Empire and Communications

by Harold Adams Innis

  The Carolingian dynasty recruited its secretaries and notaries from the educational institutions controlled by the Church and Charlemagne demanded higher educational qualifications for the clergy. In capitularies of 787 he established schools in connexion with every abbey. An armarium for the teaching of writing was added to the scriptorium. He insisted on uniform obedience in the monasteries to the rule of St. Benedict and was active in securing a uniform liturgy and ritual in church services. The texts, including a revised Vulgate, were written in the Caroline minuscule which was apparently developed at Corbie and which gradually prevailed over other scripts. It marked the triumph of control by the Church over education. Writing ‘being in itself an instrument of conservatism, it was in the nature of things extremely conservative’ (Lowe). The use of abbreviations and suspensions made reading and writing highly skilled crafts.

  The Visigothic minuscule which had wide circulation in the Etymologica and the Chronicle of Isidore, archbishop of Seville, and which had spread with the migration of Spanish scholars after the Saracen invasion, had been finally suppressed by an ecclesiastical council in favour of the Gallic minuscule which in turn was superseded by the Caroline minuscule. The uncial and the half-uncial which had probably been used by scribes writing on parchment reached their highest developments in the fifth and sixth centuries respectively. Demands for more rapid writing and the necessity of economy in the use of parchment had favoured the half-uncial. In Ireland scant supplies of parchment led to a crowded half-uncial script and extensive use of a system of abbreviation. It was followed by English script probably in the seventh century which was ‘less bizarre, clearer and less crowded’ (Lowe). Both English and Irish scripts spread to the Continent, the influence of the latter being evident in the large number of palimpsests at St. Gall and Bobbio. The demands of public and private notaries for a more efficient script led after the fourth century to a new cursive of curved strokes and a new type of ligature which became the base for a book script and the minuscule. From this the Caroline minuscule was apparently developed and eventually won its way, even in Rome, against the uncial script or littera Romana, and finally against the entrenched position of Beneventan script[191] in southern Italy. The clear, precise, and simple Carolingian minuscule replaced a diversity of script and became the basis for more efficient communication.

  The achievements of Charlemagne were disastrously impaired by the Teutonic principle of equal division among the heirs which was accepted by the sons of Louis the Pious after the battle of Fontenay in 841. An empire extending from Hamburg to Barcelona was permanently split into independent and national kingdoms. Attacks from the Danes and the Magyars accentuated local organizations of force and separatist tendencies. Defeat of the Danes at Paris in 886 marked the beginnings of a new kingdom in France. In the East defeat of the Magyars in 933 and in 955 laid the foundations of royal power in Henry the Fowler and his son Otto the Great, who was crowned by John XII in 962. Power was extended in a marriage arranged between Otto II and Theophano, a Byzantine princess. Otto III (983-1002) began the Teutonic reforms by nominating Germans to the papacy. These encroachments on the Church brought resistance from monastic organizations notably by the Order of Cluni. In 1059, under the influence of Hildebrand, Nicholas II fixed a definite body to choose the supreme pontiff and to evade control by the emperor. With Hildebrand's succession to the papacy reforms of a drastic nature were introduced. The Church was to be freed from ties binding it to the state. It became a sin for an ecclesiastic to receive a benefice from laymen. Condemnation of feudal investitures of land to the clergy struck a deadly blow at the authority of the secular arm. Within the Church celibacy was enforced as a means of exercising control over men's consciences, preventing the establishment of ecclesiastical dynasties, and guaranteeing the supremacy of Rome. He attempted to extinguish simony and to make the clergy a caste and a pattern of purity to the laity.

  Parchment as adapted to the demands of monasticism had contributed to the development of a powerful ecclesiastical organization in western Europe. The monopoly of knowledge which had been built up invited competition from a new medium of communication which appeared on the fringes of western European culture and was available to meet the demands of lower strata of society. The impact of Mohammedanism which followed its abhorrence of images was enormously strengthened by a new medium in which the written word became a more potent force. The significance of paper and the brush had been evident in China and the Far East, and its influence was enhanced by substitution of the pen in western Asia and Europe.

