4.20 Europe: a.d. 601 to 700  (Page 2/4)

By the end of the century northeastern Germany had quadrupled its population over that of Roman times, chiefly due to the more abundant food supply available with the use of the "moldboard" plow, introduced by the Slavs. This plow required eight oxen to pull it but it allowed three-field rotation of crops and allowed not only the production of more, but also better food, containing more amino acids and protein, thus giving the people more energy and greater stamina. (Ref. 211 ) (See also FRANCE, this chapter)

Austria

The area now known as Austria was partly controlled by the German duchies and partly by the raiding Avars.

Hungary

This was the homeland of the Avars who raided in all directions from this base. Please see this section in the previous chapter.

Czechoslovakia

Moravians gained independence by holding off the Avars and then they were able to stop the Franks who tried to come in from the west. After the death of their King Samo, however, this first attempt at a Slavic state in central Europe collapsed. Samo may actually have been a Frank but he had managed to unite the Czechs and some of the Wends. The people of Bohemia also repudiated Avar suzertainty and after that the Avar power declined rapidly. (Ref. 136 )

Switzerland

This was simply part of the Frankish kingdoms.

Western europe

Spain and portugal

Between A.D. 612 and 621, Sisebut, a well educated Visigoth monarch, reconquered most of the peninsula from the Romans and his successor, Swintilla, completed the job. Even so, the Visigoths became "Romanized" by legal unification through the Liber judiciorum of Reccesivinth after 649 and the warrior aristocracy of the Goths was united with the plutocratic-bureaucratic aristocracy of the Roman world. The common people raised sheep. (Ref. 211 ) Although the Visigoths had not used slaves in any significant degree previously, they took over the Roman custom with a vengeance and in the Code of King Erwig (680-687) there were 21 provisions giving severe penalties for harboring fugitive slaves. (Ref. 249 )

France&Netherlands and belgium (see also germany)

At the beginning of the century there were actually three separate Frank kingdoms: (a) Austrasia with a capital at Metz, lying to the east, actually in Germany and having chiefly Teutonic blood