What period of time was consitered to be the dark ages?

Question

What period of time was consitered to be the dark ages?

Answer 1

   In European historiography, the term Dark Age or Dark Ages refers to the Early Middle Ages, the period extending from the overthrow of the last Roman Emperor in 476 to approximately AD 1000.

  The concept of a Dark Age was created by the Italian scholar Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca) in the 1330s and was originally intended as a sweeping criticism of the character of Late Latin literature.

I hope this was of some help to you. Good luck.

Answer 2

Fall of Rome Empire ~ Failure of Crusades

Answer 3

The most widely used definition is after the fall of Rome in 476 AD:

http://www.allabouthistory.org/the-dark-...

Others date the start of that period earlier, during the decline of Rome, perhaps around 400 AD.  Some historians have pinned the end of that period at around 1000 AD.

Even these dates aren't precise, however, as this History.com page notes:

http://www.history.com/marquee.do?conten...

"It should be emphasized ... that the fixing of dates for the beginning and end of the Dark Ages is arbitrary; at neither time was there any sharp break in the cultural development of the continent."

More on that period, as well as the broader period known as the "Middle Ages", from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Ages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Ages

As both articles note, the concepts of both the Dark Ages and the Middle Ages have changed over time.  The first "AllAboutHistory" article (which has a noted religious bent near the end) points out that:

"The Dark Ages as a term has undergone many evolutions; its definition depends on who is defining it. Indeed, modern historians no longer use the term because of its negative connotation."

That period is defined as "dark" by some - and in each case this is simply a value judgement on the part of these observers - because a) some later observers regarded some of the practices of people living in Europe during that period as barbaric; b) there was an emphasis on faith, often to the detriment of scientific discovery; c) there was a low level of economic activity; d) there were frequent invasions of Western Europe by people living outside that area; and/or e) there was little written history of the period.  Regarding the latter, more and more records of life during the so-called "Dark Ages" have been uncovered over time.