Your Medieval Questions Answered

From long lost Viking ships and kings buried in unexpected places, to tales of murder, power, faith, and the lives of ordinary people across medieval Europe and beyond. Join me, Matt Lewis, Dr Eleanor Yarniger, and some of the world's leading historians as we bring history's most fascinating stories to life, only on History Hit. With your subscription, you'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries, with a brand-new release every week, exploring everything from the ancient world to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. Ontdek the new Game of Thrones series, A Night of the Seven Kingdoms, Gebaseerd op de bestseller van George R.R. Martin. Kijk door lid te worden van HBO Max. So be brave, be just. Dus wat je ook zoekt, Prime Video. Hier kijk je alles. Abonnementen verhuisd. Inhoud conferenties bevatten. 18+. Algemene voorwaarden zijn van toepassing. Hello, I'm Dr. Eleanor Janneke. And welcome to Gone Medieval from History Hit. The podcast that delves into the greatest millennium in human history. We uncover the greatest mysteries, the gobsmacking details, and the latest groundbreaking research from the Vikings to the Normans, from kings to popes, to the Crusades. We delve into the rebellions, plots, and murders that tell us who we really were. And how we got here. way way back in the mists of time well april 2021 to be precise a child was born in the private chambers of the lord high king dan snow at history hit towers almost immediately the joyful tidings of this newborn spread throughout his realm and beyond and crowds of admirers flocked from all over the world to bask in the presence of this newborn. That child, you may have guessed by now, was given the name Gone Medieval and was lovingly nurtured by a host of attendants to spread knowledge, joy and a fair smattering of violence unto all that followed its progress, as it was allowed out twice a week to shower its benedictions upon the adoring multitudes. I, of course, was but a mere child myself when Gone Medieval came into the world. But when I attained the age of consent, I was permitted to join Matt Lewis to continue rearing the babe that is Gone Medieval. Guiding its development, teaching it the myths and legends of the land. Meeting warriors, Vikings, Queens and Popes. and occasionally leading it astray down some very murky thoroughfares. Sorry about that. I will arrange for trauma counselling later. Everyone needs a bad influence. But for now, a momentous occasion has arrived. This is Gone Medieval's 500th episode. So unfurl the banners, let the drums roll, let the trumpeters... Um, trumpet? it? Neither the prophets nor soothsayers of 2021 could ever have predicted how quickly five years might go by and how Gone Medieval would flourish. Its many, many followers are a discerning group, inquiring peasants who love a cheeky joke, a rousing tale, and a good argument. So, to celebrate this prestigious anniversary, I appealed for Matt to be let out on day release from his dungeon in history-hit Towers. I've coaxed him out with half my rations, which is a turnip and two jelly deals. And we've invited you, dearest rabble, to pick the subjects for discussion. These are the medieval questions that most exercise your curious minds, and we are so excited to have a go at answering them. So, Matt, I hope your eyes are becoming more accustomed to the light, and congratulations on 500 incredible episodes. I'm still blinking, but yeah, thank you. I mean, it's an incredible milestone to hit, isn't it? It's really weird to think we've done this 499 times before today. Yeah, it's one of these things where the number is just so large that it kind of beggars belief. But I suppose also we do spend rather a lot of time on it, to be fair. Yeah, and I mean, it's one of those things as well that you would think after 500 episodes, I guess you have that slight fear that we might run out of things to say. but there is always something new. There is always a new direction, a new bit of research, or every once in a while, we just uncover someone huge that we've not even tackled before. And you think, how has this person slipped past us? It feels like there is always something to keep us going, hopefully. Absolutely. And I think we really also have the listeners to thank for that, because we get such incredible and incisive questions. And that's something I really value, because I think you and I, since we're so steeped in medieval history all the time, It doesn't necessarily occur to us. Sometimes things that we think are really obvious need to be elucidated. So I really thank the listeners for keeping us on the straight and narrow. Let's just say that. Yeah. And I think some of the best episodes that we've done might be the result of, you know, an odd interaction on social media somewhere where someone said, have you ever done an episode on this? And you scratch your head and you think, we haven't. Why haven't we done that? Let's do it. It's really incredible. And I mean, it just goes to show you how long a thousand years really is. But I think we should probably kick off with some related questions about how we define the medieval period. Yeah. So Bethan Watts has written to us and asks which period of the Middle Ages interests you the most? The early, the high or the late Middle Ages? I guess the obvious answer for me is late Middle Ages because Wars of the Roses is where I'm at home. But I have to say that after 500 episodes of Gone Medieval, I'm becoming slightly obsessed with the early medieval period too. Delving into the Anglo-Saxon stuff and the Viking stuff and, you know, getting into the Dark Ages, as I'm sure you'll be very happy to hear me describe them. But, you know, it's something that I didn't know all that much about before because I've been so focused on the high and the late medieval periods, really. Most of the stuff I've written about has been late with a smattering of high. But I have found some of the stuff that we've done about the early medieval period, the aftermath of the fall of Rome, the emergence of the kingdoms in France and Charlemagne and all of that, but also the Vikings, the Anglo-Saxons. I found that so fascinating. I've become slightly obsessed with the early medieval period at the moment. Great answer. I guess that as a specialist, I'm a 14th century person, technically. I mean, that's what my PhD is in. And I love the 14th century, as everyone has heard me say a million times, because I think that you really can find out most about a society when things go really, really wrong. Like that's when you get to the beating heart of what makes people tick. And I think that we get a lot of that in the 14th century. But having said that, I love the high Middle Ages, me, because it's sort of like that's when everything really gets off the ground. I love especially like the 12th century Renaissance, obsessed with it. The 13th century has a bunch of my really favorite people in it. And I like how this incredibly complex society gets set up at that point in time. That's nothing like what we've seen before, right? When you get to the high Middle Ages, I think that we're really seeing this pure, distilled medievalness, right? I think that if people are sort of imagining the Middle Ages in their heads, that's what they're thinking about. And I think that that is just incredibly delightful. So, yeah, for me, I guess my favorite stuff is sort of like 12th century to 15th century. That's when I'm really in my zone. But having said that, like you, I am quite interested in the early medieval period, especially sort of like the Roman successor states. I think if you are quite interested in the Iberian Peninsula or the Eastern Roman Empire, right? I love me a bit of Constantinople and that stuff is absolutely fascinating. So yeah, I think that there's sort of a difference between my specializations and also what I think