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                 Study Guide: Ch 7 - 8

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http://www.historyteacher.net/EuroCiv/ReviewQuizzes/MAges- Feudalism .htm
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The Carolingian World       

                                                Practice Questions                         Sample Questions      

Abbey: A monastic community of either monks or nuns. Ruled by an Abbot or Abbess Usually founded by a particular monastic order and bound by their rules. Abbeys many times owe some form of feudal obligation to a lord. Basically they are self contained with all basic function performed by the monks or nuns.

Aid: A special obligation of a vassal to provide money for such occasions as his lord's ransom, the marriage of his daughter, the knighting of his son, or for going on Crusade.

Albigensians: Name for the heretics of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; derived from the city of Albi in southern France, one of their centers of influence; also called Cathars.

Bailiff: (or bailie, bailo) Manorial official, overseer of the manor, chosen by the lord.

Banalities : Fees which a feudal lord imposed on his serfs for the use of his mill, oven, wine press, or similar facilities. It sometimes included part of a fish catch or the proceeds from a rabbit warren.

Hugh Capet was a couny who controlled estates around Paris and Orleans. After the Carolingian king died, the archbishop of Reims convinced an assembly of nobles to elect Hugh Capet king. Hugh Capet initiated a hereditary line of French kings, the Capetians. 

Charles Martel - c.690 - 741 Charles Martel, meaning Charles the Hammer, was mayor of the palace (or chancellor) of Austrasia, which was the eastern part of the Frankish kingdom. He restored a united Frankish kingdom and established a power base on which the Carolingian empire was founded. In 732 he defeated the invading Moslems at Poitiers and stopped further Moslem expansion into Europe. 

Charlemagne - 742 - 814 - created the first large central European realm and ruled as emperor from 800 to 814. For a brief time nearly all of Christian Europe, save England and Scandinavia, was united in the Frankish empire. Carolus Magnus, meaning Charles the Great, was a member of the Carolingian family, the eldest son of Pepin the Short. He became king of the Franks in 768. He conquered the Lombards and the pagan Saxons, whom he Christianized. His alliance with the papacy and the papal desire for a western emperor to counter Byzantium led to the coronation of Charlemagne as emperor by pope Leo III in 800.
From his palace school in Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen) Charlemagne initiated a cultural revival known as the Carolingian Renaissance. His reign was an attempt to consolidate order and Christian culture among the nations of the West, but his empire did not long survive his death, for is sons lacked both his vision and authority.

chivalry: Code of behavior/ethics for knights, based on telling the truth, keeping one's word and protecting those weaker than oneself.

Cistercians: A variety of Benedictine monks, who appeared as a reform movement in 1098 and flourished in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; they advocated a return to the strict, literal observance of Benedict's Rule.

Clovis - 466 - 511 - Clovis I was the founder of the Merovingian (476-751) kingdom in Gaul. He succeeded his father as Frankish chieftain in 481. He unified the Franks and within twelve years had conquered all of northern Gaul. He defeated the Burgundians and drove the Visigoths from southern France. He became a Christian in 498 and established his capital in Paris.

Danelaw: Area acknowledged by the West Saxon kings as under Danish law in the tenth century.

demesne : The part of the lord's manorial lands reserved for his own use and not allocated to his serfs or freeholder tenants. Serfs worked the demesne for a specified numbers of days a week. The demesne may either be scattered among the serfs land, or a separate area, the latter being more common for meadow and orchard lands. / Land devoted to the lord's profit, whether a manor, or a portion of land within a manor, worked by peasants as part of their obligations.

fair: A market held at regular intervals, usually once to twice a year. Fairs tend to offer a wider range of goods than normal markets.

Fealty, Oath of:    The oath by which a vassal swore loyalty to his lord. / An oath of fidelity. Sometimes combined with homage since both were commonly performed together when a vassal received a fief from a lord.

Feudalism:  The system of governing whereby semiautonomous landed nobility have certain well defined responsibilities to the king, in return for the use of grants of land (fiefs)

fief - Land or revenue-producing property granted by a lord in return for a vassal's service. / a grant by a lord to a vassal to secure the services of the vassal.

guild: Trade associations formed to protect members from the competition of foreign merchants and to maintain commercial standards. Guilds maintained a system of education, whereby apprentices served a master for five to seven years before becoming a journeyman at about age nineteen. Journeymen worked in the shop of a master until they could demonstrate to the leaders of the guild that they were ready for master status. Guild members were forbidden to compete with each other, and merchants were required to sell at a "just price".

heretic: A person who obstinately holds to a view that is contrary to one or more of the fundamental beliefs of the church; it is not mere error, but obstinate holding to the error when instructed by a properly constituted authority.

Homage:   The ceremony by which a vassal pledges his fealty to his liege, and acknowledges all other feudal obligations, in return for a grant of land.

Iconoclasm: The destruciton of icons; iconoclasm was a policy of some Byzantine emperors between 725 and 842; eventually repudiated by the Christian churches of the medieval east and west.

Investiture: The act of formally putting someone into an office or a landholding; it was a major occasion of dispute in the eleventh and twelfth centuries when reformers opposed lay rulers who invested clergy with the symbols of their positions.

