I'm currently reading A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century by Barbara Tuchman, one of my favorite historians. In her chapter on the Black Death, Tuchman proposes an interesting hypothesis: The Black Plague may have been the beginning of the modern world (or at least the origin of many modern ideas).

There are many good arguments for this idea. Firstly, the social order of Europe was subjected to violent change. Peasants who had escaped the plague's wrath simply moved into houses where wealthy nobles killed by the disease had formerly lived. But most radically, prices dropped and demand for labor grew. With fewer tennants, landlords lowered the rents on their land for fear that the remaining serfs would leave, and all income would disappear. With fewer workers to acomplish the same amount of jobs, Guilds struck for higher wages, which the gentry were forced to grant. People in general became richer, not because there was more money, but because there were fewer people to spend it. Nobility increasingly allowed their children to marry lower class but affluent bourgeois, seeking some stability for their progeny.

The Catholic Church, the Middle Ages' instrument of repression, also suffered from the plague. Citizens became increasingly critical of the clergy, since many of it's members began profiteering off the crisis, charging more to administer sacraments. The plague was widely seen as God's punishment on humanity for their sinfulness, and seeing priests and bishops afflicted by the disease made people begin to think that maybe the Church was not fulfilling it's duty to the people and to God. People turned to heretical beliefs and other alternative forms of spirituality. Depopulation led to a similar decrease in clergymen, and ill-educated replacements did not met the religious needs of many people.

Education also grew during the plague. More educated persons started to wonder how the disease spread. This led to increased questioning of the natural world, and the idea that science and not the church was the best way to explain the way the world worked.

I just thought this was an interesting hypothesis. Anyone agree/disagree?

The Black Death killed 1/3 of the European population. I call that the peak of Medieval Dark Ages. Of course, it couldn't go worse afterwards.

Originally posted by D' Artagnan
The Black Death killed 1/3 of the European population. I call that the peak of Medieval Dark Ages. Of course, it couldn't go worse afterwards.
Many similar plagues had ravaged Europe in the centuries before. I just thought it was interesting how such a catastrophe could usher in so many revolutionary ideas.

There was more to it than just the plague as the middle east, central asia, and china were also being ravaged by it and were depopulated by extremes, yet they didn't upheaval their society. I think there were other important factors to play, not being destroyed by the Mongols is a start, and the spread of technology from the east into Europe would have helped a lot also. The Italians were entering the renaissance not long after thanks to the rapid spread of trade routes due to depopulation of the old centres, and rediscovering the ancient greek and roman sciences and culture were also important factors. The Black Death was important, but it wasn't THE most important factor in it.

Our guest history teacher told us this. I was wondering where she got the idea.

Originally posted by Mongoloid Cow
There was more to it than just the plague as the middle east, central asia, and china were also being ravaged by it and were depopulated by extremes, yet they didn't upheaval their society.The plagues didn't affect China too extremely, in the European sense. I guess it's because the Chinese have a tradition of medicine, that's still widely available today (think acupuncture and Chinese herbs).

The Italians were entering the renaissance not long after thanks to the rapid spread of trade routes due to depopulation of the old centres, and rediscovering the ancient greek and roman sciences and culture were also important factors.And the fall of Constantinople in 1453 to the Ottomans led to an exodus of scholars, and the said Roman and Greek works, to the West... ;)

Here is something that I posted some time ago in a thread about the longbow.
It may have some relevance to the current discussion......

Originally posted by Kryten
Medieval Englishmen were no different from the rest of the human race, so why didn't the other nations adopt the longbow?
I think that the answer to this question is because of the Black Death of the 1350's.

Edward the 1st was a very strong king, and the feudal system was at it's height, so if your local Baron said "you're gonna learn to use the longbow", there wasn't much you could do about it. But the plague broke the back of the feudal system, as there wasn't enough skilled people such as farriers/fletchers/blacksmiths/yeomen to go around, so wages soared and people had a little bit more freedom about who they worked for (if the local Baron only paid two groats a day but his mortal enemy next door paid three, people went where the money was!). So to force a society to adopt all the years of hard work longbow training was only possible in a strong feudal system with a strong king, and once the law had been enforced by years of custom, it was possible to maintain it even in the more free society following the Black Death. France, Germany, Scotland and Ireland missed their chance, as after the plague their society no longer had the power that England had pre-plague.

