illegal creations that were justified by outside threats that required them to have a secure place to stable warhorses and house men-at-arms. Where there lacked both established strategic defences and strong central authorities, they thus profited from circumstances to make themselves local overlords who fought for local power.
At this time, siege machinery that could hurl large stones and heavy pointed stakes at walls and over them were introduced again after the fall of the Roman Empire from the Eastern Empire, and therefore stone castles began to be built in the early eleventh century onward, when every member of the feudal aristocracy frequently depended on their ability to maintain their power and security when attacked by superior forces, and maintaining their defiance of royal authority. Until then, in the absence of a powerful monarch at the head of a well-trained army, each district was left to protect itself with locally available resources. Many nobles who were gradually becoming independent princes earned the loyalty of the people around them by taking the lead in defending the country around them against invaders and by constructing fortresses as places of refuge when the community was hard pressed. These conditions serve to explain why such forms of political authority continued existing for centuries following the rule Charlemagne that was continued mainly by great landowners, who considered themselves quite as important as the king, whose power they defied while it was necessary that self-sufficiency, which was already strong, was intensified by the needs of security and protection. This system thus developed gradually and irregularly without any planning, simply because it seemed convenient and natural under the circumstances. The feudal system that developed first in northern France spread to adjacent parts of Europe, but a somewhat different evolution occurred in the German states. The old German tribes that had been incorporated into Charlemagne’s empire succeeded in maintaining some sense of their corporate existence under the rule of the rudimentary Carolingian bureaucracy, and as the strength and efficiency of the central government decreased under Charlemagne’s successors, new political units began to form along the old tribal lines. Thus arose four stem or tribal duchies: Saxony, Franconia, Swabia and Bavaria.
The horrors of constant private warfare fighting, which also subjected churches and monasteries to depredations, led the church to try to check it as being incompatible with living according to Christian precepts. Several church councils in Burgundy declared that fighters were not to attack churches or monasteries, clergy, pilgrims, merchants and women and peasants. Church councils also decreed what was known as the Truce of God in 1041, which provided that all warfare stop during Lent and other holy days, as well as between sunset on Wednesday and sunrise on Monday every week. No one was to attack anyone else during this time, and keeping it would absolve them of their sins. If anyone failed to observe the truce, they were to be excommunicated, or cast out of the church, or abjure themselves of their offence by going on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. However, it is difficult to ascertain the degree to which this church directive had a positive influence, as it was not always observed as nobles usually appealed to armed conflicts rather than appealing to their peers to resolve disputes, and continually contributed to weakening the central authority of a monarchy. Henry III, the king of the German states and of Lombardy, likewise attempted to reduce private warfare by proclaiming a General Peace throughout the kingdom in 1043.
Further troubles were present in the German states, in addition to private warfare during the absence of a central authority that resulted in weaker parties could seldom obtain full justice, as well as the prevalence of robbery, from which petty nobles primarily derived their income. The monarchical supremacy that Otto I had established over the border nations eventually dissipated during the reign of his descendants, Otto II and Otto III, as the Danes withdrew their allegiance to the Holy Roman Empire, the majority of the Wends freed themselves from Germanic subjugation, and Polish resistance was resumed, and the Carolingian dynasty in the West Frankish kingdom was supplanted by duke Hugh Capet who was elected the king of West Francia in 987, although regional nobles maintained their sovereignty, while the Capetian dynasty only had direct control over the Ile de France and other small scattered territories, and therefore had limited power while cooperating with other French nobles, whose authority was also challenged by their vassals. At the time of the death of Otto III in January 1002, all of the Italian states were revolting against Germanic rule.
