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Middle Ages - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
 | | As centralized Roman authority weakened, the imperial territories were entered and settled by succeeding waves of "barbarian" tribal confederations, some of whom rejected the classical culture of Rome, while others, like the Goths, admired and aspired to it. |
 | | In the east, the Eastern Roman Empire (called by historians the "Byzantine Empire"), maintained a form of Christianised Roman rule in the lands of Asia Minor, Greece and the Slavic territories bordering Greece, and in Sicily and southern Italy. |
 | | The spread of Christianity in the Migrations Period, both from the Mediterranean area and from Ireland, occasioned a pre-eminent cultural and ideological role for its abbots, and the collapse of a res publica meant that the bishops became identified with the remains of urban government. |
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