Daily Medieval

The title of the second longest reign in Scottish history goes to William I (c.1142 - 1214). Only James VI was longer (of course that was he...

Although you wouldn't suspect that the life of Fergus of Galloway  (who died in 1161) would lend itself to the Arthurian Romance cycle, ...

(The illustration is a sketch of Cruggleton Castle, an important Galloway fortress which now is more accurately called a pile of rock than e...

In yesterday's post about St. Ninian , I suggested that the biography of him written 700 years later by Aelred of Rievaulx may have had...

Aelred of Rievaulx (c.1110-1167) wrote several works, including biographies, one of which was about a saint from several centuries earlier, ...

Aelred of Rievaulx took a successful abbey and made it even more grand (although the illustration will show that its fortunes have fallen so...

In 1134, a man in his 20s entered Rievaulx, a Cistercian abbey in North Yorkshire. A sentence like this has been written many times in this ...

King David's rule over Scotland was entwined with his relationship with England. When England experienced the constitutional crisis and ...

King David I (pictured here) was one of many sons of Malcolm III of Scotland, several of whom had their chance on the throne after it had be...

King Henry I of England changed a lot of the political atmosphere that had been damaged by his brother, William Rufus . One of his changes ...

Also called the Battle of Northallerton (because it took place near Northallerton in Yorkshire), the Battle of the Standard was between a sm...

Thurstan (or Turstin) of Bayeaux (c.1070 - 1140) was the son of a priest (this was before Anselm disallowed priests in England to marry ). ...

While Anselm was still abbot of Bec and avoiding the journey to England to become Archbishop of Canterbury because of William II's auth...

One of Anselm's last challenges was dealing with a challenge to his authority, but this time not from a secular source. England had two ...

Recent posts have mentioned three of William of Normandy's sons who had claims (some of them realized) to the throne of England. The Con...

As mentioned  here , the relationship between Archbishop of Canterbury Anselm and King Henry I of England was not completely adversarial. He...

I have written before of how William II of England died  unexpectedly, and how his younger brother Henry quickly assumed control of England...

The early Church fathers struggled to explain exactly how salvation worked; that is, what was the actual way that Christ's death and res...

Even during all the political troubles that Anselm of Bec was having with William Rufus because of Anselm's role as Archbishop of Cant...

The professional relationship between Anselm of Canterbury and King William II of England was as rocky as any similar pairing through Engl...

Anselm of Bec was the natural successor to Lanfranc as Archbishop of Canterbury, but King William II "Rufus" left the see vacant ...

Anselm of Canterbury has been referred to in this blog a few times by one of his other names, Anselm of Bec. He was born 1033/34 in the Uppe...

Matilda of Tuscany had become a powerful woman with a great deal of influence in northern Italy. She had a big concern, however: she was th...