Timeline

Prehistoric
Ancient Near East Ancient Egypt Mesopotamia Semitic Indo-European Vedic Hinduism Greco-Roman Celtic Germanic
Axial Age
Vedanta Śramaṇa Dharma Tao Hellenism Monism Dualism Monotheism
Middle Ages
Christianization Dharmaization (Hindu-Buddhist Indianization) Islamization
Age of Discovery
Renaissance Reformation
Modern day
Age of Reason New religious movements Great Awakening Fundamentalism New Age Postmodernism

Nicene
Catholic Latin Eastern Old Catholic Independent Catholic Eastern Orthodox Oriental Orthodox Church of the East Protestant Adventist Anabaptist Anglican Baptist Free Evangelical Lutheran Methodist Moravian [Hussite] Pentecostal Plymouth Brethren Quaker Reformed United Protestant Waldensian Nondenominational Christianity
Restorationist
Christadelphians Iglesia ni Cristo Irvingians Jehovah's Witness Latter Day Saints Members Church of God International The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The New Church (Swedenborgian) Unitarians and Universalists

Christianization (or Christianisation) is a term used to describe conversion to Christianity. An individual's Christianization begins when they adopt certain designated beliefs and become part of a community which shares those beliefs. Throughout history, a long list of previously pagan songs, practices, spaces and places have been (voluntarily and involuntarily) Christianized through ritual rededication and redefinition of their purpose or meaning in Christian terms. Christianization occurs in a nation when common lifestyles and community activities reflect some measure of Christian ethics and goals.

Christianization began when the early individual followers of Jesus became itinerant preachers in response to the command recorded in Matthew 28:19, (sometimes called the Great Commission), to go to all the nations of the world and preach the good news about Jesus. ^[1] It spread through the Roman Empire, Europe of the Middle Ages, and in the twenty-first century, has become a global phenomenon.

Individual conversion

Main article: Conversion to Christianity

James P. Hanigan writes that individual conversion is the foundational experience and the central message of Christianization.^[2]^: 25 The normative form of Christian conversion begins with an experience of being thrown off balance through cognitive and psychological disequilibrium, followed by an awakening of consciousness and a new awareness of God.^[2]^: 28–29 Hanigan compares it to "death and rebirth, a turning away..., a putting off of the old..., a change of mind and heart".^[2]^: 25–26 The person responds by acknowledging and confessing personal lostness and sinfulness, and then accepting a call to holiness thus restoring balance.^[2]^: 25–28

Baptism

Main article: Baptism

Jesus began his ministry after his baptism by John the Baptist which can be dated to approximately AD 28–35 based on references by the Jewish historian Josephus in his (Antiquities 18.5.2).^[3]^[4]^[5]^[6]

Individual conversion is followed by the initiation rite of baptism.^[7] In Christianity's earliest communities, candidates for baptism were introduced by someone willing to stand surety for their character and conduct. Baptism created a set of responsibilities within the Christian community.^[8] Candidates for baptism were instructed in the major tenets of the faith, examined for moral living, sat separately in worship, were not yet allowed to receive the communion eucharist, but were still generally expected to demonstrate commitment to the community, and obedience to Christ's commands, before being accepted into the community as a full member. This could take months to years.^[9]

The normative practice in the ancient church was baptism by immersion of the whole head and body of an adult, with the exception of infants in danger of death, until the fifth or sixth century.^[10]^: 371 Historian Phillip Schaff has written that sprinkling, or pouring of water on the head of a sick or dying person, where immersion was impractical, was also practiced in ancient times and up through the twelfth century.^[11]^: 469 Infant baptism was controversial for the Protestant Reformers, but according to Schaff, it was practiced by the ancients and is neither required nor forbidden in the New Testament.^[11]^: 470

Eucharist

Main article: Eucharist

The celebration of the eucharist (also called communion) was the common unifier for early Christian communities, and remains one of the most important of Christian rituals. Early Christians believed the Christian message, the celebration of communion (the Eucharist) and the rite of baptism came directly from Jesus of Nazareth.^[7]

Father Enrico Mazza writes that the "Eucharist is an imitation of the Last Supper" when Jesus gathered his followers for their last meal together the night before he was arrested and killed.^[12]^: 583 While the majority share the view of Mazza, there are others such as New Testament scholar Bruce Chilton, who argue that there were multiple origins of the Eucharist.^[13]^[12]^: 584

In the Middle Ages, the Eucharist came to be understood as a sacrament (wherein God is present) that evidenced Christ's sacrifice, and the prayer given with the rite was to include two strophes of thanksgiving and one of petition. The prayer later developed into the modern version of a narrative, a memorial to Christ and an invocation of the Holy Spirit.^[12]^: 583

Confirmation

During the Middle Ages, confirmation was added to the rites of initiation.^[14]^: 1 While baptism, instruction, and Eucharist have remained the essential elements of initiation in all Christian communities,

Some see baptism, confirmation, and first communion as different elements in a unified rite through which one becomes a part of the Christian church. Others consider confirmation a separate rite which may or may not be considered a condition for becoming a fully accepted member of the church in the sense that one is invited to take part in the celebration of the Eucharist. Among those who see confirmation as a separate rite some see it as a sacrament, while others consider it a combination of intercessory prayer and graduation ceremony after a period of instruction.

Temple conversion within Roman Empire

Main articles: Christianization of the Roman Empire and Spread of Christianity

Further information: Constantine I and Christianity and Persecution of paganism under Theodosius I

In Late Antique Roman Empire, sites already consecrated as pagan temples or mithraea began being converted into Christian churches.^[38]^[39] Scholarship has been divided over whether this was a general effort to demolish the pagan past, simple pragmatism, or perhaps an attempt to preserve the past's art and architecture, or most likely, some combination.^[40]

R. P. C. Hanson says the direct conversion of temples into churches began in the mid-fifth century but only in a few isolated incidents.^[41] According to modern archaeology, 120 pagan temples were converted to churches in the whole of the empire, out of the thousands of temples that existed, with the majority of those conversions dated after the fifth century. It is likely this timing stems from the fact that these buildings and sacred places remained officially in public use, ownership could only be transferred by the emperor, and temples remained protected by law.^[42]

In the fourth century, there were no conversions of temples in the city of Rome itself.^[43] It is only with the formation of the Papal State in the eighth century, (when the emperor's properties in the West came into the possession of the bishop of Rome), that the conversions of temples in Rome took off in earnest.^[44]

According to Dutch historian Feyo L. Schuddeboom, individual temples and temple sites in the city were converted to churches primarily to preserve their exceptional architecture. They were also used pragmatically because of the importance of their location at the center of town.^[45]

Christianization of places and practices

Main article: Christianized sites

Christianization has at times involved appropriation, removal and/or redesignation of aspects of native religion and former sacred spaces. This was allowed, or required, or sometimes forbidden by the missionaries involved.^[15] The church adapts to its local cultural context, just as local culture and places are adapted to the church, or in other words, Christianization has always worked in both directions: Christianity absorbs from native culture as it is absorbed into it.^[16]^[17]^: 177

When Christianity spread beyond Judaea, it first arrived in Jewish diaspora communities.^[18] The Christian church was modeled on the synagogue, and Christian philosophers synthesized their Christian views with Semitic monotheism and Greek thought.^[19]^[20] Christianity adopted aspects of Platonic thought, names for months and days of the week – even the concept of a seven-day week – from Roman paganism.^[21]^[22]

Christian art in the catacombs beneath Rome rose out of a reinterpretation of Jewish and pagan symbolism.^[23].^[24] While many new subjects appear for the first time in the Christian catacombs - i.e. the Good Shepherd, Baptism, and the Eucharistic meal – the Orant figures (women praying with upraised hands) probably came directly from pagan art.^[25]^[26]^{[note 1]}

Bruce David Forbes says that "Some way or another, Christmas was started to compete with rival Roman religions, or to co-opt the winter celebrations as a way to spread Christianity, or to baptize the winter festivals with Christian meaning in an effort to limit their [drunken] excesses. Most likely all three".^[28] Michelle Salzman has shown that, in the process of converting the Roman Empire's aristocracy, Christianity absorbed the values of that aristocracy.^[29]

Some scholars have suggested that characteristics of some pagan gods — or at least their roles — were transferred to Christian saints after the fourth century.^[30] Demetrius of Thessaloniki became venerated as the patron of agriculture during the Middle Ages. According to historian Hans Kloft, that was because the Eleusinian Mysteries, Demeter's cult, ended in the 4th century, and the Greek rural population gradually transferred her rites and roles onto the Christian saint Demetrius.^[30]

The Roman Empire cannot be considered to have been Christianized before Justinian I in the sixth century.^[31] Instead, there was a vigorous public culture shared by polytheists, Jews and Christians alike.^[31] By the time a fifth-century pope attempted to denounce the Lupercalia as 'pagan superstition', religion scholar Elizabeth Clark says "it fell on deaf ears".^[32] In Historian R. A. Markus's reading of events, this marked a colonialization by Christians of pagan values and practices.^[33] For Alan Cameron, the mixed culture that included the continuation of the circuses, amphitheaters and games – sans sacrifice – on into the sixth century involved the secularization of paganism rather than appropriation by Christianity.^[34]

Several early Christian writers, including Justin (2nd century), Tertullian, and Origen (3rd century) wrote of Mithraists copying Christian beliefs and practices.^[35]

In both Jewish and Roman tradition, genetic families were buried together, but an important cultural shift took place in the way Christians buried one another: they gathered unrelated Christians into a common burial space, as if they really were one family, "commemorated them with homogeneous memorials and expanded the commemorative audience to the entire local community of coreligionists" thereby redefining the concept of family.^[36]^[37]

Temple and icon destruction

During his long reign (307 - 337), Constantine (the first Christian emperor) destroyed a few temples, plundered more, and generally neglected the rest.^[46] Classicist Scott Bradbury says Constantine "confiscated temple funds to help finance his own building projects", and he confiscated temple hoards of gold and silver to establish a stable currency; on a few occasions, he confiscated temple land.^[47]

In the 300 years prior to the reign of Constantine, Roman authority had confiscated various church properties, some of which were associated with Christian holy places. For example, Christian historians alleged that Hadrian (2nd century) had, in the military colony of Aelia Capitolina (Jerusalem), constructed a temple to Aphrodite on the site of the crucifixion of Jesus on Golgotha hill in order to suppress Jewish Christian veneration there.^[48] Constantine was vigorous in reclaiming such properties whenever these issues were brought to his attention, and he used reclamation to justify the Aphrodite temple's destruction. Using the vocabulary of reclamation, Constantine acquired several more sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land.^[49]^[50]

In Eusebius' church history, there is a bold claim of a Constantinian campaign to destroy the temples, however, there are discrepancies in the evidence.^[51]^{[note 2]} Temple destruction is attested to in 43 cases in the written sources, but only four have been confirmed by archaeological evidence.^[60] Trombley and MacMullen explain that discrepancies between literary sources and archaeological evidence exist because it is common for details in the literary sources to be ambiguous and unclear.^[61] For example, Malalas claimed Constantine destroyed all the temples, then he said Theodisius destroyed them all, then he said Constantine converted them all to churches.^[62]^[63]^{[note 3]}

The element of pagan culture most abhorrent to Christians was sacrifice, and altars used for it were routinely smashed. Christians were deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars.^[68]

Additional calculated acts of desecration – removing the hands and feet or mutilating heads and genitals of statues, and "purging sacred precincts with fire" – were acts committed by the common people during the early centuries.^{[note 4]} While seen as 'proving' the impotence of the gods, pagan icons were also seen as having been "polluted" by the practice of sacrifice. They were, therefore, in need of "desacralization" or "deconsecration".^[74] Brown says that, while it was in some ways studiously vindictive, it was not indiscriminate or extensive.^[75]^[76] Once temples, icons or statues were detached from 'the contagion' of sacrifice, they were seen as having returned to innocence. Many statues and temples were then preserved as art.^[75] Professor of Byzantine history Helen Saradi-Mendelovici writes that this process implies appreciation of antique art and a conscious desire to find a way to include it in Christian culture.^[77]

Other sacred sites

Christianizing native religious and cultural activities and beliefs became official in the sixth century. This argument (in favor of what in modern terms is syncretism), is preserved in the Venerable Bede's Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in the form of a letter from Pope Gregory to Mellitus (d.604).^[78] L. C. Jane has translated Bede's text:

Tell Augustine that he should by no means destroy the temples of the gods but rather the idols within those temples. Let him, after he has purified them with holy water, place altars and relics of the saints in them. For, if those temples are well built, they should be converted from the worship of demons to the service of the true God. Thus, seeing that their places of worship are not destroyed, the people will banish error from their hearts and come to places familiar and dear to them in acknowledgement and worship of the true God. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (1.30)

When Benedict moved to Monte Cassino about 530, a small temple with a sacred grove and a separate altar to Apollo stood on the hill. The population was still mostly pagan. The land was most likely granted as a gift to Benedict from one of his supporters. This would explain the authoritative way he immediately cut down the groves, removed the altar, and built an oratory before the locals were converted.^[79]

Christianization of the Irish landscape was a complex process that varied considerably depending on local conditions.^[80] Ancient sites were viewed with veneration, and were excluded or included for Christian use based largely on diverse local feeling about their nature, character, ethos and even location.^[81]

In Greece of the sixth century, the Parthenon, the Erechtheion, and the Theseion were turned into churches, but Alison Frantz has won consensus support of her view that, aside from a few rare instances, temple conversions took place in and after the seventh century, after the displacements caused by the Slavic invasions.^[82]

In early Anglo-Saxon England, non-stop religious development meant paganism and Christianity were never completely separate.^[83] Lorcan Harney has reported that Anglo-Saxon churches were built by pagan barrows after the 11th century.^[84] Richard A. Fletcher suggests that, within the British Isles and other areas of northern Europe that were formerly druidic, there are a dense number of holy wells and holy springs that are now attributed to a saint, often a highly local saint, unknown elsewhere.^[85]^[86] In earlier times many of these were seen as guarded by supernatural forces such as the melusina, and many such pre-Christian holy wells appear to have survived as baptistries.^[87]

