Boring is the one term you can never use to describe a period of history. It doesn't matter what your you choose something interesting happened, there was some war being fought, some dynastic struggle taking place, one group vying for control of somehting with another, that is one of the most important things I've learned in all my studies; no period of history is boring. The only reason you might think so is simply because you don't know enough about it. Now there may be certain historical interpretations that some might not find interesting like the oft derided women's history (though that can be interesting as well).

But moving on to answer your question, here is a brief summary of what occurred during this period. A ton of stuff happened (even just limting the scope to Europe and the near east), in the wake of the western empire falling germanic kingdoms form, British states form, and christianity spreads to ireland and the baltic. The vandals conquer north africa but are subsequently vanquished by the rising Islamic Caliphate which displaces existing states from Morroco to India. And of course their is the Easter/Byzantine Empire which continues to ebb and flow through out the period.

Germanic Settelement fo Western Europe

In 476 the western Empire fell but it wasn't necessarily the end of civilization as it is often portrayed. Throughout what would become Italy, France, Spain, and Britain new barbarian chieftains took power who would become kings of these lands. In Italy itself Odacer conquered Rome and established his own kingdom there which was subsequently conquered by Theodoric (and was actually dispatched by the Eastern Emperor) in 493 who established an ostrogothic kingdom there which lasted until 552. Meanwhile in Britain the Angles, and Saxons are arriveing by boat and are beating back the native britains into wales while establishing their own realms in Mercia, Northumbria, Wessex, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk.

In Gaul the Franks had already been present for at least a century by this point and were quickly consolidating power into what would eventually form an enormous and powerful state whch brings us to...

The Rise of the Frankish Kingdom

The Franks were in many ways the true heirs to the Roman empire and in a sense their Kingdom survives to the day in France. In 496 they converted to christianity )though many had already been Christian for some time) and which enabled them to co-opt the existing Gallo-Roman population many of whom still controlled vast tracts of land and wealth from Imperial days giving rise to what we call Feudalism today. In fact the Gallo-roman influence was so strong the Latin became the language of state and the pre-existing Frankish language died out, which also serves to demonstrate the assimilation which took place between the two cultures during this period.

By 714 the Franks controlled much of Modern France, Belgium and the Netherlands but had also made inroads to Germany. It is important to understand that during this period there wasn't much of a distinction between France and Germany, the frontier wasn't so defined like it is today. There was a much more of a gradient between Frankish culture and Germanic culture and of course the ideas of Germany and France did not yet exist.

This of course lays the foundation for Charlemagne/ Carolus Magnus/ Karl der Grosser as he is known in Englsih, Latin, and German. Charlemagne conquered Lombardia as well as Bavaria. After doing so he took on the Saxons and subjugated then converted them. There would be several more small annexations but at this point Charlemagnes empire reached from halfway down the italian peninsula, to Brittany to the Ele in Germany.

his empire wasn't merely a military one. Charlemagne enacted reforms and promoted education and scholarship. He wrote laws and promoted a literate bureaucracy which ensured that his empire was governed effectively. Though his realm would be divided between his heirs two of the three would survive for many years to come.

Further Reading: 1 2

All was not well though for these emerging realms though because the Viking onslaught was about to begin.

Viking Invasion

For a myriad of reasons which I really can't get into here Scandinavian men began going Viking on a frequent and terrifying basis. They would load into their longboats and set out on raids which would take them to them down Russian Rivers all the way to the Black Sea and Constantinople (where they formed the Emperors Varangian Guard) in the East, and to Britain, France, the Netherlands and even Sicily. They raided pretty much every coastal and river town in Western europe during this period but they didn't just raid mercilessly. In many places they settled down and created states of their own.

In England and France especially the Viking were successful at forming states and settlements and most town and cities in Ireland and England that end in -wick or -wich are viking settlements. They were able to establish what is known as the Danelaw in England which was ruled by the King of Denmark. In addition they also formed a realm in Nromandy which would go on to conquer in England in 1066 and essentially form the Kingdom of England that we know today.

During this period the vikings also settled Iceland and Greenland and ventured as far as newfoundland in North America.

Further Reading: 1 [2](www.vikings.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/anglo.htm

Stuff that I'm Just Gonna Brush Over and maybe fill in more later

The Rise of Freaking Islam! I mean this is an incredible period and surpemely interesting and lasts from 632 pretty much right up to the crusades. Empires Rise then divide and continue conquering. You've got the Ummayid Caliphate followed by the Abbasids and the rise of Baghdad and Cairo as major centers of trade and learning. Muslim Spain itself is a whole post on its own right up to the maximum extent of their conquest at the battle of Poitiers in 732 where the Franks stopped their expansion into europe.

The Byzantine Empire: This wasn't just some static realm that just sat there for another thousand years after the fall of Rome. These people were romans, they thought of themselves as romans and in a very real sense were. Wrapped up in this you also have the Great schism which is a ton of drama within the church that gives rise to separate Catholic and Orthodox faiths. For fucks sake be proactive, here

The Kievan Rus, there was a whole country that rose out of Kiev and was effectively the first Russian country to exist. Read about it

And lets also not forget about the rest of the world. In china the Tang Dynasty gave way to the Sung for example. Its not like everyone else in the world was just sitting on there hands waiting for europeans to show up. Everyone had stuff going on. And I know there is all kinds of stuff I left out but really if you dig just a little, tiny bit you will find a wealth of information and events to explore and you will quickly realize that a lot of stuff happened.

*edits: Visigoths corrected to vandals, spelling

Do you have a particular country in mind? There are a lot of very interesting things that happened throughout Europe during that time period! I personally work on the Carolingians, but there is also the viking raids into England, tons of stuff in Italy that's pretty fun to read about. Again really depends on what you are looking for.

I'm not well qualified to provide great detail, but the Carolingian Renaissance and the Battle of Tours were two of the most important events of the period. The first had a huge impact on literacy and learning during the period you provide and the second saved what became France from Islamic rule. Now that I think of it, if you're interested in this period you should study the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties.