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The fall of the Western Roman Empire marks the beginning of the Middle Ages. Western’s Rome collapse was due to a string of military losses. Rome had fought with Germanic tribes for centuries. In the 300’s barbarian groups encroached beyond the Empire’s borders. Several decades the Empire was under threat. In 476CE the Germanic Leader Odoacer staged a revolt and deposed of the Emperor Romulus Augustulus. -
During the Early Middle Ages, Charlemagne united the majority of western and central Europe. He was the first recognised emperor to rule from western Europe since the fall of the Western Roman Empire around three centuries earlier. The expanded Frankish state that Charlemagne founded is known as the Carolingian Empire. -
The Crusades were organized by western European Christians after centuries of Muslim wars of expansion. Their primary objectives were to stop the expansion of Muslim states, to reclaim for Christianity the Holy Land in the Middle East, and to recapture territories that had formerly been Christian. -
The Magna Carta was signed 15 June, 1215 at Runnymede by King John. Magna Carta means ‘great charter’. The Magna Carta has become one of the founding documents of the English legal system.
The Magna Carta’s significance was not immediately recognised. England was in a period of political and military upheaval and King John was forced to sign the Magna Carta by rebel barons as part of peace negotiations. -
The Great Famine started with bad weather in spring 1315. Crop failures lasted through 1316 until the summer harvest in 1317, and Europe did not fully recover until 1322. Crop failures were not the only problem; cattle disease caused sheep and cattle numbers to fall as much as 80 percent.
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The plague that caused the Black Death originated in China in the early to mid-1300s and spread along trade routes westward to the Mediterranean and northern Africa. It reached southern England in 1348 and northern Britain and Scandinavia by 1350.
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The Pope’s residency between 1309-1377 in France. In 1377 Romans rioted to ensure the pope was a Roman, and with Gregory XI returning to Rome the Pope resided in Rome. Pope Urban VI was elected in 1378. Urban VI proved suspicious, a reformist, and prone to violent outbursts of bad temper. The cardinals that had elected him regretted their decision and in 1378 elected a rival pope, Robert of Geneva.