My interest in medieval history comes from a love of language. My favourite Old English word is wordhord, which refers to a poet’s mental stockpile of words and phrases. My word hoarding (and sharing) started with tweeting the Old English word of the day in 2013. This spread to other social media platforms, a blog, an app, and now two books. I have a PhD in English from King’s College London (my thesis was on blood in Old English, even though blood actually makes me squeamish). I enjoy histories that make me think about the past from a different perspective.
Why did the earn (eagle) fly to the sun? Where do you find henna (hens) that burst into flame? How do you defeat an ylp (elephant)? And what on earth is a moon-head?
Many of the animals we encounter, from those in our fields to the ones in our fantasies, have remained the same since medieval times—but the words we use, and the ways we think about them, have often changed beyond recognition. Old English was spoken over a thousand years ago, when every animal was a deor. In this glittering collection of words and animals, we find deor big and small, in a world both familiar and strange.
Reading this book is like listening to your incredibly knowledgeable historian friend talk about medieval society over drinks. Janega’s turns of phrase and sharp observations make me laugh, and at the same time, I feel my mind soak up knowledge like a sponge.
This book is about what medieval people thought and why, going back to the philosophies and influences of ancient Greece and Rome. It tackles medieval beauty standards, sexual practices, family life, and work life. It addresses fart jokes and eyeliner, as well as ideas about biology and class disparities. We see women farming, ruling, weaving, brewing, and writing.
Janega argues that it is through seeing the past truly that we can "imagine new futures," making the necessary changes for "a more equitable world."
What makes for the ideal woman? How should she look, love and be? In this vibrant, high-spirited history, medievalist Eleanor Janega turns to the Middle Ages, the era that bridged the ancient world and modern society, to unfurl its suppositions about women and reveal what's shifted over time-and what hasn't.
Enshrined medieval thinkers, almost always male, subscribed to a blend of classical Greek and Roman philosophy and Christian theology for their concepts of the sexes. For the height of female attractiveness, they chose the mythical Helen of Troy, whose imagined pear shape, small breasts, and golden hair served as beauty's…
This book is filled with fascinating facts about medieval medicine, surgery, humoural theory, disease, and diagnosis. But what is surprising is how many other aspects of the Middle Ages are covered through the theme of bodies.
We learn about strange creatures like blemmyae (who have no heads and faces in their chests) and cynocephali (dog-headed people), saints and relics, race relations and politics, manuscript manufacture, religion, literature, travel, eating habits, love, sexuality, and gender identity.
I love how the chapters are organized by body part, from head to feet, a clever approach I have never seen in a history book before. Hartnell demonstrates how the medieval past is "an uncanny place at once startlingly different from and strangely familiar to our own."
Just like us, medieval men and women worried about growing old, got blisters and indigestion, fell in love, and had children. And yet their lives were full of miraculous and richly metaphorical experiences radically different from our own, unfolding in a world where deadly wounds might be healed overnight by divine intervention, or where the heart of a king, plucked from his corpse, could be held aloft as a powerful symbol of political rule.
In this richly illustrated and unusual history, Jack Hartnell uncovers the fascinating ways in which people thought about, explored, and experienced their physical selves in the…
This book is about medieval manuscripts, but those parchment pages are only the "portals that connect us to lives in the past." This book’s stories are, in fact, about the hands that wrote, illustrated, commissioned, collected, and composed those manuscripts.
Wellesley’s enthusiasm for the forensic study of the physical as well as textual past is infectious. She gently corrects popular assumptions about the Middle Ages (yes, women were involved in all aspects of book-making, from commissioning to composing to writing to illustrating), all the while dropping in delectable details that make you stop and think (the word "artist" doesn’t appear in English until after the medieval period).
A breathtaking journey into the hidden history of medieval manuscripts, from the Lindisfarne Gospels to the ornate Psalter of Henry VIII
“A delight—immersive, conversational, and intensely visual, full of gorgeous illustrations and shimmering description.” –Helen Castor, author of She-Wolves
Medieval manuscripts can tell us much about power and art, knowledge and beauty. Many have survived because of an author’s status—part of the reason we have so much of Chaucer’s writing, for example, is because he was a London-based government official first and a poet second. Other works by the less influential have narrowly avoided ruin, like the book of illiterate…
This book is not just a rich and detailed portrait of various times and places throughout the medieval period—it explains how history itself is written, how certain stories are told (and prioritized), and how certain individuals are remembered.
From page 1, Ramirez draws you in with her irresistible storytelling, making historical figures seem like the real people they were. She corrects popular misconceptions about the Middle Ages as well as how history is itself created.
Each chapter begins with a discovery, which is just as dramatic and exciting as the medieval subject matter. I love how Ramirez paints a picture of the past using sight, sound, and smell, drawing on the evidence provided by jewelry, weaponry, coins, manuscripts, and even human remains.
THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER LONGLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE
'Revelatory' GUARDIAN
'A firecracker somehow captured between two covers' LUCY WORSLEY
An instant bestseller and one of the most celebrated history books of the year, Femina reveals the power and influence of medieval women who have been written out of our history. From royalty and religion to fame and fury, see the medieval world - and the women erased from it - with fresh eyes.
'Absolutely brilliant and highly recommended' CAITLIN MORAN
'Femina is a ground-breaking history of the Middle Ages' SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIORE
This is a medieval history unlike any other you’ll read, literally bringing the past into the present. How do medieval thoughts and practices relate to modern life, from the usefulness of minimalism to church "vision boards" to the healing properties of green spaces?
Cybulskie is lightheartedly critical of certain practices of the past but is always respectful, never treating people as strange or backward.
Illustrated with images from medieval manuscripts, this book covers everything from Easter ball games to party saint Brigid to Benedict’s vision of a room for communal undies. We see medieval religious folks interested in science and innovation, as well as history and ritual, and connected to the world around them in ways we might not have imagined.
We know that they prayed, sang, and wore long robes, but what was it really like to be a monk? Though monastic living may seem unimaginable to us moderns, it has relevance for today. This book illuminates the day-to-day of medieval European monasticism, showing how you can apply the principles of monastic living, like finding balance and peace, to your life.
With wit and insight, medievalist and podcaster Daniele Cybulskie dives into the history of monasticism in each chapter and then reveals applications for today, such as the benefits of healthy eating, streamlining routines, gardening, and helping others. She shares…
When Miranda’s fiancé, Russ, is being vetted for his dream job in the U.S. attorney’s office, the couple joke that Miranda’s parents’ history as antiwar activists in the Sixties might jeopardize Russ’s security clearance. In fact, the real threat emerges when Russ’s future employer discovers that Miranda was arrested for felony kidnapping seven years earlier—an arrest she’d never bothered to tell Russ about.
Miranda tries to explain that she was only helping her best friend, in the midst of a nasty custody battle, take her daughter to visit her parents in Israel. As Miranda struggles to prove that she’s not a criminal, she stumbles into other secrets that will challenge what she thought she knew about her own family, her friend, Russ—and herself.
When Miranda’s fiancé, Russ, is being vetted for his dream job in the U.S. attorney’s office, the couple joke that Miranda’s parents’ history as antiwar activists in the Sixties might jeopardize Russ’s security clearance. In fact, the real threat emerges when Russ’s future employer discovers that Miranda was arrested for felony kidnapping seven years earlier—an arrest she’d never bothered to tell Russ about.
Miranda tries to explain that she was only helping her best friend, in the midst of a nasty custody battle, take her daughter to visit her parents in Israel. As Miranda struggles to prove that she’s not…
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