By 771, Charlemagne had inherited the three-century long conflict with the Saxons who regularly specifically targeted churches and monasteries in brutal raids into Frankish territory.^[88] In January 772, Charlemagne retaliated with an attack on the Saxon's most important holy site, a sacred grove in southern Engria.^[89] "It was dominated by the Irminsul ('Great Pillar'), which was either a (wooden) pillar or an ancient tree and presumably symbolized Germanic religion's 'Universal Tree'. The Franks cut down the Irminsul, looted the accumulated sacrificial treasures (which the King distributed among his men), and torched the entire grove... Charlemagne ordered a Frankish fortress to be erected at the Eresburg".^[90]

Early historians of Scandinavian Christianization wrote of dramatic events associated with Christianization in the manner of political propagandists according to John Kousgärd Sørensen [Da] who references the 1987 survey by Birgit Sawyer.^[91]^: 394 Sørensen focuses on the changes of names, both personal and place names, showing that cultic elements were not banned from personal names and are still in evidence today.^[91]^{: 395–397} Considering place names, large numbers of pre-Christian names survive into the present day demonstrating missionaries had the sense that eradicating elements of the old religion was not necessary.^[91]^: 400 Indications are that the process of Christianization in Denmark was peaceful and gradual and did not include the complete eradication of the old cultic associations. However, there are local differences as well.^[91]^{: 400, 402}

Outside of Scandinavia, old names did not fare as well.^[91]^{: 400–401}

The highest point in Paris was known in the pre-Christian period as the Hill of Mercury, Mons Mercuri. Evidence of the worship of this Roman god here was removed in the early Christian period and in the ninth century a sanctuary was built here, dedicated to the 10000 martyrs. The hill was then called Mons Martyrum, the name by which it is still known (Mont Martres) (Longnon 1923, 377; Vincent 1937, 307). San Marino in northern Italy, the shrine of Saint Marino, replaced a pre-Christian cultic name for the place: Monte Titano, where the Titans had been worshipped (Pfeiffer 1980, 79). [The] Monte Giove "Hill of Jupiter" came to be known as San Bernardo, in honour of St Bernhard (Pfeiffer 1980, 79). In Germany an old Wodanesberg "Hill of Ódin" was renamed Godesberg (Bach 1956, 553). Ä controversial but not unreasonable suggestion is that the locality named by Ädam of Bremen as Fosetisland "land of the god Foseti" is to be identified with Helgoland "the holy land", the island off the coast of northern Friesland which, according to Ädam, was treated with superstitious respect by all sailors, particularly pirates (Laur 1960, 360 with refer- ences), ^[91]^: 401

The practice of replacing pagan beliefs and motifs with Christian, and purposefully not recording the pagan history (such as the names of pagan gods, or details of pagan religious practices), has been compared to the practice of damnatio memoriae.^[92]

Conversion of nations

Main articles: Early Christianity, Acts of the Apostles, Historiography of the Christianization of the Roman Empire, and Christianization of the Roman Empire as diffusion of innovation

Dana L. Robert has written that Christianization across multiple cultures, societies and nations is understandable only through the concept of mission.^[17]^: 1 Missions, as the embodiment of the Great Commission, are driven by a universalist logic, cannot be equated with western colonialism, but are instead a multi-cultural often complex historical process.^[17]^: 1

Roman Empire

Christianization without coercion

There is agreement among twenty-first century scholars that Christianization of the Roman Empire in its first three centuries did not happen by imposition.^[93] Christianization emerged naturally as the cumulative result of multiple individual decisions and behaviors.^[94]

According to historian Michelle Renee Salzman, there is no evidence to indicate that conversion of pagans through force was an accepted method of Christianization at any point in Late Antiquity. Evidence indicates all uses of imperial force concerning religion were aimed at Christian heretics (who were already Christian) such as the Donatists and the Manichaeans and not at non-believers such as Jews or pagans.^[95]^[96]^[97]^[98]^{[note 5]}

Constantine's role in Christianizing Roman Empire

Main article: Historiography of Christianization of the Roman Empire

The Christianization of the Roman Empire is frequently divided by scholars into the two phases of before and after the conversion of Constantine in 312.^[114]^{[note 6]} Contemporary scholars are in general agreement that Constantine did not support the suppression of paganism by force.^[120]^[46]^[121]^[122] He never engaged in a purge,^[123] and there were no pagan martyrs during his reign.^[124]^[125] Pagans remained in important positions at his court.^[120] Constantine ruled for 31 years and despite personal animosity toward paganism, he never outlawed paganism.^[124]^[126]

While enduring three centuries of on-again, off-again persecution, from differing levels of government ranging from local to imperial, Christianity had remained 'self-organized' and without central authority.^[127] In this manner, it reached an important threshold of success between 150 and 250, when it moved from less than 50,000 adherents to over a million, and became self-sustaining and able to generate enough further growth that there was no longer a viable means of stopping it.^[128]^[129]^[130]^[131] Scholars agree there was a significant rise in the absolute number of Christians in the third century.^[132]

Making the adoption of Christianity beneficial was Constantine's primary approach to religion, and imperial favor was important to successful Christianization over the next century.^[133]^[134] However, Constantine must have written the laws that threatened and menaced pagans who continued to practice sacrifice. There is no evidence of any of the horrific punishments ever being enacted.^[135] There is no record of anyone being executed for violating religious laws before Tiberius II Constantine at the end of the sixth century (574–582).^[136] Still, Bradbury notes that the complete disappearance of public sacrifice by the mid-fourth century "in many towns and cities must be attributed to the atmosphere created by imperial and episcopal hostility".^[137]

Germanic conversions

Further information: Germanic conversions

Christianization spread through the Roman Empire and neighboring empires in the next few centuries, converting most of the Germanic barbarian peoples who would form the ethnic communities that would become the future nations of Europe. The earliest references to the Christianization of the Germanic peoples are in the writings of Irenaeus (130–202 ), Origen (185-253), and Tertullian (Adv. Jud. VII) (155–220).^[138]

File:Bateme de Clovis par St Remy-edit.jpg

Statue depicting the baptism of Clovis by Saint Remigius.

In 341, Romanian born Ulfila (Wulfilas, 311–383) became a bishop and was sent to instruct the Gothic Christians living in Gothia in the province of Dacia.^[139]^[140] Ulfilas is traditionally credited with the voluntary conversion of the Goths between 369 and 372.^[141]
The Vandals converted to Arian Christianity shortly before they left Spain for northern Africa in 429.^[142]
Clovis I converted to Catholicism sometime around 498, extending his kingdom into most of Gaul (France) and large parts of what is now modern Germany.^[143]
The Ostrogothic kingdom, which included all of Italy and parts of the Balkans, began in 493 with the killing of Odoacer by Theodoric. They converted to Arianism.^[142]
Christianization of the central Balkans is documented at the end of the 4th century, where Nicetas the Bishop of Remesiana brought the gospel to "those mountain wolves", the Bessi.^[144]
The Langobardic kingdom, which covered most of Italy, began in 568, becoming Arian shortly after the conversion of Agilulf in 607. Most scholars assert that the Lombards, who had lived in Pannonia and along the Elbe river, converted to Christianity when they moved to Italy in 568, since it was thought they had little to do with the empire before then.^[142] According to the Greek scholar Procopius (500-565), the Lombards had "occupied a Roman province for 40 years before moving into Italy". It is now thought that the Lombards first adopted Christianity while still in Pannonia.^[142] Procopius writes that, by the time the Lombards moved into Italy, "they appear to have had some familiarity already with both Christianity and some elements of Roman administrative culture".^[142]^{[note 7]}

Tacitus describes the nature of German religion, and their understanding of the function of a king, as facilitating Christianization.^[148] Conversion sometimes took place "top to bottom" in that missionaries aimed at converting Germanic nobility first. A king had divine lineage as a descendant of Woden.^[149] Ties of fealty between German kings and their followers often rested on the agreement of loyalty for reward; the concerns of these early societies were communal, not individual; this often produced mass conversions of entire tribes following their king.^[150]^[151] Afterwards, their societies began a gradual process of Christianization that took centuries, with some traces of earlier beliefs remaining.^[152]

In all these cases, Christianization meant "the Germanic conquerors lost their native languages. In the remaining parts of the Germanic world, that is, to the North and East of France, the Germanic languages were maintained, but the syntax, the conceptual framework underlying the lexicon, and most of the literary forms were thoroughly latinized".^[153]

St. Boniface led the effort in the mid-eighth century to organize churches in the region that would become modern Germany.^[154] As ecclesiastical organization increased, so did the political unity of the Germanic Christians. By the year 962, when Pope John XII anoints King Otto I as Holy Roman Emperor, "Germany and Christendom had become one".^[154] This union lasted until dissolved by Napoleon in 1806.^[154]

Christianization with coercion under Justinian I

Constantine had granted, through the Edict of Milan, the right to all people to follow whatever religion they wished. Also in the West, Emperor Gratian surrendered the title of Pontifex Maximus, the position of head priest of the empire. The religious policy of the Eastern emperor Justinian I (527 to 565) reflected his conviction that a unified Empire presupposed unity of faith.^[155]^[156]

Herrin asserts that, under Justinian, this involved considerable destruction.^[157] The decree of 528 had already barred pagans from state office when, decades later, Justinian ordered a "persecution of surviving Hellenes, accompanied by the burning of pagan books, pictures and statues" which took place at the Kynêgion.^[157] Herrin says it is difficult to assess the degree to which Christians are responsible for the losses of ancient documents in many cases, but in the mid-sixth century, active persecution in Constantinople destroyed many ancient texts.^[157]

According to Anthony Kaldellis, Justinian is often seen as a tyrant and despot.^[158] Unlike Constantine, Justinian did purge the bureaucracy of those who disagreed with him.^[159]^[160] He sought to centralize imperial government, became increasingly autocratic, and "nothing could be done", not even in the Church, that was contrary to the emperor's will and command.^[161] In Kaldellis' estimation, "Few emperors had started so many wars or tried to enforce cultural and religious uniformity with such zeal".^[162]^[163]^[164]

Bulgaria

Main article: Christianization of Bulgaria

Christianity had taken root in the Balkans when it was part of the Roman Empire. When the Slavs entered the area and conquered it in the fifth century, they adopted the religion of those they had subdued.^[211] In 680, Khan Aspuruk, the leader of an ethnically mixed pagan tribe led an army of Proto-Bulgars across the Danube, conquering the Slavs.^[212]^[213] They settled, and the First Bulgarian Empire was founded in 680/1 with the capitol at Pliska. Over the next two centuries, they fought on and off to protect their borders from various tribes and Byzantium.^[214]

Omurtag became Khan in 814. He persecuted Christians, but war with Byzantium, and other wars to acquire territory, brought many Christian prisoners of war into the state. The histories say their faith in the face of extreme misery impressed some of their captors including one of Omurtag's sons who converted. Under Omurtag, Bulgaria and Byzantium maintained a 30-year peace treaty that allowed for more contact, and this increased Christian missionary activities.^[215] Christianity spread, while the nobility who were largely Proto-Bulgarians, remained steadfastly pagan.^[211]

Official Christianization began in 864/5 under Khan Boris I (852– 889) who had been baptized in 864 in the capital city, Pliska, by Byzantine priests.^[216] The need to secure the country's borders, at least from Byzantium, was compounded by the need for internal peace between the different ethnic groups.^[217] Boris I determined that imposing Christianity was the answer.^[218] The decision was partly military, partly domestic, and partly to diminish the power of the Proto-Bulgarian nobility. A number of nobles reacted violently; 52 were executed.^[219] After prolonged negotiations with both Rome and Constantinople, an autocephalous Bulgarian Orthodox Church was formed that used the newly created Cyrillic script to make the Bulgarian language the language of the Church.^[220]

Boris' eldest son, Vladimir, also called Rasate, probably ruled from 889 – 893. He was deposed in 893 amidst accusations he was planning to abandon the Christian faith. Scholars remain uncertain as to the veracity of the accusation.^[221] His younger brother Symeon, Boris' third son, replaced him, ruling from 893 to 927. He intensified the translation of Greek literature and theology into Bulgarian, and enabled the establishment of an intellectual circle called the school of Preslav.^[221] Symeon also led a series of wars against the Byzantines to gain official recognition of his Imperial title and the full independence of the Bulgarian Church. As a result of his victories in 927, the Byzantines finally recognized the Bulgarian Patriarchate.^[221]

Serbia

Main article: Christianization of Serbs

Serbs migrated to the Balkan Peninsula between the fifth and seventh centuries. Christianity had been introduced there under Roman rule, but the region had largely returned to paganism by then.^[222] Serbian tribes adopted Christianity very slowly. The first instance of mass baptism happened during the reign of Heraclius (610–641) by "elders of Rome" according to Constantine Porphyrogenitus in his annals (r. 913–959).^[222]

The full conversion of the Slavs dates to the time of Eastern Orthodox missionaries Saints Cyril and Methodius during the reign of the Byzantine emperor Basil I (r. 867–886).^[222] The Serbian prince Vlastimir (c. 830 until c. 851) was probably pagan as all his sons had pagan names. In the next generation of Serbian monarchs and nobles there are Petar Gojniković, Stefan Mutimirović, and Pavle Branović.^[223] Serbs were baptized sometime before Basil sent imperial admiral Nikita Orifas to Knez Mutimir for aid in the war against the Saracens in 869, after acknowledging the suzerainty of the Byzantine Empire. The fleets and land forces of Zahumlje, Travunia and Konavli (Serbian Pomorje) were sent to fight the Saracens who attacked the town of Ragusa (Dubrovnik) in 869, on the immediate request of Basil I, who was asked by the Ragusians for help.^[224]

The first diocese of Serbia, the Diocese of Ras, is mentioned in the ninth century.^[222] Its provenance is uncertain, but it was probably founded about 871.^[225] Serbia can certainly be seen as a Christian nation by 870.^[223]

Serbia was annexed by Bulgaria, becoming a Bulgarian province under Samuel of Bulgaria (997-1014), bringing with it the Cyrillic alphabet and Slav texts.^[226] The full Byzantine conquest that followed Samuel's rule did not alter that use of Slavic language and liturgy within the Serbian church.^[226]

The medieval Serbian state was created in the second half of the twelfth century.^[227]

