Nomads and crusaders, A.D. 1000-1368 PDF
Preview Nomads and crusaders, A.D. 1000-1368
Page iii Nomads and Crusaders A.D. 1000–1368 Archibald R. Lewis INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS Bloomington and Indianapolis Page iv Disclaimer: This book contains characters with diacritics. When the characters can be represented using the ISO 88591 character set (http://www.w3.org/TR/images/latin1.gif), netLibrary will represent them as they appear in the original text, and most computers will be able to show the full characters correctly. In order to keep the text searchable and readable on most computers, characters with diacritics that are not part of the ISO 88591 list will be represented without their diacritical marks. First Midland Book Edition 1991 © 1988 by Archibald R. Lewis All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses' Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data Lewis, Archibald Ross, 1914 Nomads and Crusaders, A.D. 10001368. Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Civilization, Medieval. 2. Comparative civilization. 3. Europe—Territorial expansion. 4. Middle Ages—History. I. Title. CB353.L48. 1988 940.1 8745588 ISBN 0253347874 ISBN 0253206529 (pbk.) 2 3 4 5 6 95 94 93 92 91 Page v CONTENTS Introduction vii Part One The Matrix of Old World Civilizations I. East Asia and Greater India 3 II. The World of Islamic Civilization 27 III. ByzantineRussian Civilization 48 IV. The Civilization of Western Europe 67 Part Two Nomadic and Western European Expansion V. The Assault of Western European and Nomadic Peoples, A.D. 1000–1100 88 VI. The Balance Restored: Byzantium, Islam, Western Europe, China, and India, 113 1100–1195 VII. Western European and Mongol Aggression, 1195–1270 138 VIII. Western European and Mongol World Domination, 1270–1368 166 IX. Epilogue, 1368–1500 194 Bibliography 202 Index 209 Page vi MAPS 1. East Asian and Indic Worlds, 1000 6 2. The Islamic World, 1000 30 3. Western Europe and ByzantiumRussia, 1000 52 4. The Civilized World, 1000 91 5. The Civilized World, 1100 116 6. The Civilized World, 1195 141 7. The Civilized World, 1250 169 8. The Civilized World, 1368 197 Page vii INTRODUCTION Today in the late twentieth century we live in an age in which the dominant civilization has, for some time, been that of Western Europe. We are all familiar with the broad outlines of how this came about since the time of Columbus and Vasco da Gama, as Western European explorers, mariners, merchants, colonists, and conquerors spread their dominion and their ideas everywhere and in the process overwhelmed all other peoples and civilizations. Talented historians as diverse in their points of view as Arnold Toynbee and William McNeill have told this story eloquently indeed, just as a number of others, like Robert Lopez, concerned with Western Europe proper, have explained how the latter in medieval times came to develop those special features which made its later success possible. Despite all this we are still faced with the basic problem as to why Western Europe was able to develop in such a way that her civilization could prevail, in modern times, over others which earlier had seemed to be just as vigorous and just as promising. To explain this, it is not enough to concentrate one's attention upon Western Europe and the wider world of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries only or even to delve deeply into the earlier medieval bases of the accomplishments of Latin Christendom. One must instead try to grasp why those other great civilizations of medieval times—the ByzantineRussian, the Islamic, the Indic, and the East Asian— failed to match the medieval performance of Western Europe, for their failures obviously explain in part the successes of the latter. Fortunately for those who would engage in such an enterprise, recent scholarship has made available to us a store of new information and insight which is concerned with Byzantium and Russia, the Islamic world, East Asia, and even India and Southeast Asia. Thanks to this we now have a clearer view of these civilizations during their medieval phase. This makes it possible for us to pursue a comparative history of them which promises us a better understanding than ever before, for our comparisons can be much more meaningful. The pages which follow are dedicated to just such an enterprise as the author strives to compare Western European society in the broadest sense with sister civilizations of the Old World during the High Middle Ages from the year 1000 to 1368 in the belief that such comparisons will tell us something of value and help to explain both the success of the former and the failure of the latter in subsequent centuries. In doing so, the careful reader will note that the author has placed a heavy emphasis upon geographical, demographic, economic, technological, military, naval, and maritime factors, Page viii although political, religious, and cultural elements have by no means been entirely overlooked. He has done so in the belief that the former factors were the decisive ones in the story he is telling. The reader will also soon be aware of the fact that when the author is dealing with Western Europe in particular during these centuries a very conscious attempt has been made to consider the positive accomplishments which every area of Western Europe has made to its development in medieval times. Thus one will find stressed here the role played by the Catalans and Provençals in the Mediterranean, which supplemented that of the betterknown Italians, and of the Portuguese, the Castilians, the British, the Scandinavians, the Netherlanders, the French, the Germans, and the Slavs of northern and Atlantic Europe as well. Only when the accomplishments of all the peoples of medieval Western Europe are included can a true picture of its development emerge. Finally, the author hopes that he has been able to write in a way which reflects little or no racial or cultural bias. He is well aware that even today the dominance of Western Europe throughout the world is by no means total and that the other great civilizations of medieval times still exist under the veneer of a modern Western European culture they have only partly accepted. Indeed, it seems quite possible to this observer that the next century may well emphasize the power and leadership of East Asia rather than that of Europe and the Americas, for the Japanese, Koreans, and Chinese all show signs that they are building cultures which may be better suited than our own to cope with a variety of modern problems. The historian is neither a prophet nor a seer, but if his craft teaches him anything it is that there can be no assurance that the Western European civilization which now seems so dominant in the world is more than a temporary phenomenon. Civilizations are and have been many, but man is one, so it may well be that our worldwide Western civilization at this very moment is in the process of giving place to another or others which are better adapted to the future needs of mankind. Even if this proves to be the case, however, there is still a value to be found in explaining how, during the late Middle Ages, Western Europeans laid the bases for worldwide dominance in modern times, while at the same time those living in other civilizations failed to achieve as much. It is to this end that this volume is dedicated in the knowledge that it can only open up this subject to the talented historians who in the future will no doubt develop it more adequately. Finally, since a project as ambitious as this has taken years of research and travel in all the areas of the Old World mentioned in these pages, the author must thank those who have aided him in special ways. Most important are those institutions at which he has taught—the University of South Carolina, the University of Texas at Austin, and the University of Massachusetts— Page ix along with the American Council of Learned Societies, the Ford Foundation, and the United States government through Fulbright grants for study in both Belgium and Egypt, all of which have generously supported his researches. Second, he is indebted to a score of libraries and museums overseas as well as the University of Arizona Library, the Widener Library of Harvard University, the University of Massachusetts Library, Princeton University Library, the University of Texas Library, and the Libraries of Mystic Seaport and the Peabody Museum of Salem for use of their important collections. Last of all he must thank those who have read these pages and made valuable suggestions. They are his colleagues at the University of Massachusetts, Frederick Drake and George Kirk; William McNeill of the University of Chicago; Richard Sullivan of Michigan State University; and Lynn White, Jr., of the University of California, Los Angeles. The errors found here are his own, but without their help they would be much more numerous. He also wishes to thank Doris Holden of Amherst and Nikki Matz of Tucson for their help in final drafts and his wife Elizabeth Lewis for long years of patience and understanding while he labored. Page x For Del and Allyson who would have approved of this volume Page 1 1— THE MATRIX OF OLD WORLD CIVILIZATIONS
The list of books you might like
