Were the 5th and early 6th centuries truly "dark" or is that monicker only justified for the Europe post Plague of Justinian?
>>18285064You tell me.
>>18285073
>>18285073>>18285075With the added lol faction that this (>>18285073) was commissioned by a random nobody while this (>>18285075) was commissioned by a monarch to glorify his victory.
>>18285064Depends where in Europe you're talking about. For the med no, for the post-roman territories north of the Alps yes.
>>18285064depends what "dark" means. maybe it was darker when people were being enslaved and thrown ad bestias for brainlet proles to pass away the time
>>18285064The late 6th century and throughout the 7th century is a period of history with little to nothing in terms of archeology and writing compared to earlier periods, and the quality of goods decreases significantly in that period. It picks up again in the 8th century
>>18285064Italy was officially still part of the Roman empire, the senate and most Western Roman institutions continued to function.It wasn't until the Lombards that it was truly ogre, they didn't give a fuck about any of that Rome shit.
>>18285064The term dark age originally just meant that there are not many written sources from the period, so historians are in the dark on what happened. It doesn't mean that life was necessarily worse. Italy under Theoderic was more stable then in the final decades of the WRE, and the few written sources are mostly positive on it. Generally states became smaller and less organized but that doesn't mean things got worse for the average peasant who were now at least weren't taxed to hell.
>>18285096>It doesn't mean that life was necessarily worse7th century Italy was post-apocalyptic. Population down from 13 million in Roman times to 3 million.
>>18285073>>18285075>>18285076This is bait but whatever, why not.Comparing statues with tapestries isn't fair since they're entirely different mediums and are intended to show things in different ways. You should compare your statue of Cato to the Essen Madonna, or the Bayeaux tapestry to the Hestia Tapestry and you'd still be able to get your point across.
>>18285100Fucking lmao
>>18285064>Collapse of centralized authority>Endemic warfare>Large scale foreign invasionsMaybe parts of it could be considered bright but no matter where you lived your situation was pretty shit for most of it compared to the high point of the Roman Empire or the later middle ages.>Clovis converts to Christianity, defeats Pagans and Aryans and creates a powerful empire>Dies in his 40s, splits his empire, and his successors devolve into infighting and giving more control to the mayors of the palace>Theoderic saves the goths from complete collapse in the face of the Franks and becomes hegemon of the Western Mediterranean>Not long after his death infighting weakens the Visigoths and the Greeks start decades of war that will ravage Italy>Eastern Roman Empire survives the Germanic migrations with their culture and religion intact and even begin to expand control to retake much of the empire>Ravaged by plagues, invaded by Persians, and eventually lose most of their empire to Slavic migrations and Muslims
>>18285064>Slavi as one huge empirehttps://files.catbox.moe/9ouac3.mp4
>>18285098Recorded population*10 millions people didnt disappear into ashes
>>18285098Yeah, but that was the result of Justinian's wars, which was supposed to bring back the pre-"dark ages" world, and even moreso the plague. The plague's effect is very underrated. Large areas depopulating, people leaving cities, widespread breakdown of infrastructure: much of that was caused by the plague, not the conquests and changes in the political landscape.
