Medieval history, also known as medieval history, refers to the period from the demise of the Western Roman Empire in 476 to the outbreak of the British bourgeois revolution in 1640. The formation, development and disintegration of feudal system is the main line of European history in this period. However, the development of feudal society in the world is unbalanced. When Western Europe just entered the feudal society in the 5th century, China had already completed the feudal social course of about 1000 years.

In European feudal society, kings, nobles and feudal lords of all sizes formed a pyramid hierarchy, but their rights and obligations were limited. "I am a minister, not a minister", which makes the feudal countries in Europe in a state of separatism for a long time. Oriental China is "king all over the world?" On the coastal land, is it very different from the centralized feudal monarchy in Wang Ju? The rulers of various countries are still waging wars, plundering and annexing each other, and many countries have never had a unified and stable regime. Feudal landlords exploited farmers by virtue of land ownership and political power. In Europe, Christian churches became the tools of feudal rule, and they maintained the feudal system together with secular feudal owners. The labor of peasants and serfs was embezzled by feudal lords in the form of servitude, land rent in kind, various taxes and church tithes. Farmers resisted constantly, but the scale of the uprising was generally small, and there was no large-scale peasant war that overthrew a dynasty many times like China.

Regardless of the west or the east, the feudal economy is mainly a self-sufficient natural economy with a farmer as the basic production unit. Because farmers can have some basic means of production and living and obtain certain products of labor, their enthusiasm for labor is much higher than that of slaves. The popularity of iron tools in the Middle Ages, coupled with the continuous progress of production technology, greatly enriched social wealth and promoted the development of commerce. 14 and 15 centuries, in the Mediterranean coastal areas, capitalist workshops and handicrafts specializing in commodity production appeared in cities with developed commodity economy. 16 and 17 centuries, capitalism sprouted in cities south of the Yangtze River in China. Capitalist relations of production are produced in feudal relations of production, which shows that feudal society has come to an end. Since then, the rise of capitalism in some European countries has formed an irreversible momentum.

Medieval Europe was a so-called "dark age", with backward culture and ignorant thoughts, while in China, it was a period of highly developed culture and science and technology, with a strong cultural contrast between the East and the West. Religion occupies a dominant position in the ideological field in vast areas of the world. Buddhism, Christianity and Islam have become the "state religions" in many countries. Confucianism dominated China's ideological field. Although this cultural phenomenon once promoted the consolidation of feudal society, it became an obstacle to social progress and scientific development after the rise of capitalism. With the emergence of the seeds of capitalism, the Renaissance in Europe was a great liberation of human thought, which promoted the prosperity of culture and art and the great leap of modern science. In the East, due to the long-term bondage of feudal ideas, social development tends to be slow, and it has since fallen behind the West.

the Enlightenment

The Enlightenment took place in Europe in the18th century, first in Britain, then in France, Germany and Russia, and then in the Netherlands, Belgium and other countries. Compared with other countries, the Enlightenment in France is the most powerful, combative and far-reaching, and it can be called a model of the Enlightenment in Western Europe.

Literally speaking, the Enlightenment is a movement of enlightening ignorance, opposing ignorance and advocating the popularization of culture and education. But in essence, it is a movement to publicize bourgeois political ideology, not just a literary movement. It is the continuation and development of bourgeois anti-feudalism, anti-asceticism and anti-church struggle during the Renaissance, which directly laid the ideological foundation for 1789 French Revolution. Enlightenment thinkers took over the banner of anti-feudalism and anti-church from humanists, further proved the irrationality of feudal system in theory, and put forward a set of philosophical theories, political programs and social reform programs, demanding the establishment of a society based on "rationality". They opposed tyranny with political freedom, religious oppression with freedom of belief, destroyed Catholic authority and religious idols with deism and atheism, opposed the view of "divine right of monarch" with the slogan of "natural human rights" and opposed the hierarchical privilege of nobles with "everyone is equal before the law". They used these ideas to inspire and educate the masses, overthrow the rule of feudalism, and then establish bourgeois political power. The above thought is called enlightenment thought, and if it is spread, it is called enlightenment movement. Enlightenment is not only the continuation and deepening of the struggle of the emerging bourgeoisie against feudalism and Christianity during the Renaissance, but also the theoretical preparation stage of the bourgeois political revolution. If we compare it with the Renaissance, it will be clearer. First of all, from the aspect of anti-feudalism, the anti-feudalism of the Renaissance mainly opposed the separatist state of feudal lords, demanding the establishment of a unified monarchy in the country and the development of capitalist economy under the protection of kingship. In the Enlightenment, the bourgeoisie has completed the process of primitive accumulation of capital, and further demanded to gain political power and establish a capitalist political system. Anti-feudalism in the Renaissance focused on ideology and ethics. The Enlightenment paid attention to the nature of political system and regime.

Secondly, from the aspect of anti-church, the Renaissance mainly exposed the corruption of the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages, condemned the evil of monasteries against humanity, demanded religious reform, abolished cumbersome religious ceremonies and advocated simpler etiquette. During the Enlightenment, due to the development of materialism and natural science, anti-church was more thorough than during the Renaissance, and it had risen to the height of deism and atheism.

