Best books on the Dark Ages?

by Cannessian

I'm looking for a good book on what the world was like after the fall of the Roman Empire. Like how Europe went from Roman control to the self ruled countries they are now. I'm really interested in that transition period; what went on geopolitically and culturally. Can anyone recommend a good book on that?

sunagainstgold

Two of the books we recommend a lot around here:

  • Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom - more focused on culture/religion, but wonderfully readable
  • Chris Wickham, The Inheritance of Rome: Illuminating the Dark Ages (or switch the two halves around, depending on your edition) - very comprehensive, including North Africa and the Near East...but that means it's also quite long and dense

If you want to go a little farther towards "countries like they are now," (the 1000-1300 time frame), two of the classics would be R.I. Moore, The First European Revolution, and Robert Bartlett, The Making of Europe. Then there's John Watts, The Making of Polities to finish it off and poise you to enter the (early) modern era. ;)

Happy reading!