Croatia

According to Constantine VII, Christianization of Croats began in the 7th century.^[228] Viseslav (r. 785–802), one of the first dukes of Croatia, left behind a special baptismal font, which symbolizes the acceptance of the church, and thereby Western culture, by the Croats. The conversion of Croatia is said to have been completed by the time of Duke Trpimir's death in 864. In 879, under duke Branimir, Croatia received papal recognition as a state from Pope John VIII.^[229]

The Narentine pirates, based on the Croatian coast, remained pagans until the late ninth century.^[230]

Hungarian historian László Veszprémy writes: "By the end of the 11th century, Hungarian expansion had secured Croatia, a country that was coveted by both the Venetian and Byzantine empires and had already adopted the Latin Christian faith. The Croatian crown was held by the Hungarian kings up to 1918, but Croatia retained its territorial integrity throughout. It is not unrelated that the borders of Latin Christendom in the Balkans have remained coincident with the borders of Croatia into present times".^[231]

Bohemia/Czech lands

Main articles: Christianization of Bohemia and Christianization of Moravia

What was Bohemia forms much of the Czech Republic, comprising the central and western portions of the country.^[232]

Evidence of Christianity in this region north of the Danube can be found dating from the time of Roman occupation in the second century.^[233] Christianity was developing organically until the arrival of the Huns in 433 which Christianity survived only to a small extent. From the 7th century, in the territory of contemporary Slovakia, (Great Moravia and its successor state Duchy of Bohemia), Christianization was sustained by the intervention of various missions from the Frankish Empire and Byzantine enclaves in Italy and Dalmatia.^[234]^[235]

Significant missionary activity only took place after Charlemagne defeated the Avar Khaganate several times at the end of the 8th century and beginning of the ninth centuries.^[236] A key event with significant influence on the Christianization of Slavs was the elevation of the Salzburg diocese to archdiocese by Charlemagne with permission from the Pope in 798.^[237]

The first Christian church of the Western and Eastern Slavs (known to written sources) was built in 828 by Pribina (c. 800–861) ruler and Prince of the Principality of Nitra. His career is recorded in the Conversion of the Bavarians and the Carantanians (a historical work written in 870).^[238] Pribina was driven out by Mojmír I in 833.^[239] Mojmír was baptized in 831 by Reginhar, Bishop of Passau.^[240]^[241] Despite formal endorsement by the elites, Great Moravian Christianity was described as containing many pagan elements as late as in 852.^[241]

Church organization was supervised by the Franks. Prince Rastislav's request for missionaries had been sent to Byzantine Emperor Michael III (842–867) in hopes of establishing a local church organization independent of Frankish clergy.^[237]^[242]

In the Christianization process of Bohemia, Moravia and Slovakia territories, the two Byzantine missionary brothers Saints Constantine-Cyril and Methodius played the key roles beginning in 863.^[243] They spent approximately 40 months in Great Moravia continuously translating texts and teaching students.^[244] Cyril developed the first Slavic alphabet and translated the Gospel into the Old Church Slavonic language.^[242] Old Church Slavonic became the first literary language of the Slavs and, eventually, the educational foundation for all Slavic nations.^[244]

In 869 Methodius was consecrated as (arch)bishop of Pannonia and the Great Moravia regions.^[244] In 880, Pope John VIII issued the bull Industriae Tuae, by which he set up the independent ecclesiastical province that Rastislav had hoped for, with Archbishop Methodius as its head.^[245] The independent archdiocese managed by Methodius was established only for a short time, but relics of this church organization withstood the fall of Great Moravia.^[246]

Ireland

Pope Celestine I (422-430) sent Palladius to be the first bishop to the Irish in 431, and in 432, St Patrick began his mission there.^[165] Scholars cite many questions (and scarce sources) concerning the next two hundred years.^[166] Relying largely on recent archaeological developments, Lorcan Harney has reported to the Royal Academy that the missionaries and traders who came to Ireland in the fifth to sixth centuries were not backed by any military force.^[165]

Patrick and Palladius and other British and Gaulish missionaries aimed first at converting royal households. Patrick indicates in his Confessio that safety depended upon it.^[167] Communities often followed their king en masse.^[167] It is likely most natives were willing to embrace the new religion, and that most religious communities were willing to integrate themselves into the surrounding culture.^[168] Conversion and consolidation were long complex processes that took centuries.^[165]

Great Britain

Further information: Germanic conversions

The most likely date for Christianity getting its first foothold in Britain is sometime around 200.^[169] Recent archaeology indicates that it had become an established minority faith by the fourth century. It was largely mainstream, and in certain areas, had been continuous.^[170]

The conversion of the Anglo-Saxons was begun at about the same time in both the north and south of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in two unconnected initiatives. Irish missionaries led by Saint Columba, based in Iona (from 563), converted many Picts.^[171] The court of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria, and the Gregorian mission, who landed in 596, did the same to the Kingdom of Kent. They had been sent by Pope Gregory I and were led by Augustine of Canterbury with a mission team from Italy. In both cases, as in other kingdoms of this period, conversion generally began with the royal family and the nobility adopting the new religion first.^[172]

Frankish Empire

Main articles: Germanic Christianity and Christianisation of the Germanic peoples

The Franks first appear in the historical record in the 3rd century as a confederation of Germanic tribes living on the east bank of the lower Rhine River. Clovis I was the first king of the Franks to unite all of the Frankish tribes under one ruler.^[173] According to legend, Clovis had prayed to the Christian god before his battle against one of the kings of the Alemanni, and had consequently attributed his victory to Jesus.^[143] The most likely date of his conversion to Catholicism is Christmas Day, 508, following that Battle of Tolbiac.^[174]^[143] He was baptized in Rheims.^[175] The Frankish Kingdom became Christian over the next two centuries.^[154]^{[note 8]}

The conversion of the northern Saxons began with their forced incorporation into the Frankish kingdom in 776 by Charlemagne (r. 768–814). Thereafter, the Saxon's Christian conversion slowly progressed into the eleventh century.^[154] Saxons had gone back and forth between rebellion and submission to the Franks for decades.^[176] Charlemagne placed missionaries and courts across Saxony in hopes of pacifying the region, but Saxons rebelled again in 782 with disastrous losses for the Franks. In response, the Frankish King "enacted a variety of draconian measures" beginning with the massacre at Verden in 782 when he ordered the decapitation of 4500 Saxon prisoners offering them baptism as an alternative to death.^[177] These events were followed by the severe legislation of the Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae in 785 which prescribes death to those that are disloyal to the king, harm Christian churches or its ministers, or practice pagan burial rites.^[178] His harsh methods of Christianization raised objections from his friends Alcuin and Paulinus of Aquileia.^[179] Charlemagne abolished the death penalty for paganism in 797.^[180]

Italy

Christianization throughout Italy in Late Antiquity allowed for an amount of religious competition, negotiation, toleration and cooperation; it included syncretism both to and from pagans and Christians; and it allowed for a great deal of secularism.^[181] Public sacrifice had largely disappeared by the mid-fourth century, but paganism in a broader sense did not end.^[182] Paganism continued, transforming itself over the next two centuries in ways that often included the appropriation and redesignation of Christian practices and ideas while remaining pagan.^[183]

In 529, Benedict of Nursia established his first monastery in the Abbey of Monte Cassino, Italy. He wrote the Rule of Saint Benedict based on "pray and work". This "Rule" provided the foundation of the majority of the thousands of monasteries that spread across what is modern day Europe thereby becoming a major factor in the Christianization of Europe. Benedict's biographer Cuthbert Butler writes that "...certainly there will be no demur in recognizing that St. Benedict's Rule has been one of the great facts in the history of western Europe, and that its influence and effects are with us to this day."^[184]^[185]^[186]^[187]

Greece

Christianization was slower in Greece than in most other parts of the Roman empire.^[188] There are multiple theories of why, but there is no consensus. What is agreed upon is that, for a variety of reasons, Christianization did not take hold in Greece until the fourth and fifth centuries. Christians and pagans maintained a self imposed segregation throughout the period.^[82] In Athens, for example, pagans retained the old civic center with its temples and public buildings as their sphere of activity, while Christians restricted themselves to the suburban areas. There was little direct contact between them.^[82]

J. M. Speiser has argued that this was the situation throughout the country, and that "rarely was there any significant contact, hostile or otherwise" between Christians and pagans in Greece.^[82] This would have slowed the process of Christianization.^[189]

Timothy Gregory says, "it is admirably clear that organized paganism survived well into the sixth century throughout the empire and in parts of Greece (at least in the Mani) until the ninth century or later".^[15]^[190] Gregory adds that pagan ideas and forms persisted most in practices related to healing, death, and the family. These are "first-order" concerns – those connected with the basics of life – which were not generally subjected to objections from theologians and bishops.^[191]

A seismic moment on the Iberian Peninsula

San Pedro de la Nave, one of the oldest churches in Spain.

Hispania had become part of the Roman Republic in the third century BC.^[192] In his Epistle to the Romans, the Apostle Paul speaks of his intent to travel there, but when, how, and even if this happened, is uncertain.^[193] Paul may have begun the Christianization of Spain, but it may have been begun by soldiers returning from Mauritania.^[193] However Christianization began, Christian communities can be found dating to the third century, and bishoprics had been created in León, Mérida and Zeragosa by that same period.^[193] In AD 300 an ecclesiastical council held in Elvira was attended by 20 bishops.^[194] With the end of persecution in 312, churches, baptistries, hospitals and episcopal palaces were erected in most major towns, and many landed aristocracy embraced the faith and converted sections of their villas into chapels.^[194]

In 416, the Germanic Visigoths crossed into Hispania as Roman allies.^[195] They converted to Arian Christianity shortly before 429.^[142] The Visigothic King Sisebut came to the throne in 612 when the Roman emperor Heraclius surrendered his Spanish holdings.^[196] The emperor had received a prophecy that the empire would be destroyed by a circumcised people; lacking awareness of Islam, he applied this to the Jews. Heraclius is said to have called upon Sisebut to banish all Jews who would not submit to baptism. Bouchier says 90,000 Hebrews were baptized while others fled to France or North Africa.^[197] This contradicted the traditional position of the Catholic Church on the Jews, and scholars refer to this shift as a "seismic moment" in Christianization.^[198]

Despite early Christian testimonies and institutional organization, Christianization of the Basques was slow. Muslim accounts from the period of the Umayyad conquest of Hispania (711 – 718) up to the 9th century, indicate the Basques were not considered Christianized by the Muslims who called them magi or 'pagan wizards', rather than 'People of the Book' as Christians or Jews were.^[199]

Armenia, Georgia, Ethiopia and Eritrea

In 301, Armenia became the first kingdom in history to adopt Christianity as an official state religion.^[200] The transformations taking place in these centuries of the Roman Empire had been slower to catch on in Caucasia. Indigenous writing did not begin until the fifth century, there was an absence of large cities, and many institutions such as monasticism did not exist in Caucasia until the seventh century.^[201] Scholarly consensus places the Christianization of the Armenian and Georgian elites in the first half of the fourth century, although Armenian tradition says Christianization began in the first century through the Apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew.^[202] This is said to have eventually led to the conversion of the Arsacid family, (the royal house of Armenia), through St. Gregory the Illuminator in the early fourth century.^[202]

Christianization took many generations and was not a uniform process.^[203] Robert Thomson writes that it was not the officially established hierarchy of the church that spread Christianity in Armenia. "It was the unorganized activity of wandering holy men that brought about the Christianization of the populace at large".^[204] The most significant stage in this process was the development of a script for the native tongue.^[204]

Scholars do not agree on the exact date of Christianization of Georgia, but most assert the early 4th century when Mirian III of the Kingdom of Iberia (known locally as Kartli) adopted Christianity.^[205] According to medieval Georgian Chronicles, Christianization began with Andrew the Apostle and culminated in the evangelization of Iberia through the efforts of a captive woman known in Iberian tradition as Saint Nino in the fourth century.^[206] Fifth, 8th, and 12th century accounts of the conversion of Georgia reveal how pre-Christian practices were taken up and reinterpreted by Christian narrators.^[207]

In 325, the Kingdom of Aksum (Modern Ethiopia and Eritrea) became the second country to declare Christianity as its official state religion.^[208]

Europe of the Middle Ages

In Central and Eastern Europe of the 8th and 9th centuries, Christianization began with the aristocracy and was an integral part of the political centralization of the new nations being formed.^[209] Bulgaria, Bohemia (which became Czechoslovakia), the Serbs and the Croats, along with Hungary, and Poland, voluntarily joined the Western, Latin church, sometimes pressuring their people to follow. Christianization often took centuries to accomplish. Christianization established schools and spread education, translated Christian writings to local languages, often developing a script to do so, thereby creating the first literature of what had been a pre-literate culture.^[210]

Northern crusades and coercion

The Northern Crusades, from 1147 to 1316, form a unique chapter in Christianization. They were largely political, led by local princes against their own enemies for their own gain, and conversion by these princes was almost always a result of armed conquest.^[247]

From the days of Charlemagne (747-814), the people around the Baltic Sea had raided – stealing crucial resources, killing, and enslaving captives – from the countries that surrounded them including Denmark, Prussia, Germany and Poland.^[248] In the eleventh century, German and Danish nobles united to put a stop to the raiding, in an attempt to force peace through military action, but it didn't last.^[249]^[250]

When the Pope (Blessed) Eugenius III (1145–1153) called for a Second Crusade in response to the fall of Edessa in 1144, Saxon nobles refused to go. They wanted to go back to subduing Baltic Tribes instead.^[251] These rulers did not see crusading as a moral, faith based duty as western crusaders did. They saw holy war as a tool for territorial expansion, alliance building, and the empowerment of their own young church and state.^[252] Succession struggles would have left them vulnerable at home while they were gone, and the longer pilgrimage could not benefit them with those things that crusading at home would.^[253] In 1147, Eugenius' Divini dispensatione, gave the eastern nobles full crusade indulgences to go to the Baltic area instead of the Levant.^[251]^[254]^[255] The Northern, (or Baltic), Crusades followed, taking place, off and on, with and without papal support, from 1147 to 1316.^[256]^[257]^[258]

