Class 4: Before Europe (5)
and by way of Normandy the remaking of England
into the form that we now know it, all those things,
the Viking Age is very important for Europe,
Northern Europe, North America,
our class is also part of the Viking Age, right?
Because when the Vikings bump into the Franks
and then set all, and become a kind of counter power, right?
The power that uses the boats,
the power that's in charge, that can move, right?
One of the places they get to is Kyiv.
Getting to Kyiv in the eighth century, the ninth century,
is part of the Viking Age.
So another thing that the Franks do
is they set off the Viking Age
and the Viking Age leads to Kyiv.
So that brings us to where we need to be
when we start the next time.
Byzantium is trying to convert from the south.
Byzantium is in a contest with the Franks
about which kind of Christianity, under who's domination.
Meanwhile, the Vikings have been released
and are moving around the north
and are trying to find a way from the Baltic Sea
down to the Black Sea in their boats.
And the reason why they're doing this,
one of the reasons, is because of the slave trade,
the economics of the slave trade.
They're capturing and they're enslaving
the people who live, are Slavs, right?
They're capturing those people
and they're bringing them down.
So the metamorphosis that's going to happen
is when these Vikings have an encounter with the Byzantines
and decide to become Christians,
and as they become Christians,
the people around them become, not potential commodities,
but rather become people to be ruled by law.
And at that point then we can start to talk about a state.
So I've tried to line up the things that we need to have,
the religion, the language, right,
a little bit of the economics,
before we get to this very important moment,
which is the conversion of the people who are ruling Kyiv,
which is next time.
Okay, thank you.
(gentle electronic music)
