Take a photo of a barcode or cover
565 reviews for:
The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century
Ian Mortimer
4.02 AVERAGE
565 reviews for:
The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century
Ian Mortimer
4.02 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
informative
lighthearted
medium-paced
I enjoyed this travel guide back to Medieval England. I definitely got a sense of what it was like to live in those times where a full bath for the commoner happens only a few times a year. However, everyone keeps themselves relatively clean by bathing their faces, hands, and feet regularly. I only wish there were more pictures of some of the homes, city layouts, structures, markets, and people included. There were some works of art but very limited, which is a sign of the times, that art was only made to depict certain outstanding aspects of life and not necessarily to capture the mundane things.
As with most communities, we behave according to the standards of our day. An example was given that parents in this century who beat their children are seen as abusive, whereas in medieval times (and even more recently in various communities) parents who don't beat their children are acting irresponsibly, so they do, to conform with external perceptions and norms.
I am definitely grateful for the medical advancements that have been made to increase human life spans and the survival rates of babies and children and mothers giving birth. Antibiotics and pain relievers and surgical abilities with anesthesia are essential. Figuring out the body was such a mystery and challenge--it still is!
We have come so far. Will we ever stop advancing? If we do, it will be because we have found a place of stasis where we can survive harmoniously on this Earth. But is there a place of stasis where we can rest so that we don't blow it all up?
"But most of all, it needs to be said that the very best evidence for what it was like to be alive in the fourteenth century is an awareness of what it is like to be alive in any age, and that includes today. Our sole context for understanding all the historical data we might ever gather is our own life experience. We might eat differently, be taller, and live longer, and we might look at jousting as being unspeakably dangerous and not at all a sport, but we know what grief is and what love, fear, pain, ambition, enmity and hunger are. We should always remember that what we have in common with the past is just as important, real, and as essential to our lives as those things which make us different. . . W.H. Auden once suggested that to understand your own country you need to have lived in at least two others. One can say something similar for periods of time: to understand your own century you need to have come to terms with at least two others. The key to learning something about the past might be a ruin or an archive but the means whereby we may understand it is--and always will be--ourselves." pg. 5
"Galen teaches that women must have an orgasm in order to conceive a child. That is all well and good for those women whose husbands will toil long and hard to help them conceive, but for those who come into contact with the mass of young men traveling around the country, it is dangerous. The implication is that if a man wants to seduce a women, and rapes her so brutally that she derives no physical pleasure from the experience, she should not conceive. There is a specific statute making rape a crime, and it is taken seriously enough to be deemed one of the crimes which can only be dealt with by the king's justices (rather than in the local courts), but it is very difficult to apply. If the woman fails to conceive, and there is no other evidence that sex took place with the accused, it is unlikely that the perpetrator will be held to account: any trial would be just her word against his. On the other hand, if the woman does conceive, then she is deemed to have physically enjoyed the experience (according to Galen's teaching) and so legally no rape has taken place." pg. 56
"The word which best sums up the medieval attitude to the Devil, miracles, and everything in between is 'superstition.' People do not understand the laws of physics, the nature of matter, or even how the human body functions. Hence they do not see limitations on how the world operates. Their sense of normality is thus somewhat precarious. Anything can happen. In their minds, sorcery really does work, and all sorts of supernatural forces are suspected to have dreadful power. Astrology is used for everything from determining when to take medicine to when to take in the washing. Alchemy might well result in lead and iron being turned into gold. And as for the possibilities of witchcraft and magic, these are limited only by the onlooker's imagination; they have nothing to do with the witch's or magician's actual abilities." pg. 75
"In 1300 many people find the idea of being out of sight of land psychologically disturbing: the sailors themselves do not like it, preferring to follow the coasts." pg. 135
"But, as this book has shown, there is no reason why we cannot consider medieval England as a living community. It is just another place in time, like France in the twenty-first century, or Garmany in the twentieth, and so on. Knowledge of it as it actually was might be difficult--impossible even--but so is knowledge of England as it actually was yesterday. If we accept that the evidence available to us in writing about any place in any time is always going to be partial and incomplete--including a modern country which could be physically visited (for you cannot see all of it at once, or meet everyone)--then certainly one can write a guidebook to medieval England which in theory is as comprehensive and accurate as a guidebook to a modern country." pg. 290
"In this way we can begin to appreciate the changes in almost every aspect of life from the age structure of the population to the changing nature of the diseases we suffer. Everything changes. What does not change? Only that these people, like us, are human, and have urges, needs, and challenges; and that these are continually shifting. If we really want to understand what humanity is, and how adaptable we are, we must see ourselves as a constantly living, evolving race--always on the very cusp of a vast and unimaginable future, whether we live in the fourteenth century or the twenty-first--and in no way dead until the whitened bones of the last human being lie abandoned on the sand." pg. 291
"History is not just about the analysis of evidence, unrolling vellum documents or answering exam papers. It is not about judging the dead. It is about understanding the meaning of the past--to realize the whole evolving human story over centuries, not just our own lifetimes." pg. 292
Book: borrowed from SSF Main Library.
