2: Europe in 1500
Political structures.
The predominant form of government in Europa was monarchy. There were monarchies who
were hereditary dynasties and (like the Holy Roman Empire and the Papacy) those who were
elective. Even city states in Italy were often ruled by one man. Not all monarchies had grew
more powerful, the Holy Roman Emperor was less formidable than his predecessors in the
12th century. The papacy had also lost power in the 14th and 15th centuries, forced to make
compromises with lay rulers. The largest country in Europe was Poland-Lithuania. The rulers
dominions were extensive but their authority weak and the monarchy elective. Poland had a
strong representative assembly. France and Spain were the principal secular powers in
Western Europe.
Society and economy.
The nobility, ruler and church possessed the most land. The nobility and what they did varied
greatly per country. The Italian nobles were involved in commerce while the French were not.
The English paid taxes, the French did not. Almost everywhere were nobles considered to be
the natural advisors to rulers. They played crucial roles in central and local government. New
economic instruments and institutions were developed in towns and cities, and created an
early form of commercial capitalism. Merchants came to enjoy a far higher social standing
than in the antiquity and they began to play a leading role in the government of many cities.
You had the bourgeois, who were the upper class of the towns (old families). Under them you
had the artisans, organised into guilds. Below them the industrial workers. The commercial
revolution had made the manorial system largely disappear from Western-Europe. This was
replaced by rents, share-cropping or wage labour. In Eastern-Europe towns were far less
important and the power of the landed nobility generally greater, serfdom and labour services
throve.
Cultural horizons.
Most Europeans looked for moral direction, hope and consolation to the church. It gave
meaning to their lives, tis use of visual aids and symbols conveyed to the illiterate majority.
The doctrine of purgatory gave the living an effective means to help their dear departed.
Rulers and subjects.
The revival of a money economy had major implications for government and power relations.
Rewards took the form of wages, not land, so they cut off if the recipient proved disloyal.
Warfare changed. First mercenaries and then later rulers started to deploy standing armies.
The pay of soldiers had to come out of taxation. The process of winning agreement to taxation
often involved consulting a representative assembly. In the second half of the 15th century in
England and Germany the balance of power between kings and representative assemblies
began tilting more towards the kings. Administration became increasingly profession, largely
thanks to the growth of universities. Kings did not only rely on force to secure obedience,
they also used the resources of patronage. This was one reason why the courts played such a
crucial role in government. Governance was reactive.
,3: Environments
The Little Ice Age
From around 1300 till 1800 the world was slightly cooler than today. But Europe also
experienced some of its hottest moments. Climate extremes included winter droughts that
caused famines and excessive cold and rain. Low temperatures and shorter growing seasons
placed stress on food supply, bad weather was interpreted providentially and contributed to
political unrest, and centre-periphery relations became strained amidst a generally less
favourable climate.
Columbian Exchange.
European contact with the Americas initiated deep changes in both environments. This is the
‘Columbian exchange’ and ‘ecological imperialism’. The exchange is the exchange in plants,
animals, micro-organisms and diseases between Afro-Eurasia and the Americas. This was by
no means equal, wilful or consensual. Many indigenous populations suffered dramatic
collapses post-contact. Susceptibility to disease was increased by malnutrition and social
dislocation brought on by conflict with Europeans, as well as the ecological disruption caused
by European plants and animals. Key commodities extracted from the New World to Europe
included hard woods, precious metals, furs and plant species. The colonies Europeans
founded introduced new extractive and environmentally destructive forms of industry and
agriculture.
Energy.
Muscle, wood and flowing water were the primary sources of mechanical power in the period.
However in early modern times there was a transition form an ‘organic economy’ to an
‘advanced organic economy’. This new economy was characterized by the exploitation of the
photosynthesis of millennia of plants concentrated in coal. In England this happened first and
fastest. By 1600 Londoners consumed on average a ton of coal per person per year. Where
coal was not adopted early, energy crisis ensued. The use of coal was able to free up land for
purposes other than primary fuel production, woodlands could be converted for agriculture,
while cities could grow unrestricted by the supply of wood.
