In many ways, it is the knight who seems to embody the spirit of the Middle Ages.
With his horse and sword, his armour, and the perception that he fought with honour and for good, the knight seems to harken back to a simpler time of when the forces of evil had a singular face and could be vanquished with a noble heart and a strong forearm.
To begin with, the four seasons – marked in accordance with the medieval agricultural calendar – were observed at different times of the year than we recognize then today.
Ancient Greek men at a symposium (being entertained by a female musician) (painted mixing bowl, c. 420 BC)
Ever since I decided my next writing project would be my first (incomplete, shelved) novel – a fantasy – rewritten as historical fiction and set in Ancient Greece, I knew I had to seriously beef up my knowledge of that period in history.
In many ways, this would be me starting from ground zero in my research.
Books I’ve stolen borrowed from others (and haven’t even read yet)
I fully acknowledge the hypocrisy, and perhaps even level of selfishness, that applies to this policy of mine.
I’m not even a particularly good borrower of other people’s books. Or rather, good returner of them, I should say.
1225 reissue of England’s 1217 Charter of the Forest
To say nothing for the corresponding legend – one that lives on to this day – that grew up surrounding it.
As mentioned in my first post about medieval hunting, forest law stipulated such matters as who was permitted to hunt what and when, what the punishment for poachers would be, and even how many talons were permitted on dogs that lived in households and villages within a royal forest.
It wasn’t, however, the only way to bring down prey – or even the most popular one, particularly among the noble class.
Neither were deer and boar – which were restricted to all but the king and his favourites – foxes, hares, squirrels, and other beasts of the warren the only quarry that was hunted during the Middle Ages.
They’re not who you think they are
In previously Medieval Mondays posts, I’ve written at length about medieval marriage. This in turn led me to write about medieval divorce.
Divorce (technically annulment of the marriage in its strictest sense) was a matter at the sole discretion of the Church, whose preference was almost always to keep marriages together. As such, the Church generally only granted divorces for six specific reasons.