Law professor Eric Christiansen indicates the primary motivation for these wars was the noble's desire for territorial expansion and wealth in the form of land, furs, amber, slaves, and tribute.^[259]^[260]^{[note 9]} Taking the time for peaceful conversion did not fit in with these plans.^[262] Conversion by these princes was almost always a result of conquest, either by the direct use of force, or indirectly, when a leader converted and required it of his followers.^[263]

Monks and priests had to work with the secular rulers on the ruler's terms.^[264] According to Fonnesberg-Schmidt, "While the theologians maintained that conversion should be voluntary, there was a widespread pragmatic acceptance of conversion obtained through political pressure or military coercion".^[265] Acceptance led some commentators to endorse and approve coerced conversions, something that had not been done in the church before this time.^[266]^[265] Dominican friars helped with this ideological justification by offering a portrayal of the pagans as possessed by evil spirits. In this manner, they could assert that pagans were in need of conquest in order to free them from their terrible circumstance; then they could be peacefully converted.^[267]^[268]^[269] There were often severe consequences for populations that chose to resist.^[270]^[271]^[272]

Eastern Europe

In Asia, the combination of Christianization and political centralization created what Peter Brown describes as, "specific micro-Christendoms".^[209] It did not only create new states, László Veszprémy says it also created "a new region which later became known as East Central Europe".^[273] Conversion began with local elites who wanted to convert because they gained prestige and power through matrimonial alliances and participation in imperial rituals.^[209]^{[note 10]} Christianization then spread from the center to the edges of society.^[209]

Historian Ivo Štefan writes that, "Although Christian authors often depicted the conversion of rulers as the triumph of the new faith, the reality was much more complex. Christianization of everyday life took centuries, with many non-Christian elements surviving in rural communities until the beginning of the modern era".^[209]

Poland

Main article: Christianization of Poland

Hungary

Kievan Rus'

Main article: Christianization of Kievan Rus'

In 945, Igor, the duke of the Rus', entered a trade agreement with Byzantium in exchange for soldiers, and when those mercenaries returned, they brought Christianity with them.^[288] Duchess Olga was the first member of the ruling family to accept baptism, ca. 950 in Constantinople, but it did not spread immediately.^[289]

Around 978, Vladimir (978–1015), the son of Sviatoslav, seized power in Kiev.^[290] Slavic historian Ivo Štefan writes that, Vladimir examined monotheism for himself, and "Around that same time, Vladimir conquered Cherson in the Crimea, where, according to the Tale of Bygone Years, he was baptized".^[289] After returning to Kiev, the same text describes Vladimir as unleashing "a systematic destruction of pagan idols and the construction of Christian churches in their place".^[289]

Bohemia, Poland, and Hungary had become part of western Latin Christianity, while the Rus' adopted Christianity from Byzantium, leading them down a different path.^[291] A specific form of Rus' Christianity formed quickly.^[289] The Rus' dukes maintained exclusive control of the church which was financially dependent upon them.^[289] The prince appointed the clergy to positions in government service; satisfied their material needs; determined who would fill the higher ecclesiastical positions; and directed the synods of bishops in the Kievan metropolitanate.^[292] This new Christian religious structure was imposed upon the socio-political and economic fabric of the land by the authority of the state's rulers.^[293] According to Andrzej Poppe, Slavic historian, it is fully justifiable to call the Church of Rus' a state church. The Church strengthened the authority of the Prince, and helped to justifiy the expansion of Kievan empire into new territories through missionary activity.^[292]

Clergy formed a new layer in the hierarchy of society. They taught Christian values, a Christian world view, the intellectual traditions of Antiquity, and translated religious texts into local vernacular language which introduced literacy to all members of the princely dynasty, including women, as well as the populace.^[294] Monasteries of the twelfth century became key spiritual, intellectual, art, and craft centers.^[295] Under Vladimir's son Yaroslav I the Wise (1016–1018, 1019–1054), a building and cultural boom took place.^[295] The Church of Rus' gradually developed into an independent political force in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.^[296]

Scandinavia (Sweden, Norway and Denmark)

Main article: Christianization of Scandinavia

Before Christianity arrived, there was a common Scandinavian culture with only regional differences. Early Scandinavian loyalties, of the Viking Age (793–1066 AD) and the early medieval period (6th to 10th century), were determined by warfare, temporary treaties, marriage alliances and wealth.^[297] Having nothing equivalent to modern borders, kings rose and fell based primarily on their ability to gain wealth for their people.^[298]

Christianization of Scandinavia is divided into two stages by Professor of medieval archaeology Alexandra Sanmark.^[299] Stage 1 involves missionaries who arrive in pagan territory, on their own, without secular support.^[300] This began during the Carolingian era (800s). However, early Scandinavians had been in contact with the Christian world as far back as the Migration Period (AD 375 (possibly as early as 300) to 568), and later during the Viking Age, long before the first documented missions.^[301]

Florence Harmer writes that "Between A.D. 960 and 1008 three Scandinavian kings were converted to Christianity". The Danish King Harald Gormsen (Bluetooth) was baptized c. 960. The conversion of Norway was begun by Hákon Aðalsteinsfostri between 935 and 961, but the wide-scale conversion of this kingdom was undertaken by King Olav Tryggvason in c. 995. In Sweden, King Olof Erikson Skötkonung accepted Christianity around 1000.^[302]^[303]

According to Peter Brown, Scandinavians adopted Christianity of their own accord c.1000.^[304] Anders Winroth accepts this view, explaining that Iceland became the model for the institutional conversion of the rest of Scandinavia after the farmers voted to adopt Christian law at the Assembly at Thingvellir in AD 1000.^[305] Winroth demonstrates that Scandinavians were not passive recipients of the new religion, but were instead converted to Christianity because it was in individual chieftains' political, economic, and cultural interests to do so.^[306]

Women were important and influential early converts.^[307] Scandinavian women might have found Christianity more appealing than Norse religion for a variety of reasons: Valhalla was unavailable to the majority of women; infanticide of female infants was a common practice, and it was forbidden within Christianity; Christianity had a generally less violent message, and it inserted "gender equality into marriage and sexual relations".^[308]

Although Scandinavians became nominally Christian, it would take considerably longer for actual Christian beliefs to establish themselves among the people.^[309] Archaeological excavations of burial sites on the island of Lovön near modern-day Stockholm have shown that the actual Christianization of the people was very slow and took at least 150–200 years.^[310] Thirteenth-century runic inscriptions from the bustling merchant town of Bergen in Norway show little Christian influence, and one of them appeals to a Valkyrie.^[311]

Stage 2 begins when a secular ruler takes charge of Christianization in their territory, and ends when a defined and organized ecclesiastical network is established.^[312] For Scandinavia, the emergence of a stable ecclesiastical organization is also marked by closer links with the papacy. Archbishoprics were founded in Lund (1103/04), Nidaros (1153), and Uppsala (1164), and in 1152/3, Cardinal Nicholas Breakspear was sent as a papal legate to Norway and Sweden.^[302] By 1350, Scandinavia was an integral part of Western Christendom.^[313]

Iberian Reconquista

Main article: Reconquista

Between 711 and 718, the Iberian peninsula had been conquered by Muslims in the Umayyad conquest. Spain and Sicily are the only European regions to have experienced Islamic conquest.^[314] The blended Muslim, Christian and Jewish cultures that resulted from the eighth century onward left a profound imprint on Spain.^[314]

The centuries long military struggle to reclaim the peninsula from Muslim rule, called the Reconquista, took place until the Christian Kingdoms, that would later become Spain and Portugal, reconquered the Moorish states of Al-Ándalus in 1492 (see: Battle of Covadonga in 722 and the Conquest of Granada in 1492).

Isabel and Ferdinand united the country with themselves as its first royalty quickly establishing the Spanish Inquisition in order to consolidate state interest.^[315] The Spanish inquisition was originally authorized by the Pope, yet the initial inquisitors proved so severe that the Pope almost immediately opposed it; to no avail.^[316] Ferdinand is said to have pressured the Pope, and in October 1483, a papal bull conceded control of the inquisition to the Spanish crown. According to Spanish historian José Casanova, the Spanish inquisition became the first truly national, unified and centralized state institution.^[317] After the 1400s, few Spanish inquisitors were from the religious orders.^[318]

Romania

Romania became Christian in a gradual manner beginning when Rome conquered the province of Dacia (106-107). The Romans brought Latinization through intense and massive colonization.^[319] Rome withdrew in the third century, then the Slavs reached Dacia in the 6th to 7th centuries and were eventually assimilated.^[320] By the 8th to 9th centuries, Romanians existed in a "frontier" on the other side of the Carpathian mountains between Latin, Catholic Europe and the Byzantine, Orthodox East.^[321] During most of this period, being Christian allowed its relative observance in parallel with the continued observance of some pagan customs.^[322]

Missionaries from south of the Danube moved north spreading their western faith and their Latin language.^[323] In the last two decades of the 9th century, missionaries Clement and Naum, (who were disciples of the brothers Cyril and Methodius who had converted the Old Slavic language to a written form in 863), had arrived in the region spreading the Cyrillic alphabet.^[320] By the 10th century when the Bulgarian Tsars extended their territory to include Transylvania, they were able to impose the Bulgarian church model and its Slavic language without opposition.^[324] Nearly all Romanian words concerning Christian faith have Latin roots, while words regarding the organization of the church are Slavonic.^[319]

Romanian historian Ioan-Aurel Pop writes that "Christian fervor and the massive conversion to Christianity among the Slavs may have led to the canonic conversion of the last heathen, or ecclesiastically unorganized, Romanian islands".^[320] For Romanians, the church model was "overwhelming, omnipresent, putting pressure on the Romanians and often accompanied by a political element".^[320] This ecclesiastical and political tradition continued until the 19th century.^[325]

Albania

Main article: Church of Caucasian Albania

Most scholars agree that Christianity was officially adopted in Caucasian Albania in AD 313 or AD 315 when Gregory the Illuminator baptized the Albanian king and ordained the first bishop Tovmas, the founder of the Albanian church. It is highly probable that Christianity covered the whole of antique Caucasian Albania by the late fourth century.^[326]^[327]

The king of the country then was the founder of the Arsacid dynasty of Albania Vachagan I the Brave (but not his grandson Urnayr), and the king of Armenia was Tiridat III the Great, also Arsacid. As M.-L. Chaumont established in 1969, the latter, with the help of Gregory the Illuminator, adopted the Christian faith at the state level in June 311, two months after the publication of the Edict of Sardica “On Tolerance” by Emperor Galerius (293–311). In 313, after the appearance of the Edict of Milan, Tiridat attracted the younger allies of Armenia Iberia-Kartli, Albania-Aluank' and Lazika-Egerk' (Colchis) to the process of Christianization. In the first half of 315, Gregory the Illuminator baptized the Albanian king (who had arrived in Armenia) and ordained the first bishop Tovmas (the founder of the Albanian church, with the center in the capital Kapalak) for his country: he was from the city of Satala in Lesser Armenia. Probably, at the same stage, Christianization covered the whole of antique Albania, i.e. territory north of the Kura River, to the Caspian Sea and the Derbend Pass.^[328]

Lithuania

The last of the Baltic crusades was the conflict between the mostly German Teutonic Order and Lithuania in the far northeastern reaches of Europe. Lithuania is sometimes described as "the last pagan nation in medieval Europe".^[329]

The Teutonic Order was a crusading organization for the Christian Holy Land founded by members of the Knights Hospitaller. Medieval historian Aiden Lilienfeld says "In 1226, however, the Duke of Mazovia (in modern-day Poland) granted the Order territory in eastern Prussia in exchange for help in subjugating pagan Baltic peoples".^[261]

Lilienfeld says "their status as a crusading "monastic" order meant that they could only claim autonomy and legitimacy so long as they could convince the other European Catholic states, from whom they received recruits and financial support, that the Order had a job to do: to convert pagan populations that Catholic rulers perceived to be a threat to Christendom. The greatest of these perceived threats was the Grand Duchy of Lithuania."^[261]

Over the course of the next 200 years, the Order expanded its territory to cover much of the eastern Baltic coast.^[261]

In 1384, the ten year old daughter of Louis the Great, King of Hungary and Poland, and his wife, Elizabeth of Bosnia, named Jadwiga, was crowned king of Poland. One year later, a marriage was arranged between her and the Grand Duke Jogaila of Lithuania. Jogaila was baptized, married, and crowned king in 1386 beginning the 400 year shared history of Poland and Lithuania.^[330] This would seem to obviate the need for the Order's crusade, yet activity against local populations, particularly the Samogition peoples of the eastern Baltic, continued in a frequently brutal manner.^[261]

The Teutonic Order eventually fell to Poland-Lithuania in 1525. Lilienfeld says that "After this, the Order's territory was divided between Poland-Lithuania and the Hohenzollern dynasty of Brandenburg, putting an end to the monastic state and the formal Northern Crusade. All of the Order's most powerful cities–Danzig (Gdansk), Elbing (Elblag), Marienburg (Malbork), and Braunsberg (Braniewo)–now fall within Poland in the 21st century, except for Koenigsburg (Kaliningrad) in Russia."^[261]

Early colonialism (1500s -1700s)

Following the geographic discoveries of the 1400s and 1500s, increasing population and inflation led the emerging nation-states of Portugal, Spain, and France, the Dutch Republic, and England to explore, conquer, colonize and exploit the newly discovered territories.^[331] While colonialism was primarily economic and political, it opened the door for Christian missionaries who accompanied the early explorers or soon followed thereby connecting Christianization and colonialism.^[332]^[333]

History also connects Christianization with opposition to colonialism. Historian Lamin Sanneh writes that there is an equal amount of evidence of both missionary support and missionary opposition to colonialism through "protest and resistance both in the church and in politics".^[334] In Sanneh's view, missions were "colonialism's Achilles heel, not its shield".^[335] According to historical theologian Justo Gonzales, colonialism and missions each sometimes aided and sometimes impeded the other.^[336] According to Sanneh, "Despite their role as allies of the empire, missions also developed the vernacular that inspired sentiments of national identity and thus undercut Christianity's identification with colonial rule".^[337]

Different state actors created colonies that varied widely.^[338] Some colonies had institutions that allowed native populations to reap some benefits. Others became extractive colonies with predatory rule that produced an autocracy with a dismal record.^[339]

