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Barbarians to Angels: The Dark Ages Reconsidered | 
 enlarge | Author: Peter S. Wells
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 66320
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.8 x 1
ISBN: 0393060756
Dewey Decimal Number: 940.12
EAN: 9780393060751
ASIN: 0393060756
Publication Date: July 14, 2008
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Product Description
A surprising look at the least-appreciated yet profoundly important period of European history: the so-called Dark Ages.
The barbarians who destroyed the glory that was Rome demolished civilization along with it, and for the next four centuries the peasants and artisans of Europe barely held on. Random violence, mass migration, disease, and starvation were the only way of life. This is the picture of the Dark Ages that most historians promote. But archaeology tells a different story. Peter S. Wells, one of the world's leading archaeologists, surveys the archaeological record to demonstrate that the Dark Ages were not dark at all. The kingdoms of Christendom that emerged starting in the ninth century sprang from a robust, previously little-known, European culture, albeit one that left behind few written texts. This recently recognized culture achieved heights in artistry, technology, craft production, commerce, and learning. Future assessments of the period between Rome and Charlemagne will need to incorporate this fresh new picture. 24 illustrations.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 Interesting revelations based on new evidence December 1, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Been to Europe lately? Every village seems to have an archaeological dig, and what this new information reveals is most interesting.
Wells may be making too strong a case to talk of us now believing the barbarians have been revealed as angels, but certainly the Dark ages have been shown to much less dark than thought.
What happened to the formerly Roman cities? "There is no archaeological evidence for destruction or even rapid abandonment of" (p 77) many once flourishing cities. Although Roman-style architecture ended, for the most part, habitation remained.
Wells argues that in Britain a return to the original styles of building may be thought of as cultural choice rather than decline. He points to "rapidly accumulating signs of high status and great wealth in early Medieval London" (p 119).
Even though there is evidence of some sorts of decline, the populations still had access to knowledge unknown before Rome, such as the use of iron. Lovely jewelry gives evidence of a taste for luxury and beauty.
The book will make you reconsider your view of the Dark Ages.
 Enjoyable but Maddening September 19, 2008
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
Barbarians to Angels is a fun, quick read, but maddening at the same time. Sometimes it feels as though Wells is attacking a straw man by dispelling myths that few share any more (at least, those who pay any attention to post-Roman society at all). Sure, there were interesting cultural trends among the tribes that took the place of declining Roman society, and sure, people like Gibbon exaggerated the differences between Rome and what came after. But Wells is too brief to make a good case for re-thinking Barbarians. And I seriously wonder whether many of the tribes called "barbarians" deserve that much re-thinking.
We can take it for granted that Goths, Alans, Suevi, etc. were illiterate and more violent than what came before. We don't have to be prejudiced against paganism, certainly, but we should recognize at the same time that the spread of Christianity brought an order to many regions that was not there during the pagan period. And Wells does not make the case that nothing happened to the former Roman cities - there were deliberate policies among some Dark Ages peoples of deliberate depopulation a la Khmer Rouge. And there were slaughters of urban Romanophiles in the UK during the fifth and sixth centuries - these events did happen, and Wells can't sweep them under the rug.
In short, this book reminds me of the apocryphal story of the British history prof who found too many of his students, with a New Age bent, were making pilgrimages to Stonehenge and worshiping pagan barbarian culture. This prof was not a strong advocate of traditional Western Civ, but said, "There's a reason they're called barbarians. They were mostly barbaric." Yes, so were the Romans on a larger scale. But Roman culture was replaced in the Dark Ages by an inferior, illiterate, more personally violent culture, and Wells minimizes that. You don't have to be a lover of "dead white guys" to know that barbarianism doesn't deserve this much cheerleading.
Digging Deeper into the Dark September 13, 2008
I never cease to be amazed at the conclusions archeologists can draw from looking at a few shards of pottery and funereal remains from long ago. Dr. Wells is a gifted interpreter and storyteller who had much more fascinating material to work with than just a few scraps. Based on the treasures that have been uncovered during the last century, he enthusiastically and rather convincingly fills in the gaps of recorded European history between the decline of the Roman Empire and Charlemagne's time.
This book is a well-organized quick read which contains quite a few surprises about how people lived between 400 and 800 A.D. It would have been even better with colour photos of the archeological finds and a map for the places mentioned in chapter 7. Where exactly were Gudme, Staraja Ladoga and Haithabu located? Despite these shortcomings, we have a much brighter picture of the Dark Ages thanks to the digging that has been done both in the ground and into the murky backgrounds of those who left behind that evidence.
The fall of the Roman Empire finally explained August 13, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I vaguely recall Ludwig von Mises, the famous free-market economist, writing that the Roman Empire fell because its economy was ruined by inflation and price controls. Because of the decrease in productivity, Rome was unable to fight back the hordes of barbarians attacking the empire.
Wells explains how grave goods, artifacts, soil analysis, etc. gives a better picture of the emergence of Western civilization than the writings of pro-Roman fanatics like Gibbons, St. Jerome, Augustine, etc. For example:
"If the stories recounted by the Dark Age writers were historically accurate, we would expect to find abundant material evidence for the arrival and settlement of new groups in different parts of Europe, with new types of houses, new styles of pottery and metalwork, and new burial practices. We would also expect to find evidence of abandonment in the areas from which people were suposed to have emigrated. But we do not find these patterns to any appreciable degree." (p. 31)
I always thought that Germany and Scandinavia were the homelands of uncivilized warmongers that migrated south. Wells describes the development and changes that occured in farming villages throughout Europe:
"Well beyond the frontiers of the Roman Empire, on the Jutland peninsula of Denmark, the village of Verbasse was inhabited continuously from the first to the eleventh century....In the early period, the settlement consisted of 13 farmsteads...furnaces for processing iron were situated outside of the settlement... By the eighth century, changes in the layout of the settlement indicate a growth in population and important changes in the scale and intensity of economic activity in this village." (p. 136)
Very good read.
Skeptic Reads Book, Has Doubts August 11, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
Like another reviewer, I remain unconvinced of the author's thesis about post-Roman Europe. He rejects the term "barbarians" for the people who followed the Romans, but because they lacked a written language, their level of "civilization" cannot be demonstrated. The fact that they made and imported decorative objects is not proof of either moral enlightenment or intelligence. I read this book with much interest, and admire its succinct coverage of a complex subject, accessible to the nonspecialist. However, I sense an apologia for our Enlightenment viewpoint, an attempt not to judge, to give "Dark Ages" Europeans too much of the benefit of the doubt. His philosophy is much like Jared Diamond's in his two best-selling books which try to downplay the "superiority" of the West and explain the lack of development in the Third World totally in terms of geographical happenstance and environmental negligence. I would put credence in the written evidence of contemporary Roman writers. The quality of the human beings involved to me is always paramount. And given the paltry evidence for Dark Ages civilization (except for the monasteries), I read this book with yes, skepticism.
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