is just quite a bit of fun. Yeah, so essentially what we're saying is the whole millennium is brilliant and we love it all. Yeah, all of it. All of it. We're not picking a favorite child here. Absolutely. And building on that, we've got a question from A.A. who's talking a little bit about how the medieval period is sort of judged to arrive and maybe end at different times across Europe a little bit so Italy and Denmark and Germany and all of those places have the same period of early medieval history and they close the medieval period at the same time as we do in England you know we tend to be really really Anglo-centric when we think about that and I guess you and I have spoken a little bit about this before but as a a European medievalist much more than I am, that probably confuses you slightly that we have this really narrow view that it starts when Rome leaves Britain and it ends at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. It's a really horribly Anglo-centric view. Yeah, it's quite an interesting one because I thought this was a super interesting question when it got sent in because I was genuinely confused by it. I didn't really understand and I suppose that's because I'm more of a continentalist, right? Because I'm like, what do you mean the Middle Ages starts when Rome leaves England? No, it does not. I mean, that doesn't even make any sense to me, right? And I guess that I'm sort of a traditionalist for when we talk about the start of the medieval period. I just think 476, because it's got to start sometime. And that is the so-called fall of the Western Roman Empire, which obviously I don't believe in. But, you know, listen, we got to pick a date, right? And I think that that is a really good place to start. And I suppose also, you know, I don't really think that we can say in that same way that the Middle Ages starts in different places at different times. That just doesn't work for me because then what do we say about places like, you know, my beloved Bohemia where Rome's not involved? It's got nothing to do with Rome. So you just sort of need to pick a time and go with it. I think 476 is as good as any other time. And what I've said repeatedly about the end of the Middle Ages is it really depends on who you're asking. Because I think, for example, Iberia, you've got a really good claim here with Spanish unification. Because when you don't have a bunch of different kingdoms, then I think that's a completely different ballgame. in Bohemia, the minute there's Hussites and the country has left the Catholic Church, like, I'm sorry, that's a Protestant kingdom now. So if it's a Protestant kingdom, then by definition, it can't be medieval. And sure, if you're a German speaker, maybe 1517 with Martin Luther here in England, yeah, okay, the Wars of the Roses. But I do think that all of these things combined just do sort of raise the question. But as we've said repeatedly, when you're talking about periodization that's tools for us as historians to kind of make it easier to explain what our deal is what our problem is but i thought that this was just a really really interesting question because i just never thought about things like this before i guess we as historians feel compelled to shove all these things into a box and put a label on it in a way that simply doesn't fit with the facts and the timelines and different things are happening at different points and and you can point to this in this place that says that looks really medieval but next door there's something quite ancient going on and it's quite a blurry mushy transitional period but like you said some point you have to put a number on it 476 is as good as any a fall of a roman empire and same with the end you know you have to put a number on it somewhere 1485 for a long time was used particularly in britain but you can talk around 1500 you can talk around the emergence of Martin Luther slightly later if you want to. I always like the idea that a load of Roman citizens wake up in the morning on a date in 476. They look at their togas on the chairs and they go, I'm not wearing that rubbish anymore. We're medieval now. Someone give me some hose and a doublet. You know, it just doesn't happen like that, does it? No. I mean, I think that one good one I've heard from people who work on Byzantium is, you know, you can go 476, 1453, right? That's like, there's no more Roman empire anywhere. And I think that that is actually kind of a neat way of doing it. But again, then it just becomes Roman centric. And listen, this is a medieval podcast. All right. We also want to claim as much as we possibly can. We want to stretch out our wings as far as we possibly can. That's right. Yeah. And we've kind of got a similar question to add to that from James Shaddock as well, who asks, how do other cultures view our Middle Ages, by which I presume he means European Middle Ages. So fascinated to know how historians from outside the Anglosphere or Europe view, study and teach it? Are things like the Hundred Years' War and the fate of the princes in the tower interesting to them? So this is an interesting question, you know, obviously as someone who did her bachelor's in the States, but then I was also at university for a while in Tokyo and for a while in Prague. And this is one of these things where, you know, we are increasingly as scholars moving towards what we call the global Middle Ages. So just acknowledging that, listen, this is a time period that involves everyone. But in Japan, for example, when I was studying, yeah, you would learn kind of Japanese, I guess, feudal is the closest translation. They don't necessarily call it the Middle Ages. They call it the feudal period or, you know, sometimes the warring period. And in China, similarly, basically the Middle Ages, the way they think about it, stops at the year 1000. They're done. Once you get to the Tang transition, it's over and you're suddenly in the early modern period. And that does track with the amount of tech that they're using, the way that their society is set up. By then you have the system in place in China whereby people take the exams in order to work in the imperial court. You have basically the set of structures that is going to continue through. But that's not particularly useful for us if we're going to sort of look at things in a global context. But then it's quite interesting if you are in Asia looking at people who are studying the European Middle Ages as I was because I'll tell you what, Japanese people love French medieval history. That's what they were really studying at my school, in particular, huge emphasis on France. So, yes, the Hundred Years' War, they were very interested in Princess and the Tower, a lot less so. and I guess I also saw a lot when I was studying in the States. My school, we were quite continental, which is, you know, I suppose how I get created. Again, a lot of French stuff, a lot of holy Roman things. There was some English in there, but listen, if you're going to be completely honest, England's not that important in the grand scheme of things in the medieval period. It's interesting because it's this weird little thing where, I mean, like other countries, you don't get to like kill kings all the time and stuff like that. The things that are happening in England are really out of pocket, which is why people really like it. But to be honest it does not have the same cachet globally as it does here And I guess part of the challenge to that is if we think people might be interested in our particularly Western European history how much do you know about Japanese Chinese history? How much do you know about the Americas and the Mexicas and people like that? I guess the challenge is if we're wondering whether they know a lot about us, how much do we actually really know about them? And we try to cover lots of continents and different regions everywhere, but it can be slightly