High Middle Ages

Around the year 1000 the people in Western Europe began to get their shit together and moved out of the Dark Ages. The economy steadily improve and cities began to grow again. Though no single state had risen to unify Europe since the Carolingian Empire, individual kingdoms had risen to replace the old tribal confederations (though feudalism was still the rule of the day), allowing for a degree of political stability, and with it, trade networks. Skills were honed, new technologies were acquired. Some of these were brought in from the east such as gunpowder, giant hamster wheel powered cranes and paper but others were developed locally such as stained glass and an increasingly wide use of water power. Gothic architecture emerged as Cathedrals reached to the sky. Slavery had been abandoned in much of Europe while trade in the Mediterranean became more and more profitable. The Crusades also happened at this time.

Unfortunately the good times did not last as the 14th century was a bit of a doozy. First there was famine, which is never a nice thing. Then in 1346 there was the Black Death which wiped out about a third of the people in Europe with some areas getting hit worse than others. However, the tradeoff was that peasants, being in lower supply, were now more valuable and could now earn wages to lift themselves out of serfdom and earn some (very basic) rights.

Notes

• This time also largely lines up with the Islamic Golden Age, in which the Islamic world was doing very well and advancing in terms of science, mathematics (there's a reason why they call them Arabic Numerals), technology, art and trade with Baghdad being a center of learning. At least until the Mongols came and trashed up a lot of the Middle East.
• This is the high points of chivalry, when an Armored Knight on Horseback had been refined into a truly devastating force.
• Cannons and Firearms begin to show up in Europe around the late 13th century, though both were crude affairs.

The appeal of the High Middle Ages

How do you like your medieval fantasy? Do you like it more refined and heroic? With beautiful Gothic cathedrals with stained glass windows and mighty castles of stone with fluttering banners full of fat friars and proud knights. Well this period is for you. Not that it was all lolipops and sunshine. The nobles were still playing their Games of Thrones in dynastic squabbles and there were the Crusades. Being a serf or a jew in the path of these armies at this time sucked. The mix of Medieval Splendor and Brutality makes for a nice contrast.

This period also gave us some heroes such as Robin Hood. And though King Arthur has his roots in the Dark Age when the native British were fighting against the invading Saxons, his popularity massively took off thanks to Norman literature and adapted by countless countries across Europe.

High Middle Age inspired Games, Factions and Settings

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Historical Time Periods
Deep Time:	Prehistory
Premodern:	Stone Age - Bronze Age - Classical Period - Dark Age - High Middle Ages - Renaissance
Modern:	Age of Enlightenment - Industrial Revolution - The World Wars - The Cold War - Post-Cold War