LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 5.10.2004 10:24am page i The Birth of Europe LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 5.10.2004 10:24am page ii The Making of Europe Series Editor: Jacques Le Goff The Making of Europe series is the result of a unique collaboration between five European publishers – Beck in Germany, Blackwell in Great Britain and the United States, Critica in Spain, Laterza in Italy and le Seuil in France. Each book will be published in all five languages. The scope of the series is broad, encompassing the history of ideas as well as of societies, nations, and states to produce informative, readable, and provocative treatments of central themes in the history of the European peoples and their cultures. Also published in this series The European City* The Population of Europe Leonardo Benevolo Massimo Livi Bacci Women in European History Europe and the Sea* Gisela Bock Michel Mollat du Jourdin The Rise of Western Christendom: The Culture of Food* Triumph and Diversity 200–1000 ad Massimo Montanari Second edition The First European Revolution, Peter Brown 900–1200 The European Renaissance R. I. Moore Peter Burke Religion and Society in Modern Europe Europe and Islam Rene´ Re´mond Franco Cardini The Peasantry of Europe* The Search for the Perfect Language Werner Ro¨ sener Umberto Eco The Birth of Modern Science The Distorted Past: A Reinterpretation of Paolo Rossi Europe States, Nations and Nationalism Josep Fontana Hagen Schulze The European Family European Revolutions 1492–1992 Jack Goody Charles Tilly The Origins of European Individualism Aaron Gurevich The Enlightenment Ulrich Im Hof * Title out of print LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 5.10.2004 10:24am page iii The Birth of Europe Jacques Le Goff Translated by Janet Lloyd LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 5.10.2004 10:24am page iv # 2005 by Jacques Le Goff English translation # 2005 by Janet Lloyd BLACKWELL PUBLISHING 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148-5020, USA 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK 550 Swanston Street, Carlton, Victoria 3053, Australia The right of Jacques Le Goff to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher. First published 2005 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Le Goff, Jacques, 1924– [Europe est-elle ne´e au moyen aˆge. English] The Birth of Europe / by Jacques Le Goff; translated by Janet Lloyd. p. cm.—(The making of Europe) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-631-22888-8 (hardcover: alk. paper) 1. Middle Ages—History. 2. Civilization, Medieval. 3. Europe—History—476–1492. I. Title. II. Series. D117I42 2005 940.1—dc22 2004011509 A catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library. Set in 10 on 12.5pt Sabon by Kolam Information Services Pvt. Ltd, Pondicherry, India Printed and bound in the United Kingdom by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Cornwall The publisher’s policy is to use permanent paper from mills that operate a sustainable forestry policy, and which has been manufactured from pulp processed using acid-free and elementary chlorine-free practices. Furthermore, the publisher ensures that the text paper and cover board used have met acceptable environmental accreditation standards. For further information on Blackwell Publishing, visit our website: www.blackwellpublishing.com LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page v Contents Series Editor’s Preface ix Acknowledgments xi Maps xii Introduction 1 Preludes: Before the Middle Ages 6 1 The Conception of Europe (Fourth to Eighth Centuries) 14 2 An Aborted Europe: The Carolingian World (Eighth to Tenth Centuries) 29 3 A Dream of Europe and the Potential Europe of the Year 1000 40 4 Feudal Europe (Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries) 49 5 The ‘‘Fine’’ Europe of Towns and Universities (Thirteenth Century) 99 6 The Autumn of the Middle Ages or the Spring of a New Age? 154 LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page vi vi contents Conclusion 194 Chronology 202 A Selective Thematic Bibliography 211 Index 252 LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page vii For Bronislaw Geremek LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page viii LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page ix Series Editor’s Preface Europe is in the process of constructing itself. The hope that it holds out is great. This will only be realized if Europe is mindful of its history, for a Europe without its history would be a sorry orphan. Today comes from yesterday and tomorrow emerges out of the past. It is a past that should not paralyze the present but help it to be faithful to its inheritance yet different and innovative as it progresses. Our Europe, flanked by the Atlantic, Asia and Africa, has existed for a very long time, marked out by its geography and modeled by its history ever since the Greeks gave it the name that it has retained to the present day. The future must rest upon the legacies which, ever since antiquity or even prehistory, have made Europe a world of exceptional richness and extraordinary creativity, in both its unity and its diversity. The Making of Europe series was generated by the initiative of five publishers, all with different nationalities and languages: Beck in Munich, Blackwell in Oxford, Crı´tica in Barcelona, Laterza in Rome, and le Seuil in Paris. The aim of the series is to illuminate the construction of Europe, together with all the unforgettable trump cards that Europe holds, but without concealing its inherited problems. In its pursuit of unity, the con- tinent of Europe has survived bouts of internal dissension, conflict, division, and contradiction. The Making of Europe series does not seek to hide them. Commitment to the European endeavor must accommodate a knowledge of the entire past as well as a vision of the future. Hence the proactive title of the series. It does not yet seem the moment to write a synthetic history of Europe. The essays that this series presents are works by the best historians LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page x x series editor’s preface of the present day, some European, some not, some already well known, some not. They will be tackling themes that are essential to the history of Europe right across the board, in domains economic, political, social, reli- gious, and cultural; and they will be based not only on the long historio- graphical tradition inherited from Herodotus but also on new ideas elaborated in Europe that have deeply reinvigorated twentieth-century his- torical studies, particularly in the last few decades. These essays should be accessible to a wide readership, for one of their prime objectives is clarity. Our ambition is to provide at least partial replies to the major questions posed to those engaged in the making of Europe both now and in the future: ‘‘Who are we? Where did we come from? Where are we going?’’ Jacques Le Goff LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page xi Acknowledgments First I should like to thank the E´ ditions du Seuil team who have worked with great competence, intelligence, commitment, and flexibility in the production of this book: Nicole Gre´goire, with whom collaboration has been an exceptional pleasure, also Gre´goire Monteil and Catherine Rambaud. Special thanks go to the friends who read my book in manuscript so attentively: Richard Figuier and my colleague and dear friend Jean-Claude Schmitt, whose enlightened comments and advice were of the greatest value; and Jacques Berlioz , for his unfailing friendly support. I am also extremely grateful to Patrick Gauthier-Dalche´ for his help with matters of space and cartography, and to Pierre Mounet for all his valuable assistance with the medieval Germanic area. LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page xii Map 1 The barbarian invasions, fifth to sixth centuries, which led to the medieval mixing of races Source: Georges Duby, Grand Atlas historique (Paris: Larousse, 1995), p. 30. LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page xiii Note Lying between, on the one hand, the America of Indian tribal settlements and the Inca and Aztec empires, and, on the other, the Far East of the Chinese Ming dynasty, little Europe discovered Africa and America, while Zheng He’s ambassadorial missions to the Near East and Africa were never followed up. The Ottoman Empire and the Muscovite state constituted a barrier to Europe in the east. Map 2 Europe’s position in the world between the Middle Ages and Modern Times (1400 to 1500: Zheng He, Columbus, Gutenberg, the Renaissance) Source: Jacques Bertin, Atlas historique universel (Geneva: Minerva, 1997), p. 116. LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:45am page xiv LE GOFF / Middle Ages and the Birth of Europe Final 1.10.2004 2:49am page 1 Introduction Every historical work, even those concerned with periods in the far distant past, relates to the present.