Middle Ages Weren't "Dark"

[Aldarion]

Oh, yes, there was intentional suppression for centuries. And I mean centuries. The only reason Europe had a Renaissance at all was because a single Pope had a mind more bent to war than theology or politics and he took on a wait and see position. And boy, did we see. The Church couldn't stuff that genie back in no matter how much they tried, and it resulted in much of what we know as the Reformation. Good times.

Yeah, not seeing it at all.

"Dark Ages" are a myth that was constructed during the Renaissance because they were in love with antiquity and thus anything that came after antiquity yet wasn't its direct copy had to be dirty, backwards and stupid.

True, Middle Ages didn't have much in terms of grandiose construction works. But technological advancement did happen. Even just looking at armor and weapons shows massive advancement. Construction techniques as well. Agriculture, medicine, literature... all of it advanced by leaps and bounds compared to Antiquity, even before the Crusades and everything acquired from the Islamic world.

And a lot of it was supported by the Church. Catholic Church was historically one of greatest patrons not just of arts, but of science as well.

Renaissance itself is in fact largely a myth.

Renaissance life was worse than that in the Middle Ages. Terror, invasion, plague, deaths... it all continued as it was during the Middle Ages. Except worse, because centralization of state and its increased capacity for violence made everything worse.

In Italy, average life expectancies in the solidly Medieval 1200s were 35-40, while by the year 1500 (definitely Renaissance) life expectancy in Italian city states had dropped to 18.

In fact, most, and perhaps all, of the stereotypes of the "bad Middle Ages" were true... for the Renaissance. Bad hygiene? Check. Rotting teeth? Pretty much - we can thank the 1500s and industrial production of sugar for that. Witch hunts? Only began at large scale after - and largely because - of the Protestant Reformation. Church never believed in witches, you see - it was only the weakening moral authority of the Church, caused by the Reformation, which allowed the witch hunts to happen in the first place.

 

[Finchbearer]

The dark ages were not dark, I agree. I personally love Francis Pryor’s take on it. He called them ‘the not so dark ages’ in his book Britain AD. He puts it that we had our own renaissance at that earlier time.