When did the Middle Ages end in Europe?

[Antonio the Sixth]

We know historical periodization is inherently arbitrary, of course, and that eras don't actually "begin" and "end" but gradually phase into one another. Still, I think it's an interesting exercise to figure out what date makes the best symbolic cutoff point, in the sense that it marked an event that can legitimately be said to have upended the status quo.

In this spirit, I see three strongest candidates for the end of the Middle Ages in Europe. Specifically limiting this to Europe, because the events that mattered here are different from those that mattered in other parts of the world (and if we needed a global date, then 1492 would have to take the cake).

So we have:
- 1453: Fall of Constantinople + End of the Hundred Years' War + Gutenberg's Bible
- 1492: Beginning of Columbus' Travels + End of the Reconquista
- 1517: Beginning of the Protestant Reformation (+ close enough to the formation of Charles V's empire)

Personally, this is a case where I'd stick with the classics and go with 1453, partly because the Middle Ages are already so long that it really feels wrong to extend them even further, partly because the fall of the Byzantine Empire bookends the period really nicely (as well as having major repercussions for trade patterns and thus colonization), and partly because the printing press really was the driver for a lot of the stuff that followed. The end of the Hundred Years' War was hugely consequential for Western Europe (not only for the two belligerents but also for Ireland, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands, which were affected by those countries turning their attention elsewhere) but not so much beyond that. Still, I like that this date marks a big change from London to Constantinople.

1492 makes sense, but again, it feels more like a global event than a European one. Colonization of America would take decades before it had the massive impact that it would eventually have on European history. As for 1517, the Reformation was immensely important and probably the single biggest development of the period in Europe, but I prefer seeing it in continuity with the social changes that unfolded over the previous half-century.

Thoughts?

[Antonio the Sixth]

1850. Bite me.

I know Le Goff is a Big Name, and I get the point he's trying to make, but that's really too much of a stretch. If the same historical period includes the early barbarian Kingdoms as well as the hypersophisticated courts of 1700 and the political turmoil of 1800, it's really extended beyond utility. Even the idea that "feudalism" was the same thing in the 6th century than it was in the late Ancient Regime (let alone in the 30 years after the Revolutionary and Napoleonic armies steamrolled over it) seems pretty silly to me. As for Christianity, it had radically reshaped itself over this period, and I'm pretty sure even the common believer from 500 would find much in common with that of 1800.

If anything, I'd be far more interested in a periodization that "breaks up" the Middle Ages into more coherent pieces of 2-3 centuries each (for example, the Dark Ages up to Charlemagne, the transition into strong feudalism up to the First Crusade, the Golden Age up until the Great Famine, and the Crisis up until 1453). This is how we usually periodize the modern era, so I think it's a lot more helpful in terms of understanding what happened in the Middle Ages. History might have been "slower" back then, but it wasn't that slow.

Tbh we have the same problem in our periodization of the Classical Era. The idea that we can say anything coherent in a time that spans between the outset of Greek city-states and the fall of Rome is pretty surreal. But at least it's kept at around 1000 years total, which should be the absolute maximum for a historical cycle.

[Antonio the Sixth]

If anything, I'd be far more interested in a periodization that "breaks up" the Middle Ages into more coherent pieces of 2-3 centuries each (for example, the Dark Ages up to Charlemagne, the transition into strong feudalism up to the First Crusade, the Golden Age up until the Great Famine, and the Crisis up until 1453). This is how we usually periodize the modern era, so I think it's a lot more helpful in terms of understanding what happened in the Middle Ages. History might have been "slower" back then, but it wasn't that slow.

I could get on board with that. Primarily, my objection is to including the period from 1453 to 1648 with the rest of the "Modern Age." Arguably a peasant farmer in 1600 had more in common with a nineteenth century tenant farmer than a ninth century serf; but I would submit as well that he had more in common with a thirteenth century serf than with the nineteenth century man. The same for the Protestant reformer and the Renaissance classicist and their various counterparts. Of course it's not original to suggest all periodization is inherently arbitrary, but given how reliant the major developments of this period were on their Medieval antecedents, I have a hard time driving my staff in the sand at 1453 and saying "yep, this is Modern now!"

Well, if the idea of a unified "Middle Ages" is silly, then the idea of a unified "Modern era" is patently absurd, yeah. That's certainly not what I meant in arguing for 1453 as the endpoint of the Middle Ages. "Modernity", if this is even a meaningful notion, starts in 1789 at the earliest and possibly as late as 1848, yeah. Whatever happened in between needs a different name (and probably more than one).

