How early could the 'Middle Ages' have started?

By this I mean the decline and fall of the Roman empire and the development of tribal and later feudal warlords in its place. Does such a structure depend on Christianity? Could the fall of the empire in, for instance, 100 AD have resulted in a similar world history, only three hundred years 'early'?
 
Well, what do you mean by fall? Because in 476 and later, most of the barbarian warlords, Odoacer included, largely viewed themselves as viceroys for the Roman Emperor, first Nepos then Zeno and the other Emperors at Constantinople. I would argue the fall didn't happen until Justinian's campaigns devastated most of the infrastructure of Italy. In such a case you'd need an earlier Emperor not willing to have the Germanic military officers rule the West on his behalf.
 

PhilippeO

Banned
Middle Ages is probably special phenomena because influence of Church and Christianity keep United culture. Otherwise tribal organizations might be a lot stronger. 100ad collapse could mean Germans, Celts, Magyar, and other barbarians failed to embrace Roman heritage. Tribalism could be more influential.

No one know, really. Roman culture might be as strong as Han Chinese, and absorb barbarian or it might failed and cultural unity collapse and Roman Empire forgotten and become legend.

And Feudal is difficult matter. There is argument that without Church consanguinity and monogamy law, Feudalism would not exist. Homage and vassal age born as result of lack of tribal family ties. on the other hand, Japanese sengoku jidai look similar enough to feudalism without Christianity.
 

tenthring

Banned
How are you defining the Middle Ages? The High Middle Ages, the middle of the three typical classifications, was an era of advancement and accomplishment to be proud of.

Do you mean the early middle ages or "dark ages"?
 
To answer this question, you need to define, what ancient times means and what middle ages means.

The so called Transformation Theory (one of the Big Three theories) claimed, that Rome never fell. Empires usually don't fall, they just transform. Pirenne, one historian of this school, defined the ancient times as a culture based on the mediterrenean sea as the central hub for trade, communication, cultural exchange and everything. So the ancient times ended, when the mediterrenean sea lost its role as the central hub of ancient times.

This happened, when the Arabs conquested the southern shores of the mediterrenean sea with Syria, Egypt and Africa (latest done 711). From now on, the mediterreenan sea was more of a dividing border than a connecting hub. And so the ancient times ended, and the early mid ages (aka dark ages) began. Now also ancient roman empire ended, and transformed into the medieval roman empire in the east and the loosely coupled chatolic western europe under the lead of the pope.

So if you like to start the medieval ages earlier, you have to destroy this hub earlier. A succesful persian invasion of Syria, Africa and Egypt during the 3d century crisis might do the trick. But I doubt this would damage the hub as it did with the arabs. The hostility and cultural difference is not that strong. So you might need christianity and islam in order to succesfully destroy the hub.
 
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To answer this question, you need to define, what ancient times means and what middle ages means.

The so called Transformation Theory (one of the Big Three theories) claimed, that Rome never fell. Empires usually don't fall, they just transform. Pirenne, one historian of this school, defined the ancient times as a culture based on the mediterrenean sea as the central hub for trade, communication, cultural exchange and everything. So the ancient times ended, when the mediterrenean sea lost its role as the central hub of ancient times.

This happened, when the Arabs conquested the southern shores of the mediterrenean sea with Syria, Egypt and Africa (latest done 711). From now on, the mediterreenan sea was more of a dividing border than a connecting hub. And so the ancient times ended, and the early mid ages (aka dark ages) began. Now also ancient roman empire ended, and transformed into the medieval roman empire in the east and the loosely coupled chatolic western europe under the lead of the pope.

So if you like to start the medieval ages earlier, you have to destroy this hub earlier. A succesful persian invasion of Syria, Africa and Egypt during the 3d century crisis might do the trick. But I doubt this would damage the hub as it did with the arabs. The hostility and cultural difference is not that strong. So you might need christianity and islam in order to succesfully destroy the hub.
In terms of the Transformation Theory, the version I have heard most puts the dividing line between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages proper as the end of Justinian's Italian Campaign.
 
Pirenne was just one of many members of this school. And there are many more historians of other schools.

The question is, why should the end of the italian wars be the end of ancient times. How was the world before this war less ancient than afterwards? Was'nt Italy more ancient again and less gothic after the war? Which leads again to the question what "ancient" really means.
 
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To answer this question, you need to define, what ancient times means and what middle ages means.

The so called Transformation Theory (one of the Big Three theories) claimed, that Rome never fell. Empires usually don't fall, they just transform. Pirenne, one historian of this school, defined the ancient times as a culture based on the mediterrenean sea as the central hub for trade, communication, cultural exchange and everything. So the ancient times ended, when the mediterrenean sea lost its role as the central hub of ancient times.

This happened, when the Arabs conquested the southern shores of the mediterrenean sea with Syria, Egypt and Africa (latest done 711). From now on, the mediterreenan sea was more of a dividing border than a connecting hub. And so the ancient times ended, and the early mid ages (aka dark ages) began. Now also ancient roman empire ended, and transformed into the medieval roman empire in the east and the loosely coupled chatolic western europe under the lead of the pope.

So if you like to start the medieval ages earlier, you have to destroy this hub earlier. A succesful persian invasion of Syria, Africa and Egypt during the 3d century crisis might do the trick. But I doubt this would damage the hub as it did with the arabs. The hostility and cultural difference is not that strong. So you might need christianity and islam in order to succesfully destroy the hub.

