Where the Middle Ages Begin
As the school year begins, it’s the perfect time to sharpen your knowledge of the Middle Ages! Medievalists.net is offering a Back to School discount of 15% off all our online courses.
What everyday objects did people use in the Middle Ages? From clothing and household necessities to tools for work and warfare, these 25 medieval items were essential to daily life and shaped how people lived, ate, and survived.
Delve into the pivotal figures of the Middle Ages whose enduring legacies shaped the course of history. From visionary leaders and profound scholars to prolific writers and formidable warriors, these individuals left an indelible mark on medieval society.
Discover the 50 most significant events of the Middle Ages, spanning the years 500 to 1500.
Here are seven vivid facts about colour in the Middle Ages
In medieval times, many unique jobs, such as Ale-wife and Groom of the Stool, were essential but have since vanished. Discover these obsolete occupations and how historical changes led to their disappearance.
Are you wanting to talk more like someone from the Middle Ages? We have a list of 30 great sayings and proverbs that you can use in your conversations.
Have you wondered what a medieval king did on a typical day? Thanks to Christine de Pizan, we have an account of what daily life was like for King Charles V of France.
Some of our most popular phrases have a long history, including some that go back to the Middle Ages.
Want to know what kind of jobs there were in the Middle Ages? A unique source from the 15th century gives us some beautiful images of medieval people at work.
As the school year begins, it’s the perfect time to sharpen your knowledge of the Middle Ages! Medievalists.net is offering a Back to School discount of 15% off all our online courses.
Explore 20 pieces of political wisdom from Francesco Guicciardini, a medieval statesman whose sharp maxims on power, ambition, and human nature remain strikingly relevant today.
How free should speech be? And what limits, if any, should restrain it? This question echoes across centuries—from modern debates to the turbulent politics of medieval Italy. This book examines the latter, revealing how words shaped power, conflict, and society in the city-states of medieval Italy.
Learn how Archbishop Albero of Trier used siege warfare to secure independence and reshape power in medieval Germany.
Discover ten medieval kings who met their end while hunting, from fatal falls to arrows gone astray, revealing the deadly risks of royal sport.
Discover how medieval fashion reflected power and status in 13th-century England, from the luxurious wardrobes of queens to the livery of their servants.
Celebrate 50 years of Monty Python and the Holy Grail with exclusive screenings at Doune Castle, the medieval filming location of the comedy classic.
Discover how the Venerable Bede, a Northumbrian monk, shaped the history of early medieval England through his Ecclesiastical History and lasting influence.
Maid, hero, heretic, saint – Joan of Arc is one of the most fascinating figures of the Middle Ages. This week on The Medieval Podcast, Danièle speaks with Deborah McGrady about Joan’s incredible life and death, her voice, and her complex and enduring legacy.
Norwich Castle has reopened after a £27.5 million transformation, offering full access from basement to battlements, immersive medieval rooms, and a new British Museum gallery of 900 artefacts.
The rebranded Royal Fortresses of Languedoc—long known as the ‘Cathar Castles’—highlight France’s medieval military heritage in a new UNESCO bid.
Discover the medieval tale of Sir Gowther — a knight born of demonic origins whose violent youth gives way to a powerful story of repentance and redemption.
Discover how the Council of Nicaea not only defined early Christian doctrine but also laid the foundations for the medieval Church’s authority, canon law, and institutional structure, shaping the course of European history for centuries.
Medieval Arabic literature frequently included Black African characters, offering valuable insight into contemporary ideas about race and race relations. This book examines those sources to uncover how such concepts developed in the Middle Ages and how they have continued to influence perceptions of race up to the present day.
This article examines the Viking raids of 1006 and 1007 in the Rhine Delta region and shows how local militias in the early German kingdom defended towns such as Utrecht and Tiel, highlighting the importance of leadership and local military institutions.
Pola of Rome defied expectations in more ways than one: not only was she a professional scribe in the late thirteenth century, she was a Jewish woman working in a field dominated by male Christian clerics. Her surviving colophons offer a rare glimpse into the intellectual life, family networks, and self-perception of a medieval woman who made her living through the written word.
Here are five changes in English castle design that had a big impact on history.
Explore the first phase of the Crusades to the Holy Land, from the capture of Jerusalem in 1099 to the fall of Edessa and the failed Second Crusade.
A new Fulbright project in Uganda is preserving traditional orature and connecting it to the Global Middle Ages, expanding the scope of medieval studies beyond Europe.
Les Grandes Chroniques de France, one of the most important sources for French medieval history, was first compiled in the 13th century and continued until 1461. This book explores not only its value as a historical record but also its role in shaping the ideals and lessons intended for French kings.
This week on The Medieval Podcast, Danièle speaks with Myra Stokes and Ad Putter about where we find love letters, and the way people wrote and sent them, along with a couple of spicy – and hilarious – examples.
The Getty Center will present Going Places: Travel in the Middle Ages from September 2 to November 30, 2025, exploring medieval journeys through rare manuscripts, pilgrimages, trade, and imaginative voyages.
Archaeologists have analysed the DNA of two unrelated individuals buried in seventh-century cemeteries on England’s south coast, revealing that both had recent ancestors—likely…
Faith Tibble’s new book, The Crown of Thorns: Humble Gods and Humiliated Kings, challenges centuries of assumptions about one of Christianity’s most iconic symbols. Drawing on meticulous research and a storyteller’s touch, she invites readers to look again at the medieval art they thought they knew.
How free should speech be? And what limits, if any, should restrain it? This question echoes across centuries—from modern debates to the turbulent politics of medieval Italy. This book examines the latter, revealing how words shaped power, conflict, and society in the city-states of medieval Italy.
Maid, hero, heretic, saint – Joan of Arc is one of the most fascinating figures of the Middle Ages. This week on The Medieval Podcast, Danièle speaks with Deborah McGrady about Joan’s incredible life and death, her voice, and her complex and enduring legacy.
This week on The Medieval Podcast, Danièle speaks with Myra Stokes and Ad Putter about where we find love letters, and the way people wrote and sent them, along with a couple of spicy – and hilarious – examples.
This week on The Medieval Podcast, Danièle speaks with Sharon Kinoshita about why Marco travelled so far, what sort of detail he wanted to share with his readers, and what was going on in the world around him.
A conversation with Ada Palmer about the invention of the idea of the Italian Renaissance and the functions that it serves in the western historical imagination. “Byzantium” is a similarly invented category that often works in tandem with “the Renaissance” to mark good and bad moments in the history of culture.
This week, in celebration of Episode 300, Danièle answers your questions on everything from Hastings to hose, with a couple of surprises along the way.
A conversation with Anastasia Koumousi about the recently identified portrait of the last emperor of the Romans in Constantinople, Konstantinos XI Palaiologos, in a monastery church in the northern Peloponnese.
