Second, the «dark ages» if
by that you meant the post-Roman period in Europe, is a historicization that has found its way into popular culture — Originally the term
characterized the bulk of the Middle Ages, or roughly the 6th to 12th centuries, as a period of intellectual
darkness between extinguishing the «light of Rome» after the end of Late Antiquity, and the rise of the Italian Renaissance in the 14th century.