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Why and how did medieval culture change. The main features of medieval culture and its achievements

Why and how did medieval culture change. The main features of medieval culture and its achievements

21.02.2019

Culture of the European Middle Ages

2. Features of the development of culture of the Middle Ages

Medieval culture - European culture in the period from the 5th century. AD until the 17th century (conditionally divided into three stages: the culture of the early Middle Ages of the 5th-11th centuries; the medieval culture of the 11th-13th centuries; the culture of the late Middle Ages of the 14th-17th centuries). The beginning of the Middle Ages coincided with the extinction of the Hellenic-classical, ancient culture, and the end - with its revival in modern times.

The material basis of medieval culture was feudal relations. The political sphere of the Middle Ages represented primarily the dominance of the military class - chivalry, based on a combination of land rights with political power. With the formation of centralized states, estates were formed that made up social structure medieval society - the clergy, the nobility and the rest of the inhabitants ("third estate", the people). The clergy took care of the human soul, the nobility (chivalry) was engaged in state and military affairs, the people worked. Society began to be divided into "those who work" and "those who fight." The Middle Ages is an era of numerous wars. Only "crusades" (1096--1270) official history counts eight.

The Middle Ages are characterized by the unification of people in various corporations: monastic and knightly orders, peasant communities, secret societies, etc. In cities, the role of such corporations was primarily played by workshops (associations of artisans by profession). A fundamentally new attitude towards labor as a value has been developed in the shop environment, a fundamentally new idea of labor as a gift from God has arisen.

The dominant spiritual life of the Middle Ages was religiosity, which determined the role of the church as the most important institution culture. The Church also acted as a secular force in the person of the papacy, striving for domination over the Christian world. The task of the church was rather complicated: the church could preserve culture only by "secularizing", and it was possible to develop culture only by deepening its religiosity. This inconsistency was emphasized by the greatest Christian thinker Augustine "Blessed" (354--430) in his work "On the City of God" (413), where he showed the history of mankind as the eternal struggle of two cities - the Earthly City (a community based on worldly statehood). , on self-love, brought to contempt for God) and the City of God (a spiritual community built on love for God, brought to contempt for oneself). Augustine put forward the idea that faith and reason are only two different kind activities of one kind of thinking. Therefore, they do not exclude, but complement each other.

However, in the XIV century. a radical thought triumphed, substantiated by William of Ockham (1285--1349): there is and cannot be, in principle, anything in common between faith and reason, philosophy and religion. Therefore, they are completely independent of each other and should not control each other.

Medieval science acts as a comprehension of the authority of the data of the Bible. At the same time, a scholastic ideal of knowledge is emerging, where high status acquires rational knowledge and logical proof, again placed at the service of God and the church. The convergence of science with teaching contributed to the formation of the education system (XI-XII centuries). Appears a large number of translations from Arabic and Greek - books on mathematics, astronomy, medicine, etc. They become a stimulus for intellectual development. It was then that higher schools were born, and then universities. The first universities appeared in early XII 1st century (Bologna, Paris, Oxford, Montpellier). By 1300, there were already 18 universities in Europe, which turned into the most important cultural centers. The universities of the late Middle Ages were built on the Parisian model, with the obligatory four "classical" faculties: arts, theology, law and medicine.

In the late Middle Ages, Europe entered the path of technological progress: the use of water and windmills, the development of new designs of lifts for the construction of temples, the appearance of the first machines; watches were invented, paper production was established, a mirror, glasses appeared, medical experiments were carried out.

The spiritual life of society also changed; fiction acquires a secular character, the tendency to turn to earthly life is gaining strength. Chivalric literature became a special phenomenon. The epic is developing, leaving such talented works as the French poem "The Song of Roland" and the German "Song of the Nibelungs" as a legacy. The growing attention to man, his passions is brilliantly expressed by Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) in the Divine Comedy. At the beginning of the second millennium, a synthesis of Romanesque artistic heritage and Christian foundations of European art. Until the 15th century, its main form was architecture, the peak of which was the Catholic Cathedral. From the end of the XIII century. the gothic style, born of urban European life, becomes the leading one.

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· Introduction…………………………………………2

Christian consciousness is the basis of the medieval mentality………….4

Scientific culture in the Middle Ages………….……7

Artistic culture of medieval Europe…….….10

Medieval music and theater………………16

Conclusion………………………………………..21

List of used literature……………….22

INTRODUCTION

Culturologists call the Middle Ages a long period in the history of Western Europe between Antiquity and New Time. This period covers more than a millennium from the 5th to the 15th centuries.

Within the millennial period of the Middle Ages, it is customary to distinguish at least three periods. This:

Early Middle Ages, from the beginning of the era to 900 or 1000 years (up to the 10th - 11th centuries);

High (Classical) Middle Ages. From the X-XI centuries to about the XIV century;

Late Middle Ages, 14th and 15th centuries.

The early Middle Ages is a time when turbulent and very important processes took place in Europe. First of all, these are the invasions of the so-called barbarians (from the Latin barba - beard), who from the 2nd century AD constantly attacked the Roman Empire and settled on the lands of its provinces. These invasions ended with the fall of Rome.

At the same time, the new Western Europeans, as a rule, accepted Christianity. , which in Rome towards the end of its existence was the state religion. Christianity in its various forms gradually supplanted pagan beliefs throughout the territory of the Roman Empire, and this process did not stop after the fall of the empire. This is the second most important historical process that determined the face of the early Middle Ages in Western Europe.

The third significant process was the formation of new state formations on the territory of the former Roman Empire. , created by the same "barbarians". Numerous Frankish, Germanic, Gothic and other tribes were in fact not so wild. Most of them already had the rudiments of statehood, owned crafts, including agriculture and metallurgy, were organized on the principles military democracy. Tribal leaders began to proclaim themselves kings, dukes, etc., constantly fighting with each other and subjugating weaker neighbors. On Christmas Day 800, Charlemagne, King of the Franks, was crowned Catholic in Rome and Emperor of the entire European west. Later (900) the Holy Roman Empire broke up into countless duchies, counties, margraviates, bishoprics, abbeys, and other destinies. Their rulers behaved like completely sovereign masters, not considering it necessary to obey any emperors or kings. However, the processes of formation of state formations continued in subsequent periods. characteristic feature life in the early Middle Ages were constant robberies and devastation, which were subjected to the inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire. And these robberies and raids significantly slowed down economic and cultural development.

During the classical or high Middle Ages, Western Europe began to overcome these difficulties and revive. Since the 10th century, cooperation under the laws of feudalism has allowed the creation of larger state structures and the collection of sufficiently strong armies. Thanks to this, it was possible to stop the invasions, significantly limit the robberies, and then gradually go on the offensive. In 1024, the crusaders took the Eastern Roman Empire from the Byzantines, and in 1099 they seized the Holy Land from the Muslims. True, in 1291 both were lost again. However, the Moors were expelled from Spain forever. Eventually Western Christians won dominance over mediterranean sea and him. islands. Numerous missionaries brought Christianity to the kingdoms of Scandinavia, Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, so that these states entered the orbit of Western culture.

The onset of relative stability provided the possibility of a rapid rise in cities and the pan-European economy. Life in Western Europe has changed a lot, society was rapidly losing the features of barbarism, spiritual life flourished in the cities. In general, European society has become much richer and more civilized than during the ancient Roman Empire. An outstanding role in this was played by the Christian Church, which also developed, improved its teaching and organization. On the basis of the artistic traditions of ancient Rome and the former barbarian tribes, Romanesque and then brilliant Gothic art arose, and along with architecture and literature, all its other types developed - theater, music, sculpture, painting, literature. It was during this era that, for example, such masterpieces of literature as "The Song of Roland" and "The Romance of the Rose" were created. Of particular importance was the fact that during this period Western European scholars were able to read the writings of ancient Greek and Hellenistic philosophers, primarily Aristotle. On this basis, the great philosophical system Middle Ages - scholasticism.

The late Middle Ages continued the processes of formation of European culture, which began in the period of the classics. However, their course was far from smooth. In the XIV-XV centuries, Western Europe repeatedly experienced a great famine. Numerous epidemics, especially the bubonic plague (“Black Death”), also brought inexhaustible human casualties. The development of culture was greatly slowed down by the Hundred Years War. However, in the end, the cities were revived, crafts, agriculture and trade were established. People who survived pestilence and war were given the opportunity to arrange their lives better than in previous eras. The feudal nobility, the aristocrats, instead of castles began to build magnificent palaces for themselves both in their estates and in cities. The new rich from the "low" classes imitated them in this, creating everyday comfort and an appropriate lifestyle. Conditions arose for a new upsurge of spiritual life, science, philosophy, art, especially in northern Italy. This rise necessarily led to the so-called Renaissance or Renaissance.

Christian consciousness is the basis of the medieval mentality

The most important feature of medieval culture is the special role of Christian doctrine and christian church. In the context of the general decline of culture immediately after the destruction of the Roman Empire, only the church remained for many centuries the only social institution common to all countries, tribes and states of Europe. The church was the dominant political institution, but even more significant was the influence that the church had directly on the consciousness of the population. In the conditions of a difficult and meager life, against the background of extremely limited and most often unreliable knowledge about the world, Christianity offered people a coherent system of knowledge about the world, about its structure, about the forces and laws acting in it. Let us add to this the emotional appeal of Christianity with its warmth, universally significant preaching of love and all understandable norms of social coexistence (Decalogue), with romantic elation and ecstasy of the plot about the redeeming sacrifice, and finally, with the statement about the equality of all people without exception in the highest instance, so that at least approximately evaluate the contribution of Christianity to the worldview, to the picture of the world of medieval Europeans.

This picture of the world, which completely determined the mentality of the believing villagers and townspeople, was based mainly on the images and interpretations of the Bible. Researchers note that in the Middle Ages, the starting point for explaining the world was the complete, unconditional opposition of God and nature, Heaven and Earth, soul and body.

The medieval European was, of course, a deeply religious person. In his mind, the world was seen as a kind of arena of confrontation between the forces of heaven and hell, good and evil. At the same time, the consciousness of people was deeply magical, everyone was absolutely sure of the possibility of miracles and perceived everything that the Bible reported literally. According to the apt expression of S. Averintsev, the Bible was read and listened to in the Middle Ages in much the same way as we read fresh newspapers today.

In the very general plan the world was then seen in accordance with some hierarchical logic, as a symmetrical scheme, reminiscent of two pyramids folded at the base. The top of one of them, the top one, is God. Below are the tiers or levels of sacred characters: first the Apostles, the closest to God, then the figures that gradually move away from God and approach the earthly level - archangels, angels and similar heavenly beings. At some level, people are included in this hierarchy: first the pope and the cardinals, then the clergy of lower levels, below them the simple laity. Then even farther from God and closer to the earth, animals are placed, then plants and then - the earth itself, already completely inanimate. And then comes, as it were, a mirror reflection of the upper, earthly and heavenly hierarchy, but again in a different dimension and with a “minus” sign, in the world, as it were, underground, with the growth of evil and proximity to Satan. He is placed on top of this second, chthonic pyramid, acting as a being symmetrical to God, as if repeating him with an opposite sign (reflecting like a mirror) being. If God is the personification of Good and Love, then Satan is his opposite, the embodiment of Evil and Hatred.

The medieval European, including the upper strata of society, up to kings and emperors, was illiterate. The level of literacy and education even among the clergy in the parishes was appallingly low. Only by the end of the 15th century did the church realize the need to have educated personnel, began to open theological seminaries, etc. The level of education of the parishioners was generally minimal. The mass of the laity listened to semi-literate priests. At the same time, the Bible itself was forbidden for ordinary laity, its texts were considered too complex and inaccessible for direct perception of ordinary parishioners. Only priests were allowed to interpret it. However, their education and literacy was in the mass, as said, very low. Mass mediaeval culture is a bookless, “pre-Gutenberg” culture. She relied not on the printed word, but on oral sermons and exhortations. It existed through the mind of an illiterate person. It was a culture of prayers, fairy tales, myths, magic spells.

