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Chapter 45: The Quiet Changes in Europe

Rurik successfully borrowed the rope ruler. He felt that as long as he had this, everything would become easier.

In fact, purely theoretically, as long as a standard unit of length is clarified, many things can be measured.

Because there are many things that are constant, such as pi and the inclination of the earth.

In winter time, a child has a lot of time to kill, and Rurik did use a short period of time to basically understand the knowledge on the wooden board.

His attitude towards the large number of Norse mythology stories that Vilia has mastered shows that he is not interested in them.

It's not so much a myth as it is a bedtime story used by mothers to put their children to sleep.

The era is the ninth century AD, and European society is quietly undergoing changes.

What forces drive change?

It is climate change that forces people to work hard to obtain more food.

It is the pursuit of wealth that forces powerful people or groups to desire to gain greater power by various means.

The strength of the Frankish Empire is slowly declining. Her huge territory relies on the control of local lords. Objectively, this huge empire has the possibility of becoming multiple plates. And this trend has already happened, and Frank’s past has no choice but to lead

The army went around to suppress the rebellion.

The empire was no longer stable, and the Danes' overland raids southward became more and more frequent. And in the process, the Danes had begun to learn horse riding and cavalry training!

The prosperous Britain is slowly developing towards unification. The Danes and Norwegians have begun to harass them on a large scale, and the pace of Britain's unification will also accelerate.

The power of the Eastern Roman Empire was also declining, which led to the emerging Bulgars growing in size.

Central Europe is still the territory of large and small Slavic tribes, and they are still spontaneously continuing to explore the east.

Like the Novgorod people who paid tribute to the Rus tribe, this "giant village" was originally a fusion of migrating Slavic tribes. Of course, they are not the inherent owners of this land.

In the seventh century, a large number of Slavic tribes marched eastward, and they continued to drive the indigenous Finns to Finland and the harsher and colder Ural Mountains.

It can be said that Novgorod itself is already the northern boundary of the Slavic tribal clusters.

Each Slavic tribe has its own title. In the ninth century, they had formed settlements with a population of more than 100,000 people in different regions. In a sense, the only thing they lacked to become a real country was the canonization of the Eastern Roman Empire. Or

Those who are brave can unite all the tribes in the area and become their own king.

Give to God what is God's, and to Caesar what is Caesar's.

But in this era, what belongs to God must belong to the church, and what belongs to Caesar must also belong to the church. Whether they are from the East or the West, they are trying to gain greater power until they gain power over Augustus.

In Western Europe, the foundation of the huge Frankish Empire was unstable. Only a common belief could maintain this "super state", and the power of the Holy See in Rome was naturally growing.

In Eastern Rome, the Eastern Holy See's plan to seize power was defeated by the emperor's stormy iron-fisted methods. The long-term "Icon Destruction Campaign" was an action carried out by the emperor to confiscate the church's wealth, but it also objectively defended the secularism of Eastern Rome.

However, during this long movement, the Eastern Holy See suffered a severe blow, and the strength of the Eastern Rome itself was also severely damaged.

The Slavic people developing southward have already crossed the northern defense line of Eastern Rome, and Eastern Rome has also been strategically shrinking, which gives the Slavs greater opportunities.

The city of Constantinople was beautiful and wealthy, and the neighboring Thrace region provided the main wealth at the heart of the empire. The Romans in the city gradually embarked on the old path of Western Rome such as Rome, Ravenna, and Rome.

People indulge in pleasure, and the population of cities gradually declines.

This is a long process, so the Romans living in the Peloponnese or the Aegean Islands were happy to settle in their capitals because they could gain more wealth there and have the opportunity to advance in social class.

.

However, Roman laws quite restricted the settlement of foreigners in the city. Those Slavic merchants, the Varyag merchants who came occasionally, and even the Frankish merchants who came from afar were all taxed heavily.

The emperor and ministers seemed not to have noticed that the glorious Eastern Rome was hollowing out. As the scattered Romans gradually moved into key Thracian regions and capitals, those abandoned areas were naturally taken over by the Slavs.

The Slavs who went south became citizens of Eastern Rome. They began to speak Greek, learn Greco-Roman life, and gradually became Romans.

So when the Purple Empire came to an end, there were not many real Romans in the huge Constantinople, and they were replaced by tens of thousands of Eastern Romanized Slavic descendants to defend their Roman identity.

Compared with the Frankish Empire in Western Europe, the emperors of Eastern Rome attacked the church and consolidated imperial power.

However, Western European society increasingly needs the Holy See to mediate the struggles of various kingdoms. It is also a historical necessity that religious power overrides royal power.

