High Middle Ages

High Middle Ages
Europe and Mediterranean region

Large map
Europe and the Mediterranean region, c. 1190

British Isles   Gaelic Kingdoms   Principality of Wales   Kingdom of England   Kingdom of Scotland   Earldom of Orkney (Norway)   Kingdom of Mann and the Isles (Norway) Northern Europe   Kingdom of Norway (872–1397)   Kingdom of Sweden   Kingdom of Denmark   Terra Mariana   Grand Duchy of Lithuania Eastern Europe   Principalities of Polotsk   Territory of Novgorod   Kama-Bulgarians   Kievan Rus'   Viatka   Cumans/Cumania or Polovtsians Iberian Peninsula   Kingdom of Portugal   Kingdom of León   Kingdom of Castile   Kingdom of Navarre   Crown of Aragon Central Europe   Kingdom of Bohemia   Kingdom of France   Kingdom of Germany   Kingdom of Hungary   Holy Roman Empire   Kingdom of Poland   Prussia

Italian Peninsula   Kingdom of Italy   Corsica   Sardinia   Kingdom of Sicily   Republic of Venice Southeast Europe   Kingdom of Croatia   Kingdom of Serbia   Second Bulgarian Empire   Byzantine Empire Caucasia   Khazar Empire   Alania   Kassogs   Kingdom of Georgia   Atabegs of Azerbaijan Near East   Kingdom of Armenian   Seljuks of Rum   Kingdom of Cyprus   Dominion of Shaharmen   Kurdistan   Ayyubid dynasty   Principality of Antioch   County of Tripoli North Africa   Almohad Caliphate

The Crusades

•   (Solid Line) Second Crusade of Louis VII and Conrad III
•   (Line and dot) Third Crusade of Richard I, Philip II, and Fredrick I

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Small map

Central Europe
Guelf, Hohenstaufen, and Ascanian domains in Germany about 1176

Duchy of Saxony    Margravate of Brandenburg    Duchy of Franconia

Duchy of Swabia    Duchy of Bavaria

The High Middle Ages, or high medieval period, was the period of European history that lasted from AD 1000 to 1300. The High Middle Ages were preceded by the Early Middle Ages and were followed by the Late Middle Ages, which ended around AD 1500 (by historiographical convention).^[1]

Key historical trends of the High Middle Ages include the rapidly increasing population of Europe, which brought about great social and political change from the preceding era, and the Renaissance of the 12th century, including the first developments of rural exodus and urbanization. By 1350, the robust population increase had greatly benefited the European economy, which reached levels that would not be seen again in some areas until the 19th century. That trend faltered during the Late Middle Ages because of a series of calamities, most notably the Black Death, but also numerous wars as well as economic stagnation.

From around 780, Europe saw the last of the barbarian invasions^[2] and became more socially and politically organized.^[3] The Carolingian Renaissance stimulated scientific and philosophical activity in Northern Europe. The first universities started operating in Bologna, Oxford, Paris, Salamanca, Cambridge and Modena. The Vikings settled in the British Isles, France and elsewhere, and Norse Christian kingdoms started developing in their Scandinavian homelands. The Magyars ceased their expansion in the 10th century, and by the year 1000, a Christian Kingdom of Hungary had become a recognized state in Central Europe that was forming alliances with regional powers. With the brief exception of the Mongol invasions in the 13th century, major nomadic incursions ceased. The powerful Byzantine Empire of the Macedonian and Komnenos dynasties gradually gave way to the resurrected Serbia and Bulgaria and to a successor crusader state (1204 to 1261), who continually fought each other until the end of the Latin Empire. The Byzantine Empire was reestablished in 1261 with the recapture of Constantinople from the Latins, though it was no longer a major power and would continue to falter through the 14th century, with remnants lasting until the mid 15th century.

In the 11th century, populations north of the Alps began a more intensive settlement, targeting "new" lands, some areas of which had reverted to wilderness after the end of the Western Roman Empire. In what historian Charles Higounet called the "great clearances",^[4] Europeans cleared and cultivated some of the vast forests and marshes that lay across much of the continent. At the same time, settlers moved beyond the traditional boundaries of the Frankish Empire to new frontiers beyond the Elbe River, which tripled the size of Germany in the process. The Catholic Church, which reached the peak of its political power around then, called armies from across Europe to a series of Crusades against the Seljuk Turks. The crusaders occupied the Holy Land and founded the Crusader States in the Levant. Other wars led to the Northern Crusades. The Christian kingdoms took much of the Iberian Peninsula from Muslim control, and the Normans conquered southern Italy, all part of the major population increases and the resettlement patterns of the era.

The High Middle Ages produced many different forms of intellectual, spiritual and artistic works. The age also saw the rise of ethnocentrism,^{[dubious – discuss]} which evolved later into modern national identities in most of Europe, the ascent of the great Italian city-states and the rise^{[citation needed]} and fall of the Islamic civilization of Al-Andalus. The rediscovery of the works of Aristotle, at first indirectly through medieval Jewish and Islamic philosophy,^[5][6][7] led Maimonides, Ibn Sina, Ibn Rushd, Thomas Aquinas and other thinkers of the period to expand Scholasticism, a combination of Judeo-Islamic and Catholic ideologies with the ancient philosophy. For much of this period, Constantinople remained Europe's most populous city, and Byzantine art reached a peak in the 12th century. In architecture, many of the most notable Gothic cathedrals were built or completed around this period.

The Crisis of the Late Middle Ages began at the start of the 14th century and marked the end of the period.