Thomas Cahill

After the long period of cultural decline known as the Dark Ages, Europe experienced a rebirth of scholarship, art, literature, philosophy, and science and began to develop a vision of Western society that remains at the heart of Western civilization today. On visits to the great cities of Europe--monumental Rome; the intellectually explosive Paris of Peter Abelard and Thomas Aquinas; the hotbed of scientific study that was Oxford; and the incomparable...

Presents an accessible and revealing portrait of medieval times. As Europe reaches intellectual stagnation and decline, Ireland bursts forth as a vigourous haven of scholarship.

The author reveals the changes in thinking that made Western civilization possible. He portrays the ancient Jewish society and their vision that would later inspire the concept of individual worth.