tricky because time periods simply don't fit exactly the same as they do in Western Europe. That's absolutely true. And so, you know, again, it's just this periodization thing. These are technicalities. So somewhere in our 499 episodes, we do address this. So Matt, you and I have done episodes about the early Middle Ages and the high Middle Ages. Those are great to go have a look at if you're interested in this area. right i think we probably ought to move on to some other questions that we had we had some great questions from everybody it's been really hard picking our way through them so we've got a question from jt is there one question that you would like to ask a monarch that could potentially change a decision and change the course of history who would it be and what would you ask them i have been absolutely going back and forth about this for ages because there's so many ones. And my question boils down to, you sure about that? Repeatedly to a lot of different kings. But I think in particular, I want to have a discussion with one of my most hated kings, who is Richard II. And I'm going to be like, what do you think this looks like when you treat peasants like that? And this is, of course, in reference to the fallout after the peasants uprising here in England. And the way that Richard comes down incredibly hard on a bunch of people who are fundamentally seeking a better life and who have been put in absolutely dire circumstances is, for me, one of the more disgusting things that happens in the medieval period. So I would just at least like to make him squirm. I want to put the fear of God into him a little bit. I want to go, what do you think your boy Jesus Christ thinks about this, Richard? I want to give it that way. Yeah. I really struggled with this as well. And my answer is very Anglo-centric, which is probably naughty. But it occurred to me that if you're thinking about a moment that would really change history, there's the Battle of Hastings. We always consider that as a fairly significant moment in Western European history. Could we have a word with Harold Godwinson and say, you sure you're ready to go and face William now? Do you think maybe you could wait a little bit for some reinforcements? Although as soon as I thought that, it occurred to me that the Chronicles tell that lots of his family said that to him. His mom and his brothers said, wait for reinforcements. And he threw a massive strop and stormed out of London with the forces that he had and went on to lose Hastings. So how much good it would do, I don't know. Maybe I would need to flash some time traveller credentials and say, no, I really think you should hang on just a little bit longer. Yeah. Alternative, going to Harald Hodgrod, I'd be like, are you sure that you can go into York this lightly armoured? Yeah. That is a moment that changes history significantly in this neck of the woods. So, you know, what if Anglo-Saxon England had continued for longer? Yeah, I think that we would just be more aligned with Scandinavia. That's what I tend to think. My answers to all of these things are quite interesting. I think you have to have that particular series of events to get England being as it is now. I think that if the Anglo-Saxons or indeed the Danes had triumphed, we would be more Scandinavian. And I also think that if England had won the Hundred Years' War, we would be more French. and sort of along the similar lines we've got a question from chris thomas who says my question is if you had a time machine and could travel back in time to change one moment in the medieval period and alter the course of history again what moment would you change and why so i guess this isn't having a word in the ear of a king this is going back and doing a little bit of tinkering yes so my answer here is related i'm scooping watt tyler off of the smithfield i'm saving my boy I want Tyler. I am keeping the peasants' uprising going. I'm going to take it to all of those nobles. I just want to save him. And this is my answer. And again, I know I'm being a little bit Anglo-centric here, but it's rare for us to have a named individual who is involved in one of the peasants' uprisings. They're happening all over Europe at the same time. You know, you can think of the Jacaree in France, for example. But we don't get to know who the people involved were. And Watt Tyler is an individual that we can really rally around. So I would save Watt from getting stabbed out on Smithfield. And I would try to keep pushing things forward. What about you, Matt? We did an episode on the People of the Peasants' Revolt. So the project that's looked at cataloging all of the people involved. And it's interesting that we tend to have Watt Tyler, Jack Straw and John Ball as the three leaders. And Watt Tyler is the only one of those who is documented being involved in the uprising. Jack Straw. I think there's a name Jack Straw that appears two years later in some related court documents, but nowhere at the time is he singled out as a leader. And John Ball is definitely a heretic preacher at the time. There's no evidence he was wrapped up in the Peasants Revolt. So what Tyler is kind of the one that stands out as the guy who actually was there and actually was doing this stuff that other people have only been accused of? Yeah, absolutely. And Listen, I'm team peasant. We all know it. So this is a peasant whose name I know, who managed to enter the historical record. And that's why I'm going to come and save my boy. Yeah. I was trying to think whether, you know, if you're thinking about ways to change history in a big way, I was trying to think whether there's a way to stop the Black Death. But then I guess, you know, we get to the modern era and we can't stop pandemics very well. So maybe that's just kind of wishful thinking because it was so devastating. But then maybe it changed things in ways that somehow turned out to be good, I don't know. But it occurred to me being slightly less Anglo-centric this time. What if we went and convinced the Mongol Empire to stop having this weird succession process that requires them to withdraw from all fighting, go back to Mongolia and spend potentially years selecting a new leader, by which time all of the momentum from their conquests has gone. What if they just went, okay, you're the new leader, we'll carry on? Because they were so devastating when they were on the move. And why would you want to do that Well, I think we tend to associate, I mean, Chinggis Khan is like everybody's granddad, right? So we all owe him something. But we tend to think of the Mongols being particularly violent and vicious. But actually, it's a really, it's almost like an egalitarian society. They're really open. They're really tolerant of religion and social status. And they're into freeing up trade across continents and things like that. Would the world have been a better place if the Mongol Empire had got further? I think this is such a good answer. I am feeling like I want to bow down at your feet, Matt. Now we're cooking. What would happen if we had these ideas that, yeah, it depends on how good you are at your job. How smart are you? How good are you at leading people? Don't you think that every religion should be able to be in a particular city? You know, I think that these are really interesting questions that the Mongol empires ask. And I mean, OK, yeah, if you say you don't want to be amalgamated into the trade conglomeration, they are going to kill you. But listen, I've got a great workaround for that. Don't say that you don't want to be amalgamated into the trade empire and then things will be good. And fundamentally, I think that we do have a chauvinism when we talk about the Mongols. On the one hand, people will wax lyrical about Alexander the Great, but you cannot do that and also talk down our boy Temujin. You have to say one way or another, conquest is okay. And