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Readin', Writin' and 'Rithmetic
I think most of us have a pretty good grasp on the idea that literacy was not universal in the Middle Ages ... and that it was limited to a small number of people ... but there are some very interesting wrinkles that most people don't know and which can have a considerable impact on how RPGs are run ...

Readin'

Reading was taught by rote - generally from a Psalter (a collection of The Psalms from the Bible) - directly from the (almost universally) single copy of the book that was available for the class and in Latin.

But the actual language (Latin, that is) wasn't taught ... students had glosses (think 'Cliff Notes' or summaries) to explain what the passage(s) was/were about but wouldn't actually know what each word was.

Oh, and they read aloud, often by following the line of text with their finger to keep track - and this was the case even for well-educated people (who presumably knew Latin). There is actually a reason for this, modern investigations have shown that a different part of the brain engages when reading aloud, and makes it easier to read medieval texts - because medieval Texts used Scriptio Continua (i.e. there was no punctuation and no letter spacing between words, not even to indicate where sentences ended or began) and sounding out the letters made it easier to recognise the words!

So, as often as not, people could be deemed 'literate' who could only 'read' texts they were familiar with but might not actually understand the words that made them up in any other context as they might not actually understand Latin, and only understand the text because they had memorised glosses!

And the need to read texts aloud gives at least some excuse for Mages needing to be able to have their hands free and able to speak the words of a spell aloud!

Oh, no chalk, no slates ... no blackboards ... all are much later developments. Some people still used wax tablets and metal or bone styli as the Greeks and Romans had, but even that seems to have been rare.

Writin'

Students were taught to read first.

Writing was taught later - and usually by a separate teacher, often not on the permanent staff, an itinerant Scrivener.

If you're in the education trade you'll know that automaticity (being able to repeat an action or series of actions automatically) takes around three years to achieve ... which is why early-stage students learning writing look so awkward and seem to have to concentrate so much to draw their letters ... and generally do such a poor job of it, though gradually improving ... so that's why modern schools teach reading and writing simultaneously.

So you can probably see what effect the different way of doing this the medievals had would have been ... a lot of supposedly, indeed, a lot of actually, literate people might only be able to read well, and their writing ability might actually be ... rubbish.

'Rithmetic

Despite 'common knowledge' that Arabic Numerals were introduced to Europe in this period, it's another case of something not being entirely true ...

Yes, knowledge of Arabic numerals and positional notation were introduced ... but to an extremely limited audience and were rarely used. Almost everyone still used Roman Numerals ... it's only with the introduction of the Printing Press in the mid 15th century that Arabic numerals spread explosively and displace Roman numerals ... though the latter fight a rearguard action for another century or more.

There's a lot more about medieval literacy, numeracy and general education in the Ars Scholastica chapter in OM2.

 

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Give Us Our Daily Bread ... Or not

Everyone knows that the main component of a medieval Peasant's (or the poor in general) diet was bread ...

As you have probably guessed by now ... this simply isn't true!

Bread only starts to dominate the diet of the poor from the 15th century ... after the end of the period covered by OM2.

So, what did the medieval poor person's diet mainly consist of during the 10th-14th centuries?

Gruel. Ever popular in fairy tales and Dickensian novels ... and a basic medieval food. A watery porridge made from any cereal available boiled in water (for the poor) or milk (for the better off). Might be drunk or eaten with a spoon.

Porridge. A thicker form of gruel, usually made from Barley in northern Europe, and usually with at least some additional ingredients ... usually vegetables. Occasionally (for the poor, anyway) with a little fish or meat ... very little. Usually eaten with a spoon.

Pottage. A thick mix of cereal grains (often in the form of flour) and vegetables ... with much more of the latter than a porridge ... commonly boiled until it had the consistency of either a very thick soup or a porridge like mix. Fats and oils were routinely added where available, and the better off would include meat and fish. Usually eaten with a spoon.

Yes, bread was eaten, and eaten commonly, but it was a supplementary part of a Peasant (or poor person's) diet which was otherwise dominated by the three types of food mentioned above.

The reason seems to have been that baking bread was more fuel intensive than cooking Gruels, Porridges and Pottages ... and fuel was scarce and expensive ... so the poor economised as much as possible.

Even after Bread came to be a much bigger part of the diet of the poor, from the 15th century, it was alongside these three right through to the 17th or even the 18th centuries as a staple.

 

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The Grim Reaper ...

Most of you are probably aware that medieval life expectancy was less than that of a modern First World country today - a range (depending on time and place) of 30-40 years compared to the 82.45 years a modern Australian (for example) can expect.

