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The Medieval Mind Research Paper

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Journal: The Medieval Mind The purpose of the section The Medieval Mind is to summarize the time period prior to the Renaissance, while still explaining how the papacy rose to power. It provided information on Christianity’s followers, fundamentals, and flaws. The most significant events are the Fall of Rome, the Dark Ages, and the beginning of the Renaissance. Manchester (1993) found that the Fall of Rome and the end of the Western Roman Empire occurred in the year 476 (p.5). Although the Fall of Rome was extremely aggressive and wild, it allowed for Europe to advance further than the constraining minds of the Roman rulers. After the Fall of Rome, Manchester (1993) explains that the Dark Ages began. The Dark Ages were full of “Famines and …show more content…

The Huns, states Manchester (1993), are barbarians who pillaged the Eternal City and caused its fall (pp. 4-5). The Huns played a crucial role in history, because the Fall of Rome led to a completely new society. Manchester (1993) found that Clovis was a Frankish chieftain. Clovis “accepted the divinity of Christ and was baptized” around the time of A.D. 493. He was an aggressive warrior, but his violence was praised. (pp. 6-7). Manchester (1993) found that “Aurelius Augustinus… devoted thirteen years to writing his response, Decivitate Dei (The City of God), the first great work to shape and define the medieval mind… The pagan deities, he wrote, had lewdly urged Romans to yield to sexual passion” (p.9). Augustinus promoted conservativeness and looked down on corruption and the papacy’s sins. He claimed that Christianity was not the problem, but sins committed because of lust were. Leo III was called “history’s most celebrated iconoclast” by Manchester (1993) because he was one of the first people who attacked Christianity’s cherished beliefs (p.14). This allowed people to try and challenge the Church for the first time, and although at Leo’s time, the Church intervened and prevented a rebellion, the iconoclastic way of thinking sparked later

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