Medieval Ages

Historians have only recently awakened to the importance of the family, the basic social unit throughout human history. This book traces the development of marriage and the family from the Middle Ages to the early modern era. It describes how the Roman and barbarian cultural streams merged under the influence of the Christian church to forge new concepts, customs, laws, and practices. Century by century, it follows the development—sometimes gradual, at other times revolutionary—of significant elements in the history of the family.

The most famous date in history is 1066, and with good reason, since no battle in medieval history had such a devastating effect on its losers as the Battle of Hastings, which altered the entire course of English history. 

The Dark Ages is the story of the birth of Western civilization. It was a harrowing crucible of war, destruction, and faith. For over 100 years, Charles Oman's famous history has remained one of the finest sources for the study of this period. Covering a period of 500 years and an area stretching from Northern Germany to Egypt, this is the definitive history that will alter your conceptions of a period of history that gave birth to the civilization we live in today.

The 10 enlightening (and often humorous) lectures of Medieval Myths and Mysteries will show you how far from the “dark” times of legend these centuries were. Uncover the facts about the Knights Templar. Reveal the truth behind the tales of legendary creatures like the Questing Beast and the unicorn. Trace the events of the Black Death and the ways it altered the world in its wake, and much more. With Professor Armstrong, you will dig deep into the ways that later generations reshaped the narrative of the medieval years and perpetuated the myths.

"Not only an engrossing read about the distant past, both informative and entertaining, but also a profoundly thought-provoking view of our not-really-so-‘new’ present . . . All medieval history is here, beautifully narrated."—Wall Street Journal "A lively history . . . [Jones] has managed...

In 1349, one small town in Germany disappeared and was never resettled. Tom, a contemporary historian, and his theoretical-physicist girlfriend, Sharon, become interested. By all logic, the town should have survived, but it didn't. Why? What was special about Eifelheim that it utterly disappeared more than 600 years ago?

In the tradition of Why Nations Fail, this book solves one of the great puzzles of history: Why did the West become the most powerful civilization in the world? Western exceptionalism—the idea that European civilizations are freer, wealthier, and less violent—is a widespread and powerful...

He bought me, chained me, but nothing prepared me for the beast who now claims me. Zivra They sold me as a prize to the highest bidder—Korvax, a minotaur warlord with a savage reputation. He’s monstrous, relentless, and intent on breaking me. Yet each brutal touch ignites desires I never knew existed. My mind screams for freedom, but my traitorous heart yearns to surrender completely to the beast whose darkness matches my own. Korvax She’s mine by right of purchase, a beautiful, defiant treasure I intend to tame. Zivra fights me at every turn, her fiery resistance fueling my obsession...

Explore Captivating Viking Tales and Sagas Two captivating manuscripts in one book: Viking Sagas: The Captivating Tale of Ragnar Lothbrok, Ivar the Boneless, Lagertha, and More, in Their Historical Context Tales from the Viking Age: Captivating Legendary and Historical SagasThe period between the end of the eighth century CE and the middle of the eleventh is often called the “Viking Age” because this is the period in which Scandinavian people expanded their contacts with the outside world through trade, raiding, exploration, and colonization. The first manuscript of this book presents a...

A young man from a privileged family, Jan Mydlar, is about to graduate from medical school when a sudden shift of fate changes his life forever. He becomes stuck in the most detested profession for the rest of his life—an executioner. Master Jan Mydlar finds himself in the middle of historical events of Bohemia. The religious and political turmoil in the Habsburg empire reaches its climax in the beginning of the 17th century. When Protestant leaders throw imperial Catholic governors out of the window of their offices at the Prague Castle, a civil war between Protestants and Catholics in ...

NEW AND IMPROVED SECOND EDITION - 2025 Initially published by Peter Owen Publishers, 2013 When nine-year-old Henry III ascended to the throne of a kingdom on the verge of collapse, none could have predicted his fifty-six-year reign would become the longest in medieval England. The first child king to inherit the English throne since the Norman Conquest, his reign (1216–72) transformed the kingdom politically and culturally during one of the most turbulent periods in its history. Though often overshadowed by his father, King John, and his son, Edward I, Henry III was one of England’s ...

Weird but True Stories from Medieval Europe: Bizarre, Shocking, and Unbelievable Tales from the Middle Ages Step into the shadowy, surreal, and surprisingly real world of medieval Europe like never before. Weird but True Stories from Medieval Europe takes readers on a riveting journey through the strangest corners of the Middle Ages—where pigs stood trial, bishops exploded in their coffins, and entire cities danced themselves into exhaustion. Based entirely on documented historical events, this fascinating and entertaining book reveals ten unbelievable but true stories from across Europe ...

Thomas Bulfinch introduces us to the gods of the Greek, Roman, and Norse mythologies. We learn their stories and we also observe the similarities between the deities of yore. Comparing these stories and characters to those of some modern religions may produce some surprising results!

In the fair autumn of Our Lord's grace 1431, the nuns of England's St. Frideswide's prepare for the simply ceremonies in which the saintly novice Thomasine will take her holy vows. But their quiet lives of beauty and prayer are thrown into chaos by the merciless arrival of Lady Ermentrude Fenner and her retinue of lusty men, sinful women, and baying hounds. The hard-drinking dowager even keeps a pet monkey for her amusement. She demands wine, a feast.... And her niece, the angelic Thomasine.

We tend to think of the Middle Ages as a dark, backward, and unchanging time characterized by violence, ignorance, and superstition. By contrast, we believe progress arose from science and technological innovation, and that inventions of recent centuries created the modern world. We couldn't be more wrong.

Just like us, medieval men and women worried about growing old, got blisters and indigestion, fell in love, and had children. And yet their lives were full of miraculous and richly metaphorical experiences radically different from our own, unfolding in a world where deadly wounds might be healed overnight by divine intervention, or where the heart of a king, plucked from his corpse, could be held aloft as a powerful symbol of political rule.

Why do civilizations rise, flourish, weaken, and fall? Centuries before sociology had a name, before modern economics became a discipline, and before historians spoke of systems theory, one fourteenth-century Muslim thinker looked at the rise and fall of nations and saw a hidden pattern. His name was Ibn Khaldun. In his masterpiece, the Muqaddimah, Ibn Khaldun transformed history from a record of kings and battles into a science of civilization itself. He asked questions that still haunt the modern world: What holds a society together? Why do ruling classes decay? How does wealth weaken the...

A history of peasants in the Middle Ages, the story takes the listener into the life of Marion, the carpenter's wife, and her extended family as they struggle to survive through hardship, featuring a year in their lives at the mercy of the weather and the Lord of the Manor. Existing without soap, paper or glass and only with the most basic of tools, we learn how they survive starvation, sickness, fire and natural disaster in their home on the edge of the Weald.

Uncover the secret annals of untold history in these eighteen medieval manuscripts. Each tortured scribe will bring you face to face with ancient horrors lurking in cursed castles, wild woodlands, haunted hamlets, and mysterious monasteries. Including a lineup of authors both established and emerging, HOWL Society Press presents the first-ever anthology of historical horror from the medieval period, fittingly introduced by the writer who arguably started it all: Christopher Buehlman, author of the medieval horror epic Between Two Fires.

Drawing from both Christian and Islamic sources, Reconquest and Crusade in Medieval Spain demonstrates that the clash of arms between Christians and Muslims in the Iberian peninsula that began in the early eighth century was transformed into a crusade by the papacy during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Successive popes accorded to Christian warriors willing to participate in the peninsular wars against Islam the same crusading benefits offered to those going to the Holy Land.