My experience in teaching this sort of thing over the years has been that not everyone fully grasps exactly what this means ... and, indeed, that there is a great deal of confusion over it (if you're not in that category, bear with me for a moment) ...

The 30-40 figure is reasonably correct (there are some problems with it due to the lack of actual written records ... but experts agree it is in the right ballpark) ... but some people assume that means everyone was dead by the time they hit 40!

Of course, that isn't true ... it's an average ... and its dragged down by the extremely high infant mortality rate, a rate akin to the worst Third World hellholes today.

What gives a better picture of the medieval reality is the median age - today it is ~38, back then it was ~21 ... that is, approximately 50% of people were 21 years of age or younger (in fact, a full 29% were in the 0-13 year age group, compared to around 7-8% for modern Europe).

Wherever you went in medieval Europe you will see lots of young people. Lots.

Still, it doesn't mean everyone was dead by 40 ... in fact, if a male managed to hit his 20th birthday the statistics (such as they are) show they were more likely than not to reach their 45th birthday ... and if they reached their 30th birthday they were more likely than not to make it into their 50's. Some even managed to make it to the biblical three score years and ten. Not many, though ... about 2.1% (and 0.1% for 80+) compared with 3.2% for (0.7% for 80+) modern males (and 5.4%/1.6% for modern females).

The interesting thing is, as far as we can tell, there wasn't a huge variation across social classes ... modern medicine makes a huge difference there ... because the rich almost universally ate an unhealthy amount of rich foods, so they died of different diseases to the peasantry.

Where there was a big difference was with female life expectancy ... until recently (the last 40-50 years or so) the single biggest killer of women by far was pregnancy, childbirth and related complications. In the medieval period that was much worse ... in general, women had a 10% bonus to life expectancy through to marriage, a 40% drop during their childbearing years, and a 10% bounce-back (for those who survived) after menopause (usually in their 40's ... poor diet).

In fact, there was a 5% chance per pregnancy of them dying ... compared to modern First World countries where it is generally 0.01% or less.

So, a lot of young faces in the crowd ... and a reason why the evil stepmother is a stock fictional character from pre-modern times!

 

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Furniture & Fakes

Medieval displays in many museums include what is purported to be medieval furniture.

Unfortunately, that is not always the case.

What's on display in almost all second and third tier museums are reproductions ... the museum may think they're medieval, as may have the original donors, but they almost universally came with provenance equal to nothing more than 'they're old!'

First tier institutions are, at least for select key pieces, somewhat better off ... as for those (relatively few) pieces provenance exists or testing (Radiocarbon dating) has shown them to be genuine.

The only type(s) of furniture you can realistically include in your medieval dwelling is whatever may be shown in contemporary Illuminated Manuscripts ... but the accuracy of these is suspect as they either show only elite households or, where they show 'common' establishments, one has to strongly suspect they show an idealised version of the contents ... after all, their audience was the elite!

Elite Furniture

For almost all of the period Elite Households were peripatetic ... they moved from Manor to Manor, Castle to Castle, Estate to Estate every week or so (sometimes more, sometimes less).

Their destinations rarely, if ever, had much furniture beyond what was needed by the skeleton staff that maintained them between visits ... so all of the furniture and fittings needed by the elite household travelled with them. It had to be portable.

(The obvious exception was the urban elite, who were, for the most part, sedentary ... or the bulk of their household was, anyway).

So an elite household would have Folding Chairs for the Lord, his immediate family and honoured guests but Trestle Seating for the rest. Tables would almost universally be of the trestle type (or stools - which were almost always of the three legged variety)

Beds (in medieval times this meant Matresses as well) that could be taken down for the Lord, but Paliasses (or similar) which were basically bags filled with bedstraw (not Straw ... a softer and not scratchy plant) lain directly on the floor (normally covered with bundles of rushes). Very junior staff might sleep directly on the rush covered floor (modern re-enactors have found this to be quite comfortable).

Something like a Wardrobe (for hanging clothes ... not to be confused with a Wardrobe, the room(s) where clothes and other valuables were stored or the official in charge of such) might be found ... basically an upright chest. Otherwise, storage was universally in Chests ... neither Cupboards (cups, plates etc. might be displayed on shelves when not in use) nor Chests of Drawers exist ... yet.

The other thing to note is that, even in elite households, there's not a lot of furniture ... not by modern standards. Rooms are very sparse.

 

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An Explosive Matter ...

Orbis Mundi 2 covers the period from the 11th century through to the 14th century (1001 to 1400) for several reasons, one of which is that it terminates before gunpowder weapons start to dominate the battlefield.

Still, something like cannon started to appear as early as 1313 at Ghent and they were being used in the siege of Metz in 1324.