The most distinctive characteristic of that civilisation was the prominence of the church in nearly every aspect of life, in addition to important economic developments and the expansion of interests outside of Europe through the crusades. The Middle Ages between the collapse of the Roman empire and the Renaissance of early modern Europe could be divided into separate time periods to be analysed separately: the early Middle Ages began with the fall of the Roman empire in 476, and lasted roughly until 1000 C.E.; the high Middle Ages from 1000 to 1300; the late Middle Ages from 1300 to the Renaissance, which lasted until roughly 1450. A new civilization arose in western Europe during the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries, transforming medieval society as a result of economic and religious elements. Local political and administrative systems were roughly set up on the basis of local official and dynastic traditions, and were further modified by fighting wars to compose various administrative areas to bring local orders of society on the basis of aristocratic interests that became semi-independent, subject to a higher aristocratic authority, and exercised the rights and privileges of a rudimentary state. The Holy Roman Empire” was never united, as its medieval emperors were wandering rulers with a limited bureaucracy and even more limited power. They constantly tried to stay on top of rivaling centers and dynasties, struggled with the Pope, and sought to mediate in numerous conflicts between cities and territorial states within their realm. A hereditary monarchy did not take hold, and the selection of the German emperor by the seven, later ten, electors (privileged princes and archbishops) became dependent upon the size of a candidate’s armies and foreign bribes. The house of Habsburg, the Austrian dynasty, became most successful at claiming the throne of the Holy Roman Emperor for their own family members, but internal and external powers always collaborated when the Habsburgs tried to impose tighter unity on the Holy Roman Empire.
The papacy also became a prize for noble factions in Rome and Italy, and battles between rival claimants were frequent among the petty nobles among the city of Rome, and also among other high clerical positions. They also claimed the right to name German bishops and abbots, since they had given them tracts of land and increased their power with the hope of gaining their support. As a result, a considerable part of western Europe was in the hands of the Church. A king of landowner could also grant fiefs to clerics as well as to laymen. The bishops became the vassals of the king or of other feudal lords by doing homage for a fief and swearing fidelity, just as any other vassal would do. Monasteries and bishoprics possessed extensive and rich lands, and such lands were tempting targets for the strong and rapacious. In the absence of effective public enforcement of peace and order, it became necessary for abbots and bishops to do what they could to safeguard their possessions for their services as defenders of the Church lands. Thus, the church became very feudalised, and in fact, abbots and bishops themselves came very generally recruited from among the younger sons of the feudal aristocracy. Such ecclesiastics found opportunity to employ their knightly education to lead their men into battle against some neighbouring lord with whom they quarreled. An abbot would also sometimes also secure the protection of a neighbouring lord for the monastery he headed by giving up his land, and receiving it back again as a fief.
There was one considerable difference between church and ordinary fiefs. Since ecclesiastics could not legally marry, their positions could not become hereditary, and thus the power of appointing bishops and abbots was important for this purpose. Whoever could assert control over ecclesiastical elections could expect political and military control from his appointees, and might be able in addition to secure an increase to his revenue, since an eager candidate could be expected to pay something for his office. On one hand, the rule of the Church had always been that the clergy of the bishopric should choose the bishop, and their choice was to be approved by the people. Meanwhile, the abbots were to be chosen by the members of the monastery of which they were in charge, in accordance with the rule of St. Benedict. On the other hand, by the tenth and eleventh centuries, the bishops and abbots had come to be selected by the various kings and feudal lords who refused to hand over lands attached to a bishopric or monastery.
Many bishops and abbots could also scarcely be distinguished from other nobles as far as their conduct was concerned. Most parish priests were married despite the prohibitions of church law. Besides the feudalization of its property and the marriage of the clergy, a third great and constant source of weakness in the church was the buying and selling of church offices, or simony, in order to secure the income from a great church office and the high rank that went with the office while a king or nobleman had the right of investiture, and then shared in the advantages of the office. The practice of simony spread downward and affected the whole body of the clergy. Church possessions were openly sold, and ecclesiastical offices were subject to purchase or forcibly seized.
