Published in 1893, Oman’s history remains a dazzling narrative of the centuries after Rome’s fall, and complicates the darkness traditionally ascribed to them. Battle of Tours (732), by Charles de Steuben (1837) Sir Charles Oman For a modern reader, the very title ‘The Dark Ages’ is a red flag. Over decades, we have been well-schooled by academia to treat the phrase “the Dark Ages” with a mixture of condescension and linguistic allergy. To speak of the five centuries followin