  In China[192] writing began with the use of silk and the hair brush, invented in the third century B.C. for painting, and bamboo, but the inconveniences of these media led to the development of paper about A.D. 105. Textiles were broken down into fibres which, placed in a solution of water to secure uniformity, could be matted into paper and dried. Rags could be used and gradually flax fibres in linen were found to be more satisfactory. Use of the brush implied that writing developed from painting to pictographs. ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ (Confucius). Ink[193] made from lamp black was gradually improved between A.D. 220 and 419 to produce indelible writing. Since the pictograph was never exposed to conventionalization which came with successive conquests in the West, each character represented a single word and about 1,500 came into general use.

  Attempts had been made to preserve the oral tradition by an edict against books in 213 B.C., but this had been revoked in 191 B.C. Paper was used to establish Confucianism in classical literature and to supplement the oral tradition in the development of an examination system after A.D. 124 for the selection of talent for administrative purposes. The governing official class was made up of scholars. The empire was organized in districts connected by roads and post relays over which official reports, news-letters, and official gazettes were sent from and to the central administration. Imperial organization was designed to check independent thought. The polished essay was introduced as ‘a clever contrivance adopted by a former dynasty to prevent the literate from thinking too much’. Protests of public opinion were largely reflected in songs and ballads reflecting on the dangers of maladministration which had befallen previous governments. The Chinese were ‘consistently and thoroughly cynical about most of their officials all the time’ (Lin Yutang). Student movements, developed in relation to the civil service, grew up in opposition to empresses and eunuchs, but with little notion of personal civil rights were rigorously suppressed.[194]

  The wide gap between the governing and the lower classes facilitated the spread of Buddhism from India. Monopoly of knowledge of the Veda by the Brahmans invited the introduction of a medium from the periphery which would appeal to the lower classes. The power of the oral tradition as controlled by a priestly class in India had resisted the spread of Buddhism and writing, but after Alexander they spread rapidly with the encouragement of Asoka.[195] But weakening of Macedonian power was followed by the decline of Buddhism and its migration to central and further Asia. Again the monopoly of the Brahmans invited the inroads of Mohammedanism and success accompanied its alphabet and access to supplies of paper. In China Buddhism found an efficient medium of communication in paper and emphasis on the importance of a knowledge of writing. Characters were cut in reverse on wooden blocks, reproduced on paper in large quantities, and sold as charms. With this advance in printing attempts were made to reproduce the classics cut in stone by making ink rubbings on very thin transparent paper for impressions on wood. The enormous labour involved in cutting large numbers of woodcuts for single pages implied state support on a generous scale.

  Communication in China was handicapped in the oral tradition and large numbers of dialects, but it was facilitated by a relatively simple script which was understood throughout the empire and bridged enormous gaps. The emphasis on space concepts in imperial organization implied a neglect of time concepts[196] and inability to solve dynastic problems. Domination of the Mongols from 1280 to 1368 suggested
the limitations of political organization, but also the advantages of a tenacious language.

  Paper was probably introduced to the West from China by the reign of the Persian king Chosroes II, but the technique of manufacture was learned by the Mohammedans. Chinese workmen had been brought to Tibet to manufacture paper in 648. After the capture of Samarkand in 704 and of Turkestan in 751 manufacturing began in the West. Expansion of Mohammedan territory to the east created problems of government which became acute with dynastic difficulties incidental to polygamy which had been extremely effective in conquest but was less suited to periods of order. Omayyah at Damascus established his government on the Arab tribal system and came into conflict with the new Moslems who had been subjects of the Persian kingdom. Abassid capitalized Persian antagonism and the last Omayyah caliph was slain in 750. The Abassids started a new capital at Bagdad[197] and completed it in 763. A member of the Omayyah family escaped to Spain and established the Caliphate of Cordova which declared its independence in 756. At Bagdad, located at considerable distance from supplies of papyrus in Egypt and prohibited from using pig skins for parchment and reluctant to use other animal skins because of difficulties of detection, the Mohammedans concentrated on paper production. The introduction of paper coincided with the splendour and prosperity of Haroun al Raschid (786-809).