This is exactly my view on the matter.
 

tenthring

Banned
To answer this question, you need to define, what ancient times means and what middle ages means.

The so called Transformation Theory (one of the Big Three theories) claimed, that Rome never fell. Empires usually don't fall, they just transform. Pirenne, one historian of this school, defined the ancient times as a culture based on the mediterrenean sea as the central hub for trade, communication, cultural exchange and everything. So the ancient times ended, when the mediterrenean sea lost its role as the central hub of ancient times.

This happened, when the Arabs conquested the southern shores of the mediterrenean sea with Syria, Egypt and Africa (latest done 711). From now on, the mediterreenan sea was more of a dividing border than a connecting hub. And so the ancient times ended, and the early mid ages (aka dark ages) began. Now also ancient roman empire ended, and transformed into the medieval roman empire in the east and the loosely coupled chatolic western europe under the lead of the pope.

So if you like to start the medieval ages earlier, you have to destroy this hub earlier. A succesful persian invasion of Syria, Africa and Egypt during the 3d century crisis might do the trick. But I doubt this would damage the hub as it did with the arabs. The hostility and cultural difference is not that strong. So you might need christianity and islam in order to succesfully destroy the hub.

The focus on the Mediterranean is good, though I've never been a fan of the transformation school. It just so damn obvious there was massive decline in the west.
 
The focus on the Mediterranean is good, though I've never been a fan of the transformation school. It just so damn obvious there was massive decline in the west.

Just because it transformed, does not mean that it did not decline. I have never seen someone claim that the the West did not decline.
 
The focus on the Mediterranean is good, though I've never been a fan of the transformation school. It just so damn obvious there was massive decline in the west.
Declining and transformation aren't mutually exclusive.

The arbitrary lines we put on "the fall of the Roman Empire" are just that - arbitrary lines drawn through centuries of hindsight. Odoacer styled himself as a patrician and claimed sanction from the emperor, and even his successors at least made noises about bending the knee to Constantinople until Justinian rolled up with the big stick. The Roman people didn't just disappear.
 
There's some bleed-over from Late Antiquity to Early Middle Ages. Now to me, the Middle Ages began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire, but it could start earlier, maybe around the time of the Migration Period to the Hun Horde invasion. Many Romans also blamed the Sack of Rome on adopting Christianity as it's official religion, so maybe a storyline where the Roman Empire actually fragmented because of that. It's still not going to be a step backward in progress for an earlier Middle Age, because most of us agree that there was several advancements and improvements during that long time period. It's also nowhere near a decline in trade or commerce either, look at Marco Polo, the Vikings and others for that. But yeah, the Middle Ages could easily have started around the time of the Migration Period.
 
Declining and transformation aren't mutually exclusive.

You could even add the third theory:

The roman empire declined due to sometimes longterm detrimental processes and structures (structural theory),
so when a chain of unlucky events happened, the WRE was not able to recover (shock theory), or break the chain by repulsing the invaders earlier,
and it finally transformed to something we call the medieval world with a smaller roman empire in Constantinople and the catholic world led by the pope. (transformation theory).

So all 3 theories are right. Actually I am convinced every historian agrees to that. The difference is just, how strong they weight decline, shock and transformation.

But imho, the Fall of Rome does not mean the end of ancient times. Imagine Aurelianus is not able to reunite the empire in the 3rd century. It even splits further into more than 3 parts. Let's say 5-8 parts. Some parts are even ruled by germans or persians. Does that mean, that ancient times end now? Of course not. We had ancient times and culture before the Rise of Rome, so we can have it after the Fall of Rome, too. The unification of the ancient world by the romans, was not the beginning of ancient times. So it is no prerequisite either.

You need more to offically pronounce the ancient times dead. So we cannot answer the question about the end of ancient times by just discussing about the Fall of the WRE again.

PS: Perhaps the ancient times ended around 476. But definately not, because Rome fell. We need much better arguments than this one.
 
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Just because it transformed, does not mean that it did not decline. I have never seen someone claim that the the West did not decline.

Not explicitly, but given that transformation theorists tend to stress the ways in which things remained the same after the fall of the West, I can see how someone might get the impression that they think that Western Europe post-Rome didn't actually decline, even if that's not what they actually think.
 

tenthring

Banned
Not explicitly, but given that transformation theorists tend to stress the ways in which things remained the same after the fall of the West, I can see how someone might get the impression that they think that Western Europe post-Rome didn't actually decline, even if that's not what they actually think.

Yeah, one often gets this wishy washy feel from them. Like we don't want to be racist against the Goths or something.

I think the High Middle Ages were pretty advanced, but what came before was pretty bad. You've got whole barbarian kingdoms where the entire leadership can't read or write. Massive depopulation. Complete breakdown in trade. Some of these writers make it sound like the entire great migration was some sort of multi-cultural kumbuya where they repurposed the aqueducts to make folk pottery.
 
I think the High Middle Ages were pretty advanced, but what came before was pretty bad.

Just on the european / christian side of the mediterrenean sea. There were no dark ages in the former african and asian provinces of the roman empire.
 
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Is Asia Minor counted here, or are you just referring to the parts ruled by the Arabs?
Afaik, the grade of civilization in the medieval roman empire was higher than in the rest of the christian world. At least during the centuries, which are called the dark ages.

But honestly, I was never that much interested in the roman empire after the Battle of Yarmouk.
 
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