At the same time, the meaning of the word, written and especially sound, in medieval culture was unusually great. Prayers, perceived functionally as spells, sermons, biblical stories, magic formulas - all this also formed the medieval mentality. People are accustomed to intensely peer into the surrounding reality, perceiving it as a kind of text, as a system of symbols containing some higher meaning. These symbol-words had to be able to recognize and extract from them the divine meaning. This, in particular, explains many features of medieval artistic culture, designed to perceive in space just such a deeply religious and symbolic, verbally armed mentality. Even the painting there was first of all the revealed word, like the Bible itself. The word was universal, suited to everything, explained everything, hid behind all phenomena as their hidden meaning. Therefore, for the medieval consciousness, the medieval mentality, culture first of all expressed the meanings, the soul of a person, brought a person closer to God, as if transferred to another world, to a space different from earthly existence. And this space looked like it was described in the Bible, the lives of the saints, the writings of the church fathers and the sermons of the priests. Accordingly, the behavior of the medieval European, all his activities, was determined.

Scientific culture in the Middle Ages

The Christian Church in the Middle Ages was completely indifferent to Greek and, in general, to pagan science and philosophy. The main problem that the Church Fathers tried to solve was to master the knowledge of the "pagans", while defining the boundaries between reason and faith. Christianity was forced to compete with the mind of the pagans, such as the Hellenists, Romans, with Jewish learning. But in this rivalry, it had to remain strictly on a biblical basis. It may be recalled here that many of the Church Fathers had an education in the field of classical philosophy that was essentially non-Christian. The Church Fathers were well aware that the many rational and mystical systems contained in the works of pagan philosophers would greatly complicate the development of traditional Christian thinking and consciousness.

A partial solution to this problem was proposed in the 5th century by St. Augustine. However, the chaos that occurred in Europe as a result of the invasion of the Germanic tribes and the decline of the Western Roman Empire pushed back serious debates about the role and acceptability of pagan rational science in Christian society for seven centuries, and only in the X-XI centuries, after the conquest of Spain and Sicily by the Arabs, did interest in the development of ancient science revive. heritage. For the same reason, Christian culture was now capable of accepting the original works of Islamic scholars. The result was an important movement that included the collection of Greek and Arabic manuscripts, their translation into Latin, and commentary. The West received in this way not only the complete corpus of Aristotle's writings, but also the works of Euclid and Ptolemy.

Universities, which appeared in Europe from the 12th century, became centers of scientific research, helping to establish the unquestioned scientific authority of Aristotle. In the middle of the 13th century, Thomas Aquinas synthesized Aristotelian philosophy and Christian doctrine. He emphasized the harmony of reason and faith, thus strengthening the foundations of natural theology. But the Thomist synthesis did not go unanswered. In 1277, after the death of Aquinas, the Archbishop of Paris invalidated 219 of Thomas' statements contained in his writings. As a result, the nominalist doctrine was developed (W. Ockham). Nominalism, which sought to separate science from theology, became cornerstone in redefining the spheres of science and theology later, in the 17th century. More complete information about the philosophical culture of the European Middle Ages should be given in the course of philosophy. During the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, European scholars seriously touted the fundamental tenets of Aristotelian methodology and physics. The English Franciscans Robert Grosseteste and Roger Bacon introduced mathematical and experimental methods to the field of science, and contributed to the discussion about vision and the nature of light and color. Their Oxford followers introduced quantitative, reasoning and physical approach through his research on accelerated motion. Across the Channel, in Paris, Jean Buridan and others became the concept of momentum, while investing a number of bold ideas in astronomy that opened the door to the pantheism of Nicholas of Cusa.

Alchemy occupied an important place in the scientific culture of the European Middle Ages. Alchemy was devoted primarily to the search for a substance that could turn ordinary metals into gold or silver and serve as a means of indefinitely prolonging human life. Although its aims and means were highly dubious and most often illusory, alchemy was in many respects the forerunner of modern science, especially chemistry. The first reliable works of European alchemy that have come down to us belong to the English monk Roger Bacon and the German philosopher Albert the Great. They both believed in the possibility of transmuting lower metals into gold. This idea struck the imagination, the greed of many people, throughout the Middle Ages. They believed that gold is the most perfect metal, and the lower metals are less perfect than gold. Therefore, they tried to make or invent a substance called the philosopher's stone, which is more perfect than gold, and therefore can be used to improve the lower metals to the level of gold. Roger Bacon believed that gold dissolved in aqua regia was the elixir of life. Albertus Magnus was the greatest practical chemist of his time. The Russian scientist V. L. Rabinovich did a brilliant analysis of alchemy and showed that it was a typical product of medieval culture, combining a magical and mythological vision of the world with sober practicality and an experimental approach.

Perhaps the most paradoxical result of medieval scientific culture is the emergence on the basis of scholastic methods and irrational Christian dogma of new principles of knowledge and learning. Trying to find the harmony of faith and reason, to combine irrational dogmas and experimental methods, thinkers in monasteries and theological schools gradually created a fundamentally new way of organizing thinking - disciplinary. The most developed form of theoretical thinking of that time was theology.

It was theologians, discussing the problems of synthesis of pagan rational philosophy and Christian biblical principles, who groped for those forms of activity and transfer of knowledge that turned out to be the most effective and necessary for the emergence and development of modern science: the principles of teaching, evaluation, recognition of the truth, which are used in science today. “The dissertation, defense, dispute, title, citation network, scientific apparatus, explanation with contemporaries using supports - references to predecessors, priority, a ban on repetition-plagiarism - all this appeared in the process of reproduction of spiritual personnel, where the vow of celibacy forced the use of “foreign "For the Spiritual Profession of the Rising Generations".

The theology of medieval Europe, in search of a new explanation of the world, for the first time began to focus not on a simple reproduction of already known knowledge but on the creation of new conceptual schemes that could unite such different, practically incompatible systems of knowledge. This eventually led to the emergence of a new paradigm of thinking - forms, procedures, attitudes, ideas, assessments, with the help of which the participants in the discussions achieve mutual understanding. M. K. Petrov called this new paradigm a disciplinary (Ibid.). He showed that medieval Western European theology acquired all the characteristic features of future scientific disciplines. Among them - "the main set of disciplinary rules, procedures, requirements for the completed product, ways to reproduce disciplinary personnel." The pinnacle of these ways of reproducing personnel has become the university, the system in which all the above finds flourish and work. The university as a principle, as a specialized organization, can be considered the greatest invention of the Middle Ages. .

Artistic culture of medieval Europe.

Roman style.

The first independent, specifically European artistic style of medieval Europe was Romanesque, which characterized the art and architecture of Western Europe from about 1000 to the rise of the Gothic, in most regions until about the second half and the end of the 12th century, and in some even later. It arose as a result of the synthesis of the remains of the artistic culture of Rome and the barbarian tribes. At first it was the proto-Romanesque style.

At the end of the Proto-Roman period, elements Romanesque style mixed with the Byzantines, with the Middle East, especially the Syrians, who also came to Syria from Byzantium; with Germanic, with Celtic, with features of the styles of other northern tribes. Various combinations of these influences created many local styles in Western Europe, which received the common name Romanesque, meaning "in the manner of the Romans." Since the main number of surviving fundamentally important monuments of the Proto-Romanesque and Romanesque style are architectural structures: the various styles of this period often differ in architectural schools. Architecture V-VIII centuries is usually simple, with the exception of buildings in Ravenna, (Italy), erected according to Byzantine rules. Buildings were often created from elements removed from old Roman buildings, or decorated with them. In many regions, this style was a continuation of early Christian art. Round or polygonal cathedral churches, borrowed from Byzantine architecture, were built during the Proto-Roman period;

later they were built in Aquitaine in the south-west of France and in Scandinavia. The most famous and best-designed examples of this type are the Cathedral of San Vitalo of the Byzantine emperor Justinian in Ravenna (526-548) and the octagonal palace chapel built between 792 and 805 by Charlemagne in Ai-la-Capella (now Aachen, Germany), directly inspired by the Cathedral of San Vitalo. One of the creations of Carolingian architects was the westwork, a multi-storey entrance facade flanked by bell towers, which began to be attached to Christian basilicas. Westworks were the prototypes for the facades of giant Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals.

Important buildings were also constructed in the monastic style. Monasteries, a characteristic religious and social phenomenon of that era, required huge buildings that combined both the dwellings of monks and chapels, rooms for prayers and services, libraries, and workshops. Elaborate proto-Romanesque monastic complexes were erected at St. Gall (Switzerland), on the island of Reichenau (German side of Lake Constance) and at Monte Cassino (Italy) by Benedictine monks.

The outstanding achievement of the architects of the Romanesque period was the development of buildings with stone volts (arched, supporting structures). The main reason for the development of stone arches was the need to replace the flammable wooden ceilings of Proto-Romanesque buildings. The introduction of voltaic structures led to the general use of heavy walls and pillars.

Sculpture. Most Romanesque sculpture was integrated into church architecture and served both structural, constructive and aesthetic purposes. Therefore, it is difficult to talk about Romanesque sculpture without touching on church architecture. Small-sized sculpture of the Proto-Roman era made of bone, bronze, gold was made under the influence of Byzantine models. Other elements of numerous local styles were borrowed from the crafts of the Middle East, known for imported illustrated manuscripts, bone carvings, gold objects, ceramics, fabrics. Motifs derived from the arts of the migrating peoples were also important, such as grotesque figures, images of monsters, intertwining geometric patterns, especially in areas north of the Alps. Large-scale stone sculptural decorations only became common in Europe in the 12th century. In the French Romanesque cathedrals of Provence, Burgundy, Aquitaine, many figures were placed on the facades, and the statues on the columns emphasized the vertical supporting elements.

Painting. Existing examples of Romanesque painting include decorations on architectural monuments, such as columns with abstract ornaments, as well as wall decorations with images of hanging fabrics. Picturesque compositions, in particular narrative scenes based on biblical stories and from the life of saints, were also depicted on the wide surfaces of the walls. In these compositions, which predominantly follow Byzantine painting and mosaics, the figures are stylized and flat, so that they are perceived more as symbols than as realistic representations. Mosaic, just like painting, was mainly a Byzantine technique and was widely used in the architectural design of Italian Romanesque churches, especially in the Cathedral of St. Mark (Venice) and in the Sicilian churches in Cefalu and Montreal.

decorative arts . Proto-Romanesque artists reached the highest level in illustrating manuscripts. In England, an important school of manuscript illustration arose already in the 7th century in Holy Island (Lindisfarne). The works of this school, exhibited in the British Museum (London), are distinguished by the geometric interlacing of patterns in capital letters, frames, and whole pages, which are called carpet, are densely covered with them. Drawings of capital letters are often animated by grotesque figures of people, birds, monsters.

Regional schools of manuscript illustration in southern and eastern Europe developed different specific styles, as can be seen, for example, in a copy of the Apocalypse of Beata (Paris, National Library) made in the middle of the 11th century in the monastery of Saint-Sever in Northern France. At the beginning of the 12th century, the illustration of manuscripts in the northern countries acquired common features, just as the same happened at that time with sculpture. In Italy, the Byzantine influence continued to dominate both in miniature painting and in wall paintings and mosaics.

Proto-Romanesque and Romanesque metal processing- a widespread art form - were used mainly to create church utensils for religious rituals. Many of these works are still kept in the treasuries of large cathedrals outside of France; French cathedrals were robbed during the French Revolution. Other metalwork from this period is early Celtic filigree jewelry and silverware; late products of German goldsmiths and silver things inspired by imported Byzantine metal products, as well as wonderful enamels, especially cloisonné and champlevé, made in the areas of the Moselle and Rhine rivers. Two famous metalworkers were Roger of Helmarshausen, a German known for his bronzes, and the French enameller Godefroy de Claire.

The best-known example of a Romanesque textile work is an 11th-century embroidery called the Baia Tapestry. Other patterns have survived, such as church vestments and draperies, but the most valuable fabrics in Romanesque Europe were imported from the Byzantine Empire, Spain, and the Middle East and are not the product of local craftsmen.

Gothic art and architecture

In place of the Romanesque style, as cities flourished and social relations improved, a new style came - Gothic. Religious and secular buildings, sculpture, colored glass, illustrated manuscripts and other works of fine art began to be executed in this style in Europe during the second half of the Middle Ages.

Gothic art originated in France around 1140 and spread throughout Europe over the next century and continued to exist in Western Europe for most of the 15th century, and in some regions of Europe well into the 16th century. Originally, the word gothic was used by Italian Renaissance authors as a derogatory label for all forms of architecture and art of the Middle Ages, which were considered comparable only to the works of the Goth barbarians. Later use of the term "Gothic" was limited to the period of the late, high or classical Middle Ages, immediately following the Romanesque. Currently, the Gothic period is considered one of the most prominent in the history of European artistic culture.