  Persia had been a repository of Greek philosophy. Followers of Nestorius at Edessa, founded in 428, and other colleges in Berytus and Antioch translated Greek and Latin works into Syriac. After the closing of Edessa by Zeno in 489 scholars migrated to Nisibis and then to Jundeshapur. Scholars fled from Athens, following the closing down of the schools by Justinian in 529, to Persia. After the capture of Alexandria in 642 the university was spared, but in 718-20 moved to Antioch. The tradition of learning was continued under the Abassids. The Caliph Al-Mamun (813-33) founded a school to translate Greek, Syriac, and Persian works into Arabic. Hunayn ibn Ishaq headed a group of translators who made large numbers of works in medicine available in Syriac and Arabic.

  Increase in the prestige of Bagdad following the interest in scholarship stimulated an interest in learning in Constantinople. The iconoclastic party established supremacy after the death of Leo in 820 and a vigorous edict of 832 was followed by persecution of painters[198] who were chiefly monks. With the accession of Michael, however, a council in 843 restored the sacred images to the veneration which had formerly been shown to them. Settlement of the controversy was followed by intellectual revival. Caesar Bardas established a university presided over by Leo the mathematician. Basil I, the founder of a Macedonian dynasty, and his son Leo VI compiled the legal code in sixty books and as the Basilica (887-93) it became ‘the most complete monument of Graeco-Roman law’ (Vasiliev). Photius, a prodigious scholar with a belief in the universality of knowledge, became the patriarch of Constantinople in 858 and gave a tremendous stimulus to learning. The prestige of Constantinople in turn invoked the hostility of Rome. The attack of Photius on Latin influence and his opposition to the filioque addition to the Latin creed led to his excommunication by Pope Nicholas I in 863. In turn the pope was anathematized and denounced for his illegal interference in the Eastern Church in 867. Union with Rome was restored in 869 but again broken from 879 to 893. During this period of difficulty the influence of the Eastern Church was extended by missionary activity in competition with Rome. In 864 King Boris of Bulgaria was baptized and soon after his people became Christians.[199] St. Cyril and St. Methodius translated the scriptures into Slavic and invented the Glagolithic alphabet. The offices were celebrated in the Slavic tongue and a Slavic clergy was organized with the sanction of the patriarch of Constantinople. The university was closed in 959 but reopened in 1045 under Constantine IX Monomachus. The intelligentsia became a ruling element in the state. As head of the faculty of philosophy Psellus gave a powerful impetus to Platonism and brought the encyclopædic phase of Byzantine scholarship to an end.[200] The emphasis on secular learning which characterized Byzantine education widened the breach with Rome and in 1054 the Churches of the East and the West finally separated.

  In the eleventh century the energy of the Abassids was replaced by that of the Seljuk Turks. In 1070 Atzig, the Seljuk Turkish general, captured Jerusalem and in 1071 Byzantine forces were defeated at Manyikait. The Byzantine emperors were compelled to turn to the papacy for assistance, but the latter turned to the idea of the crusades. The fratricidal abuses of private war in a feudal society incidental to feudal over-population were checked by concentrating attention on the sanctity of battle against the infidel. Division in the leadership of the crusades and in the objectives of the papacy, the German emperor, and the Byzantine emperor limited the possibilities of success. The kingdom of Jerusalem was established between 1100 and 1131, but in 1187 Jerusalem was lost. Attention was directed toward Byzantium and in 1204 Constantinople was captured and the Latin states set up in the East. Holy relics were transferred to west European churches. In the Lateran council of 1215 the pope was proclaimed head of all Eastern Latin patriarchs. The Greeks retreated to Nicaea and began an intensive reorganization of political and religious life. A council in 1234 intended to bring union between the East and the West ended by the Greeks stating: ‘“You are heretics. As we have found you heretics and excommunicated so we leave you now as heretics and excommunicated”, to which the Catholics replied “You also are heretics”.’[201] Constantinople was recaptured by the Greeks in 1261 and the dream of the papacy brought to an end. But Byzantium was irrecoverably weakened during the crusades by the rise of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa and the shift of commercial activity from Constantinople to the West. Large territorial organizations were ground down with advantage to the commercial city-state.

