Dark Age Dbq

There are many theories surround the fall of Rome and the descent into the ‘Dark Age”. It was commonly believed for some times that the collapse was due to Germanic invasions. Henri Pirenne argues against this in his book Mohammed and Charlemagne. He claims that the economic and agricultural depression that sent Europe into a ‘Dark Age’ was due to the disruption of a sea based economic system by the rising power in the Middle East, Islam. Michael McCormick supposes that Pirenne was incorrect in his findings. Islam did not disrupt trade, but instead trade flourishes through Islam.

For some time it was believed that Rome fell due to the raiding of barbarian Germanic tribes. Henri Pirenne saw this theory to be flawed. According to Pirenne the Germanic invaders had no desire to destroy the empire. In fact, they want to share in its benefits and integrate into the society. The Germanic people want to

share in the benefits and would settle and intermarry. German landowners replaced Roman landowners and the system of agriculture and land management is unchanged. This results in no essential change in structure or economic decline. Trade continues throughout the empire and Roman culture was maintained throughout the legal, governmental and commercial systems, “The Germanic invasions in the West could not and did not in any way alter this state of affairs.” Pirenne declares it would be the rise of Islam that would change everything in Europe.
According to Pirenne the Empire is depleted from the concluding wars with Persia and is not prepared for an Islamic attack. The Muslims were nothing like the Germanic invaders. Instead, they did not adapt or assimilate into Roman culture and society, nor did they convert, they conquered and imposed their own systems of administration, justice and language. By the seventh century, the entire western Mediterranean and Aegean Sea are in Islamic hands, closing it off to the Christian world and ceasing trade, “As Ibn-Khaldun says ‘The Christian could no longer float a plank upon the sea.’”
Pirenne goes on to state that the decrease in trade is the beginning point to the shift into the middle ages. This loss of trade turns life in the empire into a more local community that is centered on land. Gold minting ceases; oriental goods are no longer imported and the professional merchant class disappears. The disappearance of papyrus is one of Pirenne’s lead arguments. There is a shift from writing on papyrus, which is imported from Egypt, with animal skins, which are locally based. But papyrus was readily available in parts of Italy and even Pirenne was aware of this.
The following argument by Pirenne is based on the oriental goods. These goods, such as silk and spices, disappear from the Empire. That may not be true according to McCormick. He agrees with Pirenne that Carolingian cooks used less spices in their cooking in the early eight-century. However he does not believe that this lasts for generations. McCormick reasons that Pirenne does not take into account other factors that may contribute to this, such as different varieties of foods or the way the recipes were presented, orally not written. It can be hard to remember recipes from generations past. Nevertheless spices in cooking are not where McCormick makes his ground for spices. Spices were also used in medicine. Physician’s books show various Indian and Asian spice use in abundance. This imminently discredits the disappearance of spices because as McCormick states, “The notion that Europe had no access to Asian spices collapses as soon as on opens the well-worn medical handbooks.” Silk is also said to have disappeared from Europe. There are records of silk consumption in papal courts that show that they were imported and were quite expensive. In the 770s Pope Hadrian I gave away “a minimum of 837 hangings and altar coverings of silk.”
How are these goods transported and paid for if Islam disrupted trade?

McCormick concurs that there was a drop in trade in the beginning of the seventh century but by the second half of the seventh century trading in places like the North Sea was a bustling place of trade. He continues to support his theory on the quick reemergence of trade through a series of documents that show by the middle of the eight-century there were at least six new ways to reach the Middle East. If trade is stagnated by Islam why is there a development of new trade routes? For McCormick the answer is simple, trade is booming.

But we run into a problem here, if trade is booming why is there a shortage of gold minting during this time? McCormick addresses this issue by stating that silver coinage replaces gold coinage in the beginning when trade becomes more localized to fit well into small-scale transactions. So how then are the goods coming in being paid for? According to McCormick the Europeans have something of greater value to the Muslims than silk, spices and gold, they have

slaves.
With Islamic law prohibiting the enslavement of Muslims, there is a search for slaves from other regions. With the end of military expansion the Muslims no longer had access to war slaves and the recent plague had killed many of those that remained, leaving a demand for slave labor. There was money to be made from exporting slaves to the Arab world and the Venetians were first to jump at the opportunity. But there were problems with this trade. The Church was highly against this due to the face that the people that were being sold were Christians. They urged emperors to pass laws that would put an end to the trade. There were rules that limited the trade, but never truly ended it. In fact, according to McCormick, “economically, the slave trade mattered.” It explained why people returned to their homes with eastern goods and money. This growth would lead to a more advanced commercial economy with a need for more ships, cities, and rise to a more developed merchant class, pulling Europe slowly out of the ‘Dark Ages’.
There are many theories surrounding the fall of Rome and the duration of the ‘Dark Ages’. Barbarian Germanic invasions were for a time the most accepted theory. Henri Pirenne comes to the stage with a shocking new theory that states that it was Islam that will disrupt the economy and push Europe in a ‘Dark Age’. This theory became popular amongst some historians, while others, like Michael McCormick saw it in a new light. For McCormick Islam wouldn’t be the downfall of Europe but its recovery.