A catastrophe was wrought upon the Amerindians by contact with Europeans. Old World diseases like smallpox, measles, malaria and many others spread through Indian populations. "In most of the New World 90 percent or more of the native population was destroyed by wave after wave of previously unknown afflictions. Explorers and colonists did not enter an empty land but rather an emptied one".^[340]

Portugal and Spain

France

In the seventeenth century, the French used assimilation as a means of establishing colonies controlled by the state rather than private companies.^[355] Within the context of western geocentrism, assimilation (integration of a small group into a larger one) has been used to legitimize European colonization morally and politically for centuries.^[356] It advocated multiple aspects of European culture such as "civility, social organization, law, economic development, civil status," dress, bodily description, religion and more to the exclusion of local culture.^[357]

Their goal was a political and religious community representative of an ideal society as articulated through the progressive theory of history. This common theory of the time asserts that history shows the normal progression of society is toward constant betterment; that humans could therefore eventually be perfected; that primitive nations could be forced to become modern states wherein that would happen.^[358]

This was linked with the emergence of the modern state and was instrumental in the development of racialism as an explanation of the failure of Christianization.^[359]^[360]

The Dutch Republic

The Dutch Reformed church was not a dominant influence in the Dutch colonies.^[361] However, the Dutch East Indies Trading Company used assimilation in its Asian port towns, encouraging intermarriage and cultural uniformity, to establish colonies.^[362]

Britain

Great Britain's colonial expansion was for the most part driven by commercial ambitions and competition with France.^[363] Investors saw converting the natives as a secondary concern.^[364] Laura Stevens writes that British missions were more talk than walk.^[365] From the beginning, the British talked (and wrote) a great deal about converting native populations, but actual efforts were few and feeble.^[365] These missions were universally Protestant, were based on belief in the traditional duty to "teach all nations", the sense of obligation to extend the benefits of Christianity to heathen lands just as Europe itself had been "civilized" centuries before, and a fervent pity for those who had never heard the gospel.^[366] Historian Jacob Schacter says "ambivalent benevolence" was at the heart of most British and American attitudes toward Native Americans.^[367] The British did not create widespread conversion.^[365]

In the United States

Main article: History of immigration to the United States

Colonies in the Americas experienced a distinct type of colonialism called settler colonialism that replaces indigenous populations with a settler society. Settler colonial states include Canada, the United States, Australia, and South Africa.^[368]

Missionaries played a crucial role in the acculturation of the Cherokee and other American Indians.^[369] A peace treaty with the Cherokee in 1794 stimulated a cultural revival and the welcoming of white missionaries. Historian Mark Noll has written that "what followed was a slow but steady acceptance of the Christian faith".^[369] Both Christianization and the Cherokee people received a fatal blow after the discovery of gold in north Georgia in 1828. Cherokee land was seized by the government, and the Cherokee people were transported West in what became known as the Trail of tears.^[370]

The history of boarding schools for the indigenous populations in Canada and the US is not generally good. While the majority of native children did not attend boarding school at all, of those that did, recent studies indicate some found happiness and refuge while others found suffering and abuse.^[371]

Historian William Gerald McLoughlin has written that, humanitarians who saw the decline of indigenous people with regret, advocated education and assimilation as the native's only hope for survival.^[372]^[373] Over time, many missionaries came to respect the virtues of native culture. "After 1828, most missionaries found it difficult to defend the policies of their government" writes McLoughlin.^[372]

The beginning of American Protestant missions abroad followed the sailing of William Carey from England to India in 1793 after the Great awakening.^[374]

New imperialism (19th and 20th centuries)

Further information: Civilizing mission

Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, New Imperialism was a second wave of colonialism that lasted until World War II.^[375] Economists Jan Henryk Pierskalla and Alexander de Juan write that "Early colonial encounters in the Americas of the fifteenth century had little in common with colonization in Africa during the age of the 'New Imperialism'."^[376] During this time, colonial powers gained territory at almost three times the rate of the earlier period.^[377]

By 1914, these empires extended over 85% of the globe.^[377] The two largest and most powerful empires were the British empire and the Japanese empire. "In addition to colonial rule, other means of domination were exercised in the form of spheres of influence, special commercial treaties, and the subordination that lenders often impose on debtor nations".^[377]

The sixteenth century had been the "great age of Catholic expansion" whereas the nineteenth century was that for Protestantism.^[378]

Germany

As a latecomer to the Scramble for Africa, Germany's main interest was in making its colonies secure rather than to maximize extraction. Germany largely focused on the idea that disturbances could be interpreted as a sign of weakness by its international rivals.^[338]

Impact of colonialism

Sociologists have identified the key role of Christian missionaries, in particular Protestant missionaries, in generating a democratic legacy for many former colonies, through the spread of literacy, mass printing, and voluntary organizations.
Although contact with Christian missionaries might have had beneficial long-term effects for human capital, political participation, and eventually democratization, contact with the colonial slave trade has had pernicious effects.^[379]

Some of the different colonial practices, along with the pre-existing conditions in the colonial states, have had long-term negative impact on modern post-colonial countries in their economic development, their democracy, and the ability of their government to accomplish policy goals.^[380] The political legacies of colonialism include political instability, violence, and ethnic exclusion which is also linked to civil strife and civil war.^[381]

Decolonization

Just as Christianization had a role in colonialism, it has also played a central role in decolonization moving former colonies toward independence.^[382] Shifting beliefs about Christianity's role in empire began in France in the 1930s and 40s.^[383] Christians were rethinking the relationship between religion and politics. From the 1960s onward, this new understanding of theology combined with Christian activism, was instrumental in motivating indigenous people, such as the Algerians, to work toward and fight for independence from foreign governments. This in turn, influenced global trends.^[384] In many colonial societies, Christian missionaries played a transformative role in the development of decolonization and post-colonial Christianity.^[385]

In the post-colonial world, it has become necessary for Christianization to break free of its colonial moorings, says Sanneh.^[386] Mark Boyle writes that:

Christianity's historical alignment with the Western project and [the overlapping] histories of colonialism and imperialism raises questions about its capacity to serve as a progressive force in global affairs today. Placing Christianity under postcolonial scrutiny, ... Christianity offers a variety of complex, contradictory, and competing approaches to peace building that variously defend the hegemonic ambitions of the West on the one hand, and support critical practices that usurp and decenter the sovereign supremacy assumed by the West on the other.^[387]

Global Christianization

Dana L. Robert has written that one third of the world's population is now Christian in a huge variety of forms. The geographic range, cultural diversity and organizational variety of these many types of Christians includes traditional Catholics in Brazil, Apostles in Zimbabwe, Coptic Christians still surviving in Egypt, new Pentecostals in Ghana, established Lutherans in Germany, and secret House church believers in China.^[17]^: 1

In the early twenty-first century, Christianity has been declining in the West and growing in former colonial lands.^[388] In 1900 under colonial rule there were just under 9 million Christians in Africa. By 1960, and the end of colonialism there were about 60 million. By 2005, African Christians had increased to 393 million, about half of the continent's total population at that time.^[388] Population in Africa has continued to grow with the percentage of Christians remaining at about half in 2022.^[389] Sanneh says Christianity has become the most diverse, pluralist, fastest growing religion in the world.^[388]

In the process of Christianization, the Bible and other Christian writings have been translated into more than 3000 of the world's 7000 languages. Approximately 90% of those languages have a written grammar and a dictionary because missionaries worked with indigenous people to create them while doing those translations.^[388] Tracing the impact of this on local native cultures shows it has produced "the movements of indigenization and cultural liberation".^[390] "The translated scripture ... has become the benchmark of awakening and renewal".^[391]^[386] According to Sanneh, this means that western missionaries pioneered the "largest, most diverse and most vigorous movement of cultural renewal in [the] history" of Africa.^[392]

