complexity is good--but I have seven pages to cover seven centuries

[redbird]

I can summarize the history of Kievan Rus quickly, because I don't know much about it. That's a matter of a little quick reading, and the highlights of two or three sources. "Barbarian invasions" of Europe is harder. Which ones are important? And in what sense of "important"? The sample test has nothing on any of this, so it's no help. And does it matter, for this purpose, that the Rus, who we generally think of as Slavs, seem to be kin to the Vikings, if not just Vikings trading under a different name?

I am glad to have found the Oxford History of Medieval Europe sitting on a bookshelf in our bedroom, though.