Narratives of resistance: arguments against the mendicants in the works of Matthew Paris and William of Saint-Amour
The rise of the new mendicant orders, foremost the Franciscans and Dominicans, is one of the great success stories of thirteenth-century Europe. Combining apostolic poverty with sophisticated organization and university learning, they brought much needed improvements to pastoral care in the growing cities.
Pedlars and Alchemists in Friuli History of itinerant sellers in an alpine reality
This short review discusses about itinerant sellers in Friuli, who are Cramaro called (XI-XIX centuries). Attention is focused, in particular, on the question if some of theme were alchemists.
Conversion on the Scaffold: Italian Practices in European Context
11 January 1581 was a fine day in Rome. That morning, Michel de Montaigne, recently arrived in the city, had gone out on horseback when he encountered a procession accompanying a condemned man to execution. Montaigne stopped to watch the sight.
Living cheek by jowl: the pathoecology of medieval York
This paper aims to present the environmental context for disease combined with the human osteological record to reconstruct the pathoecology of medieval York.
The cultural identity of medieval Silesia: the case of art and architecture
The cultural identity of architecture and visual arts of the Middle Ages in Silesia can be analyzed in the following frameworks: 1.) the distinct formal features of local artwork; 2.) the specific content expressed through it. Macro factors (the type of materials and their availability) are important in architecture, as are architectural patterns and styles.
Air Pollution and Fuel Crises in Preindustrial London, 1250-1650
I intend to show in this paper that the occurrence of air pollution in London before the Industrial Revolution was symptomatic of one of these basic environmental problems
Restaurants, Inns and Taverns That Never Were: Some Reflections on Public Consumption in Medieval Cairo
The article shows that, contrary to a commonly accepted assumption, no public consumption facilities such as restaurants, taverns or inns existed in medieval Cairo.
Urban Jousts in the Later Middle Ages: The White Bear of Bruges
Jousting competitions between towns excited passions which, far from releasing citizens into some escapist unreality, could plunge them instead into violence.
Kingdom, emporium and town: the impact of Viking Dublin
In recent years the precise location and nature of Viking Dublin have been much debated. It is now generally accepted that there was a longphort phase from 841 to 902: a period of enforced exile from 902 to 917, and thereafter a dún phase.
Images of the Medieval City
What did medieval cities look like? Here are 15 images of the urban world from the Middle Ages.
Florentine politics and the ruling class, 1382-1407
Although outwardly the regime respected the institutions of communal Florence and republican formalities, real power in the state supposedly resided in the hands of a narrow group of families.
The Medieval Plumbers of Exeter
Underneath the streets of the English city of Exeter their lies a network of medieval tunnels. For hundreds of years they were used to bring fresh drinking-water to the city. Now, a new book by Mark Stoyle is taking a look at the medieval plumbers who worked in these tunnels going back to the 14th century.
Estonian small towns in the Middle Ages: archaeology and the history of urban defense
The purpose of the current article is to summarize the material gathered from the excavations of the medieval town walls from the Estonian towns of Viljandi, Haapsalu, and Narva, to discuss when they were erected, and to analyze what their place was in Old Livonian and Baltic contexts.
Property, Propriety, and Patriarchy: Abduction, Assault and Housebreaking in the Court of Common Pleas, 1399-1500
The purpose of this thesis is to examine how pleas of assault, housebreaking, and abduction cases in the Court of Common Pleas were shaped by social visions of gender hierarchy, and the personal conduct expected of persons as members of households and governors of households
Time, space and power in later medieval Bristol
With a population of almost 10,000, Bristol was later medieval England’s second or third biggest urban place, and the realm’s second port after London. While not particularly large or wealthy in comparison with the great cities of northern Italy, Flanders or the Rhineland, it was a metropolis in the context of the British Isles.
Origin and Creation: London Guilds of the Twelfth Century
London, as well as other towns and cities of the twelfth century, acted as the epicenter for guilds to create a regulated authority over members, monopolies, and outside merchants.
Environmental management in medieval London: was London a ‘filthy city’?
The BBC series ‘Filthy Cities’ presented medieval London as knee deep in muck, with rivers of butchers’ waste washing into streams and chamber pots emptied on the heads of hapless passers-by.
BOOKS: The Feuding Families of Medieval and Renaissance Italy
Put down the Godfather, turn off the Sorpanos, and check out the real Italian families of Medieval and Renaissance Italy!
The Red Sea and the Port of Clysma. A Possible Gate of Justinian’s Plague
The aim of this study is to present the sea and land commercial routes of the Byzantine Egypt and their role in the dissemination of the plague bacteria Yersinia pestis from the Red Sea to Mediterranean ports. The Mediterranean port of Pelusium was considered as the starting point of the first plague pandemic…
Women in early towns
What do we know about women’s role in these societies? What did women do and how numerous were they? And did they pay the same role in Viking-Age proto-towns as in more developed medieval urban communities?
Notarial Convention in the Facilitation of Trade and Economics in Mid-Thirteenth Century Marseille
This paper examines Marseillaise notarial documents of 1248 from the cartulary of Girauld Amalric. Amalric’s cartulary demonstrates how notarial techniques and related legal conventions facilitated Marseille’s long- and short-distance trade.
The Stench of Disease: Public Health and the Environment in Late-Medieval English towns and cities
This article explores the urban environmental concerns of late-medieval English towns and cities and argues that these urban areas had a form of public health.
Violence and Repression in Late Medieval Italy
Between the second half of the thirteenth century and the first half of the fifteenth, central and northern Italian city-states frequently suffered moments of disruption of the social peace because of factional battles.
The medieval social topography of Szeged
As the name historical social topography implies it comprehends the ancient location and distribution of particular groups and layers of inhabitants in a settlement.