MEDIEVAL STUDIES MAGAZINE FROM MEDIEVALISTS.NET

MedievalverseNumber 24 July 13, 2015

Engaging the Public at theTower of London

Explaining Extreme Weather Minecraft and the MiddleAges

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The

The Afterlife of the Dead: Reform in Attitude Towards Medieval Burials, Corpses and Bones

How ChristianityCame to Europe

The Medievalverse July 13, 2015

‘But Where are the Dungeons?’:How to Engage the Public at theTower of LondonA talk about how historical sites, like the Towerof London, engage the public. How to handlevisitor expectations, what do people come tsee and how to tell history in a captivating butaccurate manner.

In a paper published in the world-leadingscientific journal, Nature, Dr ConorKostick’s research into medieval evidencefor climate events to pinpoint therelationship between historical volcanicactivity and severe winters.

Medievalist helps scientistsrewrite climate records terrain is the threat of

How Christianity came to Europe

During the Middle Ages nearly all the landsof Europe converted to Christianity. In thisshort guide, we take a look at how variouslands adopted Christianity, including bymeans of missionary efforts, politics andwarfare.

Coverage of three papers from theInternational Medieval Congress on death,burial and the treatment of corpses

The Afterlife of the Dead: Reformin Attitude Towards MedievalBurials, Corpses and Bones

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THE MEDIEVALVERSE

Edited by:Peter Konieczny and SandraAlvarez Website: www.medievalists.net This digital magazine is publishedeach Monday. You can buy a copyor subscribe for up to 6 monthsthrough joomag.com Cover Photo: 11th century imageof Saint Stephen of Hungary

Table of Contents‘But Where are the Dungeons?’: How to Engage the Public at the Tower of London Medievalist helps scientists rewrite climate records Explaining Extreme Weather in the Middle Ages How Christianity came to Europe The Afterlife of the Dead: Reform in Attitude Towards Medieval Burials, Corpsesand Bones Medieval Articles Minecraft and the Middle Ages PREDATOR: Dark Ages Medieval Videos

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‘But Where are theDungeons?’: How toEngage the Public atthe Tower of London

This was the topic of a paper given by Sally Dixon-Smith one of the leading curators for HistoricRoyal Palaces, the body that manages the Towerof London. She spoke last week at theInternational Medieval Congress, held at theUniversity of Leeds, as part of the session‘Engaging the Public with the Medieval World’.Her paper ‘But Where are the Dungeons?’: SomeChallenges in Presenting the Tower of Londonto 2.5 million People a Year, was one of threeaimed at demonstrating how to engage thepublic at historical sites, and in the classroom.Dixon-Smith spoke about how she engagesvisitors to the Tower of London and how curatorscan handle visitor expectations whilemaintaining the integrity and authenticity of thehistorical experience. What is the Tower of London About? The Tower of London can be a bit of a confusingsite, it has a lot going on in one space. The castletoday is how you would have seen it by 1300 butthe White Tower was built by 1100. It’s a UNESCOWorld Heritage site, and has three separatemuseums: The Royal Armouries, HistoricalPalaces, and the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.Even today, it still a functioning army base!Dixon-Smith explains that there are days wherethey have over 10,000 people on the groundsand up to 70% are international. Manyinternational visitors of them have littleknowledge of English history or don’t speakEnglish as a first language so there is a challenge

in presenting important information whenlanguage can be a barrier. Dixon-Smith isinterested in improving the approaches tointerpretation and is concerned that thelanguage provisioning isn’t done well enough.She also notes that some of the way the Toweris presented dates back to the 1840s and needsto be updated. What are People coming to see at the Tower ofLondon? Dixon-Smith reveals the most popular aspects ofthe Tower of London:

The Crown JewelsTorture/Executions/GoreAnne Boleyn/Henry VIIIThe RavensBeefeaters (Yeoman Warders)

She adds that torture/gore aspect was a part ofthe history but a very small part of it, so there issome disappointment when visitors realise thatand you have to manage those expectations. Difficult Choices: Things We Don’t Say Dixon-Smith mentioned the difficulty inselecting what stories to tell that will interest thevisitor and what stories to leave out. She citedone example to do with Traitor’s Gate, which wasbuilt by Edward I. What’s not said during tours isthat this building was financed by a large tax on

The Tower of London is the the most visited site in the United Kingdom – lastyear alone three million people passed through its gates. How should its medievalhistory be presented?