Landscapes, nature and culture.
Changes in landscape wrought by early modern Europeans represented a significant
intensification of prior practices as well as the development of new ones. Throughout Europe
wetlands were drained to increase the cultivable area for arable and pasture. Early forms of
conservation were also attempted. The ‘improvement’ of wetlands removed habitat for wading
birds and fish. Drainage projects were met with fierce resistance form locals who stood to lose
their land and livelihoods. We see both strong continuities as well as ruptures in how the
natural world is understood across the period. A new appreciation of empirical observation
and mechanical explanation could be pioneered by members of the clergy, while catastrophes
could provoke both pious exhortations to repent and questioning of the nature of God.
Landscape and livelihood were read through a moral lens which lent ecological regions
distinct and sometimes caricatured identities. Polders came to stand for hard work and goldy
labour.
,4: Gender and Family
Gender.
It was an axiom in Europe that the two sexes possessed very different characteristics, and that
the male was superior. The Christian religion was essentially male-oriented. The Protestant
Reformation further strengthened the religion’s male character by rejecting the cult of saints
and of the Virgin Mary. This was supported by medical science stretching back to the Greeks.
For centuries physicians explained that the balance found in women made them intellectually,
morally and physically weaker. Physical strength remained an essential requirement in many
occupations, which gave men an obvious advantage. Though manual work made women
strong, this was offset by repeated pregnancies and the care of children. Gender-based
assumptions had led in many areas to the exclusion of women form education, many trades
and professions. So women inevitably appeared incapable of taking on male roles. People
naturally absorbed the ideas and values of the society in which they had grown up. The
society can be described as patriarchal, with male authority underpinned within the family and
in society at large by a web of laws, regulations and custom. There where however regional
variations. Roman law, religion and custom combined to limit women’s freedom and rights far
more severely in Southern Europe than in the north.
Gender and Education.
Informal dame of charity schools taught reading, writing (only boys) and basic religious
principles, beyond that girls were steered towards practical skills like sewing and embroidery,
with formal schooling kept primarily for boys. Girls boarding schools began to spread from
the mid-17th century, though their syllabus was geared more to music and dancing than to
academic study. Everywhere literacy rates remained lower for women than for men. For
women, chastity and fidelity were everywhere the prerequisites for a good name, so this is
what they were taught. For men, a good name rested on a wider range of attributes: courage,
the ability to maintain and govern a household and honesty in honouring promises and debts.
Work.
Boys were destined for a life working the land, they learned skills on the job. Many young
women also helped on the family farm or were hired as dairymaids. A farmers wife would
play an active role, taking responsibility for the poultry, pigs and vegetable garden. In towns,
men entered a crat or trade. In a family business women would often work alongside their
husbands, a widow too enjoyed the right to continue the business after the husband’s death.
But guild regulations were tightening to exclude women. They were seen as unwelcome
competition. Only in trades that men never colonised, lacemaking and millinery, they could
sometimes earn reasonable incomes. Far more often they entered domestic service of worked
in poorly paid activities like spinning, knitting, laundering, sewing or nursing.
The public sphere.
Almost everywhere women were excluded from the political world. There were some women
who inherited the throne but only if there was no other option. Ministers, officials and
diplomats were always male, so were urban magistrates. Aristocratic women were able to play
active roles in the bloodthirsty politics of late 16th century France. Women often occupied a
significant position at courts, wielding informal power through personal influence. Among the
, poor, women quite often became involved in popular politics, riots and demonstrations, where
gender could play to their advantage. They were less likely to face retribution They played an
important role in shaping local public opinion, through their ‘gossip networks’. In the judicial
system judges, lawyers and juries were male. The law regarded husband and wife as one
person, the men. This gave the men control over the money and goods of his wife.
The family.