As with most communities, we behave according to the standards of our day. An example was given that parents in this century who beat their children are seen as abusive, whereas in medieval times (and even more recently in various communities) parents who don't beat their children are acting irresponsibly, so they do, to conform with external perceptions and norms.
I am definitely grateful for the medical advancements that have been made to increase human life spans and the survival rates of babies and children and mothers giving birth. Antibiotics and pain relievers and surgical abilities with anesthesia are essential. Figuring out the body was such a mystery and challenge--it still is!
We have come so far. Will we ever stop advancing? If we do, it will be because we have found a place of stasis where we can survive harmoniously on this Earth. But is there a place of stasis where we can rest so that we don't blow it all up?
"But most of all, it needs to be said that the very best evidence for what it was like to be alive in the fourteenth century is an awareness of what it is like to be alive in any age, and that includes today. Our sole context for understanding all the historical data we might ever gather is our own life experience. We might eat differently, be taller, and live longer, and we might look at jousting as being unspeakably dangerous and not at all a sport, but we know what grief is and what love, fear, pain, ambition, enmity and hunger are. We should always remember that what we have in common with the past is just as important, real, and as essential to our lives as those things which make us different. . . W.H. Auden once suggested that to understand your own country you need to have lived in at least two others. One can say something similar for periods of time: to understand your own century you need to have come to terms with at least two others. The key to learning something about the past might be a ruin or an archive but the means whereby we may understand it is--and always will be--ourselves." pg. 5
"Galen teaches that women must have an orgasm in order to conceive a child. That is all well and good for those women whose husbands will toil long and hard to help them conceive, but for those who come into contact with the mass of young men traveling around the country, it is dangerous. The implication is that if a man wants to seduce a women, and rapes her so brutally that she derives no physical pleasure from the experience, she should not conceive. There is a specific statute making rape a crime, and it is taken seriously enough to be deemed one of the crimes which can only be dealt with by the king's justices (rather than in the local courts), but it is very difficult to apply. If the woman fails to conceive, and there is no other evidence that sex took place with the accused, it is unlikely that the perpetrator will be held to account: any trial would be just her word against his. On the other hand, if the woman does conceive, then she is deemed to have physically enjoyed the experience (according to Galen's teaching) and so legally no rape has taken place." pg. 56
"The word which best sums up the medieval attitude to the Devil, miracles, and everything in between is 'superstition.' People do not understand the laws of physics, the nature of matter, or even how the human body functions. Hence they do not see limitations on how the world operates. Their sense of normality is thus somewhat precarious. Anything can happen. In their minds, sorcery really does work, and all sorts of supernatural forces are suspected to have dreadful power. Astrology is used for everything from determining when to take medicine to when to take in the washing. Alchemy might well result in lead and iron being turned into gold. And as for the possibilities of witchcraft and magic, these are limited only by the onlooker's imagination; they have nothing to do with the witch's or magician's actual abilities." pg. 75
"In 1300 many people find the idea of being out of sight of land psychologically disturbing: the sailors themselves do not like it, preferring to follow the coasts." pg. 135
"But, as this book has shown, there is no reason why we cannot consider medieval England as a living community. It is just another place in time, like France in the twenty-first century, or Garmany in the twentieth, and so on. Knowledge of it as it actually was might be difficult--impossible even--but so is knowledge of England as it actually was yesterday. If we accept that the evidence available to us in writing about any place in any time is always going to be partial and incomplete--including a modern country which could be physically visited (for you cannot see all of it at once, or meet everyone)--then certainly one can write a guidebook to medieval England which in theory is as comprehensive and accurate as a guidebook to a modern country." pg. 290
"In this way we can begin to appreciate the changes in almost every aspect of life from the age structure of the population to the changing nature of the diseases we suffer. Everything changes. What does not change? Only that these people, like us, are human, and have urges, needs, and challenges; and that these are continually shifting. If we really want to understand what humanity is, and how adaptable we are, we must see ourselves as a constantly living, evolving race--always on the very cusp of a vast and unimaginable future, whether we live in the fourteenth century or the twenty-first--and in no way dead until the whitened bones of the last human being lie abandoned on the sand." pg. 291
"History is not just about the analysis of evidence, unrolling vellum documents or answering exam papers. It is not about judging the dead. It is about understanding the meaning of the past--to realize the whole evolving human story over centuries, not just our own lifetimes." pg. 292
Book: borrowed from SSF Main Library.
