Chris Wickham. Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400-800. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. xxviii + 990 pp. $50.00 (paper), ISBN 978-0-19-921296-5.

Reviewed by Julie A. Hofmann (Department of History, Shenandoah University)
Published on H-German (April, 2008)

Far More Than a Framework

Framing the Early Middle Ages is a monograph on the social and economic changes of the period, and a study of breadth and rich detail that will serve as a reference for many years. The sheer scope of the book is difficult to grasp--it encompasses virtually the entire Roman (or ex-Roman) Empire, as well as areas like Ireland, Scandinavia, and Europe northeast of the Rhine-Danube frontier. Chris Wickham uses a broad range of evidence and methodological approaches in his study, generally with strong results. Throughout, he argues the importance of understanding regional and micro-regional differences in order to understand better the period as a whole. This approach is especially useful because the study of the early Middle Ages tends to be limited to smaller geographic areas: the average specialist on Anglo-Saxon history, for example, may have a very limited knowledge of what was happening in Egypt at the same time. The book is also so packed with detail, however, that sometimes the author's comparisons are inconspicuous. Nevertheless, it is hard to imagine tackling a project like this in any other way.

While the attention paid to covering and comparing each geographical area is impressive, the organization of the book favors readers already familiar with the period. This is not a book for beginners: understanding the tone and level of detail requires a great deal of specialist knowledge. The attention paid to covering and comparing each geographical area is impressive. The book itself is divided into four main parts entitled "States," "Aristocratic Power-structures," "Peasantries," and "Networks." Those parts are subsequently divided into smaller chapters: each chapter covers its topic geographically as well as chronologically. This comparative analysis is the book's greatest strength but it also means that the readership may be divided into two groups--those who know enough of the period to fill in the narrative on their own and to lend Wickham's analysis the context of their own knowledge and experience, and those readers who necessarily must use the book as a reference tool.

Another of the book's strengths is that Wickham is fastidious about defining his terms. For example, in chapter 3, "The Form of the State," Wickham offers five criteria by which he defines a "state." These criteria are general enough that most historians would agree with them and yet are specific enough that the reader cannot be confused by Wickham's usage. This precision is especially useful when discussing the early Middle Ages, where the meanings of even the simplest terms can change over time and place. The results are not universally effective, however. For example, although Wickham is careful to explain his description of some societies as "tribal," the discussion that follows is more likely to convince the reader that the word has little meaning than it is to show that "tribal" society underwent changes in structure and self-identification.

Despite such rare examples, the work is organized coherently, and the changes in approach employed by Wickham are appropriate to the individual chapter topics. The first part, for example, "States," lays the groundwork for the rest of the book. This relatively concise section also provides the clearest narrative, and introduces many of the historiographical arguments that will reappear in other forms in later chapters. "Peasantries" examines peasant society and the transformation of peasant-mode economies to feudal-mode economies (terminology that will doubtless raise questions in the minds of those medievalists who consider the terms "feudal" and "feudalism" to be "f-words"). Here, Wickham moves from narrow case studies in chapter 7 to a series of broader generalizations in chapter 9, "Peasant Society and its Problems." The case studies focus largely on material culture; where little physical evidence survives, Wickham provides the artificial construct of a village called Malling. Although the construct is plausible, its use may present problems to less careful readers, as subsequent references to the hypothetical village fail to mention that Malling itself never existed. The generalizations in the chapter help to balance out the detail of the previous chapters. Yet, even within these generalizations, Wickham is forced by the nature of his subject to point out the many regional exceptions. The result is a chapter that sums up the arguments of the rest of the section clearly, reiterating the most valuable points, but which is perhaps general only in comparison to the minute detail with which peasant society is described in the previous chapters.

The final section of the book, "Networks," offers the best examples for the usefulness of Wickham's approach. The constitution and definition of these networks are not always obvious or intuitive to the reader, but Wickham takes great care to reiterate the larger picture several times within each chapter. In this section we see the best use of the archeological evidence for alternative arguments to explain the changes described in "Cities" (chapter 10) and "Systems of Exchange" (chapter 11). In both chapters, Wickham presents arguments that challenge much of the historiography of the last century, largely by pointing out places where adding archeological evidence to the traditional narrative compels us to read previous evidence in new ways.

Before approaching the physical evidence, however, in "Cities," Wickham also discusses the difficulties of terminology, where meanings of some terms change not only from place to the place for the early Middle Ages but also vary in the scholarship of different regions. These difficulties are largely resolved by a reliance on Martin Biddle's criteria for the definition of towns, and in a further discussion of various cultural assumptions tied to the ideas of "town," "city," "urban," and so on. What follows is a series of remarks that demonstrate that, despite myriad regional variations, some general conclusions can still be drawn for the post-Roman world as a whole.

The final substantive chapter, "Systems of Exchange," is in Wickham's own words "in many ways the core of the book" (p. 693). Beginning with a critique of earlier studies of exchange, Wickham questions many prevailing theories, demonstrating successfully that in many cases, they present only part of the story. Through careful use of the archeological record, we can see that the exchange of goods was much more extensive than was previously thought. While this chapter presents arguably the clearest expression and defense of Wickham's overall thesis, it also demonstrates one of the book's few drawbacks. The work is in many ways an attempt to fill a gap, to provide a coherent, synthetic framework for the period, often using less familiar approaches and sources to support that framework. There is no doubt that Wickham has accomplished that task. However, the level of technical discussion of, for example, pottery types, might have benefited from more explanation or illustrations. The amount of detail here reminds us of the general point that this book is not for novices, even if no one working on the period will be able to ignore it.

The maps, which are some of the best and most comprehensive I have seen in any text on the subject, are placed together at the beginning of the book. Although Wickham does return to the same areas in each section, a future edition would benefit from better placement or better map references within the text. Finally, something needs to be said about the paperback edition. Despite the enhanced affordability of a paperback, the book's sheer size requires a tougher binding, one that will be much more resistant to breaking under normal use.

If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at: https://networks.h-net.org/h-german.

Citation: Julie A. Hofmann. Review of Wickham, Chris, Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400-800. H-German, H-Net Reviews. April, 2008.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=14452

Copyright © 2008 by H-Net, all rights reserved. H-Net permits the redistribution and reprinting of this work for nonprofit, educational purposes, with full and accurate attribution to the author, web location, date of publication, originating list, and H-Net: Humanities & Social Sciences Online. For any other proposed use, contact the Reviews editorial staff at hbooks@mail.h-net.org.