you can't get mad just when Mongolian people are doing the best at it. I wonder what the world would have been like if they hadn't had that period of withdrawal from conquest every once in a while while they went and fought over who was going to be the next Khan. maybe we would be all really good at riding horses and we could do the cool thing of leaning off of them and shooting arrows and then i would be like my life's complete yeah if i could shoot a bow from horseback i'd be a happy happy man absolutely okay look matt we had a few other related counterfactual questions and we've got them about someone i think you know a little bit about this guy? I'd never heard of him personally. Richard III? Yeah, I think I'm aware of him. You're pretty Ricky. All right, listen, this is Matt Corner because we're going to sit down and we're going to think about a Richard III. And Andy Hurley has written in to ask, Matt, in your opinion, what would England look like today if Richard III had won at Bosworth? Andy, thank you very much for just the chance to think about this for a moment. I just revel in the joy that I might have felt. I mean, obviously, if Richard had won at Bosworth, all of England would be sunny uplands. I'm looking out right now on misty grey clouds that simply wouldn't be there if Richard had won at Bosworth. I'm sure there would be no government taxation. We would have the best health care and education systems in the world. And we would all be the happiest we have ever, ever been. Obviously. Obviously. But I do think on a serious note, it could have changed the face of English history quite radically in that we know Richard was in the process of arranging a marriage to a Portuguese princess after his wife had died. So if England is allied to Portugal and the Iberian Peninsula earlier than perhaps the arrival of Catherine of Aragon, and I'm not sure that that ever made that kind of link that they were hoping for. But does England then get involved in the age of exploration much earlier? You know, we see Spain and Portugal kind of carving up the new world between them. Is England in on that a little bit earlier? Does that connection to the Iberian Peninsula make sure that we remain Catholic when the Reformation comes, because we know the Iberian Peninsula is staunchly Catholic and kind of never really rocks from that. Imagine if there had been no destruction that was caused by the very peculiar English Reformation that we have and the dissolution of the monasteries and the libraries and the knowledge and the social support that that system was providing had never been swept away. You know, what if we still had all of those books that were in those monastic libraries, because the destruction of those is a very Henry VIII thing, a very peculiar to the English Reformation and the way and the reasons that Henry VIII does it. So if there's none of that, I do think the face of English history could have looked very, very different. And the way that we have leaned maybe more into Central Europe might be different. We might have a much more Iberian outlook and an Iberian connection than we've got now. I think you're bang on here. I also want to shout out that Laura Campbell asked a similar question and also was thinking, what do you think it would mean if Henry V hadn't died? And Chelsea Tippins wanted to know what we thought that England would look like as well. I second everything that you say. And I do think that also what we might see is more of a sort of Atlanticism on the English part, you know, more of a link with the Iberian Peninsula, perhaps more with France kind of like keeping that shipping lane open, as it were. And I do think you're right. I think one of the first things that strikes me is that I think England would still be Catholic. I think that the Reformation here was particularly driven by Henry VIII, and it was a brutal one. My job would be easier because Henry VIII wouldn't have lost all of those wonderful documents that we sort of needed from the libraries and that sort of a thing. And, you know, we would still probably have more extant medieval buildings as well. You know, listen, I love the vibe of a ruined abbey. I'm not a monster. Okay. I, for one, love to go to Fantevrault and places like that and have a great time. Be a lot cooler if they were extant. You know, things like that. So if we had actually kept the buildings, which most people did because they weren't Henry VIII, I think things would be better. And also, you know, I just despise the Tudors. I also think some of those counterfactuals are quite interesting because in the medieval period, government and policy is still so utterly reliant on the personality of the king and what interests them and what drives them. So if you think about Henry V, we often think of him as this great warrior hero, partly because he dies at the height of his powers. He dies while he's winning. If he'd lived longer, it's hard to imagine that he wouldn't actually have still encountered the same struggles that England does in France in the long run, in terms of men and money and everything else. But would he have handled them differently? would he have been able to keep harnessing and moving forwards in the way that he had up until his death? We can't know. So he would probably have faced the same challenges, but would he have dealt with them differently? And Richard III, if he hadn't died in 1485, he'd already lost his son and his wife and he was arranging another marriage maybe. But would he have still faced a succession crisis that might have just meant that the crisis around 1485 was simply shunted on into the slightly later 15th century or the early 16th century or something like that. So it's kind of hard to do those counterfactuals, but interesting to think about because it relies so much on the individual personality of a king still in a way that politics kind of doesn't really anymore. That's a really good point. You know, we don't have these same ideas about where power comes from and how it is allied to an individual. So it is a very different way of thinking about power, fundamentally. But yeah, it's always a difficult one because, you know, what makes it so interesting as a field of study, you know, I don't need to tell you, Matt, is that we do have these sliding door moments. You know, we do have these really big questions where things could have been drastically different, which I think is what draws us back to them over and over again. But related. Listen, Matt, I've got a, hmm, this is gonna be a tricky one. I think you'll be puzzling out over the answer to this question that Pat Corfman has written into us. Which ruler's reputation do you think was unfairly damaged by future historians? Oh, I mean, do you know what? I'm going to go left field in an effort to pretend that I am vaguely mysterious and not utterly predictable in everything that I say. So yes, there's an obvious answer to this question. But I'm going to go controversially, and I'm looking at your face while I answer this to see what response I get. I'm going to go King Stephen. Oh, okay. All right. Now we're cooking. This is hot. This is hot. Let's go. Simply because I think, don't get me wrong, big fan of Empress Matilda. The anarchy is a fascinating part of history. I think the anarchy is completely the wrong name for it. I don't think it's at all anarchic. I think you get a situation where England is divided into three, with David of Scotland having some of the north, Matilda having some of the west and the southwest, and Stephen having kind of London and the rest of the country. His authority demonstrably stretches as far as York throughout his reign. So there is not a moment when England is not ruled in the sense that it would be anarchic. It's simply split into three. Whoever side you're on, Matilda or Stephen, I think it's impressive that Stephen manages to be king against all of those