The Medieval Synthesis--And It's Cracks

I. The Church’s Mission

A. Innocent III and the Fourth Lateran Council

1. Innocent III and the Creation of the Council — During the thirteenth century, the church sought to strengthen its institutions of law and justice and to reorder the world in the image of heaven. Pope Innocent III (r.1198–1216) was powerful and respected. He was trained at the University of Bologna in theology, and he sought to magnify papal authority. In 1215 he called a church council, the Fourth Lateran Council, to regulate church teaching and Christian life.

2. The Laity and the Sacraments — The council made teachings on the sacraments (rituals conveying grace) more precise and detailed. They reinforced the importance of the Eucharist and the teaching that through transubstantiation, the host and the wine became Jesus' body and blood. The church claimed more authority over the sacrament of marriage, including claiming jurisdiction over marital disputes and strengthening the church’s role in seeking out impediments to marriages. The impact of these teachings, especially on the Eucharist and annual confession, was considerable.

3. Labeling the Jews — The council required Jews to make themselves known through outward signs, usually badges, clothing, or hats. The rules were enforced variously on the local level.

4. The Suppression of Heretics — The Fourth Lateran Council directed secular authorities to rid their lands of heretics; rulers were threatened with excommunication and loss of land and vassals if they failed to do so.

B. The Inquisition

1. Purposes of the Inquisition — The council challenged religious and secular authorities to put down heresy. The inquisition, originally set up in the wake of the crusade against Albigensianism in southern France, became permanent in 1233. Aided by secular authorities, the church-appointed inquisitors now called those suspected of heresy to testify, sometimes nearly entire villages.

2. The Inquisition in Action — Inquisitions usually began with a “preaching,” where individuals suspected of heresy were questioned, and clemency was promised to those who confessed. Those who quickly recanted, or were unaware that their beliefs were heresies, were given lenient penalties, but those who refused to repent were viewed as threats to the salvation of others and punished severely. During the thirteenth century, long-term imprisonment became a tool for repressing heresy, even if the heretic confessed, and for further interrogation concerning other supposed heretics and heretic plots.

C. Lay Piety

1. Preaching Friars and Receptive Townspeople — The number of preaching friars in towns increased, some of them university trained. Friars focused on applying Christian teaching to ordinary life. Some laypeople became tertiary friars, engaging in works of prayer and piety in imitation of the friars.

2. The Piety of Women — There was an explosion of female piety in this era. Many new nunneries were founded, female mystics proliferated, women joined mendicant orders, and domestic piety intensified for many, particularly in urban areas. Some women were so dedicated to the Eucharist that they ate little else. In this way women used their control over ordinary food to gain social and religious power.

D. Jews and Lepers as Outcasts

1. Jews Exploited and Expelled — The situation for Jews became abnormally tense in this era, as Christian monarchs gained power and piety intensified. Jews moved to cities, but they were often excluded from guild activities. Many were compelled to become moneylenders because other fields were closed to them. Kings in England and France imposed special taxes on Jews and confiscated their property. Lesser lords and monarchs alike capitalized on popular anti-Jewish sentiment to enrich themselves or rid themselves of debt. Sensational stories of Jews sacrificing Christian children or disrespecting the Eucharist circulated, and in some areas Jews were forcefully expelled or massacred. For example, all Jews were expelled from England in 1291.

2. Fearing the Contamination of Lepers — Lepers increasingly became objects of both charity and disgust. Because of their contagious and disfiguring disease, they were forced to live outside of society in special isolated houses set up for charitable reasons and the purpose of segregation. Lepers also had to worship in their own churches.

II. Reconciling This World and the Next

A. The Achievement of Scholasticism

1. Reconciling Faith and Reason — Scholasticism used logical inquiry in an attempt to summarize and reconcile all knowledge. Scholastics in the universities were confident that knowledge from the senses and reason was compatible with knowledge obtained through faith and revelation. Scholastic knowledge would produce effective preaching and conversion. The method made confident use of Aristotle’s rules of logic and often investigated the natural world.

2. St. Thomas Aquinas — Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) was the most famous scholastic, a Neopolitan Dominican who was a master at the University of Paris. He published the monumental Summa Theologica in 1273, which intended to cover all important topics. The topics were divided into questions, many of which spoke to practical concerns of the day, such as whether or not it was lawful to sell something for more than it was worth. Scholasticism was enormously optimistic and offered a sense of purpose and order and a guide to behavior.

3. Later Scholastics — Scholasticism did not always provide unity, and later scholastics such as John Duns Scotus (c.1266–1308), a Franciscan who taught at Oxford and Paris, concerned themselves with the limits of reason. Duns Scotus found the world and God to be less compatible: he believed illumination came not as a matter of course but only when God chose to intervene.

