I have an M.A. in Medieval History, and I Don’t Know When the Middle Ages Ended.

I do have a date that I hold to, but it is really just a place marker, and not universally agreed. My date: 1492.

If you want to cover your butt, you would say the Middle Ages ended circa 1500.

The most common date given for the beginning of the Middle Ages is 476 C.E. (or A.D. if you like), which was the year of the fall of Rome. But even that is tricky, after the fall of Rome things only gradually changed over the next few centuries, and new kingdoms tried to run themselves as small versions of Rome, and the Eastern Roman Empire (The Byzantines) would continue strong for a thousand years. The late Roman period and the early post Roman period is now known as “Late Antiquity.”

(This is something to for another post, but I believe the reason for the “decline” in the Middle Ages stems from broken trade networks in the former Roman Empire, less trade, less educational diversity, less exposure, more regionalism and insularism.)

The Middle Ages ended, depending on who you ask, with the end of the 100 Years’ War (1453) (1453 is also the year the Byzantine Empire fell to the Turks,) The Protestant Reformation in 1517, or even the Counter-Reformation (1545).

The reason for this lack of consensus is the “Middle Ages” is a made up time. It was a made up time between “Then” (The Romans) and “Us” (The post-Renaissance world). The slightly amusing thing about this is that the “Middle Ages” was a Renaissance term, and now we tend to put the Renaissance as the last part of the Middle Ages. But the Renaissance is also the first part of the early modern period.

This is why I dislike “name and dates” history. History tends not to be black and white; there is a lot of gray in the way we shape the historical narrative, especially in terms that are supposed to denote transition.

The date for the end of the Middle Ages I usually use is 1492.

In Western History it is easy to see everything as pre or post 1492, when Columbus sailed the ocean blue. It is one of the few times in history when the entire perception of the scope of the world changed. The world could no longer be insular (which may in many ways not have been a good thing). Very quickly after 1492, we get the reformation and the beginning of the formation of the modern European states as we know them.

1492 was also the year of the Spanish Reconquista, when they expelled the Moors from Spain, making Europe, for the most part, a Christian continent.

1492 is not the perfect date for the end of the Middle Ages, but it is my date. For a peasant in France in 1493, life had not really changed at all from 1491. Which is why, again, the date does not matter. For me 1492 is a place holder denoting the course of Western Civilization prior to circa 1500 was not the same for that after circa 1500, which is as true a statement as could be made.

Note-to the extent that “names and dates don’t matter,” the only date that I knew for sure above was 1492. I knew the reformation was probably around 1519, but had to look it up- it was 1517, I was not sure of the Counter Reformation. I just knew it came a time after. I knew that the Byzantine Empire fell in the 1450s and I also knew that Rome “fell” in the 470s, but I too needed to check those date. That being said, I knew the narrative, and the dates were merely sign posts. And again, I went to Graduate school for two years studying nothing but Medieval History.