Late Middle Ages

The Late Middle Ages was the last phase of the medieval period in Europe, in which many of the structures of medieval society came under strain. A great famine at the start of the fourteenth century was followed by the Black Death, which killed a large share of the population. These disasters, together with wars such as the Hundred Years' War, peasant revolts and the Western Schism that split the papacy, shook the old order. At the same time, cities, trade and banking grew, vernacular literature flourished, and the Renaissance began in Italy. The invention of printing with movable type, the rise of strong monarchies and the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople marked the transition to the early modern age.

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