The only reason we have as much record of the Western Roman Empire as we do is endless copying and recopying by monks. The Eastern Roman Empire and later the Ar

The only reason we have as much record of the Western Roman Empire as we do is endless copying and recopying by monks. The Eastern Roman Empire and later the Arabs preserved a lot but without the ecclesiastical establishment much more of the Wheat would have lost all literate culture. On economic and technological growth Brad Delong has a new book out, Slouching Towards Utopia, and he kind of hits the idea of very, very slow technological progress before 1870 over and over again. I want to say 1% growth every 50 years on average? Doubling slow enough to be easily outpaced by population growth anyway. The Church preserved learning. It didn’t stifle it. For most of the history of the Church it was the only set of institutions one could do intellectual work in at all.