The Medieval Magazine 102 – Vol. 3, No. 19: Merry Medieval! Christmas – Part I
The first of our holiday issues! Christmas cheer, Medieval style! A mulled wine recipe, monastic brewing practices, Japanese Anime’s take on Medieval legends, and the Circumcision of Christ. We’ve got your table talk covered in in this issue, so pass the gravy!
Book Tour: Heroines of the Medieval World by Sharon Bennett Connolly
This November, Medievalists.net is pleased to feature Sharon Connolly’s book tour for Heroines of the Medieval World. The book shares the stories of women, famous, infamous, and unknown, who shaped the course of medieval history.
The Medieval Magazine (Volume 3, No. 10) : The Great Famine
In this issue: The Great Famine – Food and Hunger in the 14th Century Feature: 10 Things to Know About the Great Famine Exhibits: Saints…
The career of Roger Mortimer, first earl of March (c.1287-1330)
A straightforward analysis of his regime is accompanied by a demonstration that, even though the court dictated political life, Roger Mortimer was able to extend his influence across the British Isles and pose a serious threat to the kingship of Edward III.
Isabella of France: The Rebel Queen
Read an excerpt from the new book by Kathryn Warner
Tall Tales: The Trouble with Tours
Tours. They can be great, or they can be cringeworthy and rife with misinformation. A great tour guide knows how to add a flourish or two to a story to keep the audience engaged and the history interesting. A bad tour guide invents things and hopes there isn’t a historian in the audience dismayed by the falsehoods they’re spreading to unwitting listeners…
Magna Carta Conference Offers New Insights Into The 800-year-old Document
Magna Carta just celebrated its 800th birthday this past Monday. In honour of this incredible milestone, King’s College London, and the Magna Carta Project, hosted a 3 day conference dedicated to this historic document.
Chronicles and Politics in the Reign of Edward II
Historians have tended to give more weight to sources such as governmental and legal records than to chronicles, not least because so many survive. They open up areas of history impossible to access through chronicles alone, and they also provide a much more precise and detailed political narrative.
Edward II and his Children
Kathryn Warner, author of Edward II: The Unconventional King, takes a look at the English king’s three sons and two daughters.
What’s the Matter?: Medieval Literary Theory and the Irish Campaigns in The Bruce
John Barbour’s Bruce, composed in the mid 1370s, is the first long poem in the Scots vernacular. It contains twenty books, the first thirteen of which trace the Wars of Liberty from their origins until triumph at the Battle of Bannockburn. At this point the Irish ‘matter’ enters the poem.
Alice de Lacy and the Hazards and Possibilities of Medieval Widowhood, 1322-1348
The widow of Thomas, earl of Lancaster, Alice found herself in a precarious position after her husband’s execution for treason in 1322.
The Management of the Mobilization of English Armies: Edward I to Edward III
This thesis examines government administrative action that can be described as ‘management’, in the context of the logistics of mobilizing royal armies during the reigns of Edward I, Edward II and Edward III.
Queer times: Richard II in the poems and chronicles of late
The article focuses on the representation of deviant sexual behavior in 14th-century English poetry and other chronicles. The portrayal of King of England Richard II as a rebellious youth, which is interpreted as perverse and lacking manliness, and the propaganda needed to offset this perception are discussed. Historical information is given about the political culture and power of the church. The murder of Edward II after being accused of sodomy by the Bishop of Hereford is mentioned.
Gower’s “Confessio” and the “Nova statuta Angliae”: royal lessons in English law
In the following discussion, I will explore some hitherto unexamined links between the Confessio Amantis and one of these legal texts, the Nova Statuta Angliae or New Statutes of England, which circulated among professional and non-professional readers in the 1380s and 1390s and which Richard II received in a manuscript now in Cambridge: St. John’s College MS A.7.
Letter from Robert the Bruce to Edward II discovered – attempt at peace before Bannockburn
New research has revealed a letter written in 1310 by Robert Bruce to King Edward II, presenting historians with fresh information about a pivotal time in the Wars of Scottish Independence.
Edward II: His Friends, His Enemies, and His Death
Edward I was a hard act to follow. By 1295, he had subdued Wales. He promulgated what Michael Prestwich calls a “majestic set of statutes” that led to his being called the English Justinian. Though his relationships with the nobility were sometimes stormy, there was no doubt who was in charge. The same would not be said about his son.
Edward II and the Expectations of Kingship
Although historians generally agree that Edward II’s reign was a complete failure, and that the king himself was rather inept, debate has centered on the specific causes for his downfall.
Manhood, kingship and the public in late medieval England
Were medieval kings like other men? A century’s work on the sacrality of kingship has tended to stress how kings differed from their fellow adult males, even fellow nobles.
Sir Thomas Gray’s Scalacronica: a medieval chronicle and its historical and literary context
Sir Thomas Gray’s Scalacronica is almost unique amongst medieval English chronicles in having been written by a knight, and it is therefore surprising that so little work has been done on it; this thesis attempts to remedy that omission.
The personnel of English and Welsh castles, 1272-1422
In England, the role played on the continent by the castellanies would appear to have been performed by the county castle and the sheriff, a post that remained firmly under the king’s control in all but a few counties. Instead, a more subtle link between the castle community and political power will have to be found. It will be searched for in the appointment of constables to royal castles, and in grants of ownership of castles, royal or forfeited. It may be found in the building activity that was so common in this period, or in the marriage alliances that created many of the great castle owning estates.
English Longbow Testing against various armor circa 1400
The purpose of this research is to determine the effect various medieval arrows have on various medieval armour types. The time period that I tested is around 1400, the time of the English longbow.