odds for 19 years. And the man dies having arranged peace with his enemies and he dies wearing the crown of natural causes. And that's a heck of an achievement after 19 years of civil war. So I think there's lots of impressive things about him. When you look at the way chroniclers talk about him, they quite often criticise him for being too nice. I mean, is that something we complain about today? You know, the fact that he doesn't murder women at the first given opportunity. Are we really going to linger and hold on to that? And I think the reason that we have some of the view that we have of lots of the medieval monarchs actually but Stephen maybe in particular is still a hangover from the kind of Victorian kind of Whiggish view of history as wanting to structure all of English and British history as a move towards the inevitable empire Yeah. And because Stephen contributes nothing to that, and in fact, under his rule, England becomes fractured and separated rather than united and moving forward. You know, he's not necessarily building the great institutions of state. He doesn't develop the exchequer. He doesn't invent parliament. He doesn't contribute to that grind towards empire. They were willing to view him as a failure. I would question whether we ought to hold on to those as our measures of history. Here is a man who is king for 19 years, and everything that I said before defies the odds of civil war, reaches peace with Henry II, who will become one of the most impressive kings ever to sit on the throne of England. Stephen can't be dislodged by Henry II, for crying out loud, or Empress Matilda, and he dies having found a way to peace with the crown on his head. I think that's impressive. How about you? Is there someone that you think has been unfairly maligned over the centuries? Well, we've already mentioned one, so we don't need to go into it. But Genghis Khan, friend of the podcast, Temujin, we love him. But I do think that we are rehabilitating him. And that is something that has been really looked at again. Similarly, I wanted to shout out the Empress Theodora. Now, granted, I think now we really understand her as an incredibly fearsome ruler, you know, fundamentally able to talk some sense into her husband during the Nika riots, able to get Constantinople back on its feet after terrible, violent unrest. She's a woman who was really able to enact her force of will on an empire at a time when such things were incredibly difficult. But she's, you know, facing the OG historical hit job on the part of Procopius, who writes The Secret History. That is, oh, you know, she is just a floozy. She's having sex with animals. She's not actually helping sex workers get out of the game. She's imprisoning them. They all want to kill themselves. She's a witch. and that was a prevailing way to relate to her for quite some time even in the 19th century people would write about Theodora in that way and I'm really glad that we have gone back to that but I think it bears repeating and it's something that we need to continue to look at because that is historiography right that is the game is sitting there and looking at these documents thinking about why people might have written them and trying to push forward to get rid of these old biases. So yeah, I think that Theodora faced basically the archetypical slander job that we see most women in the Middle Ages face if they gain any sort of power. So we love her. Thank you, Theodora. I bet you were a really good dancer. The End to the Romans, and visit the ancient sites which reveal who and just how amazing our distant ancestors were. That's the ancients from History Hit. We've had some questions as well. So we often talk about big battles, Battle of Bosworth, just as a random example, you know. Or we talk about the accessions or the deaths of particular kings and things like that but we're also always keen to try and get at the ordinary people so julie dyer has asked i've always wondered if ordinary people noticed a difference or even cared much about a change of monarch so for example henry the fourth usurping henry the seventh winning at bosworth or even just the general deaths of kings and their sons inheriting did ordinary normal people care notice i think no um i mean i think the major thing that ordinary people notice is when kings are really bad because there will be an army in your back garden stealing your pig and trampling on your crops. I think the major thing that ordinary people see is disruption and they see when things are quite bad. Now, there are exceptions to this, but even when you have a quite good ruler, like, oh, I don't know, off the top of my head, Charles IV. You know, the things that people write about there are he put lots of patrols on the roads, which makes it easier to go from town to town. And he actually prosecutes noblemen who are being unfair to their peasants. And it's like that's the best you get to hope for, right? There isn't such thing as statecraft in the medieval period in the way that there is now. When you pay your taxes, you're not going to get a school. Or, I mean, you might get okay roads or bridges, but that's about it. So the things that tend to happen are very small. It's more that kings have the possibility of making your life really rubbish. So, I mean, really, if you go to very far-flung parts of people's kingdoms, they might not even necessarily know who's on the throne. Or they know in passing because their priest brings it up. No, we certainly see from sermons across Europe, there's a lot more talking about how so-and-so sucks than there is about saying, oh, the king was glorious and did nice things. And it's because they don't really do good things. So fundamentally, they don't care who's kings. They want you to leave their crops alone and basically leave them be, I think. Yeah, I always think people are much more worried about getting the crops in for the winter, laying down enough provisions. Have they got any spare to take to market? Will they have a bit of spare cash this month or whatever else? I think they care much more about that than about which king is whacking which earl at the moment somewhere else off in the distance. Like you say, unless it's happening in your back garden, why would you care? I guess the other major impact is if you get a king with an aggressive foreign policy, you're much more likely to see taxation, which is going to impact your pocket. you know someone's going to turn up and say give us some money because we want to go and bash some french people for a while and it's like there's i'm going to give you this money but there's no benefit to me in that you know a load of noble guys are going to go over the sea get rich come back even richer than they already are and ask me for some more money to go and do it again so i guess there's an impact that you'd see there but otherwise you probably like you say you wouldn't notice and wouldn't necessarily care yeah it's it's kind of depressing how not good for ordinary people kings and queens are and then they're the ones that we get to know about so it really is a shame. Yeah. I mean, we've got a similar question from Buffy Boyley. Great name, Buffy. Great name. How did people know what year it was? I know over time the actual year changed and I've heard a theory that there are missing years. But even before that, did people actively know the year or did it not really matter as much to the average working person? So the answer is the church. You will know because your priest knows and your priest absolutely does know because every single priest has some connection to Rome, no matter how tenuous, because their bishop or their archbishop kind of has this information trickle down to them. So it's something that you are going to hear from the pulpit when you go to mass and you go to mass all the time, right? And certainly we do know that there are times when it freaks