For the past week, I have been spending time in the tenth century—the 900s—that led ultimately to the concept of “Europe” as nation-states we know today as Germany, France, Spain, and Italy. Across the Channel, England, Ireland and Scotland were besieged by the Vikings who also attacked Europe along with the Magyars who ravaged Europe from the East.
My vehicle to the past was “The Birth of the West” by Paul Collins, a historian who takes the reader to the last century of the first millennium; a hundred years of chaos.
Though the early Catholic Church was the plaything of various warring parties, it was the glue of society, infusing all aspects of life despite being the plaything of warring “nobles”, men who sought property and power while providing protection for those under their control. Seen as the Dark Ages from which Europe would emerge centuries hence during the Renaissance, it was the many monasteries of the time that would preserve the knowledge of the ancient Greeks and Romans to pass it on to future generations.
All were united against the spread of Islam that began in the seventh century and which controlled Spain and would be stopped in France in 732 and later outside of Vienna in 1683. It is a battle that rages today as the jihad of the past is being played out in our times. It was a brutal century that concluded the first millennium and one in which the Christianity triumphed over the paganism of the era, eventually converting the Vikings and Magyars.