of principalities, especially on the border between the county of Toulouse and the duchy
of Aquitaine, but the main purposes of the bastides were to attract population to the
frontiers and to provide the founder with a political base.
Stacy L.Boldrick
[See also: BASTIDE; CAHORS; CARCASSONNE; CASTLE; CHÂTEAU-
GAILLARD; WARFARE]
Enlart, Camille. Manuel d’archéologie française depuis les temps mérovingiens jusqu’à la
Renaissance: architecture civile et militaire. 2 vols. Paris: Picard, 1932.
Higounet, Charles. “Zur Siedlungsgeschichte Sudwestfrankreichs vom 11. bis zum 14.
Jahrhundert.” Vortrage and Forshungen 18(1975).
Toy, Sidney. Castles: A Short History of Fortifications from 1600 B.C. to A.D. 1600. Toronto:
Heinemann, 1939.
Trabut-Cussac, J.P. “Bastides ou forteresses?” Moyen âge 60 (1954):81–135.
MILLENNIALISM
. Literally, millennialism (also millenarianism, chiliasm) refers to the belief, expressed in
the book of Revelation, that Christ will establish a 1,000-year reign of the saints on earth
before the Last Judgment. More broadly, millennialists expect a time of supernatural
peace and abundance here on earth. Both usages reflect the eschatological belief that at
the end of time God will judge the living and the (resurrected) dead. This belief in
ultimate divine justice has provided the solution to the problem of theodicy for countless
generations of Christians suffering under hardship and oppression.
In most early forms, millennial beliefs were anti-imperial, even antiauthoritarian: as
the messianic vision of Isaiah 2:4 depicts, the instruments of war and domination will be
beaten into instruments of peace and prosperity. Apostolic Christianity demonstrates all
of the key traits of apocalyptic millenarian groups: the rhetoric of the meek versus the
powerful, of the imminence of the Lord’s Day of wrath and the coming Kingdom of
Heaven; the shift from a disappointed messianic hope (Crucifixion) to a revised
expectation (Second Coming or Parousia); a following among common, working people;
the rituals of initiation into a group preparing for and awaiting the End; the fervent
spirituality and radical restructuring of community bonds; and the prominence of women
visionaries.
As Christianity evolved from a charismatic cult on the fringes of society into a self-
perpetuating institution eager to live in harmony with Rome, the hopes of apocalyptic
millenarianism embarrassed church leaders who emphasized that Jesus’s kingdom was
“not of this world.” With the advent of imperial Christianity, millenarianism was pushed
to the margins of acceptable Christian thought.
As a result, as early as the 2nd century, two of the principal themes of medieval
millennialism emerged: the use of chronology to postpone the End, thus encouraging
patience, and the transformation of the Roman Empire into a positive force. The former
teaching invoked a sabbatical millennium that would come in the year 6000 after
Creation; ca. A.D. 200, the first Christian chronology placed the Creation in 5500 B.C.,
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