The period extending from the second to the tenth centuries A.D. is regarded as the Dark Ages in Europe. During this period Europe made little or no progress in science for nearly a thousand years. These middle ages are known as the Dark Ages because of their darkness in the fields of science, philosophy and other branches of knowledge.

The people of that continent were living in completely disorganized state. It was this time when the degradation of the human intellect was most widespread over Europe. Through out the Dark Ages in Europe, science remained in obscurity and subordination.

Almost every material phenomenon was attributed to the will of a spirit. In all fields of life, there was want of reasoning, thinking and looking into things. Ideas in all spheres of life were so much based on superstitions that an average European, “fever-stricken or overtaken by accident, ran to the nearest saint-shrine to be cured by a miracle”. The clouds of Dark Ages began to dissolve with the rise of the crescent of Islam. When the Europe was in Dark Ages Muslims did great work in science.