DEEPTHI TK
LCL051505
DARK AGES AND
MIDDLE AGES
As we know that literary creation is
almost as old as human history and literary criticism nearly as old as
literature , the world would be unimaginably poorer without literature and
literature , in turn needs the understanding and judging provided by criticism .
Although the study of literature began as a serious pursuit only after the
Renaissance , there were many important and revolutionary periods in the development of many aspects of literature in the English language.
There were old
English period , dark ages and middle ages before the age of renaissance. There
happened some occasions which made these ages literally famous. Anglo-saxon is
the ancestor of modern English or it is
otherwise called as Old English according to some scholar. It is a an Aryan
tongue. Beowulf was the oldest extant
poem of Old English. The poem gives an
interesting picture of the life of the Anglo-saxons in the early days of their
history. Northumbria , especially York was the original seat of both poetry and prose. A prominent prose
writer of the period was Venerable Bede who wrote mainly in Latin. He was the
first English historian and the
Ecclesiastical History of the English People is his most famous work.
The dark ages, as
the name signifies, was an era of darkness
and ignorance. This period reflects the ill-consequences of the centuries from eleven to thirteen. Historians
mentioned this period of history as “
dark ” because of the reducing and exhausting ways , depleting customs and
practices that was prevalent during that time. The dark age is commonly
considered as the early medieval period of
European history. There is very little information about this age is
available. That is also a reason why many historians used the term dark age
to denote this period. Modern historians do not prefer to use this term
because there is no written historical records are available about this period
yet.
During that period Europe faced a severe
political , economic and social set back. So the period reflects the appalling
consequences of this set back. With this
enormous collapse , European society fell in the clutches of feudalism. The
continuous struggles between the barbarians and the feudal nobles destroyed the
peace of common men and it made their life difficult to live in. Another
important consequence of the feudal
system was the decline in church structures because of feudalistic pressures
and control that was stressed them.
During that period , monasticism , a new
religious movement was developed. Although the church was blamed for the
spiritual darkness of dark ages ,it was the only light that was shone in the
darkness of surrounding barbarism. During
this time , it was the monks and the priests who saved treasures of classical
literature including the scriptures of Holy scriptures and patristic writings.
The concept of
dark ages originated with Petrarch ( Francesco Petrarca) , the Italian scholar
and historian. He was largely influenced by the greatness of ancient Rome
empire. He coined this term in order to condemn the Latin literature. Nowadays
nobody use this term , yet , it can be used to represent the period following
the fall of Roman Empire in the western
world.
In the early middle ages commerce and
industry declined and land became increasingly concentrated in the hands of a
few , with famine and disease often widespread. The economic system was limited
largely to local trade. The intellectual currents of the early Middle ages were driven by two
broad factors: the heritage of classical thought , and the varying relation of
developing Christian theology to this heritage.
The attempt of Christian
philosophy to come to terms with its classical Greek and Roman heritage continued
through Gregory of Nazianzus , Gregory of Nissa , Jojn Chrysostom, and Ambrose reaching
unprecedented heights in the work
of St. Bonaventura ,and St Aquinas.
Norman conquest was the
last successful conquest of Britain and
far –reaching changes were brought about in various fields including social ,
political , and linguistic. It was the period of the making of the English language. The French element in the English
language was incredibly large. Of these, about 75 percent are still in current
use. With the advent of the Normans a new chapter was opened in the history
of English church also.
The period
in between the two major events in European history vaguely goes by the name of
the Middle ages or the Medieval age. The one major development during this
period of roughly eight hundred years is the adoption of Christianity as the religion of the
Mediterranean region.
The later middle
ages beginning around 1050 ,witnessed considerable progress on many levels . Most
fundamentally , there was an economic revival. It is in this period that the
system of feudalism gained a relatively stable formation. The society was
increasingly divided into two classes ,the one a landed aristocracy and clergy
the other composed of the mass of peasants , with a small middle class of
merchants , trades , and craftsmen.