  The commercial revolution beginning about 1275 was marked by the spread in the manufacture of paper to Europe.[202] Paper facilitated the growth of credit in the use of documents for insurance and bills of exchange. With Arabic numerals it enormously enhanced the efficiency of commerce. Production had increased in Bagdad and by 1226 it was celebrated for its manufacture of an excellent grade of paper. Over one hundred booksellers and paper-sellers were located on the chief street. Damascus became an important export centre. The sack of Bagdad in 1227 and its capture by the Mongols in 1258 brought this activity to an end. Apparently its use began to supersede papyrus even in Egypt since in the eleventh century mummies were being disinterred for supplies of cloth for paper-making. The unsatisfactory character of the Arabian paper led Roger of Sicily in 1145 to order the recopying of acts written on it and Frederick II in 1221 to prohibit its use for public acts. It was claimed that Fez had 400 paper-mills in the twelfth century. The manufacture moved to Xativa at least by 1173 but again its poor quality involved limited use. Attempts were made in Italy to improve the quality of paper by the introduction of stamps run by water power to produce a finer pulp, the use of metallic forms, and the introduction of glue for sizing. The production of a better quality was marked by the use of filigraines or watermarks about 1282. A paper-mill existed at Fabriano before 1268 and at least seven paper-makers were located at that centre in 1283. The superior quality of paper was accompanied by a rapid extension of markets. Toward the end of the second third of the thirteenth century the more primitive Arab processes were gradually abolished. Marked increase in production in Italy after 1300 was evident in exports to the French Midi. By the latter part of the fourteenth century Italian paper-makers had migrated to France, the art of paper-making was still further improved, and paper production had moved to the north. Linen production beginning in Flanders spread to other areas after the eleventh century, particularly as it brought a decline in cutaneous diseases. Linen rags were available in larger quantities and paper manufacture became established near large centres such as Paris and Languedoc to meet the demands of governments, universities, and schools. The long apprenticeship and training necessary for paper-makers meant that skilled labour had a monopoly. Numerous attempts were made to check the migration of pap
er-makers, but the cost of moving labour to take advantage of such geographic factors as power and water proved less than that of moving the raw material and the finished product. Monopoly positions of various sites were gradually broken down. In contrast with parchment, which could be produced over wide areas, paper was essentially a product of the cities in terms of cheap supplies of rags and of markets. The control of monasteries in rural districts over education was replaced by the growth of cathedral schools and universities in cities. The religious prejudice against a product of Judeo-Arabic origin was gradually broken as the demands of trade and of governments increased.

  The impact of Moslem civilization[203] on the West was most powerful through Sicily and Spain. After the Mohammedans had been expelled in 1090 enlightened rulers in Sicily encouraged the translation of Arabic works on a large scale. Under Frederick II (1194-1250) Greek, Latin, and Arabic were recognized for legal purposes. About 1228 Michael Scot translated the biological works of Aristotle. Farrachius translated the enormous medical treatise of Rhazes of Khorasan (865-925). In Spain the Caliph Hakin II established at Cordova the largest library of over 400,000 volumes in a total of at least seventy libraries. After the fall of Toledo in 1085, Cordova in 1236, and Seville in 1248 the resources of the Moslem world were thrown open to the West. Adelard of Bath translated the trigonometrical tables of al-Khwarizini in 1126 and Evendeath (1090-1165) made available the system of Arabic numerical notation which slowly gained ground throughout Europe. The work of Averroes (1126-98), the greatest of Moslem philosophers, in his commentaries on Aristotle was made available by Michael Scot in Toledo after 1217. Jews[204] were active in the transmission of Greek learning from Spain to Christian Europe. Maimonides (1153-1204) contributed to the accommodation of Aristotelian teaching to biblical doctrine. As these works became available to the West the Church attempted to offset them and to adapt them to Christian teaching. Albertus Magnus and other schoolmen made prodigious compilations of knowledge. St. Thomas Aquinas, influenced by Maimonides and Averroes, attempted to give reason a proper place between sceptical mysticism and rationalism divorced from the belief in the possibility of a revealed religion. He was assisted by direct translations from the Greek following the fall of Constantinople, which placed the work of Aristotle in a clearer light. From the Latin translations of Aristotle's work at Toledo to the translation from the Greek of Constantinople about 1260 meant that knowledge passed from ‘a phase of almost total darkness to one of nearly perfect light’.[205]