Sean O'Hara wrote
Rod Speed wrote
jmfbahciv wrote

The Dark Ages were dark because trade was constrained to local geographical areas.

No it wasnt. Most obviously with the crusades.

"The Dark Ages" refers to the early Medieval period --
end of the Western Empire to about 900 or 1000 AD.

Wrong. The term was invented by Francesco
Petrarca for the time prior to his time of 1330s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Ages

The Crusades didn't start until well after that.

Pity there was plenty of trade outside local geographical areas
even at the time you listed, most obviously with pilgrimages etc.

And those were in fact the reason for the crusades,
because so many of those pilgrims to the middle east
were ****ed over there when they attempted to do that.

And there were plenty of wars etc in the time you listed too,
and plenty like the vikings got up to raids over their entire
known world and quite a bit of their unknown world too.

Jim's claim is just plain wrong.