Gone Medieval

Between 1000 and 1500, European towns and cities started to take shape, impacting the lives of millions of people as different cultural, social and religious groups began to interact. But who was allowed to settle in a city and how was it decided who belonged? In this edition of Gone Medieval, Dr. Cat Jarman talks to Professor Miri Rubin, author of  Cities of Strangers: Making Lives in Mediev...

Matt Lewis concludes his series on the Wars of the Roses with a look at a figure who is often divisive and misunderstood, despised or loved, but who might even be labelled as a winner, maybe the winner of the Wars of the Roses. Margaret Beaufort was the mother of Henry Tudor and the matriarch of England’s most famous dynasty. But the story of her early life gives no hint of what would follow. To d...

When HM The Queen was crowned in 1953, her Coronation ceremony contained some subtle nods to another Queen who made history 1100 years earlier. Princess Judith of Flanders was the first woman to be crowned as Queen among the West Saxons. But her two royal marriages were not without controversy. In this episode of Gone Medieval, Dr. Cat Jarman finds out more about Queen Judith from medieval histori...

To celebrate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, Matt Lewis revisits the fascinating story of Empress Matilda who came within a hair’s breadth of being crowned England’s first Queen regnant in the 12th century. Sent away aged eight to match with the Holy Roman Emperor, Matilda represented status for her father and money for her intended. However, Matilda was independent, intelligent, educated and author...

What do human remains - and the objects buried with them - tell us about people’s lives in Britain in the first millennium, what they thought about mortality, how they felt about loss, and what they believed came next? The anthropologist and author Professor Alice Roberts has been exploring the ways in which Ancient Britons bade farewell to their dead, examining sites of Roman cremations and grave...

As part of our Wars of the Roses special month, there’s one family that demands more attention than they usually get: The Beauforts’. The influence of the Beauforts’ in the Wars of the Roses can still be felt today, as Margaret Beaufort, the eventual heiress, gave birth to Henry VII, the first Tudor monarch.  Though like most things in history, it’s not straightforward, and it doesn’t help th...

Rivers, Silk roads and camels - how did international trade adapt and survive beyond the Roman Empire into the middle ages? In today's episode Cat is joined by author Hilary Green to talk about her debut non-fiction book, "International Trade in the Middle Ages". Together they examine products like wool, silk, spices and salt - items we take for granted now, but materials that were once symbo...

All things must end. This final special episode on the Wars of the Roses deals with a series of endings and considers what finding a date for the end of the conflict means for how we think about this critical period. Lancaster will be revived, only to meet a final end. The House of York seems secure, but would fall, replaced by an unknown Welshman who had lived half his life in exile. Does the arr...

Early medieval royals ate mostly meat, right? Wrong! A new study that’s made headlines around the world has shown that medieval kings were largely vegetarian! To help shed light on this exciting new discovery, today Cat is joined by Dr Sam Leggett of the University of Edinburgh, a bio-archaeologist and the lead author of the study. For more Gone Medieval content, subscribe to our Medieval Mondays...

Part one of this comprehensive trilogy covering the Wars of the Roses left the Yorkist lords attained and in exile. From this point, the 15th century civil wars were transformed into a bitter procession of dynastic clashes between the rival houses of Lancaster and York - the result of which would reforge England's destiny for centuries to come. In part two, Matt Lewis explains how and why feuding...

Margery Kempe was an English Christian mystic, known for writing "The Book of Margery Kempe", a work considered by some to be the first autobiography in the English language. She's also thought to be the first case of schizophrenia. In honour of Mental Health Awareness week, Dr Cat Jarman is joined by Dr Alison Torn from Leeds Trinity University to explore Margery's complicated legacy and whe...

The Wars of the Roses is a complex and fascinating period of English history that dominates the second half of the 15th century and leads to the rise of the Tudor dynasty. It’s often characterised as a dynastic struggle between Lancaster and York, but it was much more than that. In this first part of three special episodes, Matt Lewis details the origins of the conflict and how it erupted into ope...

