Let me guess.., there's a conspiracy in place that denies the middle ages were intellectually dark in order to defend Christianity, right?

That wouldn't surprise me a bit, considering how Christians hampered intellectual thought for a millennia after the fall of the Roman empire. Christianity has a history of manipulating belief.

Yeah, historians are referring to the dark ages as the middle ages now because it's "trendy"




That's brilliant.



I think cosmologists are positing a multiverse now because it's trendy.

The Roman Empire could boast a huge diversity of religions; while the Dark Ages had One True Religion. It was a bitch if you were a Jew or Muslim or a non-believer.

The Roman's supporting a huge diversity of religions was conditional.
You left that out of the Roman tolerant spirit and what the implications were if certain conditions were NOT met.

Also, you forgot to mention that the Roman's were so tolerant of Christianity they allowed Christians to pick what particular lion would eat them during Saturday's entertainment festivities.
I suppose that was part of their boasting of religious tolerance as well.


Interbane,
You may thank me for this post.

In an interview, Bob Dylan referred to contemporary times as "the new dark ages". Maybe poets are constitutionally pessimistic or is it the way they see things?

Flann 5 wrote:In an interview, Bob Dylan referred to contemporary times as "the new dark ages". Maybe poets are constitutionally pessimistic or is it the way they see things?

Historical scholarship is based on what is the most fashionable thing to say these days.
Unless of course it aligns with your presuppositions. If it does, it's serious scholarship!

Flann 5 wrote:In an interview, Bob Dylan referred to contemporary times as "the new dark ages". Maybe poets are constitutionally pessimistic or is it the way they see things?

Most any age will be "dark" if you are taking the denizens of that age out of their historical context and comparing it to yours, hundreds or thousands of years removed.

What is the scholar's argument against using the term, Dark Ages, Ant? Can you actually articulate it or do you just like to condemn those who use the term as "uniformed or dishonest religious bigot imbeciles." Is that maybe a bit of an overreaction?

It's true the term has fallen out of favor and its usage has evolved over time. Many historians have used the term Dark Ages as a simple shorthand reference to the early Middle Ages. It's not always used as an attack on Christianity. Sometimes it merely refers to gaps in what we know about that time period. I can find the term "Dark Ages" in several history books on my shelves. Sometimes as merely a reference to the time period and others with a qualified explanation as to how the meaning has changed over time.

For example, Barbara Tuchman uses the term in this passage from her book, A DISTANT MIRROR.

In the earliest Latin documents, Coucy was called Codiciacum or Codiacum, supposedly derived from Codex, codicis, meaning a tree trunk stripped of its branches such as those the Gauls used to build their palisades. For four centuries through the Dark Ages the place remained in shadow. In 910–20 Hervé, Archbishop of Reims, built the first primitive castle and chapel on the hill, surrounded by a wall as defense against Norsemen invading the valley of the Oise. Settlers from the village below, taking refuge within the Bishop’s walls, founded the upper town, which came to be known as Coucy-le-Château, as distinguished from Coucy-la-Ville below. In those fierce times the territory was a constant bone of conflict among barons, archbishops, and kings, all equally bellicose. Defense against invaders—Moors in the south, Norsemen in the north—had bred a class of hard-bitten warriors who fought among themselves as willingly and savagely as against outsiders. In 975 Oderic, Archbishop of Reims, ceded the fief to a personage called the Comte d’Eudes, who became the first lord of Coucy. Nothing is known of this individual except his name, but once established on the hilltop, he produced in his descendants a strain of extraordinary strength and fury.

It's also in the dictionary.

Dark Ages
noun - 1. the period in European history from about a.d. 476 to about 1000.

Dark Ages
1 the period in western Europe between the fall of the Roman Empire and the high Middle Ages, c. ad 500–1100, during which Germanic tribes swept through Europe and North Africa, often attacking and destroying towns and settlements.

Webster's:
Dark Ages - the period 5th - 8th cc of European history following the fall of Rome.

Collins:
(European history) - the period from about the late 5th century ad to about 1000 ad, once considered an unenlightened period