people out. so for example around about the year 1000 there is some minor freaking out about whether or not it may be the end of the world but it doesn't matter to people in the same way that it does now yeah i mean you're right on this one buffy because they're sort of like oh great it's uh what year is it 1256 cool i have to get the crops in right it just doesn't mean the same thing you You know, you don't have every single kid going to school and having to write the date on the top of their homework. Things like that don't exist in the same way. So, you know, we struggle with this all the time. We don't know even when people's birthdays are. You know, we don't really know when bloody Eleanor of Aquitaine was born. We've got to guess. Dates just don't mean the same thing to them as they do to us. Because, again, what matters is crops. There's not career progression to think, you know, where would you see yourself being in five years' time? Well, I see myself in that field getting the crops in like I'm about to go and do now and you stopped asking me this stupid question. So there are other ways. So I guess you're right. The pulpit, people are talking in terms of the year of our Lord for the areas covered by the Catholic Church. And there is also the system of kind of regnal years for kings that's used in administration and things like that. So you'll have the fifth year of the reign of Henry V or whatever else, which I guess muddies the waters a little bit. So they might be trying to keep track of a couple of different years, but only loosely. And as you say, it doesn't really matter what year it is. Yeah, absolutely. It's more a point of interest than it is a universal unifying idea. And it's just because it's a very different world. This is a world ruled by farming, not by bureaucrats. So, you know, the church, everybody is really on top of it because those are the bureaucrats, right? And, you know, they're the lawyers who are lawyering. But that is just kind of how these things trickle down. And it does show you how different the world is because it's just not a way of thinking that we share. So similar question from Holly Gad, who asks, how did common people receive news of the world in the medieval period? I mean, I guess we're going to come back to the church an awful lot again. And, you know, the place that you're going, and as you said, all the information is trickling through the church hierarchy and stuff like that. You know, you might expect to go to church and hear something important that's happened. And I guess that we're talking before the printing press, so there is not newspapers. Anything that you want to send has got to be handwritten and you've got to be able to write to do that. And you've got to be able to send it to someone who can read in order to do that. And for most people who are worried about getting their crops in, learning to read and write isn't necessarily the most important thing that is going on in their life. it's almost no benefit to them whatsoever so i guess you are talking outside of the church and proclamations from royal households perhaps if the king wants you to know something you'll send letters out to the sheriffs and expect those to be read in town squares and things like that and after that you're talking about the grapevine aren't you you're talking about the dissemination of information by people who have heard it and want to pass it on which i guess always brings dangers of it not being accurately reported everywhere you know we can all go to a printed newspaper or a web page today and read the same thing. But that simply isn't true in the Middle Ages. Messages rely on being passed on in an accurate fashion and they potentially, they change as they move. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, I suppose one of the big things that we do see if there is a real seismic shift in the way the world is going to run is that people will show up and proclaim things. So for example, we see this specifically with Charlemagne when he sets up his empire. And he brings in a codified series of laws that is going to apply to everyone now who is under the Carolingian Empire. And the way that this is done is he sends people who can read out with the legal codes and they have to go to every single town and read them out loud so that everyone can hear them. Right. And obviously this is a huge, huge undertaking and it requires an incredibly wealthy, unified government like you get under Charlemagne. So it doesn't always happen. But what we can infer from this is if there are large bits of news or big things that are going to impact ordinary people, what they will do is send messengers who will go out and yell it at you in the town square. Yeah. We've also got loads of other questions about ordinary people, which is absolutely great. Loralee asks, if you had to choose one job from the medieval period, which one would you choose? And Laura Lee helpfully adds that she would like to be with the mead cart next to the battlefield, fueling the rage on alcohol and then watching it all happen. Now, I love that, but I'm going to be an annoying medieval historian and point out that mead was not that common tale. Although I do love mead. And if you see any, please tell me where you did. I have the same answer that most women who are medieval historians have. I'll be a nun, thanks. I don't want to be dealing with childbirth in the middle ages. I like me little books, don't I? I like to sit in a library, don't I? So the way that you do that if you are a woman is you have to be a nun. There isn't another option. If you're a book girl and I'm a book girl, the answer is none. I mean, I guess probably I would probably have to say something like a monk as well, partly because I think I'd be rubbish at fighting and here's an opportunity to hide behind some walls and pretend that I'm not fighting because God doesn't want me to. That's right. Rather than the fact that I'm a coward and not very good at it. But again, also similarly, it's that access to books and knowledge that simply aren't available to other people. The only people who are seeing books and reading books and getting the chance to write in them are either the incredibly wealthy who can afford to commission them or the monks who are sitting there getting to copy things out and translate things and all of that kind of stuff. So you're seeing knowledge that the overwhelming majority of the rest of the world is simply not getting their hands on. And the opportunity to see some of the information that must have passed through their hands and to think about the way that it impacted and affected their worldview. And then also, you know, slightly egotistically and narcissistically, when we look at those documents today, we're still impressed by them. We still think this took so much skill and effort and a thousand years later, we can still touch and read those pages and be impressed by the art and the workmanship that's gone into it. So I'd probably end up in a religious establishment with you. This is like the archetypical medieval historian answer. Sorry, everybody. Everyone is going to tell you the same thing. We love it. We love a manuscript. but okay listen tal lavin wrote to ask what did medieval people sing when they were drunk and hanging out and similarly pete gibson wants to ask what the general population did in the evenings particularly in wintertime and these are i think related no matt i think the answers are related in that what do people do in the evenings in the winter they drunk and hang out i think you know You and I did a documentary on medieval winter, didn't we? When we thought about how do you cope with an agrarian economy when there is nothing to farm particularly, things aren't growing very well, and the days are so incredibly short, so you've got much less daylight. And to light anything requires using fuel that you've set