Justinian I - 483 - 565 - At the time when Justinian became emperor of the eastern Roman empire, barbaric tribes had conquered most of the western Roman empire. Justinian spent more than 20 years in driving the Vandals, Huns, and Franks from Italy and North Africa. He temporarily restored Roman control.  Of more lasting importance was his 'Corpus Juris Civilis' a legal code that became the foundation of law in most western European countries.
 
knight: The retainer of a feudal lord who owed military service for his fief. 

Louis I, the Pious, was the son of Charlemagne and  the last ruler to maintain the unity of the Carlongian empire. His eldest son Lothar was crowned co-emperor and the younger sons (Charles the Bald and Louis, the German) were allocated parts of the empire. This led to tensions within the family that were to beset Louis for the remainder of his life.  But after his death civil war between the brothers broke out and the empire was split. 

manor:  A small holding. The manor as a unit of land is generally held by a knight or managed by a bailiff. / Estate held by a lord and farmed by tenants who owed him rents and services, and whose relations with him were governed by his manorial court.

monk:  a man who joined a religious house, called a monastery, where he took vows of poverty, chastity and obedience; the commonest form of monk was a man living under the provisions of the Rule of St Benedict.

Orthodox Church: The dominant form of Christianity in the Byzantine Empire and in the Slavic lands converted from that empire

Peace of God: A movement that arose in southern France in the tenth and eleventh centuries to place limits on fighting; it placed certain classes of people - non-combatants, women, clergy and the poor - under the protection of the church.

Pepin II - 635 - 714 - Chancellor of the Franks
After the death of the Merovingian king of Austrasia in 679 Pepin of Heristal established himself as the major-domo (chancellor / mayor of the palace) of Austrasia. After his victory over the major-domo of Neustria he ruled the entire Frankish kingdom. The Merovingian kings were still tolerated until 743 when the last Merovingian king was removed by a grandson of Pepin (Pepin III, the Short).

Pepin the Short - c.716 - 768 - Pepin was the son of Charles Martel and the father of Charlemagne. He served as major-domo in the Merovingian kingdom of Neustria & Austrasia (future Germany and France). In 751 an assembly of the Franks deposed the last of the weak Merovingian kings and proclaimed Pepin king. Pope Stephen II asked Pepin for help against the Langobard king who had captured Ravenna. Pepin sent his army and forced the Langobards to return the conquered territories, which were then given to the pope. These areas together with Rome became the Papal States. The pope - in return - confirmed Pepin as the first Carolingian king of the Franks. 

The battle of Poitiers (also called the battle of Tours) was a decisive battle of world history because it stopped further intrusion of the Moslems into Europe. Abd-ar-Rahman, ruler of Cordoba, had invaded Aquitaine and advanced north. Charles Martel, Carolingian mayor of the palace and ruler of the Frankish kingdom, stationed troops to defend the city of Tours. The Moslem attack was broken near Poitiers (732), Abd-ar-Rahman was killed, and the Arabs withdrew.
 
reeve: A royal or manor official appointed by the lord or elected by the peasants. / Manorial overseer, usually a villager elected by tenants of the manor.

serf: A semi-free peasant (cottagers, small holders, or villeins) who worked his lord's demesne and paid him certain dues in return for the use of land, the possession (not ownership) of which was heritable. These dues ("corvee"), were in the form of labor on the lord's land, averaging three days a week.

sheriff  (from "Shire Reeve"): The chief administrative and judicial officer of a shire. He collected taxes and forwarded them on to the Exchequer, and was also responsible for making sure that the King's table was well stocked.

simony  The buying or selling of spiritual things, particularly Church offices

steward: The man responsible for running the day-to-day affairs of the castle when the lord was absent.

tithe  One tenth of a person's income given to support the church annually.

Truce of God: A movement that began in the eleventh century which sought to forbid fighting on Sundays and the chief religious seasons and feasts.

vassal: A free man who held land (fief) from a lord to whom he paid homage and swore fealty. He owed various services and obligations, primarily military, but he also advised his lord and paid him the traditional feudal aids required on the knighting of the lord's eldest son, the marriage of the lord's eldest daughter, and the ransoming of the lord, should he be held captive.

The Vikings  - In the period from 800 to 1050 A.D., the Nordic peoples made their dramatic entry into the Europeanarena.Early writers called them Vikings, which means 'inlet-men', because they came from the deep inlets of Scandinavia. The expansion of the Vikings was the result of Scandinavian overpopulation troubles, which skill in
The Vikings were raiding all the European coasts down to Spain and along the rivers into the heart of Europe. Danish vikings plundered Frank. cities and undertook campaigns as far as Portugal and Italy. They subjugated parts of England. The Swedish vikings undertook campaigns in Eastern Europe and along the rivers of Russia all the way to the Black Sea and Constantinople.
The Norwegian vikings occupied the Orkneys, the Shetlands, and Ireland. They explored the northern seas until they arrived in Iceland and around AD 1000 they reached Greenland and discovered America.
 
wattle: A mat of woven sticks and weeds. daub: A mud and clay mixture applied over wattle to strengthen and seal it.

            Western Civilization Practice Exam V     Ch. 7  at Discovery.com

            Western Civilization Practice Exam VI    Ch. 8  at Discovery.com

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          Civilization in the West Online    

          A History of Western Society

          Western Civilization : Ideas, Politics, and Society

          Western Civilization : The Continuing Experiment

          The Western Heritage     Vol. 1

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