Where the Middle Ages Begin
Jörg’s memoir is a particularly informative example of how one knight understood his own calling to knighthood and his practice of it. The medieval knight had a voice, and although precious few memoirs like Jörg’s exist, knightly perspectives inform a considerable breadth of primary materials.
The prevalent use of cosmetics among women fast became a topic for moralist discourse, both inside and out of the Peninsula.
This is a review of the Spanish medieval film: Captain Thunder or Order of The Holy Grail (El Capitán Trueno y el Santo Grial)
Associated to the practice of gossip, bartering, display and selling of her trinkets around neighborhoods and streets, the old woman was allowed into the female domestic spaces of late medieval Europe.
In the sessions of our section over the past decade, I introduced a significant distinction between two rabbinic attitudes in the Mediterranean countries during the Middle Ages of 12th and 13th centuries as to their view of Christianity.
David Porreca examines how the magical spells found in the Picatrix made use of precious gems.
The concept of chivalry, a traditional code of conduct idealised by the knightly class relating to times of both peace and war, dominated the medieval period and many of the scholars who contributed to the principle of jus in bello were in fact writing about chivalry.
The Arabic inscriptions in this building fascinated me, and led me down a long path of research that continues today over a decade later. Today I will present some of that research, showing you some of the other structures and objects that are adorned with the same inscription.
During the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, the word beguine was used by women to identify themselves as members of a wide-spread and influential women’s movement. The same term was used by their detractors and overt opponents, with the highly charged negative meaning of “heretic.” The etymology of the term “beguine” and ultimate origins of the movement have never been satisfactorily explained.
In this article, I examine the medieval evidence for how pig husbandry functioned in wood pasture in England.
Put down the Godfather, turn off the Sorpanos, and check out the real Italian families of Medieval and Renaissance Italy!
I have tried to show the degree of discrimination suffered by the Jewish community in these two kingdoms in the Middle Ages through a deep analysis of the legal sources, lay as much as ecclesiastical, and also through documentary collections reflecting their practical application
Most famous of all, perhaps is the tale of the woman whose husband leaves for battle. Her lover then sends his boy to tell her he is coming to her, and she seduces the boy.
Of the many works that form the canon of the debate on women in the fifteenth century, particularly in the Iberian Peninsula, there is a text that often omitted. This lesser known text was written by one of the most notorious figures in Spanish history: don Alvaro de Luna.
Reconquista society in medieval Christian Spain is all too often considered through only economic and martial eyes. In this study of the prevelant cult of Santiago de Compostela (or St. James the Greater) I will demonstrate how medieval society meshed both war and religion.
In the last third of the fifteenth century, Hugo de Urriés’s work can offer the modern reader a very rare and informative perspective from the points of view of social history and history of ideas.
This article argues that the common modern version of the invasion, in which Byzantine forces arrived in 552, fought on the side of the usurper Athanagild until 555, and then fought against Athanagild for a brief period before concluding a treaty with him, is flawed and, relying on a more precise reading of the sources, proposes a new chronology and narrative, in which Byzantine forces did not arrive until 554.
The medieval period in Spanish history has alternately been cast as a Golden Age of interfaith harmony and an example of the ultimate incompatibility of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish communities.
Pediculosis seems to have afflicted humans since the most ancient times and lice have been found in several ancient human remains. Examination of the head hair and pubic hair of the artificial mummy of Ferdinand II of Aragon (1467-1496), King of Naples, revealed a double infestation with two different species of lice…
The “Ordenamiento de las tafurerias” is a law code about gambling, established by a certain Maestre Roldan in 1276 or 1277 CE (1314 / 1315 era hisp.)by command of King Alfonso X of Castile. It represents the most detailed and exhaustive regulation of gambling from the Middle Ages, providing useful information about the practice of gambling, the presumed or real problems connected to it, and the measures taken by authorities.
Literary and historical evidence of religious disputes that took place between Jews and Christians during the Middle Ages exists in a varietyof sources.
Rodrigo Díaz, better known by his title El Cid, has traditionally been portrayed as one of the great heroes of Spanish history, perhaps the perhaps the Spanish national hero par excellence.
An evil king versus a good king. They are half-brothers. It’s a fight to the death. In a tent!
Archaeologists have discovered an abandoned settlement in the Basque Country of Spain that seems to have been turned into a medieval version of a factory-farm in order to concentrate the cultivation of vineyards.
In a recent paper, Danie Curtis has given a framework for classifying preindustrial societies in accordance with four variables, these are, the property, the power, the market of basic products and the modes of production.
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