down to last you the whole winter. So to some extent, you have to ration that. You need to be planning weeks in ahead what wood you're going to need because you need to chop it and put it out to dry and have it prepared to come in the house and be used So there is this whole long scheduled process that you would go through every winter which is undoubtedly dull but let face it it the way that you stay alive. So how much of an evening you have, I guess, depends on how well you've managed to provide for that. Have you got fuel to put on the fire to keep you warm and to provide some light in your house? Because if you haven't thought that through, then it's an early night for you because there's nothing else to do and you can't see anything that you might want to do anyway and so on those evenings i guess places like inns become a communal opportunity to share some warmth to share some ale and to share some stories and some fun and to sing and we did one episode of gone medieval a little while ago about a manuscript that was found it was sort of a list of what he was going to do in his show and the kind of jokes that he would tell it's like the script for a stand-up routine that a minstrel would have had in the 15th century i think so there were opportunities to be entertained if you could get down to the inn and there were you know similar kind of regional efforts to enjoy yourself and have fun and I think what struck me about that minstrel's manuscript was the ways in which it could change so we expect comedians in stand-up shows today to talk about the next door town and slag it off and poke fun at it and then when they get to that town they'll do the same to you and it seems like that's been happening you know all through the medieval period as well. So I think there are things that you can do. It partly depends how well you've planned weeks in advance to enable you to do that and whether you can afford to go out to the pub a little bit. Absolutely. And I do think there's a trickle down effect from that. I would say a thing to keep in mind is a lot of the songs are what we would call bawdy. That is kind of the deal. There's one that I can remember part of off the top of my head because I've written about it called Serving Girls Holiday. And because Johnny will pay my way at the ale fair this Sunday. And then it goes on to talk about having a shag in a field and getting knocked up and hoping that your employers are not going to notice that you're pregnant. So, you know, this is the level of stuff we're talking about. You know, it's basically like jokes about sleeping with people and that sort of thing, which is probably not that different to a pub on a Sunday night. Yeah. Up until fairly recently at least um we've got one from barbara brown an interesting one what did folks back then do for toilet paper um the answer is they washed so yeah they don't use toilet paper it's just after you would go to the loo you'd give yourself a quick wash up which was pretty standard for most of the world and indeed i believe that the first time europeans encounter toilet paper it's when they are traveling to China and they're like, ew, that's disgusting. Yeah, the Chinese are using it and the Europeans are like, that is gross. Why on earth would you clean yourself that way? You're just smearing things around with a bit of paper? That is vile. And yet here we all are today. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. These are soap and water people. They're trying to get down to as clean as possible, which I think is a really important thing to point out because people have a tendency to think medieval Europeans are gross and actually they are pretty speak and span in certain areas. Yeah. And we've got a question in a similar vein from Madeleine König-Shapa who has asked us the concept or lack thereof of privacy in the Middle Ages and how that worked with concepts of modesty. I don't understand, she writes, how sex, bathing, bathroom business, breastfeeding or anything like that happened with little privacy and an expectation of modesty. See, this is a really good question because the answer is that they simply do not have the same conception of modesty that we do. And they don't think that it's weird to bathe in front of other people because they all do it. They don't think that it's strange to breastfeed in front of other people because how are you going to feed the baby if you don't do that? In terms of sex, it is a slightly different thing because, you know, this is part of the reason why there's curtains around your bed. You know, there's curtains around your bed in order to keep you warm. It's like having a tent, but it's also, well, you don't get to see what's going on. Can you hear what's going on? Probably. But again, how are you going to get some if you have to like wait? Now, we do also see that people who want to have sex sometimes will, you know, go into fields where they know other people won't be around. There was a whole section of Bristol that was called the fucking woods. that is on maps of Bristol from the late medieval period, because that's where you went to shag, right? So there is this kind of thing of like, well, yeah, you'll just go as far away as you can from other people in order to do it. But listen, there are just limitations on that. And I think that a really great example, when we can't quite get our heads around this, for example, is Japanese culture now. Go find yourself any bathing culture, right? And Japanese people will all very happily go to the onsen, go to the ophiro together, and everybody gets naked, you have a really good bath. But they also still have a large emphasis put on modesty. But it just doesn't count when you're in the bathhouse, because how could it do? So our ideas of what is modest, our ideas of what is private, are all intensely modern. And by that I specifically mean kind of 19th century forward. These are Victorian things that we're dealing with now, and they just did not share that. Yeah. Like you say, those things have to happen and you can't be too precious about it all, I guess. And as you say, it's the Victorians really in the 19th century who are driving people undercover to do all of these things that are considered immodest. Absolutely. Like you're just going to have to get on with your life. The End and visit the ancient sites which reveal who and just how amazing our distant ancestors were. That's the ancients from History Hit. Okay, Matt, we're running low on time because you and I can yap. Boo hiss. I don't want to go back to the dungeon yet. Keep talking. I know. Okay. All right. Listen. Okay. Are you ready for the quickfire round? Go, go, go. Okay, so first up, we've got Julius Hallman, who writes, I think, specifically to you and says, apart from Richard III, do you have another favorite person from the medieval period? If so, who are they? And what is it about them that interests and inspires you? I quite often describe Richard III's dad, just to stay on brand a little bit, Richard, Duke of York, as my historical man crush. I find him so fascinating, the way that history has remembered him as this kind of pyromaniac who just wanted to set the world on fire. And that simply doesn't fit with the facts that we have about him. And I think there are really interesting parallels between Richard III and his dad, Richard, Duke of York. How about you? I have to go with my boy, the preacher, Jan Milledge of Kremershij. I wrote an entire PhD about him. I'm obsessed with this man. He's a weird little guy. He is so obsessed with Antichrist. He is just preaching constantly. He is annoying as hell. I love him. I'm obsessed with him and he would hate me, which I think is really funny. Related quickfire questions about favourite people from the medieval period. Will Rees asks, who are your top five people from the medieval period? Okay, so this is so hard, but we've got to say