Research on Medieval Life

[SlowRain]

I’ve looked back through the threads for several months, but I couldn’t find anything on researching medieval life. I’m particularly interested in non-fiction books that deal with life, food, housing, clothing, transportation & travel, weapons & military strategy, et cetera in medieval times. I’d appreciate it if someone could post a link to any discussions you’ve had on the subject, or recommend any books or websites that may help.

Thanks,

SlowRain

 

[Marlys]

Try your local library. Here are some to get you started:

The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in the Middle Ages--Sherrilyn Kenyon. Very basic, but a starting place.

Daily Life in Chaucer's England--Jeffrey L. Singman

A number of books by Frances Gies:
Daily life in medieval times : a vivid, detailed account of birth, marriage and death; food, clothing and housing; love and labor in the middle ages
A medieval family : the Pastons of fifteenth-century England

Cathedral, forge, and waterwheel : technology and invention in the Middle Ages

Women in the Middle Ages

Life in a medieval village

Marriage and the family in the Middle Ages

The knight in history

by Joseph and Frances Gies:
Life in a medieval city

Life in a medieval castle

Food in medieval times--Melitta Weiss Adamson

Medieval Costume and Fashion--Herbert Norris

A Distant Mirror--Barbara Tuchman (highly recommended)

Ancient and Medieval Siege Weapons--K. Nosov

Barbarians, marauders, and infidels : the ways of medieval warfare--Antonio Santosuosso

Medieval armies and weapons in western Europe : an illustrated history--Jean-Denis Lepage

 

[alleycat]

Medievalist should be along shortly . . .

 

[C.bronco]

http://www.sca.org/misc.html

Here you go!

 

[badducky]

The scattershot method of getting a bunch of books that differ from each other is fine, and I do it, too.

However, nothing beats a good old fashioned history class at your local university. Also, middle english - or medieval - literature courses are a great way to learn this stuff.

It may not help you in Taiwan... but wait!

Find an expert in the field, do a google search for their course notes and syllabus (many are on-line, these days) and you'll find lots of experts with guided radings of the texts listed.

Another great place to look after you've done some research in the field and noticed a few experts that really seem to help you make sense of the world is that professor's personal website.

Take, for instance, my favorite valued medieval mentor from my undergraduate and graduate days at the University of Houston, to whom
I owe a huge debt of gratitude for all the knowledge I got that was subsequently applied to writing that I have sold for money:

http://www.class.uh.edu/English/faculty/stock_l.asp

Now, I can go through these pages, and locate her articles, her tv appearances, and any books she's worked or working on. I can also drop her a line now and then, when I'm discovering a gap in the research materials that bothers me and e-mail her briefly for her advice as a scholar. We are scholars in our own way.

Anyway, just something that isn't done enough, I think.

Med will be here momentarily.

 

[Shadow_Ferret]

Marlys recommended some excellent books. I especially like the books by Joseph Gies and Frances Gies, such as "Life in a Medieval City" "Life in a Medieval Village" "Life in a Medieval Castle" and "Women in the Middle Ages."

Using those as a base and adding to it with specific searches either on the web or the reference library should give you a good handle on how life was back then.

 

[zornhau]

Medievalist should be along shortly . . .

Well, untill she trundles up, I'll add my knightly groat's worth (I'm also a Medievalist by academic background, but a bit rusty).

Thing is - the original question is too vague.

Everyday life - i.e. culture, technology, custom and law - is very different depending on where and when in the Middle Ages you land.

At one end of the period, you have mailed knights, feudalism and lo-tech, at the other, plate armour, mercenaries, indentures and early modern technology.

Geographically, Christendom encompasses the Celtic Fringe of semi-barbs in the extreme west, through to the sophisticated cities of the Med.

The period is also punctuated by huge and dramatic transitions and traumas, such as the Hundred Years War and the Black Death.

So, what you have to do is pick a period and an area, and read very specifically around that, and not get sidetracked. (A scattershot approach will drive you insane, or at least plunge you into 4 years of research.)

If the issue is gathering enough information to make that decision in the first place, then you need the general histories covering the whole period.

If you let us know more precisely what you're after, I'm sure we can come up with some focussed reading for you.