By no means was everyone married, about 20% of women remained unmarried their whole
lives. In most of Northern Europe the nuclear family was the norm, generally comprising a
married couple and their children. Adults often played an important role in the lives of their
siblings, financially and emotionally. The eldest brother was considered to have a moral
obligation to assist his sisters and younger brothers. Sisters often provide practical support
and comfort. Grandparents also were significant. In the Mediterranean region it was common
to find larger and more complex families occupying one household. Extended or multiple
families contained more than two generations and siblings of the main householder. Farmers
might also have live-in farm servants, while many modest urban households contained at least
one maidservant, often one or two apprentices and perhaps an older journeymen (everywhere
in Europe). The house was also the workplace, domestic chores were time-consuming making
help essential and domestic labour was cheap. The marriage formation was usually arranged
by parents. A merchant would often wait years until his business was securely established and
then choose a much younger bride. There was far greater freedom of choice in the lower
levels of society where there was little property at stake. Even the poor however looked for
parental approval and support. The fact that husbands and wives had complementary roles
made them to some extent interdependent. Widowers often remarried quickly for practical
reasons, it was nearly impossible to support a family on their own.
Continuity and Change.
The Reformation was at best a mixed blessing for women. In theory, justification by faith
alone made men and women spiritual equals and removed priests as indispensable
intermediaries. It elevated the status of marriage. But it also stressed the father’s authority.
Divorce remained difficult to obtain. Protestantism removed women’s option of a religious
vocation and the possibility of achieving any position of authority. The Catholic Reformation
triggered a burst of female religious activity. Also guilds controls gradually weakened and
women played a prominent part in the proto-industrial cloth and silk industries. As
innovations in the textile industry occurred outside guilds, opportunities for women opened up
there as well as in the burgeoning retail sector. In the 18th century women were increasingly
seen as frail and in need of protection instead of threatening and to be controlled.
5: Rural Society
Landscapes and victuals.
Most Europeans lived in rural surroundings in settlements of less than 5000 inhabitants, this
remained true till the middle of the 18th century. Environmental conditions were highly varied.
Prominent European products included barley and wheat in the north, olives and grapes in the
Political structures.
The predominant form of government in Europa was monarchy. There were monarchies who
were hereditary dynasties and (like the Holy Roman Empire and the Papacy) those who were
elective. Even city states in Italy were often ruled by one man. Not all monarchies had grew
more powerful, the Holy Roman Emperor was less formidable than his predecessors in the
12th century. The papacy had also lost power in the 14th and 15th centuries, forced to make
compromises with lay rulers. The largest country in Europe was Poland-Lithuania. The rulers
dominions were extensive but their authority weak and the monarchy elective. Poland had a
strong representative assembly. France and Spain were the principal secular powers in
Western Europe.
Society and economy.
The nobility, ruler and church possessed the most land. The nobility and what they did varied
greatly per country. The Italian nobles were involved in commerce while the French were not.
The English paid taxes, the French did not. Almost everywhere were nobles considered to be
the natural advisors to rulers. They played crucial roles in central and local government. New
economic instruments and institutions were developed in towns and cities, and created an
early form of commercial capitalism. Merchants came to enjoy a far higher social standing
than in the antiquity and they began to play a leading role in the government of many cities.
You had the bourgeois, who were the upper class of the towns (old families). Under them you
had the artisans, organised into guilds. Below them the industrial workers. The commercial
revolution had made the manorial system largely disappear from Western-Europe. This was
replaced by rents, share-cropping or wage labour. In Eastern-Europe towns were far less
important and the power of the landed nobility generally greater, serfdom and labour services
throve.
Cultural horizons.
Most Europeans looked for moral direction, hope and consolation to the church. It gave
meaning to their lives, tis use of visual aids and symbols conveyed to the illiterate majority.
The doctrine of purgatory gave the living an effective means to help their dear departed.
Rulers and subjects.
The revival of a money economy had major implications for government and power relations.
Rewards took the form of wages, not land, so they cut off if the recipient proved disloyal.
Warfare changed. First mercenaries and then later rulers started to deploy standing armies.
