Were the Dark Ages Really That Dark?
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- Опубликовано: 13 июн 2024
- Every amateur historian knows the term "Dark Ages." It conjures up images of political upheaval, filthy living conditions, and widespread ignorance. But were the Dark Ages really dark? Not so much. Throughout the Mediterranean, into Europe and the British Isles, and from the expanse of the Byzantine Empire, the period from roughly 300 CE to about 1500 CE brought plenty of beauty and wisdom to the world.
To read more about how the Dark Ages MAY not have been as dark as we think, go here:
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#darkages #europe #weirdhistory 
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About the door opening: you're actually only partially correct. I mean, you show exactly why it's NOT always about heating because windows right next to it (single glazed medieval windows!) were much taller than the doors!
One of the big reasons for smaller door openings is simply a way of crowd control in the event of a castle siege or riots. It would slow down invaders and force them to bend their heads when going through doorways making it a lot easier to defend room by room.
Great way to start a stampede
Fun fact: the Ye in Ye olde is actually The. The Y represents a no longer used letter called a thorn which made one of two TH sounds.
That's not a fun fact at all! I really like saying that word...
This is obvious
Um there is more than one sound TH makes ? Thhhhh
Þe we need to bring it back into normal writing
Wasn’t it “dark” because everyone was illiterate and there were no books and nobody recorded anything much other than religious clerics.
yes.
Correct
Only in Europe the Middle East had many books and many people were able to read and China had books and most people could read
And because people did not appreciate roman and greek cultures enough, that is literally why renaissance artists thought these ages were dark.
Yes. But I think that constant invasions and suchlike added to the overall "atmosphere" of its naming.
I call middle school my 'Dork Ages'.
😂 i think you should have told your marriage time is ...
😂😂😂😂😂
Were they really that dark? It depends who you were. The peasants had it hard, the nobility had it easy. Some were born to sweet delight, some were born to endless night, as Blake said.
They were called the dark ages only in the modern era. And that was not so much due to there being more hardship but due to the fact that this time period was the aftermath of the fall of Europe's great civilisations, and it went into a period of social and cultural stagnation and adjustment. Some places even going backwards once Rome finally fizzled out and was diluted by peoples with less advanced civilisations.
But life still went on. People still created beautiful things and art. Just not in as organised an effort as was the case in Rome, for example. It was a time of consolidation and redistribution of power, wealth and land. Tumultuous times, but not necessarily dark. There had been much darker times in the past and there were also darker times to come in the future. It just depends who you were and where you lived.
It depends on the location when it comes to how dark the "dark ages" were.
And nobody expected the inquisition! 😮
Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise....
Your voice is perfect for this channel. Please never leave me? lol
Relax
@@Dave-bj3pq don’t do it
People took baths but the streets were dirtier.
As for ethnic perception, it depends on the region. England and the North was probably mostly or all white. The Mediterranean...not do much
There are misleading inaccuracies. The non White in Medieval Europe, outside of Southern Spain that was occupied by an Arab Army, black people were a small number, about 200 people in England during the middle ages or 1 in 20000 people. Height was shorter it was about 10cm-20cm shorter than today but it varied in good times the average height for a man was 1.70 cm born in good times and 1.60cm born in bad times of famine. People did live shorter lives lots of women died in childbirth, 1/3 of men would receive a violent death and whilst it's true that if a person lived to 18 would expect to live to their 50s or 60s its not like 75-80 like in Europe today. The crusades were religious in nature but also there were a lot of young men who were second born and not inheriting land and needed to fight for lands. The Popes thought if people were fighting Muslims it would spare Europe from an invasion and it worked. Once Constantinople fell in 1453, South west Europe was invaded and occupied for 450 years by Turkish forces.
I really hope you mean 1.70 m and 1.6 m. I don't think any medieval people were less than an inch tall
Did the term "Dark Ages" extend to other countries on the Globe back then? Because, whenever the "The Dark Ages" is mentioned, it's usually Eurpoe that's depicted. How did Asia, Africa, The America's etc. feared during "The Dark Ages"?
I don’t know. Probably better considering no one lumps them in with the Dark Ages. Also it is just taking about Europe anyways. That would explain why everyone talks about Europe. Isn’t that weird? That’s like complaining why no one talks about Portugal in WW1 when Portugal really wasn’t involved with it at all
Exactly the dark ages only applies to Europe, not much happened elsewhere
In other countries they just call it 'Middle Ages'. For example, in that time period the Americas had some civilizations that consolidated into kingdoms. Actually they didn't have kings, they were ruled by military and religious leaders, but for comparison with the same period in Europe some called it kingdoms. And then centuries later these civilizations merged into the Aztec and Inca Empires, until they were conquered by the Spanish.
