World History Class Notes: November 5th

New Powers and Religions in Europe

Charlemagne's Empire ca. 800

Charlemagne

• Charlemagne (768-814) acted "imperial"
• Charlemagne as Emperor 
• Hesitates to challenge Byzantines by taking title "emperor" 
• Pope Leo III crowns him emperor in 800

Carolingian Renaissance 

• Wealth/resources 
• Aix-la-Chapelle became center of learning
• Preserved Roman writings in easier to read Carolingian script
• Served as vehicle to train bureaucrats 

Aachen Cathedral 

Ends of Carolingians 

• Decline and Dissolution of the Carolingians Empire
• Louis the Pious
  • Son of Charlemagne 
• Lost control of courts, local authorities
• Civil war erupts between three sons 
• Empire divided in 843
  • Treaty of Verdun 

Important Groups in the Early Middle Ages (Vikings and Jews in the West )

Vikings 

• North: Vikings
  • Norse expansion begins
    • c. 800 CE (to 1066)
  • Driven by population pressure, hostility to spread of Christianity 
  • Superior seafaring technology 

History of the Jewish People

Key Points

• Jewish identity 
• Early history 
• Diaspora
• Medieval Europe
• Middle East 

Jewish Identity 

• Difficult: diaspora
• Race (ethnicity)
• Religion
• One definition: People of the Tanakh 

Tanakh 

• Written between the eleventh century BCE and the sixth century BCE 
• Torah: first five books of the Bible (ascribed to Moses)
• Prophets 

Israel 

• Early history unclear 
• Accounts in Torah vs. archaeology 
• Unified kingdom? 

Invasion and Diaspora 

• In 722 BCE the northern kingdom was destroyed by the Assyrians 
  • population deported (resulting in the so-called Lost ten Tribes of Israel)
• Judah was destroyed by the Babylonians in 598-582 BCE
• Persians, following their conquest of the Babylonian Empire, returned the Israelites to their homeland in 538 BCE
• Alexander conquest 
• Seleucids 
• In 168 BCE when the Israelites revolted under the leadership of the Maccabees who established the Hasmonaean Dynasty 

Survival of Judaism 

• Second Temple Judaism 
• Jewish Wars with Rome
  • 70CE
• Judaism moved to emphasis of scripture
  • Judaism practiced in diaspora

Rise in Messianic Judaism 

• Political upheaval: desire for Messiah 
• Bar kokhba Revolt (132-136 CE)
  • Judea renamed