Bibliography

Abruzzi, William (2018). Mithraism and Christianity. doi:10.13140/RG.2.2.36486.52804.
Aleksidze, Nikoloz (2018). "7: Caucasia: Albania, Armenia and Georgia". In Lössl, Josef; Baker-Brian, Nicholas J. (eds.). A Companion to Religion in Late Antiquity. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 9781118968109.
Alexiou, Margaret; Yatromanolakis, Dimitrios (2002). The ritual lament in Greek tradition. Rowman & Littlefield.
Anastos, Milton (1967). "The Edict of Milan (313): A Defence of Its Traditional Authorship and Designation". Revue des études byzantines. 25 (1): 13–41. doi:10.3406/rebyz.1967.1383.
Antoljak, Stjepan (1994). Pregled hrvatske povijesti (2. dopunjeno izd ed.). Split: Orbis. ISBN 953-6044-01-3.
Bagnall, Roger S.; Alan Cameron; Seth R. Schwartz & Klaas A. Worp (1987). Consuls of the Later Roman Empire. Oxford University Press. ISBN 1-55540-099-X.
Bagnall, Roger S. (2021). Egypt in Late Antiquity (illustrated, reprint ed.). Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1-4008-2116-7.
Barbero, Alessandro (2004). Charlemagne: Father of a Continent. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-23943-2.
Barford, P. M. (2001). The early Slavs : culture and society in early medieval Eastern Europe. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Barker, Adam; Lowman, Emma Battell (n.d.). "Settler colonialism". Global Social Theory. Retrieved January 22, 2023.
Barnes, T.D. (1985). "Review of Christianizing the Roman Empire A.D. 100–400 by R. Macmullen". Echos du Monde Classique: Classical Views. 29 (3): 495–496.
Barton, Simon (2009). A History of Spain (2nd, revised ed.). Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 9781137013477.
Bayliss, Richard (2004). Provincial Cilicia and the Archaeology of Temple Conversion. Oxford: Archaeopress. ISBN 978-1-84171-634-3.
Bede (2007) [1910]. The Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. Translated by Jane, L. C. New York: Cosimo Classics. ISBN 9781602068322. Retrieved September 16, 2017.
Belmessous, Saliha (2013). Assimilation and Empire: Uniformity in French and British Colonies, 1541–1954. OUP. ISBN 9780199579167.
Berend, Nora; Urbańczyk, Przemysław; Wiszewski, Przemysław (2013). Central Europe in the High Middle Ages: Bohemia, Hungary and Poland, c. 900-c. 1300. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521781565.
Berkhofer, Robert F., Jr. (2014). Salvation and the Savage: An Analysis of Protestant Missions and American Indian Response, 1787–1862. University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 9780813162102.((cite book)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Bilias, Konstantinos; Grigolo, Francesca (2019). "04 Lares and lararia: The domestic religion brought out to the sidewalk". public private. An exhibition of the Q-Kolleg at the Winckelmann-Institut Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin in cooperation with the Dipartimento Scienza dell` Antichitá of the Sapienza-Università di Roma (19/06/2019 – 31/12/2019). Berlin, Germany: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. pp. 79–101. doi:10.18452/20022.
Boockmann, Hartmut (1975). Johannes Falkenberg, der Deutsche Orden und die polnische Politik. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. ISBN 9783525353547.
Bouchier, Edmund Spenser (1914). Spain Under the Roman Empire. B. H. Blackwell.
Boyd, William Kenneth (2005). The Ecclesiastical Edicts of the Theodosian Code (reprint ed.). The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN 9781584775317.
Boyle, Mark (2010). "Beyond the 'Sigh of the Oppressed Creature': A Critical Geographical Enquiry into Christianity's Contributions to the Making of a Peaceable West". Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 100 (3): 678–94. doi:10.1080/00045601003795095. JSTOR 40863555. S2CID 55367128.
Bradbury, Scott (1995). "Julian's Pagan Revival and the Decline of Blood Sacrifice". Phoenix. 49 (4): 331–56. doi:10.2307/1088885. JSTOR 1088885.
Bradbury, Scott (1994). "Constantine and the Problem of Anti-Pagan Legislation in the Fourth Century". Classical Philology. 89 (2): 120–139. doi:10.1086/367402. S2CID 159997492.
Brink, Stefan (2004). "New Perspectives on the Christianization of Scandinavia and the Organization of the Early Church". Scandinavia and Europe 800-1350: Contact, Conflict, and Coexistence. ISD. pp. 163–175. ISBN 9782503510859.
Brita, Antonella (2020). "Genres of Ethiopian-Eritrean Christian Literature with a Focus on Hagiography". In Kelly, Samantha (ed.). A Companion to Medieval Ethiopia and Eritrea. Brill. pp. 252–281. ISBN 978-90-04-41943-8.
"British Empire". British Empire | History, Countries, Map, Size, & Facts | Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica. January 5, 2023. Retrieved January 23, 2023.
Brown, P. R. L. (1961). "Religious dissent in the later Roman empire: the case of North Africa". History. 46 (157): 83–101. doi:10.1111/j.1468-229X.1961.tb02436.x. ISSN 0018-2648. JSTOR 24405338.
Brown, Peter (1963). "Religious Coercion in the Later Roman Empire: The Case of North Africa". History. 48 (164). Wiley: 283–305. doi:10.1111/j.1468-229X.1963.tb02320.x. JSTOR 24405550.
Brown, Peter (1998). "Christianization and religious conflict". In Averil Cameron; Peter Garnsey (eds.). The Cambridge Ancient History XIII: The Late Empire, A.D. 337–425. Cambridge University Press. pp. 632–664. ISBN 978-0-521-30200-5.
Brown, Peter (1993). "The Problem of Christianization" (PDF). Proceedings of the British Academy. 84. Oxford University Press: 89–106. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 3, 2022. Retrieved August 24, 2022.
Brown, Peter (2003). The rise of Western Christendom : triumph and diversity, A.D. 200-1000 (2nd ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 978-0-631-22137-1.
Brown, Peter (2012). Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350–550 AD. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-15290-5.
Bukowska, Aneta (2012). "The Origins of Christianity in Poland. Actual Research on the Church Archaeology". Christianisierung Europas: Entstehung, Entwicklung und Konsolidierung im archäologischen Befund. Schnell & Steiner. pp. 449–468.
Burton, Edward (January 19, 2018). "Chapter IV: "Paul is sent to Rome"". History of the Christian Church in the 1st Century. Ozymandias Press. ISBN 978-1-5312-8668-2.
Butler, Cuthbert (1919). Benedictine Monachism: Studies in Benedictine Life and Rule. New York: Longmans, Green and Company.
Cameron, Averil (1993). The Later Roman Empire, AD 284-430 (illustrated ed.). Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-51194-1.
Cameron, Alan (2011). The Last Pagans of Rome. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-974727-6.
Casanova, José (1994). Public Religions in the Modern World. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-09535-5.
Castañeda, Antonia I. (1993). "Two: Sexual violence in the politics and policies of Conquest". In de la Torre, Adela; Pesquera, Beatriz M. (eds.). Building with Our Hands: New Directions in Chicana Studies. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520070905.
Champion, Matthew (2011). "Crushing the Canon: Nicolas Jacquier's Response to the Canon Episcopi in the Flagellum haereticorum fascinariorum" (PDF). Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft. 6 (2): 183–211. doi:10.1353/mrw.2011.0022. S2CID 73545212.
Cheng, Christina Miu Bing (1999). Macau A Cultural Janus. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 9789622094864.
Christiansen, Eric (1997). The Northern Crusades. London: Penguin books. ISBN 978-0140266535.
Clark, Elizabeth A. (1992). "The End of Ancient Christianity". Ancient Philosophy. 12 (2): 543–546. doi:10.5840/ancientphil199212240.
Clark, Jerry E. (1979). "Jesuit Impact on Potawatomi Acculturation: A Comparison of Two Villages in the Mid-Plains". Ethnohistory. 26 (4): 377–95. doi:10.2307/481367. JSTOR 481367.
Cohan, Sara (2005). "A brief history of the Armenian Genocide" (PDF). Social Education. 69 (6): 333–337.
Collar, Anna (2013). Religious Networks in the Roman Empire (illustrated, reprint ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107043442.
Constable, Giles (1998). The Reformation of the Twelfth Century (illustrated, revised, reprint ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521638715.
Constantelos, Demetrios J. (1964). "Paganism and the State in the Age of Justinian". The Catholic Historical Review. 50 (3): 372–80. JSTOR 25017472.
Cotts, John (2012). Europe's Long Twelfth Century: Order, Anxiety and Adaptation, 1095–1229. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-137-29608-5.
Crampton, R. J (2005). A concise history of Bulgaria (second ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521850858.
Crislip, Andrew T. (2005). From Monastery to Hospital: Christian Monasticism & the Transformation of Health Care in Late Antiquity. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. ISBN 978-0-472-11474-0.
Cusack, Carole M. (1998). Conversion Among the Germanic Peoples (reprint ed.). A&C Black. ISBN 9780304701551.
Danuta, Shanzer (March 1998). "Dating the Baptism of Clovis: The bishop of Vienna vs the bishop of Tours". Early Medieval Europe. 7 (1): 29–57. doi:10.1111/1468-0254.00017. S2CID 161819012.
Dean, Sidney E. (2015). "Felling the Irminsul: Charlemagne's Saxon Wars". Medieval Warfare. 5 (2): 15–20. JSTOR 48578430.
de Bérier, Franciszek Longchamps; Domingo, Rafael (2022). "Introduction". In de Bérier, Franciszek Longchamps; Domingo, Rafael (eds.). Law and Christianity in Poland. Routledge. pp. 1–6. ISBN 978-1032019727.
"Osbernus: De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, 1147". Internet History Sourcebooks Project.
de Juan, Alexander; Pierskalla, Jan Henryk (2017). "The Comparative Politics of Colonialism and Its Legacies: An Introduction". Politics & Society. 45 (2 Special Issue).
Digeser, Elizabeth DePalma (2000). The Making of a Christian Empire: Lactantius & Rome. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-3594-2.
Dollinger, Philippe (1999). The German Hansa. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-19073-2.
Dragnea, Mihai (2020). The Wendish Crusade, 1147: The Development of Crusading Ideology in the Twelfth Century. NY: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-367-36696-4.
Drake, H. A. (1995). "Constantine and Consensus". Church History. 64 (1): 1–15. doi:10.2307/3168653. JSTOR 3168653. S2CID 163129848.
Drake, H.A., ed. (2006). Violence in Late Antiquity: Perceptions and Practices. Aldershot: Ashgate. ISBN 978-0-7546-5498-8.
Drake, H. A. (2011). "Intolerance, Religious Violence, and Political Legitimacy in Late Antiquity". Journal of the American Academy of Religion. 79 (1). Oxford University Press: 193–235. doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfq064. JSTOR 23020391.
Drake, H. A. (1996). "Lambs into Lions: Explaining Early Christian Intolerance". Past & Present. 153 (153): 3–36. doi:10.1093/past/153.1.3. JSTOR 651134.
Duni, Matteo (June 2016). "Doubting Witchcraft: Theologians, Jurists, Inquisitors during the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries". Studies in Church History. 52: 203–231. doi:10.1017/stc.2015.12. S2CID 164173947.
Dunn, Marilyn (2013). Belief and Religion in Barbarian Europe c. 350-700. A&C Black. ISBN 978-1-4411-2382-4.
Dunn, Dennis J. (2016). A History of Orthodox, Islamic, and Western Christian Political Values. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-3-319-32566-8.
Eder, Jeanne; Reyhner, Jon (2017). American Indian Education: A History (2nd ed.). University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 9780806159911.
Ekonomou, Andrew J. (2007). Byzantine Rome and the Greek popes: Eastern influences on Rome and the papacy from Gregory the Great to Zacharias, AD 590-752. Lexington Books. ISBN 9780739133866.
Elsie, Robert (2015). "The Early History of Albania" (PDF). Retrieved December 12, 2022.
Errington, R. Malcolm (1997). "Christian Accounts of the Religious Legislation of Theodosius I". Klio. 79 (2): 398–443. doi:10.1524/klio.1997.79.2.398. S2CID 159619838.
Errington, R. Malcolm (2006). Roman Imperial Policy from Julian to Theodosius. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-0-8078-3038-3.
Evans, Arthur (2007) [1876]. Through Bosnia and the Herzegovina on Foot During the Insurrection, August and September 1875. New York: Cosimo. ISBN 978-1602062702.
Fahy, T. (1963). "The Council of Jerusalem". Irish Theological Quarterly. 30 (3): 232–261. doi:10.1177/002114006303000303. S2CID 170396423.
Fairchild, Mary (2021). "Take an Illustrated Tour of Christian Symbols". Learn Religions. Interdenominational Christian Training Center. Retrieved October 27, 2021.
Farmer, David Hugh, ed. (1995). Benedict's Disciples. Gracewing. ISBN 9780852442746.
Firlej, Dominik (2021–2022). "Why did Polish Kings not go on Crusade in the Levant?" (PDF). The Cupola. 16: 120–135.
Fletcher, Richard (1999). The Barbarian Conversion: From Paganism to Christianity. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21859-0.
Fonnesberg-Schmidt, Iben (2007). The popes and the Baltic crusades, 1147–1254. Brill. ISBN 9789004155022.
Fonnesberg-Schmidt, Iben (2009). "Pope Honorius III and Mission and Crusades in the Baltic Region". In Murray, Alan V. (ed.). The Clash of Cultures on the Medieval Baltic Frontier. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. pp. 103–122. ISBN 978-0-7546-6483-3.
Fontaine, Darcie (2016). Decolonizing Christianity: Religion and the End of Empire in France and Algeria. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107118171.
Forstreuter, Kurt (1938). Deutschland und Litauen. Studien zum Detuschtum im Osten. Vol. 1. Königsberg: Ost-europa.
Fowden, Garth (1978). "Bishops and Temples in the Eastern Roman Empire A.D. 320–435". The Journal of Theological Studies. 29 (1). Oxford University Press: 53–78. doi:10.1093/jts/XXIX.1.53. JSTOR 23960254.
Fox, Robin Lane (1987). Pagans and Christians. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-394-55495-2.
Friese, Thomas (March 22, 2017). "In Deep: A Brief History of Bohemia". Butterfield & Robinson. Retrieved October 17, 2022.
García-Arenal, Mercedes; Glazer-Eytan, Yonatan (2019). Forced conversion in Christianity, Judaism and Islam: coercion and faith in premodern Iberia and beyond. Brill. ISBN 9789004416826.
Gerberding, R.; Moran Cruz, J. H. (2004). Medieval Worlds. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. pp. 55–56.
Ghosh, Shami (2016). "Paul the Deacon and the Ancient History of the Lombards". Writing the Barbarian Past: Studies in Early Medieval Historical Narrative. Brill. pp. 115–152. ISBN 978-90-04-30522-9.
Gibbon, Edward (1776). The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Vol. I: The Decline And Fall In The West.
Goldberg, Eric J. (2006). Struggle for Empire: Kingship and Conflict under Louis the German, 817–876. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-7529-0.
Gonzalez, Justo L. (2010). The Story of Christianity. Vol. 2: The Reformation to the Present Day. HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-06-185589-4.
Goodenough, Erwin R. (1962). "Catacomb Art". Journal of Biblical Literature. 81 (2): 113–142. doi:10.2307/3264749. JSTOR 3264749.
Graf, Fritz (2014). "Laying Down the Law in Ferragosto: The Roman Visit of Theodosius in Summer 389". Journal of Early Christian Studies. 22 (2): 219–242. doi:10.1353/earl.2014.0022. S2CID 159641057.
Green, Bernard (2010). Christianity in ancient Rome : the first three centuries. London: A&C Black. pp. 126–127. ISBN 978-0-5670-3250-8.
Gregory, Timothy E. (1986). "The Survival of Paganism in Christian Greece: A Critical Essay". The American Journal of Philology. 107 (2): 229–242. doi:10.2307/294605. ISSN 0002-9475. JSTOR 294605.
Grimassi, Raven (2000). Encyclopedia of Wicca & Witchcraft. Llewellyn Worldwide. ISBN 978-1-56718-257-6.
Haas, Christopher (2002). Alexandria in Late Antiquity Topography and Social Conflict. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 9780801870330.
Haight, Roger D. (2004). Christian Community in History Volume 1: Historical Ecclesiology. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 0-8264-1630-6.
Hakobyan, Aleksan H. (2021). "About the Dating of the Christianization of Caucasian Albania". Afro-Aziatskie Obshchestva: Istoriia I Sovremennost. 5 (5): 71–81. doi:10.31857/S086919080014885-0. S2CID 240239868.
Haley, Gene C. (2002). "Tamlachta: The Map of Plague Burials and Some Implications for Early Irish History". Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium. 22: 96–140. JSTOR 40285165.
Hamlet, Ingomar (2004). "Theodosius I. And The Olympic Games". Nikephoros. 17: 53–75.
Hanson, R. P. C. (1978). "The transformation of pagan temples into churches in the early Christian centuries". Journal of Semitic Studies. 23 (2): 257–267. doi:10.1093/jss/23.2.257.
Harmer, Florence E. (1946). "The english contribution to the epistolary usages of early scandinavian kings". Saga-Book. 13: 115–155. ISSN 0305-9219. JSTOR 48611990.
Harnett, Benjamin (2017). "The Diffusion of the Codex". Classical Antiquity. 36 (2). University of California Press: 183–235. doi:10.1525/ca.2017.36.2.183. JSTOR 26362608.
Harney, Lorcan (2017). "Christianising Pagan Worlds in Conversion-Era Ireland: Archaeological Evidence for the Origins of Irish Ecclesiastical Sites". Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature. 117C: 103–30. doi:10.3318/priac.2017.117.07. S2CID 165970409.
Hart, David Bentley (2009). Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies (unabridged ed.). Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-15564-8.
Haverkamp, Alfred (1988). Medieval Germany, 1056–1273. Translated by Helga Braun; Richard Mortimer. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-822132-6.
Headrick, Daniel R. (2012). Power Over Peoples Technology, Environments, and Western Imperialism, 1400 to the Present. Princeton University Press. ISBN 9781400833597.
Hebblewhite, Mark (2020). Theodosius and the Limits of Empire. London: Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781315103334. ISBN 978-1-138-10298-9. S2CID 213344890.
Herrin, Judith (2009). "Book Burning as purification". In Rousseau, Philip; Papoutsakis, Emmanuel (eds.). Transformations of Late Antiquity: Essays for Peter Brown, Volume 2 (illustrated, reprint ed.). Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. ISBN 9780754665533.
Hopkins, Keith (1998). "Christian Number and Its Implications". Journal of Early Christian Studies. 6 (2): 185–226. doi:10.1353/earl.1998.0035. S2CID 170769034.
Horn, Cornelia B. (1998). "St. Nino and the Christianization of pagan Georgia". Medieval Encounters. 4 (3): 242–264. doi:10.1163/157006798X00151.
Hunyadi, Zsolt; Laszlovszky, József (2001). The Crusades and the Military Orders: Expanding the Frontiers of Medieval Latin Christianity. Budapest: Central European University Press. ISBN 978-963-9241-42-8.
Irmscher, Johannes (1988). "Non-christians and sectarians under Justinian: the fate of the inculpated". Collection de l'Institut des Sciences et Techniques de l'Antiquité. 367 (1): 165–167.
Ivanič, Peter (2016). "The origins of Christianity in the territory of Czech and Slovak republics within the contexts of written sources". European Journal of Science and Theology. 12 (6): 123–130.
Jestice, Phyllis G. (1997). Wayward Monks and the Religious Revolution of the Eleventh Century. BRILL. ISBN 9789004107229.
Jimeno Jurío, José María (1995). Historia de Pamplona y de sus lenguas. Tafalla: Txalaparta. ISBN 978-8481360172.
Johansen, Bruce Elliott (2005). The Native Peoples of North America A History · Volume 1. Praeger Publishers. ISBN 978-0275987206. In the Americas, the Catholic priest Bartolome de las Casas avidly encouraged enquiries into the Spanish conquest's many cruelties. Las Casas chronicled Spanish brutality against the Native peoples in excruciating detail.
Jones, Arnold Hugh Martin (1986). The Later Roman Empire, 284-602: A Social Economic and Administrative Survey. Vol. 1 (reprint ed.). JHU Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-3353-3.
Kahlos, Maijastina (2015). Seizing History: Christianising the Past in Late Antique Historiography.
Kahlos, Maijastina (2019). Religious Dissent in Late Antiquity, 350–450. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-006725-0.
Kaldellis, Anthony (2012). Procopius of Caesarea: Tyranny, History, and Philosophy at the End of Antiquity. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-0241-0.
Kelly, Thomas Forrest (1989). The Beneventan Chant. CUP Archive. ISBN 978-0-521-34310-7.
Klaniczay, Gábor (2004). "The birth of a new Europe about 1000 CE: conversion, transfer of institutional models, new dynamics". Medieval Encounters. 10 (1–3): 99–129. doi:10.1163/1570067043077823. S2CID 162367005.