The main representative and spokesman of the Gothic period was architecture. Although a huge number of Gothic monuments were secular, the Gothic style served primarily the church, the most powerful builder in the Middle Ages, which ensured the development of this new architecture for that time and achieved its fullest realization.

The aesthetic quality of Gothic architecture depends on its structural development: ribbed vaults became a characteristic feature of the Gothic style. Medieval churches had powerful stone vaults, which were very heavy. They sought to open, to push out the walls. This could lead to the collapse of the building. Therefore, the walls must be thick and heavy enough to support such vaults. At the beginning of the 12th century, masons developed ribbed vaults, which included slender stone arches arranged diagonally, transversely and longitudinally. The new vault, which was thinner, lighter and more versatile (because it could have many sides), solved many architectural problems. Although early Gothic churches allowed for a wide variety of forms, the construction of a series of large cathedrals in Northern France, beginning in the second half of the 12th century, took full advantage of the new Gothic vault. Cathedral architects have found that now the external bursting forces from the vaults are concentrated in narrow areas at the junctions of the ribs (ribs), and therefore they can be easily neutralized with the help of buttresses and external arches-flying buttresses. Consequently, the thick walls of Romanesque architecture could be replaced by thinner ones, which included extensive window openings, and the interiors received hitherto unparalleled lighting. In the construction business, therefore, there was a real revolution.

With the advent of the Gothic vault, both the design, the form, and the layout and interiors of the cathedrals changed. Gothic cathedrals acquired a general character of lightness, aspiration to the sky, became much more dynamic and expressive. The first of the great cathedrals was Notre Dame Cathedral (begun in 1163). In 1194, the foundation stone for the cathedral at Chartres is considered the beginning of the High Gothic period. The culmination of this era was the cathedral at Reims (begun in 1210). Rather cold and all-conquering in its finely balanced proportions, Reims Cathedral represents a moment of classical calm and serenity in the evolution of Gothic cathedrals. Openwork partitions, a characteristic feature of late Gothic architecture, were the invention of the first architect of Reims Cathedral. Fundamentally new interior solutions were found by the author of the cathedral in Bourges (begun in 1195). The influence of French Gothic quickly spread throughout Europe: Spain, Germany, England. In Italy it was not so strong.

Sculpture. Following Romanesque traditions, in numerous niches on the facades of French Gothic cathedrals, a huge number of figures carved from stone, personifying the dogmas and beliefs of the Catholic Church, were placed as decorations. Gothic sculpture in the 12th and early 13th centuries was predominantly architectural in character. The largest and most important figures were placed in openings on both sides of the entrance. Because they were attached to columns, they were known as pillar statues. Along with column statues, free-standing monumental statues were widespread, an art form unknown in Western Europe since Roman times. The earliest surviving statues are columns in the western portal of Chartres Cathedral. They were still in the old pre-Gothic cathedral and date from about 1155. The slender, cylindrical figures follow the shape of the columns to which they were attached. They are executed in a cold, strict, linear Romanesque style, which nevertheless gives the figures an impressive character of purposeful spirituality.

From 1180, the Romanesque stylization begins to move into a new one, when the statues acquire a sense of grace, sinuosity and freedom of movement. This so-called classic style culminates in the first decades of the 13th century in a large series of sculptures on the portals of the north and south transepts of Chartres Cathedral.

The emergence of naturalism. Starting around 1210 on the Coronation Portal of Notre Dame Cathedral and after 1225 on the West Portal of Amiens Cathedral, the rippling, classical features of the surfaces begin to give way to more austere volumes. At the statues of the Reims Cathedral and in the interior of the Saint-Chapelle Cathedral, exaggerated smiles, emphasized almond-shaped eyes, curls arranged in tufts on small heads and mannered poses produce a paradoxical impression of a synthesis of naturalistic forms, delicate affectation and subtle spirituality.

Medieval music and theater

medieval music is predominantly spiritual in nature and is a necessary component of the Catholic Mass. At the same time, already in the early Middle Ages, secular music begins to take shape.

The first important form of secular music was the songs of the troubadours in Provençal. Since the 11th century, troubadour songs have been influential in many other countries for more than 200 years, especially in northern France. The pinnacle of troubadour art was reached around 1200 by Bernard de Ventadorne, Giraud de Bornel Folke de Marseille. Bernard is famous for his three lyrics about unrequited love. Some of the verse forms anticipate the 14th century ballad with its three stanzas of 7 or 8 lines. Others talk about the crusaders or discuss any love trifles. Pastorals in numerous stanzas convey banal stories about knights and shepherdesses. Dance songs such as rondo and virelai are also in their repertoire. All of this monophonic music could sometimes have string or wind instrument accompaniment. This was the case until the 14th century, when secular music became polyphonic.

Medieval theatre. Ironically, theater in the form of liturgical drama was revived in Europe by the Roman Catholic Church. As the church sought ways to expand its influence, it often adapted pagan and folk festivals, many of which contained theatrical elements. In the 10th century, many church holidays provided the opportunity for dramatization: generally speaking, the Mass itself is nothing more than a drama.

Certain holidays were famous for their theatricality, such as the procession to the church on Palm Sunday. Antiphonal or question-and-answer, chants, masses and canonical chorales are dialogues. In the 9th century, antiphonal chimes, known as tropes, were incorporated into the complex musical elements of the mass. The three-part tropes (dialogue between the three Marys and the angels at the tomb of Christ) by an unknown author have been considered since about 925 as the source of liturgical drama. In 970, a record of instructions or manuals for this little drama appeared, including elements of costume and gestures.

Religious drama or miraculous plays. Over the next two hundred years, the liturgical drama slowly developed, incorporating various biblical stories enacted by priests or choir boys. At first, church vestments and existing architectural details of churches were used as costumes and decorations, but more ceremonial decorations were soon invented. As the liturgical drama developed, many biblical themes were sequentially presented, usually depicting scenes from the creation of the world to the crucifixion of Christ. These plays were called differently - passions (Passion), Miracles (Miracles), holy plays. Appropriate decorations were raised around the church nave, usually with heaven in the altar and with the Hell's Mouth - an elaborate monster's head with gaping mouth, representing the entrance to hell - at the opposite end of the nave. Therefore, all the scenes of the play could be presented simultaneously, and the participants in the action moved around the church from one place to another, depending on the scenes.

The plays, obviously, consisted of episodes, covered literally millennium periods, transferred the action to the most diverse places and represented the atmosphere and spirit of different times, as well as allegories. Unlike ancient Greek tragedy, which clearly focused on creating the prerequisites and conditions for catharsis, medieval drama did not always show conflicts and tension. Its purpose was to dramatize the salvation of the human race.

Although the church supported the early liturgical drama in its didactic capacity, entertainment and spectacle increased and began to predominate, and the church began to express suspicion of the drama. Not wanting to lose the useful effects of the theater, the church compromised by bringing dramatic performances from the walls of the church churches themselves. The same material design began to be recreated in the market squares of cities. While retaining its religious content and focus, the drama has become much more secular in its staged character.

Medieval secular drama. In the 14th century, theatrical productions were associated with the feast of Corpus Christi and developed into cycles that included up to 40 plays. Some scholars believe that these cycles developed independently, albeit simultaneously with the liturgical drama. They were presented to the community for a whole four to five year period. Each production could last one or two days and was staged once a month. The staging of each play was financed by some workshop or trade guild, and usually they tried to somehow connect the specialization of the workshop with the subject of the play - for example, the shipbuilders' workshop could stage a play about Noah. Because the performers were often illiterate amateurs, the anonymous playwrights tended to write in easy-to-remember primitive verse. In accordance with the medieval worldview, historical accuracy was often ignored, and the logic of cause and effect was not always respected.

Realism was used selectively in productions. The plays are full of anachronisms, references to purely local circumstances known only to contemporaries; the realities of time and place received only minimal attention. Costumes, furnishings and utensils were entirely modern (medieval European). Something could be depicted with extreme accuracy - there are reports of how actors almost died due to a too realistic performance of a crucifixion or hanging, and of actors who, playing the devil, literally burned down. On the other hand, the episode with the retreat of the waters of the Red Sea could be indicated by a simple throwing of a red cloth over the Egyptian pursuers, as a sign that the sea had swallowed them up.

The free mixture of the real and the symbolic did not interfere with medieval perception. Spectacles and folk plays were staged wherever possible, and the infernal mouth was usually a favorite object of exertion for mechanical marvels and pyrotechnics. Despite the religious content of the cycles, they increasingly became entertainment. Three main formats were used. In England, carnival carts were the most common. The old church decorations were replaced by elaborate moving scenes, such as small modern ships that moved from place to place in the city. Spectators gathered in each such place: the performers worked on the platforms of the wagons, or on the stages built on the streets. They did the same in Spain. In France, synchronized productions were used - various scenery rose one after another along the sides of a long, raised platform in front of the assembled spectators. Finally, again in England, plays were sometimes staged "round" - on a circular platform, with scenery placed around the circumference of the arena and spectators sitting or standing between the scenery.

Moral plays. In the same period, folk plays, secular farces, and pastorals appeared, mostly by anonymous authors, who stubbornly retained the character of worldly entertainment. All this influenced the evolution of morality plays in the 15th century. Though written on themes of Christian theology with related characters, the moralites were not like cycles in that they did not represent episodes from the Bible. They were allegorical, self-contained dramas and performed by professionals such as minstrels or jugglers. Plays such as "Everyman" were usually treated life path individual. Among the allegorical characters were such figures as Death, Gluttony, Good Deeds and other vices and virtues.

These plays are sometimes difficult and boring for modern perception: the rhymes of the verses are repeated, they are in the nature of improvisation, the plays are two or three times longer than Shakespeare's dramas, and the morality is announced straightforwardly and instructively. However, the performers, by inserting music and action into performances and using the comic possibilities of numerous characters of vices and demons, created a form of folk drama.

Conclusion

So, the Middle Ages in Western Europe is a time of intense spiritual life, complex and difficult searches for worldview structures that could synthesize historical experience and knowledge of previous millennia. In this era, people were able to enter a new path of cultural development, different from what they knew in previous times. Trying to reconcile faith and reason, building a picture of the world based on the knowledge available to them and with the help of Christian dogmatism, the culture of the Middle Ages created new artistic styles, a new urban lifestyle, a new economy, and prepared people's minds for the use of mechanical devices and technology. Contrary to the opinion of the thinkers of the Italian Renaissance, the Middle Ages left us the most important achievements of spiritual culture, including the institutions of scientific knowledge and education. Among them, first of all, the university as a principle should be named. In addition, a new paradigm of thinking arose, a disciplinary structure of cognition without which modern science would be impossible, people got the opportunity to think and cognize the world much more effectively than before. Even the fantastic recipes of the alchemists played their part in this process of improving the spiritual means of thinking, the general level of culture.

The image proposed by M.K. Petrov seems to be the most successful: he compared medieval culture with scaffolding. It is impossible to build a building without them. But when the building is completed, the scaffolding is removed, and one can only guess what it looked like and how it was arranged. Medieval culture in relation to our modern culture played precisely the role of such forests:

without it, Western culture would not have arisen, although medieval culture itself was largely unlike it. Therefore, one must understand the historical reason for such a strange name for this long and important era development of European culture.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

· Gurevich A. Ya. Medieval world; silent majority culture. M., 1990.

· Petrov MK Socio-cultural foundations for the development of modern science. M., 1992.

Radugin A.A. Culturology: textbook. M., 1999.

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

FEDERAL AGENCY FOR EDUCATION OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

SEI HPE "SYKTYVKAR STATE UNIVERSITY"

VORKUTA BRANCH

TEST

discipline: Culturology

on the topic: "Peculiarities of the culture of the Middle Ages"

Completed by: 1st year student

group number 4159

Gorelova A.V.

Checked: k. f. PhD, Associate Professor

Vakhnina E. G.