Genghis Khan. Eleanor of Aquitaine will haunt me if I don't say Eleanor. I have to say my boy Charles IV because thanks for Prague. Great job. I really love it. I love the Emperor Frederick II. He is so cool. I like how he's just constantly telling the Pope to shut up and go away. Brilliant stuff. And how about Trotta of Salerno? Thanks for the Trotula, girl. I think that that is a really important thing. We love a physician. Women in men's fields. I guess if I had to pick five, I've chucked in Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine just because I think they are both incredibly impressive. and both lead incredibly fascinating lives. I've added Athelstan because my slight obsession with the early medieval period has got me interested in Athelstan and what he was up to and what he was doing. So I find him quite interesting in the period that he lived in. And I've also chucked in Harold Hardrada as well, just because we've mentioned him before. We stan Athelstan, but we'll stan Harold Hardrada as well. A guy who has travelled from the Nordic regions down to Byzantium, across to Italy, been fighting in the Varengian Guard and then decided he's going to invade England. You know, why not? I mean, he's pretty impressive. Great. I've got a fun one from Anne Gibson. She wants to know, you can have two guests at a dinner party from any period of history. Who would they be and why? I mean, do you just go Empress Matilda and King Stephen and watch them argue the point? That's so fun. Just put someone like that together just so you can drink a glass of wine and watch. You know, you don't even have to participate then, do you? How about you? Who's at your dinner party? Controversial. I'm bringing Oscar Wilde. He was absolute kick in the pants at all dinner parties. And maybe I'm going to invite him and Cengiz Khan because I think they're going to make out. Yeah. And that'd be cool. I'd be like, go for it, lads. Now that's a dinner party. Okay. Thank you very much. And I think we've got one for you here, Eleanor, particularly up your street. MTO Suffolk asks, which medieval myth or misconception frustrates you the most and why? And I know you love to be frustrated by a myth. Well, listen, I have to go with the answer that makes me so frustrated. I made a pair of booty shorts about it. The Dark Ages refers to a lack of sources, not intellectual decline. And further, the Dark Ages does not mean the medieval period. It only ever meant the early medieval period. We were not talking trash. We were not saying that was a bad time. That's not what Dark Ages means. We were just saying, where's all the sources? We don't have any sources. and related, then people say, oh, well, why aren't there any sources? I'll tell you why, buddy. 1500 years is a really long time ago. That's very difficult to keep things from that long ago. Stuff burns down all the time when you light everything with candles and you lose them. And then dudes like Henry VIII come along. They just destroy every single library. And now suddenly we don't know what's going on. That's what Dark Ages means. It doesn't mean bad. And if you say it, you sound stupid. And actually, you're being ignorant. I'm sorry for yelling. And here ends the public service broadcast by Helena Yarniger. Hell yeah. Another one from Danny Barrow who wants to know our opinions on medieval fashion. Bring back the Hennon. That's what I say. That's the, you know, the one with the two horns, the headdress. Bring it back. Why can't we have Hennons? Like, what's wrong with fashion and personal style? You know, related, one of my very favorite ever Met galas that happened was the Catholic Imagination one. and, you know, Rihanna's wearing a Diamante papal tiara. Come on. You know it's good. You know this is good stuff. Check it out, you know. Yeah. I mean, I would agree. Bring it all back. You know, someone recently made me, as part of another project, made me a pair of hose and a linen shirt. And it was like a spray-on tight hose. I mean, I'm not pretending I look good in it. But, you know. Listen. The only thing I disapprove of is lacing all of that stuff together because when you need the toilet, it's like an hour long job to pick it all apart to go to the toilet. But otherwise, bring it back. I think it looks great. Bring back slutty little outfits for men. Aaron has sent us over a message. What's the most historically accurate part of Monty Python and the Holy Grail? The whole film, yeah. Obviously. That is a documentary. Duh. Yeah. One of the bits I really, really love, and it's kind of a fleeting moment, but when they're crossing the bridge and they all have to answer a riddle to get across the bridge, and he's asking, easy questions like what's your favourite colour and then it'll ask a really complicated question and if you don't get it right you get sucked up into the sky and he asks Arthur about the speed of a swallow through the air and Arthur says oh is that a European swallow or an African swallow because he's encountered that distinction earlier in the film and the guy asking the question is like well I don't know so he gets sucked off into space and one of the knights says to Arthur you know how do you know so much about swallows and Arthur's like oh you know you have to know a lot of these things when you're king and I just really like that because I think it's that kind of blagging the idea that kings know everything and they have access to everything and the fact that that is all either coincidence or a show but it's a that kings have to project this idea that they are supreme and they know everything and they're better than everybody else but are they really no that's a really good answer um i think that my my answer is uh you know when the peasants are there in the mud and he says i'm your king and they say no you're not and you know they say that You don't become king just because some watery tart throws a sword at you. And yeah, okay, they probably do understand that people are your kings. But fundamentally, as we were saying earlier, that has no bearing on their day-to-day life. It's like, oh, cool, you're the king. Great. Good job, buddy. Like, I'm still going to be down here in this pit mucking it out, right? And I think that they really get that correct about what the concept of kingship means to the average person. Yeah, still got to get the cops in. Well, Matt, I think you and I have managed to thoroughly run us out of time. And I can hear your jailer stomping up the tower stairs, ready to take you back down to the God Medieval Dungeon. But it's been great seeing you out. And thank you to all of the listeners who sent us questions. Obviously, we didn't have time to answer them all, but we've made a note of all of your ideas. And I think that some of them are even going to give us the subject for entire episodes by themselves. So do keep listening to Gone Medieval. Definitely. And we definitely have to do this again sometime, Eleanor, maybe for 750th episode, which I think if I do some really quick maths, obviously, will be April 2028. So maybe I'll see you then. But I better get my shackles back on, I guess, and make my way back to the dungeons. Well, Matt, I have slipped a couple jelly deals in your back pocket. Okay. So that's for you later if you need a little late night snack. I was wondering what the smell was and whether I needed to apologize. Thank you, Matt. And thank you all for listening to Gone Medieval from History Hit. Remember, you can enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original TV documentaries, including my recent film, The Dead of Winter Medieval Ghost Stories, and ad-free podcasts by signing up at historyhit.com forward slash subscription. You can follow Gone Medieval on Spotify, where you can leave us comments and suggestions, or wherever you get your podcasts. And tell all your friends and family that you've gone medieval. Until next time.