a large tax on the Jewish community underEdward I, who went on to expel the Jews fromEngland in 1290. Why is this not addressed? TheTower of London may have a dark and violentpast but this particular tale isn’t one that can bespun into something digestible. The financing ofTraitor’s Gate off the backs London’s Jewry wouldseem like a very relevant piece of informationabout the Tower’s history, and while it may be ofinterest to most historians, stories like these areoften left out for the average guest. One the onehand, some pieces of history are left out becausethey aren’t that captivating and may only appealto specialists, and then there is also, as this storypoignantly illustrates, some inherentembarrassment; this isn’t a story that makes onefeel proud to share with visitors. Communicating to the Masses: The DumbingDown Question “Are you dumbing down?” is the most commonquestion asked of Dixon-Smith. It is also one thatshe dislikes, stating ‘I don’t think clarity ofcommunication is dumbing down’. She explains

there has to be a balance between making historyaccessible, and informative, yet captivating, toeveryone who comes to the Tower. Since 70% ofthe visitors are not from England, it’s importantto make English history comprehensible whilestill retaining authenticity and accuracy. This is astruggle faced by all curators as they changeexhibits, and the ways people move through orinteract with the material and spaces aroundthem. For myself, and many people at the paper,engaging the public with medieval history (anyhistory for that matter) has always beenextremely important. As cuts hit the humanities,donations from alumni trickle out, and the generalpublic asks: why is this relevant, why should wecontinue to fund these subjects? Papers like hersbring back the focus as to why history is importanttoday and how to connect it in fun and interestingways for the non-specialist.

The White Tower of The Tower of London. Photo by Medievalists.net

Medievalist helpsscientists rewriteclimate records

A University of Nottingham historian has helped resolve a globaldebate about scientific evidence for ancient extreme climate eventsby examining medieval manuscripts and other historical sources.

In a paper published in the world-leadingscientific journal, Nature, Dr Conor Kostick’sresearch into medieval evidence for climateevents has allowed scientists to pinpoint theexact relationship between historical volcanicactivity and severe winters. Climate science has made major steps forwardin recent years as data collection from naturalsources such as tree-rings, ice cores andmineral cave formations has become more andmore sophisticated. Much can be learnedabout the Earth’s changing climate fromanalysing the chemicals found in ice cores, forexample, and a crucial phenomenon affectingclimate is volcanic eruption. Rewriting climate history Scientists know that a major volcanic eruptioncan have significant cooling effects becauseits smoke plume injects sulphur particles intothe atmosphere which reflects sunlight awayfrom the planet. But what is the past historyof such volcanic climate forcing? Most climatescientists believe it played a part in creatingsome of the cold years faced by ourpredecessors, such as 536 CE when a cloudcovered Europe for a year, with disastrousconsequences.

But the exact relationship between historicalvolcanic activity and severe winters has beenconfused by the fact that for various reasons,dating errors can accumulate as scientistsattempt to count the layers of ice in their cores. Now though, a team of ice-core experts has duga new Arctic core and used new techniques toestablish with great precision the dating ofeach ice layer. The results of their work showsthat our previous ice-core dates for the periodbefore about 1000 CE (and therefore forvolcanic activity) are wrong by about sevenyears. With the new data it becomes evidentthat for certain years, such as 79, 536, 626 and939 CE, volcanoes did indeed cause severe coldto develop over Europe. Medieval evidence Dr Conor Kostick commmented, “WhenMichael Sigl from the Desert Research Institutein Reno, Nevada and his team learned of mywork on extreme medieval climate events, theyasked could I find ‘tie-points’ – years in whichthe historical sources suggest volcanic activity.Thanks to my Nottingham Advanced ResearchFellowship and my subsequent Marie CurieFellowship I have been able to assemble a greatdeal of relevant evidence for unusual climateevents in the medieval period.

my subsequent Marie Curie Fellowship I havebeen able to assemble a great deal of relevantevidence for unusual climate events in themedieval period. “I looked through my data and gave them alist of events, based not just upon obviousreports, such as eyewitness accounts of theeruption of Vesuvius in 472 CE, but also onmore subtle evidence such as reports of thesun being dim, or discoloured. And the beautyof what happened next is that these examplesformed a perfect match with the new ice-coredata, even though I hadn’t seen their data andhad no idea which years they were interestedin.” The resulting revision of the global history ofvolcanic aerosol forcing will be veryimportant to researchers working in the

climate sciences, historians andarchaeologists. The major compilation ofhistorical data published with the paper willalso be a valuable asset in its own right. Dr Conor Kostick has been awarded a BritishAcademy Rising Star Engagement Award forearly career researchers. Click here to visit his webpage at the University of Nottinghamwebsite. Click here to access the article ‘Timing andclimate forcing of volcanic eruptions for thepast 2,500 years’ from Nature.

