Early Medieval Europe 300-1000

Roger Collins’s Early Medieval Europe 300-1000 is a textbook that covers a lot of ground. He starts with the decline of the late Roman Empire and the transition into the successor states of the Goths, Vandals, and others. He lays out the subsequent historical changes across Europe, up to Charlemagne’s Carolingian dynasty and the subsequent Ottonian dynasty. Collins also describes the surrounding geographic regions, such as England, Spain, Scandinavia, and Byzantium.

A few things frustrated me about the book, which I’d attribute to the subject matter instead of the author. Knowledge of the Dark Ages is limited, leading to inevitable gaps in the narrative and a great focus upon individuals, such as church leaders, who left more of a written record. With such broad geographic and chronological coverage, at times it was difficult to keep track of who the relevant people were and what was going on.

Still, Early Medieval Europe gave me a decent understanding of a historical period that I knew almost nothing about. Since I’m feeling saturated with history, I’ll read other books for a while. After that, I’ll move on to the High and Late Middle Ages, which are much better understood and documented.