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Peer to peer and the feudal transition | 19 comments (19 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Re: Peer to peer and the feudal transition (none / 1)
All true.

600 was chosen deliberately as it is after the collapse of western Rome and before the heavy plough had started to work its miracle. (Also, Livi-Bacci has 600 in a handy table.)

Plough - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Despite a number of innovations, the Romans never achieved the heavy wheeled mouldboard plough. The first indisputable appearance after the Roman period is from 643, in a northern Italian document[2].


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by A swedish kind of death on Sat Mar 1st, 2008 at 06:25:48 PM EST
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Re: Peer to peer and the feudal transition (none / 1)
However, if it were not for the Bubonic plague, 600 would not have been "after the collapse of the Western Empire", as Justinian had reconquered North Africa and Italy, and it is not implausible that if those conquests had been consolidated that Iberia would have been added as well ... only leaving Julius Ceasar's pointless conquests of Transalpine Gaul and Britannia out of a revived Roman Empire.

Its the flea ... the flea I tell ya. There's your transition from late antiquity to the early medieval period.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Sat Mar 1st, 2008 at 08:06:49 PM EST
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Peer to peer and the feudal transition | 19 comments (19 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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