Limitations of Gunpowder

As most of you probably know, the earliest form of gunpowder was simply that, a powder - a mix of finely ground sulphur, saltpeter and charcoal. The problem with it was that it tended to separate, even if it was simply sitting in a barrel and, of course, much more quickly when transported any distance. The saltpeter tended to work its way to the bottom and the charcoal to the top, rendering the mix progressively useless.

As a result, until the invention of corned powder (worked into small grains by mixing the powder with spirits of wine) in the late 15th century, gunpowder was mixed on the spot and normally only in the quantities actually needed. This was, of course, a dangerous procedure and it was common for artillerists to wear something to warn others they were up to dangerous activities ... so they normally wore something red to indicate this, and red remains a colour associated with artillery units in modern militaries.

The other issue with early gunpowder was that the formula hadn't been perfected - modern optimal Black Powder mixes are 75% Saltpeter, 15% Charcoal and 10% Sulphur ... Roger Bacon's mix (1267) was 41.2/29.4/29.4 and by 1400 it was still 71/12.9/16.1, still suboptimal.

Finally, early gunpowder was expensive ... 1 pound (Tournois) cost 10/- (Tournois) in 1370-80 and remained at that level well into the 15th century, dropping to 5/- by 1410-20 and 1/6 to 2/- by the end of the 15th century. A typical Bombard required 30-40 pounds of gunpowder per shot!

 

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You just can't trust 'em

Those of you have have studied History at any level will probably be aware of Primary and Secondary Sources ... though, based on almost 4 decades of teaching the concept(s) as part of the NSW Junior and Senior History Curriculum, not everyone will have fully grasped the whole concept.

Primary Sources are, simply, those created (directly or indirectly) by people who lived at the time.

Secondary Sources are everything else.

The potential problem is that too many people assume that Primary Sources are somehow inherently better than Secondary Sources and are inherently infallible... which is where things tend to become ... problematic.

And I'm not just talking High School or University students either ... some authors of some texts (all too many, it seems sometimes) are guilty of this. Well, perhaps that's being a little harsh ... they are, perhaps, too trusting of the sources they use ... and that's often one of the reasons, one of the main reasons in fact, for the various 'everyone knows' issues I've been highlighting.

So, what are some of the more important shortcomings ...

A general dearth of (Written) Sources - prior to the development of printing by Gutenberg most people were illiterate and every record, letter, book or legal document had to be written out longhand. This constrains our picture of medieval life considerably ... there's a lot we simply can probably never know because there are no surviving records to tell us.

This is compounded by the fact that, even in England, most records for the period are written in an almost illegible (to modern sensibilities) hand with no punctuation and either in a corrupt form of Latin or in Norman-French (which isn't all that close even to medieval French) ... a lot of the relatively small (compared to later periods) number of surviving documents haven't been studied, or not sufficiently, because they haven't been translated or because those with the skills to decipher them are a small subset of active Historians.

Bias. This is so blindingly obvious you'd think it was blindingly obvious. Yet it isn't always - sure, people get things like sexism, classism and the like, but they miss the most pervasive.

The simple fact that so few people could read and write!

Records were done for the elite either by themselves or by those whose livelihoods depended on the elite giving them a job. To use a modern slang term ... how much of it is actually fake news?

You can, generally, discount pretty much any comments, even in passing, about the 'peasants' and their lifestyle ... they're all leaners, after all, at least to the literate Elite.

There's more to this whole aspect of medieval (or any) history, of course, and there's a discussion of its impact on how the uncritical, or not sufficiently critical, use of those wonderful primary sources can be so potentially misleading ...

 

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Arbalests, Crossbows & Bows

There's a lot of misinformation (Heck. There's a lot of downright wrong information) out there on these three basic forms of missile weapon … the following is gleaned from a variety of re-enactor sources ...

Arbalest. These only start to appear in the late 14th century, only start to be more than an occasional raruty by the middle of the 15th century, and only become (somewhat) common by the late 15th century. They differ from an ordinary Crossbow in that they have a spring-metal bowstave and, therefore, cannot be spanned without some form of mechanical aid. Rate of Fire was no more than a round a minute for a trained user and maximum range was 380-400 yards (~100 yards for aimed fire at individual targets). They were most commonly used as sniping weapons during sieges.

Crossbow. Though their use as Hunting weapons goes back to Roman times, they weren't widely adopted for military use, and then mostly on the Continent, until the 13th-14th centuries. They originally had a simple self bowstave and could be spanned by hand … later models (from the middle of the 14th century) started to appear with composite bowstaves which required some form of assistance to be spanned. Rate of Fire was 4-6 round per minute. Maximum range was 300-350 yards, but accurate range for massed fire was 200 yards and for aimed fire at individual targets more like 60 yards.

