Medieval Madness

Gertrude of Merania, Queen of Hungary, and Agnès Sorel, the first officially recognised mistress to a French king. One a ‘princess’, the other a minor aristocrat. What could these two young women born two centuries apart possibly have in common? Welcome to Medieval Madness! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thought to have been built sometime between 800 and 1100 AD, around 2,000 Erdstall tunnels can be found across central Europe, particularly in Bavaria, where there are over 700. With only one way in and one way out some of these claustrophobic tunnels have crawl spaces that are just over one foot wide. Could they be graves for the souls of the dead or have some other religious purpose? Maybe they...

When many people think of the Medievals, they imagine castles and knights on white horses saving damsels in distress, or perhaps superstitious, backward-looking peasants, who’s only thought is to toil in the fields and serve their lord. It may come as a shock to discover that there were some great innovations in the Middle Ages, such as the mechanical clock, the printing press and coffee houses! B...

Today we thought we would travel outside of the Middle Ages and into the early modern period. But why? We hear you shout when you have 1,000 years of medieval history to go at. Well, the answer is easy. The Great Fire of London was one of the greatest catastrophes ever to befall the City and was a tale just too extraordinary not to be told. Over ffour days from Sunday 2nd to Wednesday 5th Septembe...

The Medievals are often criticised for their bad child-rearing skills, such as sending their youngsters off to be fostered and trained by other families. Many of the decisions they made as parents are considered bizarre, if not downright cruel, today. So, just what was needed to survive babyhood in the Middle Ages? Let’s travel back in time now to discover how medieval babies were fed and clothed,...

During the Middle Ages, disabled people were found in all parts of society. Those born into ordinary peasant families just got on with their lives and coped as best they could, whatever their impairment, be they “lame”, “blynde,” or “dumbe”. However, the ‘Little People’ with their short stature found themselves popular with monarchs across Europe. At court, they were required to fill roles such as...

The 14th century wasn’t a great time for sunbathing in Europe. Right from the start it seemed as though a distinct chill had settled over the land. The Baltic Sea froze over twice in 1303 and again over the winter of 1306 to 1307. For many years following there were cold storms and heavy rains, resulting in a rise in levels in the Caspian Sea. What the Medievals could not have known then, was that...

For most of us, Halloween is the commercial holiday celebrated every year on the 31st of October, when people carve jack-o-lanterns from pumpkins and dress up in scary costumes to go out trick or treating. But what did Halloween mean to the Medievals and how did their superstitions and beliefs influence how we celebrate Halloween today? Let’s travel back now to a time of witches, soul-hunters, and...

Like us, the Medievals wanted to step out looking and smelling their best. For women especially, grooming was not just about creating the illusion of beauty, it was also a way to show off their social status because the higher the rank and wealth then the more access people had to expensive cosmetics made with rare ingredients. Let’s travel back to the Middle Ages to take a look at male and female...

English soldier and knight, condottiero, Captain-General of Florence, Duke of the Duchy of Spoleto. Who was this man? A man nicknamed John Sharp by the Italians in reference to his “cleverness and cunning”. A man so highly thought of by the Italians that he is depicted in a fresco painted by Uccello at the Duomo in Florence. Could such an honourable man really be responsible for one of the worst m...

Where do we go when we die? It’s a question that humans have been pondering for thousands of years. For the Christian Medievals, there were only three options – heaven, hell, or purgatory. The problem was, they didn’t know what condition their soul was in until they died and that was causing concern. Even the theologians, with all their ecclesiastical knowledge and writings, debated the problem wi...

We’ll begin, as all good murder stories do, with the finding of a body. It was the end of May 1375, in the Lincolnshire countryside when the decomposing remains of a man were discovered in the fields near Grayingham. The man was about 30 years old and had been lying there for several months but his clothes showed he was a man of means. On examining the body, the coroner decided he had died from “d...