Everyone else was fine😂
Nothing unique comes from Europe, all those other places are much bigger with denser populations and history going back millennia on millennia 😐
I feel like Simon Whistler should be quoted in this saying “the past was the worst…” somewhere
Eugh, Simon Whistler. Every time I seem to get rid of one of the channels he presents, more crop up.
@@faithrewarded7486 each to their own. I’ll also say that I liked a couple of his channels a bit more a few years ago, but I do still like his presentation on a lot of things. Although I am a believer and his stance with atheism seems to be more overwhelming each time he mentions it. Aside from that I do like his content.
and on top of that, the past really was the worst
The times are dark in area that is ruled by any religious fundamentalists.
The movie Idiocracy is a warning of the coming modern era dark ages.
that is where Crocs sandals were debuted. The maker thought they weren't going to sell
It’s more of a documentary now.
@@sam6235 Yes. I watched it recently for some laughs and it was actually depressing. I still remember seeing it in a theater opening weekend, and there were only 3 other people in the theater.
They are here!
@@brianharned9501 I tried watching, but I wanted to cry instead.
People were objectively shorter because of malnutrion, disease and other causes.
Peasants also bathed irregularly, especially during the winter months for obvious reasons. And they didn't have as many clothes as the top of the triangle to change frequently. So they stank and were dirty, especially during those months.
There were people, especially nobles, royals and church folk, who lived until their 80s or even 90s. But they were an exception. Many women (and their babies) died during child birth. Half of the children born safely were not expected to live past infancy and many adolescents and young adults died because of war and diseases.
Of course that Europe had other races besides caucasian. But it is a fact that is was more likely to found them south... I seriously doubt it that England had many people from Middle East, Asia or Africa (even because of the commerce, which was a way of contact with other people from foreign lands).
Thanks for this! 🏹
01:20. Not only that. Noble women and abbesses had coats of arms and territorial rights. They were equal to feudal lords except in that they didn't combat, but were represented by a champion.
" Less Victoria Secret and More Victoria's Denial " 😹🙈😹😭😹
Very interesting subject thanks.
I would like to learn about the first red scare after WW1, I feel like it doesn’t get the justice it deserves. Reportedly it was way worse than the second under Joseph McCarthy.
It's always a good day whenever Weird History uploads
Only the time period between the fall of rome in 476 to about 1100 is considered as the "dark ages" according to most modern historians. However people like ptrarch, dante allegriari and others writing in the 1300s often used the term to refer to their own time period as well due to the nature of the time and the closer resemblance to the early ages. Niccolo machiaveli also used it to refer to the same time as i said at first.
5:11 it is absolutely true that many people in centuries past lived for decades beyond 30 yrs of age. I’ve been working on my family tree and am back to the early 1200s and both sides have a VAST number of people that lived into their 80s and even 90s.
I watched a video made by historia civilis showed that medieval workers had a far better work life balance than we do today.
These videos are amazing! Please do a video about 'The Terror' in revolutionary France.
Fun fact: The European intellectual elite in the medieval era were well aware that the Earth was spherical. There were even books that explained why the Earth was spherical and not flat, so any literate European living during the era would have known. Even Dante Alighieri's classic 'The Divine Comedy' even briefly explore the affects of gravity at the center of the Earth as Dante travelled through Hell in a spherical Earth.
Bring back timeline that is what i would like to hear about
No, Europe was not 'diverse' and filled with Africans and Middle Easterners in the Dark Ages/Middle Ages/Medieval age. Even into the Renaissance non-White people were still a rarity. These unnamed sources and studies are likely biased and engaging in rewriting history. Europe was overwhelmingly Caucasian/White. You would maybe find foreign people in ports, mostly in the Mediterranean and major cities for the purposes of trade, but for the most part a majority of people could not travel because it was prohibitively expensive, potentially dangerous, and most people simply had no reason to. Europe was 99.9% White until after WW2.
Do you have any source for this?
Moreover, the entire Eastern Europe was a diverse region since many tribes from Central Asia had invaded that region. The ancestors of Hungarians as well as the Bulgarians were actually from Asia who intermixed with the locals (most probably Slavs) and decided to stay there.
7:20 It was not. In fact it was way less diverse than people think nowadays, stop listening to modern scientists and historians, the ones Netflix listened to to make Anne Boleyn and Cleopatra movies (which Disney was sued by Egypt for the latter)
"Charlie Murphayyyy!"
The Roman Empire could be brutal, but there was at least a semblance of rights, secular government, and the rule of law. All of those things vanished in the dark ages.
*Not the whole Middle Ages.* Only the Early Middle Ages have been called that, because after the fall of the Roman Empire few records were kept and that makes the work of historians way harder. It is "dark" because it is "unknown," same as "dark matter" is called that way not because it is literally or figuratively "dark," but because it is not known.
