4-20
Tribonian: next 400 years from the republican age. Law also exists as a series of edicts. Emperor is constintutionally a magistrate, could do edicts – say what the law was. Permanent unless superceded by another emperor.
432, 438, Theodosian code. 2nd edition cleans up the bad editing. Most comprehensive code the romans had up to this point. It didn’t look at every single area of law. By justinians day it is almost 100 years old. Justinian got 500 scribes and jurists. Difference is large. Justinian was so pleased that he gave trebonian other tasks.
Digest is twice as long as the code. A discussion of the principles of the law, the procedures, the remedies. Excerpting the particular topic – what they thought at the time. Quite a bit is philosophical. And a bit based on case law. Therefore it is unique. If you knew nothing about the roman law and you read it – you would know everything. 1000 year old system of written law. His most enduring contribution, Justinian. One of the three most important books beside the bible and quaran.
Lenord the 3rd wrote the Ekolga. Justinian had reconquered the west. 1079 – one or two copies of the digest are found. Digest is not law in England, Germany. England were developing their own system, Germany wouldn’t develop until the 19th century. Every other latin speaking areas used it.
Islam
Decade seperates death of Justinian and birth of Mohammed. Justinian died in 565. Suceeded by several emperors in the next 45 years. Couple decent, one loser, one tyrant. Tyrant was overthrown in 610 – phocus. Heraclius would found the dynasty that would govern the eastern empire. By 600 there were few people that understood latin. Heraclius would be troubled by the byzantian-persian war – during his first 20 years. He would emerge victorious in the long run. He beat the Persians into submission but the prosperity and enthusiasm had largely been dissipated. Soldiers didn’t get regular paydays unless they mutinied.
Massacres based on religious belief are new.
Battle of 636. Lakhmids and Ghassanids had been beaten down like byzantans and Persians. They were used as a buffer.
Mecca and the Ka’ba. Muslim tradition – this shrine was constructed by Abraham and ishmail. Arab tribes that were zorastrian, Christian, or jewish. Then those that were clearly polytheistic, sky god Ba’al. Portrayed as a demon. He was worshipped on a mountaintop. Every once in a while he sent a sign from the heavens. Piece of mountain onto the earth aka a meteorite. There a shrine would be built aka mecca. One slightly less famous was emesa. School of thought that Yawey was the local ba’al of ?.
Mohammed
At 40, visitation from angel Gabriel, mission from God. He became a teacher. He was not trying to found a new religion but he really did. Christ claimed to be the fulfillment of the propheses of the old testament. Mohammed claimed that both Christians and jews had strayed frm the faith of Abraham, his mission was to restore the purity. He was a monotheist. Deeply disturbed by pollution of the Kabba. All these false gods set up shop. In 622 there was an assassination attempt resulting him and his followers leading Mecca. This begins year1 in the muslim calendar. His followers went north, slightly to east to the city of Yathrib. Eventually in 630, Mecca would surrender to mohammed in a largely bloodless conquest.
Christ – profit of god or son of god. Islam would be described as a sort of arianism. Claimed that Christ was less than god because he was the son of god. Islam itself means submission; those who submit to the word of god. There is no god but god. Don’t need complicated theology that Christians proclaim necessary. Much less about niceties and more about practice and ritual.
Five pillars
Practicing muslim follows this. Profession, prayer, charity/almsgiving, fast
Profession: there is no god but god and mohammed is his greatest prophet.
Prayer: pray 5 times a day facing mecca. Before the conquest of mecca, in the first 2 decades of islam, muslim faced jeuraselm. Friday is the muslim Sabbath. Must participate in public prayer. Common for muslims and Christians to share churches because they did not meet on the same day
Charity: help support the poor and the defenders of the faith.
Fast: from sunrise to sunset during the month of Ramadan. Ramadan moves around the Julian and Gregorian calendar. Not eat or drink.
Pilgrimage: once in his or her lifetime a muslim is expected to go to mecca.
Mohammed tried to restrict the custom of having many wives. Kalifa means successor. When he died there was a question about this. What had he founded – a state, way of life, or religion. In 632 those questions hadn’t been answered. Mohammed wanted his son in law Ali to succeed him. Ali had a very different view of the role of the new islam than mohammed’s intial successors. By the time Abu Bakr dies, arab raids of bisantine emperor are reported. Sunni and Shia split at around 661. There are some that the real split happened here in 632 when ali was passed over as successor and Abu bakr became successor instead. Period of explosive growth.
