A World Lit Only by Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance: Portrait of an Age is an informal history of the European Middle Ages by American historian William Manchester. Published in 1992, the book is divided into three sections: "The Medieval Mind", "The Shattering", and "One Man Alone". In the book, Manchester posits, as the title suggests, that the Middle Ages were ten centuries of technological stagnation, short-sightedness, bloodshed, feudalism, and an oppressive Catholic Church wedged between the golden ages of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance.