The Early Middle Ages: Europe 400-1000 (Short Oxford History of Europe)

The _Short Oxford History of Europe_, under the general editorship of T.C.W. Blanning, is an especially well-edited series of 11 brief but meaty topical surveys covering the region's entire recorded history, from Ancient Greece to the latter part of the 20th century. The reader is assumed already to know the broad outlines of European history and to want look below the surface of events to the underlying forces and trends. While each volume is composed of a series of articles by experts who bring unique understanding and insights the result is much more integrated and consistent than that of the usual collective work. The transitions between volumes are well managed so that the series can be read as a seamless history from start to finish if desired, but the reader who is looking only for insight into a particular period can read just one or two volumes without feeling that he is missing the secret key.The overall impression, in fact, is a good deal like a far shorter (and much more affordable) version of the _Cambridge History_ series.The chief lack is of good references to sources. At the end of each volume is a "further reading" section which is generally pretty thorough and helpful, but there is no way to tell where a particular fact or insight comes from except in those cases where the chapter author has mentioned the origin in his or her text.It should be understood that these are not narrative histories of the events of their periods. A timeline of major events is provided at the back, but the chapters cover topics rather than sub-periods, and generally are not themselves organized chronologically.The period of this volume, the Early Middle Ages, was proverbially the "Dark Ages." It's a term historians dislike, but it is appropriate to the extent that the documentary evidence from this period is quite slim. People had other things to do, such as struggling to survive. The volume covers six centuries at one gulp not because little happened but because our knowledge of what did happen is so sketchy. In general the authors do a good job of teasing out from this dearth of material the story of how Europe began to become European rather than Roman and Barbarian.

It's fine if you are good at skimming academic literature. If you can take in whole paragraphs at once and translate them to mean "don't accuse this author of not knowing something about the topic," then you can tear through it pretty easily and find the content you're looking for. The writing is better than most academic books.

Was sold out and this was the only place to get it. It came in great time and I have had no problem with the book.

Ended up not reading it and was able to feign it easily in class discussion. Waste of money if for school purposes

gave this to someone who is an art historian specialising in the Middle Ages and he loves it. Apparently it's very informative, gave him new insight on certain events and is easy to read.