The Middle Ages was an age of kings and empires.
The Middle Ages encompasses the period between the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and the end of the Hundred Years War between England and France in 1453. This stretch of nearly 1,000 years saw sweeping social changes, the rise and fall of empires and the rise of a major world religion resulting in political tensions between the East and West that still resonate today.
The Byzantine Empire
While the Western Roman Empire fell to Germanic tribes in 476, the Eastern Roman Empire, comprised of the Balkans and the Middle East, survived as the Byzantine Empire until the Ottoman Turks took the city of Constantinople in 1453. A fusion of Greek culture within a framework of Christianity, it was ruled by an emperor who styled himself as God's direct representative. The Catholic church in Europe considered the Byzantine Empire schismatic, and sought to force them back under the control of the Pope in Rome.
The Rise of Islam and the Crusades
Islam was founded by Muhammad in the seventh century in the city of Mecca. After converting or conquering surrounding tribal areas, Muhammad continued to spread Islam, eventually uniting the Arabian peninsula under the auspices of the new religion. After the Muslims took Jerusalem and moved into the Iberian Peninsula, the Catholic church launched military crusades against them in an effort to drive them out of Europe and the Holy Land.
The Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire began in western Turkey in the early 14th century, starting as a small military state and expanding over the next hundred years until it breached the mighty Byzantine Empire. Eager to topple the bastion of Christianity in Eastern Europe and the Arab world, the Ottomans moved their capital into Europe in 1402 and began to threaten the Byzantine capital of Constantinople. Sultan Mehmed finally took the city in 1453, the year that marked the end of the Middle Ages.
The Hundred Years War
The Hundred Years War between England and France stretched from 1337 to 1453, with periods of relative calm interspersed with battles and sieges. The war began over French attempts to regain control of the duchy of Aquitaine in southwest France from the English. England controlled parts of France since the Norman Conquest of 1066, in a complex arrangement under which the English ruler was a vassal of the French ruler. The end of the war saw England ejected from Europe, except for a stronghold in Calais.
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