Daily Medieval

Yesterday's post mentioned Cassiodorus (c.485-c.585), a contemporary of Boethius, and his description of the relationship between Ari...

Much of the medieval attitude about music and its forms came from Boethius (c.480-524 CE). In his de institution music [Latin: "On th...

When Gerard Segarelli was rejected by the Franciscans, he took matters into his own hands and formed the Apostolic Brethren in 1260. The B...

Mendicants In the later part of the 13th century, a new order was founded in northern Italy. Sort of. The founder, Gerard Segarelli...

The Roman Severan family, with Geta "erased" from lower left by orders of Caracalla [ link ] Memory is a tricky thing: it can...

rom a 14th century Welsh Book of Hours, this is thought to depict Maximus [ link ] Yesterday we introduced Magnus Maximus, a general wh...

Yesterday's post on St. Illide mentioned that he cured the daughter of Roman Emperor Magnus Maximus. Although Maximus was Emperor of We...

Yesterday's post featured a picture of the chapel of Saint Illide, belonging to the Château d'Alleuze. The chapel was built in th...

The picture below was posted on Facebook a few days ago by a long-time friend. (That's his daughter seen to the right of it. Hi, Kyrie!...

The wren, O the wren, is the King of All Birds. On St. Stephen's Day he got caught in the furze. So goes a medieval carol. But why w...

The Plague, also called the Black Death, spread across Sicily shortly after the arrival of a fleet of a dozen Genoese galleys bringing go...

Christine de Pizan and her dog [ link ] In Chaucer's Canterbury Tales , the Prologue describes the Prioress as having small lapdogs...

Among the groups in history that have long since disappeared, there are the Pechenegs. They were a semi-nomadic group that spoke a Turkic l...

St. Fructuosus on Braga Cathedral It is not unknown for rulers who have been harsh to try to "buy their ay into Heaven" near ...

In the 7th century, the Kingdom of the Visigoths covered much of the Iberian peninsula and a good chunk of what is now southern France. A G...

Recent posts have talked about the sons of William the Conqueror: how he left the kingdom to his second son, William Rufus; how the eldest,...

A copy of the Coronation Charter of Henry I/Charter of Liberties When William Rufus died, his younger brother Henry assumed the throne....

The Battle of Tinchebray When Ralph Flambard escaped from the Tower of London, he fled to Normandy to the court of its duke, Robert Cur...

Ralph Flambard was born in Bayeux, Normandy six years before William the Conqueror crossed the English Channel and became King of England. ...

When William the Conqueror died in 1087, he decided to leave the throne of England to his second eldest, William Rufus. To his eldest, Robe...

Yesterday's post mentioned Henry becoming king of England upon the death of his brother, William Rufus. Their father was William the C...

The phrase "Father of His Country" is usually reserved for George Washington, first President of the United States, for his role ...

Saluzzo, a town and principality in northern Italy, had some interesting connections to England. It was a simple tribal city-state in Roman...

Bread has all the characteristics of a staple food: the plant is easy to grow, the product is relatively easy and cheap to produce, and it ...

Memorial to Battle of Näfels Military engagements between England and France were a large part of the 14th century in Europe, but those...

It is the first of April, and while you might expect something about pulling pranks and acting the fool, instead we are going to talk about...

This is worth knowing. A bear hunter hugging a bear? Early 16th c. German "Geese Book" Sarah Laseke, writer of a medieva...

King Louis IX of France could not convince any of the rulers of Europe to accompany him on a Crusade to free Jerusalem, which had been reca...

In 1244, allies of the Egyptian Mamluks, retreating westward from the advancing Mongols, stopped at Jerusalem long enough to recapture it f...

Saint Isabella, at a church in Paris Isabella of France (1224 - 1270) was the daughter of King Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile. Her b...

Glastonbury is a small town in Somerset, England, that has been inhabited since Neolithic times. A recent post discussed the discovery of ...

In 1977-79, a shipwreck off the southern coast of Turkey was investigated. It was determined to have sunk about 1025. The ship's hold c...

A 1568 German woodcut showing a shoe shop Which guilds were the biggest? Not the most powerful, but those with the most members? Let...