B. New Syntheses in Writing and Music

1. Vernacular Literature Comes of Age: Dante Alighieri — Dante Alighieri’s poetry harmonized the scholastic universe with the mysteries of faith and the poetry of love. His Divina Commedia  (Divine Comedy) described an imaginary journey  through hell and purgatory to paradise. The allegorical poem explores the soul’s search for meaning, enlightenment, and divine love. The popularity of the poem influenced the development of the Italian language, and other writers addressed similar themes.

2. Polyphony and the Motet — Musicians, too, developed new forms that bridged the secular and the sacred. Freer melodies led to harmony. Motet music began in France, probably Paris, and often used two or three lines of melody, sometimes “sung” by instruments. Motets were written for and by the clerical elites but made use of the music of ordinary people. New notation and rhythm helped composers indicate rhythm and notes more precisely.

C. Gothic Art

1. Stained Glass — Gothic architecture began around 1135 with the remodeling of the church of Saint-Denis and spread from France throughout Europe. Gothic church architecture allowed for large windows, and chemically treated colored glass with lead and painted images was used to depict complicated religious scenes.

2. Sculpture — Gothic cathedrals were also decorated with sculpture. Sculpted in the round, Gothic figures moved and interacted with one another, often to tell a religious story or express a spiritual truth. Themed sculptures were used to sum up a body of truths. Gothic sculpture spread from France throughout the thirteenth century, with regional variations.

3. Painting — In painting, Giotto (1266–1337) experimented with the illusion of depth, and his figures express a range of emotion. By blending religious meanings with human forms, Giotto found another way to bring together the natural and divine realms. Gothic style also appeared in paintings as a decorative motif, and manuscript illuminations featured stained-glass windows as background themes

III. The Politics of Control

A. The Weakening of the Empire

1. The Papacy and the German Emperors — The papacy and the German emperors continued to struggle for control of Italy, which was symbolically significant and offered a rich source of income. Barbarossa’s son married Constance, an heiress of Sicily, but died before he could use his position in southern Italy to expand his power. During his son Frederick II’s childhood, the German princes and the papacy attempted to control the imperial office. Pope Innocent III crowned Otto of Brunswick emperor in exchange for his promise not to invade Italy, a promise that was soon broken. When Otto invaded Sicily in 1211, the pope excommunicated him. In 1212, Innocent gave the crown to Frederick II (r. 1212–1250). Frederick was heir to Sicilian and German culture. Innocent’s papacy was expansionistic and determined to strengthen its claim to the Italian papal states and resist any German expansion into Italy.

2. The Rule of Frederick II — Frederick sought to control Italy with a three-pronged approach that involved strengthening his hold over Sicily, making concessions to the German princes, and expanding his control of Italy by entering through Lombardy. Four popes after Innocent resisted Frederick’s efforts and excommunicated him on several occasions, including most seriously at the Council of Lyon in 1245. They also preached a crusade against him, which lasted until his death in 1250.

3. The Consequences of Frederick’s Failure — The concessions Frederick made to the German princes allowed them to turn their regions into virtually independent states and left German regions divided until the nineteenth century. Frederick’s failure strengthened the position of the German princes and in 1273 brought the Swabian Hapsburg family to imperial power as the “Holy Roman Emperors,” a prestigious but meaningless honorific. Frederick’s failure in Italy meant that the Italian cities would continue to be divided. Sicily was ruled by a succession of other families; it was eventually claimed by both the kings of Aragon and the house of Anjou. While the popes resisted losing control of Italy, they came under attack for using religion as a political tool.

B. Louis IX and a New Ideal of Kingship

1. Louis and the Paternal Ideal of Kingship — Louis IX (r. 1226–1270) established a new ideal of kingship. He was revered as a military leader but also primarily as an administrator, judge, and “just father” of his people.

2. The Reign of Louis IX — Louis used salaried magistrates to expand the influence of royal courts. A zealous crusader, Louis resisted territorial conflicts at home. He respected the church and the pope in spiritual matters but also protected his own royal authority, particularly in matters of excommunication. He hated Jews, canceling debts owed to them and ordering them to leave France or live “by the labor of their hands” in 1253. Many of his contemporaries considered him to be a saint because of his concern for the poor and sick and his personal piety, and he was canonized in 1297. Louis increased the power and prestige of the French monarchy

C. The Birth of Representative Institutions

1. Spanish Cortes — Rulers sought to enlist broad support for their policies from the two most powerful “orders” of medieval society, the nobility and the clergy. Across Europe rulers summoned parliaments, and as townsmen became more important, they became more closely integrated into royal government. One of the earliest were the cortes of Castile-Leon, representative assemblies that included townsmen. Once convened at court, the townsmen joined bishops and noblemen in formally counseling the king and assenting to royal decisions. Alfonso IX (r. 1188–1230) summoned them in the first year of his reign and then called on them regularly to participate in major political and military decisions and to assent to taxes.