Introduction 3

1. Christian consciousness is the basis of the medieval mentality 5

2.Early Middle Ages 8

2.1. Merovingian Art 9

2.2. "Carolingian Renaissance" 9

3. High Middle Ages 10

3.1 Literature 10

3.1.1. Heroic epic 11

3.1.2. Knight literature 12

3.1.3. Urban Literature of the Middle Ages 13

3.2. Music 16

3.3. Theater 17

3.3.1. Religious Drama or Wonder Plays 17

3.3.2. Medieval Secular Drama 18

3.3.3. Morality plays 19

3.4 Great Architectural Styles 20

3.4.1. Romanesque 20

3.4.2. Gothic style 22

4. Late Middle Ages 25

Conclusion 26

Bibliography 27

Application 28

INTRODUCTION

The Middle Ages (Middle Ages) - the era of domination in Western and Central Europe of the feudal economic and political system and the Christian religious worldview, which came after the collapse of antiquity. Replaced by Renaissance. Covers the period from the 4th to the 14th centuries. In some regions, it was preserved even at a much later time. The Middle Ages are conventionally divided into the Early Middle Ages (IV-1st half of the 10th century), the High Middle Ages (2nd half of the 10th-13th centuries) and the Late Middle Ages (XIV-XV centuries).

The beginning of the Middle Ages is most often considered the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476. However, some historians suggested that the Edict of Milan of 313, which meant the end of the persecution of Christianity in the Roman Empire, was considered the beginning of the Middle Ages. Christianity became the defining cultural trend for the eastern part of the Roman Empire - Byzantium, and after a few centuries it began to dominate in the states of the barbarian tribes that formed on the territory of the Western Roman Empire.

Regarding the end of the Middle Ages, historians have no consensus. It was proposed to consider as such: the fall of Constantinople (1453), the discovery of America (1492), the beginning of the Reformation (1517), the beginning of the English Revolution (1640) or the beginning of the Great French Revolution (1789).

The term "Middle Ages" (lat. medium ævum) was first introduced by the Italian humanist Flavio Biondo in Decades of History since the Decline of the Roman Empire (1483). Before Biondo, the dominant term for the period from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Renaissance was the concept of "Dark Ages" introduced by Petrarch, which in modern historiography means a narrower period of time.

In the narrow sense of the word, the term "Middle Ages" applies only to the Western European Middle Ages. In this case, this term implies a number of specific features of religious, economic and political life: the feudal system of land use (feudal landowners and semi-dependent peasants), the system of vassalage (the relations of seigneur and vassal connecting feudal lords), the unconditional dominance of the Church in religious life, the political power of the Church ( the inquisition, church courts, the existence of feudal bishops), the ideals of monasticism and chivalry (a combination of the spiritual practice of ascetic self-improvement and altruistic service to society), the flowering of medieval architecture - Romanesque and Gothic.

Many modern states arose precisely in the Middle Ages: England, Spain, Poland, Russia, France, etc.

The object of study of this work is the Middle Ages, the subject of study is culture in the Middle Ages. The purpose of the work is to study the features of the culture of the Middle Ages. The goal is to solve the following tasks:

● study of the role of the church and Christian doctrine

● study of the three periods of the Middle Ages

● identification of cultural characteristics at each stage and in general

1. CHRISTIAN CONSCIOUSNESS IS THE BASIS OF THE MEDIEVAL MENTALITY

The entire cultural life of European society of this period was largely determined by Christianity.

Monasticism played a huge role in the life of society at that time: the monks took upon themselves the obligations of “leaving the world”, celibacy, and renunciation of property. However, already in the 6th century, monasteries turned into strong, often very rich centers, owning movable and immovable property. Many monasteries were centers of education and culture.

However, one should not think that the formation of the Christian religion in the countries of Western Europe proceeded smoothly, without difficulties and confrontation in the minds of people with old pagan beliefs.

The population was traditionally devoted to pagan cults, and sermons and descriptions of the lives of the saints were not enough to convert them to the true faith. They converted to a new religion with the help of state power. However, even a long time after the official recognition of a single religion, the clergy had to deal with persistent remnants of paganism among the peasantry.

The church destroyed idols, forbade worshiping gods and making sacrifices, arranging pagan holidays and rituals. Severe punishments threatened those who practiced divination, divination, spells, or simply believed in them.

The formation of the process of Christianization was one of the sources of sharp clashes, since the concept of people's freedom was often associated with the old faith among the people, while the connection of the Christian church with state power and oppression stood out quite clearly.

In the minds of the masses of the rural population, regardless of belief in certain gods, attitudes of behavior were preserved in which people felt themselves directly included in the cycle of natural phenomena.

In the most general terms, the world was then seen in accordance with a certain hierarchical ladder, as a symmetrical scheme, reminiscent of two pyramids folded at the base. The top of one of them, the top one, is God. Below are the tiers or levels of sacred characters: first the Apostles, the closest to God, then the figures that gradually move away from God and approach the earthly level - archangels, angels and similar heavenly beings. At some level, people are included in this hierarchy: first the pope and the cardinals, then the clergy of lower levels, below them the simple laity. Then even farther from God and closer to the earth, animals are placed, then plants and then - the earth itself, already completely inanimate. And then comes, as it were, a mirror reflection of the upper, earthly and heavenly hierarchy, but again in a different dimension and with a “minus” sign, in the world, as it were, underground, with the growth of evil and proximity to Satan. He is placed on top of this second, atonic pyramid, acting as a being symmetrical to God, as if repeating him with an opposite sign (reflecting like a mirror) being. If God is the personification of Good and Love, then Satan is his opposite, the embodiment of Evil and Hatred.

The medieval European, including the upper strata of society, up to kings and emperors, was illiterate. The level of literacy and education even among the clergy in the parishes was appallingly low. Only by the end of the 15th century did the church realize the need to have educated personnel, began to open theological seminaries, etc. The level of education of the parishioners was generally minimal. The mass of the laity listened to semi-literate priests. At the same time, the Bible itself was forbidden for ordinary laity, its texts were considered too complex and inaccessible for direct perception of ordinary parishioners. Only priests were allowed to interpret it. However, their education and literacy were, as said, very low in the mass. Mass mediaeval culture is a bookless, “pre-Gutenberg” culture. She relied not on the printed word, but on oral sermons and exhortations. It existed through the mind of an illiterate person. It was a culture of prayers, fairy tales, myths, magic spells.

2. EARLY MIDDLE AGES

The Early Middle Ages in Europe is the period from the end of the 4th century. until the middle of the tenth century. In general, the early Middle Ages was a time of deep decline in European civilization compared with the ancient era. This decline was expressed in the dominance of subsistence farming, in the fall of handicraft production and, accordingly, urban life, in the destruction of ancient culture under the onslaught of the non-literate pagan world. In Europe during this period, stormy and very important processes took place, such as the invasion of the barbarians, which ended with the fall of the Roman Empire. Barbarians settled on the lands of the former empire, assimilated with its population, creating a new community of Western Europe.

Federal Agency for Education of the Russian Federation

State Institution of Higher Professional Education

"South Ural State University"

Culture of Medieval Europe

TEST

By discipline (specialization) "Culturology"

Chelyabinsk 2014

Introduction

Periodization of the culture of the Middle Ages

Christianity as the basis of the worldview of the Middle Ages

attitude medieval man

Medieval art. Romantic and Gothic style

Conclusion

Bibliographic list

Application

Introduction

The medieval culture of Western Europe is the era of great spiritual and socio-cultural conquests in the history of all mankind. The Middle Ages covers from the 5th to the 17th centuries. The term "Middle Ages" was assigned to this period due to the fact that it occupies an intermediate place between Antiquity and Modern times.

The formation of medieval culture took place as a result of a dramatic and contradictory process of the collision of two cultures - ancient and barbarian, accompanied, on the one hand, by violence, the destruction of ancient cities, the loss of outstanding achievements of ancient culture, on the other hand, by the interaction and gradual merging of Roman and barbarian cultures.

Medieval culture differs from many previous and subsequent eras in the special tension of spiritual life both in the sphere of the ideal, due, and in the realm of the real, practical. Despite the strong discrepancy between the ideal and the real, the very social and everyday life of people in the Middle Ages was an attempt, a desire to embody Christian ideals in practical activities.

The spiritual life of the Middle Ages is usually described through the dominant religion at that time - Christianity. The picture of the world of medieval culture is defined as God-centric. This is due to the fact that the absolute value is God.

The culture of the Middle Ages in Western Europe marked the beginning of a new direction in the history of civilization - the establishment of Christianity not only as a religious doctrine, but also as a new worldview and attitude, which significantly influenced all subsequent cultural epochs.

Thanks to the spiritual and absolutely positive understanding of God, a person acquires special significance in the religious picture of the world. Man - the image of God, the greatest value after God, occupies a dominant place on Earth. The main thing in a person is the soul. One of the outstanding achievements of the Christian religion is the gift of free will to man, that is, the right to choose between good and evil, God and the devil.

The culture of medieval Europe is the creation of new peoples, who again established their national existence on the ruins of ancient civilization, but mainly in its specifically Roman aspect. Art, which arose in the Middle Ages and reached its greatest flowering in the Renaissance, marks a huge contribution to the culture of all mankind.

Medieval culture, despite its apparent lightness and "recognizability", is quite complex. An extremely simplified and erroneous assessment of the Middle Ages as a gloomy millennium of universal savagery, the decline of culture, the triumph of ignorance and all kinds of prejudices prevails. Less often - the idealization of this culture as a time of genuine triumph of nobility. It is clear that the reason for such categoricalness is both the complexity of the problems of medieval culture itself, and a superficial acquaintance with this important stage in the development of European culture, which determines the relevance of the disclosure of the topic.

The purpose of the work: to show the features of the medieval culture of Europe.

To reveal the specifics and uniqueness of medieval culture.

To study a characteristic feature of medieval culture - differentiation into socially opposite types. 3.Characterize Christianity as the core of medieval culture.

1. Periodization of the culture of the Middle Ages

Culturologists call the Middle Ages a long period in the history of Western Europe between Antiquity and New Time. This period covers more than a millennium from the 5th to the 15th centuries. The millennial period of the Middle Ages is usually divided into at least three stages.

Early Middle Ages, (from the X - XI centuries);

High (Classical) Middle Ages. From XI - XIV centuries;

Late Middle Ages, XIV - XV centuries.

At the same time, the new Western Europeans, as a rule, accepted Christianity, which in Rome by the end of its existence was the state religion. Christianity in its various forms gradually supplanted pagan beliefs throughout the territory of the Roman Empire, and this process did not stop after the fall of the empire. This is the second most important historical process that determined the face of the early Middle Ages in Western Europe.

The third significant process was the formation on the territory

the former Roman Empire of new state formations created by the same "barbarians". Numerous Frankish, Germanic, Gothic and other tribes were in fact not so wild. Most of them already had the beginnings of statehood, owned crafts, including agriculture and metallurgy, and were organized on the principles of military democracy. Tribal leaders began to proclaim themselves kings, dukes, etc., constantly fighting with each other and subjugating

own weaker neighbors. On Christmas Day 800, Charlemagne, King of the Franks, was crowned Catholic in Rome and Emperor of the entire European west. Later (900) the Holy Roman Empire broke up into countless duchies, counties, margraviates, bishoprics, abbeys, and other destinies. Their rulers behaved like completely sovereign masters, not considering it necessary to obey any emperors or kings. However, the processes of formation of state formations continued in subsequent periods. A characteristic feature of life in the early Middle Ages was the constant robbery and devastation to which the inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire were subjected. And these robberies and raids significantly slowed down economic and cultural development.

During the classical or high Middle Ages, Western Europe began to overcome these difficulties and revive. Since the 10th century, cooperation under the laws of feudalism has allowed the creation of larger state structures and the collection of sufficiently strong armies. Thanks to this, it was possible to stop the invasions, significantly limit the robberies, and then gradually go on the offensive. In 1024, the crusaders took the Eastern Roman Empire from the Byzantines, and in 1099 they seized the Holy Land from the Muslims. True, in 1291 both were lost again. However, the Moors were expelled from Spain forever. Eventually, Western Christians won dominion over the Mediterranean Sea and its islands. Numerous missionaries brought Christianity to the kingdoms of Scandinavia, Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, so that these states entered the orbit of Western culture.

The relative stability that followed made it possible for the rapid rise of cities and the pan-European economy. Life in Western Europe has changed a lot, society was rapidly losing the features of barbarism, spiritual life flourished in the cities. In general, European society has become much richer and more civilized than during the ancient Roman Empire. An outstanding role in this was played by the Christian Church, which also developed, improved its teaching and organization. On the base artistic traditions Ancient Rome and the former barbarian tribes arose Romanesque, and then brilliant Gothic art, and along with architecture and literature, all its other types developed - theater, music, sculpture, painting, literature. It was during this era that, for example, such masterpieces of literature as "The Song of Roland" and "The Romance of the Rose" were created. Of particular importance was the fact that during this period Western European scholars were able to read the writings of ancient Greek and Hellenistic philosophers, primarily Aristotle. On this basis, the great philosophical system of the Middle Ages, scholasticism, was born and grew.

