Tribal wars, the Crusades, the growth of trade and the shifting patterns of community life as villages grew into towns and towns into sizeable cities. Papal Victories-100 years war and Christendom.
A thorough and well-illustrated history with eight long essays by leading scholars which cover the history and culture of England, rather than the British Isles, from the 5th to the 15th century. Contents: Medieval England - Identity, Politics and Society ( Nigel Saul ); Anglo-Saxon England ( Janet L Nelson ); Conquered England ( George Garnett ); Late Medieval England 1215-1485 ( Chris Given-Wilson ); Economy and Society ( Christopher Dyer ); Piety, Religion and the Church ( Henrietta Leyser ); The Visual Arts ( Nicola Coldstream ); Language and Literature ( Derek Pearsall ).
Two thousand years of legend and lore about the menace and majesty of dragons, which have breathed fire into our imaginations from ancient Rome to Game of Thrones A Penguin Classic The most popular mythological creature in the human imagination, dragons have provoked fear and fascination for their lethal venom and crushing coils, and as avatars of the Antichrist, servants of Satan, couriers of the damned to Hell, portents of disaster, and harbingers of the last days. Here are accounts spanning millennia and continents of these monsters that mark the boundary between the known and the unknown, including: their origins in the deserts of Africa; their struggles with their mortal enemies, elephants, in the jungles of South Asia; their fear of lightning; the world’s first dragon slayer, in an ancient collection of Sanskrit hymns; the colossal sea monster Leviathan; the seven-headed “great red dragon” of the Book of Revelation; the Loch Ness monster; the dragon in Beowulf, who inspired Smaug in Tolkien’s The Hobbit; the dragons in the prophecies of the wizard Merlin; a dragon saved from a centipede in Japan who gifts his human savior a magical bag of rice; the supernatural feathered serpent of ancient Mesoamerica; and a flatulent dragon the size of the Trojan Horse. From the dark halls of the Lonely Mountain to the blue skies of Westeros, we expect dragons to be gigantic, reptilian predators with massive, bat-like wings, who wreak havoc defending the gold they have hoarded in the deep places of the earth. But dragons are full of surprises, as is this book. For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
The walking dead from 15 centuries haunt this compendium of ghostly visitations through the ages, exploring the history of our fascination with zombies and other restless souls. Since ancient times, accounts of supernatural activity have mystified us. Ghost stories as we know them did not develop until the late nineteenth century, but the restless dead haunted the premodern imagination in many forms, as recorded in historical narratives, theological texts, and personal letters. The Penguin Book of the Undead teems with roving hordes of dead warriors, corpses trailed by packs of barking dogs, moaning phantoms haunting deserted ruins, evil spirits emerging from burning carcasses in the form of crows, and zombies with pestilential breath. Spanning from the Hebrew scriptures to the Roman Empire, the Scandinavian sagas to medieval Europe, the Protestant Reformation to the Renaissance, this beguiling array of accounts charts our relationship with spirits and apparitions, wraiths and demons over fifteen hundred years, showing the evolution in our thinking about the ability of dead souls to return to the realm of the living—and to warn us about what awaits us in the afterlife. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Covering the period from the fall of the Roman Empire through to the beginnings of the Renaissance, this is an indispensable volume which brings the complex and colourful history of the Middle Ages to life. Key features: * geographical coverage extends to the broadest definition of Europe from the Atlantic coast to the Russian steppes * each map approaches a separate issue or series of events in Medieval history, whilst a commentary locates it in its broader context * as a body, the maps provide a vivid representation of the development of nations, peoples and social structures. With over 140 maps, expert commentaries and an extensive bibliography, this is the essential reference for those who are striving to understand the fundamental issues of this period.
With a lucid and clear narrative style William Chester Jordan has turned his considerable talents to composing a standard textbook of the opening centuries of the second millennium in Europe. He brings this period of dramatic social, political, economic, cultural, religious and military change, alive to the general reader. Jordan presents the early Medieval period as a lost world, far removed from our current age, which had risen from the smoking rubble of the Roman Empire, but from which we are cut off by the great plagues and famines that ended it. Broad in scope, punctuated with impressive detail, and highly accessible, Jordan's book is set to occupy a central place in university courses of the medieval period.
Shed some light on one of history’s darkest periods. The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to the Middle Ages gives readers the beginning, middle, and end of the era, starting with the fall of the Roman Empire in the year 550 and ending with the Renaissance in 1500—and covers some uncomfortable similarities between the so-called “Dark Ages” and today’s “modern world.” - A fascinating, fact-filled book that delivers more than a thousand years of history in easy-to-understand chapters. - Many AP European History students are urged to read an overview of medieval Europe to aid in their understanding of modern Europe, and a number of high schools have adopted elective courses in medieval history. - Complete with a timeline, a who’s who, and guides to further reading and the Middle Ages in film.
The idea that with the decline of the Roman Empire Europe entered into some immense ‘dark age’ has long been viewed as inadequate by many historians. How could a world still so profoundly shaped by Rome and which encompassed such remarkable societies as the Byzantine, Carolingian and Ottonian empires, be anything other than central to the development of European history? How could a world of so many peoples, whether expanding, moving or stable, of Goths, Franks, Vandals, Byzantines, Arabs, Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, whose genetic and linguistic inheritors we all are, not lie at the heart of how we understand ourselves? The Inheritance of Rome is a work of remarkable scope and ambition. Drawing on a wealth of new material, it is a book which will transform its many readers’ ideas about the crucible in which Europe would in the end be created. From the collapse of the Roman imperial system to the establishment of the new European dynastic states, perhaps this book’s most striking achievement is to make sense of an immensely long period of time, experienced by many generations of Europeans, and which, while it certainly included catastrophic invasions and turbulence, also contained long periods of continuity and achievement. From Ireland to Constantinople, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, this is a genuinely Europe-wide history of a new kind, with something surprising or arresting on every page.
The kid-friendly series that makes history approachable, engaging, and funny! From the publishing house that brought you the Who Was? books. The Thrifty Guide to Medieval Times: A Handbook for Time Travelers is a snappy, informative, illustrated travel guide with everything the sensible time traveler needs to know, like: * Where I can find the best hovel? * What are my healthcare options if I catch the Black Plague? * How can I avoid being attacked by pillaging Huns? * And most importantly, why on earth would anyone want to travel back to medieval times? This book is designed as a parody of Fodor's guides, complete with humorous maps, reviews of places to stay and top attractions (don't miss a jousting tournament . . . but watch out for lances!), and tips on whom to have lunch with (murderous Queen Olga of Kiev, naturally--just don't eat or drink anything around her!). If you had a time travel machine and could take a vacation anywhere in history, this is the only guidebook series you would need.