Medieval Lives – serie

The daughter of a court intellectual, Christine de Pizan dwelled within the heart of late-medieval Paris. In the face of personal tragedy, she learned the tools of the booktrade, writing more than 40 works including poetry, historical and political treatises and defenses of women.In this new biography, the first written for a general audience, Charlotte Cooper-Davis discusses the life and work of a pioneering female thinker and writer. She shows how Christine’s inspiration came from the world around her, situates Christine as an entrepreneur within the context of her times and place, and finally examines Christine’s influence on the most avant-garde of feminist artists, through which she is slowly making a return into mainstream popular culture.

This is a new account of the late-fourteenth-century mystic and pilgrim Margery Kempe. Kempe, who had 14 children, travelled all over Europe and recorded a series of unusual events and religious visions in her work The Book of Margery Kempe, which is often called the first autobiography in the English language. Anthony Bale charts her life, and tells her story through the places, relationships, objects and experiences that influenced her. Extensive quotation from Kempe’s Book, and generous illustration, gives fascinating insight into the life of a medieval woman. Margery Kempe is situated within the religious controversies of her time, and her religious visions and later years put in context. Lastly there is the story of the rediscovery, in the 1930s, of the unique manuscript of her autobiography.

As well as being an important medieval theologian, Albertus Magnus (Albert the Great) also made significant contributions to the study of astronomy, geography and natural philosophy, and his studies of the natural world led Pope Pius XII to declare Albertus the patron saint of the natural sciences. Dante Alighieri acknowledged a substantial debt to Albertus’ work, and in The Divine Comedy placed him equal with his celebrated student and brother Dominican Thomas Aquinas.In this, the first full, scholarly biography in English for nearly a century, Irven M. Resnick and Kenneth F. Kitchell Jr narrate Albertus’ key contributions to natural philosophy and the history of science, while also revealing the insights into medieval life and customs that his writings provide.

Alle Thyng Hath Tyme recreates medieval people’s experience of time: as continuous and discontinuous, linear and cyclical, embracing Creation and Judgement, shrinking to ‘atoms’ or ‘droplets’ and extending to the silent spaces of eternity. They might measure time by natural phenomena such as sunrise and sunset, the motion of the stars or the progress of the seasons, even as the late medieval invention of the mechanical clock was making time-reckoning more precise. Negotiating these mixed and competing systems, medieval people gained a nuanced and expansive sense of time that rewards attention today.

Born in the 1360s, Andrey Rublev was a Muscovite monk and icon painter who died between 1427 and 1430 in Moscow. He is acknowledged as the supreme medieval Russian painter of icons and frescos, yet much about him remains mysterious. To date there is no volume in English on him or his work.This book addresses the gap, giving an overview of Rublev’s own times and later reputation, and taking in the most recent Rublev scholarship. It uses Russian-language material (including Old Russian), but is thoroughly accessible to the non-specialist reader. Andrey Rublev is profusely illustrated with previously unpublished images, bringing the story of Rublev’s ‘rediscovery’ right up to date.

This book is the first modern history of medieval European anatomical images. Richly illustrated, it explores the many ways in which medieval surgeons, doctors, monks and artists understood and depicted human anatomy. Taylor McCall refutes the common misconception that Renaissance artists and anatomists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Andreas Vesalius were the ‘fathers’ of anatomy, and the first to perform scientific human dissection; on the contrary, she proves these Renaissance figures drew upon centuries of visual and written tradition in their works.This interdisciplinary book will appeal to general audiences interested in the history of the body and medical professionals curious about the history of their discipline, as well as historians of art, medicine and medieval culture.

This book investigates the life and world of Bede (c. 673–735), foremost scholar of the early Middle Ages and ‘the father of English history’. It examines his notable feats, including calculating the first tide-tables; playing a role in the creation of the Ceolfrith Bibles and the Lindisfarne Gospels; writing the earliest extant Old English poetry and the earliest translation of part of the Bible into English; and composing his famous Ecclesiastical History of the English People, with its single dating system. Despite never leaving Northumbria, Bede also wrote a guide to the Holy Land. Michelle P. Brown, an authority on the period, describes new discoveries regarding Bede’s handwriting, his research programme and his previously lost Old English translation of St John’s Gospel, dictated on his deathbed.

This is a new account of the life and accomplishments of medieval England’s most famous poet, Geoffrey Chaucer. For over six centuries, Chaucer has epitomized poetic greatness, though in more recent years the lively and often risqué style of his best-known work, The Canterbury Tales, has made his name synonymous with bawdy humour. Nevertheless, beyond his poetic achievements, Chaucer assumed various roles, including those of royal attendant, soldier, customs officer and Justice of the Peace. Mary Flannery chronicles Chaucer’s journey during one of the most turbulent periods of English history, illuminating how he came to be known as not only the ‘father of English poetry’, but England’s ‘merry bard’.

This book provides a concise and incisive introduction to the Teutonic Knights, or Teutonic Order, the last of the great military orders established in the twelfth century. Evolving into a powerful religious institution, the Knights left a profound and enduring legacy. Aleksander Pluskowski traces the Order’s journey from a field hospital outside the walls of Acre during the Third Crusade to its remarkable rise as a major territorial ruler and power in northeastern Europe. He charts the three centuries of theocratic rule by this remarkable religious corporation and examines the Order’s notable accomplishments, as well as its failures. From constructing distinctive fortified convents, including the largest castle in Western Christendom as its headquarters, to the Order’s decline in the fifteenth century due to a devastating war with Poland-Lithuania and the secularization of its Prussian and Livonian branches during the Reformation, The Teutonic Knights is a compelling look at a pivotal force in European history.