The Medievals consumed alcohol all the time. At every event, whether that was a wedding, a funeral, a business negotiation, or the completion of an apprenticeship ... they didn’t really need an excuse. They even drank at work, all day, every day. Which begs the question. Were the people who lived through the Middle Ages always drunk? It makes you wonder how they could work, fight their many wars,...

For the Medievals, summer was a time of celebration for all classes. Perhaps the best time of the year for social gatherings. But work still had to be carried out in the fields and summer was also a time of heatwaves, droughts, wildfires, plague, and fever. Welcome to Medieval Madness. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the West, the Middle Ages was a superstitious time, a time when what was real and unreal became blurred. Dragons, witches, basilisks, and zombies were just some of the beasts that offered an ever-present threat to Christian society. Is it any wonder then, that in a time when everything had a religious significance, any unexplained phenomenon in the skies was interpreted as either an omen, the m...

The Egyptians treated them with reverence and adoration having, first domesticated them 4,000 years ago. Since then the small, carnivorous mammals have played a major part in religion, folklore, art, and community health across the world. However, in 13th-century Western Europe, cats became associated with the supernatural, when Pope Gregory IX called them an instrument of Satan. Let’s travel back...

In 1303, Westminster was an important place. West from the City of London, it was protected by its own walls and gates. Westminster Palace was there, which was once the main residence of the kings of England. On the evening of the 12th of May, in Westminster Abbey, which lay just across the pathway from the Palace, the Benedictine could be heard singing compline, their final prayer at the end of t...

The 22nd of March 1144 was Holy Saturday, the day before Easter. Outside the city walls, the forester Henry de Sprowston was riding through Thorpe Wood on the outskirts of Norwich, England. Among other things, Henry was looking for thieves, who were known to cut timber without permission. Suddenly he came across a peasant who led him to the mutilated body of a young boy lying under a tree. It was...

Going on a Medieval Crusade was a male mission, a military enterprise in which only men could fight. Obviously, the women stayed home and did womanly things while their dashing, knightly husbands rode off and defended the Holy Land. Right? Wrong. Actually, many women also took up the cross and went off on Crusade, and they weren’t just the important warrior noble women, like Queen Eleanor of Aquit...

The White Tower, as it was originally known, was a fortress-stronghold built by the first Norman king, William the Conqueror. It was intended to protect against foreign invasion and intimidate the citizens of London in equal measure. But the Tower also had other uses. It operated as a royal residence and was where monarchs would stay as they awaited their coronation. However, The Tower of London's...

From an insignificant tribal clan, the Mongols seemed to come out of nowhere to rule over the greatest empire in the world, before disappearing just as quickly three centuries later. Their lands reached out across the Mediterranean to the Pacific from the Arabian Desert in the south to the tundra of Northern Russia and from the forests of Poland to the mountains of China. At the empire’s height, t...

Born in 1359, Owain was the last native Welshman to hold the title Prince of Wales and fought for 15 years against English rule. He led successful sieges and battlefield victories to establish an independent Welsh State, refusing to ever give up, even when it seemed that all was lost he continued to resist the English, in the Welsh mountains by utilizing guerrilla warfare. Let’s travel back in tim...

It was a spectacular win for Robert the Bruce, King of the Scots, over the two days of the 23rd and 24th of June 1314. Just like the triumph of Agincourt, which was to follow 100 years later, the Battle of Bannockburn was a win for the underdog, when a formidable army lost to one of significantly fewer numbers. A pivotal battle that would change the course of the First Scottish War of Independence...

We often think of Medieval princesses in terms of fairy tales - as beautiful young ladies waiting around, in their tall pointy hats, for some knight to come along and rescue them from a tower. But the reality was far less romantic. Let’s travel back in time now to the Middle Ages and meet some of these noble ladies and take a little look at how they navigated such an overwhelmingly male world. Lea...

There are many medieval ruins scattered throughout England and the landscape is full of crumbling abbeys that were left to deteriorate after Henry VIII’s reformation. But there are also quite a few, little-known palaces, that were once magnificent during the Middle Ages and were also discarded. Some were abandoned because of fire or war and others just fell out of favour with their wealthy owners....