If all this is a true assessment of the situation, then the English were lucky to have conquered south Wales and adopted the longbow when they did in 1295. After the plague of the 1350's it would not have been possible to enforce the archery laws. And if they had conquered Wales a century earlier, then the other nations of the period would have had time to copy the English system (of course, you could say that the 50 years between the battle of Crecy and the battle of Agincourt was enough time for the French to have adopted the longbow.....but hindsight is a wonderful thing.... ;) ).

"The plagues didn't affect China too extremely, in the European sense. I guess it's because the Chinese have a tradition of medicine, that's still widely available today (think acupuncture and Chinese herbs). "

Acupuncture and Chinese herbs can't prevent or stop the plague. The plague was not as disastrous in China as it was in Europe because China was more sanitary, and the Mongols had depopulated China extensively, causing less deaths from the plague.

"And the fall of Constantinople in 1453 to the Ottomans led to an exodus of scholars, and the said Roman and Greek works, to the West... ;)"

The Renaissance in Italy had begun before then P: :). All that did was make it spread quicker, which would have happened anyway.

Kryten, one could answer that question with the fact that one of the only woods which you can use to make a longbow were found only in England... :)

Originally posted by Mongoloid Cow
Kryten, one could answer that question with the fact that one of the only woods which you can use to make a longbow were found only in England... :)

Hmmm....I'm not sure.

Longbows are made from yew, and the yew......

"Yew, common name for a genus of evergreen, needle-bearing trees and shrubs, and, loosely, for other members of the family to which the yews belong. Yews are native to temperate and subtropical climates throughout the world and are widely cultivated as ornamental plants, especially as hedges; in Britain, they are common in old churchyards."
Microsoft® Encarta® Reference Library 2002.

My history teacher told me that so don't blame me :) but making them did take some skill too, and to build one you needed the yew to be cut the right way and to have a second special kind of wood to stop it from snapping place in the right spot, etc. Saw a documentary on longbows too. I think I got the jist of them, the French or Scots would not have been able to make them anyway.

The innovative use of the longbow in England was a fluke. True war bows used by the English require years of practice for an archer to become proficient. Crossbows, and later gunpowder weapons eclipsed the longbow because it only takes a few weeks for a soldier to learn it's operation.

I agree with you napoleon526....longbows require years of practice. And you don't need arms like Arne Schwarzenegger in order to use a crossbow or musket! :lol:

However, the English managed to enforce the Archery Laws to train these yeomen....so why didn't everybody else?
You would have thought that after Crecy (1346), Poitiers (1356), and Agincourt (1415), the French would have realise what a powerful weapon the longbow was.

After all, all the European feudal nations adopted plate armour when it became available, because it was better. And they all adopted the pike, because it could stop a mounted charge. Plus they all adopted early bombards & cannons, because these were better than catapult & trebuchets. The wars with England didn't end until 1453....surely one hundred years is enough time to learn the lesson!

I think that the French, Scots and Irish would have adopted the longbow, if they could have enforced their own archery laws.
But after the Black Death of the 1350's, their societies didn't have the power that they had pre-plague.

So you are right: it was a fluke that the English adopted it from the conquered Welsh when they did.
As I said, a hundred years earlier when everybody had a strong feudal system, then the other nations would have copied it for themselves. But after the 1350's, the back of the feudal system had been broken by the plague, and they couldn't enforce new archery training laws that had already become a custom and part of the English way of life. :)

I think that the reason the English had more success in encouraging the use of archery was that England was a more centralized state than France at the time. France had 5 times the population fo England, and it's feudal lords had much greater autonomy than their counterparts in England. This, as much as the longbow, contributed to the defeats at Crecy and Poitiers, as the French army had no real overall command structure. French knights attacked independently of each other and were easy targets for English bowmen.

History has shown that change often comes prodded with a pitchfork. Calamities such as the Plague and Norse invasions had effects lasting long after the situation resolved. Take for example the Romans and the Punic Wars. The close threat of Hannible aforced a reorganization of the whole society which was showing signs of what would eventually bring it down 8 centuries later.

J