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Old age in the Dark Ages: the status of old age during the early Middle Ages

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 September 2009

CHRIS GILLEARD
CHRIS GILLEARD*
Affiliation:
School of Medicine, University College London.
*
Address for correspondence: Chris Gilleard, Centre for Behavioural and Social Sciences in Medicine, University College London, Charles Bell House, 67-73 Riding House Street, London W1W 7EJ, UK. E-mail: CGilleard@aol.com
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Abstract

This paper reviews the position of old age in the societies of post-Roman Europe, from the fifth to the 10th centuries. Drawing on both primary and secondary literary and material sources of the period, I suggest that living beyond the age of 60 years was an uncommon experience throughout the early Middle Ages. Not only was achieving old age a minority experience, it seems to have been particularly concentrated among the senior clergy. This, together with the growing importance of the Christian Church as the institution that stabilised post-Roman society, the decline of urban living and its attendant culture of leisure and literacy, and the transformation of kinship into a symbolic ‘family under God’ contributed to a more favourable status for old age, or at least one that was particularly favourable for older men. This was based not so much upon the accumulation with age of wealth and privilege, but upon the moral worth of old age as a stage of life. The early Middle Ages, the so-called ‘Dark Ages’, was in this respect a relatively distinctive period in the history of old age. With all around instability and the future uncertain and often threatening, survival into old age was a rare but frequently revered attainment.

Keywords

old ageearly Middle AgesChristian Churchlife expectancy
Type
Research Article
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 29 , Issue 7 , October 2009 , pp. 1065 - 1084
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 Cambridge University Press

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