Hello and welcome to the history of the Germans, Episode 69, Germany in 1200 Medieval Faith.

Way back when in episode 30 we identified three drivers of the Investiture controversy.

These were the conflict between the emperor and the princes, the conflict of the

emperor with the popes, and the rise and rise of piety amongst the lay people.

These last 38 episodes we did talk at length about how the princes established their own

territory lordships against the imperial central power, and man did we talk about the conflict

between the popes and the emperors.

But that third element, we only touched in passing.

We covered the Patana uprising in Milan and later the emergence of the scholastic method,

the role of Bernad of Clairvaux and the crusading movement.

But that did not mean that lay piety had gone away.

Absolutely not. It was and remained the most crucial development in what Jacques Lagoff calls the birth of Europe. Now is the time to talk about it

in context. But before we start as always a reminder, the history of the Germans podcast is

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the generous support from patrons. And you can become a patron too and enjoy exclusive bonus episodes

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patron.com slash history of the Germans or on my website, history of the Germans.com. You find all the links

in the show notes. And thanks a lot to all of you have already signed up, especially to Laura,

Kelly and Grant. Now, as you guys may have noticed, I'm not a religious person, and I struggle

to believe spiritual phenomena appear solely from the revelations of prophets

and divine beings.

Economic, demographic and geographic conditions shape belief systems, and in turn what

...