In Norse mythology, the Valkyries determine who lived and who died on the battlefield. Translated as “Chooser of the Fallen” in Old Norse, they’re often depicted as supernatural women who guide the souls of deceased soldiers worthy enough of a place in Valhalla, to feast with the god Odin. Today, Dr Cat Jarman is joined by Dr Jóhanna Katrín Friðriksdóttir, a medievalist and literary researcher bas...

In today’s Gone Medieval podcast, Matt Lewis joins Dallas Campbell - host of our sister podcast Patented: History of Inventions - to explore the role of medieval monks in inventing. Seeing scientific and philosophical investigation as a way to get closer to God - despite the threat of being labelled a heretic - monks were considered masters of invention. Together, they explain how monks navigated...

Histories of India usually concern themselves with events and invasions in the subcontinent’s North, while the rest of India’s rich story is often reduced down to little more than dry footnotes.  Now historian and Indian history podcast presenter Anirudh Kanisetti has brought to light the early medieval period in the Deccan Plateau - between the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal - when the re...

The term “Middle Ages” is commonly used but really only applies to a Western European view of history. It was created at the beginning of the Early Modern period in England to categorise what had gone before. The acclaimed historian Peter Frankopan is widening the geographic focus to understand the period in world history as a whole, and counter a Euro-centric perspective that has dominated and sh...

The Northman  now showing in UK cinemas is an action-filled epic that follows a young Viking prince on his quest to avenge his father's murder. Its director Robert Eggers has described it as the “most accurate Viking movie ever made." But what does "accuracy" mean for a historical blockbuster? And how is it achieved? In this episode of  Gone Medieval , Dr. Cat Jarman talks to Professor N...

Easter today is marked by chocolate eggs and two Bank Holidays - in the Medieval world it had a deeply spiritual significance. But it wasn’t without its share of celebration and merrymaking too. In this episode, Matt Lewis explains the origins of many Easter traditions in the Medieval period, and how our ancestors knew how to fuse together religious worship with a bit of fun. For more Gone Medieva...

Little has been known up until now about the involvement and power of women during the Crusader period. When Saladin's armies besieged Jerusalem in 1187, behind the city walls a last-ditch defense was being led by an unlikely trio - including Sibylla, Queen of Jerusalem. She was the last of a line of formidable female rulers in the Crusader States of Outremer - a world where women conducted diplom...

Genghis Khan is still considered one of the most famous and most feared warrior kings in history. But his name still divides opinion. To some, he was the ruthless conqueror of great civilisations, for others a hero who united nomadic tribes and created an enlightened empire. But who was the real Genghis Khan? In today's episode, Matt is joined by historian and author John Man who takes us through...

1,900 miles west of South America and 1,250 miles from any other population centre, Easter Island - or Rapa Nui - is world famous for its monolithic stone statues. But new evidence indicates that the isle's infamous prehistoric 'societal collapse' may actually be a myth. With the help of fresh techniques and research, Robert DiNapoli and his team from Binghamton University in the US have found tha...

In 1216, at the adolescent age of nine, Henry became King Henry III of England. With his father, King John passing, right amid the First Barons’ War, Henry was left to inherit his mantle and all the chaos that came with it. But how did the young King rule the country? In this episode, Matt is joined by a leading authority on the history of Britain, David Carpenter, to delve into the first half of...

Several large kingdoms were formed in the Viking-Age period, the best known settlements being in Ireland and York. Dublin became a thriving hub for western Viking expansion and trade. New discoveries of silver and other items show that traded commodities traveled vast distances, but how interconnected were these towns? And how much were they a part of a greater Viking network? In this episode, Dr....

A gap in knowledge - both of stories and artefacts - provides a frustrating block when looking into the past. But, a new report, based on the use of statistics, is hoping to shine a light on some of these hidden mysteries. This week Matt is joined by Dr Katarzyna Anna Kapitan from the University of Oxford who talks Matt through her fascinating research, from finding out that medieval romance manus...

The dynamics in everyday life in the Medieval period may seem drastically different compared to how we live today. From traditions, gender, power, and religion, advancements in the present seem rapid. But do we have more in common with those of the past than we realise? In this episode of Gone Medieval, Cat is joined by Elizebeth Boyle. Elizebeth is a historian and author who specialises in the in...