Koenig, Harold G.; King, Dana E.; Carson, Verna Benner, eds. (2012). Handbook of Religion and Health (second ed.). New Yorkc: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-533595-8.
Lavan, Luke; Mulryan, Michael, eds. (2011). The Archaeology of Late Antique 'Paganism'. Leiden: Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-19237-9.
Leighton, Gregory (November 29, 2021). "Chapter 22 "The Baltic Crusades (1147–1300)"". In Curta, Florin (ed.). The Routledge Handbook of East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 500-1300. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-000-47624-8.
Leithart, Peter J. (2010). Defending Constantine The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom. InterVarsity Press. ISBN 978-0-8308-2722-0.
Lenski, Noel (1995). "The Date of the Gothic Civil War and the Date of the Gothic Conversion" (PDF). Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies. 36 (1).
Lepelley, C. (1992). "The survival and fall of the classical city in Late Roman Africa". In Rich, John (ed.). The City in Late Antiquity. London and New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-06855-0.
Leone, Anna (2013). The End of the Pagan City: Religion, Economy, and Urbanism in Late Antique North Africa (illustrated ed.). OUP. ISBN 978-0-19-957092-8.
Lichtenberger, Achim; Raja, Rubina (2018). "From synagogue to church: The Appropriation of the Synagogue of Gerasa/Jerash under Justinian". Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum. 61.
Lilienfeld, Aidan (2022). "Baltic Frontiers". Colombia Journal of History. Colombia University. Retrieved December 20, 2022.
Loosley, Emma (2012). The Architecture and Liturgy of the Bema in Fourth- To-Sixth-Century Syrian Churches (illustrated ed.). Brill. ISBN 9789004231825.
Lund, James (2022). "Religion and Thought". In Johnson, Wendell G.; Barbe, Katharina (eds.). Modern Germany. ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-1-4408-6454-4.
McLoughlin, William Gerald (1984). Cherokees and Missionaries, 1789–1839. Yale University Press. ISBN 9780300030754.
MacMullen, Ramsay (1981). Paganism in the Roman Empire (unabridged ed.). Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-02984-0.
MacMullen, Ramsay (1984). Christianizing the Roman Empire : (A.D. 100-400). New Haven. ISBN 978-0-300-03216-1.((cite book)): CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Magdoff, Harry; McDougall, Walter A. (2020). "New Imperialism". Brittanica. Britannica. Retrieved January 25, 2023.
Mansi, Giovanni Domenico (1762). Concilia. Vol. VIII.
Marcos, M. (2013). "The Debate on Religious Coercion in Ancient Christianity". Chaos e Kosmos. 13: 1–16.
Markus, Robert Austin (1990). The End of Ancient Christianity (illustrated, reprint ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-33949-0.
Mathew, Arnold Harris (2018). The Life and Times of Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander VI. Creative Media Partners, LLC. ISBN 978-0-342-68601-8.
Matthews, Roy T.; Platt, F. DeWitt (1992). The Western Humanities. Mayfield Pub. Co. ISBN 0-87484-785-0.
Meeks, Wayne A. (2003). The First Urban Christians (second ed.). Yale University. ISBN 0-300-09861-8.
Miller, David Harry (January 1974). "The Roman Revolution of the Eighth Century: A Study of the Ideological Background of die Papal Separation from Byzantium and Alliance with the Franks". Mediaeval Studies. 36: 79–133. doi:10.1484/J.MS.2.306158.
Monroe, Paul (1909). A Text-book in the History of Education. London: The Macmillan Company.
Moore, R. I. (2007). The Formation of a Persecuting Society (second ed.). Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4051-2964-0.
Moravcsik, Gyula (December 1947). "The Role of the Byzantine Church in Medieval Hungary". American Slavic and East European Review. 6 (3/4): 134–151. doi:10.2307/2491705. JSTOR 2491705.
Mulryan, Michael (2011). "'Paganism' In Late Antiquity: Regional Studies And Material Culture". Brill: 41–86. ISBN 9789004210394.
Murphy, G. Ronald (September 2014). "Book Review: The Conversion of Scandinavia: Vikings, Merchants, and Missionaries in the Remaking of Northern Europe". Christianity & Literature. 63 (4): 542–545. doi:10.1177/014833311406300419. ISSN 0148-3331.
Noll, Mark A. (1992). A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada. Eerdmans. ISBN 9780802806512.
Nowell, Charles E.; Magdoff, Harry; Webster, Richard A. (November 13, 2022). "Western colonialism". Western colonialism | Definition, History, Examples, & Effects | Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved January 15, 2023.
Olson, Roger E. (1999). The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition and Reform. Downer's Grove, In.: InterVarsity Press. p. 172. ISBN 978-0-8308-1505-0.
Oostindie, Geert, ed. (2008). Dutch Colonialism, Migration and Cultural Heritage Past and Present. Brill. ISBN 9789004253889.
Osenova, Petya (2010). "Bulgarian". Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire. 88 (3): 643–666. doi:10.3406/rbph.2010.7798.
Padberg, Lutz von (1998). Die Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter (in German). Stuttgart: Reclam. ISBN 9783150170151. OCLC 493859593.
Paiva, José Pedro (2017). "The Inquisition Tribunal in Goa: Why and for What Purpose?". Journal of Early Modern History. 21 (6): 565–593. doi:10.1163/15700658-12342575.
Paul, Marcus (2016). The Evil That Men Do: Faith, Injustice and the Church. Sacristy Press. ISBN 9781908381972.
Poulik, Josef (1978). "The Origins of Christianity in Slavonic Countries North of the Middle Danube Basin". World Archaeology. 10 (2): 158–171. doi:10.1080/00438243.1978.9979728.
Perrottet, Tony (2004). The Naked Olympics: The True Story of the Ancient Games. Random House Digital, Inc. ISBN 978-1-58836-382-4. Retrieved April 1, 2013.
Plontke-Lüning, A. (2017). "Early Christian Churches in Caucasian Albania". Early Christian Churches in Caucasian Albania ; Raně křesťanské kostely v kavkazské Albánii. Convivium Supplementum. Vol. 1. Brepols Publishers. pp. 160–175. doi:10.1484/M.CONVISUP-EB.5.131088. ISBN 9788021083226. Retrieved December 11, 2022.
Pontani, Filippomaria (2015). "Scholarship in the Byzantine Empire (529–1453)". In Montanari, Franco; Matthaios, Stefanos; Rengakos, Antonios (eds.). Brill's Companion to Ancient Greek Scholarship (2 Vols.). BRILL. pp. 297–455. ISBN 978-90-04-28192-9.
Pop, Ioan-Aurel (2009). "Romania and Romanians in Europe: A Historical Perspective". In Boari, Vasile; Gherghina, Sergiu (eds.). Weighting Differences: Romanian Identity in the Wider European Context. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 9781443812153.
Popovski, Ivan (2017). "Medieval Croatian states". A Short History of South East Europe. Lulu Press, Inc. ISBN 978-1-365-95394-1.
Poppe, Andrzej (1991). "Christianity and Ideological change in Kievan Rus': The First Hundred Years". Canadian-American Slavic Studies. 25 (1–4): 3–26. doi:10.1163/221023991X00038.
Praet, Danny (1992). "Explaining the Christianization of the Roman Empire. Older theories and recent developments". Sacris Erudiri. Jaarboek voor Godsdienstgeschiedenis. A Journal on the Inheritance of Early and Medieval Christianity. 23: 5–119.
Puspitasari, Ni Wayan Radita Novi (2013). "The history of Christianization: education as the first step of spreading the religion in Batavia in the 17th century". Historia: International Journal of History Education. XIV (1).
Quinault, Roland; McKitterick, Rosamond (2002). Edward Gibbon and empire. Cambridge. ISBN 978-0-521-52505-3.((cite book)): CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Radić, Radmilla (2010). "11:Serbian Christianity". In Parry, Ken (ed.). The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity. Wiley. ISBN 9781444333619.
Rapp, Stephen H., Jr (2007). "Chapter 7 – Georgian Christianity". The Blackwell companion to Eastern Christianity. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-4443-3361-9.((cite book)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
"Vladimir Corovic: Istorija srpskog naroda". Rastko.rs. n.d. Retrieved January 12, 2012.
Rausing, Gad (1995). "The days of the week and Dark Age politics". Fornvännen. 90 (4).
Rawlings, Helen (2006). The Spanish Inquisition. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 0-631-20599-3.
Remijsen, Sofie (2015). The End of Greek Athletics in Late Antiquity. Cambridge University Press.
Riché, Pierre (1993). The Carolingians : a family who forged Europe. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 0-8122-3062-0.
Riggs, David. "Christianizing the Rural Communities of Late Roman Africa: A Process of Coercion or Persuasion?". In Drake (2006), pp. 297–308.
Robinson, W. Stitt (May 1952). "Indian Education and Missions in Colonial Virginia". The Journal of Southern History. 18 (2): 152–168. doi:10.2307/2954270. JSTOR 2954270.
Roe, H. (1980). "Rome and the Early Germans: Some Sociolinguistic Observations". Florilegium. 2 (1): 101–120. doi:10.3138/flor.2.006.
Roux, Marie (2018). "Codex Theodosianus XVI.10.12 (8th November 392 CE)". Judaism and Rome. European Research Council. Retrieved June 20, 2022.
Runciman, W. G. (2004). "The Diffusion of Christianity in the Third Century AD as a Case-Study in the Theory of Cultural Selection". European Journal of Sociology. 45 (1): 3–21. doi:10.1017/S0003975604001365. S2CID 146353096.
Russell, James C. (1996). The Germanization of Early Medieval Christianity: A Sociohistorical Approach to Religious Transformation (reprint ed.). OUP. ISBN 9780195104660.
Salzman, Michele Renee (1993). "The Evidence for the Conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity in Book 16 of the 'Theodosian Code". Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte. 42 (3). Franz Steiner Verlag: 362–78. JSTOR 4436297.
Salzman, Michele R. (1987). "'Superstitio' in the Codex Theodosianus and the Persecution of Pagans". Vigiliae Christianae. 41 (2): 172–188.
Salzman, Michele Renee. "Rethinking Pagan-Christian Violence". In Drake (2006), pp. 265–286.
Salzman, Michele Renee (2002). The Making of a Christian Aristocracy: Social and Religious Change in the Western Roman Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctvk12r62. ISBN 978-0-674-00641-6. JSTOR j.ctvk12r62.
Salzman, Michele Renee; Sághy, Marianne; Testa, Rita Lizzi, eds. (2016). Pagans and Christians in late antique Rome : conflict, competition, and coexistence in the fourth century. New York, NY. ISBN 978-1-107-11030-4.((cite book)): CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Salzman, Michelle Renee (2021). The Falls of Rome: Crises, Resilience, and Resurgence in Late Antiquity. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1107111424.
Sam, David L.; Berry, John W. (2010). "Acculturation: When individuals and groups of different cultural backgrounds meet". Perspectives on Psychological Science. 5 (4): 472–481. doi:10.1177/1745691610373075. PMID 26162193. S2CID 220262608.
Sanmark, Alexandra (2004). "1". Power and Conversion. A Comparative Study of Christianization in Scandinavia. The University of Uppsala. ISBN 9789150617399.
Sanneh, Lamin O. (2007). Disciples of all nations: Pillars of world Christianity. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-1980-4084-2.
Sanneh, Lamin; McClymond, Michael, eds. (2016). The Wiley Blackwell Companion to World Christianity. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1118556047.
Saradi, Helen G. (2011). "Late Paganism and Christianisation in Greece". Late Antique Archaeology. 7 (1): 261–309. doi:10.1163/22134522-90000160.
Sáry, Pál (2019). "Remarks on the Edict of Thessalonica of 380". In Vojtech Vladár (ed.). Perpauca Terrena Blande Honori dedicata pocta Petrovi Blahovi K Nedožitým 80. Narodeninám. Trnavská univerzity. pp. 67–80. ISBN 978-80-568-0313-4.
Ščavinskas, Marius (2017). "A Few Remarks on the so Called First Stage of Christianization of the Eastern Coast of the Baltic Region". Tabularium Historiae. II: 57–76.
Schacter, Jacob J. (2011). Carlebach, Elisheva; Schacter, Jacob J. (eds.). New Perspectives on Jewish-Christian Relations: In Honor of David Berger. Netherlands: Brill. ISBN 978-9-00422-118-5.
Schaff, Philip (n.d.). History of the Christian Church, Volume IV: Mediaeval Christianity. A.D. 590–1073. CCEL. pp. 161–162. ISBN 978-1-61025-043-6. Retrieved June 15, 2013.
Schön, Ebbe (2004). Asa-Tors hammare : gudar och jättar i tro och tradition (in Swedish) (1. uppl ed.). Stockholm: Hjalmarson & Högberg. ISBN 91-89660-41-2.
Schrader, Charles E. (1936). "The Historical Development of the Papal Monarchy". The Catholic Historical Review. 22 (3): 259–282. JSTOR 25013503.
Schramm, Gottfried (1994). "A New Approach to Albanian History". albanianhistory.net. Translated by Robert Elsie.
Schwartz, Seth (2005). "Chapter 8: Roman Historians and the Rise of Christianity: The School of Edward Gibbon". In Harris, William Vernon (ed.). The Spread of Christianity in the First Four Centuries: Essays in Explanation. BRILL. ISBN 978-90-04-14717-1.
Schuddeboom, Feyo L. (2017). "The Conversion of Temples in Rome". Journal of Late Antiquity. 10 (1). Johns Hopkins University Press: 166–186. doi:10.1353/jla.2017.0005. S2CID 165142999.
Scourfield, J. H. D. (2007). Texts and Culture in Late Antiquity: Inheritance, Authority, and Change. ISD LLC. ISBN 978-1-910589-45-8.
Sedlar, Jean W. (1995). "King Saint Stephen of Hungary. By György Györffy. Trans. Peter Doherty". Slavic Review. 54 (4): 1119–1120. doi:10.2307/2501480. JSTOR 2501480. S2CID 165113730.
Seibt, Werner (2002). "Die Christianisierung des Kaukasus. The Christianization of Caucasus (Armenia, Georgia, Albania)". Referate des internationalen Symposions. austriaca.at. ISBN 978-3-7001-3016-1.
"Sulpitius Severus on the life of St. Martin – Vita, ch xiii". Archived from the original on September 9, 2006. Retrieved July 4, 2005.
Sharpe, Richard (1995). Life of St Columba. Penguin UK.
Shatzmiller, Joseph (1974). "Review of 'Medieval Jewry in Northern France: A Political and Social History', by Robert Chazan". Jewish Social Studies. 36 (3): 339.
Shorter, Aylward (2006). Toward a Theology of Inculturation. Wipf & Stock. ISBN 9781597525473.
Siecienski, A. Edward (2017). Constantine: Religious Faith and Imperial Policy (illustrated ed.). Routledge. ISBN 9781351976114.
Simeoni, Manuel (n.d.). "THEODOSIAN CODE (CODEX THEODOSIANUS) 16.10: TEXT". European Pagan Memory Day. Retrieved April 19, 2022.
Sisa, Stephen (1995). The spirit of Hungary : a panorama of Hungarian history and culture (3rd ed.). Morristown, N.J.: Vista Books. ISBN 978-0962842221.
Sommer, Petr; Trestik, Dusan; Zemlicka, Josef (2007), "Bohemia and Moravia", in Berend, Nora (ed.), Christianization and the rise of Christian monarchy : Scandinavia, Central Europe and Rus' c. 900–1200, Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press
Southern, Patricia (2015). The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine (second, revised ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-49694-6.
Spliesgart, Roland (2007). Koschorke, Klaus; Ludwig, Frieder; Delgado, Mariano; Spliesgart, Roland (eds.). A History of Christianity in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, 1450–1990. Eerdmans Publishing Company. ISBN 9780802828897.
Stachura, Michał (2018). Enemies of the Later Roman Order: A Study of the Phenomenon of Language Aggression in the Theodosian Code, Post-Theodosian Novels, and the Sirmondian Constitutions. Krakow: Jagiellonian University Press. ISBN 978-83-233-4505-3.
Štefan, Ivo (2022). "6". In Curta, Florin (ed.). The Routledge handbook of east central and eastern europe in the middle ages, 500–1300. Routledge. pp. 101–120. ISBN 978-0-367-22655-8.
Stephenson, Paul (2000). Byzantium's Balkan Frontier: A Political Study of the Northern Balkans, 900-1204. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521770170.
Stern, Craig A. (1998). "Justinian: Lieutenant of Christ, Legislator for Christendom". Regent University Law Review. 11 (1). SSRN 2642313.
Stocking, Rachel L. (2000). Bishops, councils, and consensus in the Visigothic Kingdom, 589-633. University of Michigan Press.
Strauss, Barry S.; Noble, Thomas F. X.; Cohen, William B.; Osheim, Duane; Neuschel, Kristen B.; Accampo, Elinore A.; Roberts, David D. (2005). Western Civilization The Continuing Experiment · Volume 1. Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 9780618561902.
Strzelczyk, Jerzy (1987). Od Prasłowian do Polaków (in Polish). Krajowa Agencja Wydawnicza. ISBN 978-83-03-02015-4.
Testa, Judith Anne (1998). "10, The Christian Catacombs". Rome is Love Spelled Backward (Roma Amor): Enjoying Art and Architecture in the Eternal City. Northern Illinois University Press. ISBN 9780875805764.
Testa, Rita Lizzi (2007). "Christian emperor, vestal virgins and priestly colleges: Reconsidering the end of roman paganism". Antiquité tardive. 15: 251–262. doi:10.1484/J.AT.2.303121.
Thomas, Charles (1981). Christianity in Roman Britain to AD 500 (illustrated ed.). University of California Press. ISBN 9780520043923.
Thomas, Charles (1997). "Evidence for Christianity in Roman Britain. The Small Finds. By CF Mawer. BAR British Series 243. Tempus Reparatum, Oxford, 1995. Pp. vi+ 178, illus. ISBN 0-8605-4789-2". Britannia. 28.
Thompson, Glen L. (2005). "Constantius II and the First Removal of the Altar of Victory". In Jean-Jacques Aubert; Zsuzsanna Varhelyi (eds.). A Tall Order: Writing the Social History of the Ancient World – Essays in honor of William V. Harris. Munich: K.G. Saur. pp. 85–106. doi:10.1515/9783110931419. ISBN 978-3-598-77828-5.
Thomson, Robert W. (1988). "Mission, Conversion, and Christianization: The Armenian Example". Harvard Ukrainian Studies. 12/13: 28–45. JSTOR 41036303.
Trombley, F. R. (1995a). Hellenic Religion and Christianization, c. 370-529. Vol. I. New York: Brill.
Trombley, Frank R. (2001). Hellenic Religion and Christianization, c. 370–529. Netherlands: Brill Academic Publishers.
Trebilco, Paul Raymond (2017). Outsider Designations and Boundary Construction in the New Testament: Early Christian Communities and the Formation of Group Identity. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-108-31132-8.
Tyerman, Christopher (2011). "Henry of Livonia and the Ideology of Crusading". In Tamm, Marek; Kaljundi, Linda; Jensen, Carsten Selch (eds.). Crusading and Chronicle Writing on the Medieval Baltic Frontier: A Companion to the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia. Burlington: Ashgate Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4094-3396-5.
Ullmann, Walter (2005). A Short History of the Papacy in the Middle Ages (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-203-34952-0.
Van Dam, Raymond (1985). "From Paganism to Christianity at Late Antique Gaza". Viator. 16: 1–20. doi:10.1484/J.VIATOR.2.301417.
Veszprémy, László (2001). "Hungary's Conversion to Christianity. The Establishment of Hungarian Statehood and its Consequences to the Thirteenth Century". Hungarian Studies Review. 28 (1–2): 73–92.
Vlasto, A. P. (1970). The entry of the Slavs into Christendom: an introduction to the medieval. ISBN 9780521074599. Retrieved January 12, 2012.
Waugh, Scott L.; Diehl, Peter (2002). Christendom and Its Discontents: Exclusion, Persecution, and Rebellion, 1000–1500. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-52509-1.
Weston, Arthur Harold (1942). "December 25th, Christmas Day". The Classical Outlook. 20 (3): 26. JSTOR 44006370.
Wiemer, Hans-Ulrich (1994). "Libanius on Constantine". The Classical Quarterly. 44 (2): 511–524. doi:10.1017/S0009838800043962. JSTOR 639654. S2CID 170876695.
Wicker, Nancy L. (2012). "Christianization, Female Infanticide, and the Abundance of Female Burials at Viking Age Birka in Sweden". Journal of the History of Sexuality. 21 (2): 245–62. doi:10.1353/sex.2012.0043. JSTOR 41475079. PMID 22606749. S2CID 44682045.
Winroth, Anders (2012). The Conversion of Scandinavia: Vikings, Merchants, and Missionaries in the Remaking of Northern Europe. Yale University Press. ISBN 9780300205534.
Wood, Ian N. (2007). "Some historical re-identifications and the Christianization of Kent". Christianizing Peoples and Converting Individuals. pp. 27–35.
Woods, David. "Theodosius I (379–395 A.D.)". De Imperatoribus Romanis.
Woods, Thomas Jr. (2012). How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization. Regnery Publishing. ISBN 9781596983281.
Wyrwińska, Karolina (2022). "3 Jadwiga of Anjou (1374–1399)". In de Bérier, Franciszek Longchamps; Domingo, Rafael (eds.). Law and Christianity in Poland. Routledge. pp. 48–63. ISBN 978-1032019727.
Ziemann, Daniel (2021). "Goodness and Cruelty: The Image of the Ruler of the First Bulgarian Empire in the Period of Christianisation (Ninth Century)". In Philip Michael Forness; Alexandra Hasse-Ungeheuer; Hartmut Leppin (eds.). The Good Christian Ruler in the First Millennium : Views from the Wider Mediterranean World in Conversation. Millennium-Studien / Millennium Studies. Vol. 92. Berlin: De Gruyter. pp. 327–360. ISBN 9783110725612.