Various forms of abuse of ecclesiastical offices led to calls for reform from among devoted members of the clergy who called for the church to be free to reform spiritual order, following devastation by Viking and other raids, and subjected to the feudal system through control by powerful aristocrats and prevailing lax moral standards. They prevailed on William the duke of Aquitaine to establish the Burgundian abbey of Cluny in 910 to take widespread precedence for monastic reform under papal protection, regardless of the powerlessness of the papacy in practice. The provisions of this monastery’s charter expressly excluded all secular control by never holding land in exchange for feudal services, and was only to receive donations for spiritual efforts in the forms of masses and prayers for donors. The monks were to choose their own abbot according to the rules of St. Benedict, without external interference, and were subject only to the pope in Rome. This soon became the centre of a movement for Church reform, which set the precedent for appealing to papal interference to mediate in secular matters that laid the basis for a great source of its power.
Other monasteries associated themselves with Cluny, adopted its rules, and accepted priors, appointed by the abbot of Cluny, as their heads. Eventually, more than three hundred Cluniac monasteries came into existence throughout Western Europe. Since the Cluniac monks quickly established a reputation for piety and holiness, the reformed monasteries attracted gifts of pious or repentant individuals who felt the need of the monks’ prayers on their behalf. Thus, the congregation of Cluny, as the association of monasteries was called, came to enjoy great wealth and influence. The Cluniac monks used their position to criticize the abuses of the feudalized church, attacking at every opportunity the evils of simony, the purchase of Church offices, and lay investiture, the installation of an ecclesiastic in his office and lands by a layman. However, the Cluniac reform movement was mainly limited to monastic affairs, since laymen were willing to renounce the powers and benefits that came through the control of ecclesiastical appointments, and thus church reform only made progress after the reorganization and revival of the papacy in the second half of the eleventh century.
Various factors contributed to the ongoing feudal anarchy on the European continent of the time. The Holy Roman Empire was left to fracturing dissentions, as each prince was striving to be develop into an independent territorial lord, and there were constant disputes regarding the proper boundaries between on neighbour and other, leading to empire being full of petty feuds and innumerable jealousies among feudal lords, until a degree of unity was restored with the accession of Rudolf of Hapsburg by engaging in staging resistance against the invasion of the Turks on the eastern boundaries of the German states. Another threat was posed by the Mongols, or Tatars, who were threatening the entire civilisation of western Europe. The grandson of Genkis Khan, Kublai Khan, launched attacks from the direction of Hungary toward the German states, Poland and Bohemia. Duke Henry of Silesia was defeated by an overwhelming Mongol force at Liegnitz in 1241. Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II likely estimated the danger of the Mongols, and marshaled the resources of his subjects, calling on every German male with an income of more than three marks of silver to take arms in defence against them in a general crusade against the invaders, and a universal peace was proclaimed in the empire. This situation was also used for Frederick II to take action in waging war against the papacy. While the Holy Roman Empire’s wars against the papacy continued, the Mongols were eventually beaten back following their defeat by Wenceslaus of Bohemia at Olmütz. The death of the khan Ögedei as the head of the Mongol empire in 1241 drew them away from Hungary and back to the Russian steppes, where the Russian tsars deploying mounted Cossacks inflicted further defeats on the Mongols, and would continue wars of expansion eastward, which would continue to the Pacific Ocean by the end of the seventeenth century.
Economic life throughout Europe was distinguished by the rapid growth of trading and manufacturing towns, which superseded the earlier agrarian society after the decomposition of the Frankish empire at the end of the ninth century, which gave rise to a commercial revolution. Beginning in about 1050, western Europe became the scene of a rapid development of towns that were inhabited and governed by merchants and artisans and began operating as centres of exchange. Towns came to serve as a focus for local exchanges of goods and services, in proportion, manors became increasingly less self-sufficient. There was also a revival of long-distance exchange of commodities, which underwent a very rapid expansion in the eleventh century, when western Europe began to import a variety of finely manufactured goods from Byzantium and the Arab territories when the crusades had provided a powerful impulse for trade. The crusades greatly stimulated all forms of commercial and industrial activity, and vast sums of money was released into active circulation. Italian towns occupying strategic positions as economic centres, and towns in Flanders as a second one, lying at a point where the overland trade routes from Italy met the coastal commerce of the North Sea and Baltic coasts. Other towns, such as London, Paris, Rouen and Cologne also became important mercantile and manufacturing centres. English merchants extended their operations to Flanders, Denmark, Ireland and Brittany, and also sought connections with the great trading and banking firms of southern Europe.