My interest in history is in the everyday. Random facts and dates and politics may tell me what shaped the world we have today, but I want to know what people were doing while all that went on. This book, then, was right up my alley. And it was in my 2014 TBR Challenge because otherwise, I was never going to get around to reading it.
The book is, as the title says, a guidebook for anyone wanting to visit England in the 1300's. It discusses customs, fashions, crime, justice, economic classes, conditions living in cities, food, travel, people's homes, and, briefly, the Black Death. It's the first history book I've read about the time period that doesn't dismiss research suggesting the Black Death was viral. But there are entire books devoted to that particular puzzle. In this, it's little more than a footnote, except to note how its effect on lifestyles and the population.
The book is absolutely packed with information. It covers any aspect a person visiting from our time period needs to know so they don't stick out. It presents the populace not as clueless rubes, but as people living their lives and worthy of respect despite their lowbrow humor.
Unfortunately, the Time Traveler's Guide isn't terribly readable. It's excellent as a resource to consult to get a good idea of the flavor of the time, but, as a cover-to-cover read, it's rather dry. That exhaustive research and thorough information doesn't take long to get tiresome. It's like that person at a party you were sorry to ask about their area of expertise when they're still going on about it an hour later.
Overall, this is a valuable resource for anyone who needs to get the flavor of everyday life during the time period. I recommend keeping it on hand to consult as needed, rather than reading all the way through at once. I'm going to keep it on hand, but I'm not going to read it as I did this time around again.
The book is, as the title says, a guidebook for anyone wanting to visit England in the 1300's. It discusses customs, fashions, crime, justice, economic classes, conditions living in cities, food, travel, people's homes, and, briefly, the Black Death. It's the first history book I've read about the time period that doesn't dismiss research suggesting the Black Death was viral. But there are entire books devoted to that particular puzzle. In this, it's little more than a footnote, except to note how its effect on lifestyles and the population.
The book is absolutely packed with information. It covers any aspect a person visiting from our time period needs to know so they don't stick out. It presents the populace not as clueless rubes, but as people living their lives and worthy of respect despite their lowbrow humor.
Unfortunately, the Time Traveler's Guide isn't terribly readable. It's excellent as a resource to consult to get a good idea of the flavor of the time, but, as a cover-to-cover read, it's rather dry. That exhaustive research and thorough information doesn't take long to get tiresome. It's like that person at a party you were sorry to ask about their area of expertise when they're still going on about it an hour later.
Overall, this is a valuable resource for anyone who needs to get the flavor of everyday life during the time period. I recommend keeping it on hand to consult as needed, rather than reading all the way through at once. I'm going to keep it on hand, but I'm not going to read it as I did this time around again.
What a delight. Overall, I loved this book for taking me on an escape that allowed me to see the good, the bad and the ugly in the 14th century. It was engaging and eye-opening. Very well done.
funny
informative
lighthearted
medium-paced
An interesting and insightful look into how people actually lived in Medieval England, from peasants to the King.
slow-paced
If you love history, but can't stand many academic books for heavy writing and dreary subjects, and if you want something vibrant and well written this is the book for you. It's well pieces, thoroughly researched and humorous to the reader which not only educates the reader but also amuses. Hard to put down and full of fantastic stories this is a book for all learning levels from beginners to experts on the life and time of medieval England.
I'm not a huge history buff, so I did not find this utterly fascinating. However, I did find parts of it quite interesting and had no trouble motivating myself to finish the book. I learned a lot about 14th century England. This book is not at all dry and ponderous, but presents historical information in a fun an breezy manner.
This is a weird complaint but I wish there were more shorter chapters. I enjoyed the history but found it a bit difficult to get through.