In the Middle Ages, most people living in the British Isles have very little knowledge of the wider world outside Europe, and their opinions of other civilisations are coloured by prejudice.

For example, William of Malmesbury, a monk writing in the first part of the 12th century, explains his view of the world: 'Of its three parts, our enemies hold Asia as their hereditary home. But now the Christians of those parts, if there are any left, squeeze a bare subsistence from the soil and pay tribute to their enemies. Africa, too, has been held by our enemies for 200 years and more. Thirdly, there is Europe. This little portion of the world is pressed upon by warlike Turks and Saracens: for 300 years they have held Spain and the Balearic Islands, and they live in hope of devouring the rest.'

For European Christians, the 'enemy' is Islam and any other religion that is not Roman Catholic, and the Islamic civilisations of southern Spain and Turkey are widely seen as a threat.

Islam

Islam means 'submission' in Arabic, and all believers have to submit to the will of Allah (God). The religion was founded by the prophet Mohammed (570-632) in the Arabian peninsula in the early 7th century, and then spread, first rapidly across the Middle East and northern Africa, and then more gradually into other continents.

During the medieval period, there is Islamic expansion across north Africa, from Mali on the Atlantic coast to Ethiopia in the east, and into Asia as far as Turkestan. Substantial Muslim communities arise in Madagascar and southern India in about 1250. After 1300, Persia (Iran) and Indonesia come under Muslim rule as Islam becomes a worldwide religion. During the Middle Ages, Islamic scholars preserve the ancient Greek and Roman learning of Europe and make a vital contribution to science and civilisation.

Pilgrimage

Christians have been making pilgrimages to religious shrines in the Holy Land (Middle East) since the 2nd century. These pilgrim routes spread ideas and trade throughout Europe. Spices such as pepper also reach Britain when people bring them back as souvenirs.

But now centres such as Jerusalem are in Muslim hands and Christian and Muslim armies become locked in conflict during the Crusades, which culminate in the Third Crusade of 1189-92.

Another popular shrine for visitors is that of St James at the church of Santa Marta de Tera at Compostela in Spain.

Europe

The largest states in Europe at the end of the 1300s are Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, Castile (western Spain), France, Sweden (including Finland), Norway (including Iceland) and the Holy Roman Empire (which includes the German principalities, Austria, Bohemia, Tuscany and Provence).

The Byzantine empire in the eastern Mediterranean, with its capital in Constantinople, is the biggest in the Christian world. When the empire's lands reach their furthest in the 11th century, it takes two months to travel overland across them, from the Adriatic in the west to Antioch in the east. There are several hundred religious buildings in Constantinople, including the Roman cathedral of St Sophia. In 1136, the monastery at Pantokrator employs 165 staff and harvests more than 20 million kilos of corn a year.

The battle of Kosovo is fought in 1389 between the armies of the Serbian prince Lazar and the Islamic Turkish forces of the Ottoman sultan Murad I. The result is a Turkish victory, the collapse of Serbia and the encirclement of the Byzantine empire by Turkish armies.

Constantinople is captured by the Ottoman Turks on 29 May 1453 and they gradually take over the region.

Southern Spain is ruled by two Islamic peoples from north Africa – the Almoravids and the Almohads – from 1050 to 1269. An example of their influence is seen in the stunning architecture of the region. The 'reconquista', led by Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella, is a successful attempt by Christians to reconquer southern Spain – by 1492, only Granada remains in Muslim hands.

Ireland

Ireland is divided into provinces – Northern Uí Néill, Southern Uí Néill, Munster, Leinster and Connacht. It is an agricultural economy ruled by elected semi-nomadic kings (or chiefs) who are frequently at war with their neighbours. They are resilient herdsmen.

Monasteries thrive as centres of learning, but the bulk of the population labours on the land, whether free or unfree. Their numbers are hugely reduced by the Black Death in the mid-14th century.

After Henry II's invasion in 1171, Anglo-Norman settlers marry into the local population and their descendants become the local rulers.

Wider world

Venetian merchant Marco Polo travels to China in the late 1200s. Portuguese traders arrive in west Africa in the 1480s, drawn by the promise of gold. But European explorers have not yet set sail for the Americas or Australasia. Most European maps of the world show large stormy oceans with the warning: 'Here be dragons.'

Empires with customs very different to Western Christian ways of life are in power in the Americas. The rise of the Incas in the Peruvian Andes starts around 1300 in Cuzco, where the streets are arranged in the form of a cat. Inca military successes are due to a policy of road and fortress building, and of giving military training to young noblemen.

The Maya, a literate civilisation dating back to 2000 BC, rule the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico from a new capital, Mayapan, from 1328. But 100 years later, the city is destroyed and their supremacy declines.

The Aztecs expand their territory across Mexico during the 1400s. It is an apparently bloodthirsty culture, dominated by a sun god, Huitzilopochtli, which needs human blood to prevent the world from ending. In one four-day celebration, as many as 20,000 prisoners are sacrificed.

On the other side of the world, southern India is dotted with Hindu temples for the worship of god-kings. The temples run agriculture, schools and banks. The mighty Hindu state of Vijayanagara emerges in the mid-1300s and remains the dominant military power for 200 years.

The massive Hindu/Buddhist temple complex of Angkor, capital of the Khmer empire, is the sight to see in south-east Asia. It stretches over an area measuring 25 kilometres (15.5 miles) by 10km (6.2 miles). Meanwhile, in central Asia, the nomadic Mongols, led at first by Genghis Khan (c 1162-1227), rule over a huge empire during the 1200s and 1300s. Relying on their formidable cavalry, the Mongols invade their way across Asia, Russia and Hungary.

In China, the despotic Ming dynasty – founded by a Buddhist monk turned soldier – rules from 1368, after uprisings against the Mongol invaders who have occupied most of China since 1280. A massive programme of public works to revive the agrarian economy leads to a population explosion: from 60 million in 1350 to 200 million by 1550. The Chinese invention of the mariner's compass enables expeditions to south-east Asia, India and east Africa between 1405 and 1433.

Japan operates a feudal system. The military rulers from 1185 to 1333 are known as 'shogun'. The country is run on the basis of ownership of land rights, called 'shiki'. The rights vary according to your place in the class system. At the top, a noble receives an income for defending the rights of those below him. These include the warrior ('samurai') who receives a percentage of the harvest his land yields. At the bottom of the scale, a farmer receives some crops for his labour.

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