The pay of soldiers had to come out of taxation. The process of winning agreement to taxation
often involved consulting a representative assembly. In the second half of the 15th century in
England and Germany the balance of power between kings and representative assemblies
began tilting more towards the kings. Administration became increasingly profession, largely
thanks to the growth of universities. Kings did not only rely on force to secure obedience,
they also used the resources of patronage. This was one reason why the courts played such a
crucial role in government. Governance was reactive.
,3: Environments
The Little Ice Age
From around 1300 till 1800 the world was slightly cooler than today. But Europe also
experienced some of its hottest moments. Climate extremes included winter droughts that
caused famines and excessive cold and rain. Low temperatures and shorter growing seasons
placed stress on food supply, bad weather was interpreted providentially and contributed to
political unrest, and centre-periphery relations became strained amidst a generally less
favourable climate.
Columbian Exchange.
European contact with the Americas initiated deep changes in both environments. This is the
‘Columbian exchange’ and ‘ecological imperialism’. The exchange is the exchange in plants,
animals, micro-organisms and diseases between Afro-Eurasia and the Americas. This was by
no means equal, wilful or consensual. Many indigenous populations suffered dramatic
collapses post-contact. Susceptibility to disease was increased by malnutrition and social
dislocation brought on by conflict with Europeans, as well as the ecological disruption caused
by European plants and animals. Key commodities extracted from the New World to Europe
included hard woods, precious metals, furs and plant species. The colonies Europeans
founded introduced new extractive and environmentally destructive forms of industry and
agriculture.
Energy.
Muscle, wood and flowing water were the primary sources of mechanical power in the period.
However in early modern times there was a transition form an ‘organic economy’ to an
‘advanced organic economy’. This new economy was characterized by the exploitation of the
photosynthesis of millennia of plants concentrated in coal. In England this happened first and
fastest. By 1600 Londoners consumed on average a ton of coal per person per year. Where
coal was not adopted early, energy crisis ensued. The use of coal was able to free up land for
purposes other than primary fuel production, woodlands could be converted for agriculture,
while cities could grow unrestricted by the supply of wood.
Landscapes, nature and culture.
Changes in landscape wrought by early modern Europeans represented a significant
intensification of prior practices as well as the development of new ones. Throughout Europe
wetlands were drained to increase the cultivable area for arable and pasture. Early forms of
conservation were also attempted. The ‘improvement’ of wetlands removed habitat for wading
birds and fish. Drainage projects were met with fierce resistance form locals who stood to lose
their land and livelihoods. We see both strong continuities as well as ruptures in how the
natural world is understood across the period. A new appreciation of empirical observation
and mechanical explanation could be pioneered by members of the clergy, while catastrophes
could provoke both pious exhortations to repent and questioning of the nature of God.
Landscape and livelihood were read through a moral lens which lent ecological regions
distinct and sometimes caricatured identities. Polders came to stand for hard work and goldy
labour.
,4: Gender and Family
Gender.
It was an axiom in Europe that the two sexes possessed very different characteristics, and that
the male was superior. The Christian religion was essentially male-oriented. The Protestant
Reformation further strengthened the religion’s male character by rejecting the cult of saints
and of the Virgin Mary. This was supported by medical science stretching back to the Greeks.
For centuries physicians explained that the balance found in women made them intellectually,
morally and physically weaker. Physical strength remained an essential requirement in many
occupations, which gave men an obvious advantage. Though manual work made women
strong, this was offset by repeated pregnancies and the care of children. Gender-based
assumptions had led in many areas to the exclusion of women form education, many trades
and professions. So women inevitably appeared incapable of taking on male roles. People
naturally absorbed the ideas and values of the society in which they had grown up. The
society can be described as patriarchal, with male authority underpinned within the family and
in society at large by a web of laws, regulations and custom. There where however regional
variations. Roman law, religion and custom combined to limit women’s freedom and rights far
more severely in Southern Europe than in the north.
Gender and Education.