Check the Wikipedia article 'Dark Ages (historiography),' and/or *ask a historian.*
You can also watch the StarTalk episode in which Neil DeGrasse Tyson talks about scientific developments during the Middle Ages.
It wasn't that Rome fell, everybody forgot about everything they knew, and out of nowhere rediscovered everything in the Renaissance. Knowledge had been preserved in *monastic libraries.*
Early 50 years of 1900 is darker on a certain point of view
@@MorganBrunson The second didn't see a major global war though and at least a part of the world saw a rise of living conditions and widespread welfare
-"And those 'Old Spice' ads wouldn't start airing for a few hundred years."
So, what "Weird History" is saying is that the world is far darker and horrific now than it was then.
I've always just thought that there was problem with candle and/or match production
Can you do videos on the ice ages?
Interesting stuff
A woman who can brew me beer, i couldn’t get to the jewelry shop fast enough.
My dad and I made batches when I was growing up. It was a lot of fun. Great family activity. 🍻
The “castle” you showed at 2:11 is the Citadelle Laferiere in Haiti 🇭🇹
What is the name of the platform that does historical recipes?
If they had a better publicist, they could have come up with a better name.... 😁
I was in the Canary Islands and their old buildings had huge doors! Wide and tall! But it doesn't get all that cold there.
I was watching some videos about world war II aircraft dog fights. You should do a video about the farmers and civilians that were on the ground while bullets were being sprayed everywhere.
So glad we live in this time.😊
Anyone else have to rewind and rewatch the part where (3:01 or so) the woman was walking on the high ledge? I’m sure she wasn’t in danger and it was just made to look that way but I was holding my breath lol 😮
Same! Like please don’t fall down😭
I had thought they never were clean
I don't care how much heat it saves, I'm not making my door 1 foot shorter for me to bang into every time I walk through it. Probably doesn't save that much heat anyway
The Catholic Church sponsored quite a few scientific experiments 😐
What kind of scientific experiments did the Church sponsor?
And founded several colleges.
No electricity and candles only burned with 1 lumen. Duh! 🥴
“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.” - Maya Angelou
You’ve made this video like 5 times, I’ve been watching since before Covid and I’ve definitely seen this topic more than once
Would I survive? Absolutely not! I would have not passed the duck test. 😂
If they had to boil their water, it was just the same to make beer out of it.
Navigating the landscape of storytelling and video experimentation, VideoGPT silently empowers my creative journey, adding a layer of sophistication to my content.
Rod Bennet has put together a really good history collection of what was going on during this time. It is religion related but still historical facts nonetheless. The book is called “The Apostasy that wasn’t” - Rod Bennet.
04:32. Some of that survived, mixed with the religious art. You just take a look at the manuscripts, paintings and sculptures, and you'll see plenty of representation of daily life, often with a whimsical sense of humor.
If you go to a medieval church, look whether the seats the monks used (the choir) can be lifted. If so, it's likely there are a "misericord" there, a bump on which the monk could support himself. Given their use and location (lol) sometimes they were carved with mythological or humorous designs.
Also, check the history and meaning of the Carmina Burana songs. They are *not* pious.
Just in western europe...
Ah….the past
10:00. Food was not *that* scarce, just less varied than it is nowadays. People didn't forget how to grow grain and veggies and fruits, and keep farm animals and hunt/fish when the Roman Empire fell. Recommendation: the channel Tasting History recreates historical recipes; it has made a bunch of tasty ones from the Middle Ages. Enjoy!
(2:12) .. Is that real? Where is that?
For being a history channel you not knowing what the crusades were about is sad.
Be very careful trusting this video, well it fun & RUclips. Do ur own research many things wrong.
Scientists are now saying that Europe was diverse in the Dark Ages… What are they studying, Netflix documentaries? Scientists say a lot of stuff now to be politically correct or to keep their jobs.
IF it's possible I'd like a video about what was going on during Rome and Greece from between the fall of the Roman Empire to just before 15 hundreds ( around the time America was discovered ) . Wanna see how the ancient civilisations that brought us Colosseum fights and philosophy progressed to what we have today .
♑️✍️🇳🇴🇦🇺
i like history channel.
A+ video!
LOVE IT! What it would be to live in that age!
The 'Dung Ages'
I really enjoy this narrator for the videos the other ones that narrate not so much... They just don't have the right voices in my opinion...
It was called the dark ages because there was a lack of written records, unlimited historical documentation during this time
Eating ANOTHER Weird History meal!
Eating CINNAMON TOAST CRUNCH*†...while watching this Weird History video!