European Middle Ages
Early Middle Ages	Migration Period Decline of the Western Roman Empire Barbarian kingdoms Late antiquity Decline of Hellenistic religion Christianity in the Middle Ages Christianization Rise of Islam Papal States First Bulgarian Empire Frankish Empire Kingdom of Croatia Anglo-Saxon England Viking Age Carolingian Empire Old Church Slavonic Rise of the Venetian Republic Civitas Schinesghe Kievan Rus' Growth of the Eastern Roman Empire Reconquista
High Middle Ages	Norman Conquest Holy Roman Empire Second Bulgarian Empire Georgian Empire Kingdom of Poland Feudalism Rise of the Republic of Genoa Great Schism Investiture Controversy Crusades Republic of Florence Scholasticism Monasticism Communalism Manorialism Medieval Warm Period Mongol invasion of Europe Kingdom of Portugal
Late Middle Ages	Hundred Years' War Wars of the Roses Hussite Wars Burgundy Milan France England Castile Western Schism Fall of Constantinople Rise of the Ottoman Empire Swiss mercenaries Chivalry Renaissance Humanism Universities Crisis of the late Middle Ages Great Famine Little Ice Age
Culture	Agriculture Architecture Art Church and State Cuisine Crusading movement Dance Demography Domes Hastilude Household Hunting In popular culture Itinerant court Literature Medicine Minstrel Music Philosophy Poetry Science Slavery Technology Theatre Warfare Women
Related	Dark Ages Disability in the Middle Ages Basic topics list Land terms Medievalism Medieval reenactment Medieval studies Misconceptions Neo-medievalism Post-classical history Timeline
Portal Category WikiProject

History of Europe
Prehistory	Paleolithic Europe Neolithic Europe Bronze Age Europe Iron Age Europe
Classical antiquity	Classical Greece Roman Republic Hellenistic period Roman Empire Early Christianity Christianity in late antiquity Crisis of the Third Century Fall of the Western Roman Empire Late antiquity
Middle Ages	Early Middle Ages Migration Period Christianity in the Middle Ages Christianization Francia Anglo-Saxon England Byzantine Empire Papal States Bulgarian Empire First Second Maritime republics Venice Genoa Pisa Amalfi Viking Age Kievan Rus' Crown of Aragon (Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia, Majorca) Holy Roman Empire High Middle Ages Republic of Florence Feudalism Crusades Mongol invasion Serbian Empire Late Middle Ages Black Death Hundred Years' War Kalmar Union
Early modern	Renaissance Christianity in the modern era Reformation Age of Discovery Baroque Grand Duchy of Tuscany Thirty Years' War Absolute monarchy Ottoman Empire Portuguese Empire Spanish Empire Early modern France Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth Cossack Hetmanate Swedish Empire Dutch Republic British Empire Habsburg monarchy Russian Empire Age of Enlightenment
Late modern	Great Divergence Industrial Revolution French Revolution Napoleonic Wars Nationalism Revolutions of 1848 World War I Russian Revolution Interwar period World War II Cold War European integration European debt crisis COVID-19 pandemic Russian invasion of Ukraine
See also	Art of Europe Bibliography of European history Genetic history of Europe History of Christianity History of the Mediterranean region History of the European Union History of Western civilization Maritime history of Europe Military history of Europe Crusading movement

Western world and culture
Foundations	Cradle of civilization Old World Greco-Roman world Greece Hellenistic Kingdoms Rome Roman Empire Western Eastern Roman legacy Romanization Romano-Germanic culture Christendom
History	European Bronze Age Classical antiquity Late antiquity Middle Ages early high late Renaissance Early modern period Age of Discovery Reformation Age of Enlightenment Scientific Revolution Late modern period Age of Revolution Romanticism Abolitionism Emancipation Capitalism Industrial Revolution Great Divergence Modern era Modernism World War I Interwar period Universal suffrage World War II Cold War Post–Cold War era Information age War on terror
Culture	Alphabet Greek Latin Cyrillic Architecture Art Periods Calendar Cuisine Diet Classical tradition Studies Clothing History Dance Esotericism Astrology Folklore Immigration Law Languages Eurolinguistics Standard Average European Literature Canon Media Internet Music Chant Classical Folk Mythology Painting (contemporary) Philosophy Science Values Physical culture Sport Religion East–West Schism Western Christianity Decline Secularism
Philosophy	Ancient Greek philosophy Hellenistic philosophy Ancient Roman philosophy Judeo-Christian ethics Christian philosophy Scholasticism Rationalism Empiricism Existentialism Christian existentialism Humanism Christian humanism Secular humanism Liberalism Conservatism Socialism Continental philosophy Analytic philosophy Post-structuralism Tolerance Paradox Relativism Peritrope Atlanticism Values
Religion	Abrahamic Judaism Culture Christianity Culture Western/Eastern Catholic Church Latin Church Eastern Orthodoxy Greek Orthodox Church Protestantism Islam Culture Cultural Muslim Bábism Azali Baháʼí Druze Mandaeism Rastafari Samaritanism Paganism Baltic Celtic Finnish Germanic Anglo-Saxon Frankish Gothic Old Norse Hellenistic Roman Slavic Neo Agnosticism Atheism
Law	Natural law Rule of law Equality before the law Constitutionalism Human rights Life Thought Speech Press Religion Property Democracy International law
Contemporary integration	ABCANZ Armies Anglo-Portuguese Alliance ANZUS Arctic Council AUKUS Baltic Assembly Benelux British–Irish Council Bucharest Nine Council of Europe Craiova Group EEA EFTA ESA EU EU Customs Union Eurozone EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement Five Eyes G7 Lancaster House Treaties Lublin Triangle NATO Nordic Council OAS OSCE Pacific Islands Forum PROSUL/PROSUR Rio Treaty Schengen Special Relationship Three Seas Initiative USMCA Visegrád Group West Nordic Council Western Bloc Western European and Others Group Westernization

Authority control databases
National	Germany Czech Republic
Other	Historical Dictionary of Switzerland