Eruption of the Etna volcano, March 2 1669, seen from the east

Halley's comet in 1456

Explaining ExtremeWeather in the Middle Ages

What was causing extreme weather in the MiddleAges? A medieval historian is starting to examinehow chroniclers and writers from this period wereturning to the night sky to better understand andperhaps prevent natural disasters. In his paper, ‘Managing Meteorological Hazardsin the Early and High Middle Ages, 5th-11thCenturies’, Thomas Wozniak explained how he islooking at how medieval communities often usedweather to explain unusual circumstances. Thepaper was given earlier this week at theInternational Medieval Congress at theUniversity of Leeds. Wozniak, who is currently doing a Post-Doctoralprogram at Philipps University Marburg, notedthat it is important to understand the differencebetween weather and climate. Weather is the

current state of the atmosphere and climate isthe weather over a longer period of time; weeks,months, seasons or even years. Wozniak assertedthat his paper was not about climate changebecause these weather and climate models arenot useful at the micro scale level. “Weather isjust one possible part of the framework in whichpolitics and change occur,” he explained. Wozniak’s research has involved compiling over120 sources, such chronicles, annals and lettercollections, that examined several specificweather related situations. At this point, he hasdecided not to use other types of sources, suchas charters – which he notes rarely mentionweather data, and are often forged so they areunreliable as accurate sources of information –or hagiographic material.

However, the sources he did use were not withouttheir own set of problems. Annals could bewritten by different authors, and newer writerscompleting older annals. Writers from differentregions might determine certain weather ascolder than it really was if they came from awarmer climate, like Ibn Fadlan, the traveller whovisited Bulgaria in the winter of 921/922. It wasalso important to consider the writer’s intent.Narratives that provide actual dates and times,are more likely eye witness accounts. He also categorised his sources by region:Byzantine sources, Irish sources, etc. Wozniaknoticed that the Byzantine descriptions weremuch wider and contained more information. Wozniak gave examples of some how medievalwriters looked for answers: Locust Invasion of 873/874 AD The hot summer of 872 created the perfectconditions for an excess of locusts. That year,there was a massive famine in parts of Europeand the locusts appeared in the words of onechronicler, “Like snow they covered the entiresurface of the country. They were able to gnawthrough the roughest tree bark.” The reactionsto locusts were between scientific interpretationand prayer but oddly enough, no one likened it

to the Egyptian plague of locusts from the Bible. A Comet in Constantinople in 975 AD In the History of Leo the Deacon, the author tellsof how a comet that could be seen in the nightsky for 80 days, “a marvelous and novel sightexceeding human understanding; for nothing ofthe sort had been seen in our time, nor had oneshone previously for so many days.” Leo goes on to explain: When the emperor saw the unusual portent, heasked scholars of astronomy for their opinion onthe significance of such phenomenon. And theyinterpreted the appearance of the comet, not astheir technical knowledge would lead them toconclude, but in accordance with the wishes of theemperor, and declared that he would be victoriousover his enemies and live a long life…But theappearance of the comet did not foretell theseevents, which the men told the emperor to pleasehim, but bitter revolts, and invasions of foreignpeoples, and civil wars, and migrations from citiesand the countryside, famines and plagues andterrible earthquakes, indeed almost the totaldestruction of the Roman Empire, all of which Iwitnessed as the events unfolded.

How Christianity came to Europe

1. Early Christianity

Starting with the first followers of Jesus Christ, Christianity spread out intothe Middle East and along the Mediterranean Sea to other parts of theRoman Empire. Although believers faced periodic Roman persecutions, thereligion would grow, with some scholars suggesting that its idea about theresurrection of the dead and immortality of the spirit were appealingtheological ideas, while others believe that the practical efforts of thechurch to help the poor was important in its increasing popularity. 2. Armenia Armenia became the first country to establish Christianity as its statereligion when, in the year 301, St. Gregory the Illuminator convincedTiridates III, the king of Armenia, to convert to Christianity. 3. Constantine I By the beginning of the fourth century official persecution of Christianityhad ended in the Roman Empire, and support for the religion grew evenamong elites. It was under the reign of Constantine I (306-337) whereChristianity became an official religion of the empire. Constantine himselfhad been introduced to the religion by his mother Helena, and accordingto Christian sources, he himself witnessed a miraculous cross in the skybefore a battle. While Constantine himself did not become a Christian untilhe was on his deathbed, he supported the Church financially and oversawits administration, even judging which religious beliefs were to be followed.