Longbow. Maximum range was around 300 yards, Effective Range for Massed Fire was 200 yards and for aimed fire at individual targets, around 80-100 yards. Rate of Fire was 5-6 arrows per minute for aimed fire, or a dozen arrows per minute for massed area fire.

As you can see, despite claims by older works (and more recent ones that uncritically rely on them), the ranges at which these three weapons were effective was close to identical. Likewise, the damage they did was close to identical as well … with higher draw weights being almost completely cancelled out on Crossbows and Arbalests by the very short arms and short draw distance compared to the Longbow.

The big advantage that the Crossbow family had over the Longbow was that it took, at most, weeks to make an effective Crossbowman, but it took many many years to train an effective Longbow Archer.

Short Bow. Differed from Longbows in that (on the Continent, where they dominated) they were drawn to the chest, not the ear. Maximum range was around 250 yards, effective range was around 100 yards for massed fire and 40 yards for aimed fire. Rate of fire was similar to that of a Longbow.

Composite Bow. Generally found only on the margins of Europe or in the Arab/Muslim world.Despite claims by older works, often (all too often) repeated uncritically by more recent works, they don't have a significantly greater massed fire, effective fire or aimed fire range than Longbows, nor do they do significantly more damage than a Longbow of the same draw weight. Their big advantage is that they are shorter for the same draw weight than a Longbow … an important consideration for use by Mounted troops.

 

[aspqrz]

As Medieval as Apple Pie

Apples have been regarded as a good way to end a meal since at least Greek times and mention of Apple Pies dates back to medieval times, though the first actual 'recipe' isn't found in written material until the 14th century ...

Take gode Applys and gode Spycis and Figys and Rey­sons and Perys and wan they are well ybrayed coloured with Safron wel and yt in a cofyn (pie crust) and yt forth to bake wel.

Note that no additional sweeteners - Honey or, indeed, Sugar (expensively imported) are mentioned.

What, exactly, are Herbs?

In medieval usage, Herbs include any green plant, roots, what we would call vegetables and herbs today, there is rarely, if ever, any mention of 'vegetables.'

So, for example, the following 13th century recipe for a 'Herbed Salad' -

'Take Parsley, Sage, Garlic, Chives, Onions, Leeks, Borage, Mint, Scallion, Fennel and Nasturtium, Rue, Rosemary and Purslane, rinse and wash clean. Chop them small and mingle (toss) them well with raw (Olive) oil, then lay on Vinegar and Salt and serve.'

Some unusualities ... only Fava or Broad Beans were available ... 'Common' or 'String' Beans come from the New World. Red (tasty) or Yellow (stringy) Carrots - Orange Carrots don't appear until the 17th century. White Watermelons, not Red.

Spiced rotten Meat

Nope.

Claims that the heavy use of spices was to disguise the taste of rotten (cooked) meat simply don't stand to even cursory consideration ... sure, the fashion was for heavily spiced foods, but, while spices might disguise the taste of rotten meat, they won't prevent you from dying of food poisoning if you eat it!

Another 'everyone knows' factoid.

(Though, of course, fermented meats are different ... like Icelandic Hakarl ... or, more commonly, salamis and the like ... as are smoked or dried meats which might, sometimes, be rubbed with herbs or spices)

 

[aspqrz]

A Project We Love!

We've hit $7112 funding and have been rated as a Project We Love by Kickstarter!

I am still trying to find freelancers who can do additional work on those countries/regions for which my access to English language sources has limited the amount of information I have been able to include ... but no bites so far.

I am very happy with the way things are going!

 

[aspqrz]

Putting Meat on the Table
Without going into exactly how much Meat each class of people in medieval times ate, consider how much of a meat animal they ate (or otherwise used) ...

Pretty much everything was consumed, one way or another.

They didn't just eat what we consider the prime (muscle) cuts and select internal organs (Kidneys or Liver), they ate the Brain, the Lungs, the Womb, the Testicles, the Intestines (as Tripe), Tails and Tongues, Snouts and Ears, Trotters and Knuckles and used other bits for food related purposes ... Intestines, Stomach and Bladder, for example, as sausage casings.

The Hides, of course, were used for leather or parchment (for writing on or as window panes) which required different methods of preparation, while the Bones and Horns were the medieval equivalent of modern plastics (and bones and other bits could be boiled down to make glue for industrial purposes), bristles were used for brushes of various sorts, wool and hair for cloth, sinew for Bowstrings.

Pretty much everything could be used ... which doesn't mean it always was in every instance.