Paper Topic:

economic growth and technological advance interact and drive the rise of Western Civilization through 1500?

Running Head : Western civilization through 1500

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Western civilization through 1500 : Interaction of economic growth and technological advancement

Introduction

The Western civilization has continued to evolve to be what it is today tracing its roots back to the fall of the Roman Empire . Western civilization has continued to flourish up to the present era in the whole of Europe , New Zealand , North America and Australia

The years between 1300-1500 are always classified as the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance . One memorable

phenomena of this era was the Black Plague ' or Black Death , a bubonic plague outbreak that wiped close to a 1 /3 of Europe 's population . The plague was rated as one of the most deadly pandemics in the history of mankind . This is because almost 75million people across the world lost their lives with the biggest number of victims being found in Europe where close to 50 million people died (McKay , Hill , Buckler , 2003 . The results of the plague encouraged a radical transformation of the economy and the European society at large . There was an obvious shortage of labor providing a fertile ground for economic diversification and innovation in technology . This period was a very tough period in Europe there was famine and pestilence , which would lead to the capital accumulation intensification in the urban areas , stimulating the growth of trade and industry (McKay , Hill , Buckler , 2003

The Protestant Reformation played a very important role in the transformation not only on the dominance of the Catholic Church but the whole of Europe as well . The Reformation came about because the Catholic Church then , wielded so much power that it had become so wealthy and corrupt . This made the likes of Martin Luther revolt in1517 against this authority . His ideas would spread so quickly fueling the flames of Protestantism across Europe , which would eventually bear the fruits of the nation-state . Leaders like Henry VIII used these ideas to break away from the yoke of the Catholic Church (McKay , Hill , Buckler , 2003

The invention of the movable type by Johannes Gutenberg in 1450 enable the ideas to be printed ant transmitted much faster than before greatly influencing the printing of the Bible and would help the development of academic freedom (McKay , Hill , Buckler , 2003

During the 14th century the influence of feudalism system was declining giving way to the influence of the middle class in Europe . The middle-class was normally defined as the social class that fell between the nobility on one hand and the peasantry on the other . This class consisted of people with some form of economic independence , and included professionals and merchants some farmers , skilled workers and bureaucrats . This class lacked great social and political power (McKay Hill , Buckler , 2003

The rise of the middle class directly influenced the growth of towns and cities and went on to influence the growth of Europe economically Subsequently the renaissance a new cultural movement in the West started taking shape . Renaissance began in Italy because...

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