guards, and served in their armies when they did not happen to be fighting against them. But at length, after many years of continuous struggle, the great crisis came. It happened just about a century after the reign of Constantine. The Teutonic nations themselves began to be pressed by foreign foes-by the fierce and savage Turanian tribes that poured forth in vast, overwhelming hordes from the wilds of the far east of northern Asia. Chief among

these tribes were the Huns, who were now making their way into Europe, and bringing terrible devastation as they came. And though the great attempt of the Huns to enter the Roman empire did not take place till half a century later, when Attila their leader was beaten back by Romans and Teutons combined at the great battle of Châlons (451), yet this immigration of theirs caused a tremendous confusion among the Teutonic tribes, who were already dwelling upon the fringe of the Roman world.

28. The Invasion of the Goths and Franks.-The first nation thus unsettled by the Huns were the Goths, who were driven across the Danube and settled in the Roman empire in 376 A.D. They were always at variance with the emperors, and at last a great leader of theirs, Alaric, king of the West Goths, took and sacked Rome itself (410). His successor Athaulf led the Goths into Gaul and Spain, and set up a Gothic kingdom there (414). Other tribes made similar incursions, and also settled down into what afterwards became celebrated kingdoms-the Burgundians in the south-east of Gaul, and the Franks in part of Gaul and part of what is now Germany. The first great king of the Franks was Clovis (481-511), whose name is really the same as the modern French Louis so common among later French kings.

The East Goths and Vandals also poured in over the Roman empire; but though Theodoric, a king of the East Goths, reigned at Rome for some years (493-526) and made Italy a very flourishing country, no great lasting kingdom was founded by either of these tribes. But from the West Goths and the Franks the Romance nations and kingdoms finally rose up, and the great Teutonic invasion

in the course of time quieted down, and, as it did so, laid the foundations of what we know as medieval and modern Europe. At the same time, too, other Teutonic tribes, the Angles and the Saxons, were settling in Britain and laying the foundations of our own English nation.

29. Division of the Roman Empire: Further Invasions. Now, during the fourth and fifth centuries, while the old Roman empire was breaking up, it was divided into two parts (364), the Eastern and the Western, Constantinople being the capital of the former. But in the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries there was only one Emperor who reigned at Constantinople. Under Justinian (527-565), a very famous emperor, aided by his great general Belisarius, a very large part of the Western empire was won back from the Goths and Vandals; but in the next two centuries this, together with Spain and Egypt, was lost again. Another great incursion took place. The Lombards, coming from Jutland, descended upon Italy in 568 and settled there. Then the Saracens conquered the eastern and African provinces of Rome, and established themselves in Spain (710), where they remained for centuries. Finally in the eighth century Rome and Italy separated entirely from the Eastern empire and chose the famous Frank king, Karl the Great, as Emperor of the West (800 A.D.) 1

1

30. Results of these Invasions.—Now these great waves of national migration that passed over all Europe utterly obliterated for a time the old civilisation and the old commerce. Only in the extreme East, in the Byzantine empire, did a few relics remain. Everywhere else was chaos and disorder. The long period we have just hurriedly sketched, from the reign of Constantine to that of Karl the Great (306-800), affords little material for the history of commerce. It is one of the few great breaks in commercial history. For a long time the semi-barbarian immigrants were content with the simplest necessaries and the products of their own soil. There was no demand

1 For the history of this period cf. Prof. Freeman's General Sketch of European Hist., ad loc.

for foreign wares or costly articles of comfort and luxury such as the old Roman world had delighted in. It was in Italy, Spain, and the intermediate coast of the Mediterranean, where the influence of the Roman civilisation was strongest, that commerce first began to spring up again. In the Teutonic world of the Franks, i.e. in France and Germany, we cannot really discover much commercial activity till the reign of Karl the Great (771-814). But under him a new civilisation arose, and new industrial life sprang up with the great works,—the roads, bridges, and canals,—and with the encouragement of education, agriculture, and manufactures which are due to him. He renewed relations with the far East, and was a friend of that famous Caliph of the Arabian Nights, the great Haroun al Raschid (786808).

