Sixth-Century Disasters

There have been plenty of low points in European history (think, the first half of the twentieth century).  But one of the definite low points was the sixth century.

As I have discussed previously, one cannot really speak of a “fall” of the Roman Empire.  But the empire certainly lost its power and authority, with economic slowdown evident from the third century on, and an end to expansion and even winning by the fourth and fifth. The disasters of the sixth century broke down the empire's urban structure and communication networks.  The rise of Islam in the seventh century, leading to major loss of Roman territory in North Africa and the Middle East, pretty much finished it off.

Historians and scientists have identified two especially bad years in the sixth century, the volcano of 536 and the plague of 542.  There have been plenty of studies, based on pollen deposits and tree rings, showing a chilling of Europe’s climate in the first half of the sixth century, and now scientists studying particulate matter deposited in glaciers in the Swiss Alps have been able to pinpoint a volcano in 536 that sent so much dust and debris into the air that sunlight was blocked, and there were several “years without a summer.”  Debris in the glaciers indicates the volcano was in Iceland, then uninhabited (the Vikings came later).

(For those who think hopefully that maybe we can stop global warming with a volcano, be careful what you wish for.)

As a result of the volcano, there were massive crop failures and famines.  Urban culture disintegrated, because cities can’t survive without food imports, which means the countryside has to be producing a surplus, which it wasn’t.  Then the weakened population (the parts that had survived so far) was hit six years later by an outbreak of the bubonic plague (Black Death).  It reached Europe from Byzantium (and eventually central Asia).  Justinian was emperor then (headquartered in Constantinople, although he sometimes visited western Europe), and the devastating plague was sometimes referred to as “Justinian’s flea.”

Having killed off a sizeable chunk of the population (maybe half?), the Black Death did not return to Europe for 800 years, when the plague returned, marking both economic collapse and the beginning of the Renaissance.

Somehow sixth-century Europe staggered on after its back-to-back disasters, although with a much smaller population and seriously disrupted trade and communication.  Long-distance luxury trade continued, even if at a reduced level.  Once the volcano settled down it began to be possible to grow crops reliably again.  The economic collapse began to turn around in the first half of the seventh century, after a hundred years or so of very hard times.  One of the markers of the improved economy, also found in the Swiss glaciers, is particles of lead.  Lead is used in smelting silver, in making coins, a clear indication that trade within Europe had picked up, though the urban economy did not fully recover until the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

© C. Dale Brittain 2018

For more on medieval society and economy, see my new ebook, Positively Medieval: Life and Society in the Middle Ages.