During the Middle Ages nearly all the lands of Europe convertedto Christianity. In this short guide, we take a look at how variouslands adopted Christianity, including by means of missionaryefforts, politics and warfare.

How Christianity came to Europe

4. Arianism The fourth-century also saw the rise of a new branch of Christianity, knownas Arianism. Based on the teachings of a scholar named Arius, it advocatedthe position that Jesus Christ was created by God and not completely equalto him. While the mainstream Christian churches considered Arianism aheresy, it did find many followers, including a couple of Roman emperors.More importantly, some Germanic tribes accepted the Arian version ofChristianity, including the Ostrogoths, who took over parts of Italy, theVisigoths, who seized control of the Iberian Peninsula, and the Vandals,who moved all the way into North Africa and ruled what is now Tunisia.The Vandal persecution of other Christians was one of the reasons whythe Byzantine Empire conquered their territories in the years 533-34. 5. Rise of the Papacy Even in the early centuries of Christianity, the Bishop of Rome made claimsto be the head of the church, although it is unclear how much other partsof the Christian world accepted this claim or what it meant practically. TheRoman bishops, who were known as Popes, at times had considerableinfluence, but during parts of the Early Middle Ages the Popes wereoverseen and controlled by the Byzantine Empire. However, the Popeswere also prominent in sending out missions to convert other parts ofWestern Europe. Gradually the Roman church broke off from their co-religionists in the Eastern Mediterranean - the main churches would beknown as Roman Catholic and Orthodox. 6. Ireland There was a Christian presence in Ireland by the year 400, and it is believedthat during the 5th century that St Patrick, a Romano-British man who wasonce captured by Irish pirates and served as a slave, returned to Irelandand led efforts to convert the population. Through the work of him andothers, a thriving Christian community was established in the fifth andsixth centuries, with Irish monasteries becoming centres of learning andmany missionaries leaving Ireland to spread the Christian faith in the BritishIsles and continental Europe.

The Arian Baptistry in Ravenna, Italy

7. Anglo-Saxon England

Efforts to bring Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England were not as smooth,but during the seventh century Christian missionaries, sent from bothIreland and the Papacy, were able to convert various rulers. However, partsof the country would revert to paganism as the Vikings invaded andestablished their rule during the ninth and tenth centuries. 8. Central Europe The baptism of Clovis I, ruler of the Franks, which took place on ChristmasDay, 496, was an important milestone in the establishment of Christianityin continental Europe. Medieval historians have pointed out that conversionof efforts of Christian missionaries were often a top-down process, in whichthey looked to convert their leaders of various peoples, with the hopes thatthe lower classes would gradually fall in line. 9. Carolingian Wars against the Saxons The Carolingian Emperor Charlemagne led a series of campaigns againstthe Saxons, a Germanic tribe, in order to pressure them to convert toChristianity. This included the destruction of the Saxons' holy site at Irminsuland the massacre of 4500 Saxon captives at Verden in 782. Three yearslater the Saxon leadership and peoples surrendered and accepted baptism. 10. Scandinavia While missionaries came to bring Christianity to parts of Scandinavia asearly as the 8th century, it took a considerably long time before most ofthe region would abandon the Norse religion. Rulers such as Norway's OlafTryggvason attempted to impose Christianity on his subjects, only to seethem rebel and overthrow him. The Sami peoples who live on the northernstretches of Scandinavia did not accept Christianity until after the MiddleAges.

11. Iceland

While Christian missionaries had come to Iceland in the 10th century andconverted some people, others remained committed to their old religion.In the year 1000, during the Alþing - a general assembly of the Icelandicpeople - it was decided that law speaker of the Alþing, Thorgeir Thorkelsson,would be given the role to arbitrate on which religion to choose for thepeople. After spending a day and a night thinking about the matter, Thorgeirdecided that Christianity would become the official religion, while theNorse faith could still be practiced in private.

12. Bulgaria During the ninth century, both the Papacy and the Byzantine church workedtowards converting the Bulgarian peoples under their own jurisdiction. TheBulgarian ruler, Boris I (852–889) used this situation to court each side,looking for the best choice for his own strategic interests. Eventually, hewasable to make a deal with the Byzantine Empire that allowed for thecreation of a national Bulgarian church that was only loosely under theauthority of the Archbishop of Constantinople. Even the Bulgarian languagewould serve as the official liturgy for this church. 13. Poland It was on 14 April 966 that Mieszko I, the first ruler of the Polish state, wasbaptized. According to early chronicles, much of the credit for this was togo his wife Dobrawa of Bohemia. However, historians believe that it wasmore likely that Mieszko accepted baptism in order to make an alliancewith Dobrawa's father, Boleslav I, Duke of Bohemia.