Although the total numbers and populations of the towns were not high, they were able to exercise an important influence on the social relationship that had existed earlier. One obvious consequence was the gradual spread of a money economy over western Europe during the eleventh and twelfth century, and the reappearance of merchants, tradesmen and artisans living in growing towns, which had declined with trade that had been disrupted during the civil wars of the second and third centuries that was further aggravated by the Germanic invasions, and continued worsening until the ninth century as Muslims disrupted the Roman empire’s former trade arteries in the Mediterranean and Viking raiders destroyed merchant settlements on European coasts. When towns began to grow in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and goods were made and sold, money began to be used again once more, as it had in Greek and Roman times, and tended to undermine the importance of countryside manors. The former practices of barter, exchanging goods with distinctive values, without the use of money, began disappearing. Peasants from manors near the new towns began to acquire money from the sale of their products in the markets of the town, and could buy products in exchange. They also soon found it more profitable to pay the lord a certain sum instead of working for him, and then they had time to attend to their own farms. The landlords, on the other hand, found it to their advantage to accept money in the place of services from their tenants.
Using minted money opened the way for landlords to hire labourers to cultivate his field and could buy the luxuries that were brought to their notice as manufacturing and commercial activity increased. Feudal lords thus gradually gave up their control over the peasants, and there was no longer very much difference between the serf and the freeman who paid a regular rent for their land, although remaining subject to arbitrary jurisdiction in the absence of codified legislation in exchange for their protection in a nearby castle. Money revenue also allowed for feudal lords to hire soldiers and officials to administer their affairs that would put their interests first. The rise of towns opened the possibility for a new way for any enterprising or discontented peasant to a new way to make a living, and at the beginning, the towns were populated in a considerable part by such runaways seeking personal security. A serf could also have acquired liberty by escaping away from a manor to a town, and it became a general rule in the towns that if they remained undiscovered or was unclaimed by their lord for a year and a day, they became free and protected by the townspeople. Consequently, it became more necessary for a manorial lord to keep peasants as well content as possible, and in the more economically active parts of Europe, the personal services of serfdom were largely abolished or commuted to money payments by 1300.
While towns became fairly independent of the feudal lords in the districts in which they controlled, these towns often provided feudal lords with income from rents, proportion of market tolls and a share of the fines levied in the town courts. New towns were frequently founded by enterprising feudal lords, in the hope that a community of merchants and artisans would bring them additional revenue in exchange for physical and legal protection, which, combined with produce for sale and demand for craft services, stimulated the market. Towns were granted charters in which the liberties of the town dwellers were set forth, either in the new towns, or by purchase or rental agreement with the feudal possessor of the land in which they had formed. In general, the townsmen were guaranteed personal freedom from manorial exactions, were allowed to buy, sell or bequeath land within the town limits, subject to a commission paid to a lord, and were assured some commercial monopoly within some definite region. In addition, the revival of commercial life along with the development of towns greatly increased the power of the feudal princes, as their revenues made them the greatest beneficiaries of being able to raise armies and bodies of administrators, which included raising taxation and enforcing legislation. These developments undermined the authority of the lesser feudal lords, whose strong castles could no longer guarantee their independence, since they could be besieged for as long as necessary. Many villages that were built outside manors, castles and monasteries and along trade routes also eventually grew into towns and cities enclosed within protective stone walls and towers to defend the residents therein, who were either born within them, or had escaped from manorial estates in the countryside where they were obliged to work the noble’s lands, in addition to their own. They would become free upon living in a town or city for a year and a day, without being forcibly removed by a lord’s steward or bailiff.