* From the Weird History video "Why the 80s is the Golden Age of Cereal"
† Cinnamon Toast has been endorsed by Jason Derulo, a celebrity that was in the Nebraska News one night for giving a waiter a $5000 tip at an Omaha restaurant named Charleston's.
Pointless comment as always from this idiot
Europe was still overwhelmingly white as it is today it was very rare actually to see a sub Saharan African or Asian. Yes there’s different ethnicities like today but the overwhelming majority was white, it was very rare not to be.
Somebody said that the dark ages were not very dark, because they were illuminated by the fires of the inquisition.
No Roman Empire, Barbaric Gauls claiming to be Emperors, and you’re only allowed to practice one religion? If that ain’t a dark age I don’t know what is
People think science just stopped
Speaking of x files. Could do episodes of the real story on some episodes. Or so called real. Monster of the week episodes alot of times had some foot in history
One error to note here: the crusades happened after the dark ages, so the argument of "religious fervor" shouldn't be used as an example.
I knew times were dark…but not that dark…
0:01 Speaking of dark ages...it hardly gets any darker than the film Melancholia!
For Kirsten Dunst's birthday on April 30th I am going to watch her films The Power of the Dog and Meloncholia (both on Netflix).
April 30th is also the birthday of both directors of the films (Lars Van Trier and Jane Campion).
Make chastity belts great again
If you're at least halfway well versed in medieval historie or anthropology;the "dark ages is a controversial/outdated term if you listen to what most alot of historians would say. Sounds pretty pro roman empire bias if anything.
I just can’t get over that there was a medieval time lol 😂 just like Wild West
❤
I thought they were 'dark' because of a (relative) lack of documentation
Am I the the only one that feels they have transitioned to AI for the visuals ?
A quick jaunt down the reddit aisle tells me chastity belts were probably useful with how these women behave.
I don't know why people keep harping about the crusades...we still fight over religion, besides I like hearing about the crusades. Richard the Lionheart and all that jazz are really my cup of tea. Wars were pretty common in those days. King's didn't need anyone's permission or vote lol
Wouldn’t prehistory be the only dark age? Thousands upon thousands of years where humans were developing and expanding across the globe with no major writing or other forms of records/evidence?
The nonsense about a diverse dark ages Europe is exactly that and throws all your credit right out the window.
Depends on who u ask
For the Muslims? No
The west? Yes
Ah, yes. Instead of being nomadic camel herders with no technolgy, they were ...nomadic camel herders?
@@PDZ1122the crusade saved a lot of poor goats.
@@PDZ1122 Nope, they had hygeine and were discovering things while the westerners were legit eating they xcreeta lmao
@@hamofbuddha Yeah the crusaders did take out some Christians and jews
Welp. Don't we have religious extremism today?
It's called the dark ages because people didnt write history for that era.
So its dark. As in not much known.
The chastity belt was also used to protect women from being raped. It was not something women would ware all the time. But that was one of the main uses of it. I also imagine that women would use them because they just like them. Not terribly long ago, a British man in South Africa bought a diamond encrusted chastity belt for his wife as a gift. If people are getting chastity belts now because they like the aesthetics, it wouldn’t be a stretch that people did the same in the Dark Ages
It’s called the middle ages
Daily showering is a very modern thing, like post WW2. If you don't count roman bathhouses, but historically everyone kind of always smelled funny, you giant modern babies, I've seen roommates have a full on crisis because the shower was broken, like the next step must be scurvy.
Second.
✨️😱😱😱✨️😢
Nope
Too much stock footage .. really boring. More actual historic imagery please.
So something that was supposed to "enlighten" actually caused it to be dark? Hum, who would have thought religion would cause slower progress. Kind of like today?
The safe societal foundation which you preach from is based on religion 😊
Finally someone said it
I'm not sure which country they're from, but the US is based on the constitution which gives freedom of religion, not based on christianity. The first of the 10 commandments say to not worship other gods before the god of Moses, but the 1st Amendment gives freedom of religion as well as freedom of speech (so no religious blasphemy laws).
@@lovestarlightgiver2402excellent wording. But the bulk of our government can be attributed to judeo-christrian philosophy. With the better portion of the Christian idea of free will serving as the bread holding the sammich together.
@@MorganBrunson The idea of a constitutional democracy doesn't sound judeo-christian to me. It sound Greco-Roman. Jews and Christians believed in kings who were supposedly of the god of Moses like King David or like the Christian kings of Europe. Remember, the founding fathers of the US were rebelling against a Christian empire (The British Empire), and wanted the Congress to pass no law respecting an establishment of a religion.
It was the dark age cause no one but the church could read the Bible 😊
The Bible was the cause of many dark ages and events but you were so close.