14. Kievan Rus'

By the ninth century the Byzantines were making efforts to Christianizethe peoples of Eastern Europe in what is now Ukraine and Russia. Whilesome people living in the region did convert, it was until the ruler of KievanRus' Vladimir Sviatoslavich the Great (980-1015) that Christianity becamethe main religion. According to the Primary Chronicle, in the year 986Vladimir met with representatives of several religions, including Jews andMuslims, to help him decide which religion to follow. He also sent envoysto neighboring nations - those who came to Constantinople were veryimpressed with Hagia Sophia. Ultimately, Vladimir and his family werebaptized and followed the Orthodox church. 15. Hungary After the Magyars invaded and conquered the Carpathian Basin at the endof the 9th century, efforts were made to convert them, with mild success.It was during the reign of King Stephen I (1000 or 1001–1038) that themonarchy undertook considerable actions to promote Christianity andremove their pagan religion. Stephen, who is regarded as the national saintof Hungary, made sure that churches were built and those who did notfollow Christian practices were punished. 16. Lithuania The last major holdouts to Christianity in Europe were peoples in the Balticregion - and during the 12th to the 14th centuries crusades were undertakento force these people to convert. The Teutonic Order was able to carve outa state for themselves in parts of the Baltic region, but the Grand Duchy ofLithuania was unconquered and becoming an important regional power.It was not until Grand Duke Jogaila (1377-1434) married the Polish QueenJadwiga in 1386 (and becoming Władysław II Jagiełło) that he was baptizeda Roman Catholic Christian. A year later he had the Lithuanian peoplebaptized, although elements of the pagan faith survived past the MiddleAges.

Sandra Alvarez reports from the International Medieval Congress at theUniversity of Leeds

As usual, I’m drawn to the macabre so I kicked offmy Leeds experience by taking in 3 papers ondeath, burial and the treatment of corpses.Basically, the premise here was: how were peopleburied? Why did people in the Middle Agesdisturb corpses on a much more frequent basisthan we do? And how were criminals treatedduring and after death? The first paper was, False Continuity, CommunityIdentity, and Death: The Creation of ‘Tradition’ inthe Cemeteries of Northern Britain 650-900 AD byAlexandra Aversa Sheldon (University of Oxford).Sheldon’s areas of interest are: burial practices,churchyard cemeteries, and viewing deaththrough an archaeological, theological, andanthropological lens. She started off by listing the various burials, notall of which are included here as her list wasextensive: plank linings, clothed burials, chestburials, coffin burials etc… for the sake of brevity,Sheldon chose log coffins (that resemble roughcanoes), quartz stone burials (where milky quartzwas deposited on top of the grave) and Long Cist

(stone built coffin) burials. There were commonalities amongst log coffinburials: The practice is pre-Northumbrian, datingto 500-750 AD and there appeared to be prestigeand elevated social status associated with logcoffin burials. Quartz burials took place between 700-1066 AD.Large swaths of white stone covered the top ofthese graves and at first glance, seem Pagan, butSheldon countered that they could’verepresented a fusion of Paganism andChristianity; the cross between local culturalpractice and religion. St. Columba was rumouredto have blessed a white stone like the quartz stoneand curing stones continued to have a place inAnglo-Saxon medicinal purposes. She also addedthat the colour white in this period was associatedwith purity, goodness, God, and holiness, and itwas often found in Anglo-Saxon poetic imagery.After Christianisation, this practice of usingquartz only survived in the north and in Ireland.Quartz stone burials appear almost exclusivelyin churchyards.

