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The Roman Empire: The Decline Of Western Europe

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Rome, from its inception as a monarchy to its transition to a republic and then an empire, has set patterns in government, religion, and technology for later civilizations. In its prime, Rome dominated the Western world, controlling trade, taxes, and agriculture throughout the Mediterranean. Eventually, due to many internal and external issues, the Roman empire transitioned from a time of prosperity during the Pax Romana and the early days of the empire to an age of chaos, war, and fear. Like any empire, Rome fell, leaving starving and vulnerable people in its wake. With little resources, destroyed cities, and lack of government and law enforcement, the people were left to fend for themselves, creating a system that shaped Western Europe and …show more content…

The barbarian invaders left the Roman Empire fragmented, broken into small kingdoms ruled by separate leaders. Feudalism began to thrive as peasants needed protection from the common attacks of invaders. In exchange for protection, the peasants, known as serfs, worked the land and payed taxes to their lieges. This economic, social, and political system resulted in the continued fragmentation and interregional disputes among Western Europe. As a result, continental trade decreased because feudal manors were self-sufficient. Because trade was scarce, Western Europeans had little contact with each other and the surrounding world during the early Middle Ages. There wasn’t much cultural diffusion, meaning that new ideas concerning technology, law, education, and art were scant. The lack of technology affected serfs the most, as they were the people who cultivated the land without the efficiency of advanced agricultural equipment. The only organized authority with a clear hierarchy during the Middle Ages was the Church. The Church, although arguably corrupt, provided foundation and religious unity to Western Europeans. Monasteries preserved Greek and Roman texts, which were later combined with Christian principles in a philosophy called scholasticism. Art was centered around Christian images such as Jesus, …show more content…

The Muslim Empire expanded westward from the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa and Spain until the Umayyads were thwarted by Charles Martel in the Battle of Tours, stopping the Muslim invasion into Western Europe. The Abbasids moved the Muslim capitol from Damascus to Baghdad and established it as a center of learning. Baghdad became a center of learning and established the House of a Wisdom, an academy of scholars dedicated to the advancement in fields of philosophy, math, and medicine. Intellectuals from all over the world came to the House of Wisdom and it was the best center of learning since the Hellenistic era and the university of Alexandria. Meanwhile, Cordoba, Spain built legendary mosques and impressive aqueducts and studied agricultural science. China had recovered from its fall during the Han dynasty, ruling eighty million people over four million square miles during the Tang dynasty. The Tang dynasty is known for its art and poetry while its successor, the Song dynasty invented and perfected many products. The Song dynasty was an important figure in commerce, trading silk, metal, and porcelain. The abundance in trade of China caused a shortage of metal for coins, prompting the empire to invent paper money. Along with paper money, the Chinese invented gun powder, a weapon that led the

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