The English and French kings became guarantors of many town privileges, and what amounted to an alliance between the royal power and the townsmen came into existence since the interests of each in general opposed the feudal nobility. This alliance became one of the essential elements of the consolidation of the national monarchies in France and England. Certain towns in Germany and Italy were able to set up what were effectively sovereign governments of their own, or remained subject to a local feudal lord. Many towns in the German states became imperial free cities where duchies ceased to exist or lost their former importance, which only recognised the supremacy of the monarchy while being self-governing. As towns became more populous, internal affairs required the elaboration of town governments and gild associations. Artisans in various crafts organised separate craft guilds to protect their special occupational interests by increasingly greater degrees, and later the general concerns of the townsmen were entrusted to elected officials, and remained independent from outside control. All craftsmen were obliged to be guild member to practice their trade, while the guild provided all raw materials, determined the wage rates and production amounts, tested finished works, and prescribed agreements with apprentices.
Another significant development during this time was the rise of the papacy to political pre-eminence. Papal claims to political leadership of Christendom were justified in theory by the Donation of Constantine and the doctrine of the “Two Swords.” The Donation of Constantine was a document purporting to show that when Constantine transferred his capital to Constantinople, he delegated his authority in the west to the popes. It was actually a forgery, executed in the papal chancellery in the eighth century, but its authenticity was not called into question until the fifteenth century. The doctrine of the Two Swords was an interpretation of the biblical passage in the Gospel of St. Luke: “But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip; and he that hath no sword let him sell his garment and buy one … And they said, Lord, behold here are two swords. And He said onto them, it is enough.” (22: 36, 38). The two swords in the possession of the disciples were interpreted by medieval commentators as symbolizing the temporal and spiritual power; and since both were in the hands of the apostles, both, it was argued, belonged to the heirs of the disciples. That is, to the ordained bishops of the church, and to their leader, the pope.
Such theoretical claims to temporal authority were made into practical realities by the practical realities of the Church. It was divided into two parts: the secular clergy who ministered to individuals in ordinary life, and the regular, or monastic, clergy who devoted themselves to personal holiness and salvation. The monastic tradition continued in the high Middle Ages with two great orders of friars, the Franciscans, named after their founder St. Francis (1182-1226), and St. Dominic (1170-1221). St. Francis of Assisi was the son of a merchant who turned his back on ordinary secular life, and set out to imitate the life of Christ by preaching the gospel in public, living in absolute poverty, and ministering to the needs of the poor and the sick by establishing hospitals in the towns. He remained a simple layman, and attracted a large number of disciples who came to be known as friars, which was recognized as a new association by Pope Innocent III in 1210. St. Dominic founded his order with the intention of training eloquent and learned preachers who would be able to refute and convert the heretics who were distressingly numerous in the towns. They consequently emphasized the importance of learning, and they became prominent as theologians and philosophers in the newly established universities.
Meanwhile, the secular clergy were hierarchically organized. Western Europe was divided into a series of archbishoprics, which were divided into bishoprics and dioceses, and the dioceses were in turn subdivided into parishes. The popes were able to exert varying, but usually important influence on the selection and appointment of archbishops and bishops, who were the principal administrators of the Church. They ordained and supervised priests who were enlisted from the class of free men; educational institutions were frequently under their control, as were some of the monasteries within their diocese. Most important of all, bishops were usually the feudal owners of large estates, which made them powerful members of the ruling class.
While the Catholic church as a whole did not dispose of military power directly, the fundamental basis of the church’s political might was the hold it exercised on individuals’ hearts and minds. The Church was believed to be the channel of grace, through which the sinful all might hope to achieve salvation. Excommunication thus threatened damnation, and the tortures of hell loomed large in the imaginations of many. In political quarrels, the papacy could use the interdict, by which some or all of the activities of the Church were prohibited in a given area, and could therefore turn a ruler’s subjects against them since they saw their souls imperiled by a quarrel with the pope. In addition to obliging all to attend church, confess their sins, perform penance assigned by a priest, and partake in the Eucharist, the Church touched everyday life through canon law, or the law administered by the Church, including the crime of simony.