Most of the
intellectual currents of the middle ages are founded on the grammatical
tradition of textual interpretation , extended by Christian scholars to
scriptural exegesis. The medieval tendency to situate literature as one
component in an ordered and hierarchical scheme of learning was expressed in a
widely influential educational treatise composed in the late 1120s by Hugh of
St.Victor , the Didascalicon . He
provides a scheme for reading both secular texts and the sacred scriptures.
There was a wide
spread tendency throughout the medieval period to view all things in the world
and the universe as essentially symbolic , as signs in a vast lexicon through
which God speaks to humanity. We can see the placement of poetry as a part of philosophy or theology in
the writings of Boccaccio and Christine de Pisan who effect a humanistic
revival of allegorical traditions.
The major figures of these periods ranging
from dark ages to middle ages are :
ST.AUGUSTINE
St. Augustine was one
of the chief figure of dark ages. He was a Christian thinker who strongly
influenced the traditions of both Roman Catholic and Protestant thought. His
works like Confessions and City of God
are famous. Augustine expounded his theology in City of God , where he viewed human history as the
unfolding of a divine plan. He states that only God can restore the natural
state of goodness in which man was created. Augustine’s concept of the two cities had a invasive influence
during the Middle ages , approving the struggles of Church against the state. While he
sympathized with Plato’s arguments for banishing poets and dramatists on moral
grounds , his views of poetry’s
connection with truth were somewhat different. He proposes that paintings ,
sculptures and plays were necessarily false , not from any intention to be such
but merely from an inability to be that which they present.
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS
Thomas Aquinas was one
of the greatest scholar and philosopher
of the dark ages. He was highly
influenced by Aristotle and also by Augustine , Cicero , Boethius , Maimonides.
Aquinas is well-known for his two major works. The first one is Summa contra
Gentiles which was written between 1259 and 1264. The purpose of that book was
to defend – or argue – the truth of Christianity against gentiles who did not accept the
authority of the scriptures. Aquinas died at the age of 49
giving to the western world a legacy of theological and philosophical work
greater than that of Plato and
Aristotle.
DANTE
Dante was one of the
greatest poet the western world had ever produced. Allegory is integral to the
work of Dante Alighieri . He is best
known for the epic poem Divina Commedia and his earlier cycle of love poems
published as La Vita Nuova, written in honor of Beatrice Portinary. Dante also
wrote literary criticism , which was in part indebted to Aristotle, Cicero, and
Aquinas.
BOCCACCIO
Giovanni Boccaccio was
a pioneer of Italian vernacular
literature with Dante and Petrarch. Decameron is his famous work. He was also
the pioneer of the humanism that would become the philosophical basis of the
Renaissance. Like John of Salisbury in
the twelfth century , Boccaccio defends poetry in terms that are unmistakably
medieval. But he also stands in a long line of practicing poets who have
written in defense of their art , ranging from Horace to Shelley. He intended Genealogy of the Gentile Gods as a
monumental work of scholarship , a mythological source book that would
introduce readers to the study of the ancient poets.
CONCLUSION
As we can see there
were tremendous changes occurred in the social , political and economic fields
of the society in the periods ranging from dark ages to middle ages. Literature
in England developed in many directions . English writing revived fully in
English after 1360 and flowered in the reign of Richard ii. It paved the way to
modern form of verse , of prose and of drama. And of course , as we see above,
so many critics largely contributed to the extreme changes that took place
during these ages.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Nagarajan , M S. English Literary Criticism and Theory.
Hyderabad . Orient BlackSwan Private Limited , 2006
Abraham , K M. Social and cultural history of
Great Britain. Kozha. Institute of
Secularism ( Deepa Books ) ,2011
Habib , M.A.R. A History of Lterary Criticism From Plato to
Aristotle. USA. Blackwell Publishing, 2005
No comments:
Post a Comment