The late Middle Ages continued the processes of formation of European culture, which began in the period of the classics. However, their course was far from smooth. In the XIV-XV centuries, Western Europe repeatedly experienced a great famine. Numerous epidemics, especially the bubonic plague (“Black Death”), also brought inexhaustible human casualties. The development of culture was greatly slowed down by the Hundred Years War. However, in the end, the cities were revived, crafts, agriculture and trade were established. People who survived pestilence and war were given the opportunity to arrange their lives better than in previous eras. The feudal nobility, the aristocrats, instead of castles began to build magnificent palaces for themselves, both in their estates and in cities. The new rich from the "low" classes imitated them in this, creating everyday comfort and an appropriate lifestyle. Conditions arose for a new upsurge of spiritual life, science, philosophy, art, especially in northern Italy. This rise necessarily led to the so-called Renaissance or Renaissance.

2. Christianity as the basis of the worldview of the Middle Ages

The most important feature of medieval culture is the special role of Christian doctrine and the Christian church. In the context of the general decline of culture immediately after the destruction of the Roman Empire, only the church remained for many centuries the only social institution common to all countries, tribes and states of Europe. The church was the dominant political institution, but even more significant was the influence that the church had directly on the consciousness of the population. In the conditions of a difficult and meager life, against the background of extremely limited and most often unreliable knowledge about the world, Christianity offered people a coherent system of knowledge about the world, about its structure, about the forces and laws operating in it. The emotional appeal of Christianity with its warmth, universally significant preaching of love and all understandable norms of social community, with romantic elation and ecstasy of the plot about the atoning sacrifice, and finally, with the statement about the equality of all people without exception in the highest instance, in order to at least approximately evaluate the contribution of Christianity into the worldview, into the picture of the world of medieval Europeans.

According to the successful expression of S. Averintsev, the Bible was read and listened to in the Middle Ages in much the same way as we read fresh newspapers today.

In the most general terms, the world was then seen in accordance with some hierarchical logic, as a symmetrical scheme resembling two pyramids folded at the base. The top of one of them, the top one, is God. Below are the tiers or levels of sacred characters: first the Apostles, the closest to God, then the figures that gradually move away from God and approach the earthly level - archangels, angels and similar heavenly beings. At some level, people are included in this hierarchy: first the pope and the cardinals, then the clergy of lower levels, below them the simple laity. Then even farther from God and closer to the earth, animals are placed, then plants and then - the earth itself, already completely inanimate. And then it goes like mirror reflection of the upper, earthly and heavenly hierarchies, but again in a different dimension and with a minus sign, in the world, as it were, underground, according to the growth of evil and proximity to Satan. He is placed on top of this second, tonic pyramid, acting as a being symmetrical to God, as if repeating him with an opposite sign (reflecting like a mirror). If God is the personification of Good and Love, then Satan is his opposite, the embodiment of Evil and Hatred.

only clergy. However, their education and literacy were, as said, very low in the mass. Mass mediaeval culture is a bookless, “pre-Gutenberg” culture. She relied not on the printed word, but on oral sermons and exhortations. It existed through the mind of an illiterate person. It was a culture of prayers, fairy tales, myths, magic spells.

Thus, for the medieval consciousness, the medieval mentality, culture, first of all, expressed the meanings, the soul of a person, brought a person closer to God, as if transferred to another world, to a space different from earthly existence. And this space looked like it was described in the Bible, the lives of the saints, the writings of the church fathers and the sermons of the priests. Accordingly, the behavior of the medieval European, all his activities, was determined.

3. World attitude of medieval man

The attitude of the world is formed on the basis of attitude and world outlook. Attitude of the world - a set of value attitudes of a person on certain life issues. The attitude of the world has such features as subjectivity and discreteness. The world relation of a human being is conceptually difficult to define, since, like any other relation, it is “not a thing and not a property, but that through which the properties of a thing receive their appearance.” The relation of the world arises and is carried out as a process and result of revealing various individual properties of an integral human being, his essential forces and their realization in accordance with the specifics of the fragments of the World accessible to him. The peculiarity of the world relationship lies in its predominant conjugation with the spheres of human existence. Therefore, it makes sense to highlight the somacentric worldview that is formed in a person who clearly gives priority to the realities of the natural sphere of his existence. Accordingly, if the social sphere has a dominant role, then a person’s attitude to the world will be personacentric, but if the spiritual sphere comes to the fore, then his attitude to the world will certainly reveal a spiritualistic character.

The worldview, the vision of the world of a person of an agrarian society by nature, changed incomparably more slowly than the culture of educated people. It changed, but the rhythms of change were completely different. One gets the impression that the dynamics of the “top”, elite forms of spiritual life were far ahead of the changes “in depth”. The picture of the world of medieval man was not monolithic - it was differentiated depending on the position of this or that stratum of society.

The Christian religion has determined the way of world relations in the West and in the East. Religious worldview was organized by works of art. The concept of "world" for the Middle Ages was revealed exclusively as "God". And the concept of "man" was revealed as "believer in God", namely "Christian". The Middle Ages is the "golden age" of the Christian self-consciousness of the individual, the era when Christianity fully realized the necessary reunification of the human and absolute principles. In the Middle Ages, Christianity was not only a cult, but also a system of law, and political doctrine, and moral teaching, and philosophy. Christ acted as a standard for medieval man; Every Christian was busy building Christ in himself.

The era of the early Middle Ages was marked by the process of active Christianization of the population. The entire space of human life was built as elements of a cult, and a cult in the broadest sense of the word: life was understood as a constant service, a constant stay in contact with its master - the Lord God.

Medieval world consciousness was organized extremely harmoniously; each type of activity was subject to a hierarchical order. The Church, as a mediator, played a leading role in the relationship between the human and the divine. It was a system of reference intermediaries organized into a hierarchy represented by a ladder. "Ladder" in the culture of the Middle Ages appears as a philosophical category. The ladder is a symbol of the descent of the Divine into the earthly world. human forms and the reverse, reciprocal ascent of man in his spirit. The difference between the religious models of Catholicism and Orthodoxy lies in the different dominant movement along this ladder.

The era of the Renaissance - Renaissance (the term was introduced in the 16th century by Giorgio Vasari) is a period in the cultural and ideological development of the countries of Western and Central Europe, a transitional period from medieval culture to the culture of the New Age. The emergence of machine production, the improvement of tools and the continuing division of manufacturing labor, the spread of printing, geographical discoveries- all this has changed people's ideas about the world and about themselves. In the humanistic worldview of people, a cheerful free-thinking is affirmed. In the sciences, interest in the fate and capabilities of a person will prevail, and in ethical concepts, his right to happiness is justified. The founder of Lutheranism M.L. King proclaims that all people are equally endowed with reason. A person begins to realize that he was not created for God, that in his deeds he is free and great, that there are no barriers to his mind.

Scientists of this period considered their main task restoration of ancient values. However, only that and in such a way that was consonant with the new way of life and the intellectual atmosphere conditioned by it was “revived”. In this regard, the ideal of the “universal man” was affirmed, which was believed not only by thinkers, but also by many rulers of Europe, who gathered the outstanding minds of the era under their banners (for example, in Florence at the Medici court, the sculptor and painter Michelangelo and architect Alberti worked).

The new attitude was reflected in the desire to take a fresh look at the soul - the central link in any scientific system about man. At the first lectures at universities, students asked teachers: “Tell me about the soul,” which was a kind of “litmus test”, a characteristic of the worldview, scientific and pedagogical potential of the teacher.

The problems of psychological research were also peculiar: the dependence of man on the constellation of stars; the connection between the abundance of bile and mood; the reflection of spiritual qualities in facial expressions, etc. Drawing a conclusion from his observations, Juan Huart in 1575 writes that the composition of the body and appearance with regular accuracy corresponds to the spiritual characteristics of each person. Such problems and conclusions reflected the need to free the science of the soul from the old medieval stereotypes.

Thus, the new era brought to life new ideas about the nature of man and his mental world, gave rise to titans in the power of thought, passion and character.

Cultural differentiation: the culture of the clergy, the aristocracy and the "silent majority"

culture medieval clergy

With the formation of centralized states, the formation of a new worldview, a new social culture, estates are formed that make up the structure of medieval society - the clergy, the nobility and other inhabitants, later called the "third estate", "the people".

The clergy was considered the highest class, it was divided into white priesthood - and black - monasticism. He was in charge of "heavenly affairs", caring for faith and spiritual life. It was precisely this, especially monasticism, that most fully embodied Christian ideals and values. However, it was also far from unity, as evidenced by the differences in the understanding of Christianity between the orders that existed in monasticism. Benedict of Nursia, the founder of the Benedictine Order, opposed the extremes of hermitage, abstinence and asceticism, was quite tolerant of property and wealth, highly valued physical labor, especially agriculture and gardening, believing that the monastic community should not only fully provide itself with everything necessary, but also to help in this entire district, showing an example of active Christian mercy. Some communities of this order highly valued education, encouraged not only physical, but also mental labor, in particular the development of agronomic and medical knowledge.

On the contrary, Francis of Assisi - the founder of the Franciscan order, the order of mendicant monks - called for extreme asceticism, preached complete, holy poverty, because the possession of any property requires its protection, i.e. the use of force, and this is contrary to the moral principles of Christianity. He saw the ideal of complete poverty and carelessness in the life of birds.

The second most important layer was the aristocracy, which acted mainly in the form of chivalry. The aristocracy was in charge of "earthly affairs", and above all, the state tasks of preserving and strengthening peace, protecting the people from oppression, maintaining faith and the Church, etc. Although the culture of this layer is closely related to Christianity, it differs significantly from the culture of the clergy.

Like monastic orders, there were orders of chivalry in the Middle Ages. One of the main tasks facing them was the struggle for the faith, which more than once took the form of crusades. The knights also had other duties, in one way or another related to faith.

However, a significant part of knightly ideals, norms and values were secular. For a knight, such virtues as strength, courage, generosity and nobility were considered mandatory. He had to strive for glory, doing for this feats of arms or achieving success in jousting tournaments. External physical beauty was also required of him, which was at odds with Christian disdain for the body. The main knightly virtues were honor, fidelity to duty and noble love for the Beautiful Lady. Love for the Lady assumed refined aesthetic forms, but it was not at all platonic, which was also condemned by the Church and the clergy.

The lowest layer of the medieval society of the “silent majority” was the third estate, which included peasants, artisans, merchant and usurious bourgeoisie. The culture of this class also had a unique originality, which sharply distinguished it from the culture of the upper classes. It was in it that elements of barbarian paganism and idolatry were preserved for the longest time.

Simple people were not too scrupulous in observing strict Christian frameworks, quite often they mixed the "divine" with the "human". They knew how to sincerely and carelessly rejoice and have fun, giving it all their soul and body. The common people created a special culture of laughter, the originality of which was especially pronounced during folk holidays and carnivals, when the seething streams of general fun, jokes and games, explosions of laughter leave no room for something official, serious and lofty.

Thus, the dominance of religion did not make the culture perfectly homogeneous. On the contrary, one of the important features of medieval culture is precisely the emergence in it of quite definite subcultures caused by the strict division of society into three estates: the clergy, the feudal aristocracy, and the third estate of the “silent majority”.

Medieval art. Romantic and Gothic style

Along with religion, other areas of spiritual culture existed and developed in the Middle Ages, including philosophy and science. Theology, or theology, was the highest medieval science. It was theology that possessed the truth that rested on Divine Revelation.

The beginning of the mature period of the Middle Ages in the 10th century turned out to be extremely difficult and difficult, which was caused by the invasions of the Hungarians, Saracens and especially the Normans. Therefore, the emerging new states experienced a deep crisis and decline. Art was in the same situation. However, by the end of the X century. the situation is gradually normalizing, feudal relations are finally winning, and in all spheres of life, including art, there is a revival and upsurge.