31. The Northmen.-But owing to the weakness of his successors the great empire of Karl was split up in the course of the ninth and tenth centuries. The kingdom of France, as we know it, arose in Gaul; the kingdom of England grew up in Britain. Another great movement of nations took place in northern Europe among the Scandinavian peoples or "Northmen." These formed the kingdoms of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark; and many Danes and Northmen, as all know, settled, some in Gaul, where Rolf gained the Duchy of Normandy, and some too in England, where they were joined again in 1066 by William the Norman, a descendant from the common Scandinavian stock that started from the north many years before. This brings us now to the beginning of our own English history.

The time of the great incursions is now over; and it was well that they should have ceased. Fortunately the last migration, that of the Northmen, had a very beneficial effect upon industry, though perhaps indirectly. It caused a great step forward in the new Western civilisation, in the development of cities and townships. Many of the old ruined Roman towns found themselves once more centres of the political and social life of the surrounding territories as peace returned to the land. They became seats of

government both temporal and spiritual, or strongholds for industrious workers who were afraid of war.

32. Decay and Insecurity of Commerce.—But meanwhile these immigrations had caused the almost entire decay of agriculture and industry. During the four or five centuries in which they took place the finest regions of Europe became unfruitful and desolate. It was impossible in such troubled times to improve the fertility of the soil by renewed applications of capital and skill. And of course the condition of internal trade was hardly superior to that of agriculture, and for the same reasons. For some centuries there is no trace of any important manufactures, except of course those domestic arts of weaving and spinning which are absolutely necessary for providing clothes, and which can be practised by separate individuals in every village or household. Rich men, indeed, used to

keep artisans in their households as servants; but this only shows that there were no recognised seats of manufacture from which they could easily procure what they wanted. Even kings, in the ninth century, had their clothes made by the women upon their farms. No doubt the villages had their smiths and weavers, but these occupations belonged to a few isolated individuals, and had not yet developed to any considerable branch of industry. Trade between various localities was very limited, for the general insecurity of the times made mercantile traffic highly dangerous. The want of communication prevented men from easily moving about to supply one another's wants, and at the same time made it difficult for them to find out what these wants were. Robbery by violence was frequent, and robbery by extortionate tolls still more so. The ordinary knight of those times was nothing more or less than a bandit, perhaps not always so openly criminal as a highwayman, but very often employing the same methods. They made merchants pay extravagant tolls at every bridge and market and along every highway in their domains. Frequent complaints of these exactions are found in Karl the Great's capitularies or enactments, and the most open robbery was practised by the German barons.

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33. Insignificant Trade with the East.—This state of things naturally ruined industry and prevented the developments of manufactures or of the products of the soil. Hence Europe in general had practically nothing to offer in exchange for the products of Asia, the only other continent then open to commerce. This is the reason why for so many centuries we have hardly any foreign trade. Almost the only imports were fine Eastern cloths and spices for the nobility. But how were these paid for? In return Europe gave the East gold and silver-the remnants, apparently, of the money in circulation under the Roman empire, but the supply of which thus greatly diminished before the eleventh century. Armour and furs were also exported. A great feature in European exports was, however, the slave trade; for often only by the sale of slaves were the upper classes, as they are called, enabled to pay for the Eastern luxuries they desired. Karloman, the brother of Karl the Great, made a law to try and stop this sale of European slaves to the Saracens, but it was ineffectual. This, and indeed all other trade, was carried on via Constantinople by the only two trading centres of importance in those ages, Venice and Amalfi.

From the era of Karl the Great, however, we may begin to trace the growth of a fair amount of industry and commerce, which, together with the rise of towns and the appearance of a distinct manufacturing class, contributed largely to the wealth of Europe, and laid the foundations of what afterwards became a considerable internal and foreign trade.

NOTE.-Roman Law.

The great barbarian invasions, although, so to say, they stopped the machine of commerce, did not destroy it or even greatly damage it. Roman roads, and Roman cities, and Roman law, remained ready for a revival of trade. The Theodosian Code (drawn up for the Emperor Theodosius II. in 438 A.D.) afforded a convenient collection of statutes and legal principles, and most of this was adopted by the Visigoths, Franks, Burgundians, and Lombards, at least for their subjects though not always for themselves. The influence of the Church also, and of the ecclesiastical (or canon) law was very potent in maintaining a memory of orderly government. Hence, after the pacification of