2. English Parliament — In the twelfth century, the English King Henry II had consulted with prelates and barons at Great Councils, using these Parliaments as tools to ratify and gain support for his policies. During the first sixteen years of the reign of young Henry III (r. 1216–1272), England was governed by a council of a few barons, university-trained administrators, and a papal legate. In 1258 the barons, unhappy over Henry III’s wars and debts, threatened rebellion and forced a Council of Fifteen on the king. When another civil war was won by Simon de Montfort, he attempted to consolidate his control over the king by convening a parliament and including, along with earls, barons, and churchmen, representatives from the towns—the “commons.”

D. The Weakening of the Papacy

1. Taxing the Clergy — Kings gradually gained power relative to the papacy. Popes attempted to exempt clergy from taxation and keep them subject only to ecclesiastical courts, but by the end of the thirteenth century, monarchs challenged these privileges. Philip the Fair of France and Edward I both financed wars by taxing clergy. Pope Boniface VII insisted that only the pope could tax clerics and ordered the clergy to disobey the royal orders. Edward threatened to declare resisting clergy outlaws, and Philip forbade the export of all metals, money, or jewels, forcing Boniface to back down and concede the right to tax in 1297.

2. The King’s New Tools: Propaganda and Public Opinion — When Philip the Fair arrested a bishop on a charge of treason in 1301, another confrontation with Boniface began, with Philip deriding and humiliating the pope and calling a French assembly, the Estates General, to support his policies. When the pope issued a defiant bull, the king accused him of various crimes and heresies.

3. Papal Defeat — Philip’s agents invaded the papal palace at Anagni and attempted to capture the pope, but local people resisted them. Boniface died shortly after, but the next popes pardoned Philip. The humiliation of the popes weakened the institution’s influence over monarchs and even its own churchmen, and the balance between church and state broke down.

4. The Avignon Papacy — In 1309, the pope fled civil disorder in Rome and settled in Avignon, where they remained until 1378. Many Europeans were concerned about the Avignon popes, many of whom were French, and saw the pope’s absence from Rome as a calamity. The Avignon organization was efficient, and regular revenues gave the papacy more influence over church appointments then they had before, even as they slowly abandoned the idea of leading all Christendom.

E. The Rise of the Signori

1. The Struggle for Power in the Italian Communes — During the thirteenth century, within the Italian communes non-noble groups called the popolo struggled to gain influence. The popolo, armed and militant, attempted to form alternate centers of power to the nobility, particularly seeking a role in determining tax policies. In some cities, nobles overcame and dissolved the popolo, while in others the popolo squeezed the nobles out of the government.

2. The Rise of the Regional Nobility in Italy — Regional nobles were able to take advantage of the unrest within communes to increase their own power and influence. They often established themselves as signori (lords) of the cities. Typically, signori kept the peace at the price of repression.

F. The Mongol Takeover

1. The Golden Horde in Russia — From the 1230s, the Mongols attacked Russia, Poland, and Hungary, where regional princes were weak. They also attacked Germany, and in 1250, conquered Iran and Iraq. Their sophisticated military tactics of multipronged invasion and mobility made them tough adversaries. They were most successful in Russia, capturing Kiev in 1240 and dominating Russia’s principalities for two centuries. Russian princes paid tribute to the Mongol khan, and the Russian church was tolerated.

2. The Opening of China to Europeans — The Mongol conquests opened China to Europeans for the first time, as missionaries, diplomats, and merchants traveled there over land or sea. Marco Polo (1254–1324), a merchant from Venice, was the most famous of these, but others went as well, perhaps even as entire communities. The pope sent the Franciscan missionary John of Monte Corvino as his envoy to China. In general, contact with the Mongols opened up new land routes to the east and helped bind together East and West.

G. The Great Famine

1. Hunger and Its Effects — The Great Famine (1315–1322) left many weak and sick and strengthened social divisions. Heavy rains and the death of farm animals drove up prices and spread suffering and death. Peasants and the poor were most at risk, while monasteries, lords, and the well-to-do peasants benefited from high prices. Rural and urban areas lost 5 to 10 percent of their population.

2. Reactions to the Famine — Charities offered relief and many prayed for deliverance, while monarchs tried to control prices and some peasants migrated in search of better land and weather. Towns became important, for they provided charitable relief.

3. Social Causes and Consequences of the Great Famine — Population growth contributed to the difficulty in producing enough food. By 1300, exponential population growth had entirely halted, but no technological advances aided agricultural productivity. Wars between rulers and the associated destruction of crops in the countryside pushed some localities over the edge. High taxes and grain requisitions also exacerbated the famine. In some places, peasants revolted and the limits of authority were made clear.