Anglos Saxon grave – skeletal remains of a 16-year-old female Catholic convert

The Afterlife of the Dead: Reformin Attitude Towards Medieval

Burials, Corpses and Bones

The second paper in the session tackled crumbleburials in, From Outcast Sinners to FellowChristians: The Effect of Purgatorial Thinking onthe Burial Treatment of Executed Criminals inMedieval England 900-1200 AD, by AlyxandraMattison (University of Sheffield). Mattison is a medieval archaeologist interestedin corporeal punishment, decapitation, death andburial in Britain, and bodily fragmentation in themiddle ages. Burials of Anglo-Norman criminal are not visiblein the archaeological records. WithChristianisation, burial in consecrated groundbecame important. In typical medieval burials,the corpse was often wrapped in a shroud, withthe bodies oriented east-west, supine, withextended arms by their sides, and in simple,unfurnished graves. This is a problem forarchaeologists looking for criminal burials;unless you can get radio carbon dating it isdifficult to securely date churchyard graves. Deviant Burials Deviant burials, however, give us someinformation. Deviant burials do not hey usuallyface east-west, they exemplify osteologicaltrauma, like decapitation, or bone damage, andsome show evidence of bound arms and legs.These deviant cemeteries became known asexecution cemeteries. A list was compiled onAnglo-Saxon execution burials and they show afew similarities: they are located on the bordersof hundreds or towns, but near roads in an effortto exclude sinners from the community of thedead, as criminals were excluded from thecommunity of the living. There is also evidencethat suggest criminals may have actually beenexecuted at these places, because they are buriedaround what were believed to be gallows. Therewas an increase of these sites in the later periodas government grew and exercised its control. After the Conquest, execution cemeteries werenot abandoned immediately. When the Normanstook over, they initially adopted the practicesthat the were used by the Anglo-Saxons as it tooka while for Norman reeves and justices to replaceAnglo-Saxon ones. However, no new cemeterieswere created after the Conquest.Mattison suggested several reasons for the lack

of criminal burials: 1.) Criminals were buried outside the knownrange of cemeteries.2.) The bodies of criminals may have been left tohang until they rotted away and the remainsscattered.3.) William the Conqueror attempted to get rid ofexecution when he came into power. Executionstill existed but he implemented mutilation aspunishment for former death penalty offences.4.) Criminals could have been buried inconsecrated churchyards like everyone else – andMattison believes this is the most likely case ofthe 4 reasons given for the lack of finding criminalburials in the Anglo-Norman period. Decapitation Decapitation was one of the most identifiablemethods of execution and easy to see withosteological evidence. Mattison found a samplefrom a church in Thetford and in Barton Bendish’sAll Saint’s Church. The bodies were buried awayfrom deviant cemeteries, buried facing east-west,and in consecrated ground. There were no arm orleg bindings found in Anglo-Norman periods, soeven if criminals were hanged, they may havebeen buried in the churchyard. The Move to ‘Merciful Mutilation’ So why the sudden shift? This change may havebeen due to Norman cultural influences, like earlyconceptions of Purgatory which believed inproviding a second chance to the soul. Anglo-Saxon corporeal punishment was limited to hand,tongue and foot mutilation. These mutilationsreplaced beheadings and the punishment wasconsidered merciful because the soul was savedfrom death and the suffering of the criminal fromphysical wounds was believed to cleanse thesinner’s soul. William the Conqueror only has 1execution occurring during his reign, he movedtowards amputation, blinding and castration, asmerciful substitutes for death. However, Mattisonpointed out that it was difficult to find evidenceof the move from execution to mutilation inosteological records because amputated handand foot bones because these bones are delicateand often disintegrate or get lost.

Our last paper talked about the medievalpropensity for disturbing the dead. To themedieval mind – death wasn’t the end of the road,there was plenty that could be done after thedeceased was put in the ground and this paperexamined why they didn’t always stay there.What did medieval people do to their dead afterthey buried them? How were the dead treated?These are the questions Jennifer Crangle(University of Sheffield), tried to answer in, Post-Depositional Disturbance of the Medieval BuriedDead: A Functional Response to OvercrowdedCemeteries, or a Forgotten Funerary Practice.Crangle is a Funerary archeologist and focusesher research on the curation and the treatmentof the dead in the Middle Ages. While the idea ofdisturbing a dead body seems pretty horrific tous, by looking at bones, we can see other reasonsmedieval people had for disturbing the dead. Post Mortem and Post-Burial PhysicalTreatments:

reburialsarticulate additions to gravescharnel depositsossuariesrelicsintercutting

Charnel Houses Crangle looked at charnel houses and medievalossuaries, which were storehouses for the deadand for skeletal material. They were morecommonly called Charnel Chapels, ossuaries,bone house, and had links to penance andconfession. People assume that these wereuncommon in medieval England however, theyproliferated in the 12th century. Why was that?They spread because pilgrimage took off at thistime along with a shift in the view of purgatory.This means they were clearly prevalent inmedieval England. There were 2 types of charnel houses: they wereeither below churches, or freestanding and theyalways had a semi-subterranean basementchamber that was never completelyunderground. They were created this way forvisibility and accessibility, and always in veryprominent locations. These charnel houses wereoften along pilgrimage routes because they had