In the XI-XII centuries. the role of monasteries, which become the main centers of culture, increases significantly. It is under them that schools, libraries and book workshops are created. Monasteries are the main customers of works of art. Therefore, the entire culture and art of these centuries is sometimes called monastic. In general, the stage of the new upsurge of art received the conditional name of the "Roman period". It falls on the XI-XII centuries, although in Italy and Germany it also catches the XIII century, and in France in the second half of the XII century. Gothic already reigns supreme. During this period, architecture finally becomes the leading form of art - with a clear predominance of cult, church and temple buildings. It develops on the basis of the achievements of the Carolingians, influenced by ancient and Byzantine architecture. The main type of building is the increasingly complex basilica.

The essence of the Romanesque style is geometrism, the dominance of vertical and horizontal lines, the simplest figures of geometry in the presence of large planes. Arches are widely used in buildings, and windows and doors are made narrow. The appearance of the building is distinguished by clarity and simplicity, majesty and austerity, which are complemented by severity, and sometimes gloom. Columns without stable orders are often used, which, moreover, perform a decorative rather than a constructive function.

The most widespread Romanesque style found in France. Here, among the most outstanding monuments of Romanesque architecture is the Church in Cluny of the 11th century, as well as the church of Notre Dame du Port in Clermont-Ferrand of the 12th century. (app. 1). Both buildings successfully combine simplicity and elegance, austerity and magnificence.

The secular architecture of the Romanesque style is clearly inferior to the church. She has too simple forms, almost no decorative ornaments. Here, the main type of building is a castle-fortress, which serves both as a dwelling and a defensive shelter for a feudal knight. Most often it is a courtyard with a tower in the center. The external appearance of such a structure looks warlike and wary, gloomy and menacing. An example of such a building is the Chateau Gaillard on the Seine (XII century), which has come down to us in ruins.

In Italy, an excellent monument of Romanesque architecture is the cathedral ensemble in Pisa (XII-XIV centuries). It includes a grandiose five-aisled basilica with a flat roof, the famous "Leaning Tower", as well as a baptistery designed for baptism. All buildings of the ensemble are distinguished by strictness and harmony of forms. A magnificent monument is also the Church of Sant'Ambrogio in Milan, which has a simple yet impressive façade.

In Germany, Romanesque architecture develops under the influence of French and Italian. Its highest flowering falls on the XII century. The most remarkable cathedrals turned out to be concentrated in the cities of the Middle Rhine: Worms. Mainz and Speyer. Despite all the differences, there are many common features in their external appearance, and above all - the aspiration upwards, which is created by the high towers located on the western and eastern sides. The cathedral in Worms, which looks like a ship, stands out in particular: in its center the largest tower rises, from the east it has a semicircular apse protruding forward, and in the western and eastern parts there are four more high towers.

By the beginning of the XIII century. the Romanesque period of medieval culture ends and gives way to the Gothic period. The term "Gothic" is also conditional. It originated in the Renaissance and expressed a rather contemptuous attitude towards Gothic as a culture and art of the Goths, i.e. barbarians.

Scientific and creative activity is moving from monasteries to secular workshops and universities, which already exist in almost all European countries. Religion by this time begins to gradually lose its dominant position. In all areas of society, the role of the secular, rational principle is growing. This process did not pass by art either, in which two important features arise - the growing role of rationalistic elements and the strengthening of realistic tendencies. These features were most clearly manifested in the architecture of the Gothic style.

Gothic architecture is an organic unity of two components - construction and decor. The essence of the Gothic design is to create a special frame, or skeleton, which ensures the strength and stability of the building. If in Romanesque architecture the stability of a building depends on the massiveness of the walls, then in Gothic architecture it depends on the correct distribution of gravity. The Gothic design includes three main elements: 1) arched vault on ribs (arches);

) a system of so-called flying buttresses (semi-arcs); 3) powerful buttresses.

The peculiarity of the external forms of the Gothic structure lies in the use of towers with pointed spiers. As for the decor, it took a variety of forms. Since the walls in the Gothic style ceased to be load-bearing, this made it possible to widely use windows and doors with stained-glass windows, which opened up free access of light into the room. This circumstance was extremely important for Christianity, because it gives the light a divine and mystical meaning. Colored stained glass windows evoke an exciting play of colored light in the interior of Gothic cathedrals. Along with stained-glass windows, Gothic buildings were decorated with sculptures, reliefs, abstract geometric patterns, and floral ornaments. To this we should add the skillful church utensils of the cathedral, beautiful products of applied art, donated by wealthy citizens. All this turned the Gothic cathedral into a place of genuine synthesis of all types and genres of art.

France became the cradle of Gothic. Here she was born in the second half of the 12th century. and then for three centuries it developed along the path of ever greater lightness and decorativeness. In the XIII century. she's really blossomed.

In the XIV century. the strengthening of decorativeness is mainly due to the clarity and clarity of the constructive beginning, which leads to the appearance of a "radiant" Gothic style. The 15th century gives birth to the "flaming" Gothic, so named because some decorative motifs resemble flames.

Cathedral of Notre Dame of Paris XII-XIII centuries. became a true masterpiece of early Gothic (app. 2). It is a paginaf basilica, which is distinguished by a rare proportionality of constructive forms. The cathedral has two towers in the western part, decorated with stained-glass windows, sculptures on the facades, columns in the arcades. It also has amazing acoustics. What was achieved in Notre Dame Cathedral is developed by the cathedrals of Amiens and Reims (XIII century), as well as the Upper Church of Sainte-Chapelle (XIII century), which served as a church for the French kings and is distinguished by a rare perfection of forms.

In Germany, Gothic became widespread under the influence of France. One of the most famous monuments here is the cathedral in Cologne XIII-XV. (Appendix 2) . In general, he develops the concept of Amiens Cathedral. At the same time, thanks to the pointed towers, it most vividly and fully expresses the verticalism, the aspiration to the sky of Gothic structures.

English Gothic also largely continues the French models. Here recognized masterpieces are Westminster Abbey (XIII-XVI centuries), where the tomb is located. English kings And prominent people England: as well as the chapel of King's College in Cambridge (XV-XVI centuries), representing the late Gothic.

Late Gothic, like the entire culture of the late Middle Ages, contains an increasing number of features of the next era - the Renaissance. There are disputes about the work of such artists as Jan van Eyck, K. Sluter and others: some authors attribute them to the Middle Ages, others to the Renaissance.

Conclusion

The Middle Ages in Western Europe is a time of intense spiritual life, complex and difficult searches for worldview structures that could synthesize the historical experience and knowledge of the previous millennia. In this era, people were able to enter a new path of cultural development, different from what they knew in previous times. Trying to reconcile faith and reason, building a picture of the world based on the knowledge available to them and with the help of Christian dogmatism, the culture of the Middle Ages created new artistic styles, a new urban lifestyle, a new economy, and prepared people's minds for the use of mechanical devices and technology. The Middle Ages left us the most important achievements of spiritual culture, including the institutions of scientific knowledge and education. Among them, one should name, first of all, the university as a principle. In addition, a new paradigm of thinking arose, a disciplinary structure of cognition without which modern science would be impossible, people got the opportunity to think and cognize the world much more effectively than before.

The culture of the Middle Ages - with all the ambiguity of its content, occupies a worthy place in the history of world culture. The Renaissance gave the Middle Ages a very critical and harsh assessment. However, subsequent epochs introduced significant amendments to this estimate. Romanticism XVIII-XIX centuries. drew his inspiration from medieval chivalry, seeing in it truly human ideals and values. Women of all subsequent eras, including ours, experience an inescapable nostalgia for real male knights, for knightly nobility, generosity and courtesy. The modern crisis of spirituality encourages us to turn to the experience of the Middle Ages, again and again to solve the eternal problem of the relationship between spirit and flesh.

Bibliographic list

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Belyaev I. A. Intentionality of a holistic worldview // Bulletin of the Orenburg State University./ Belyaev I.A. 2007. No. 1. S. 29-35.

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Gurevich A.Ya. Problems of medieval folk culture. / Gurevich A. Ya. - M., 2004. 305s.

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Korostelev, Yu.A. Culturology / Yu.A. Korostelev. - Khabarovsk: Priamagrobusiness, 2003.

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Annex 1

Basilica of Our Lady of Clermont-Ferrand, 12th century Abbey Cathedral of Cluny, 11th century

Annex 2

early gothic

Cathedral of Notre Dame

(North-Dame de Paris) XIII century. Cologne Cathedral XIII century.

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The concept of "Middle Ages" arose in the 15th century. among Italian humanists to designate the period that separated their time from antiquity. Ancient scholarship and ancient art were perceived by humanists as an ideal and a model for imitation. From this point of view, the time that separated the Renaissance and the ancient world was seen as a break in the traditions of literacy, as a decline in the arts.

This appraisal in relation to the Middle Ages, reflected in the term itself, persisted for several centuries. Negative and even scornful statements of enlighteners in relation to this period are known.

This situation changed only in the 19th century. First, the romantics created their own image of the Middle Ages. Noble knights who sing of beautiful ladies and perform feats in their honor, mysterious castles and feelings far from ordinary - all this Romanism contrasted with contemporary reality.

From the middle of the XIX century. new approaches to the Middle Ages are being formed within the framework of historical science. The emergence of the concepts of "civilization" and "formation" made it possible to consider the Middle Ages systematically. The civilizational approach made it possible to see medieval Europe as a community of people who lived in a certain territory, connected by the unity of religion, customs, mores, way of life, etc. The formational approach presented the Middle Ages as a certain stage in the development of society, which was based on the feudal mode of production and the corresponding production relations.

A look at the Middle Ages as one of the steps in social development allowed in the future to transfer the concept of the Middle Ages to non-European cultures. For supporters of this approach, medieval Europe and Rus', the medieval Arab-Muslim world and the medieval Far East typologically uniform in their diversity.

The most important typological features of the Middle Ages are the following. From the socio-economic point of view, the Middle Ages is the time of the formation, establishment and flourishing of feudalism, although its concrete historical variants differed significantly. The ethno-cultural foundations of this historical stage can be represented as a synthesis of the cultures of peoples who had centuries-old traditions of statehood and peoples who were at the stage of decomposition of the tribal system.

The universal role of religion should be mentioned as an extremely important feature of medieval cultures. It was both a system of law, and a political doctrine, and a moral doctrine, and a methodology of knowledge. Also, artistic culture was almost entirely determined by religious ideas and cult.

In accordance with the decisive role of religion in many medieval cultures, its institution, the church, was of great importance. As a rule, it was a vast, branched, powerful organization that practically merged with the state apparatus and controlled almost all aspects of human life and society.

As a characteristic of the Middle Ages, one can also name the fact that since that time it has become possible to talk about world religions, which the ancient world did not know. Buddhism and Christianity, which arose within the framework of ancient cultures, in the Middle Ages turn into world-class religions. Islam arises and spreads during the Middle Ages.

Typologically similar features of medieval cultures were realized in various forms, each of these cultures went its own way, individual and unique.

Among the cultures of the Middle Ages, the culture of Byzantium should be called the first in time of formation.

While the culture of the Eastern Roman Empire entered its first heyday, the Western Roman Empire found itself in a period of cultural calm. This period is sometimes called the "Dark Ages" because the early European Middle Ages left quite a few events, facts and phenomena capable of becoming the property of the history of culture, especially in comparison with the Eastern Christian Middle Ages. The content of the process that took place in Europe during the early Middle Ages should be considered the formation of European culture itself in the collision of the ancient world with the world of "barbarians", in combining the achievements of the Mediterranean culture, Christian ideas and tribal cultures of the peoples of northern Europe.

The most common periodization of medieval culture reflects its three states. From the 5th to the 10th century, the formation of cultural foundations takes place, this time is called the early Middle Ages. The 11th-11th centuries - the mature Middle Ages - the period of the highest flourishing, the most striking manifestation of all the features of this culture. The 14th-16th centuries are considered the late Middle Ages, although in the south of Europe, the culture of the new time began to form from the 14th century, giving rise to a very bright period in European culture - the Renaissance. The late Middle Ages are characterized by an increase in crisis phenomena in traditional culture and the flourishing of urban culture, which prepared the secular culture of the new time.

Christianity became the basis of medieval culture. Despite the fact that this religion arose even within the boundaries of antiquity, it differed significantly from most religions of the ancient world. The most important features of Christianity were that the new religion put ethical values in the first place and proclaimed the spiritual life as genuine, as opposed to the "material" life as transient and sinful. The idea that justice can be achieved only in life after earthly death once again emphasized the imperfection and vanity of earthly life and justified the need to be guided by ideal values that reflect true and eternal life.

