Эпоха трансформации в истории Европы с точки зрения ее цивилизационного содержания

Abstract

One of the most studied, debated, noticeable and important gaps in history is the transition period between the Middle Ages and Modern Times. This is primarily due to the specifics of the civilizational development of Europe in this period. It is almost universally accepted that its essence is connected with the transition from feudalism to capitalism. This era is ‘transitional’ and includes many different transformations: cultural, mental economic, political, when instead of an ethno-political space, a national-political world is formed. Therefore, it makes sense to call it so — the era of transformation, when the agrarian economy is transformed into a post-agrarian one, although not yet ‘industrial’, ‘pagan’ culture comes out from the ‘underground’ and actively pushes the Christian religion-ideology, ‘A Christian’ becomes a ‘free person’, etc. It is during this period that civilizationally significant processes begin and end: - The Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Counter-Reformation are coming to an end. - There is basically a ‘progressive’ stage of absolutism. - All means of ‘feudal redistribution’ of Europe have been exhausted (The Italian Crusades, the Thirty Years’ War). - The final division into ‘national states’ takes place. - Geographical discoveries are being fully completed. - In general, the first stage of the technical revolution is coming to an end. - A new bourgeois type of man is being actively formed. This article offers a brief analysis of this period as a special Era of Transformation, within which complex processes take place: Renovatio – as a ‘return’ to the state of culture ‘before the fall’ (first of all, ancient); Reformatio – as a ‘return’ to the ‘correct’ form of Christianity (‘early Christianity’); Revolutio – as a ‘return’ to the ‘correct’ form of government (a wide range from the ‘Roman Republic’ to the traditional German community or the Old Testament model). They are difficult to relate, they do not go synchronously, during the period they significantly change their meaning, at the same time, the logic of civilizational development implies a movement from Renovatio to Revolutio, from cultural deformations and changes to the replacement of the social system.