On the other hand, when we come to consider the social and political conditions, the word Romanesque is too narrow. It was, it is true, a period of gradual reconstruction of order upon the ruins of the Roman Empire and one of the forces that made for order was the partial revival by Charlemagne of Roman Law. The latter became a model by which the slow process of organising society anew could shape itself. So far, at least, the social tendency of the period was Romanesque. But after all, this was only a detail of the new order, and by no means the most significant. Indeed the attempt to revive an empire was in itself reactionary and opposed to the spirit of the time. For the latter was groping toward the organising of independent nationalities. The millions who had overwhelmed the Roman Empire possessed a certain kinship of race and language; but they were divided into tribal units which clung to their separate identities, the more so as the difference of localities in which they settled increased their separateness. Thus the movement of the time was a slow change from tribal to national unity, and the gradual construction of a social and political order, suited to their racial instinct of independent freedom. The advance was much more rapid in social than in political order. For centuries the independent and adventurous spirit of the various peoples was to keep them embroiled in constant warfare, postponing the settlement of national landmarks. Back of this political chaos, however, was a steady and sure growth in social order, which, indeed, was largely assisted by the necessity of self-preservation. While popes, emperors, kings, dukes, and counts were fighting in colossal or petty rivalries, the “honest man,” as the saying is, “came into his own.” The merchants grew in importance, the craft-gilds consolidated their strength, and the cities became oases of comparative order. It was an age distinguished by the growth of “communes”; that is to say, of burgs, boroughs, and cities, possessing certain rights of self-government and immunity from indiscriminate taxation. Not that these privileges escaped infringement. The fight for them had to be perpetually maintained and the fortunes of the commune varied from time to time. Yet the seed of self-government was sown, to stay in the soil of every Teutonic nation.