Forget everything you've read about the middles ages, or "The Age of Faith" as it is also known. Yes, the gothic cathedrals were the most impressive monuments of the era; and its greatest poem was a description of Hell, Purgatory and Paradise; and the crusades dominated the headlines, so to speak. "The Commercial Revolution of the Middles Ages, 950-1350" by Robert S. Lopez presents quite a different story that reminds us that the past is indeed prologue, and that much of what we take for granted today was begun at this time.
Commerce, which had played second fiddle in antiquity and had sharply declined in the early Middle Ages, became the leading force in economic development that more than any other single force transformed Europe into an economic powerhouse. In 1000 A.D. Europe couldn't feed itself and was badly divided, and ripe for attack by the next band of barbarians that happened along. Three-hundred years later, Europe was the most prosperous place on Earth, with an abundance of food, a wealth of luxuries, universities, soaring cathedrals, incredible art, and no longer prey but a predator looking to colonize distant lands.
Commerce imported and exported not merely spices and exotic fabrics from the near east, but a world of ideas. Algebra was an import as were the writing of Plato and the Greek philosophers and playwrights. It was commerce that dramatically increased the production and variety of food, raised the standard of living, fostered reading, writing and arithmetic, financed the Renaissance, built the gothic cathedrals, invented eye glasses, eliminated slavery in Europe, created the middle class, created cities, and brought some semblance of peace to the continent. The merchant class, the men of trade, of money and banking, in going about their business, invented the corporation, created capitalism, fostered a spirit of tolerance and pluralism, and ruled democratically. Kings ruled the country, but the merchant class ran the cities. If you were a runaway serf, you found refuge--and a better job--in the city. The expression "the air breathes freer in the cities" is from this time. Christianity played a very big role too, but it was commerce that vastly improved man's temporal comforts and made his life and that of his family better, healthier, and vastly easier.
Read Lopez's book and you'll come away with a better opinion of the future of mankind.
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