Informal dame of charity schools taught reading, writing (only boys) and basic religious
principles, beyond that girls were steered towards practical skills like sewing and embroidery,
with formal schooling kept primarily for boys. Girls boarding schools began to spread from
the mid-17th century, though their syllabus was geared more to music and dancing than to
academic study. Everywhere literacy rates remained lower for women than for men. For
women, chastity and fidelity were everywhere the prerequisites for a good name, so this is
what they were taught. For men, a good name rested on a wider range of attributes: courage,
the ability to maintain and govern a household and honesty in honouring promises and debts.
Work.
Boys were destined for a life working the land, they learned skills on the job. Many young
women also helped on the family farm or were hired as dairymaids. A farmers wife would
play an active role, taking responsibility for the poultry, pigs and vegetable garden. In towns,
men entered a crat or trade. In a family business women would often work alongside their
husbands, a widow too enjoyed the right to continue the business after the husband’s death.
But guild regulations were tightening to exclude women. They were seen as unwelcome
competition. Only in trades that men never colonised, lacemaking and millinery, they could
sometimes earn reasonable incomes. Far more often they entered domestic service of worked
in poorly paid activities like spinning, knitting, laundering, sewing or nursing.
The public sphere.
Almost everywhere women were excluded from the political world. There were some women
who inherited the throne but only if there was no other option. Ministers, officials and
diplomats were always male, so were urban magistrates. Aristocratic women were able to play
active roles in the bloodthirsty politics of late 16th century France. Women often occupied a
significant position at courts, wielding informal power through personal influence. Among the
, poor, women quite often became involved in popular politics, riots and demonstrations, where
gender could play to their advantage. They were less likely to face retribution They played an
important role in shaping local public opinion, through their ‘gossip networks’. In the judicial
system judges, lawyers and juries were male. The law regarded husband and wife as one
person, the men. This gave the men control over the money and goods of his wife.
The family.
By no means was everyone married, about 20% of women remained unmarried their whole
lives. In most of Northern Europe the nuclear family was the norm, generally comprising a
married couple and their children. Adults often played an important role in the lives of their
siblings, financially and emotionally. The eldest brother was considered to have a moral
obligation to assist his sisters and younger brothers. Sisters often provide practical support
and comfort. Grandparents also were significant. In the Mediterranean region it was common
to find larger and more complex families occupying one household. Extended or multiple
families contained more than two generations and siblings of the main householder. Farmers
might also have live-in farm servants, while many modest urban households contained at least
one maidservant, often one or two apprentices and perhaps an older journeymen (everywhere
in Europe). The house was also the workplace, domestic chores were time-consuming making
help essential and domestic labour was cheap. The marriage formation was usually arranged
by parents. A merchant would often wait years until his business was securely established and
then choose a much younger bride. There was far greater freedom of choice in the lower
levels of society where there was little property at stake. Even the poor however looked for
parental approval and support. The fact that husbands and wives had complementary roles
made them to some extent interdependent. Widowers often remarried quickly for practical
reasons, it was nearly impossible to support a family on their own.
Continuity and Change.
The Reformation was at best a mixed blessing for women. In theory, justification by faith
alone made men and women spiritual equals and removed priests as indispensable
intermediaries. It elevated the status of marriage. But it also stressed the father’s authority.
Divorce remained difficult to obtain. Protestantism removed women’s option of a religious
vocation and the possibility of achieving any position of authority. The Catholic Reformation
triggered a burst of female religious activity. Also guilds controls gradually weakened and
women played a prominent part in the proto-industrial cloth and silk industries. As
innovations in the textile industry occurred outside guilds, opportunities for women opened up
there as well as in the burgeoning retail sector. In the 18th century women were increasingly
seen as frail and in need of protection instead of threatening and to be controlled.
5: Rural Society
Landscapes and victuals.
Most Europeans lived in rural surroundings in settlements of less than 5000 inhabitants, this
remained true till the middle of the 18th century. Environmental conditions were highly varied.
Prominent European products included barley and wheat in the north, olives and grapes in the