Expansion lasts precisely 100 years. Failure to take city of Constantinople in 717. Had Constantinople had fallen there would had been no power to withstand it.
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Spain was a contested land.
Omar
Central important leader of islam. One of the fathers in law of mohammed. Organizer of muslim/arab empire. Clear to mar that you can’t form a state by looting and plundering. He establishes a system of contributions; taxes. He would take the title emir; commander. After a 10 year reign he was assassinated. With his death there is a generation change. No longer the fathers in law but now the sons in law of mohammed are the leaders.
Othman
He was a member of one of the most important influential powerful families in mecca. He was one of the early converts of islam. He was responsible for exiling mohammed from mecca in 622. During his reign the Caliphs lived humbly. As islam expands he is one of the most powerful people in the world. What he did was not popular with early followers of mohammed. Nepitism; giving lots of jobs to family members. Latin word that gives us nephew. Every loser 3rd cousin giving a job as a supervisor.
Finally it became Ali’s turn. He considered islam a way of life/religion. Distant counsins of Othman named Muawiyah rose in rebellion against Ali. When Ali tried to compromise, his followers turned against him. Him and sons were eventually murdered.
Muawiyah emerges as Kaliway (?) Kalieffs ?
Shia translates to the party of Ali. It is only the descendents of Ali that are legitamte Kailiffs. Suni accept legitimacy of Muawiyah and his succesors. Point to Othman as the same family. The core areas of the east has been conquered. Africa, spain, were not. Muawiyah moves capital to Damascus. During the next 40 years there are multiple sieges of Constantinople. The arabs would have prolly taken the city except for a secret weapon that was engineered at the time called greek fire; a priminitive sort of napalm. It would set anything on fire including the surface of the sea. Arabs couldn’t control the sea lanes, food could still get to the city.
Once this split is out in the open, ali’s relatives try to overthrow Umayyed. None prosper til the last. Late 740s, decendant of inlaw of Ali, would raise a rebellion against Umayyed. It would exterminate the whole family except for one person. After 750, for the first time of history of islam, it was not a unified state. One centered in spain and western Africa. Never again would the muslim world be ruled by a single man.
Abbasids moves the capital to Baghdad. From this period on, the real focus on the muslim world is to the east. The most famous character of medieval legend is Sinbad. His journeys take place in the east – the Indian ocean.
4-22
Kings trained the bureaucrats. Monk missionaries spread Christianity into the north and the east. First part of the 5th century. These monasteries were true retreasts, where older men (movers and shakers) would retire and the end of their lives. Because they were retreats of elite, they were already centers of learning. Men who were weary of the world could provide solace. St. martin: bishop of Christian community. They kept dragging him bank. He agreed to be bishop as long as he didn’t have to live in the city. He set up a hermitage outside of the city. The city of tour develops around the tomb of saint martin. The monastery of saint martins begins to train missionaries. This is why tis monastery is on our map today.
Ireland: Patrick wasn’t an Irishman but a britan. He was kidnapped and hauled off to Ireland as a slave. He spent 7-8 years there. He escaped, fled to gaul. Once there he found his way to the monastery of saint martins and was trained as a missionary. Ireland had never been part of the roman empire. It was a land without any cities. It was a rural land. The most important things are land and cattle. There was already a Christian community in Ireland. At first people disregarded him when he advocated Christianity. He had to appear as an Irish lord. Had to appear as an important man. Christianity is different in Ireland because Ireland is different. Tribes. Age of 100 kingdoms. Bishops were the head of communities. Irish monks were typically married. As they converted to Christianity they had to be able to read. They became experts at learning, translating, and teaching greek and latin. They admired antony. There weren’t deserts but there was arctic deserts. Iona is one of these famous monasteries (565). Columba was the founder of Iona. Columban was a famous missionary on the continent.
Bobbio: in the middle of the alps. Columban got the pope on his side. Popes are beginning to assert greater and greater authority. Bobbio was completely independent. Similar to the monasteries of Ireland. Monasteries own half the farmland of the Frankish kingdom.
