growth and social mobility were being produced by an influx of refugees and adventurers and by a flow of cash and booty from raids of Muslim territory. It was Italy, however, that stood poised for the most dramatic take-off. Demographic recovery was accompanied by the more efficient division and administration of estates, the leasing out of church patrimonies to entrepreneurs and the investment in land of capital accumulated by churches and townspeople. As a land market developed and rents were paid increasingly in cash, increased demand and monetary circulation stimulated commerce and urban development. Milan had already grown to the full extent of its walls, and the vitality and collective awareness of townspeople can be glimpsed in episodes such as an uprising of Cremona merchants against their bishop in 924.
Much of the history of the Mediterranean area in the early Middle Ages is perforce 'subterranean' history. The most visible developments are the negative ones of political disintegration and physical upheaval. A great deal of the classical inheritance was preserved, such as Roman law and administrative traditions in Byzantium, ancient science and medicine in the Muslim world, and an enduring attachment to urban life in Italy. The early Middle Ages were a period of creative achievement as well as fragile survival and agonizing transformation; in the three spheres of the Mediterranean religious structures and beliefs acquired their developed form and the decentralization brought about by weak central authority helped to promote local trade and political and cultural activity, especially in Italy and the Islamic world. With the rigidities of ancient society broken down, new durable institutions, more adaptable social groups, and new dynamic communities had emerged to meet the challenges of better times.
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