This course will ask you to stretch your mind by changing the way you think about history, as well. In my first post I mentioned that many people look at history as a collection of dead people, events, dates, and facts to be memorized. I think that is why many people claim to hate history, do poorly in history courses, and show very little interest in history beyond the occasional Band of Brothers marathon on the History Channel (We won't concern ourselves with the appropriateness of this name right now). What they miss out on is the glue that holds all of those dates, people, events, and facts together. They miss out on the connections between events and other events. They fail to concern themselves with the connections between ideas and events, or ideas and other ideas. That's the good stuff! That's the stuff that makes history work! It's also the stuff that will help you to make sense of the past, and allow you to better remember the details.
I'll use an example from the 14th century (Chapter 11 in our text) to illustrate some "big idea" thinking.
The really big idea that sums up the 14th century is that it was a major disaster for European civilization. Actually, the 14th century saw three major disasters; famine and plague, the Hundred Years' War, and series a crises in the Roman Catholic Church. As students of history we should be concerned with finding cause and effect relationships within these three disasters. It's important to remember that all things are connected. Let's look at the example of the the first of these disasters, the Black Death.
A doctor treats victims of the Bubonic Plague (From the Toggenburg Bible, 1401) |
Thanks to the modern science of biology, we now know that the Black Death was caused by a nasty bacterium called Yersinia Pestis that was transmitted by fleas on the backs of black rats. So what? Where did the rats come from? Why did they come in the 14th century? What was the effect of the Black Death on European society? The causes of the Black Death provide us with a great example of the cause-and-effect relationship of historical events. During the 13th century, the Mongols (Genghis Khan, his sons, and grandsons) conquered most of the Eurasian continent, from Poland and Hungary in the west to China in the east. In the process, they conquered the Persian Empire and tied the old Silk Road together under one empire. This unity further opened up the east-west trade routes, bringing about a medieval boom in trade that was dominated by the Italian cities of Venice and Genoa in the Mediterranean. It was along these trade routes that the black rats and their fleas hitched rides out of the steppes of Mongolia during the 14th century into China and eventually Europe. So, Mongolian conquest and expanded trade in the 13th century eventually led to the Black Death and the loss of up to half of the European population.
Peasants working a lord's demesne (domain) in France (from the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 1412-16) |
I know that seems like a lot of information, but it's not that bad if you focus on the big idea stuff. Here it is in a shortened form (notes):
Black Death (14th century):
- Carried to Europe on trade routes from the east
- first outbreak in mid-14th century
- killed up to 50% of European population
- social upheaval
- labor shortage- accelerated end of serfdom
- higher wages
- lower prices
- lower revenue from rents
- high standard of living for peasants
- lower standard of living for noble landowners
- peasant revolts in Flanders, France, England