"In Framing the early middle ages Chris Wickham links documentary and archaeological evidence together, and creates a comparative history of the period 400-800. He sets out thematic analysis of each of the regions of the latest Roman and immediately post-Roman world, from Denmark to Egypt. The book concentrates on classic socio-economic themes: states and their funding, the wealth and identity of the aristocracy, estate management, peasant society, rural settlement, cities, and exchange. These are discussed region by region, in a way not attempted before. Wickham argues that, without this, the broader development of Europe and the Mediterranean cannot be properly understood."--BOOK JACKET.

States -- Geography and politics -- The form of the state -- Aristocratic power-structures -- Aristocracies -- Managing the land -- Political breakdown and state-building in the North -- Peasantries -- Peasants and local societies: case studies -- Rural settlement and village societies -- Peasant society and its problems -- Networks -- Cities -- Systems of exchange -- General conclusions.