Despite the fact that Christianity was the stronghold and core of all medieval culture, it was not homogeneous. Quite clearly, it broke up into three layers, which were subsequently joined by a fourth. Already in the 11th-12th centuries, the European medieval self-consciousness presented its modern social structure in the form of three groups: “those who pray”, “those who fight” and “those who work”, that is, clergymen, warriors and peasants. With the formation of urban culture as a result of the growth and strengthening of cities in the period of mature and late medieval another social force appeared - the townspeople, the burghers. Each of these four social groups of the Middle Ages created its own cultural layer, connected with others by a commonality of ideological and practical attitudes, but at the same time realizing this commonality in different forms, reflecting different sides Christian worldview.

The medieval peasantry became the main bearer and exponent of folk culture. This culture developed gradually on the basis of a complex and contradictory combination of the pre-Christian worldview with Christian ideas. Despite the fact that the Christian Church struggled with manifestations of paganism, folk culture retained many elements of pagan rituals, symbolism and imagery.

The formation of the military class took place gradually and unevenly in different parts of Europe. As a result of the establishment of a hierarchical system of vassal-seigneurial relations and the consolidation of a monopoly on military affairs for secular feudal lords, the concepts of a warrior and a noble person merged into the word "knight".

Chivalry arose as a community of warriors - from the poor to the very government "tops". The heyday of chivalric culture fell on the 11th-12th centuries, and in the 17th-14th centuries, chivalry essentially turned into a closed aristocratic military caste, access to which from the outside was extremely difficult, and sometimes impossible. With the strengthening of the role of the city militia and the spread of mercenary warriors in hostilities, the role of chivalry begins to decrease. Parallel to this, the chivalrous culture is also in decline, being replaced by new cultural phenomena.

The culture of chivalry was based on a special ideology. An important concept for the system of knightly values was the idea of courtesy (from the French "courteis" - courteous, chivalrous) as a special behavior noble people. The concept of nobility has become key to chivalrous behavior. The code of knightly honor named generosity, compassion for the weak, fidelity, striving for justice and much more among the necessary qualities of a knight, combining Christian virtues with military virtues in a special way.

The medieval clergy was, on the one hand, very close-knit and organized - the church had a clear hierarchy, on the other hand, it was a rather heterogeneous estate, since representatives of different levels of society fell into it - both social "lower classes" and aristocratic families. In accordance with the decisive role of Christianity, the clergy largely regulated culture - both ideologically and practically: at the level, say, of the canonization of artistic creativity. In this sense, one can speak of a certain influence of clerical culture on folk culture and culture of secular feudal lords. At the same time, the independent value of the culture of the clergy should also be noted - a number of its phenomena were of exceptional value both for the medieval culture of Europe and for the fate of European and world culture as a whole. First of all, we are talking about the activities of monasteries that preserved and reproduced many cultural values.

Monasticism, which arose in the East in the III-IV centuries as a hermitage, the departure from the world, monasticism in medieval Europe changed its character. As a result of this, monasteries arose based on the principle of a hostel with a common economy and common cultural tasks. Medieval European monasteries acquired the character of the most important cultural centers; their role, especially in the early Middle Ages, can hardly be overestimated. A significant part of the heritage of antiquity was preserved in the monastic libraries despite the negative attitude of the Christian church towards pagan antiquity. As a rule, each monastery had a library and a scriptorium - a workshop for copying books, and besides this, also schools. In some periods of the Middle Ages, monastic schools were practically the only centers of education.

Speaking of the medieval church, one cannot fail to mention the split of Christianity into Western and Eastern directions, or Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The rather autonomous development of Christianity in Western Europe and in the east - in Byzantium - determined the ritual and dogmatic differences that led to the final demarcation in 1054.

As the fourth, the latest in time of formation, the cultural layer of the Middle Ages should be called urban culture, noting, however, the fact that the townspeople were a heterogeneous mass in the social sense. Nevertheless, urban culture can be considered in a certain integrity as, so to speak, a crucible in which the foundations of the culture of the new time were melted, combining traditional Christian values and ideas with realism and rationalism, irony and skepticism in relation to established authorities and foundations.

For the formation of medieval culture, the ancient tradition turned out to be very important, giving initial impulses to the development of various areas of culture. This is also true of philosophical and theological thought, which has mastered important ideas and principles. ancient philosophy. This also applies to art, which sometimes, obviously, turned to ancient experience, as it was in Romanesque architecture, in other cases it was formed in polemics with ancient tradition, as opposed to it: this is how medieval pictorial art developed.

For the formation of the education system in medieval Europe, cultural continuity turned out to be essential: the basic principles of the ancient school tradition and, above all, academic disciplines were adopted. The Seven Liberal Arts, as they were called, were studied in two stages. The initial level - "trivium" - included grammar, dialectics and rhetoric. Grammar was considered the "mother of all sciences", it provided the foundations of education. Dialectics introduced the beginnings of formal logic and philosophy, and rhetoric helped to beautifully and convincingly express one's thoughts. The second level involved the study of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music, and music was understood as the doctrine of the numerical ratios on which world harmony is based.

The principles borrowed from the ancient school system, of course, gave rise to only the formal side of medieval European education, and its content was Christian doctrine. Everything that did not concern religious issues, in particular, mathematical and natural scientific information, was studied unsystematically and inconsistently. In addition, non-religious knowledge was not only presented in a small amount, but quite often it was very far from reality and represented errors or was based on them.

The first significant for medieval school education was the end of the VIII and the beginning of the IX century - the Carolingian Renaissance, during the reign of Charlemagne and his closest followers. Charlemagne saw the need to create an education system and ordered the opening of schools in every diocese and at every monastery. Along with the opening of schools, textbooks in various disciplines began to be created, access was opened to the children of the laity. However, after the death of Charlemagne, his cultural undertakings gradually faded away. Schools closed, secular tendencies in culture died out, education for some time was closed within the framework of monastic life.

In the 11th century, there was a new upsurge in the school business. In addition to monastic schools, parish and cathedral schools spread - at church parishes and city cathedrals. The growth and strengthening of cities, which took place during the period of the mature Middle Ages, led to the fact that non-church education became an important factor in culture. Basically, education in urban schools - guild, municipal and private - continued to be Christian in its worldview grounds, but it was not under the jurisdiction of the church, which means it provided more opportunities. Elements of a new worldview and freethinking, the beginning of natural scientific knowledge and observations of the surrounding world - all this became an important component of medieval urban culture, which, in turn, prepared the culture of the Renaissance.

In the 12th-13th centuries, the first universities appeared in Europe - higher educational institutions that got their name from the Latin word "universitas", which means "total". The university consisted of a number of faculties: artistic, where the traditional for the Middle Ages "seven free arts" were studied, legal, medical and theological. Universities were given administrative, financial and legal independence by special documents.

The significant independence of the universities played an important role in preparing the ground for the changes that would later lead to the formation of a modern culture. The assertion of the value of knowledge and education, the development of natural scientific ideas, the ability to think independently and unconventionally, to conduct a discussion and convincingly express one's ideas - all this shook the foundations of medieval culture, prepared the foundations of a new culture.

Nevertheless, almost throughout the entire period of the Middle Ages, it was Christianity that determined the specifics of knowledge and the forms of its existence, determined the goals and methods of cognition. Medieval knowledge was not systematized. Theology or theology, in accordance with the general character of medieval Christian culture, was central and universal knowledge. In essence, theology included other areas of knowledge, which periodically went beyond its scope and returned to them. Thus, rather complex relationships existed between theology and philosophy. On the one hand, the goal and objectives of medieval philosophy were to comprehend the divine and comprehend Christian dogmas, on the other hand, quite often philosophical reasoning led to a rethinking of the traditional view of the world for the Catholic Church. This happened with the ideas of Pierre Abelard, whose famous juxtaposition of faith and reason, decided in the spirit of rationalism - “I understand in order to believe” - provoked a sharp rebuff from the official church, and his views were condemned by councils in 1121 and 1140.

The mature Middle Ages is characterized by a rather stormy development of thought for a traditional, authority-oriented and continuity-oriented culture. During this period, scholasticism was formed and developed, so named from the word "school", which existed in both Greek and Latin. This type of religious philosophy is characterized by a combination of tasks traditional for theology and rationalistic, formal-logical methods. Despite the fact that subsequently the humanists of the Renaissance opposed scholasticism, for the Middle Ages it turned out to be extremely useful and important. The clash of different points of view, rationality and logic, doubts about seemingly unshakable foundations - all this has become an invaluable intellectual school.

Within the framework of scholasticism, there is an interest in the ancient heritage. Little-known or not known at all works are beginning to be translated into Latin, for example, the works of Aristotle, which played an important role in medieval religious philosophy, the works of Ptolemy, Euclid. In a number of cases, the ideas of ancient authors were assimilated and translated from Arabic manuscripts, which preserved and reworked the ancient heritage. It can be considered that, in a certain sense, the interest of the Middle Ages in ancient authors prepared the movement of humanism, which became the basis of the culture of the Renaissance.

The mature Middle Ages made some contribution to the development of natural scientific knowledge. It was still extremely imperfect, since the natural scientific methods of cognition had not been developed, moreover, the line between the real and the unreal was rather unsteady, a prime example what - medieval alchemy. Nevertheless, we can talk about some attempts to develop physical, in particular - mechanical, representations, astronomy and mathematics. There was an interest in medical knowledge, and within the framework of alchemy, the properties of various substances were discovered, some chemical compounds were obtained, various devices and experimental installations were tested. The legacy of antiquity and the Arab world played a significant role in the formation of the natural-scientific ideas of the Middle Ages.

Roger Bacon, an English philosopher and naturalist of the 13th century, professor at Oxford, became an important figure in increasing knowledge about the world around him. He believed that the knowledge of nature should be based on mathematical and experimental methods, although he saw one of the ways of acquiring knowledge in internal mystical insights. Bacon also expressed a number of ideas that anticipated many later discoveries, in particular, he considered it possible to create vehicles that independently move on land and water, flying and underwater structures.

At the end of the mature Middle Ages and in the late period, a lot of geographical works appeared - descriptions compiled by travelers, updated maps and geographical atlases - the ground was being prepared for the Great Geographical Discoveries.

A significant figure at the turn of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance was the 15th-century thinker Nicholas of Cusa. One of the predecessors of the ideas of Copernicus, the author of mathematical works, the forerunner of experimental natural science, he developed ideas that did not agree with the traditional Catholic ideas about the world around him. Having had a significant influence on the formation of the natural philosophy of the Renaissance, in a certain sense it can be considered the completion of the development of medieval thought about the universe.

The historical ideas of the Middle Ages were reflected in various chronicles and biographies. Descriptions of deeds and, of course, in the heroic epic. Medieval epic, which was a phenomenon verbal creativity, at the same time, reflected the most important collective ideas: the perception of time and space, the main values, behavioral principles, aesthetic norms. The European medieval epic was genetically connected with the mythologies of the so-called barbarian peoples and reflected their characteristic way of life and picture of the world.

Questions about the formation of the heroic epic, about the relationship between the mythological and historical beginnings, the degree of presence of authorship in it has always been debatable and can hardly be resolved unambiguously. It is reliably known that the earliest records of epic works date back to the 8th-9th centuries. Obviously, the epic developed in the era of the mature Middle Ages. The characters gradually changed - the images of heroes, rooted in myths and legends, are brought into line with knightly Christian ideals. The most famous are the Anglo-Saxon epic "The Legend of Beowulf", the German epic "The Song of the Nibelungs", the Spanish - "The Song of My Sid", the French - "The Song of Roland" and the Icelandic sagas.

The poetic creativity of the Middle Ages, having begun to take shape in epic works, is later closely connected with knightly culture. Lyrical and laudatory songs, poetic expositions of various exploits of a knight served, so to speak, as a poetic school of the Middle Ages. The poetic tradition began to take shape as early as early middle ages, but most pronounced in the mature period. Then in different parts of Europe there was a fascination with the work of poet-knights, who in the south of France were called troubadours, in the north of France - trouvers, in Germany - minnesingers.

Within the framework of knightly culture, prose literature also began to take shape in the 12th century. The knightly novel quickly gained popularity and became an important part of medieval non-religious culture. Many novels were based on the events of the Celtic epic about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. The well-known story of tragic love Tristan and Isolde is also based on epic stories.