 

[waylander]

Excellent list of books so far to which I would add another - The Medieval Traveller - Norbert Ohler

 

[Deleted member 42]

You wanna maybe narrow "medieval" down a bit in terms of era and place?

Medieval in Europe, alone, covers roughly a thousand years . . .

And the books folks have posted look super to me.

 

[ink wench]

I'll throw in one more book rec: Daily Life in the Middle Ages by Paul B. Newman. Any of the books by Frances and Joseph Gies are also great.

 

[batgirl]

Umm, in the cities, in the villages, during war, during peace, during famine, during plague, in the convents, in the armies, among the nobility, among the peasantry, among the artisans, guilds, confraternities, beggars, ...?

Lost Country Life by the Hartleys is a good one, and includes most of Thomas Tusser's calendar, which is otherwise hard to find.
The Singman book is useful for the high middle ages, but won't help if you're earlier or later.
Medieval Rural Life in the Luttrell Psalter, by Janet Backhouse (hm, my focus is starting to show, isn't it?)
-Barbara

 

[zornhau]

Good grief! How many Medievalists are there on this board?

Not that I am complaining...

 

[MattW]

Medieval Underworld by Andrew McCall

While it isn't the greatest read, it was informative about attitudes toward certain fringe groups. Certainly not a detailed study of any.

 

[Deleted member 42]

How many Medievalist?

We are legion.

 

[Simon Woodhouse]

When I needed to do a bit of medieval research, I went to the children's section in the local bookshop. I bought one of those books that shows everything as a cut-away diagram, you know the sort of thing – a castle with one wall removed so you can see inside. I found this really useful. It was full of helpful little snippets of info, as well as being very visual.

 

[Higgins]

I like those too

When I needed to do a bit of medieval research, I went to the children's section in the local bookshop. I bought one of those books that shows everything as a cut-away diagram, you know the sort of thing – a castle with one wall removed so you can see inside. I found this really useful. It was full of helpful little snippets of info, as well as being very visual.

A lot of those "cut-away" books are pretty informative. The only possible problem with them is if you don't have other sources to give you an idea of how typical or prevalent what they pick for their depictions are...of course that is true for detailed reconstructions in general; you often have only a few good cases (eg, shipwrecks, Beowulf, Venetian armor buried accidently by the Turks) and you have to work out how to generalize them.

 

[SlowRain]

Thanks everyone for your replies. Keep them coming if you have more.

 

[TheIT]

On AW, be sure to look at the Historical Writing forum, especially the stickied Resources thread at the top. Lots of links there. Also search through the Story Research forum for more specific questions.

 

[C.bronco]

Tidbits: They had open sewers. No one used forks- just spoons and knives. People commonly used cloves for fresh(er) breath. Ah, the memories...

 

[Deleted member 42]

Tidbits: They had open sewers. No one used forks- just spoons and knives. People commonly used cloves for fresh(er) breath. Ah, the memories...

Well . . . forks were used for cooking. There are very specific laws about fork-management in Irish (really! it has to do with rank and class and communal cooking pots . . . )

 

[ColoradoGuy]

So Eileen Power's venerable Medieval People is now passe. God, I feel old.

 

[Deleted member 42]

No, it's still used as a text for undergrads, but, well, it's awfully fictionalized.

I tend to point people towards the Paston letters, from 1425-1496.

 

[jpsorrow]

And I thought I'd be able to contribute, but all of the books I used for research have already been mentioned. That's what happens when you step into a thread with 20 comments already. *grin*

 

[SlowRain]

Don't worry

And I thought I'd be able to contribute, but all of the books I used for research have already been mentioned. That's what happens when you step into a thread with 20 comments already. *grin*

Don't worry if the book or website you like has already been listed. If you mention it again, that will give it more weight when I come to choose. I'm not only looking for suggestions, I'm also wondering which ones are the best and most comprehensive. All comments and opinions are welcome.

Thanks everyone for the replies.

 

[batgirl]

Well . . . forks were used for cooking. There are very specific laws about fork-management in Irish (really! it has to do with rank and class and communal cooking pots . . . )

And the laws about how to wear those big shoulder brooches so no one was stabbed while embracing.
-Barbara