410–800     "Dark Ages"
800–1199     Medieval
1199–1517     High/Late Medieval
1517–1648     Post-medieval/Pre-modern
1648–1815     Early Modern

I'm really surprised that you're skipping over 1315 (or possibly 1347 if you think plague rather than famine is what kickstarted the crisis).  The 14th century crisis was such a fundamental upheaval of the economic structure and social order of the time that I think if you want a date to end the Middle Ages that's far from the conventional dates, I'd argue for pushing it back in time to 1315/1347 rather than forward to the 1800s or whatnot. It's when feudalism began its death spiral and you saw the first real state-building efforts like the Hundred Years' War kick off, so arguably some of the trend that would eventually come to define "modernity" started there. Of course it's not "modernity" itself, but it's also something markedly different from what came before.

Also, why 1199? From what I can gather all the significant events of that year involved the usual squabbling between France and England. If you want a date to mark the beginning of the High Middle Ages, I'd go with 1095, since the Crusades were genuinely a big deal for European history and culture even if the ways in which they were is not always obvious. You could even push it a century or so earlier with the end of the last waves of invasions that allowed Europe to start stabilizing politically and militarily.

Yes but by your same argument, it's absurd to categorize the fall of Constantinople in the same "modern" era as the atom bomb. I mean, for the average person there was less change in life between 550 and 1450 than between 1450 and 1950.

If you were to look at the most fundamental distinctions between average life in the indisputably modern era and, say, the 13th century, the broadest possible measure, the things a time traveler would notice first and be most struck by, you would say the modern era has these things:

- light/power as a mass utility, & other utilities
- powered (vs animal) transportation, whether by land, air or sea
- instant long distance communication
- the production of images/screens

and to a lesser degree:
- artificial computing (although less noticeable in everyday life)

The average time traveler would not notice that Constantinople had fallen, certainly not before any of the things I mentioned, and certainly would not consider that fact to be more definitive of the differences between their time and ours.

These all point to the mid 19th century.

See my point above.

[Antonio the Sixth]

It seems to me it would make sense for "ages" to get shorter, the closer you get to the present.

Oh, definitely. Both because having more sources allows us to make finer distinctions and because despite everything, it is undeniably true that history has been moving "faster" over the past 3-4 centuries.

That said, people in this thread have taken this sort of attitude way too far. We're now at the degree of presentism where everything that feels vaguely different from now is being associated with the Middle Ages, even things that are obvious products of modernity like the colonial racial hierarchy. This is patently absurd. The Middle Ages aren't "everything that feels old-timey to us 21st century people", they have to be defined by their own inner logic and not in opposition to our present time.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The Middle Ages aren't "everything that feels old-timey to us 21st century people", they have to be defined by their own inner logic and not in opposition to our present time.

The issue here is that Americans are sundered from the Middle Ages and what it wrought in ways that Europeans are not. It has no real existence in the American imagination other than 'the olden days when there were knights and castles'. As far as most Americans are concerned, Chaucer, Hildegard von Bingen and the Catalan Company are no more real than Robin Hood. Whereas I (for instance) am surrounded by the period's extremely visible legacy; by the ruins of castles and abbeys, by still-extant churches and cathedrals, by woods, boundary-ditches, hedges and fields that the people of the time knew as well as I do, and even by the continuing impact of administrative boundaries first idly sketched out during the period. And one way or another, this is true of everyone else in this continent. The period is part of our living past; it almost feels as if one can reach out and touch it, and in a way, of course, one can. The result is a fundamental divergence in perspective, amongst other things. There is a reason why academic Mediaevalism in North America is such a poisonous pit of stupidity.

Yeah, that might be the one thing about Americans I've had the most trouble relating to. I've been keenly aware of being part of a multi-millenary history since third grade (Our Ancestors the Gauls etc. - though of course I never bought that part for obvious reasons), and that has always been a source of wonder for me, even when modern history became my main interest. It's hard for me to put myself in the shoes of someone from a "young" country whose history is four centuries old at most (of course, the lands they occupy had a much older history, but that history was deliberately destroyed, so those few centuries are all that remains).

Now, stopping at 1945 as Nathan points out is an entirely self-imposed problem, and one that's becoming more and more dangerous as time goes on. I can see an argument for not teaching the last few decades, since it's genuinely hard to put much historical analysis on them, but you people are soon going to miss a full century.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I've been thinking about this thread for a while, and I think it's hard to come up with a better answer than 1492. The fall of the Roman Empire was important, but there's nothing more era-ending than adding two new continents to the equation (of what Europeans knew about).

Fair point, actually.  However, I think "Middle Ages" is used in such a Euro-centric way that the fall of the Byzantine Empire (an empire that based its entire existence and purpose on God's will and Orthodox Christianity, perfectly encapsulating the "Middle Ages" to me) is a pretty monumental shift ... even if it was a client state when it finally fell.

Yeah, the thing with the Middle Ages is that it really doesn't make any sense except as a periodization of European history specifically. The modern era is clearly a world-historical reality, and 1492 obviously marks its beginning. The Middle Ages, however, weren't really a Thing in the Islamic World, or East Asia (we do use the word sometimes, like with the Japanese Middle Ages, but those were fundamentally different periods and not really connected in any meaningful way, and we'd be better off using a different one).