The French appeared from the ashes of the earlier Frankish Empire. As imperial authority collapsed, the empire’s western part reformed as the Kingdom of France. This didn’t stop the decentralization process, however. The first centuries of French history were exceedingly feudal: noble lords squabbled while serfs tilled the land. The King of France, meanwhile, ruled […]

The third estate was the economic engine of the Middle Ages: most of its members worked the land, but through guilds, some grew into a burgeoning ‘burgher’ class. Read MoreThe Three Estates (3): The ‘Laboratores’ – Working hard, or hardly working? The ‘bellatores’, or “those who fight”, were the second estate of medieval society. Through […]

The mighty city of Ghent was one of Burgundy’s most prized possessions. But the relationship with its powerful Burgundian overlords was difficult, complicated and often tempestuous. How was one city able to be such a persistent and painful thorn in Burgundy’s side? Grab a short intro to the Duchy of Burgundy from our Medieval Guidebook. […]

The Anglo-Saxons were a cultural group on the island of Great Britain. They hailed from the continent and were ethnically Germanic. Their most important tribes – the Angles and the Saxons – mixed and intermarried with the original, Celtic inhabitants (the Britons) and the offspring of the Roman rulers. An interesting, hybrid culture thus sprang […]

Italy as we know it only became a unitary state in 1861 CE, well beyond the end of the Medieval Era. Nevertheless, the term “Italians” remains a handy catch-all term for the inhabitants of the many polities that made up the geographical area of Italy during the Middle Ages. The medieval Italians, then, were not […]

The Franks were Germanic people that rose to great historical significance. They were originally a collection of tribes living on the Lower Rhine (in present-day Germany and the Netherlands). In the centuries that followed their kingdom became the largest European state of the Early Middle Ages. Befitting of its size, its king had himself crowned […]

Medieval cuisine featured a lot of food that would be familiar to us. But the medieval kitchen was also the origin of extravagant and elaborate culinary traditions that have since then gone out of style. Especially the better-off knew how to host a good banquet. At first, refined food was quite sparse. Agriculture was aimed […]

An example of the beauty of the Middle Ages, gothic architecture gave the era towering cathedrals, bronze bells and stained glass. Read MoreGothic Architecture: The Pinnacle of Medieval Civilization? The third estate was the economic engine of the Middle Ages: most of its members worked the land, but through guilds, some grew into a burgeoning […]

Skip to content William of Guelders was a five-time crusader, the first continental Knight of the Garter, and pilgrim to the Holy Land. He befriended the Teutonic Grand Master and the Holy Roman Emperor. Read MoreThe Crazy Crusader: William I of Guelders and Jülich The famous poet Poeun was forced to choose between aggressive revolutionaries […]

The English came forth from the Norman invasion of Anglo-Saxon Britain in 1066 CE. The invaders, a Viking/French hybrid themselves, mixed and mingled with the Anglo-Saxons, who had invaded the island some six centuries earlier. During the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries, this all fused into a new civilization: the English. Through the Norman connection, […]

The medieval Saxons were a Germanic people who greatly influenced the Early Middle Ages. Their legacy, however, is hard to pin down. Many people confuse them with either the Anglo-Saxons (not quite the same thing, as we’ll explain), or the inhabitants of present-day Saxony, a federated state in the east of modern Germany (which is […]

Medieval Reporter Covering history’s most marvelous millennium Simon has a master’s degree in History and has written tens of articles on the Middle Ages. Next to building his blog at MedievalReporter.com, he has been published on WorldHistory.org, Ancient-Origins.net & TheFreelanceHistoryWriter.com. Byzantine, Holy Roman, Frankish Both the Holy Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire […]

Skip to content Entrepreneurial and opportunistic, the Normans were virtually the template for feudal, high-medieval societies. The fierceness of their heritage made them a veritable warrior culture, but one that nevertheless pursued piety and refinement. The earliest Normans were, in fact, Vikings. A Viking warband led by the renowned chieftain Rollo (in Scandinavian: Hrolf) besieged […]

Walls are meant to protect civilization. It doesn’t matter whether we think about ancient city walls or large defensive projects such as Hadrian’s Wall in Scotland or the Great Wall of China. We easily conjure images of civilized lands – beacons of progress as they are – that need protection from the ferocious savages of […]