The art of falconry was one of the most fascinating aspects of medieval society. For medieval people falconry was not just about hunting, it encapsulated sovereignty, power and diplomacy. This book describes and assesses the visual culture of falconry, tracking how images, traditions and the birds of prey themselves spread throughout the medieval world, along with equipment such as hoods and lures. It shows how falconry was global from its very beginning: Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II hired falconers from far and wide to carry out his ‘art of hunting with birds’. This beautifully illustrated account shows how different cultures impacted the visual sphere of medieval falconry, both in the East and West.

Composing songs of love and war in medieval Western and Southern Europe, troubadours spanned the social spectrum from kings and nobles to penniless minstrels. This book tells the story of the lives and art of these remarkable poet-musicians, famed for their brilliant, innovative use of words and music, and the emotional power of their compositions. The troubadours’ songs explored new ideas of love – the infamous ‘courtly love’ – as well as medieval perceptions of gender, class, war, chivalry, religion and the Crusades. Linda M. Paterson examines the troubadours’ music and performance, as well as their legacy, balancing insightful quotations in English translation with the original texts to highlight the forms and sounds of the poetry.

Aged seventeen, Marco Polo left his home in Venice on a continent-spanning adventure that lasted for nearly a quarter of a century. Imprisoned in Genoa five years later, he collaborated with Arthurian romance writer Rustichello of Pisa on a work they called The Description of the World. Their book recounted ‘all the greatest marvels and great diversities of Greater Armenia, Persia, the Tartars, India, and many other provinces’. In Marco Polo and His World Sharon Kinoshita brings these marvels to life, describing the rich commodities, plants, people and animals that Marco encountered and recorded. Copiously illustrated, and ranging from Venice, Genoa and Pisa to Khanbaliq, Quinsai and Zaytun, this is a vivid account of Marco Polo’s astounding adventures.

Frederick Barbarossa, also known as Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor from 1155, was a dominant figure in late 12th-century European history. He is remembered as one of the greatest medieval German emperors; some even regard him as a German hero. He brought peace to Germany, fought to maintain control over Italian cities and engaged in a lengthy dispute with the papacy. Barbarossa died on a Crusade to reclaim the Holy Land for Christianity. But despite his efforts, his reign marked a decline in imperial authority, with defeats in Italy and growing local power among German princes. Frederick Barbarossa examines this paradox, revealing the realities and limitations of monarchical power in medieval Europe. This is a cogent, original and up-to-date analysis of Barbarossa, suitable for both students and the general reader.

Johannes Gutenberg is famous as the inventor of Europe’s first typographic printing method, and his life and legacy have long fascinated a wide audience. Due to scant and vague fifteenth-century documentation, however, Gutenberg’s career has long been obscured by derivative storytelling, competing agendas and scholarly guesswork. This new biography removes these barriers to retell his story directly, through his pioneering work: schoolbooks, pamphlets, indulgences, broadsides and, notably, the first printed Bible. The book also describes Gutenberg’s posthumous fortunes, and his eventual recognition as ‘Man of the Millennium’. This much-needed corrective to the old legends and conjectures brings Gutenberg to life through the books that remain his lasting monument.

This book explores the turbulent life and violent death of Thomas Becket, one of the most controversial figures of the Middle Ages. From a London merchant’s son to royal chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury, Becket’s murder in Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170 elevated him to England’s most celebrated saint. Michael Staunton looks at Becket’s complex and contested legacy, drawing from Becket's own words and those of his contemporaries.Based on extensive contemporary medieval sources, this account offers a fresh perspective on Thomas Becket’s life and places him within the broader landscape of twelfth-century England and Europe – a time of rapid change, conflict and achievement. Thomas Becket and His World is perfect for anyone wanting to learn more about this pivotal figure in medieval history.

Eleanor of Aquitaine (1124–1204), the legendary queen of France and later England, has captivated historians for centuries. Heiress to the duchy of Aquitaine, wife to King Henry II and mother to Richard the Lionheart and King John, her life was marked by power, influence and myth. This concise, accessible history sheds new light on Eleanor, cutting through the hearsay and slander with a close reading of primary sources. It highlights the family bonds that shaped her power and identity, tracing her roots to the Loire rather than the Occitan south. Lindy Grant demonstrates that Eleanor’s story is one of resilience: like Churchill, she saved England during a national crisis, though her political judgement could be equally erratic.

This book explores the role of horses across the medieval world, from the Kievan Rus' and Scandinavia to Central Europe, Byzantium, the Arab world and Asia, including China and India. Covering the early medieval period to the late Middle Ages, it examines how horses shaped societies, warfare and culture and how their legacy persists in traditional equestrian sports today. Drawing on little-known primary sources, artefacts, and the author’s hands-on experience with historical horsemanship, the book offers a vivid account of the deep connection between people and horses. Combining scholarly insight with practical knowledge, this is the most comprehensive study of medieval horses in Europe and Asia to date.

How did Richard the Lionheart, who once said he would sell London if he found a buyer, become celebrated as the ideal of English chivalry? This book examines the life of Richard I (1157–1199) through the captivating stories told about him, from accounts of his deeds in medieval sources to his portrayals in modern literature and media. Tales of Richard’s exploits were as colourful as they were varied, ranging from him wielding King Arthur’s sword to being a son of the Devil or even a cannibal. Instead of separating fact from fiction, this book explores how these tales shaped his legacy in both his time and ours.