Communication in Europe and its Influence

The worldview of the churchmen, sometimes referred to as a cosmography, regarded nature as a book to be interpreted, not a domain amenable to empirical discovery or rational analysis. However, with new ideas entering Europe from the Crusades and through the Islamic presence in Spain, as well as from the newly emergent church-founded universities, some accommodation became necessary. In response, Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) argued for a partial application of rational methods to an understanding of the world, provided scriptural revelation remained the final arbiter. The Franciscan Roger Bacon (1214–1294) abused this license with a series of experiments, most notably in optics, that resulted in his imprisonment. The fate of others who transgressed Catholic ideology is chronicled in the history of the Inquisition.

In communicating its teachings to the mostly nonliterate masses, the church employed a rich iconography. Cathedrals were texts to be read; each image told a story. By the thirteenth century, clerics, drafting voluminous contracts, charters, and wills, began to increasingly serve the needs of both secular rulers and a merchant class that had been growing since the emergence of towns two centuries earlier. Still, in this mostly oral world, the language of everyday life remained poetic. Rhymes were used to remember everything from agricultural practice to accountancy, and newsworthy events were conveyed in song by traveling troubadours. The period also saw the beginnings of writing in local languages, or vernaculars, facilitated through the spread of paper, which had initially entered Europe via trade and by the fourteenth century was increasingly being manufactured there. Vernacular literatures emerged, as evidenced in the writings of Dante (1265–1321), Petrarch (1304–1374), and Chaucer (c. 1342–1400).