Thirdly, judging from the connotation of humanistic thought, the Renaissance emphasized anti-asceticism, demanded individual liberation, persisted in the world and faced reality. In the enlightenment era of18th century, the focus of humanism shifted to advocating political principles such as "freedom, equality and fraternity". Because the Enlightenment is a political and ideological revolutionary movement, the participants in the Enlightenment are by no means limited to writers. In addition, there are four French Enlightenment writers, such as Goodsdorfer, Voltaire, Diderot and Rousseau, British philosopher Locke, scientist Newton, German aestheticians Lessing and Elder, and Dutch philosopher Spinoza. , all belong to the ranks of enlightenment thinkers.

Similarly, from the perspective of literary style and method, realism in the enlightenment period is a continuation of realism in the Renaissance period, but it has made new development. Its characteristics are not vivid and rich plots, nor characterization of characters, but more political. Writers consciously integrate their political thoughts into literary works. These enlightenment works have become the spiritual weapons for the bourgeoisie and the feudal class to compete for political power, and they are the "encyclopedia" for spreading the bourgeois world outlook. The language in the works is not poetic, but fluent and eloquent political prose, which is logical, inspiring and combative. Some works, because of their profound and strong philosophical significance, have turned them into fictional philosophical essays. The works of enlightenment writers all have the characteristics of pure rationality.

The Renaissance

Renaissance is a historical period of European culture and thought development from14th century to16th century. It is an important new culture movement in European history, and it is also a moderns full of flowers, fruitful achievements, bright stars and talented people in human history. Engels called it "the greatest and most progressive change that mankind has never experienced" and "this is an era when giants are needed and produced".

The Renaissance originated in Italy. Italy had taken the lead in completing the class preparation, ideological preparation and material preparation for the transition from feudalism to capitalism in Europe at that time. Marx once said, "Capitalist production first developed in Italy". In Florence, Italy and other places in the 14 and 15 centuries, with the continuous expansion of workshop production scale and the continuous progress of production technology, wealthy craftsmen and large workshop owners became the emerging bourgeoisie. They need to obtain a social status that is compatible with their economic status, and they need to upgrade their values, ideology and culture to the mainstream of society. However, at that time, the bourgeoisie was still a growing new force. In order to counter and finally defeat the stubborn, conservative, ignorant and cruel Catholic church at that time, we must find a powerful ideological weapon to arm ourselves. It must be able to arouse the public's awareness of awakening, and at the same time, it must appear as a non-violent and non-revolutionary face. Therefore, the bourgeoisie turned its attention to the ancient Greek and Roman period. In their view, it is a moderns that Europeans are proud of and a peak in the history of European culture. At that time, classical natural science, philosophy, literature, art and Roman law, which were in their heyday, would be used as practical and effective weapons against the Catholic Church. Therefore, the bourgeoisie actively advocated the "resurrection" and "regeneration" of ancient Greek and Roman culture, and set off reform activities in all fields from culture to society. The Renaissance got its name from this.

The guiding ideology of the Renaissance is humanism, the core of which is that man is the foundation of everything, and it advocates taking individuals as the yardstick to measure everything. Humanists attach importance to human value, advocate individuality and human rights, advocate individuality freedom and oppose Catholic theocracy; Advocate hedonism and oppose asceticism; Advocate science and culture and oppose feudal superstition.

The development of the Renaissance has roughly experienced four stages: (1)13rd century belongs to the early Renaissance, and its outstanding feature is that the development of literature has reached an unprecedented level. The cultural center city of this period was Florence. The representative figures are three writers called "the top three masters": Dante (1265 to 132 1), Petrarch (1304 to 1374) and Boccaccio (/kloc-0). Because their works are widely circulated, the dialect of Florence, the hometown of these three poets, has become the predecessor of modern Italian. At this stage, the master Giotto (1267 to 1337), who is revered as the father of European painting, has a direct influence on the Italian painting style in 100. (2) The period from the end of14 to the first half of 15 is the preparation period for the climax of the Renaissance. During this period, humanism and literature and art developed further, resulting in a number of high-level painters, sculptors and architects, such as painter Ma Saqiao (140 1 to 1428) and sculptor Donatello (1386 to1428). Among them, the large vault of Florence church designed by Brunelleschi from 1434 to 1437 is magnificent and unforgettable. (3) From the end of15 to the first half of 16, the Renaissance flourished and the cultural center city was transferred from Florence to Rome. The main representatives are the last three masters-Da Vinci (1452 to 15 19), Michelangelo (1475 to 1564) and Raphael (1483 to 654). The Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, David, The Sadness of the Virgin and Lady Sisto, as well as a large number of murals in the Raphael Studio of the Vatican Museum, are treasures of the world art galleries and are well-known in China. (4) The second half of16th century to the first half of17th century is the late Renaissance. The representatives of this period are four famous Venetian painters: giorgione, Titian (1490 to 1576), Veronica and Tintoretto, and three famous scientists and thinkers: Bruno, Galileo and campanella.

The Renaissance has played an important role in promoting the social and cultural development in Europe and even the world: the Renaissance triggered the religious reform and created the embryonic form of a modern secular state; Personalized content and rigorous and elegant form in the cultural field have become models for future generations to learn; The outstanding contribution of humanists lies in laying the foundation of modern natural science; The Renaissance was a great ideological emancipation in European history, which expressed the bourgeois demand to break the spiritual shackles of feudal ideology, liberate productive forces and establish new relations of production.