The power of the papacy as the head of an international government thus came into conflict with the Holy Roman Emperor. Charlemagne and Otto I were in charge of all papal appointments, and as a matter of course appointed, deposed or confirmed popes, just as they did other powerful bishops. Yet, such procedures were difficult to reconcile with canon law, which prescribed that bishops were to be elected by the clergy in the diocese. In the course of the tenth and eleventh centuries, many pious individuals came to believe that the prevalent corruption and degradation of the church could not be remedied as long as laymen had the power to appoint prelates, especially as long as they sold such offices to unworthy candidates.
From the point of the view of the Holy Roman Empire, reform of the church by abolishing simony and lay investiture was difficult to reconcile with traditional powers and methods of administration. Bishops and abbots held extensive lands, and the right to appoint men to such offices brought a substantial income and influence to the imperial court. There was also the fact that the imperial government depended very largely on the administrative services of clergymen, and were able to pay these loyal servants by appointing them to church offices, and otherwise no easy or obvious substitute of income with which to maintain a loyal body of subordinates. Full accomplishment of the papal reform might improve the spiritual quality of the church, but it would also destroy the basis of imperial power.
Before the reformers could effectively challenge established practices, it was first necessary to secure the independence of the papacy from imperial control. Two changes made in 1059 accomplished this first step. The first great step toward freeing the Church from the control of the kings and feudal lords was taken by Pope Nicholas II. He issued a famous decree that took the election of the head of the church out of the hands of both the emperor and the people of Rome by placing it definitely and permanently in the hands of the cardinals who represented the Roman clergy, and set forth the canonical method for the election of popes. A College of Cardinals was established, whose members had the right to elect a new pope, and the majority of the new body belonged to the reformist, anti-imperial persuasion. This assured that the future popes would not be imperial puppets, but instead would strive for the claims of the Church to become independent of lay control. The reform party that directed the policy of the popes now proposed to free the church as a whole from worldly things: first, by strictly forbidding the clergy to marry, and secondly, depriving the kings and feudal lords of their influence over the choice of bishops and abbots, along with the suppression of simony. The papacy also concluded an alliance in 1059 with the Norman rulers of a compact state in southern Italy, which had been subjugated under the leadership of Robert Guiscard and his brother Roger de Hauteville by this time. Guiscard needed legitimation and the pope needed military help. Guiscard therefore formally swore allegiance to the over lordship of the pope, and the pope formally granted Guiscard the right to rule what he had already won. This arrangement assured potent military support for the papacy in any conflict with the Holy Roman Emperor, and the papacy was able to challenge and undermine imperial authority.
Controlling ecclesiastical appointments remained a central problem in the underlying matter of ongoing church reform. Whereas the church needed learned and devout clergy who were devoted to its interests, the lay lords wanted the members to ecclesiastical hierarchy within their lands to serve their own interests instead, rather than serving God under papal leadership. Allowing the church interests to take precedence over secular interests potentially threatened feudal lords, as they could lose control over members of the clergy who were the most literate segment of the population, and were needed to provide administrative services for temporal authorities. Moreover, the church controlled enormous resources on their own lands. The question remained whether the church could renounce its secular interests, and thereby abandon laying claim over all temporal power.
What were significant developments during this period of European history? What were their causes and effects?
Structured problem solving
1. Students begin with brainstorming the reading question prompt
2. Organise groups of 4
3. Follow the steps in a problem-solving procedure:
Identify the problem
Generate possible solutions
Evaluate and test the various solutions
Decide on a mutually acceptable solution
Implement the solution (in writing)
Evaluate the solution (supported through credible and corroborated evidence)
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