Saint benedict of Nursia. Italian monk. Founded monte casino. Author of the rule of saint benedict. Modeled by the rule of pachomius. Benedicts rule wasn’t as harsh. Disciplined but not abusive. The abbot was vested with a great deal of authority. Once in office he was almost impossible to remove and he wasn’t subject to anyone’s authority.
Pope Gregory the 1st, Gregory the great, was one of the most important medieval popes. His brothers was one of the last consuls of rome. He was a close friend of… tireless, great organizer.
In 596, he sent one of his other monks, Augustine, the other monks to the city of Kent. King of kent was aethelbert. He had married a Frankish princess. He was pagan. It was agreed that th bride could bring her confessor with her and have a small church for her and her retinue to attend. This was the opening Gregory was looking for. The letter requested that the Frankish bishops consecrate something? Augustine is sent to England to convert people. He founded the monastery of saint marys and saint pauls.
Roman version of Christianity was hard to spread. Irish was thriving. Abbots more important than bishops. They celebrated easter on different days. Irish did not recognize rome as the head of Christendom. Strands of monasticism comes together. Monks are missionaries devoted to the pope. Masters of greek and latin and teaching it to people that aren’t greek or latin. Monks will become responsible for conversion of pagan people in the east.
Merovingian age. Several different kings thus several kingdoms. Merovingian come to be kings as minors and are then dead by there mid 20s. Tradition: do nothing kings. Presided but did not rule. Monarchy had given so much land to the church that it was no longer of the majority of the land. Once they lost this source of wealth, they didn’t have to be respected as much anymore.
Multiple kingdoms, palaces, great lords. If you wanted to petition the king you had to go to the major domo or the mayor of the palace. They come to violent ends too.
Bannum: power of the counts. Ridiculous survivors of an earlier age. As kings became weaker the counts became more powerful. Abbots become more powerful because church had so much wealth. Merge of count and bishop. Controls religious authority, land, and the kings agent that controls tax revenues among other things.
Pepin of Heristal never overthrew the kings he was satisfied as major domo. They called him prince -first among equals. Pepin begins to work closely with anglo-irish regimes. When he died he had his succession planned out. An illegimate son Charles martel the hammer succeeded him. Like his father he was content as mayor of the palace. He would rule as mayor over 3 empty palaces.
Martel succeeded by his two sons – pepin the short and his brother. He deposed of a figurehead and boniface declared pepin the king of the franks.
768 pepin the short dies. Succeeded by two of his sons: Charlemagne and Charles. Charlegmagne dies and Charles rules alone. He writes a series of laws called the capituaries. Establishes control in Saxony. He brought Saxons lords to his court.
Battle vs iconoclasm. Whether god should be worshipped with paintings.
Two types of rulers in the middle ages: holy ones and warriors. From the days of pepin to short to the days of charlegmane the Frankish kingdom is organized for military expansion.
Charlegmagne writers were misshapen, he’d keep his attempts beneath his pollow. He fostered education. He established the palace school. Used especially to train clerks and administrators. He placed a monk in charge called Alcuin. He was charlemagne’s minister of eduction.
He’s responsible for the Carolingian renaissance.
100 manuscripts from british isles, 500 from the continent. Very litter that survives before the Carolingian period at all. From the Carolingian period from 750-900 we know of more than 7000 latin manuscripts that have survived in monasteries, other. We know of more than 60 authors. A lot of these are suspected to be written by women nuns. Charter is a document that conveys something.
Alcuin and the people he worked with invented a different script called the caroline miniscule. I and j written with the same symbol, others as well. Many of the shapes of the letters are a little different thn the ones we are familiar with. No spaces between words to save paper. No consistent capitalization or punctuation. Abbreviations are different in insular compared to italics. All sorts of errors were creeping into texts, especially the bible. Alcuin fixed this stuff.
Charlegmagne would die in 1814. He would crown his sons Louis king. He didn’t think that was appropriate so he made the pope crown him. Louis is not a powerful king. He wasn’t weak but a lot weaker than his father. His children were one his problems. During his reign he made his will known and split the land between his sons. Then he remarried and had another boy. He redid his will to make sure his youngest son got some but the older sons wouldn’t share. Sons were so quarrelsome that Louis was established after he spent some time in a monastery.
Carolingians effect the future. Borderland is battled for for over 1000 years.