Therefore, the Holy See takes its own scriptures and believes that it is all laws. They are especially sure that the world is flat.

The Western Vatican has this attitude, and the Eastern Vatican has a similar attitude.

However, in Eastern Rome, commercial activities were very developed, and a large number of classics from the ancient Greek period were not lost. All businessmen were doers, and they would not completely believe in the description of the world in the scriptures. They would rather

Believe in the results of your own exploration. After all, only a map that you personally prove to be true can lead them to trade.

Among the people of Eastern Rome, there were many people who believed that the world was a ball. Only the Eastern Church still clung to the scriptural theory that the world was a flat surface.

But not all priests are monolithic. After all, they have access to a large number of ancient documents, and they always have their own understanding of science.

After all, the universe model of these priests allows them to feel the greatness of the Lord. It is said that human beings live in a huge ball, and all the stars and even the sun rotate around this ball, and there is an alternation of day and night. For this reason, they do not

Be stingy with words of praise and praise the greatness of the Lord.

The progress of the wheel of history cannot be stopped!

After all, the emperor of Eastern Rome always worked hard to suppress the Eastern Holy See. Of course, the emperor wanted to ensure his strong power, which also led to the protection of a large number of secular forces. Therefore, the private exploration of natural philosophy has not been suspended, but it has not received official encouragement from the empire.

.

Through observations of astronomy and geography, as well as the practice of traditional Mediterranean maritime trade, isn't the world a ball?

With the destruction of Eastern Rome, a large number of unemployed scholars brought their well-preserved books and poured into Venice, their former business partner, and the dawn of the Renaissance was born in northern Italy.

However, until the Renaissance, and even Portugal discovered the Indian route and Spain discovered the American continent, the only remaining Western Holy See still firmly believed that the world was the plane created by God!

But Portugal has falsified some of the contents of the scriptures. It is said that traveling south along the African coastline will not fall into the hell at the end of the ocean, but the Indian shipping route full of wealth! For this reason, Portugal has made a fortune and has rapidly transformed from a borderland and desolate country.

become a powerful country.

In the end, the Holy See recognized that the world is a ball, not only because Magellan’s fleet completed its circumnavigation, but also because according to the treaty a hundred years ago, the previous pope mediated the fight between Portugal and Spain. Portugal owned the wealth of the eastern ocean, and Spain owned the west.

The wealth of the ocean.

As a result, the two countries explored in different directions, and eventually a war broke out in Borneo. In order to bridge the contradiction between the two countries, the Holy See not only had to recognize the reality of the earth, but also delimited the spheres of influence of the two countries based on astronomical drawings with clear accuracy.

But these are already seven hundred years later.

In 828 AD, only a handful of people on the entire earth, probably less than 500 people, believed that the world was a big ball. People in Western Europe and Eastern Rome were very worried that if they went too far, they would reach the end of the world and fall into the abyss accidentally.

The Vikings around the Baltic Sea were also generally worried that entering the vast western sea, they would either be destroyed by earthly pythons or giant sea snails, or they would escape from the "land of humans" and fall into the endless darkness beyond the World Tree.

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All of these are human beings' fear of the unknown world and are derived from the self-preservation instinct of human beings. However, human beings are also extremely curious, and it is also their own instinct to explore outside.

Rurik got the rope ruler and took action immediately.

The time has almost reached December of the Julian calendar. After all, the error of the Julian calendar changes every year, and some of its self-repairing calendar settings cannot remain accurate again.

Fortunately, it was only the ninth century and the situation was not that bad.

In Rurik's mind, he took it for granted that December 22nd was the east solstice. In fact, it didn't matter whether it was this day or not. As long as he continued to observe for a month, he counted the shadow of the wooden pole standing outdoors exactly one stika every day.

changes, that is, it is possible to outline a function curve.

After all, the earth revolves around the sun according to certain rules, and the changes in the sun's shadow are a special reflection of the changes in the earth's orbital position.

What Rurik believed was that the universe could be explained using mathematics, and mathematical laws were the basis of everything.

November 28th was a relatively sunny day.

All preparations are completed!

In an open space next to the sacrificial longhouse, he used a traditional level to measure the level of a ship (actually, it is a grooved wooden board with water filled in the groove to determine whether the measured object is parallel to the earth by whether the water will flow out).

Create a flat land.

He also prepared some scraps of wooden boards used for ship repairs as tools for writing and calculation. Since he did not have a real pen, he used a dagger to chip the wooden boards into a similar shape and used them as writing tools.

Vilia noticed all the strange behaviors, but she just watched quietly and even provided a lot of help.

She really didn't understand what this child was trying to do, at least it wasn't related to measuring the sun's shadow.


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