links to relics. Another assumption was that graveyards wereemptied for future interment and skeletalmaterial was moved to charnel houses, like thesituation that occurred in the late 18th centurywith Les Innocents in Paris. However this was notnormally the case. Crangle looked at medievalcemetery management, and the types and rangeof sites. 25 of them gave very clear evidence thatthere was an ideal method for medieval burials.Rows were north-south, and bodies laid out east-west. The rows were filled from the north to thesouth and radiated from the outside of the church.When cemeteries became full, burials wereplaced between individual graves. This meantthey knew where the bodies were buried and itwasn’t some haphazard operation. There wassome evidence of intercutting but not directly tothe bodies. Translations and Elevations Translations and elevations were found in casesof canonisation to recognise the individual as asaint. The ceremony was a community event withmany people invited. The person who removedthe bones out was usually the most pious personin the community, and often the head of a religioushouse or a monk. The bones were washed withwater and relocated near the altar. In early graves,the individual religious community made thisdecision, but in the later medieval period,translation was a papal decision and theceremony accompanying it was massive. Royallay saints were also translated in the later MiddleAges, like the Winchester chests; it was not longersolely for ecclesiastics. Treatment of the dead didn’t finish once the bodywent into the ground, and there was also the ideaof the ‘sentience’ of the corpse. In the MiddleAges, a corpse was considered dangerous. Therewas a prohibition against disturbing flesh burials;superstition, bad air, and blood contaminationwere all reasons to leave flesh burials alone. Itwas believed that it took a year for the body tofully decompose. Crangle finished by saying thatthe dead featured heavily in the lives of the living,and there was intense protection and care for thedeceased’s physical remains and skeletalmaterial.

Medieval Articles

A Comparative Analysis of the Concepts of Holy War and theIdealized Topos of Holy Warrior In Medieval Anatolian AndEuropean Sources

By Ceren Çıkın Sungur Master’s Thesis, Bahçeşehir University, 2014

Abstract: Claims of holy war characterized the Middle Ages in both Muslim Anatolia andChristian Europe, where soldiers on both sides were portrayed as holy warriors. Namedgazis, akıncıs, alps, chevaliers and knights, they came from the elite military classes. Literarydepictions of these men as holy warriors were fundamentally idealized topoi created bywriters who were patronized by or were close to those in power. These topoi were largelydetermined by political, social and economic circumstances, as well as the ambitions of thesovereigns, but they also reflected the ideals, beliefs and customs of the past. The idea ofholy war was generated by the collaboration of power holders, religious scholars and writerswho had received a predominantly religious education. Similar circumstances which aroseseparately in Anatolia and the West caused transformative movements in the idea of holywar in both regions. Thus, as writers produced works which involved the idealized topos ofthe holy warrior, Islamic and Christian versions of holy war peculiar to the Middle Ages wereformed. Written in simple language which ordinary people could understand, these topoirepresented role models for the people, catering to the needs of the ruling classes andforming society’s self-image during this formative period.

Click here to read this article from Academia.edu

Could Christ Have Been Born a Woman? A Medieval Debate

By Joan Gibson Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Vol. 8, No. 1 (1992)

Introduction: Contemporary Christianity is far from resolving many controversies aboutgender and religion. Problems arise around issues ranging from the role of women in society,to the suitability of church art portraying Christ as a woman; from a tendency to identifywomen with the flesh or sin, to the ordination of women or the use of inclusive language.While differing responses to feminist, or even feminine, elements in our understanding ofthe divine are clearly at stake in all these issues, it is important to note how current debatesare also fueled by conflicting interpretations of history and historical documents.

Click here to read this article from the University of Winchester

Minecraft and the MiddleAges

It is one of the most popular video games ever created. Moreover,educators are finding ways to use Minecraft as a teaching tool,and one that could be ideal for learning about the Middle Ages.

At first look, it seems odd that Minecraft is sowell-loved. The graphics on this game look as ifthey come from the 1980s, and when you firststart the game, your character is dumped into afield or forest with no obvious idea on what youshould be doing. However, looks are deceptive,and it is the simplicity of the game that allowsusers to add in their own creativity. Created by Swedish programmer Markus “Notch”Persson, Minecraft was first released to the publicon May 17 2009. Within less than a year Minecrafthad gained over a hundred thousand years,despite the fact that it will still in ‘developmentstage’. By July 2011 the number of users hadgrown to ten million, while the game was pickingup many awards. As the game got released ondifferent platforms, interest and salesskyrocketed. On a single day – Christmas Eve of2012, over 453 000 versions of Minecraft weresold. Last year the company that owned the gamewas sold to Microsoft for $2.5 billion U.S. Among the fans is my nine-year old son, who gotthe game about four months ago. “Finding avillage and living it it,” is his favourite part ofplaying. “The second part I like is how zombiesand skeletons die!” he adds. The official handbook explains that “Minecraft isa block-building game with no set rules, whereyou build anything you can possibly imagine.”There are two ways of playing the game: inSurvival Mode, the player enters the game in awilderness area and then needs to collect itemsso he can build shelter and find food, all the whiletrying to avoid various monsters that mightappear from time to time – spiders, skeletons andEnderman are among the baddies. Gradually,

