Daily Medieval

"Know that we, in the sight of God, and for our souls, and for the sake of our predecessors and heirs, have granted and confirmed by th...

Eleanor of Castile (1241 - 1290) was not always well-liked by the English. Although she was performing the expected duty of providing childr...

Despite Muhammad's treatment of the Jewish tribe the Banu Qurayza , he was not opposed to tolerance of the Jewish religion. He felt the ...

Once the Confederacy gave up the Battle of the Trench because of discord and mistrust in the alliance, Muhammad turned his attention to th...

The first thing we should establish is that "anti-semitism" is the wrong term for what happened to Jews in Western Europe and else...

The first case in England of " blood libel " (although more precisely it was only child sacrifice) was the case of William of Norw...

Yesterday was Palm Sunday, so let's talk about a terrible Palm Sunday (18 March) event in 1190 in the English town of Bury St. Edmunds. ...

In the second half of the 12th century there was a monk in the town of Bury St. Edmunds in Suffolk named Jocelyn de Brakelond. He became cha...

The death of Hugh of Lincoln led to the arrests of so many Jews because of the belief in "blood libel": that the Jews stole/kidna...

The murder of a child is a particularly heinous act that tugs at the heart strings. In the eyes of society, the murderer of a child must be ...

When Simon de Montfort wanted to kick off the Second Barons War , he needed funding. One of the easiest ways for most medieval Europeans to ...

The king of Poland from 1333 to 1370 was Casimir III, later called "the Great" (the only Polish monarch to be given that title). W...

When Jews were expelled from England (1290) and Sephardic Jews from Spain (1492) and other locations in Europe, many of them wound up in Nor...

In the earliest days of this blog, there were no illustrations. I eventually decided there were some posts that would be enhanced by an appr...

In 1194, Richard I of England created a system by which all financial transactions by Jews would be documented by the Crown. This system cre...

When Richard I of England was kidnapped coming back from the Third Crusade, the ransom was going to be enormous: 100,000 pounds of silver. ...

William Longchamp (or "de Longchamp") achieved success the old-fashioned way: he paid lots of money for it. That's not fair; b...

Anti-semitic riots at the coronation of Richard I cannot really be seen as an anomalous event: anti-semitism—even when not overtly practice...

During the coronation of Richard I , many citizens wanted to show their loyalty to the new king (and perhaps gain future favor) by giving hi...

We talked here about how women and Jewish women could be physicians in the Middle Ages, but it would be a mistake to think that there was n...