Knightly novels were created in different European languages and had, so to speak, an ornamental structure: the adventure of the heroes seemed to be “strung” one on top of the other; The characters' personalities were not developed. By the 14th-15th centuries, the genre of the chivalric romance fell into decline, parodies of the chivalric romance began to appear within the framework of urban culture - a picaresque novel ironically set out the exploits traditional for knight heroes.

Urban culture becomes the basis for the formation of a number of new genres of literature. First of all, these genres are satirical and parodic. The emergence of irony, parody - this is especially clearly seen in the example of traditional cultures - indicates a rethinking of the most important cultural foundations. In essence, this suggests that the old picture of the world needs to be revised, that it no longer corresponds to cultural reality. The rationality and practicality of the emerging urban culture came into conflict with established values and lifestyle. In art, this manifested itself in satirical and parodic tendencies. Rapidly developing at the end of the mature Middle Ages and in the late period. A bright page of satirical and parodic creativity was the poetry of vagants - wandering schoolchildren and students.

At the turn between the poetry of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance is creativity French poet 15th century Francois Villon. In his work, scenes from the life of the Parisian "bottom" and irony against hypocrisy and asceticism were reflected, the motives of death were replaced by the glorification of the joys of life. The humanism of his poetry, the desire for the fullness of the sensation of life make it possible to see in Villon's work a prototype of Renaissance art.

And one more name cannot be omitted when speaking of medieval literature. This is Dante Alighieri, the last poet of the Middle Ages and the first poet of modern times, as he is sometimes called. Poet's Divine Comedy. Written by Dante belongs to the best achievements of world culture. Passion, emotionality, drama, with which the poet draws images and plots that are generally traditional for the Middle Ages, take Dante's work beyond the scope of medieval literature. His figure, which arose in the culture of Europe at the turn of the 13th-14th centuries, can rightfully be considered the beginning of the formation of Renaissance art.

The spatial arts of medieval Europe were represented mainly by architecture and sculpture. Can often be reduced as the architecture is referred to as the leading view medieval art. This is not entirely true. Indeed, among the most striking phenomena of medieval culture are the constructions of the Romanesque and Gothic styles. But it is important to remember that their construction was not an end in itself. Architecture, especially temple architecture, had to play a service role: it created a closed, symbolic environment for the service. Architecture, in fact, only created the conditions for the main thing - carrying the "word of God."

Quite often, attention is paid to the synthesis of architecture and sculpture as one of the important characteristics of medieval European culture. But perhaps it would be more accurate to say about the synthesis of a whole range of arts in a Christian church. In the European Middle Ages, within this synthetic whole, architecture and sculpture come to the fore.

The Romanesque architectural style appeared in Europe in the 10th century and was characterized by severity, simplicity and austerity. An essential characteristic of the Romanesque style was its versatility - this style characterizes both secular and religious buildings. Churches, castles, monastic complexes were located on a hill, dominating the surrounding landscape. Powerful walls, narrow windows that let in some light, emphasized that the Romanesque building, regardless of its purpose, is primarily a fortress. Indeed, often during hostilities, the walls of a church or monastery served as a reliable defense.

A completely different image of the relationship between the earthly and the divine arose when looking at Gothic buildings. The Gothic style, which was formed in the 12th century and fairly spread throughout Europe, embodied architectural lightness, airiness, grace, and aspiration to the sky. Gothic buildings, as it were, broke through the earthly space, embodying the aspiration to values of a different order. The frame arch system, numerous windows decorated with stained-glass windows made it possible to create special interiors filled with light and air in Gothic buildings. Most often, city cathedrals were built in the Gothic style, but there were also secular buildings - town halls, shopping arcades, and even residential houses.

Along with the significant development of sculpture, the fine arts themselves hardly developed in medieval European culture. Painting was represented mainly by paintings of altars and book miniatures. Only at the end of the Middle Ages did the easel portrait appear and secular monumental painting was born.

It is impossible not to say a few words about the theatrical performances of medieval Europe, refuting the widespread opinion that theatrical art ceased to exist during the Middle Ages. Chronologically, theatrical performances that accompanied the church service were the first to appear - a liturgical and semi-liturgical drama that explained and illustrated the events of Holy Scripture. In parallel with this, in the work of wandering performers, the beginnings of secular theatrical art were formed, which later, in the late Middle Ages, was realized in the genre of areal farce.

Religious and secular lines were united in a special way in three theatrical forms of the Middle Ages: morality, miracle and mysteries. The allegorical figures of the morality and the wonderful stories of the miracle had a pronounced didactic character, and although these genres were not directly connected with Christian plots, they reflected the basic Christian ideas about good and evil, about virtue and vice, about divine providence that decides the fate of man. The pinnacle of theatrical experiments of the Middle Ages should be considered mysteries - grandiose performances that took place during the days of the festivities, in the preparation and creation of which almost the entire city participated.

Medieval art, like all medieval culture, was based on fidelity to tradition and the inviolability of authorities. The anonymity of artistic creativity, adherence to the canons, existence within the framework of given themes, plots and images are important typological characteristics of medieval artistic culture.

Despite the fact that medieval culture was represented by several cultural layers and different periods of its existence, nevertheless, the Christian worldview turned out to be a very significant worldview framework that ensured the unity of Christian medieval culture. In essence, it was the last integral type of culture in the history of culture.

The Middle Ages became an extremely important period in the history of European culture - the time when all its foundations were formed. In the clash of different pictures of the world, in the interaction of peoples not similar to each other, a cultural community, a cultural synthesis, was formed. And despite the fact that subsequently European culture came down with criticism on the Middle Ages, this is the era of its inception, and only in this way can the Middle Ages be valuable. But in addition, medieval European culture has an independent cultural significance. This is a fairly long period in the history of culture, which has its own logic, its own ups and downs. It is a unique fusion of the ideal and the real, the spiritual and the material, the divine and the earthly. Gothic architecture and epic poetry, crowded mysteries and the severity of monastic life, chivalrous deeds and scholastic wisdom - these are the unique faces of this culture.

The Arab-Muslim medieval world is the result of the spread of Islam, Muslim conquests and the creation of an Arab caliphate. Caliphate in the IX-X centuries. broke up into a number of states united by close trade ties, language and culture. Nevertheless, within this community, each culture acquired its own characteristics and found its own way.

The culture of the Arab-Muslim world was based on earlier, pre-Islamic cultures of the Middle East and North Africa. But it acquired its essence and most important features thanks to the emergence and spread of Islam, which determined all aspects of culture and human life.

The socio-economic basis of the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages, in comparison with other medieval societies, had a number of features. For culture, the most important circumstance turned out to be that the hierarchy typical of feudal society was combined in the Islamic world with a very high social mobility. The service could raise a person from the "lower classes" to significant social heights. The middle urban strata were very influential. In power was not only the tribal nobility, but also the military and officials.

In comparison with medieval Europe, cities were of great importance in the Muslim Middle Ages. The countryside played a service role. Such centers of economy and culture as monasteries and knightly castles in Europe, the Muslim medieval world did not know. The status of the townspeople was very high, and their position was stable. Trade was a particularly revered occupation.

The most important feature of the medieval Islamic world can be considered that it did not develop the institution of the church as an intermediary between the earthly and the divine world. The clergy in Islam was part of a single state apparatus, an element of the political and administrative system.

The material culture of the medieval Near East was represented by a variety of tools, irrigation facilities and various devices in the water supply system, as well as buildings for various purposes. A number of buildings and most handicraft products, such as carpets, fabrics, dishes, weapons, can be considered borderline phenomena, equally belonging to material and artistic culture.

A lot of cultural facts are located on another "border" - between spiritual and artistic culture. Religion widely and variedly used the artistic forms of verbal creativity, and knowledge was clothed in artistic forms.

Despite the fact that the spiritual culture, as well as culture in general, was determined by Islam, one can find phenomena that go back to ancient traditions. Particularly in philosophy medieval East one can see the development of some ideas and principles of ancient philosophy. The same ancient tradition, obviously, also determines the close relationship between philosophy and natural science - medical, physical and chemical, mathematical and astronomical.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages far surpassed other medieval cultures in the field of science and philosophy. In particular, Europe has repeatedly turned to the Middle Eastern heritage as a source of wisdom and learning, using in it the reworked antique and the oriental proper.

Since the spread of Islam, i.e. from the 7th century until the 12th century. we can talk about the flourishing of the artistic culture of the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages. It clearly manifested all the most essential characteristics of medieval artistic culture. These are tradition and canon as the main guidelines for artistic creativity, imitation of models and predecessors as the most important creative methods, didactic nature of art, and much more.

Nevertheless, special features also appeared in the Muslim medieval artistic culture. First of all, this big role personal and authorial principles in creativity. The inseparability of the spiritual and secular, earthly and divine, characteristic of Islam, led to the fact that medieval Muslim art, to a greater extent than Christian art, drew attention to the “earthly” problems of a person, touched upon everyday and everyday topics and plots.

All this, together with greater freedom in the use of ancient heritage compared to Europe, makes it possible for a number of researchers to talk about the "renaissance" of medieval Arab-Muslim culture.

The perception of the Koran as a model of perfection led to the fact that the style of this holy book was reflected in a special way on the entire artistic culture. As you know, the most important stylistic feature of the Qur'an is in the neighborhood of elements that are difficult to combine or not at all combined: discourses about the divine are combined with everyday comparisons and trade concepts, speculative ideas - with quite realistic images. The same features characterize the language of literature of the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages.

As the most important feature of Muslim art, it is necessary to name the attraction to the independence of individual parts and elements. artwork. Prose texts are often artfully combined, but independent of each other plots. Poetic works consist of separate parts that make sense and are structurally complete. Within a large poetic work, they are quite autonomous, they can change their places without essentially changing the structure of the text as a whole.

Works of architecture face the outside world with blank walls, while decorative and functional elements are inside. Thus, the architectural work is, as it were, closed in itself and completely completed.

The ornament consists of separate repeating finished forms. At the same time, in ornamentality one can find the following the most important characteristic Arab-Muslim medieval culture. It can be formulated as a striving for extension, repeatability, a striving to flow from one form to another, from one state to another. A piece of music is built on the same melody in its various variations, in literary works, separate finished parts seem to be strung on top of each other.

The ban on the depiction of living beings led to the fact that the fine arts did not receive significant development in the Arab-Muslim artistic culture. Fine arts turned out to be within the framework of artistic craft and in the role of a service.

But we can observe a different form of representation in the Arab-Muslim artistic culture. It is in admiring a fragment, an element, a detail - a sound, a phrase, a word, an element of an ornament.

This property, along with a special reverence for the word in medieval Muslim culture, led to a special position of calligraphy. Letters became not just signs for expressing any content, but also acquired artistic significance. The inscriptions on various objects and buildings were essentially of little substance - the information that could be extracted from them was trivial. Their meaning was different - they visibly embodied the artistic power of the word and its divine nature. They served as a reminder of the word of God - the Koran.

The art of the book is connected with admiration for the divinity of the word and attention to its form. Quite traditional for any medieval culture, the art of the manuscript book of the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages has made its page in world culture.

A feature of the artistic culture of the medieval Middle East can also be considered the fact that creativity there was almost always a professional occupation, although it was also possible to combine different occupations.

Literary was the most revered among artistic pursuits. This led to the fact that poets were very influential in society, in addition, the income that creativity brought them was so high that they often provided writers with a comfortable existence.

Performers of literary works were considered respected people, but still their gift and skills were valued lower than the talent of a writer.

On the formal side, the work of singers, musicians and dancers, or rather, dancers, was not considered worthy of respect. Nevertheless, their performances were watched and listened to with pleasure everywhere - both in the bazaars and in palaces.

The work of a craftsman was quite honorable. Moreover, arts and crafts, as well as architecture, was not anonymous - quite often you can find the names of the authors of certain works of art.

It so happened that artistic crafts were an essential part of the artistic culture of the medieval Arab-Muslim world. The acquaintance of other peoples with the culture of the Muslim Middle Ages was also most often associated with works of applied arts - with weapons decorated with calligraphy and ornaments, carpets, clothes, dishes. Now we can say that the Koranic legends, and poetic works, and philosophical ideas, and architectural structures and much more - the invaluable and unique contribution of the Arab-Muslim Middle Ages to world culture.