your shelter becomes a house, and then villagesare built. You can go into caves to mine variousgoods, or build up farms, as civilization graduallygrows around you. If you want to avoid having to fight monsters orworry about where you will sleep each night, theplayer can select Creative Mode, which allowsthem to build with unlimited resources. Thisallows the player to build on a vast scale, and Iwas surprised how quickly my son was able tolearn how to build not only houses, but apartmentbuildings, bridges, and even landmarks. The simple architectural elements of the gamemake Minecraft ideal to be used in teaching aboutthe Middle Ages. One example can be found inthe recently published book Minecraft in theClassroom: Ideas, inspiration, and studentprojects for teachers – one chapter examines howJohn Miller, a history teacher based in California,made use of the game for Grade 7 classes learningabout medieval China. The students used thegame to recreate the Tang Dynasty capital ofChang’an. “They were highly motivated and inspired by thework done by previous classes,” Miller explained.“They challenged themselves to learn more andto be better and more historically accuratebuilders. They created choices for buildingmaterials and debated which blocks to use forgreater authenticity.” He now is planning on enlarging the project sothat students “could pass through the gates,travel north on horseback, and encounter theGreat Wall. Beyond that be Genghis Khan and theMongols. As student progress, I’ll create a

By Peter Konieczny

A quick look on Youtube will reveal that users have been able tocreate elaborate constructions, including copies of medievalcastles and cathedrals.

Mongols. As student progress, I’ll create apathway west that would take them along theSilk Road, with building options to support thestudy of trade and commerce. They wouldeventually end in Constantinople and then travelto Florence and learn about Renaissance Italy.” Other teachers and educational companies haveestablished lesson plans making use ofMinecraft. At Wonderful World of Humanities onMinecraftedu.com, detailed resources areoffered that allow one to use the game to dothings like explore Ancient Lighthouse ofAlexandria or live in a medieval castle. With access to data, the possibilities with thisgame even grow further. Last year the DanishGeodata Agency used official topographical datato create a 1:1 facsimile of Denmark, includinghistorical places, buildings, roads and

monuments. “You can freely move around inDenmark,” the agency explains, “find your ownresidential area, to build and tear down as youcan in whichever any other Minecraft world.”Meanwhile, the New York Public Library hasmade it possible for users to turn one of thelibrary’s 20,000 digitized historical maps into aMinecraft world. There is also potential for Minecraft to be usefulin higher levels of education, including as a cost-effective way of creating models of medievalbuildings and settlements. This is being donealready by Project 1845, a Digital HistorianProject that is creating full size virtual realitymodels from within the game of Minecraft. Thebegan with by developing a model of theForbidden City inside the Beijing as it would havelooked in 1751. They are now planning to createfacsimile of Pompeii and an Aztec city.

PREDATOR: Dark Ages

Set during the Crusades, the faith and fightingskills of a group of Templar Knights is put to thetest when they encounter the Predator. Their battleis the thing Myths and Legends are born from. This is fan-made film, a tribute to the Predatorfilm franchise, was written and directed by JamesBushe. It stars Adrian Bouchet, Amed Hashimi,Sabine Crossen, Ben loyd-Holmes, Jon Campling,Joe Egan and Philip Lane. The 27-minute film, which was funded by aKickstarter campaign last year, has been gettingstrong reviews. The A.V. Club calls PREDATOR:Dark Ages “surprisingly well done and incredibly

competent fan film, while Blastr.com comments“they do a great job of setting the tension acrossthe board, and it never delves too far into cheesyterritory (despite the light Monty Python and theHoly Grail vibe at times). They also did anexcellent job with the on-screen Predator.Ahnold would be proud.” You can follow the film on: Facebook: www.facebook.com/PredDarkAges Twitter: @Predator_DA

Watch medieval warriors take on the ultimate hunter in the galaxy in PREDATOR:Dark Ages!

Medieval VideosMedieval Poleaxe Combat Demonstration at the 2015 International Medieval Congress atthe University of Leeds. This live combat display was performed by the European HistoricalCombat Guild.

Archaeologists discovered the remains of a child or teenager from the 12th or 13th century